Cpt Robert Cuthbert RN

He served aboard HMS Sandwich in the Caribbean for over nine months in 1780 and 1781, being rated Able Seaman for seven of those and promoted Midshipman for the last two months; he was present at Rodney's two actions against a French fleet under Admiral de Guichen on 7th April and 19th May 1780. He must have impressed Rodney since, apparently 'by Order of Adml. Rodney', he was transferred on 8th January 1781 as 2nd lieutenant to the 3rd rate 74-gun ship-of-the-line HMS Montagu, part of the newly-arrived squadron of reinforcements commanded by Rear Admiral Sir Samuel Hood, later Viscount Hood (1724-1816).

While serving on HMS Montagu, a new ship, the first of her name and commanded by the newly-promoted Captain George Bowen - who would end his days as an Admiral of the White Squadron - Cuthbert saw action in Admiral Graves's battle with Admiral de Grasse off the mouth of the Chesapeake on 5th September 1781 and again in Admiral Rodney's more famous Battle of the Saintes, which resulted in De Grasse's defeat, on 12th April 1782. He may well have distinguished himself in one or both battles since he was appointed lieutenant in the 12-gun brig-sloop HMS Lively in July 1782, again as a result of Rodney's direct order.

However, a career that was clearly on the rise was unfortunately cut short by the capture of HMS Lively late in 1782 by some American prisoners she was carrying. These prisoners took over the ship and sailed her into Havana, Cuba - then under the colonial domination of Spain, an ally of America - ultimately freeing their prisoners. Cuthbert returned to England via Antigua in 1783 and, along with many similarly non-commissioned sailors, was paid off at the ending of the war with America.

Although he had served as a lieutenant during the war, this was a local and temporary appointment not equivalent to being formally commissioned as such: he had not fulfilled the qualifying period of six years' 'sea-time' as an Able Seaman or Midshipman that would allow him to apply for a lieutenant's commission. Thus, in 1783 he was, effectively, redundant. His activities between 1783 and 1790 are unknown: he may have returned to Suffolk or he may have joined the naval service of the East India Company - a popular refuge for unemployed Royal Naval seamen.

A brief period of national panic in 1790, when war with Spain threatened over the ownership of a fur-trading station in Nootka Sound - on the west of what is now Vancouver Island, Canada, saw Cuthbert back in a rapidly-mobilised and expanded Royal Navy and enabled him to put in a further four months' 'sea-time' towards his eventual commission. During this brief period, he served in two 5th rate 32-gun frigates, HMSs Juno and Iris, as an Able Seaman, and in the 4th rate 50-gun heavy frigate, HMS Assistance, as a Midshipman.

While serving in HMS Juno for two months, Cuthbert was under the command of Captain Sir Samuel Hood, later Vice-Admiral Sir Samuel Hood, baronet (1762-1814) who was a fighting sailor in the 'Hornblower' or 'Jack Aubrey' mould. Hood was to be one of Cuthbert's referees when, eventually, he came before the examination board for his promotion to lieutenant and it is clear that Cuthbert made a memorable impression on him. Hood was also one of two captains under whom Cuthbert served who were to become members of Nelson's 'Band of Brothers' - the Nile captains.

After two and a half years of further naval unemployment, following the ending of the Nootka Sound crisis at the end of 1790, Cuthbert rejoined the Royal Navy in February 1793, as war with Revolutionary France loomed and as, again, Britain mobilised its armed forces in the face of national peril. Needing only a few months' 'sea-time' to qualify for his commission as lieutenant, Cuthbert transferred rapidly from ship to ship throughout the spring and summer of 1793. He was first rated Able Seaman in HMS Camel, an unarmed store ship commanded by Captain Benjamin Hallowell, later Admiral Sir Benjamin Hallowell Carew GCB (1761-1834) - who would command HMS Swiftsure at the Nile five years later -and then Midshipman in HMS Mentor, a 10-gun armed vessel based at Sheerness, and in HMS Sandwich, a very old 2nd rate 98-gun ship-of-the-line ending her days as a floating battery at the Nore.

Late in July, having amassed his six years' 'sea-time' and armed with an impressive sheaf of references from the captains and lieutenants under whom he had served since 1777, Cuthbert attended the examination board for his commission as lieutenant. Within that six years' of 'sea-time' he had, as required, been rated Midshipman for at least two and was able to attest, with the support of his referees, that he had been 'known for his Sobriety, Diligence and Qualifications as an Able Seaman'. He was examined on 7th August 1793 and commissioned lieutenant on 8th October 1793, being posted to the 14-gun sloop HMS Thorn, in which he served -in the North Sea and Caribbean- until March 1796.

On 7th March 1796, he joined the ship in which he would see his most celebrated action. She was HMS Majestic, a 3M rate 74-gun ship-of-the-line, built at Deptford in 1785. She was commanded in 1796 by a Devonian, Captain George Westcott, who, at forty-three, was only two years older than Cuthbert. Westcott had seen considerable action during the American War for Independence and had most recently served as flag-captain to Rear Admiral Benjamin Caldwell in HMS Impregnable at the battle of 1st June 1794. Westcott was another tradesman's son who had made his way in the Royal Navy by virtue of merit, hard work and resultant patronage, so he and Cuthbert had much in common.

Cuthbert was to remain on Majestic for slightly more than three years - the longest posting that he ever had in one ship - and sailed in her to the Caribbean and back before the ship joined the Channel Fleet as part of the blockade of the French harbour of Brest late in 1796. Majestic was among the ships of Lord Bridport's fleet caught up in the Spithead Mutiny of 1797 but, like the rest of the fleet, was able to put to sea in May 1797 after the resolving of the sailors' grievances over pay, rations, shore leave and medical care; she remained as part of the Channel blockade until late in 1797 when she sailed south to join Lord St Vincent's fleet off Cadiz.

In May 1798, HMS Majestic was sent into the Mediterranean to reinforce Nelson's fleet that, by June that year, consisted of thirteen 74-gun ships-of-the-line and one 50- gun heavy frigate. Nelson's orders were to find and destroy a French fleet representing the naval element of Napoleon's expedition to Egypt, an expedition that, if successful, would ultimately threaten Britain's possessions in India.

Ideally, Nelson wanted to catch the French fleet en route to Egypt, when it would have troops on board, and destroy it before those troops could land; this was not to be, however, and the French army landed in Egypt on 1st July 1798, occupying Cairo three weeks later. The search for the French continued until, late on 1st August, Nelson found his prey anchored in Aboukir Bay, a sheltered anchorage west of the mouth of the River Nile.

The French were not expecting Nelson's fleet either to arrive or, more particularly, to attack just as the daylight was failing. The French fleet, consisting of thirteen ships-of-the-line, four of which were larger than anything under Nelson's command, was anchored in a line, bow-to-stern, across the bay and defending the approaches to the lake of Aboukir: they resembled a single line of fortification, bristling with guns.

Nelson and his captains noted that the French ships were anchored only at their bows, in order to allow them to swing with wind, tide and current. This implied that there was enough water inland of the French line to enable the British ships to get between the ships and the land and thus for the French to be attacked on both sides; it also suggested that the apparently impregnable French line could be breached. What could not have been known by Nelson at the beginning of the action was that a large proportion of the French crews were ashore collecting fresh water and therefore that the French ships' guns were only manned on the seaward side.

The British fleet entered the bay at about six o'clock in the evening of 1st August 1798 and manoeuvred into line of battle. The British line was headed by HMS Zealous, commanded by Captain Samuel Hood, Cuthbert's former commanding officer, although Captain Thomas Foley, in HMS Goliath, raced Hood to be first at the French. As the British line, in which HMS Majestic was towards the rear, approached the French line at an oblique angle the French guns opened fire, the British gunners replying with their customary accurate and rapid fire once the range closed.

The British line divided, the first five ships heading for the van, or front, of the French line and crossing its head, each ship raking the leading French ships from stem to stern as it passed them and then anchoring opposite its identified target to engage it on landward side. The rear five ships of the British line turned to engage the centre and rear of the French line, breaching it in three places and dealing devastating raking fire as British broadsides tore the length of the French ships through their undefended bows and sterns.

HMS Majestic identified the 80-gun Tonnant as her target and bore down upon her, intending to engage Tonnant's starboard side with her starboard battery, but matters did not go according to plan. Majestic appears to have experienced problems in anchoring and so, after briefly engaging her, overshot Tonnant, entangling her mizzen rigging with the jib-boom of the next French ship in the line, the 74-gun Heureux. Captain Westcott was shot in the throat by a French marksman, either from Tonnant or from Heureux and died almost at once.

As First Lieutenant, Robert Cuthbert was now in command: his ship was entangled with that of an enemy, his guns could not easily be brought to bear, the light was fading fast and the noise, smoke and destruction of the guns was unceasing. Fortunately, Heureux's jib-boom, the foremost part of her bowsprit, broke and Majestic drifted down alongside Heureux, fighting her gun-to-gun and yard-to-yard as she did so, and eventually anchored between Heureux's stem and the bow of the next ship in the line, the 74-gun Mercure. So devastatingly did Cuthbert bring his ship's guns to bear in raking his two, equally-sized, opponents, that both Heureux and Mercure eventually cut their cables, drifting inshore and running aground: although able to continue fighting, they were effectively out of the action, unable to escape and so could be left to their eventual fate.