equipages considerablement affaiblis par l’armement des prises et les engagements soutenus pendant la campagne m’expédia un detachement de 60 marins de la frégate la Manche et de la corvette l’Entreprenant, sous le commandement de MM. Coste, lieutenant de vaisseau; Vieillard, Esnouf Junot, enseignes; et Duhosq, Vergos, Fautrel, Arnauld, et Descombes, aspirants; auquel j’assignai de suite un porte à bord des divers bâtiments[1].
The loss on board the French ships, according to Commodore Duperré’s statement, amounted to 37 killed, and 112 wounded. Amongst the former were “MM. Montozon et Meunier, officiers de la Bellone; Lanchon, de la corvette le Victor; et Arnaud, aspirant.” Our readers will not fail to observe, that those officers, the only French ones slain, belonged to la Nereide’s immediate opponents; and that Captain Willoughby’s was the only English ship that had an officer killed. The number of men on board la Bellone at the commencement of the battle, could scarcely have been less than 400 or 420, and none were wanted to attend to the sails. The enemy’s admitted loss, considering that it must nearly all have been inflicted by la Nereide, was highly creditable to the skill and exertions of her officers and crew; to whose assistance not a single man was sent during the whole conflict, although, at the time when all the French ships and batteries opened upon her, or, more properly speaking, at the commencement of the second action, Captain Willoughby, the two senior Lieutenants, and half of her men, were already hors de combat.
We say at the commencement of the second action, because we consider that la Nereide fought two distinct battles on the 23d Aug. 1810 – the first with la Bellone and le Victor, which ships, although supported by a flanking battery, were indisputably defeated by her; and the second with the whole French squadron, supported by several batteries.
Judging from what la Nereide effected alone, we also think that Captain Pym was perfectly justified in saying, “nothing was wanting, to make a most complete victory, but one of the other frigates to close with la Bellone;” and that if he could have got alongside of her, all the enemy’s ships would have been taken in less than half an hour. It is our firm belief, that if it had been decreed from above, that even the Magi-
- ↑ Gazette des Isles de France et Bonaparte, 26 Sept. 1810.
