Minerve vs Santa Sabina – 20 December 1796
Just weeks before his astonishing success at the Battle of Cape St. Vincent in February 1797 which would make him famous with the British public, Commodore Horatio Nelson was to lead a brave and skilful frigate action against several vessels of the Spanish fleet in the Mediterranean.
The action occurred following the withdrawal of Admiral Sir John Jervis’ fleet to Gibraltar on 1 December in response to the recent Franco-Spanish alliance. A small force was required to go back into the Mediterranean to assist with the evacuation of the garrison and stores on the island of Elba, and with a Spanish fleet at large, the mission would call for an officer with strong nerves and a bold approach. Fortunately, Captain Nelson of the Captain 74 was on hand, and so on 15 December he raised a commodore’s broad pennant aboard the Minerve 38, Captain George Cockburn, and in company with the Blanche 32, Captain D’Arcy Preston, sailed east from the Rock.
The two frigates were off Cartagena at 10 p.m. on the fresh and cloudy night of 19 December, when the Blanche signalled that she had spotted two strange sail. Twenty minutes later Captain Preston closed with the commodore to advise that the strangers were Spanish frigates. The vessels were the Santa Sabina 40 and the Ceres 40, and they were the outlying scouts of Don Juan de Langara’s Cartagena fleet that was returning to its base. Choosing to engage the larger frigate (which was showing a bright poop light), the Santa Sabina, Nelson ordered Cockburn to cross in front of the Blanche, which in turn wore ship and set off to leeward after the Ceres.
HMS Minerve
The Minerve had been launched at Toulon in September 1794 and had fallen into British hands nine months later, having been captured in the Mediterranean by the Lowestoft 32, Captain Robert Gambier Middleton, and the Dido 28, Captain George Henry Towry. She was armed with twenty-eight 18-pounder cannons on her gun deck and ten 9-pounder cannons and four 32-pounder carronades on her quarterdeck and forecastle, giving her a broadside weight of metal of approximately 370 pounds. At this time, she had a reduced crew of 241 men and boys aboard. Coc kburn, a 24-year-old Scotsman, had joined her in August with three years seniority as a post captain, and with a burgeoning reputation as one of the finest young officers in the service. His superior, Commodore Nelson, was already recognised as the most brilliant captain in the Mediterranean fleet and a man who would stop at nothing to engage the enemy.
The Santa Sabina was a much older frigate, having been commissioned in 1781. She carried 28 Spanish 18-pounder cannons on her gun deck and 12 Spanish 8-pounder cannons on her quarterdeck and forecastle, giving her a broadside weight of metal of 300 pounds. Her crew numbered 286 men; her captain was a highly regarded and experienced officer, Don Jacobo Stuart, who also happened to be a great-grandson of the deposed King James II of England.
Coming within hail of the Santa Sabina in a raking position at 10.40 a.m., Nelson demanded that she surrender or else suffer his fire. In reply, he was informed that ‘this is a Spanish frigate, and you may begin as soon as you please.’ In the ensuing engagement Cockburn handled the Minerve skilfully, using his superior firepower to inflict on the Spanish what was in their own words ‘a perfect hell’. Shot after shot struck home, carrying away the enemy’s mizzen mast and inflicting serious damage to her fore and main masts. Despite their brave resistance the Spaniards were clearly losing the duel, yet several offers of quarter received the defiant response ‘No Sir, not whilst I have the means of fighting left’. Only after almost three hours of punishment did the Santa Sabina surrender to the Minerve at 1.20 a.m. When the proud Don Jacobo Stuart came aboard the Minerve to offer his sword in submission, Nelson recognised his bravery by refusing to accept it.
The bloodshed on the Santa Sabina 40, was horrendous. Her captain was the only officer not included amongst the casualties, which according to Nelson numbered 164, although Spanish authorities later reported a figure of 10 men killed and 45 wounded. In addition to a great deal of damage aloft, the Minerve had lost a midshipman and six seamen killed, with another 34 men wounded. Her crew was now further depleted with the dispatch of a prize crew of 24 men to the Santa Sabina under the first and second lieutenants, John Culverhouse and Thomas Masterman Hardy, who began effecting repairs while under tow by the Minerve.
Whilst the Minerve had been engaging the Santa Sabina, the Blanche had easily forced the surrender of the Ceres after firing nine broadsides into her in half an hour. Unlike her consort, this Spanish frigate had performed poorly, with much of her shot ranging over her opponent into the sea beyond. As a result, no one was killed or injured aboard the Blanche, while the Ceres suffered casualties of 7 men killed and 15 wounded before hauling down her colours. However, taking possession of the defeated vessel was going to be difficult – two other enemy frigates from the approaching Spanish fleet were almost in gun shot, causing the Blanche to wear ship and stand away. When the two frigates seemed to ignore the defeated Spaniard, Captain Preston tried to close with the Ceres once more, but she was able to outsail him and seek the protection of the massive three-decked Principe de Asturias 112.
Back on the Minerve, Nelson had retired below to pen a triumphant dispatch to Admiral Jervis, but by now the situation was growing increasingly precarious. The Blanche was no longer in sight, the Minerve was hindered by towing the Santa Sabina, elements of the Spanish fleet were coming up with them, and the wind blowing on shore meant that they were in danger of being wrecked on the coast near Cartagena. When another frigate was seen through the morning murkiness at 3.30 a.m., Nelson and Cockburn initially supposed her to be the Blanche, but instead she proved to be the Perla 34. Forty-five minutes later the Spanish frigate hailed the Santa Sabina, and after failing to receive a satisfactory answer she unleashed a broadside. Nelson immediately ordered the prize to be cast off, and the Minerve engaged the Perla for the next half-hour until the latter broke off.
Daylight revealed that the Minerve and Blanche were some ten miles apart, and that six Spanish vessels including two sail of the line were in pursuit. That the British frigates were able to escape from this situation was primarily due to the self-sacrifice of Lieutenants Culverhouse and Hardy, who realising that they could not escape in the disabled Santa Sabina, set English colours above the Spanish and steered in the opposite direction, to the north-east, in order to entice the Spanish to go after them. Sure enough, the prize was overtaken by a three-decked ship and a frigate, whose fire brought her fore and mainmasts down; Culverhouse surrendered what was almost a wreck at about 9.30 in the morning. Meanwhile, two Spanish sail of the line and a frigate did get close enough to the Minerve to give cause for concern, and over the next few hours the British frigate’s fate hung in the balance. She tried some pot shots at a three-decker, (the Principe de Asturias 112.) but only the onset of darkness at around 6 p.m. allowed her to finally escape her pursuers.
Nelson continued on his mission and the Minerve arrived at Porto Ferrajo, the principal port on Elba, on Boxing Day. Two days later, the Blanche came in, and Nelson made a point of boarding her to thank her officers and crew for their exertions a week earlier. Penning a letter to the Captain-General of Cartagena, the commodore offered to exchange Captain Stuart once Lieutenants Hardy and Culverhouse had been safely delivered to Gibraltar. He then rounded up all the Spanish prisoners he could find and offered them in exchange for his prize crew. It was not until 29 January 1797 that he departed Elba with a small squadron in order to rendezvous with the Mediterranean Fleet, which by then was off Cape St. Vincent where Nelson would perform so magnificently two weeks later.
The French-built Minerve went on to experience a somewhat curious career, for in 1803 she fell back into French hands after she had grounded off Cherbourg under the command of Captain Jahleel Brenton. Seven years later, on 3 February 1810, and having initially been renamed the Canonnière and then in 1809 recommissioned as a privateer, the Confiance 14, she was again captured (off Belleisle) by the British, but not reincorporated in the Royal Navy. Meanwhile, the Santa Sabina was repaired and continued in the Spanish service for some years after her engagement with the Minerve.
Nelson presented Captain Cockburn with a gold-hilted sword in commemoration of his skill and bravery during this epsiode. Cockburn was to enjoy a long and notable career in the Navy, in which the most famous event was the burning of the American ‘presidential palace’ (the White House) in Washington during the War of 1812. He held several important administrative posts at the Admiralty, finally reaching the exalted rank of admiral of the fleet in 1851 . Sadly, whilst Lieutenant Hardy would also achieve fame and fortune as Nelson’s favourite flag captain, the pleasant and respected Lieutenant Culverhouse did not reach similar heights, for when he drowned at the Cape of Good Hope in 1809 he was a captain holding the position of agent for transports. In 1847 the handful of survivors of the crews of the Minerve and Blanche were awarded the Naval General Service Medal with the clasps ‘Minerve 19 Decr 1796’ and ‘Blanche 19 Decr 1796’.