Mutiny at Spithead – April 1797

In April 1797 a large part of the British fleet at Spithead mutinied, essentially going on strike over pay and working conditions, and putting British control of the Channel at risk for several weeks. Despite government delays in meeting the sailors’ demands, bloodshed was kept to a minimum, and the popular Admiral Lord Howe helped bring the mutiny to an end.

Ever since his great victory at the Battle of the Glorious First of June in 1794, Admiral Lord Howe, the commander-in-chief of the Channel Fleet, had been lamenting the crumbling discipline aboard his flagship, the Queen Charlotte 100, and he had alerted Earl Spencer, the first lord of the Admiralty, to his concerns. The men’s chief cause for resentment was a rate of low pay that had remained unchanged since the reign of King Charles II. Ordinary seamen were paid nineteen shillings a month, and able seamen twenty-four shillings a month, before deductions. The army had recently received a wage increase, merchant seamen could earn four times as much, and the navy’s pay could be years in arrears. In addition to this understandable grievance, there were complaints about poor food, inadequate treatment of the sick, diversion of an eighth of their provisions by the purser, infrequent leave, the unfairness of prize-money allocation, and the cessation of pay for men who were sick or wounded. The men were also unhappy at the oppressive conduct of some officers, and although many admirals, such as Howe himself, were well regarded, others (such as the Earl of St. Vincent), were disliked, as a contemporary verse suggested: “Damn and blast old Admiral Jervis / for he is no seaman’s friend”.

‘Delegates in Council’ – a contemporary view of the naval mutinies in 1797

By the early months of 1797 a number of articulate leaders had come to the fore among the seamen of the Channel Fleet. In the first week of March they sent Howe (who was convalescing at Bath from an attack of gout) a handful of petitions complaining of their ills. Although the petitions were in differing handwriting and were unsigned, they all expressed very similar grievances. Howe’s initial suspicion was that a few subversives were responsible, a view endorsed by an investigation conducted at his request by Rear-Admiral Lord Hugh Seymour, a member of the Board of Admiralty. However, having second thoughts about the depth of feeling apparent amongst the fleet, Howe travelled up to London on 22 March to bring the petitions to the Admiralty’s attention. By then events were moving faster than he or the First Lord could possibly have anticipated.

On the last day of March, when the fleet returned to Spithead following a four-week cruise off Brest, Howe’s long-standing deputy as commander-in-chief, Admiral Lord Bridport, went ashore and took the first coach to London. Although aware of rumblings of discontent amongst the men he did not report them, nor indeed did he visit the Admiralty during his time in town. Ten days later, having dealt with his private affairs, he made his way back to Portsmouth where the fleet was urgently victualling with the intention of getting back on patrol as soon as possible. When Bridport re-hoisted his flag aboard his flagship, the Royal George 100, he did so as commander-in-chief, having just been formally appointed in place of the ailing Howe.

The first notice that the Admiralty had of the imminent trouble in the fleet came when the Transport Board’s superintendent at Portsmouth, Captain Charles Patton, went aboard the Queen Charlotte at Spithead on Thursday 13 April. Astonishingly, he found the crew mingling in groups on the deck with no regard for their officers, discussing ‘the petitions’. Taking to his boat, he hurried back to Portsmouth and made for the semaphore station on the tower of the Church of St. Thomas a’Becket, where a telegraph station had been established (which remains to this day). Making its way along the chain of eight further stations perched high on the hills of Hampshire and Surrey, his urgent signal was soon received at the Admiralty to the effect that a ‘mutiny was brewing in Spithead’.

Later the same day, Bridport sent a letter express to the Admiralty, stating that he expected trouble from the rest of the fleet, as the men felt that their petitions had been ignored. Grumbling that he had been kept unaware of their previous petitions, he was particularly unhappy that no response had been given to the men’s grievances, with most of which he sympathised. To supplement Bridport’s letter, Admiral Sir Peter Parker, the commander-in-chief at Portsmouth, wrote to the Admiralty the same evening, 13 April, stating that the seamen of the Queen Charlotte 100 and Royal Sovereign 100 planned to refuse their duty. Bridport, hoping to get in front of imminent trouble, then took the initiative by asking for petitions from sixteen ships in his fleet, and he forwarded the results to the Admiralty, together with the eleven earlier appeals.

Receiving the letters at the Admiralty on Friday 14 April (which happened to be Good Friday), Lord Spencer decided that the appropriate response to the disturbance was for the fleet to put back to sea immediately. The rebellious ships should join Rear-Admiral Sir Roger Curtis, who had sailed to watch Brest on the 6th with nine sail of the line. On Saturday, 15 April, he dictated orders to Admiral Parker to ensure that all the officers remained aboard their ships in readiness for the fleet’s sailing. The next day, Easter Sunday, Bridport received the Admiralty instructions, and he responded that, in his judgement, the men would only put to sea if their petitions were answered. Sure enough, when Vice-Admiral Sir Alan Gardner tried to set sail for St Helens later that day with his flagship, (the Royal Sovereign 100) and eight other men of war, the men refused to obey his orders. Dramatically, the crew of the Queen Charlotte raced aloft and gave three cheers. This was the signal for the mutiny to begin in earnest.

Soon men from the Queen Charlotte and the Royal George were touring the fleet inciting the men to revolt, although the fact that many hands were unaware what was going on indicated that the intention to rebel was far from universal. A leader of the mutineers emerged – the composed and sensible twenty-six-year-old Jersey-born Valentine Joyce. Once a Belfast tobacconist, now a quartermaster’s mate from the Royal George, he had come into the service via the quota after being gaoled for sedition. Each ship’s crew chose two delegates, and that evening the mutineers met in Lord Howe’s quarters aboard the Queen Charlotte. Rules were formulated for the control of the fleet: The frigates would continue their patrol and escort duties in order to ensure that trade was not disrupted. All officers would be treated with courtesy and obeyed, except when giving orders to make sail. Normal regulations would apply at all times. Watches would be kept. Drunkenness would be punished by ducking and flogging. The shrouds would be manned morning and night.

Evidently the men were calm, but they were also resolute. Everywhere the slogan was ‘Remember the Culloden’, a reference to the mutiny aboard that 74-gun ship in 1794, when the Admiralty had reneged on promises of an amnesty. The leaders drafted and appended their names to two more petitions, which also stated that the fleet would put to sea and fight the French if they came out. These were sent to the Admiralty and Parliament. The delegates also made it clear that they would not allow any political agitators to hijack their mutiny. For his part, Lord Bridport shrewdly advised his officers not to resist, and he specifically instructed the abrasive and unpopular Vice-Admiral John Colpoys to accept the delegates on to his flagship, the London 98.

Lord Spencer – the First Lord of the Admiralty

At midnight on Easter Sunday, 16 April, Rear-Admiral Sir Charles Pole, the captain of the fleet, reached the Admiralty on horseback with a firsthand account of the mutiny. His tidings were initially greeted with scepticism by the government, including the prime minister William Pitt, who had been recalled to town. However, after having second thoughts about the severity of the situation, Lord Spencer and two members of his Board of Admiralty, Sir Richard Arden, (a lawyer), and Rear-Admiral William Young, set out overnight on Monday 17th for Portsmouth. The next day they met Bridport and Parker at the Fountain Inn. As a result of these discussions proposals aimed at resolving the dispute over pay were delivered to the delegates aboard the Queen Charlotte by Vice-Admirals Gardner and Colpoys and Rear-Admiral Pole. However, the men were suspicious and wanted other grievances in addition to pay considered. These issues their Lordships refused to address.

With the seamen in control of the fleet, pamphlets appeared in their support, denouncing the government’s conduct and the Board’s intransigence. Yet when the Prince of Wurttemberg, betrothed to the Princess Royal, arrived on a pre-arranged visit he was able to tour the ships and receive the hurrahs from each crew in turn before going ashore to be received by the Admiralty Board members. This was an encouraging sign of the men’s loyalty to king and country, as was their allowing the Venus 36, Captain Sir Thomas Graves, and Romney 50, Captain Frank Sotheron, to sail in escort of the Newfoundland convoy.

On Wednesday 19 April, the Board of the Admiralty convened a meeting with all the captains and admirals of the fleet at the Fountain Inn; it concluded with the officers advocating the Admiralty agree to the men’s demands. Yet the Board made no new offer to the mutineers, and on the 21st, having seen what they considered to be a fair offer of a pay increase rejected by the delegates, Vice-Admiral Gardner together with Vice-Admiral Colpoys and Rear-Admiral Pole, ill-advisedly boarded the Queen Charlotte in an attempt to harangue the men back to their duties. ‘You’re a damned mutinous blackguard set that deserves hanging’, the pugnacious Gardner snarled, seizing one man. ‘I’ll hang every fifth man in the fleet.’ Unsurprisingly, he was unceremoniously ejected from the ship and was perhaps lucky to reach the shore unharmed.

Now both outraged and emboldened, the seamen raised the red flag that traditionally symbolised mutiny. Fearing the repercussions Gardner had threatened, Valentine Joyce felt it was necessary to demand the King’s Pardon for the mutineers. The delegates sat down and wrote three letters: the first two were to Bridport, whom they addressed as the ‘father of the fleet’, apologising for the continued insult to his flag and attributing the continuation of the mutiny to Gardner’s intervention. The third letter was addressed to the Admiralty, re-affirming their grievances and demanding that they be addressed, whilst also requesting the King’s Pardon as a condition of bringing the mutiny to an end.

On Saturday 22 April, Lord Spencer met the Prime Minister and the King at Windsor Castle, requesting he grant the Royal Pardon, which he did. The agreement was then rushed to Bridport at Portsmouth who joined his assembled men aboard the Royal George. Following the reading of the pardon, the red flag of mutiny was replaced with Bridport’s own flag as admiral. Yet when the new commander-in-chief ordered the fleet to drop down to St. Helens on the 24th only six ships obeyed, leaving the London 98, Marlborough 74, Ramillies 74, Minotaur 74, and Nymphe 36 behind at Spithead. Unfortunately for Bridport, news had filtered through to Spithead that the ships at Plymouth and in the North Sea Fleet were displaying signs of mutiny. In addition, the delegates were concerned over the failure of Parliament to sanction the promised increase in pay.

To make matters worse the Government now decided it was time to harden its attitude, and the officers of the fleet were instructed that the marines should be held in readiness to retake control of each mutinous ship. Bridport immediately complained to the Admiralty, stating that they should be placating the mutineers, not antagonising them. Nevertheless, the government contrived to delay the debate on the grievances in the House of Commons, in order to allow their agents to attempt to identify radical elements within the fleet, which they failed to do.

The ensuing stalemate was broken on 7 May when Bridport ordered Vice-Admiral Gardner’s squadron out from St Helens to investigate rumours of a French fleet at sea. The men refused their duty by manning the rigging, running up the red flags once more, and training their cannon upon the wavering ships – in this act of defiance the men of the Defence 74, Captain Thomas Wells, were particularly hostile. Once again delegates made for the Queen Charlotte, where Captain Walter Locke, after failing to persuade the marines to repel them, allowed the men on board. Following another conference the delegates then rowed back towards Spithead and headed for the London. By now the exasperated Vice-Admiral Colpoys had had enough truck with mutiny, and seeing the boats approach he ordered the London’s crew aft to tell him of their grievances. When nobody spoke up, he sent them below, battened down the hatches, and attempted to seal the gun ports to keep the delegates out. What occurred next would be the most incendiary incident of the mutiny.

Realising that the delegates in the boats alongside were being denied admission, the men of the London forced their way back on deck and took up arms. A gun crew pointed a cannon on the forecastle aft, and when they refused to move away from the gun, Colpoys ordered the flagship’s first lieutenant, Peter Bover, to fire into them. William Barker was shot and fatally wounded by a ball to the chest, and another man was wounded. An armed conflict then broke out as the officers attempted to prevent more men from surging up from below and to stop the forecastle party from storming aft. Crucially, the majority of the marines refused to join in the fight, with some throwing their muskets to the deck and others joining the group of mutineers. Realising the hopelessness of his position, Colpoys ordered a ceasefire, and his outnumbered officers called for quarter. By now, a lieutenant and a midshipman had been wounded and two further seamen killed.

Admiral Lord Howe – ‘the seaman’s friend’.

Demanding blood for blood, some members of the crew rove a rope to the foreyard, seized Lieutenant Bover, and dragged him forward to place a noose around his neck. Boats began to gather around the London to witness his execution, and another lieutenant, the eighteen-year-old Edward Hoare, was also condemned to death. Bover, described as a brave and popular officer, lambasted the mutineers as the ‘most dastardly of cowards and traitors’, but his life was apparently saved by the arrival of Valentine Joyce who, rushing aboard, threw his arms around Bover’s neck and exclaimed that he would die first rather than let the lieutenant hang. At the same time the London’s surgeon, a respected man by the name of Smith, was making entreaties for Bover’s life. Though fearing for his own safety, Colpoys bravely forced his way through the mob to declare that Bover had been acting on his orders. The tension was then broken when a mutineer who harangued Colpoys for being bloodthirsty was in turn castigated by his comrades for speaking to the admiral in such a fashion. Released from his noose, Bover and the other officers were led below to be confined with their admiral and captain.

As the funeral procession for Bover’s victim was being held on the Hard at Portsmouth, the mounting bad news reached an astonished government. Gardner’s squadron had refused to set sail from St. Helens, Gardner and four of his captains had been turned ashore, and there had been fatalities on the London. Prime Minister Pitt now realised that he had no alternative but to rush through legislation to end the insurrection. On Wednesday 10 May the bill was given royal assent, and four days later old Admiral Lord Howe, the ‘seaman’s friend’, took to the water to personally placate the men. Afforded powers to yield to any further reasonable demands from the mutineers, and to present them with a ‘Proclamation of Pardon’, he was rowed out to St Helens where he read the statement on board Bridport’s flagship, the Royal George, and then to every other ship off Portsmouth. This included the ships of Rear-Admiral Curtis’ squadron, which had arrived at Spithead in a mutinous state from Torbay on the 13th, having learned of the discord from contacts at Plymouth. Using his authority, Howe accepted the mutineers’ request that Vice-Admiral Colpoys and four captains, Edward Griffith of the London, John Cooke of the Nymphe, Henry Nicholls of the Marlborough, and George Campbell of the Terrible, be removed from their commands. Somewhat surprisingly, grumpy old Vice-Admiral Gardner and Lieutenant Bover were accepted back onto their respective ships with cheers, although the former initially refused to re-board his mutinous flagship, only returning on a direct order from Howe. Lieutenant Bover also rejoined the ship where he had nearly been hanged, despite being advised by family and friends not to do so.

On 14 May the mutiny was officially called off and on the next day Howe, Valentine Joyce and all the delegates celebrated the return to duty by drinking wine and eating cake at the house of the lieutenant-governor, General Sir William Pitt, in the company of Lady Pitt and Lady Howe. A procession of the fleet’s boats took place, the band played ‘God Save the King’ and ‘Rule Britannia’ and amid cheers from the populace, cannon salutes were fired. By the 17th the fleet was back at sea in thick weather, somewhat short of officers, but with instructions to remain out as long as possible.

Even so, a sign that all was still not well came aboard the London, now commanded by Captain John Child Purvis. Elements of her crew tried to sink Lieutenant Robert Barrie’s gig by dropping round shot into it after the latter officer had come aboard to complain of some indiscretions by the London’s crew. Although the London put to sea the next day, some of the crew were still noticeably agitated and resentful. Similarly, whilst the frigate Pique 36, Captain David Milne, was returning with the fleet to blockade Brest, some of her crew attempted to seize the ship, taking advantage of a fog concealing the Pique from the rest of the fleet. Having captured the principal petty officers and placed them in irons, the mutineers attempted to gain the quarterdeck. Milne chased their leader into the waist and down a hatchway and dragged him on deck, before walking into the main body of mutineers and pulling out the first man who tried to block his way. Milne’s confidence had a dramatic effect on the remainder of the mutineers, who fled below. Next day, when the Pique fell in with the Atlas 98, her captain Matthew Squire refused to take the two prisoners on the Pique aboard for fear of causing a mutiny aboard his own ship. Thus, Milne was obliged to accept a hastily scribbled repentance from the culprits, who were then released.

Discontent continued to fester throughout the next few weeks in the Channel Fleet, with a number of isolated instances of disaffection. On 21 May Rear-Admiral Lord Hugh Seymour’s division of four sail of the line and two frigates returned to Portsmouth after failing to hunt down a Spanish treasure fleet reputedly worth five million dollars. Immediately the crew of the Triumph 74 demanded that Captain Erasmus Gower send several unpopular officers ashore; when he refused (though promising to look into their complaints) the Triumphs insisted on their removal. Gower himself also left the ship, despite the pleas of his crew, feeling that his authority had been undermined, even though he had always treated his men well. The regretful Triumphs repeatedly tried to persuade him to return, but he rebuffed them and sought employment elsewhere. On the Révolutionnaire 38, Captain Francis Cole, and Stag 32, Captain Joseph Yorke, the crews called for the removal of their first lieutenants but failed to succeed in having them sent ashore.

On 4 June there was a brief insurrection at sea aboard the Pompée 74, during which some men dragged a newly joined lieutenant, Francis Beauman, forward and put a noose over his head. Fortunately, Captain James Vashon was able to secure his release, and loyal men soon revealed that the mutineers were threatening to take the ship to France. Bridport ordered the ship back to Portsmouth where court-martials resulted in four men being sentenced to death, although two of these were pardoned at the behest of Captain Vashon. Beauman, who had earlier shown exemplary bravery in trying to prevent the Spithead Mutiny spreading to the fireship Incendiary, was removed from the Pompée and placed aboard the Neptune 98. This vessel was being dispatched under the broad pennant of the similarly transferred Captain Gower to act against the more politically motivated mutiny which had broken out at the Nore. The severity that the Admiralty would display in handling that particular insurrection would be at odds to their more lenient treatment of the Spithead Mutiny.

Mutinous Ships: