Terpsichore vs. Vestale – 13 December 1796

As dawn broke on 12 December forty miles west of Cadiz, the Terpsichore 32, Captain Richard Bowen, discovered a large frigate about four miles away on her weather quarter. In stormy conditions with a gusting south-easterly wind and a choppy sea, the British frigate hoisted her topgallants and tacked ship to investigate – the stranger made sail away to windward.

The other vessel would prove to be the French frigate Vestale 36, Captain Foucaud, which had become detached in a storm from the squadron commanded by Rear-Admiral Pierre Villeneuve that had raced through the straits of Gibraltar bound for Brest three days previously. Commissioned in 1781 during the American Revolutionary War, she carried an armament of twenty-six French 12-pounder cannons on her upper (gun) deck and six 6-pounder cannons together with two 36-pounder carronades on her forecastle and quarterdeck, giving her a broadside weight of metal of approximately 226 pounds. Her nominal crew numbered 264 men, although at this time there were reportedly three hundred men aboard.

Captain Richard Bowen

Launched in 1785, the Terpsichore (named after the Greek muse of dance) had first been commissioned several months into the French Revolutionary War in 1793. She had seen service in the Leeward Islands during the campaign of 1794, where the recently posted Captain Bowen had joined her. Following her capture of the Spanish frigate Mahonesa 34 two months earlier, the ship had undergone a refit at Gibraltar. She carried an armament of twenty-six 12-pounder cannons on her gun deck in addition to six 6-pounder cannons and six 18-pounder carronades on her quarterdeck and forecastle, giving her a broadside weight of metal of 228 pounds. Her normal crew numbered two hundred and fifteen men and boys, but with two lieutenants, three midshipmen, the boatswain, and some forty men away on prizes or in hospital, she now had just 166 board. Her commander was an experienced officer in his mid-thirties, one of three Bowen brothers from Ilfracombe in Devon who would all reach post rank despite their humble origins.

At 2 p.m. the weather forced the French vessel to wear ship and set a course to the east north-east, reducing the distance between her and the chasing Terpsichore. As the hours passed and night came on, the wind increased, causing the fore and main topmasts of the British frigate to spring (crack); having to reduce sail she began to drop behind. At 2 a.m. on the 13th Captain Bowen, nearing land , was obliged to take in sail and wear away from the coast, at which point his chances of bringing the enemy to battle seemed slim. When the French frigate was spotted again six hours later from the Terpsichore’s masthead, the prospects of an action were momentarily raised, particularly as the Frenchman was now on the Terpsichore’s lee bow due to a wind change. However, it soon became apparent that the enemy was winning the race to reach the safe port of Cadiz; it seemed that the long chase had been in vain. Even so, Captain Bowen persevered for the next twelve hours, and then suddenly at 9.30 p.m., to the amazement of all aboard the British frigate, the Vestale took in her courses, hove too, and waited for the Terpsichore to come down to her.

There was probably much debate on the British frigate as to the reason for the French captain’s actions. Coming alongside at around 10.00 p.m., Bowen hailed the Vestale several times but received no response. He therefore gave the order to unleash a broadside on the unresponsive ship, and in the words of one of his officers the gun crews ‘tipped her a Terpsichore’, which struck down many of the enemy. In response, the French finally ran up their colours and opened fire. A close action followed, during which the Terpsichore was temporarily disabled for several minutes when her rigging was damaged , yet despite the valiant French defence Bowen’s ship continued to get the best of the engagement. At 11.40 p.m. the Vestale struck her colours.

Shortly after her surrender, the French frigate’s mizzen mast fell over the side, and at about the same time a double-shotted gun accidentally went off, killing one of the British ship’s boys and wounding five men including the Terpsichore’s only lieutenant. This officer, George Bowen (the brother of the captain), already lacerated from head to toe by splinters, was so badly wounded in the shoulder by the errant shot that he lost the use of his arm permanently. This unfortunate incident raised the Terpsichore’s casualties to four dead and eighteen wounded, whilst the damage to her masts and rigging also bore evidence of the spirited French defence. The Vestale’s casualties were later recorded as 30 men killed including her captain, in addition to 37 wounded.

There now began a struggle to secure the prize, both to keep her afloat and to prevent her recapture. Such was the Vestale’s damage that, even as the Terpsichore’s boat arrived to take possession, her remaining masts and bowsprit tottered overboard taking perhaps a dozen men with them. In the absence of Lieutenant Bowen, the Terpsichore’s sailing master (James Elder) boarded the Vestale with seven men and a midshipman, the largest prize crew the undermanned British frigate could afford to provide. Their task was difficult, for the mastless hulk lay in just twenty-five feet of water on a lee shore. There was no possibility of removing any additional prisoners (only the second lieutenant had been transferred) and the decks were littered with the dead and wounded. Having broken into the spirit room, the French crew was at least comparatively subdued, and so Mr Elder was able to devote his efforts to keeping the Vestale afloat. That night she rode out the rough weather some two miles to the northwest of Cape Trafalgar.

Although the Terpsichore was unable to maintain her station alongside the Vestale, she did remain in sight, and at 10 a.m. on the following morning she rejoined her prize, the two vessels then being some four miles to the south-west of San Pedro Island. Six hours of struggle followed in the dangerous rock-strewn shoaling waters before Bowen at last succeeded in getting a tow rope aboard the Vestale. Elder managed to hoist a scrap of sail aloft and the British were on the verge of bringing their prize out when the cable snared on a rock and she had to be cast off.

That night the weather moderated to a calm, and the Terpsichore drifted eastwards into the Straits of Gibraltar away from her prize. On the morning of the 15th, Bowen (who during the previous two days had remained on deck and taken all his meals there) was temporarily distracted by the pursuit of another vessel, which proved to be a neutral Swede. With the wind coming from the south-east, he now steered north-west, seeking to rejoin the prize. Unfortunately, he was met by the mortifying sight of the Vestale, showing French colours, heading straight into the port of Cadiz. It transpired that, having exhausted their liquor during the night, the French crew had sobered up and retaken their ship from the tiny prize crew, and a flotilla of Spanish boats had come out of the port to assist the crippled ship to safety. Mr Elder and the prize crew were made captive but soon exchanged and returned to the Terpsichore.

Writing from Gibraltar on Christmas Eve, Bowen sent a letter to Cadiz addressed to ‘Citizen Henri Jacques, the first lieutenant and now the commander of the French frigate Vestale’ claiming that the ship was his prize. Reiterating that the Vestale had struck to him, he added that he had sent a prize crew aboard her, and that on the next day he had hauled her off a dangerous lee shore in an act of humanity, rather than fulfilling his public duty of destroying her. Suffice to say there was never any hope of the French giving up the Vestale, and although the French consul formally replied to the request, Lieutenant Jacques did not.

To the surprise of many, Captain Bowen did not receive any public honour for his earlier capture of the Mahonesa and the defeat of the Vestale. Though his commander-in-chief, Admiral Sir John Jervis wrote him a warm private letter of congratulation, Bowen’s own report to Jervis did not appear in the London Gazette, where publication was a sign of official approval. The only reference to the engagement in the press came in the form of a letter from a gentleman in Cadiz, and a later one from one of the Terpsichore’s junior officers. The reward of a piece of plate from the merchants of London seemed scant reward indeed for Captain Bowen’s brilliant endeavours.

The Vestale was to survive but another two years in the French service, for on 20 August 1799 she was captured off Rochefort by the Clyde 38, Captain Charles Cunningham. The Terpsichore achieved more glory two months after the engagement with the Vestale when she attacked the giant Spanish four-decker Santissima Trinidad 136 during the aftermath of the Battle of Cape St. Vincent. Sadly, five months after that incident, the talented Captain Bowen lost his life in Commodore Sir Horatio Nelson’s rash attack on Santa Cruz, Tenerife in July 1797.