Action of 29 November 1811
Encyclopedia
The Action of 29 November 1811 was a minor naval engagement fought between two frigate
squadrons in the Adriatic Sea
during the Adriatic campaign
of the Napoleonic Wars
. The action was one of a series of operations conducted by the British Royal Navy
and the French Navy
to contest dominance over the Adriatic between 1807 and 1814. During this period the Adriatic was surrounded by French territory or French client states and as a result British interference was highly disruptive to the movement of French troops and supplies.
The action came over eight months after the British had achieved a decisive victory over the French at the Battle of Lissa
and was the first squadron action since that engagement. The action of November 1811 was the result of the British interception of a French military convoy traveling from Corfu
to Trieste
with a consignment of cannon, and resulted in a British victory, only one French ship escaping capture by the British force. It has been suggested that this action was a factor in Napoleon's decision to change the direction of his planned eastwards expansion in 1812 from the Balkans to Russia
.
and Naples
that controlled the western shores of the Adriatic. Over the next four years, strategically important islands and territories had been seized in the treaties of Tilsit and Schönbrunn
, giving Napoleon direct command of the eastern shore. With these treaties, France had seized not only several important fortress islands, most notably Corfu
, but also many important shipyards and harbours. Maintaining control of the Adriatic was however even harder than seizing it had been, the threat of attack by Austrian
, Russian or Ottoman
armies and the mountainous terrain of the Balkans
forcing the development of garrisons that could be effectively resupplied only by sea.
The Royal Navy, preeminent in the Mediterranean since the Battle of Trafalgar
in 1805, sought to disrupt French convoys across the Adriatic. Following the Russian withdrawal in 1807, the Royal Navy dispatched a small frigate
squadron to operate in the sea. The squadron was commanded by Captain William Hoste
, who seized the Illyrian island of Lissa
(present-day Vis) to use as a base, waging a campaign against the French and their allies that forced the French Navy to deploy significantly larger forces to combat him. This escalating series of raid and counter raid continued until March 1811, when the French commander in the Adriatic, Bernard Dubourdieu
attacked Lissa with force twice that available to Hoste. In the ensuing battle Hoste not only routed his opponents, but captured two ships, sank another and killed Dubourdieu.
In the aftermath of the Battle of Lissa, the badly wounded Hoste returned to Britain in HMS Amphion
leaving Captain James Brisbane
in command in the Adriatic. Conflict in the theatre was widely dispersed, and so Brisbane delegated command to various commanders of small squadrons and independent cruisers. These dispersed forces continued to have success against French convoys; on 27 November 1811, the independently sailing HMS Eagle
foiled an attempt to send supplies to Corfu and captured the unarmed frigate Corceyre. The following day at 07:00, a message was received at Port St. George
on Lissa warning that another French convoy had been sighted close to the island.
of HMS Alceste
with two other frigates and a sloop
. Maxwell responded to the signal by readying his squadron to seek out and destroy the convoy, but the attempted invasion of Lissa the previous March had bred caution in the British defenders and Maxwell was therefore compelled to disembark 30 sailors and most of his marines at Port St. George
and leave behind the 20-gun HMS Acorn
to protect the harbour. This not only weakened the squadron but also delayed it, Maxwell's force not departing Port St. George until 19:00. It was assumed among the British squadron that the convoy comprised the Danaé
, Flore
and Corona, the survivors of the Battle of Lissa now sailing from Trieste
to Corfu to supply the island.
Shortly after passing the southern headland of Lissa, the British squadron encountered a neutral merchant ship that had been carrying Lieutenant John McDougal, formerly of HMS Unite, to Malta
. McDougal had seen the French ships in passing and identified them as a convoy heading north from Corfu rather than south to it, and had ordered the merchant ship to return him to Lissa to bring warning. The French convoy was under the command of Commodore François-Gilles Monfort and consisted of three ships, the two large frigates Pomone
and Pauline
and the smaller Persanne
. The convoy had departed Corfu on 16 November carrying a cargo of cannon
to Trieste.
Key
(Lastovo), Captain Gordon in Active sighted the French force at 09:20 on 29 November, sailing to the north-west. Initially the French ships held their course, but on determining that the approaching squadron was British, Monfort spread all sail to escape pursuit. By 11:00 it was evident that Persanne could not maintain the pace of the two larger frigates and so turned north-east in hopes of escaping independently. The Active initially gave chase to the smaller ship, but Maxwell recalled her and sent Unite after Persanne, keeping Active and Alceste in pursuit of the larger French ships. At 11:50 it became clear that Alceste would soon catch the heavily laden French ships, and Maxwell sent the telegraph signal to Gordon; "Remember the battle of Lissa", the action of eight months before at which Hoste had raised the signal "Remember Nelson".
The first shots were fired at 12:30 by Persanne close to the island of Pelagosa
(Palagruža), but the main action did not begin for another hour, when Alceste and Pomone exchanged shots from their stern and bow guns. By 13:40, Alceste was firing her broadside into Pomone and simultaneously pressing on all sail in an effort to reach Pauline, but this ambition was thwarted when a shot from Pomone brought down Alceste's main topmast, slowing her suddenly and allowing Pauline to pull a little ahead. At 14:00, Active had arrived in action and was also firing into Pomone, forcing Monfort to bring Pauline round to protect her outgunned colleague. By 14:20 the conflicts between Active and Pomone and Alceste and Pauline had separated into different duels, Pomone particularly suffering severely but Active also taking heavy damage, a 32 pounder carronade
shot severing Captain Gordon's leg at the height of the engagement.
At 15:05 another British ship appeared on the horizon, the sloop HMS Kingfisher
, which persuaded Monfort that he could no longer protect the battered Pomone against superior numbers. Pauline set all sail to the west, away from her opponents who were either too battered or too distant to pursue. Alceste and Active now concentrated their full broadsides on Pomone, which soon lost both masts and was forced to surrender to prevent total destruction. Pauline escaped, later reaching Ancona
safely but having suffered severe damage in the engagement.
Promotions were granted to the junior officers of Alceste and Active and both crews received praise and prize money for their service in the operation. Similar rewards were not made to the crew of Unite, probably because Persanne was so much smaller and less-well armed than her opponent. The total prize money was £3,500, not as much as first anticipated because neither of the captured ships were of sufficient quality to warrant purchase into the Royal Navy. Pomone had been hastily built in 1803 as the personal warship of Jérôme Bonaparte
and as a result was of weak construction while Persanne had been designed as an armed storeship rather than a full-scale warship. Ultimately Pomone was transferred to Britain, briefly renamed HMS Ambuscade
and broken up for materials while Persanne was sold to the Bey of Tunis. Nearly four decades later the battle was among the actions recognised by a clasp attached to the Naval General Service Medal, awarded upon application to all British participants still living in 1847.
In France, the action had more significant consequences. The loss of two ships and over 200 cannon was a serious blow to the French army marshalling in the Balkans. Napoleon himself took an interest in the engagement and it has been suggested by British historian James Henderson that this action convinced Napoleon of his inability to control the Adriatic Sea, which was vital to launching operations in the Balkans. This action may have been a factor in his decision to abandon plans to invade the Ottoman Empire, and instead to turn his attention on Russia
. In the French Navy, the flight of Pauline was deemed cowardly and Captain Monfort was court-martialled and relieved of command. In 1817, when Murray Maxwell
visited St Helena on his return from the East Indies where HMS Alceste had been wrecked, Napoleon greeted him with the words "Your government must not blame you for the loss of Alceste, for you have taken one of my frigates".
The effects on the Adriatic itself were slight, the action only confirming the already overwhelming British dominance in the region. The French Navy would continue to seek reinforcements for their squadrons, concentrating on the construction of several new ships in Italian seaports that would not be ready until 1812. As a result this was the last significant action of the year in the Adriatic.
Frigate
A frigate is any of several types of warship, the term having been used for ships of various sizes and roles over the last few centuries.In the 17th century, the term was used for any warship built for speed and maneuverability, the description often used being "frigate-built"...
squadrons in the Adriatic Sea
Adriatic Sea
The Adriatic Sea is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine Mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges...
during the Adriatic campaign
Adriatic campaign of 1807–1814
The Adriatic campaign was a minor theatre of war during the Napoleonic Wars in which a succession of small British Royal Navy squadrons and independent cruisers harried the combined naval forces of the First French Empire, the Kingdom of Italy, the Illyrian Provinces and the Kingdom of Naples...
of the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
. The action was one of a series of operations conducted by the British Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
and the French Navy
French Navy
The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...
to contest dominance over the Adriatic between 1807 and 1814. During this period the Adriatic was surrounded by French territory or French client states and as a result British interference was highly disruptive to the movement of French troops and supplies.
The action came over eight months after the British had achieved a decisive victory over the French at the Battle of Lissa
Battle of Lissa (1811)
The Battle of Lissa was a naval action fought between a British frigate squadron and a substantially larger squadron of French and Venetian frigates and smaller ships on 13 March 1811 during the Adriatic campaign of the Napoleonic Wars...
and was the first squadron action since that engagement. The action of November 1811 was the result of the British interception of a French military convoy traveling from Corfu
Corfu
Corfu is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the second largest of the Ionian Islands, and, including its small satellite islands, forms the edge of the northwestern frontier of Greece. The island is part of the Corfu regional unit, and is administered as a single municipality. The...
to Trieste
Trieste
Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...
with a consignment of cannon, and resulted in a British victory, only one French ship escaping capture by the British force. It has been suggested that this action was a factor in Napoleon's decision to change the direction of his planned eastwards expansion in 1812 from the Balkans to Russia
French invasion of Russia
The French invasion of Russia of 1812 was a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars. It reduced the French and allied invasion forces to a tiny fraction of their initial strength and triggered a major shift in European politics as it dramatically weakened French hegemony in Europe...
.
Background
Since the War of the Third Coalition, the French had maintained client kingdoms in ItalyKingdom of Italy (Napoleonic)
The Kingdom of Italy was a state founded in Northern Italy by Napoleon, fully influenced by revolutionary France, that ended with his defeat and fall.-Constitutional statutes:...
and Naples
Kingdom of Naples
The Kingdom of Naples, comprising the southern part of the Italian peninsula, was the remainder of the old Kingdom of Sicily after secession of the island of Sicily as a result of the Sicilian Vespers rebellion of 1282. Known to contemporaries as the Kingdom of Sicily, it is dubbed Kingdom of...
that controlled the western shores of the Adriatic. Over the next four years, strategically important islands and territories had been seized in the treaties of Tilsit and Schönbrunn
Treaty of Schönbrunn
The Treaty of Schönbrunn , sometimes known as the Treaty of Vienna, was signed between France and Austria at the Schönbrunn Palace of Vienna on 14 October 1809. This treaty ended the Fifth Coalition during the Napoleonic Wars...
, giving Napoleon direct command of the eastern shore. With these treaties, France had seized not only several important fortress islands, most notably Corfu
Corfu
Corfu is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the second largest of the Ionian Islands, and, including its small satellite islands, forms the edge of the northwestern frontier of Greece. The island is part of the Corfu regional unit, and is administered as a single municipality. The...
, but also many important shipyards and harbours. Maintaining control of the Adriatic was however even harder than seizing it had been, the threat of attack by Austrian
Austrian Empire
The Austrian Empire was a modern era successor empire, which was centered on what is today's Austria and which officially lasted from 1804 to 1867. It was followed by the Empire of Austria-Hungary, whose proclamation was a diplomatic move that elevated Hungary's status within the Austrian Empire...
, Russian or Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
armies and the mountainous terrain of the Balkans
Balkans
The Balkans is a geopolitical and cultural region of southeastern Europe...
forcing the development of garrisons that could be effectively resupplied only by sea.
The Royal Navy, preeminent in the Mediterranean since the Battle of Trafalgar
Battle of Trafalgar
The Battle of Trafalgar was a sea battle fought between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of the French Navy and Spanish Navy, during the War of the Third Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars ....
in 1805, sought to disrupt French convoys across the Adriatic. Following the Russian withdrawal in 1807, the Royal Navy dispatched a small frigate
Frigate
A frigate is any of several types of warship, the term having been used for ships of various sizes and roles over the last few centuries.In the 17th century, the term was used for any warship built for speed and maneuverability, the description often used being "frigate-built"...
squadron to operate in the sea. The squadron was commanded by Captain William Hoste
William Hoste
Captain Sir William Hoste, 1st Baronet KCB RN , Royal Navy captain, was the son of Dixon Hoste, rector of Godwick and Tittleshall in Norfolk...
, who seized the Illyrian island of Lissa
Vis (island)
Vis is the most outerly lying larger Croatian island in the Adriatic Sea, and is part of the Central Dalmatian group of islands, with an area of 90.26 km² and a population of 3,617 . Of all the inhabited Croatian islands, it is the farthest from the coast...
(present-day Vis) to use as a base, waging a campaign against the French and their allies that forced the French Navy to deploy significantly larger forces to combat him. This escalating series of raid and counter raid continued until March 1811, when the French commander in the Adriatic, Bernard Dubourdieu
Bernard Dubourdieu
Bernard Dubourdieu was a French rear-admiral who led the allied French-Venetian forces at the Battle of Lissa in 1811, during which he was killed....
attacked Lissa with force twice that available to Hoste. In the ensuing battle Hoste not only routed his opponents, but captured two ships, sank another and killed Dubourdieu.
In the aftermath of the Battle of Lissa, the badly wounded Hoste returned to Britain in HMS Amphion
HMS Amphion (1798)
HMS Amphion was a 32-gun fifth rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She served during the Napoleonic Wars.Amphion was built by Betts, of Mistleythorn, and was launched on 19 March 1798....
leaving Captain James Brisbane
James Brisbane
Captain Sir James Brisbane, CB was a British Royal Navy officer of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. Although never engaged in any major actions, Brisbane served under both Lord Howe and Horatio Nelson and performed important work at the Cape of Good Hope, prior to the Battle of...
in command in the Adriatic. Conflict in the theatre was widely dispersed, and so Brisbane delegated command to various commanders of small squadrons and independent cruisers. These dispersed forces continued to have success against French convoys; on 27 November 1811, the independently sailing HMS Eagle
HMS Eagle (1804)
HMS Eagle was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 27 February 1804 at Northfleet.In 1830 she was reduced to a 50-gun ship, and became a training ship in 1860. She was renamed HMS Eaglet in 1919, when she was the Royal Naval Reserve training centre for North West...
foiled an attempt to send supplies to Corfu and captured the unarmed frigate Corceyre. The following day at 07:00, a message was received at Port St. George
Vis (town)
Vis is a town on the Vis island of the same name in Croatia. It has a population of 1960 residents . It is the center of the Vis municipality and part of Split-Dalmatia County.-History:...
on Lissa warning that another French convoy had been sighted close to the island.
Chase
The British commander on Lissa in November 1811 was Captain Murray MaxwellMurray Maxwell
Captain Sir Murray Maxwell, CB, FRS was a British Royal Navy officer who served with distinction in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars...
of HMS Alceste
HMS Alceste (1806)
The Minerve was a 38-gun Armide class frigate of the French Navy, captured by the British in 1806 and brought into Royal Navy service as HMS Alceste. She was wrecked in 1817.-French service:...
with two other frigates and a sloop
Sloop
A sloop is a sail boat with a fore-and-aft rig and a single mast farther forward than the mast of a cutter....
. Maxwell responded to the signal by readying his squadron to seek out and destroy the convoy, but the attempted invasion of Lissa the previous March had bred caution in the British defenders and Maxwell was therefore compelled to disembark 30 sailors and most of his marines at Port St. George
Vis (town)
Vis is a town on the Vis island of the same name in Croatia. It has a population of 1960 residents . It is the center of the Vis municipality and part of Split-Dalmatia County.-History:...
and leave behind the 20-gun HMS Acorn
HMS Acorn
Six ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Acorn. A seventh was planned but never completed: was a 22-gun ship hired between 1649 and 1654. was an 18-gun sloop launched in 1807 and broken up in 1819. was an 18-gun sloop launched in 1826 and wrecked in 1828.*HMS Acorn was to have been an...
to protect the harbour. This not only weakened the squadron but also delayed it, Maxwell's force not departing Port St. George until 19:00. It was assumed among the British squadron that the convoy comprised the Danaé
French frigate Danaé (1807)
The Danaé was a 44-gun frigate of the French Navy.On 12 March 1808, she was part of Bernard Dubourdieu's squadron sailing to raid the British commerce raider base of the island of Lissa...
, Flore
French frigate Flore (1806)
The Flore was a 44-gun Armide class frigate of the French Navy.In 1808, she was part of Ganteaume's squadron that cruised in the Mediterranean....
and Corona, the survivors of the Battle of Lissa now sailing from Trieste
Trieste
Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...
to Corfu to supply the island.
Shortly after passing the southern headland of Lissa, the British squadron encountered a neutral merchant ship that had been carrying Lieutenant John McDougal, formerly of HMS Unite, to Malta
Malta
Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...
. McDougal had seen the French ships in passing and identified them as a convoy heading north from Corfu rather than south to it, and had ordered the merchant ship to return him to Lissa to bring warning. The French convoy was under the command of Commodore François-Gilles Monfort and consisted of three ships, the two large frigates Pomone
French frigate Pomone (1805)
The Pomone was a 40-gun Hortense-class frigate of the French Navy, built at Genoa for the puppet government of the Ligurian Republic, which was annexed as part of France in June 1805, a month after the Pomone was completed...
and Pauline
French frigate Pauline (1807)
The Pauline was a 44-gun Hortense class frigate of the French Navy.On 27 February 1809, along with Dubourdieu's Pénélope, she captured the 32-gun HMS Proserpine ....
and the smaller Persanne
French ship Persanne (1809)
The Persanne was a 24-gun Mérinos class transport of the French Navy.On 29 November 1811, Pauline ferried a cargo of 201 bronze and iron cannon, 220 iron wheels for gun carriages and numerous other military stores from Corfu to Trieste, escorted by frigates Pomone and Pauline...
. The convoy had departed Corfu on 16 November carrying a cargo of cannon
Cannon
A cannon is any piece of artillery that uses gunpowder or other usually explosive-based propellents to launch a projectile. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees,...
to Trieste.
Squadrons
| Captain Maxwell's squadron | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ship | Rate | Guns | Navy | Commander | Casualties | Notes | ||||
| Killed | Wounded | Total | ||||||||
| HMS Alceste HMS Alceste (1806) The Minerve was a 38-gun Armide class frigate of the French Navy, captured by the British in 1806 and brought into Royal Navy service as HMS Alceste. She was wrecked in 1817.-French service:... |
Fifth rate | 38 |  |
Captain Murray Maxwell Murray Maxwell Captain Sir Murray Maxwell, CB, FRS was a British Royal Navy officer who served with distinction in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars... |
7 | 13 | 20 | |||
| HMS Active HMS Active (1799) HMS Active was a Royal Navy fifth-rate frigate launched on 14 December 1799 at Chatham Dockyard. Sir John Henslow designed her as an improvement on the Artois-class frigates. She served during the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars, capturing numerous enemy vessels... |
Fifth rate | 38 | |
Captain James Alexander Gordon James Alexander Gordon Admiral of the Fleet Sir James Alexander Gordon, KCB, RN was a distinguished British officer in the Royal Navy. His 75 years in the service, from Midshipman to Admiral of the Fleet was unprecedented in its duration. He served in the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812... |
9 | 26 | 35 | |||
| HMS Unite | Fifth rate | 36 | |
Captain Edwin Henry Chamberlayne | 2 | 4 | 6 | |||
| HMS Kingfisher HMS Kingfisher (1804) HMS Kingfisher was a Royal Navy 18-gun Merlin-class ship sloop, built by John King and launched in 1804 at Dover. She served during the Napoleonic Wars, first in the Caribbean and then in the Mediterranean before being broken up in 11816.-Caribbean:Kingfisher was commissioned under Commander... |
Sloop Sloop A sloop is a sail boat with a fore-and-aft rig and a single mast farther forward than the mast of a cutter.... |
18 | |
Captain Ewell Tritton | 0 | 0 | 0 | Independent sailor, not engaged in the action. | ||
| Casualties: 18 Killed, 43 Wounded, 61 Total | ||||||||||
| Commodore Monfort's Squadron | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ship | Rate | Guns | Navy | Commander | Casualties | Notes | ||||
| Killed | Wounded | Total | ||||||||
| Windward Division | ||||||||||
| Fifth rate | 40 |  |
Commodore François-Gilles Monfort | - | - | unknown | ||||
| Pomone French frigate Pomone (1805) The Pomone was a 40-gun Hortense-class frigate of the French Navy, built at Genoa for the puppet government of the Ligurian Republic, which was annexed as part of France in June 1805, a month after the Pomone was completed... |
Fifth rate | 40 | |
Captain Claude-Charles-Marie Ducamp-Rosamel | - | - | ~50 | Captured and taken to Britain, later broken up. | ||
| Persanne French ship Persanne (1809) The Persanne was a 24-gun Mérinos class transport of the French Navy.On 29 November 1811, Pauline ferried a cargo of 201 bronze and iron cannon, 220 iron wheels for gun carriages and numerous other military stores from Corfu to Trieste, escorted by frigates Pomone and Pauline... |
Sixth rate | 26 | |
Captain Joseph-André Satie | 0 | 0 | 0 | Captured and sold to the Bey of Tunis. | ||
| Casualties: At least 50 killed and wounded | ||||||||||
| Sources: Gardiner, p. 178; James, p. 378 | ||||||||||
Key
- A † symbol indicates that the officer was killed during the action or subsequently died of wounds received.
- The ships are ordered in the sequence in which they formed up for battle.
Battle
Casting south close to the island of AugustaLastovo
Lastovo is an island municipality in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County in Croatia. The municipality consists of 46 islands with a total population of 792 people, of which 93% are ethnic Croats, and a land area of approximately . The biggest island in the municipality is also named Lastovo, as is the...
(Lastovo), Captain Gordon in Active sighted the French force at 09:20 on 29 November, sailing to the north-west. Initially the French ships held their course, but on determining that the approaching squadron was British, Monfort spread all sail to escape pursuit. By 11:00 it was evident that Persanne could not maintain the pace of the two larger frigates and so turned north-east in hopes of escaping independently. The Active initially gave chase to the smaller ship, but Maxwell recalled her and sent Unite after Persanne, keeping Active and Alceste in pursuit of the larger French ships. At 11:50 it became clear that Alceste would soon catch the heavily laden French ships, and Maxwell sent the telegraph signal to Gordon; "Remember the battle of Lissa", the action of eight months before at which Hoste had raised the signal "Remember Nelson".
The first shots were fired at 12:30 by Persanne close to the island of Pelagosa
Palagruža
Palagruža is a small, remote archipelago of dolomite in the middle of the Adriatic Sea in Croatia. It consists of one main island, called Vela or Velika Palagruža, and one smaller one, Mala Palagruža, and there are twenty or so other closely associated rocks or reefs...
(Palagruža), but the main action did not begin for another hour, when Alceste and Pomone exchanged shots from their stern and bow guns. By 13:40, Alceste was firing her broadside into Pomone and simultaneously pressing on all sail in an effort to reach Pauline, but this ambition was thwarted when a shot from Pomone brought down Alceste's main topmast, slowing her suddenly and allowing Pauline to pull a little ahead. At 14:00, Active had arrived in action and was also firing into Pomone, forcing Monfort to bring Pauline round to protect her outgunned colleague. By 14:20 the conflicts between Active and Pomone and Alceste and Pauline had separated into different duels, Pomone particularly suffering severely but Active also taking heavy damage, a 32 pounder carronade
Carronade
The carronade was a short smoothbore, cast iron cannon, developed for the Royal Navy by the Carron Company, an ironworks in Falkirk, Scotland, UK. It was used from the 1770s to the 1850s. Its main function was to serve as a powerful, short-range anti-ship and anti-crew weapon...
shot severing Captain Gordon's leg at the height of the engagement.
At 15:05 another British ship appeared on the horizon, the sloop HMS Kingfisher
HMS Kingfisher (1804)
HMS Kingfisher was a Royal Navy 18-gun Merlin-class ship sloop, built by John King and launched in 1804 at Dover. She served during the Napoleonic Wars, first in the Caribbean and then in the Mediterranean before being broken up in 11816.-Caribbean:Kingfisher was commissioned under Commander...
, which persuaded Monfort that he could no longer protect the battered Pomone against superior numbers. Pauline set all sail to the west, away from her opponents who were either too battered or too distant to pursue. Alceste and Active now concentrated their full broadsides on Pomone, which soon lost both masts and was forced to surrender to prevent total destruction. Pauline escaped, later reaching Ancona
Ancona
Ancona is a city and a seaport in the Marche region, in central Italy, with a population of 101,909 . Ancona is the capital of the province of Ancona and of the region....
safely but having suffered severe damage in the engagement.
Unite vs. Persanne
The secondary engagement of the battle was contested initially within sight of the other combatants, Persanne firing the first shots at the pursuing Unite at 12:30. The smaller size of these vessels made them faster and more maneuverable than their larger counterparts, and as a result it was not until 16:00 that Unite caught the smaller ship. During the pursuit, the ships had exchanged long-range shots from their stern and bow guns which caused six casualties aboard Unite but none on Persanne. From external appearances, Persanne seemed to be a frigate of similar size to the fifth rate Unite, but in fact the French ship was only lightly armed, carrying 26 small guns to her opponents 36. As a result, when it became clear that his ship could not outrun Unite, Captain Satie surrendered after firing a token broadside rather than be destroyed by the more powerful ship.Aftermath
Casualties suffered in the action were relatively heavy on both sides. The British ships, with their reduced crews, suffered 61 men killed or wounded while the French lost over 50 on Pomone alone. There were no casualties on Persanne, and Pauline's losses are unknown, although believed to be heavy given her battered condition. The French also lost the cargo aboard Persanne and Pomone, which amounted to 201 bronze and iron cannon, 220 iron wheels for gun carriages and numerous other military stores.Promotions were granted to the junior officers of Alceste and Active and both crews received praise and prize money for their service in the operation. Similar rewards were not made to the crew of Unite, probably because Persanne was so much smaller and less-well armed than her opponent. The total prize money was £3,500, not as much as first anticipated because neither of the captured ships were of sufficient quality to warrant purchase into the Royal Navy. Pomone had been hastily built in 1803 as the personal warship of Jérôme Bonaparte
Jérôme Bonaparte
Jérôme-Napoléon Bonaparte, French Prince, King of Westphalia, 1st Prince of Montfort was the youngest brother of Napoleon, who made him king of Westphalia...
and as a result was of weak construction while Persanne had been designed as an armed storeship rather than a full-scale warship. Ultimately Pomone was transferred to Britain, briefly renamed HMS Ambuscade
HMS Ambuscade
Eight Royal Navy ships have borne the name HMS Ambuscade: was a 40-gun fifth rate, formerly the French ship Embuscade, captured in 1746. She fought off Cape Finisterre, captured the privateer Vainqueen and fought with Boscawen against de la Clue off Lagos. She was sold at Deptford in 1762...
and broken up for materials while Persanne was sold to the Bey of Tunis. Nearly four decades later the battle was among the actions recognised by a clasp attached to the Naval General Service Medal, awarded upon application to all British participants still living in 1847.
In France, the action had more significant consequences. The loss of two ships and over 200 cannon was a serious blow to the French army marshalling in the Balkans. Napoleon himself took an interest in the engagement and it has been suggested by British historian James Henderson that this action convinced Napoleon of his inability to control the Adriatic Sea, which was vital to launching operations in the Balkans. This action may have been a factor in his decision to abandon plans to invade the Ottoman Empire, and instead to turn his attention on Russia
French invasion of Russia
The French invasion of Russia of 1812 was a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars. It reduced the French and allied invasion forces to a tiny fraction of their initial strength and triggered a major shift in European politics as it dramatically weakened French hegemony in Europe...
. In the French Navy, the flight of Pauline was deemed cowardly and Captain Monfort was court-martialled and relieved of command. In 1817, when Murray Maxwell
Murray Maxwell
Captain Sir Murray Maxwell, CB, FRS was a British Royal Navy officer who served with distinction in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars...
visited St Helena on his return from the East Indies where HMS Alceste had been wrecked, Napoleon greeted him with the words "Your government must not blame you for the loss of Alceste, for you have taken one of my frigates".
The effects on the Adriatic itself were slight, the action only confirming the already overwhelming British dominance in the region. The French Navy would continue to seek reinforcements for their squadrons, concentrating on the construction of several new ships in Italian seaports that would not be ready until 1812. As a result this was the last significant action of the year in the Adriatic.