annoying the Glatton with a raking fire, which, in her present position, she could not return. After a cannonade of about 20 minutes, the Commodore and his second a-head dropped a-stern out of gun-shot; and immediately the two rearmost frigates advanced upon the Glatton’s starboard quarter; as did the leading ship of the line, on the opposite tack, upon her larboard beam. In another twenty minutes, these three frigates, having, in the shattered state of their hulls, experienced what it was that had so suddenly put to flight their companions, sheered off in equal confusion.
The dismantled state of the Glatton discovered itself the moment an attempt was made to wear in pursuit; every brace and rope had been cut away. The principal part of the enemy’s fire had passed between her top? and gunwale, so that her lower sails were in ribands, and her shrouds nearly all shot through. The main-mast and the fore and mainyards were also badly wounded, and ready to fall. Scarcely half a dozen shot had struck the hull; and, in consequence, no men were killed, and but 2 wounded: one of these was Captain Strangeways of the marines, who, although wounded badly in the thigh, insisted on returning to his quarters; where he remained until, being faint with loss of blood, he was carried off the deck; he died shortly afterwards.
While the Glatton’s people were hastening to repair her damages, in order that the ship might wear clear of the Helvoet shoals, on a part of which she then lay, the French frigate and brig, already mentioned as approaching from toleeward, fired several shot at her; but did no material injury. Captain Trollope, soon after, discovered his former opponents, drawn up in close order under his lee; and used every exertion, during the night, to put his ship in a state to renew the action in the ensuing morning, with the assistance, as he hoped, of part of the British squadron before alluded to. At day-break, however, not a friendly sail was to be seen, a circumstance much to be regretted, as even the aid of a single frigate, the enemy being panic-struck, might have led to the capture of one, if not more of his ships. As it was, the Glatton, in her present disabled state, declined to become a second time the assailant; but neither attempted, nor, being between the enemy and the land, could well have effected her
