From the same to the same, dated Penzance, Cornwall, Mar. 2, 1814.
“When last I had the pleasure of writing you, I had not determined on what I have since done, in giving up the Thais for the renovation of my health, and I must now congratulate myself on the resolution. The whole of the Thais’ crew have been in succession to the hospital, and perhaps they are almost as extremely enervated and debilitated as your Amelia’s were when I saw them, – a cause that must have acted most unhappily, and been insurmountable in your late gallant action[1].”
So much for the “effectiveness” of the Amelia: let us now present our readers with the means of forming an opinion of their own, as to the loss and damage sustained by her antagonist.
M. Bouvet, or rather the French Minister of Marine for him, says, “l’Arethuse had suffered enormously; 20 men killed outright had been thrown into the sea during the engagement; 88 men, previously wounded, were down in the surgeon’s berth; and, excepting the master-carpenter, all my naval officers were killed or wounded: such men as were only slightly wounded had not quitted their posts, or had returned to them after having their wounds dressed; and in the midst of this scene of carnage, the fourth part of the crew left wished only for recommencing the attack[2].”
Lieutenant Henry Ducie Chads, late of the Java, who, when on his return to England with the surviving officers and crew of that ship, was boarded by l’Arethuse, in a letter dated Mar. 20, 1813, says:– “She had suffered most severely,
- ↑ The late Sir George Collier, in his report to the Admiralty, printed by order of the House of Commons, May 25, 1820, says – “The vessels employed in the Slave Trade are navigated almost entirely by natives of Africa, or of similar climate, and they are thereby enabled to endure that which no ships, manned by Europeans, ever can. For I venture confidently to predict, that every British cruiser, exposed to the deluging rains of Africa during the sickly season, for a few days only, will generate fever of so malignant a nature, that half the crew may be the sacrifice, and herself thereby incapacitated from service.” We have already shewn, that the Amelia had been upwards of twelve months on that station: the enemy’s frigates only sailed from France ten weeks and four days previous to the action.
- ↑ See Nav. Chron. v. 29, p. 385.
