Angot and Leseigneur accompanied him to Rouen, where they obtained permission for him to rest several days, previous to his proceeding, via Beauvois, Soissons, Rheims, and Chalons, to the dépôt for British prisoners at Verdun.
All the intelligence that could be obtained from the wounded men who escaped to the Rattler, and survived, tending to confirm the belief that Lieutenant Dalyell was no more. Captain Mason, on the 15th Jan., 1805, wrote to Mr. (now Lieutenant-Colonel) Robert Dalyell, as follows;
“It is with the most heartfelt sorrow I confirm the melancholy intelligence you have heard, of your gallant brother being missing. I have a very faint hope that, although he was seen to fall after his sword broke, he may still be alive – but I confess it is very faint. I sent a flag-of-truce to St. Valery last Saturday, to inquire if he is still alive; but the unfeeling rascal of a commandant fired at us, instead of replying to my letter. If any thing can compensate his friends for his loss, it must be the knowledge of his having fallen, as he has ever lived, in the performance of gallant and glorious actions. In him I lose an officer I highly admired, and a friend I sincerely esteemed; and his country has to regret the loss of one of her best officers.”
In an official letter to Admiral Lord Keith, the commander of the Rattler had previously thus expressed himself:
“Among the missing from this ship is Lieutenant Dalyell, whose zeal, courage, and abilities have ever been eminently conspicuous: his premature death deprives his country of an officer who was an honor to the service.”
On the receipt of Captain Mason’s letter, Lady Dalyell and the whole of her family and relatives went into mourning; but their hearts were soon gladdened by the unexpected tidings, derived from le Vimereux, (which privateer was at length captured by a British frigate) that he for whom they had put on the sable weeds of death, was not only living but likely to do well. Some time afterwards, her ladyship’s second son, John Graham Dalyell, Esq. informed his gallant brother, that the Patriotic Society at Lloyd’s had voted him £100; that he would assuredly be promoted, if at home; and that Government had set at liberty, on parole, the commander of le Vimereux, his son, his brother, and the French surgeon, entirely on account of the care taken of him and Mr. Donaldson, at St. Valery.
