Page:Royal Naval Biography Marshall v4p1.djvu/40

 On the evening of the 3d Feb. 1804, four of the Centaur’s boats, containing sixty seamen and twelve marines, under the orders of Lieutenant Robert Carthew Reynolds, assisted by Lieutenant Bettesworth, Mr. Boss, and Mr. John Tracey, secretary, were detached to attempt the capture of the French national brig Curieux, mounting 16 long 6-pounders, with a complement of 105 men, lying at anchor close under Fort Edward, at the entrance of the Carénage, Fort Royal harbour, Martinique, victualled for three months, and all ready for a start to sea. The result of this enterprise is thus stated in James’s Naval History, 2d edit. Vol. III p. 354 et seq.:

“Although the suspicion that an attack might he made by a part of the blockading force had led to every commendable precaution to prevent surprise; such as loading the carriage-guns with grape, and the swivels (of which there were eight) and wall-pieces with musket-balls; spreading on the quarter-deck, and in the arm-chest, the muskets, sabres, pistols, tomahawks, and pikes; filling the cartouch-boxes; placing as sentries, one marine at each gangway-ladder, one at each bow, and two at the stern; tracing up the boarding-nettings; and directing a sharp look-out to be kept by every officer and man of the watch; yet was the Curieux, owing to the vigour of the onset, and the hour chosen for making the attack, unapprized of her enemy’s approach, until too late to offer a successful resistance.

“At about three-quarters past midnight, after a hard pull of twenty miles, and just as the moon was peeping from behind a cloud, the Centaur’s boats were hailed by the Curieux, and then fired into by the sentries, by two of the starboard guns, a swivel, and a wall-piece. The marines returned the fire with their muskets, and the boats pulled rapidly on. In the midst of a scuffle alongside, the barge pushed for the brig’s stern. Here hung a rope-ladder, to which two boats were fast. Lieutenant Reynolds, and a seaman named Richard Templeton, ascended by it to the taffrail, and, in defiance of the swivels and wall-pieces mounted at this end of the vessel, were quickly followed by the rest of the barge’s crew. In his way up the ladder. Lieutenant Reynolds, with admirable coolness, cut away one of the tracing-lines with his sword, whereby the corner of the netting fell, and thus enabled the other boats to board on the brig’s quarter.

“Since the first alarm had been given, all the Curieux’s crew, headed by their brave commander (Mons. Cordier), had been at their quarters; and a sanguinary combat now ensued, in which the French officers took a