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76 Corbett : The Campaign of Trafalgar
THE CAMPAIGN OF TRAFALGAR. By Julian S. Corbett. Pp. xvi, 473,
with Charts and Diagrams. 8vo. London : Longmans, Green & Co.
1910.
1 6s. nett.
IT is hardly an exaggeration to say that if there had been no battle of
Trafalgar the naval campaign of 1805 would be very much better understood
than it is. That most people have thoroughly erroneous ideas about
it is partly because the true relation of the battle to the campaign is not
grasped, and partly because Nelson's share in the campaign, invested with
the special
interest attaching to his
personality, has unduly eclipsed the
work of other men who, like Barham and Cornwallis, really played greater
parts. The most conspicuous naval victory gained by England over
the combined forces of France and Spain, the crowning moment in
Nelson's career, to some extent the decisive battle of the Napoleonic
wars, inasmuch as the destruction of the largest portion of his fleet
made it impossible for Napoleon to revive his schemes for the invasion
of England, and so drove him to have recourse to the ' Continental
System' and all that it involved, Trafalgar was nevertheless merely the
epilogue to the campaign of 1805, so far at least as that had as its
object the invasion of England. That great project
to which Napoleon
had devoted so much thought and labour only to be countered by his
less famous opponents with no less ingenuity and a much more accurate
appreciation of the essentials of naval strategy, had been foiled two months
before Trafalgar, and it is not that battle but Calder's action of July 22nd
off the Spanish Finisterre, it
tactically incomplete though was, which has the
best claim to be called the decisive blow of the campaign as far as concerned
the invasion of England. To students of naval history, these points are
familiar enough ; but it is to be hoped that Mr. Corbett's admirable account
of the campaign, told with all his vigour and vividness in narrative and all
his
lucidity
in argument and exposition, will do much to make the true
version of the story more universally recognised. And while Nelson's work
is in no danger of being undervalued, certainly not by Mr. Corbett, it is high
time that adequate justice should be done to the even greater services of
Barham and Cornwallis, to say nothing of lesser men. But this is
just what
Mr. Corbett's
study of the campaign does. It goes without saying that he
has availed himself of the great mass of materials, published and unpublished,
dealing with the naval side of the campaign, but what is of special value is
that he has brought the naval events into their true connection with the
military and the diplomatic, and that the different features of the story are
arranged in their proper proportion.
One is accustomed to expect something new in Mr. Corbett's books, not
merely new facts brought to light by his researches, but new constructions
put on old facts and new solutions of old puzzles. His wide knowledge, his
ingenuity and his insight help him to bring fresh light to bear on the most
familiar points, and it would have been surprising indeed had he not found
reason to call for a reconsideration of some of the salient features of the
Trafalgar campaign. His most important new contention is that one should
not regard the campaign, as one of mere defence against invasion, not as a
merely naval campaign, but as essentially offensive and closely connected