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Auction: 16043 - Autographs, Historical Documents, Ephemera and Postal History
Lot: 24

Documents
Captain Lord Cockrane
1808 (17 February) a folio printed petition for the Seizure and Capture as Reprisals of the brig 'La brigen del Carmen' "by His Majesty's Ship Imperieuse Captain the Right Honourable Lord Cockrane" and signed by William Toye and Richard Mountney Jephson. Horizontal folding creases and some peripheral ageing. An unusual naval document

On January 7 1808, Impérieuse was passing by the anchorage at Arcachon Bay and spotted a small convoy, escorted by gunboats, anchored under the protection of a coastal fort. The French recognized Impérieuse and immediately took extraordinary measures to prevent the convoy from being cut out. The smaller craft were beached and the fort’s garrison took up protective positions on the beach to fend off any cutting out expedition Cochrane would inevitably be organizing.

Shoals kept Impérieuse from coming close inshore and the small fort contained four 36-pounders, two field guns, and a 13-inch mortar. Undeterred, in the early morning hours of January 8, Cochrane dispatched his marines and a large detachment of sailors under his first lieutenant, David Mapleton, to seize the fort rather than cut out the convoy.

The first the French knew of this unexpected turn of events was when the fort was stormed. Now the convoy could neither move forward, it’s way being blocked by Impérieuse nor could it stand fast as there was no longer a fort to protect it. The garrison guarding the convoy had the same dilemma. They were vulnerable to being defeated in detail and had to seek a defensible place.

In the end, the French sailors and soldiers decamped. Cochrane’s men burned seven ships and carried off five more as prizes. They also blew up the fort by firing its magazine and destroying the guns in the bargain

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