CHAPTER II

THE BEGINNING OF SERVICE

I was sent to sea for the somewhat vague reasons which so often

determine a boy's future. There was a belief that I was of a delicate

constitution, and an impression--perhaps justified--that I needed

discipline. I was sent to Bayford School in England when I was very

young, together with two of my three brothers. We were known as the

three "wild Irish." Among my schoolfellows were the present Lord

Rosebery, James Lowther, Lord Newport, Lord Claud Hamilton and Lord

George Hamilton, Lord Worcester, and Lord Methuen. From Bayford I went

to the educational establishment of the Rev. David Bruce Payne

(afterwards Canon) at Deal, where I first saw the ships of the Royal

Navy, as already related. Canon Payne was a splendid type of the best

British clergyman, and I had a great respect and affection for him. I

was afterwards a pupil of the Rev. Mr. Foster, of Stubbington, Fareham.

I received my nomination from Captain Charles Eden, C.B., and qualified

as a naval cadet on 12th December, 1859. The qualifying certificate

must be signed by the candidate; a regulation which, simple as it

seems, was nearly my undoing.

"Do you always sign your Christian name William with one 'l'?" asked

the examiner.

It was a critical moment. Irish resource supplied the answer.

I said, "Only sometimes, sir."

The examiner smiled grimly. But he passed me. It was my first narrow

escape in the Navy.

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I have the faded blue paper before me as I write. The signature,

laboriously written in a round hand, is "Charles Wiliam Delapoer

Beresford."

The qualifying examination was not very formidable in those easy days.

The knowledge required consisted of a little "English," less French or

Latin (with the "aid of a dictionary"), a "satisfactory knowledge of

the leading facts of Scripture and English History," a certain amount

of geography, and an elementary knowledge of arithmetic, algebra and

Euclid. The preliminary course of education afforded to "Volunteers,"

as the naval cadets used to be called, at the Royal Naval College,

Portsmouth, had been abolished in 1837, and for the next twenty years

cadets were sent straight to sea. In 1857, cadets were entered for

training in the _Illustrious_, Captain Robert Harris. The number of

cadets exceeding the accommodation in the ship, the _Britannia_ was

commissioned on 1st January, 1859, by Captain Harris. But not for many

years did the entrance examination become the competitive ordeal for

which cramming is the only preparation, known to the present

generation. But I remember Admiral William Bowles, commander-in-chief

of Portsmouth, taking me kindly by the shoulder and saying, "Well, my

little man, you are very small for your age. Why are you being sent to

sea?"

I said that I wanted to go to sea.

"Are you good at your books?" asked the admiral. "Bless me, I know

many an admiral who could not pass the examination you have passed.

Good Heavens, what they expect boys to do nowadays!"

The _Britannia_ was then moored at the entrance to Haslar Creek in

Portsmouth Harbour, where the depot ships of the submarines are moored

to-day. Alongside her, in the following year, lay the training frigate

_Eurydice_, which was afterwards capsized off the Isle of Wight on 24th

March, 1878, when 318 lives were lost out of a complement of 320. I

learned to heave the lead from the chains of the _Eurydice_.

[Illustration: THE AUTHOR AS NAVAL CADET]

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In addition to the ordinary school curriculum on board the _Britannia_,

the cadets were taught seamanship, gunnery and navigation. Book-work

did not interest me, but I took great pains to become proficient in

seamanship, in which I always secured a high place.

A cadet entering the _Britannia_ under 14 years of age, would be

rejected from the Service if he failed to pass the fourth quarterly

examination after his entrance. Having entered the _Britannia_ in

December, 1859, I was sent to sea in March, 1861. I was very happy

during my time in the _Britannia_. Out of school time, we did a great

deal of boat-pulling. My boat was called the _Gazelle_. I remember

that one day, when I borrowed a private boat to put off to the

_Gazelle_, my comrades pushed me out into the stream, and I drifted out

to Spithead, without oars. There was nothing in the boat but a

painter, which I considered it to be my duty neatly to coil down. Then

I sat still and waited until a boat came to fetch me.

Seamanship was taught by the use of models, and sail-drill was taught

upon the mizen-mast. I remember being haunted by a doubt lest the

handling of small models, and going aloft in a stationary ship, might

not enable me to practise the knowledge thus acquired when I came to

deal with the real full-size objects and to go aloft in a ship at sea.

My prevision was largely justified; and when I came to command a ship,

I made the youngsters learn their business by handling real things and

not the models of them. For if anything goes wrong while teaching a

youngster, for instance, to lay out a 6-ton anchor upon a model, he

puts it right with his finger and thumb and thinks he can do the same

with the real anchor.

The captain of the _Britannia_ was Robert Harris, to whom the Service

owes the inestimable benefit of cadet training ships. The first

lieutenant was George S. Nares (now Vice-Admiral Sir George S. Nares,

K.C.B.). He commanded the _Challenger_ in her voyage of scientific

discovery of 1872, during which he was recalled to proceed {8} upon his

celebrated voyage of Arctic exploration. Another lieutenant was

William H. Heaton, whose long whiskers afforded the cadets much

innocent amusement. On a windy day his whiskers used to stream

backwards over his shoulders. Lieutenant Heaton chose to wear his

stripes running longitudinally up his arm, a peculiarity which

exemplifies the prevailing latitude with regard to uniform. There was

no rule prescribing the pattern of cap or great-coat worn in the

Service. Officers might wear the mohair band and badge on any kind of

cap that took their fancy. Some of them used to transfer plain clothes

buttons to a uniform coat or greatcoat, if they were going ashore, for

the sake of economy; for we were nearly all poor in those days. The

chaplain and naval instructor was the Rev. Robert M. Inskip.

My chest on board the _Britannia_ stood between the chests of poor

"Andy" Wauchope and Henry John Thoroton Hildyard. Both subsequently

left the Navy for the Army. The late Major-General Andrew Gilbert

Wauchope, D.S.O., was fatally wounded at Magersfontein during the South

African war. General Sir Henry J. T. Hildyard, G.C.B., K.C.B., retired

in 1911, after long and distinguished service. I was strongly inclined

to follow the example of my comrades and to join the Army; and I have

since occasionally regretted that I remained in the Navy, in which

Service there is less opportunity for attaining the highest rank.

I was raised to the rank of "captain" in the _Britannia_; but I regret

to say that my enjoyment of that dignity was singularly brief, for I

was disrated upon the same day, even before I had time to put on the

stripe. For my delight at my promotion so exhilarated me, that I

forgot to resist the temptation to empty a bread-barge upon the head of

the old master-at-arms as he was coming up the hatchway, and the

spectacle was so amusing that I stayed to laugh at it.

When I entered the Service, the system of training {9} young seamen, as

well as cadets, was in operation. To Sir James Graham, First Lord of

the Admiralty, is due the credit of introducing the training of seamen.

In 1854, he caused the _Illustrious_, two-decker, to be commissioned

for that purpose, under the command of Captain Robert Harris. The fact

was that as sails gave place to steam and as the science of gunnery

progressed, it became necessary to enter seamen as boys and to train

them for continuous service. For some time the short service and long

service systems were concurrent. When I went to sea, captains still

entered men direct from the merchant service, and very good seamen they

were. They were engaged for a commission, at the end of which they

could re-engage or not as they pleased. But in the meantime, under the

admirable administration of Captain Harris, "Jimmy Graham's novices,"

as they were called, earned an excellent reputation in the Fleet; and

continuous service gradually replaced intermittent service. In the

continuous service system resided our chief superiority over foreign

Navies. The objection to it on the part of the Government was (and is)

the increasing permanent charge of pensions. But in the interests of

the Service and of the country, it cannot be too clearly understood

that the system is well worth the cost, and that the revival of the

short service system is profoundly to be regretted.

NOTE

H.M.S. _Britannia_.--She was the seventh ship of her name. She was

launched at Plymouth in 1820, was pierced for 120 guns, and her

complement was 900 men. Her length, beam and draught were 205 feet, 53

feet and 18 feet respectively. In the Crimean war, she landed 200 men

as part of the naval brigade which assisted the Army at the siege of

Sevastopol, and took part in the bombardment of that town. She was

commissioned on 1st January, 1859, by Captain Robert Harris, as a

training ship for cadets. {10} The _Britannia_ was stationed first in

Portsmouth Harbour, then at Dartmouth. She was broken up in 1869. The

memory of Captain Robert Harris deserves to be held in high honour.

Vice-Admiral Sir William Fanshawe Martin, who himself achieved great

reforms in the discipline of the Fleet, while in command of the

Mediterranean Fleet, wrote to Captain Harris under date 18th January,

1861, "There is no man in England whose opportunity of doing good to

our country for ages to come is greater than yours; and assuredly the

Navy is greatly your debtor." (_The Story of the Britannia_, by

Commander E. P. Statham, R.N. Cassell.)

The successor of the _Britannia_ in which Lord Charles Beresford

received his training, the eighth of her name, known and remembered

with affection by all naval officers save the new generation, lay at

Dartmouth for more than forty years, when her functions were

transferred to the colleges on shore. (_The King's Ships_, by H. S.

Lecky, Lieut. R. N. Muirhead. Vol. 1.)

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