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10 The Rise and Fall of an Admiral When Samuel Hood left New York to return to his station in the Leeward Islands, he again assumed responsibility for the most important area for British trade and wealth. For the eighteenth-century governments of Britain —and France—the wealth generated by the West Indian possessions exceeded all other sources of revenue. In the North American theatre he left behind, the war was rapidly becoming unwinnable. It had always been balanced on a knife edge, and it had progressively deteriorated after Sir William Howe failed to deliver a death blow to the American cause in August 1776. The decision not to destroy Washington’s army in the operations at Long Island and a similar failure in the Pennsylvania Operations in August and September 1777 led inexorably to the surrender at Saratoga, the entry of the French into the war, and the surrender at Yorktown. The British forces could never be numerous enough, no matter how many engagements they won against the Americans , to subdue the country. Hood returned to a command that had been, and was, under serious threat from the French and Spanish forces, which intended the seizure of all the remaining British possessions, including Jamaica. The loss of colonies on such a scale was seen by the Bourbon powers as a means of inflicting a swift defeat on Britain, an ideal revenge for the humiliations of the previous war. To counter this threat, the British government had decided to reinforce the fleet in the Leeward Islands to the point where it held both numerical and qualitative superiority. Its mission would include intercepting French reinforcements from Europe. Until superiority was attained with the return of Rodney, Hood had to carry on with the numbers he had brought back from America. The repercussions of the action of 5 September now began to reach him. An account critical of Hood in the Morning Chronicle, written by “an officer 195 The Rise and Fall of an Admiral of the Squadron,” had reached his notice. It had been read to a gathering of captains and “heartily laughed at” except, it seems, by the captain of the ship from which the account was said to have emanated, who was furious that such “a farrago of absurdity” could come from his ship. The captain promptly placed a letter in a Barbados newspaper that had reprinted the London article and also sent one to England. All such criticisms were treated by Hood with great disdain, as he showed in a letter to Alexander: . . . my conscience is perfect clear and I bid defiance to the utmost malice can do; and though the times are, I confess, full of calamity and danger particularly for Military Men, I have naught to fear. But admitting the partisans of Rear Admiral Graves, could fix delinquency upon me, it must be from the private representations of the Rear Admiral, and which must prove him a delinquent in a very high degree, not only for not making my failure of duty known in his public letter, but for calling on me, three several times after, for my opinion and advice; and more especially when I was so candid to tell him, where I thought he had been mistaken in a conversation we had together the evening after the action. How our friend could take it into his head, that I should apply to go home upon Sir George Rodney’s return, astonishes me much, it is a measure I could not have the shadow of pretence for and thought he knew me better. Being almost the youngest Flag Officer in His Majesty’s Navy, how could I imagine a fleet of that vast magnitude, which must be employed in these seas, could be placed under my direction. Be assured I shall descend with as much pleasure to serve as second, as by accident I rose, to be first in command. I will most cheerfully, and to the utmost of my poor abilities support Sir George, as it is my duty to do, as I also would any other Admiral, to whom Government should think fit, to commit the care and protection of the Islands.1 It is probably fair to say that the four months that stretched from his return to Barbados on 5 December to the battle of the Saintes on 12 April 1782 were the high point of his professional career. It was this period that cemented his reputation, both among his contemporaries...

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