Capture of Toulon

Royalist control of Toulon was not assured, particularly since there was a strong Republican faction in the fleet, led by Contre-amiral Saint-Julien [fr], and to establish which faction controlled the city Hood sent Lieutenant Edward Cooke into the harbour on 24 August with instructions to meet with the Royalist leader in Toulon. Cooke was forced to approach the harbour in darkness to avoid Republican boat patrols, but was successful in bypassing them, having visited the harbour under during temporary truce in July, and sending a message to the Royalist party. Julien learned of Cooke's presence and spread word that if he should capture Cooke he was to have him hanged, but Cooke, who had sheltered on shore overnight, returned to the city the following day to meet with the Royalist delegates. During the discussions he was able to negotiate for the seizure and disarmament of the French fleet by the British in exchange for protection for the city of Toulon, on the understanding that when the Republicans had been defeated and the French monarchy restored all would be returned to France.^[5] On his return to the British fleet, his boat was intercepted by a French frigate, and it was only by careful manoeuvres in shallow water under fire from the frigate's boats that he returned safely.^[6] On 26 August Cooke returned to the port with a Royalist naval officer, to discover that Julien had seized control of the fleet and promised to resist the British if they entered the port. To this end, Republican sailors had occupied Fort Lamalgue and other defensive positions on the western bluffs overlooking the harbour. On 27 August Hood landed a small expeditionary force under Captain George Elphinstone and drove the Republican forces off, Julien and more than 5,000 French sailors retreating inland.^[7]

With British forces controlling the batteries overlooking the harbour, the remaining Republicans capitulated. On 28 August those ships of the French fleet still anchored in the roads were moved into the arsenals as Hood brought the British fleet, supported by 17 Spanish ships of the line under Admiral Juan de Lángara into port. Command of the city was granted to Rear-Admiral Samuel Goodall and command of the defences to Spanish Admiral Don Federico Gravina.^[8] During early September French Republican armies slowly advanced on Toulon under the command of General Jean François Carteaux to the west and General Jean François La Poype to the east.^[9] Concerned by the lingering Republican faction in Toulon, most strongly represented by 5,000 discharged sailors, Hood ordered that four ships and a corvette be released from the seized French fleet, disarmed, and used as cartels to convey the sailors to Republican ports on the Atlantic. These ships, Apollon, Entreprenant, Orion, and Patriote, plus the corvette Pluvier, sailed on 14 September, arriving at their destinations in mid-October.^[10]

Fighting on the heights

In late September heavy fighting began for control of the high ground which overlooked the harbour. Republican shore batteries exchanged fire with Royal Navy ships during which HMS Princess Royal suffered heavy casualties in an ammunition explosion, and on 30 September Republican troops under Captain Napoleon Bonaparte captured the hill of Pharon, only to be driven off the following day by a combined force of British, Spanish, Neapolitan and Sardinian soldiers under Lord Mulgrave.^[11] In early October Neapolitan reinforcements encouraged a series of successful assaults on the Republican held heights, but later in the month Hood and Lángara had a serious disagreement over command of the siege, Lángara going so far as to threaten Hood's flagship Victory before ultimately backing down.^[12] At the end of the month the allies mustered more than 16,000 men, including 6,000 Spanish troops. The British contribution was just over 2,000 men, reduced by the Royal Navy's commitments elsewhere in the Mediterranean. A substantial body of Austrian reinforcements was expected from Genoa, but were prevented from embarking by a combination of Austrian intransigence and Genoese anger at the British violation of their neutrality during the action of 5 October 1793.^[13] So short of troops were the Allies that Hood hired 1,500 mercenaries from the Knights of Malta, although they did not arrive before the conclusion of the siege.^[14] Republican forces were growing rapidly during this period as reinforcements released by the conclusion of the Siege of Lyon reached the besiegers at Toulon, the Republican army mustering approximately 33,000 soldiers under General Jacques François Dugommier.^[15]

Destruction of the French fleet

Lángara ordered Don Pedro Cotiella to take three boats into the arsenal to destroy the French fleet, and the recently arrived Sir Sidney Smith volunteered to accompany him with his ship Swallow and three British boats. The flotilla was augmented by the fireships HMS Vulcan and San Luis Gonzago.^[21] Cotiella was tasked with sinking Toulon's powder hulks, one a disarmed former British frigate captured during the American Revolutionary War, Montréal, and the other the frigate Iris.^[22] These ships contained the gunpowder stores for the entire fleet and due to the danger of explosion were anchored in the outer roads, some distance from the city. He was then instructed to enter the Old Arsenal and destroy the ships there. Smith's boats approached the dock gates, which had been barred against attack and manned by 800 former galley slaves freed during the retreat whose sympathies were with the advancing Republicans. To ensure that they did not interfere, Smith kept his boat's guns trained on them throughout the operation.^[23] Dockyard workers, rapidly abandoning Royalist insignia, also attempted to block Smith's operation but were successfully locked out of the Arsenal.^[21] In addition, Smith's boats had been spotted by the Republican batteries on the heights and cannonballs and shells rained into the arsenal, although none struck Smith's men. As darkness fell Republican troops reached the shoreline and contributed musketry to the fusillade, Smith replying with grape shot from his boat's guns.^[24]

At 20:00 Captain Charles Hare brought Vulcan into the New Arsenal, Smith halting the ship across the row of anchored French ships of the line. The fuses were lit at 22:00, although Hare was badly wounded by an early detonation as he attempted to leave the ship.^[25] Simultaneously, fire parties set alight to the warehouses and stores ashore, including the mast house and the hemp and timber stores,^[26] creating a blazing inferno across the harbour as Vulcan's cannons fired a last salvo at the French positions on the shore.^[27] With the fires spreading through the dockyards and New Arsenal Smith began to withdraw, his force illuminated by the flames as an inviting target for the Republican batteries. As his boats passed the Iris however the powder ship suddenly and unexpectedly exploded, blasting debris in a wide circle and sinking two of the British boats. On Britannia all of the crew miraculously survived, but on Union the master and three men were killed.^[28]

With the New Arsenal in flames, Smith realised that the Old Arsenal appeared intact, only a few small fires marking the inefficient Spanish efforts at destroying the French ships anchored within. He immediately led Swallow back towards the arsenal but found that Republican soldiers had captured it intact, their heavy musketry driving him back.^[29] The gun batteries defending the Arsenal, reported sabotaged by French Royalist troops, had been taken intact and opened a heavy fire on the boat parties.^[30] Instead he turned to two disarmed ships of the line, Héros and Thémistocle, which lay in the inner roads as prison hulks. The French Republican prisoners on board had initially resisted British efforts to burn the ships, but with the evidence of the destruction in the arsenal before them they consented to be safely conveyed to shore as Smith's men set the empty hulls on fire.^[24] The nearby frigate Courageuse was also set on fire, but it failed to spread and the ship survived.^[30]

Once the British and Spanish boat parties had departed, the galley slaves opened the dockyard gates, allowing dock workers and Republican troops to enter the Arsenal. Forming improvised fire-fighting teams, these men worked to extinguish the blaze, saving a number of burning ships, moving unburnt ships away from the inferno and putting-out fires in the grain store, rope house and gun store among other shore installations.^[31]

Evacuation

With all available targets now on fire or in French hands, Smith withdrew once more, accompanied by dozens of small watercraft packed with Toulonnais refugees and Neapolitan soldiers separated during the retreat.^[24] As he passed the second powder hulk, Montréal, it too unexpectedly exploded. Although his force was well within the blast radius, on this occasion none of Smith's men were struck by falling debris and his boats were able to retire to the waiting British fleet without further incident. As Smith's boats had gone about their work Hood had ordered HMS Robust under Elphinstone and HMS Leviathan under Captain Benjamin Hallowell to evacuate the allied troops from the waterfront.^[23] The allied troops embarked in good order, protected by the rearguard of Sardinian soldiers under Major George Koehler and fire from the frigate HMS Romulus.^[32]

They were joined by HMS Courageux under Captain William Waldegrave, which was undergoing repairs in the Arsenal to replace a damaged rudder. Despite this handicap, Courageux was able to participate in the evacuation and warp out of the harbour with the replacement rudder following behind suspended between two ship's boats. The fireship HMS Conflagration, also undergoing repairs, was unable to sail and was destroyed during the evacuation. By the morning of 19 December Elphinstone's squadron had retrieved all of the Allied soldiers from the city without losing a single man.^[23]

In addition to the soldiery, the British squadron and their boats took on board thousands of French Royalist refugees, who had flocked to the waterfront when it became clear that the city would fall to the Republicans; as many as 20,000 thronged the waterfront in search of a vessel. Among the evacuees was Trogoff and other senior French leaders of the garrison.^[33] Robust, the last to leave, carried more than 3,000 civilians from the harbour and another 4,000 were recorded on board Princess Royal out in the roads. In total the British fleet reported rescuing 14,877 Toulonnais from the city; witnesses on board the retreating ships reported scenes of panic on the waterfront as stampeding civilians were crushed or drowned in their haste to escape the advancing Republican soldiers, who fired indiscriminately into the fleeing populace.^[34] A host of small craft carried refugees out of the harbour to the waiting British ships or safe harbours in Italy or Spain. Hundreds drowned.^[35] Modern historian Bernard Ireland estimates that the actual number of civilians evacuated was approximately 7,000.^[36]