French Ship Vengeur Du Peuple - Legacy

Legacy

The sinking of Vengeur du Peuple was exploited for political purposes in France, as several sailors were said to have cried "Vive la Nation, vive la République!" ("Long live the nation, long live the republic") from the bow of the ship as she foundered; this was bloated out of proportion by French politicians, who added that the sailors had waved the tricolour and sung La Marseillaise in defiance while they sank with the ship rather than surrender. They also extrapolated that the entire crew had disappeared with the Vengeur, a claim disproved by the return of captured crewmembers as they were quickly released from British captivity.

The origin of the legend is a speech made by Bertrand Barère at the National Convention on 21 messidor (9 July), Rapport sur l'héroïsme des Républicains montant le vaisseau le Vengeur, where he claimed that Vengeur had refused to surrender, nailing her flag, and that all the sailors had died with the ship, giving a last shout of "long live the Republic" and waving all sorts of flags and pennants while the ship disappeared.

Lord Howe denies the account entirely, claiming that it never occurred, a position followed by many British sources. Thomas Carlyle originally included the legend in his history of the French Revolution, prompting Admiral John Griffiths – who, as a lieutenant on HMS Culloden at the time, had been an eyewitness to the sinking – to publicly challenge Carlyle's tale. Carlyle set out to get to the bottom of the story, eventually unearthing the official report of Vengeur's captain, Renaudin. Carlyle concluded that Barrère had concocted a "cunningly devised fable", and changed his account of the sinking of the Vengeur in subsequent editions.

The three most serious reports of the events are the report of Jean François Renaudin, captain of Vengeur, written in captivity on 1 Messidor an II (19 June 1794), signed by Renaudin, Jean Hugine, Louis Rousseau, Pelet, Trouvée, Lussot and others, then in British custody in Tavistock; the report of Cyprien Renaudin, first officer of Vengeur (and cousin to Jean François Renaudin), which was found around 1929 in family archives; and later accounts written in 1838 by Admiral John Griffiths, who had witnessed the event 44 years earlier.

In French drawings, Vengeur is often depicted as flying the Tricolour, which had been recently ordered by the Convention to be flown as battle ensign; however, due to a lack of bunting in Brest, Villaret had not been able to distribute this flag to all his ships, and thus Vengeur probably still flew the white flag with a canton of three equal columns of red, white, and blue.

The notion that the ship would have nailed her flag and never surrendered, as Barère claimed, is never accounted in any of the reports. Though Jean François Renaudin never explicitly states that he surrendered, he does mention that he had his flag flown half-mast in distress when he was surrounded by British ship, indicating that he was requesting assistance from the enemy. Griffiths observes that Vengeur was dismasted to the point that there would have been nothing on which to nail a flag anyway, and James makes mentions of Vengeur hoisting the Union Jack in submission.

The exact cause of the sinking was also the subject of dispute. Barère's account describes Vengeur as sinking from the shots that would have holed her hull; actually, Cyprien Renaudin mentions only two such holes in the lower hull of Vengeur and a noise "like a strong waterfall" at the poop, which he could not identify; this is consistent with James' account of "the Brunswick, by a few well-directed shot, split the Vengeur's rudder, and shattered her stern-post ; besides making a large hole in her counter, through which the water rushed in great quantity." In any case, the superstructures were very much battered, prompting Lieutenant Rotheram, of Culloden, to report that he "could not place a two-feet rule in any direction, he thought, that would not touch two shot-holes". Claude Farrère attributes the sinking to ineptitude of the crew who had failed to close damaged lower gunports. The later study conducted by Captain Diaz de Soria in the 1950s suggests that water did enter from the gun ports of the lower battery, ripped off in the collision with Culloden and shattered by artillery fire, and that the crew failed to obstruct them with temporary contrivances. The panicking crew would have aggravated the situation by failing to man the pumps, explaining why it took four hours for Vengeur to sink between her surrender around 14:00 until her sinking between 18:00 and 18:30.

The most debated point is the patriotic shouts, sometimes claimed to have been accompanied by singing of the Marseillaise. These shouts are denied entirely by Griffiths, but are mentionned in French accounts. Renaudin's report does claim that sailors shouted "Vive la République", but that it was in desperation for being unable to reach the British craft; it does not mention any particular defiance in the intent, though, nor does it mention flags or La Marseillaise; this position is followed by Troude and Farrère. William James provides an alternative theory when he suggests that any person who behaved in such a manner on the stricken ship was acting under the influence of alcohol; Troude, otherwise very critical of Barère's account, vehemently dismissed this idea.

Captain Renaudin was said in a naval registry to have swum to safety. He had in fact abandoned his ship with the first British boat, leaving his men behind in disregard for military customs and the 1765 standing order that Captains had to be last to abandon ship, and though his account insinuates that he was on a boat close to Vengeur when she foundered, he was in fact dining in the mess of Culloden at the moment of the sinking.