Anna, you didn't give us the link where your information came from, but there does seem to be a little confusion. Alexander Stilwell's book
'The Story of HMS Revenge' (which I haven't read) is not a novel , but a history of the three Royal Navy ships that have been named
Revenge. But the story of Jeannette, rescued from the sea after the
Achille blew up at Trafalgar, is indeed very famous. She was taken on board the Pickle, and subsequently transferred to the Revenge, and was eventually reunited with her husband. She features in many accounts, including a letter from Captain Moorsom of the Revenge to his wife. According to one account she was picked up by one of the Belleisle's boats, but she is not mentioned by Lt. Paul Nicolas in his account of Trafalgar, which was included as an appendix to the
'Memoir of the life and services of Admiral Sir William Hargood' by Joseph Allen (1841). By the way, Paul Harris Nicolas was the brother of Sir Nicholas Harris Nicolas, author of the
'Dispatches and Letters of Nelson'.
One of the accounts of Jeannette is supposedly from an unnamed lieutenant of the Revenge, and was included in 'The Enemy at Trafalgar' (1906) by Edward Fraser:
Quote:
A very remarkable incident is on record in connexion with the burning of the " Achille."
One of those rescued by the British boats was a young Frenchwoman. The story of her extraordinary escape is thus told in the words of a lieutenant of the " Revenge," on board which ship the woman was taken :
"Towards the conclusion of the battle the French 80-gun ship Achille, after surrendering, caught fire on the booms. The poor fellows belonging to her, as the only chance of saving their lives, leaped overboard, having first stripped off their clothes, that they might be the better able to swim to any pieces of floating wreck or to the boats of the ships sent by those nearest at hand to their rescue. As the boats filled, they proceeded to the Pickle schooner, and, after discharging their freight into that vessel, returned for more. The schooner was soon crowded to excess, and, therefore, transferred the poor shivering wretches to any of the large ships near her. The Revenge, to which ship I belonged, received nearly a hundred of the number, some of whom had been picked up by our own boats, Many of them were badly wounded, and all naked. No time was lost for providing for the latter want, as the purser was ordered immediately to issue to each man a complete suit of clothes.
" On the morning after the action I had charge of the deck, the other officers and crew being at breakfast, when another boat load of these poor prisoners of war came alongside, all of whom, with one exception, were in the costume of Adam. The exception I refer to was apparently a youth, but clothed in an old jacket and trousers, with a dingy handkerchief tied round the head, and exhibiting a face begrimed with smoke and dirt, without shoes, stockings, or shirt, and looking the picture of misery and despair. The appearance of this young person at once attracted my attention, and on asking some questions on the subject, I was answered that the prisoner was a woman. It was sufficient to know this, and I lost no time in introducing her to my messmates, as a female requiring their compassionate attention. The poor creature was almost famishing with hunger, having tasted nothing for four-and-twenty hours, consequently she required no persuasion to partake of the breakfast upon the table. I then gave her up my cabin, for by this time the bulk-head had been replaced, and made a collection of all the articles which could be procured to enable her to complete a more suitable wardrobe. One of the lieutenants gave her a piece of sprigged blue muslin, which he had obtained from a Spanish prize, and two new checked shirts were supplied by the purser ; these, with a purser's blanket, and my ditty bag, which contained needles, thread, etc., being placed at her disposal, she, in a short time, appeared in a very different, and much more becoming, costume. Being a dressmaker, she had made herself a sort of a jacket, after the Flemish fashion, and the purser's shirts she had transformed into an outer petticoat ; she had a silk handkerchief tastily tied over her head, and another thrown round her shoulders ; white stockings and a pair of the chaplain's shoes were on her feet, and, altogether, our guest, which we unanimously voted her, appeared a very interesting young woman.
" ' Jeannette,' which was the only name by which I ever knew her, thus related to me the circumstances. She said she was stationed during the action in the passage of the fore-magazine, to assist in handing up the powder, which employment lasted till the surrender of the ship. When the firing ceased, she ascended to the lower deck, and endeavoured to get up to the main deck, to search for her husband, but the ladders having been all removed, or shot away, she found this impracticable ; and just at this time an alarm of fire spread through the ship, so that she could get no assistance. The fire originated upon the upper deck, and gradually burnt downwards. Her feelings upon this occasion cannot be described : but death from all quarters stared her in the face. The fire, which soon burnt fiercely, precluded the possibility of her escaping by moving from where she was, and no friendly counsellor was by with whom to advise. She remained wandering to and fro upon the lower deck, among the mangled corses of the dying and the slain, until the guns from the main deck actually fell through the burnt planks. Her only refuge, then, was the sea, and the poor creature scrambled out of the gun-room port, and, by the help of the rudder chains, reached the back of the rudder, where she remained for some time, praying that the ship might blow up, and thus put a period to her misery, At length the lead which lined the rudder-trunk began to melt, and to fall upon her, and her only means of avoiding this was to leap overboard. Having, therefore, divested herself of her clothes, she soon found herself struggling with the waves, and providentially finding a piece of cork, she was enabled to escape from the burning mass. A man, shortly afterwards, swam near her, and, observing her distress, brought her a piece of plank, about six feet in length, which, being placed under her arms, supported her until a boat approached to her rescue. The time she was thus in the water she told me was about two hours, but probably the disagreeableness and peril of her situation made a much shorter space of time appear of that duration. The boat which picked her up, I have heard, was the Belleisle's, but her sex was no sooner made known than the men, whose hearts were formed of the right stuff, quickly supplied her with the articles of attire in which she first made my acquaintance. One supplied her with trowsers, another stripped off his jacket, and threw it over her, and a third supplied her with a handkerchief. She was much burnt about the neck, shoulders, and legs, by the molten lead, and when she reached the Pickle was more dead than alive. A story so wonderful and pitiful could not fail to enlist, on her behalf, the best feelings of human nature, and it was, therefore, not praiseworthy, but only natural, that we extended towards her that humane attention which her situation demanded. I caused a canvas screen berth to be made for her, to hang outside the wardroom door, opposite to where the sentry was stationed, and I placed my cabin at her disposal for her dressing-room.
" Although placed in a position of unlooked-for comfort, Jeannette was scarcely less miserable ; the fate of her husband was unknown to her. She had not seen him since the commencement of the battle, and he was perhaps killed, or had perished in the conflagration. Still, the worst was unknown to her, and a possibility existed that he was yet alive. All her enquiries were, however, unattended with success, for several days, during which I was so much busied in securing the ship's masts, and in looking after the ship in the gales which we had to encounter, that I had no time to attend to my protegee. It was on about the fourth day of her sojourn that she came to me in the greatest possible ecstacy and told me that she had found her husband, who was on board among the prisoners, and unhurt. She soon afterwards brought him to me, and in the most grateful terms and manner returned her thanks for the attentions she had received. After this, Jeannette declined coming to the ward-room, from the very proper feeling that her husband could not be admitted to the same privileges. On our arrival at Gibraltar, all our prisoners were landed by order of the Port- Admiral, Sir John Knight, at the Neutral Ground, but under a mistake, as the Spanish prisoners only should have been landed there. Her dress, though rather odd, was not unbecoming, and we all considered her a fine woman. On leaving the ship, most, if not all of us, gave her a dollar, and she expressed her thanks as well as she was able, and assured us that the name of our ship would always be remembered by her with the warmest gratitude."
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so thanks for the correction. I had read it before but didn’t know who wrote it – and neither does anyone else, apparently! I wonder if the tale was romanticised by the lieutenant in his recollections. I must say I’m impressed that Jeanette was able to make a new jacket and re-work a couple of shirts into a petticoat in such a short space of time. It's a charming story, though.