He arrived off that island, on the 2d of July, with 25 sail of the line, 10 frigates, and near 10,000 troops, off the

Edwards, vol. i. p. 376.

town of St. George. The English force upon that island consisted of 90 men of the 48th regiment, 150 seamen from the merchant ships, and 300 militia of the island.

The next morning the Count d'Estaing invested, with 3000 men, the intrenchment upon Hospital Hill: they advanced in three columns, and carried the lines after losing 300 men. Lord Macartney, the governor, with the remains of his garrison, retired into the old fort at the mouth of the harbour, which was commanded by the guns on the Hospital Hill battery. All offers of capitulation were rejected, and such terms proposed that Lord Macartney preferred to surrender at discretion.

This resolution enraged the French commander; for it disappointed him of a legal reason for obtaining a large sum of money, which he had demanded as a ransom for the town of St. George. He therefore chose to consider the place as taken by storm, and let loose the ruffians under his command to pillage the town for two hours. These exercised great cruelties on the inhabitants, who had thrown themselves upon their mercy. An immense booty was taken from the town; and his Majesty's sloop York, and thirty merchant ships, valued at £400,000, were taken in the harbour and roadstead. Upwards of 100 pieces of cannon, 24 mortars, and a great quantity of ammunition and provisions, fell into the hands of the conquerors.

The French appointed the Count de Durat governor of the island; who issued an ordinance, forbidding, upon pain of military execution and confiscation of property, the payment of all debts due by the inhabitants to British subjects. He also ordered, that all the estates belonging to English absentees should be put into the hands of "conservators," to be named by himself, and the produce to be paid into the public treasury. These appointments were, however, abolished by orders from the court of France, and the estates ordered to be restored to the absent proprietors.

Soon after the surrender of Grenada, Admiral Byron had returned to St. Lucia-heard there of the loss of St. Vincent'sand was proceeding, with General Grant, to recover that island -when, upon their passage, they received information, that D'Estaing was attacking Grenada. The advices were very imperfect they represented Lord Macartney to be in a condition to hold out for some days, under-rated the French force, and did not mention the junction of De la Motte with D'Estaing.

Upon the appearance of the British fleet, on the 6th of July, off the harbour of St. George, the French put to sea, many of them slipping their cables for that purpose. The greatest exer

Beatson's Memoirs, vol. iv. p. 463.

Edwards, vol. i. pp. 378. .380.

Annual Register, 1779, p. 203.

tions of the British could only bring on a partial action. Admiral Barrington, in the Prince of Wales, and Captains Sawyer and Gardner, in the Boyne and Sultan, at half-past seven, brought the van of the enemy to action for a considerable time before they could be supported. The vice-admiral was wounded, and the ships damaged. The French ships had the superiority in point of sailing, which enabled them to avoid a decisive action: they were to leeward, and always bore up as the British ships got near. The Grafton, Captain Collingwood; the Cornwall, Captain Edwards; and the Lion, Captain Cornwallis, sustained at one time the fire of the whole French fleet, as they passed upon the opposite tack; and Captain Fanshawe, who tried to stop the enemy's van, and bring on a general action, in the Monmouth, got that ship very much disabled.

Some of the ships in the action stood to the entrance of the harbour of St. George, intending to administer hope at least to their supposed friends in the garrison; but when they saw the French colours on the fort, were fired at from the battery, and found the island was already lost, the British commander changed his object. His transports had been a constant clog upon him during the action - their protection, and that of his disabled ships, became the only subjects of consideration. The action continued at intervals during the evening. The Lion, unable to join the fleet, was obliged to bear up for Jamaica, and arrived there almost a wreck. D'Estaing would not venture to send a single ship after her. The Monmouth, with the transports, were ordered to make the best of their way to St. Christopher's or Antigua.

The British fleet was now reduced to nineteen sail of the line, of which several were disabled. At the close of the evening, they were three miles from the enemy. In the night, M. D'Estaing returned with his fleet to Grenada. The English went to St. Christopher's: their loss was 183 killed, and 346 wounded. The lowest estimate of the loss of the French is 2700 killed, and 1200 wounded; but the English were very much damaged in the masts and rigging.

It was now considered impossible to oppose M. D'Estaing, and a general panic spread through all the British islands. M. D'Estaing, however, contented himself with returning the visits he had formerly received at Martinico, by parading for a whole day in sight of St. Christopher's. He afterwards waited to see the French homeward-bound West India convoy clear of danger, and proceeded, with about twenty-two sail of the line, and ten frigates, to the coast of North America.

An act was passed, "To allow the trade between Ireland, and the British colonies and plantations in America and the East Indies, and the British settlements on the coast of Africa, to be carried on, in like manner as it is now carried on between Great Britain and the said colonies and settlements."

Rear-Admiral Hyde Parker succeeded Admiral Byron in the command on the Leeward Island station. On the 24th of October he captured the Alcmena, French frigate, and from her he learnt that the Count D'Estaing was gone to the coast of North America.

Admiral Parker afterwards destroyed the greater part of a convoy, within sight of Fort Royal, Martinico. M. de la Motte Piquet, with three ships, slipt their cables in that bay, engaged the headmost of the British fleet, and saved the rest of the convoy. Captain Griffith, of the Conqueror, was killed by a shot from the batteries, as he was chasing M. de la Motte.

Three French frigates were taken by Admiral Parker's squadron, after an extraordinary long chase off St. Lucia. On the 21st of December, his Majesty's ship Magnificent came up with the sternmost, La Blanche, thirty-six guns, and 212 men, commanded by M. Galissoniere; and the Suffolk captured the Fortunée, forty-two guns, and 247 men. The third was taken on the morning of the 23d, by the Magnificent and Stirling Castle, and proved to be the Ellis, of twenty-eight guns and sixty-eight men.

The Dutch colonies in the West Indies exported colonial produce, which employed above 170 large vessels to carry it to the mother country.

The exports from Essequibo and Demerary employed twentyfour ships, and consisted of 58994hhds. of sugar, 927 tierces and 25,234 bags of coffee, and 2868 bales of cotton.

The whole average produce of the French West India colonies was estimated at 100,000,000 livres tournois, and the number of Negroes at about 438,000.

In the island of Grenada, there were 35,000 slaves this year. The population of St. Domingo consisted of 32,650 Whites, 7055 free Negroes, and 249,098 slaves.

That of Guadaloupe, of 13,261 Whites, 1382 free Negroes, and 85,327 slaves.

Upon the 16th of June, the Spanish ambassador, the Marquis d'Almadovar, delivered to the English government a paper, in which he stated, that "the sovereignty of his Majesty in the

Annual Register, 1780, pp. 81. 215. 359. Beatson's Memoirs, vol. iv. p. 473. Brougham's Colonial Policy, book i. sect. 3. pp. 523. 368. Bolinbroke's Voyage to Demerary, Appendix. Coke's West Indies, vol. ii. p. 59. Report of the Lords of the Committee, from M. Neckar's book on the Administration of the Finances.

province of Darien and on the coast of St. Blas has been usurped, the governor of Jamaica having granted to a rebel Indian the commission of captain-general of those provinces: in short, the territory of the Bay of Honduras has been recently violated, by exercising acts of hostility and other excesses against the Spaniards, who have been imprisoned, and whose houses have been invaded; besides which, the court of London has hitherto neglected to accomplish what the 16th article of the last treaty of Paris stipulated relative to that coast." After naming some other reasons not relating to the West Indies, the marquis states, that his Majesty the King of Spain "finds himself under the disagreeable necessity of making use of all the means which the Almighty has intrusted him with, to obtain that justice which he has solicited, by so many ways, without being able to acquire it."

In the Spanish manifesto published at Madrid, declaring the motives which induced His Catholic Majesty to act hostilely against England, among other reasons are enumerated the following relating to the West Indies, in addition to those stated by the Marquis d'Almadovar :

"That Dr. Irwin, in 1775, had landed several families in the province of Nacha, for the purpose of making a lasting settlement there; and that the said doctor had educated in his own house a son of an Indian king, and two Indians of note in those countries.

"That in June and July 1778, the English prompted the Characas, Miraquies, and Micathas Indians to rebel-paying to each Indian the value of a skin of venison a day, and inducing them, with brutal cruelty, to destroy the Spanish settlements.

"That the English had ordered a fort to be built near lake Iberville, at the mouth of the Mississippi.

"That the insults offered by the English navy to the Spanish navigation and trade, from the year 1776 to the beginning of 1779, were eighty-six in number, including prizes taken by unjust practices, piracy, robberies of various effects out of vessels, attacks made with gun-firing, and other incredible violences.

"That in the two last years, and till the beginning of March of the present year, the English navy had insulted, at twelve different times, in the European and American seas, the ships of His Catholic Majesty."

The manifesto states, "It makes one blush to describe with what indecency and ignominy the King's flag was treated by the English officers, in those and other similar cases. We shall only relate the transaction of the 31st of October of the last year, when an officer having been dispatched by two English frigates to reconnoitre the Spanish sloop named Nostra Signora de la Esclavitud, between the isles of Mona and La Saona, he obliged

Annual Register, 1779, pp. 367–371.