Arrival in Nassau

It was about a week's sail from Mole St Nicholas and the route was well frequented by ships from Nassau, handing back French prisoners at Cap Français (Cap Haïtien) in exchange for British prisoners who were delivered to the Mole.  That there was a serious outbreak of fever at the Mole was well known in Nassau, and quarantine restrictions had been imposed on all shipping arriving from St Domingue since before the autumn of 1796.^[iv]

The increased number of slaves in the Bahamas since the arrival of Loyalists in the 1780s, along with the arrival of French émigrés and prisoners from St Domingue in 1793-95, made the white settlers in Nassau uneasy about their security.  Moreover, at the beginning of 1797 the town was still feeling the social divisions caused by Lord Dunmore who, despite having been deposed as Governor, was still resident on the island and making life difficult for Acting Governor Forbes.^[v]  Spain had declared war, and there was great uncertainty over whose side the United States would take.  So Nassau society was perhaps a little on edge, but ready for some privateering action, when the 32nd Regiment arrived in the third week of February 1797.

Once again the weather was against them.  As they sailed into harbour in four transport ships escorted by HMS Lark , a storm got up and they nearly ran aground.  Recalling the event nearly 40 years later, Harry Ross-Lewin, who had then been an ensign in the regiment, ends his highly dramatic account by saying : "In a few hours I found myself with my brother officers in Nassau, at the comfortable inn, whose then landlady was a person of the very uncommon name of Smyth."^[vi]  If his recollection is accurate, it was presumably the privilege of rank that excused officers from quarantine restrictions, with perhaps fatal consequences for the townsfolk.  While the officers may have enjoyed the freedom of the town, the rank and file were kept in quarantine on board transport ships and in the Copper Hospital which, despite initial hindrance (see below), had been built on Hog Island by May 1797.

 Forbes was understandably not best pleased with the troops he had been sent:

             In consequence of Mr Dundas' Order that five Hundred Effective men should be

            detatched from St Domingo to New Providence, the Commander in Chief at Cape

            Nicola Mole [Gen. White] has sent the 32nd Regt here consisting of three hundred

            and eighty men Rank & File; one hundred and three of whom are sick and forty

            are convalescents.^[vii] 

He promised to do his best to get as many as possible fit for duty, but thought the best he could hope for was 300, and that at great expense.  He was concerned about the defence of the islands: "such is the miserable state of it [the 32nd] at present that for six weeks from hence our Force must be inferior to what it was before the arrival of that Regiment."^[viii]  Matters were not helped by the fact that the local militia was depleted as many preferred to go privateering.^[ix]

 His efforts to provide medical care were initially hampered by Dunmore:

             and last week tho' two or three soldiers of the 32nd Regt died every day on board

            the Transports he refused permission to me to erect a Copper Hospital on Hog

            Island, which is neither cleared or cultivated, under pretence that the soldiers might

            injure his Grounds, or steal his stock, consisting of a few Pigs & Pea Fowl;  however

            he has allowed a captain of the navy to station 150 men on the island.^[x]

Portland's reply to these letters at first seems complacent, but his references to "internal defence" and an unspecified "Enemy" are perhaps already indicative of the way events would turn :

             With regard to your Military Force, as I have little or no doubt but that the whole of

            the 32nd Regt or by far the greatest part of it will soon become effective from the

            change of their situation, they with the military of the Bahamas (which in case of

            actual necessity it would be proper to keep within the Island embodied & on duty)

            will be found, I trust, an adequate force for the internal defence of your Government

            against anything the Enemy will be able to bring against you.^[xi]

Forbes' response to the condition of the 32nd - apart from trying to help them - was to seek replacements.  But his efforts were cut short when he died on 3 June.  He was temporarily replaced by Robert Hunt, President of the Assembly, who wrote to Portland on 5 June to tell him of Forbes' death.  A similar letter from Forbes' executors mentions the factors they believed contributed to Forbes' death, including his grief at the recent death of his secretary, with whom he had been very close, and his "close confinement " indoors.  They go on to express the resentment that was perhaps felt by the whole community, not against the regiment, but against the then Commander-in-Chief at the Mole :

             The general sickness that has prevailed here for some time past (the effects of

            which have proved fatal only to new settlers) we ascribe to our contiguity, and of late

            frequent intercourse with St Domingo, and from whence Genl. Whyte lately swept

            his Hospitals upon the Bahamas by drafting all the sick and convalescents of the

            Army into the 32nd Regt. ordered for this Island instead of sending 500 effective

            Men, as directed by Mr Secretary Dundas's Letter of November last.^[xii]

 Such sentiments were also relayed to the British government throughout the summer of 1797 by George Chalmers, the Colony's agent in London.  In October he advised the Colony:

             I have stated to his Grace [Portland] the fatal consequences of the misconduct of

            General White in emptying the Hospitals into your Islands whereby the Country was

            left defenceless, was put to great charge for Hospitals, was infected by the Yellow

            fever, and in addition to the loss of valuable lives, the Climate which had been

            celebrated for Salubrity is now dreaded as pestilential.^[xiii]

In between these exchanges, Hunt was also making a strong case for replacing the 32nd.  He did so in the context of reporting the foiling of a planned revolt by French slaves in August 1797, which was superficially his primary reason for writing to Portland.  The scale of this planned revolt is debatable;  Dunmore had deployed the same reason in 1795 to justify expenditure on the islands' defences.^[xiv]  That Hunt should play up the internal threat to the islands as justification for having a  strong military force is not surprising.  Chalmers had advised the colony as early as 30 April 1797 that, with the defeat of the Spanish at Cape St Vincent and the capture of a Spanish fleet at Trinidad, the external threat was perceived to be minimal;  there was, moreover, a large British force nearby at St Domingue.  Not long afterwards, relations with neighbouring Spanish colonies were deemed stable enough to permit a measure of trade.^[xv]

The alleged French slave revolt was the closest the 32nd came to facing hostile action in the Bahamas, the slaves having supposedly planned to take advantage of their sickly condition to take control of the fort they were now occupying (Fort Charlotte), set fire to the town, and steal a boat to escape to St Domingue.  The 32nd were instructed by Hunt to double the guard and "be more than commonly vigilant."  They may also have manned patrols, though this duty more likely fell to the militia, given the reported condition of the 32nd.

But, whether or not there really was such a plot, Hunt used the opportunity to make a forceful statement of the 32nd's condition:

            The present dibilitated condition of the 32nd Regiment, making some

            reinforcement absolutely and indispensibly necessary, I have accordingly

            written to Major General Simcoe on the subject, requesting any reinforcements,

            however trifling, that he could spare.

            It is my duty to acquaint Your Grace, and I do it with great concern, that the condition

            of the 32nd Regiment in garrison here is wretched beyond discription ;

            notwithstanding the airy situation of the Barracks, the convenience of the Hospitals

            and constant supply they have had of every necessary, and the attendance of most

            of the faculty of the Town,  the malignant distemper they brought with them has

            raged, and continues to rage with such unabated violence, that the whole Regiment

            sick and well does not much exceed two hundred, and out of these I do not believe

            that there are Forty men capable of doing duty even in this moderate climate; and

            unless some providential interference should put a stop to the mortality that prevails,

            this Regiment must be considered as annihilated.^[xvi]

Hunt's letter - aided no doubt by Chalmers' intervention - did the trick.  Portland replied by return that "In consequence of your representation of the reduced state of the 32nd Regt ... Instructions have been given for bringing home the remains of that Regt and for drafting the 6th Regt of the Irish Brigade into the 47th [then in Bermuda]."^[xvii]  It was to be two years before this promise was fulfilled.

Fever

End Notes