her her captain, Sir George Carew, and all hands, except about thirty-five persons. This awful catastrophe was witnessed from the shore, not only by the king, but also by Lady Carew, the wife of the gallant and unhappy commander.[1]
French historians are almost unanimous in asserting that the Mary Rose was sunk in action, some, as Du Bellay, attributing the result to gun-shot, and others, as Guérin and other modern writers, claiming the ship as the victim of the galleys of Polain. There is not a shadow of doubt that she perished as has been related, before she had an opportunity of getting into action.
The wind was too light to enable the English ships to manœuvre properly; and, as the French galleys did not depend upon wind, they were able to inflict a certain amount of annoyance, especially upon the Henry Grace à Dieu. But the armed boats of the fleet and the row-barges made a good fight with the enemy until, late in the day, the wind freshened. The galleys were then driven off, and, had not D'Annebaut moved to their assistance, would have suffered heavily. No serious effort, however, was made to engage the main force of the French; and once more the English spent a night among the shoals.
On July 20th, the French landed men at three separate places in the Isle of Wight and plundered some villages, but were easily driven off. Soon afterwards the whole fleet withdrew, coasting as far as Dover, landing at Brighton and Newhaven, but being repulsed there; and then crossing to Boulogne, near which place D'Annebaut put ashore four thousand soldiers and three thousand workmen to assist in the long-deferred siege.
An easterly wind presently drove D'Annebaut from off Boulogne, and obliged him to anchor near the English coast, probably somewhere off the Sussex shore. By that time Lord Lisle, his fleet reinforced to one hundred sail, was cruising in the Channel, and, on August 15th, sighted the enemy to leeward. D'Annebaut had
- ↑ 'Life of Sir Peter Carew' (Maclean), 34.
experience of gunports, they should have been cut so low, since she (the Mary Rose) had been rebuilt in or before 1536. Moreover, Anthony's drawings show them to have been pierced very much higher in other vessels." The 'Life of Sir Peter Carew,' in fact, attributes the disaster to the insubordination and disorder which reigned on board. Yet still, the port-sills may have been low, and even lower than normal, and so may have conduced to the accident. When the Duke of Wellington left Spithead during the Russian war, her lower port-sills, owing to the extra men and stores on board, were little more above water than those of the Mary Rose are alleged to have been.
