The Court-martial of James, Lord Gambier, was a notorious British naval legal case during the summer of 1809, in which Admiral Lord Gambier requested a court-martial to examine his behaviour during the Battle of Basque Roads in April of the same year. Noted for the acrimony and corruption of proceedings, it has been described as "one of the ugliest episodes in the internal history of the Royal Navy".
Gambier was the Royal Navy commander of the Channel Fleet during the later Napoleonic Wars, primarily tasked with the blockade of the French Atlantic Fleet in Brest. In February 1809 the French fleet tried to break out into the Atlantic and was chased into the anchorage of Basque Roads near the river Charente. On 11 April a major attack was launched on the anchored fleet by fireships and over several days the French fleet was driven ashore and battered by an inshore squadron commanded by the maverick officer Lord Cochrane. Gambier, stationed just offshore with the main fleet, refused to support Cochrane and as a result, although damaged, most of the French fleet eventually escaped to safety.
On his return to Britain, Cochrane used his position as a Radical Member of Parliament to attempt to block an effort to thank Gambier formally for the victory, placing him in direct opposition to Prime Minister Lord Portland's administration and First Lord of the Admiralty Lord Mulgrave. Mulgrave warned Gambier of the position taken by Cochrane, who responded by demanding a public examination of his conduct via a court-martial. Convened at Portsmouth on 26 July 1809, the members of the court were deliberately chosen by Mulgrave to favour Gambier, and over the next eight days a call was issued for particular witnesses who largely discredited Cochrane with misleading evidence. When Cochrane was called to give evidence he was subject to aggressive questioning, lost his temper and was officially reprimanded.
At the conclusion of the court-martial the members of the court unanimously found in Gambier's favour and despite Cochrane's best efforts Parliament voted thanks to Gambier. Gambier was restored to command and served in the Navy until his death in 1833. Despite popular support, Cochrane's resistance had alienated much of the naval and political establishment in Britain and not long afterwards he was implicated in the Great Stock Exchange Fraud of 1814, convicted and publicly humiliated. He was dismissed from the Royal Navy, although he was later pardoned and reinstated in 1832. Historians have subsequently sided with Cochrane, with even French Emperor Napoleon describing Gambier as a "fool".
Background
In February 1809 the French Atlantic Fleet, based at Brest, was ordered to sail to the Caribbean. Since the outbreak of the Napoleonic Wars in 1803 the French Navy had suffered a series of defeats and the British were now threatening to invade the Caribbean island of Martinique. The fleet, under Contre-amiral Jean-Baptiste Willaumez, sailed on 22 February but was unable to escape British pursuit and four days later anchored in the sheltered position of Basque Roads at the mouth of the Charente, later retreating into the more-sheltered Aix Roads nearby, under the batteries of the fortified Île-d'Aix. A fleet from the British Channel Fleet, commanded by Admiral Lord Gambier, had followed Willaumez to the harbour and there enacted a close blockade. Gambier was an unpopular officer, whose reputation rested on being the first captain to break the French line at the Glorious First of June in 1794 in HMS Defence. Since then he had spent most of his career as an administrator at the Admiralty, earning the title Baron Gambier for his command of the fleet at the Bombardment of Copenhagen in 1807. A strict Methodist, Gambier was nicknamed "Dismal Jimmy" by his men.
While Gambier debated what action to take, Willaumez was censured for his failure to escape the British fleet and was replaced by Contre-amiral Zacharie Allemand, who strengthened the fleet's defences and awaited a British attack. In Britain, First Lord of the Admiralty Lord Mulgrave called on one of the nation's most popular, maverick young naval officers for a solution, Captain Lord Cochrane. Cochrane had operated off the Charente and knew the area well, but he was also a controversial choice for the operation. Placing him in command would mean by-passing a number of more senior officers, inevitably causing offense, while his status as a Radical Member of Parliament for Westminster made him an outspoken opponent of Prime Minister Lord Portland.