The _St. George_ was manned by eight hundred men, and in 1860 was considered a well-equipped vessel, and as compared with the days of Nelson and Collingwood showed a great advance in naval strength and efficiency. At Trafalgar the biggest gun in the whole British fleet was only a fifty-six pounder, but the _St. George_ had in addition to a number of that calibre several sixty-eight pounders, while her speed of ten knots an hour was considered highly satisfactory. Though these equipments would not bear comparison with present-day standards, the young midshipman was proud of his ship and proud of the service, and in after years could with no little exultation { 32} honestly say that, 'though armaments had changed, the hearts of oak remained as of yore; while the old red rag, which had withstood the battle and the breeze for a thousand years, was still able to claim the allegiance of its people.'
Wauchope's commanding officer on board the _St. George_ was Captain the Hon. Francis Egerton--whose son, Commander Egerton, was killed at Ladysmith in November 1899--and among his brother officers were H.R.H. Prince Alfred, afterwards the Duke of Edinburgh, and latterly known as the Duke of Saxe-Coburg Gotha, and Admiral Sir Robert Harris, now Commander-in-Chief of the Cape of Good Hope station.
The _St. George_ was commissioned at Portsmouth, and was transferred to Devonport early in 1861. She was then one of the noblest and most imposing-looking ships of the service, having the year before been thoroughly overhauled and converted from a one hundred and twenty gun ship to one of ninety guns. As a three-decker sailing ship she was considered one of the finest fighting vessels afloat, and her conversion to a steamship of the line had been attended with the most successful results. She was selected by Prince Albert for his son, the youthful Prince Alfred, who joined her as a midshipman a few months after Wauchope--on the 16th January 1861--as she lay in Plymouth Sound, under orders for a cruise to the British North American Stations and the West India Islands.
The greater part of the year seems to have been spent in and about Halifax, the capital of Nova Scotia, which became a centre for cruises in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Canadian ports. We have it on the authority of several of those who were midshipmen with the Prince, that they were a jovial, happy company, all on the most friendly { 33} terms with one another. The Prince, who was very fond of 'Andy,' as he was always called, showed him particular friendship, and the affection which as boys and shipmates they formed then continued more or less in later years.