“Lord Cochrane’s reasons for running in with the frigate was, that he considered the loss of life would be much less by this manœuvre than if he had despatched the boats, and this privateer he had determined to capture. He did not suppose, nor indeed did any one, that, lying as she was under the guns of the frigate, she would dare to fire a shot, but in this he was mistaken. The boats were manned, and the remaining crew of the _Impérieuse_ at their quarters. The word was given and the boats shoved off; one pinnace, commanded by Mr. Caulfield, the first lieutenant, pulling for the polacre ship, while the others went to take possession of the brigs and zebecque.
“To our astonishment, as soon as the pinnace was alongside the ship, she was received with a murderous fire, and half of our boat’s crew were laid beneath the thwarts; the remainder boarded. Caulfield was the first on the vessel’s decks--a volley of musquetoons received him, and he fell dead with thirteen bullets in his body. But he was amply avenged; out of the whole crew of the privateer, but fifteen, who escaped below and hid themselves, remained alive; no quarter was shown, they were cut to atoms on the deck, and those who threw themselves into the sea to save their lives were shot as they struggled in the water. The fire of the privateer had been the signal for the batteries to open, and now was presented the animated scene of the boats boarding in every direction, with more or less resistance; the whole bay reverberating with the roar of cannon, the smooth water ploughed up in every quarter by the shot directed against the frigate and boats, while the _Impérieuse_ returned the fire, warping round and round with her springs to silence the most galling. This continued for nearly an hour, by which time the captured vessels were under all sail, and then the _Impérieuse_ hove up her anchor, and, with the English colours waving at her gaff, and still keeping up an undiminished fire, sailed slowly out the victor.”
It was on such an occasion as this, if not in this very affair, that Marryat is said to have had the adventure recorded by him in “Frank Mildmay.” Like the hero of that story, he was knocked down by the body of his leader, who was shot in front of him in a boarding affair, and then almost trampled to death by the men who pressed on to carry the prize. When the fight was over he was dragged out insensible, and laid among the dead. The unfriendly remark of a comrade--that he had cheated the gallows--revived him to give a vigorous denial. Mrs. Ross Church states that this happened in Arcassan Bay during the first cruise of the _Impérieuse_, but Cochrane himself mentions no such fight there, and no loss of any of his officers. Frank Mildmay’s adventure happened in Arcassan Bay, but Marryat would have obvious reasons for not being strictly accurate as to place. If the incident was taken from his own life, it can only have happened at Almeria. It may be noted that both Mr. Handstone in the novel, and Mr. Caulfield in history, were first lieutenants, and that both died in the same way, riddled with bullets, at the head of a boarding party. Was Caulfield oppressed with a presentiment of his coming death like the lieutenant in “Frank Mildmay”--or was he indeed the original of that officer who, be it observed, is a very distinct character, and has much the air of being a portrait? Perhaps a preliminary question ought to be asked, namely, whether this incident did actually happen to Marryat as recorded in the novel? It is possible. The fact that he does not mention it in the passage quoted above proves nothing. It is apparently taken from his unfinished life of his friend Napier, in which he would naturally not dwell on his own personal adventures. On the other hand, it is very much the sort of story which might be transferred from the hero of the novel to its author.