for an hour and a half, bore away.  The superiority of fire from the Sandwich, and the gallant behavior of the officers and men, enabled her to sustain so unequal a combat; though before attacked by them, she had beat three ships out of their line of battle, had entirely broke it, and was to leeward of the French Admiral.”  Possibly the French accounts, if they were not so very meagre, might dispute this prowess of the flagship; but there can be no doubt that Rodney had set an example, which, had it been followed by all, would have made this engagement memorable, if not decisive.  He reported that the captains, with very few exceptions, had placed their ships improperly (cc).  The Sandwich had eighty shot in her hull, had lost her foremast and mainyard, and had fired 3288 rounds, an average of 73 to each gun of the broadside engaged.  Three of her hits being below the water line, she was kept afloat with difficulty during the next twenty-four hours.  With the wearing of the French the battle ceased.

In the advantage offered by the enemy, whose order was too greatly extended, and in his own plan of attack, Rodney always considered this action of April 17th, 1780, to have been the great opportunity of his life; and his wrath was bitter against those by whose misconduct he conceived it had been frustrated.  “The French admiral, who appeared to me to be a brave and gallant officer, had the honour to be nobly supported during the whole action.  It is with concern inexpressible, mixed with indignation, that the duty I owe my sovereign and my country obliges me to acquaint your Lordships that during the action between the French fleet, on the 17th inst, and his Majesty’s, the British flag was not properly supported.”  Divided as the Navy was then into factions, with their hands at each other’s throats or at the throat of the Admiralty, the latter thought it more discreet to suppress this paragraph, allowing to appear only the negative stigma of the encomium upon the French officers, unaccompanied by any upon his own.  Rodney, however, in public and private letters did not conceal his feelings; and the censure found its way to the ears of those concerned.  Subsequently, three months after the action, in a public letter, he bore testimony to the excellent conduct of five of the captains, Walter Young, of the flagship, George Bowyer of the Albion, John Douglas of the Terrible, John Houlton of the Montagu, and A.J.P.  Molloy[83] of the Trident.  “To them I have given certificates, under my hand,” “free and unsolicited.”  Beyond these, “no consideration in life would induce” him to go; and the two junior flag-officers were implicitly condemned in the words, “to inattention to signals, both in the van and rear divisions, is to be attributed the loss of that glorious opportunity (perhaps never to be recovered) of terminating the naval contest in these seas.”  These junior admirals were Hyde Parker and Rowley; the latter the same who had