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The daredevil Captain John Cooke joined the blockade off Cadiz in the Bellerophon on 10 June 1805. Four months later, on the evening of 19 October, he was looking forward to dining with Nelson in the Victory when the signal that the enemy were ‘coming out of port’ changed everything.
At Trafalgar, the order of sailing placed his ship fifth in line of Collingwood’s division. Foreseeing the bloodiness of the ensuing battle, he felt that he could be ‘bowl’d out’ at any time, and in an act of leadership worthy of Nelson took his first lieutenant, William Pryce Cumby, and the master, Edward Overton, into his confidence. He showed them Nelson’s memorandum so they knew clearly what they were expected to do. Also, when he made out the admiral’s signal, ‘England expects that every man will do his duty’, Cooke went below to pass it on to the gun crews.
After the Bellerophon had broken through the enemy line, the fighting became furious and men were falling all around Cooke as he stood with Cumby and Overton on the quarterdeck. He was locked in combat with the French ship L’Aigle, whose captain had filled her fighting tops and rigging with sharpshooters. Cumby pointed out to his senior that he was wearing his epaulettes, which marked him out to the enemy musketeers in the tops and rigging. Unperturbed, Cooke exclaimed, ‘It is too late to take them off, I see my situation, but I will die like a man.’ He continued discharging his pistols at the enemy, even killing a French officer on his own quarterdeck. After a short time, he directed Cumby to go down to the gun decks to ensure that the starboard guns kept firing at all costs. Even before Cumby got back to the quarterdeck, he was met by the quartermaster, who had come to inform him that Cooke was very badly wounded, hit twice in the chest by musket balls while reloading his pistols. When Cumby reached the quarterdeck, Cooke was dead. His last words were, ‘Let me lie quietly one minute. Tell Lieutenant Cumby never to strike!’
He had been hit at almost the same time as Nelson.
John Cooke was born in 1763. His father, Francis Cooke, was an Admiralty cashier. Aged thirteen, he entered the service as a midshipman in 1776 and saw action almost immediately. His ship, the Eagle, was at the attack on Rhode Island during the War of American Independence. Three years later, he was promoted lieutenant and served in the Duke at Lord Rodney’s victory over De Grasse’s French fleet at the Battle of the Saintes, in April 1782. Ten years later, he was promoted commander, served under Admiral Lord Howe, and was in command of the fireship Incendiary at another major fleet action at the Glorious First of June in 1794.
Cooke was promoted captain after the battle and appointed captain of the Nymphe in 1796, in which he took part in the capture of the French frigates Resistance and Constance in 1797. Later in the same year, he was at the Nore when the ships there mutinied and his crew put him ashore. Two years later, and now in command of the Amethyst (38), he took HRH the Duke of York to Holland for his ill-fated expedition, immortalised by the famous nursery rhyme. He was still in the Amethyst when he joined the operations under Lord Bridport, near Quiberon, and in 1800 the expedition to Ferrol under Rear Admiral Sir JB Warren. Close to the end of the French Revolutionary war in 1801, Cooke was in the Channel where he met and captured the French frigate La Dédaigneuse, and the Spanish Général Brune.
In April 1805, he took command of one of the Navy’s oldest ships, the Bellerophon (74), affectionately known to her crew sa the Billy Ruffian. Cooke would have seen her at the Glorious First of June and she was also a veteran of the Battle of the Nile. By now Cooke had a reputation as an excellent officer but a strict disciplinarian. Midshipman John Franklin, later to become the ill-fated arctic explorer, found him ‘very gentlemanly and active. I like his appearance much.’
Cooke left behind a wife and an eight-year-old daughter. His widow received the naval gold medal for the battle, and a silver vase from the Lloyd’s Patriotic Fund.
PW
Memorials
Type: Wall Plaque Material: Marble Location: The crypt of St Paul’s Cathedral, London Click here to read more…
Type: Wall Plaque Material: White marble Location: St Andrew’s Church, Donhead St Andrew, Wiltshire Click here to read more…