Lieutenant Hornblower

I first read the Horatio Hornblower novels as a teenager because I knew that this was a character that had influenced the creation of James T. Kirk. And anyone who can be an influence on Kirk is by definition awesome. It's a known fact. Just like the fact that Kirk is better than Picard--AND NO ONE SHOULD EVER SAY DIFFERENTLY IN MY PRESENCE!

But I digress. I read the Hornblower novels in internal chronological order (which is different from their original publication order) and was hooked by the time I was one chapter into Mr. Midshipman Hornblower. I've re-read the series multiple times since then.

It was easy to see the aspects of Hornblower that influenced Kirk: his sense of duty and responsibility; his ability to think quickly under pressure and improvise clever plans; his courage and his need to lead from the front even when he gained command of a ship and could have legitimately delegated front-line duties to someone else. He's often unable to communicate with his superiors and his ship is thus often on its own. Perhaps the most notable similarity with Kirk is Hornblower's willingness (however reluctant that willingness) to break a rule in order to do what he thinks is right.

But Hornblower is quite different from Kirk in a lot of ways. He's more melancholy and given to deeper self-doubts that Kirk ever was. He's perpetually unable to fully accept that others admire and respect him. When he does have to confront this startling fact, he assumes that this is only because they don't really know him. He stinks at personal relationships.

That last point is important--perhaps the most notable difference is that Hornblower, unlike Kirk, could never establish the sort of close friendship that Kirk had with Spock and McCoy. The closest he ever came to this was with William Bush.

Bush would serve Hornblower for years as First Lieutenant and, when Hornblower became a commodore, command the flagship of Hornblower's squadron.

Bush was already an established character in the series when the book recounting his first meeting with Hornblower was written. But since I read them in chronological order, I met Bush along with Hornblower in the pages of Lieutenant Hornblower (1952).

Both men are lieutenants on the Renown, a 74-gun ship-of-the-line assigned to carry out a mission in the Caribbean. Bush is our point-of-view character--in fact, this is the only book in the series not told from Hornblower's point-of-view. Though Bush himself is unimaginative and perhaps a bit thick about some things, he comes to understand Hornblower better than anyone else and can often be very perceptive in regards to the man who would eventually become his commanding officer.

At this time, though, Bush is senior to Hornblower. The Renown, it turns out, is tasked with capturing a Spanish port that was being used as a haven for privateers. This would be a fairly straightforward if dangerous mission, but its complicated by the fact that the captain is nuts.

And not just a little nuts. Captain Sawyer is full-on paranoid, convinced his officers are plotting against them and constantly giving them harsh punishments. He simultaneously sucks up to the crew, which is extremely damaging to the stern military discipline that is necessary to keep a ship operating efficiently.

The officers meet secretly in a dark hold one night, trying to figure out what to do. Are they justified in relieving Sawyer of command? If they did, who would the crew support? And if they succeeded, was there any hope of convincing the inevitable court-martial they were justified? Mutiny in the early 19th Century was a hanging offense and even if they saved their necks, they would certainly be flushing their careers away.

Well, the problem is solved when Captain Sawyer takes a tumble down the hatch, breaking a number of bones and setting off a wave of paranoid delusions that make it obvious he has to be confined to a sick bed.

The beautiful part about the novel is that there are indications that perhaps Hornblower gave Sawyer a shove down the hatch. Lt. Buckland, who takes command of the Renown, and Bush both think Hornblower at least knows more than he admits. But these are only suspicions.

And, by golly, we as the readers don't know either. Did Hornblower push Sawyer? Was it someone else that Hornblower is covering for? Was it just an accident. Author C.S. Forester sets up the situation perfectly, leaving us with our suspicions along with our doubts.

The bulk of the remaining story is about Renown accomplishing its mission. Buckland is in command during this time, but he's uncertain and hesitant. It's up to Hornblower to come up with one plan after another, respectfully urging Buckland in the right direction to accomplish their goals. He never steps outside the bounds of military propriety, but he makes sure stuff gets done. Gradually, Bush comes to feel the respect and fondness for Hornblower that will allow the two men to work together so well for years to come.

The action, as is typical in Forester's novels, is exciting and vividly described. Forester's characterizations are equally vivid, with both action and characters used to move the novel along at an appropriately brisk pace.

I've just re-read Lieutenant Hornblower for perhaps the 15th time. It's just as exciting and engaging as the first time I read it. And I still have no idea whether Hornblower pushed Captain Sawyer down that hatch.

A Barbarian and a Midshipman

What do Conan the Barbarian and Royal Navy officer Horatio Hornblower have in common?

Well, the most obvious thing would be that both have commanded ships. Conan’s checkered career includes time on the high seas as a pirate. Most famously was the few years he spent with his first real love—Belit the she-pirate. Even after Belit was killed, Conan returned to the seas several more times before settling down as king of the Hyborian Age’s most powerful nation.

And Hornblower commanded a number of ships during his country’s war with Revolutionary France and later Napoleonic France—the Hotspur, the Atropos, the Lydia, the Sutherland.  Later, as he moved up in the ranks, he commanded squadrons and fleets.

But these two otherwise totally different heroes have another thing in common. Both of them had occasion to capture a slave galley even when the odds were stacked completely against them.

For Conan, it happened when he was King of Aquilonia. During the events of The Hour of the Dragon (the only novel-length Conan adventure written by Robert E. Howard), our hero had lost his throne through treachery and sorcery. Up against a powerful wizard, he found out the only way to obtain victory was to track down a particularly powerful magical artifact.

Well, that kicked off quite a few bloody encounters—a ride through a small country racked by civil war; an encounter with man-eating ghouls; and a few instances of betrayal, torture and murder.

The trail leads him to a port city, where he dragoons help from a man who had been a fence for stolen goods during Conan’s pirate days. This guy double-crosses the barbarian, though, and Conan is knocked out and press-ganged aboard a merchant ship rowed by black slaves.

Well, that’s a mistake. A lot of the slaves had sailed with Conan in the old days. So, after breaking the captain’s arm and wrenching an axe from the weapons rack, Conan leads an impromptu mutiny. Within a few minutes, he’s the new captain.

Hornblower’s encounter with a galley happened in the late 18^th Century, not long after Spain had allied itself with France and also declared war against Britain. Hornblower was still a midshipman at the time, serving aboard the frigate Indefatigable. When that ship is becalmed and a Spanish galley arrives to attack some nearby merchant ships, the young hero and a half-dozen seamen lowered a small boat and took off after the much larger enemy vessel.

But what can those few men hope to accomplish? Well, for one thing, they certainly have surprise on their side.  Combine that with the well-aimed throw of a grappling hook and…

You know, I was going to summarize that action sequence, but I don’t think I will. I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who hasn’t read it. Find yourself a copy of Mr. Midshipman Hornblower and read the chapter titled “Hornblower and the Spanish Galleys.” You won’t be sorry.

I’ve always imagined that each year, Superman’s Fortress of Solitude hosts a gathering of all the people who aren’t actually real, but should be. (There would have been talk about having it at Doc Savage’s Fortress, but the Man of Steel’s place has an intergalactic zoo and all those Superman robots to serve refreshments.)

And you’d think that Conan and Hornblower wouldn’t necessarily spend much time talking to each other. The Cimmerian would be busy hitting on Hawkgirl or Candy Matson and Hornblower always felt awkward at social gatherings. But if you think about it for a minute, the two really do have some mutually interesting stories to swap.

Well, they would, if Long John Silver would ever let them get a word in edgewise.

Best Battle Scene Ever

If I had to make a list of my favorite make-believe people...


Well, that list would be a little different every time I made it. But Captain Horatio Hornblower of His Majesty's Royal Navy would have a spot on it somewhere nearly every time.


Created by C.S. Forester in the 1937 novel The Happy Return (titled Beat to Quarters in the U.S.), Hornblower is a brilliant seaman who served his country during the Napoleanic Wars. He is one of the most purely human characters you'll ever meet in a work of fiction--flawed, secretly full of doubts, and emminently likeable. It's easy to believe he's a real guy, which--of course--makes the novels all that much more immersive.


Forester wrote ten complete Hornblower novels (and left an eleventh incomplete at the time of his death) and all are fast-moving adventure stories with strong plots. Forester did not write them in internal chronological order, but by the time he was finished, we can trace Hornblower's career from Midshipman to Admiral, sharing in innumberable adentures along the way.


The first novel, Beat to Quarters, would be the fifth chronologically. Set in 1808, it has Hornblower in command of a frigate, the Lydia. He is bringing guns to an anti-Spanish rebel leader in Central America, since at the moment Spain is an ally of France and also at war with England.


He delivers his cargo to the obviously psychotic rebel leader, then uses a clever tactic to capture a large Spanish warship (the Natividad) intact. He turns this over to the rebels as well.


The Lydia sails off, with Hornblower relieved that he doesn't have to have any more dealings with the whacko rebel. But then he discovers that Spain has switched sides and is now allied with Spain. So now he has to track down the Natividad and destroy it. (He also reluctantly picks up a lady passenger--a stranded Englishwoman--with whom he eventually falls in love.)


This (the stalking of the Natividad that is, not the falling in love part) leads to an absolutely riveting battle sequence. The two ships meet in stormy seas. Hornblower's better trained crew allows his smaller ship to get in some licks, but the Lydia takes some damage as well. The weather forces the opponents apart. When they meet again, the wind has died away completely and Hornblower has to use his ship's boats to tow the Lydia into battle while under constant fire from the Natividad.


Man, it's great stuff; in part because Forester has crewed the Lydia with characters we really care about and in part because his straightforward prose and sense of pacing generates a super-high level of excitement and suspense.


I've re-read all the Hornblower books several times. Beat to Quarters is perhaps my favorite, in no small measure because it contains one of the best battle scenes ever.