The pamphlet revealed a tragic detail in John Deane’s personal life. He wrote, ‘At the first publication of this narrative, the master, the mate and Mr Whitworth, were all in England; but, in a course of fifteen years since, the master alone survives of all that he particularly knew’. As far as he was aware, John Deane was now the only surviving veteran of Boon Island. Among those that had passed away since John Deane had left England for Russia was his brother. Jasper Deane had died on 23 October 1723, aged 70 years. He was buried in St Wilfrid’s church cemetery. His tombstone declared that he had been married four times and had fathered ‘several children’.
Before John Deane was dispatched on his last great adventure, there was some unfinished business to attend to. Lord Townsend’s obsession throughout Deane’s tenure as interpreter and political adviser to Sir Charles Wagner had been the fear of an imminent Russian-funded Jacobite invasion of the British Isles. Townsend desperately wanted to get to the bottom of what the three Russian ships bound for Cadiz, the ships that Deane had originally spotted in Elsinore, had been up to. Townsend still believed that the purpose of the ships was to deliver weapons to the Irish and Scottish supporters of James III. Townsend’s spies were busy all around Europe trying to pull together the different strands of the alleged conspiracy, or else determine whether there indeed was a conspiracy. In the latter stages of the investigation John Deane was ordered to interview an Englishman who had sailed on one of the three vessels bound for Cadiz. The interview took place in London in November 1727. The name of the Englishman was Mr Young. It had been Mr Young that Deane had spoken to in Elsinore when he had first observed the Russian ships two years previously.
Deane asked Young what was on the ships.
Young replied: ‘Anchors, cables, cannon, small arms, shot, shells, tallow and tarr’. Despite the presence of weapons and ammunition this was not an arms stash, but rather a ‘naval store’.
Deane wanted to know what Young’s commanding officers had thought about him and what he was doing in the vicinity.
Young replied that they thought Deane’s business was, ‘to settle a correspondence as a merchant’.
The Russians’ route to Spain was indirect and therefore suspicious. Deane wanted to know why they went ‘north about’.
Young explained that it was the commander’s orders ‘to go north about’ in order ‘to avoid the channel’.
The ships had put in on the Irish coast. Was this by ‘design or necessity’?
Necessity, Young said. There had been ‘very bad weather’. Young’s ship had lost its fore-topmast and had been forced to refit.
In that case how did the Russian officers ‘behave to those of His Majesties Customs when they came onboard?’
Compliant, Young replied.
Did the Russians ‘correspond with, or receive visits from any people of fashion on that coast?’
‘Gentlemen of fashion did come aboard,’ Young said but he ‘was never admitted to their company’.
‘Were there any arms or ammunitions delivered from your ship while on their coast, or did you observe any such design, had they met with proper persons or opportunities?’
Young said no, ‘nor could I observe they put in shore with any other design than to refit.’
‘When you arrived at Cadiz, did officers immediately go about delivering their goods and receiving others in order to get home before their ports should be frozen up?’
Young stated that the Russians took their time. They received a cargo of salt to take back to Russia. ‘There was no haste made to leave this port because they designed to winter in Ireland.’
Deane wanted to know if any British or Spanish ‘persons of rank’ had visited the Russian ships.
Young answered yes on both counts although he didn’t know who they were.
The interview continued.
Deane turned his attention to Young and company’s journey home and the fact that the three ships had put into the Spanish port of St Andero.
‘Where did your commander purpose to winter, or was it a design or necessity to put into St Andero?’
The commander’s plans had been to winter in Ireland if the weather was bad. As it had stood the weather was fine, enabling them to sail on to St Andero without interruption.
‘Had you delivered all your goods at Cadiz or did you deliver and receive any at St Andero?’
‘We unloaded our ships at Cadiz and took in nothing more than provisions.’
‘Did you not touch on the Irish or Scottish coast on your return?’
‘We saw no land from St Andero.’
Mr Young’s inconclusive testimony joined the glut of intelligence that trickled back to Walpole and Townsend from a series of creditable sources in Europe. The consensus was that no invasion was imminent. Townsend was not convinced by the increasingly overwhelming evidence to the contrary and carried on in his paranoia trying to connect dots that did not exist.
John Deane’s interview with Mr Young was his last contribution to the invisible war that had quietly raged between Great Britain and Russia. With the interview completed, the state of Russia was now no longer his concern. He had a new post and new responsibilities. John Deane was bound for Ostend.
Part Four: Statesman
18
Water for Wine
Eighteenth-century Flanders was a country with something of a divided personality. At the beginning of the century Flanders had languished under Spanish control. In 1713, at the conclusion of the War of Spanish Succession, control of Flanders had passed from Spain to Austria.
Now that a sort of peace had descended on the country, as far as Austria was concerned, Flanders’ numerous ports could be properly utilised for trade. The target was East India. Since the sixteenth-century, England and Holland had exerted dominance on trade in East India. Now Austria was keen to establish an East India Company in the Flanders port of Ostend. Austria established trade deals with the French and the Spanish, and the Ostend East India Company was formed. England and Holland made their disapproval known. They virtually threatened Austria to desist and forced the new company to dismantle itself. Consequently the Ostend East India Company was given a period of seven years to put its house in order and then disappear. So that it did not lose money, the British and the Dutch extended one concession to the company. The company was permitted to conduct a maximum of two trading voyages to India for every year of the company’s remaining existence.
Naturally the British government did not trust Austria to uphold their end of the enforced agreement, so John Deane’s covert agenda as the commercial consul for the ports of Flanders and Ostend was to report to Lord Townsend anything that might threaten British interests in East India. And although Townsend’s concerns about a Russian-backed Jacobite invasion of Britain had proved something of a fever dream, the Jacobite threat was still a cause for genuine concern. There was a powerful Irish presence in Ostend, many of whom were suspected Jacobites. John Deane was the obvious person to report on and frustrate Jacobite designs.