1811	Colonial Expeditions - East Indies	28

orders of Captain George Sager, of the 18-pounder 36-gun frigate Leda. Since Sir Edward Pellew had proved that Batavia and Sourabaya were assailable anchorages, the harbour of Marrack, situated about 74 miles to the westward of Batavia, was the only spot to which the French frigates, daily expected with troops, could run for safety. The anchorage was defended by a strong fort, standing upon a promontory, and mounting 54 pieces of cannon, 18, 24, and 32 pounders, with a garrison of 180 soldiers. Captain Sager resolved to make a night-attack upon this fort with the boats of the Leda and of the 74-gun ship Minden, Captain Edward Wallis Hoare. The force, with which the attempt was to be made, was to consist of 200 seamen and marines and 250 troops, the latter to be embarked in the flatboats which the two ships had on board ; and Lieutenant Edmund Lyons, of the Minden, who had previously reconnoitred the fort, was, at his particular request, to lead the party. A few hours before the boats were to push off from the Minden, intelligence reached Captain Hoare, of the arrival of a battalion of Dutch troops at the barracks situated about half a mile in the rear of the fort. Under these circumstances, the attack was deemed too hazardous, and the Leda's boats returned to their ship.

On the 25th of July Captain Hoare, by Captain Sayer's direction, detached Lieutenant Lyons with the Minden's launch and cutter, containing 19 prisoners, with orders to land them at Batavia ; and, while there and on his return down the coast, to gain all the information possible as to the movements in that part of Java. On the 27th Lieutenant Lyons landed his prisoners at Batavia ; and, from a conversation which he held with an intelligent resident, was fully persuaded that the Dutch had no intimation of the expedition being near Java, and did not expect to be attacked during the present monsoon. Conceiving that an attack at the north-western extremity of Java would draw the Dutch troops in that direction, and thereby operate a favourable diversion, Lieutenant Lyons, on the morning of the 29th, determined to make a midnight attack upon Fort Marrack. This would appear, indeed, a rash undertaking for two boats' crews of 35 officers and men, especially when a force of 450 men had been thought inadequate to the service ; but Lieutenant Lyons was one of the officers who, about a twelvemonth before, had accompanied Captain Cole in the storming of Belgica : * he therefore made light of difficulties, which to many, and those brave men too, would have seemed insurmountable.

Having made, during the day, every necessary arrangement, Lieutenant Lyons, at sunset, placed his two boats behind a point, which sheltered them from the view of the enemy's sentinels. At half an hour past midnight, the moon sinking in the horizon,

See vol. v., p. 321

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