"Hornblower and the Widow McCool" is a short story by C. S. Forester featuring his fictional naval hero

Horatio Hornblower Horatio Hornblower is a fictional officer in the British Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars, the protagonist of a series of novels and stories by C. S. Forester. He later became the subject of films, radio and television programmes, an ...

. It was first published in the 9 December 1950 issue of

The Saturday Evening Post ''The Saturday Evening Post'' is an American magazine, currently published six times a year. It was issued weekly under this title from 1897 until 1963, then every two weeks until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely c ...

as "Hornblower's Temptation" and then in the UK in the April 1951 Argosy as "Hornblower and the Big Decision." It was published as "Hornblower and the Widow McCool" along with the unfinished novel ''

Hornblower and the Crisis ''Hornblower and the Crisis'' is a 1967 historical novel by C. S. Forester. It forms part of the Horatio Hornblower series, and as a result of Forester's death in 1966, it was left unfinished. There is a one-page summary of the last several ch ...

'' and the short story "

The Last Encounter "The Last Encounter" is a short story by C. S. Forester, notable as providing the final chapter in the life of his fictional naval hero, Horatio Hornblower. It was published together with the unfinished novel ''Hornblower and the Crisis'' and anot ...

" in 1967, after Forester's death. The story is set after ''

Mr. Midshipman Hornblower ''Mr. Midshipman Hornblower'' is a 1950 Horatio Hornblower novel written by C. S. Forester. Although it may be considered as the first episode in the Hornblower saga, it was written as a prequel; the first Hornblower novel, ''The Happy Retur ...

'' and before ''

Lieutenant Hornblower ''Lieutenant Hornblower'' (published 1952) is a Horatio Hornblower novel written by C. S. Forester. It is the second book in the series chronologically, but the seventh by order of publication. The book is unique in the series in being told no ...

''.

Plot summary

The story opens in the winter of 1799–1800 when "until three months before, ornblowerhad been a prisoner in Spanish hands." He is the most junior of five lieutenants in the

ship of the line A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which depended on the two colu ...

HMS ''Renown''. The ship has just captured a French vessel, and one of the prisoners is recognised as Irish revolutionary Barry McCool. Admiral

William Cornwallis Admiral of the Red Sir William Cornwallis, (10 February 17445 July 1819) was a Royal Navy officer. He was the brother of Charles Cornwallis, the 1st Marquess Cornwallis, British commander at the siege of Yorktown. Cornwallis took part in a n ...

gives Hornblower the distasteful task of arranging McCool's execution for desertion from the Royal Navy. Cornwallis insists that McCool is to make no final speech before his execution, so that he cannot try to incite mutiny among the Irish sailors in ''Renowns crew. Hornblower is unwilling to prevent McCool speaking by gagging him. However, in return for a promise by McCool not to speak before he is hanged, Hornblower agrees to send McCool's only possession, a sailor's sea chest with his name "B I McCOOL" in raised letters on the carved lid, to his widow, along with a covering letter. He is prevented from immediately doing so when ''Renown'' has to put hastily to sea after McCool is executed. While at sea, Hornblower discerns a message hidden in an oddly clumsy poem in McCool's letter. By moving the letters of the carved name in a sequence and in a manner revealed by the poem, a secret compartment forming the lid of the chest is revealed. The compartment is stuffed with currency notes and secret correspondence to other Irish rebels, in fact "Everything one would need to start a rebellion," as Hornblower comments to himself. Hornblower, revolted at the spectacle of McCool's execution and suspecting the money could be French counterfeits, decides to spare other Irishmen from the gallows and throws the chest overboard. Later, "when the ''Renown'' lay in the Hamoaze, completing for the West Indies," he discovers that McCool actually left no widow, and the chest was intended to reach an Irish revolutionary society. As McCool's letter said, he had remained "faithful unto death," though to the cause of Irish independence, not a woman. Hornblower now throws McCool's final letter overboard too. The setting of this final action links it to the opening of ''Lieutenant Hornblower'' which begins in mid-1800. 1950 short stories Short stories by C. S. Forester Horatio Hornblower Fiction set in 1799 Historical short stories {{1950s-story-stub