Language, looting, and wine deepen Tate's command crisis

The French never recognized that Fishguard had briefly been left with only its gunners and residents. Tate was occupied with a force whose convicts and unreliable soldiers had found Portuguese wine from an earlier wreck and were slipping beyond officer control. The Legion Noire's mixture of French, Irish, and American personnel created serious language barriers, and Tate himself did not speak French. Whether some orders were translated accurately or understood at all remains open. Welsh residents continued capturing isolated soldiers, so every failure of communication further reduced the force Tate could actually command.