 Although Queen Charlotte pressed on all sail , she was not the first through the enemy line . That distinction belonged to a ship of the van squadron under Admiral Graves : HMS Defence under Captain James Gambier , a notoriously <unk> officer nicknamed " <unk> Jimmy " by his contemporaries . Defence , the seventh ship of the British line , successfully cut the French line between its sixth and seventh ships ; Mucius and <unk> . <unk> both opponents , Defence soon found herself in difficulty due to the failure of those ships behind her to properly follow up . This left her vulnerable to Mucius , <unk> and the ships following them , with which she began a furious <unk> . However , Defence was not the only ship of the van to break the French line ; minutes later George Cranfield @-@ Berkeley in HMS Marlborough executed Howe 's manoeuvre perfectly , <unk> and then <unk> his ship with Impétueux . 
