Locked boat

[Grey Roger]

I go to Anse Casse-Bois along with Richard Sharpe and Teresa Moreno, there to meet with Major Hogan and retrieve Teresa's thingy from the church. That done, and after a side-trip to find a signal tower disguised as a lighthouse, I return to the beach, where I find the boat is locked.

 

[Grey Roger]

There is a workround. Pressing "Enter" brings up the fast travel menu, the one viable location being the ship's deck, so I bypass the boat and go straight aboard.

Various shenanigans ensue. I'm to blow up the signal tower, Hammond Sr. is to blow up the fort, then Pellew is to blow up the French fleet. Various people aren't who they appear to be, this being shown by various dialogues in which the player changes personality to one of the participants in the dialogue. And then it's back to the boat, which once again is locked. In addition, the multiple personalities assumed during the dialogues has left me confused because apparently I'm still William Bush.

 

[Grey Roger]

There's a workround to that, too, which is just as well because poor Maria is heartbroken that she may never see Horatio again and will think anybody entering her house in a naval uniform is him. So, to prevent her from making a horrible mistake, press F2 to call up the Character menu, rename yourself to "Horatio Hornblower", change clothes to Hornblower's commander uniform, and basically do manually what the game failed to do automatically.
Then go and propose marriage. End of story.

 

[Hylie Pistof]

Yeah, that final part was always a bit buggy and I for one just sort of muddled through as best I could.