It took Byng twenty-six days to reach Gibraltar where he arrived on 19 June. There he was cheered to find Commodore Brodrick with a reinforcement of five ships for Minorca. It was a belated, albeit small offering from the Admiralty. Byng at once set about repairing his ships and taking on stores for an early return to Minorca.
His dismay can be imagined when the Antelope man-of-war arrived on 3 July with Admiral Hawke on board, bringing orders not only to succeed him in his command but to recall him to England. Gloom descended on Byng as he sat in his cabin and read:

Sir,
His Majesty having received an account that the squadron under your command and that of the French under Galissonniere came to an action off Mahon the 20th of last month; and that the French - though inferior in numbers - obliged you to retreat, I am obliged by the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to send you a letter of M. de Galissonniere to his Court, giving an account of the action; and to acquaint you that His Majesty is so much dissatisfied with your conduct, that he has ordered their Lordships to recall you and Mr. West, and to send Sir Edward Hawke and Rear-Admiral Saunders to command the squadron. . .

The Admiralty's action had been taken solely on an enemy report, and Byng replied briefly, expressing his surprise at being so 'ignominiously dismissed from his employment'. He sailed home a few days later, arriving at Plymouth in the Antelope on 26 July, expecting an apology for such summary treatment.
The reality was different. On stepping ashore he was arrested, placed in irons, and confined in a room without a bed. Orders were presently given to confine him in the Tower of London, but on the way there, his coach was halted by messengers, and he was told the Admiralty had changed its mind. He was sent back to Portsmouth, and next day despatched to the Royal Hospital at Greenwich (now the Royal Naval College).
At Greenwich he was put in a tiny attic room, with sentries placed at his door and on his stair. The Hospital Commandant was sadistic in his treatment, had bars put on his windows, and placed every obstacle he could in the preparation of his defence. Fortunately Augustus Hervey was back in England and threw himself wholeheartedly into the defence of his friend.
The trial opened at Portsmouth on board the St George on 28 December, and lasted for a month. It took the form of a courtmartial and was legally constituted, but from the members selected there was little doubt what their verdict would be. He was tried under the 12th Article of War, which read as follows:

Every person in the fleet, who, through cowardice, negligence or disaffection, shall in time of action, withdraw or keep back or not come into fight, or engagement, or shall not do his utmost to take or destroy every ship when it shall be his duty to engage; and to assist all and every of His Majesty's ships, which it shall be his duty to assist and relieve; every such person, so offending, and be convicted thereof by the sentence of a court-martial, shall suffer death. - Act of George II.

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