The Invasion Year Page 3

  “Mon Général, Dessalines, ’e say, messieurs, z’at you British are ze so despicable, ze grasping beasts, as bad as ze French!” Mirabois translated, looking a tad nervous himself. “You kill-ed z’ousands of nôtre pauvre soldiers, came to Saint Domingue to conquer and enslave! E’ say ’e despise all of you, and v’ish every White devil to die … seulement…’e also say if Rochambeau surrender to you and leave ze harbour tomorrow, ’e will not fire on z’eir ships. Z’ey stay une hour longer, ’e will fire upon z’em, and burn z’em all to Hades. ’E agree wiz vôtre Commodore Loring in z’iz. You ’ave ’ees word of honnour. ’E say vôtre Commodore mus’ be satisfy-ed vis z’at, not ze correspondent letter. Maintenant, you go! I see you to ze port in safety, or pay v’is my life. Vite, vite! Go!”

  Captain Bligh opened his mouth as if to say something further, but clapped it shut as Colonel Mirabois began urgent shoving-herding motions, backing them ignominously towards the doors, and looking back over his shoulder to see if any of the bile the British had engendered from the victorious generals would stick to him for bringing them.

  In a trice, they were down the stairs, across the grand lobby, and out into the sunshine, with their escorting soldiers guarding them even closer with bayonet-mounted muskets held out to fence off and deter the chanting, fist-shaking, weapon-shaking mob. Picking up on their officers’ nervousness, and the hostile mood in the building they left behind, those soldiers set a wicked pace back to the quays and their waiting barge, forcing Bligh, Barré, and Lewrie to trot double-time.

  * * *

  Once the barge was shoved off and under oars, with a wee Union Jack in the bows, and a large white flag of truce stood up by the Midshipman in the stern-sheets, they finally got their breaths back, and broke out a small barrico of stale water from beneath the seat for the barge’s Coxswain. They took turns gulping from a battered pewter mug and swabbing their reddened faces; ruddy from being un-used to so much exertion after the restrictions of shipboard life, and the embarrassing manner of their departure. They had almost been shoved aboard the boat!

  “Bit iffy there, for a moment,” Bligh commented.

  “Be back in ten years,” Captain Barré breezily opined, now that he was in calmer takings. “Can you gentlemen imagine that those three jackanapes, or their other generals, Petion and Moise, can really run a country?” he scoffed. “More-like, it will be a decade of civil war between them, before the country is so devastated, and de-populated, that it will be ripe for the plucking.”

  “We had hopes that the Americans’d beg t’be back in the fold, too, when we left in 1783,” Lewrie pointed out.

  “Barbaric as are our American cousins, sir,” Captain Barré rejoined, “they don’t hold a candle to those savages back yonder. And, the Yankee Doodles are White, and civilised, after all.”

  “Different kettle of fish,” Captain Bligh stuck in with a mirthless laugh. “I say … let us take a slant to starboard, and look over our future prizes … assuming General Rochambeau has a lick of sense.”

  “Aye, sir,” their Midshipman in charge of the barge agreed, and the tiller was put over to angle their boat closer to the French ships.

  “Indiamen, there, a brace of ’em. Don’t see any guns in their ports,” Lewrie pointed out. “That’un, though, she’s a two-decker, a Third Rate seventy-four. And, still armed.”

  All the gun-ports on each beam of the 74 were hinged open for desperately needed ventilation, any wisp of a breeze that could sweep through both her over-crowded gun-decks to relieve the panting of the hundreds of pale faces pressed close to the openings. Those people had no other place to go, for the weather decks, gangways, poops and forecastles, and quarterdecks of all the French vessels were already teeming with refugees, almost arseholes-to-elbows.

  “Lovely pair of frigates, there,” Captain Bligh said with an avid note in his voice as they passed the two-decker. “Chlorinde … and Surv … Surveillante,” he read off their name-boards on the transoms. “As big as our frigates of the Fifth Rate … thirty-eights or better.”

  The frigate closest to them had her single row of gun-ports open, too, with children and teenagers sitting on the barrels of her guns to be close to the fresher air, and haloes of faces round every edge.

  “Might be nigh a thousand people aboard this’un, alone, sirs,” Lewrie said with a grim shake of his head. Were I a Frog, I’d be on-board one of ’em, too, Lewrie thought; Beats bein’ murdered all hollow!

  “Be a shame, does Dessalines set them ablaze,” Captain Bligh told them, sounding sad. “Yon brace of frigates would fetch us fifteen or twenty thousand pounds each, perhaps thirty thousand for that Third Rate, and about the same for the Indiamen, each.”

  “Head and Gun Money for all the sailors and soldiers captured, to boot,” Captain Barré pointed out.

  “Well, perhaps but half that much, sir,” Lewrie told Bligh. “I think our Prize Courts would most-like steal half for themselves.”

  “Oh, tosh!” Barré said with a chuckle. “They ain’t cut up from a drubbin’, and won’t need serious refits, like most French warships we’ve made prize. Even so … aye, it would be a pity, do those apes ashore burn them up.”

  “Dessalines might just do it for spite,” Bligh suggested. “To show us how little he cares for us, or the French, or any Whites.”

  “Beg pardon, sirs, but there’s a breeze coming up,” their Midshipman hesitantly interjected, pointing an arm to the wind-rippled patch of water off their barge’s larboard bows. “Are your observations done, sirs, I’d care to steer for it, and hoist the lugs’l.”

  “Might be enough wind to carry us beyond the harbour mole, and out to a decent sea-breeze, aye,” Captain Bligh, senior-most of their party, agreed. “Spare your oarsmen three or four miles of rowing, hey?”

  “You left your gig at the flagship, Captain Lewrie?” Captain Barré casually enquired.

  “Sent her back to Reliant, not knowing how long we’d be away, sir,” Lewrie told him.

  “She’s closer inshore than the flag? Well, now our duty has been done, there’s no reason to detain you any longer,” Barré said as the barge crossed the mill-pond flat water for that disturbed patch, now as big as a lake and growing larger as the breeze picked up. Two of their oarsmen stowed away their oars and began to fetch up the lug-sail which, with its simple running, rigging, was wrapped about its upper gaff boom.

  “Make for the Reliant frigate, once under sail,” Captain Barré directed the Midshipman. “We’ll spare Captain Lewrie, here, the long time it’d take him to send for his gig, twiddle his thumbs aboard the flag, and another hour or two to return to his ship.”

  “That’s most kind of ye, sir, thankee,” Lewrie told Barré as he pulled out his pocket-watch to note the time. It was already almost a quarter to one P.M.; aboard Reliant they’d soon be sounding Two Bells of the Day Watch, and her Commission Officers, Sailing Master, Lieutenant of Marines, and Surgeon would be sitting down to take their mid-day dinner, now that the ship’s people had had their own mess. If Barré had not made the offer, even with a decent wind, it would have been at least 2 P.M. before they would have fetched the flagship, and perhaps two more hours before he could expect to sit down to a meal of his own; there might have been some leftovers from Commodore Loring’s table, if he begged properly, but … even this quick return to his ship would result in whatever cold collation that his personal cook, Yeovill, had at-hand. The ship’s cook would be just beginning to boil up victuals for the crew’s supper, with nothing to offer him.

  It’ll be wormy cheese and ship’s bisquit, Lewrie bemoaned; some jam, or a slice’r two off last night’s roast. The cats’ sausages?

  And, Lewrie was feeling most peckish, by then!

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The appointed morning dawned cooler than the day before, though the sea-breezes that had blown light but steadily throughout the night began to fade and clock round the compass by the start of the Forenoon Watch at 8 A.M. If anything, it was replaced by
a faint land-breeze as the island of Hispaniola was heated by the risen sun. The waters about HMS Reliant dropped to a slight two-foot chop, and long, rolling wave sets that slatted the remaining wind from her fore-and-aft sails and spanker, and fluttered her square sails, to the accompaniment of slapping rigging and the loose squeal of blocks, to the basso of the hull as it rocked, heaved, and scended, her timbers groaning.

  “The tide ebbs from the harbour … when, Mister Caldwell?” her captain enquired a tad impatiently, pacing about the freshly cleaned quarterdeck, from the starboard bulwarks facing Cap François to the binnacle cabinet and double-wheel helm, and back.

  “By my ephemeris, sir, it should have turned half an hour ago,” Reliant’s Sailing Master informed him, after another quick peek at his book of tide tables, and a sidelong glance at the gathered officers.

  “Mean they ain’t coming out?” Marine Lt. Simcock complained.

  “The land-breeze seems to be strengthening … a bit,” Lieutenant Spendlove, the Second Officer, noted. “That, and the ebbing tide, should carry them out nicely. If they’re of a mind.”

  The Reliant’s people, from her captain to her Commission Sea Officers to her Midshipmen, Warrants, petty officers, Able and Ordinary Seamen, her Landsmen, “Idlers and Waisters,” her Marines and ship’s boys and servants, were all on deck, Half were on watch, of course, but the rest were there to satisfy their curiosity … and to see if their prize-money would actually sail out and surrender; or if they did not, their burning would be a “raree.” Wagers slyly made during the night rode on the results.

  Even Lewrie’s cats, Toulon, the older, stockier black-and-white, and Chalky, the grey-splotched white’un, were on deck this morning, and when not perched atop the canvas coverings of the quarterdeck hammock nettings, were scampering about in pursuit of a champagne cork with a length of ribbon tied round it, footballing it from one end of the quarterdeck to the other, hopping up on their hind legs in mock battle to play tail-chase when the champagne cork toy palled.

  “Ye’d think someone slipped ’em some fresh catnip last night,” Lewrie grumbled, forced to halt his pacing as Chalky chased Toulon aft right through his booted legs. “Damn my eyes, ye little…!”

  “They do seem very spry, today, sir,” Lt. Westcott, the First Officer, agreed, watching them go, flashing his teeth in a brief grin as Toulon fluffed up, turned sideways, and hopped in warning at his playmate, one paw lifted and his bottled-up tail lashing.

  “Deck, there!” Midshipman Rossyngton called down from his wee seat on the main mast cross-trees. “The French … are … making … sail!” the youngster pealed out, each word distinct.

  “Come on, yer beauties!” a sailor on the starboard gangway was heard to hoot. “Come out an’ fetch us yer guineas!” which raised a great cheer and laughter.

  Lewrie went to the binnacle cabinet to fetch his telescope … just in time for Chalky to be the pursued, and take bottled-up refuge atop the cabinet. Toulon, always the less-agile since he was a kitten, could only stand on his hind legs with his front paws on the woodwork and make moaning sounds, whilst Chalky hissed back and spat.

  “Ever’body’s celebratin’, seems like,” Quartermaster Hook, at the helm, chuckled.

  “Many a slip, ’twixt the crouch and the leap, though,” Lewrie said with a grin. “Keep yer fingers crossed,” he cautioned as he went to the bulwarks for a better view.

  “Yes, by God!” Lewrie crowed, once he’d had a look-see. Faded, patched, and sun-worn parchment-tan canvas was sprouting aboard every remaining vessel in harbour. Closer to shore, several British barges or cutters were loafing with idled oars or furled lug-sails, waiting with small boarding parties from various ships to go aboard them once their “honourable” broadsides were fired, and their colours struck, to oversee their disarming. Lewrie lowered his telescope a trifle, just in time to see one of the boats hold up a single signal flag from the new Popham Code … “To Weigh”!

  “Excuse me, sir, but, should we Beat to Quarters?” Lt. Westcott asked, close by Lewrie’s side, with a telescope of his own.

  “In case they mean t’make a fight of it?” Lewrie asked back with a grin. “Ye didn’t see how many people they’ve taken aboard, Mister Westcott. They’re beyond over-crowded, without enough room to swing a cat, much less serve their guns.”

  Dear as I’d desire it, Lewrie told himself; if it was just us and their sailors and such … without the civilians, I’d love to lay into them, the murderin’ bastards!

  “Deck, there!” Midshipman Rossyngton called down, again. “The French … are … under way! A seventy-four … is … leading!”

  “Took their own sweet time,” Lewrie said with a snort, now he was satisfied that they would come out.

  “The tide will help fetch them out, but they have waited a bit too late, sir … the land-breeze won’t last long,” Westcott said.

  “With just the tide, aye … they’ll be boxin’ the compass in an hour,” Lewrie agreed. “Un-manageable.”

  “Perhaps the smaller of them could employ sweeps?” Lt. Westcott posed, tongue-in-cheek.

  “Were it me, I’d paddle a log with my hands, to get out of port,” their Third Officer, Lt. George Merriman, added with a guffaw.

  * * *

  The leading ship, the two-decker, came on as ponderously, and as slowly, as treacle poured on porridge on a winter’s day. Even under all her course sails and tops’ls, and with her jibs and staysails loosely sheeted and bellied out, she barely was making steerage way. A vessel so heavy and deep-draughted found it hard to overcome her own inertia, even on a good day, with a following or beam wind. Lewrie pulled out his pocket-watch, stuck an upright thumb against her to measure with, and growled under his breath as he realised that the two-decker was not making much more than two or three knots, and was still no larger than his thumb-nail, after a full half-hour under sail! It would take her another half-hour just to pass the breakwater to the open sea … with her potentially swifter and lighter consorts bunched up astern of her, and their own sails trapping and stealing the wind of the land-breeze … which was slowly fading.

  Should’ve let the wee’uns sail, first, Lewrie thought; but, hey, they’re French, and they will do it orderly, t’look proud.

  “At long, bloody last!” Lt. Westcott muttered as the flagship of the French squadron passed through the breakwater and reached open waters … as a weak gust of wind arose, and soughed cross their frigate’s decks. The Nor’east Trades were coming back to life, and over yonder, the French two-decker’s sails shivered and rustled in gross disorder for a moment before being sheeted home and braced round to adapt to it, slowly bearing up roughly West-Nor’west, presenting her larboard side to Reliant and finally showing a tiny mustachio of foam under her forefoot as she put on another knot or two.

  And, when she was about a mile offshore, still two miles short of Reliant, her guns began to roar down her larboard side; first the spewing of gunpowder smoke, then seconds later the flat thuds of the explosions.

  “A full broadside, I say!” Lt. Clarence Spendlove, the Second Officer, exclaimed. “Her pair of bow chase guns would have sufficed.”

  “Showy,” Marine Lt. Simcock commented.

  “And to Hell with you perfidious Britons,” Lt. Westcott added with a laugh. “Ve show vous ’ow to surrender vis panache!”

  And, once the last after guns of her upper and lower batteries had shot their bolts, and the immense pall of spent powder smoke was drifting leeward enough to see the two-decker again, the blue-white-red Tricolour of France was hauled down to drape over her taffrails and transom. A lug-sailed cutter flying a British Jack quickly made its way alongside her to take possession.

  Next came the Indiamen, large merchant ships or former ships of the line employed as troop transports; they mounted many fewer guns than the warship that had preceded them, so they fired off only a half-dozen for their “honourable broadsides,” perhaps only bow-chasers and some light quarterdeck pieces, before striki
ng their colours, as well. One of those impressively big frigates passed through the breakwater, after, and found her wind, rapidly gathering an impressive turn of speed before firing her final broadside, and striking her colours … followed by a gaggle of brigs, snows, or locally-built schooners, all overloaded and clumsy on the ebbing tide and the scant wind, but making decent progress to freedom and safety. The second frigate, however …

  “Damn my eyes, but, has she taken the ground, yonder?” Lieutenant Spendlove declared, a telescope to his eye. “She doesn’t seem to be moving. There, sir!”

  “Yawing all over Creation before that, aye, Clarence,” Lieutenant Merriman was quick to agree with him. “Good God, it appears that she has … just past the breakwater!”

  “The land-breeze failed her before she got much way upon her, it appears, sir,” Lt. Westcott said, turning to Lewrie. “She looks aground on the eastern breakwater … must have been crowded onto the shallows.”

  “Or, carried there by the tide, with no steerage way,” Lewrie supposed aloud. “Mister Caldwell?”

  “Uhm, there’s a rocky shoal, upon which they built the breakwater, sir,” the Sailing Master quickly supplied, with no need to refer to his harbour chart. “And a wide field of spoil rock and sand either side of it, and, if not dredged properly, has encroached on the entrance channel. Do the Trades turn brisk, she’ll pound herself open. Poor devils.”

  A British rowing boat, one waiting to take possession of a prize, was wheeling about and stroking hard towards the French frigate, now to render what assistance she could. Another, the flagship’s barge that had borne Lewrie and the others to the Cap François quays the day before, was approaching her, too, now displaying a long signal flag held up by her Midshipman; “Assistance.”

  “Now, he’s come prepared for anything,” Lewrie japed.

  “Is there any aid we might give them, sir?” Lt. Spendlove, ever a generous soul, asked.

  “Hmm,” was Lewrie’s reply as he mulled the matter.