The Fort: A Novel of the Revolutionary War

by Bernard Cornwell

  “Straight at the fort, sir?”

  “Why not? Let’s attack before they make that nearer wall any higher.” A cannon fired to the north, the noise sudden, close and loud. It was an eighteen-pounder of the Massachusetts Artillery Regiment and it fired from the trees on the high ground at the redcoats working to raise the fort’s curtain wall. The sound of the cannon cheered Wadsworth. “We won’t need to get behind them now,” he said to Dennis. “Colonel Revere’s guns will batter that rampart down to nothing!”

  “So we attack along the ridge?” Dennis asked.

  “It’s the simplest way,” Wadsworth said, “and I have a mind that simplicity is good.”

  “Captain Welch would approve, sir.”

  “And I shall recommend it,” Wadsworth said.

  They were so close, the fort was unfinished, and all they needed to do was attack.

  “I hate New York,” Sir George Collier said. He thought New York a slum; a fetid, overcrowded, ill-mannered, pestilential, humid hell on earth. “We should just give it to the bloody rebels,” he snarled, “let the bastards stew here.”

  “Please stay still, Sir George,” the doctor said.

  “Oh Christ in his britches, man, get on with it! I thought Lisbon was hell on earth and it’s a goddamn paradise compared to this filthy bloody town.”

  “Allow me to draw your thigh?” the doctor said.

  “It’s even worse than Bristol,” Sir George growled.

  Admiral Sir George Collier was a small, irascible and unpleasant man who commanded the British fleet on the American coast. He was sick, which is why he was ashore in New York, and the doctor was attempting to allay the fever by drawing blood. He was using one of the newest and finest pieces of medical equipment from London, a scarifier, which he now cocked so that the twenty-four ground-steel blades disappeared smoothly into their gleaming housing. “Are you ready, Sir George?”

  “Don’t blather, man. Just do it.”

  “There will be a slight sensation of discomfort, Sir George,” the doctor said, concealing his pleasure at that thought, then placed the metal box against the patient’s scrawny thigh and pulled the trigger. The spring-loaded blades leaped out of their slits to pierce Sir George’s skin and start a flow of blood which the doctor staunched with a piece of Turkey cloth. “I would wish to see more blood, Sir George,” the doctor said.

  “Don’t be a bloody fool, man. You’ve drained me dry.”

  “You should wrap yourself in flannel, Sir George.”

  “In this damned heat?” Sir George’s foxlike face was glistening with sweat. Winter in New York was brutally cold, the summer was a steamy hell, and in between it was merely unbearable. On the wall of his quarters, next to an etching of his home in England, was a framed poster advertising that London’s Drury Lane Theatre was presenting “Selima and Azor, a Musical Delectation in Five Acts written by Sir George Collier.” London, he thought, now that was a city! Decent theater, well-dressed whores, fine clubs, and no damned humidity. A theater owner in New York had thought to please Sir George by offering to present Selima and Azor on his stage, but Sir George had forbidden it. To hear his songs murdered by caterwauling Americans? The very thought was disgusting.

  “Come!” he shouted in response to a knock on the door. A naval lieutenant entered the room. The newcomer shuddered at the blood smearing Sir George’s bare thigh, then averted his eyes and stood respectfully just inside the door. “Well, Forester?” Sir George snarled.

  “I regret to inform you, sir, that the Iris won’t be ready for sea,” Lieutenant Forester said.

  “Her copper?”

  “Indeed, sir,” Forester said, relieved that his bad news had not been greeted by anger.

  “Pity,” Sir George grunted. HMS Iris was a fine 32-gun frigate that Sir George had captured two years previously. Back then she had been called the Hancock, an American ship, but though the Royal Navy usually kept the names of captured warships Sir George would be damned and condemned to eternal hell in New York before he allowed a British naval ship to bear the name of some filthy rebel traitor, and so the Hancock had been renamed for a splendid London actress. “Legs as long as a spritsail yard,” Sir George said wistfully.

  “Sir?” Lieutenant Forester asked.

  “Mind your own damned business.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  “Copper, you say?”

  “At least two weeks’ work, sir.”

  Sir George grunted. “Blonde?”

  “Ready, sir.”

  “Virginia?”

  “Fully manned and seaworthy, sir.”

  “Write them both orders,” Sir George said. The Blonde and Virginia were also 32-gun frigates and the Blonde, usefully, had just returned from the Penobscot River, which meant Captain Barkley knew the waters. “Grayhound? Camille? Galatea?”

  “The Grayhound is provisioning, Sir George. The Galatea and Camille both need crewmen.”

  “I want all three ready to sail in two days. Send out the press gangs.”

  “Aye aye, sir.” The Grayhound carried twenty-eight guns, while the Camille and Galatea were smaller frigates with just twenty guns apiece.

  “The Otter,” Sir George said, “to carry despatches.” The Otter was a 14-gun brig.

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  Sir George watched the doctor bandage his thigh. “And the Raisonable,” he said, smiling wolfishly.

  “The Raisonable, Sir George?” Forester asked in astonishment.

  “You heard me! Tell Captain Evans she’s to be ready for sea in two days. And tell him he’ll be flying my flag.”

  The Raisonable was a captured French ship, and she was also a proper warship fit to stand in the line of battle. She carried sixty-four guns, the heaviest of them thirty-two pounders, and the rebels had nothing afloat that could match the Raisonable even though she was one of the smallest ships of the line in the Royal Navy.

  “You’re going to sea, Sir George?” the doctor asked nervously.

  “I’m going to sea.”

  “But your health!”

  “Oh, stop twittering, you imbecile. How can it be bad for me? Even the Dead Sea’s healthier than New York.”

  Sir George was going to sea, and he was taking seven ships led by a vast, slab-sided battleship that could blow any rebel warship clean out of the water with a single broadside.

  And the fleet would sail east. To the Penobscot River and Penobscot Bay and Majabigwaduce.

  Excerpts from Brigadier-General Solomon Lovell’s orders to his troops, Penobscot, July 30th, 1779:

  The General is much alarm’d at the loose and disorderly inattentive Behaviour of the Camp. . . . As the Success of Arms under God depends principally on good Subordination the General expects that every Officer and Soldier who has the least Spark of honor left will endeavor to have his Orders put in Execution and that Colonel Revere and the Corps under his Command incamp with the Army in future on Shore, in order not only to strengthen the Lines but to manage the Cannon.

  Excerpts from a letter sent by General George Washington to the Council of Massachusetts. August 3rd, 1779:

  Head Quarters, West Point.

  I have Just received a Letter from Lord Stirling stationed in the Jerseys dated yesterday . . . by which it appears the Ships of War at New York have all put to sea since. I thought it my duty to communicate this Intelligence that the Vessells employed in this expedition to Penobscot may be put upon their Guard, as it is probable enough that these Ships may be destined against them and if they should be surprised the consequences would be desagreeable. I have the honor to be with very great respect and esteem, Gentlemen Your Most Obedient Servant

  George Washington

  From the deposition of John Lymburner to Justice of the Peace Joseph Hibbert, 12th May 1788:

  [I was] taken prisoner by the Americans at the Siege of Penobscot, and was in close confinement . . . we were treated very severely for adhering to the British troops, called Tories and Refugees, was threat
ened to be hanged as soon as they had taken Fort George.

  Chapter Nine

  “Where the devil is Revere?” Lovell asked. He had asked the question a dozen times in the two days since he had captured the heights of Majabigwaduce and each time there had been increasing irritation in his usually calm voice. “Has he attended a single council of war?”

  “He likes to sleep aboard the Samuel,” William Todd said.

  “Sleep? It’s broad daylight!” That was an exaggeration, for it was only a few minutes since the sun had lit the eastern fog bright.

  “I believe,” Todd said carefully, “that he finds his quarters aboard the Samuel more amenable to his comfort.” He was polishing his spectacles on the skirt of his coat and his face looked strangely vulnerable without them.

  “We’re not here for comfort,” Lovell said.

  “Indeed we are not, sir,” Todd said.

  “And his men?”

  “They sleep on the Samuel too, sir,” Todd said, carefully hooking the cleaned spectacles over his ears.

  “It won’t do,” Lovell exploded, “it will not do!”

  “Indeed it will not, General,” Major Todd agreed, then hesitated. Fog made the treetops vague and inhibited the gunners on Cross Island and aboard the British ships so that a kind of quiet enveloped Majabigwaduce. Smoke drifted among the trees from the campfires on which troops boiled water for tea. “If you approve, sir,” Todd said carefully, watching Lovell pacing up and down in front of the crude shelter made of branches and sod that was his sleeping quarters, “I could advert to Colonel Revere’s absence in the daily orders?”

  “You can advert?” Lovell asked curtly. He stopped his pacing and turned to glare at the major. “Advert?”

  “You could issue a requirement in the daily orders that the colonel and his men must sleep ashore?” Todd suggested. He doubted Lovell would agree, because any such order would be recognized throughout the army as a very public reprimand.

  “A very good idea,” Lovell said, “an excellent notion. Do it. And draft me a letter to the colonel as well!”

  Before Lovell could change his mind Peleg Wadsworth came to the clearing. The younger general was wearing a greatcoat buttoned against the dawn chill. “Good morning!” he greeted Lovell and Todd cheerfully.

  “An ill-fitting coat, General,” Major Todd observed with ponderous amusement.

  “It belonged to my father, Major. He was a big man.”

  “Did you know Revere sleeps aboard his ship?” Lovell demanded indignantly.

  “I did know, sir,” Wadsworth said, “but I thought he had your permission.”

  “He has no such thing. We’re not here on a pleasure cruise! You want tea?” Lovell waved towards the fire where his servant crouched by a pot. “The water must have boiled.”

  “I’d appreciate a word first, sir?”

  “Of course, of course. In private?”

  “If you please, sir.” Wadsworth said and the two generals walked a few paces west to where the trees thinned and from where they could gaze over the fog-haunted waters of Penobscot Bay. The topmasts of the transport ships appeared above the lowest and densest layer of fog like splinters in a snowbank. “What would happen if we all slept aboard our ships, eh?” Lovell asked, still indignant.

  “I did mention the matter to Colonel Revere,” Wadsworth said.

  “You did?”

  “Yesterday, sir. I said he should move his quarters ashore.”

  “And his response?”

  Fury, Wadsworth thought. Revere had responded like a man insulted. “The guns can’t fire at night,” he had spat at Wadsworth, “so why man them at night? I know how to command my regiment!” Wadsworth chided himself for having let the matter slide, but at this moment he had a greater concern. “The colonel disagreed with me, sir,” he said tonelessly, “but I wished to speak of something else.”

  “Of course, yes, whatever is on your mind.” Lovell frowned towards the topmasts. “Sleeping aboard his ship!”

  Wadsworth looked south to where the fog now lay like a great river of whiteness between the hills bordering the Penobscot River. “Should the enemy send reinforcements, sir’” he began.

  “They’ll come upriver, certainly,” Lovell interjected, following Wadsworth’s gaze.

  “And discover our fleet, sir,” Wadsworth continued.

  “Of course they would, yes,” Lovell said as if the point was not very important.

  “Sir,” Wadsworth was urgent now. “If the enemy come in force they’ll be among our fleet like wolves in a flock. Might I urge a precaution?”

  “A precaution,” Lovell repeated as if the word was unfamiliar.

  “Permit me to explore upriver, sir,” Wadsworth said, pointing north to where the Penobscot River flowed into the wider bay. “Let me find and fortify a place to which we can retreat if the enemy comes. Young Fletcher knows the upper river. He tells me it narrows, sir, and twists between high banks. If it was necessary, sir, we could take the fleet upriver and shelter behind a bluff. A cannon emplacement at the river bend will check any enemy pursuit.”

  “Find and fortify, eh?” Lovell said, more to buy time than as a coherent response. He turned and stared into the northern fog. “You’d make a fort?”

  “I would certainly emplace some guns, sir.”

  “In earthworks?”

  “The batteries must be made defensible. The enemy will surely bring troops.”

  “If they come,” Lovell said dubiously.

  “It’s prudent, sir, to prepare for the least desirable eventuality.”

  Lovell grimaced, then placed a fatherly hand on Wadsworth’s shoulder. “You worry too much, Wadsworth. That’s a good thing! We should be worried about eventualities.” He nodded sagely. “But I do assure you we shall capture the fort long before any more redcoats arrive.” He saw Wadsworth was about to speak so hurried on. “You’d require men to make an emplacement and we cannot afford to detach men to dig a fort we may never need! We shall require every man we have to make the assault once the commodore agrees to enter the harbor.”

  “If he agrees,” Wadsworth said drily.

  “Oh, he will, I’m sure he will. Haven’t you seen? The enemy’s been driven back yet again! It’s only a matter of time now!”

  “Driven back?” Wadsworth asked.

  “The sentries say so,” Lovell exulted, “indeed they do.” Mowat’s three ships, constantly battered by Colonel Revere’s cannon on Cross Island, had moved still farther eastwards during the night. Their topmasts, hung with the British flags, were all that were presently visible and the sentries on Dyce’s Head reckoned that those topmasts were now almost a mile away from the harbor entrance. “The commodore doesn’t have to fight his way into the harbor now,” Lovell said happily, “because we’ve driven them away. By God, we have! Almost the whole harbor belongs to us now!”

  “But even if the commodore doesn’t enter the harbor, sir’” Wadsworth began.

  “Oh, I know!” the older man interrupted. “You think we can take the fort without the navy’s help, but we can’t, Wadsworth, we can’t.” Lovell repeated all his old arguments, how the British ships would bombard the attacking troops and how the British marines would reinforce the garrison, and Wadsworth nodded politely though he believed none of it. He watched Lovell’s earnest face. The man was eminent now, a landowner, a selectman, a churchwarden, and a legislator, but the schoolmaster in Wadsworth was trying to imagine Solomon Lovell as a boy, and he conjured an image of a big, clumsy lad who would earnestly try to be helpful, but never be a rule breaker. Lovell was declaring his belief that Brigadier McLean’s men outnumbered his own. “Oh, I realize you disagree, Wadsworth,” Lovell said, “but you young men can be headstrong. In truth we face a malevolent and a mighty foe, and to overcome him we must harness all our oxen together!”

  “We must attack, sir,” Wadsworth said forcefully.

  Lovell laughed, though without much humor. “One minute you tell me to prepare our
selves for defeat, and the next moment you wish me to attack!”

  “The one will happen without the other, sir.”

  Lovell frowned as he worked out what Wadsworth meant, then shook his head dismissively. “We shall conquer!” he said, then described his grand idea that the commodore’s ships should sail majestically into the harbor, their cannons blazing, while all along the ridge the rebel army advanced on a fort being hammered by naval gunfire. “Just imagine it,” he said enthusiastically, “all our warships bombarding the fort! My goodness, but we’ll just stroll across those ramparts!”

  “I’d rather we attacked in tomorrow’s dawn,” Wadsworth said, “in the fog. We can close on the enemy in the fog, sir, and take them by surprise.”

  “The commodore can’t shift in the fog,” Lovell said dismissively. “Quite impossible!”

  Wadsworth looked eastwards. The fog seemed to have thickened so that the topmasts of only one ship were visible, and it had to be a ship because there were three topmasts, each crossed by a topgallant yard. Three crosses. Wadsworth did not think it mattered whether the commodore attacked or not, or rather he thought it should not matter because Lovell had the men to assault the fort whether the commodore attacked or not. It was like chess, Wadsworth thought, and had a sudden image of his wife smiling as she took his castle with her bishop. The fort was the king, and all Lovell had to do was move one piece to acheive checkmate, but the general and Saltonstall insisted on a more complex plan. They wanted bishops and knights zigzagging all over the board, and Wadsworth knew he could never persuade either man to take the simple route. So, he thought, make their complicated moves work, and make them work soon before the British brought new pieces to the board. “Has the commodore agreed to enter the harbor?” he asked Lovell.

  “Not exactly agreed,” Lovell said uncomfortably, “not yet.”

  “But you believe he will, sir?”