Sea of Grey

by Dewey Lambdin

  “Gad, quite the quadrille we’re dancin’ with ’em, hey, Mister Winwood?” Lt. Catterall said as he ascended the lee ladder from below. “Thought we would do ‘swing your lady,’ the rest of the afternoon!”

  “Mmmmmm!” Lewrie harumphed quite pointedly, though he felt like growling at him.

  “Though, they aren’t quite fetched-to, yet,” Mr. Winwood noted.

  “Save us a spot o’ bother, that,” Catterall breezed blithely on. “And give them a shorter row.”

  “And us with more rigging and sail aloft, with more freeboard, we’ll drift right down aboard her, if this fellow don’t …” Winwood began to fret.

  “I’ll skin the bastard, swear it! That cack-handed, whip-jack, cunnythumbed sonofa … lubber! Damn him!” Lewrie swore, nigh to one of his rare foot-stomping rants or a helpless whimpering, flinging his arms up in appeal to Heaven at Trumbull’s captain, and his ignorance, his clueless disregard for side-timbers, paint-work, or seamanship!

  “Do we get under way once he’s aboard, sir, perhaps our loo’rd drift will not be so great, before we, uhm … ?” Lt. Langlie helpfully suggested, heaving a deep, speculative shrug.

  “Ah, hummm … p’rhaps, Mister Langlie,” Lewrie said. Helpless appeal to Heaven won over rage, as he sagged in philosphical defeat.

  “Side-party for a mere lieutenant, or a putative captain, sir,” Lt. Catterall casually enquired.

  “Bu’ck?” Lewrie answered, with a “what can you do?” shrug, and an unintelligible little noise that sounded hellish-like a cluck.

  “Very good, sir,” Catterall replied, backing away with a wary look on his face.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The crew of HMS Proteus had “oohed” and “aahed” over the sights of land they had encountered as the frigate continued on about Antigua and sailed near Nevis and St. Kitts before reaching English Harbour; a pack of mostly “Johnny Newcomes” to the bleak infinity of the sea, and starved for even a hint of green. Sere as those isles were, they did have trees and bushes, and plantations that reached down near the thin sand beaches. But those appreciative noises were nothing like the ones they made when once they sighted Jamaica!

  Morant Point was barely above the horizon, but the Blue Mountains stood tall and cool and bold to the Nor’west, with Blue Mountain Peak spearing over 7,400 feet into the air; smoky and hazy blue-grey, clouddraped as if it bore a magical snowcap even in the tropics, all above a descending, hilly swath of headland so lushly verdant, land so brightly green and welcoming that the hands could almost mistake it for Faeryland, or the Irishmen in the crew could conjure that they had discovered the legendary Happy Isles that always lay just beyond a sunset, somewhere across the wide western sea.

  The officers and midshipmen—and Lewrie, too, it must be admitted—stood entranced at the starboard rails or bulwarks as Proteus cruised on under “all plain sail” nearer the coast, straight West and within a bare two miles of Morant Bay and bound for Kingston. For Alan Lewrie it was almost like coming home, for Jamaica had been the scene of many of his adventures, and misadventures, during the American Revolution, where he’d won and lost a very young and missish Lucy Beauman, had gotten orders to scout the Florida coast and march inland to the Muskogee Indians, where he’d learned the war was over in the summer of ‘83 and knew he’d lose his brief command of HMS Shrike, the old snowrigged brig o’ war he had “inherited” from her former master, Lieutenant Lilycrop. Lewrie did not need a telescope to “see” the old headlands, the planter houses near the shore, the hints of coastal road between groves of trees, or the fringe of beaches where he had once gamboled nigh-nude in shallow surf with some hired strumpet.

  “I do believe that is the Palisades before our bows, sir,” Lt. Langlie announced. “Just above the horizon.”

  “And the ruins of old Port Royal at its western tip,” Lewrie said with a slow, pleased grin. “Once the wickedest town in the whole wide world, or so ‘twas said. And Kingston beyond … a ‘comer’ on the wicked roster, itself. Let’s take two reefs in the courses and harbour gasket the royals, Mister Langlie. Slow but steady, on a ‘tops’l breeze.’ The harbour entrance is narrow, at the western tip of the Palisades, just by Fort Charles, and I’m damned if I wish to tangle with another frigate leaving port … and both of us with a ‘dash’ on.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “Mister Wyman, once we’re ship-shape aloft, you and the Master Gunner, Mister Carling, will have a salute ready for Admiral Sir Hyde Parker. Mister Catterall?”

  “Sir?” the Third Lieutenant said, after a long moment.

  “Ashore and with the Jamaican ladies already, were we, Mister Catterall?” Lewrie said with a smirk, twitting him.

  “Natural philosophy, sit … the flora looks quite intriguing,” Lt. Catterall quickly replied. “Why, I might discover a new orchid or a sprig of Captain Bligh’s infamous breadfruit trees, or …”

  “When we enter harbour, round up into wind and let go anchors. I’ll be depending on you, sir, to make it presentable. With our new admiral and two-dozen post-captains watching. Flora, indeed. Ha!”

  “Aye aye, sir,” Catterall answered, the underlings’ best reply in such situations. “Best performance.” Catterall gave the middies who would serve at both forecastle and stern kedge anchor a glare, to warn them and pass the “mustard” on.

  “Mister Winwood?”

  “Aye, sir?” the Sailing Master said, presenting himself.

  “I think we should steer a point more direct for the entrance,” Lewrie said. “Do you concur?”

  “Aye, sir … we can round up abeam once we’re fair in the channel. Better than coming abeam a mile or more off the entrance, and get a veer in the wind off those mountains.”

  “Then make her head West-by-North, half North.”

  “Very good, sir. Quartermaster …”

  “If I wer‘nt a gunner, I wouldn’t be here … number five gun, fire!” their new Master Gunner, Mr. Carling, droned, pacing aft from the forecastle belfry towards the stern, one arm swinging like a bandmaster’s, now and then swinging in a larger arc to point to a waiting gun-captain in signal to trigger his fire-lock and discharge his piece. “I’ve left my wife, my home, and all that’s dear … number six gun … fire! If I wer’nt a gunner, I wouldn’t be here …”

  Marines in full red-coated kit, pipe-clayed crossbelts, and hats of white-piped black felt for once, stood at the hammock nettings overlooking the waist, and along the starboard side facing Fort Charles, their muskets held at “Present Arms.” Usually, they saved wear on expensive uniforms (for which they’d have to pay if faded, torn, or soiled) and wore sailors’ slop-clothing when not standing guard duty by doors to the officer’s gun-room, Lewrie’s quarters, the spirits stores, or the ladders to the quarterdeck.

  Proteus ghosted into harbour on tops’ls, jibs, and spanker, and wreathed in gunsmoke from her salute that only slowly drifted leeward on a mild breeze. There were several two-decker 74-gun 3rd Rates anchored near the north shore, but none flew an admiral’s broad pendant or looked even close to being a flagship. Frigates, sloops of war, brigs, and hired or captured warships below the Rates were two-a-penny, though, presenting a pretty problem as to where Lewrie could find room for his ship to anchor, and swing.

  Why so many in port? he wondered to himself: don’t they know I need room? Don’t they know there’s a war on?

  “There’s a guard-boat, sir … waving a jack at us,” Lieutenant Langlie pointed out. “I do believe he’s showing us an anchorage.”

  “Well, thank God for small favours. Come about onto the wind, and steer for him, Mister Langlie,” Lewrie said with a well-concealed sigh of vast relief. “Do not run him over, sir. It’s bad form.”

  “Ya gig’s ready, sah,” his Cox’n Andrews informed him from his left side. “Ya don’ mind, sah … I’ll bring de boat off, oncet you step ashore, an’ keep an eye skinned t’come fetch ya when ya done.”

  Lewrie frowned and turned to look at Andrews, who was “s
ulled up like a bullfrog,” ducking his head and his eyes darting as cutty as a bag of nails—looking six ways from Sunday—in embarassment.

  “Something wrong with a drink ashore, Andrews?” he teased.

  “Be sumptin’ bad wrong, do my old master see me, Cap’um, sah.”

  “Oh, that’s right, you ran from Jamaica. But surely, so long ago …”

  “Woll, he allus liked Spanish Town more’n Kingston, true, sah, but him an’ his neighbours, dey was a hard set, sah. Hold grudges as bad as dem Serbs an’ Turks back in de Balkans. D‘ya not mind, sah, I don’t wanna take no chance o’ gettin’ took up, again.”

  “Remind me to have my clerk Padgett forge you a letter of manumission from a master … in the Carolinas, Andrews,” Lewrie decided. “For the other Black hands, too, just to be safe.”

  “Law, thankee, sah!” Andrews said with a wide grin of relief on his phyz. “Dot’d be hondsome-fine, sah!”

  “After all, forging runs in the family.” Lewrie chuckled. “But ‘til we’ve proper, uhm … ‘certificates’ ready, aye, bring the boat back to the ship, and I’ll hire a bum-boat for my return.”

  “Aye aye, sah.”

  Proteus found her anchorage, rounded up to slither on windward for a piece, her fore-tops’l flat a’back to brake her progress, until the very last of her way fell off and the helm went helpless. At that moment, the best bower anchor dangling from the larboard cat-head was let go to splash into the water, and the hawser paid out then snubbed after a run of half a cable, to see if the anchor would hold. With a faint jerk and groan, Proteus came to a stop, her voyage over.

  “Hello, the boat!” Lewrie called down to the guard-boat that had been so obliging. “Where am I to report to Admiral Parker?”

  “His flagship’s in the careenage, sir!” the midshipman in the boat’s sternsheets called back. “His staff captain keeps office at Fort Charles, for now!” he added, pointing back at the tip of the Palisades, the natural breakwater mole that made Kingston such a calm anchorage in most weathers, with the Blue Mountains lying in the harsh Nor’east, where most hurricanes blew their fiercest early winds. Lewrie looked in that direction, using a telescope to see if anyone had hoisted the usual “Captain Repair On Board” code flags. No, nothing. For the main base of the West Indies Station, Kingston maintained what could only charitably be termed as “peacetime” activity.

  “Very well, sir, thankee!” Lewrie shouted down.

  “I’m going that way, sir!” the midshipman offered. “Would you care to be rowed over?”

  “Aye, that’d suit admirably. Come alongside!” Lewrie agreed.

  “Thank de Lord,” he heard Andrews whisper sotto voce.

  “Don’t feel too relieved, Andrews … you may have to come and fetch me back, then take me ashore to the civilian part of town. You scamp, you.”

  “Mebbe you’d speak t’Mister Padgett afore ya go, then, sah? He get dem certificates started?” Andrews countered, still looking wary.

  “Dear Lord, what a lack-wit!” Captain Sir Edward Charles said, after Lewrie had filled him in on his meeting with the hapless Lieutenant Gordon of the United States Treasury Department cutter Trumbull. “If he’s an example of what we may expect to meet in the near future, then God help them. In such a small service as their Treasury, or the new navy of theirs, surely only their very best and most experienced officers would gain commands. Unless they simply have none, o’ course.”

  “I gathered that most of their experienced naval officers by now are quite aged, sir,” Lewrie informed him, “those who won fame back in the Revolution; and most of them were privateersmen, to begin with.”

  The interview was going quite nicely, Lewrie thought. Captain Charles was Admiral Sir Hyde Parker’s staff captain, a most ebulliently friendly sort—big as a rum keg about the middle and twice as stout, with the rosy cheeks and nose of the serious toper. The first thing to be done was to fetch newcome Captain Lewrie a glass of claret, and take up a refill with him to be convivial. They sat in leather wing chairs to either side of a wine-table, not before and behind the massive desk as junior and superior might, like cater-cousins or fellow clubmen.

  Lewrie was turned out in his newest and nattiest uniform, run up in London for the December fête to celebrate Camperdown. The dark blue wool coat was hard-finished and smooth, and perhaps a bit too hot for a tropic day, but a snowy-white silk shirt and equally pristine sailcloth cotton waistcoat and breeches somewhat eased any discomfort that Lewrie might have felt. The single gilt epaulet on his right shoulder, all the buttons, and gold-lace cuff trim was so new, and so well packed away so long, that he fair gleamed. And the two medals hung about his neck had gotten a polish, along with his new Hessian boots with the gilt tassels. Captain Sir Edward Charles’s eyes had drifted to the medals several times, in an almost wistful way, since their introduction.

  Ain’t ev’ry one-winged captain that can boast one medal, Lewrie smugly told himself; much less two! Poor old soul’s jealous!

  “Within two day’s sail of Antigua, was it?” Sir Edward asked as he topped up their half-filled glasses.

  “Aye, sir. Mister Gordon told me that Saint Kitts would be one of their ‘rondy’s,’ as would Dominica. American merchantmen will gather there and await escort for convoys, he said, to perhaps as far north as Savannah, in Georgia. He gave me the impression that what few French privateers or warships that had harried their coastal shipping were now scared off by their new frigates, and that the bulk of their losses now take place in the Caribbean. This new naval minister of theirs, termed a Secretary of the Navy, a man name of Benjamin Stoddert, gave Gordon the further impression that he’s that eager to make a ‘forward presence’ … as soon as they have enough ships in commission, of course.”

  “Well, if Gordon’s little cutter was the best they have to show the flag …” Sir Edward smirked over the rim of his glass. “How well-armed was she?”

  “Four four-pounders, and a batch of swivels, Sir Edward, and all rough-cast,” Lewrie said with a deprecating sneer of his own. “Not two from the same foundry. Old-style touch-holes with powder-filled quills for ignition. That, or port-fires. The muskets and pistols that I saw were a tad rough, as well. Copies of Tower muskets,” he said, heaving a tiny shrug. “Though some mates and officers had purchased long-range Pennsylvania rifles, and those were quite well-made and very accurate. We had a little shoot-off, sir. I with my Ferguson breech-loader, and they with their muzzle-loaders.”

  “Who won?” Sir Edward snapped, “tetchy” of a sudden.

  “Uhm … they did, sir. Though ramming the ball down a rifled barrel with a lubricated leather patch about it takes forever. I was told that their new Marine Corps will be issued rifles, not muskets. A squad of Marines in each top, with rifles, could decimate the officers of a foe at nearly two hundred yards, maybe even a full cable’s range. Then, sir, God help the French, when they meet!”

  “Don’t hold with such doings, myself,” Sir Edward scoffed, now growling with ill humour. “My Marines’ll volley from the bulkwarks. Shooting officers, sir, is un-gentlemanly. Deliberately targeting an officer is abominable! Dishonourable! Might as well cut their throats in their beds! Piratical, barbaric! Just what I’d expect of American manners, morals, or ‘honour!’ Pack of Red Indians, near-like, sir, in all those deerskin clothes, with feathers—and dung!—in their hair so please you! We’ll not have such in this fleet, sir, and I’ll thank you to remember that!”

  The feathers, deerskins … or snipin’? Lewrie had to ask himself.

  “Never stood and fought in the open, Captain Lewrie, no! They skulked in the bushes and shot from cover, the coward’s way! Armed to the teeth, e‘en the women and children,” Sir Edward querulously carped, in a “pet” over past experiences, Lewrie surmised. “Uncivilised thieves and highwaymen, riotous armed bullies, hah! But never the stomach for a proper battle, and I doubt they’ve improved, now they’re on their own without English law to rein in their chaotic nature. Do we reall
y see American warships down here, I’ll lay you any odds you wish, they will skulk in port, fatten off our stores, but leave the hard work to a proper navy such as ours! The French’d eat ’em alive!”

  “Well, sir, even as addle-pate as their Lieutenant Gordon was,” Lewrie dared to point out, “they did run a taut enough ship, and they sounded quite eager to prove themselves against the Frogs.”

  “Ev’ry calf-headed innocent sings eager before his first fight, Captain Lewrie,” Sir Edward countered. “‘cause he knows nothing about battle. Let idiots and fools like your Lieutenant Gordon cross hawse with a real French frigate, and then see what tune he sings, hah! No, sir … Americans are too disorganised, too stubbornly individualistic to achieve much. Put a dozen in a room, you’ll hear fifteen different opinions! Lazy, idle; twiddlers, who’d rather get drunk on their corn whiskey—a vile concoction! —just enough bottom to ’em to plant more corn, so they can make more whiskey! As money-grubbing as Jews, too. But not a single gentleman, a single educated and civilised man in a thousand to boast of. Barbarians, sir! Ignorant … peasants!”

  Does he really hate ’em that bad? Lewrie wondered. Or is he just drunk, and ravin’? And how ‘in-the-barrel’ was he before I got here?

  “I s’pose we’ll see, Sir Edward,” Lewrie said, noncommittally. “This Gordon fellow expected their warships rather soon.”

  “In hurricane season?” Sir Edward responded, leaning far back in his chair to the point that it almost tipped off its front legs, agape with a mix of horror and amazement on his now-glowing phyz.

  “Their Secretary of the Navy, that Mister Stoddert, is of the opinion that really bad storms occur more rarely than people think. I believe Gordon said perhaps no more than once a year, sometimes once in five years, sir. American merchantmen in the Caribbean keep records of weather, and their studies of those records—”