Flashman and the Seawolf

by Robert Brightwell

  We were now patrolling north east to Port Mahon in Menorca which was the Speedy’s home base and where some of her crew that had made up earlier prize crews waited to rejoin the ship. If the first part of the cruise had been a nightmare the second part was a delight. The winds were fair and the days warm for the time of year. While the ship carried the usual barrels of salt beef and pork and ship’s biscuit, these were often putrid or rife with weevils and so stores were often liberated from captured coastal traders or bought from local fishing boats. When no other ships were in sight Cochrane even allowed fishing by a handful of the crew to supplement the communal pot. As the tiny galley on the ship struggled to do anything but boil things, Cochrane had a brick charcoal pit made between the masts well away from the sails and in a huge shallow dish he had liberated from somewhere we would fry shrimps, pieces of fish and shellfish. The cook would often add rice to make a dish he had learnt in Spain and with a stock made in the galley from fish heads and other bits we would soon have a filling and tasty dish. Some of the happiest nights I can remember were sitting on the deck of the Speedy with virtually the whole crew apart from a regularly changed helmsman and lookout, with a dish of rice and fish while we chatted under the stars.

  The numbers around the pot dwindled over the next two weeks as we took two prizes and sent them ahead with prize crews. In both cases the captures were anticlimaxes. We were sailing along the Spanish coast and at night would try to get close inshore to cut off the escape of any ships visible in the dawn. Twice we spotted ship’s sails silhouetted in the dawn sky to the east and set off in pursuit. Approaching from the still darkened west we gained several leagues before we were even seen and by then it was too late to escape. In both cases they struck their colours before we had even fired a shot across their bows. I joined the boarding party for one of them as interpreter and the captain of the coaster had heard all about the ‘diablo Cochrane’ and crossed himself every time the name was mentioned. After the second capture we had barely enough men to sail the Speedy and so set a course directly to Port Mahon.

  Mahon turned out to be a deep sheltered anchorage that had been in British hands for nearly a hundred years bar a couple of interruptions with brief ownership by the French before the revolution and more recently by the Spanish. The Governor then was another Charles Stewart, no relation of my London acquaintance but instead an irascible soldier who had led the forces that recaptured the island two years previously. Cochrane had offered to return me to Gibraltar on his next trip and so there seemed no need to disturb the general. I still needed to check that the Spanish agent had completed his mission but could do that in Gibraltar. Indeed I was not sure if I wanted to return to England directly, particularly when I discovered that I had earned a good few guineas as prize money in my honorary midshipman role. Once on the Speedy’s decks I now felt secure and with as strong a sense of belonging as I had experienced since school. If more prizes were to be had the ease of the recent ones then it seemed sensible to stay with my new friends and build up my cash at the same time. Wickham had after all told me to take my time coming back.

  While Cochrane wrote the report of his latest cruise for the Admiralty, I sent a report of recent events to Wickham care of the War Office. Naturally I gave it some embellishment in my favour and described how I had tricked the Spanish agent into revealing that Consuela was a double agent working for the Spanish. I wrote that I had killed the Spanish agent after he tried to pull a knife on me, the same story I had given the crew of the Speedy, and described my capture against overwhelming odds. I gave Cochrane full credit for the defence of the tower and subsequent destruction of the enemy forces but implied that we had jointly planned my rescue in advance in case of need. It made damned good reading and I was confident that it would earn me credit back home. I also wrote to my father explaining that I was still on my diplomatic mission, my first objective had been achieved but my mission might take some time to complete. In the meantime I told him I was with a very capable naval escort. I added that I was also being generously paid for my work and was accruing prize money as an acting midshipman so he was not to worry. As it turned out he was not worrying but he did start thinking about how he could spend my prize money for me as he access to my bank account while I was still under the age of 21.

  I sent my report via Admiral Keith’s Secretary,a man called Mansfield, who was based at the naval Headquarters there. He may have been a clerk but I quickly realised that Mansfield wielded considerable influence. As in all walks of life there are capable men who manage those beneath them and less capable men that delegate much of their responsibility to their juniors. Admiral Keith was evidently one of the latter. Cochrane had previously told me that his first command was not originally to have been the Speedy but instead a corvette of eighteen guns called the Bonne Citoyenne. Mansfield’s brother, also a naval lieutenant happened to arrive from Gibraltar at the same time and the able clerk engineered his brother getting the Bonne Citoyenne and Cochrane was relegated to the Speedy.

  Naturally Cochrane had railed against this decision and wrote directly to the Admiral, although whether Admiral got the letter remains in doubt. In any event Cochrane earned the enmity of the clerk and as the Admiral invariably followed every recommendation that the clerk gave, this meant that Cochrane and the Speedy were rarely shown any favour. Mansfield was damned offhand with me too when I arrived in his office to send my report. “What does a crewman of the Speedy have to do with the War Office?” he asked imperiously as he looked at the address

  “None of your damned business” I replied sharply. “I carry diplomatic papers signed by the Prime Minister and my instructions do not include keeping naval clerks informed.”

  He gave me an angry glare but that is the only way to deal with imperious underlings, give them an inch and they will take a mile, as Admiral Keith discovered to his cost later.

  I strolled out of the headquarters feeling well pleased with myself. It was pleasant to be back on friendly shores again and it did not take long to explore the town. Having killed the man that had arranged Jasmine’s death I felt strangely released as though a debt had been paid and for the first time since I left London I felt a strong urge for female company. As in any sea port there were some rough looking females hanging around the harbour and a couple of equally tawdry ale houses where doubtless women could be had but I was looking for a more quality establishment. I found it at the end of the main street, Madam Rosa’s House of Relaxation and Entertainment for Gentlemen was just what I was looking for. Comfortable surroundings, a reassuring obsession with cleanliness and some of the prettiest girls I had seen in a long time. I chose a pretty young thing from Naples who was most obliging and I was in fine fettle all afternoon. The visit also confirmed my suspicion that if ever you want to know what is going on in a place then the local whorehouse is the place to go. Most men will try to impress the girl they are with by imparting some bit of news or gossip and most girls are expert in extracting information if it does not come willingly.

  I once suggested to Canning that the War Office set up their own whorehouse in every major European city and establish a system to get the resulting information to London. We would have had the best intelligence network the world has ever seen. I even offered to help set it up. What a job that would be: clean sheets and endless girls instead of mud, muskets and cannonfire. He just looked at me appalled when I suggested it and said that it was immoral. No vision some of our ministers…unless the French have already done it and he was already under their ‘pudenda’. It would be just like the French too.

  In any event from my friendly little Neapolitan I discovered that all was not well in Port Mahon. For a start Cochrane was not making himself popular with his fellow captains firstly by moaning about the size of his command and then by being so successful with it. Other captains felt he was getting more than his fair share of prizes but why they could not go and get their own with their bigger ships was beyond me. The town was dependent on w
hichever Navy held the island and it seemed friend Mansfield as well as trying to run the Admiral was trying to run the town too. He was on bribes and kickbacks from nearly every business. Madam Rosa’s was one of the few places able to hold out as it had so many senior naval officers as patrons. My dislike of the man grew and so for devilment I hinted that I had overheard him talking to a ship’s surgeon about cures for the pox. I was sure that little gem would find its way back to Madam Rosa. As her livelihood depended on the cleanliness of the girls, with a bit of luck it would see him banned from the only good whorehouse in town.

  After a few weeks refit in Port Mahon the Speedy put to sea again in mid March 1801. She had reverted to her more conventional naval appearance as word of the disguise would have spread along the Spanish coast now and would not fool anyone. It felt good to be at sea again and this time I did not feel seasick. The boat was more crowded with the full complement of crew but I was now used to my hutch like cabin and stooping while below decks. As Cochrane, Archie, Parker, Guthrie and I squeezed into the main cabin on the first afternoon we all felt right at home. The skylight was open and the ceiling was so low that when Cochrane stood up his head and shoulders protruded onto the deck, indeed this was how he shaved every morning. Lunch was boiled horsehoe crab bought on the quayside that morning, served with butter and was delicious. All was well with the world and we were not unduly concerned when the lookout called that there was a sail astern. There had been several other warships in Port Mahon when we left and we assumed that it was one of them. Cochrane ordered the recognition flags to be flown and poked his head through the skylight to check on their response.

  We all went on deck shortly after wards and through telescopes could see that the ship following us was a powerful frigate. At least the naval types among us could. All I could see was some of masts and sails on the horizon. For all I knew it could be a frigate, a ship of the line or the Isle of White Packet. Cochrane warned that it had not given any response to our recognition signals. As a precaution he ordered more sail in the freshening wind in the hope of out running the stranger or losing her at night. Twice more that afternoon recognition signals were raised by the Speedy and ignored by the ship on the horizon. At deck level you could still just make out the masts and some sail but with Cochrane and Archie I went aloft to the main mast top, which is a platform above the yardarm to get a better view. Needless to say to get to the top the Cochrane brothers swung out hanging over the deck to climb the futtock shrouds while yours truly was more than happy to take the easier route through the gap known as the lubber’s hole.

  A sailing ship at sea seems like a living thing. When you are below in the cabins at night there is a constant creaking and groaning from the timbers as they move through the waves, which once you get used to it, is quite comforting. The noises develop into rhythms and regular sounds and in my case I found that they very easily lulled you to sleep. But it was only when you climbed the mast that you got a sense of the power that drove the ship. There was a constant whine and whistle of the wind through the rigging and the ropes themselves often vibrated with the strains and pressure they were under. I had been up to the mainmast top before, it was a large platform roughly a third of the way up the mast and I felt reasonably secure standing on it holding a rope for support and staring back towards the sails in our wake. I could see little more than from deck level and Archie and Cochrane persuaded me to go higher to the much smaller top above the main topsail. Cochrane went first and carried on right to the mast head while Archie guided me up. The ratlines or rope ladders were near vertical now and the higher we got the more pronounced became the movement of the ship as the bow surged up over the waves.

  Eventually I reached the upper top where another sailor also waited to help me climb up on it. At this height the relatively benign movement of the deck below pushing through the waves translated into a swing of around thirty degrees either side of horizontal. Various topmen scampered about the rigging with casual ease. They were greatly amused to see a terrified newcomer in their midst and one evil bastard called out “’ave you seen the view of the deck from there sor?” Like a fool I instinctively looked down and then shrank back in horror to gales of laughter from the topmen. The deck looked tiny from up there and as the mast swung about in the waves there were moments when we were not over the deck at all but over the sea instead. Half hugging the topmast like a long lost friend I stared aft and this time could make out the dark shape of a hull beneath the masts. Archie lent me his telescope but holding it one handed as I refused to let go of the mast I only got fleeting glimpses of the enemy ship as it passed the lens.

  Getting down from the upper top was even harder than going up especially getting off the top itself as you could not see where you were putting your feet but eventually I was back on deck. The ship behind us, which Cochrane was now convinced was French, looked more distant. We had on as much sail as we could carry and we seemed to maintaining the distance with the ship behind but dinner in the crowded cabin that evening was a tenser affair than lunch. We were going as fast as we could and while we did not change course the hope was that the horizon would be clear in the morning. Come dawn most of the crew were on deck straining their eyes astern and sure enough as the light spread across the horizon the sails were still there.

  Cochrane was convinced that they would give up sooner or later if we could maintain the distance. If not we would change course to a friendly port like Gibraltar. That plan came apart along with our main top gallant yard just after mid day. There was a crack as it broke and the sail started flapping uselessly in the wind. The crew did what they called ‘fishing’ to repair it, which is binding a cord tightly around the break to hold it together and straight. While it would take some sail then it would not take as much as it did before without risking more damage. We were still moving on at a fair old clip but over the hours it was clear that the chasing ship was gaining. As the sky started to darken for the second night, instead of just the top sails being visible from deck level, now virtually the whole masts could be seen, and with a telescope, glimpses of the hull. Again Cochrane was unconcerned and ordered an empty water barrel and some rocks from the ballast to be brought on deck. It was a moonless night and as complete darkness was achieved an item was lowered over the side. Then all lights were extinguished over the ship and the course was changed by ninety degrees from south east to the south west.

  There was a lot of cursing and banged heads that night, you don’t realise how useful a lantern in a passageway is until it is not there. Even after having spent some weeks on the ship I found myself ducking too early for a beam and bringing my head up again exactly underneath it. Concussions aside we did not get much sleep and again everyone was on deck just before dawn. As the sun came up most of us would have given a week’s pay to see what was happening on the French frigate at that particular moment. The French would have spotted the problem with our main topsail the previous afternoon and seen that they were now gaining on their prey. They ploughed on through the night and sensed that that they were getting closer still. They may even have had their bow chaser cannon loaded and ready for a ranging shot at dawn. Imagine their confusion then when as the sun crept over the eastern horizon they discovered that the stern light from the Speedy that they had been tracking all night, was in fact a lantern nailed to the top of a weighted barrel that was bobbing about in an otherwise empty sea.

  ~~~~~~

  Chapter 13

  On the Speedy we were jubilant that the horizon was clear. The crew and to a degree even I began to look upon Cochrane as some sort of magician who had a trick to get us out of any scrape. It was a confidence that was soon to be sorely tested. In the meantime Cochrane decided to continue upon the south westerly course, away from the coast of Spain our usual hunting ground, towards Malta. He reasoned that with the disguised frigate we had encountered before and now the one that had stalked us from Port Mahon, the enemy were making a determined effort to track down a ship that h
ad been a prodigious thorn in their side. It would make sense to cruise in a new area for a while and come back when their guard was lowered. He also admitted that he was curious to see Malta and the rest of the crew were also interested to see the island that had until very recently been ruled for 500 years by the Knights of St John. Napoleon had tricked his way into the harbour and captured the Island in 1798 but just a few months ago the Island had willingly come under the protection of the British.

  We had a good mooring in the harbour of the capital Valetta and planned to stay there for a week while we resupplied and made repairs. While other captains may have had to worry about press ganged sailors deserting the ship, in the Speedy there were no such concerns. The crew were making more prize money than they had ever known and so shore leave was allowed for all. Cochrane, Archie and Parker spent much of their time with the dockyard sorting out repairs to our damaged rigging and I was left to my own devices.

  In many ways it was not the ideal time to visit Valetta as a tourist as the island had undergone so much change in the last two years. First it had been captured and looted by the French of anything valuable and transportable. Say what you like about the French, nobody loots better than them. In the Peninsular campaign I remember seeing a marching column of French infantry cross a battlefield and loot countless dead without even breaking their stride. When I looked at the corpses later all the pockets had been cut open, hat linings ripped, there was not even a pinch of snuff left behind. Most of the Knights of St John had left and this devout island had seen churches plundered, priests exiled and papal jurisdiction abolished. The Maltese rose in rebellion and the French retreated to Valetta where they underwent a siege with the remaining civilian population lasting a year. Evidence of that siege was still very visible when we arrived. Many people still looked painfully thin and with the exception of fish, food was still in short supply.