A Victorian Gent (The Making of a Man Series, Book 1)

by Andrew Wareham

  “The rules of God and Man exist for those who need them, the cowards and the weak, and they have made me neither. God help them!”

  He could not plan further, he lacked the knowledge, but the newspapers he had read told him there was opportunity: he must find it and seize it.

  Then what?

  Work! First wealth and then power, and he would show them, the ones who had laughed and sneered at the boy weakling, the ones who had abused him. They would hurt, all of them, just as he had.

  He drank his tea, went quietly to bed, slept soundly.

  He rode northwards again in the morning, realising that he was too close to home still, could easily be traced by enquiry after his mount – a recognisable blood horse that attracted stable boys’ eyes.

  Better get rid of the animal, take to the railway instead. A ticket to where?

  He made his way into Rugby and put Thunder up in a livery stable on the outskirts, telling the ostler that he was visiting at the School for two days, would pick the horse up again on Thursday. He paid four shillings down and instructed the man to look after the nag well.

  “His name’s Thunder and he’s a good-tempered horse. Walk him a bit for me tomorrow.”

  He left his tack in the stable and took his saddle-bags.

  He could have tried to sell the horse, but it would have taken time, several days perhaps, unless he accepted a suspiciously low price, with the risk that the livery owner might call the police in for his own protection. Better to accept that Thunder was not his anyway and that he was losing nothing – and there would be few questions asked until it was clear he was not coming back, and even then the owner might not raise an alarm with three or four hundred guineas worth of uncut blood horse gifted him.

  He walked to the railway station, enquired the times of the next train to Birmingham and found he had ten minutes to wait. He bought a First Class ticket and stepped out at New Street Station less than two hours later. Railway lines spread out to the whole of Britain from Birmingham.

  Decision time! He had procrastinated too long.

  Should he stay in England or flee overseas? There were arguments in favour of both courses. England was civilised, but contained Sergeant Bill; anywhere else was more-or-less primitive, but far safer.

  There was only one logical answer: he took out a sovereign and solemnly tossed it.

  Heads – overseas.

  The next question was where – ‘overseas’ was a big place.

  Empire or foreign?

  He spoke no other language so it would have to be an English-using country.

  India was restricted by the Company and the government, and Englishmen became known very quickly there. Australia and the Cape were months of sailing away, and still quite small, a population of a very few thousands in which he might stand out.

  East and West Africa had gold and plantations but were far smaller as well as being tropical and diseased. The West Indies were equally tropical and diseased and poverty-stricken besides – even less attractive.

  Canada was long established and heavily populated in parts, but it was not a rich colony, being almost entirely given to agriculture.

  That left the United States, about which he knew almost nothing other than that it was the ‘land of opportunity’ and beset by the growing dispute over ‘bond-servants’.

  All things considered, the States was the best bet – the Northern part, obviously, because he would have nothing to do with the disgusting institution of slavery. He had read in the newspapers that Liverpool was the main port for steamers across the Atlantic.

  He looked at the Departures board in the station, saw that the Liverpool trains ran hourly. He went to the ticket-office.

  The port was busy and he could buy passage on any one of several ships sailing within days; he could indeed have taken a first-class berth on a mixed passenger and cargo carrier sailing on the next tide, but he would have seemed an obvious fugitive, running aboard with no more than a pair of saddlebags to his name. He needed to disappear and to do that he must seem very ordinary. He would have to spend some money – but it was not his, why should he not?

  He took a room in a respectable hotel, neither overtly luxurious nor a poor flop-house, the sort of place that a comfortably-off businessman would choose, and enquired where he could replace the baggage he had recently lost, stolen he presumed. He had put his trunk and bags in the care of a porter at Weymouth and had changed trains three times, assuming all to be well; he had arrived in Liverpool but his luggage had not and the railway officials held out little prospect of ever finding his belongings again.

  The manager of the hotel sympathised with him and directed him into the shopping centre, gave him the name of his own tailor and a boot maker who would certainly be able to fit him out inside a week.

  “Going to the States, do you say, sir? Robust, country-style clothing, rather than elegant, perhaps. Evening-dress, certainly, but for the day twills and tweeds will be more appropriate I suspect, sir.”

  The cobbler said much the same, supplying good boots and a single pair of light shoes for dress use.

  Trunk and a leather suitcase together added to the bill, but a hundred sovereigns saw him equipped unexceptionably for life in the West and, importantly, ensured that he was in no way noticeable as being in any way different to the ordinary run of people.

  He purchased his ticket for the Atlantic crossing, taking advice from the hotel manager again.

  “A smaller, fast ship, sir, will be the best. Just a few berths in First-Class and far less formality. A collar and necktie at dinner, of course, but with no requirement for dress as is the case in larger vessels. Businessmen use the smaller ships far more frequently while society idlers are to be found aboard the large. Far more interesting conversation in the lounge, sir – the opportunity to discover the latest news of what is really happening in the States and where the chances are for a man with energy and go and a little of hard cash.”

  He boarded the Delaware just two weeks after last seeing his father.

  She was an American ship, four masted with a screw propeller, the mixture of steam and sail guaranteeing, he was told, not less than two hundred miles a day and often more, unless the weather set particularly foul. Her holds were fully loaded with British woollens, as, he was told, was normally the case; on the opposite run she brought wheat and timber, the demand for both insatiable in England.

  The First-Class dining saloon was small, just two tables, each presided over by a ship’s officer, Master and First Mate when possible, and formality was, as predicted, kept to the necessary minimum decency demanded.

  “Where do you go to, Mr Burke?”

  The speaker was an American, a businessman who had come to England seeking contracts for timber and was returning very satisfied indeed.

  “I do not really know, Mr Harris. My father died unexpectedly recently and my elder brother inherited, leaving me with a small legacy and the need to make my own way and find my own home. I prefer to go to a land of opportunity, I find, and there is general agreement that America is the place for a young man who is willing to work hard and make the most of his chances. So, a ticket to New York has been the first step.”

  There was a mutter of agreement round the table, four other Americans who all agreed that theirs was the land of the future.

  “Do you believe that I should stay in New York, or would I be better advised to go further afield?”

  “If you have a hundred thousand, then New York is the place for you, Mr Burke. Set up a factory or buy real estate and build on it. Middle-sized men become millionaires in New York, and very quickly. Assuming that you have less than that, then buy a ticket on the railroad cars and ride as far West as you can, then take to horseback and go looking for opportunity. Cash money is short out there and you can turn a thousand dollars into ten in a twelvemonth, and then double again every year, sir!”

  “Provided you stay alive, that is!”

  There was general agr
eement that the western lands could be dangerous and that every man must carry a gun.

  “The problem is slavery, of course, Mr Burke. The Southern States want more of it; many of the North want none of it; a lot of people have had enough of it and just want an end to the squabbling. New states and territories such as Missouri and Kansas are effectively in civil war already over the issue. There can be no peace until there is an agreement, and there can be no agreement until there is a peaceful solution devised.”

  Dick thought that through, did not like the conclusion he came to.

  “War is inevitable, you would say, Mr Harris?”

  “It is only a question of ‘when’, Mr Burke.”

  Two of the others agreed with Harris, the other pair quite sure that men of goodwill could find a compromise, could discover a solution short of slaughter.

  “There are no men of goodwill left, I fear, Mr Burke. Compromise is no longer possible.”

  “Will it be a major war, do you think, sir?”

  “Hopefully not, Mr Burke. The South has no great basis of industry to fight from. The North has more of men, of guns, of ammunition. It should be a short conflict.”

  “It will not be, Mr Harris.” The intervention came from one of the pair certain that war would come, a Mr Keane, still with a trace of Irish in his accent. “The South has nothing other than a pretence of gentility and an agriculture bound up wholly with slavery. Lose their slaves and every Southern ‘gentleman’ becomes a pauper. They will fight on even though they have logically been defeated. The North will have to kill half of the men in the South before they will give up, and the casualties will be high and the cost enormous. If the English come in on the side of the South then they may yet win.”

  “You are the Englishman, Mr Burke. What do you think will happen?”

  “If there is a war and the supply of cotton dries up, then there will be hardship in England… But, that said, I cannot imagine the English going to war to support slave-owning. The Navy has spent the past forty years since the end of the Napoleonic conflict crushing the trade; the churches are united against it, apart from the Romanists, that is. Both political parties publicly despise the Turks as slaveholders and the Russians as slavedrivers and could not be seen as hypocrites in America. There would be outrage in the country was the government to send an expedition to intervene in such a conflict. No, sir, I do not expect England to become involved.”

  “You are certain of this, Mr Burke?”

  “I am within reason sure that the government of the day would be very hard-pressed to keep its majority in the House of Commons and might well be defeated in the Lords. Of course, political considerations would be paramount, as always, the welfare of the Party to be put ahead of any question of principle, but I cannot imagine that they will risk all in order to support any group of foreigners, except there is a sufficient financial gain to persuade them.”

  “An expensive business, one presumes, to buy the British government, sir!”

  “You would need say three hundred and thirty Members to vote for you, including all fifty or so of the ministers who form the government. Even at as little as ten thousand pounds apiece for each member that comes in at the better part of fifteen millions of your dollars, and I do not think you would buy Cabinet Ministers for that low a price, sir. Then you would have to keep them bought, for a single payment would not be enough – very short memories politicians tend to have, or so I read, and they would have to be reminded at frequent intervals. Not less than twenty millions a year, I would guess, gentlemen. And then you would have to buy the newspapers, for the electors must be persuaded to support the Members… Not cheap, I believe we may say!”

  “What of France, Mr Burke?”

  “Possibly, sir. That is where I would spend my money, certainly. But, I read that the French have some worries about the movement to unify the German states – they might not wish to send any significant army overseas, and they have ambitions in Africa and the Middle East and are entangled in Mexico. A war in America, which would give them little gain, for they have no great cotton industry after all, is unlikely. It would be an unprofitable exercise, unless perhaps they were promised American support to take back their old colonies in Canada.”

  “Impossible, Mr Burke. Such a promise, if made public, would bring England to war – it would not be a wise undertaking to make.”

  “Then, sir, the Southern States would be on their own, you believe?”

  “I think they must be, sir.”

  “They have more of a military tradition of recent years that we in the North. Most of our best officers are now Southerners.”

  Dick shrugged – soldiers could be made, he believed.

  “England was never a militaristic country, sir, but Napoleon was mistaken to despise us. The North may not have an army at first, yet there are men in plenty who will flock to your colours, I doubt not, and even if they are the rawest, greenest of amateurs then the taste of blood will soon mature them!”

  “Many will die, Mr Burke.”

  “That is war, sir, and it is a very good reason for all men of intelligence to try to avert it. Yet sometimes a war is the sole answer. I will not say that war is ever ‘good’, sir, but sometimes no war is worse. I would not have wished to live under the tyranny of Napoleon, and I cannot conceive why the Irish do not fight the English to the death.”

  “The Irish are far too busy fighting each other, Mr Burke!”

  “As, it would seem, the Americans soon will be, sir!”

  It was an unfortunate comment.

  “And what will you do, Mr Burke?”

  “I do not know, sir. I cannot approve of slavery, and it is probably the duty of every Christian man to fight against it. I must suppose that if the need arises, if war becomes a reality, then I will be unable to refuse to join it. I am a peaceable sort of chap, I believe, but there are certain provocations against decency and humanity that cannot be ignored. Slavery, I suspect, is one of them.”

  “Well said, sir.”

  There was general agreement round the table; the only man who did not approve of such belligerency seemed to be Dick himself, and he did not voice his doubts.

  “Was I you, Mr Burke, I would take the cars as far as Chicago and buy a pair of good horses there – cheaper and probably better than you could find further west. Buy yourself all of the necessities of western existence there and then make your way towards the edges of civilisation, eyes wide open for opportunity. Many young men will hire themselves out for a season as wagon guards to freighters. The land is wild and there are Border Ruffians and such who will seek to loot the wagons. It will do you no harm to have the name and appearance of a man who will fight if he must, and it will be easier to travel from place to place if you are in company, particularly in Missouri and Kansas.”

  A few months of, in effect, exploring the land might make sense, Dick thought, especially if his meals and lodging, such as it might be, came free.

  “What, sir, are the necessaries of western existence?”

  “Coffee-pot and a few pounds of beans. Water bottle for the saddle. Oilskin, which can be used underneath your bedding at night. Thick blanket and a buffalo hide coverall which can be worn in snow as well. Warm clothes – nights can be cold out on the prairies. A skillet and a pan to boil water or beans. Matches in a waterproof box. A block of salt – can be hard to come by on occasion. Pistol, rifle and two hundred rounds for each. Scatter gun can come in handy – quail or pigeon make a pleasant change. A pair of good sharp knives for butchering and skinning out anything you shoot, and for cutting bacon off the slab.”

  “Soap and a razor, I presume?”

  They shrugged – most places had a barber shop with baths as well; there was little need to waste scarce water out of town.

  “If you hire on as a guard then your food will be supplied, sir. On your own – a slab of bacon and a sack of beans generally does for most folk. I have known one or two who would take oats with them, and
some have a few packets of navy biscuits in their packs, but most don’t bother.”

  “Fill up on steak in town, and eat bread there, too – most places have an eating house with a cook who knows his way about his kitchen. Good living for a man who can dish up tasty food.”

  It sounded incredibly primitive, further from civilisation than Dick would have credited.

  “Have you any recommendations for the guns I should carry, sir? I am told there are many of various sorts. I know the duelling pistol from practice but have small familiarity with any other.”

  “Colt revolving pistols, sir, a pair of them, a heavy Walker Colt for the saddle holster and a Navy Colt as a belt gun.”

  The Irishman, Keane, demurred that having two different calibres could be a nuisance, the Walker Colt being a forty-four while the Navy was only thirty-six parts of an inch. Harris pointed out that the rifle would almost certainly be of a third specification, it was impossible to maintain a single calibre.

  “You will wish to reload at leisure in any case, Mr Burke. Loose powder, ball and cap to each chamber and a dab of grease to each to prevent any leakage of flame from one chamber to another – not to be done in any great hurry, as a rule. It will be simple enough to make sure that you load each pistol correctly.”

  “What of the rifle, sir?”

  “Sharps, 1853 model, sir. Fifty-two calibre, paper or linen-wrapped cartridge and breech-loading, the most modern of weapons, but not inexpensive – three times as much as a muzzle-loader and the cartridges themselves cost a little and are not to be found in every local store. But, and a very big but it is, you have a weapon that can easily fire an aimed round every ten seconds, or slightly better in the hands of an expert, will carry more than a thousand yards and is generally accurate at a quarter of a mile. It needs to be cared for, but it is a grand piece of persuasion to possess.”

  “It is, as well, a strong recommendation to a haulier, Mr Burke. A man who is hiring on guards may well look askance at a very young-seeming Englishman, a greenhorn, as they call them. But a man carrying a Sharps is a different matter.”