An Honorable War
The Honor Series
By Robert N. Macomber
At the Edge of Honor
Point of Honor
Honorable Mention
A Dishonorable Few
An Affair of Honor
A Different Kind of Honor
The Honored Dead
The Darkest Shade of Honor
Honor Bound
Honorable Lies
Honors Rendered
The Assassin’s Honor
An Honorable War
An Honorable War
A Novel of
Captain Peter Wake, Office of Naval Intelligence, USN
13th in the Honor Series
Robert N. Macomber
Pineapple Press, Inc.
Sarasota, Florida
Copyright © 2017 by Robert N. Macomber
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Inquiries should be addressed to:
Pineapple Press, Inc.
P.O. Box 3889
Sarasota, Florida 34230
www.pineapplepress.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Macomber, Robert N., 1953- author.
Title: An honorable war : the Spanish-American War begins : a novel of Cmdr.
Peter Wake, Office of Naval Intelligence, USN / Robert N. Macomber.
Description: Sarasota, Florida : Pineapple Press, Inc., [2017] | Series:
Honor series ; 13
Identifiers: LCCN 2016034078| ISBN 9781561649723 (hardback) | ISBN
9781561649730 (pbk.)
Subjects: LCSH: Wake, Peter (Fictitious character)--Fiction. | United States.
Navy--Officers--Fiction. | United States--History, Naval--19th
century--Fiction. | GSAFD: Historical fiction.
Classification: LCC PS3613.A28 H662 2017 | DDC 813/.6--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016034078
First Edition
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Design by Demi Brown
Printed in the United States
This novel is respectfully dedicated
to two masters of the historical novel genre.
C. S. Forester (1899–1966)
and
George MacDonald Fraser (1927–2008)
Who understood the nineteenth century so well,
and led the way back for the rest of us.
Robert N. Macomber
An Introductory Word with My Readers
When writing this thirteenth novel in the Honor Series about Peter Wake, it occurred to me both new and longtime readers might appreciate a simple timeline of our fictional hero’s life until this point. It is thus appended below. I also suggest reading each chapter’s endnotes for more information on the places and people in the story.
Timeline of Peter Wake’s life from 1839 to early 1898:
1839—June 26—born into seafaring family on coast of Massachusetts
1852—goes to sea to learn the trade in his father’s schooner
1855—promoted to schooner mate
1857—promoted to command of a schooner
1861—Civil War begins
1863—loses merchant marine draft exemption and volunteers for the navy—stationed at Key West—“Acting Lieutenant” Wake commands sailing gunboat Rosalie on SW Florida coast and the Bahamas—Irish boatswain’s mate (bosun) Sean Rork joins Rosalie’s crew—Wake and Rork become lifelong best friends
(as depicted in At the Edge of Honor)
1864—chases Union deserters to French-occupied Mexico—marries Linda Donahue at Key West, with Rork as best man—engaged in shore operation against Confederates in Florida
(as depicted in Point of Honor)
1865—daughter Useppa born at Useppa Island—tumultuous end of Civil War in Florida and Cuba—post-war mission to find ex-Confederates in Puerto Rico
(as depicted in Honorable Mention)
1867—gains regular commission as lieutenant—son Sean born at Pensacola Naval Station
1869—court-martialed for mutiny after relieving his captain of duty at sea on coast of Panama while on mission against renegade American former naval officer—acquitted of charges but reputation tarnished
(as depicted in A Dishonorable Few)
1874—involved in sordid incidents in Spain and Italy—saved by Jesuits—a French woman enters his life—rescues French civilians in Africa and awarded Legion of Honor by France—promoted to lieutenant commander
(as depicted in An Affair of Honor)
1880—embarks on first espionage mission during South American War of the Pacific—cements his lifelong relationship with the Jesuits—awarded the Order of the Sun by Peru—his wife Linda dies of cancer—sinks into depression—helps form the Office of Naval Intelligence
(as depicted in A Different Kind of Honor)
1883—espionage mission to French Indo-China—becomes lifelong friends with King Norodom of Cambodia—promoted to commander—awarded the Royal Order of Cambodia—Wake and Rork buy Patricio Island in SW Florida and build bungalows there
(as depicted in The Honored Dead)
1886—meets Theodore Roosevelt in NYC—meets José Martí in NYC—espionage mission against the Spanish in Havana, Tampa, and Key West—deadly struggle against Spanish secret police begins—lifelong friendship with Martí and Roosevelt starts
(as depicted in The Darkest Shade of Honor)
1888—a search for lady friend’s missing son in the Bahamas and Haiti becomes a love affair and espionage mission—begins relationship with Russian secret service—his marriage proposal rejected by his lover after which he falls back into depression
(as depicted in Honor Bound)
1888—mission to rescue Cuban spies from the Spanish in Havana—through Martí’s introduction, a lifelong friendship with Free Masons begins—barely escapes Spanish secret police in Cuba
(as depicted in Honorable Lies)
1890—learns the love affair in 1888 produced a daughter, Patricia, who is growing up in Illinois
1889—espionage mission against the Germans in the South Pacific—awarded Royal Order of Kalakaua by the Kingdom of Hawaii—gains gratitude of President Cleveland—shame at his actions in Samoa
(as depicted in Honors Rendered)
1890—leaves espionage work and returns to sea in command of cruiser—his son Sean graduates from the U.S. Naval Academy and becomes a commissioned officer
1892—has love affair with Maria Ana Maura of Spain—brought back into espionage work on counter-assassination mission in Mexico and Florida—saves Martí’s life—returns to sea command
(as depicted in The Assassin’s Honor)
1893—marries Maria at Key West in double ceremony with daughter Useppa and her Cuban fiancé Mario Cano—promoted to rank of captain—Rork promoted to the newly established rank of Chief Boatswain Mate
1895—May 19—dear friend José Martí killed in action fighting the Spanish in Cuba
1897—ends seven years of sea duty with special assignment at Navy Department
1898—Spanish-American war begins
In An Honorable War, we find Wake in the thick of events leading to the Spanish-American War, the pivotal event which changed America’s role in the world. It is a war Wake predicted for a decade and tried t
o avert for years. Now, he must fight it. Three novels in the Honor Series will cover the Spanish-American War in Cuba and Puerto Rico.
Wake’s active duty naval career will continue beyond this war, not ending until 1908. This means many more novels in the Honor Series, for the turn of the century was full of momentous events, the consequences of which dictated world history for the next ninety years. And what, you may fairly ask, will happen with our man after 1908?
With a fellow like Peter Wake, anything is possible.
Robert N. Macomber
The Boat House
St. James, Pine Island
Florida
Preface by Peter Wake
For twelve years, I’d predicted war with Spain was coming and that we in the navy had to be ready. For many national leaders, my message was not only uncomfortable, it was inconvenient.
Then USS Maine exploded in Havana’s harbor. Instantly, everything changed. Several officials, who for years had studiously ignored the horrific situation in Cuba, did an abrupt about-face. In their fevered ignorance of modern combat, these politicians righteously shouted this would be an honorable war against a despicable and cowardly foe.
Such naïveté was soon echoed among people across the land. Hundreds of thousands of men flocked to the bright colors and stirring sounds of parades. Signing on the dotted line, they enlisted with a grin, as if joining a sports team. Within months, ill-equipped and untrained, they endured experiences in the jungles of Cuba far more terrible than most could have ever imagined. They learned war is not a game. In the brutality of combat, the luxury of honor is one of the first things lost.
I was in the middle of it all, from the beginning to the end. This memoir reveals what happened to me at the beginning of the war. Some of my decisions were subsequently deemed controversial by those august personages who sit in the plush halls of power. I will let the reader decide whether I was right or wrong.
RADM Peter Wake, USN (Ret.)
12 June 1909
1
A Muffled Thud
Havana, Cuba
Tuesday evening
15 February 1898
Though it was the middle of February, the Cuban night was unseasonably warm and quiet. As if the island were exhausted from the tragedies endured by its inhabitants, only the tiniest breath of humid air ruffled the water from the far side of the harbor. Above me, a fleeting glimpse of constellation Leo could be seen between scattered clouds, but the Southern Cross was still hiding below the horizon. Exotic blends of African-Latin music drifted over from the dimly lit taverns along the shoreline. The faint slow rhythm carried with it a whiff of charcoal and stale fried fish.
The whole place was asleep or drunk or, in the case of sailors aboard the scattered ships at anchor, dreaming of getting drunk if they ever got ashore. Life was slow. Its energy was sapped by the indolent atmosphere, as it has been for the past four hundred years in the latitudes of mañana. So listless was the scene on the shoreline that, except for the guard boats traversing the harbor, you would never imagine there was a bloody, no-quarter-given, thirty-year civil war going on outside the city and across the island. Tens of thousands had already died, and no end was in sight.
After thirty-five years in the navy, none of this was new or exciting to me anymore. I felt tired, wanting to go home to Maria. Finally, my orders from Roosevelt had arrived and I was heading home at last. But there were things to do first, professional responsibilities which also weren’t new or exciting anymore.
The tiny bumboat had just shoved off from the anchored American warship. She was illuminated with lines of electric light bulbs suspended from the rigging, an outward show of friendly intent on her “routine goodwill visit.” If you looked closer, though, you could see she was anything but peaceful. On the main deck patrolled an armed double watch of wary sailors and nervous officers. Colt machine guns in the upper works were manned and loaded. The massive ten-inch guns loomed over everything. The pretty lighting fooled few. The huge ship was designed to kill people, ships, and cities, quickly and efficiently. She was ready for action, should her captain order it.
The bumboat headed for the Regla docks, half a mile away. I judged there was a fifty-fifty chance it would sink before reaching our goal, due to a leak in the transom which was filling the bilge. With me in the stern and two ancient boatmen amidships, both of them reeking of rum and cheap cigars, the freeboard was a perilous eight inches at most. Drunk they most certainly were, but I had to admit each of them pulled his oar with a steady stroke and our voyage across the dark harbor was arrow straight. I upped the odds of making it to the dock to sixty percent.
Of course, a proper naval officer wouldn’t dress in my present attire or step foot into such a craft. But at this moment in time, I wasn’t a proper naval officer. The boat and clothes fit my façade as a down-and-out Canadian tobacco broker. The faded blue cotton suit, half-tied old brogans, battered valise, and floppy straw hat seemed to work. The American sailors and officers on the ship initially believed my ruse as much as the street idlers did on land. The only men in Havana who knew my identity were the captain of the ship and Rork at Regla. No, there was one other—Colonel Isidro Marrón, of the dreaded Spanish secret police.
Two hundred feet from the ship, I heard a muffled thud from behind, seemingly from below the water. I started to turn around to see what had happened.
In that instant, everything erupted into a blur of light and deafening noise.
2
Dead Man Floating
Havana, Cuba
Tuesday evening
15 February 1898
My next impression was of being under water. I was suspended in a curiously blissful state, in a black world. My mouth and stomach filled, but there was no panic, no fear, only stunned resignation at the hand fate had dealt me—so this was the end?
Without any effort on my part, my body rose to the surface. The bliss ended.
Fear gripped me. I couldn’t see. No stars, shore lights, ships. Everything was still black. I reached for my eyes to make sure they were open. They were, but I still couldn’t see. No sounds came to me beyond a loud high-pitched buzzing.
My hands searched for the bumboat. It and the old men were gone. Hunks of metal and wood rained down on my head and shoulders, pummeling me painfully. Blind and deaf and bleeding from a dozen places, I floated, unable to do anything else, utterly disoriented as to where I was and what had happened.
Moments later, I felt waves push over me. Guessing small boats were moving nearby, I tried to call out for help, but couldn’t. The most I could do was gag on the filthy water choking up from my stomach.
How long I floated there I cannot say—at least ten minutes, or perhaps thirty. Time had no measure. My mind began to process the scene. In my career, I had been near enough to explosions to recognize the sensations taking over my body, the loss of sight and hearing and mental perception. And I knew those senses might return in minutes, or hours, or maybe never.
Primal instinct took over. This must be an act of violence, of war. Enemies were all around. The slimy water was safer than being taken by the enemy. I would stay hidden in the water.
I had to think, to assess. Flexing my hands and feet, I found them sore, but still working. Legs and arms hurt even more, as if forced into unnatural attitudes, but seemed able to function. The back of my head and neck produced a sharp pain when turning my head to the left, the position I was in when everything happened. I deduced the lacerations on my shoulders and arms, already inflamed by the salt water, weren’t too deep or the muscles wouldn’t have performed. Fear was replaced by reason. Breathing became more regular. I willed myself to remain calm.
Sight was the first sense to gradually return. Darkness evolved into shades, from pitch black to gray. Points of light came into focus, faint colors became discernable, then shapes and movements. My ability to understand what I was seeing cam
e next, and it was frightening.
The warship I’d just been aboard was a huge mass of twisted metal sitting low in the water, enveloped by flaming eruptions and churning banks of red tinged smoke. It all seemed unreal, some sort of grotesque hallucination from Dante’s lower levels. My hearing returned, then smell. The shrieking men and the putrid-sweet odor of burning flesh proved this nightmarish tableau wasn’t a delusion. It was only too real.
The U.S.S. Maine, which I had just departed, was no more. My guess was by a torpedo launched from the nearby Spanish cruiser Alfonso. The war my friend Roosevelt had predicted eleven months earlier, and which I had feared for over a decade, had finally begun. Floating there, surrounded by the dead and the dying, another fact progressively became obvious. Officially, to both my enemies and my compatriots, my status had drastically changed.
I was now a dead man.
The logical part of my mind deemed this as a good thing. It provided me with unbounded freedom of action. Spurred by this analysis, I began to use my arms to propel me toward the Regla docks. Rork would be there—if he was still alive.
But the passionate side of me soon intruded into my calculations, bringing visions of my darling Maria. Our last time together had been a stressful confrontation. Emotions rose in my throat when I thought of her pain when she would learn of my apparent death, the details of which would not, could not, be revealed to her by the naval authorities.
I had to banish her from my mind—the memory made me weaker, not stronger. I must think clearly, for many lives, perhaps thousands, might depend on what I did next. I dogpaddled onward, analyzing what the enemy’s other moves would be, and what Rork and I could do against them.
Halfway to shore, my psyche and body weakened. Unable to swim any farther, I drifted amidst the debris. Other memories began parading through my mind. They were from eleven months earlier, at a far different place, where my strange journey leading to Havana had begun.
An Honorable War Page 1
