Run Them Ashore

by Adrian Goldsworthy

  ‘She is a handsome craft and a sweet sailor,’ Edward Pringle said, breaking the silence he had maintained as they rowed over in answer to the signal ‘Officers to repair on board’. Williams still did not know why he was included in the party, his only guide a gruff ‘You may be of some use’ from Sparrowhawk’s captain.

  The gig lurched as they once again felt the swell, but Williams made himself look up at the stern gallery of the ship. It was painted black, decorated in white and gold, and with the name TOPAZE painted in immaculately even and perfectly rounded golden letters above the row of seven windows.

  ‘Say what you like about the French, but they build damned fine ships.’ The captain smiled at Williams’ evident surprise, almost the first trace of humour he had shown in their brief acquaintance. ‘We had her from them back in ninety-three. Have even built some thirty-twos following her lines, but they never quite look the same. Too cramped, of course, far too cramped for comfort on a long voyage, but truly beautiful.’

  Williams was unsure that he would employ the word, and yet could see the elegance of the Topaze’s lines and appreciate the training, ritual and taut discipline which kept a working and fighting ship in such a state of neatness and order. He could also, even though they were now windward of her, still catch a trace of the smells of fresh paint, tar and all the odours inevitable on even the cleanest of ships when more than two hundred men lived so close together.

  Born in Cardiff, a few years later Williams’ widowed mother had taken the family to Bristol, with its far bigger port, and had run a boarding house, mostly for the masters and mates of merchantmen who had no family. Later still, he became an apprentice clerk in a shipping office, and so the world of cordage, canvas, spars and chandlers’ supplies was one he knew well. Although being on the coast was familiar and reassuring, Williams did not especially like the sea – or perhaps it was better to say that it seemed not to care for him – for he felt queasy at the gentlest motion and had suffered greatly on the transport ships which had carried the regiment to war and home again. It was far better aboard the Sparrowhawk, and he guessed that men-of-war were generally better handled and more stable than the old tubs hired to move soldiers. The milder waters of the Mediterranean no doubt also played a part, for, apart from one squall, the winds had been light. Williams could not yet claim to have embraced life at sea, but had to admit that this recent voyage was at least tolerable, rather than a prolonged test of endurance which he wished only to end.

  ‘Gently now.’ Without another order, the coxswain brought the boat alongside. The crew shipped oars, and after the softest of bumps the man in the bow fastened a long boathook into a ring on the frigate’s side. Captain Pringle was already on his feet and went up the steps cut in the side of the Topaze with practised ease. He was a small man, thin of face and narrow of lip, so unlike his big, plump younger brother that Williams struggled to see any similarity. When he mentioned this to his friend, Billy had joked that ‘Yes, it was a puzzle, but they do say I have a quite startling resemblance to the old baker’s boy!’ It was hard to imagine the older brother making any joke, let alone one with such vulgar implications. At twenty-eight, Edward Pringle looked older, although some of this was the air of stern omniscience he assumed as captain of his own ship. He also looked capable, and in this regard at least the brothers were alike.

  Williams could not actually see the captain climb on to the deck, but heard the pipe whistling. Lieutenant Reynolds, Sparrowhawk’s only other officer, went next, just a little more slowly, even though the stocky, red-faced man must have been at least forty, his dark hair streaked with grey. Things were better than in the past, but even so unlucky and poorly connected officers in His Majesty’s Navy could find promotion painfully slow, even in comparison to the army. The coxswain gestured for Williams to go next, just in case the soldier had forgotten the proper order of things. He had come clumsily down into the boat, foot slipping on one of the steps, and was determined not to make a similar mistake. Deliberation was likely to make things worse, and so he tried not to think, bounding from the boat and trusting to instinct.

  His left knee struck hard against the timbers of Topaze and bounced out, his other foot was waving in empty space, while both hands clawed at the same step. Somehow one boot and then the other found toeholds and then he began to climb.

  ‘Ruddy lobsters,’ a voice whispered faintly from among the gig’s crew.

  ‘Hush, damn your eyes,’ the coxswain said almost as quietly.

  Williams ignored them and climbed. As he came nearer the top the side of the ship curved steeply inwards, another feature of French design which came as a great relief to the redcoat officer. Finally on deck, he found himself marvelling at the sheer bulk of the mainmast just ahead of him and the sense of being almost enclosed in endless webs of rigging and ropes. They were led aft towards the quarterdeck, where presentations were made to Captain Hope, his two lieutenants and a very young lieutenant of marines. Williams was glad that he had had time to don his good jacket, white breeches and boots, for this was a smart gathering. It was widely believed that the Royal Marines were always especially keen to outshine any redcoats from the army, and at least today he was able to give a good account of himself.

  With introductions made, they processed down a companionway on to the gun deck. Williams had already passed several of the stubby carronades, the barrel half the length of a cannon, but far thicker and throwing two or three times the weight of shot. At close range these heavy smashers were devastating, but on the gun deck Topaze had conventional twelve-pounders, as big as the biggest cannon ever used by the army in battle. There were thirteen on either side, and these could throw their shot a mile or more. It was a humbling thought that even this fifth-rate ship, too small to serve in the line-of-battle of a great fleet action, could still fire a greater weight of shot than all the field guns of Lord Wellington’s army lined up wheel to wheel.

  Topaze’s guns were silent at the moment, barrels black and carriages red-brown with recent paint, and it was not really the heavy armament which made a man-of-war so different from a merchant ship or transport. For Williams it was partly the Navy’s dedication to – even obsession with – cleanliness. As they came down from the quarterdeck he saw dozens of sailors crouching, pulling at ropes to drag holystones – heavy blocks of Portland stone several feet in length – to grind the sand sprinkled on the planking of the lower deck, rubbing it smooth. Sparrowhawk holystoned the deck only on Sundays and Thursdays – the noise and sacred respect given to the work made it impossible even for passengers to ignore – and so he guessed Captain Hope must have a different routine on his ship. Everything was neatly stowed, where possible scrubbed, painted or polished until it shone, and there was also an abundance of everything. The ropes on a merchantman almost always looked old, their owners even less keen than their Lords of the Admiralty to spend money keeping their ships in trim. There was an abundance too of people, and in the end this for Williams was the key distinction. Men-of-war were crowded, bustling places in a near-constant state of activity – indeed, of many distinct activities carried on side by side. A merchant ship never had a big enough crew to attend to so many different things.

  It was a world of its own, Williams decided, and one in which he remained a stranger, with a constant sense that he was in the way. No one said anything to him as they went through the doors, in his case instinctively ducking for he had more than once hit his head on the low doorways of Sparrowhawk. He was relieved to find that the frigate offered far more space, and when they came to the captain’s day cabin, it seemed spacious indeed, bright sunlight coming through the stern windows he had seen from outside as they had rowed across.

  Captain Hope came swiftly to the matter in hand, assembling them around the long table on which a number of charts were spread and weighted down.

  ‘Gentlemen, as you know, tonight I intend to raid the harbour at Las Arenas.’

  Williams had not known, but since he was sup
posed to be on shore with the others there was no reason for anyone to have told him. No one else gave the slightest hint of surprise. Instead they had the same predatory eagerness of the young captain. All of the officers, save for the marine – a gap-toothed fellow named Jones, whose mouth hung permanently open – had spent the greater part of their lives at sea. Captain Hope was twenty-three and had been made post more than two years ago. Reynolds had told him this, in a tone mingling admiration with the bitter disappointment of a man who had been a lieutenant for more than a decade. A post captain would rise steadily in seniority, but the prospects of a lieutenant put on shore on half-pay were a good deal less rosy.

  ‘I had hoped the Rambler would have reached us, but there is no sign of her, and we must seize this opportunity while it is offered.’ Williams had heard mention of the other brig, and understood that she and Topaze frequently cruised together.

  ‘We cannot wait. At dawn this morning I stood off and took a look at the place and the harbour was busy. There are usually half a dozen or so privateers there, but today there are twice as many masts as usual. Some may be prizes, some merchantmen supplying Bonaparte’s army, but there is a schooner and a couple of xebecs I am sure belong to Bavastro.’

  That caused a stir, and Hope let them smile and chatter.

  ‘He is an Italian rogue,’ Reynolds said to Williams. ‘Keeps a squadron with letters of marque and preys on shipping all along the coast of Spain. They do say Napoleon has given him medal after medal.’

  ‘Yes, we all know that rascal, and it seems the report that some of his men have come farther west than usual is true. I have seen the schooner before, although have never been close enough to catch her. She is pierced for twelve guns, although who knows how many she actually mounts.’

  ‘Can we be sure they are still there?’ Edward Pringle asked.

  ‘A good question, and as you would guess I cannot give a certain answer. Most must be, or we would have seen them leave. Rambler should be coming from east-nor-east down the coast, so there is always a chance that she will catch any of them trying to slip out that way. But if we wait longer then the odds are that more of them will get away, and so many fast, small craft will be the devil of a job to catch.

  ‘Therefore we shall go in tonight in boats, cut out as many as we can and burn the rest. We shall need both your boats, Captain Pringle, as well as our own. There are two batteries guarding the harbour, and we must deal with them. Now you have all done this sort of thing before, so I do not need to tell you that we must move fast and everyone must know the tasks they are to perform.’ The young captain paused for a moment, smiling. ‘My apologies, Mr Williams, I am speaking out of turn and forgetting that you are not a mariner. It is perhaps unfair to ask you this in company, but from what Captain Pringle has told me, it appeared safe to anticipate your answer. With Rambler still absent and several prize crews not yet returned, we have fewer officers than I would like, and it is leaders we need on a night like this. Would you do us the honour of joining our little enterprise?’

  It was a courteous enough request, but the unfairness was also obvious as the others all turned to look at him. Sergeant Dobson had strong opinions about volunteering and would no doubt stretch the boundaries of discipline to their limit in expressing them. The veteran had an equally strong sense of pride and a decidedly tribal attachment to the reputation of the company, the battalion and the army as a whole. Expecting and sympathising with the complaints, Williams knew that there was no real choice, both because of their duty and his confidence that a request could surely become an order if required. All that remained was to accede with grace.

  Williams straightened up, coming to attention. ‘It will be an honour to serve under your command, sir,’ he said, and then bowed.

  ‘Excellent.’ Captain Hope looked genuinely pleased. ‘I trust we shall provide you with a diverting evening. Even if boarding ships is new to you, much of the fighting will be on shore and I doubt very much that you have much to learn on that score.’

  Williams bowed again, but could think of nothing to say that would not sound a little pompous.

  ‘Good, then that is settled.’ The young captain looked down at the table. Presumably his command of the small flotilla granted him commodore’s rank, if only fleetingly, but no one mentioned the title and the redcoat had not spotted a pennant as he came aboard.

  ‘Now if you would care to look at this plan of the harbour,’ Hope said, and Williams craned his neck to see better. Las Arenas itself lay half a mile back from the mouth of a river, a place which before the war had thrived from fishing and the coastal trade. Its name came from the sandy beaches on either side, and the sandbanks which made the channel narrower than it seemed, and closed the port off to any really big ship. An old sea wall and jetty formed a harbour just in front of the village, but the estuary opened into a partly enclosed bay that was a natural anchorage. Most of the ships were anchored in the bay, although several were usually along or near the jetty. The batteries were both marked, one on the southern headland enclosing the anchorage and the other guarding the jetty itself.

  ‘It’s a tough little nut,’ Captain Hope declared, ‘and this is how we shall crack it.’ He slammed his palm down on the table and began to explain.

  They went in early, before the moon rose. Williams was in the leftmost division, formed from Sparrowhawk’s cutter and gig, a rope linking them so that they kept together during the long row in. Captain Pringle, Cassidy, a coxswain and sixteen sailors were crammed into the cutter. Williams, Dobson, a Midshipman Treadwell and Sparrowhawk’s gunner were in the gig, along with Corporal Milne, seven marines and six sailors. All of the sailors wore dark blue shirts or jackets. If they saw anyone this night who was not in blue or the scarlet and white of a marine then they were an enemy. To starboard, Captain Hope in his pinnace led the red and the black cutters from Topaze, some seventy officers and men divided between the boats. Williams could see Hope standing in the prow, searching ahead with the aid of a night glass. He could just see the outlines of the right division, with Topaze’s launch, gig and little jolly-boat filled with another fifty-five men. All the boats had just changed the men rowing. Half would now rest, and these men were to be the first to board or land on shore. Once they were nearer, the lines linking all the boats would be cast off as each went about its task.

  Williams found the soft rhythmic slashing of the oar blades through the water restful, blending naturally with the gentle slap of the tide against the boats. It was still coming in, although he could sense the flow of the river emptying into the sea. They had already passed one of the sandbanks, a darker shape in the water, surprisingly small and low compared to the ones he had grown up seeing in the Bristol Channel. The tide was also far less formidable, and he had to concentrate as he tried to gauge whether or not it had started to turn. They wanted it to be going out so that it was easier for them to float out the captured vessels. Not that those were his first concern. When the signal came, the gig would cast off and his party was to secure the battery near the jetty. Once there, they were to spike or otherwise render the cannon useless – Mr Prentice the Gunner had tinderbox, fuses and a small keg of powder as well as hammer and nails. After that, they were either to retire in the gig, join Captain Pringle on one of the prizes, or take or burn any other vessel which had not been otherwise dealt with.

  ‘We must not be too prescriptive,’ Captain Hope had said. ‘Night actions are always confused, and it is better to have the freedom to seize any opportunity.’ Williams suspected that Edward Pringle was less convinced and fonder of greater rigidity, but he said nothing and deferred to the senior officer.

  There was such an assurance about the naval officers’ manner that it was readily infectious. Given that a few men must stay with the gig, there were fifteen of them to overpower the guards and gunners in the battery and hold it against any reinforcement until it was destroyed. Williams had asked Reynolds about the likely number of crews on board the ships a
nd other defenders near by and was amazed, even appalled, at the reply. At the very least, the attacking parties would face three or four times their own numbers.

  ‘Privateers tend to have large complements,’ the lieutenant explained. ‘Their business is to capture ships, so they rely on boarding and swamping their opponents with numbers. No sense pounding a little brig to pieces if you intend to make it your own property.’ There might well be regular troops as well. ‘Bonaparte has sent contingents of naval gunners to man the coastal batteries, and there are usually a few soldiers about.’

  Reynolds had sounded gloomy, but only because he was to be left to command the Sparrowhawk. The brig was to come closer to the estuary, ready to meet any enemy who tried to slip out. Topaze was to engage the battery on the headland if it opened fire, so that the enemy might suspect they were under a full assault by ships and not parties in boats.

  The plan was bold, and Williams could not help feeling that anyone proposing a similar attack on land would be dismissed as a reckless fool. Yet the sailors spoke with perfect confidence. They had all done such things before, of course, and belonged to a service which had been doing such things for decades, more often than not – indeed, far more often – with great success. As yet the army could not match such complacent expectation of victory, but then nor could it boast so many successful actions. It was just a few days since they had sailed past Cape Trafalgar, Williams and the other soldiers almost as deeply moved as the sailors to be so near such a hallowed place – if the ever-moving waters could be called a place. It was not quite five years since Nelson had fallen at the moment of triumph, and since then no French fleet had dared to challenge the King’s Navy in battle. It was not the same on land, and Napoleon’s legions crushed enemy after enemy. Under Lord Wellington the army had won a few battles, but somehow it always seemed to end with retreat.