Nelson: The Poisoned River

by Needle, Jan

  Tim took the proffered notebook, but there was no time for more talk, because other men were shouting for assistance. The cutter nosed among the native craft and dories, separating the deep draft from the shallow, exhorting those that were too heavy to find a shore or sandbank and offload and lighten. After a while he was hailed by Colonel Polson, and they rested on their oars to parley.

  ‘We can’t go on, sir,’ Polson said. ‘We have hardly made two miles. There is not a vessel in this fleet that has not been on the bottom. What say you, sir? We stop.’

  A question of command arose here, but Nelson was careful to make nothing of it. His mobile face was like a picture, though, which Tim was reading like a book.

  ‘I would say we’ve managed three,’ he said. ‘Three miles or maybe four. Certainly a good tally for the very first attempt, sir. Stop, sir? What for? By all means for a conference and restowing of the boats. Some of them aren’t fit to go across a pleasure pond.’

  Before the colonel could respond, Nelson bellowed orders, to his own boat and to others within earshot.

  ‘That bank looks likely! When all boats are clear we head for that. Haul up as far as each hull can, then unload your heavy stuff. This time we do it navy fashion!’

  In twenty more minutes all boats were ashore, except the bigger craft, which were stuck fast way out in the river. Canoes were directed to lighten them and bring the surplus to the bank. Very soon the piles of lumber were growing up like man-made mountains.

  Nelson gathered up his boatswains and their mates, Captain Despard joined them, a Lieutenant called James Mounsey, and finally the colonel.

  ‘It is now gone four o’clock,’ Polson began. ‘Which means the dark comes soon. I fear we must go back down river for this night.’

  Before anyone could respond there was a sharp scream from the treeline. A flash of yellow, then more yells, and then, belatedly, a shot.

  ‘By God, did you see that! A bloody tiger! It has got that man!’

  ‘They call them jaguars round here,’ said Captain Despard, laconically. ‘Sometimes mountain lions. Tigers come from very far away.’

  ‘In India,’ responded Nelson. ‘I have seen them, sir. In any way, if it got that man, the fellow seems quite well on it. Just see him run!’

  ‘And time is running also,’ snapped Polson. ‘We must leave a guard on all this stuff and run back with the current to the town.’

  ‘What if the guard gets eaten, though?’ suggested Despard. His Irish brogue was unnaturally pronounced. He was making fun, thought Hastie.

  So did Polson, but Nelson nipped further conflict in the bud.

  ‘Here is what we’ll do,’ he said. ‘With your agreement, Colonel Polson. We will unload further, then half the boats can continue upstream with the residue. The other half will hurry downstream empty, and explain the problem of shoals and shallow draft. They will share out the contents of the boats waiting at Greytown, and set off in the morning to rejoin us here. The heavy transports, grounded now, can stay and act as guardships. When we have a constant chain moving upriver, we can unload them till they’re light enough to move. That way, nothing is lost.’

  Everyone but Polson was nodding. His face was dour.

  ‘And tonight?’ he said. ‘I suppose you think we stand here on the beach and wave our handkerchiefs?’

  Nelson chuckled.

  ‘I like your humour, sir,’ he said. ‘That is very droll. But for myself I propose to have a tent erected. Good God, sir, why be in the navy if your men can’t rig a shelter?’ His smile broadened. ‘Or the army too, for that matter. I’m looking forward to it, sir. I have much of the child about me still, I fear.’

  The job was done, the poison drawn from Polson’s temper. Tim caught him with a smile upon his face, half hidden, and felt his own heart lighten.

  Although, he told himself two hours later, I’m damned if I know why. I’m lying here in a tent much hotter than an oven, pitch-pitchy black and only half past six at night, with a sweaty bastard stretched beside me snoring like a sow. And outside the tent it’s ten times noisier, at least. Are those birds screaming? Do alligators roar? Will the hungry puma come back for his interrupted meal?

  I want to write my journal down for you, he thought. My Sarah, cariad. For you will not believe me if I leave it till long, you will say I made it up to frighten you. But I can’t write, though, because I have no light, and tomorrow I must surely be too busy.

  And there’s a new noise now, and it’s getting louder than the snoring and the howls of the monkeys in the trees. I know this noise though, and I hate it, for I fear it’s going to kill Horatio.

  The mosquitos. They start at dusk, go on till closing midnight as far as I can tell, and then the cold comes down, or up out of the ground, the cold, and mist, and running, running dew.

  Our official medical supremo, Dr Moseley, who did not dare to join us on the expedition, and his pupil Dr Dancer who did, both insist the mosquitos have naught to do with the vile disease, malaria.

  But Sarah, I am telling you. They’re wrong.

  As he drifted off to sleep, still scratching, still smacking at his skin, still worrying, he had at last one thought that made him smile.

  At least I’ve got my bollocks still. The fishes didn’t bite them off…

  Thirteen

  There appear to be no humans on this river, Hastie thought when he emerged not long after sun-up the next morning, but there might be some supermen. Or one, at least – Horatio Nelson.

  He saw it as his duty, having not slept beside him, to check him out as soon as possible, and monitor his health, and feed him any necessary potions. But when he crawled out into the thick and noisome mist that lay on shore and river, he found the captain was already gone.

  Despard hailed a greeting.

  ‘Mr Hastie. You look displaced, sir. Did someone creep into your tent and inflict indignity upon you?’

  He laughed as heartily as if he was in a four-ale tavern. He was bedraggled, as was Tim and every other fellow. The night had gone from hot to freezing, and the morning soup was burning off before their eyes. As the dank mist faded, the heat rose like a wild horse on the leap.

  ‘Where is my captain, sir? Is he still sleeping? That would be good news indeed.’

  Despard coughed, and spat on to the mud.

  ‘The devil he is. He was up and out of here an hour since. Damn near trod on my face in getting out of doors. Or tent flaps, rather. He has taken pitpans down to Greytown. More stores, more organising. That man is like a firecracker, sir. He dines on farts and gunpowder.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Hastie. ‘Oh. And was he…? How did his health seem, sir?’

  ‘Nelson is busy,’ Despard said. ‘Nelson is well, therefore. And I am busy now, because he says there are tasks that only I can do. He did not mention you, so come with me and complete the destruction of your uniform if you wish! Liverpool Blue, eh? Liverpool gooseshit green, more like.’

  Tim Hastie, on a whim, agreed to go with Despard. The Irishman was strong and funny, and as lively as ten crickets in a bag. And Nelson was up and jolly, which, Tim hoped, was all he needed for recovery. To be busy, and away from Dr Dancer.

  The task was simple (for a man like Despard, who had trained in bush fighting against the rebels of America), and a hundred times better than crawling up the river humping stores and dragging boats off mud. Hastie recovered his small belongings from the lieutenant’s tent, washed his mouth out from his water bottle, and hurried to the water’s edge. Then into the water, shouting, for Despard’s Indians had already set off.

  ‘Sir! Captain! Wait for me!’

  He was up to his upper thighs before he caught the cockleshell, and the Mosquitos joined in Despard’s merriment. But they handled their paddles to the manner born, and the vessel went up river like an arrow. Within five minutes he was handing instruments and pencils, chart-blanks and cartridge paper, to the captain. And aiding in a survey of the banks.

  ‘Note that,’ said the of
ficer at one point. ‘If worst comes to worst, that could be our camp tonight. We made six miles last evening by the end, despite old Polson’s grumbling, and although it’s not enough it’s not disastrous. There’s a good savannah there, good cover from the trees, good driftwood just begging to be fired. Note the shape of that rock there. That can be our marker.’

  By the time they turned about they had found two more stopping sites, and mapped the deeps and shallows on all the river bends between. It was well into afternoon that they met the Nelson vanguard pushing hard upstream, and both sides rested on their oars and paddles.

  ‘Well met!’ cried Nelson. ‘And Timothy indeed, that’s a relief. I figured you had been took by a cayman for his luncheon.’

  ‘I beg your pardon, sir. I was—’

  ‘Bored, I hope, and quite right too. But Despard, if Tim was a help to you, you cannot have him, sir! I saw him first, and like his funny accent!’

  Which coming from you, thought Timothy, is rich indeed.

  ‘I hope, sir,’ he said however, on a sudden whim, ‘I hope that Captain Despard will let me aid him at the writing table. He says he must do reports, and fill in maps and all sorts. You might tell him, sir, that I am always scribbling.’

  ‘Good man!’ said Despard. ‘I have a folding table in my tent. Captain Nelson takes up rather too much room for you to squeeze in also, but you can bivouac hard by, for certainty. Good man!’

  That evening, the camp went much as previous. Men who had been rowing, and hauling, and wading, and lifting gear from one hull to another were too fatigued in general to do more than hit the ground and sleep. There was some bickering over precedence among the junior officers, and some arguing over discipline. But before anything like a fight could break, the squabbles slipped to snoring.

  There were factions developing, however, which Nelson, Polson and Despard had little control over. The regular men, the men in proper regiments, were watched like hawks for drinking in particular, and two or three were threatened with a whipping for it. But the irregulars, the Jamaica Volunteers, the slaves and free blacks, and more particularly the Mosquito men, did not like camp discipline, and could see no need for it.

  Some of the Indians indeed, to men newly from England like Hastie and his fellows, were impossible to believe or understand. Their headmen rejoiced in names Tim found amazing, and was certain Sarah would take as jests. One called himself an Admiral, and insisted that his title should be used. Another of the chiefs was General Tempest, whose uniform consisted of some feathers and a cloth. But when Nelson caught Tim laughing at it, he had his ears pinned back.

  ‘Do not show your ignorance, Mr Hastie,’ the captain said. ‘Without these savages, as you care to think them, this expedition is lost. Our pilot Mr Hanna, between you and me, is ten times worse than useless, but the admiral and the general will whisk us up this river in fine order. Just wait until you meet the King!’

  As so often, Hastie was thrown aback. Nelson could seem so grave and formal, could hand out punishment without fear or favour, and then slip into humour that was hard to read or fathom. Was this a jest, or real?

  ‘Sir?’ he said, weakly. ‘The King?’

  Bright eyes in pale and sweating face. Nelson nodded.

  ‘There is a Duke of York as well. Fine men, the lot of ’em, and under no circumstances to be mocked. They may well yet save all our useless lives.’

  The problem was, though, that the Indians hated the English style of conduct. They hated the rations they were expected to eat, they hated taking orders from men they thought hopeless on their land, they did not want to sleep at certain hours, they did not want to be silent after dark. And they loved to drink.

  As did the soldiers, too, especially the irregulars. The navy men were not more harshly ruled, but they obeyed more readily. Nelson said it was because the sea was unforgiving. Hastie thought it was their shipmates who controlled them, for the common good.

  But by the third day there was danger in the air, not just from crocodiles and puma. As the men got more accustomed to the killing labour, they retained more energy for drinking and for argument.

  Tim Hastie noted in his journal: ‘It is like a bear garden. We need an enemy, and quick. Despard, tonight, sent out Indians to go upstream as far as maybe. I pray, my dear, they bring news of a fight.’

  It was the Duke of York’s men who obliged. They slipped back into camp just before next dawn, and reported men at arms ahead. There was an outpost.

  Fourteen

  By full daylight, the expedition had been split to several sections. The rearmost still worked and cursed and sweated to get the heavier hulls upriver, while the navy boats pushed ever onward with as many of the native craft as could keep up. Colonel Polson, aware that there were rapids in the offing, which would slow down his main advance, chose to commission the clearing of a pathway through the forest at the water side.

  Despard and Nelson took the opposing view. This happened with almost every advance they made, and Polson sometimes took it badly.

  ‘All very well for you to stick to comfy hulls,’ he said, ‘but I must have men with boots on ground. This is an armed camp up ahead, or at least a post that we must take. If we pass them in the water, there are then armed men in rear of us. That way, my friends, disaster lies.’

  Nelson retained his good humour.

  ‘My dear sir,’ he said, ‘if their eyes are open the Dons will see us coming, and so will never be behind us. My way would be to come up with them, then go ashore and fight. It is an outpost, it is not a fort. When we come ashore they will run or die. Spaniards might not speak English, sir, but they are not fools.’

  ‘And I have checked the undergrowth,’ said Despard, ‘and have consulted with my royal consorts. Both Duke and King say the land way is impassible on our side. But it might be possible on the other side. And what is more, the outpost is perhaps on a small island.’

  Polson was no fool himself. He gave a decisive nod.

  ‘So Lieutenant Mounsey must take a band ashore and cut through that way,’ he said. ‘I will take this side, and you may struggle up the river as well as maybe, then we’ll have them from both sides. Is that agreeable?’

  Hastie went in the cutter with Nelson, and from what he later learned was grateful for it. It was a tremendous slog, with the waters running faster than a gallop, and there were many leaps ashore to pull and haul, and a good few wettings. But Polson and his men had by far the worst of it, near torn to pieces by the thorns and briars, some as big as dirks or daggers according to report. They were constantly menaced by snakes, frightened by spiders ‘the size of plates,’ and sucked at by flies and leeches.

  The bands regrouped some hours later, filthy and exhausted, in sight of the island in the middle. Despard and Nelson favoured a surprise attack, and proposed some Indians should creep upstream in canoes to get above the post. The difficulties were many, said the Mosquito men, but they had spotted Spanish uniforms by now, and (as Hastie wrote for Sarah) ‘were almost slavering, my dear, at the thought of taking them for slaves. That is their promised reward. The bribe for which they’re helping us.’

  The night of grinding labour seemed to never end. By the break of dawn, as far as they could tell, half the pincer, maybe a little more, was fixed in place. Mounsey and his secret band were on the far side from Nelson and Despard, who shared the cutter’s well, while the colonel and a bigger party held the other bank. There were Indians upstream, and Tim Hastie fancied the screams of monkeys, as the light began to wake them, might in fact be them. From the silent ramparts of the island battery there came not a sound.

  Five minutes later Nelson gave the whispered order, and his seamen bent to the oars. They pulled hard but silently, and the cutter leapt towards the earthworks. Beside him Despard seemed relaxed, while Hastie was so tense he thought he’d die.

  When they were close enough to open fire, the morning air was torn by a booming cry in Spanish. They had been rumbled.

  ‘Ha ha!
’ said Despard. ‘Not so sleepy after all, the bastards!’

  ‘Hard ahead all!’ shouted Nelson. ‘Pull your guts out, lads, pull your guts out! Make way there before I have your heads off! I’m coming through!’

  Small man, big cutlass. As Nelson leapt onto the nearest thwart, his curved bright sword swung out and forward, above the oarsmen’s heads. He was almost dancing as he skipped from stern to bow, using shoulders, hats and pigtails to keep him steady. As the nose of the cutter drove into the shore, Despard was on his heels. And Timothy was a half a pace behind them.

  There was a sudden fusillade of shooting, with musket bullets splashing and skidding in the water all around. When the battery fired its first cannon shot at them, the sailors cheered.

  Tim Hastie watched in horror as his captain hit the shore, and stumbled, and sank on to his knees. As the clouds of filthy smoke enveloped him, Nelson fell.

  Fifteen

  It was from this point onwards that the dying really started. Choking in the smoke, flecked with burning wad and powder, Tim was held steady by a sailor until he could make out his captain’s body. And watch it rise upward in the thick red mud, straighten its back, throw its arms out sideways to catch a balance.

  ‘The devil take it!’ shouted Nelson. ‘It’s like ten tons of glue and suet!’

  Shots were still buzzing and shrieking round his head, and he seemed to be inviting them with his cutlass. He was pludging and stamping with his feet, trying to pull first one free then the other. Hastie thought he saw one ball clip his wig.

  ‘I can’t get out!’ he roared. ‘Tim! To me, man! Give me a pull for Christ’s sake! I’m like a duck in aspic!’

  Tim jumped, and found a slightly harder spot of banking. He sank in an inch or so, compared with Nelson’s plunge beyond the ankles. Nelson grabbed him, he grabbed Nelson, both jerked and staggered. Even above the gunshots they could hear the squelching and the sucks.

  ‘Lost my shoes,’ said Nelson. ‘Both of them. My God, the vile corruption squeezing through my toes!’