Every Man Will Do His Duty

by Dean King

  About the beginning of July we received orders to proceed to the longitude of 12° west, to join our old consort the Reindeer; this was very agreeable to us all, as we had not only more than once cruised together before, but had always admired the spirit and activity evinced by the management of this ill-fated vessel, and the officerlike and gentlemanly bearing of her truly noble commander, Captain Manners, with whom I had the pleasure of being on the most intimate terms. We had frequently discussed together the best way of dealing with our disproportioned American foes, to which one or both were liable every hour to be opposed. His favourite idea always was, “Yard-arm, and yard-arm, three broadsides double-shotted, and board.”—Poor fellow! he little thought the opportunity of essaying the experiment was so near. Approaching our ground, we fell in with the Achates, Captain Langhorn, and the following day discovered the wreck of a vessel’s mast and rigging floating in the water. This at first created no sensation, supposing it to have belonged to some unfortunate foundered trader, one of those numerous instances of unnavigable craft, so little seaworthy, that no one will underwrite them, but which nevertheless are permitted to sacrifice the lives and property of thousands.

  Our feelings may be imagined, when, on sending a boat to examine the wreck, the evidence afforded by the grape-shot sticking in the mast, the marks and dimensions of the main cap, the sails, and rigging, left no doubt of the Reindeer’s fate.3 The main-mast appeared to have been burnt off by the copper in the wake of the main boom. Everything denoted that the strife had been sanguinary, and the catastrophe recent; whoever had been the antagonist, he had found tough work. We steered away to the westward, keeping a sharp look-out, and, impotent as our endeavours might prove, fervently prayed for the opportunity of avenging our unfortunate companions. At the end of a week we returned to the spot, where we now found the wreck of the fore-mast.

  Not long after, in company with the Scylla, eighteen, about two hundred miles west of Scilly, we descried a large ship under a heavy press of sail, steering about W by N. She was painted black, showed no guns or colours, other than a small white flag at the fore-mast, which, with the manner she shortened sail, and backed her main-top sail, keeping the foresail and jib on her, after we had whipped a few shot across her bows, impressed us with the idea of her being a merchantman. I proceeded to board her, and on pulling up in her wake, was struck with her breadth of beam, and the warlike cut of her canvass. When close up on her quarter, I hailed her, and was given to understand she was the United States ship John Adams, having on board the American Envoy from the Texel, bearing the proposals for peace, and with an Admiralty passport. The captain at the same time invited me on board, pledging his word of honour, that I should not be detained. On this I pulled up and mounted the side. To my astonishment, as I was about to step on deck, I found the whole crew at their guns prepared for action, the matches burning, and the man with the train tackle falls in hands ready for running out the guns. This corresponded so little with the peaceable declaration I had just received, that, not choosing to risk my own honour and the fate of the two vessels, I instantly jumped into the boat, and returned to report what I had seen. By this time the Scylla was on her weather quarter, and her commander, a fine veteran of the old school, being senior officer, I reported to him what I had seen. He replied, “Bear a hand on board your ship; tell W— to keep his jib-boom on my taffrail, and we will soon see who he is.” A few minutes after, both brigs ranged up on his weather beam, as close as we could without danger of falling on board, and with a voice like the roaring of a lion old Darby then hailed, ordering him to send an officer with his passport. This was complied with, and all being found correct, I returned with the American first lieutenant, a fine young fellow, and was received very ceremoniously.

  On entering the cabin I was introduced to the envoy, Mr. Dallas4; refreshment was offered, and I am almost ashamed to say refused; however, a young man may sometimes be excused if, influenced by a national sentiment, and in the hurry of the moment, he should overlook those nice shades of conduct, which should guide him according to time, place, and circumstance. A mutually courteous bearing between individuals of hostile nations, thus thrown together, certainly tends “to smooth war’s wrinkled front,” the ordinary evils of which are enough for suffering humanity, without carrying the brand to the social board. The American captain expressed himself hurt at the cavalier and imperious manner in which he was hailed by the English commodore, as he styled him. I assured him nothing offensive was intended, but that it was his natural manner, being a plain rough seaman. This ship had been a frigate, now razee, and mounting twenty forty-two pounders, and two long twelves, with a crew of three hundred men.

  The downfall of Napoleon, and the consequent turn which affairs had taken in Europe, having now left us but one enemy to contend with, we continued on our old station, keenly looking out for, and expecting every day to come to the scratch with some of our “Yankee cousins,” who were making great havoc among our merchant-ships, but never could get scent of any of them. We had by this time weathered out four years on this trying service, and, as little was now to be done, began anxiously to wish for a change. At length Buonaparte returned from Elba, and in the beginning of April we were sent to Nantes, with the Prince Regent’s proclamation, promising protection to all vessels navigating under the white or Bourbon flag. The merchants of this large city were so well pleased with this intelligence, that they sent on board about two hundred dozen of their choice wines, for the admiral, Sir Henry Hotham, and ourselves. Fifteen months after, when the battle of Waterloo, and the surrender on board the Bellerophon, had finally sealed the emperor’s fate, we were again sent to the same place with the news. On this occasion the purser, doctor, and myself accompanied the captain to the city, and were received by the mayor and authorities with marked respect and attention. The former, being too much occupied with his municipal duties to be much with us, consigned us to the care of his brother-in-law, who entertained us at the Hotel de France, where we had an excellent dinner, and in the evening, accompanied us to the theatre. Between the play and farce we adjourned to the coffee-house attached to the latter, and were sipping our punch, when the hussar officers entered, apparently in a state of intoxication, and in the greatest excitement. On seeing us, one of them exclaimed, “Voilà! les b—s Anglois, les pirates!” with other insulting language. I was for resenting the injury instanter, by sending a bottle at his head, and was with some difficulty prevailed on by my companions to take no notice of the affront, which, under all the circumstances of our situation, was undoubtedly the most prudent course. Our respectable host, aware of the effervescing feeling of the military, who were entirely opposed to the political opinions of the commercial part of the community, and expressed the most rancourous hatred of every thing English—appeared very uneasy. Our hero, having apostrophized us in some of the choicest rhetorical flowers of La Halle, appropriately finished by filling a paper biscuit-bag with wind, putting it behind one of our chairs, and, stamping on it, which made it explode like a pistol; then drawing his sword, he flourished it over his head. I never found it more difficult to repress my indignation. We now rose to leave the room, and, loitering behind the others, I fixed myself in the middle of the saloon, opposite to our Bobadil, and fixing on him a look which could not well be misinterpreted—for I knew not a word of the language—drew my sword half way out of the scabbard. The effect was magical; he cowered from my gaze, all his heroics seemed in an instant to have evaporated, and in a minute he was taken out of the room as peaceable as a lamb by a gendarme, and placed under arrest by order of his colonel.

  During our final cruise in the bay, in the month of February, I had a very narrow escape. One afternoon, on a bitter cold day, we fell in with the wreck of a schooner abandoned by her crew. On going in the boat to examine her, I found her floating on her broadside, half full of water, her sails all blown away. On her deck were a few pieces of salt provisions, two trunks, and some other articles. By a rope, whic
h hung over the side and was quite fagged out, we were led to conclude that her boat had gone down under her counter, and the crew had probably perished. A starved cat in her last agonies was stretched on the cabin floor. In the hold was a quantity of salt, and, floating in all directions, a number of broken fruit-boxes. About one hundred cases of oranges and lemons, and some bales of figs, were in good preservation. The flag of Oldenburg was in her rigging, and by her papers we judged she was from St. Ubes [Setubal, Portugal]. I sent the boat back with two cases of oranges, advising the captain to hoist the cutter out, clear her of all that was worth taking, and let her go. The boat returned with orders to endeavour to pump her out, and put her in sailing order, for which purpose I received a reinforcement of the boatswain and twelve men. Her pumps were hoisted on deck, cleared, and with copper strainers over their heels put down again, and placed in ballast-baskets. With these, and a well formed in the main hatchway for baling, we soon freed her, set her on her keel, and fitting her with some of our storm stay-sails, put a midshipman with a few men on board, took her in tow, and made sail for Scilly.

  A heavy swell from a previous westerly gale got still higher as the wind freshened in the night. At daybreak I perceived her heeling very much to leeward, and I requested permission to go on board, to see how matters really were. I was desired to wait until after breakfast, when I reminded the captain of it again. Again procrastination was the order of the day. “When the lower deck was cleared I might go.” I felt uneasy; the breeze was freshening, and the sea rapidly getting up. About ten A.M. the jolly-boat was lowered, and with the boatswain and fourteen men I went on board. I immediately perceived she was settling fast in the water, and sent the men’s hammocks and bags with the midshipman, whom I desired to say that she could not swim long. The boat returned with orders to cast her off and leave her. Unluckily the stream cable, by which she had been towed, was so jammed with the strain, that some time was lost in obeying the order; at length we attempted to cut it with our knives, but, before this could be done, seeing her going down, I ordered every man into the boat, and was in the act of shoving off, when I found three of them missing.

  I jumped on board again, and was urging them to lose no time, when she suddenly lurched to port, fell on her broadside, her mast heads in the water, and nearly sunk the boat, which had got entangled with her mainmast head and crosstrees. We meanwhile secured ourselves as well as we could in what had been the weather rigging, every moment expecting to share the fate of the boat and crew, which, if she went down, appeared inevitable. When the former at length got clear, I gave the boatswain the necessary orders for extricating us from our perilous situation; this was scarcely done, when she settled gradually for a few seconds, and then as quick as lightning sunk to rise no more. The world of waters closed over our heads; it was an awful moment. How far I was carried down, or how long under water, I do not know: when I emerged, I felt as if about to burst. My leather hat, forced down over my eyes by the pressure of the water, at first prevented me from seeing; and, when this was a little arranged, all I could perceive was an empty orange-case, which I ineffectually attempted to reach: clogged with a pair of heavy boots, and my winter dress saturated with water, I in vain struggled towards it—a mountain-sea was running, which, just as I thought it within my reach, came and carried it further from me. At length I saw a glimpse of a hat waving, and immediately after, as the sea lifted, the boat, with the boatswain standing abaft. She was, however, so crowded, that they could scarcely keep her head to the sea; and, although only a few yards distant, I was so exhausted, that I could only just keep my head above water. My legs were beginning to sink; my sight was getting dim; at every breath I was swallowing the brine, and was suffering the last horrors of a protracted death by drowning, when my hand was seized by a marine in the bow of the boat, and I was saved. The carpenter’s mate and the captain of the top, the latter a good swimmer, were also saved, but a third companion in danger was seen no more. I was put to bed, and by proper treatment brought about again, but my health had received a severe shock, and I remained for some time languid and spiritless.

  One morning at daylight, about ten days after, we perceived a large ship, apparently steering for Bourdeaux; we instantly gave chase, and in ten hours came up with, and took possession of her; she proved to be an American from Charlestown [Charleston, South Carolina], bound to Bourdeaux with cotton, cocoa, and rice; we sent her into Plymouth, and she turned up a noble prize. It is astonishing how this operated on my impaired health; I seemed suddenly to have taken a new lease of existence.

  At length we were at peace with all the world, our exertions were no longer needed, we were ordered to Hamoaze and were paid off all standing, with scarce sufficient time, with the assistance of our acquaintance, to sweat out the fifty dozen of wine, presented to us by our liberal friends, the merchants of Nantes.

  Scarcely was the pendant hauled down, when I received an appointment to the Y—brig of eighteen guns, fitting at Woolwich for the North Sea station, and I joined her in September 1815. Not being allowed to open a rendezvous for the entry of seamen, the greater part of my time was passed in the neighbourhood of Tower Hill, and the purlieus of Wapping, with now and then a trip to the Brickhelms, Epping Forest, and other places, whither our tars had retired to rusticate, and where, with the characteristic improvidence of real sailors, they were “spending like asses” that pay and prize-money which “they had earned like horses.” While the cash lasted, to say nothing of the general antipathy to the service, there was little inclination for employment. But, by dint of coaxing—for Jack, if humoured, is easily managed—and a liberal supply of “heavy wet,” I succeeded in getting the vessel tolerably well manned.

  At the latter end of September, we sailed for Shields, where we remained nearly four months to keep the colliers in order. During this interval, our men, taking advantage of the captain’s disinclination to punishment, became quite disorderly, and, availing themselves of our proximity to the shore, before we sailed, the greater part of them deserted. In consequence of this we returned to Sheerness, to complete our compliment; and I, once more enacting the part of Sergeant Kite, was sent up to London to enter men. This, as on a former occasion, cost me about thirty pounds in treating, and redeeming Jack’s traps “out of chancery,”5 for which I never received a farthing’s compensation, while the officers of larger ships employed on this service had a liberal allowance. Except on the principle that “the weakest goes to the wall,” I know of no reason why this, as well as many other invidious distinctions made between large and small craft, should have place.

  Once more manned, we sailed in April on a cruise to the North Sea, against the smugglers, and were not long before we sent some hundreds of tubs to the custom-house. Our captain, who had made but little prize-money during the war, hoped now to bring up the lee-way, or get promoted for working up the unfortunate contrabandiers; with this view we had procured at Dover, a sailing galley, about thirty-six feet long, by eight broad, built on the plan of some lieutenant of the impress at Folkstone, a complete coffin. The most arduous period of the war, when surrounded with enemies, and the strictest vigilance was necessary, was nothing to this harassing service. Day and night there was no rest for a soul on board; every floating thing was taken for a smuggler and chased, boarded, and submitted to the most rigorous search. I soon got sick of this sort of employment; and, the galley being equipped as a tender, I was very glad to get the command of her, receiving an order to cruise eight days off Flushing, and then join the ship at or off the Hock of Holland. With a midshipman, twelve seamen, and two marines, riflemen, I set out in search of adventures. I had been ordered “rigorously to blockade the port,” and could not help smiling on contrasting the present with my former service on the same spot in the P, seventy-four, when, in many a heavy gale, with three cables ahead, we had been pitching bows under on the seventeen fathom bank; West Cappel church or lighthouse dipping in the horizon, with seventeen sail of the line “blockading the D
utch fleet.” The day was fine when I quitted the brig, and I stood close in and reconnoitred my ground, anchoring in the evening on Steer Bank in eight fathoms, West Cappel in sight to the eastward. About two A.M. the wind got up, and soon freshening into a gale, the boat became very uneasy. I tried her in every way, but could not make her lay-to with-out shipping so much water that we could scarcely keep her free, all hands baling.

  The weather became worse, and our situation alarming. I consulted with the quarter-master, and it was deemed necessary to bear up for shelter, but where? Dangerous sands lay between us and the shore, I did not know the channels, and the rain and sea prevented us from seeing the buoys. The lead was kept going, and a man was placed at the fore-mast head to look out for the Dumloo Channel; nought however was perceptible but the sea breaking in all directions. “One wide water all around us, all above but one black sky.”