Chesapeake

by James A. Michener

  Thirteen men walked forward, one by one, to sign, and then the pen was handed to the chairman, who signed boldly in the place reserved for him, Steed of Devon, and before the sun had set, the two energetic correspondents were on the way to Annapolis with the document which they labeled The Patamoke Determination.

  In the early months of 1775 Teach Turlock’s private war against England came to an abrupt halt. He lost his sloop.

  He was drifting lazily back from Barbados with a legal cargo of sugar, salt and slaves when he was hailed by an English customs frigate whose captain wished to conduct a routine search. Since Turlock carried no contraband, he should have submitted, but he was so antagonistic to authority that he resisted. When the English captain ran out his guns, Turlock fled.

  In a decent vessel the waterman would have escaped, for he was much the better sailor, but his old, hog-backed sloop was in sad shape and was quickly overtaken, but with dusk approaching, there was still a likelihood that Turlock would escape, so the frigate began firing, and one heavy ball struck Turlock’s mainmast, shattering much of it and leaving the topsails flapping in the wind.

  This enabled the English captain to close, but instead of finding a chastened merchantman waiting to be boarded, he found a little battleship preparing for hand-to-hand combat. “Put down those guns!” the English captain called as the ships were about to touch, but before he could repeat the cry, shots were being exchanged and a full-scale naval engagement was under way.

  The English won. Three of Turlock’s sailors were killed, and when the rest had been herded aboard the frigate, the old black pirate sloop was set ablaze and Turlock, in captivity, had to watch it sink into the Atlantic, while his crew was chained for transport to London.

  “Piracy, mutiny, firing on His Majesty’s ship,” intoned the captain. “You’ll be hanged, every one.”

  But as the frigate entered the North Atlantic it was overtaken by a speedy privateer out of Boston, and now a second battle ensued, with the English losing. The American prisoners were unchained, and after the English vessel had been stripped, it was turned over to Turlock and his gang, who now had a fine London frigate in place of their hog-backed sloop, and with it they captured an English trader making for Plymouth.

  But when they sailed victoriously into the Chesapeake they were met by a Virginia patrol boat; it led them to Jamestown, where their prize was confiscated by the government. They were shipped back to Patamoke, where Turlock announced, “Fought two battles. Lost two ships. Wound up flat on my ass.”

  For several weeks he tried to find a vessel, but although he was a hero to the mob, he was a pirate to the gentry, and it was they who were the owners. So he retired to the marsh, and was hunting squirrels one day when he happened to look across the waving grass and saw, returning from a surreptitious voyage to Jamaica, the finest schooner he had ever seen, Mr. Steed’s Whisper, long and slim and heavy with sail. It sped by the marsh, seeming to float above the waters, and as it disappeared toward Patamoke, Turlock said, “That’s my next command.”

  His campaign started that day. When Simon Steed came down to the wharf to inspect his schooner, there was Teach Turlock, bowing properly and saying, “Fine schooner, sir. If you let me take her out ... profits ... profits.”

  The idea was so preposterous that Steed ignored it, but when the Whisper was empty, there was Turlock suggesting, “They’d never catch me in this.”

  Steed did not propose to risk his heavy investment on a barefoot rogue, but one day when he visited his Patamoke store Turlock presented him with a substantial reason: “Soon we have war—real war—and do you think he can captain the Whisper?” And with his thumb he pointed toward Captain Allworthy.

  The question had perplexed Steed. Allworthy was a substantial man and a good sailor, but he was hardly right to command an important vessel if war threatened. He would not be valiant in running blockades, and so the first seed was sown.

  It germinated some days later when the Whisper began loading spars to be sold in France, for as Steed watched on the wharf, Turlock sidled up to him and said quietly, “Let me sail to France. Learn the waters. Then give Captain Allworthy the new one Paxmore’s building.”

  The idea was so sensible that Steed hesitated for a moment and looked into Turlock’s eyes. What he saw was a dedication so powerful that on the spur of the moment he capitulated. “All right. Get aboard as second mate. See what you can learn.”

  When the Whisper sailed down the Choptank toward the bay, Teach Turlock was aboard, bearded and barefooted, feeling her sway, sensing her power and her problems. As they passed Devon Island he saluted and muttered, “Simon Steed, you’re goin’ to be proud of what this schooner does,” and at night he would lie in his hammock, tracing her lines from memory, recalling how each rope passed through the blocks and where it was secured. And he could feel each of her movements and how she took the various waves.

  Most interesting was his relationship to Captain Allworthy, of whom he had spoken so poorly. He paid the man great respect, following him when possible and listening to all he had to say, for he realized that this man knew the sea. For generations, dating far back before the first words of the Bible were composed, certain men like Allworthy had attained through study and experience a sense of what a wooden ship could do. This knowledge, transmitted from one generation to the next—Phoenician to Greek to Gaul to Anglo-Saxon to the herring fisherman off Newfoundland—constituted the lore of the sea, and when its customs were observed, the ships came through; when they were not, the ships landed on rocks. And no captain in that unbroken succession could have explained what exactly he knew. On this voyage, Teach Turlock joined the procession.

  When the Whisper came home to Patamoke, he stood by the wheel, his heart racing with excitement, for he saw that Paxmore had launched the next schooner; its masts were already in place. He said nothing, but watched like a marsh eagle as Captain Airworthy went down the plank to report to Mr. Steed, and he held his breath as the owner came aboard.

  “Well, Mr. Turlock, are you ready?”

  “I am.”

  “The Whisper’s yours.”

  “You’ll hear good reports of her,” Turlock said.

  But later, when he sailed a small boat out to Devon Island to discuss strategies, he ran into trouble, for Jane Fithian was disgusted that her family was placing a major schooner in the care of such a man. “Look at him! Can’t read or write! Barely speaks two words together. He’s the worst sort of American.”

  When Simon tried to explain why Turlock was precisely the kind of man needed in these uncertain times, she said indignantly, “Can you imagine him arriving in London and meeting with the captain of a proper English ship? Laughable.”

  “In the years ahead, Jane, my captains won’t be going to London.”

  “Are you speaking more treason?”

  “I’m facing facts. Teach Turlock is the man we need.”

  “Then may God have mercy upon us.”

  “And on England.”

  He said this with such depth of feeling that even she could see that he had reached a great fork in some imaginary road he had been traveling, and for a moment she wanted to share his experience; instead she said, “To throw Turlock into the Atlantic with an armed schooner is like throwing a lighted bomb into the bedclothes of King George.”

  And the more he reflected on this remark, the more apt it seemed. But even he was not prepared for some of the things his unpredictable captain was capable of, because when the time came for sailing, Steed went aboard for a last-minute inspection, and what he saw pleased him. The sailors were content to work for. a local hero like Turlock, and under his direction they had trimmed the Whisper excellently. The hogsheads were lashed with extra care, and all was shipshape, but as Steed was about to depart, satisfied that at least the traditional amenities were in order, he spied in a corner of the captain’s room a redheaded boy who could have been no more than seven.

  “Who’s that?”

&nb
sp; “Matt.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “My son.”

  “He’s not sailing with you?”

  “Got to learn sometime,” and he told the boy, “Take Mr. Steed to the gangplank,” and the little fellow moved down the passageways with an expertness that showed he had already memorized his portion of the Whisper,

  The fact that Jane Steed argued with her husband about colonial behavior toward England did not mean that their married life was either tense or unpleasant. She loved her pompous husband and considered his attempts at being an English gentleman amusing. He was generous and kind-hearted, and he indulged her in the petty expenditures which gave her so much pleasure. From the first she had wanted a slave who could sew in the French manner, so he had bought her one in Annapolis. When she heard that an actual theater had been erected in that city, she wanted to cross the bay to see for herself, and he took her. And when she protested if anyone called her an American or a Marylander, insisting that she was English, he agreed: “Jane’s from London. A Fithian, our factors.” And whenever he said this, she seemed to glow and feel better, for she always thought of herself as an English gentlewoman.

  For his part, he loved her more than he had when they first traveled together in Virginia. Her smile was so genuine, and it irradiated her face so totally that it kept him enchanted. She was kind, and laughing; any room she entered was illuminated, and it pleased him to see the way men inadvertently followed her with their admiring eyes. Under her care, Rosalind’s Revenge became the outstanding house on the Eastern Shore insofar as generous hospitality was concerned, and when she became visibly pregnant both she and Simon moved with stately pride, and his love for her increased.

  “When I think of the years we might have been married,” he said ruefully one day, and she answered, “There was no possibility that we could have been wed a day earlier. I wasn’t ready.”

  When he asked her how it was that a girl so charming had been free to come to America, “I mean, why weren’t you married already?” she said, “From the time I was a little girl Guy told me that my fate was to come to America and marry you. He used to bring your letters home and let me read them ... tobacco and pig iron ... I became an expert on the Maryland plantation.” She smoothed the apron over her protruding stomach and said, “He also told me you were rich and kind.” She reached up and drew her thumbnail down his chin. “And he said that in France you had acquired perfect manners. He made you sound irresistible. So I waited.”

  “You saved my life,” he said simply, and she accepted this, for she could see the change that had come over him since her arrival. She knew that prior to her visit his life had been trapped in an iron routine: each day he had risen, read in the classics, written his letters to Europe, breakfasted, and gone about the business of managing a great plantation. He had assumed that this was his permanent destiny and that if he conserved the wealth of the plantation, it would pass into the hands of his nephews, who would live much as he was living.

  Jane’s arrival had revolutionized that staid routine. She had driven him to new occupations, such as boating for pleasure and having neighboring plantation couples in for six or seven days. Also, the orders being carried to London by the Steed captains were much different now, and when the fine furniture arrived the interior of Rosalind’s Revenge became as elegant as the exterior.

  “You launched a revolution,” he told her affectionately one morning in February, but instead of acknowledging his compliment as she usually did, she startled him by saying abruptly, “Don’t use that word around me. These damned colonies want nothing but revolution.”

  Eager to assure her, he said that whereas Maryland might kick up its heels, it would never break away from the king. “We might have arguments,” he said quietly. “And maybe even an exchange of fire. But we’ll always honor our loyalty to the king.” She rejected this, claiming that everything the colonials were doing implied disloyalty to the king, but he reminded her that in The Patamoke Determination it was he who had insisted on the sentences reaffirming loyalty.

  “Words!” she said, and the force with which she spoke made him realize that she had for some time been brooding about the actions of the colonies. Some days later Simon was handed an unsealed letter for transmission to London. It was addressed to Guy Fithian, and since it was a family custom for both Jane and Simon to add postscripts to each other’s letters to Guy, he casually unfolded the paper and was shocked by its contents:

  Life here becomes almost unbearable. The average Marylander is a peasant with no appreciation of manners and no desire to acquire any. Conversation is so boring I could scream. No politics, no fashion, no gossip, no comment on the life of a city. I crossed the bay to see what they call their theater. Sheridan, and not one person on stage could act and the violins were out of time.

  I haven’t had a decent piece of beef in two years, and if anyone gives me oysters again, I shall throw them in his face. Horrible food. But I could bear this if the citizens were civil, but all the whispers are of war against England and of ships clashing at sea. Simon, good man that he is, assures me that this pitiful country of his will always remain loyal to our beloved King; but why the King should want it is beyond me. I say cut it loose and be damned.

  Guy, tell me why it is that we English were able to subdue the Scottish rebels in ’15 and ’45 and the French in ’63, and now permit these ridiculous colonials with no fleet, no army, no cities and no leadership to give us trouble? Why doesn’t the King send a troop as he did with Scotland and knock these silly people about the ears? I warn you, if these rebellious fools, and you should see the idiot Simon has put in command on one of his ships, if they take steps against the King I shall jump on the first English ship that touches here and come home till the idiots are disciplined. I am having a baby soon and will bring it, too.

  Soberly, his jaw quivering, he carried the letter to his desk, lit a taper, melted the wax and sealed it, without adding the customary postscript. He placed it with the substantial pile of correspondence intended for Europe, leaving it on top so that Jane could satisfy herself that it had been posted. He said nothing to her about its contents, but he did become trebly attendant, listening to her complaints about their neighbors and responding to each of her small demands.

  When word reached the Chesapeake of how conditions in Massachusetts had deteriorated after Lexington, with rebels continuing to fire upon the king’s men, Jane fell into a despondency from which Simon could not lure her. She began ranting openly against the drabness of Maryland life: “No breeding, no sense of station. And those damnable month-long visits by plantation boors. And what I simply cannot abide a day longer, the monotony of the greasy cooking.”

  Steed deemed it wise not to remind her that only a month previous she had been praising Maryland cooking. Instead he did his best to placate her, but nothing offset the fact that insolent colonials had fired upon the king’s troops. Her impressions were intensified when Captain Turlock sailed into Patamoke with triumphant news about the Whisper. In a moment of thoughtlessness Simon invited him to Devon, where his crude manners and peasant gloating infuriated Jane. Turlock said, “This schooner can do anything! Fore-and-aft sails, close to wind. Big ones upstairs, before the wind like a hawk.” Enthusiastically he reported on a close brush with an English frigate and on how the Whisper had shown her heels.

  “Did you fire on the king’s ship?” Jane asked.

  “Didn’t need to.” Turlock recalled the encounter and grinned, his broken teeth showing through his beard. “Matt stood aft, laughing at the Englishmen as we pulled away.”

  “Who’s Matt?” Jane asked.

  “My son.”

  “How old is he?”

  “Soon to be eight.”

  Jane gave a little shudder and left the room.

  “I think you’d better get back to the Whisper,” Steed said, and in some confusion the lanky captain left. He had expected dinner, but at the wharf he assured Simon, “I’m ready
to sail any time,” and they stood beside the vessel and talked over plans.

  “Always the same problems,” Steed said, one foot on the gunwale. “No salt. No money.”

  “In Jamaica they say the Portuguese port St. Ubes has plenty of salt.”

  “Our ships have never sailed there. Too close to England.”

  “I’d like to try St. Ubes. Big cargo, big profit.”

  “You willing to risk it?”

  “With Whisper, yes.” So it was agreed that Turlock would try a risky passage to a new port whose salt mines were reputed to be the best after the ones in Poland and Austria.

  When Steed said that his perpetual problem was money, he did not mean that the Devon plantations were in financial straits; they were building two more Atlantic schooners and the manufactures were doing well. The problem was: the rich men of the English government refused to coin sufficient currency to enable the colonies to function. For a century tobacco had been utilized as coinage, but with the dreadful slumps in recent years, it no longer served as currency; instead business was conducted with the aid of an incredible mélange of paper documents and European coins. Letters of credit from one merchant to another were circulated like pound notes, and none were more highly sought than those of John Hancock, Robert Morris and Simon Steed. But these were scarcely adequate to meet the needs of a burgeoning commerce, so every colonist had to contrive one trick or another to get his hands on real money.