Iron Maiden

by Jim Musgrave

  The captain, ever caring for his men, requested that Chip and the seaman get aboard, but both of them, in the same voice, told the captain to get in first. The moment he was over the bows of the boat, Lieutenant Greene cried, "Cut the painter! Cut the painter!" Chip thought, Now, or I am lost, and, in an instant, exerting all the strength that his slim body could muster, he jumped, caught on the gunwale, and was pulled into the boat with a boat-hook into the hands of Mister Greene, who put him in a seat next to one of the oarsmen. The other seaman, Thomas Joice, managed to get into the boat in some way, Chip could not see how, and he was the last man saved from the ill-fated ship. As they were cut loose, Chip saw several men standing on top of the gun turret, apparently afraid to venture down upon the deck, and it may have been that they were deterred by seeing others washed overboard while Chip was getting into the boat.

  After a fearful and dangerous passage over the frantic seas, they reached the Rhode Island, which still had the tow-line caught in her wheel and had drifted perhaps two miles to leeward. They came alongside under the lee bows, where the first boat, which had left the Monitor nearly an hour before, had just discharged its men. However, the men in the second boat found it a more difficult task getting on board the Rhode Island than it had been getting from the Monitor. They were carried by the sea, from stem to stern, for to have made fast would have been fatal; the boat was bounding against the ship's sides; sometimes it was below the wheel, and then, on the summit of a huge wave, far above the decks; then the two boats would crash together; once, while Surgeon Weeks was holding on to the rail, he lost his fingers by a collision which swamped the other boat. Lines were thrown to them from the deck of the larger ship, which were of no use, for not one of the men could climb a small rope. The men who threw them would immediately let go, in their excitement to throw another, and Chip found himself hauling in rope instead of climbing.

  Two vessels, lying side by side, when there is no any motion to the sea, move alternately; in other words, one is constantly passing the other up or down. At one time, when the little boat was near the bows of the steamer, they could rise upon the sea until they could touch her rail, then, in an instant, by a very rapid decent, the men in the little boat could almost touch her keel. While they were rising and falling upon the sea, Chip caught a rope, and, rising with the boat, managed to reach a foot or two of the rail, when a man, if there had been one, could have easily hauled him on board. But they had all followed after the boat, which at that instant was washed astern, and Chip hung, dangling in the air over the bow of the Rhode Island, with Ensign Norman Atwater handing to the cat-head, three or four feet from Chip, and like him, with both hands clenching a rope and shouting for someone to save him. Their hands grew painful and all the time weaker, until Chip saw the young ensign's strength give way. He slipped a foot, caught again, and with his last prayer, "Oh God!" Chip saw Atwater fall and sink into the deep, never to rise again. The ship rolled, and rose upon the sea, sometimes with her keel out of water, so that Chip was hanging thirty feet above the sea, and with the fate of the ensign before him, which no one else had seen, the youth still clung to the rope with aching hands, calling in vain for help. But Chip could not be heard, for the wind shrieked far above his voice. At that very moment, Chip lost hope, as he believed he could hold on no longer, and he began to see his parents fading from his mind. While in this state of confused abandon, within a second of releasing his grip on the rope, the sea rolled forward, bringing with it the boat, and just when he would have fallen into the sea, it was there, like a miracle, and Chip could only think about what the old black cook, Robbins, said as the young lad fell into the bottom of the boat beside him, "Where in the hell did he come from?"

  When Chip finally became aware of what was going on around him, he saw that no one had succeeded in getting out of the boat, which by then lay just forward of the wheel-house. The Rhode Island captain ordered his men to throw bowlines, which was immediately done. The second one Chip caught, and, placing himself within the loop, was hauled on board. He then assisted in helping the other men out of the boat, and the rescue boat continued back to the Monitor.

  It was half-past twelve, the night of the thirty-first of December, 1862, when Chip stood on the forecastle of the Rhode Island with Lieutenant Greene. They were watching the red and white lights that hung from the pennant-staff above the turret, and which now and then were seen as both ships would rise on the sea together, until at last, just as the moon had passed below the horizon, the lights were lost, and the U.S.S. Monitor, the iron maiden, was seen no more.

  The Rhode Island cruised about the scene of the disaster for the rest of the night, and until the following noon, in hopes of finding the rescue boat that had been lost. She then returned to Fort Monroe, where Chip and the other survivors arrived the next day with their sad news.

  Chapter Forty-Two: Greene and Chip Come Aboard

  January 2, 1863, Brooklyn, New York

  Lieutenant Dana Greene and Chip Jefferson came aboard in the morning, and the ladies were there to greet them and to console them after their tortuous ordeal. Anna Cameron was joining their crew in the afternoon, and Penelope and Amelia were busy fixing up their quarters for the new woman. Captain Sinclair gave the ladies his cabin, as it was the largest, and he bunked with the men in the Crew's Quarters. The Captain's Cabin was now a frilly place, with laced pillowcases, curtains over the portholes, and several watercolors of English country scenes hanging from the bulkhead. The women, however, refused to wear female attire aboard ship, as they chose, instead, the regular seamen's wear of blue gabardines.

  Their journey would take them over 11,000 nautical miles, and Captains Ericsson and Sinclair were well aware of the hazards and potential dangers of such a bold venture. However, now the combined courage and will power of these undaunted souls would be tested far more than the endurance required for the travel. They came from different worlds, both in the psychological and in the physical senses, and these differences, more than any other, worried Captain Ericsson the most. He had never planned to have so many people along with him on his escape to Easter Island. Certainly, he wanted the young lad, Lieutenant Greene, and his young fiancée, Anna

  Cameron. They reminded him of him and his wife, Anna, when they were young and full of adventure. But, Sinclair and his fiancée, and the Negro orderly, Chip Jefferson, they were impending storms on the horizon. Sinclair had actually sailed to the South Pacific before, and the little former slave knew far too much for his own good.

  * * *

  January 3, 1863, at sea.

  Ericsson decided he was going to challenge everybody on the voyage by having each person keep a journal of his or her adventure. He called a meeting on the first night at sea, and he addressed them all at the captain's table, his glass of port raised high, his eyes gleaming with emotion. "We are making history, ladies and gentlemen. Just as our forefathers sailed to the New World to make their mark, we, too, will be voyaging to our paradise to establish a new existence. However, we shall be keeping our existence simple. Our purpose will be to maintain a peaceful, harmonious bond with Nature, and we will make all of our duties and daily plans reflect this purpose. With this in mind, I want all of you to keep a daily journal of our progress. Future historians will want to read a chronological record of our story, and this will give them what they need to judge us. Thus, you will each receive a ship's log, and in this log, each of you will write down what he or she needs to express in the way of personal discovery. You may write any ideas or reflections you may have about your daily activities, and your record will remain sacred and secret, until such time as we all agree to turn these records over to the authorities for publication. Is this acceptable?"

  "Are you certain these will remain secret?" asked Penelope, who was already beginning to complain about the shipboard lifestyle. "I don't mind telling everyone that this little 'adventure,' as you call it, seems more appropriately called 'misadventure' every day."

  Anna Ca
meron laughed. "Right you are, Pen. I believe we will all have a great deal to say in our journals, and we should have them remain secure. As a young girl, I know that my diary was one of my most secret and prized possessions. If someone were to read it, I would have been traumatized beyond repair!"

  John Ericsson cleared his throat. "Now, ladies. You will each have a locked safe in which to store your journal. The key will be yours to keep around your beautiful necks. Nobody will have access to your journals but you. That's a promise."

  "I think it's a grand idea!" said Chip Jefferson, reaching over to grab another cinnamon roll from the platter. "It's the way a free democracy should permit it. Each person has freedom of expression."

  "Well stated, young man," said Dana Greene, as he smiled broadly at the lad. "I agree. Historians will be able to better evaluate our progress, as a whole, with these different journals from which to choose. We can also explore ideas for new inventions in our new paradise. I, for one, plan on beginning a new life, with my love and with my new friends, and this journal will be my record of this journey to freedom. We will all remember our deeds, and we can thus begin to separate ourselves from the hell on earth back in the States."

  "Then, it's agreed! Let's drink on it!" said Ericsson, lifting his wine glass, as the others also stood up with their glasses and lifted them up to seal the pact of their new constitution.

  Chapter Forty-Three: Amelia Ericsson's Journal

  January 4, 1863, at sea.

  The first day at sea we are struck by inclement weather. We are all retching violently from the constant motion by the ship, and I became ill just watching the furniture slide across the room, until that little Negro, Chip, pokes his nappy head into my cabin and announces that "Dinner is being served." Luckily, I have a large porcelain bowl next to my bed, so the instantaneous regurgitation is released into a proper receptacle. Chip then carries it out to be tossed overboard, sloshing the contents back and forth, until my stomach feels another wave of nausea, and I have no place to vomit! I soon retain another bowl, and thus I am prepared for the worst.

  Captain Sinclair, Lieutenant Greene and my husband are the only members of our expedition who do not get ill from bad weather. They boast to us of their "sea legs," and their cocky behavior is enough to make one sick all over again. I once left my husband because of his poverty, and this voyage is not endearing itself to my Epicurean nature. It is my husband's bold personality that has caused him problems in the past, and I can see it becoming a problem on this adventure. I hope I am not correct in this assumption, but when I see him parading around the ship, issuing orders and discussing the "new philosophy of paradise" with the other men; I begin to suspect we are in for some inclement psychological weather as well.

  For example, at dinner tonight, Mister Greene began the meal with one of his ghastly readings from his god-poet, Walt Whitman. John, my husband, encourages the young man, and thus we are trapped before dining, under a canopy of romantic images and tired leaps of unreal imaginings. As I was still quite queasy from the weather, these poetic musings added to the nausea, until my face must have turned an emerald-yellow colour, quite amusing to the others at dinner.

  I do love my John, and if I must endure this as a punishment for my rather spoiled upbringing in London, then so be it. The others are quite encouraging, and full of humor, so my personal misgivings are often buffered. Penelope, in particular, is my best bulwark against this masculine environment, and we often share little jokes between ourselves, to soften the impetuous philosophies of our men. "Wait until the weather is back to normal, Amelia," says my darling Pen, lifting her eyebrow with coquetry. "We shall again hold sway over the parlor and the bedroom!"

  We let little Anna Cameron in on our joke, but she is rather indifferent, as she is still too young to understand how we older women have learned to control our men. However, Penelope and I are both certain, after this voyage has come to its destination, we will have convinced Anna that it is much better to join our ranks than it is to follow her quixotic husband into some inauspicious escapade. Her Mister Greene often looks to me to have the gaze of some young bull in the pasture that has been struck by Cupid's arrow, and he thus begins to sniff flowers, instead of snorting and grinding his hoof into the earth. Penelope's Mister Sinclair, on the other hand, is all bull, through and through, and I have often wondered about his handling of Pen in the boudoir. My Dear John, heaven knows, must be drugged into a state of romance, and even then he has often fallen asleep before I am able to seduce him!

  This shall be a long voyage, and I hope we are all able to get to know each other better. If we are to be living under primitive conditions on this Easter Island, then we indeed must learn to survive together. Even though I may come from austere surroundings, I am a fighter. We British have been able to conquer many foreign shores, and we can bring about a change that will make our reputations known all over the world. I plan to carry on this tradition of my relatives, and so does Pen, and thus our affiliation has begun! We secretly call our order, "The Amazon Women," although every time I utter the title, Pen begins to giggle uncontrollably.

  Chapter Forty-Four: Charles McCord's Journal

  January 6, 1863, at sea.

  I've been off the liquor for over two weeks now, and I don't really crave it, although it was quite a bit of a rough going there for a few days. I experienced some strange hallucinations, some of them telling me I was being kept prisoner aboard this ship by the devil himself. That's correct; I even tried to strangle my fine friend and employer, Captain John Ericsson! The other men pulled me off of him, as I was quite out of my senses, and I was immediately sedated with some laudanum. When I awoke, I apologized profusely to the good Captain, to his wife, and then to the entire ship's company and I have been keeping myself busy ever since.

  Captain Ericsson and Mister Greene are two of the most brilliant inventors I have ever worked for, that's to be sure. They have outfitted a large sanctum aboard the ship, and I am able to put in a good day's work at the drafting board, designing the new devices these men have created for our new home on Easter Island. The inventions range from a cocoanut harvester to a device to catch fish with a mechanical net. They have even developed some contraptions for the ladies, including a privy that allows one to shower inside a tent under a heated stream of water, and a steam-powered booster ladder, that pushes the rider up to a higher level, in case the ladies need to exit the ship or a smaller boat with little discomfiture. I am certainly happy to keep busy at the drafting board, as my mind can stay concentrated on the work and not on the sugarplum visions of whiskey bottles floating above my head at odd times in the day, mostly in the evenings.

  I have no doubts that we will arrive safely at our destination. Even though, I am told, it will take well over eight months to reach Easter Island, the company I keep is good, and we will certainly have some of the most talented and beautiful people in the world to establish this new existence of ours. I must say I have taken to praying to Jesus, Mary and Joseph these days, as I need to get my spirits in some way. Most of these people are not of a religious nature, except for the little Chip lad, and he told me he is of the Protestant faith. Mister Greene says he is a believer of something he calls the "Over Soul" or "overalls" as I like to jest with him. He reads Emerson incessantly, and when he reads at dinner, I quietly make the sign and say my own prayer to the Lord. Captain Ericsson has assured me we will be able to practice the religion of our choice on our island, even though the natives are yet to be converted to any of our known religions.

  We also have an armory on board, and Captain Ericsson has appointed me the Master-at-Arms. I consider it an honor, and I spend a few hours of my day cleaning the rifles and pistols we have stored in there, and this is when I also take the time to write in this journal. It was a good idea the Captain had about writing our own journals. I was never much for writing, but the women have shown me the dictionary, and I take time to correct my grammar, as much as I can, and it gives me some amount o
f satisfaction to know that someone might be reading my thoughts about our journey sometime in the near future. It's rather like the people must have felt in the Bible when they had their stories written down. It's a real honor, I must say, and I will do my best to keep up with this writing work, in addition to my other chores. This sobriety has given me a great deal of extra time, and I enjoy staying busy. It's now time for dinner, and I must get these rifles stored back in their proper closet. Did I mention, dear journal, that I am also the salad maker? Mrs. Ericsson is the chef, Mrs. Sinclair is her assistant, and I am their salad man. My nose is still a bit bulbous and red, and Mrs. Sinclair has called me "Charlie Tomato" during some of our lighter moments in the galley, bless em' all!

  Chapter Forty-Five: Anna Cameron-Greene's Journal