The starboard lugger had been cut free and shoved away. A few men could be seen on her deck trying to gain some control. Where are the rest? wondered Neville. I wouldn’t have thought we had killed so many, despite all the blood I see flowing out the scuppers. His curiosity continued until a sudden cloud of smoke billowed up through their main hatchway. They were likely below fighting a fire!
“Lt. Ratshaw,” bawled Neville, “we have to…”
His words were cut short by a tremendous blast from behind. The heat of it singed through his coat and the force of it knocked him down. Holes appeared in Experiment’s sails. It was a single blast, however, allowing Neville to get up to his knees and turn around to see the source of it, already knowing in his mind what it was. Pieces of wood began to rain on them from above.
Sounds were muted and distant now, though he could still see considerable activity. Dozens of men were picking themselves up just as he was. He looked to where the starboard lugger had been. He had last noted it to be about a cable away. She was still there; or rather, some of her was still there, but none of it was above six feet high. No masts, or even decks, and certainly no people. What was there was in flames. There was no question that the fire had reached her magazine, which by the scene visible now, must have been recently filled to the brim with powder. Planks, pikes, barrels, oars, ship’s parts and a few bodies littered the water. It was so unlikely that any person survived the blast that Neville made a mental note that he would not even bother to look. A metal-tipped pike landed point-first three feet from him, sticking into the wood of the deck like an arrow.
She’s done, Neville thought. Look to the other. The pirates of the larboard lugger had been shielded from the blast by Experiment for that few seconds they had needed to chop free, and their ship now had haphazard ragged sails drawing her away from the battle. Two more cannon fired from Experiment. Bless me. What stalwart chaps, Neville thought of his gun crews. He then remembered that they would have had cotton wadding stuffed in their ears to serve the guns and would not suffer the hearing loss as he was. They fired yet again. One ball cut through the chains of her main yard, which then fell at an angle across the ship and slid directly into the sea. It remained alongside, ensnared in all the rigging and scraps of sail and threatening to pound a hole in the hull as each wave passed. Still she tried to sail away on the foresails, chopping at the main rigging as she went, but she did not go far.
Mr. Stokes arrived at Neville’s side and helped him to stand. He was yelling something, but Neville could not understand it. He pointed to where Wasp was about to make target practice of the lugger. She was given no quarter by Jamaicans incensed by years of conflict with pirates and Frenchmen, regardless of her Spanish name, Flor de Espania. Her ability to maneuver severely handicapped, she moved sluggishly in a straight line while Wasp sailed by twice and bashed her to splinters at close range. Her foremast toppled into the sea, dragging the remains of the mainmast with it, and it could readily be seen that Flor de Espania had been hit low and was taking on water. She began heeling to larboard. Her stern rose in the air and she slipped under the waves to a chorus of cheering on Experiment’s foredeck that was loud enough for Neville to understand.
“Wasp is putting out boats for the survivors,” Greaves yelled in Neville’s ear.
“I see. Mr. Greaves,” Neville yelled back. “I’ve not gone blind.” It didn’t seem like yelling.
“That saves me a problem, Mr. Stokes. Wasp can hang them for piracy, so it’s not up to me.”
Shaky on his feet, Neville leaned on the binnacle. The compass and even the hour-glass were standing undamaged, as was the wheel, except for a few spokes. The quartermasters were back on their feet, so to one of them he said, “Be ready to come about.” Even within his own head, his voice sounded distant. He could tell by looking at the blank stares of the quartermasters that they had not heard him. After a few foggy-brained moments, he pantomimed to them that they were to turn the ship about. They began to turn the wheel, but he motioned for them to wait for his signal.
Where are my officers? he wondered, sliding his eyes across the decks. He could see Mr. Greaves lying at the bottom of the steps - knocked down there from up here, perhaps, and still unconscious. He could also see Ratshaw moving about up for’rd. He looked to be all right. Tilburne was just getting to his feet. “Mr. Tilburne,” he yelled loudly enough to make his throat hurt, but there was no response. He decided to go to him, suspecting Tilburne’s ears were ringing like his.
Neville waded across the rubble on the quarterdeck, down the steps to the waist and across to Tilburne. He tried again to speak with him, but had no success. He tapped Tilburne on the arm, causing him to jump, and again pantomimed coming about. Tilburne nodded ‘yes’ and set off to sort out how to accomplish it with a boat full of deaf men.
Twenty minutes later Experiment was again pointed west toward Spanish Florida and moving in company with Wasp under several miscellaneous sails. Wasp had retrieved her boats and a few swimming pirates.
The effect of the blast on the men’s ears began to wear off. Their hearing passed from deafness to buzzing or high-pitched whines to a roaring sound something like that of a hurricane in the rigging, and finally back to normal. Most were able to speak with each other after three hours, although with raised voices. By then, Wasp had moved some distance ahead.
“We’ll pay hell trying to catch them with these rags up here, Captain,” said Greaves.
“Mr. Hatter is at work,” said Neville, referring to the sailmaker and his mates. “They are first looking for some old but serviceable sails, and he has some men patching holes in the fore tops’l. Unless some errant cannonball found its way into sail storage, the stuns’ls should be in good shape, and we’ll be able to use them for the first time this passage.”
“I am told we have a choice ahead, Lt. Ratshaw. We have either to sail outside the Bahamas or between them and the Florida coast. If we are outside when a hurricane comes, we are in certain trouble. I would prefer inside by Florida, but there we may find another fight.”
“To fight, we need men, Sir. I don’t know-”
“That’s it, exactly. With so many killed or injured, we will have a difficult time fighting the ship and sailing her at the same time. It’s time to go see Mr. MacRead for the ‘butcher’s bill’.”
When he arrived below, Neville found Greaves lying still on the deck with another man.
He waited while MacRead to finish sawing off the stump of a man’s arm that had been mangled by something. It was already missing the hand. Neville then got MacRead’s attention and pointed at Greaves. “Will he recover?” he asked.
“Them two’l be fayne win they wake up,” was all he said about them. “Lost ay-ut-teen dead, we ‘ave. And fourdeen wounded. We’ve also lost two to an outbreak of flux.”
“If I can count, Lt. Ratshaw, that brings our number down to ninety two. Half of the fourteen injured will probably not be active before Norfolk. Let’s go over those muster bills again.”
“I don’t think we’ve enough men, Sir,” said Ratshaw later. “We had only one hundred and twelve to begin, which is less than complement. Now at best we have eighty-five.”
“Call it a round eighty,” said Neville. “We must ask Wasp for a few good men, and we must do it before we reach the Bahamas.”
“We’ve set the old main course at sunrise, Captain, and she’s holding,” reported the bandaged Mr. Greaves in the morning. “The weather will allow stuns’ls, I’m sure. Shall we set them now?”
“Aye, Mr. Greaves. We must catch the fleet before the convoy reaches the Bahamas. How do you feel?”
“Middlin, with an awful lump, Captain. I don’t know what it was. I can’t yell or it hurts awful, but Mr. MacRead says it will pass in four days if I drink that disgusting potion of his.”
In mid-morning, Experiment came up alongside Wasp, who was now last in line, to ask for men. After dinner, Wasp’s Master made his decision and the transfer was made,
but four men was all Wasp could spare.
The distant low purple Cuban shore crawled by to larboard for the next three days as they held their west - northwest course for Florida. Cuba became more and more distant until only a strip of white cloud that denoted her north coast was visible, and then even that was gone.
“We’ve sunk Cuba,” commented Ratshaw. “May I ask our intended route?”
“I would have thought you had smoked it by now, Lieutenant. We should raise Florida this afternoon. We’ll haul our wind when we see Andros Island to starboard and shift our course due north.”
“We should pass Grand Bahama in the night after next, if this wind holds fair,” announced Greaves over the noise of sawing and chopping at the taffrail. We can feel the strong effects of the great Caribbean Stream here, and the trade winds are holding steady on the beam.
“I agree with your calculations, Mr. Greaves. After that we have agreed to stand nor-west in an attempt to ride the stream until almost the latitude of Norfolk and thus avoid the approaches to the Carolinas.” They stood looking for a minute or two at the low coast of Florida.
“’Tis a fine thing, is it not, Mr. Greaves, that all of these thirty-one sail stretched out in our lee have come this far with no loss.”
“Please mind your tongue, Sir. The Good Lord tells us that pride goeth before the fall, and he’ll prove it by sending pirates and storms both if you test him.”
Have sailors always been superstitious? wondered Neville, but decided he would keep quiet on it. There’s no sense tempting fate just to have something to say.
Mr. Greaves was soon back on full duty, but he complained of a ringing in his ears for several days. “You can see her there clearly now, Captain,” he said to Neville after breakfast, “When the rain clears she’s just two points forward on the port quarter.”
“Two days now, Mr. Greaves. She’s catching us slowly. We’ll need to keep a close eye on her, but I’d say she’s alone.”
The unknown sail was much closer on the next day. “She’s hull up now, Cap’n,” said Lt. Ratshaw- “a packet boat, perhaps? Have a look?”
“She’s curious, sure,” said Neville once he was peering at her through the glass. I can’t imagine what one small boat is thinking, though.”
“Maybe she’s thinking she can cut off our last ship. She must see us now, though, even with a telescope. Certainly, she would not attack a navy frigate. Oh, wait. I’d wager she has finally smoked us and is giving up.”
The ghost ship tacked for shore and in a half hour was invisible again.
“Thank goodness for that. No new men have arrived.”
“We must turn northeast here, Captain,” said Greaves, if you don’t want the pirate lairs of the Carolinas to see our sails. Forty miles off should do it. The islands of the Bahamas are behind us now, but if we have an early hurricane, we would surely fare poorly offshore.”
No hurricane came, but they were chased north for ten days by typical summer thunderstorms with the most towering clouds Neville had ever seen. Anxiety increased as the convoy neared the low land of the Virginia colonies.
“Lt. Ratshaw,” said Neville. “We are on the correct latitude, but other than that I have little information on this place. It occurs to me, though, that the Elizabeth must know it well. Let us simply request her to lead us in.”
The idea resulted in an unremarkable arrival. They went in on a clear morning with a rising tide, and once the southern shore was visible there was little of difficulty to do, except that arrival conflicted with supper. The moment the anchor splashed in the huge and protected harbor, the meal began. Unlike offshore, myriad birds passed overhead regularly. Flocks of ducks and geese, gulls and white ibis by the hundreds flew past. Seals and wading birds covered the sands and the air smelt of fish, not the local dump.
Burton and Ratshaw stood on the poopdeck looking toward shore and discussing their observations of the place.
“Not much you’d call a city, is it, Captain?”
“It most certainly is not, but it is one of the larger settlements in New England. Quebec is the largest, but it is French, not ours. Beyond those, there are Boston, New York, Philadelphia, this place here, and Charles Town, which we carefully avoided. They are all small settlements, indeed, for such a huge land.”
“Verily. Will you allow the men have shore leave here?”
“I think we must, though they may tire of it. I doubt there is much to do. I hear no tales of any similarity to Port Royal, but there is no place for deserters to go. It is surrounded by Indian lands. We will have to keep them at repairs. There must be a place to careen and scrape off the weed.”
“I am going ship-visiting this afternoon, to the Elizabeth,” he said. “She is the one who joined us the day before we left, if you remember; the one we followed in. She is owned by a local shipping company that bears my name. I am most curious to speak with her, but if she is from here, I fear her company will go ashore to their homes before it is even dark. I should go now. Call my gig, if you please.”
Neville was not wrong about the intentions of the Elizabeth’s company. As he was being rowed across, a launch full of men was shoving off from her side.
They neared the ship and were hailed from her, “Ahoy the gig!”
“Experiment,” responded Neville’s coxswain.
“Larboard chains, if you please.”
A middle-aged man with the bearing of an officer greeted them there and bade them climb aboard. There is no telling the rank of any of these merchantmen, thought Neville. No uniforms or insignia of any kind, unless the man was once in the navy and preferred it.
“Good afternoon, Captain,” the man said, holding out his hand, “It’s Burton, I hear, yes?”
Neville touched his hat to the man out of habit before taking the hand to shake it, “It is indeed. Is the master available?”
“I’m sorry. We get few visitors, and I forget my manners. Master Caward, at your service, Sir. I must certainly express my appreciation and that of the company for the protection you gave us on this passage. I am grieved of your losses.”
Neville winced at the reminder. “As am I, Sir,” he responded, wishing to change the subject, at least for now. “My visit is entirely out of curiosity. May I…”
“Oh, I really must apologize,” Caward interrupted. “I have a cabin. Please come down out of the sun, though it looks as if we’ll have another rain in a few minutes.” A ridge of dark cloud was approaching quickly from landward, and below it a thin veil of gray that they could already smell as rain. It would bring with it cool air soon that would last until the sun came out and turned the water back into humidity.
They made themselves comfortable below and a sweet smell unfamiliar to Neville assailed his nose. “A short rum, Sir?” posed Caward. Within minutes, the drumming of rain began on the decks above. “At least we don’t have to stand out in it, right, Captain?”
“That is good, yes, but it does wash out some salt, ha, ha! I am told that your employer is the Burton Shipping Company. Is that correct?”
“The Elliott Burton Shipping Company, yes,” said Caward, passing him a small glass of rum.
A new curiosity soon overcame Neville. “What is your cargo? We certainly have no such sweet smell aboard Experiment.”
“I can no longer smell any of it,” said Caward, “but I know what you mean. We carry mostly molasses, sugar and tobacco. I think it is the combination of sugar and tobacco that you smell.”
“It’s quite nice, really. Are their offices here? Is there an Elliott Burton I might visit? I don’t know of any relation, but I am quite interested to investigate.”
“By all means you should. If there is no relation, I would be surprised. You look for all the world a younger version of the man. You cannot miss the place. There is a large sign above a two story warehouse one block back from Front Street. When you land …”
During the remainder of the visit, Neville learned what the master had to offer about the set
tlement of Norfolk and the Burton Shipping Company, got his directions thither, and waited out the rain. He departed with an invitation to Caward’s home for a “proper home-cooked meal” and a “real church service.” By dinner time, when his gig clunked home against Experiment’s side, the sun was out and turning the bit of water still sloshing in the bottom of the little boat into a steamy mist.
Their Majesties’ Ship Experiment
At Norfolk, Virginia Colony,
24 July, 1691
My Dearest Maria,
With God’s grace, we arrived at Norfolk yesterday with all our Convoy together. A few of them stay here and others will go on to the Northe and England. I give you joy to write that I am not ordered to go with them, and will be Returning from this Place in a few months - with some small Convoy, I expect. I have not been ashore here yet, but it looks quite lovely – well-treed and very green. The weather is very warm and though I think the Jamaican sun hotter, the humidity here has so far made the day very oppressive.
We had only one other minor skirmish off the barrier islands of the Northern Carolinas, but it was only a few small Pirates who were easily driven off by us and our two larger well-armed sloops. Wasp had one man killed and Beagle two (I don’t know their names yet, as we have just now dropped our anchor), but we lost no more. Four more of our Company who were Injured in the Battle near Spanish Cuba have died of their Wounds and we put them in the Sea before we sent down our anchor in this Place. I shall enclose a note to the family of the one man from St. Catherine’s Parish so you may propose Prayers for him of a Sunday, and with luck, there will be some ship sailing Southe despite the season to take this.
I will write much more now, as I fear there will be little to do for some time - not atall like when we are Under Way. The men will be happy of the rest, I am sure.
Pray think of me daily, as I do of you, and I shall Remain
A Journal of The Experiment at Jamaica (The Neville Burton 'Worlds Apart' Series Book 2) Page 31
