Billy Bacon and the Soldier Slaves (Colonial Warrior Series, Book 1)

by Andrew Wareham

  She paid him a visit that afternoon and very quickly was able to find a way of occupying the idle hours. She moved in two days later, rapidly adding a degree of comfort to the little hut. Billy had kept the place scrupulously clean, with the aid of a single sergeant’s mess servant, but Julie added a little of colour and brightness that was surprisingly welcome. Billy very quickly found himself relaxing in her company, much enjoyed having a laughing, happy partner to share his free hours and was able to talk easily to her and soon mentioned the desire to recruit men to the battalion.

  There were very few men on the island, she thought, but there was also very little for those few to do. The best land had been taken by the plantations and fishing was poor – many of the boys could find nothing to do other than idle in the sun. All very well in itself, but a man could not take a wife and have a family without a means of keeping them. There might be as many as fifty or sixty families of fishermen with younger sons with no future, possibly as many again scraping a living from the poor soil of the hills.

  “What of slaves, Julie? If they ran and joined up, we would protect them. They would never be taken back to their masters.”

  She did not know – the free Creoles had nothing to do with the bonded Africans.

  Billy had a word with Colonel Searson.

  “Was we able, sir, to offer a bounty payment, in coins, then many a family would be very glad to push a younger son in our direction. I do not know what the official payment might be, sir, but a little of silver, and less of gold, will go a long way on this island.”

  Colonel Searson could lay his hands on coinage – that he had in good supply, the family having sent him off very well provided for.

  “Eight guineas is the standard bounty, Sergeant-Major, or was when last we paid it.”

  Eight guineas amounted to one hundred and sixty-eight shillings, a positive fortune on the island.

  Julie passed the word around the harbour and in the market especially, that a father who brought a son along to carry a musket for the English, could find himself with one hundred of silver shillings in his hand. Should he bring two strong boys to the ranks, they would pay him one hundred and ten for each. Billy had told her that he would find her five shillings for each who turned up. The remainder would go into his pocket, to add to the little he had put together in Antigua.

  Julie’s family lived on the produce of a large garden and a fishing canoe and from her mother’s talents at smoking and selling reef fish. In a good week, they put two or three pennies or sous into the little pot in her mother’s bedroom, their whole reserve against disaster. Five extra shillings a man meant that Julie was enthusiastic in talking to every family that had been blessed with children, who they were hard-put to feed.

  Four young men showed themselves in the first week – boys who had reached manhood, but of what exact age they were unsure. They were thin, poorly nourished, but willing; Billy thought they might make soldiers and Colonel Searson doled out his silver.

  Four fathers sat down and counted their coins, and worked out what to do with them. One hundred shillings could buy a pair of fishing nets and a boat to cast them from. Alternatively, a score of nanny-goats and a pair of enthusiastic billies would still leave a lot of change. Three took practical action to improve their whole way of life; the fourth made his way to the rum shop and spent fifteen of his shillings in the space of three unbroken days and nights and was buried on the fourth. His family bewailed his passing, and then set to using the remainder of his money sensibly.

  Ninety youths, and one or two older men, appeared in the following weeks, once it was confirmed that the story of the bounty was true, and were welcomed into the ranks, and given their equipment. Colonel Searson had sent the Adjutant back to Antigua with an urgent demand for muskets, powder and ball and uniforms, persuading the General that he had a source of recruits and could make his numbers up to a respectable level and become one of the largest battalions to hand, in fact. Soldiers coming out from England were dying in their hundreds, the graveyards expanding every week and the General was faced with the demands from Westminster that he made use of the men being sent him. The politicians in England seemed incapable of comprehending that of every battalion sent out to the Sugar Islands, one half of the men died in the first two years, and that was without seeing action to further thin their numbers. The recruitment of even another two companies of soldiers, local men who had a chance of surviving, was more than welcome.

  “Peasant he may be, this Brigadier Searson,” the General remarked to his aides, “but he can do the job. Where do we send him next?”

  “Not back here, sir – we don’t really want his sort hanging around Headquarters! The next island south in the chain, St Pierre – it’s a bit bigger than his present place, but he might be able to do something with it. Send down the 54th as garrison, sir, and order Searson south, with his guns again.”

  The 54th had been badly hit by the fevers; they were Norfolk farmboys from the edge of the Fenlands and had no exposure to the plagues of the big towns to protect them. They numbered barely two hundred and needed a safe, quiet place to rest while they waited for a draft from England.

  The Adjutant was sent back with his stores and orders to make ready for a further excursion. He carried a personal note from the General, informing Searson that he must retain his position as Brigadier; action was in hand in Antigua to raise companies of a West India Regiment – black men, of course – who would be sent to him at an early date, just as soon, in fact, as officers could be found for them.

  “The verbal, sir, is that some of the officers will be our sergeants made up for the purpose; we will have the opportunity to fill a number of vacancies in their Officers Mess.”

  “Mr Bacon will welcome that, I suspect. I shall speak to ‘im.”

  “A regiment of black men, Colonel? With vacancies in the Officers Mess?”

  “That’s right, Sergeant-Major. The opportunity of a lifetime because the commissions are being made regimental, not army, and without purchase, by the Governor. Being as ‘ow they are regimental, they will count as purchase when it comes to your next step. You start as a lieutenant, because they don’t want no experienced ensigns what might know more than their company commanders, do you see.”

  Billy did see, and wondered whether he would be able to accumulate the one thousand pounds that would make him captain after a few years as a lieutenant.

  “I would like to be an officer, sir. I am sure that I could perform the duties required of me.”

  “I know damned well you could, Sergeant-Major. I also know that purchase of your next steps won’t come easy – but, being as how we are in the Sugar Islands, there will be such things as non-purchase vacancies, what come up very frequent. Say that a captain gets so ill what ‘e can’t continue in service, but don’t die or sell out, then the vacancy to the rank is there and can be filled, without-purchase. Five years in the rank and it’s yours, and can be sold, if you wants out, or want to make major. Fifteen hundred quid added, and it’s major for you, Sergeant-Major. And if so be that comes ‘ard to find, then you send a letter to Searsons in England, and you watch what happens! My family don’t forget them that gives us a leg up, and you have done more than your share for me, though I cannot say such in public, as you must know.”

  “Then, sir, I must, in the privacy of this office, express my thanks – and say that I have done my duty – the more easily for having a very considerable respect for my colonel, sir!”

  That seemed entirely reasonable to Colonel Searson, for he knew that he was the sort of man who attracted the respect of others, had never doubted that to be the case.

  “You know, Sergeant-Major, your predecessor said very nearly the same words – and he is a very good officer, as you well know!”

  Billy could not comment upon an officer but let his agreement be seen in his face.

  “Very good, Sergeant-Major. You will be a lieutenant just as soon as this black regiment gets here.
If I can give a word of advice, Sergeant-Major – crack the whip, good and hard – natural slaves these Africans, you won’t get anything from them except at the flogging triangle!”

  Three months of drilling the new recruits and fitting them into their companies, teaching them their musketry and most importantly, easing their feet into shoes, kept Billy busy. It had never occurred to him before that men who had been barefoot all their existence would have so much trouble in marching in the regulation army shoe, but some were almost crippled by their blisters in the first month or two. All, however, survived their training – they could not let their families down by failing. The battalion paraded each week, the companies a little larger each time, the initial losses to the dysentery and recurrent fevers made up and then the number actually increasing over their original strength. When the order arrived that they were to prepare for invasion of the neighbouring island of St Pierre, the Fencibles were almost seven hundred in number.

  The West India Regiment arrived with the orders, a thin first battalion of no more than four hundred men in six companies, all carrying their muskets and wearing their uniforms and seemingly efficient and obedient to command.

  “They’re barefoot, Mr Muldoon!”

  “Better for ‘em, Billy. Their feet have been hardened since birth, and there probably wasn’t enough shoes in the store anyhow.”

  They watched the men disembark from five small island boats and march up to the warehouses that had been set aside for them as barracks. No officers were to be seen. They were under the command of sergeants, six of them, put across from the battalions remaining in Antigua. A sixth boat disgorged the officers. They were met by the Adjutant of the Fencibles and given freedom of the Mess, as was only courteous.

  “Hell’s teeth! Will you look at them?”

  Billy did, mouth gaping in amaze.

  “One major; two captains; three lieutenants and an ensign.”

  Seven, all told. The ensign was a merchant’s son from Antigua, a boy of sixteen perhaps, and hopeful of becoming a gentleman. The other six were aged or decrepit. Four bore the pot-bellies of the habitual drunkard, suspended from the skinny frames of men who took their whole sustenance from the bottle; the other two were ancient, the major sixty if he was a day and leaning on a walking cane.

  “All they could get, even on a free purchase of their promotion. Four thrown out of the battalions as useless; two too poor to buy their step and sat in their ranks these thirty years, now looking for two years of service before they sell out. They need good officers, Billy, but I don’t envy them their task!”

  “I need to talk to their sergeants, Clarence. I should think they took the transfer for expecting to be made gentlemen in their place as they die on campaign.”

  Lieutenant Muldoon disagreed.

  “Not them – look at their faces. Every one of those sergeants is getting on in years, closer to fifty than forty. Time their battalions get back to England, it’s out the gate for them – past it, finished, no money, no nothing. Taking this posting gives them a few more years, and probably a promise of a job in Antigua – servants in the Governor’s house or something like. They could be very useful men, too, Billy. Seen it all, done it all, no need to curry favour, no wish to push the men too hard – could be very handy, those sergeants.”

  “I hope so, Clarence. Honestly and truly I do!”

  Colonel Searson called Billy to him next day.

  “Sergeant-Major Bacon, as I promised, you have the opportunity to become a lieutenant, without purchase, in the West India Regiment. Bearing in mind your experience, you will be placed in the grenadier company. Two other sergeants of the battalion will be offered the same chance.”

  “Thank you, Colonel Searson. I am very pleased to accept your kind offer, sir. Be sure, sir, that I shall not disappoint you.”

  “You will not, Lieutenant Bacon. The other two might, but you won’t. Don’t forget that I or my brother will expect a letter from you one day when you make your purchase as major. Unless you get made in the field, of course – and then you can send a letter to tell us what you’ve done, sir!”

  Billy laughed – he thought that an unlikely event.

  “Your uniforms, Lieutenant Bacon, will be arranged for you. In fact, they have been, you might say. There is a man in Antigua, a Snyder – a Jew-boy tailor – what has got your measurements and has sent your equipment down on the boat with the officers. All arranged!”

  Billy made his thanks, overwhelmed by Colonel Searson’s generosity, not realising that the post of Brigadier had enabled the family ambitions to come much closer to realisation. As a merchant by upbringing, Colonel Searson had grown up to the concept that a debt was an absolute obligation, always to be discharged; he believed that he owed much of his promotion to the efforts of the two sergeants he had borrowed.

  “I am made an officer, Julie. I must live in the Officers Mess – by order. This hut must be made over to the man who becomes Sergeant-Major in my place.”

  “And an officer cannot have a Creole lady, Billy?”

  “Not without the whole battalion knowing and laughing, Julie. It is not possible. The Army does not work that way. You could not live in the Mess, and I am not to be seen to be diving into this hut of an evening. I am sorry.”

  “So am I, Billy. You must go. I have a lot of money, now, so you have been very good to me. My mother is pleased. You are not a bad man.”

  Billy wondered about that, for he was sure in his own mind that he had not behaved properly to her. She had been convenient – he had been able to find the recruits because of her; add to that, she had been an attractive armful, but that was all. He had used her, when all was said and done, and that was not right. It was the Army way, however. No doubt he would do the same again, somewhere else. He wandered off in search of Clarence, who had promised to escort him into the Mess, where he was to be introduced to his fellow officers.

  Two companies of recruits, in the end, he mused. Ninety-five Creole men, and Julie had pocketed five shillings for each. Twenty-three pounds and fifteen shillings – which was a lot of money on the island. She and her mother and sisters could fence off a few acres of the land just along the coast, near to the creek so that they had drinking water to hand, and then they could keep chickens and goats and run their fishing boat. The fish guts could be dug into the soil so that they could put together a kitchen garden. They could plant paw-paw trees as well, for their fruit. The money would set the family up for a generation, possibly longer if they saved and built a bigger house and another boat. He had not been bad to her, and the Army had to come first… but he would miss her, a lot.

  He found Clarence and stepped up to his room and changed uniforms. Lieutenant in the West India Regiment – green facings, otherwise in no way unusual.

  “Watch ‘em, Billy! Your major is old and bent over by rheumatics – his hips and back hurt, I reckon, and that makes him crabby – irritable all the time. The old captain is sour, for never seeing action in all his days and never having a chance. The younger captain and all four lieutenants are no-hopers – just bad-tempered pissheads! The ensign is the Major’s aide, and don’t know his arse from his elbow yet. You are on your own, Billy – and they all of them know it!”

  Colonel Searson was present and made a show of welcoming Billy as a brother in the Mess.

  “Lieutenant Bacon, I have pleasure in introducing you to Major Palmer, your Commanding Officer.”

  Colonel Searson had that the wrong way round – he should have said the senior officer’s name first according to the rules of precedence and courtesy. Major Palmer thought it might have been an intentional insult; he did not offer a hand to shake.

  “Sir!”

  “You are welcome, Lieutenant Bacon. I shall expect you to take the Grenadiers in hand and make them into our best company, our fighting spearhead, as it were.”

  Major Palmer’s voice was thin and old; he would never be heard in battle, but he probably had little expectation of
using his battalion as other than garrison troops. Billy suspected he might be due a surprise; Colonel Searson would wish to protect his own battalion and keep his numbers intact.

  “Thank you, sir, for your confidence in me. I shall do my very best, sir!”

  “Captain Simons of B Company is second in the battalion, Mr Bacon. He will introduce you round.”

  Simons was older by many years than the other captain; nearly three decades a lieutenant since being made on the battlefield in the Sixties, he had been granted his captaincy one minute before the other was confirmed. He had existed on his pay all his career and now hoped that the major would drop dead of his unwonted exertions and give him a final promotion and a retirement to half-pay that he could survive on.

  Major Palmer had carried out his official duty to a new officer and Captain Simons took over.

  “You are welcome, Lieutenant Bacon. The other officers are all present, as you see, but there is small point to introducing you at this time of day – they will be hard put to remember their own names by now, let alone yours. I shall try soon after stand-to in the morning. Ensign McKay is here, however.”

  The ensign was of Scots descent, in common with the great bulk of the merchant community on Antigua. He had been educated privately on the Island and knew nothing of the outside world and had become an ensign because his father intended to buy his promotions as quickly as possible and make him a gentleman by rank before he sold out to join the firm. Captain McKay would be valuable, the older gentleman thought, impressing the merchants of the Sugar Islands by his gentility. He was a pleasant boy, Billy decided, and quite harmless; he would need his hand held if they went into battle.