The Sea and the Sand

by Christopher Nicole

  Truxton shook his head. ‘You’ll beat to dinner, Mr Rodgers. And join me for the meal. We won’t come to blows for several hours yet.’ He looked at the sun, which was just past noon high. ‘Maybe not until dark. That might not be a bad thing.’

  *

  ‘Fifty-two guns,’ Tom McDonough muttered, leaning on the rail to watch the mountains of Martinique looming against the darkening horizon, dominated, to the north of the island, by the active volcano of Mount Pelée, more than three thousand feet high. St Lucia was now on the starboard quarter, but both the islands were becoming indistinct as the sun sank in the west; they could already make out twinkling lights ashore. The afternoon rainsquall had long passed and the air was almost cool. Although there was no moon due, as was common in the Caribbean they could anticipate a clear, bright night.

  ‘That’ll be a big ship,’ the midshipman mused.

  ‘You heard the Britisher,’ Toby said. ‘She’s a fourth-rate, fit to take her place in a line of battle.’

  The navies of the world divided their vessels into two broad categories: those big enough and sufficiently well armed to fight in the line of battle, and thus known as line-of-battle ships, and those regarded as too small to take the battering of a fleet action, and therefore to be used for scouting and reconnaissance and patrol, and convoy duty — these included frigates such as the Constellation. Line-of-battle ships were further divided into rates. Thus the very largest warships, those carrying a hundred guns and more, were called first-rates; second-rates carried eighty-four guns or more; third-rates seventy or more, and fourth-rates fifty or more. Ships, such as the Constellation, carrying between thirty-two and fifty guns were called fifth-rates. Normally only those of the first three rates were ever included in a battle line, but it was not unknown for fourth raters to be so used, and certainly no naval officer would doubt the superiority of a fourth-rate over a frigate.

  ‘But you reckon we can beat her?’ McDonough asked.

  ‘I reckon the captain’s right,’ Toby said. ‘A gun has only the strength of the man serving her, as a ship has only the purpose of the man in command. The French Navy is still suffering the effects of the revolution. They don’t have many trained officers, and they have no traditions. Oh, aye, we’ll beat her, if we’re determined enough.’

  Yet, for all his confident words, his heart pounded and the adrenalin flowed into his veins. They were accepting immense odds. And he knew, for all the gruff refusal of Truxton to help the British as an ally, that his captain certainly meant the convoy, and its passengers, to escape, by keeping himself between Martinique and the British ships until they were out of danger. Even if the Frenchman did not immediately come out, it might be a lengthy operation, for the British remained close at hand, as the wind had dropped with the dusk. The frigate, Lancer, had also moved to the east of her charges, placing herself between them and Fort Royal. Both warships had lit their stern lanterns, and others besides; if the Frenchman was going to come out, they each wanted him to know where they were. To the west, the three ships of the convoy were in darkness; the passengers on board would be praying they would pass unnoticed by the French.

  Toby wondered what it must be like, to be in the position of Jonathan Crown, and know that he was not merely seeking to do his duty by his profession and for his country, but actually in defence of his own family. Would that strengthen, or weaken, a man? And to have that family on board one’s very ship …

  ‘There, Toby,’ McDonough said, forgetting their respective ranks in his excitement. ‘There!’

  Toby levelled his telescope at the headland which protected the port of Fort Royal, and caught his breath. Even in the gloom of the dusk he could make out the tall masts and white canvas of the Frenchman, slowly coming into view. ‘You’ll inform the captain, Mr McDonough,’ he said quietly.

  Truxton was up a moment later, hat askew on his head, telescope levelled before he reached the rail. Across the water behind them they heard a drum roll; the British had also seen the enemy.

  ‘He’d best not get in my way,’ Truxton growled. ‘You’ll watch him, Mr McDonough; I meant what I said. Beat to quarters, Mr Rodgers. Shorten sail, Mr McGann, and come about on the port tack.’

  ‘Aye-aye,’ answered both officers, and went about their duties. McDonough remained on the quarterdeck to relay any additional orders his captain might need to give, while the junior midshipmen hurried about their gun duties on the main deck.

  Toby had the topmasts sent down for stowage, the nets rigged at once to repel boarders and to catch falling spars. Under her working canvas alone the Constellation moved quietly across the water towards the Frenchman, who still carried all possible canvas in the fair offshore breeze. His intention was clear: to burst past the warships and reach the convoy.

  Aboard the Constellation the drums began to beat, a sound always prone to quicken the blood, while the fife men were playing Yankee Doodle Dandy as the ports were dropped and the guns run out, sixteen thirty-two-pounders to each broadside, all on the single main deck; the four long chasers were mounted two in the bows and two in the stern. Powder and ball were brought up from the orlop deck below the waterline and heaped beside each gun, while the gunners themselves, stripped to the waist and with bare feet to aid them to grip the deck when it became slippery with blood, their heads wrapped in bandannas to keep the sweat from their eyes, quipped and chatted as they prepared their deadly work.

  The rest of the crew busied themselves with stacking muskets and cutlasses for use if it came to close work, and scattering sawdust over the deck to absorb any blood which might be spilt. This was the province of Mr Rodgers, who commanded the main deck during any action.

  Toby made his way right forward to the forecastle, where the opening shots would be fired. Now the darkness was sweeping across the sea at increasing speed; the lights on Martinique gleamed ever more brightly, but those on the French ship had been doused as her captain had seen the United States ship making towards him. The range between the two vessels was perhaps four miles, and closing every second.

  Tom McDonough joined Toby. ‘The captain says to show him we mean business, Mr McGann,’ he said, just the faintest of trembles affecting his voice. They had both taken part in the encounter with L’Insurgente, but that had been a year ago, and L’Insurgente had only carried forty guns, four more than the Constellation, to be sure — but a long way short of fifty-two.

  ‘Raise your elevation,’ Toby commanded.

  The wheels were turned, and the long barrels of the culverins slowly crept towards the sky, while the frigate plunged onwards, close hauled now, spray breaking against the bows as they went down, and being thrown high into the air as the bowsprit came back up. Although the seas were gentle, it was still necessary to time the shot very accurately, or it would merely plunge harmlessly into the waves. Toby waited for one dip and rise to be completed, and then the next; behind him it seemed that the entire ship, giving off a demoniacal red glow from the battle lanterns strung fore and aft, also waited: even the fifers had ceased their tune.

  On the top of the next surge he gave the command, ‘Fire!’

  The huge gun roared and leapt; she fired only a twenty-four-pound shot, as opposed to the heavier weight of the main armament, but she could throw that ball for twice the distance of the cannon. And in the darkness the watchers could clearly see the splash of white as the ball entered the sea, some quarter of a mile ahead of the Frenchman.

  ‘Try again, Mr McGann,’ Truxton’s voice boomed; he was using a speaking trumpet.

  The first gun was being reloaded; the second was ready. Again Toby chose his moment, and this one brought a cheer; it entered the sea much closer to its target and some of its spray clearly scattered across the French decks.

  ‘Good shooting, Mr McGann,’ Truxton called. ‘Keep at her.’

  Toby obeyed, but the French captain, realising he had a fight on his hands, was already altering course, to come directly towards his impudent opponent, and thus
not only present less of a target but use his greater strength to its best advantage. Toby straddled the approaching giant with two more shots, and suffered several in return, but these were well wide.

  ‘She must not pass us unscathed, Mr Rodgers,’ Truxton called.

  ‘Aye-aye,’ Rodgers agreed, prowling up and down the deck between the two rows of cannon. Should the bigger, and therefore faster, ship get past them, they would hardly catch her again. They had to hit her, hard enough to cause some damage, and then outmanoeuvre her by superior seamanship. But no one on the American frigate doubted their ability to do that.

  ‘Stand by the guns,’ came the order, and Toby left the chasers to go aft; the culverins would be of little value in the coming work, as they lacked the weight to smash stout timbers — that was the job of the main battery of carronades, ‘smashers’, they were called. His job now was to mount the horse blocks — little platforms let into the bulwarks on either side of the helm — and take over the responsibility both of conning the ship, as the helmsman could not of course see over the high rails and cluster of masts and sails, as well as keeping the sails filled, giving a quiet order to the attentive boatswain to harden a sheet whenever he saw the canvas flapping. Fighting an action was the reverse of ordinary sailing; in the latter, the ship was usually steered to gain the maximum value from wind and sails; in the former, the ship was placed where it could do most damage to the enemy and receive least damage itself, and it was the business of the sails, and those who manned them, to find the wind where they could.

  ‘You’ll fire as you bear, Mr Rodgers,’ Truxton called, looking down on the waist.

  ‘Aye-aye,’ came the response.

  ‘Bear away, if you please, Mr McGann,’ Truxton said.

  ‘Starboard your helm, coxswain,’ Toby said. ‘Free those sheets, Mr Barclay,’ he called to the boatswain.

  The Constellation swung to the south-east, away from the wind, and the sails, allowed to balloon by the freed sheets, filled and bulged as she gathered speed. The frigate crossed the bows of the Frenchman, now just a dark mass in the gloom, even as his chasers exploded again; he was so close that the flashes of light and the whistle of the balls seemed almost as one; there came a crack from above their heads and one of the mizzen spars crashed into the netting.

  ‘Aloft there,’ Toby snapped at his repair squad.

  The seamen swarmed into the rigging to make the necessary running repairs.

  ‘Fire!’ John Rodgers called.

  The ship exploded into smoke and flame, heeling even farther away from the wind before coming upright again.

  ‘Bring her about, Mr McGann,’ Truxton called. ‘Bring her about.’

  ‘Hard to port, coxswain,’ Toby bawled. ‘Hand those sheets now, smartly.’

  Even before the smoke had cleared to let them see what damage they had done to La Vengeance, the Constellation, flawlessly handled, was coming about once more, intending again to cross the Frenchman’s bows even at this close, and closing, range, and hit him again before he could bring his own broadsides to bear. And the main deck gunners were giving a cheer as, despite the gloom, they made out the shattered bowsprit of their adversary. The Frenchman’s fire was desultory, and the Americans delivered their starboard broadside as they surged past, within a hundred yards now, while the port guns were run in and reloaded.

  At last the Frenchman came about, and the Constellation had to take his fire in return. Only some, because the Americans were again wearing ship with all the expertise of hours of practice, presenting the smallest of targets as they did so. Yet several of the huge balls smashed home, splintering the bulwarks and dismounting one gun while reducing its crew to so much carrion.

  ‘Swab those decks.’ Toby stepped down from the horse block and went forward to supervise, instinctively ducking as another spar thudded into the netting immediately above his head. ‘Easy, lad, easy.’ He knelt beside a moaning seaman, whose right leg had been blown off at the thigh and who was clearly bleeding to death. ‘Help is on its way.’

  He assisted the orderlies to lift the dying man on to a stretcher, then wiped the back of his hand across his forehead as he stood straight. Even when faced with the horrible effects of being hit by a cannon ball, you still always felt, you knew, that it would be the next man to go down, never yourself, until the fatal moment. But what must it feel like to look down at your body, and know that however strongly your heart still beat, you were going to be dead in a matter of minutes?

  At least the poor fellow would have felt no pain; the shock would have seen to that.

  He returned aft.

  ‘Hot work, Mr McGann,’ Truxton said. ‘Your father would have enjoyed it.’

  ‘No doubt he would, sir,’ Toby agreed. But he was happy enough that the old man was not here today, however often he had wished he could have sailed with him — because now it was hot work. The broadsides of the French vessel filled the night with flying ball, and although the American ship was far faster, and far better handled, delivering three broadsides to every one of her enemy’s, she had yet to stay too close for comfort if she was to stand any chance of inflicting a mortal or even crippling blow.

  But their first objective had been attained. The Frenchman was damaged, and more important, he wanted to settle this matter. The convoy should be safe by now. Toby cast a hasty glance to the west, and could see the lights of the British frigate, some distance away to be sure, acting as a second line of defence should the Frenchman break through, but obeying Truxton’s command not to interfere, and beyond … the lights of the convoy. Because now they, too, had set lights, no doubt to inform their escort of where they were. But yet they hardly seemed to have moved in the light airs.

  It was time to concentrate once again, as the Constellation delivered another broadside, to the accompaniment of cheers as La Vengeance’s mizzen mast trembled and then went by the board, crashing over the side in a welter of sails and cordage. Now the stars were gleaming in the cloudless sky, and visibility was quite good; the Americans could see the French seamen frantically trying to cut the encumbering wreckage free.

  ‘We have him now,’ Truxton shouted slapping his thigh with delight.

  ‘Will you board, Captain?’ Midshipman McDonough asked eagerly.

  ‘No, sir,’ Truxton said. ‘He’ll have twice our numbers, and marines, too. No, sir, we must batter him into submission.’

  Which was going to take time, Toby knew. There was a lot of fight left in the Frenchman yet. He watched men still hacking away the fallen mast and ropes, and the French guns were continuing to belch smoke and flame. As were the Constellation’s as round she came yet again. Toby ceased to be aware of the passage of time, as he gave the various changes of course to the helmsman, ordered the necessary adjustment of the sails time and again, sent repair parties fore and aft to cobble up the damage being done by the French shot. Balls whistled about his head, and twice men on the quarterdeck were hit, while the waist was a bloody swamp, and all the men he could spare from trimming the yards were hard at work carrying the wounded down to the sickbay where Dr Lamming would be waiting — what the cockpit was like did not bear consideration. But the firing never ceased, as they hammered the huge French ship again and again, sailing round and round her like a dog attacking a bear.

  ‘Mr McGann, sir.’ The boatswain stood to attention before the helm. ‘The forestays are shot away. I’ve doubts about the mast, sir.’

  ‘You go forward, Mr McGann,’ Truxton said. ‘I’ll con her. Don’t lose that mast.’

  ‘Aye-aye,’ Toby agreed, and accompanied the boatswain forward; the foremast was essential to manoeuvre the ship, especially to windward. Now it was necessary to pass between the gun batteries, keeping his footing with difficulty as he tried to avoid stepping on dead or dying men or slipping in their blood, while there was a continuous cloud of heavy white smoke swirling about his head to make breathing difficult. The guns slid back and forth on their restraining cables as they were fired, r
ecoiled and reloaded, and the noise was an unending peal of thunder, through which the cries and curses of the men could dimly be heard.

  He gasped with relief when he emerged on to the fore-deck, and could look up at the mast, which was indeed swaying dangerously as it lacked all support, and still carried the weight of the sail and the jibs; indeed, the fore halliards were acting as auxiliary stays to keep the mast up, but the next time the ship went about and the wind came from aft, the timber would undoubtedly snap.

  ‘She’ll not hold for long without guying, Mr McGann,’ the boatswain said, confirming his opinion.

  Toby nodded. ‘I’ll inform the Captain,’ he said. It was not an order he dared give himself in the midst of battle, to take all the foresails off the ship. He hurried aft, listening to an immense cheer, blinked into the darkness as he gained the quarterdeck, and saw that the Frenchman’s mainmast has also gone; she was down to foremast only, and in addition there were several fires burning on her deck.

  ‘She’ll not escape,’ Truxton said, snapping his fingers with satisfaction. ‘Damage, Mr McGann?’

  ‘The foremast will not carry sail before the wind, until we’ve rigged some fresh stays, sir.’

  Truxton considered for a moment, then nodded. ‘Very good, Mr McGann. Hand your foresails and make your repairs. Smartly, now.’

  ‘Aye-aye.’ Toby went forward again, but had not yet reached the forecastle when he heard the cry, ‘Cease firing,’ from aft. He jumped on the bulwark the better to see, and saw a lantern being waved to and fro on board the Frenchman, not a hundred yards away: La Vengeance also had ceased firing.

  ‘Ahoy, USS Constellation,’ came the call over the water, the accented English booming through the speaking trumpet. ‘We ‘ave struck our flag, sir. You are too quick for us.’

  An enormous burst of cheering rose from the deck of the Constellation.

  Toby leapt down from his perch and continued forward. ‘Get sail off her, Mr Barclay,’ he told the boatswain. ‘And smartly. Retain one jib as a support until we can rig some jury stays.’