Red Man

by Andrew Wareham

  Micah raised an eyebrow.

  Daniel laughed in response.

  “A professional officer will make his assault and call it off when he can see his men are being defeated. If the losses mount out of proportion to the ground being taken, he will pull back. If he loses one in ten, or thereabouts, of his men, he will accept defeat and either seek terms or go into headlong retreat. All very well when both sides fight according to the same book; if one side has never read the book, then they will not behave in the proper fashion. I have only fought irregulars once, and on that occasion we killed a good half of them and they still kept coming forward! We defeated them in the end – and we lost far too many men in process!”

  “I must imagine you killed almost all of them, sir.”

  “Every last one, Red Man. The men were so much angered by the fight that they gave no quarter, slaughtered the wounded as well. Out of control, would not even listen to their sergeants – I have never seen the like and want to see no repetition, Red Man. If the need arises, I shall order the men to fall back in the centre and draw them in so that the pikes can hold while the shot fires from three sides. Your horse can break them when they come to a halt – drive them off. When men have no discipline to fall back on, any retreat immediately becomes a rout; they will run and not stop until they get back home. We will kill many that way, but hopefully fewer than by simply holding our line against them.”

  Micah was surprised by his superior’s desire not to kill the enemy.

  “They are not soldiers, Red Man! It is none of their business to be going to war. I will kill – most happily – those villains who have brought them to arms, make no mistake about that. But the untutored peasantry have no place on the field of battle. Make soldiers of them by all means – that is what they are good for. Do not send them ignorant into battle; that is wrong.”

  There was a morality to soldiering, it seemed.

  “Ride out in the morning, Red Man, your whole troop together in column of twos, along the road to Upavon where you may be surprised to discover the enemy and will flee before them. They have only a few horse, you tell me, and we can bring them down upon us and dismiss them at an early stage. Hopefully, the foot will follow and come upon us piecemeal. It will reduce our losses and possibly theirs.”

  An early breakfast in the damp river mists before dawn.

  “I hate this time of day, Rootes!”

  “It ain’t day. It’s bloody night, sir. I emptied the pans of your pistols last night, sir. Need to prime them again this morning. Didn’t want the powder to get damp and flash in the pan, sir.”

  Micah nodded his appreciation and checked the spark of each flint before filling the pans with fine powder and carefully laying the firing hammer flat on them. He called Lieutenant Halleck across.

  “You are to be captain from this day, Mr Halleck. The Major is very pleased with you. I am sure you will replace me most effectively. Watch your match this morning – it may play up in the damp airs. Use the campfires to dry and then light it.”

  “Thank you, sir. I shall, sir. Can I have another ensign, sir?”

  “Name him to Major Carew, Mr Halleck. It is thy company and choice is thine.”

  Micah deliberately resorted to the more formal language to emphasise that Halleck was now his own master.

  “Very good, sir. Will you want to take more men for the horse, sir?”

  “If we can lay our hands on the mounts for them, certainly. Continue to recruit – we need more bodies.”

  “The regiment is already big, sir…”

  “It may yet become two battalions, and horse besides. Every chance for an active captain to rise in the world still further.”

  “So there is, sir. Very good, sir.”

  Halleck marched away, shoulders back and strutting, the epitome of the ambitious young man. He had evidently forgotten his cousin, Captain Dunton; certainly he had buried any grievance in his shallow grave.

  Micah grinned.

  “I shall talk to him again tonight, Rootes.”

  “Hold his hand while he counts his losses on the day, sir? If he makes it, that is. Going to be prancing about at the front, showing off to the men, ain’t he?”

  “Likely so, Rootes. A young man in his first fight in command. He will wish to show that he deserves to be where he is. If he lives, that one will do well enough, I think.”

  “He ain’t stupid and he’s got a pair of balls, sir. Don’t need much else to command a company.”

  “Thank you, Rootes!”

  The horse walked out, slowly – it was likely to be a long day.

  Half a mile short of the village they saw smoke, too much for campfires. A voice called from the scrubland at the bottom of the hillside.

  “Soldier! Don’t go shooting at we over ‘ere!”

  Micah drew rein, looked across.

  “Come on out. You are safe from us. Who are you?”

  The scrawny landlord of the beer house showed himself.

  “They burned us out. Last night, the bastards! Come to the pub wanting beer, so they did, and I ain’t got no more than the half of a barrel fit to drink, for not brewing up much at a time, not having the sale for it. Ran out of beer inside ten minutes, so I did, and they ripped the place apart looking for more. Then they set fire to it and it spread all over. The others in the village what got any sense all run for it. Dunno what might ‘ave ‘appened to some of them. Wasn’t no officers nowhere to stop it. Didn’t have much before. Now we ain’t got nothing.”

  “Go down the road to the soldiers there. They will look after you for the next while. Wait in hiding till the battle is over. After we have dealt with the soldiers, you must go somewhere else. Walk down to Salisbury, perhaps. The churchmen at the cathedral might find charity for you… Maybe.”

  The landlord showed little joy at that prospect, but a crust of bread at the camp was better than nothing. He called to the others who had joined him and told them the soldiers would at least see them fed for the day.

  “Keep off the road, man! There will be fighting here before long. Stay out of sight.”

  Peter Peveril, riding two ranks behind Micah, spoke up.

  “All the same, the King’s men, sir. They do not care for the ordinary people of the land.”

  “That is why we fight them, Peveril. Why we must win. They must learn that they cannot treat us in the way I am told the French nobility behave to their peasants. We are free-born Englishmen and we have our rights and no damned King is to trample on them!”

  The words passed down the little column, were greeted by the occasional ‘amen’ and ‘hallelujah’ and more of thoughtful nodding.

  “Forward, men. Let us find these villains!”

  Micah felt slightly embarrassed at his own words; the men seemed to think them only right.

  “Corporal Weaver. Take Ayreton and ride a furlong or so to the front. Give me the word on anything you see.”

  Two bends of the winding valley road and the pair came back at speed.

  “Horse just this side of the village, sir. Small troop but about all they got from what we saw yesterday. They was scattered out on a loose front, sir, but it looked like their officer was calling them together after he spotted us.”

  “Bringing them into a single body for a chase? Well done.”

  Micah turned in the saddle and called the troopers to spread out into a double line on either side of the road.

  “Fast walk. Watch for soft ground and rabbit holes! Sergeant Driver, bring your people in behind them if you can. On the caracole – lead in and fire one pistol then return to use the other.”

  Driver raised a hand in acknowledgment.

  “Fletcher, hold the line to the right until you can flank them. I shall stand here in the centre.”

  It was a simple plan but they had the advantage of numbers.

  The ground was open and they could not mount an ambush. Micah hoped that the King’s people would be sufficiently arrogant – or stupid – to ch
arge headlong.

  Two minutes, they had barely formed their lines and set their spacing, and the first of the enemy came round the bend a hundred yards distant, almost silently, the sounds of their hooves muffled on the damp turf.

  They had spread out, were galloping, the better horses – or worse disciplined riders – to the fore. The thirty men were spread out over at least eighty yards in a loose mob. An officer well to the fore started to wave his sword and yell, seemingly shouting them to charge.

  “Ready! Draw your pistols. Wait my command… Cock your locks… Fire at will!”

  Micah urged his horse forward, slowly. His shouted commands had drawn attention and there were three of the cavaliers riding directly for him. He fired his pistols, right and left and holstered them, making a display of calm, drawing his sword with his right hand, firing a third shot with the left. One of the three fell. He tucked the pistol away and drew a fourth and put his spurs to his gelding.

  The horse jumped forward, between the remaining pair and he slashed with the sword, hitting something hard and feeling a blow in exchange while triggering the pistol at the man to his left, no more than two yards distant. Something hurt and his right arm was stiff, but both men were down. He looked around and saw the skirmish was ended, had lasted no more than a minute.

  “Sergeant Fletcher! Report!”

  “All over, sir. Tidying up now. Looks like a good score of horses taken, sir. Maybe ten down and being seen to now, sir.”

  He heard the sporadic crack of pistols as the wounded horses were put down.

  “What have we lost?”

  “No horses, sir. They didn’t use their pistols, sir. The officer kept yelling something about swords and cold steel, sir. That is, ‘e did until you bloody near chopped his head off, sir. Blood from arsehole to breakfast time, sir! Three of the troopers behind him just dropped their swords and stuck their hands up at the sight of it! You’re covered in it, too – proper Red Man, sir!”

  “Some of it may be mine, Fletcher. He poked me a bit before he went down.”

  Rootes heard and came scurrying to Micah’s side. He had dismounted and had been running his hands over Micah’s three and his own victim, now turned to more important business. He had, besides, discovered the officer’s purses and finger rings and a pin with a stone that tied his cravat, had done the bulk of the job.

  “Let’s take a look, sir. Down you get.”

  They sat Micah on the turf and removed his breast-and-back and cut his shirt sleeve open, over his protests that it was too good a shirt to ruin.

  “Bugger the shirt, sir! Sliced you up from a hand’s width above the elbow to the point of the shoulder, so he did. Deeper than I like… You can see he swiped at you and bounced off the breast, sir. Silly bugger never learned you got to thrust a straight sword, not slash with it. He ain’t going to learn much now, anyhow. Going to hurt, this bit, sir. Got to clean it up.”

  Micah sat stoically as Rootes soaked a piece of cloth in gin, taken from a pocket flask, and wiped it down the wound.

  “Got a few bits from your shirt stuck inside, sir. They’re out now. Waste of good gin, sir, but I seen it to work for healing before now. Any case, it’s pretty bloody poor gin, truly speaking. Didn’t cost no more than tuppence in the boozer in Romsey. Kept it because it tastes so bloody bad I didn’t want to drink it if there was anything else.”

  Micah almost laughed.

  “Tie it up tight in its own blood. Always best for healing that. Stands to reason, don’t it, sir. The body ain’t going to be hurt by the blood what belongs to it. You hear these silly buggers what says they ought to be washing cuts clean, but that don’t make sense, to my mind. Up you stands, sir. Best to keep moving. Stirs up the humours, sir.”

  Micah could not argue; Rootes’ words made simple common sense. He tucked his right hand into his breeches pocket and asked Rootes to strap on his armour – he had to show the men that he was ready and able to lead them still.

  “Drag the dead horses off to the side, in the bushes. Is that fellow from Upavon still here?”

  “He stopped where he was, hiding, when he heard there was going to be fighting, sir.”

  “Sensible man. Ride back and bring him here.”

  Ten minutes saw the cadaverous landlord nervously standing before Micah.

  “Get your people busy, man. There’s the better part of a dozen dead horses here. Have you got butcher’s knives?”

  The mournful face lit up.

  “Bloody right we ‘as, Soldier! Us can go down the valley, Netheravon way and get one of their blokes with a cart to come up. I’ll send the boy off running now. They’ll take the horsehide and a good bit of the meat what we joints up and let us have some flour for it. Give us use of a barn to live in maybe as well. Saved our necks, so you ‘ave, Soldier. Not going to live, othergates, we wasn’t. Can’t do much, for thee. I can tell the other folks what it was Parliament what looked after us, and King what did us down.”

  “Do that, man. I wish you luck in your future.”

  “Needs it, don’t us, Soldier!”

  The field was cleared, the bodies and wounded removed, put out of sight behind scrub, together with the dead horses. The troop rode back to the battalion, to warn them of the impending onslaught.

  Daniel walked across.

  “You are wounded, Red Man?”

  “Cut on the arm, sir. I shan’t be waving the sword again today. I shall be leading my men.”

  “Take care. If you become faint, get down from your saddle and give command to your second. Eglinton can do the job, or all I want from him today.

  Micah did not say that he had his doubts about that. He nodded.

  “Place your troop on the road, behind the battalion, Red Man. When the time comes, I shall call you forward into the attack, through our line and then right or left as I point you. Did you lose many?”

  “Only one dead. Six cut beside me. They would not use pistols. Their lieutenant in command was a youngster and was shouting them to get into us with the sword. Apparently he was of the opinion that gentlemen with cold steel would defeat any number of ‘tradesmen and peasants’, such as we are. There were thirty-one of them and we have taken eight unharmed and eleven variously wounded and twenty good horses. We have the tack and all of their pistols and swords and some good boots.”

  Daniel was amused that they had possessed pistols but had chosen not to use them.

  “How many? All flintlocks?”

  “Fifty-two, sir. Some men had only the one. More of them are wheellocks than flintlock; we have the spanning keys for them. Each man had a straight sword with a thirty-inch blade, sharpened both sides, not point and single-edge which is more normal.”

  “Slashing – not so effective as the thrust. Poor practice. What of armour?”

  “Old helmets, all to a pattern. For the rest, a mixture of new and old and none at all. The lieutenant had a breast plate and some sort of thigh guards of overlapping layers. I thought his armour was old – his grandfather’s, perhaps. Heavy, for sure.”

  “Not sure that armour makes sense in this day and age, Red Man. A musket ball will pierce most plate mail and shot from a gun will certainly destroy any man, whatever he wears. I saw cuirassiers in the Germanies, armoured top to tail and slow, and never thought them so dangerous as light horse with leather coat and sword and carbine or pistol. Their day is done, I suspect, except that they look most fearsome. Place yourself, Red Man. The foot must arrive soon.”

  The horse walked back to their place and dismounted to rest their horses.

  Rootes appeared with a camp chair.

  “Do you sit down for the while, sir. We ain’t doing much for the next little while. Take a count of what we picked up this morning while we’re quiet, sir. That officer was a rich man’s son if ever there was, sir!”

  No fewer than three heavy purses were laid at Micah’s feet.

  “One in his pocket and two in the saddlebags, sir.”

  The largest of
the three, more of a leather sack than a pocket purse, contained silver half crowns only.

  “Sixty of ‘em, sir. I reckon that to be two week’s pay for the troopers.”

  “Thirty pennies a week? Not much for horse. More like just the one week’s money, I would say.”

  Rootes agreed that might be more likely.

  The others had mixed gold coinage, minted in all of the countries of Europe, as was usual enough. Any man taking payment in gold would expect to put the coins over the scales first and calculate their value by weight.

  They hefted the heavy purses and agreed on the better part of a hundred pounds sterling.

  “Tuck those away safe, Rootes. Share them out later. What else did he have?”

  “Got a tiepin, sir, what you might want to wear. And a ring or two what won’t do for your fingers.”

  “Good enough. What’s the chance of something hot, Rootes?”

  “Got a mug of smouch steeping, sir. Thick and strong, what does you good.”

  Bitter and harsh on the throat, as well – but Micah would drink it, accepting it as medicinal, a tonic as well as something warm.

  An hour and they heard a pair of drums beating in the distance.

  “That reminds me, Rootes. We have taken on drummer boys but have no drums for them.”

  “Buy them when we get back to London, sir. Not going to pick them up out in the sticks here. Ready to go, sir?”

  Micah rose to his feet, not entirely steadily.

  “Only a cut, Rootes! Shouldn’t be doing this to me!”

  “Shakes you up, it does, sir, taking any wound. You’ll forget it when you get busy.”

  Micah hoped his man was right. The wound hurt, was throbbing, and his whole shoulder felt bruised. He pulled himself into the saddle – there was work to be done.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The drums rattled and banged, hammering out a quick march, the boys keeping well to time and clearly enjoying themselves. A pair of trumpets squawked an uneven counterpoint, very martial if short on musicality.