by M. C. Muir
‘We need a team of sodding draft horses to haul this blighter!’
‘Thank you, Bungs. I am afraid we do not have a team of horses handy,’ the captain advised. ‘But you will be surprised what you can achieve once the tackle is rigged. Pull hard and you’ll have the gun at the tunnel in no time.’
‘Only tunnels I’ve ever known was at the bottom of a pit not up on the top of a mountain,’ Tommy Wainwright said.
‘Silence!’ Mr Tully shouted. ‘Bungs, make sure the barrel is lashed tightly to the cradle. It if teeters, it will overbalance and crush anyone who is in its way. And if it rolls down the hill, then we will have to start again at the bottom. Our destination is the north end of the rock. You will be relieved to know we are not going as high as the signal tower.’
‘Some consolation,’ Entwhistle murmured.
Once the lines were rigged, a team of ten men stood to the ropes. Three more were stationed at each side of the carriage to help turn the wheels, while two stood behind for pushing. Meanwhile three sailors were sent to clear the track ahead, rolling the largest boulders aside but taking care not to let them topple over the edge as a single rock could gather others with it and deliver an avalanche of stones on the houses far below. Another pair followed close behind the carriage, armed with crowbars and wooden chocks. Their job was to prevent the cannon from sliding back if the lines snapped.
The marines appeared happy to look on for the present.
When everyone was in place Mr Tully gave the order. ‘Heave men! Haul away!’
But the gun did not move. ‘Heave, with all your might! Only twenty yards to the next ring!’
With his third call came the crunch of metal wheels as they ground the rocks beneath them.
‘She’s adrift. Keep hauling! Don’t stop.’
With the wheels turning slowly, the team hauled the cannon, first towards the north. Then, when the track zigzagged, they found themselves heading due south. Despite encouragement from the officers, progress was painfully slow. Half-way to their destination, a band of chattering monkeys bounded down the hill to investigate the intruders in their domain. One of the Barbary Apes, with an infant clinging to its back, leapt onto the gun’s barrel apparently to take a ride. The sailors found it amusing.
The marine corporal prodded it several times with his musket and eventually dislodged it, but it promptly climbed back on. He aimed for it again.
‘Don’t hurt it,’ the sergeant warned, ‘unless you want the town’s folk to string you up.’
The marine shook his head in disgust, but in doing so the monkey was attracted to the wavering plume on his hat. Leaping quickly to his shoulders and dropping back nimbly to the ground, it dragged the hat from his head and ran off. The Irish marine dived after it yelling abuse at the beast. The other macaques screeched wildly in response and scampered after it, followed by four young recruits who thought it a great game.
‘That will come out of your pay,’ the sergeant called, but his order could not be heard above the excited cries.
‘Get back in line this instant!’ Captain Quintrell yelled.
The men stopped, turned and slowly regrouped much to the amusement of the Perpetuals. The antics of the monkeys and men had been a welcome distraction but it had resulted in the carriage wheels grinding to a halt.
‘Back to work, Perpetuals,’ Mr Tully bellowed. ‘Keep your mind on the task. It ain’t no different to running out a gun!’
‘No different? We’re hauling it up the side of a bloody mountain or ain’t he noticed?’
‘Did you say something, Brickley?’
‘No, sir, wasn’t me, Mr Tully, sir.’
‘Then one of the men sounded exactly like you. Keep it shut in future.’
After a brief rest, the men took up the lines and hauled again.
Up ahead, Tommy was clearing rocks from the track but suddenly, for no apparent reason, he stopped and sat down allowing the gun to gain on him.
‘Get out of the way!’ Bungs yelled.
‘You there,’ Mr Tully ordered. ‘Stand up. Get off the track!’
Tommy turned his head and looked questioningly from the lieutenant to the gun which was only a few yard from him and moving closer.
‘What’s the matter with him? Is he deaf?’ Bungs said.
‘Get him off the track!’ Mr Tully yelled.
‘Stop hauling!’ the Captain ordered.
The men dropped their lines and cursed. The gun immediately lost its forward momentum and came to a dead stop. Everyone knew that getting it rolling again was the hardest part.
‘You,’ Mr Tully shouted to three marines still taunting the Barbary Apes. ‘Get down here and clear the track ahead, or lend a hand on the lines. Not far to go. Haul away, men!’
After two hours, the men were near exhausted. By now, the sun had risen over the ridge that runs along the top of the Rock, and with it the temperature had risen considerably.
Approximately an hour later, the exhausted crew pushed the big gun into the entrance of the Windsor Gallery – the great cavernous tunnel dug by hand formed a gallery for big guns. The small cave-like openings in the cliff’s face provided ideal port-holes for the cannon to be fired through.
A single guard stationed outside greeted the captain.
After a brief conversation, Captain Quintrell learned that the signal tower had been active during the morning but, as it was not visible from the tunnel’s entrance, it was impossible to know if it had stopped. However, the position high on the north-east corner of the Rock provided a broad vista over the mile-wide isthmus joining the British colony to the mainland of Spain. It also provided a panoramic view over the Mediterranean Sea.
But from this position, Captain Quintrell was not able to see his frigate. If the French were aware of the epidemic and the state of the garrison, did they also know about the treasure he had been entrusted with? The occupants of the old hulks were also a potential threat, the traders-cum-smugglers having already demonstrated they would stop at nothing. Then there were the occasional bad apples in his own crew to consider. He remembered a handful of greedy men who had chanced their lives for a lump of ambergris. What would such men do for a chest full of silver? Added to that were the Spanish gunboats. They were as annoying as mosquitoes as they flittered across the bay.
The sooner he could return to his ship the better.
‘Steady men,’ Mr Tully warned, as he watched the cannon being manoeuvred through the entrance leading into the Rock. Chiselled out by hand in 1782 by the military artificers of the Corps of Engineers, the mouth of the tunnel was broad enough to accommodate a London coach and four. The rock floor was angled on a slight declivity and led into a long tunnel bathed in blackness.
Lashed with ropes to hold it back, the massive cannon now wanted to run on its own and was more unmanageable than when it was being hauled up the hill.
‘Don’t let it get away!’ Captain Quintrell called.
After the searing sunlight, the tunnel within the Rock was dimly lit. Only a few well-spaced lanterns hung from the walls, each glim as insignificant as the glow of a single firefly in a meadow. But at each gun embrasure rays of sunlight streamed from the hole in the rock face. Long rope mantles dangling across the apertures didn’t block the view but they concealed the apertures from the outside.
Wide eyed, to accommodate the darkness, the sailors eased their load past the first three embrasures. The 32-pound gun’s metal wheels ground slowly down the decline heading to the next hole in the wall where a gun could be positioned.
A group of artificers working further down the tunnel, were surprised by the approaching noise and voices and came back to investigate. A corporal, carrying a lantern, appeared out of the darkness and presented himself to the naval captain. He advised the captain where the vacant embrasure was – fifty yards further down the gallery.
When the cannon had finally been rolled into place, Oliver slid aside the rope curtain and looked down. It was a near perpendicular
drop. The Eastern Beach was to the north and Catalan Bay slightly to the south over 1000 feet below.
While Oliver assessed the capability of the gallery’s guns, Mr Nightingale announced loudly, ‘Three sail of ships to the north.’
The captain darted to the nearest opening to look through. No doubt the ships were the reason the tower had been signalling.
Everyone stopped and waited.
With a glass supplied by the corporal, Oliver studied the ships. ‘French. And heading this way.’
With Mr Tully keeping watch, Oliver spoke with the military officer. ‘How many men do you have?’
‘Only half a dozen, sir, but we’re not gunners. We’re artillery artificers. We’re here to care for the ordnance, and keep watch.’
Not very well, Oliver thought. ‘Does the garrison post guards at Catalan Bay?’
‘No, sir. The Line Wall ends before the beach. Besides, there’s nothing worth guarding down there, just a couple of fisherman’s huts. As for the men on the wall, I heard that most had been moved to Windmill Hill, because of the sickness.’
‘Did the garrison never consider the possibility of a landing party arriving on the Mediterranean Coast?’
‘I don’t know, sir.’
‘Sergeant, have this gun ready for firing as quickly as possible.’
‘You intend to test the gun, sir?’ Perpetual’s sergeant of marines asked.
‘I intend to fire the gun, Sergeant. In fact I intend to fire five guns with the help of your men.’
‘You there,’ he called to the artillerymen in the tunnel, who appeared to have nothing to do. ‘I need cartridges and shot. Show the powder monkey where the arsenal is and lend a hand. Be quick about it!’
‘They’re hauling their sails, Captain,’ Mr Tully warned. ‘Looks like they intend to drop anchor off Catalan Bay.’
He turned to his two lieutenants. ‘Each of you, take a position and choose a gun crew. Sergeant, your men can work another two guns. I shall remain with this one. Gentleman, you wanted to see some action. Prepare your guns and be ready to run them out on my command.’
Priming the guns was not a problem, but loading a 32-pound cannon ball into a barrel, then depressing it to a steep incline was no easy task. Metal carriages were very different to flat wooden carriages and quoins.
The first shot pushed up into the captain’s gun rolled out as soon as the cannon’s muzzle was depressed. It dropped with a dull thud on the rock floor, rolled forward and fell for 1000 feet showering an avalanche of scree on the jagged rocks below.
‘Fools! Do you want to announce we are here? Look to the wedges,’ the captain shouted, pointing to a bag containing circlets of rope.
With grommets and wads the size of Dutch cheeses inserted into the barrel, the heavy ball was held firmly in place. Now there was nothing to do but wait to discover what the intentions of the French ships were.
CHAPTER 18
Catalan Bay
Only two hundred yards off the fisherman’s beach at Catalan Bay, the three French ships hove to.
‘They are opening their gun ports,’ Mr Nightingale called.
‘Hold your fire!’ Oliver’s voice echoed along the length of the gallery.
From his vantage point, he could see boats being lowered into the water from the three frigates. Uniformed troops were lined up along the decks.
‘Wait,’ Captain Quintrell ordered. ‘They are transporting soldiers. Two hundred men or more!’
He turned to the corporal in charge of the artificers. ‘Send one of your men with an urgent message to the garrison. Tell the commander that a French force is about to make land on the east coast.’
‘But the lookout at O’Hara’s Folly will have seen them,’ he argued.
‘There is no line of sight from the top of the Rock to the beach below. Did you hear my order, corporal? Do it now. Send a message down the hill this instant!’
Once each boat was filled with troops, it was pushed off from the frigates’ sides and immediately began pulling for the shore only a few hundred yards away. Already there were six boats on the water, each carrying near four dozen men. With no defences on the beach at Catalan Bay, there was nothing to stop them landing there or slightly further north on the Eastern Beach. From here they could cross the isthmus beneath the old Moorish castle and enter the town via the Land Port Gate.
With no sign of any defensive fire from the garrison’s forces on the northern line-wall, Oliver had one thought. He must stop them before they reached the beach. He glanced from the aperture in the cliff. The angle of fire was incredibly steep. Could the guns be angled sufficiently? He could only try.
‘We will stop the boats, and sink the ships,’ he ordered. ‘Run out your guns, men!’
When the order echoed through the tunnel, any weariness the men had felt after the long climb up the hill was forgotten. Running each gun forward. Pushing its barrel through the curtain of rope. Heaving its muzzle through the cliff face for several feet. And elevating the carriage to allow the barrel to point almost vertically down to the sea below, appeared almost impossible. But the crews worked well and the guns were ready.
To an observer on the water, the muzzle of each cannon was no larger than the eye of a seagull nesting on a ledge.
‘Prepare to fire!’ the captain yelled.
With bunches of teased oakum stuffed in their ears, and neckerchiefs or scarves wrapped around their heads, all the men had to do was wait for the command.
‘Fire!’
The thunderous noise was ear-shattering and, despite the earplugs, even Hobbles heard it. With a flash of orange flame and a thick cloud of grey smoke, five 32-pound projectiles were shot from the cliff face.
The cannon reared on their ungainly metal carriages like angry stallions. And while the gun crews feverishly wormed, sponged and reloaded the barrels with another ball, the officers and gun captains peered through the curtains to see where their shots had landed,
The shot from the marines’ guns at the most northerly end of the tunnel had landed closest to its target. The poor aim of the second gun had sent their shot drifting too far to the left. The Perpetuals, unused to firing at such elevations, had delivered their shots hundreds of feet over the French frigates’ masts. They quickly made adjustments and prepared to fire again.
The marine captain was waiting. He had his gun ready. Firing from the top of a battlement was what his men were best suited to.
Hobbles assessed the distance, considered the wind and likely drift, checked his carriage’s elevation, the barrel’s depression and adjusted the angle even further.
‘Run out your guns,’ Oliver shouted.
The iron wheels ground towards the openings. The muzzles poked through the rope curtains.
‘Ready.’
The gun captains waited, excitement simmering.
‘Fire!’
Five 32-pound balls hissed through the air and again splashed into the water sending columns of water shooting as high as the ships’ masts. The shots fell close, but not close enough.
‘I want the next one in the waist!’ Oliver demanded.
It was obvious to him that there was panic on the decks of the ships below. The frigate captains knew they were under attack but apart from the puffs of smoke emitted from the face of the rock, they could not see the guns that had fired at them. Nor could they elevate their own guns to bear on a target 1000 feet above them.
Oliver was elated. ‘They cannot touch us here, men. Never did I walk a safer gundeck. I want a hole the size of this embrasure in the side of one of those ships, and a double ration of rum for every man when we get back.’
There was obvious confusion on the stretch of water between the ships and the beach. Of the six boats making for the shore, three continued pulling for the sand while the other three tried to pull around and return to the frigates.
Putting his head to the curtain, Oliver listened. The faint sound of musket shots was drifting up from below, yet there h
ad not been sufficient time for a message to be delivered to the Lieutenant-Governor. The garrison’s troops had responded to the sound of gunfire and had arrived to defend the beaches.
‘Fire!’ Oliver yelled.
Thunder roared through the gallery with the destructive noise, which rendered artillery men deaf before they reached the age of 20 years. Tongues of orange flame spat out from the Rock’s sheer face. But when the captain’s gun recoiled, the rope curtain failed to prevent the cloud of smoke and shower of sparks being sucked back into the tunnel with it.
The men coughed and spluttered. Their eyes watered.
‘Is this the fresh air we were promised?’ Bungs asked.
‘Tend to your gun!’ the captain reminded them.
Heads quickly poked through the mantle to check where the shots had landed. Each man gulped fresh air in the process. Several yards too far from Mr Nightingale’s shot. Too short from Mr Tully’s gun. Then the delayed explosion from one of the marines’ guns sent a blast reverberating along the tunnel.
‘Direct hit!’ Mr Tully shouted. ‘The main’s gone.’
The men cheered.
The response from the French frigates was a display of defensive broadsides delivering darts of smoke and licks of flame shooting from the hulls over the water. The shots hit the scree slopes sending lethal splinters rocketing across the beach. Some hit the boat crews and others splashed into the water.
Other balls ricocheted off the cliff face and rolled down the scree gathering up an avalanche of rubble as they fell.
A direct hit from the largest French frigate dashed one of the fisherman’s huts to kindling. Small overturned boats on the beach also fell victim to the broadsides, but the muffled thuds from the gundecks barely carried to the sailors and marines working in the Windsor Gallery high above.
‘Fire at will,’ Oliver ordered.
