Australian Confederates

by Terry Smyth

  ‘In 23 years of service I had never seen such a succession of violent squalls,’ Waddell writes. ‘The vessel was enveloped in a salt mist and knocked by every angry sea. The machinery acted all right, and the ship’s preparations for contending with adverse weather were so complete that wind and wave seemed now bent upon her destruction.’

  He’s mightily impressed by the way the Shenandoah handles the worst the Pacific can throw at her. ‘I have never seen a vessel in a gale stand up better to it or receive less water on deck. Her easy motion and steadiness throughout that gale increased our admiration of her.’12

  Calm seas follow, but so too does sweltering heat and heavy rain. With the trade winds proving elusive, Waddell orders steam and steers north to search for a good wind.

  Off Tabiteuea, then known as Drummond’s Island, in the Gilbert Islands – a haven for whalers and slave traders – islanders come out in canoes. Waddell describes them as docile, which is curious, given that as a former US Navy officer he must surely be aware of an infamous incident known as the Battle of Drummond’s Island.

  In 1841, sailors and marines from USS Peacock and USS Flying Fish – ships of the United States Exploring Expedition, better known as the Wilkes Expedition after its commander, Charles Wilkes – were ordered to explore the island and to investigate a rumour that the crew of a merchantman wrecked on a nearby reef had all been massacred except for a woman and child who were being held captive by the islanders.

  Although the islanders claimed to know nothing of a massacre or a shipwrecked woman and child, items from the missing vessel were reportedly found in village huts; the Americans were forbidden to search the entire village.

  When one of the sailors, John Anderson, was found to be missing, a search began, but was abandoned when the islanders, brandishing spears and other weapons, forced the Americans to return to their ship. At dawn the following day, with still no sign of the missing seaman, a landing party of about 80 marines and sailors, in seven boats, was despatched to rescue Anderson, with the Peacock and Flying Fish ready to provide covering fire from offshore.

  It didn’t go to plan. As the boats approached shore, some 700 warriors, anything but docile, rushed out of the jungle and waded out towards the invaders. The Americans retreated for some distance, then turned and opened fire. A series of close volleys cut down the first wave of advancing warriors and wounded many more. The rest fled into the jungle as the landing party made it to shore, but regrouped to skirmish with the Americans, who had set about burning the villages.

  When the smoke cleared, 12 islanders were dead. There were no American casualties. The missing seaman was never found, and the rumour of a captive woman and child turned out to be exactly that.

  It wasn’t the first time this supposedly scientific expedition of naturalists, botanists and artists was mired in bloodshed. A year earlier, in Fiji, when two sailors were killed while bartering for food, Commander Wilkes’ retribution was swift and severe. He ordered a massacre that left up to 80 Fijians dead. Wilkes was court-martialled on his return home, not for the mass murder of Pacific Islanders but for mistreatment of his junior officers and excessive punishment of his sailors. He was acquitted.

  Captain Waddell would be well aware that the same Charles Wilkes is now a commodore and his arch-nemesis. It was Wilkes who ordered his former flagship, USS Wachussett, to patrol the seas in pursuit of the Confederate raiders Florida, Alabama and Waddell’s own Shenandoah. The Wachussett had captured the Florida, in Brazil, but the Alabama had eluded her, and, thus far, so had the Shenandoah.

  Waddell might not have met Wilkes during his time in the old navy, but he must have known him by reputation. Arrogant, capricious and a harsh disciplinarian, Wilkes is believed to have been the model for Captain Ahab in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick.

  And it’s tempting to imagine James Waddell, looking out from his quarterdeck at waves lapping the shores of Drummond’s Island, quietly chuckling at the similarities between Wilkes’ Civil War story and his own.

  In 1861, Wilkes was at the centre of an international diplomatic crisis known as the Trent Affair – an incident that came close to igniting war between the United States and Britain. In November of that year, he was master of the Wachussett, the flagship of an American naval squadron on a visit to the British colony of Bermuda, chasing Confederate blockade runners. As Waddell would later do in Melbourne, Wilkes violated the neutrality laws, overstaying the time permitted in port while his gunboats blockaded St George harbour, preventing ships from leaving, and opened fire on a British mail ship, the Merlin. However, those were minor infringements compared with what he did next.

  Word reached Wilkes that two Confederate envoys, James Mason and John Slidell, were en route to England aboard the British packet Trent. The envoys’ mission was to persuade the British Government – by cotton diplomacy – to recognise the Confederacy as a sovereign nation.

  Wilkes ordered the steam frigate San Jacinto to intercept the Trent and arrest Mason and Slidell. On 8 November, the San Jacinto caught up with the mail ship, fired a shot across her bows, then boarded her and took the Southern diplomats prisoner. They were taken to Boston and confined at Fort Warren.

  The proverbial hit the fan. The British, apoplectic over such an aggressive violation of neutrality, demanded an apology and the immediate release of the prisoners, at the same time flexing Britain’s military muscle in Canada and in the Atlantic. The United States responded by threatening war with Britain if it recognised the Confederacy, and for some weeks, threats and counter-threats flew thick and fast between London and Washington. War seemed inevitable.

  In Britain, Queen Victoria’s consort, Prince Albert, was concerned that Her Majesty’s Government’s demands were too provocative. On 30 November, although gravely ill and within weeks of his death, he penned a memorandum to his wife the Queen, suggesting a less belligerent despatch be sent to Washington, giving the Americans a way to release the envoys without losing face.

  Albert’s draft, which was incorporated in an official despatch, reads, in part, ‘The United States Government must be fully aware that the British Government could not allow its flag to be insulted, and the security of her mail communications to be placed in jeopardy, and Her Majesty’s Government are unwilling to believe that the United States Government intended wantonly to put an insult upon this country and to add to their many distressing complications by forcing a question of dispute upon us, and that we are therefore glad to believe they would spontaneously offer such redress as alone could satisfy this country, viz: the restoration of the unfortunate passengers and a suitable apology.’13

  The Queen later wrote in the margin, ‘This draft was the last the beloved Prince ever wrote.’

  When he brought it to her he said, ‘I could hardly hold my pen.’14

  President Lincoln, equally desperate to find a way to defuse the situation, grasped the proposition offered. While initially, like all Northerners, he had cheered and applauded when Wilkes was hailed as a hero and officially thanked by Congress for his courage and patriotism, Lincoln publicly denied any responsibility or support for Wilkes’ actions and freed the envoys. The Southerners sailed safely to England where, after all the drama and tension wrought on both sides of the Atlantic, their mission failed.

  Charles Wilkes, whose intemperance had almost started a war, now turned his attentions to tracking down the mercurial Captain James Iredell Waddell.

  Chapter 13

  The last of Charley

  On Saint Patrick’s Day, 17 March 1865, in a criminal sitting of the Supreme Court of Victoria, the sailor known as Charley to everyone but himself stands before his Honour Mr Justice Molesworth and a jury of his peers. James Davidson has been indicted on 24 counts, all relating to breeches of the Foreign Enlistment Act.

  John Williams is called to reprise his Williamstown allegations, verse and chorus, as a witness for the prosecution, and is then cross-examined by Butler Cole Aspinall, counsel for the defence.
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br />   A firebrand radical, Aspinall made his name defending Eureka Stockade rebels charged with treason. Famously, he shamed the jury into acquitting the rebel John Joseph, an African-American, by asking, ‘Surely, gentlemen of the jury, you won’t hesitate to hang a trifling nigger to oblige the Attorney-General?’ He is known for representing defendants in political cases for free, as he is doing for James Davidson.

  Aspinall is also a member of the Melbourne Club, and attended the banquet for the officers of the Shenandoah.

  ‘Who took you down to Williamstown?’ Aspinall asks John Williams.

  ‘A gentleman whose name I don’t know,’ Williams replies. ‘We had no conversation about what I was to prove when I got there.’

  ‘Did he say anything more than that he should like to sail on the Shenandoah?

  ‘He said he should like to join the vessel. The defendant was dressed in the uniform of the Confederate States, but he did not wear full dress. He wore only the trousers and cap when he was cooking.’

  ‘Were not the trousers an old cast-off pair given him by one of the sailors?

  ‘No, the trousers were new.’

  Changing tack, Aspinall asks, ‘How are you living now?’

  ‘By the United States consul,’ Williams replies, then, apparently flustered, contradicts his earlier statement. ‘The trousers were given to the defendant by one of the sailors,’ he says.

  Aspinall changes tack. ‘Have you seen anyone on the subject of the prosecution?’

  ‘I have seen the United States consul. I had a conversation with the person who drove me down to Williamstown about the trial.’

  The next prosecution witness, Walter Madden, a seaman from the captured D. Godfrey who shipped with the Shenandoah, is asked by Aspinall if he is being paid by US consul Blanchard for giving evidence at the trial.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Madden says.

  ‘Are you to get money at all?’

  ‘I believe so.’

  ‘What leads you to suppose so?

  ‘The consul said we were to get some money.’

  ‘What are you to get for your evidence on this occasion?’

  ‘Seven shillings a day, I suppose.’

  ‘Who is to pay it?’

  ‘The Government, I believe. The consul pays my board and lodging, but he says I am to pay for my own board after this. I have not got the money for attending the trial yet.’

  ‘It depends on the Appropriation Act being passed whether you get it at all,’ Aspinall quips, and the courtroom dissolves into laughter.1

  Charles Behncke, an Alina crewman who joined the Shenandoah and jumped ship in Melbourne, also admits to being paid by the consul.

  Police Superintendent Thomas Lyttleton tells the court that when he went on board the Shenandoah looking for Charley, he saw officers and men in uniforms that he understood to be those of the Confederate Navy.

  Aspinall asks, ‘I believe the uniform is something like that worn in Pentridge [prison]?

  ‘It is something like it in colour but not in shape.’

  ‘You were entrusted with the capture of the vessel, were you not?’ Muffled laughter at this.

  ‘No, I was entrusted with the slip.’

  ‘I think they gave you the slip!’ Much raucous laughter.2

  With the case for the Crown closed, Aspinall submits there is no proof that the Shenandoah is a vessel of a belligerent power; that there being no proof of the commander’s commission he might simply be a pirate; that there is no proof of the recognition of the Confederacy as a belligerent power; and – drawing a very long bow – that there is no proof of any war between the Northern and Southern states of America because the North has not recognised the South as a sovereign nation and considers the conflict a rebellion.

  It’s a brave effort by the defence counsel, but Judge Molesworth is unconvinced. He gives his reasons at length and in mind-numbing detail, then adjourns the court until the following day.

  Next day, the judge rambles on for another hour or so then directs the jury to retire and consider its verdict. When the 12 good men and true return to the courtroom, James Davidson, alias Charley, is found guilty on the second count – that is, that he did ‘unlawfully agree to enlist and enter himself to be employed and engaged in and on board a certain ship of war called the Shenandoah, in the service and for, under, and in the aid of certain foreign states styling themselves the Confederate States of America’. Judge Molesworth sentences him to 10 days’ imprisonment – the lightest penalty the law allows.

  Davidson’s co-accused, William Mackenzie, pleads guilty and receives the same sentence. The Crown drops all charges against 17-year-old Arthur Walmsley, who had hoped that on the Shenandoah he could get to America to join his elder brother who had gone to fight in the war. The youth walks free to the sound of cheers and laughter from all in the courtroom, including the judge.

  The delightfully acerbic editor of the Creswick & Clunes Advertiser, Francis Martin, sums up the case:

  The Crown has obtained a conviction against the arch culprit ‘Charley’ for the crime of having attempted to serve the Confederate cause. The counts which charged him with enlisting, serving, etc, could not be sustained, but the jury appears to have no doubt of his attempting.

  Cooking on board a fighting ship would probably, in the eyes of the law, be ‘constructive fighting’, so poor little Charley (for he is a diminutive chap) must be held to be guilty of intending to annihilate the whole northern marine, if he could.

  As it was understood that the sentence would be a nominal one, Mackenzie, another of the prisoners, was advised to plead guilty of also ‘attempting’. The third prisoner (a mere youth) was at the request of the Attorney-General set at liberty. Charley and Mackenzie were then sentenced, each to 10 days imprisonment which the Attorney-General admitted to be an ample punishment. So ended the great trial about the battle of the Shenandoah.3

  Chapter 14

  The captain and the king

  They seek her here, they seek her there. And where might she strike next? Judging by a 30 March report, San Francisco newspaper The Alta California is unfamiliar with the maxim ‘Loose lips sink ships’.

  We have today the unpleasant announcement of the arrival of the pirate Shenandoah, formerly the Sea King, at Melbourne. She is most probably bound for this coast. There is, of course, no danger to this city. It is so thoroughly fortified that the appearance off the bar of all the ships of war that England and France could bring together in these waters would occasion very little alarm; but we have but few vessels of war. The Lancaster, the only man-of-war of any force on this station, is now at Callao. The Wateree, originally intended for the defence of this port, sailed for Panama a few weeks ago. The Saranac is at Acapulco, and the St. Mary’s is now on her way here.

  If the pirate should lie on and off the port, burning outward and inward bound vessels, we would have only the Saginaw and the Shubrick to go out and give her battle. The Comanche, of course, is only intended for harbour defence, and it would not be judicious to send her across the bar. If the Shenandoah is bound in this direction, we shall probably hear from her first on the lower coast.

  It is not a month ago since General McDowell wrote to the department at Washington, urging the necessity for more vessels of war in these waters. We ought to have a fleet in the Pacific equal, at least, to the combined fleets of England and France. The capture of all the Atlantic rebel ports has released a great many vessels from blockade duty, which might as well be cruising in this direction. General McDowell has not yet received a reply to his demand.1

  If Captain Waddell had happened to find that particular newspaper report on a captured vessel, he surely would have been grateful for the intelligence. And as it happened, he did, and he was.

  Two days out from the Gilbert Islands, the Shenandoah meets a friendly Hawaiian schooner, the Pfeil, trading in turtle shell. The skipper of the schooner tells Waddell that Chabrol Harbour, on Strong Island – now Kusaic, or Ualan Island
– in the Caroline Islands group, north of New Guinea, is a regular rendezvous for whaling ships. He now has a fine trade wind and makes good time to the island under sail, and when close by, under steam. But when he gets there the harbour is empty.

  Disappointed, Waddell makes sail for Ascension Island – now Pohnpei – in the Carolines. This time, he’s in luck. He recalls, ‘A little before midday the Shenandoah had approached sufficiently near to distinguish five sail at anchor close in with the land, and we began to think if they were not whale ships it would be a very good April Fool. The Honolulu schooner was the only sail we had seen from the 20th of February to April 1st, which was evidence that the South Pacific whaling fleet had taken flight. We were never on any occasion so long without seeing a sail, and sailing over almost unknown and strange seas produced a dullness and monotony intolerable.’2

  As if on cue to relieve the monotony, just outside Lohd Pah harbour, on the southern side of Pohnpei, a small boat comes in sight, bearing one man. The man, an Englishman, comes aboard and introduces himself as Thomas Harrocke, a runaway convict from Sydney, New South Wales. He escaped from the penal colony many years ago – he doesn’t say how – made it to these islands, where he married a native woman, and occasionally acts as the harbour pilot. Covered in tattoos and dressed in rags, Harrocke speaks with hesitation at first. Clearly, he hasn’t conversed in his native tongue for some time.

  Without revealing their identity, the Confederates ask Harrocke to direct them to a safe anchorage in the harbour. He obliges, and as the Shenandoah drops anchor, three of the ships in port hoist the Stars and Stripes, and a fourth raises the flag of the Kingdom of Hawaii. All four are whalers and, for the Confederates, all are sitting ducks.

  Four boats are launched from the Shenandoah, each carrying two officers and seven men, armed with pistols and cutlasses. For Marine Corps Private William Kenyon and his fellow Australian Confederates, this is first blood, but they can soon rest easy. The Confederate flag is hoisted, a shot is fired, and, even before the boats reach them, the whalers haul down their flags.