The China Station (The Earl’s Other Son Series, Book 1)

by Wareham, Andrew

  Magnus showed a keen enthusiasm, agreeing absolutely.

  “That said, sir, there seems to be some question about the nature of patrols along this coast…”

  “Officially, Captain Campbell, there is none, sir! Your reports will reflect that fact. The civilian chappies, though, the Colonials and the Foreign Office, are anxious that the local warlords shall look to Britain for their support, rather than to Peking or, far worse, Russia. We will expect to hear that you have offered all sensible aid to the local man, Ping Wu. Damned strange sort of name, if you ask me, but that’s what it is, or so they say, not that any two of them spell it the same. Some sort of trouble, he’s been having, with one of these peculiar local sects – one of these Triad or Tong things, I expect; the Empress don’t like him either. The Germans have been poking their noses in as well. Bandits and pirates also present - Bustard has done good service so far in putting them down, despite the moaning of these damned missionaries, and I will expect her to continue to do so.”

  It was an order, and could not be disobeyed. Magnus wondered why the missionaries had moaned, and about what.

  “I am told that you stepped out of line in England, Captain Campbell. Sent out here to get you out of sight for a few years. You ain’t the only one, and it need make no difference, provided you pull your weight. Sit down and sulk and I will break you, sir!”

  “I shall do my duty, sir, and willingly.”

  “I ask no more of any officer, Captain Campbell. You have a fine ship, sir, and I expect to see you sailing her – sail has been good enough for a thousand years for small ships, and still is. I will expect to see those sails hoisted, sir, and I shall scrutinise your coaling to check all that you do when out of my sight and at sea. Use the engines in the rivers – you would be a fool to do otherwise – but it’s sail at sea, sir.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  Admiral Seymour was far from stupid, instantly picked up on the nuance, heard that Captain Campbell was to obey an order that he disagreed with.

  “Tell me, Captain Campbell, what is to be done if Bustard is two hundred miles up the coast and runs out of coal and you cannot sail her, sir?”

  “Well, sir, I would expect to be court-martialled and broken, dismissed the service, for such shocking seamanship, sir. With respect, sir, what will happen to Centurion in like case?”

  Admiral Seymour stared angrily, half-rose, then sat back, a reluctant smile on his lips. His two acolytes snorted in sympathy.

  “That served me out, did it not, eh, Captain Campbell? You are a battleship man, of course – never used anything other than coal in all your time at sea. Why do you think you have three masts on Bustard, sir?”

  Magnus thought to himself that he might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb…

  “Because an old-fashioned designer was thirty years behind the times, sir. He should have saved the weight and added another fifty tons to the bunkers, sir. Four years from now, sir, and we shall be in the twentieth century, sir. We live in the age of the torpedo, sir, not in the days of sail.”

  Admiral Seymour was a Beresford man and suspected from the sound of it that Magnus might be one of Fisher’s people. Damned torpedoes, Fisher was forever ranting about them. That was a black mark for Magnus, but a political brother and a father who was a royal favourite outweighed such personal shortcomings. Additionally, and Admiral Seymour felt he must admit to the fact, it was possible that he was right – sail was handsome, and traditional, but steam was half a century old now and was certainly the future. The Americans and Germans, and even the bloody French, certainly acted as if it were.

  “So it appears we do live in the age of the torpedo - damn your impudence! I suppose you will next tell me that if you run out of coal you will set the men to with axes to feed the masts and yards to your boilers… Perhaps sailing may be confined to the boats, Captain Campbell. At least, you know your own mind, and that may be useful when you are on your own with no support to hand. What do you need for your sloop, sir?”

  “Quick-firing guns, sir. The old five-inch will do very well if it comes to a pirate fleet of junks, but I might not wish to tackle a steel-hulled Russian or German, sir, far less one of the new Americans.”

  “Not the French?”

  “The French are no threat to us, sir. Even if their ships were worth fearing, their country is not – they have lost the martial spirit at sea, sir. I do not know about these Japanese, however, sir. I was told on the voyage out that they are growing in strength and are willing to fight all comers.”

  Admiral Seymour wondered just who might have been aboard Oriental to whisper in his captain’s ear. A man of importance in Whitehall, must be, or Campbell would not have hinted at his existence. He scribbled a brief note to himself to have the passenger list examined.

  “The Japanese are better allies than enemies, Captain Campbell. They are Westernising and doing so very effectively. They butchered the Chinese in ’94; literally in the towns they captured! Mark my words, sir, before too many years they will go head-to-head with Russia, and the Russians will receive a surprise when they do. As for the French – you are right to ignore them. They are nothing in these waters, or in any others I suspect. Eight of four point seven QF guns, Captain Campbell. They will be to hand in the yard within days, in fact. Due out from Newcastle any day now. You will get them when you return from your first patrol. Northeast up the coast towards Amoy, calling in at any ports that take your fancy. Back again by the end of three weeks.”

  It seemed somewhat on the casual side to Magnus.

  “Shake down, Captain Campbell. You are a battleship man, used to standing on a great bridge and giving commands at a distance, calling down a voice-pipe to a distant wheelhouse. Conning a sloop is a different matter, sir, as you will soon discover.”

  “I have discovered the absence of a bridge already, sir. I would expect to con the ship from the position immediately to the fore of the funnel. One can hardly use the old quarterdeck, with a pair of five-inch barrels facing to the stern; in any case, steamers need instant contact with the engine room. I would prefer a raised conning tower, sir, even of only four or five feet. Visibility in action will be inadequate, to my mind. No doubt I shall cope, sir. I expect the Carpenter will be able to bodge something for me.”

  Admiral Seymour approved of initiative; the good captain did not go whining to the yard – he set to and fixed the problems that he discovered.

  “The previous captain of the sloop had said the same thing, and done the same, some sort of bandstand, all unofficial but practical, though I am not sure that he placed it forward of the funnel as you are proposing to do. What do you think of the Maxims?”

  “Seen them before, sir. Useful weapons, especially the larger calibres. To my mind, sir, rifle calibre is unnecessarily light – better a round that will knock a man off his feet.”

  “McGurk said the same, but the move is to three-o-three calibre for rifle and machine guns alike. Not sure it’s wise, meself, but the gunnery people are insistent. Seen the Nordenfelt before, have you?”

  Admiral Seymour was not a supporter of the Gunnery enthusiasts – he could not accept the concept of an officer specialising in just one part of his profession. To his way of thinking, an officer was a seaman above all, and could command his guns and navigate his ship, and if need be fire damned torpedoes, too.

  “Yes, sir. I was on the staff at Portsmouth, sir. Accompanied the admiral on inspections and was shown the Nordenfelt volley gun, sir. It’s a half-way house, sir. It works, but it’s a long way from being the last word – it’s not fast enough to be a true machine gun, not big enough to simply be a quick-firer. We need something like a one inch, or a little bit bigger, Maxim, sir. Explosive shells, high rate of fire, range out to about four cables, sir. Able to put down any of these fast torpedo boats, sir. I am told, sir, that there is a QF one-pounder in trials just now.”

  “Do we really need to worry about torpedoes, Captain Campbell?”

&nb
sp; “Very much so, sir. In the nature of things, sir, shells hit above the waterline, no matter how big they are. A torpedo hits below, in the hull, sir. Before too long, we shall be looking at warheads of five hundred pounds, sir. One of those in the engine room, the boilers blowing, and the biggest ships will be crippled, sir, if not sunk outright.”

  “Perhaps. They have to get close enough to hit first.”

  “At night, sir. The defence will need high-power searchlights, and small quick firing guns. Torpedo boat destroyers will do much of the work, but they cannot guarantee to get every attacker – the battleships must be able to defend themselves.”

  “You make a strong argument, Captain Campbell. Too damned strong for me to be happy… Who do you think will be our next enemy?”

  Magnus was not convinced there ever could be an enemy as such – Britannia was simply too powerful at sea to fear any foe.

  “Hard to say, sir. I cannot imagine the French ever to be a threat at sea, sir, despite this nonsense about small, fast ships to break any British blockade; the country is simply effete, sir. Russia is falling into decay, sir, or so I have been told. Turkey can be ignored. Austria-Hungary is disintegrating – the different nationalities are agitating for independence. That leaves the Americans to consider; they are thinking of empire, but their arguments seem to be aimed against Spain. Remains only the German Empire, sir – and there is a good chance that they can be persuaded towards alliance, I am told. There is very little prospect of a major European war, sir, or so I hope. We are as likely to be involved in war here in China as anywhere, I believe, sir.”

  “Well thought out, Captain Campbell, but I think you might be wrong to dismiss the Russians so casually. Why do you do so?”

  “From the little I have seen and heard, sir – and I am open to correction on this – Russia is badly governed, and its army and navy are commanded by officers whose sole qualification is birth, sir. With respect, sir, admirals who do not know how to command a ship are of little value in war.”

  Admiral Seymour snorted – you would find none of that sort in the Royal Navy, but he knew very well that they proliferated in Russia.

  “Correction, Captain Campbell. Not ‘little’ value – none at all, sir! You may have a point there. However, government by an emperor has much in its favour, you know – better than these damned politicians. You won’t find a Gladstone in Russia!”

  “No, sir. Nor a Disraeli, either. That is another point, as well, sir. The Russians keep persecuting their Jews and forcing them out of the country – and they take their businesses with them. You can’t build a modern country without shipyards and steel plants and coal mines and banks, sir. Don’t make sense to drive your money men out of a country.”

  Magnus had heard that argument in Portsmouth, from his own admiral there who had been irritated by a diatribe from one of the increasing number of supporters of ‘eugenics’, men who believed that certain races were naturally superior and that the ‘white Anglo-Saxon stock’ of England risked contamination by the influx of refugees from Russia.

  “Good point, Captain Campbell. My own father always said to me that money don’t have a religion, and that you can’t build a navy without hard cash. Talking of which, religion, that is, these bloody missionaries – country’s full of them, these days. Your ordinary Johnny Chinaman don’t like ‘em much, either. They keep ‘converting’ coolies, and then claiming they should not pay taxes or be taken as soldiers by their old masters. Add to that, if there’s an argument in a court of law, they claim that they are to be judged in the same courts the missionaries answer to – which ain’t Chinese. Your ordinary man in the rice fields ain’t very pleased by the God-men and their something-for-nothing ways. Trouble is, Westminster says we must look after the missions, must take their side against the Chinks, and it ain’t fair and puts the Chinese against us as well. Leaves you in the middle, in the small ships which actually travel up the rivers and call at the little ports. Do your best not to offend the missionaries, but don’t turn the mandarins against us.”

  Magnus’ face presumably showed his opinion of those orders. Admiral Seymour laughed.

  “Sail tomorrow. Dine with me tonight. Five-thirty. Tropical dress. You can greet most of what passes for Society here in Hong Kong – the ladies will be happy to meet a title – and that tells you all you need to know about things here! Keep clear of scandal, Captain Campbell; too easy to get a name out here and end up cited in divorce papers – these merchant types ain’t gentlemen and won’t turn the blind eye like a husband will in London. Plenty of clean Chinese girls and costing almost nothing, so keep away from the merchants’ wives!”

  Magnus raised an eyebrow, finding the advice unpalatably blunt.

  “None of my business, you’re thinking, Captain Campbell, but you’re wrong. You can end up with a Prussian spy trying to blackmail you in exchange for keeping you out of a divorce case.”

  An officer named in divorce proceedings was obliged to send in his papers – he could not remain in his ship or infantry battalion or cavalry regiment. A poor officer forced to resign from the service in Hong Kong would find himself with no income and quite possibly insufficient funds to pay a passage home to England. He could find employment as a mercenary in Chinese service with all of the risks implicit in such a course. He would not then be recognised as a gentleman, would be cold-shouldered, given the cut direct, by any of his previous contemporaries he happened to meet.

  “That, I had not realised, sir. Of course, one hears whispers of such things in London, sir, spies and such, but one can never be certain that such rumours are more than fabrications. Spy stories are very popular, you know, sir.”

  “They are not necessarily untrue, Captain Campbell. I can assure you that Intelligence is aware of several examples of influence being exerted on British officers by foreign nationals. Certain individuals might be seen as more vulnerable than others, sir.”

  “Including the impecunious younger sons of Scottish Earls who have been sent out of England following certain indiscretions, sir?”

  Admiral Seymour nodded grimly.

  “Just so, Captain Campbell. I am told by the advisers to my command that you in particular may confidently expect to be cultivated by gentlemen from Germany and Russia – men who will be far richer than you and will be generous in their hospitality before eventually they hint that you could easily lay your hands on a few thousands, merely by discussing the latest in guns and armour. You will oblige me, Captain Campbell, by listening to these men and keeping on friendly terms with them; you will undoubtedly be provided with occasional snippets to drop in passing, while refusing to accept their money, indeed, failing to understand their veiled enticements.”

  “I am a gentleman, sir.”

  “And as such may not have any truck with spying. I know. But if you, purely in passing, mentioned that the new thirteen-inch guns from Armstrong Whitworth are a failure in service and will not be installed in the next generation of battleships, then you would be performing a useful function. You would not be telling an untruth, either.”

  Magnus did not understand – why should he offer that information, that confession of weakness in the Navy?

  “The decision has been taken to work on higher-calibre twelve-inch guns, Captain Campbell. They will have a higher muzzle velocity and be more effective against armour plate. Rather than a result of the failure of bigger guns, the new twelve inchers will be just what is intended. It is called misinformation, I am told – the art of telling the truth in a dishonest fashion.”

  “How very interesting, sir – I had imagined spies to be very unpleasant, underbred people. It is a fascinating game, it might seem.”

  “It is – and one that is of great importance to us on the China Station. Thing is, Captain Campbell, that we don’t want to get into a direct competition with Russia or America or Germany – because that could get out of control and lead to war that would spread to Europe. But we don’t want them to steal a march
on us. So, intelligence is the name of the game, like it or not.”

  The dinner provided some amusement, as long as one had a sufficiently broad and unsubtle sense of humour. Society in Hong Kong was so small that it could not be exclusive; possession of a white skin and an income sufficient to dress for dinner had to suffice as passports to the upper class of the colony. The correct accent helped as well, though it became clear that some of those present were still picking up the intricacies of King’s English as spoken by the Mayfair set. Fortunately, a Scottish accent was also acceptable – courtesy of Her Majesty and her love of all things Celtic, and of John Brown particularly. Also, the bulk of the merchants originated from north of the border.

  First introductions made it clear that the evening was exclusively British – none of the diplomatic people had been invited.

  “Essentially a Service dinner, Captain Campbell. The General Commanding is to return to England on Oriental when she comes back from Shanghai and there is to be a series of dinners over the next week to make formal farewell to him. The Governor’s dinner will be last and will be open to the foreigners, but this week’s affairs are closed – so that Army can talk to Navy on an open basis. Major-General Ponsonby-Snaithe’s successor, Major-General Meiklejohn, is here already, of course, in order to take over smoothly. Both wives are present.”

  The Flag-Captain had been deputed to keep an eye on Magnus at the beginning of the evening, to warn him of the less obvious pitfalls.

  “Never an easy business, keeping the two wives apart, Lord Magnus. The one is handing over the Official Residence, the other walking in, and they have to agree a full and exhaustive inventory, signed by both. Not quite pistols at dawn, but next best thing. The Admiral’s wife has the pleasure of keeping the pair off each other’s throats this evening. When you greet one, take extreme care to offer precisely the same depth of bow as you gave the other. Say nothing that might be interpreted as taking a side.”