Women of Courage

by Tim Vicary

  Mary Carter said nothing. The officer heaved himself to his feet. “And you won’t mind if my men search the house for arms. ‘Tis a time of rebellion and we can’t be too careful.” He consulted his list again. “I see your husband provides his own musket. Is that here now, or did he take that to Exeter with him too?”

  Again Mary said nothing. Ann broke the silence, unable to bear the ironic leer the man was giving her mother.

  “He threw it away. At ... at the last inspection it was judged to be too old and rusty to fire. Isn’t that on your list?”

  She smiled faintly as the man glanced down. Then he looked up again, more amused than angry.

  “It says nothing of that here. But let’s hope ‘tis true, eh, miss? For ‘twould be a terrible thing if he did happen to fall in with the Duke of Monmouth after all, and the first time he fired his musket it blew his face off for him, now wouldn’t it? Your daddy would’t look so nice then, would he, eh?”

  He laughed heartily, enjoying the stony glares around him, and Ann prayed silently for her father’s safety as the heavy feet of the searching militiamen echoed overhead.

  14

  “DEUTERONOMY 31, 6. ‘Be strong and of good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them; for the Lord thy God, He it is that doth go with thee; He will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.”‘

  A butterfly landed briefly on the helmet of William Clegg, opening its orange and black wings in a slow, trembling ecstasy to the warmth of the sun. The men of Colyton sprawled in the grass, and high above them, in the blue and endless sky, larks trilled like tiny archangels. Behind Israel Fuller, as he preached from his precarious perch on a gate, a detachment of pikemen marched and countermarched; and every few minutes his words were lost in a ragged roar of musketry that sent clouds of smoke drifting lazily towards them over the hedge, from where other recruits were training.

  To Adam, each moment was as clear as any he had known. He watched the butterfly with a fearful intensity, waiting for the moment when the delicate wings would lift it from the iron of William’s helmet, up into the clear blue air. His own spirits were as trembling and alive as the butterfly – what would happen if he, too, got to his feet and just walked away, through the rustling grass, down the other side of the hill, away from the talk of war and the preparation for the battle that they were going to fight?

  But the butterfly flew and Adam did not run. He only watched it and listened for a little to the lark, and then turned his mind back to Israel Fuller’s words as though they might be the last he would ever hear. He felt the meaning of the text burn like a brand in his mind. For it was surely true, he thought – even if the Lord had abandoned him, Adam Carter, He could not abandon His army; and he, Adam, was part of that. If he stayed a part of the army he might live and keep his pride.

  He stayed a part of it as they ate a good meal and marched down into the town to join the horse, zestfully singing the 31st psalm. Each man, like Adam, drew heart from the voices of the others, and looked about him to see his own grim smile reflected on the faces of his friends. They were only a small detachment - 400 foot and 100 horse, under the command of a thin, solemn man in a green coat, Colonel Venner - but their march eastward to clear the militia from Bridport was the first organised sortie the army had made, and the hopes of hundreds went with them.

  They paused at the top of the steep East Hill, and looked back at the beginning sunset and the magnificent panorama of Lyme Bay, with the little spars of the tiny ships far below. Then they swung into an easier stride, down and up and down again along the narrow sunken lanes, trying as best they could to obey Colonel Venner’s instructions for quiet; though, as William Clegg said, anyone who didn’t notice an advance guard of fifty horsemen clattering by his front door was hardly likely to be disturbed by the soft tramp of eight hundred feet.

  The whisper had gone back along the line that Chideock was a Catholic village, where they might be ambushed. As they wound down the narrow defile towards it, Adam’s eyes and ears sharpened warily, and the silence deepened in the ranks.

  There was a sudden cry of alarm from ahead, followed by a burst of laughter and a curse as a group of deer crashed across the road and away up the hillside. More muttered calls for silence; and then quite suddenly they were in the village - a single, narrow street, ideal for an ambush - but in the event nothing happened. Lord Grey’s troop of horse had passed through, searching behind the houses, and stood on the other side, waiting; and the whole body of foot and the horse of the rearguard marched through without even a face showing through a cottage window, and only a single dog barking, endlessly in a field somewhere. Adam wondered if anyone was at home in the silent cottages, or whether their inhabitants had fled, and were armed and waiting for them further ahead.

  A little beyond Chideock, they halted, and stood nervously in the dark, wondering what had happened. After a while the news filtered back that the advance guard had met a villager on his way home from Bridport, and learnt that the town was full of militia, both from Dorset and Somerset – a hundred horse and twelve hundred foot – three times their own number. Surely they would turn back now, Adam thought, with a kind of sick relief and disappointment. But they did not, and as they swung into their stride again, Adam felt his heart pound in his chest and throat with pride as much as fear. They had come this far – to go back now would only save their fear and anxiety for another day.

  And so the endless slow march wore on, until there seemed no past nor future, only the dull steady tramp in the dark, while the hilly road rose and fell under their feet. At first there had been moonlight, but now the moon had set and the silhouettes of the horsemen ahead had vanished into a thick mist. Adam could see only a couple of paces ahead, to the rear rank of the pikemen, where Tom Goodchild’s broad shoulders lumbered steadily onward.

  His own hair and jacket were covered with a thin film of fine water droplets, and he found himself wondering if they shrouded the others as well. For a long time he could only feel them, and then he realised he could see them too, a fine skein of water drifting in the air between things, and glistening on everyone’s clothes. He realised it must be close to sunrise. The dawn chorus began; first one thrush, then another, and suddenly all the trees around them were filled with birdsong as they marched into the new day. At the same time a light breeze began to blow the mist in long, silent, curling wreaths away from the line of tired, marching men, and they saw Bridport before them.

  The town was quite still and silent, as though the new day, like themselves, had taken it unawares. A stone bridge carried the road ahead of them over a river into a long, broad street which rose between the houses to the crossroads at the centre of the town. They were looking directly east, so that they could see the inns and churches clearly framed in the grey dawn sky which was just about to burst into the orange glory of sunrise.

  On the river under the bridge, two swans drifted calmly by, fishing under the water with their long necks. A heron, standing on one leg on the bank, cocked its head sideways, and saw a long line of men watching it. It considered them for a moment, then spread its great grey wings and flew disdainfully downstream.

  The sergeant went back along the line, checking that their muskets were primed and the powder in the pans was still dry. As he reached Adam, there was a cry from the main street, and they realized that it was not only the heron that had seen them; a housewife, emptying a pot into the gutter, had looked down the main street and seen the river mist swirling away from an army about to enter her town.

  The advance guard of Lord Grey’s cavalry set off for the bridge at a smart trot, which became a canter as they reached the other side.

  “Forward, march! Smartly there, lads, but keep your line!”

  Roger Satchell’s order jerked Adam to attention. As they moved forward there were shouts and a loud crackling of pistol fire from the town, but when Adam looked ahead he could see no resistance, only the cavalry firing their pistols into the houses as they neared the crossroad
s at the top of the street.

  “Here we go the, lads. The Lord be with us!” muttered John Spragg at his side as they crossed the bridge. Now that the moment had come Adam felt excited and puzzled rather than afraid. Where was the enemy? Surely they must have some guard – or had they left the town already?

  “Pikemen, wheel right! Come on now, lads, quickly!” There was a confused moment of pushing and shoving on the other side of the bridge, as Roger Satchell tried to get the pikemen to remember their newly-learnt manoevres, but it resolved itself at last. Adam found himself marching up the main street in the front rank of the musketeers, with a clear field of fire in front of him. Tom Goodchild and the other pikemen were on his right, trying to keep up with the musketeers without being crushed between them and the walls of the houses on the right.

  Still there was no enemy; only windows on either side of the street being thrown open and hurriedly closed again, and a few men, some still in their night-shirts, rushing out of doorways and down side streets. It seemed all wrong to Adam - not a battle, but a victory, and yet he had not fired his musket! They were all moving very quickly, infected by the excitement. Adam found himself holding his musket in front of him, ready to fire, instead of over his shoulder as it should be; and then there was a loud boom! and then another from his left - as two men men fired without orders.

  “Hold your fire, you great fools!” cried the sergeant. But even as he did so, a group of three or four men rushed out of a doorway ahead of them and let off their pistols at the advancing troops. Adam and John Spragg leveled their muskets, without bothering to use the rests, and fired back. The kick and the great boom! staggered him for a moment, but he was more used to it now, and as several more muskets went off beside him he rushed forward through the smoke to see if he had hit anyone. The four men were already running away up the street, apparently unhurt, and Adam found himself in a crowd running after them, pikemen and musketeers mingled, cheering fiercely, while more shots came from behind them.

  Thus cheering and shouting, they reached the great crossroads at the centre of the town. Everywhere Lord Grey’s horsemen were clattering up and down over the cobbles, so that the foot soldiers had to draw back to keep out of their way. Some of the horsemen were looking in alleyways for the enemy, but many were fighting to control their own mounts, which reared and leapt about wild-eyed at the noise and excitement. A group of riderless, unsaddled horses galloped down the road to the south, and two horsemen rode past trying to catch them.

  Adam looked about him, elated. They had reached the centre of the town! It was a victory! They had captured Bridport! Then he saw the face the Welsh sergeant, purple with fury.

  “Get back in line, you clodhoppers! Come on, where’s your line? Form up!” Furiously, he pushed and pulled at them, some men twice his own size, until, with the assistance of the red-coated Colonel Wade, and Roger Satchell and Colonel Venner, the cheering mob were reassembled into some sort of order.

  “Steady now, lads. Remember your drill! Half-cock your muskets! Come on, move, there! Half-cock your muskets, all of you who’ve fired them! Clean your pans! That’s right! Handle your primers! Prime! Shut your pans! Shut your pan, man, or you’ll lose your powder! Blow off your loose corns! Cast about to charge!…”

  And there, in the middle of the Bridport crossroads, Adam was going through the drill all over again. At first he could not remember it. What was the need, after all, when the Lord had given them the victory? But the bullying of the sergeant forced him back into it, and as he went through the routine he became calmer, and saw the point of it; if the enemy did appear now, his musket was unloaded, he couldn’t fire back. So then he hurried, and dropped his scourer, which slowed him up; but at last the job was done. He shouldered the musket gratefully and looked about him.

  Two groups of pikemen and musketeers were being formed up on the left and right of the crossroads, to guard against flank attack, and by the sound of the shouting, a similar manoeuvre was going on down the street behind him. Some, though not all, of the cavalry were drawn up together in a fairly ordered troop near Lord Grey, and Colonels Venner and Wade were with him, pointing down the street to the east.

  Adam squinted his eyes into the orange glow of the sun which was just beginning to rise over the bridge at the far end of the street, and saw it glint and sparkle off a melee of pikes, muskets and helmets. Fascinated, he stared as an urgent, milling crowd of men hurriedly formed itself into three and four ranks of pikemen and musketeers by the bridge, and faced up the hill towards them.

  Colonel Wade turned and shouted back across the square.

  “Mr Satchell, Mr Wilson, order your men to advance! Follow me!”

  “Colyton troop, forward march!” As they started down the hill, old Colonel Venner rushed past them to the rear, shouting orders to some troops behind. Adam gripped his musket nervously. He was in the front line now, being pushed on by those behind; there was no turning back. He opened his mouth to breathe, and felt his lips peel apart, suddenly sticky and dry. Those militiamen down there by the bridge wee looking more and more ordered by the minute, and there was an enormous crowd of them.

  “Shoulder your musket, man!” He found he was unconsciously holding the musket in front of him, as he had done before, and hurriedly shouldered it. Yet he felt so vulnerable like that.

  “Nobody is to fire until I say so! Nobody! Understood?”

  Beside them a scattering of Lord Grey’s horse were clattering down the hill, in no good order. A couple of riders tried to push to the front, causing two others to rear, buck, and lurch sideways into the ranks of the foot, so that two men fell over. By the time the pushing and swearing had been sorted out, they were only fifty yards or so from the ranks of the enemy. Fifty … forty … thirty … the militiamen’s musketeers had their own guns aimed and ready in their rests, and Adam was beginning to see the individual features of their faces. They had matchlocks, he saw – a thin column of smoke trickled into the sky above each man as he held his match poised above the pan. And still his own musket was shouldered, his chest bare as a bale of hay …

  There was a sudden crackle of four or five shots, and screams and yells – from behind them! Adam faltered and tried to look over his shoulder, but could see nothing. As he stumbled forward he saw that several of Lord Grey’s horsemen had reined in and were trying to turn their mounts around. Then there was a splintered roar from in front of them, as the militiamen fired their volley. A man to Adam’s left dropped his musket with a clatter, and stumbled to his knees with a gurgling groan, as though he were going to be sick.

  “Steady now, my boys! Hold your line! They’ve fired too soon!” But the sergeant’s words of encouragement were lost in a volley of screams and curses. A horse had been hit, and it was rearing and plunging in terror, pushing others out of its way, before throwing its rider on top of a group of pikemen and careering crazily right across the front of their line. Musketeers and pikemen stumbled to an uncertain halt, huddled together against their own maddened horse rather than the enemy.

  “Come on, boys, let’s give ‘em a volley!” said Roger Satchell as the wounded horse galloped back up the side of the street, and the others reined their clattering beasts out of the way. “Set your muskets in rest!”

  Adam, his eyes fixed on the sergeant, saw him frown for a second, but then he joined in, his loud, bullying voice calming them in the turmoil, giving them something definite and clear to do. “Cock your muskets! Guard your muskets! Present! Aim!”

  Which one? Which one should he take? Adam’s barrel wavered uncertainly between two men in the line in front, men who were bending, scouring their muskets, as he had done ...

  “Fire!” The kick, the boom!, the smoke, the singing in the ears; and then, as the smoke cleared, the same two men were still there, hesitantly drawing out their scourers, looking fearfully up the road. Too late Adam remembered - he must aim low! New recruits always aim for the head and fire too high! He felt disappointed and relieved both
at once, and then there was no time to feel anything, because of the rearing and careering of the horses beside them - horses totally frenzied by the noise echoing all around them in the confined space between the houses. Then there was another ragged, crackling volley from the militia, and Adam saw Lord Grey waving his sword and pointing back up the hill, and he himself was nearly knocked over by a horse, and then there was quiet, and their cavalry had fled.

  Not really quiet. There was still the confused yelling and irregular shooting from behind them – what was that all about? – and the voice of the Welsh sergeant shouting through everything like a foghorn in a storm. “Half-cock your musket! Come on there, wake up, you’re still alive! Clean your pans!”

  Adam began to stumble through the drill again, but all around him men were drawing back in confusion, one or two even throwing down their arms to run. What had happened? What had they seen that he had missed?

  “Hold your line! For the Lord’s sake, hold your line!” But Roger Satchell’s desperate cry was ignored. Adam felt himself drawn to go back up the street - not by himself only, but as part of the crowd. All around him people were moving back - not running, mostly, not yet in panic, but with a slow irresistable surge, like a wave that has reached the height of its journey up the beach, and must withdraw. He looked to his left and right at the men still left in the front line; John Spragg was still there, and Tom Goodchild and Philip Cox, and Roger Satchell and the sergeant and a few others, but they were looking at him, as he was at them, and then with a sudden unspoken decision they turned as well. The tide was too strong; it was suddenly impossible to stand here in the middle of the street, reloading your musket and waiting to be fired on, when your own horsemen, and friends from your own line, had turned back.

  Yet once they had turned their anxiety grew, rather than fell. Adam’s back tingled as he thought of the militia musketeers behind him, shortening their scourers, setting their muskets in their rests, checking the slowmatch was still burning in its holder. John Spragg was somewhere ahead of him, further up the street. Where was William? A man began to run – two men – and Adam lengthened his stride, feeling the panic well up inside him. If only there were someone else between his back and those muskets! Then, just as the retreat began to break up into a rout, there was a check. The men in front of Adam stopped amid angry shouting. He heard the voice of Colonel Wade above the din.