Chapter 8
CAPITULATION
RICHARD landed at St Peter Port on 20 December 1780, aiming to be home for Christmas. It was bitterly cold and he made his way to the Pollet as quickly as possible.
“Richard!” his mother cried and this exclamation brought his father out from the back room.
“Welcome home!” he said in his turn, and Richard saw what effect the years had had—the spectacles, which were new, and the worried look which had grown no less.
The next hour or so were spent in mutual inquiries and assurances. Pressed by his mother, he had to admit that hardly anyone he had met in America seemed to remember Sir Edmund Andros. Then he was told, in return, of Rachel’s two children, both girls, the birth of whom had made him doubly an uncle. It was now his turn to tell his father about his de Lancey relatives in America, one of them a general, no less, in the British army. While questions were asked and answered the parents and their son were taking stock of each other. Richard, at twenty, his mother could see, was a grown man, taller now and weather-beaten, with the air of one who had crossed the ocean and been under fire. He was still modest, however, and as far as ever, he explained, from achieving commissioned rank. He wore his uniform as a midshipman nevertheless and his mother could at least take pride in that. She, to him, looked much the same as ever but his father, on the second impression, looked older still, more defeated, with fewer touches of irony in his conversation which was broken by longer periods of silence. No word was said about Michael, and Richard concluded that he was himself now, for all practical purposes, their only son.
Unpacking in his attic room, Richard thought his home but little changed. The furniture was shabbier than ever, the curtains more faded, the pictures just as he had remembered them, the books a little more numerous. There was a new carpet, though, and some better china. There would have been more signs of prosperity, he reflected, if they had not placed him on the quarterdeck. That evening they sat round the fire after supper, each with a glass of brandy, and Richard told them more about the fighting in America, about New York and Rhode Island, about the situation created by the defection of Benedict Arnold. He was given in exchange the gossip of St Peter Port and news about men he could remember only as boys. One thing apparent was that King George was very much on the defensive. There was no talk now, as there had been in the early days, of what might be planned against the enemy. More fears were voiced about the enemy’s possible activities during the year that was to come. Enemy ships were everywhere and even Guernsey itself seemed all too close to the coast of France.
To his mother, however, Richard’s return was a significant reinforcement. “Thank God you are home safely!” she repeated. “You would know what to do if the French were sighted.” Richard disclaimed omniscience but his mother went on: “And thank God you came when you did! We have a problem, Richard, and it needs an officer like you to solve it.”
“I’m only a petty officer,” Richard protested, “and don’t expect to be anything more. But tell me what the problem is.”
“Well, Richard,” said his mother more slowly, “your father’s business has improved of late, as you know. More forage is needed for the garrison—yes, and for the militia officers’ horses as well—and we nowadays want for nothing. We are proud to think that we have a son in the navy. Your father is talked of as a possible parish officer or as a member at the least of the douzaine. So we are able these days to afford a glass of wine on occasion and sometimes, as it might be this evening, a glass of brandy or maybe a jug of rum punch which is a great comfort on a cold night. We were well supplied for Christmas, Richard, even before we knew you could be with us. Now, your father has recently bought our liquor from a friend of his, Mr Isaac Perelle, whose warehouse is in the Truchot …”
“And very good it is, sir,” said Richard, with a slight bow towards his father, who smiled briefly and then looked sad again as he gazed into the fire.
“I should perhaps explain,” his mother went on, “that Mr Perelle is not one of the regular wine merchants. He is what we call a free-trader, no different in truth from the others but trading in rather a small way, through friends in Jersey. No harm in it, of course, but not a business to discuss too openly—not at least in time of war. I am sure you take my meaning.”
“I quite understand, mother,” said Richard with a smile. “You are forgetting that I was brought up here!”
“So you were, to be sure, and had your eyes open all the while. Well, then. Isaac Perelle has friends in St Malo who sometimes come over here on business. He has one of them staying with him at this very moment, a Monsieur Layard, a genteel man with a very good name in the trade. Your father met him the other evening and was told that Jersey may be attacked by the French at any time!”
“Perhaps, ma’am,” said the patient Mr Delancey, “you would do better to let me tell my own story, with more hope maybe of telling it correctly.”
“Oh, well, Mr Delancey, if you are to mount your high horse … ! I am sure that I have told Richard all that is of any consequence.”
“No doubt, ma’am. Allow me to explain, Richard, that Monsieur Layard had been very hospitably entertained that evening and talked with a freedom that amazed me. I had gone there merely to discuss a small matter of business but Mr Perelle made me come in and meet his guest. They were neither of them sober and Monsieur Layard was hardly able to stand. While in this state he spoke at length, though not always distinctly, of a body of troops now collected, by his account, near Granville. He thought poorly of the men, who were volunteers from different regiments; bad characters, in other words, discarded by their officers or seeking to escape the consequences of their ill-behaviour. He claimed to have talked with the leader of the force, the Baron de Rullecour, who had previously served under the Prince of Nassau; a good officer, he said, but ruined by gambling and desperate to recover his fortunes. The baron talked openly of his plan for capturing Jersey and boasted that he was to be the governor.”
“But all this talk seems excessively imprudent,” said Richard. “Why should this Frenchman warn you in advance of what his king intended?”
“Why, indeed? The impression I gained was that Perelle had spoken, half in jest, of the mock-hostility that exists between this island and Jersey. Taking him too seriously, Monsieur Layard had come to suppose that the capture of Jersey would be actually welcome here as giving Guernsey the whole of a trade in which we now have to share.”
“Did he give you any idea of the numbers?”
“He spoke of thousands but only very generally and vaguely.”
“So what did you decide to do, sir?”
“After warning Mr Perelle, I reported what I knew to the bailiff. He dismissed it at once, saying that he heard such a rumour every week.”
“But you still think, sir, that the report should be taken seriously?”
“Well, Richard, I think the governor of Jersey should be warned. This French expedition has also been spoken of in the market-place. There is more than a chance that something is intended.”
“Everyone knows about it!” Mrs Delancey exclaimed with animation. “There are thousands of men at St Malo and we may be murdered in our beds for all the bailiff cares! I really have no patience with that sort of man. The king should be told and the militia should stand to arms. If James Andros were still alive the South Regiment would be paraded now!”
“No doubt of it,” said Richard. “Are there no men-of-war here or in Jersey?”
“Of course not!” said Richard’s mother. “Everyone knows that we have hardly ships enough to defend our coasts. We see none here for weeks at a time and Jersey, I’ll swear, is as ill-protected. I can’t think what the king’s ministers have been doing all these years—nothing, certainly, to save us from invasion.”
“We see little of the king’s ships,” Mr Delancey agreed, “but I hear that a sloop is expected here presently, with despatches, I believe, for the governor. We could hardly expect her to fight t
he French single-handed.”
“She would at least bring a sea officer to whom I could report. I doubt whether an army officer would listen to either of us.”
His parents had to agree with Richard that their best plan would be to wait for the sloop’s arrival.
“But she won’t sail before Christmas,” said Richard. “She’ll spend the next few days in harbour, that’s certain. I never heard of a man-of-war putting to sea on Christmas Eve.”
The elder Delanceys could see the logic of that and hoped that the same reasoning would apply to the French.
At the Town Church on Christmas Day Richard could sense some change in attitude towards his father, several merchants greeting him and one, who shook hands, was (his mother explained in a whisper) a constable, no less, of the parish. During the sermon Richard thought again of the threatened invasion. Should he try to meet Layard? But then, he had himself been seen in uniform, and Perelle would have warned Layard against talking too much. There was nothing to do but wait. They had a goose that day for dinner and a bottle of claret and they rewarded with warm ale the carol-singers who came to the door. Later that evening they had rum punch and Richard gave his parents a few small gifts he had brought from America. Then they talked again about the war and the colonies.
Mrs Delancey had no patience with the colonists, who seemed to have no sense of gratitude. “If only Sir Edmund were still alive,” she sighed, “the war would soon be brought to an end.”
From what he had heard, Richard thought that Sir Edmund’s presence would have made matters infinitely worse. He kept that idea to himself, however, and spoke again of the de Lanceys of New York. But his mother would not allow that the other side of the family could be of interest.
“I have never understood,” she declared, “why people should go to settle in America. To live there for a time—say as governor of Virginia—is well enough but to make one’s home there is not at all the fashion. Now if only Prince Rupert had been alive, in the place of that General Sage or Rage, the war would have been ended by now and that odious Mr Washington would be a prisoner in the Tower of London. I can’t conceive what our generals have been thinking of.”
The sloop Ariel (18 guns) came into the roads on 2 January and saluted the castle. She was commanded, it seemed, by Captain Fearnside, who was in a hurry to return to Portsmouth. Richard was rowed out to her and reported to the officer of the watch. He was presently standing to attention before the captain, an intense young man who listened to his story in silence. When Richard had finished, Fearnside took out a chart from the drawer of his desk and began to study it. Still without saying a word he made some calculations on a piece of paper. He finally laid back and stared fixedly at Richard. After what seemed an age he finally spoke, first telling Richard to stand at ease.
“This report is almost certainly untrue and I will tell you why. First, this is the wrong time of year for the attempt described. Second, a force of at least six thousand men—and more probably eight thousand—would be needed for an attack on Jersey. No such expedition—troops, ships, artillery, supplies—could be assembled without our coming to know about it from a dozen different sources; and we have no such intelligence. Third, the story is of the sort that enemy agents put about, drawing our attention away from the place that is actually threatened. But for one word I should dismiss your report as rubbish. I would not say that you were wrong to make it but the report—save for one word—sounds totally false.” Captain Fearnside paused for another long minute, staring at Richard as before. “The word which rings true is Rullecour. There is such an officer, I believe, and he is a gambler. No one but a gambler would make the attempt you describe.” After another pause the captain asked one other question: “Where will they land?”
“I have no idea, sir.”
“But you should have an idea. Put yourself in the enemy’s place. You embark at Granville after dark. Where will you land?” He pushed the chart over to Richard, who looked at it for a minute and then replied:
“In Grouville Bay.”
“Just so. And then?”
“March on St Helier and attack the town at daybreak.”
“Or is that too risky?”
“I am a gambler, sir.”
“So you are. All at stake on a single throw. You have told me where. Now tell me when.”
“Not with this wind, sir.”
“Nor’-west? … No.”
“When the wind comes north-easterly, sir, with a falling tide in the hour before dawn.”
“Right. Now listen to me, young man. I don’t believe this report but I shall act almost as if I did. When the wind serves I shall sail for Granville and sweep round the bay. Finding nothing, as I fully expect, I shall put you ashore at Gorey. You can then report to the lieutenant-governor while I head back for Portsmouth. I shall send for you before I sail. Tell the officer of the watch where you are to be found.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
That was the end of the interview and Richard was soon ashore again, feeling suddenly several years older. He had learnt more about war in ten minutes than he had learnt in as many months aboard the Romney. Fearnside was clever, there could be no doubt of that, but he had seemed feverish, as if aware that his life would be short. Did people really have such a premonition? He was still pondering this question when he reached home. He told his parents that he was being sent to warn the authorities at Jersey, would go in the Ariel and return by the ordinary packet. He and his parents would at least have done their best.
The wind veered easterly on the evening of 4 January and the Ariel sailed with Richard aboard, scouring the French coast from Carteret down to Cancale. There appeared to be no unusual activity at Granville or St Malo and Fearnside headed north again on the evening of the 5th. He was off Gorey nearly an hour after midnight and gave Richard a letter addressed to the lieutenant-governor. “That will admit you to the presence,” he said, “and it is as much as I can do to help you. The boat’s alongside and I wish you good luck.”
After Richard had been landed in Gorey harbour, replying to the challenge of a sleepy sentinel, the Ariel sailed on northwards with the wind abeam, passing Alderney on her passage for home. Richard, meanwhile, turned his back on the looming towers of Mont Orgueil Castle and set off to reach St Helier. There were two ways of doing that—as he knew—one over the higher ground through Five Oaks and St Saviours, the other on lower ground through Grouville and La Grange, and both implying a five-mile walk. It was a cold and moonless night with the wind still easterly, the surf heavy along the shore and the neap tide high but falling. He chose the lower road, walking briskly to keep warm, and reflected that the conditions would have been right for a landing in Grouville Bay. All was quiet there, however, and he pressed on, huddled in his cloak and glad to have the wind at his back. The Grouville church clock struck two as he approached and he was challenged a minute later by a sentry who presently called out the guard from an adjacent barn. The sergeant, suspicious and surly, sent Richard under escort to a house called La Fontaine where, he said, the officers were to be found. So they were and awake, not from any excess of zeal but because they had been playing cards. The senior officer present was Lieutenant James Robertson. There was a bottle on the table, probably not the first, and the game had just finished when Richard was brought to the door. After listening to Richard’s account of himself, Robertson sent the two soldiers back to their post and asked Richard to join him at the table.
“A glass of wine, Mr Delancey? So ye seek to warn us that the French are on their way?”
“Yes, sir. I think that the lieutenant-governor should be told at once. I believe that I could reach Elizabeth Castle within the hour.”
“Sit down, man, and be easy. Ye’ll no’ be finding the governor at the Castle. He bides in La Motte House, St James’s Street. But ye’ll get no thanks, I’m thinking, if ye rouse him at this hour.”
“Shouldn’t he be told at once, sir?”
“What have ye to
tell him, man? That there are French at Granville? That this is the sort of nicht they might have a mind to come over? Let it bide ‘till the morning.”
Seeing the force of this, Richard accepted wine and took a chair. Robertson soon afterwards sent the two ensigns off to bed.
“The bairns will be wanting their sleep, Mr Delancey … Your news will wait for ye’ve nought to tell us and yon Major Corbet will no’ be sounding the alarm as yet. I doubt he’d do anything if the French were here.”
“I should expect a lieutenant-governor to be more than a major. What sort of man is he?”
“Corbet? A fine tall figure of a man. Ye’ll no’ see one better on parade. A braw commander is yon Corbet—and empty as a drum. And he being major, none else can be mair. Our garrison is all detachments—two or three companies under a captain, a half battalion under a junior major. Here we’ve part of the 83rd under gude auld Captain Campbell—the regiment was raised in Glasgow. We do nothing but mount guard. We don’t even watch the Plat Rocque Point, with the four guns mounted there. I fretted at first, ye ken, but now I leave things be.”
The Guernseyman Page 11