Prelude to Glory, Vol. 7

by Ron Carter

  Hocking descended the gangplank, and the moment his soaked shoes were on the ancient, black timbers of the dock, he turned trotting into the bustle of people of every description, working his way through the throng to the wet cobblestone street, searching for a hack for hire. He waved frantically, and a driver with a scarf tied over his hat and beneath his chin came back on the reins of his old horse, and the rig rocked to a halt. Hocking called up to him, “Lord Germain’s residence at Pall Mall, and be quick about it,” jerked the door open, and vaulted inside. The hackman’s eyes widened slightly and he muttered to himself, “Lord Germain, is it now? Aren’t we the high an’ mighty!”

  He clucked, slapped the reins on the rump of the wet hide, and the indifferent horse set out at a trot, iron shoes ringing on the wet cobblestones while the metal rims of the wheels set up a steady yammering and the aged hack swayed on its leathers. The driver worked north past St. James Park, then easterly toward the Pall Mall district, to pull up short in front of a low stone building that showed weather stains from two centuries of winters and summers. Hocking had the carriage door open and was on the ground before the hack driver wound the reins around the whipstock. He shoved coins into the hand of the startled man and bolted for the entrance where a pair of guards stood at attention in sodden uniforms. The soldiers recognized the shape and quick, quirky movements of the wiry little man, and one reached for the iron handle to swing the heavy, black oak door open. Head drawn in, shoulders still hunched against the bite of the cold wind, Hocking strode into the ante-room, removed his tricorn to throw the moisture onto the floor, and went to the desk of the aging receptionist.

  “Thomas Reeves Hocking to see Lord Germain. Urgent.”

  The elderly man nodded. “On what business, sir?”

  Hocking could not mask his impatience. “His Majesty’s business.”

  “Is Lord Germain expecting—”

  Hocking cut him off, eyes flashing as he leaned slightly forward. “No, he is not, but he knows who I am. Tell him Hocking . . . Hocking the courier . . . has just come from Calais. I carry a message from our agent in the court of King Louis of France. Tell him!”

  The old, gray eyes opened wide. “King Louis? France?”

  “Tell him. Hocking. King Louis.”

  Wordlessly the aged man rose from the chair, and in the labored way of the elderly walked down a corridor, swaying slightly on legs that would no longer bend easily, heels tapping a slow cadence on the worn marble floor. Hocking heard a door open, then close. Twenty seconds passed, and the door opened, then closed again. Fifteen seconds later the old man appeared and motioned.

  “Lord Germain will see you. Follow me.”

  Hocking waved him off. “No need. I know my way.”

  Five seconds later Hocking rapped on a door, it yawed open, and he was facing Lord George Germain, Secretary of State for the American Colonies, under authority of Lord North, First Lord of the Treasury in the cabinet of King George III. It took Hocking a moment to understand why Germain and not his ever-present secretary had answered the door. It was the Sabbath; the secretary was not on duty.

  Germain stood tall, strong, clear-eyed, capable, despite his sixty-six years. A complex man, his life had been a strange mix of heroism as a selfless officer seriously wounded at the Battle of Fontenoy early in his career, but who for reasons never established, failed to instantly follow orders at the later critical Battle of Minden in 1759, during the Seven Years’ War with France. His thirty-minute delay allowed the beaten French to regroup, and though the British carried the battle, they failed in a rare opportunity to utterly destroy a large segment of the French army. Blame for the failure to seize the moment was laid at Germain’s feet, it being generally held that had he followed orders instantly, the French would not only have lost the battle, but would have suffered a catastrophic defeat. To clear his name, Germain demanded his own court-martial, which resulted in his being stripped of all military standing and ordered never to serve His Majesty in any military capacity for the remainder of his life.

  Possessed of an odd mix of disarming congeniality and melancholy bordering on depression, he was loved and admired by some, loathed and despised by others. But whatever the mix, it was never questioned that he was an excellent administrator with keen perceptions, a soldier with a superior sense of military matters, and gifted with an innate sense of the politics required to make things happen. Thus it was that in 1775, when Lord North began his search for a fresh candidate to fill the position of Secretary of State for the American Colonies, he found no one in the British Empire better prepared than George Germain, his court-martial and punishment notwithstanding.

  For a moment Germain’s cool, penetrating stare fixed the diminutive courier where he stood. Then his expression softened.

  “Come in.”

  Hocking stepped into the cavernous office. The gray stone walls bore paintings, maps, a flag from Germain’s first military campaign, and tapestries. A fire crackled in the massive, blackened fireplace, over which a large painting of King George III hung, an unmistakable evidence that above all, Germain understood politics.

  Germain gestured to a chair facing his huge walnut desk, and took his place in his own leather upholstered chair. “You carry a message?”

  Hocking drew the parchment from within the folds of his damp cape and coat and reached to offer it to Germain.

  “From Paris.”

  Germain read the strain in Hocking’s voice and the flat look in his eyes perfectly. He broke the scarlet wax seal and unfolded the document. For more than one minute he sat stock-still, reading and rereading the terse message while Hocking breathed light, watching every movement, reading every expression that flitted across the stony face. Then Germain dropped the document on his desk and leaned back in his chair. For long moments he sat motionless, staring at the document as though it were something alive, while he brought his disoriented thoughts to some sense of order. He raised his face to Hocking and gestured to the paper.

  “You know the contents?”

  “I have not read the document. I know the message.”

  “Cornwallis went down?”

  “At Yorktown. Captured. His entire command, dead or prisoners.”

  “Our fleet? Our ships that were ordered to the Chesapeake to get him off the land if necessary?”

  “Defeated. Driven off by the French.”

  “De Grasse?”

  “De Grasse and de Barras. They defeated Graves and Hood.”

  “General Clinton in New York—didn’t he send reinforcements?—attempt some relief, some rescue?”

  “Graves sailed his fleet to New York for repairs. Clinton tried to refit the ships and send Graves back to rescue Cornwallis, but Graves arrived at Yorktown about a week too late. All three armies and both navies were gone—ours, the Americans, the French. The town was all but deserted.”

  Germain drew a great breath and let it out slowly, controlled. “Do the French know all this? King Louis? Vergennes, his minister?”

  “They’ve known since before November twentieth. It was November twentieth when Vergennes told Benjamin Franklin.”

  “Franklin’s still in King Louis’s court representing the colonies?”

  “He is.”

  “How long have you known about Yorktown?”

  “I heard the rumor three days ago. I waited for proof. I got it early this morning.”

  “What proof?”

  “The official dispatch from Clinton to yourself should arrive sometime overnight, or early morning.”

  “Arrive here? At this office?”

  “Yes.”

  Germain leaned forward, face intense. “Are you certain?”

  “Certain.”

  Germain straightened in his chair, and Hocking saw the heavy decisions begin to form in his eyes as he spoke.

  “Return to France immediately and keep this office advised of further developments. Should you need anything, ask at the outer desk. In the meantime keep all m
atters we have discussed confidential.”

  Hocking rose abruptly. “Yes, sir.”

  Germain followed Hocking to the door and held it open, gazing at the floor with his mind racing as the sounds of Hocking’s quick footsteps on the flagstones faded and the huge door into the street opened and closed. He strode quickly down the hallway to the aging receptionist who stood to meet him.

  “I will need a hack immediately.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Five minutes later Germain braced himself against the wind, closed the door behind him, and trotted to the waiting hack to cup his hand and shout orders up to the driver.

  “The residence of Viscount Stormont, Portland Place. Waste no time!”

  Clattering on the cobblestones, the hack careened northerly across Oxford Street, onto Portland Place, and the driver came back hard on the reins to bring the blowing horse to a standstill before an ancient stone building with great chimneys on both ends. Germain was on the ground, hurrying before the carriage stopped rocking. He banged on the heavy door with a clenched fist and spoke to the plump servant the moment it opened.

  “I must have audience with Lord Stormont this moment.”

  The startled man bobbed his head once, turned, left the door open, and ran up the hallway. One minute later Lord Stormont came striding down the hall working at buttons on his vest, eyes wide and inquiring. Neither man wasted time on protocol.

  “What’s happened?”

  “No time. Dress for this weather and come with me. I’ll tell you on the way.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To get Thurlow for his advice, and then probably on to see North!”

  Stormont stopped in his tracks, mouth gaping open. He recovered and clacked it shut. “Thurlow? North? Something’s happened in America!”

  “Get dressed.”

  In minutes Stormont returned, fastening the latch on his cape, and both men hurried out the door into the wind to clamber into the carriage and slam the door. The driver swung it around to return to Oxford Street, then easterly to Bloomsbury. While the passengers clung to the windowsills to hold their seats, Germain related the catastrophic story to a stunned, incredulous Stormont.

  The two men stood in the wind and waited for Lord Chancellor Thurlow to answer the pounding on his door. Two minutes later the three men were in his sumptuous library, face-to-face. Stormont remained silent with Thurlow, waiting for Germain’s lead, faces a blank.

  Neither Thurlow nor Germain had forgotten that in their beginnings, they had been formidable political enemies. But in the deadly game of high level politics where deals and careers were decided in clandestine meetings held in small rooms at night, each had grudgingly learned to respect the rare political skills of the other. While there was never warmth between them, each knew the counsel of the other would be candid and sound. And this time, Germain needed to hear the counsel of Thurlow. He came directly to it.

  “Cornwallis surrendered his entire command at Yorktown.”

  Instantly Thurlow’s face became the practiced, neutral mask of a master politician.

  “I see. When?”

  “October nineteenth.”

  “On what authority do you have this?”

  “Hocking. Our agent in Paris.”

  “Certain?”

  “Certain.”

  Thurlow paused, searching his memory. “Our fleet. What happened to our fleet?”

  “French warships under de Grasse drove them out of the Chesapeake.”

  “That left Cornwallis landlocked?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who defeated Cornwallis on land? Certainly not the Americans.”

  “The Americans with seven thousand French infantry under General Rochambeau.”

  “Rochambeau! Perhaps the best general in France.” Thurlow raised a hand to command silence. “Just a moment. Weren’t Washington and Rochambeau at New York, holding Clinton?”

  “No. Rochambeau was at Rhode Island. When de Grasse moved his fleet up from the West Indies to the Chesapeake to engage our fleet under Admiral Graves, Washington made a forced march south to trap Cornwallis if de Grasse succeeded. Rochambeau brought his French with Washington. De Grasse succeeded, and Cornwallis fell.”

  “Clinton did not rescue Cornwallis?”

  “He tried. Too late.”

  “How many did we lose?”

  “In the beginning Cornwallis had about eight thousand in his command. We lost them all. Killed or captured.”

  Uncharacteristically, Thurlow rounded his mouth and blew air. “We lost Burgoyne and his eight thousand at Saratoga in ’77, and now Cornwallis and his eight thousand at Yorktown in ’81.”

  He paced away toward the huge fireplace, hands clasped behind his back. For ten seconds the only sound was the wind sucking at the chimney. Then he turned.

  “We can survive the loss of Cornwallis and his army, but I doubt we can survive what this will do to Parliament and His Majesty. Parliament is already divided. Shaky. Rockingham and Shelburne and Hillsborough are moving away from the King over the time and the money we’ve invested in this American adventure. Six years! Two armies! Millions of pounds! This couldn’t have happened at a worse time.”

  Germain nodded and Thurlow stood stock-still, eyes burning like embers, as he continued. “North has to know immediately, and whether he has the stomach for it or not, he will have to take it to His Majesty. It would damage North if this news reached the King and Parliament through Horace Walpole and his newspaper. It may damage him no matter what he does. He has to know now.”

  Thurlow’s stare held Germain for several seconds of dead silence while each man considered the enormity of the calamity. Then Germain slowly turned to Stormont, waiting.

  Stormont returned his blank stare and nodded. “I agree. Which of us goes to Buckingham?”

  Germain drew air and slowly released it. “My responsibility.”

  He sat in abject silence for the southerly drive down Drury Lane, then west on Strand, inventing and rejecting sentences he could use to break the earthshaking truth to North. The driver sawed on the reins and the horse came to a nervous stop on Downing Street before the residence of Lord North, First Lord of the Treasury, perhaps the most powerful office in His Majesty’s cabinet. As in a daze, Germain braced himself against the wet wind and knocked on the great door. Three minutes later he was standing in the library of Lord North.

  Seldom in the history of the political hierarchy of the British Empire had two more disparate men faced each other. Germain tall, square-shouldered, erect, athletic, handsome, engaging. North shorter, rotund, face round and jowled, protruding eyes, clumsy of movement, wide-mouthed, thick-lipped, and his speech flawed with a lisp. Germain skilled at war, North skilled at peace, and very near beyond redemption in his bungling of the American theater of England’s quest for world dominance. King George had brought North into his cabinet in the hope that though North was personally incapable of directing a war, he had the political skills to find and utilize officers who could, Germain among them.

  The draw of the wind at the fireplace was the only sound as North waited. Then Germain’s words echoed in the huge, stone-walled library.

  “I have received a message from our agent in Paris.”

  North’s breathing slowed, eyes widening as he waited for the thunderclap he sensed was coming.

  “General Cornwallis has surrendered his entire command at Yorktown.”

  For five full seconds North stood like a granite statue. Then he shook his head slightly and whispered, “That is impossible.”

  “The French fleet defeated our naval forces under Admiral Graves. The Chesapeake is held by the Americans.”

  The air and half the life went out of North. He staggered backwards two steps into the leading edge of his desk and caught his balance. His right hand flew to his breast and his breathing constricted. His face became white, then began to grow red. Germain took a step forward, prepared to grasp him, fearing the man had suffer
ed a stroke.

  “Shall I summon your physician?”

  North’s eyes opened wide, protruding in disbelief, and then he flung his arms outward and turned and began to pace in great, long strides, nearly shouting, “By the Father, it is all over! It is all over! It is all over!”

  Germain stood balanced, ready to seize the man should he topple over.

  North turned suddenly, face red, eyes flat with shock. “King George! Does His Majesty know?”

  “I do not believe so.”

  North’s mind was racing. “Parliament meets Tuesday. The Privy Council will be gathering at the Cockpit tomorrow! Oh! Oh! The Empire! We are destroyed! Destroyed!”

  He began to pace again, as though his great strides could outdistance the nightmare.

  Germain waited until he slowed. “Should you take this up with His Majesty before it reaches him from the streets?”

  North gasped. “Has it reached the streets?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Then I must gain audience with His Majesty at once.” He paused, and for the first time forced his shattered thoughts into some semblance of coherence. “Have you received any official dispatch from Cornwallis? Or Clinton?”

  “I am expecting Clinton’s official dispatch yet today.”

  “I cannot go to His Majesty without an official document. The instant it arrives you must deliver it here, to me, no matter the time.”

  “I shall. What do you wish me to do in the meantime?”

  “Make as little of this as possible. Should the newsmongers come clamoring, dismiss it as an unsubstantiated rumor. I shall take the official notice from Clinton to His Majesty immediately I have it in my hands.”

  Germain nodded. “What is your present vision about continuing the war in America?”

  North’s voice rose in defensive intensity, and he jabbed a fat finger into the air. “I warned them! I warned Parliament last winter. Repeatedly! Repeatedly, mind you! As First Lord of the Treasury, I cannot . . . cannot . . . finance the war in America for another year. Nothing could be more clear than the fact we must find a way to resolve that conflict immediately . . . now . . . or abandon it!”