by John Drake
Captain Bollington was now back in the stern sheets and I was sat facing him. He was conversing in a low voice with Lieutenant Seymour and pointing out first one ship, then another. By now it was about half past six and the sky above was light. Though with the sun still hidden by the cliffs to the east, we were still in shadow in the Passage D’Aron. But we could see upwards of fifty merchantmen at anchor, the bulk of them deeper in the anchorage than ourselves, nestling under the protection of the batteries around the mouth of the Aron.
And that gave us pause. The sight of all those fat geese ready for the plucking was one thing, but there was also the realisation that we were very much in an enclosed place and totally separated from our swift and powerful ship. We had cut through the Lance about half way down its length, and behind us the islands stretched up and down like a giant’s fence while ahead the shore reared up into cliffs that ran for endless miles away to the north. And to the south, the cliffs funnelled in to meet the Lance at the narrow Straights of Beauchart and the Aron. Most chastening of all was the sight of the French batteries themselves, quietly sleeping as the dawn touched them.
The ninety of us in our two boats were like the old moggie creeping forward to take Bonzo’s food from under his mouth in Mrs Wheeler’s back yard.
Not a happy thought at that moment, for we could see the forts quite clearly now: the thick, low walls and the neat rows of black embrasures for the guns. The ancient St Denis castle was also visible, but it was too far away for its guns to reach us. But two of the forts, given their ideal situation, with big guns fifty feet above the water, would be able to drop shot all about our ears the minute they found out what we were doing.
But the game was one of secrecy and speed so the batteries should not be able to interfere. The tide would be on the ebb in half an hour’s time and if we did our work well enough, we should be beyond range of the French guns, before they knew we were there. There was even a breath of wind blowing out to sea that should help us on our way once we had a prize to take out. Meanwhile, the Captain had made his decision.
“There’s your prize, Mr Seymour,” says the Captain, pointing, then, “Silence!” in a savage hiss, as a growl of anticipation ran through the eagerly awaiting men. “I’ll have no talking unless any of you can do it in French! Remember, we’re Frenchmen until the minute we’re actually climbing aboard of ’em.” The noise died away, Captain Bollington exchanged a few more words with Lieutenant Seymour, and then the boats were under way as our oarsmen pulled with a will.
Looking over my shoulder, I could see which ships we were after, a pair of big three-masted vessels, about three hundred tons apiece. As far as I could tell, the Captain had just chosen the two most seawardly ships to give us the least distance to carry them off, but he might have considered factors beyond my inexperienced view. In any case, it took us no more than ten minutes to come upon our victim.
Captain Bollington waved to the barge as we slowed and it went gliding past towards her target. By now I could even make out the name on the stern of our ship: Bonne Femme Yvette she was called, and she was waking up, as were most of the other vessels anchored there.
Up and down the Passage, there arose a gentle chorus of noise that told the assembled vessels were stirring: muttering voices, squealing blocks and the clattering of pots and pans for breakfast. All these pleasant morning sounds drifted clearly over the quiet waters. Everything was still. There was not a sign of the French Navy and it all seemed so easy. I thought, surely some of the Frogs must have kept look-outs aloft for all that they were supposed to be safe here. For now there was plenty enough light for all the world to see our two busy boats. But nobody took the least notice of us, and I could see the wisdom of getting our marines out of their scarlet tunics. Anyone could see that they were soldiers, sat there in rows with their cross-belts and muskets between their knees. But in their dark blue jackets it was a mystery as to just whose men they were. And as for our officers, it would have taken an uncommonly sharp eye and a taste for uniform to tell the British from the French Service coat until such time as you could actually examine the buttons and lace.
Then, as we bumped alongside Bonne Femme Yvette, I nearly jumped out of my skin as someone aboard the ship yelled out a challenge. There was one look-out awake, after all, and he was asking some sort of question.
“Steady lads!” says Captain Bollington, and yelled back something in fluent French as a row of heads popped over the quarter of the ship and peered down at us, round eyed. One was a fat, bald-headed little man who turned out to be the Master. Captain Bollington concentrated on him. I’ve neither the gift, nor the slightest inclination to understand foreigners’ languages, so God knows what Captain Bollington was saying. But, by George, it was good!
“Pollywog-pollywog-pollywog!” says the Captain, firmly.
“Pollywog?” says Froggie, and up went his eyebrows in amazement.
“Pollywog!” says the Captain, sharply, and for all the world like some sort of official, he produced a paper from his pocket and waved it for the Frenchman to see. It was a letter from Mrs Bollington. I saw it, but the Frog was too far away and he peered down trying to make sense of it.
“Ah,” says he, finally, “pollywog,” and gave that strange shrug of the shoulders with the corners of the mouth turned down, that the French use to express emotions of puzzlement. But he stopped his questions and one of his men dropped us a line to make fast by. And then, that miserable little worm, Midshipman Percival-Clive shoved in his pennyworth. He was in charge of the oarsmen and suddenly remembered his duties. Loud and clear, in the King’s own English, he screeched out.
“Ship oars now, you men, and smartly with it!”
Up in the ship they heard this and a torrent of French poured upon us, but it was too late. Bonne Femme Yvette rolled as sixty men went swarming aboard by the main chains. I stuck close to the Captain as I’d been told and in an instant we were facing the French shipmaster and a couple of his men on the quarterdeck while the rest of our party ran swiftly to all parts of the ship, to secure her as planned. It was done well and silently. The loudest noise we made was the rumble of marine boots down the companionways as they went below to rout out the French crew.
There was no possibility of their resisting. We outnumbered them three to one, and we were armed and ready while they were not. But Captain Frog was high up on his dignity and starting to make trouble. I think it was his ship and his own property that was being took from him. He’d been roused from sleep by our arrival and stood before us bare legged in his shirt, but he gibbered and gabbled and had the gall to shake his fist at Captain Bollington. The Captain snapped at him in French, giving him his orders and no mistake, but the man would not be told and started to shout. Captain Bollington turned to me.
“Silence him!” says he, so I tapped Froggie on the arm to catch his attention.
“Mossoo?” says I, polite as could be, and he looked me up and down as if I’d farted in church. So I flattened the little bastard with my fist. (Serve him right too. Foreigners should give respect to a British man-o-war’s-man. Especially Frogs should.) After that, things went smoothly.
It could not have been more than ten minutes after we first came over the rail that Mr Percival-Clive was reporting to the Captain.
“All’s well, sir. Cable’s cut, topsails set and the prisoners secured on the forecastle.”
“Excellent!” says the Captain, and looked about him. Indeed, everything looked as it should be, with our men at the wheel and in the rigging, and sails unfurled above.
“The tide should be on the ebb soon and we’ve some wind to take us out. We should be joining Phiandra within a couple of hours ... Now then, Mr Percival-Clive, why don’t you see if you can turn out the Captain’s papers, so we can see what cargo’s aboard.”
And in that moment, our plans ran foul of the unexpected. Perhaps Captain Bollington had been over-ambitious to seek two prizes. Perhaps he should have kept the whole enterprise under
his own hand to employ his French-speaking skills to the utmost, for suddenly we were all reminded of Lieutenant Seymour and the barge.
Bang! The silence of the Passage D’Aron was broken by the roar of a ship’s gun. The echoes rocked back from the cliffs and the gulls rose screaming into the air. The desperate cries of men and a volley of musketry rose to join them.
Aboard Bonne Femme Yvette we rushed to the stern-rail to look back up the Passage to the sounds of action. Half a mile away, the barge was locked in action with a French merchantman. Pop-bang! More muskets went off, then a bigger puff of smoke shot from the rail of the ship, and, Bang! There came the sound of another gun. Then another and another just the same. Far beyond our aid, the little black figures of our shipmates threw up their arms and died, and the thin cries of the wounded came to us over the water. The barge drifted out from the ship with her oars crossed and tangled. Less than half were moving. Bang! Another gun went off and an oar jumped and splintered as the charge struck home.
“Hell and damnation!” says Captain Bollington, hammering the rail with his fists. “Damn! Damn! Damn! Look there Percival-Clive. D’ye see? There’s a line of swivels down the rail of that ship and they’re firing them off into our lads!” One Frenchman at least had taken his precautions before bedding down for the night, and kept her guns primed and loaded. Once an enemy was spotted, it was the easiest thing in the world to set them off. One man with a match could do it.
Five two-pounder swivel-guns was all they had for a broadside, but they were stuffed with pistol-balls, and to a boat crammed with men, each blast was devastating.
“Lieutenant Clerk!” cries the Captain. “Take a boat’s crew and half your marines, and give what aid you can to Lieutenant Seymour. Tow them clear if need be ... Make haste!”
The marine Lieutenant was away on the instant, shouting orders as he ran. His party tumbled over the side into the launch and took up the oars. The marines pulled double-banked with the tars and the boat sped away with Mr Clerk urging on his men.
“Heave!” says he. “Put your bloody backs into it!” But as the launch rowed to rescue our comrades, the gunfire and shouting had well and truly awakened the other ships in the anchorage. It was full daylight and a cacophony of noise came from each vessel. Shouts rang out, men leaped into the rigging to see what was going on and, worst of all, signal guns fired and hoists of flags shot up to the mastheads of some of the ships.
“Damnation!” says the Captain, again, and glared at the French signals. “Fletcher! Get me that Frenchie you knocked down. I must know what those flags mean.” I turned and ran for the fo’c’sle where our marines had the French crew sat on the deck, under guard. As I ran I heard from the direction of our launch a further clatter of muskets as our men opened fire on the defiant merchantman. Then: bang! One of the swivels barked again. But I was pushing through our marines and seizing the French Master.
“Up!” says I, hauling him by the collar of his shirt. If looks could kill he’d have dropped me on the spot and he cursed me viciously. But I’d no time for his nonsense so I fetched him a clout to shut him up, scragged him off his feet and hauled him to the quarterdeck. As we joined Captain Bollington he was in a passion of anxiety for our boats, staring back over the rail with Mr Percival-Clive for company.
“Come on there! Come on lads!” says he. I saw the launch towing the barge and pulling slowly towards us. A steady crack of muskets came from the launch as our marksmen kept the enemy from manning the swivels again. Soon this ceased and the two boats came safe out of range.
Captain Bollington spun round and turned his attention on the little Frenchman. He glared into the man’s eyes and pointed at the hoist of flags hanging from the mainmast of a nearby ship. He poured out a stream of words, obviously asking a question. I needed no French to understand what he was after. The Frogs had a pre-arranged danger signal to warn their batteries that intruders were present and Captain Bollington wanted an explanation of this. But the French Captain had some pluck, and faced him like a man, drawing himself erect with folded arms.
“Non!” says he. Just the single word.
Captain Bollington stormed and roared, but the Frenchman only held his head all the higher and repeated, “Non!”
I don’t know what Captain Bollington might have done to him if this had continued, but suddenly the questions became irrelevant. From less than a mile away, down at the narrows of the Passage, there came the faint sound of a bugle and a roll of drums. The sound came from one of the menacing forts on the cliff-top. We all turned to look, and very soon there came a great ball of white smoke from one of the embrasures, followed by the reverberating boom of a gun. It was unshotted and fired as a warning. As well as the sound there came a fluttering of signal flags from a flagpole set over the fort. Ominously, the other forts began to wake up, and more bugles and drums sounded out.
Captain Bollington snapped out his telescope and looked up at the flags.
“Damned if I know what that means,” says he. Then he tried the little Frenchman once more, and this time the man actually smiled. He pointed at the nearest fort and rattled off something at Captain Bollington, with obvious satisfaction.
“Bah!” says the Captain. “Send him for’ard again. He’ll tell us nothing.” He turned to Percival-Clive. “You, boy! See if you can turn out a signal-locker and copy what these others are showing.” He indicated the other French ships, now every one with a string of signals run up. “Copy them flag by flag, d’ye hear? And I’ll have every sail set. The sooner we’re out of here the better!”
So we did as he bid. Percival-Clive copied the French identification signal and tried to convince the gunners up in the forts, against the evidence of their own eyes, that we were not a prize crew, while the seamen set every inch of canvas that Bonne Femme Yvette could carry.
It was a race. On the one hand, there was the feeble wind, barely twitching our sails, and there was the ebbing tide that was slowly sweeping us beyond the reach of the batteries. On the other hand, there was the matter of how long it would take some French officer to decide to open fire on us, given that the anchorage was laid out before him like a pond full of toy ships, and ours was the only one trying to get out. Already we were far enough from the other ships to give the gunners a clear field of fire.
Another element in the race was the progress of our boats. Aboard Bonne Femme Yvette we were hanging over the side urging on our mates. With sails barely drawing, we had no more speed than the tide was giving equally to us and the boats together. So, even towing the barge, the launch was overhauling us fast. In fact, Lieutenant Seymour and those of his men still capable, had manned the oars and were trying to help. But otherwise, the scene in the barge was grim, with dead and wounded swilling around in the bilge water under the thwarts.
Then a cheer went up as they bumped alongside. The barge’s crew had been badly mauled. Of thirty-five men who’d set out fit and well, nine were dead, and fifteen badly injured. Lieutenant Seymour was among the lucky few who were unmarked. We had no time to be gentle so the dead were left where they’d fallen and the wounded heaved into Bonne Femme Yvette like bundles of rag. They lay in the waist twitching and moaning. Midshipman Wilkins was whitefaced and shuddering with his arm laid open from wrist to shoulder and blood spraying in all directions. He was in need of the Surgeon’s needle and thread to close the wound properly but all he got was a length of line twisted round his upper arm to stop the flow. I did that. Surgeon Jones had shown all hands how to set a tourniquet and I probably saved the lad’s life by doing it but the poor little devil screeched fearfully as I tightened the cord.
As I stood up from my doctoring, I was reminded of our danger by the sight of Percival-Clive running up a hoist of signals. I hoped he had made a good guess in picking the flags but it was wasted effort. Our actions, in full view of the forts, told their own tale. Finally, at about seven in the morning, in easy range of the nearest fort, there came a deep roll of thunder as five huge guns bellow
ed in rapid succession. Compared to this, the gunfire heard earlier was but the crackling of wood on a bonfire. A bank of smoke temporarily hid the fort as their first salvo came shrieking down upon us.
27
Chop! Chop! Chop! Up went the columns of water hundreds of yards ahead of us. Some of our men gave an ironic cheer at this poor shooting, and thought we were safe, but Captain Bollington disagreed. He was on Bonne Femme Yvette’s quarterdeck with his officers, and now that all his men were gathered into the ship, he’d calmed down and was steadily contemplating the fort that was firing on us.
“Mr Percival-Clive,” says he, “you may remove your signal and run up British colours. There’s no point in further attempts at deception.” He turned to Lieutenant Seymour, and pointed at the fort. “Now those are real guns!” says he, with enthusiasm. “Sixty-eight-pounders I should think. That’s what they kept up there when I was a lad.” He indicated the disturbed water where the shot had come down. “Of course, that was just ranging. They’ll do better presently.” He smiled at his gunnery expert. “Now, Mr Seymour, let’s see how quickly French gunners might work a battery of sixty-eight-pounders.” And he took out his pocket watch to time them. Lieutenant Seymour copied him and the pair of them stood there talking gunnery, as merry as could be, or pretending to be.
And the Captain was right. Within a few minutes they fired their second salvo. Again there came the terrible roar of shot in flight, then water spouts were leaping up in a cluster, a hundred yards ahead and somewhat on our larboard beam. Then the pause while they reloaded, and I imagined the gun-captains staring over their sights and barking orders to their men.
“Please God, don’t let there be a Sammy Bone among them!” I thought. And the worst of it was that there was absolutely nothing we could do to hit back while they took their target practice.