The Shores of Tripoli

by James L. Haley

  Still, Bliven felt it odd for one so young to be in command of a ship. Sterett was twenty-three, which meant that he had just turned twenty-one when he summarily executed one of his own men. But then it seemed that every navy man Bliven had encountered was unlikely in his sheer youth. Since its inception the navy had been undermanned; perfectly good ships were laid up in ordinary for want of sufficient crew.

  Sterett surveyed the deck, hands clasped behind him, and started to go below, but stopped and turned and regarded how much canvas was set. “Shorten sail, Mr. Putnam, we are outrunning the squadron again.”

  “Aye, sir.” He appreciated the fact that Sterett went below and did not superintend him further—a step doubtless calculated to build a midshipman’s confidence. “Mr. Merrick!” Bliven called forward to the bosun. He was still learning the proper address of their stations; seamen ordinary and able were called by their surnames only; warrant officers were entitled to the dignity of “mister.” His voice no longer squeaked, but it was not done changing, bridging that awkward gap between the boy and the man. “Take in your tops’ls, if you please.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  Bliven watched with some interest as Merrick sent the men aloft; the experienced ones skittered up the swaying ratlines as easily as lizards up a wall, followed by those less sure of their footing and then a few whose hearts were clearly in their throats. Their mainsail and mizzen were rigged fore-and-aft, and the men ascended higher to the topsail yards, spacing themselves out and in unison hauling in and making fast the canvas. He glanced over his shoulder, where, alternately visible and not visible beyond the taffrail, according to its rise and fall in the following swell, four hundred yards astern was a sight to make any American’s heart leap in sheer pride—three of the proudest frigates on earth, the President, forty-four guns, in company with the Philadelphia, thirty-six guns, and the Essex, thirty-two guns.

  No sooner had he turned his gaze back forward—the cause he knew not, perhaps there was dew on the line, or the man’s shoe was too large, but Bliven saw the outermost starboard man on the main topsail yardarm lose his footing; his feet shot sideways out from under him and heels over head he plummeted down, issuing a plangent screech the whole distance.

  With a helpless gasp Bliven steeled himself to hear the crunch as he struck the deck, but being the farthest outboard he and his shriek sailed past the railing until silenced by a terrific splash of water.

  At the top of his lungs, the tar next to him shouted, “Man overboard!” and the cry was taken up, and every man in the rigging was crying, “Man overboard!” until they must sound like monkeys in a tree spreading an alarm.

  “Mr. Putnam!” shouted Merrick.

  “Mr. Merrick, lower your booms, I will come about!”

  “No!” A heartbeat later Merrick sprinted aft toward him, waving his arms. “No! For God’s sake, do not turn until the booms are down! Do you hear?”

  “Yes! Hurry, then!” Bliven waited, his heart pounding. From no more than Merrick’s warning, he understood that if the supremely maneuverable Enterprise heeled over in a turn, and the following wind had caught the main fore-and-aft sails broadside, she might have lain right over. “Lower your booms, then finish taking in your tops’ls!”

  He squeezed the blood from his hands in gripping the wheel, until he saw the main and mizzen sails collapsing down their masts, before pulling the wheel hard to starboard. Enterprise heeled sharply over; her momentum carried her through the turn and to a stop a moment after heading into the wind. In seconds, as others of the crew furled the topsails to prevent her backing ship, Merrick had a crew in the cutter being lowered into the water and was pulling toward the sailor flailing in the frigid water.

  Bliven heard Lieutenant Sterett before he saw him, bounding up the ladder two steps at a time, in breeches and waistcoat, without his coat. Even as he stalked toward Bliven he turned and looked up to see the masts now bare and the cutter stroking away.

  Sterett came toward him, his hands clasped behind his back, striding in a manner that told Bliven they must have been clenched into a single fist. He did not speak until he came very near, and then with low, throaty force that Bliven found unnerving; he would rather have been shouted at. “Well, Mr. Putnam. You have taken a great deal upon yourself without my being on deck.”

  Bliven was near to hyperventilating. “Yes, sir. The man fell from the tops’l yardarm. I judged it a matter of life and death to stop the ship. I could not leave the wheel to come get you.”

  Sterett grunted. “Why did you come about and not just take in your sails?”

  “To stop our forward speed, sir. Our momentum might have carried us past rescuing him.”

  “Why did you turn to starboard and not to port?”

  “Sir, our cutter is mounted on the starboard side. The men can get right to him without rowing around the ship.”

  Sterett appeared astonished. “You thought of that?”

  Bliven’s instinct to defend himself snagged on the knowledge of his inexperience. “Well, no, sir, but as you see, it was a fortunate turn.”

  Sterett’s voice rose to a bellow the deeper into the question he got. “Did you think about three big frigates close astern who might run us over when you wheel about right in their way?” They looked up and saw that Essex had cleaved several points to starboard to give them room, and it was obvious that their distress had been observed.

  Bliven was caught and dropped his head. “No, sir, I confess I thought only of the man in the water.”

  As the men in the cutter rowed their hardest, in a moment Sterett and Bliven saw Merrick twirl a float several times over his head before flinging it out to the thrashing sailor. He seized it, Merrick began pulling him in, and all knew that the incident would have no mortal cost.

  “Do you require assistance?” It was the voice of James Barron, captain of the President, his voice tinnily amplified by a speaking trumpet as she billowed past them to port.

  Sterett had left his trumpet below, and so cupped his hands. “Thank you, no,” he shouted. “We will catch up to you.”

  Barron waved to indicate that he understood, and the President left them slowly behind.

  Alone with Sterett on the quarterdeck, Bliven began to feel sick to his stomach. “I am sorry, sir. I judged it a situation that called for the most instant action.”

  Sterett pursed his lips, looked Bliven down and up, and sighed deeply. “Well, Mr. Putnam, in an emergency at sea instinct can serve you as well as forethought, you may find. Better to have called me, even as you took action, but you have done well. You saved that man’s life. I am going below for my coat. Please, no more theatrics until I return.” It was as close to humor as Sterett ever came.

  “No, sir,” said Bliven quietly. “Thank you, sir.”

  Once on the quarterdeck, Bliven’s knees began to shake. How fast it can all change, he thought, mortality that can strike at any moment, from any quarter. Vigilance must never cease. He must learn faster. He saw Merrick standing at the cutter’s tiller, confident, his experienced sea legs absorbing the swell. The stricken sailor was stripped of his wet shirt and wrapped in a blanket that he clutched tightly about himself, no doubt sending aloft his prayers of thanks that he had not been left to drown, terrified and alone and freezing.

  Before three-quarters of an hour had passed, Sterett in complete uniform had them under way again, had overtaken the squadron and resumed their position in the van, before leaving Putnam alone again to see out his watch.

  The emergency passed, and he allowed himself a smile; he was conscious that after only three days at sea, he already felt the magic that a ship works on her sailors. Their Enterprise could not match the frigates in firepower, but she was swifter and more nimble. She had been fresh from the builder’s yard when she sallied into the Undeclared War with the French, and by the end of that conflict she had bested eight French privateer
s and liberated eleven American merchant vessels. It was a peerless record and there was no sense of inferiority to sail in her. Little schooner turned jackass brig she may have been, but she was every inch a fighter and everyone knew it.

  • • •

  ON THE QUARTERDECK OF THE PRESIDENT, Commodore Richard Dale wedged his knee against the starboard rail and observed the Enterprise through his glass. He was glad to have her with him, and wished he had more like her, but smaller vessels to support the frigates were becoming a rarity. President Adams had sold out the Pinckney before he left office; Enterprise’s own sister ship, the Experiment, was now laid up in ordinary, and even with the sudden conflagration in the Mediterranean she would likely also be sold out before the year was over. Mr. Jefferson had begun his term as the enemy of high expenses and a powerful military. In fact he had turned his famous avocation as an architect to designing a grand covered dry dock for the Potomac, where their expensive ships could be laid up, safely out of the water, and then refloated using the power of the tide when they were wanted. Ass, thought Dale. He could preserve his ships, but where would he find officers and sailors who knew what they were doing after he dispersed them into civilian life? Save money, indeed. If we are going to fight, Dale had written his superiors, let us fight, for God’s sake. Half-measures would cost much, avail little, and ultimately must only postpone an inevitable conclusive action.

  Such ancillary vessels as schooners and brigs did not command the notice and respect from foreign powers that the frigates did, but the Enterprise could fight where he could not. Dale well knew that the Enterprise drew nine feet of water; his smallest frigate, the Essex, over twelve feet. That could be a critical difference if it came to blockading or perhaps even fighting in Tangier, or Algiers, or Tunis, or Tripoli—harbors of which they had only the most dubious charts, and which surely were strewn with rocks and reefs and three thousand years of wrecks of which they knew nothing. If he ran one of America’s great frigates aground there, the disaster must be incalculable.

  • • •

  “MR. PUTNAM?” Bliven recognized the voice of Samuel Bandy, the other midshipman of the Enterprise. “Your watch is relieved.”

  Bliven held the wheel as Bandy stepped up to take it. “Course sou’east by east,” said Bliven. “She rides well. I have shortened sail; keep an eye on the squadron and let Mr. Sterett know if they come up too close.”

  “Thank you,” said Bandy. He grasped the wheel with hands as much fat as strong. Bliven felt the strain drain out of him, happy to surrender the forenoon watch; he had been at the wheel since four o’clock that morning. Yet he found the etiquette amusing, standing there at fourteen in their standing collars and bicorne hats—hats that were excessively snugged down, for in this wind they were at risk any moment of blowing off, but as mere midshipmen they were unsure whether they might be allowed to remove them. Perhaps it was necessary for the smooth operation of the ship, but he found it extraordinary, the degree to which they were expected to comport themselves as any other officers. They were not even done growing. At home they should be racing or wrestling or hunting when they found leisure time. Or rather they would, if they were neighbors, but Samuel Bandy was from the other end of the Atlantic seaboard, from South Carolina.

  He was a stout lad with straight hair of reddish blond, fair skin that tended to burn rather than tan, and blue eyes slightly popped and very clear that seemed to always express expectation. South Carolina seemed as distant and strange to Bliven Putnam as the African shores where they were bound. The Putnam family came close to sufficing for themselves on their farm at Litchfield, growing and laying by sufficient crops for themselves and their stock, selling apples and cider and dairy products for the cash they needed. Bliven’s father also operated a livery stable and drayage, putting to good use their two giant shire horses in hauling goods and merchandise for people. Though they both came from families that worked the land, Bliven was instantly aware that Samuel held himself a class higher, for the Putnams worked with their own hands, where the Bandy family commanded slaves in doing the hard labor. Bliven could not help but wonder whether this was a cause of Sam’s lack of physical toughness. He could not be called weak, particularly, but Bliven’s personal acquaintance with ax and plow had honed his strength to a higher degree. It was a greater effort for Sam to get aloft or haul lines, but he was game for it and always applied the necessary effort at a task until he succeeded. They had boarded Enterprise and begun their careers on the same day; no doubt sea duty would slim Sam down and toughen him.

  Bliven went below to their one impossibly crowded berth deck. After four hours on watch he headed straight through the wardroom, easing himself out onto the narrow stern walk and then into the absurdly small officers’ privy. He peed for several seconds down into the open water, when the door flew open and a voice barked, “Haul that in, sir! I need this space.” He knew and had already learned to dislike the voice of the second lieutenant, Phineas Curtis.

  “Yes, sir, I’m just fin—”

  “Now, damn your eyes! You want to stand about exploring yourself, go for’d to the heads and amuse the rest of the degenerate swash on this vessel.”

  “Yes, sir, I’m very sorry.” Bliven had covered himself enough to retreat back into the wardroom. He had heard it said of lieutenants that one of their primary tasks was to make life hell for midshipmen, and he was grateful that Porter had principal charge of him and Sam Bandy. Curtis enjoyed his superiority entirely too much.

  Enterprise’s bottom curved up steadily from the midships aft, making her slick as grease over the water while giving her a deep, sharp keel for stability, but this was at the cost of interior space. The midshipmen’s berth in the steerage, which necessarily conformed to the curve of the hull, was little larger than a burial crypt, and he shared even this tiny compartment with Sam. It was lit by a single battle lantern, its small glass panes solidly clamped by iron strapping. There was a bucket of sand in which to place a heated shot for warmth when needed, hooks for their clothing, ropes’ ends to practice tying their knots, books to study mathematics and navigation. There was no point in feeling they had been cheated in their accommodations; the cabin opposite the wardroom, of identical proportions, was that of the surgeon’s mate and the chaplain.

  It was the latter, a smallish, gray-haired minister of the old Episcopal faith named Pelham, who discreetly balanced out the cruelty of the lieutenants. He could not be seen to contradict them, much less quarrel with them, for navy regulations did not spell out the specific relations between line officers and those with ancillary functions—the clerk; the purser; the surgeon or surgeon’s mate, depending on the size of the ship; and the chaplain. Within bounds tolerated by the captain, a lieutenant could make life equally unpleasant for them. But with the dearth of Pelham’s listed duties—conducting divine services, and helping the surgeon’s mate tend to the sick, and after a battle the wounded—he found circumstances behind the lieutenants’ backs to take the midshipmen under his wing for some kindness and encouragement. It was after Bliven’s first humiliation at Curtis’s hands—he sent him aloft for two hours their first night out, for daring to read a book that was not about navigation or seamanship—that Pelham told him it was likely because Curtis was merely a second lieutenant, and had been for a number of years without promotion, that venting his frustration on the only officers aboard who were beneath him took on such a great importance to him.

  Already Bliven had learned to hate their lessons in swordsmanship, for Curtis’s special gift was to cloak his mania for cruelty in the guise of training. When he and Sam Bandy first came aboard ship, each found on his blanket a U.S. navy regulation cutlass, with scabbard, belt, and buckle. Bliven withdrew the slightly curved thirty-inch blade and found it stunningly sharp. No sooner had they found them than Curtis had them buckled on and was leading them up the ladder.

  “Come on, now,” he said. “What young boys do not love to pla
y at sword fighting?” He squared them off on the quarterdeck, had them strike their blades together a couple times to hear the ting of steel on steel. “Now, boys,” he took pleasure in saying, “a cutlass is ever so much more lethal than a foil. A foil can only pierce, but a cutlass can hack and slice as well, as facilitated by the curved blade. The design is copied from the Moorish scimitar, but lighter and more maneuverable.” Curtis faced Bliven and Sam against each other. “Feet apart,” he said, “weight on the back foot unless you are advancing. If your opponent lunges at you, merely step back out of his way. If you can’t do that, deflect the blow with a sideways strike of your own. Remember, economy of movement is a great advantage. All right, let’s see you go at each other.”

  Sam and Bliven looked at each other, bewildered.

  “Oh!” exclaimed Curtis suddenly. “No, wait, wait. Here.” From the netting he extracted two wooden practice swords of the same dimensions. “Wouldn’t do to have you bleeding all over the nice clean deck, would it?”

  Worse than practicing with Sam, Bliven came to loathe training with Curtis himself, for although Curtis also used the wooden cutlass, his experience was such that he easily won, and when he struck he struck hard and called it good training to learn to defend themselves.

  Safe in his berth from Curtis for the moment, Bliven gave a quick glance at a one-page inclusion in the pamphlet of regulations. This was his first Saturday at sea, and there was much still to accustom himself to. He traced his finger in the dim light down the schedule of prescribed rations—today there would be peas and cheese to augment the pound of salt pork and pound of bread. He nodded in satisfaction; they would get cheese only twice a week while it lasted, and as the bread turned foul they would turn to the infamous rocklike biscuits. Their ration also included a daily half-pint of rum. At fourteen he was not allowed the rum, but the purser credited his account four cents for every forgone ration of alcohol; Bliven had already calculated that if they were away for a year, there would be near fifteen dollars extra pay when he returned. That was an even exchange, for he felt no attraction to drink—but another morning like this, he thought and sighed, and that case may alter itself.