Midshipman Graham and the Battle of Abukir

by James Boschert

  “Demme! They cost me at least a guinea. I dare say you cheated, demn your eyes,” Tewksby muttered, his lisp getting the better of him.

  “What’s that you said?” Graham gritted. He leaned forward until his face was close to that of Tewksby. The heavier and stronger face confronted the thinner and less resolute features. Graham poked Tewksby in the chest with a grubby forefinger.

  “I shall demand satisfaction for that scurrilous remark, you toad. I do not cheat. You simply cannot play, and I will not accept an IOU either. The debt will only be settled after I have shot you to death or pinked you till you bleed like a stuck pig. We would be well rid of you,” he told the older boy.

  Tewksby drew back and licked his thin lips; he looked uncertain. His eyes wouldn’t meet those of Graham, who narrowed his own and scowled fiercely – a look that he had cultivated since a very young boy to look dangerous and threatening. He regularly practiced this when on watch: intimidation of one’s enemies was not purely in the skill of a good shot or the use of a sword, his father had once told him. No one could look as fierce as his father could when in full kilt, brandishing a claymore, having drunk a full bottle of spirits.

  Tewksby glared back at Graham. One could never quite tell when this freckle-faced Scottish boy with the mop of reddish hair and broad shoulders was joking. Standforth chose this moment to add to the looming disaster. He hated Tewksby with a passion, as the older boy never let an occasion go by when he didn’t bully the youngster of fourteen.

  “I shall be your second, Graham,” he offered.

  “Shut up, you little prick!” Tewksby snarled at him.

  “I shall welcome your support, Minnow,” Graham gave a solemn nod to his volunteer second, “and you will try to behave like a Gentleman, Mister Tewksby, even though it might be an effort,” he admonished with a curl of his lip, never taking his eyes off the boy opposite. “Well? I want satisfaction, Mister Tewksby; will you grant it to me? I even have a witness to your scurrilous accusation. Or do I add coward to your other worthless titles? Primp, Fop, Dandy among others come to mind.”

  “I, I, er, it’s forbidden to duel. We could be court marshaled for it,” Edward Tewksby, heir to a fortune in northern England and a title declared, looking satisfied with his reasoning.

  Graham sat back and scraped the small coins that were still on the chest into the palm of his hand, looking thoughtful. “Only if we are caught at it,” he stated. “I don’t care how long it takes but satisfaction I will have, Mr Tewksby. Mr Brown can act for you when the time comes. Mr Standforth is already taken, I believe.”

  “You have to choose your weapons,” Standforth reminded them, his voice squeaking with the excitement of the moment. He was enjoying the discomfort of his sworn enemy enormously. He could not count the number of times he had imagined getting rid of Tewksby, from helping him overboard in a high sea to shooting him in the back during a fierce engagement with the Frenchies. Unfortunately neither bad weather nor any reckless boarding attempts by the French had occurred, so he remained frustrated, but now … he was almost beside himself with glee. Graham, who was difficult to read most of the time, really seemed to mean it in this instance.

  Duncan nodded and said, “You are right, Minnow.” He seemed to be pondering this for a moment. Then he looked up and smiled. “Swords, I think. Yes, much more satisfying than a noisy pistol. Swords it is, then. What do you say Tewky? Its your choice anyway.”

  Mr Tewksby looked shocked. “You really mean it, don’t you? You mad Sc—” he nearly said the offending word again, but then he noticed the a gleam in Graham’s eye.

  “Of course I do. How did you expect me to respond to your accusation? You were saying?” he prompted.

  “Nothing, no, nothing. When, er, where?” Tewksby mumbled, as though he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “I’ll, I’ll take swords...”

  “On shore, don’t you think? We’ll find a way, I’m sure.” Graham yawned. “Now it’s late and I’m tired. Time for the hammock. We’ll settle the details in the morning.”

  Mr Tewksby left to commence his duty. He was late already.

  Chapter 8

  Invasion of Abukir. June 1799

  The Turkish armada was composed of Turkish owned warships and fifty smaller vessels carrying upward of 15,000 troops and artillery. The troops had been drawn from Constantinople and other garrisons and assembled on the island of Rhodes prior to embarking for Egypt.

  The Turks were supposed to commence the assault on the peninsula in the very early hours of the morning, but there were many inexplicable delays, which Sir Sidney attributed to the Pasha, who it seemed had no inclination to move with any speed to capture a vital foothold on the mainland.

  Sir Sidney fumed while messages went back and forth between the British fleet and the ships of the Turkish high command, but eventually, quite late in the morning, the flotilla began to move towards the beaches. It was headed by the Turkish gunboats with the British boats in support. Sir Sidney was quite unable to sit out the assault, so despite the pleading of his senior officers he took his place on one of the Tigre’s two Longboats and ordered the crew to row hard to ensure that he had a good view of the battle to come.

  Midshipman Graham was thrilled to be detailed off for one of the jolly boats. He was made aware of this happy event by Lieutenant Jekyll Canes, who beckoned him over to the quarterdeck and fixed him with a disapproving eye. He looked the young midshipman up and down, from his blue hat to his not-too-clean and scuffed shoes, noting the short sword and pistol slipped into the belt.

  “I’ve got my eye on you, Mr Graham. You are in command of the jolly boat,” he said, his tone cold. “Normally Lt Fowler would be in charge, but he is indisposed today. You have a responsibility to your men and the boat. Do not act the fool; bring the boat and the men back in one piece, do you hear me?”

  “Aye Aye, Sir!” Graham touched his hat respectfully. His eyes slid to where Tewksby was standing. The boy glowered at him. It took a great deal of self-control for Duncan not to wink at him.

  “Dismissed,” snapped Lt Canes.

  “Thank you, Sir.”

  “Good luck, Graham!” called out young Standforth from the after part of the quarterdeck. He received a glare from Tewksby, and Lt Bowles frowned in annoyance.

  Duncan grinned at Standforth, then hurried over to the starboard side where he was all but dragged into the longboat just as the order came to lower the boats. He got a grin from the bosun’s mate as he picked himself up from among the crew and tried to regain his dignity.

  “Get a lecture from his nibs, did we, Sorr?” the man asked in an undertone. Graham glowered at the seaman and then couldn’t help himself: he grinned. “Nothing unusual about that, Chan.” He used nicknames for most of the men he knew well. The men chuckled around him. They liked this young fighting cock of a Scot.

  The boats were in the water within moments and unhooked. “Push off and watch what yo’r doin’, or you’ll be on the paint detail for the rest of the voyage!” Chauncey, the bosun’s mate, admonished the men. Then they were rowing hard to keep up with the admiral and his longboat, which was trying to join up with the now hurrying Turks.

  Graham moved forward to join the gunner and his mate at the bows. “Are we ready, Guns?”

  “Loaded and ready, Sorr,” he responded. Graham looked over the four-pounder that was mounted in the bows. Anything larger would have broken the boat in two with its recoil. As it was, placing this kind of gun in a small boat had its own risks. It took forever to re-load, so the placing of its shot was important. He stared forward at the Admiral’s boat.

  “Come on, come on, you lazy buggers!” he fretted out loud. “It’s all going to be over before we even get there! I should have ye all bloody keel-hauled!”

  The men grinned but pulled that much harder; they were well used to the boy’s ways and enjoyed his blunt language. They pulled abreast of the Admiral’s boat and were told to stand off some fifty yards from the shore once the
Turks had landed.

  From here Graham and his crew had a grandstand view of the landing, and were thus witnesses to an appalling event.

  The peninsular known as Abukir stuck out of the coast like a thick thumb, its location was east of Alexandria. For the most part a flat almost featureless sand bar, half a league wide, that extended into the sea by about a league. At its very end there was a small citadel which could hold a tiny garrison while camped on the sand in front of the citadel there was a contingent of soldiers.

  Though a cannon boomed from the fortress, it quickly became clear to the British sailors that the garrison was very small. Besides the garrison behind the walls there were about 300 French soldiers who barely had time to form up before the flotilla of crowded boats full of Janissaries and other Turkish soldiers arrived in a swarm and splashed onto the beach as a mob. Screaming and brandishing their weapons they charged up the gentle slope towards the tiny group of French soldiers. The men on the boats heard the rattle of musketry over the screams and yells of the Turks but very soon there was no further shooting.

  The Turks overwhelmed the French soldiers within minutes, then set about mutilating the bodies of the dead and hacking the heads off the still living victims who had remained alive long enough to face this hideous fate. There were no prisoners.

  Graham and his rowers watched with horror from the water’s edge, their support quite unnecessary as the Turks completed the massacre of the French soldiers before turning their attention to the fortress. The garrison had no chance either; the walls were scaled by yelling men clambering up ladders hastily placed against the walls. Brandishing their swords and spears and discharging their muskets in all directions, the butchery began again. It was all over within an hour. The Turkish flag was raised on the battlements of the fort and the Turks howled their victory to the heavens.

  “Dear God Almighty!” Graham said out loud.

  “Bugger me!” Chan breathed, “Them’s savages, them is!” Even the hard-bitten sailors well used to the horrors of ship-to-ship battles were shocked at the behavior of their allies.

  “Poor buggers, never stood a chance!” another muttered to his rowing mate.

  Sir Sidney Smith and his officers arrived back on the Tigre with tight expressions on their faces. He barely remembered to tip his hat as they were piped aboard by the bosuns and arms were presented by the marines. Graham and his men hooked up the jolly boat in total silence and then they too climbed aboard. The young midshipman dismissed the men and walked the length of the deck to report to the officer of the watch.

  With a face like thunder Sir Sydney called out just before he went below, “Major Bromley and Colonel Douglas, please attend me in my day cabin. I would be glad if you could come too, Lieutenant,” he looked over at Lt Canes, then stamped down the stairs toward his cabin.

  “Aye Aye, Sir,” said the Lieutenant, but paused to wait for Graham.

  Graham stopped in front of him and stood to attention. “Permission to be dismissed, Sir,” he said.

  Lt Canes had observed the events through his glass. He was as shocked as his senior officers, but he greeted Graham without expression.

  “Anything to report?” he demanded.

  “No, Sir. They’re barbarians, Sir!” the boy said in a clear voice. The men on the quarterdeck heard him speak and looked at one another. Lt Canes tightened his lips. The boy was very angry. That was a good thing, but the outspoken lad had to lean to restrain himself.

  “Hold your tongue, Sir!” he snapped.

  “Yes, Sir. Sorry, Sir,” Midshipman Graham came to attention.

  “Mr Graham, a word.” Lt Canes led the way to the after part of the quarterdeck.

  There he turned and said, “You Sir, should understand that war, for the most part, is barbaric, but I will agree with you in this instance. Just learn to keep your feelings to yourself, Mr Graham.”

  “Yes, Sir. Sorry, Sir. Thank you, Sir.”

  “You are dismissed.”

  The officers wasted no time in presenting themselves at the cabin where they were treated to a small glass of precious sherry from Sir Sidney’s much depleted supply.

  He stood, so they remained standing and waited for him to calm down and discuss the event they had witnessed.

  Lt Canes knocked and walked in. “Sorry I’m late, Sir. I was dealing with that scamp, Mr Graham.”

  “How is he bearing up?”

  “He’s bearing up very well, I’d say, Sir. Given the circumstances.”

  “Yes, I agree. Must have been a shock for him. It was for the rest of us, I can tell you.”

  Sir Sidney took a deep breath and a gulp of sherry, then said, “We have witnessed an act of extreme barbarity today and I am ashamed to admit that we are a part of it.”

  “Indeed Sir, we did. I share your sentiments completely.” Colonel Douglas spoke for both himself and the Major, who looked equally distressed. Lt Canes looked at the three men and said nothing.

  Sir Smith continued. “Unfortunately they are our allies in this endeavor, but I am very unhappy that I was not able to be on the ground to perhaps protect the French prisoners. It was inexcusable butchery!”

  “Sir, there was no way on earth that you could have stopped that carnage. None at all!” Major Bromley protested.

  “Well, now I must put on a good face and visit with the Pasha to discuss the next step, I suppose,” Sir Sidney said, glancing out of the window toward the peninsula.

  “If our intelligence is correct and Boney is back in Cairo, we might have a chance to consolidate the defense before he has time to react,” Colonel Douglas said tentatively. He wanted to move past the horror of what they had witnessed that morning.

  “You are perfectly right of course, Colonel,” Sir Sidney said. “It is too late to dwell on remorse, we now have to take advantage of the situation and make sure these … these people can take the next step toward regaining their empire. Although God knows how brutal they will be once they achieve that. I would not like to be an Egyptian when the Turks rule.”

  “We were given a taste of their behavior at Acre, Sir. But the French have been uncommonly badly behaved themselves at times, as for example at Jaffa.” Colonel Douglas was referring to the massacre of thousands of Turks by the French on their way through the coastal town of Jaffa. Napoléon had decided that he could not contain nor hold that many prisoners, so he had ordered them bayonetted and shot on the beaches.

  “You don’t need to remind me, Major. What goes around can come around, and we were witness to it in small part today.”

  Sir Sydney sighed, then said, “We must put all this behind us, and the first thing to do to ensure that the beachhead is retained, after which it is vital to ensure that it is adequately protected by better defenses than it possesses at present. Both cavalry and light artillery, which the French still possess, would be able to barrel in without opposition at this moment in time.

  “I want both of you to help with this endeavor, and I shall do my best to provide you with a conduit to the Pasha in order that you have his full support. Please wait until I have seen him and then we can begin. One thing we can safely rely upon is that Boney is not going to sit idly by while we are here.”

  The officers nodded agreement and left to attend to their duties. Lt Canes remained behind. It was stifling hot in the cabin even with the window open. The heat at this time of year was fierce and there was almost no wind to cool the ship. Sir Sidney wiped his brow with a handkerchief.

  “Have we any chance of moving the ships farther in toward the fortress, Edward?” he asked.

  “We have already moved just under half a cable closer, Sir. I dare not move any closer; we only have two fathoms beneath our hull at present.” He left unsaid the peril of being this close, should a storm spring up from the north, or any direction for that matter. The Mediterranean Sea was unpredictable. They would be in dire straits with no leeway to get the ships off the shore. That could mean a disaster for the British squadron.

>   Sir Sidney nodded reluctant agreement. “Very well then, we must load the boats and make sure that they can perform as gun boats. This is the only way we can protect the flanks of the Turks should Boney arrive at an inopportune time.”

  “I have already seen the Turk unload many guns, Sir. There doesn’t appear to be a shortage of those,” Lt Canes said.

  “If our training officers are correct then it is unlikely that they will position them well. We will have to show them how, I fear.”

  “Indeed, Sir. I shall also see to it that the boats are well-supplied with shot and powder in case of need.”

  Graham had gone below in a state of shock. He felt like crawling into a dark corner of the ship and crouching there. What he had witnessed horrified him. The pleading of the victims and the savagery of their attackers, clearly heard and seen across the sort distance to the boats, was something he would never forget. Yet there was little time to feel sorry for himself. His watch was on and he needed to brush his coat and clean himself up before presenting himself to the quarterdeck and the unsympathetic eye of Lt Fowler.

  The rest of his watch was spent overseeing the men and preparing the boats for the next day. The guns were checked, the rounds stacked and the powder and grape bags sorted and wads prepared. He examined the gun tools, the ram rods for wear and chipping, the wet wads for their sheepskin wraps, rejecting some for wear; anything to keep his mind off what he had witnessed, although on occasion he would glance out over the glittering waters towards the peninsula which was now seething with activity where the Turks were busy erecting tents and defenses. It was comforting that Bosun’s Mate Chauncey came up to him during one quiet moment and muttered, “You did fine today, Sir. None of us could have foreseen such a thing.”

  Duncan nodded. “Thanks, Chan. I agree,” he murmured, then walked the length of the busy deck staring morosely at the distant fort.