“The ideal will be to control a small port with facilities enough for the brigs to tie up. It would be possible to get a company over a brig’s side in five minutes, I think, Major Campbell.”
“Faster than that, sir, but there would be the problem of a rearguard.”
“There would indeed.”
Frederick sat in his small cabin, notes spread across his desk in disorder. It sounded very simple when said in an office on shore. ‘Make a landing in a small port to destroy a battery or burn out warehouses or a boatyard’s slip’ – nothing to it! But organising the transports and boats to get the men in and out again was no easy task. Each of the brigs and the sloops, and the schooner as well, would require a written order detailing all that it must do, where it must be, and when, without ambiguity and allowing for the differing degrees of perception shared by the captains. He suspected that a number of them would be as clever as him, or more so, was certain that Horrocks, for example, was barely able to read and write, and that only short words.
He considered as well the problems of intercepting a coastal convoy – schooner to scout, two sloops and Acheron to attack, one sloop to convoy the brigs to a safe rendezvous, distant from the action, but not so far that they might go astray. He called Dunnett in from his little cubby-hole, asked him to make a fair copy of his first conclusions.
“One copy only, Dunnett, in the first instance. When we have revised it sufficiently, then a set of standing orders for each of the squadron to refer to, so that they have an idea of what I shall be intending as a general rule.”
Book Seven: The Duty and Destiny Series
Chapter Three
“Rye, that is the place, Sir Frederick; there is an anchorage at the mouth of the river with a depth of water sufficient – amply so – for your needs. The town is silted up to such an extent that nothing greater than a fishing boat can use it, or indeed would wish to. The demise of the harbour has, quite naturally, led to the exodus of ships’ chandlers and such so that it is now a country town of little interest or wealth. But, an anchorage at Rye places your flotilla no more than two, or perhaps three, hours of sailing from the French invasion coast.”
Admiral Girton displayed great enthusiasm for the shift out of Portsmouth, probably believing that it would lead to Frederick being based out of Chatham, and thus ceasing to be a demand on his dockyard and stores. The squadron being under Admiralty orders, Girton would have no share in any prize-money it made – as far as he was concerned, the invasion flotilla was no more than a nuisance, making work and spending his funds for no return.
“What do you know of the water there, sir?”
Girton was forced to be honest; he could not lie on so important a matter.
“With Rye so very close, Sir Frederick, and no doubt emptying its sewers, such as they are, and its cess-pools directly into the river – well, sir, I do not believe that I would wish to fill my barrels from that source.”
“Then it would be Portsmouth to water, sir, for I would not wish to voyage into Chatham and find myself wind-bound in the Downs for perhaps weeks at a time.”
Girton agreed, reluctantly, that he was wise in his assessment; he turned to more important matters.
“Your two luggers will go to the Prize Court, Sir Frederick, with their part cargoes, but, believe it or not, the cargo taken on land is in dispute – the Revenue men at Bridport claim it as their own, on the grounds that they should have been notified before the capture so that they could have been there to perform their duty.”
“I much suspect they owned shares in it already, sir!”
“Quite possibly, Sir Frederick. It is an ill-paid profession and attracts the less than rigorously honest to its ranks.”
“It is a matter of a few thousands only, is it not, sir?”
“Probably no more than five, but there is an issue of principle here. The Navy made the capture and the profits should be wholly ours. The First Lord is to argue the case, and it may well end up in the High Court. Whatever happens, you will not spend that money these next five years.”
“Damned lawyers – they are so slow one can be an old man before a case is determined, and then discover that their fees have eaten up all of the disputed funds so that you gain nothing from the affair no matter who wins.”
“It is as well that the invasion barges will be worth almost nothing, Sir Frederick – there will be no cases to argue there.”
“Small comfort there, sir. Has there been any communication from the Admiralty during my short absence?”
“None, sir.”
“A pity. Bluenose schooner is to visit the Gun Wharf today, sir, as we expected might happen. Her captain is an enterprising young man, as you suggested; he will make post-captain before he is one-and-twenty or court-martial within the month, and I do not know which is the more likely. I intend to send him out tomorrow to see what may be found on the French coast, sir.”
“A long run across and back – you will hardly be able to intercept any convoy she may discover.”
“She will have to look into the smaller harbours along the coast, sir, and determine which may best be attacked. I can see no alternative, lacking information.”
Four days and Bluenose was back, having poked her nose into several likely places and found each to be more heavily defended than she liked.
“I think I aroused no suspicions, sir – I flew French colours and waved at the gunners in the batteries – and there were batteries over even the smallest of harbours, sir. If there was a mole and shelter for a dozen barges then there was an emplacement for a pair of guns at least. I suspect that some of them were field artillery, sir; twelve pounders, no more, but behind stone walls and often on a cliff or a low bluff or even in a castle of olden times, brought back into military use.”
It would make very little sense to attack such a place. The whole complement of Marines landed in the night, the battery stormed, with inevitable casualties, the fishing village taken, possibly with more losses if there were soldiers billeted there, and then a dozen invasion barges burned. Nine ships, five hundred and more of sailors and three hundred of Marines put into danger’s way and all for almost nothing by way of results. Yet he had to show active, to be seen to be attacking the invasion.
Larger harbours would have garrisons and probably battalions of invasion troops camped in the fields behind the town. There was little gain to be discovered in making landings, except that the threat might force the French to waste their resources on building bigger batteries, emplacing larger guns. It was a doubtful strategy. The answer had to be to attack convoys and to keep the barges in port, distant from where they were needed. Alternatively, one might wish to venture along the coast, away from the Channel itself and assault the yards located on Dutch soil, or along the Norman or Breton shores.
The politicians wanted action against the invasion forces themselves – visible, simple, unarguable fires among the barges. It was of small use to destroy the yards if the little men of Whitehall could not appreciate their significance. Burned-out boatyards were worth no votes in the Houses of Parliament; flaming barges, no matter how easily they might be replaced, represented feet marching through the Division Lobbies. The squadron must destroy barges.
Frederick returned to the Port-Admiral’s office.
“You are right in your analysis, sir – I must base myself in the narrow waters. It would make good sense, sir, if I was to leave the brigs and Marines here in Portsmouth, the men living in barracks rather than confined to the unhealthy holds of small vessels. It would be possible to re-embark the men in an hour or two and sail the brigs overnight to Rye should the need arise, as I have little doubt it will.”
Admiral Girton could see the sense in the proposal and had sufficient independence in his own port to be able to vary the Admiralty’s orders to that extent. He agreed that it might be done.
“As for your use of Rye, Sir Frederick, it must be understood that you are still based on Portsmouth but merely hap
pen to be at anchor there. I broached the question of changing your base to the Admiralty and the response was that you must continue to victual out of Portsmouth. The First Lord did not state that you must lie at anchor here, however.”
Admiralty orders must always be obeyed to the letter; the spirit was open to interpretation.
“Will you sail this day, Sir Frederick?”
They glanced out of the windows, looked up at the wind vanes, shook their heads together.
“Half a gale out of the south-west and strengthening, sir. As like as not to end up on the French coast. Not today, nor yet tomorrow, I fear, sir.”
“There will be three days in this one, Sir Frederick. I would not sail till Sunday at earliest, and better to wait another day then.”
The admiral was renowned as a weather prophet, and in any case was very much Frederick’s superior.
“Monday at earliest, sir. Such being the case, may I beg your permission to sleep outside of my ship, sir?”
“Very tactful of you, Sir Frederick! Granted, of course.”
A captain, once read in, must remain aboard his ship except he was granted permission to go ashore by his immediate commanding officer; a commodore was in this, and many other ways, an anomalous species, almost – but not quite – as independent as an admiral. Frederick could probably have absented himself for a few days without comment, but it was a courtesy to consult with the admiral.
“Bosomtwi! Long Common tonight! Ask Ablett to arrange for a pair of chaises at the Crown and tell Marc and Jean that they are to provide me with escort – there has been mention of disorder in the villages, labourers rioting and that sort of thing.”
It would have aroused discontent to have permitted his followers shore leave when the rest of the crew must stay aboard - but to order them on duty ashore was an entirely different matter. The two sharpshooters took up their rifled muskets and prepared themselves for their duty, and were taken to one side by the boatswain and warned to be most careful; the judges would look unkindly on them if they shot unarmed rioters, they must be sure that any attack upon Sir Frederick was made with deadly intent before they could risk opening fire.
“Was I you, lads, then I would take a pair of half-pikes with you, with the blades taken off. Bloody near as thick as your wrists and a fathom long, they’ll do to crack a skull or two and not be half as deadly as them old rifles of yours!”
They thanked the boatswain kindly for his advice and were seen to follow it, carrying the staffs very prominently as they left the ship.
Long Common was warm and dry – all that a ship was not – and the few days sat listening to the wind howl in the trees and simply quietly talking made Frederick wonder just why he stayed at sea. Was the life really so very attractive? He did not need the prize money, or the columns in the newssheets that told him what a hero he was. So, why?
“Duty, I suspect, sir.”
Elizabeth smiled her approval – she had grown up in a house which had valued devotion to higher goals.
“The harvest at Boorley has come in well, husband, and the young agent seems to have the estate well in hand. It is very strange, but when I look at him, his face seems somehow familiar.”
Frederick stared suspiciously at the wife of his bosom, decided that she was not indulging in satire or ribaldry, unlikely though the latter might have been.
“I suspect that Squire Paget may have been a little careless some eighteen years ago, my love. He did pay for young Mr Bates’ education, I believe.”
“Oh! Oh, but… Well! I would never have thought it of him!”
“I regret, ma’am, that it is not quite as uncommon as one might wish. Where one party has wealth, and the other a degree of beauty, then the results tend to be fairly much predictable.”
She was not to be placated so easily – it was not the way the world ought to be.
“What is this I hear of dissatisfaction among the poor, my dear?”
“The price of corn is rising again husband, and of beef even more so. Where the farmers offer some of their pay in kind the hardship is not so great, but men subsisting on wages alone are finding it hard to feed their families. Even in this area around Southampton where there is more of dairying to produce cheeses, there is still hardship.”
Frederick was not quite sure why cheese-making should make a difference, but was prepared to accept that it might. Kent, after all, was making money that way back at Abbey.
“It provides paid work for the females, sir. There is skim milk as well, not all of that reaching the pigs, and most farmers will give a woman half a pound of cheese a week for the family.”
That was all very logical; Frederick was pleased to understand it.
“The war does not help the poor, I fear, Frederick. There is less of grain coming into the country. From the landowners’ point of view, of course, the lower the level of imported stuffs, the higher the price of the home-produced; we are not the ones to suffer.”
That was reasonable enough, but the war could not be stopped – the last had dragged on for almost a decade and this seemed to have many years left in it.
“All we can do, my dear, is encourage men to leave the land. There is a great call for seamen still, and I believe the army to be increasing its numbers again. It is hard, I know, but there seems little alternative, other than the Poor Law, and that costs enough already.”
They shook their heads in unison – there was no solution that they could see. Times were changing and some of the people were suffering while others gained from the new circumstance; sad, but inevitable.
“I must go across to Boorley Green tomorrow, my dear, to visit my mother. Will you come?”
“Of course, the children as well. I believe she intends to remain at the house, husband. I had wondered whether she might not prefer to settle in retirement by the sea at Weymouth or in one of the spas, but she seems happy in her own home.”
“She is at liberty to take any of those courses – I promised my father that. Is she keeping the whole house open or merely living in a wing?”
“I do not know what she plans, or whether she wishes to take a companion to stay with her.”
A younger cousin from either side of the family, a spinster lady or early widow, would make good sense; company for the evenings and a useful, more vigorous member of the household as she grew older. Frederick cast about in his memory for relatives to fit the bill.
“It is an excellent idea, of course, but I cannot think of any of our families to be invited to take up residence. We are very short of cousins – no more than two or three children to a generation for many years. I wonder if the Pagets might not have a spinster sister or two who might enjoy life in a larger house again. I shall ask my mother whether she might like to have her loneliness alleviated.”
Elizabeth had feared that he might have intended high-handedly simply to produce a suitable lady and dump her upon his mother; fortunately his habits of command seemed not to extend that far.
His mother was well, busy in her daily tasks, but welcomed the idea of another voice in the house. She had her own ideas of whom.
“Do you remember Miss Tredger, Frederick?”
He did not.
“She was the friend of my childhood years, never wed and moved away with her parents when they left Hampshire some years ago. We have kept in correspondence and I know that she is now living in two rooms in Norwich, her parents having passed away there and left her a bare competence. I believe her papa was something in the Customs, an official of some standing. I suspect that she might rather like to return to Hampshire and to an abode outside of town. I shall write this very day!”
Very tidy, a satisfactory outcome for both, he had no doubt. It was important to keep the big house in occupation rather than allow it to fade into disrepair. Robert would inherit the Boorley Green estates in due course and his house must be in good order for him – the land belonged to all of the generations of the family, including those yet unborn, and there
was a duty to them. That thought reminded him that he had to speak to Stainer to amend his Will to allow for a proper portion to little Jane in case of his early death; in wartime he must not allow that to slip.
“Young Mr Bates seems very satisfactory as an agent, Mama.”
“Very active, a most busy young man, Frederick. Far too solitary in his habits, of course – but he has no childhood friends of his own and is not in the way of meeting young people of his own sort. I suspect he will find some farmer’s daughter before too many years go by, however; more likely, one will find him. He has a very comfortable income for a young man and will no doubt buy a few acres of his own at a later time in his life. I suspect that there may be a small inheritance…”
“His closest relative mindful of his obligations, do you think. Mama?”
“Just so, Frederick. Mr Bates, senior, Squire Paget’s bailiff, has no other child – one believes he suffered the mumps as a boy of sixteen or so… He will have an amount of savings to leave and I know that Squire has a kindness for both father and son. The young man will eventually be within reason comfortable.”
“Very good; all will be well, it would seem.”
Elizabeth heard and did not understand all, but once again concluded that country ways were slightly alien to those appertaining to the society she had grown up in. Later she enquired of the significance of the mumps and then was very sympathetic to poor Mr Bates.
The wind blew high that night and she was glad her husband was not at sea.
“Equinoctial gales, my dear – though what they have to do with the date I am not quite sure. Really, they herald the end of the invasion season – not even a soldier such as Bonaparte would attempt to launch ten thousands of heavily laden flat-bottomed barges into these seas at this time of year. A convoy would be hard-pressed to keep to four knots and must find a landing-place on a flattish part of the coast and will have to travel some forty miles to do so, even from Calais – and they cannot all set out from that one port. The army will wish to land with some hours of daylight in hand to secure its beachhead, thus must do much of its sailing at night. The bargemen will demand the gentlest of winds and an almost calm sea, preferring to set the soldiers to rowing, and they will not discover those conditions at this time of year.”
The Odd-Job Man (The Duty and Destiny Series, Book 7) Page 7