I never did give an order to stop shooting. Everything just tailed off as we ran out of targets.
******
From the roof of the forecastle where my son and I were standing, I could see and hear the progress of our boarding parties and prize crews on the quay and in the harbour. We had taken the French by surprise, and there was no doubt about it. Already our prize crews were starting to raise the anchors and sails of some of the transports in the harbour in preparation for sailing them to London.
The situation was much the same here at Harfleur’s long quay. The prize crew on the two-masted transport to my right had already cast off its mooring lines and was starting to raise its sails, despite some of its crew jumping off its deck and onto the quay in a desperate effort to escape. Some did escape; others drew an unnecessary arrow.
There was trouble, however, three berths down to my left. Our boarding party was meeting resistance on the big transport we’d passed earlier which had already loaded some of its soldiers. I would have sent reinforcements running down the quay to help them if I could, but the Frenchman’s mooring lines had been cut or cast off, and it was beginning to drift away. The boat was out of control with our prize crew and archers on board and in serious trouble.
Pushing away from the quay and rowing out to the aid of our boarding party turned out to be unexpectedly difficult and time-consuming. Our sailors had trouble pushing us far enough away from the quay with their pikes so we could get our quayside oars into the water and begin moving towards the drifting ship.
The brief delay was all it took to turn a problem into a serious crisis. Now our only chance of saving our prize crew was to reinforce them by boarding the drifting Frenchman in the harbour, just as we would if we encountered it out in the ocean. It was very distressing.
******
My father got very upset when we had trouble getting our quayside oars into the water. I started to say something to him when Harold shouted out an order sending Michael and me scurrying up to the lookouts’ nest with our bows to join the two archers already up there. Two of Harold’s sailors were assigned to carry arrows up to the four of us. I never did know their names.
“Go up there and help the archers pick them off!” Harold roared.” John from London’s prize crew and the archers on yonder Frenchman’s deck are in trouble. We’ve got to support them. Hurry lads, hurry!”
Michael and I ran to the mast and scrambled up the rope ladder to the nest. When we arrived we could see my father and some archers getting ready to shoot from the roof of the stern castle and Harold preparing to lead a boarding party consisting of every sailor remaining on our galley, even the sailing sergeant and the rowing sergeant and the cook. We could also see a small, desperate band of our men on the transport’s deck. They were backed into a defensive position in the bow and being assaulted by a much larger group of Frenchmen. There were dead and wounded men all over the deck. Some of them belonged to us.
Chapter Twenty
My role in the battle.
I was Edward Ditchling on the rolls of the company, and I’d been the sergeant captain of galley number sixteen ever since Captain William made me up to be the sergeant captain of the prize crew that took it out of Tunis. Old number sixteen leaked a bit but she was a sturdy, single-masted, eighty oar galley with two rowing decks and a new leather sail. I sailed from Cornwall with seventeen sailor men on board along with seventy-two archers and forty-four seasick landsmen on the lower benches to do the rowing and bail the water.
My sailing sergeant and pilot was old white-haired Jack who’d been a draper’s apprentice in London before running off to sea many years ago before Richard was king. Jack kept us close together with the other galleys, and we spent the entire day following Harold’s command galley down the channel. Jack Draper had been the three-stripe sergeant of my sailors and my pilot for years, ever since we were sergeants on the prize crew that took our galley from the Moors
That evening, we once again hung out all our candle lamps and continued to make good time even though the wind fell off a bit after dark. As you can well imagine, Jack and my other sergeants and I and my lookouts stayed awake all night as the landsmen took turns rowing on our lower bank of oars. Jack had his sailors continually adjust the sail to get the most we could from the wind in order to rest our rowers and still be able to stay with the fleet.
There were galley lights twinkling all around us and galleys in the fleet stayed close—too close. Two or three times we almost collided with another galley, and once we actually took a minor hit.
Our galleys were still together the next morning. We were in the middle of the channel and already well past the Pointe de Barfleur when the sun came creeping up over the far end of the earth. I’d climbed the mast and been up there in the nest to be able to see our position for myself. I’d wager every sergeant captain in our fleet was on his mast waiting for the sun to arrive.
What we saw was quite encouraging, though we’d sailed too far to the east in the darkness. Harold’s desire to keep us together and safe from running aground had kept us more towards the middle of the channel than some of us might have preferred. All in all, however, our position was quite acceptable. We were well placed and safe, ready to move towards Harfleur where we’d been told the French fleet was at anchor.
Harold turned his galley south to lead us towards the French fleet as soon as the sun rolled up over the horizon enough for him to see the shore and fix our position. Our still-seasick lower deck landsmen soon settled into the steady rate of rowing needed to stay in the middle of our fleet; our archers and boarding parties began opening their arrow bales and laying out their arrows, swords, and bladed pikes.
After a while, I sent the men to breakfast and made sure they each had two bowls of morning ale and all the bread and cheese they wanted to eat. Some of them got seasick but most of them seemed to feel better for the meal and the extra ale. I know I did.
We’d hoped to reach Harfleur’s big harbour and its long stone quay about three hours after sunup. It was not to be. We were too far east. Jack said it would most likely take us four or five hours to reach the French transports we’ve been told are assembling to carry the French army to England. We agreed it wouldn’t be a problem; we’d have more than enough hours of daylight to attack the French transports and take as prizes.
The best news was our fleet of war galleys appeared to have stayed together and safe in the night. It meant we would be able to hit the French with one mighty blow and get rich from all the prizes. I shared the good news with the archers, sailors, and rowers as I walked about the decks.
Some of the seasick men were obviously more interested in getting ashore than anything else. Most of the archers and sailors, however, seemed to be quite anxious for the fighting to begin. I certainly was.
Everywhere there was talking as the men examined their arrows and bows and used the smooth river stones each of our galleys carries so they can sharpen their blades and arrowheads. I began sharpening mine when I returned to the roof of the stern castle after a brief visit to the shite nest hanging over the stern.
******
Almost immediately upon turning south to follow Harold’s galley, my lookouts on the mast began to report seeing potential prizes and a number of large fishing boats. The French transports didn’t even attempt to flee; their captains probably thought we were coming to join the French invasion fleet. In a manner of speaking we were.
My crew and I watched intently and with more than a bit of jealousy as one of the galleys behind us turned and began rowing hard towards the first of our armada’s potential prizes. She was a big, inbound, two-masted cog riding high in the water to indicate she was empty. She was almost certainly a transport ship coming in to help carry the French army to England.
Our prize crews were to sail for either London or Cornwall, depending on the wind and weather. If the weather was bad, they were to wait until their prize sergeants thought it good enough for them to be able to r
each one or the other. At that moment, the wind and weather favoured London, but it could change in an instant; one could never be sure about the weather in the channel. Fortunately were almost midway between Fowey and London and could sail in either direction.
******
We followed Harold’s galley, and suddenly we could see Harfleur on the horizon. As we got closer we could see the city’s harbour was packed with shipping. There were more potential prizes in sight than you could possibly imagine.
My galley’s particular assignment was to be one of the three galleys following Harold’s galley to the Harfleur quay, and to join it in taking prizes from among the French transports moored along it.
At first, we had trouble keeping up with Harold’s galley as we rowed towards the harbour entrance. Harold had begun moving faster for some reason. We were still using only our landsmen as rowers. They were all on the lower deck and doing their best. Even so, it was all we could do to keep Harold’s galley in sight and follow him as he weaved in and out among the numerous French transports anchored in the harbour.
My initial reaction was one of excitement and wonder at all the French shipping, but I couldn’t understand why Harold and Captain William were in such a great hurry. The Frenchies weren’t going anywhere, and we were at great risk of collision.
We didn’t find and move into an open mooring space on the Harfleur quay at exactly the same moment as Harold’s galley, but we reached one shortly thereafter because Harold went for an open space at the most distant end of the quay and had a further distance to row.
“Back oars! Back oars!” my rowing sergeant, Charlie, yelled to our rowers as we surged towards an open space on the Harfleur quay about six hundred paces south of where Harold’s galley had just moored. We were lucky to find an open space, though the quay was quite large and had many berths. There were French transports tied up all along it.
I climbed down from the lookouts’ nest to make room for more archers and trotted down the deck to stand on the roof of the stern castle with a dozen or more of my best archers and Jack.
******
Harold’s archers were already pushing out arrows at the men on the quay as we moved into the vacant mooring position. Me and my archers had helped by adding our arrows to those falling on the French as soon as we got close enough to reach them. We grabbed up and pushed out arrows from the bales we’d opened on the galley deck so we could keep our quivers full.
We could see great confusion on the quay as we approached it. There were men running about in every direction and wounded men on the ground or trying to stagger away to safety. Some among the French obviously didn’t know what to do and were cowering on the ground.
For a few moments after the first hailstorm of arrows began to land, some of the French soldiers were still trying to gather up the personal effects they had obviously intended to carry aboard the transports with them. Their efforts didn’t last long. With men dropping all around them, the French soldiers soon realised their only choice was to either cower on the ground and play dead or run through our storm of arrows and try to escape. If they just stood there, they would die for sure.
Of course, they ran. They may be French and eat snails and give each other disgusting poxes, but no one wants to die if he can avoid it.
Until our galleys arrived and the arrows started flying, the French soldiers had obviously been boarding or preparing to board the transports moored along the quay. The unsuspecting Frenchmen quickly fell into a state of total confusion. They began running about on the quay in all directions, and there was a great deal of shouting and screaming and noise both from the men on my galley and from the Frenchmen on the quay and the nearby transports. One thing was clear—the French soldiers on the quay were totally confused, surprised, disorganized, and leaderless.
******
Most of the unwounded French soldiers had escaped by the time Jack brought our galley up against the quay. We hit it so hard several of the archers around me fell off the roof of the castle and landed on the deck. Jack and I and some of the archers standing with us on the roof saw it coming and braced ourselves. Even so, I went to my knees and only avoided smashing my nose by dropping my bow and throwing out both hands to break my fall.
Some of the archers on the castle roof with me were not so lucky. They had been rightly concentrating on shooting Frenchmen and were taken by surprise when we crashed into the quay. The railing around the castle roof broke from the weight of the men thrown against it, and several of them fell off the roof. One of them didn’t get up immediately, but at least he was alive and trying to sit up; he was lucky not to have gone into the water and drowned.
At least, thank God for his mercy, none of my archers in the lookout’s nest came down. Falling from the castle roof to the deck is one thing; falling from the lookouts nest to the deck is something else.
For some reason, and despite all the chaos and noise around me, being knocked off my feet and seeing the men around me fly forward when we hit the quay made me think of how enemy knights fly off into the air when the grounded pikes of our archers abruptly stop their horses. Just going to my knees when we hit the quay was unsettling; I can only imagine what it must be like to fly through the air wearing armour and land with a crash in the middle of a large number of enemy soldiers. And I certainly don’t want to find out. It is almost always fatal.
******
My archers and prize crews were waiting impatiently and quickly recovered from the chaos caused by our hard arrival. They didn’t have to wait for our galley to finish being moored to the quay, because it would not happen. Jack had sailors standing along the deck railing using the hooks on the blades of their long pikes to hold us against the quay. This allowed for a fast departure if we had to run.
There was much swearing and yelling as my men picked themselves up from the deck and began climbing onto my galley’s railing. From there, they pulled themselves onto the quay. Others used our boarding ladders which had been deployed and waiting in case our galley’s deck was too far below the quay. All the whilst, the archers and I poured arrows into the few panic-stricken Frenchmen we could see on the quay.
Within seconds, the men of our prize crews were running unmolested along the quay to get to the transports moored on either side of us, finishing off the wounded French soldiers as they ran past them on their way to board the French transports and take them as prizes.
As we had rowed up I had counted thirteen French transports moored along the quay. Now Harold’s galley and two of our other galleys and mine were up against the quay and unloading their prize crews. Only one of our galleys intended for the quay, my good friend Richard’s, had not yet disembarked its prize crews. The quay was so crowded with French shipping that Richard couldn’t find enough space to even get his galley’s bow in to unload his men, let along enough room to come in alongside it.
Richard thought quickly when he found no room along the quay; I’ll give him that. His prize crews immediately began boarding one of the French transports on its seaward side. Richard’s intention was obvious—to take the Frenchman and send the rest of his prize crews and archers across its deck to reach the quay and the other Frenchies tied up in the berths along it.
Richard must be furious. He’ll never hear the end of it, will he? Arriving last and finding no place to land his men, I mean.
Chapter Twenty-one
George Woods
I was a free man from a manor south of Walsall when I made my mark on the company’s rolls years ago at Acre as George of the woods. There were already a number of Georges in the company, so I used “woods” because my father laboured for Sir Robert as his gamekeeper and woodcutter before I ran away to go for a crusader. I made my mark and joined the archers in the early days when the company was first beginning to recruit men to replace its heavy losses in the crusade. I got my galley when I was the prize captain who took it out of Tunis and got it to Malta.
My galley was one of the three assigned to da
mage the French fishing boats before we start trying to take prizes. We weren’t to destroy them, only to temporarily damage them by using our axes to chop a plank out of each hull so it couldn’t be used to carry French soldiers out to reinforce the French transports in the harbour.
According to Captain William, our spies had said most of the fishing boats could be found along the beach to the north of the quay and the rest along the beach to the north of the harbour. So that’s where we headed—to the beach just north of the harbour where the fishermen bring in their catches and beach their boats.
We followed Harold and the main force of our galleys until we reached the entrance to the crowded harbour. When they turned and entered the harbour, my galley and two others kept going until we’d gone past the northern side of the stone jetty which helped enclose and protect it. Then we turned to our right and headed towards the fishing boats. A few seemed to be anchored just off the shore, but most were pulled up on the beach immediately next to the harbour.
We were the first to arrive, and many of the men and women on and around the fishing boats looked up as we approached. No one seemed particularly alarmed, even when the bow of my galley nudged the sandy bottom just before the shoreline. They appeared more curious than anything else.
Everything changed when my men began to pour over the bow of my galley into the knee-deep water and splashed ashore with axes and swords in their hands and shouting their battle cries. At first the people on the beach just stood there, gaping at us. Then they began screaming and running.
My men ignored the people and made straight for the fishing boats. There were quite a few of them on the beach, certainly more than we expected. It took more time than I’d hoped for my men to finish temporarily disabling each of them with a few well-placed chops of an axe. Not a single man or woman on the beach was touched. My men were under strict orders not to hurt them, only to disable their boats so they couldn’t be used to ferry soldiers out to help defend the French shipping anchored in the harbour.
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