The Greater the Honor

by William H. White

  “No, Oliver. You may stay. Our conversation is concluded. Tom, here, has made his position clear, as have I. We have little further to discuss.” Judd still kept a wary eye on Wheatley.

  “Beggin’ yer pardon, sirs. Got your vittles, here.” Riley, our steward, stood in the doorway directly behind me, his arms laden with our “vittles.”

  I stepped out of his way and he set his burden on the table. The confrontation had ended, but tension hung heavy in the air. I side-stepped around the table and opened my chest to find some dry clothes. I suddenly remembered that the first lieutenant had sent me; I looked up at Judd Devon.

  “Oh, Lord, Judd! I very nearly forgot; Mister Cutler sent me to tell you he wanted a word with you quick as ever you please.”

  Devon nodded at me and, stepping around the unmoving and still flushed Wheatley, left the confines of the cockpit with an admonition tossed over his shoulder to “Save me a ration!”

  “I’ll weather the bastard next time, by God!” Wheatley muttered ominously as he shifted his gaze to me. “What happened to you, Baldwin? Fall overboard? And where’s your fat little friend?” Thwarted in his attempt to best our senior, and biggest, member, my repugnant shipmate turned his bullying sneer to me.

  “We took some spray over the bow, Tom. It was quite exciting. I reckon I got taken with the moment and stood a bit too long. But there were little rainbows and the water was sparkling. I was enthralled by the whole of it.” I smiled, hoping to show that I was no threat to him. I had met many of his stripe in the Academy, usually to my sorrow. I wanted none of that here. “James is feeling poorly and will likely not be here for dinner.” I felt momentarily guilty at my earlier lack of feeling for him and added, “He seemed quite ill. And even a little afraid.” Wrong words, I realized too late. Tom would use any weakness to make Stevens’ life even more miserable than it already was. I tried to pass it off lightly. “I am sure it will pass. Soon’s he gets used to it all.” The wolfish smile told me my efforts were for naught. James would bear Wheatley’s invective at the first opportunity.

  “Oh, that fat little mama’s boy ain’t likely to miss a meal, no matter how sick he is! You mark my words, Baldwin, your little friend’ll show up when there’s food to be had ! “ The grin had been replaced by an all-too-familiar sneer, and Wheatley took his place at the table, looked around our diminutive quarters, taking in Riley and me. Then he stood and shifted his seat to the one at the head of the table. His nasty smile challenged me to comment, but I kept my own counsel.

  “I believe, sir, that the seat you’ve taken is Mister Devon’s. I ‘spect he’ll be wantin’ it when he returns for his vittles.” Riley continued setting out our food and utensils. He spoke without looking at Thomas.

  “You just set out our food, Riley, and I’ll worry about where I rest my arse. ‘Sides, Mister Devon ain’t here, now is he? No tellin’ when he’ll be finished with the First and with him gone, I guess I’m the senior and got a right to set myself anywhere I like.” The flippant manner with which Wheatley brushed aside the steward’s remark told of the midshipman’s regard for any beneath him. His jaw assumed its defiant thrust, daring the older sailor to challenge his self-proclaimed authority.

  Dinner was a quiet affair, quite a departure from our usual boisterous meals. Even Riley seemed moved to make no noise as he shifted dishes and brought additional elements of the meal to us from the pantry he shared with the Gunroom stewards. Of course, it was just the two of us. Then Judd appeared in the doorway.

  He stood for a moment taking in the scene before him, and particularly, Wheatley seated at the head of the table. “I’ll have my seat now, Tom. You may shift over to your usual one.” Judd took a step toward the head of the table.

  I could see Tom quite literally thinking over his choice; would he acknowledge Judd’s authority or would he challenge it? The tableau remained for a heartbeat and more. Then Lieutenant Hobbs appeared at our door and Tom stood with a thin smile.

  “Of course you shall have your seat, Judd. We weren’t sure when you would return. I sat here merely to make it easier for Riley to get around the table.”

  Riley snorted, but said nothing.

  Without further word, Judd took the vacated seat, Riley put a plate before him, and Lieutenant Hobbs spoke, directing his words to all.

  “Cap’n Decatur has let out the word that we’ll be exercising the great guns immediately all hands are fed. You lads’re going to have to see that your divisions are mustered when we beat to quarters and then stand ready by your guns for Mister Tarbox to give you and your crews instruction. Lieutenants Morris and Cutler will be making rounds as well, should you have any questions.” Hobbs raised his eyebrows which, with his head down as he peered over his spectacles, gave him a curiously owlish look. His gaze went from me to Judd and finally settled on Tom. “You all understand that we have only the time of our crossing to prepare for fighting the Bashaw. We have half the crew as landsmen; you and your crews must learn fast and be able to stand up to anything those piratical bastards can think of. Cap’n Decatur will tolerate no foolishness nor skylarkin’. Be clear on that! “ He spoke to all of us, but his eyes had fastened on Tom Wheatley.

  “Aye, aye, sir. You can surely count on us doin’ our duty. Yes, sir!” Wheat-ley’s ingratiating tone fooled none of us, but save for a brief hardening of his stare, Hobbs merely nodded and left the cockpit.

  “Where’s James?” Judd glanced quickly around our tiny quarters and directed the question to me.

  Tom answered before I could even take a breath and, as though his earlier effort at civility was too much for him, had again become antagonistic. “Oh, little limmy is feeling poorly and misses his mama. He didn’t care to join us for dinner, so I reckon the poor dear really is feelin’ low; it’s not like fat James to miss a meal!”

  Judd shot a glance at him, then at me.

  “Aye, Judd. He was on the spar deck earlier and sick. I think he might have been a mite bit scared as well. I suspect he’ll get used to it before long, and he will be fine.” I smiled at our senior midshipman.

  “He’s going to have to do his work whether he feels poorly or not. What Lieutenant Cutler wanted me for was to give out the assignments for each of our gun batteries.” He stopped and consulted a piece of paper he had withdrawn from his jacket pocket. “Oliver, you’ll be in charge of the forward three carronades, twenty-four-pounders, they are, larboard and starboard. That’s six guns. Tom, the next three aft larboard and starboard. I have the aftermost battery on the gundeck, and James will be in charge of the long twelve-pounders on the spar deck. When I finish my dinner, I will find him and so inform him.”

  “I’ll lay a wager right here and now that my crews will out-shoot any of yours in the first competition. And you can pass that on to young James ‘in charge of the spar deck long guns’ as well.” Wheatley’s challenge dripped with rancor and bravado. Neither Judd nor I felt moved to comment, and our meal was finished peacefully, albeit quietly. For a change, there was none of the banter and horseplay in which we usually indulged, which caused Riley no end of frustration.

  My own thoughts were consumed with the notion that we would be exercising the great guns’. I barely chewed my food, so anxious was I to get started with this, the most exciting and, I was sure, the most rewarding part of my new employment. This was what we were all about! No sooner had I finished the last morsel of my dinner than I stood, asked permission from our senior member to be excused—even in my excitement, I remembered the rules of the cockpit so carefully drummed into my head—and dashed headlong out the door and up the ladder. In my haste, I missed most of the derisive comment that Thomas Wheatley threw after me. I thought, as I tore up the second ladder to the spar deck, that firing the guns would be a perfect tonic for poor suffering lames. And I wanted to be the one to tell him of Captain Decatur’s plans for the afternoon!

  I reached the top deck and immediately headed forward to the spot where I had last seen the boy hanging breath
lessly over the bulwark. As I made my way up the windward side, I wondered idly whether he had taken my advice about moving to the leeward side. I hoped that the move might not have been necessary and that he was through with the seasickness.

  He still looked pale, though less so, I thought as I studied his face, and the soil on his jacket seemed to have dried, perhaps because he had not been sick again, since he still stood exactly where I left him at the weather fore shrouds. He still clung tenaciously to them.

  “We’re going to fire the guns, lames! And you’re to be in charge of the long guns right here on the spar deck.” I pointed excitedly at the sleek cannon forward and vaguely motioned to the other aft of the quarterdeck.

  He stared at me, glassy-eyed and uncomprehending.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘Them salutes we fired back in the harbor was only half-charges o’ powder, Mister Baldwin. And you’re right; they wasn’t turrible loud.” Gunner Tarbox stood with me as the three forward guns in the larboard battery were swabbed out and loaded yet again. I had jumped back at the first discharge and covered my ears for the next two. I suddenly understood why Tarbox’s natural voice was so loud; most men could hear little immediately after the discharge of cannon, and the gunner’s employment required him to give orders all during firing. I noted that his voice came through the ringing in my own ears with a quite natural sound. But I have gotten ahead of myself.

  Within half a glass of my sharing our good news with James, the Marine on the spar deck began beating his drum. It was echoed by another on the gundeck as the ship was called to quarters. Remembering my assignment was on the gundeck, I dashed for the ladder, leaving the still-sick midshipman where he stood. The deck was in turmoil; men ran about, shouting at each other; questions, curses, and the din of confusion filled the air. The gundeck was little better.

  Tarbox and Judd stood amidships shoving sailors fore and aft, urging them to quiet and alacrity as they stumbled to their assigned stations. I pushed through them and stood by my six charges waiting expectantly for my three gun crews to arrive. A petty officer who seemed to know what he was about was first on the scene. He acknowledged me with a cursory nod (it might have been a form of salute) and immediately began to check over the guns. I watched in rapt attention as he uncoiled the breeching tackles and laid them carefully on the deck. He then pulled a curious instrument, one that put me in mind of a nail with a kind of loop in one end, out of a pouch slung over his shoulder and, with the concentration of one who has seen the result of slovenliness, pressed it into the hole atop each cannon, larboard and starboard. He looked up and caught me watching.

  “I’d reckon you’ll be Mister Baldwin.” He waited not a moment for me to acknowledge his accuracy and returned his attention to the task at hand while he continued. “Bradford, gun cap’n. I’m makin’ sure the touch holes is clear on these pieces so the powder’ll run down to the charge when we load ‘em. Powder don’t get through, gun don’t fire. Simple as that.” He looked up at me again as he moved to the next twenty-four-pounder carronade and repeated the operation. “Johnson and Parker’ll be the other gun cap’ns. Don’t know where they got to, but they’s good men. Shipped with ‘em in that business with the French. In the New York frigate we was. You been to sea afore, sir?” He still hadn’t looked up, so intent was he on the matter at hand.

  Why did everyone want to know if I’d been to sea before? “No, this is my first ship, Bradford. I want to learn as much as ever I can about these guns and how they work. That’s why I’m watching you so carefully.” I got a glance (was it approving?) as he moved to the next behemoth in the line.

  “Right simple, it is, sir. First thing we do is pull the tompions,” he pronounced it tomkins, “out o’ the barrels. They’s in there to plug up the ends and keep the water out. Powder charge goes in first, rammed in tight, then the ball an’ wad. Ram ‘er again so it’s all nice an’ tight in there an’ then I pierce the cartridge with the priming iron—that’s this.” He held up the nail-like implement he had been using. “Then I pour some powder into the pan and the touch hole—that’ll be this here what I’m clearing—and when the order to fire is given—that’s your job—I lay the hot end of the linstock into the powder here, and boom, off she goes. Simple as that, like I said.” He returned to his work, satisfied that he had told me everything necessary about the ungainly-looking, short-barreled guns.

  Fortunately he was not looking at me when he uttered the words ”. . . that’s your job” or he would have seen me blanch in the sudden and horrifying realization of my awesome responsibility. My thoughts raced ahead to our firing and flashed through my brain like bolts of lightning. How would I know when to give the order to fire? Who would tell me, or would I have to determine it on my own ? And what would happen if I gave the order to fire at the wrong time? I suspected that determining at what I was to fire would be evident. Suddenly, my great anticipation and excitement at exercising the great guns seemed to lose some of its luster!

  During the time Bradford had been talking about his guns, most of the other sailors assigned to me for my three gun crews had shown up. The other two petty officers, I recalled their names as Johnson and Parker, or Perkins, or something like that, were organizing the men at each gun, assigning them to tasks. I heard him mention ‘train tackles’ and ‘breeching tackles’ as well as ‘handspikes.’ And suddenly, there seemed to be order—at least around my guns. The men were quiet and listened, as did I, to Bradford as he explained to them what was expected of each. I noticed Lieutenant Cutler heading for us from somewhere aft. As he passed Wheatley’s battery and the confusion that still reigned there, he stopped and spoke a few words with Tom. From the look that crossed Tom’s face, I knew Mister Cutler had not been offering praise. Then he was at the aftermost of my carronades. I stepped forward to greet him with a crisp salute and, as I lifted my hat off my head, it hit the low beams of the ceiling (I quickly learned it was properly called the overhead) and flew out of my hand. I heard a few of my sailors snicker as I bent to retrieve it and felt my face flush with embarrassment as I straightened to face our first lieutenant.

  “Well, Mister Baldwin. I see . . . well. Are your guns manned properly and ready to fire?”

  I shot a glance in Bradford’s direction and received a barely perceptible nod.

  “Yes, sir. They are ready. And so are the men.” While I really had no idea as to this last, I didn’t think it would hurt to sound confident, and it might cause him to forget my clumsy salute.

  “It is customary to send a man to the quarterdeck to report when your battery is ready, Mister Baldwin. Since this is our first time beating to quarters, I shall excuse it. But remember your duties.” He scowled at me, paused, and continued. “Either Lieutenant Hobbs or Gunner Tarbox will be along directly to oversee your firing. Kindly wait until one or the other arrives before you load.” He looked over my shoulder at the carronades and squinted his eyes.

  “With what, exactly, were you planning to load them, Mister Baldwin?” he said.

  “Why, sir, with a powder cartridge and ball, sir. Ram down a wad and then pour some powder into the priming hole and touch it with the linstock!” I smiled, knowing I had impressed him with my complete grasp of the art of naval cannonading. I refrained from adding, “Simple as that, sir!”

  “And what were you planning to use for ‘powder cartridges and balls,’ Mister Baldwin?” Cutler, his eyebrows raised and a tiny smile working at the corners of his mouth, studied me for a reaction.

  “Lieutenant, sir. If I may.” Bradford was coming to my rescue! “I have sent the boy to the magazine for the cartridges, sir. I reckon it’ll take him longer than it might on account of this bein’ our first firin’ an’ all. Our shot is stacked right yonder in the shot rack, sir.” Bradford stood straight and tall; there was no hesitation in his response. “Mister Baldwin didn’t have a chance to send for our charges since he was busy assignin’ the men to they’s stations. So I took care of it.” The gun captain st
ood just out of Cutler’s line of sight and winked at me.

  “Very well, then. You may load and fire when Mister Hobbs or the gunner gets here. And, Baldwin, send a man to the quarterdeck to let us know when that will be.” The First turned and headed back the way he had come, his gaze locked onto Thomas Wheatley’s still disorganized and quite voluble crews.

  “Oh, my goodness! Bradford, you saved me there, and I thank you! It never occurred to me that I was supposed to send someone after our powder. I shan’t forget next time, you may be sure!” I offered a most sincere smile to the gun captain, who merely nodded his acknowledgment.

  In a few minutes Gunner Tarbox showed up and, in his booming voice, inquired as to our readiness. The boy (Tarbox corrected me, calling the boy a powder monkey) Bradford had sent for the powder charges had not yet returned, but otherwise, we, and the carronades, were ready. Tarbox explained the exercise to the men, admonishing them to go slowly at first so “no one gets ‘emselves hurt.” Serious nods and furtive glances at the three behemoths pulled back from the gunports for loading was the only response, and then our powder monkey staggered up with an armload of charges, each charge amounting to six pounds of powder wrapped in a flannel bag. He set them down carefully where directed at each gun and I summarily sent him to the quarterdeck to inform Cutler, and, I suppose, Captain Decatur, of our readiness to fire. I wanted our guns to be the first!

  Bradford and his fellow gun captains laid out charges and shot by each gun and made sure the rammers and swabs were in their places on the bulwark by each. They each ran through the loading procedure with their crews again, and this time actually had them clap on to the side tackles, haul the heavy monsters toward the bulwark so their snouts poked out of the ports, then back by way of the train tackles. Of course, he explained, the guns wouldn’t have to be hauled back; they’d each get back to the “... limit of they’s breechings quicker ‘an kiss my hand when they fired... an’ woe be to whoever be standin’ too close.” More serious looks from all and nods from the more seasoned hands.