Reefs and Shoals

by Dewey Lambdin

  All was as calm and easy and pleasant as a slow drift on the upper Thames in mid-summer, as a punt among the swans at Henley. That early in the season, the vast, wind-ruffled seas of reeds and marsh grasses were new-shoot green and pleasing to the eyes, not the cured-tobacco-leaf or old-parchment brown of late Autumn. Two or three of the sailors had begun a soft crooning song. The return journey was so close as any of them would get to the royal leisure of “yachting” that they could conjure that they were sailing to the legendary sailors’ Eden, Fiddler’s Green, where the beer and rum never ran out, all the doxies were beautiful, and the publicans never called on them for the reckoning, and the landing to that Paradise was just round the next bend in the river.

  Except for Lewrie.

  After eating, a mug of beer, and a dip of his hands into the river to wipe them and his mouth of grease, he had turned quiet and sombre, pondering upon all that he still did not know of enemy privateers’ activities, or American involvement in support … and upon how short a time he had remaining to “smoak” them out.

  Once Reliant weighed anchor and set sail from Tybee Roads, he could not linger off the coast of Georgia to look into the sounds, or put in to tiny Brunswick, without exciting the American authorities and provoking a diplomatic incident upon suspicion that he was “blockading” a neutral nation! He could not play the innocent “we’re just fishing” ploy again, so soon after employing that ruse off Port Royal, or lying at anchor for two days in Tybee Roads, which was just a hop, skip, and jump from the Sea Islands and their sounds! From the mouth of the Savannah River, it was but half a day’s slow sail to Cumberland Sound, and the mouth of the St. Mary’s River, where Spanish Florida began.

  The only thing he could do would be to admit failure and join Lizard, Firefly, and Thorn off St. Augustine. He had grimaced, nigh-winced, as he’d thought of how he’d word a fresh report to Admiralty. The only slightly cheering idea that had come to him was his estimation of Consul Hereford, which he would also send to the British Ambassador in Washington. If he needed a good excuse, “His Excellency” R. L. E. Hereford would do quite nicely!

  * * *

  Idly stroking the cats, now they had calmed down from frantic welcome, and lifting his mug now and again for a sip of beer, Lewrie tallied up what little he did know, so far.

  Firstly, he could safely rule out any privateering activity from North Carolina. Their hired Consul, Mr. Osgoode Moore, and his old friend, “Kit” Cashman, had an eye on things, from Topsail Island to Lockwood Folly Inlet. What might transpire North of Topsail Island from Beaufort, or the Albemarle or Pamlico Sounds, was beyond their ken, but … most British convoys made sure that they were well out to sea, and clear of any risk of being driven onto the Hatteras Banks, the Graveyard of the Atlantic, and his orders from Admiralty had not mentioned any losses from those convoys that far up the American coast.

  Secondly, Mr. Cotton at Charleston had established good relations with the trading firms and chandleries in South Carolina waters, and was fairly sure that Georgetown and Winyah Bay, where so many rivers joined, dealt mostly in rice exports.

  Charleston had the Ashley and the Cooper Rivers, but the only traffic on them was barges and small boats, and Charleston was not so far up-river from the sea. It was the most important seaport in the American South, but it was open, garrisoned by American troops, with Revenue cutters and Navy gunboats, and even if there were major shipyards, and many chandleries and trading firms that could be in collusion with enemy privateers, Cotton had left Lewrie with the impression that, but for the presence of Mollien’s privateer schooner, the problem lay elsewere. If there was indeed a problem!

  Lewrie felt that he could have been hunting leprechaun’s gold, for all the good of it, so far, yet … Mollien had been there, sure sign that he was hunting British ships somewhat close to Spanish Florida. He might have put into Charleston to flaunt his country’s flag, or to call upon a decent tailor.

  Stono Inlet had been a bust, as had Edisto, too. Port Royal, and the other Beaufort (in North Carolina it was “Bo”; in South Carolina is was “Bew”) had seemed intriguing, but had little in the way of ship chandlers or trading houses, little shipbuilding beyond large fishing boats, and no one they had encountered could recall French or Spanish vessels of any description entering the sound in ages, so Lewrie might be able to rule them out.

  “Top-lofty bastard,” Lewrie muttered to himself, thinking about Hereford.

  “Sir?” Pettus asked, from the bed-space, where he was sponging Lewrie’s best-dress coat.

  “Just maunderin’, Pettus,” Lewrie assured him. “Thinkin’ of a man I met in Savannah.”

  “Oh, sir,” Pettus replied, “before Lights Out, sir, I think we need a pot of water boiled in the tea-pot. Your sash got all crumpled up in your coat pocket, and it needs a good steaming before it goes back into its box.”

  “Aye, boil away,” Lewrie allowed. “Have Cooke heat up an iron in the galley, if ye think it’s needful.”

  “Brr, sir!” Pettus commented with his mouth pursed. “Got to be careful with silk or satin, sir. A too-hot iron will scorch them something horrid.”

  “Whichever ye think best,” Lewrie said, bringing the mug to his mouth. There was only a swallow left, and he thought of ordering Pettus to tap a second, but forbore.

  Georgia … bloody Georgia, he silently mused; the worst maze o’ creeks, inlets, sounds, and channels back o’ the islands of all I’ve seen, so far. Worse than the bayous in Louisiana! If ever a place was made for pirates, smugglers, and privateers, that’d be it. I wish t’God I could linger long enough, I’d be sure t’find something.

  Lewrie wondered if his suspicious feeling had more to do with his anger over Hereford’s sloth-like reaction to his suggestion, and his haughty rejection of looking into even the most overt violations of American neutrality, standing on his lofty and too-fine sense of personal honour. If Hereford wouldn’t look into things, and Lewrie couldn’t stay long enough to do it himself, then that left the coast of Georgia, and the port of Savannah, the last area that had not been absolved.

  What’d they say? That all the rogues went to Georgia? Lewrie thought with a mirthless grin; Or gets sent there, an Crown expense, to do nothing!

  On their carriage tour, their coachee, a Free Black fellow, had pointed out several of the sights, naming each square, and indicating the stately homes by their owners’ names, assuring them that they were all prominent Savannah residents of long standing. He had seemed delighted to mention who the significant patriots of the Revolution were, and what roles they had played. Some homes had temporarily been used by British “occupiers” for headquarters, officers’ residences, barracks, or stables, the churches and their pew-boxes being grand horse stalls. “And o’ course, gennelmuns, dat house on de right, dar, be yo’ Consul’s home, dat Mistah Hereford.”

  Dammit, it had been grand; not as large and imposing as its neighbours, the other manses that lined the streets or fronted upon the green public-squares, but it had been impressive enough.

  And it didn’t look as if there were any plasterers or painters workin’ on it, either, Lewrie fumed; It was a lot finer than Mister Cotton’s at Charleston. And, just how much does a consul get paid on a foreign station?

  Britain’s public services, and government offices, were rife with jobbery, graft, and “interest”. There was good reason for families to wheedle a minor clerk’s job for their sons, for aspiring men to spend as much as £5,000 to gain a government post that paid no more than £300 or £500 a year. Once in place, and assured a life-long living, the sky was the limit on how much they could earn on the sly in bribes. Christ, they even knighted some of the bastards at the end of a long career!

  Lewrie wondered if Hereford’s eagerness to see him off quickly was due to catching him asleep in his offices, and most remiss in his duties overall, or did Hereford fear that he might learn something criminal about his dealings if he stayed a night or two?

  Hereford could be
a haughty, useless fool with a private income from his family in England, or have umpteen thousands in the Three Percents and a slew of annual interest, Lewrie considered. The British pound sterling was worth a lot more than any unit of currency that the United States could ever issue, so an hundred pounds could go a very long way towards purchasing, or running up, a house. A private income, plus his annual pay and expenses for a residence and offices, could be a more-than-tidy sum.

  Or, he could be a shifty criminal in league with his country’s enemies! At the very least, making money on the side by looking away, not looking at all, from the dealings of a Savannah businessman.

  Damme! Lewrie chid himself of a sudden; If I hadn’t been so angry, I should’ve looked up … what were their names?

  During the Quasi-War ’twixt France and the United States over high-handed French boarding and seizure of American merchants who were not trading with France, there had been a “hostilities only” bought-in ship, the U.S. Armed Brig Oglethorpe, fitted out and armed by eager public subscription in Savannah, and crewed by merchant masters, mates, and sailors, for the most part, with a sprinkling of U.S. Navy officers who had no ships in which to serve. She, Captain McGilliveray’s Thomas Sumter, and the U.S. Frigate Hancock, had formed a squadron in the West Indies to protect their country’s shipping, and seek out any French merchantmen they could find, and, most honourably, fight and take any French warship or privateer they encountered, too.

  And Oglethorpe’s captain had been a Savannahan gentleman seafarer named…? Randolph! Lewrie recalled; If I didn’t have my nose outta joint, I could’ve looked him up and asked him a few questions! Too damned late, now!

  Lewrie also glumly considered that Randolph might have stayed in the sea trade, and might have been halfway to Canton, China, or he might have passed away of something; a lot of people whom Lewrie had known from his time round Jamaica, and at Nassau, as he’d learned from his recent call there, had joined The Great Majority.

  Toulon and Chalky had abandoned his lap and thighs and gone to the middle of the settee to groom themselves before supper, so Lewrie could get to his feet and stroll aft to the larboard side to step into his quarter-gallery toilet to relieve himself of beer. The upper sash-windows were open for the sundown breeze, and Reliant had swung on her single anchor to face her stern up-river, so he could savour another fine sunset as he piddled.

  I have t’re-join the squadron off Saint Augustine, he thought; I’ve already been away too long. But, if Darling, Lovett, and Bury say that blockadin’ the place ain’t worth a candle, what’s t’stop me from bringin’ ’em back up here t’prowl the Georgia coast for a bit? Maybe poke into the St. John’s River in Spanish Florida on the way? And, do we use some o’ those boats we captured at Mayami Bay, and keep well to the Spanish side o’ the Saint Mary’s…? Hmm.

  As he did his breeches’ buttons up, he stepped to the aft windows for a last peek at the sunset, and a deep, appreciative breath of cooler evening air. The larger merchant ships that had been anchored off Cockspur Island the night before, on the Southern side of Tybee Roads, were reduced in number. There had been four, but now there were only two, surrounded as before with lighters nuzzled alongside like a pack of nursing piglets. Up-river, nearer Turtle Island and Jones Island, the night lanthorns had already been lit on the clutch of smaller brigs and snows, also attended by lighters. Some of the lighters sat lower in the water than others, evidently still full of exports or chandlers’ goods, to be laded in the morning.

  And, coming down-river was a pair of those stout and dowdy cargo barges under two masted lugs’l rigs with single jibs. With the sun low on the Western horizon, almost lost in the trees, the sails glowed amber against the red band of sunset, and tiny, glim-like lanthorns at their binnacles and sterns winked a cheery yellow. Quite pretty, Lewrie thought, in all.

  Lewrie left the quarter-gallery and shut the door behind him, and took seat upon the upholstered transom settee to continue watching the sunset through the transom sash-windows. The lower halves of the windows were kept closed at all times, so one, or both, of his cats on a romp or gambol in the night, did not fall out and be lost at sea; they needed a cleaning of salt-air rime on the outside, and smudges of paw prints on the inside. He had to stand again to watch through the open upper halves.

  The sailing barges stood on, bound for the larger ships which lay off Cockspur Island, almost passing out of view as they neared the starboard quarter. But, they weren’t reducing sail.

  What the Devil? Lewrie wondered, going over to the starboard side of his cabins to open the door to the other quarter-gallery, which was used for storage, so he could follow the barges’ progress.

  They weren’t stopping at the large ships’ anchorage; they were bound out to sea!

  Where the bloody Hell are they goin’? Lewrie asked himself; At this time o’ night? Pettus and Jessop hadn’t bothered to clean the window panes in the starboard quarter-gallery, since it was not used as a lavatory, so Lewrie had to pull out his long shirt-tail to scrub himself a clear patch, but all he accomplished was a worse smear. His curiosity piqued, he dashed for the door to the waist and ran up the ladderway to the quarterdeck in his shirt sleeves.

  “Captain’s on deck,” Midshipman Warburton cautioned the idling quarteredeck watch, and the officers who had come up before their own supper for a smoke, or a breath of air.

  “Glass, Mister Warburton!” Lewrie snapped.

  “Something amiss, sir?” Lt. Westcott asked, coming to the starboard bulwarks a step behind his captain.

  “Those two sailin’ barges yonder, sir,” Lewrie said over his shoulder. “They’re not closin’ with those anchored ships; they’re on their way to sea. Lading’s done for the day, so where are they goin’, I wonder. Why are they bound out just at sundown, not…? Thankee, Mister Warburton,” he said as the requested telescope was fetched.

  He couldn’t see all that much, even if the barges were only a mile or so off. The telescope was a day-glass, with little light-gathering strength. A night glass would have shown more detail, but its assortment of internal lenses resulted in an image that was upside-down and backwards.

  “They look t’be about fourty or fifty feet, or so, two-masted, and…” Lewrie muttered. “Do they look like the run-of-the-mill barges you’ve seen, Mister Westcott?”

  “I suppose so, sir,” the First Lieutenant admitted sheepishly, “I fear I’ve not given any of them more than a passing glance. Just work-boats,” he said with a shrug.

  “Have any of you seen any o’ them goin’ to sea, or entering the Roads from seaward?” Lewrie asked.

  His sudden appearance on the quarterdeck had drawn the other two Lieutenants, and the Marine Officer, from the idle gathering, and to stand near him by the starboard bulwarks in a befuddled pack.

  “I cannot say that we have, sir,” Lt. Spendlove, the most earnest of them, confessed.

  “As Mister Westcott said, sir … just work-boats,” Lieutenant Merriman seconded. “Strings of them come down-river each morning, and return to Savannah in the afternoons, mostly.”

  “Or, they spend the night alongside the merchant ships, then sail the next morning, sir,” Lt. Spendlove added.

  “Is their going to sea suspicious, though, sir?” Lt. Westcott asked. “There are plantations on almost every island along the coast, I heard, so … they must get goods from Savannah somehow.”

  “After dark, though?” Lewrie pointed out. “It’d make more sense to sail from the Savannah docks at dawn, and get to Saint Simon’s, or Jekyll Island, or Brunswick port, in late afternoon, in safety, and not risk the barges to the shoals and such in the dark.”

  “Even goods required instanter, sir?” Marine Lt. Simoock asked.

  “Instanter, my foot!” Lt. Merriman scoffed with a laugh. “It would take a whole day to send an order by boat from Brunswick, and a day to fill it, then a third day, weather permitting, to ship it down to them.”

  “Instanter’s what you have at hand, and sn
atch up quickly,” Lt. Spendlove added.

  “Well, I’m no mariner, I will admit,” Simcock replied, “so I will trust to your seasoned judgement.”

  “There is the possibility that those two barges are from one of the Sea Islands further South, sir, or belong to a Brunswick merchant, returning home,” Westcott slowly speculated. “If their masters know the waters well enough, and stand far enough offshore during the night, they may not think a night passage all that much of a risk.”

  “An everyday or weekly occurrence, then, sir?” Lewrie asked, lowering his telescope, and wondering if he was grasping at straws in the need to discover something criminal to justify the days that he had so far wasted chasing after Will-O’-The-Wisps. “Possibly,” he allowed … grudgingly.

  Wish I could send a cutter in chase of ’em, Lewrie thought; or shadow ’em and see what they’re up to.

  He closed the tubes of the telescope with a thump and heaved a deep sigh, partly in disappointment, and partly to calm his excitement and appear “captainly” to his officers and men. He turned and handed it back to Midshipman Warburton with a polite “Thankee.”

  I send a cutter t’board ’em in the dark, or lurk so bald-faced in American waters, I could halfway start a war! he told himself.

  “Good evening, gentlemen,” Lewrie said to one and all, on his way to the head of the starboard ladderway, then paused at the top. “There will be some of those lighters alongside with the Purser’s goods tomorrow. Without appearin’ too curious, let’s take her measure, and ask about the barge trade. And, keep a closer eye on the traffic in the Roads, hey? Bon appetit!” he bade them on his way to his supper.