Nelson: The Poisoned River

by Needle, Jan

  His crime was drunkenness, which considering General Campbell had expended many guineas to get the men on board, and most were already drunk when he made the offer, was no surprise at all. This man had no special grating, but was lashed by wrist to shroud. He hung there limply, and two corporals swung at him with manic vigour. Many of his fellows seemed to take it as a jest, despite the fact that the lash was made of twisted hide and a flying end of it nearly took his eye out. When he was cut down his comrades cheered, and he collapsed on to the deck. They would have left him there had not the navy officers begun to bellow angrily.

  It was a lovely day, though, and the warm breeze and splashing water would have made a devil smile. Nobody seemed even a mite upset, thought Hastie, and after the whippings the sailors pumped up water which gushed across the decks, and everybody was allowed a quiet skylark. The officers foregathered on the poop deck, lighting pipes and the cigars the Yankees smuggled in from Cuba, while many drunken soldiers slunk below once more. One look at Nelson told Hastie that he also needed his cot, and urgently. Sea motion or whatever, he looked badly.

  ‘Sir,’ said Tim, out of other earshot, ‘I beg you, you must come below and sleep. Have the mosquitoes bit you in the night?’

  The captain’s face was as yellow as his wig, and he answered in a weakened, creaking voice.

  ‘Tim, you have not been in the Carib long, have you? This is nothing, and I am hardly ill. I need rest is all, and wine, and a nice fresh joint of goat’s meat when I wake.’ He laughed. ‘And keep that Dancer man at bay with all his quackery, for I fear that he might kill me if you don’t. He thinks the ship is full of detriment, but I swear to you the worst is over. At sea I’ll be as healthy as a blowfly on a turd.’

  Nelson did not arise for two days after that, two days in which Hastie tended him like a mother would a babe. He used every remedy that he had ever learned from his apothecary master, and he let no one near him but himself. Nelson survived.

  After that he had indeed to appear on deck, however, because there was a duty to be done that could not be conducted by any other man on board. A captain’s duty. The burial of the dead.

  Throughout the time of Nelson’s sickness, Dr Dancer had been coddling the mass of men below. One of them, a soldier of Hastie’s own 79th, had caught malaria when the regiment had first landed in Jamaica, and as so often it had proved ‘the fever that returns.’ He had paraded with the rest in Kingston, had come on board quite fit, before falling into stiffness and disease.

  Dancer, a most confident physician, had given him the drugs he swore by, including draughts of porter – and the soldier had developed ‘putrefactions,’ and promptly died. Nelson himself, doing the oration, could barely speak.

  He was able to pronounce the words ‘vile body’ though. And that night again he could hear the biting insects swarm.

  Six

  When Hastie came on deck next morning there was a riot going on. He looked about for constable and bosun’s mates, but saw none. He looked aft in some anxiety as a swarm of men in trousers only, naked to the waist, rushed across the well in a stampede, and saw the first lieutenant in his position, and the master, and the sailor at the helm. Then he heard cheers.

  Despard and Polson, two of the army officers, were watching him from the shadow of the shrouds. Despard, a long-faced man with Irish clearly in his blood, laughed.

  ‘Fear not, young mister medical,’ he said. ‘This is Captain Nelson’s way. He is confined to his sick bed maybe, but the men must keep fit. Army and navy have a rivalry. So we’ve set them on to games.’

  Nelson was not, in fact, in his cot, but he was certainly not well, and Tim Hastie had already given him an infusion as a part of breakfast. But well or not, he had taken time to confer with his officers, and with some of the army men. This, presumably, was the upshot.

  The weather in the Caribbean this day was balm to a physician’s heart. The breeze was not over-light, not over-stiff, and the ship, as far as he could see, was carrying all her sails. The sea was blue and sparkling, with white horses but no monstrous waves. All along the lee rail men were being sick, he noticed now, but that was inevitable. Hastie had done enough voyages to learn that some men never got over the sickness, and anyway, they were only two days away from land.

  ‘There will be dancing later,’ said Despard. ‘He is a great one for dancing, your master. Drinking, dancing, staying up all night. I hear that in Jamaica he haunted the governor’s house like a jolly wraith. Haunted the young women, also.’

  Hastie was obscurely scandalized at this, although he knew it was in some wise true. Nelson liked fine wine, and called it ‘his medicine’ when he was not feeling up to much. He also had a longing after young women, although always in the most proper way. Cuthbert Collingwood had sometimes teased him to his face.

  ‘He comes from a large family, Tim, you must understand that fact,’ he’d said on the verandah one pleasant evening. And, more quietly another time: ‘His mama died when he was only nine. He craves a mother, maybe, more than a wife. But also longs for children.’

  Colonel Polson, who was in no way as open as Despard, said rather sourly, ‘He haunted Governor Dalling for advantage also, mayhap. For so young a captain, he has done exceeding well. It cannot all be by merit, surely?’

  Despard, despite his lesser rank, did not hold back his opinion. He made a face at Polson that came close to sneering.

  ‘That smacks of sour grapes, Lieutenant Colonel!’ he said, his voice still full of laughter to remove a sting. ‘Good heavens, sir, this expedition has made you up from captain quick enough. Would you call that a lack of merit also?’

  Polson had the grace to laugh, but added, ‘Aye, but you must accept his uncle being Comptroller helped him in his rise. When I first saw him I asked myself “who is this light-haired boy, and how well will he lead men?” I am not convinced that letting men play sports and lark about gives me much added confidence.’

  ‘His hair is growing well now, sir,’ Hastie said stiffly. ‘He had to shave it off for medical reasons. In any way, his real hair is more sandy than pale. A sort of ginger, as they call it.’

  ‘Has he got Irish blood?’ asked Despard. ‘It could be we will turn out blood related!’

  Hastie shook his head.

  ‘No, pure English stock as I believe, Captain. His father is a churchman in Norfolk. Governor Dalling is also a Norfolk man. I believe that explains why they first got on well.’

  ‘But the Comptroller—’ Polson started, and Hastie cut him off.

  ‘Was dead when Nelson became post,’ he said. ‘And every navy man that I have ever met, sir, says that he is exceptional. And—’

  ‘And will end up admiral of the fleet!’ laughed Despard. ‘I think there is merit in both positions, gentlemen, but please don’t let’s fall out for it. Look there! There’s wrestling about to start! My money’s on that great bull-neck man. He’s a Liverpool Blue, the 69th. He’s had more pox since getting to Jamaica than any other three men in the regiment. Outrageous.’

  When the larking and racing were considered over for the day, Nelson appeared on deck and set on the men to small arms practice. The army officers assumed this would be a formal thing, but again the captain – although pale as a spring onion – would have none of it. After less than half an hour of line-ups aiming listlessly at nothingness over the side, he had the master and the boatswain lower boats, crew them with oarsmen, and tow kites and other targets for the musketmen to shoot at.

  ‘Enough fiddle-faddling,’ he cried. ‘There will be prizes! There will be wine and rum! I wager the navy men will prove the best!’

  In musketry he was proved wrong, which he then turned to advantage by insisting on a contest with great guns. This caused extreme excitement and great merriment, for the soldiers had no knowledge, and not a little fear, of the Hinchinbrook’s nine-pounders.

  Polson, who had lost his hangdog air, entered into it with enormous verve, and wagered five guineas with Despard on a
running-out and laying challenge, by the clock. Polson even took it lightly when Nelson refused to bet. Not for fear of losing, as he explained it, but out of distaste for the sport. He later on, at dinner, spun the yarn that he had won £300 at a gaming table when serving on the frigate Seahorse out in India – ‘almost as a child’ – and had pledged never to repeat the exercise.

  ‘I realised when I saw the money that I could as easily have lost,’ he said. ‘In which case, sirs, I might just as well have thrown my carcass in the ocean, for I would never, ever, have had a chance of paying it.’

  The soldiers proved ready learners, although hauling in and out the massive carriages required a great deal more than just brute strength. The tally at the end of it was five sprained shoulders, two broken fingers and a rupture. Hastie, not to his pleasure, was told off to fit the groin-pad.

  When the dry-run (no powder and no shot) was finished, Nelson set his gunners on to their own challenge, watch against watch, again against the clock. From set-to to fire was pretty smart to begin with – the Hinchinbrooks having been active throughout their cruising after smugglers – but it was tightened considerably, again with liquor as the spur.

  In the cabin later, Polson was a shade po-faced, and questioned Nelson on the wisdom of such inducements. In the army, he contended, it would lead on to broken discipline and very ill behaviour. Nelson seemed unimpressed.

  ‘Mr Polson,’ he said, ‘I know my people well. I would venture that my regime works exceeding fair.’

  ‘Ah,’ rejoined the colonel, ‘at present I can only agree with you, but what of later? Indeed I fear, sir, you are a thought over-familiar with them. To treat men like that as of a higher order than a half-trained beast strikes me as…’

  Despard was shaking his head at him, as if in warning. Hastie, too, was looking for perhaps a fire-cracker going off. But Nelson only fixed Polson with a cold, blue, gleaming eye, until the man fell silent. Then he said mildly, ‘I treat them as I treat any man, sir. As I will treat you, in fact. I give respect when it is due, and I expect it in return.’

  Polson swallowed, but he would not give up.

  ‘And when that trust is broken, captain? What then?’

  He said it with an air of triumph, and Nelson met it with quite well-concealed contempt. Clearly, the colonel had not angered him.

  ‘Then there is the lash, sir. I do not administer it lightly, for I believe bestiality breeds beasts. It may come as a raw surprise to you, but I have a great admiration for my people, not one of whom is like a half-trained animal. Indeed I not only admire them, but I like them, too. I consider them my friends. I would lead them in to hell and I am confident that they would follow me.’

  He stopped, then gave a sudden little laugh. A very jolly laugh.

  ‘Pray God they don’t choose to prove me wrong,’ he said. ‘Then I would look a sorry gull indeed!’

  Afterwards, when the servants had cleared away, the charts and maps came out, and the officers of both the services fell into confabulation. They traced the Mosquito Shore – the parts of it in question – down for some two hundred miles and more. Colonel Polson pointed at the several rendezvous agreed already with the Superintendent General of the territory, James Lawrie, and the landfalls at each point were discussed.

  ‘I know this coast quite well,’ said Nelson. ‘From the Black River in the north to down as far as Monkey Point. Close to, the shore is difficult. Which is our first point for picking up, colonel?’

  ‘Captain Lawrie will meet us at Cape Gracios a Deos. He will have assembled a force of up to one thousand men. At least a hundred British settlers, and free blacks and mulattoes, perhaps five hundred slaves. Plus Mosquito Indians in great profusion to act as porters, guides and canoe paddlers. A formidable force indeed, and then an easy sail down to Rio San Juan. Which I believe you know, sir?’

  Despard exchanged a glance with Captain Nelson. Who again failed to show any irritation.

  ‘I said I know the coast to Monkey Point, Colonel Polson. I do not know the entrance to the river, nor yet a dozen feet inside it. We are sailing now to Providence Island where I shall procure a pilot. Without a pilot, this expedition would be doomed before we pulled an oar.’

  Now Colonel Polson showed self-satisfied. He took a draught of wine, expansively.

  ‘I have a name, sir. An excellent man called Hanna who comes fully recommended. He knows that shore, and all its rivers, like the back of his own hand. Indeed, sir, I have already sent a message to him from Jamaica. One must not let the grass sprout up between ones feet.’

  Nelson nodded imperceptibly, and added a small smile. Despard sighed.

  ‘Good, then,’ said Nelson. ‘We are all on the same lines. It would take a cruel Providence indeed to upset us now. A cruel Providence indeed.’

  Rightly or wrongly, all around the table except Polson could detect the irony.

  Seven

  To Timothy Hastie, it seemed that Providence Island must have been named for irony. Almost as soon as the Hinchinbrook’s anchor had taken hold, the confidence that all had felt for the expedition began to crumble. The flotilla anchored at night, and early next day, the pilot was rowed out for a conference. He was a man of great ebullience, red-faced and meaty, and put Nelson’s back up instantly.

  The captain, over a glass of tea, put some simple questions to him, some concerns, and they were brushed off like so many flies. Nobody was to worry over anything, boomed Hanna. He knew the coast entirely, and the commission could not have employed a better man.

  This was the sort of talk, Tim knew, that Nelson hated, but as he was in a particularly weak state from ‘the intermittents’ he did not make any argument. Dr Dancer, following on the lead of Benjamin Moseley, the surgeon general in Jamaica, had lately insisted that the captain’s condition was not malaria but gout, located on his chest. He had dosed him very heavily the night before with port wine, which at the least, Tim thought, accounted for the crashing headache.

  Seeing the captain’s dubious response, Colonel Polson put in his own pennyworth.

  ‘Mister Hanna has visited the San Juan river within a month or less,’ he said. ‘He assures me that we will have four feet of water at the very minimum underneath our keels as we go inland. I promise you, Captain Nelson, we are in the safest of safe hands.’

  But when part of the convoy left Providence on the pilot’s suggested course – although he was not on board the leading ship – disaster quickly followed. Sailing across a reef not far distant, the transport struck the bottom, in a moderately dangerous sea, and stuck fast.

  Nelson was below engaged in vomiting when the distant sound of cannon fire alerted him. He straightened up from the bowl that Timothy was steadying, and wiped his mouth.

  ‘Is it an attack, sir? Are we coming under fire? Shall I fetch your shirt and tunic?’

  ‘Not a bit of it, worse luck. That is a signal gun. God’s bones, sir, if that man has—’

  Has what? Hastie did not need to wonder. The door opened and the master hurried in.

  ‘Beg pardon, sir, it is the Penelope. She’s on a reef, sir. Did you hear the signal?’

  ‘I am not deaf yet, sir. Good Christ alive, we must go to her immediate. If that damned pilot… Mister, get the capstan rigged. How is the wind? Man the yards! Shit!’

  To Hastie’s eyes the scene on deck was utter chaos, especially as the soldiery were being ‘cleared below to make some space.’ The capstan was manned, all boats were either brought on board or strung out astern, and the decks were a riotous noise of tramping feet and whistles. He watched in awe as the huge sails dropped down from the yards to be braced and sheeted in, the sailors transformed from a mass into groups and lines of ordered, straining men.

  Captain Nelson, a stickler for ceremony in other men, stood on the poop deck less than fully clothed; his white face and ragged yellow wig in a state he would have deemed disgraceful in any of his officers. Hastie hovered with drinks and napkins, to be sent away with a flea in his e
ar for ‘fussing like a nursemaid.’ Nelson was unwell; Nelson had work to do. There could only be one winner in that contest.

  By the time they came within telescope range of the Penelope, the extent of the disaster could be seen. They were jettisoning guns to lighten her to get her off the reef. Not just her carriage guns, but artillery pieces being shipped to the Mosquito Shore for the raid upriver. Colonel Polson was beside himself with rage.

  ‘Are they mad! Are they demented! Christ, Captain, stop them instantly!’

  Nelson did not deign a reply to this, but Despard muttered, ‘Who chose the pilot, pray?’

  Before the Hinchinbrook had reached Penelope, Nelson had directed smaller vessels of the convoy to run ahead and stop the jettisoning, then go alongside to take off weight. First and mainly that meant soldiers, who made a dreary song and dance of it, many being not quite sober. Then, as her hull still ground on the coral, more desperate measures were required. Rations, butts of beer, spare chain and anchors, grappling hooks for castle ramparts, then muskets, swords, small arms and ammunition were transhipped. It was a never ending, wearisome parade.

  It did not work, though, and when night fell the flotilla was in major disarray. As the wind was getting fresher the ships must separate for fear of collisions, and some made anchor, including the Hinchinbrook. Dinner in the great cabin that night was an uncomfortable affair, and not just because of the constant rolling lop, and the sight and sound of army officers vomiting. Nelson, when he went to bed, was as weak as a sick kitten, to Hastie’s eyes. Dancer dared suggest the gout was getting worse.

  Polter, throughout the evening, showed signs of growing nervousness, and even Nelson’s legendary loyalty looked to be under a certain strain. Polter kept bleating on that time was of the essence, and Governor Dalling would not take kindly to any more delay.