One Sloop and Slow Match

by James Spurr

  James shot her a glance that revealed his intent. It was all she needed to know. “Abigail, are you leaving? Are you returning to England?” She took heart from his tone. For James not to comment upon Lord Castlereagh, the Admiralty orders, or his father meant his visit was intensely personal in nature.

  She turned, walked a few steps to the top of a gradual ridge to take the view of Lake Erie. Just as she made to respond, the wind suddenly increased; first just a puff, carrying with it her answer. But in an instant, a gust followed with a sustained breeze. All James caught was the sun on her hair being blown back, the loose braids failing under the sudden strain of the new breeze.

  “I beg your pardon, Abigail, what was that?” James implored. He also had to catch his hat and removed it entirely to provide his nervous hands some purpose.

  She turned and laughed at the wind, her hair now blowing in front of her from each side and playfully shielding her face. James was reminded of his graceful sloop with a beautiful pennant running before a fine breeze, her canvas not unlike Abigail’s white cotton skirts. Her hands made to comb back her waves of golden hair and she raised her voice while smiling. “My visit with my mother has been a joy and my time with you, precious, but I appear to have little purpose, no home on this continent to call my own and it is time, I suppose, I make my way, if I must.”

  She turned once again and looked out over the Lake. James followed her gaze and thought he could have been handed no better introduction to say what he had come to reveal. But then he scowled from that which both had witnessed but only he observed.

  There were whitecaps on the harbor! A new, fresh, strong wind, having arrived and built in seconds from the south, would within a minute be upon them standing on the ridge. James watched Salina swing three points to her anchor and while he was not immediately concerned for his ship with Mr. O’Connell aboard, as was so often the case on the inland seas the weather had turned within minutes, and just over the horizon he caught the dark edges of an ominous cloud bank moving quickly toward his command. He gestured, demonstrating to Abigail the reason for his concern and their prompt departure as he took her by the arm and began, now with the increasing wind to their back, to lead her back to the house.

  On his way, however, he burst forth with that which had troubled him since departing Amherstberg, “Abigail, let us forget this past decade and begin again where we left off. I have means, you will have property, and we can make our home together as it always should have been. Certainly, if I can forget, so, too, can you.”

  Abigail was grateful for the wind. It kept some urgency and purpose to their walk. Their destination approached, imposing a finite limit, as with a wine glass filling, from which no uncomfortable topic must be allowed to spill. The analogy brought to mind for her that which she had witnessed on far too many occasions with James. He would invariably continue his pour as his control, discipline, wit and charm, his charity as a Christian, his duty as an officer, and his strength as a man emptied; as did so many a bottle in his hands.

  Abigail supposed James had sought her commitment. While the new wind was now upon them and the dead oak leaves not yet fallen caused the branches along the windbreak to the house to rustle with some urgency, she knew she could not pretend to have not heard. It would, no doubt, require all of her skills as a woman and her way with a man in order to form an effective response. Her mother, she noticed, was standing on the back porch, Thomas was closing the doors to the barn and both of them looked relieved to see Abigail approach. They would be among them within seconds.

  Abigail stopped, turned to James, and she ignored the expressions of bewilderment from her mother and jealousy from Thomas. Over the rush of the wind, her mother and Thomas, unintended witnesses, would hear nothing. By time they approached, should they even try, it would be over. Abigail took his hands and pleaded, “James, let us give this more time. It is a serious matter, both of us forgetting a decade, if even possible, that others will not. I will think about it, as should you. You have not lived in London for some time, after all.”

  James did not take it as a rejection, although in her heart, Abigail was scared. Not of the public reaction, for her wealth, upon her marriage, would eventually quiet most tongues and render the remainder largely irrelevant. No, she was scared of James. While the hardness and cruelty of his father, Sir Edgar, was never directed at her and she had adapted well to his absence and what she came to realize was his disinterest, she knew that James would adhere to no such limitations and boundaries. What good the wealth, without the freedom? What good the vows, without the safety of benevolence?

  James, for his part, took what moment the rising gale would allow to clarify their future, “London? I’ve seen enough. With your past, we shall make our home in Upper Canada.” Thinking he had solved for her the only hesitation on her mind, he turned and, taking her hand, led her onto the porch.

  Abigail, with that single comment from James, made her decision. If James thought she intended to live out her life in Dover Mills, or some other such small community on the Northwest frontier, he was sadly mistaken. Having just been insulted by an arrogant, aging lieutenant with a reputation of temper and drink, himself having lost a vessel amid rumors of incompetence, hers was not the reputation, she knew, as between them would cause any concerns for their future.

  No, Abigail was certain. The problem now, as James made his goodbye, promised to write and rushed off to face the onslaught of a late winter gale, would be to arrange an alternative.

  Abigail looked over at Thomas, who having finished closing the barn door in the rising wind, retrieved a freshly sharpened ax, normally kept on the porch so to assist with splitting wood. As he jogged to the house, one hand holding his straw hat, she focused rather upon what Thomas carried in the other and the glint from the blade, reflecting in the sun.

  The gusts blew the canvas tarps from the heavy timber frames spanning the unfinished hulls. The canvas had held all winter, which served up some notable gales. With just a couple of weeks remaining, however, the yard crews would now have to make significant repairs so in order to keep the work dry and themselves barely comfortable. Just another minor setback in Presque Isle at the end of a winter where major challenges had been overcome, thought Captain Daniel Dobbins. Indeed, as Daniel took shelter in Captain William Lee’s modest cabin along the waterfront, he also regarded the gale and any forthcoming damage as a frustration well within their stride.

  Both Captains, neither with a command, had over the course of their careers at sea come to know the Great Lakes and their ever changing, fast moving weather fronts as well as any. Both felt the moisture in the strong south wind and knew from the manner in which the wind had built that it had moved up from the south very quickly. The storm would likely upon encountering Lake Erie deflect sharply to the east. The strong southerly would likely shift just as quickly to a violent and much colder north wind as the storm front moved off and brought down with it on its backside frigid Canadian air.

  “This gale will likely last through tomorrow. Can we keep the men busy inside?” asked William.

  “Aye,” replied Daniel. “There are hatch covers to assemble and paint, belaying pins to turn, and blocks to oil. Samuel could use some help with some sails for the schooner.”

  Daniel, who was from Presque Isle and had lobbied the Navy as it presenting the best location for a naval base on Lake Erie, was leading an effort to build two new vessels. He knew William, and his friend, Samuel, since his days as a Merchant Master of a variety of ships on the Great Lakes. Daniel welcomed William’s experience and leadership and Samuel could still make a sharp fitting sail, recalling skills he learned during the Revolution on Lake Champlain. Both Daniel and William spent many a winter night after hard days over the last three months in the crudest of shipyards, recounting how they had recently lost their respective commands at the outbreak of the war the past summer. William lost Friends Good Will in the same manner as had Daniel lost Salina. Both knew Lake Erie wou
ld be contested this coming summer and both looked forward to the opportunity to settle a score.

  William heard word of Constitution’s victory over Java just the previous week from a dispatch Daniel received from the Navy Department. William was generally optimistic and in good spirits, but he worried, having heard no word from James since December, that his son may have been one of the casualties.

  William closed the ill fitting cabin door. He thought of his son at sea. “I would offer my condolences to any mariner out on the Lake tonight. The north shore will be pounded by steep seas.”

  Daniel nodded, knowing well that that both of them had seen such conditions and Samuel as well, in his time, now sleeping in his bunk along the south wall with the brick hearth. “A bit early for a voyage,” Daniel observed, “but the sections of open water earlier today, when spring seemed upon us, were tempting, I admit.”

  At that moment, a gust roared overhead interrupting their casual conversation. The mariners recalled the power of the wind, the rage of the inland seas, and sighed. William reached for his clay pipe and settled into still another night of near hibernation while searching for still more distractions from Samuel’s snoring.

  Daniel stayed a short while. In what seemed a brief respite, he elected to brave the gale and walk to his more comfortable, permanent home on the bluff overlooking Presque Isle Bay, which within weeks would witness the launch of new American naval vessels.

  Mr. O’Connell was also contemplating the track of the storm. Salina had weighed anchor as soon as Captain Fleet stepped aboard. O’Connell had, on his own initiative, tightly furled the outer jib and mainsail, doubled up on the quarter tackles and assured that the main vangs assisted in securing the now lowered main gaff. They would give her just the foresail and jib.

  With a rising south wind and short, choppy whitecaps upon waves which at that moment were not really so large as yet, Salina stood out on a starboard tack. O’Connell was immediately concerned sailing southwest with the shoal water surrounding Long Point, but the ice floes apparent from the cross trees left for no other option. Captain Fleet suggested Salina sail along the northern shore once around the point until O’Connell pointed out the obvious—either the seas would build, and fast, with tremendous breakers, or the ice floes, pushed by a south wind, would trap Salina in precisely that position as no ship should be purposefully exposed—upon a lee shore. Captain Fleet just nodded and walked away, the memories of H.M Schooner Hope fresher in his mind than anyone on board would have guessed.

  O’Connell was determined to get Salina well away from shoal water and off the lee shore, but ironically the southwest tack paralleled Long Point, just as they had tracked enroute to Fort Erie days before. O’Connell had a plan for that as well. With some few hours of daylight remaining, the very moment O’Connell was certain Salina would lay the point on a larboard tack, he would recommend to Captain Fleet that Salina come about. Within minutes, Salina would be in deep water and far from the northern shore. For some reason, the Captain seemed blessedly disengaged in this most recent challenge and O’Connell was hopeful that his normally difficult captain would yield to his advice. Unspoken was still another reason, but superstition among sailors with respect to their own foundering required that O’Connell keep that thought to himself.

  It was grand sailing. Salina heeled well to larboard, leaned her bow into each rising sea like a firm shoulder sending spray flying as she battled with less than half her canvas, clawing as close to the wind as her trim would allow, all while her crew were kept looking for ice. Two hours from Dover Mills the crew reefed the foresail and at dusk O’Connell took a reef in the jib as well. The reduced sail, made amid the rising wind, barely reduced the heel of the vessel and if anything, Salina only increased her speed through the water.

  Just after dark with a half moon rising and as would be visible for no more than another glass, given the approaching clouds, O’Connell hauled himself into the main starboard ratlines and climbed aloft, taking his glass. The wind was now well above the range that allowed for communication from the deck, and the decision he contemplated would best be made with personal knowledge. He climbed from the ratboards to the cross trees, timing his movements to coincide with the movement of the ship through the seas, using gravity and momentum to his advantage.

  “Good evening, Mr. O’Connell,” greeted the lookout, now bundled tight, having withstood the unchecked winter wind while aloft for some four bells. Still, his tone sounded light.

  “Aye, a beautiful night,” O’Connell offered, taking the typical sailor’s understatement as the preferred acknowledgement of their collective efforts and hardship. “At least until that moon is lost to us.”

  O’Connell stood, wrapped his hand around the main topmast, regretted his standing upon the lookout’s hand in the cramped space amid little light, made his apology and extended the glass. As he gazed to the west, the wind eased, Salina straightened just for some seconds, but then again within a minute thereafter. While O’Connell was dejected, finding only a single, slim option for a route between the ice, he was heartened as well.

  The lookout suggested, “Seems to be getting a bit fitful. Do you think this gale is blowing itself out?”

  O’Connell considered the possibility as the dim blue-white ice passed through his narrowed field of vision through his glass amid very few ribbons of black with moonlight shimmering from its surface. “Perhaps,” O’Connell allowed. “I have seen it before. I shall report to the Captain,” he announced, and crawled again over the lookout and lowered himself by the strength of his upper body down to the ratboards, catching one and then the other with his dangling, probing feet. Again on the way to the deck, the wind dropped considerably and O’Connell checked himself against unfounded hope.

  O’Connell knocked and entered Captain Fleet’s cabin, not really certain with the din of a working schooner making her way through large seas powered by a diminishing wind that he had heard a response. With the hull working, the planks groaning, floorboards creaking and cargo occasionally shifting, strains upon the hull and all of her rigging may well have muffled Captain Fleet’s typical reply of, “Come.”

  As he entered, O’Connell caught Captain Fleet at his desk stowing a small bottle into the recesses of the storage space allotted for letters. He shielded himself over some paper upon which he seemed to be working with charcoal. O’Connell was fearful he had interrupted without permission, but the opportunity he brought to his commanding officer was too urgent to stand upon formalities. “Captain, the wind may be diminishing and there is a narrow opening to the southwest as will allow us to reach deeper water.”

  Fleet responded without so much as turning to face him, “I will be up in a moment.” The tone suggested O’Connell leave. He gladly complied.

  On deck, O’Connell pointed out the proper bearing for the narrow channel, all while steadying himself in the awkward roll brought by a diminishing wind. Fleet checked with his night glass, shrugged and muttered, “You have this schooner choked with too little canvas. Good God, man, this gale is all but over. Shake the reef from the jib, come about and head for Amherstberg. And next time, call me when there is some need of a decision by an officer.”

  O’Connell choked back a retort and offered only, “Aye, Sir.”

  He waited until Captain Fleet descended down the companionway ladder, retreating to his world as illuminated by a single candle. O’Connell called out the orders for bringing Salina about on the larboard tack amid his world of an angry inland sea illuminated by a half moon and made the notations in the log. Fleet would feel Salina go about, obvious even from his cabin. But Fleet could never tell, huddled in his private world, whether the inner jib was at full hoist. In all good conscience and amid the ice, O’Connell thought that a reckless act and merely instructed the Bosun, “Shake out the reef in the jib when the footropes off the bowsprit are repaired.”

  The Bosun, proud of Salina’s state of readiness, made to object, but O’Connell took his a
rm and whispered “… as for the offending foot-ropes, we will attend to them in good time; no sooner than morning…” The Bosun understood. O’Connell made a note in the log of the nonexistent problem and consequential delay in raising the jib to full hoist.

  Salina made her way cautiously through the narrow ever evolving channel of open water, between slush, small bergs and large chunks, with many of the crew ready along the rail with boathooks, sweeps and with the ship’s boat lowered from the davits almost to the sea should Salina suddenly strike. The wind dropped to next to nothing and was variable in direction within an hour of trimming sheets for the larboard tack. The surrounding ice reduced the seas to a heavy swell and Salina labored to hold a course for half a glass before the canvas snapped and shook. The crew looked up. O’Connell quickly ducked his head as the boom crossed the centerline. Suddenly, Salina was no longer hard on the former wind, larboard tack, but rather, on a beam reach with a new wind, starboard tack. The foresail and reefed jib suddenly filled with a new wind having formed and traveled hundreds of miles from the Canadian artic.

  Within minutes, the temperature dropped significantly. The new wind was much colder, drier and began to build, just as it had earlier in what was proving to be a very long day. The channel through the ice was as yet barely discernable, and Salina made her way slowly through mostly heavy slush, pushing the smaller chunks from her cutwater, hopefully with no damage. Soon, with the wind from the north, the ice moved differently than O’Connell had anticipated when the wind had been from the south and he confirmed, personally, that no obvious open water was in sight, even from the cross trees. The foresail was brailed and with the single headsail on a broad reach, Salina should have still been making three knots with such a strong wind propelling them from aft of the beam. But O’Connell sensed it before most. Salina was sailing not so much through water as heavy slush. Her speed was, within another hour of the wind shift, no more than one knot.