“Well, some things never change. Did you know my rockets are the same model that Wellington used during the Napoleonic Wars? Yep, there is almost no change made to them. We removed the post that they were fired from and deal with just the rocket. Maybe some smart fellow would figure out how to make them more stable. Did you see my first shot? It turned and plummeted straight down into the ocean. Honestly, I think Julius scored the hits on the enemy and not me.”
He turned and looked at Julius, who was snoring loudly through his rebreather. That was when he saw the small red electric light that was in the corner of the room go out.
The two men looked worriedly at one another. The airship had dropped low enough that they no longer needed their rebreathers. Carefully they took off their masks and tested the air.
…
On the bridge, Devareaux was doing everything that he could to ensure that his airship stayed in the air. When the red light on the bridge went out, he reached for the repeater tube.
“All weapons crews, all weapons crews, report to Bosun Hargrave in the crew quarters for sail handling detail.”
…
The door to the crew quarters opened and Hargrave entered. He looked worried. The other weapons crews entered behind him. No one had their rebreathers on now.
“Listen up. I know all of you have been briefed on sail handling. This is dangerous work. The captain would now have you do it if we were not in dire straits.”
He pointed to Jehosophat, who was standing with the rest of the crew from the port side Winans gun.
“Jehosophat here is in charge of the port sail. He used to be a top man before he came to his senses and became a gunner.”
The men dutifully laughed at his jest.
“I am in charge of the Starboard. I won’t let you go out there alone. Don’t be a hero. Use your safety line. Don’t fall.”
The men moved reluctantly towards the locker against the outside wall of the cabin. Putting on gloves and a harness with the safety line, they all moved to the door leading to outside the airship. Jehosophat’s team headed to the emergency hatch in the engine room. Their station exit door, no longer existed.
Hargrave looked at the sign on the door and just shook his head. He remembered Isaac putting the sign there before they left. It reads ‘Caution, open with care. The first step is a doozy.’
All of the men clipped onto the safety line at the door. Then with a twist of the locking bar, Hargrave and Julius pulled the door inwards.
…
Devareaux wanted a drink more than he had ever wanted before. He had men setting sails who had no business being on the outside of the hull. He felt amazed that he had not lost any more men. There was little left for him to do but wait. The bridge was cold yet he felt a trickle of sweat roll down his spine.
He pulled his pocket watch for the fourth time in the past 30 minutes. This watch meant so much to him. Devareaux’s Waltham watch was a model 1857 that was given to him by his father. He told Thomas that the watch was lucky. He carried the watch with him at the Battle of Antietam in 1862. His father James Madison Devareaux was part of Kershaw’s Brigade. He was a young lieutenant in Colonel Nance’s 3rd South Carolina Regiment. During the course of the battle, Lieutenant James Devareaux came face to face with a large Union Sergeant wielding a rifle with bayonet. The pocket watch deflected the bayonet and saved his life. His father survived the engagement. The pocket watch did as well, but the coin silver case of the watch still bears the deep scratch where the bayonet carved its path. Thomas Devareaux opened the case and looked at the time. As usual, he had to tilt the watch to look past the scratch on the crystal that was also left behind from that brutal blade. His father could not bear the thought of parting with it long enough to fix the crystal and neither now could he.
While his first thought was on the time, his next was on the portrait that he had placed on the reverse side of the watch lid. He gazed longingly at his beautiful Ann. They met at a cotillion held on her father’s plantation near the Congaree River near Columbia. He had asked her father’s permission to write her the same day. The two had been corresponding now for two years. In his room, he had the ring he had purchased in San Juan. The one he longed to place on her finger when he asked for her hand. Shaking his head to clear it of the future, he focused on the present. To see his Ann, he first had to survive the trip back to San Juan.
The engine room was doing the lion’s share of the work. They were pumping as much steam as possible into the pierced airbag. The work was nearing completion. Through his telescope, Devareaux could make out the dark smudge on the horizon that was Puerto Rico. They were going to make it.
Chapter 4: San Juan
The airfield outside of San Juan was rudimentary at best. In point of fact, the field at San Juan was just that, a large field. There were a few concrete posts placed there to secure the visiting airship. The supplies for the Appomattox were piled at one end of the field and covered in tarps to protect them from the weather. The ground crew was waiting for them and began to swarm over the airship as it landed. The ground team lashed the airship to the ground and began the work of patching the ship.
The crew stepped out of the airship and watched the ground crew get to work. They operated with a beautiful efficiency of men who knew their craft. From the stockpile of stores at the end of the field, wooden boards and tin sheets were being dragged to the underside of the gondola to patch her injuries there.
Devareaux took Midshipman Powell with him as he rushed out to meet with the Spanish authorities and Captain Jackson, the Confederate officer in command. Powell had helped him prepare his report since he was the one that made the notes on the enemy dispositions.
Powell was an interesting young man. He was fully competent at his job, yet he was hesitant around his superiors. He feared failure, which added to his hesitancy. But Powell was gifted. His memory was phenomenal. If Powell saw something, he remembered it. His recall of the enemy fleet made him the logical person to take with him rather than the more senior Passed Midshipman Sykes.
Powell was from the Oxford, Georgia. His father was a professor of theology and trained the boy to remember and memorize. His father’s intention was for his boy to memorize scripture. Instead, he used the skills his father had provided to him for more secular pursuits. He fled home to Savannah on his fourteenth birthday. He managed to make himself useful to a few naval officers and managed to become a midshipman. It was the beatings he took from his previous captain that gave him the fear of failure.
On the journey to the conference, Devareaux triple checked with the young midshipman that he had the numbers and formations correct. He needed to be precise as possible. This maiden voyage of the Appomattox could make or break his career and possibly affect the air service in general if he did not make a good showing to Captain Jackson.
Captain Jackson was not just the Confederate Expeditionary force commander; he was also captain of the ironclad CSS Richmond. Captain Jackson was of the old guard. He did not believe in the possibilities of air power and thought the airship was a waste of good personnel and money that could be used to make more ships. He was a grouchy and obstinate man who would take some convincing.
They had spent considerable time on the report. He decided to put the enemy air assets at the top of the list of enemy vessels. They went over the enemy order of battle.
Imperial German Order of Battle
Air Assets
SMS Hamburg – City Class Airship – Presumed destroyed.
SMS Blucher – Dessauer Class Airship – Presumed destroyed.
SMS Charlemagne – Dessauer Class Airship – Active
Support Vessels
2 Fleet Colliers – Unknown Classes
2 Supply Ships – Unknown Classes
1 Hospital Ship
Transport
4 Troopships – Unknown Classes
Capitol Ships
2 Preussen Class – Iron Clads – Steam/Sail Power
4 Sa
chen Class – Iron Clads
2 Kaiser Class – Iron Clads
Minor Warships
2 Blitz Class – Sloops
6 Wespe Class - Gunboats
He reviewed the fleet report. No matter where he placed the air assets, Jackson would find a reason for a complaint that they were listed at all. He ran through his presentation with Powell one more time in the carriage before they got to the headquarters building in downtown San Juan.
The joint Spanish-Confederate headquarters was in the Fort San Filipe Del Moro in San Juan. The fort was typical of Spanish design in the Caribbean. From a distance the walls were truly impressive. But as they drew closer, the state of disrepair became evident. The fort was not modern. The walls stood nearly vertically. It had none of the modern look of a Vauban style fortification. There was no way that this structure could survive naval bombardment from a modern fighting ship.
They rode through the main gates and Powell openly gaped at the crumbling mortar and the state of disrepair that the fort was in. It took Devareaux three attempts to catch his eye and get the young midshipman to remember he was an officer and not a vacationer out on a frolic.
As soon as the carriage rolled to a stop, Devareaux quickly entered the headquarters building. Powell was left with a large group of attendants and junior officers not important enough to meet with the senior officers of the joint command. He quickly found someone to talk with and settled in to wait for Devareaux’s return.
Once inside the building, a smartly dressed aide-de-camp escorted Devareaux to a conference room. When he opened the door, a cloud of smoke rolled out of the room. Cigars were the preferred smoke of the day and everyone seemed to have one. The air was nearly unbreathable as he entered the dimly lit room.
The meeting went by in a whirlwind. He noticed the slight that he was both not offered a cigar nor was he offered a seat. Instead, he was made to stand through the proceedings. Devareaux presented his written report and then gave a verbal summary as well. He emphasized the valor of his men who had succeeded in not only destroying two enemy airships, but also engaged at least three of the smaller vessels of the Imperial German Navy and fired upon one of the troop transports. The casualties of the enemy were unknown. His losses were seven men lost. Six of the sail tenders and one of the mess men were lost from the hit landed by the Blucher.
It mollified his ego that at least the Spaniards looked suitably impressed. Captain Jackson on the other hand just frowned through the entire report. His subordinates knew their commanders feelings and attempted to remain impassive.
“In summary, sir, our respirators allow us to fly higher than our opponents. The height advantage is critical to our success. The enemy will adapt in short order to attempt to negate this advantage. We should strike again as soon as possible to take the advantage while we still possess it.”
Captain Jackson leaned forward over the table in front of him. His face was a scowl of disapproval yet it was evident that he did appreciate the report and was giving Devareaux a measure of respect with his words.
“Well done Lieutenant. I am sorry for your losses, but they could have been far worse. The tactics that you described from the Blucher could be easily replicated by the Charlemagne. We cannot risk the Appomattox on another sortie. Any further attempt could meet with disaster for you and your crew. The Confederacy cannot risk losing our force here in a vain effort to support the Dons when the Spanish are ready to abandon the island.”
He reached down into his briefcase next to his chair and withdrew some papers and slid them across to Devareaux.
“You are directed to head directly to Florida once you have completed repairs. My flotilla will divert to Havana, where the Spanish presence is much stronger. The Spanish army and militia forces will attempt to hold the island for as long as they can. The Spanish navy will pull out the senior officers and withdraw to Havana shortly thereafter. I personally believe it to be a wasted effort on the part of the remaining army and militia units.”
Devareaux’s disappointment was evident on his face. The elderly captain disbelieved in any new innovations. The man is probably still miffed that many of his vessels no longer have sails. The thought of airships was just unnatural. Devareaux saluted and responded.
“Aye, Aye, sir.”
Jackson did have a point, though. The flagship of the Spanish Fleet in San Juan was the unprotected cruiser Aragon. She bore sails as well as two smokestacks. She was largely obsolescent when she was launched. What was most alarming was that two more units of her class were still being built. The aging armored frigate Numancia was perhaps the strongest unit in the flotilla. Three similar armored frigates were in Havana. The strangest ship in the flotilla was the Mendez Nuñez. It started its life as the 38-gun frigate that seemed as if it would be more in place fighting Admiral Nelson than in a modern navy. Then in 1870, the Spanish government thought they could save money by refitting her as an armored steam ship. The result was an under gunned, extremely slow ship that took too many men to properly man.
The Mendez Nuñez was not the strangest of the Spanish vessels. That had to go to the Tornado. She was a bark rigged screw steam cruiser. She was a true veteran. What made her so remarkable was her journey to become a Spanish warship. She began life as the CSS Texas. She was launched during the negotiations that led to the end of the war. During the controversy that eventually led to the universal emancipation laws, she was seized by the British Government in accordance with the treaties Britain had with the United States.
The Texas was then sold to Chile before the Confederacy had an opportunity to redress the situation. Chile then lost her to Spain in 1866 in an action off of Madeira in the Chincha Islands War (1864 to 1866). She entered Spanish service in 1870 and is now part of the joint Spanish-Confederate flotilla. When Jackson saw her the first time he nearly wept. As it turns out, the CSS Texas was his first ship that he served aboard as a lowly junior lieutenant. He was its second lieutenant when the Texas was seized by Great Britain. Devareaux later learned that Jackson was given a tour of the vessel and was horrified at her slovenly state.
The Spanish naval contingent had several smaller vessels, but nothing that could stand up to the modern armored cruisers of the Imperial German Navy. The faces on every officer in the room reflected that this fight was a foregone conclusion.
The Spanish officers looked resigned. They lacked the fighting spirit that would enable them to hold the island. Their forces were too small. Some of the ships were of dubious seaworthiness and had not left the harbor since arriving. Not only did they lack fighting spirit, they lacked the equipment to put up a fight.
The other five vessels of the Confederate Expeditionary force were two torpedo destroyers and three torpedo boats. The torpedo destroyers were newly commissioned ships from the Charleston Naval Shipyard. The torpedo boats were built in New Orleans. The torpedo boats were small vessels that mounted a main battery of deck guns like the larger ironclads. In addition, they carried two torpedo tubes as well.
The much smaller torpedo boats were created to carry a pair of torpedoes on the top of the deck. They mounted Gatling guns and small deck guns, but otherwise had little in the way of offensive power. They were mosquitos that had a sting, but were very fragile.
The only capitol ship of the Confederate force was the CSS Richmond. The Richmond was a match for the newest of the German armored cruisers. It was commissioned and laid down in Liverpool as the Confederacy still lacked the ability to produce its own capitol ships.
The meeting held an air of despair that was more choking than the smoke from their cigars. The Confederate officers were angry that they were giving up without a fight. The Spanish naval officers were relieved that they would not have to fight. The army commanders were just relieved that they were not ordered to stay and die with their men.
Devareaux was dismissed and before he reached the door, he heard Jackson dismiss the rest of the officers as well. As Devareaux left the room, a young Spanish c
aptain named Rodriguez chased after him.
“A brief moment of your time senor. May I accompany you to your airship?”
If he remembered correctly, Rodriguez was the captain of the Numancia.
Devareaux eyed the man warily.
“Yes, sir, you are welcome to come.”
His tone suggested that he was not welcome.
Captain Rodriguez smiled expansively. By this time they had reached the courtyard. Powell, seeing his commanding officer, stood up from the dice game he was playing and hurried to greet Devareaux. When Powell spotted Rodriguez, he simply fell in step behind Devareaux and listened to the conversation.
“Excellente! May I offer you a ride in my carriage? It is a most comfortable ride. It is the only luxury that I can offer you.”
With a nod the men boarded the carriage. The three officers entered the carriage.
“Senor, I appreciate your fighting spirit. I frankly agree with your assessment. We can cripple their efforts by defeating the Charlemagne. Your airship can break up their formation and we would be able to achieve a great victory. Otherwise, we are inviting them to beat us in detail. With the Estados Unidos attacking in the Philippines and the Germans attacking the Caribe, soon the Spanish Empire will be just a memory.”
Rodriguez weighs his next words very carefully.
“If you would happen to find yourself off course and near the enemy, would you engage the Charlemagne? This is only theoretically, of course. I am just asking because I hear that the winds between here and Florida can be rather strong this time of year.”
With a Cheshire cat smile, Devareaux responded.
“Theoretically, of course. It would be my duty to engage any enemy that presented itself to my airship.”
“Now, senor, I can only hope and pray that such a fate would not befall you but such an unfortunate turn of wind would be very beneficial to us and to Puerto Rico. When do you think you can make the necessary repairs to your airship?”
CSS Appomattox: A Thomas Devareaux Alternative History Military Adventure (The Thomas Sumter Devareaux Series Book 1) Page 4