by Ron Carter
Matthew grasped the strong, wiry hand. “I’m pleased to meet you, Lieutenant.”
“It is my pleasure, sir,” Jones replied. From his look and his crisp, assured manner, Matthew sensed in Jones decisiveness and self-confidence.
“If you have some time, I’ll show you the charts—the North West Providence Channel.”
“I’m at your command.”
Matthew turned back to Hopkins. “Sir, thank you.”
“No thanks necessary, Mr. Dunson. Be careful tomorrow.”
Matthew led Jones back to his quarters and spread the West Indies chart out on the large table.
“We are here. We move south to the mouth of this channel, then bring her to port, nearly southwest through the narrows—here.” He traced the route with his finger. “The Great Abaco Island is here, to the east, and on the south tip is the town of Cornwall, with a lighthouse. On the west is this fishhook formation of islands. We go between Abaco Island and these islands, due south, to New Providence. Nassau Town is right here, on the east end, with a small harbor. West of New Providence is Andros Island, with Nicolls Town on the north tip with a lighthouse. To the east is a string of scattered islands, some charted, some not, with Eleuthera Island and Governor’s Harbor behind them, farther east.”
In his fierce concentration, Jones had not moved. He raised his eyes to Matthew. “Where are the dangers?”
“Two things. First, missing a lighthouse. Remember, there’s one at Nicolls Town to the west, one at Cornwall on the east. Keep them at the distances shown on this chart and you’re in the channel. It gets narrow. Second, there will be small islands and sandbars scattered throughout, some charted, some not, some pushed up by this last storm. We can see them from the crow’s nest if the weather’s good.”
“We ride the crow’s nest?”
“We do.”
Silently Jones placed his finger on the chart and worked it down through the channel, memorizing the lighthouse locations, the islands, the depth soundings. His lips moved soundlessly as he committed names, distances, directions to memory. He retraced the route once more, then raised his head.
“Very good. I have it.”
“We’ll go over it again in the morning.”
Jones nodded. “I couldn’t help overhearing your conversation with Commodore Hopkins. You feel this war has meaning beyond breaking from England?”
Matthew caught the slight Scottish accent. “Yes, I do.”
“Deity has an interest in all this?”
“I believe the Almighty does.”
A smile flashed on Jones’s face. “I’ll gain comfort from that when we try to take munitions from two British forts at the same time.” He walked to the door. “Thank you for your help.”
“Not at all.”
For a moment Jones hesitated, groping. “I . . . I’m sorry about your father. Truly.”
“Thank you. It’s past.”
“You . . . uh . . . losing him hasn’t made you bitter about this war?”
“No. I think he expected he would not come back from the Concord fight.”
“You have family?”
“Mother, two sisters, two brothers.”
“Now without a father?”
“Yes. They’re fine. You? A family, I mean.”
“Three sisters. My brother and my parents are gone now. After age thirteen I saw little of my family. That’s when I was apprenticed to a ship owner and went to sea—from Whitehaven, not far from my native Scotland.” He stopped and drew and released a great breath. “I didn’t intend digging into your personal affairs. I hope I didn’t offend.”
“Not at all.”
“See you in the morning.”
Matthew stared at the door for several seconds after it closed, then sat down at the chart table. For long minutes he stared unseeing at the spread of parchment while his thoughts reached back to the blasting sounds of the muskets at Concord, and the sick disbelief when he saw John in his bed and knew he was dying. He straightened and pushed the thoughts away, then drew his wallet from his coat and opened the tiny wrap of paper and for a moment studied the delicate lettering on the royal blue watch fob.
The sea was glassy smooth at four o’clock a.m. when they finished the morning mess, and twenty minutes later the northeasterly trade winds began to riffle the shining surface, hot and steamy.
“Hoist anchor,” Captain Saltonstall ordered, and the anchor chain rattled as four seamen leaned into the capstan bars and began the rotation.
“Mainsails,” he called, and barefooted seamen scaled the rope ladders like cats and jerked the knots holding the sails lashed to the yards, and they dropped. Able hands tied off the sails at the bottom, and they popped and billowed full, and the two masts creaked as the ship sliced through the crystal-clear blue waters.
Matthew led Jones up the rope ladder to the crow’s nest near the top of the mainmast, and they lashed themselves to the swaying mast and the railing. They wore only their trousers and shirts in the muggy air. Fifty feet below, the seamen were miniature, and the ship left a long white wake as she cut through the sparkling waters. Both men breathed deep and for a moment felt the singular rise of joy at the feel of a tall ship with her mainsails filled, surging through good waters like a thing strong and separate and alive.
The ship entered the narrow channel, and both men raised their glass to peer north into her wake, and the Esther was there, one-half mile back, and one-half mile behind her, the Providence. The others were to follow at half-mile intervals to avoid raising fears among the islanders of an armada come to invade.
Matthew called down, “Furl the mizzen mainsail—dangerous water coming—we’re moving too fast.”
Seamen standing with bare feet curled around rope strung to the mizzenmast spilled the mainsail and lashed it to the yard, and stood waiting their next command.
The fishhook string of islands came into view to the west, and Matthew pointed and Jones nodded, and minutes later Matthew pointed to Great Abaco Island to the east. Suddenly he stiffened and raised his arm, and Jones followed his point. Half a mile ahead, port side, the waters were slightly lighter blue than those surrounding. Matthew called down to the helmsman, “Ten degrees starboard,” and the ship instantly responded while Jones asked, “You saw something?”
“The water color is wrong—sandbar.” Matthew waited thirty seconds, then called down again. “Now ten degrees port and hold her steady as she goes.”
At two hundred yards the submerged sandbar defined itself and Jones licked his lips. “Was that one charted?”
“No. There’ll be others. Keep a sharp eye.”
Jones smiled with his newfound wisdom and leaned against the railing, eager for the life-and-death challenge of avoiding the hidden traps before they ripped the bottom out of the ship. Time passed, and suddenly Jones pointed eastward, and Matthew nodded. “Cornwall lighthouse?” Jones asked.
Matthew nodded and called down to the helmsman, “Take her due south by the compass,” and the bow swung hard to starboard. Instantly Matthew tensed and again shouted, “Correct twenty degrees to port and steady as she goes.”
Jones looked at him in surprise. “I missed something?”
“There,” Matthew pointed. “Another sandbar or a reef. Must have moved from the fishhook islands during the storm.”
Jones strained for several seconds. “I can’t see the color change.”
“The sun’s wrong. But can you see how the water riffles over there? Calm around it, but small riffles?”
“That’s not a school of fish?”
“Schools of fish move. That isn’t moving.”
A minute passed before Matthew called down once more, “Correct to due south by the compass and steady as she goes,” and they studied the long, submerged sandbar as it slipped past, one hundred yards to starboard.
Jones looked at him but said nothing, and the small ship continued her course, working south to where the channel widened. Jones pointed west at Andros Island i
n the distance, with the lighthouse at Nicolls Town, and Matthew fixed his glass dead ahead at the horizon over the bowsprit. Five minutes later he pointed, and Jones glassed the distance.
“There it is,” Matthew said quietly. “New Providence. We’re leaving the channel, and the waters become shallow fast, so watch sharp.”
With the sun at its zenith they closed on the island, sweat dripping in the torrid, steamy heat, and twice more Matthew had to call course changes to the helmsman. Three miles from the island they veered southeast and swung in a slow arc to come in on the east tip of the landfall. At five hundred yards they furled all sails and dropped anchor. Less than one hour later all seven ships lay at anchor in a line offshore, and every officer stood at the bow of his ship, glassing the coast for anything that moved.
There was nothing.
Hopkins turned to Jones. “Hoist the signals. Get this operation under way.”
“Aye, sir,” Jones spat and turned on his heel. His orders were perfunctory, clear, and the seamen executed them instantly, without question. Matthew watched while the ships’ crews put twenty longboats in the water, and two hundred marines under command of Captain Samuel Nicholas scrambled down nets into the boats and turned their faces upward to receive the muskets and ammunition and bayonets lowered in nets. They were followed by fifty seamen, Matthew among them, under the command of Lieutenant Thomas Weaver. The Providence and the Wasp swung their bows northward until they were broadside to the island, and on the signal of Commodore Hopkins aboard the Alfred, the men on the longboats put their backs into the oars and started for shore under the muzzles of the cannon.
They had one hundred yards yet to go when they heard the first far distant whump of cannon, and every head came up, probing the shoreline for a moment before they dug their oars back into the water.
Matthew stiffened. Too far—not shooting at us.
“Pull,” shouted the officers in the boats. “We’re not going to get caught in the water!”
The instant the bows of the boats hit the sand the crews were in the warm waters, dragging the boats above the high-tide line on the white, sandy beach, and then they grabbed their muskets and jerked out the ramrods and reached for their powder horns, while the officers watched the heavy foliage and the palm trees for any movement.
They waited behind their beached boats with their muskets at the ready, sweat running in the sweltering sun while their eyes probed, and minutes turned into a quarter of an hour, and still nothing moved. Captain Nicholas stood to give orders, but before he could speak, the sound of far-off cannon once again reached them. Nicholas crouched behind his boat, and again they waited while long minutes slowly ticked by.
Finally Nicholas stood. “Come on, men, follow me.” He took two bold steps towards the green line of foliage and stopped in his tracks, staring.
A large native in full military dress of unknown nationality, but barefooted, had suddenly appeared as if by magic in the trees, and when Nicholas stopped, the man walked out onto the sandy beach and strode directly toward him, shoulders back, head up, indignant. Two smaller men in tattered canvas trousers and ragged cotton shirts followed him.
While the man was yet twenty yards distant, Nicholas shouted, “Do you speak English, sir?”
“I do.” The British accent was unmistakable. “I have come to demand an explanation for this.”
“What government do you represent, sir?”
“The people of this island.”
“Your name?”
“My English name is Nathaniel. Your name, sir, and your country?”
“Captain Samuel Nicholas, the colonies of America.”
The native frowned. “For what reason are you here?”
“For the British munitions at Fort Montague and Fort Nassau.”
“What of the British munitions?”
“We will take possession of all the warlike stores on the island belonging to the Crown, but we have no desire to touch the property or the person of any of the inhabitants.”
For a full minute the native studied the two hundred fifty armed men, and then the ships standing offshore, and then he spoke. “If you speak the truth, we will not resist you.”
“You have fired cannon at us.”
“No. We fired alarm shots to warn all on the island that you are here.”
Matthew felt the tension rise.
Nicholas pursed his mouth for a moment in thought. “I thank you for your message. We will continue our march.”
The native turned and within seconds had disappeared with his two companions in the dense green growth.
Nicholas signalled the other officers to come. “That man could be a decoy for an ambush.” He paced nervously. “We haven’t got time to find out. If there are British ships in these waters, our squadron may have to make a run for it, and if they do I aim to have you men on board. We’re going ahead with the plan.”
“Sir,” Matthew said, and waited.
“What is it?”
“If there’s an ambush it will be in the trees. What if we send ten or twenty men in there to spring the trap if there is one, and the rest of them travel on the beach? Nassau Town’s right on the coast, about four miles west. I’ve been there.”
Nicholas paused. “Might work.”
“I volunteer,” Matthew said, and countless other voices instantly joined him.
Nicholas quickly called out fifteen men and turned back to Matthew. “You’ve been to Nassau Town?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then you take command of this detail and move fast. We’ll give you five minutes before we start up the beach. At the first sound of your fire, we come in after you.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good luck.”
Matthew turned to the volunteers. “Single file, and keep up the pace,” he said. He led them trotting off the white sandy beach into the thick growth on the narrow footpath taken by the native and his two men, and he settled into the peculiar swinging gait he had learned from Tom and his father. He counted two hundred paces and stopped to listen; there was no sound other than the birds and the whisper of the trade winds in the trees. He counted two hundred more paces, stopped, continued, and repeated it again and again for three miles. Then he slowed and suddenly dropped to a crouch and stopped, and his men crowded around, breathing hard, sweating. He pointed through a break in the trees. “Fort Montague.”
The square, ancient, crumbling structure with thick stone walls stood alone, cannon on the walls facing three directions. The Union Jack drooped in the heat from a flagpole on the west tower. Matthew studied the walls for half a minute; nothing moved.
He gave a hand signal and turned directly north and picked his way through the growth to the edge of the sandy beach, and his detail paused at the tree line to wait and watch and listen. The only sound was the birds and the wind and light surf. Matthew rose and walked boldly onto the beach, not stopping until he reached the water. There was no sign in the sand that two hundred thirty-five men had marched past, and Matthew looked east, searching, but there was nothing. He led his men back to the tree line and they hunkered down, eyes east, probing, wondering.
“There!” One of the seamen stood and pointed, excited.
Nicholas was leading, the marines and seamen following in rank and file. Nicholas waved lustily, and Matthew held his men in the trees until Nicholas arrived.
“Report,” Nicholas said.
“No ambush, sir. Fort Montague is due west about five hundred yards. We saw nothing moving.”
“Good work.” Nicholas shaded his eyes to look at the westering sun, then pulled out his pocket watch. “We might get this finished before nightfall.” He called the officers around him. “You know the plan. Break into your groups now and follow me. I’ll position you, and then call to them and hope they parley.”
They divided into fifteen groups of fifteen men, and the assigned officers took command. Nicholas led them into the heavy growth and moved west until they were with
in one hundred yards of Fort Montague, not visible in the trees and underbrush. He gave silent hand signals and the first group stopped. Nicholas turned due south and the remaining groups followed, and he paced off five long paces and signaled to the second group. They stopped, and the others followed as he continued west, dropping off a group every ten paces until the groups were in a straight line facing the east wall of the old fort.
Nicholas remained in the trees long enough to study the structure and the one hundred yards of fairly open ground that lay between the fort and his men, and then he took a great breath and exhaled it and stepped out into the open. “Hello, Fort Montague,” he bellowed.
Three cannon on the top of the wall blasted, and the balls whistled harmlessly thirty feet over the heads of Nicholas’s line and tore into the trees.
Nicholas instantly shouted, “Fire!” and two hundred and twenty-five muskets cracked. The .60-caliber lead balls knocked moss and stone chips from the top of the wall and left a dense cloud of white smoke hanging in a line one hundred yards long in the trees.
A head cautiously appeared above the wall, saw the long cloud of gun smoke, and then instantly disappeared.
“Reload!” Nicholas bawled.
A white flag tied to a musket bayonet was thrust above the wall and waved back and forth.
“Are you surrendering?” Nicholas called.
“Parley,” a high-pitched voice answered.
“We will parley with you here,” Nicholas shouted.
Five minutes later a heavy gate in the wall of the fort opened, and three natives in full uniform walked out under a white flag.
“Over here,” Nicholas ordered, and they came. “You want to parley,” he said sternly. “Make your statement.”
“Sir, what is your purpose in being here?”
“We stated our purpose to the officer you sent to meet us. He said you would not resist, but you fired cannon at us.”
“We did not fire at you. We fired over your heads to warn you to stop.”
“We were stopped before you fired. I stood in the open and challenged you. You did not answer me. You fired.”
The officer swallowed. “We did not mean to alarm you.”