by Jay Worrall
He pushed them into his belt. “Stay close by me, please,” he said.
A loud, screeching protest of stressed timbers and cables came from beneath his feet. Cassandra slowed precipitously, her bow riding up on the obstacle. Charles clutched at a foremast shroud to keep from falling. She seemed to hang, frozen, the downward force on the cable pulling the ships closer. An unearthly rending sounded, then a snap as loud as a musket. Cassandra’s beak settled back toward the sea, the remainder of her diminished momentum pushing toward Raisonnable’s bow. His own starboard cathead and anchor smashed against the seventy-four’s sideboards in a grinding crash and carried away.
Charles drew his sword and flourished it in the air. “Boarders away!” he yelled at the top of his lungs. He jumped onto the breeching of a six-pounder cannon, then to the top of the hammock netting. The rail for Raisonnable's beak came within grasp and he heaved himself up. The space was clear; he had caught the French unprepared, rushing to man her guns. He suspected it wouldn’t be clear for very long. Already, others of his men were clambering up behind him.
Charles jumped for the ladderway to the forecastle and ran upward. Immediately two men confronted him from beside a nearby cannon. One held the gun’s rammer, which he thrust forward in defense. Charles grabbed the object in his left hand and slashed down with the sword in his right. The blade bit into the seaman’s shoulder, slicing muscle and shattering bone. The second, in a lieutenant’s uniform, screamed out a warning, drawing his own blade. Charles thrust, the lieutenant parried expertly and jumped back. Other English, shouting insanely, rushed up onto the deck with cutlasses and pikes. The French officer looked around him wide-eyed, hesitating, his guard momentarily lowered. Charles lunged for the man’s middle before he could recover, pushed the sword point into soft belly and wrenched it free as the man fell. English seamen and marines swept past. The air filled with cries and shouts in two languages; muskets fired; steel rang on steel. He saw Augustus close beside him and the blue coats of Bevan and Winchester among the seamen a short way ahead. Raisonnable's forecastle was almost won in the initial rush. His own men continued across onto the beak, and up the ladderway. He noted that the French cannon had fallen silent.
Charles started forward, looking for an opening in the mass of men. Cries of "Repell l' anglais!" reached him above the din of battle. A loud, "Horra!" sounded. He saw scores, if not hundreds of French pouring up from Raisonnable's gundecks, surging toward the ladderways. Overwhelmed by the sheer weight of numbers, the line in front of him faltered. Step by step, his men fell back, yielding precious space only recently won.
Charles threw himself toward a knot of British, nearly surrounded by French seamen, slashing and hacking with his sword. Two men fell; a third came at him inside the arc of his blade with a cutlass. They locked swords, chest to chest, wrestling and pushing in a struggle for space to swing their weapons. Augustus wrenched the man off and threw him over the side. Still the hoard of French advanced across the forecastle in overwhelming numbers. All coherence to the battle evaporated into a general melee of isolated islands of English in a sea of the enemy. The decks became slippery with blood, the footing treacherous with fallen bodies and discarded weapons.
Charles knew that he must regroup his men. A Frenchman lunged forward with an outthrust pike. He jumped to the side to avoid the strike, pulled a pistol and fired, then used its butt to smash the face of another. “Fall back! Fall back!” he shouted in desperation. He doubted the words could be heard over the uproar; there was nowhere to fall back to.
“HUZZAH!” A loud cry bellowed out from somewhere close by. Charles saw the broken stub of a ship’s mast just beyond the starboard rail. Men swarmed over, rushing at the defenders. The tide turned again. Dozens, scores, uncountable numbers of Leopard’s seamen came across, beating down the French. Those of Raisonnable’s men still on the forecastle retreated toward the ladderways, dropping weapons in their haste, or raising their hands in surrender.
Charles gasped in lungsful of air to catch his breath. His heart hammered. He knew himself to be nearly spent. The resistance stiffened in the gundeck below and along the gangways where the French retreated grudgingly toward the quarterdeck. Augustus stood beside him, his face twisted in pain. One hand clutched his arm; blood seeped between its fingers.
“Is it serious?” Charles said.
Augustus shook his head.
“Let me see,”
The hand moved. Charles saw a deep slash across the bicep. He reached into his pocket for a handkerchief. “Hold this over it,” he said. “Go back to Cassandra and have Owens tend to it.”
Augustus shook his head again. “I follow.”
“No. Go back,” Charles said. There was no time to argue. He turned and started aft to the gangway. He guessed that the numbers of English and French were about equal. Whoever controlled the quarterdeck would control the ship. He needed only a final effort from his flagging body. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed the form of a French seaman lying on his back amid the carnage, his eyes unfocused in death. Then he saw that the man had fallen on his stomach, his head twisted grotesquely backwards. He found this curious; it reminded him of something..., what? He cast the thought away.
A tightly packed group of Frenchmen ahead held off a smaller number of attackers. Charles saw Bevan in their midst. Beyond he could see Raisonnable's captain, near the wheel, with a number of others. A small collection of exhausted English seamen leaned heavily against the bulwarks or sat on the deck. All were bloodied from injuries. He recognized Sherburne and Roberts from Cassandra and two of the marines. “Come with me,” he ordered. “One last push and it will be over.”
Almost to his surprise, a half-dozen men rose and straightened. Sherburne grinned, wiping at a wound to his forehead. “Do ye promise?” he said.
Charles grinned back. “We’ll soon know, won’t we?” He moved toward the seething struggle on spent legs, into the crowd of men, pushing, heaving to get through. He saw Augustus’s bulk beside him. The line bowed, broke into individual skirmishes. More French came from somewhere, the result of shouted orders from their captain to stem the breech. A cheer went up from the far side of the deck. A space cleared in front of him and Charles saw new figures climbing over the side rail onto the deck. His fogged mind told him they must be Daedalus’s crew, finally arrived on Cassandra’s boats. He moved unmolested toward Raisonnable's commander, a white-haired man standing rigidly erect beside several of his younger midshipmen. The French captain eyed him warily.
"Vous rendez, s'il vous plait?" Charles said. “Will you surrender?”
The man nodded somberly. “Yes, I will strike,” he said. "Arrete!" he ordered sharply. "Arrete, c'est fini." He gestured to one of the midshipmen, who went to the mainmast and lowered the French flag.
It ended. Shouts for surrender echoed up and down the decks. The fighting trailed away to isolated knots of men too absorbed to hear the commands. Out of the corner of his eye, Charles noticed a group near the ladderway still grappling with each other. He went to stop it. As he neared, he saw that one of his seamen—he recognized him as the harelip Roberts—had taken the unusual tactic of circling around behind an otherwise occupied opponent, grabbing his head in an arm lock and twisting viciously. An irrational glee showed in his expression.
“Stop that,” Charles rasped at them. “Stand down, all of you.” The other English relaxed, realizing that he battle had been won. Roberts stared wide-eyed at Charles, uncomprehending. A French seaman, his head still in Robert’s grip, jerked himself free and flashed a knife upward into his assailant’s belly.
“Enough!” Charles shouted. He raised the tip of the sword and touched it to the French seaman’s neck. “Step back,” he growled. It was in English, but the man understood. To the others, he said, “Disarm them; the thing is done.” He looked at Roberts’s writhing body on the deck boards, blood bubbling at his mouth. The wound was surely fatal. At least, Charles reflected, he knew who had killed Stimson all
those months past. The why of it he would never know.
Winchester and Bevan stood together on Raisonnable’s quarterdeck, with a growing number of others. Admiral Blankett, with the still perfectly attired and unruffled Lieutenant Danforth, had arrived to receive the French captain’s sword. Charles saw Mr. Gladfridus Underwood standing alone near the far rail, between two eight-pounder cannon. The two men’s eyes met. Charles started toward him.
“Captain Edgemont,” Blankett said, noticing Charles’ approach. “It seems I owe you . . .”
“Come with me, please,” Charles said as he passed. He focused on the British representative for Mocha. “Mr. Underwood, I arrest you in the name of the king.”
“On what charge?” Underwood replied. He stepped backward against the rail and looked to the admiral. “This is absurd. I have been held prisoner on board against my will. This fool doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
“On the charge of treason against your country and providing aid to her enemies,” Charles said. “I can prove it, as you know well.”
Underwood reached beneath a fold in his shirt. His hand came out with a pistol, already cocked.
A shot rang out, deafening, just behind Charles’ ear. Underwood stared sightlessly, a red dot the size of a farthing coin on his forehead. The body fell backward against the rail and sagged to the deck. Charles turned. Constance stood with a still smoking gun in her hand. “Damn, I wanted to use my knife,” she said.
THE END .
AFTERWORD.
In the weeks following the Battle of Mocha Roads, 22 August, 1799, the British squadron guarding the exit to the Red Sea was broken up. Cassandra and Leopard remained at anchor off the harbor with their prize until rejoined by Hotspur, Fox and Hellebore, who had been sent north to bombard Koessir on Underwood’s “intelligence” that the French invasion fleet was harbored there. Daedalus was declared irreparable, her officers and ratings distributed to make up for other ships’ losses and the remainder transferred into Raisonnable to serve as her prize crew. Admiral Blankett assumed a forgiving attitude toward the independence occasionally exercised by Captain Charles Edgemont—the more so after the duplicitous role played by Mr. Gladfridus Underwood was fully explained to him—and overrode Captain Bland’s repeated demands for a court martial.
In early September, Leopard, Fox and Raisonnable sailed for Bombay, Hotspur, Cassandra, and Hellebore to return to England. In mid-November, the three reached Cape Town, where crews were given leave ashore and their stores replenished. Edgemont had his jollyboat lowered into the water to call on the port admiral almost before Cassandra’s anchor found the harbor bottom. “Captain Edgemont to see Admiral Cobbham,” he said to the first clerk he saw.
“I’m sorry, sir,” the clerk answered. “The admiral has gone to his residence for his dinner. Do you wish me to send a messenger?”
“No, thank you. Have you any mail waiting to be called for by the frigate Cassandra?”
“Yes, I believe we do. Quite a bit of it. Just a moment and I’ll see what I can find.” The clerk returned a moment later with a canvas sack, rounded at the bottom from the bulk of its contents.
Edgemont took the bundle. “May I?” he said and, without waiting for a reply, emptied the contents onto a table. He shuffled impatiently thorough the jumble of envelopes, setting a number aside. Most of it proved to be for Lieutenant Winchester, addressed in Edgemont’s sister’s hand. There were nine addressed to himself, in a precise script from, “Mrs. Charles Edgemont, Tattenall, Cheshire.” The most recent carried the date, Twelfth Day, Ninth Month, 1799. The captain tore it open, his eyes running down the lines until he found what he wanted.
“. . . young Charlie has tested his first strained vegetables and was not immediately pleased by this addition to his normal diet. He reminds me of thee in many ways and shares thy space in the closest part of my heart.”
Captain Edgemont refolded the page and replaced it in its envelope. He put the letters from his wife into his jacket pocket and the remainder back into the bag. “Thank you kindly,” he said to the clerk, choking on the words.
*****.
General Napoleon Bonaparte, who had pinned his career on the emancipation of British India, secretly abandoned his army in Egypt. He departed Alexandria on the frigate Muiron, in the dead of night on the same day he learned of the destruction of the flotilla of transports at the port of Massawa. Fearing that he would be imprisoned by the Directory in Paris on his return for the failure of his greater mission, he was instead greeted by frenzied crowds at Frejus on the ninth of October 1799, as the conqueror of Egypt. The leading French political factions vied for his endorsement. Never one to miss an opportunity, he had established himself as effective dictator of his country before the year was out.
Great Britain’s war with revolutionary France, already seven years in duration, would soon come to an end. The Napoleonic Wars had only just begun.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
The reader is reminded that this is a work of fiction, and the author has taken certain liberties. In particular, my conscience nags at the treatment afforded Rear Admiral Sir John Blankett. The actual Admiral Blankett was in fact dispatched to the foot of the Red Sea by the Admiralty to forestall any French intention to descend on India. His squadron was very much as described, although most historians have omitted Hellebore and Cassandra from the list for reasons I do not fully understand. Despite what my children will tell you, I have never personally met the admiral, nor have I corresponded with him. The character attributed is perforce a product of my imagination. He does, however, seem to have been less than aggressive in the performance of his military duties during this period, preferring commercial and diplomatic activities on shore. He died not far from Mocha from natural causes during a subsequent expedition into the Red Sea two years later.
–Jay Worrall–
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JAY WORRALL
Jay Worrall was born in Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, DC, in the middle of World War II. Raised as a Quaker and in a military family he grew up in a variety of places around the world, living in six countries on four continents. He speaks English, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Vietnamese with varying degrees of fluency. At Earlham College, a Quaker school in Indiana, he received a BA with a major in Physics, and later an MA and ABD in Anthropology from the University of Virginia. He also studied at the University of London in England. As a pacifist and conscientious objector during the Viet Nam War he worked for two years in refugee camps in the Central Highlands of that country. Afterward he taught English in Japan.
Jay worked for many years in the area of social science research in and around Washington, DC, eventually specializing in developing innovative and humane prison programs, policies and administration. He has also managed his own construction company as well collaborative programs on Soviet-American literature and Chinese-American business relations. Most recently he worked for a major Quaker organization in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as director of historical interpretation. His principal lifelong interest, both from an academic perspective and personal experience, has been the intersection of history and technology and their influence on the values, social systems and daily lives of ordinary people across time.
Jay’s first two efforts at historical fiction—Sails on the Horizon and Any Approaching Enemy—were published by Random House in 2005 and 2006. Set during the Napoleonic Wars they follow the life of Royal Navy Captain Charles Edgemont and his Quaker wife, Penelope Brown Edgemont. The series focuses on the adventures of Charles (and sometimes Penny) during the long conflict, but also explores the tensions between the two and their very different attitudes about war. Jay is very pleased to have the third volume in this series, A Sea Unto Itself, published by Fireship Press. He currently lives and writes in Downingtown, Pennsylvania, not far from Philadelphia, is married and the very proud father of five grown children and seven grandchildren.
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Table of Contents
A Sea Unto Itself
Contents
Forward
A Note on Measurements
Chapter One: 5 January 1799.
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Afterword.
Author’s Note.
About The Author
If You Enjoyed This Book.
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