A few days later, Captain Doudel discovered that the redoubtable Timothy Murphy had never officially joined his company, and he made haste to correct the oversight.
Shep Laird had the company book laid out. "Sign right here, Tim. Your pay will start back when you joined on at Reading."
Tim leaned on his longrifle, "Not quite yet, Shep. I'm still looking around."
Irritated, the sergeant said, "Damn it, Tim, nobody else will give back pay, and you should have signed with a company when you took the oath at Fort Augusta."
Tim nodded, "You're right about the pay, and I appreciate it, especially since I wasn't at Augusta and have never signed or taken the oath."
"What? How in hell . . ."
Tim shrugged, "Nobody seemed interested, so I didn't mention it."
"Well, you drew supplies at Reading so . . ."
"Not me, Shep. I've carried my own and ate what I killed."
Shep Laird slid back on his bench to reconsider. He licked his lips a few times and Tim waited.
"My God, the captain will be fit to be tied. He's been talking about how he's got the two best riflemen in the army, and here one of 'em isn't even signed."
He shoved his inkwell forward. "You got to sign, Tim. Captain Doudel will scalp me."
Tim laughed, "Pass the blame, Shep. That always works.
"Tell you what, so far this looks like the best company. Once the others are in I'll decide."
"Hell, Murph, you saw 'em at Reading. About as disciplined as a chicken flock. They won't have gotten much better."
"I don't mean them, Shep. There's Virginians coming, and I heard good things about a company under Dan Morgan."
"I know Dan Morgan. He's out of Winchester area. Good enough man, I suppose. Don’t know what kind of company he'll run."
"Well, I'll take a look, then decide."
"Don't know why you're bein' so particular. Here you're knowed. With Virginians? Hell, they don't even like Pennsylvanians."
No one knew when the Virginians would appear, but there was already warring going on. British cannon shelled sporadically and occasional sorties dashed from British lines, but the Continental noose tightened around the besieged garrison.
The British regulars fumed and took casualties, but found no acceptable answer to the constant sniping and rare and inaccurate Continental cannon fire.
What could be done? To attack the rabble nipping at them was to shovel air. The attackers fled before contact could be made. Like gnats, they were back when the attack stalled. Burn a few towns? A nettlesome solution. There was no cavalry available, and unless the flanks of marching columns were properly protected, the pestiferous rebels lay in hiding while shooting promiscuously into the passing files.
Worst were the riflemen whose long shooting made even normal military rounds and inspections hazardous. Although his name was not known, Tim Murphy was the worst of them.
Tim roamed the first few days. He was not alone. Most of Washington's army seemed to be puttering about improving shelters, hunting firewood, or hobnobbing with locals. Frontier riflemen were new to the Bay Colony, and Murphy repeatedly showed his gun to admiring citizens.
Other riflemen were also intrigued by Tim's double rifle. Few had even seen a swivel barrel.
"Handsome idea, Murphy. In war a second barrel could make one company into two. Imagine the shock of a unit taking a company's fire before coming on with the bayonet, only to find the enemy's still loaded. Wonder why the military don't use 'em."
"'Cause they're too slow to load and won't hold a bayonet." Another voiced his opinion.
"Hogwash! When it comes time, a plug bayonet could be instantly shoved into the lower barrel."
A self-informed rifleman explained, "Two barreled rifles ain't accurate. Not much better'n a musket, I been told."
Tim said, "Mine shoots pretty decent."
"Well, we could set up a shingle and compare yours to my single gun if you've got a coin to lose on it."
Tim laughed, "Not today. Good shooter like you might make me look bad. Later on maybe."
"Anytime. It'll be a cold day in hell when a good single won't whip a double rifle."
Another said, "Man must be right. I don't see any others around. Too bad, seemed like a good idea."
Tim did his shooting at the British.
The Continental's twisty trenching and crude barricades lay three hundred and more yards beyond British redoubts and blockades. Tim approached a likely looking position with open fields falling away before it. Occasional rifle reports came from a trio of half-drunken riflemen sharing a small jug and occasionally touching trigger in the British direction.
Tim peered cautiously around a log obstacle but saw no obvious targets.
One shooter laughed hoarsely, "Hell, there's nothin' out there to hit. We just let off a shot now and again to keep 'em honest. Kind of let 'em know we're a'watching."
Another said, "They don't venture out, and it's way too far from here to hit anyway."
Tim asked, "Anybody tried weaseling out and picking them off from closer in?"
Scornfully, "A'course that's been tried. Problem is, see all that tore up ground out there? Redcoats've got cannon laid so's they know just how to aim to hit any spot. They load with grape shot. Bein' exposed to grape is about like layin' into the muzzle of a giant shotgun. Blew one of our boys into tatters. Nobody's tried since."
Tim asked, "How far is it over there?"
"Don't know exactly. Ain't had a chance to pace it off." Tittering ensued. "Seven, eight hundred yards, maybe."
Tim thought under four hundred. Still, too far to just start shooting. But, there might be a way.
A rifleman shook the jug. "Just about gone." He studied Tim expectantly. "Seein' you've just come up, maybe you'd be willin' to hold this position for a bit while we scout up another jug. Hell, we won't be gone more'n an hour."
Tim judged he was willing to do that.
"If’n your short o'powder or ball you don't have to shoot. We do 'cause it gets hellacious boring just squattin' here all day."
"I'll stay for an hour or so. If you don't come back the British can have the post."
One laughed, "Hell, let 'em have it. We've been here too long anyway, place stinks to high heaven."
Alone, Tim worked at his idea. The trick would be to decide on a spot where a Redcoat might appear, then shoot carefully, adjusting each shot until you knew just how to hold to put a ball exactly where you wanted it. Then you would wait until a Redcoat stood there. With luck you could get him.
When the riflemen wandered in with their new jug, Murphy was lying on his back with his feet toward the enemy, comfortably propped, his rifle leveled in a forked stick driven into the ground. He appeared to be watching the British lines through a small opening in the parapet.
"Hell, you don't have to watch all the time. Anybody comes out you'll have to wait till he gets close enough anyway."
Another said, "I seen a fella shoot on his back like that once. Man could hit way out."
Tim said, "You know that dip in the log wall they've got thrown up? I'm waiting for someone to show right there."
"Hell, gettin' someone to look out ain't hard. If we start showin' ourselves they always start lookin, just like we do at them."
"Too far to hit though. You'll just waste powder."
"Likely, but I'll try anyway."
"Fair enough, I'll dance a jig for 'em. You shoot one." The man mounted their parapet and walked around.
A friend said, "Hope they haven't got one of them cannon trained on us."
"Probably do, but they won't waste a charge on one man unless he's causin' trouble . . . I think."
A head showed, then a second. Tim was fining his shot when both disappeared. Then another took their place.
"Hell, you got an officer. He's lookin' at me through some kind of glass." The rifleman waved at the British lines.
His blade sight more than covering the distant silhouette, Tim stroked his t
rigger. The pan flashed, he held, and the butt plate slugged his shoulder. Powder smoke hid the target, but Tim was already rolling aside to blow through his barrel making sure no burning residue remained to prematurely explode if he had to reload hastily.
"By the great gods, you got him!" The rifleman atop their logs danced in excitement. "Hit him dead on it looked like. Spy glass went flyin' and he fell out from under his hat." The voice grew wondrous. "That's the damndest shot I ever seen."
His friends hauled the enthusiast into cover. "Stay down, they're probably levering cannon around to even the score."
The partly sobered trio wished to shake on the shot. They extended work hardened hands, gave names, and told their places. Pennsylvania men, of course. So far, all the riflemen were.
"I'm Tim Murphy. Came in with Doudel's Company. I'm from just above the Juniata, about a day's walk."
"Don't know that country, but if you can all shoot like that, General Washington will want every last one of you."
"Tim Murphy, hey? Well, Murphy, you can shoot from my position any time. Damnedest most bodacious shot I ever seen."
Tim was gratified. He did not describe the four ranging shots he had used getting onto the target. To shoot like that you had to know where to hold, and you had to load exactly the same each time, you also had to swab your barrel clean between shots so that each loading and holding was one hundred percent like the one before it. Even then, luck played a part. Wind could act up or a head could move while the bullet was on its way.
Suddenly Tim realized he had just killed a man, his first human being. A man, probably with hopes and dreams much like his own. A man doing his duty for his country, just as he was.
This was not a small thing, but violent death was a constant companion on the frontier. He had seen Caraway kill, all those long years back, and now he had done it. But, what else could he, Tim Murphy, do?
Was he instantly different, altered somehow deep inside? Did God, this very moment, judge him as right or wrong? Was he damned because he hit where another tried but missed? That did not seem right. Big questions that probably no one fully answered.
Tim pumped his lungs a few times shedding the badness because he could expect to do it again and again. He found he did not feel all that disturbed. Perhaps the dead, or badly wounded, officer had been too distant to feel personal about. Of course he did not feel like screaming his long practiced scalping cry either.
Tim wondered if he ever would.
Chapter 17
Cambridge
By the first of August when the remainder of the Pennsylvania Battalion arrived, Tim Murphy had seen most of what the siege of Boston had to offer.
It was a strange kind of war. Ill-disciplined riflemen cavorted and fought each other mindlessly. They awed local citizenry with their accuracy out to two hundred yards—three times a musket's certain hit range, and on occasion they killed Redcoats.
Nearly all of the British casualties were due to Pennsylvania longrifles, but the unruly frontiersmen were also a thorn in Patriot sides. The riflemen performed no formal guard or camp duties, and their interminable whooping, drunken fighting, and target shooting stung disciplined senses.
For the most part, Tim Murphy stayed out of it. He chose to shoot each day; it was what he had come for. If the point was to kill British until they gave up or sailed away, he could contribute. A man a day. A throat choking quota, but Tim made it his goal. Often, that meant only a single careful shot, but on other occasions he worked at getting sighted in before his rifle spoke in earnest. Murphy with his rifle and forked stick rest became a recognized figure.
"Hey, there goes, Tim Murphy. He took a Redcoat at 1000 yards just yesterday, seen it myself."
"Heard he nailed two with one ball over toward the river. Waited till they got lined up and plugged 'em solid."
"Do tell! Reckon you heard about the ricochet shot he made in front of the crossroad post? Well, I got it from a friend who was there. Redcoats had a man shootin' back with one o'them German hunting rifles. His bullets were buzzin' close, but he was tucked back in, and nobody could get a ball into him. Old Tim, he lays down, measures a while, then bounces a ball off a cannon alongside the redcoat. Stings the man so he jumps a little. Instant he shows, Murphy kills him with his second barrel. The German gun fell into view, and our boys shot it into junk."
"That's Murphy for you."
Most of the stories were pure make up, but getting known spared Tim hunting provisions. Riflemen called out inviting him to eat with them. He did, listening to their yarning, spinning a tale or two of his own, and judging the outfit's worth.
They were all wild clutches of uneducated, dirty, profane, disorganized frontiersmen. Compared to musket-armed line infantry they were deadly marksmen, and some Tim had to admit could shoot with the best.
His own Pennsylvania Battalion proved no better. Discipline was abjectly slack. New packs and blankets issued at Reading were already torn and filthy. The entire band seemed on some kind of extended lark with defeat of the British far down the interest line. Tim could find no company to which he wished to attach himself. The war could move beyond Boston, and real fighting could take place. Signed on, he would be committed to standing with his company. Not with this rabble, Tim decided.
Dan Morgan's Virginians came on August the fifth. They strode in, strong, organized, and silently ready. The company was uniformed in linsey hunting shirts, and slouch hats, with leather hunting bags, hunting knives, and decorated powder horns. Long handled tomahawks with flat-ended polls were carried by most. As much camp axe as weapon, the hatchets appeared clean and sharpened.
Tim learned that Morgan's riflemen had marched 650 miles in twenty-one days. Thirty miles a day! Tim Murphy was impressed. This, he thought, might be the company he had hoped for. There was no rush. Others would appear. Until the war took a different turn, Tim could wait.
Captain Michael Cresap's frontiersmen whooped in wearing war paint. Murphy observed with quiet amusement. Few whites knew the meanings of painted designs or how to apply them. Tim doubted any of the unruly crowd had encountered war painted tribesmen.
With more frontier riflemen adding to the unruly hubbub, Tim waited for the essential training and disciplining to begin. It was not forthcoming. Captain Doudel's company seemed to be holding its own thanks to the Captain's and Sergeant Laird's steadying hands. Morgan's ninety-six men stayed to themselves and further strengthened Murphy's appreciation of how a company should be. After a week of watching, Tim decided he had waited long enough.
He chose a bright morning. Morgan sat on his campstool before a puncheon table engrossed in paper, undoubtedly reports. The reports probably concerned the almost mutinous acts on Prospect Hill where General Washington had used five hundred or so line infantry to quell riflemen's objections to the arrest of some of their sergeants. Tim had been far from that scene as, he suspected, had Dan Morgan's men. There could be repercussions from the incident, including the long awaited disciplining of the fractious rifle companies. It was time Tim Murphy settled in.
Tim waited politely, leaning at ease on his rifle. The double rifle was not as long as many, but its muzzles still came to their owner's chin. Here, clearly stood a rifleman.
A sergeant looked up, frowned, and asked, "Anything we can do?"
"I would like a word with Captain Morgan, if it is convenient."
An uneducated man who had difficulty with writing, Daniel Morgan caught the speaker's schooled English. He answered shortly, "I'm Dan Morgan, what is it you need?"
"I'm Tim Murphy, Captain, from up on the Susquehanna. I would like to join your company."
Morgan's and the sergeant's eyes studied him. Tim felt obliged to say more. "I'm a good shot, Captain, and I was raised by the Huron, so I know the woods."
The sergeant asked, "Who you with now?"
"Haven't signed on. Wanted to choose the right company. Came in with Captain Doudel's outfit a month or so back."
"You know She
p Laird?"
"Shot against him a few times, consider him a friend."
"How'd the shootin' go?"
"About even, I'd say."
The sergeant froze his look. Then he said disdainfully, "Sure it did." Tim saw his head shake to the captain.
Morgan said, "Sorry, Murphy, this is a Virginia company. Can't use you."
Stung, Tim turned away. Rejection had not entered his thoughts. He heard the sergeant say, "Shep Laird's the best rifle shot I ever seen. No two-barrel shooter'll match him. A man shouldn't make false claims."
Tim considered laying it out for the snotty sergeant, but what for? To get into an outfit where he wasn't wanted?
Not for the first time Tim wondered why he was wasting his time with the war. He had received one letter from Dancer and all had been well, but by now? Tim expected nothing had changed at home, but what was he accomplishing here? Well, he would give it a little, but only a little, longer. A man a day? God!
The captains rode their horses along the Continental lines. Not much to see, but it was important to show the men they were interested.
A rifleman said, "Howdy, Captain Morgan, Captain Doudel, Captain Hendricks. Not much doin' these days. Hope some real fightin' starts soon. This standin' guard can get mighty boring."
The informality, common to the rifle companies could grind line officers. Morgan and the others with him were used to it.
Dan Morgan asked, "Any sorties come across here?"
"Nope, they've never tried, but they've got a cannon laid on the open ground, so we don't try either. Hard to get a head to show since Tim Murphy dropped their officer."
Sergeant Shep Laird laughed, "Murphy's been here, too? Hell, he's been rangin' these lines like a hunting hound."
Morgan's sergeant felt the twinge of error. "You know Murphy, Shep?"
"Do. Best damned rifle shot in the whole damned world, bar none!"
The captains were listening, so Laird poured it on.
"Hell, Murphy fed our company getting here almost by his lonesome. We ate rich off his huntin', but long range is where Tim shines. Just raises up or lies down, dependin', lets fly and hits dead on. Man's uncanny. Top o'that, he does it with a swivel rifle."
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