The Invasion Year

by Dewey Lambdin

  “Swab out! Slow and steady does it, lads!” Merriman directed. “Overhaul recoil tackle, overhaul run-out tackle. Load cartridge!”

  The smoke-bank was drifting shoreward rapidly, thinning and rising as it went on a fair breeze, allowing Lewrie and Lt. Spendlove on the quarterdeck to lift their telescopes and survey the initial results. There were shot splashes near the invasion vessels, but so far they saw no evidence of hits; that would be far too much to hope for from the very first shots. It would take several more broadsides ’til the gun-captains honed their aims, and perhaps a couple of hours more of slow and steady hammering to inflict substantial damage.

  “Not too bad for first broadsides, sir,” Lt. Spendlove said optimistically. “Mostly short, but in line with their chosen marks.”

  “Excuse me, sir?” Midshipman Warburton intruded. “What duties might you assign me, sir, now that Captain Speaks took my place?”

  “What?” Lewrie gawped. “What the Devil are ye doin’ here, Mister Warburton? Took your place?” he spluttered.

  “At the last moment, sir,” Mr. Warburton explained, looking miserable to be deprived his shot at danger and glory. “He said that you had allowed him, that they were his torpedoes, and—”

  “Mine arse on a band-box!” Lewrie exclaimed, just shy of an outraged screech. “I’d’ve never.…”

  Well, maybe I would’ve, he told himself; if only t’get rid of the bastard for an hour or so. God rot him, he gets killed? Fine!

  “Assist Mister Merriman on the guns, Mister Warburton, and I’m truly sorry your chance was stolen,” he told the deeply disappointed sixteen-year-old.

  “Aye aye, sir,” Warburton said, doffing his hat and dashing.

  “By threes … fire!” Merriman roared again, as did the guns a moment later.

  “The French have opened upon us, sir,” Lt. Spendlove pointed out. “Enter that, and the time, in the Sailing Master’s journal, Mister Rossyngton.”

  Dusk was rapidly turning towards full dark as the return fire from dozens, perhaps an hundred shore guns, sparkled all along the low shore, the overlooks, and the fortifications. The first-class prames, the largest French gunboats anchored in the entrance channel, erupted in gouts of smoke and daggers of flame, too, though they showed little sign that they would sortie; they remained at anchor.

  “Oh, I say!” Mr. Caldwell declared, jerking an arm towards the great flashes and volcanic explosions from the bomb vessels. Thirteen-inch-diametre mortar shells soared aloft in great arcs, their burning, sputtering conical fuses making pyrotechnic trails cross the darkening sky, some of them incendiaries that seethed like shooting stars. When they reached their apogees, they seemed to pause for an instant, before dashing down and regaining their initial speed to crash into the waters of the inner harbour and burst with loud blasts.

  “Impressive,” Lt. Spendlove commented, though he shook his head in worry. “One would hope they aim well, and don’t land in the town, though, sir.”

  “Oh, look at that!” the Sailing Master declared again as a wave of Congreve rockets whooshed skyward. “Talk about your royal firework shows, hah! Now, those are truly awe-inspiring!”

  Oooh! Aaah! Lewrie thought, snickering, though such a fiery display was worthy of his awe. For a moment.

  The rockets dashed upwards, long yellow tongues of flame trailing them, almost bright enough to espy the long bamboo poles to which the bodies and explosive charges were affixed to steady them like arrow shafts and fletchings … or, should have.

  One swerved straight upwards as if trying to spear the moon; yet another swooped up, then back towards the launching ship in a circular arc. A couple more levelled off prematurely and darted shoreward nigh at sea-level, wheeling left or right like lost sparrows … prettily flaming sparrows! Some waddled up and down before diving into the sea far short of the breakwaters, and one perversely wheeled to the right just after launch and looked determined to crash into Reliant, growing bigger and brighter and closer before exploding in a shower of stars a half-mile short!

  “Well, hmm,” Mr. Caldwell said, mightily disappointed.

  “Need some work,” Lewrie said, relaxing his tense dread and letting out a whoosh of relieved breath, “even if they aimed at us!”

  “As you bear, by threes … fire!” Lt. Merriman shouted again, and Reliant was shoved a few inches to larboard by the brute force of recoil. Amid the bellowing of their frigate’s guns came the howling-humming of French shot as they passed overhead or wide of the bow and stern. Lewrie lifted his telescope to look over the shore batteries, fearing that neither side had much of a chance for accurate fire, and that it was all futile. Lord Keith had ordered them to anchor at the extreme edge of the French guns’ maximum range, and even with quoins full out and the barrels of the squadron elevated almost to the safe limit for a naval gun which was fired at low elevation and very close range—they weren’t howitzers, after all, designed to loft shot over fortress walls!—even Monarch’s lower-deck 32-pounders stood little chance of reaching that far, either. The French might even have the advantage over them, for the fortress guns, and the batteries mounted on the overlooks, stood higher above sea-level and could elevate safely to give them the required reach. And they had howitzers! Flame-shot smoke burst from batteries to either side of the breakwaters, the flat booming coming seconds later, and the shot they fired lifted high into the night, burning fuses tracing arcs as the shells came darting downwards, the thin wail-hiss of their passage through the air rising in volume and tone like an opera diva trilling for a higher note before they burst prematurely due to too-short cone fuses, or plunged into the sea and exploded in great whitish gouts of spray.

  Another shoal of Congreve rockets soared shoreward in reply to the French artillery, the slower-firing mortars of the bomb vessels belched out another salvo, and the night sky was criss-crossed by opposing streaks of fire. Explosive shells burst near the British ships, and over the French batteries, inside the harbour beyond the sheltering breakwaters … some reaching as far as the town-side warehouses and piers!

  “They must see that they’re shelling the town!” Lt. Spendlove fumed, quite out of character and the cold-bloodedness demanded from a Navy officer. “We must not do that! It’s not Christian, sir!”

  “It’s as narrow as a razor’s edge at this range, sir,” Lewrie told him, shouting a bit over the continual din. “Strike short, hit the anchored ships, or the piers and the town, if you’re over.”

  “Deck, there!” a lookout at the mast-head called down in a thin screech. “There’s French launches comin’ out!”

  That changed the subject quickly as Lewrie, Spendlove, and the Sailing Master lifted their glasses to spot the enemy launches. They were under oars, as big as admirals’ barges, and mounted cannon fore and aft. They weren’t coming far, Lewrie noted, only two or three hundred yards beyond the rows of vessels anchored outside the breakwaters, but when the boats went in with the torpedoes in tow, they would prove dangerous.

  “Mister Rossyngton, my compliments to Mister Merriman, and he’s to shift his fire onto the launches closer to us,” Lewrie ordered.

  “Aye, sir!” the Midshipman snapped crisply, dashing forward for the waist.

  Reliant’s guns fell silent for a moment as the aim was shifted. The smoke thinned, and Lewrie peered hard down the long line of barges outside the breakwater, looking intently for any sign of damage they might have inflicted, but spent powder smoke from the French batteries cloaked them, and the night was too dark, only fitfully and briefly illuminated by the passage of flaming carcase shells or rockets. He slammed the tubes of his telescope compact, shaking his head in mounting anger over how useless the assault seemed, so far. By the faint candlelight of the compass binnacle, he checked his pocket-watch, and nigh-groaned aloud to note that it was nearly 9 P.M.!

  The both of us, blazin’ away half the night, with nothing to show for it! he thought, a feeble anger growing inside him, looking seaward towards Monarch, whose starboard sid
e was lit up with stabbing flame from her guns.

  “Deck, there! Fireships is goin’ in! Cutters, launches, an’ ships’ boats is goin’ in!” the lookout wailed, sounding cheerful.

  “Mister Westcott’ll be having himself some fun,” Mr. Caldwell hooted with glee.

  “One hopes,” Lt. Spendlove glumly replied. “At least fireships are conventional weapons.” Un-like rockets, was what he meant, or the lofting of explosive mortar shells into Boulogne itself.

  Lewrie felt a faint stir of hope. It had been fireships that had panicked the Spanish Armada when sailed into their anchorage at Gravelines in 1588, driving them to cut their cables and flee to the open sea, never to re-assemble in strength. With any luck, hundreds of those anchored vessels would be set afire, and the few French sailors aboard each one would be unable to fend off, or extinguish the fire aboard their own, abandoning it and fleeing as the conflagration spread from theirs to the next and the next, and when the blazes reached the tons of gunpowder stored in the fireships’ holds went off, even more of them would be blasted to fiery kindling!

  The French saw the threat, recognised it for what it was, and shifted their aim to counter the fireships, and the swarm of sailing launches and cutters escorting them, hoping to sink them before they reached those anchored lines. Their armed launches dared to come out further from shore in anticipation, their oars flashing in unison as they rowed out, and swung to point their guns at the British launches. Lewrie’s orders from Admiral Lord Keith had stated that some of those un-manned explosive boats would be employed as well, and Lewrie hoped that the French might concentrate on those, going in before Reliant’s torpedo-towing barges and cutters, and ignore his men, who would come to a stop, then turn about and flee seaward after letting their primed torpedoes free.

  He found that he’d crossed the fingers of his right hand.

  “Deck, there! Th’ fireships is lit!”

  There was a fiendish science to how a fireship was re-built for maximum effect. Its gun-ports hinged down, not up, the lines to them fashioned to burn through so that long tongues of flame could dart out once the conflagration reached its height. Hatches were widened to let in more air to stoke the fires, slow-match was strung to fire the few old guns still aboard, and down to the holds and the tons of gunpowder. “Fire rooms” were packed with combustibles amidships and below, planned by skilled pyromaniacs to spread quickly to other points where barrels of tar and turpentine, lamp oil and opened bales of straw, waited for a single spark. If the mast-head lookout could spot the first winks of flame, then they had been ignited minutes before, and the last few men of the small crews had already lashed the helms, trimmed the braces and sheets, and scrambled into their boats to make their quick escape.

  Two … three … four of them began to light up the approaches to Boulogne, almost turning night to a ruddy, flickering day as they surged shoreward, shot splashes bursting to life all round them, drawing the bulk of French fire from the shore batteries.

  “Damned near apocalyptic, ain’t it, sir?” the Sailing Master said, quite pleased with the sight of burning ships, screaming fiery rocket trails, and the rush of burning incendiary shells from bomb vessels. Something was engulfed in flames on the far side of the arms of the breakwaters, to make the scene even more hellish. Mr. Caldwell leaned his head over to cock an ear in appreciation of the continual thunder, screech, or howl of guns and bowling roundshot; of the stench of spent powder and propellants and the sickly yellow-white clouds of powder smoke that reflected the fires, the Sailing Master sniffed deep and smiled in pleasure!

  “Ghastly,” was Lt. Clarence Spendlove’s dour opinion.

  “Sir!” Midshipman Warburton cried as he came to the quarterdeck. “Mister Merriman’s duty, sir, and he says that the guns can’t elevate enough to shoot over the heads of our small boats yonder. He requests that we cease fire ’til our boats are clear.”

  “Very well, Mister Warburton, my compliments to him and pass the word to cease fire,” Lewrie ordered, wondering just how much shot and powder they had expended the last few hours. He looked over the full hammock stanchions to the waist and saw that many of the loaders had powder ladles in their hands, as if they had fired away all of the pre-made flannel powder cartridges, and had run short of flannel bags, too. In the dull red glows of the battle lanthorns between the guns, his gun crews, bare to the waists and heads swaddled with neckerchiefs to protect their hearing, were so begrimed with powder smoke that they resembled weary junior demons who stoked the fires of Hell.

  The rest of the squadron, Monarch and the two other frigates, had ceased fire, too, and the loudest sounds of firing came from shore, the duller oven-door slams punctuated by sharp barks and cracks from lighter boat guns as the French launches and British boats fired upon each other. He could almost hear the rushing crackle of the fireships as they burned, well alight and turned into floating braziers that illuminated the night. By then, sails and tarred rigging were afire, too, with mouse-tiny fires scampering up the shrouds, finding sources for combustion in the cooking fat slush that kept the running rigging supple, too. They were close to the French barges, but … would they make it all the way before their sails vanished, or the slow-matches reached the explosives?

  There was a titanic blast near the anchored French boats, with a great sheet of flame and smoke and a mountainous pillar of seawater.

  “One of the un-manned explosive boats, I think, sir,” Caldwell speculated, pursing his lips and frowning in disappointment. “Perhaps the others will get closer.”

  “Deck, there! Ship’s boats comin’ out!” a lookout shouted.

  Not just ours, but everybody’s, Lewrie thought after an intense look through his glass. The single-masted cutters and armed launches that had gone in with the fireships were retiring. Emboldened by their seeming retreat, French launches and péniches were warily edging further from the protection of their shore batteries, as well.

  “Mister Merriman!” Lewrie shouted down to the ship’s waist. “I wish you to open upon the French launches once our own boats are clear!”

  “Aye, sir!” Lt. Merriman replied, sounding a touch weary as he took off his hat to bind a neckerchief over his ears once more. Tired gun crews slouched back to their pieces, after a last sip of water from the scuttle-butts, like over-burdened miners returning to a coal face, making Lewrie fear that with no sure signs of success, his crew was becoming dispirited. The long, inexplicable delay after anchoring just out of gun range, the sitting idle all day, might have made good sense to them, and the excitement of action, the novel sight of rockets and mortar boats, might have enthused them at first, but …

  Lewrie had to admit that he felt dispirited, too, for the lack of urgency and daring, and for the seeming lack of success, so far. He wavered between anger that the expedition looked like a failure, and a sense of futility that, as a captain, he took so little part in it!

  His people tending the guns had been doing something active and necessary, as had the hundreds more officers and sailors away in those launches and boats, while he stood about like a useless fart in a trance.

  Seniority could take all the joy of battle away, all the frenetic, neck-or-nothing intensity of a boarding action, a cutting-out raid, or amphibious landing, all the duties Lewrie had been given as a young Midshipman or junior officer. He looked over to Admiral Lord Keith’s flagship and wondered if that worthy had had a single thing to do once his guns had begun to roar and the fireships had gone in. The fellow had a Flag-Captain to run his ship, a Captain of The Fleet to handle the day-to-day mundane matters, so what was left for him to do? Tend to the supper menu? For all the good that Lewrie was doing, for all the good that Lord Keith was doing, they both might as well have gone aft to their cabins for a pot of tea!

  Lewrie almost had to shake himself to get rid of his bad mood, becoming aware of the reduction of noise and of lights. The rocket vessels must have run out of their horridly inaccurate contraptions, for they no longer soared off in s
hoals but went aloft—and far off course!—in irregular singletons. The mortars in the bomb vessels had fallen silent, too, so there were no more spectacular air-bursts or swooshing fiery incendiary carcases. It was the fires ashore, and the drifting fireships, that threw great angry glares cross the waters.

  “There, sirs!” Midshipman Rossyngton cried, pointing overside to starboard. “Small boats approaching!”

  From eye-searing glare and the inkiest shadows, a ragged line of boats slowly appeared. Two were under lug-sails. A third loomed up under oars, trailing the first two. A fourth appeared at last, in tow of the third.

  “Mister Rossyngton, do you go below and warn the Surgeon that we may have wounded men returning,” Lewrie ordered.

  “Aye, sir!”

  The first two boats, both of them thirty-two-foot barges, passed across Reliant’s bows, lowering sails and fitting oars into the tholes. Midshipman Houghton stood and waved, looking immensely pleased and excited. The second barge was Lt. Westcott’s.

  “Any hurt?” Lewrie called to him as the barges rounded up near the larboard side, slowly stroking to hook onto the main-mast channel platform.

  “Not a man, sir!” Lt. Westcott shouted back. “Not for lack of trying on the French’s part!” he added with a triumphant laugh and a brief flash of a smile. Mr. Houghton’s boat was hooking on, the man in the bows with the gaff young Grimes. His swivel gun still stood in its bracket, muzzle to the sky, and he looked pleased with himself, too. And, thankfully, there was Liam Desmond, his “Black Irish” Cox’n, at the tiller of Westcott’s barge, and Patrick Furfy ploughing forward to the bows with a gaff pole in his hand to serve as bow man, staggering over his mates as clumsily as ever.

  “Welcome back, lads, good bit o’ work!” Lewrie called as his men came up the battens and man-ropes to gather on the larboard gangway. “Mister Houghton, I’d admire did ye see to leadin’ the barges’ towing lines aft, for later.”