Billy Bacon and the Soldier Slaves (Colonial Warrior Series, Book 1)

by Andrew Wareham

  “A waste of good brandy, Doyle! Giving it away so as to lay hands on shoes for a bloody great clumsy lump of a Paddy! Don’t you forget the things I do for you! Mind you, it’s bloody awful brandy, really and truly, but that ain’t the point.”

  “I know just how much you are after doing for me, Corp, and shall not be forgetting it. Supposing we get on land in France then I shall be looking for a bottle, or even two, to be replacing it!”

  They were a good platoon, knew how to look after each other.

  The Quartermaster Sergeant denied the very existence of such things as shoes, they had none and he had never seen any in his whole existence. He offered two pairs of stockings as the nearest he could get. Billy produced the bottle.

  “Dearie me now, Billy-boy, but that restores me memory, so it does. Shoes – them things what goes on the feet – I might well have seen the odd one or two.”

  “Two pairs; the biggest you’ve got.”

  “You’ll get me hung, so you will, Billy-boy. Two pairs of shoes indeed! One pair and a sheet of good, thick leather.”

  “How big a sheet?”

  “Four pairs of soles, big.”

  “Let’s have a look at it.”

  Billy inspected the sheet, pointing out that it was thin in places and not particularly well cured.

  The QM looked at the bottle of brandy, licking his lips.

  “Shoe strings, twenty foot of them, and a bucket of dubbin, best I’ve got. As well as the leather. I cannot give away more of the shoes, counted three times over they have been!”

  “You’re on. I’ll see if I can pick something up while we’re gone.”

  “You’re a good-hearted gentleman, so you are, Billy-boy.”

  Billy returned to the barrack room, displayed his spoils.

  “Dubbin, enough there for every one of you to rub it into the stitching of your shoes and keep ‘em watertight. Use it. Shoe strings, if you need ‘em new.”

  Shoe strings were a nuisance, having to be stretched flat and then polished and buffed and polished again until the blacking had soaked right the way through the fibres. Hours of tedious work and then they had to be carefully wrapped with a thread at the ends so they would not show frayed. But if the shoe strings snapped then the shoe itself would soon be lost, dragging out of shape and falling into holes; most of the men kept a spare pair of strings on their backs.

  Dubbin was a yellowy-grey slush, a wax of some sort, made from what few wished to enquire, and waterproof when carefully rubbed into stitching. A well-dubbined pair of shoes made life easier in wet weather. Because of its colour, it could not be used on the seams of their greatcoats, though they much wished something might be done to make them more useful in the rain.

  “Sun’s shining, so do your washing while you can. Won’t be a chance to do your shirts aboard ship. I can tell you that’s true. Wore the same shirt for six months unbroken, coming back from Bombay!”

  Each man was issued with two shirts, allowing him in theory to wear one, wash one. In practice, it was not so simple. In the field and after a day of marching or duty on a wall or in a trench, laundry was impossible; most men kept one shirt for parade and wore the other until it fell off in rags.

  The morning saw the battalion together in column of route, marching the eight miles into Cowes, three hours under a pleasant sun. There were four small ships waiting at the quayside, tied up rather than needing rowing boats as ferries, but with the disadvantage that the battalion must be separated and in case of a storm at sea might end up landing many miles apart on the enemy coast.

  Headquarters, band and two companies on the largest of the four; three, three and two on the others.

  Billy’s Grenadier Company was assigned to the second largest – a matter of a fathom in length and ten tons burthen, effectively insignificant in reality. All of the rules of tonnage per man were discarded, thrown out of the window, porthole perhaps; two hundred and forty men, less a few sick, were crammed into the hull, officers remaining with their companies in case the battalion was split up.

  The great cabin, so-called, was set in the stern, the breadth of the vessel, some twenty-five feet across by twelve feet in depth and provided the twelve officers, together with the ship’s master and his two mates, with their living and dining space. They slept in six small cabins, each equipped with two bunks; this created an amount of restrained argument, there being three ensigns, six lieutenants and three captains aboard. The problem was quickly solved, the three ensigns being pushed into the boatswain’s store room, to nest in the spare suit of sails that took up most of the space. A cabin each for the captains, two lieutenants to the remaining three and all was solved, to the satisfaction of the true officers.

  Sergeant Muldoon, senior sergeant to the company, observed all and passed the message quietly that the ensigns would be in no good temper and should be avoided like several plagues. Billy gave the word to his platoon.

  They were crammed into their share of the hold space. The ship was two masted, which, according to the sailors, meant that it was not actually a ‘ship’ at all, because they must have three masts. What it was, the soldiers did not care, but two masts meant three separate holds, though not of equal dimensions. There were fore, main and aft holds and C, A and E Companies aboard and assigned at random; A Company was lucky and took the main hold.

  Two men had been left behind sick and that put seventy-one bodies into a space slightly less than thirty feet wide and a little more than thirty long. Nine hundred square feet, which gave each man twelve or so square feet apiece – six feet by two, the size of a typical grave. They had no hammocks, but the vessel had been a grain carrier and was decked over the bilges, dry underfoot, which was possibly why she had been accepted as a trooper. Each man had a single blanket and his greatcoat and would use his knapsack as a pillow; the individual would make his own choice whether to use the blanket as padding underneath or for warmth on top. There were no mess-tables and it was assumed that they would eat squatting on deck, in the open air.

  “Three days, at most, to cross from Portsmouth to France,” Captain Canford reassured them. “At least it’s summer, the weather is warm. I have arranged for a rum issue as soon as we are at sea.”

  An hour across the Solent to Spithead and they joined the remainder of the expedition sailing out of Portsmouth. Billy stood at Sergeant Muldoon’s side, listening silently as he vented his misgivings.

  “No more than a brigade of infantry, Billy! Two frigates – that’s the single-deck warships with three masts; one with eighteen gun ports on a side, the other just fourteen. Four of the smaller sort, sloops and brigs. There won’t be an admiral, just a senior captain aboard the biggest ship. The two other battalions are aboard big, old two-deckers, one apiece. The Devons would have been the same but they couldn’t put us aboard a plague ship so they had to charter what they could find in Portsmouth and Southampton and Poole. It is no invasion, that is for sure, Billy. We are to be put ashore to make an attack on some specific place, or so I should imagine, and to come away again as quickly as possible. Very peculiar!”

  Captain Canford thought the same and enquired of the other company officers whether they had heard of the purpose of their little adventure across the sea.

  The captains knew nothing and the lieutenants had heard no rumours; the ensigns remained silent in the presence of their seniors.

  The captains were called aboard the largest of their four ships on the second day, the colonel addressing them in an excited fashion.

  “Well, gentlemen! The luck has been with us on this occasion! Unfortunate for the Devons, but we must be very pleased with our good fortune.”

  Comfortable with his rise in rank, Colonel Mandeville looked around the cabin, delighting in the puzzlement he saw on every face.

  “On the Normandy coast, not so far from Bayeux, which we have all heard of, I do not doubt! The Tapestry? Ah, well, not to worry! Just along the coast on a river mouth, there stands an old castle, still in
good repair and with a coastal battery to its side. The castle is in use; it has been for years, as a prison for those of the nobility who had offended against the government of France and who were to be confined for a few months or a year or two. Now it holds just the one prisoner, a child: the son of the Martyred King of France, himself now King Louis the Seventeenth! The word has only recently reached London that the boy has been moved to this remote gaol. We are to have the privilege of releasing him from this vile captivity, gentlemen!”

  Captain Canford wondered whether he should clap his hands; the opportunity passed, however.

  “We are to be landed inside the river mouth and will march inland some two miles until we come to the high road leading from Bayeux. We shall cut the road and hold it for some four hours until we receive word that the rescue has been completed. The Nottinghamshires will land to the west of the castle and establish a perimeter there, again cutting the high road, while the Berkshires have the honour of storming the battery and castle and releasing the boy-king. We shall land at first light.”

  That all sounded very jolly, and Captain Canford could see that it would certainly lead to honours all round for the successful regiments. He presumed that the expedition had been kept small so as to attract little attention in Portsmouth; a division accompanied by a fleet would certainly have been observed by French agents, and would have taken weeks to assemble.

  “Have we any maps, sir?”

  Major Molyneux, new to the battalion in the last six months, answered that they had not, but that the land was said to comprise low hills, covered in woodland and pastures – not a true forest. If they kept to the lower land of the river valley they must soon reach the road, which would hardly run along the hilltops.

  It seemed logical.

  “Order of march, gentlemen. C Company, the Lights, will take the fore, B and A to the left and right respectively. D Company will accompany headquarters, E and F immediately behind. Four companies will remain to hold the landing place.”

  All very sensible, or so it seemed.

  The Light Company captain enquired whether anything was known of the garrison of the castle.

  “No. There must be troops there, but we have not been told how many. I suspect that the artillerymen of the battery will double as garrison. We know of camps at Bayeux and Caen, but the latter are some hours distant. At Bayeux, it is believed that there is a training camp, but that is not certain. You will appreciate that this rescue has been mounted as a matter of urgency, without time for detailed plans to be made.”

  The officers dined together, toasting their honours to come, and returned to their companies with the last of the daylight. Captain Canford called his three officers to him.

  “Well, gentlemen, this is what we are here for.”

  He told them the essential points, what they were to do and why; they listened with greater or less enthusiasm, depending on their natural characters and talents.

  Lieutenant Orton was perhaps a little more intellectually able than many who wore the scarlet coat; he was not especially delighted by the news.

  “Why might the Revolutionary government send the boy to Normandy, sir? On the coast, as well.”

  “Well, he has to go somewhere, does he not, Lieutenant Orton.”

  “Does he, sir? Would it not make far more sense to quietly cut his throat and dispose of the body? Why put him within reach of the Royal Navy, particularly?”

  Those were unanswerable questions.

  “Well, when you actually ask, Mr Orton, it does seem strange. Having killed both parents, why keep the son alive? Irrational, in the extreme. Having decided that he should live, assuming they did, then to send him off to some obscure castle and almost unguarded? Very good questions, sir. Deep in a cell in a fortress not too many miles from Paris, where they could lay their hands upon him at any time, that would make more sense. We have our orders, however, and can do no more than obey them. We must be alert at all times. What have we in the way of powder and ball?”

  They had been issued the normal sixty rounds per man, and no company reserve, there being no pack animals with them.

  “I shall speak to the sergeants, and they will pass the word to the men. To be alert and awake to the possibilities in the situation.”

  None of the officers could imagine what those possibilities might be, which was rather worrying.

  The little flotilla closed the coast under a bright moon, hoping they might be unobserved by any sentinels on the castle walls while they used the light to make their landings.

  “All well-planned, but fortunate that the sky is cloudless. It would have been a real bugger if it had been raining, sir.”

  Captain Canford agreed; he would not have fancied making his way into the boats and to the beach in pitch darkness.

  They could see the other three transports and the naval brig that was to lead them to their landing place; it was a narrow river, deep and fast, flowing from nearby hills.

  There was a tiny jetty, perhaps used by small coasters bringing supplies to the battery, a quarter of a mile away, facing out to sea.

  “I’m glad we don’t have to land from boats on the beach, Mr Orton.”

  “Me too, sir!”

  The colonel’s transport tied up at the jetty and the other three bellied up to her, the men on each climbing across the bulwarks in turn, stumbling slowly in the half-light. It took nearly an hour to get the battalion ashore and in order to move out.

  “If we have been spotted, then the word is already five miles away and running! Did you hear any horses?”

  No officer had heard the sound of galloping hooves, which was one relief.

  They looked about them; a single small and deserted wooden shed. Possibly the landing was used only when there was a coaster with supplies for the battery to be unloaded. The whole was contained in a grassy clearing of about two acres, trees all around.

  They cast about for the track along the river bank, presumably leading to the high road. Captain Canford took A Company to the right of the unmade path, found that the woodland was too thick to penetrate in darkness. B Company discovered that the track ran less than twenty feet distant from the river bank. They had no choice other than to keep to the pathway and the grass verge, C Company leading followed by B and A.

  Captain Canford swore quietly, then called the company to halt and load their muskets. He preferred to take the risk of marching loaded, the chance that a man might stumble and trigger his firelock, rather than be taken unawares and without the few seconds needed to make ready.

  The Light Company set out at a fast pace, alternating trotting and march, and quickly opened a gap between them and B Company, toiling along behind at ordinary pace, some twenty minutes to the mile.

  Billy did not like the feel of the night, marching in column of route through a narrow defile as it were, trees dark to the right, river blocking off their left.

  “How long till it’s light?”

  Private Baker, a countryman, thought less than half an hour.

  B Company came to a sudden stop and Captain Canford ordered the halt.

  “Form a double line!”

  The manoeuvre was quickly performed, the drill familiar even in the night, the men wheeling and stepping out, each into his own proper place.

  They waited, silently, wondering just what was happening, leaning on their muskets, resting as well as they could. A runner came down from C Company, stopping a few seconds by each captain he passed on his way back to the colonel.

  “Found the highway, sir. There’s a bridge, with a guard on it. Four men.”

  The runner came back from the colonel inside five minutes, not stopping. Ten minutes later there was a yell and three shots from ahead of them, presumably at the bridge. Five minutes after that they heard the sound of horses, many of them, cavalry at the gallop and coming towards them. They heard shouts from B Company.

  Captain Canford bellowed his order, no longer concerned for silence.

 
“Form Company square!”

  The light was growing, they found that they could pick out B Company as they formed up, saw they were being hindered by running men penetrating their ranks. The Light Company had gone down to the sudden charge, had broken, men scattering into the woodland, those who kept their wits about them, veterans mostly; perhaps a half of the company had simply panicked at this first experience of war, had taken off down the track, colliding with B.

  A full troop of Light Dragoons was on their heels, yelling as they swung their sabres and cut the fleeing soldiers down.

  Billy’s platoon formed the east-facing side of the square, directly in the line of the attack. Sergeant Muldoon stood immediately behind them, muttering to Billy.

  “B are going to break, they can’t form in time with those bloody fools in their way. They weren’t marching loaded, look. Don’t let any of them into our front.”

  The Dragoons hit the square as they finished loading, a few horsemen going down to the weak volley, at least half of them slashing their way through and breaking the part-formed company into a running mob, no more than fifty yards away from the Grenadiers.

  Lieutenant Orton began to shout orders.

  “Front rank, present!”

  “Front rank, fire!”

  “Rear rank, present!”

  A count of ten seconds.

  “Rear rank, fire!”

  “Front rank, present!”

  Billy had not fired, watched as the running men from B came closer, shouting at them.

  “Get into the trees! Run left. Get clear of the line!”

  Most were seeking cover, had sense enough to get into the woodland. A few came straight down the track, consumed by panic. They could not be allowed to disrupt the square and let the cavalry through to kill every man in it.

  Billy raised his musket, took a quick aim and shot the nearest running man, began his reload while Sergeant Muldoon took up the shout.

  “Go left, that man! Get into the trees!”

  Billy brought his musket up and aimed at the next private soldier, who saw what was happening and came to his senses, dived into the treeline. There was a cavalryman just a few yards behind him. Billy shot his horse, reloaded and then fixed his bayonet, picking up on the shout behind him. The volleys had continued to crash out at twenty second intervals, bringing the charge to its inevitable end.