by Dudley Pope
Ramage found Southwick beside him, watching the boats. ‘You looked as though you were enjoying yourself, sir,’ he said cheerfully, first making sure they were out of earshot of the men.
‘I was,’ Ramage admitted. ‘It’s deucedly tedious just marching up and down the quarterdeck like a sentry at the Horse Guards.’
Southwick nodded sympathetically. ‘The convoy will soon be here. We’ll be busy enough then.’
Two hours later Ramage found an excuse for going over to the Diamond: the men with the jolly boat and two cutters had not returned and it would soon be dinner time, so he ordered the cook to prepare food for the men and had himself rowed over in one of the Surcouf’s boats. As an afterthought he had ordered the gunner to fetch up a lock and spare flint, carefully wrapped against the spray, a pricker, trigger line, wads, two round shot and two cartridges, the cylindrical wooden boxes being stowed in a canvas bag as a precaution against both spray and powder accidentally spilling. It was unlikely that the gun would be ready, but he warned Southwick not to be alarmed if he heard a shot.
As the boat rounded the Rock and the cove came into view he was pleasantly surprised to see that the carriage was up on the ledge and close to it what looked like a great letter ‘A’ without the cross bar. The men had made sheers from the spars that had previously lashed the cutters together, and an oar provided the support. A heavy tackle slung from the sheers had hoisted the gun and several men were now manoeuvring the carriage directly under it.
By the time Ramage leapt on shore the gun had been lowered and he heard an excited yell from Lacey: ‘Throw over the cap-squares! Now, in with the bolts!’
The lieutenant pulled off the band of cloth he had been wearing round his brow to keep the perspiration from his eyes, snatched up his hat and jammed it on his head before saluting. ‘You beat us by a quarter of an hour, sir,’ he said ruefully, gesturing at the men hurriedly unlashing the sheers.
‘I’ve brought you all some food, anyway,’ Ramage said with a grin. ‘And powder and shot for the first round!’
Within fifteen minutes the men had hurried through their meal and were overhauling the train tackles which had kinked and tangled themselves, carrying the heavy breeching from the cove and clearing small rocks away on the ledge to make the gun platform comparatively smooth. Lacey had chosen a site which was in fact a slight depression with a piece of rock protruding like a stump of a tree on each side, ideally placed to secure each end of the breeching which, passing through the cascabel ring at the breech end of the gun, would bring the gun to a stop after it had recoiled a few feet.
Ramage went over to explore the big cave again while Lacey and his men finished preparing the gun and he was several yards inside the cave, examining it as possible accommodation for the men and a store for provisions, when he was startled to hear Lacey calling him from the entrance, obviously uncertain about entering.
Ramage joined him to find the lieutenant looking embarrassed.
‘The men – er, well sir, the men have asked me to, er…’
‘Take a deep breath and spit it out, man,’ Ramage said impatiently. ‘I assume they aren’t telling me they’re planning a mutiny.’
‘The gun’s ready for firing, sir,’ Lacey said hurriedly, ‘and the men want you to name the battery.’
‘Name it? What on earth for?’
‘Well, sir, I believe there are going to be three batteries, and I think they had in mind that it would be easier to distinguish them if each had a name. They seem particularly concerned about this first one.’
Ramage was hot, tired, and in no mood for thinking of names. ‘Tell them I’ll think of a name tomorrow.’
Lacey’s face fell. ‘They – well, sir,’ he said with a rush, ‘they’ve already chosen a name, and they want you to approve it, sir.’
Ramage frowned. With Jackson, Rossi and Stafford out there, he suspected they had thought of some ludicrous name that would be impossible for him to use in official reports: something like the Nipcheese Battery, as a dig at the purser, or the Checkmate, to tease the Surgeon.
‘They want to call it the Marchesa Battery, sir,’ Lacey said nervously. ‘I – er, I understand there’s an Italian Marchesa for whom some of them had a very high regard; the aunt of young Orsini, I think.’
Ramage tried to keep a straight face. Obviously Lacey was picturing some ancient Italian dowager. ‘Yes, that is correct; Orsini’s aunt is the Marchesa di Volterra.’ He began walking towards the battery so that Lacey should not see the delighted grin on his face. ‘A most appropriate name in the circumstances; yes, most appropriate,’ he said with all the seriousness he could muster. Most of the former Tritons were grouped round the gun: Jackson, Stafford, Rossi, Maxton… All could see from Ramage’s expression that he had agreed to the name. The gun was ready: the trigger line was neatly coiled on top of the breech, the lock was in position, the rammer, sponge and handspikes were ready. Well clear of the gun were the cartridge boxes with two round shot beside them. Jackson had the long metal primer tucked in his belt and a powder horn on a lanyard round his neck.
They seemed to be taking the naming ceremony seriously, and Ramage decided he should, too. ‘I think we might fire a round in celebration, Mr Lacey,’ he said briskly.
‘Aye, aye, sir!’ Lacey said happily and barked out an order. Immediately the eight men sprang forward and the rest stood back. Obviously the gun crew had been chosen while he was in the cave, and all of them were former Tritons.
Jackson, as gun captain, had the long pricker – officially known as the priming wire – and the powder flask ready. Stafford as the second captain was checking the lock, snapping it to make sure the flint made a good spark. One man had picked up the rammer while a fourth ran up with the thin flannel cylinder of gunpowder that was the cartridge, lifted it to the muzzle and pressed it in. He then helped the man with the rammer push it home, took the wad that was handed and helped ram that home. A fifth man came up with shot and that was pushed down the bore and rammed home. Both men jumped back clear of the muzzle as the men at the tackles ran the gun forward. If it had been mounted on board the Juno, the muzzle and much of the barrel would be poking out through the port, clear of the ship’s side. Now it was run out to leave the heavy rope breeching slack, ready to take the strain when the gun recoiled.
The drill was excellent. Lacey, in contrast to the unnecessary orders he had been giving as the men lashed the cutter together, was now standing silent at the rear of the gun, waiting for Jackson to give the signal.
The American held up his hand and Lacey shouted, ‘Prime!’
Jackson went to the vent, rammed the priming wire down the hole and made sure it had penetrated the flannel of the cartridge inside the breech, making a small hole and exposing the powder inside. Then he poured a small amount of powder into the pan, checking that it covered the vent.
‘Point!’ shouted Lacey.
Jackson took the trigger line coiled on top of the breech and walked back until he was standing at its full extent. He bent down on his right knee with his left leg flung out sideways. As he did that men picked up the handspikes and stood ready.
Jackson sighted along the barrel and called ‘Muzzle left!’ to the handspikemen, gesturing with his left hand. They levered the rear of the carriage to the right, so that the muzzle of the gun came round to the left, and stopped when Jackson called, ’Well!’
Lacey then gave the third order in the sequence of single word commands normally used. ‘Elevate!’ he shouted.
The men thrust their handspikes under the breech of the gun, levering it up by using the steps cut into the after end of the carriage as a pivot, and lifted. Stafford pulled out the wedge-shaped quoin and the handspikemen slowly lowered the breech again, watching Jackson as he sighted along the barrel.
The moment he called, ‘Well!’, Stafford rammed in the wooden wedge and as soon as he felt the weight of the breech firmly resting on it he called, ‘Down!’ The handspikemen jumped clear but Staff
ord stood by the breech, awaiting the next order.
‘Ready!’ Lacey called, looking anxiously at Ramage.
Stafford leaned over and cocked the lock, and the click, combined with Jackson looking round expectantly at him, suddenly roused Ramage; with a shock he realized that he was not sure whether he should first have taken formal possession of the Diamond Rock. What on earth did one do? When you captured an enemy ship you hoisted your own ensign above his, but what did you do with an island? He remembered vaguely that he had occasionally read of some formal annexation when a new island was discovered. A flag was hoisted and speeches were made. Did the same rules apply when you captured one?
He racked his brain for a precedent, could think of none, and hastily decided that too much formality would be better than too little. It was wiser to say a few pompous words that subsequently proved to be unnecessary than to fail to say them and provoke Their Lordships’ wrath. Apart from that, young post captains at the bottom of the Navy List rarely capture islands. If Ramage, Nicholas, is setting a precedent, then he will do it in style, he told himself.
He removed his hat and Lacey hurriedly did the same. The men stood rigidly to attention and did it so naturally that he realized they were all expecting some sort of ceremony, though probably for their battery rather than for the whole Rock.
What the deuce should he say? He coughed and tucked his hat under his left arm. He ought to be wearing his sword. Lacey’s rapt expression would have been more suitable if he was about to be blessed by the Archbishop of Canterbury rather than listen to his captain make a fool of himself.
‘I, Nicholas Ramage, captain in the Royal Navy and commanding officer of His Majesty’s frigate Juno…’ That was a good start, but what now? He thought for a moment and continued ‘…do hereby take possession of this island, known as the Rocher du Diamant, or the Diamond Rock…for and on behalf of His Majesty King George the Third!’
The men began cheering wildly and an excited Lacey joined in, waving his hat in the air. Ramage, who had been expecting the men to start giggling, was so pleased with their reaction to words which had sounded ponderous and absurd to him, that he began to grin broadly. After a moment he managed to arrange his expression into a stern look, more befitting a conqueror, albeit of a barren rock and, as soon as the cheering stopped he looked around, as though surveying this newest gem in the King’s crown, put his hat back on his head and said in a ringing voice: ‘And I hereby name this battery the Marchesa Battery. May it play its part in defending the Diamond Rock!’
Again the men burst out in a roar of cheering and one of them began singing the first line of ‘Hearts of Oak are our men!’ and the rest of them took it up, bellowing lustily.
The moment they finished Ramage gestured to Lacey who took a pace forward and shouted ‘Marchesa Battery – fire!’
Jackson tugged the trigger line and the gun gave a prodigious roar which echoed back from the Rock immediately behind it. Smoke spurted from the muzzle, spreading into an oily yellow cloud. The trucks of the carriage clattered as they ran back over the rocky surface and the rope breeching suddenly tautened and stretched as it absorbed the recoil and then thrust the carriage forward again a few inches. A mile to seaward there was a vertical spurt of water, like a whale spouting.
Ramage walked over to examine each end of the breeching to make sure it had not chafed on the rocks round which it was secured. One round remained, but he decided against using it: the next job was to get more powder and shot over from the Juno, but that could wait until tomorrow; then the men would only have to row a few yards. There was no point in leaving the gun manned; the risk of the French making a determined attempt during the night to recapture a barren rock they did not yet know they had lost was, to say the least of it, remote.
He let the men chatter happily for a few minutes, laughing and joking, teasing Jackson that he had missed the invisible ship, and then he said to Lacey: ‘Secure the gun now, and we’ll do those soundings.’
Fifteen minutes later the jolly boat was being rowed slowly up and down the south side of the Rock, close under the sheer cliff, with a man standing in the bow heaving a lead and reporting the depths he found. Ramage used the boat compass to take rough bearings and Lacey busily wrote down the depths and bearings as they were called out.
They started right close in to the cliffs, so close that the men occasionally had to fend off with the blades of their oars as a swell wave pushed the boat against the rock face. Ramage soon stopped glancing upwards because it made him dizzy: the cliff soared up vertically; from the boat it might have been five thousand feet high, rather than five hundred. Just as it soared up vertically into the sky, so it plunged vertically to the sea bed. The depths right up against the foot of the cliff were staggering, and he was glad he had told Lacey to bring the deep sea lead, as well as the hand lead. They were finding forty fathoms close into the cliff, and fifty fathoms only thirty yards out.
As the boat reached the end of the fifteenth run and turned to begin the next, and the leadsman, with water streaming down him, hurriedly coiling up the line, Ramage leaned across the thwart to look at Lacey’s rough chart. The picture of the sea bed slowly taking shape on the paper from the depths and the bearing was far from reassuring. Lacey looked up anxiously, knowing how much depended on the result of the survey, and Ramage commented with as much nonchalance as he could muster: ‘We won’t risk running aground, anyway.’
Bad as it was, it could have been worse. There was a lot of coral down there, staghorn coral as far as could be judged from the pieces that came up with the lead. The trouble was that the scooped-out depression in the bottom of the lead, which was filled with tallow, was only intended to have sand or mud adhere to it; the tiny bits of coral that the lead knocked off as it hit the bottom were hardly enough for a proper identification. Any sort of coral was bad, though: it was jagged and sharp and quickly chafed anchor cables, and the Juno, Ramage reflected grimly, would be laying out four anchors… Perhaps only three, if the present calm weather held.
As he watched the birds wheeling round the cliff – he saw a white tropic bird with its long forked tail streaming out like two ribbons – he was thankful that there were no back eddies of wind to drive the Juno against the cliff. None, he corrected himself, with the wind in this direction. No back eddies and very little swell. He looked up again at the top of the cliff, which was gaunt, grey and cold even in the sunlight, and so sheer that only a few bushes managed to grow in cracks and crevices, and for the hundredth time he wondered whether he could do it.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The sky to the eastward was gradually turning pink beyond the mountains of Martinique early next morning as the Juno’s capstan slowly revolved with Bevins, the fiddler, standing on top and scratching out a tune to encourage the men straining at the capstan bars.
Ramage stood at the quarterdeck rail, affecting a nonchalant stance to disguise the tension gripping him. The Juno was about to set out on her shortest voyage, less than half a mile, and he was as nervous as a kitten hearing its first dog bark. The ten-inch cable used to tow the Surcouf was now amidships, the first hundred fathoms of it flaked down and ready to run, only this time it would be running upwards.
The launch was towing astern with an anchor slung ready beneath it; another cable was flaked out on the quarterdeck ready to bend on to it. The two cutters were also astern, ready to tow the frigate to its final position, and the topmen were waiting ready for the order to go aloft. The jolly boat would be at the cove by now, and Aitken and his men should have started their long climb to the top of the Rock. The young Scot had been confident that he had found a route merely by examining the Rock through the telescope. Ramage, although doubtful, had not argued with him and he went off cheerfully before dawn, his men carrying rope ladders, axes, heavy mauls borrowed from the carpenter, sharpened stakes, speaking trumpet, and several coils of rope.
The Surcouf was lying head to wind, all her sails neatly furled on her yards, a
nd only a dozen men on board. The first lieutenant had worked well into the night to have the ship ready, returning to the Juno to report to Ramage at midnight, so exhausted that he was swaying as he spoke. Ramage had sent him off to snatch some sleep, telling him that it would take the Juno two or three hours to get into position so that he could sleep on, but Aitken had left orders that he was to be called at dawn.
Wagstaffe had tacked in towards the Rock with the Créole and was now stretching north again, and Ramage thought for a moment of La Mutine. She should have arrived in Barbados yesterday, and with luck she was now on her way back. By tonight or at the latest tomorrow morning he could expect Admiral Davis to arrive in the Invincible. There was barely time to get half the job done.
Slowly the frigate weighed as the sequence of reports and orders passed to and fro between the fo’c’sle and quarterdeck. The yards were already braced sharp up and the jibs were being hoisted but left to flap in the wind.
‘Short stay!’ came a shout from the fo’c’sle, warning Ramage that the anchor cable was making the same angle as the forestay. He put the speaking trumpet to his lips.
‘Away aloft!’
The topmen swarmed up the rigging and his orders followed in quick succession. While men sheeted home the headsails he shouted aloft to the topmen: ‘Trice up and lay out!’ As soon as the men were out on the yards with the studding sail booms triced up out of the way he ordered the men on deck: ‘Man the topsail sheets!’ A moment later the topmen were being told to ‘Let fall!’ and as the sails tumbled down he gave a fresh order to the men on deck: ‘Sheet home!’
By now the anchor was off the bottom and the Juno was gathering way. It would be two or three minutes before the anchor broke surface and only a few minutes more before the frigate would be anchoring again. He glanced up at the wind vane at the maintruck and then to the eastward, where the sun was just lifting over the mountains. So far, so good; at least the French convoy had not chosen this moment to round Pointe des Salines.