“What calibre are their guns?” Lewrie asked, measuring distance ’twixt thumb and forefinger, and laying them on the chart’s scale. It was a full five miles from the fort to the channel mouth.
“I’ve heard boasts that they’re twenty-four-pounders,” Pollock supplied. “Ships’ guns, on naval carriages.”
“They’d not have a hope in Hell,” Lewrie told him, sure enough of artillery, one of his chiefest delights since his first experience of a broadside on the old Ariadne. “No mortars? No big’uns?”
“Only light Coehorn mortars on the landward walls, I have discovered, over the years,” Pollock guardedly declared. “Our Spaniards are a boastful lot when shopping. Do you use my telescope, you can almost make out the fort to the north and east of us. It’s placed on firm ground, so I’m told, at this island’s tip. The Pass, the lakes, are too shallow for deep-draught ships, so I suppose the fort was set in place to counter small vessels and gunboats from getting past it.”
“Could I get some bomb-ketches in here, within three miles of the place… shallow, improvised bombs up this channel a little way, with ten-inch sea mortars, I could pound it into ruin,” Lewrie stated, standing and peering through the borrowed telescope. “Buoyed up with ‘camels’ to either beam, to get ’em up this slough. Wood-based light Coehorn mortars in launches and pinnaces to sail right up the island’s west side, that’d keep their heads down and their buttocks clenched!” he hooted in anticipatory mirth. “Two… three combined companies of Marines from off a few ships of the line could go with the small boats and assault it from the rear. Landward walls of a sea fort aren’t designed against a strong assault.” He lowered the glass and looked down at the channel.
“Though I don’t much care for the current. Looks fast to me,” he said, frowning at the eddies, swirls, and bent-over reeds. “Take a slack tide, and how long that’d last… else the mortar boats could not breast the tides under sail, and rowing’d be sheer buggery. Make less than a mile an hour, slower than a man could walk it.”
“Or Fort Coquilles could be ignored, if it can’t reach to this shore with its guns,” Mr. Pollock mused as Lewrie sat back down, handing him the glass to stow away. “Then… in your professional opinion, could a large force be landed here? Where we now sit? It’s not over thirteen miles from here to New Orleans, over a fairly good road, too. Mister Peel, being a cavalryman at one time, suggested that this might prove the best route, when we talked before leaving Kingston.”
“Beats sailing an hundred miles up the Mississippi River from the Gulf,” Lewrie cautiously allowed, “or God knows how far down from from Canada, aye. How large a force could be landed here, though…” Lewrie mused, shrugging. He fixed Pollock with a sharp, leery eye and grinned. “And did Mister Peel drop a few hints, hey, Mister Pollock, as to what he thought the size of the force required could be?”
“Well, ahem! … he did mention a squadron of horse, merely in passing, d’ye see,” Pollock responded.
“Oh, I’m sure he did!” Lewrie said, laughing. “Old habits die hard. Tarra-tarra … ‘draw sabres and charge’! Peel, no matter his influence in London or Kingston, no matter his knowledge of any secret plans already drawn, Mister Pollock, ain’t a sailor. He and his Army contacts see the problem from this hillock inland, with nary a worry ‘bout how they’re t’be gotten here. He really should’ve chosen an infantry officer in disguise for this part of our mission, not me.”
“Mister Peel, ah …” Pollock hesitantly explained, “said that the crux of the matter was the getting ashore, and that you, sir, had the wits to solve it, or, ahem! … Scotch it, should it not prove to be practical.”
“Mine arse on a band-box! Peel said that?” Lewrie gawped. “It is news t’me that… hmm. Well, well!”
And all this time Peel’s good as told me I’m an idiot! Lewrie thought; A useful idiot, now an’ again, but… hmm, well, well!
“Horse transports are even rarer than hens’ teeth, sir,” Lewrie laid out to his guide, suddenly in much better takings, even finding professional delight in sketching out a plan on the chart. “I expect only one or two might be available on short notice, so… let’s say no more than two or three troops of cavalry, not an entire squadron. A couple of batteries of horse artillery, nothing heavier than four-or six-pounders, too. Troop transports aren’t that common, either, so… no more than three or four regiments of foot, with their four-gun batteries of equally light artillery pieces.”
He’d anchor the invasion fleet off Cat and Ship Islands in deep water; sail or row barges, launches, pinnaces, and Coehorn mortar boats from there into Lake Borgne… dead of night, all that!… even tow some astern of the extemporised bombs, which could fire far inland to suppress any opposition as the troops were going ashore. Light infantry, fusiliers and such, ashore first to scout and skirmish their way west to protect the fairly small landing ground, which was not quite as big as a cricket pitch, really. Some light regimental guns next, their limbers stuffed with cannister and grape, not solid shot. Then cavalry and horse artillery, followed by the rest of the regiments… the line companies and grenadier companies, the Marines for the Bayou Bienvenu, near where they sat.
Aye, the bayou, by God! A Heaven-sent highway in its own right, that (so Mr. Pollock assured him) meandered right into the northern suburbs of New Orleans itself, fed the Marigny Canal, hard by the many farm plots and cart paths behind Fort St. John and the shore of Pontchartrain!
“Takes most of the supply waggons or pack-mules off the single road,” Lewrie said, chuckling. “Supply boats, gigs, launches, cutters … shallow-draught stuff off every vessel can get up Bayou Bienvenu. Pole ’em if they can’t be rowed! Cuts down on the number of draught animals to transport or feed, too! Less hay and oats, more shot and powder, more troops. Who are fed worse than horses, really. Hmmm, swivels and two-pounder boat-guns on the bayou boats, to keep the Dons well back, and up to their necks in muck.”
Seven miles from New Orleans, the chart showed a large tongue of higher, dryer ground to the north of the Chef Menteur road, framed by great groves of cypresses. The surprised, scurrying Spanish garrison would, in his limited military judgement, think that the perfect place to rally, to form a defence line and fight. Firm ground on which to emplace heavier guns than the landing force could boast, and Lewrie couldn’t see a way round it without a thrust into Lake Pontchartrain in boats to land infantry behind that solid ground, to take the Spanish in flank or rear before they could get sorted out and unlimber their artillery pieces… or just after, and sweep them up, thereby shattering the frantic resistance even further? Or could cavalry do it on their own, unsupported? Lewrie grimaced as he imagined that it might take a whole squadron of horse to be landed, after all!
“It’s… feasible,” Lewrie said at last, grimacing with doubt, despite his tentative statement of approval, “with a brigade of foot, a battalion of Marines, and Peel’s damned squadron of cavalry. One day to land, sort out, and march past here. Fight a battle here, on this firm ground, if cavalry can’t seize it right off, then… whistle up the bandsmen for the march into New Orleans. Land a second brigade?”
“Once New Orleans falls, a second or third brigade could sweep up the forts down the Mississippi, one at a time,” Pollock contributed.
“Whilst a squadron of frigates sails up to help reduce them by direct fire,” Lewrie supposed.
“Then what small, wretched garrisons there are at Mobile and Pensacola could be overwhelmed?” Pollock asked. “Nor more than fifty or an hundred men to each, really. Mounting guard over the mosquitoes and the mildew, heh heh!” Pollock scoffed.
“A touchy endeavour, even so, Mister Pollock,” Lewrie counselled. “Where do we get that many tropic-seasoned troops, and transports in sufficient number? If they come from England, it would depend on whether it’s hurricane season or not, or how long they have to languish aboard their ships and still be healthy, whether they go ashore on Jamaica for long during Fever Season before the Army has things done a
ll ‘tiddly,’ and Yellow Jack kills two-thirds of them. You have pen and paper?”
Lewrie sat cross-legged and jotted. Four brigades, say, and 12,000 infantry; average transport 300 to 350 tons with two men per ton of displacement; 600 to 700 men each—say, no more than 500 to 600 for health reasons in the tropics… It would take twenty-four transports, with another dozen for supplies. Nearly 500 cavalry mounts plus artillery nags (assume a quarter died or broke legs on-passage) so plan on seven or eight rare, specialised horse transports, and an equal number just for fodder and oats, and the light artillery could have eight animals per gun, not the usual six, in case the soil was soggy…
He broke off and gazed out at Lake Borgne and the open sea, in disgust. “Hundreds of barges and cutters, all coming t’this wee patch o’ mud. And our Army in charge of it? Hmmm, I don’t know …”
“Something wrong?” Pollock asked, taking fret from his tone.
“Anchored so far off, bloody miles of choppy, shallow sea they must cross,” Lewrie gloomed. “Unless it’s flat calm, it’d take days to land them, and the Spanish would have time to react. Our wonderful Army just doesn’t have ‘quick’ in its vocabulary, Mister Pollock. A large force would hamper itself, a small, quick’un could be knackered. Saw at at Toulon in ’93 and ’94, and that was a proper harbour, with wharves, cranes, and all. This sand spit ain’t! It’d be treacly chaos to get ’em landed and sorted out quickly, then march them west… up a single sandy track, one weeded bayou. Did we get a regiment ashore per day, I’d be very much surprised. I’d be surprised all the more did the general in charge dare lurch into motion before a week’d passed!”
“Our soldiers can’t be that slow, can they?” Pollock asked with a crushed look on his ill-formed phyz. “Wolfe… Montreal….”
“A fluke,” Lewrie spat. “Hah! You know, Mister Pollock… it might be better did we just slip the Dons a note and ask ’em what they’d take for Louisiana. Cheaper in the long run, especially when it comes to the lives of our soldiers, ha ha! Trade ’em Gibraltar or something?”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Lewrie!” Pollock grumped, so nettled that he quite forgot the agreed-upon alias.
“I’ll write Admiral Parker, and Mister Peel, an appreciation,” Lewrie promised, digging into their food basket to build a roast beef sandwich. “This is the quickest, easiest route to the city’s conquest, though I will have to include its warts… and my reservations.”
“That is, after all, one of the reasons Captain Nicely, Mister Peel, as well, insisted on your presence,” Pollock told him. “Sooner or later, we must have New Orleans. Louisiana and Spanish Florida, too. To keep the Americans hemmed in and humble, on their side of the Mississippi. To pay the Spanish back for switching sides and taking hand with the French in ’96, to boot!”
“Well, that’d be sweet, I grant you.” Lewrie chuckled. “Damme, is that a twist of ground pepper by your leg? That’s what’s missing on this beef!”
Pollock handed the paper twist over, then picked up the sheet on which Lewrie had marked his figures. He carefully tore it to bits, as fine as confetti, then let the soft breeze scatter it.
“Put nothing more on paper,” Pollock warned him. “Trust all to your head, or let me, ah… translate the numbers into innocent debits and such in a ledger book. Things to be ordered, shipped, sold, or as items in stock. Harmless code words, d’ye see.”
“Whatever you wish, Mister Pollock,” Lewrie happily agreed, in thrall to crunchy bread and succulent meat zested with mustard. “You do a lot of business in codes?”
“Commerce is a, ah… cut-throat business, Mister Willoughby,” Pollock said with a cryptic smile. “Ahem!”
They rolled down the sloppy streets along the waterfront levee, once they’d returned their hired mounts to the stablery, savouring the sunset and the cool, river-sweet air. A trifle stiff-legged, it must be admitted, from spending nigh the whole day in the saddle, and their fundaments, chafed thighs, and challenged leg muscles complaining.
Watching their passing image in one of the rare, large, glass storefront windows, Lewrie was put in mind of a brace of virgin girls toddling homeward after their first experience at “All-Night-In”!
“And, there’s your men, Mister Willoughby!” Pollock pointed out as Rue Toulouse dead-ended at Levee Road.
“Drunk as lords, I’ll warrant,” Lewrie growled to see them all asprawl at their ease in cane-bottom chairs round a rickety table by the entrance to a lowly sailors’ café. “Damn ’em, I warned ’em to stay sober! Much good that does, with sailormen,” he despaired.
“They look fairly sober to me, Willoughby,” Pollock countered, back in his fully civilian and “innocent” role once they had returned to civilisation.
“Hoy, Cap’m Willoughby!” Quartermaster’s Mate Toby Jugg lazily called, lifting a wooden piggin by way of salute, without rising or doffing his hat; playing his own role to the hilt, and loving every second of it, Lewrie was mortal-certain.
“Aye, Cap’m L—” Landsman Furfy, that dim but capable Irish side of beef began to say, just before his mate Liam Desmond kicked him beneath the table. “Ow, Liam, whad’ye do ‘at… oh.”
Neck burning at Jugg’s impertinence, but knowing that he would have to play up game, Lewrie only sauntered to their table, his hands jabbed deep into his trouser pockets most unlike naval officer fashion to join them. Clenched into fists, but jabbed deep.
“Havin’ a free day, are we, lads?” Lewrie casually enquired of them, rocking on his heels with his wide-brimmed “wide-awake” hat far back on his head, and with a faint grin on his face. “Not gotten all ‘three sheets to the wind’ yet today?”
“Oh, nossor,” Jugg idly replied with a smile. “For I e’spect th’ last few days o’ sportin’ done ’em in for a bit. ‘Make an’ Mend’ it ’tis, t’day, sor. ‘Caulk or Yarn’ an’ all.”
“Short o’ th’ ‘blunt’ today, sor,” Desmond added.
Damned if they weren’t drunk at all; tiddly, perhaps; “groggy” for certain, but no “groggier” than they’d be by the Second Dog Watch and the second rum issue aboard Proteus!
“Toby… Mister Jugg’s been keeping a weather eye on us, sor,”Clancey, the youngest lad in his party, good-naturedly griped, lifting his own piggin in Jugg’s direction in mock salute. “Too damn’ good, beggin’ yer pardon, sor.”
“‘Sides, our money goes fur’der with th’ doxies, we don’t drink it all up, sor,” Furfy dared to contribute with a childish enthusiasm.
“An’ would ya be carin’ for a ‘wet’ o’ yer own, sor?” the irrepressible Jugg solicitously enquired. “For ’tis good Dublin stout, as sure as yer born, so ’tis.”
Lewrie goggled at him for a moment, nigh apoplectic at Jugg’s effrontery, fighting the urge to A. jerk hands from pockets, B. curl into vises, C. leap, D. strangle.
“French beer?” Lewrie scornfully managed to croak at last.
“Faith, but that’s filthy muck, sor!” Jugg hooted in mirth as he finally got to his feet and came within arm’s reach, showing Lewrie the yeasty contents of his piggin. “No, ’tis real Irish stout, brung upriver on good Mister Pollock’s little brig, sor, an’ not so horrid dear, e’en then, agin wot th’ Frogs an’ Dons charge fer their piss. Want a sip from mine, sor?”
“Christ, no I…”
“Need a private word, sor,” Jugg muttered from the corner of his mouth, darting his eyes at Pollock to include him. “Been aboard our prize, sor, and I knows for sure about her, beg pardon.”
“Aha!” Lewrie barked, stepping to the table to pour himself a glass of vin ordinaire from an earthenware jug. “Aye, Jugg, we should take a short stroll with Mister Pollock.”
All three took a few paces apart from the rest of the crewmen, facing south across the river to the prize ship and the emporium hulks, where belfry and taff-rail lanthorns—oil lights or candles—were now cheerfully aglow for late shoppers, casting long, dancing glades across the Mississippi, which itself had put on its gay blue-g
rey nighttime masquerade, instead of its daytime muddy-brown.
“She’s our prize, sure ‘nough, Cap’m… Mister Pollock,” Jugg imparted, rocking on his heels and wearing a grin as he lifted his mug to take a leisurely sip, using that gesture to point at the hulk. “We went aboard her this mornin’, so we did… Cap’m Coffin and th’ First Mate, Mister Caldecott. Actin’ like we might buy her, like.”
“Absolutely certain,” Lewrie stated.
“Oh aye, sor,” Jugg said with a snicker, turning to look at him. “For I’d left me mark on her, by way o’ speakin’. When we woz anchored at Dominica an’ sleepin’ aft in th’ mates’ cabins for a spell, I carved me name in her fancy overhead woodwork, right above ‘er master’s bed-cot… me name an’ Erin Go Bragh, sorta. ‘At woz still there, plain as anythin’, sor. Down below, when soundin’ her well, I found Mister Towpenny’s cribbage board, too, wot he woz so proud of and missin’ so sore after they marooned us. One he shaped hisself, sure, sor. Foot o’ th’ orlop ladder, t’woz.”
“Any clue as to who claims her ownership, then, Mister Jugg?” Pollock asked in a side-mouthed mutter, looking outward, and to an idle observer merely engaged in casual banter.
“Slow-coach ol’ feller in charge o’ her Harbour Watch, Mister Pollock, sor. He said t’ask for a merchant name o’ Basternoh, or some such, who bought her, recent. I ‘spect yer Cap’m Coffin kin tell ya more about that, since ’twas ‘im did th’ bulk o’ th’ talkin’, but… seems I do recall a banker feller name o’ Merrypaws was tied up innit, too, mebbe bought inta her as a ‘ship’s husband’… even help with th’ financin’, did anyone buy her, sure.”
“Bistineau, and Maurepas, was it?” Pollock pressed, perked up as sharp-eyed as an owl.
“Aye, ’em names sound more like it, certain, sor!” Jugg agreed.
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