The Cursed Fortress

by Chris Durbin

  ***

  10: Halifax

  Sunday, Nineteenth of March 1758.

  Medina, at Anchor. Halifax, Nova Scotia.

  Neither Carlisle nor Hosking had previously been to Halifax but the pilot that brought them in was a naval sailing master, and an old friend of Hosking, quite a different character to the Boston pilot.

  ‘I hope you’re not too disappointed when you see the town, sir,’ said the pilot conversationally as they passed through the narrows to the west of Cornwallis Island. ‘It’s not been here long, less than ten years, and we’re a bit rustic still. Despite that, there’s great energy here and I do believe we have a future in this province.’

  Carlisle was surprised at the proprietorial tone of the pilot. He’d heard of sailing masters taking to pilotage, it was reasonably common as a means of eking out a warrant officer’s superannuation, but most retired to small towns in England where the living was comfortable but without the cost of the big cities. This pilot had found one of the rare employment opportunities in the gift of the Navy Board.

  ‘You sound as though you like the place,’ replied Carlisle, looking at the thickly wooded shoreline dusted with snow, with just a hint of homely white cliffs opening to larboard.

  ‘Your pardon sir,’ he replied. ‘A cast of the lead to starboard if you please Mister Hosking.’

  ‘We’re through the shallowest part now, sir, but there’s a tricky turn here with a reef to larboard and a nasty shoal just off that little spit you can see to starboard.’

  There was silence as the lead was cast. The light south-westerly breeze was just enough to waft Medina into the harbour, but Carlisle could see that the higher land concealed the risk of an awkward fluke in the wind, a squall even, and this part of the passage required all the pilot’s attention.

  ‘By the deep, fifteen,’ called the leadsman.

  The pilot nodded. ‘We’re right in the centre of the channel now,’ he said. ‘In just a mile I’ll be asking you to come three points to starboard. You may have to veer,’ he added, looking at the play of the wind on the main tops’l.

  ‘Now, you remarked that I seem to like the place, sir. Well it’s true, I do. The winters are hard and the summers short, but the air is clean, and I have a good position here. I started a family late, and my wife and youngsters are happy. The Navy Board pays me as a master of a third rate, but I don’t have to spend years away from home like I would if I were employed as a regular sailing master.’

  ‘You don’t fear invasion then?’ asked Carlisle.

  ‘There’s always a chance. The town was built as a counter to the Miꞌkmaq and the Acadians, both in the pocket of the French, of course, but there’s been no trouble for a few years now. No, I think we’re here to stay, and if you good fighting folk can kick the French out of this continent, then there’s a great future for us.’

  ‘One step at a time,’ Carlisle laughed, ‘Louisbourg first and that’s a tough enough nut to crack.’

  ‘You can make that turn now, Mister Hosking,’ the pilot said, taking a rough bearing of the north end of the island.

  It really was quite eerie, thought Carlisle. With the wind nearly dead astern and the sea reduced to just the lightest of ripples, he could hear every word that was spoken on deck. Moxon was ordering another cast of the lead – a wise precaution regardless of the pilot’s confidence – and the thuds, creaks and groans as the bosun prepared the starboard bower anchor for letting go were perfectly clear on the quarterdeck.

  ‘Of course, Halifax is quite different from Boston. It still has the character of a frontier town. The gates are barred at night, and we keep a watch on the walls. They’re still mostly wood and earth, but the gun positions are being built up with good solid masonry. We won’t hold out against a regular siege, but nor will we be surprised by the natives, be they Miꞌkmaq or Acadian.’

  The sounds of the ship veering, the tacks and sheets being swapped and the great mizzen yard swinging over to larboard were unnaturally loud. Carlisle looked astern. He could still see the open sea, but it was evident that Halifax was in a sound defensive position. Any attacking fleet would have to negotiate this tricky passage. The pilot made it look easy but in truth it would test the finest navigator if he didn’t know it well.

  ‘There’s George’s Island,’ said the pilot, pointing to a small, wooded obstruction in the harbour that blended so well with the shoreline to the north that it was almost indistinguishable. ‘The soldiers are putting up a battery, nine-pounders, I believe. They’ve cleared the trees from the top of the island, and you can see the revetments going up.’

  Carlisle looked through his telescope. There was a flag drooping lazily from a pole at the highest point of the island and all around it the bare earth showed. It must be hard work with the frost not yet gone, he thought.

  ‘Now you can see our town, just opening around that headland,’ said the pilot with evident pride.

  Carlisle’s expectations of Halifax had been low, so he was surprised by what he saw. A neat town had been laid out in a grid pattern. Most of the houses were of wood and were built one or two storeys high. Many had gambrel roofs, looking more like barns, but with windows and doors. At least one church spire was visible, and there was a big new hall with its own steeple. The whole was surrounded by a wooden stockade with bastions, and the ground was cleared for perhaps a quarter of a mile beyond the palisade. Carlisle nodded in approval.

  The most cursory inspection showed that the business of the town was mostly conducted on the shoreline, where a jetty protruded into the bay. The anchorage was crowded with shipping, loading and unloading to lighters that jostled for space at the single jetty, or run up onto the shingle beach to be unloaded across the shallows. Even at this distance, the town had an urgent air of industry, as though with the easing of winter the inhabitants had set to with a will to make up lost time.

  ‘You can’t see the navy yard yet, it’s outside the walls just to the north of the town,’ said the pilot. ‘Now if you’ll pardon me for a moment, there’s only three cables between the island and the town. It’s deep water, thirteen fathoms or so, but the locals have no sense of right and wrong, and a boat could shoot under our bows at any moment.’

  The pilot took some rapid bearings and ordered another point to starboard.

  ‘All clear now, sir. If you look past the island, you can see the village further up the bay. Dartmouth they’re calling it, and they’re building a battery and stockade. It’s really just to stop anyone taking up positions on that eastern shore.’

  Carlisle looked through his telescope. Sure enough, there were some wooden houses there and the start of a palisade. It was an excellent location to dominate the northern end of the bay and would at least provide a deterrent on that side of the harbour.

  ‘Just two miles to run now, sir,’ said the pilot. ‘Your number one seems to have it all under control.’

  Carlisle looked for’rard to where Moxon was checking the anchor. It needed to be ready to be tripped, and yet there must be no chance of it being let go prematurely. His crew were behaving like real seamen; there was no chatter on the deck and as far as he could see everyone was attending to their business.

  ‘If you look past the town now, sir, you’ll see Lord Colville’s squadron anchored off the navy yard. I suppose I should call it Admiral Hardy’s squadron, as he arrived last week. There’s still a frigate careened on the shore but otherwise they’re all there.’

  The tall masts had been in sight for a few minutes, but the full visual impact of a squadron of ships-of-the-line in this out-of-the-way place could only be appreciated as the ships themselves came into sight.

  ‘Eight of the line. Nine if you count that old fifty-gunner, and two frigates. There are a few sloops and cutters, but they come and go. And there’s Mister Hardy’s flagship, Captain, a sixty-four.’

  The sight of eleven men-of-war wasn’t so impressive to sea-officers who’d seen the fleet at Spithead, or the squadrons at
Antigua and Jamaica, but their presence here, in this bleak outpost of the British Empire was startling in the extreme. Carlisle had been raised in the colonies, so to a certain extent he was familiar with log cabins and makeshift settlements, although Williamsburg was a modern, sophisticated colonial capital with the facilities of a moderate-sized English town. Nevertheless, the juxtaposition of a frontier community clinging to the very edges of the civilised world, and a powerful squadron of line-of-battle ships, took his breath away. He could only guess at the superhuman efforts Colville had made to have these ships so trim and obviously ready for sea this early in the year.

  ‘Your berth is two cables to the east of the flagship,’ said the pilot.

  Hosking looked meaningfully at Carlisle, who nodded in reply.

  ‘Hands to furl the courses and fore stays’l,’ called Hosking, ‘brail the mizzen.’ There was no need to shout in this stillness.

  Medina ghosted towards her anchorage under fore and main tops’ls and jib. They were making no more than two knots, barely creeping forward over the ground against the ebbing tide.

  ‘Mister Gordon, you may commence the salute as soon as the anchor is let go.’

  ‘Aye-aye sir,’ replied the master gunner. The smoke from the slow matches was barely dispersed by the light breeze and Gordon breathed deeply of the intoxicating smell. This is what he lived for.

  ‘Hands to the tops’l yards, bosun,’ said Hosking, watching the bearing of the flagship.

  ‘What do you make of the tide, Pilot,’ asked Carlisle.

  ‘Just the start of the ebb, sir, no more than a knot, perhaps half a knot. There are fourteen fathoms at your berth, mostly good thick mud, and at this phase of the moon, the range is no more than eight feet. Just two cables to go now, sir.’

  Hosking exchanged another meaningful glance with his captain. ‘Furl the tops’ls, drop the jib,’ he called to the bosun.

  The bosun raised his call to his lips and blew the short sequence of notes. Nothing more was said, and as if by some sorcery, the tops’ls vanished from the yard and the jib was rushed hand-over-hand down to the jibboom. Medina moved slowly under bare poles to her designated berth.

  ‘You’ll want to make this perfect under the eyes of Sir Charles,’ said the pilot. Carlisle certainly did, and he could see the admiral, his new commander, watching Medina from the flagship’s quarterdeck.

  ‘Rightly we should let her run on half a cable, but there’s a little williwaw coming up the harbour, so I recommend we anchor now before it catches us and pushes our stern away. Nobody will notice that we’re a few yards short.’

  ‘Very well, you may anchor, Mister Hosking.’

  ‘Let go!’ shouted the master at the top of his voice. There was no value now in silence and a real danger that with all the other activity the group on the fo’c’sle might miss the order.

  The anchor fell with a splash into the cold, dark water, dragging the cable behind it.

  Bang! The first gun of the salute caught Carlisle unawares as usual, and at that moment the pilot’s williwaw – a cold gust of wind funnelling down from the hills – caught the frigate’s stern, driving the bows over the cable at the point where the anchor had descended into the mud at the bed of the harbour. Carlisle watched anxiously. Was it enough to drag the anchor?

  ‘Give her forty-five fathoms, Mister Moxon, then hold her on the bits,’ called Carlisle.

  That should be enough scope to take up the shock of the williwaw. The frigate would certainly run further up the harbour than he’d intended, but she’d be held by the cable, and the tide would soon swing her so that she faced north along with the other anchored ships, as soon as the squall passed.

  There was a slight jerk as Medina surged against her cable, and a series of creaks and scuffing sounds as her starboard bow overrode the cable. However, her port-lids on that side were closed, and no damage was done. By the time the thirteen guns had been fired, the wind had dropped, and the frigate was already drifting back onto her cable, her bows to the north. Medina appeared for all the world a regular part of Hardy’s squadron, which of course, from the moment the last gun had been fired, she was.

  ***

  ‘Welcome to Halifax, Captain Carlisle. Not quite the end of the known world, but we’ll be going there shortly.’

  Evidently, Sir Charles Hardy was in a good mood. He had every right to be, thought Carlisle. When he arrived in Halifax a week ago, he could have found a squadron rotted from neglect over a hard winter, with ships unready for sea and crews reduced by desertion and disease. In contrast, he was presented with a fighting force that, in the main, was ready to sail and eager to take part in this great endeavour.

  ‘I see you’ve brought your reports, Captain, but just let me know your frigate’s state in your own words.’

  ‘Stored for eighty days, sir, wood and water for a month. She’s sound and tight, but my sails were cut up by a French frigate a week ago. They’re patched, and my spare sails are good, but I could do with a new suit if one’s available. Ten seamen short on my establishment.’

  ‘Well, there are no spare sails in Halifax, I regret, although we may be able to offer a few bolts of canvas.’

  Hardy made no comment on the shortage of a few seamen, a deficiency of ten men was barely worth mentioning, and neither man had any illusions about picking up seamen in Halifax.

  ‘I’m not short of canvas, sir, but some of my sails were shot through in the bolt-ropes. My sailmaker’s done a good job, but they can’t match regular loft-sewn sails.’

  ‘Then I regret that you’ll have to make do until the next storeship convoy reaches us. But of course, you’ll be sailing long before then. You’ve seen the squadron,’ Hardy said, waving a hand towards the great stern windows, ‘Lord Colville insisted that all his captains lived on board right through the winter. I imagine they weren’t too happy about it, but it forced them to look to the preservation of their ships, and you can see the result.’

  How easy it would have been to use the Halifax yard’s embryonic facilities as an excuse for a derelict squadron. Carlisle could appreciate the enormous efforts that Colville must have made through the long winter.

  ‘Colville has already sent a sloop and a cutter to watch Louisbourg. As soon as they report that it’s ice-free, I’ll sail.’

  Hardy looked out of the windows at the ice-rimmed harbour. It would be hard lying in a square-rigged ship off Île Royale while winter persisted.

  ‘I have in mind that you should sail before that. I can give you two days to put yourself in order, but then you must be away. I’ll wait for the next report from the sloop, it’s Hawke I believe,’ he said glancing at some papers on his desk to remind himself. ‘Yes, Hawke, she’s been out there two weeks now and must be feeling it. You must brave the ice as she has. I need a ship of your force to watch the French as soon as is humanly possible, a brig-sloop just won’t do the job. Let’s say Tuesday, and I pray that the weather will break soon.’

  Amen, thought Carlisle.

  ***

  11: Île Royale

  Thursday, Twenty-Third of March 1758.

  Medina, at Sea. Off Louisbourg, Île Royale.

  It had been a frustrating passage north and east. Just two hundred nautical miles of sea separated Halifax and Louisbourg, and with fair winds, Medina could easily have covered the distance in twenty-four hours. Fair winds, however, were hard to find. Instead headwinds, dead calms and a persistent heavy swell from the southeast had made a frustrating time of it, and the planned day’s passage had taken more than two days.

  Hosking had tried everything, including bringing the frigate dangerously close to the Nova Scotia coast, inside the Frenchman’s Bank and the Middle Bank. Nevertheless, the sun was just not strong enough to create an evening land breeze, and the frigate rolled horribly in the swell that built up in the shallowing water. An anxious, moonlit night was spent when the boats were hurriedly manned to tow the frigate off the deadly rocks of Cape Liscomb. Carlisle wat
ched helplessly from the fo’c’sle as the longboat and the yawl strained to pull Medina’s head clear. The breaking swell made it almost impossible to keep time, and when one oar caught a crab, it put the whole bank of oars out and it was all the rowers could do to keep their seats.

  It was Moxon in the longboat who saved the day, calling the timing with one eye on the sea and the other on the oarsmen, taking a long, deep pull whenever the swell permitted, first with the starboard oars, then with the larboard. Wishart in the yawl copied him, calling for a stroke whenever the swell permitted, with one eye always on the longboat. Slowly and painfully, the frigate’s head was pulled around and dragged out to sea. With the morning, a breath of wind came from the northwest, a blessed relief that allowed Medina to set her sails and creep away from the dreadful, iron-bound coast.

  ***

  ‘I stand humbled,’ said a shaken Hosking, not caring who heard him. ‘I brought the ship into danger, and it was only you, sir, you and Mister Wishart and those brave lads in the boats, who saved us,’ he said to the exhausted first lieutenant when he climbed back on board.

  The moon had dipped to the horizon, saving Moxon’s blushes from being seen. He’d noticed a real change in his relationship with both Carlisle and Hosking since the fight with the French frigate, but he was not yet used to hearing compliments. In truth, he was pleased with himself. He knew that the boat coxswains, vastly experienced though they were, couldn’t have achieved it alone. They were too steeped in the ways of the navy and would have persisted in merely thrashing the water to no good effect, demanding greater and greater efforts from the oarsmen. In a way, it was his relative inexperience that had allowed him to see a better way – the only way as it turned out – of managing the boats.