by Chris Durbin
Carlisle nodded to Moxon who sent up a relief. Whittle slid down the backstay and arrived with a skip on the quarterdeck.
‘It’s him again, sir,’ he said breathlessly. ‘It’s that same French frigate, the one we tangled with hereabouts and the one we beat up north.’
Carlisle’s heart beat faster. That changed the equation. Assuming it was the same captain, he had a point to make. He may not even have recognised Medina, but any British frigate would do. Carlisle knew how the Frenchman thought, he recognised his own determination, his own pride in the face of all logic.
‘You’re sure, Whittle?’ Carlisle looked at him almost sternly. His next move would depend on the certainty of Whittle’s identification.
‘I’m certain, sir. He carries his fore tops’l very high, higher than ours or any frigate I’ve seen. I’d recognise him anywhere.’
They’d last seen the Frenchman five months ago when he’d limped past them into Port Dauphin, his fore topmast and main yard shot away. Since then he must have carried out rudimentary repairs and slipped past the British blockade back to Brest or Rochefort. Now he was off the American coast again, eager – no, desperate – to prove himself. Carlisle was as sure as he could be; this Frenchman wouldn’t run.
‘Bear away, Mister Hosking, put us before the wind.’
‘I beg your pardon…’ started Hosking in surprise.
‘You heard me correctly the first time, master, bear away,’ he repeated angrily. Then his face softened. This was no way to lead his senior officers.
‘Mister Moxon,’ he called down to the waist, ‘Mister Hosking, would you join me for a moment? Mister Wishart can handle the ship.’
They stood together against the taffrail.
‘This man won’t run, particularly if he’s recognised us, which I must assume he has. However, I want him to think we don’t choose to fight. We’ll run north until the light starts to fade, then we’ll turn and take him on. I fancy we’ll be better in a night engagement than he’ll be. We’ve spent long enough blundering around off Île Royale, after all.’
That brought a smile from the sailing master. It was probably true as well.
‘You may pass the word so that the people don’t think we’re shy.’
***
Medina ran north, her t’gallants and stuns’ls speeding her through the water at nine, sometimes ten knots. The French frigate – after all this time Carlisle still didn’t know her name – crept closer, and now she was only three miles astern. God, she was fast, thought Carlisle. She had a real look of determination as her forefoot clove the sea, and the broad spread of canvas rose and fell as each crest of a swell passed under her.
The sun had set fifteen minutes before and there was only another forty-five minutes or so of light left. Carlisle analysed his motives in wanting a night fight. He always felt better when there was a complicating factor in an engagement: rocks and shoals, tricky currents, back-eddies of wind. However, none of those things was available to him a hundred miles northeast of Cape Henry and the only advantage that he could give Medina was darkness. Every fibre in his being rebelled against a fair fight, a slugging match between opponents of comparable capability. He knew that even if he won – and that was the toss of a coin – he’d have a butcher’s bill a fathom long and his precious frigate would be so battered that she’d need a navy yard to refit. And of course, he may be killed or wounded himself, and he so much wanted to see Chiara and his child. Was that the real issue? Had impending fatherhood made him more careful of his own safety? He shook off the question, leaving it unanswered.
Carlisle looked down at the waist. The gun crews were relaxed, and they appeared confident, swapping jokes and the sort of barbed comments that men throw around as they wait to go into battle. How many would be laughing still in two hours? He took one more look over the taffrail at the advancing Frenchman. That ship must be moving at least a knot faster than Medina. Even if he wanted to escape, it would hardly be possible now.
‘Mister Moxon. I’ll speak to all the officers, master’s mates and midshipman, if you please. Bosun and gunner and Sergeant Wilson as well.’
They came hurriedly aft led by the gunner who evidently had not been at his station in the magazine. He’d been fussing around his guns, no doubt. Carlisle waited until they were all gathered.
‘Gentlemen, we’ll turn and fight as soon as it’s fully dark,’ he looked over the larboard quarter to where the last glow of sunset could be seen, ‘and I expect that will be about two bells.’
As if on cue, the ship’s bell struck once, half an hour into the last dog. Carlisle smiled. A good omen? His officers clearly thought so as they grinned back at him in the fading light.
‘That’s our timing then, half an hour to go. She’s faster than us, in case you hadn’t noticed,’ more smiles from his officers, they’d all seen the Frenchman eating up the gap between the two ships, ‘but our gunnery will be better; faster and more accurate. Mister Gordon, can you leave the magazine to your mate?’
‘I can, sir,’ he replied, rubbing his hands in anticipation. If it weren’t for the warrant and the pay that went with the rank, Gordon would gladly be a quarter gunner again, free to point his guns and hurl death and destruction at the enemy. Every minute spent in the magazine at action took a year off his life, he could swear, and frequently did.
‘Then you’re to be on the waist with the first lieutenant. You’re to point the guns in the first phase of the engagement.’
They all drew closer, listening to their captain and nodding in appreciation as the plan became clear.
‘But remember, gentlemen, there never yet was a plan that survived the first shots. Be alert and listen to my commands. I intend that we’ll sail into Hampton Roads tomorrow with that gentleman in our wake, flying our colours!’
***
Slowly, so slowly, the light diminished. First, the residual orange glow faded from the southwestern horizon, then the brighter stars and the planets came out, one-by-one. Soon the lesser stars showed and then the first trace of the milky way appeared. The Frenchman could be seen quite clearly by the starlight, just two miles astern, and that was all the illumination that Carlisle wanted. The moon would set soon and wouldn’t rise again until well into the morning watch, and he intended that it would be all over by then.
‘Are you ready, Mister Hosking?’ asked Carlisle.
‘Ready, aye ready,’ replied the master.
‘Then haul your wind, larboard tack.’
The sail handlers were ready for this move, and they ran aloft to furl the stuns’l. As the steersmen moved the wheel deliberately to larboard, Medina came smoothly around until she was heading west-southwest with the wind on her bow and her bowlines twanging taut.
Carlisle watched the Frenchman keenly. What he should do – what all the logic of single-ship actions dictated – was to come a point to larboard to pass close under Medina’s stern and deliver a raking broadside that would knock half the fight out of her at one blow. Yes, her bows moved to larboard and she veered her mizzen in preparation. That was what Carlisle was looking for, a sign that the Frenchman was committed.
One mile separated the two ship. The Frenchman came another point towards Medina, she was aiming for a very close pass.
‘Mister Moxon, you may commence firing as soon as your shot will reach her.’
There was a pause, the gunner ran from gun to gun, adjusting elevation, motioning for the handspike men to nudge the guns left to follow the crossing target.
Usually, Carlisle would have saved the first broadside until they were so close that none of the carefully loaded guns could miss. However, today he was determined to upset any pre-conceived notions that his opponent may have. He had trust in his gun crews and knew that the second broadside would be as good as the first; that was partly why he’d brought the gunner up from the magazine.
Half a mile now and closing fast.
‘Fire!’ shouted Moxon. Medina Staggered to the recoil
as the whole broadside hurled its load of cast iron into the night. Carlisle had just enough time to cover his eyes to preserve his night vision. When he looked again, he saw the Frenchman alarmingly close, but he’d taken hits. There was a piece of gunwale missing, and it looked like one of the gunports had a jagged enlargement. That was one gun less, he thought.
‘Now!’ shouted Carlisle. ‘Bring her about Mister Hosking.’
This was where training and long, long months at sea paid off. There was barely a man in Medina’s crew who was not a competent seaman, and the frigate could perfectly well be tacked without the gun crews leaving their stations. The bosun was on the fo’c’sle and bowsprit with the cook, the cooper and half a dozen others, and as Medina’s bows nudged into the wind, they flattened the jib out to starboard by brute force, hauling with all their might at the stiff canvas.
There was a blinding flash as the French frigate fired a broadside into Medina. They were so close – less than pistol-shot – that every gun should have hit its target. However, the French gunners had been expecting to aim at an unprotected stern with a crossing rate of around eight knots, the speed of their ship. However, what they saw instead was the whole of Medina’s larboard broadside as the frigate’s bow passed through the wind, with a combined crossing speed of perhaps twelve knots. The British guns were already re-loaded and run out.
Carlisle saw a shot hammer into the gunwale alongside number four gun, bringing down two men in a shower of splinters, and he reeled as the remainder of the shot smashed against the ship’s side. However, eight-pound shot, even at that range, could barely penetrate Medina’s timbers, which is what Carlisle had intended.
Medina’s bows passed through the eye of the wind, and the frigate paid off fast onto the starboard tack. Now the tables were turned, and Medina was passing under the French frigate’s exposed stern. It was too much to ask of the French captain that he should react sufficiently fast to avoid this blow. That was the advantage of keeping the initiative, thought Carlisle, he could dictate the shape of the battle and his crew were ready for his next move.
‘Fire as you bear!’ shouted Moxon.
Carlisle had time to notice, before his guns obliterated it forever, the name of the frigate, painted in bold white lettering across the stern. Yvette.
The larboard broadside fired again, in twos and threes as Medina passed across the Frenchman’s stern. The French captain, seeing the danger, had started to turn his ship to starboard, trying to set up a broadside-to-broadside contest, but too late. Medina’s round-shot tore through the weak structure of the stern and hurtled along the frigate’s upper deck, felling men and overturning guns.
Hosking continued the tack, bringing Medina onto the Frenchman’s starboard quarter. The Frenchman had brailed his courses and was under tops’ls only, slowing down to avoid overshooting the British Frigate.
Medina was now to windward, just where Carlisle wanted to be. There would be no slugging match, regardless of the French Captain’s wish.
‘Lay me alongside, Mister Hosking, put our bows on his quarterdeck. Away Boarders!’ he shouted.
‘Aye-aye sir,’ Hosking replied. ‘Bear away, quartermaster.’
The quartermaster elbowed aside the lead steersman and took the wheel himself. He spun it a few spokes to larboard and watched the relative position of the Frenchman as Medina’s speed increased. Closer and closer they came.
The starboard gun crews left their stations and gathered on the fo’c’sle under the urging of Moxon, crouching low behind the gunwales. The larboard gunners feverishly reloaded in the hope of another broadside before the two ships met. The bosun and his mates were aloft with grapnels ready to bind the two ships together as soon as they touched.
Closer and closer. The two ships were almost touching when a belated broadside from the Frenchman tore into Medina. This time, at a range of only a few yards, the balls penetrated the oak planking and timbers. Carlisle saw two men down from among the boarders, smashed into a red pulp by an eight-pound ball. But it was only a partial broadside, Medina’s raking attack had disabled half of the Frenchman’s battery and in any case, the time for gunnery was almost over.
‘Fire!’ Shouted the gunner who had taken control of the battery when Moxon left to head up the boarders. Medina’s larboard broadside had only lost one gun and its load of grapeshot cleared wide swathes through the men on the Frenchman’s deck. The swivel guns were firing too, and the marines on both sides were adding their deadly musket fire to the carnage.
Crash! There was nothing gentle about the two ships coming together, and Carlisle saw men thrown off their feet. The grapnels flew and with a shout of, ‘Boarders follow me!’ Moxon led the charge onto the French quarterdeck.
‘Keep the sails set as they are Mister Hosking, keep pushing our bows against her.’
With that, Carlisle drew his sword and sprinted for’rard to join the boarders.
***
In the end, it was an anti-climax. The French captain had made too little allowance for the inexperience of his crew. He’d lost his seasoned veterans, his experienced seamen, when his ship had been refitted in Rochefort. The replacements were all that the port admiral could spare, and they were an unimpressive crew: coastal fishermen and landsmen for the most part, perfectly adequate for preying on merchant ships but found wanting when faced with an enemy frigate. When asked to think and respond quickly in the heat of battle, they had simply frozen, and when their captain and the sailing master were cut down by Medina’s grapeshot, they had no fight left in them. Carlisle reached the quarterdeck just in time to see his coxswain hauling down the ensign and the French first lieutenant, bleeding from a dangerous head wound, kneeling uncertainly among the wreckage of his guns, his sword dangling uselessly by its gold knot from his wrist.
***
30: A Happy Return
Sunday, Third of September 1758.
Medina, at Anchor. Hampton Roads, Virginia.
Medina’s arrival at Hampton Roads in the forenoon watch was a very different affair to the previous time they’d visited. The frigate and her prize had been seen from Cape Henry and the word had passed quickly. The pilot cutter had left her warps dangling from the bollards on the jetty, and yet they’d beaten the horde of local boats by only a whisker. The merchants of Hampton and the James River had suffered badly from the depredations of Yvette and her ilk. They’d lost ships and cargoes, and they’d been frustrated by the navy’s response. Every ship the navy could muster had been off Île Royale throughout the summer, and the French commerce raiders had filled their boots.
‘Moxon will be enjoying this,’ said Hosking, smiling at the thought.
The first lieutenant had been given the prize to bring into Hampton. It would look well on Carlisle’s report and in the broadsheets and might even result in Moxon’s promotion to master and commander – if there was a sloop available.
They anchored in the same berth that they’d left six months before. Since then, spring had turned to summer –reluctantly off Île Royale – and now the days were shortening again, and autumn was around the corner.
There was no word of his wife at Hampton and Enrico came back from the shore with the unwelcome news that there were no carriages and no horses available that day. The innkeeper promised that he’d have the same carriage that he’d hired in March available, but not until the following day when it had been returned by its present hirers.
‘Pass the word for my coxswain,’ he called, and paced his cabin in frustration until Souter was found.
‘Souter. Here’s a chart of the James River. How quickly can you get me to here?’ he demanded, pointing to a bend on a winding creek that thrust northwards from the river opposite Hog Island. ‘Princess Anne’s Port. It’s less than a mile from Williamsburg. About thirty-two land miles of river from here then another four of Archer’s Hope Creek.’
Souter studied the chart for a moment. Truthfully, it conveyed little to him, but he could see that once they’d ro
unded the southernmost point of the peninsula, just past the village of Newport News, this southerly wind would give them a comfortable run up the river.
‘How strong’s the stream, sir?’
Carlisle thought for a moment; it had been a long time since he’d taken a boat out on the James.
‘About a knot and a half on the ebb, half a knot on the flood,’ he replied.
Souter had his own mental reckoner for speeds, times and distances. It worked well but would never pass Trinity House.
‘Bottom of the tide in an hour, sir, then it’ll start to flood. Six hours, maybe seven in the longboat,’ he said definitely. ‘If we leave now, we may just make it before night. I’ll get the boat manned right away, with your permission, sir.’
‘Very well, Souter. I want to be underway in twenty minutes. Pass the word for the doctor as you leave.’
***
There was just enough east in the wind to round the point close hauled, then Souter eased the sheets and the big lugs’l bore them away up the river. The crew took their ease, lounging on the thwarts and staring out at the passing scenery. There were plantations all along the river on both sides. Each house, with its attendant cottages and slave huts, was separated by the green of marshes and fields, and the whole was threaded by narrow creeks.
The last stretch of the river passed in silence except for the lapping of the water as it parted against the longboat’s bow. Hog Island came into sight to larboard, and Carlisle pointed out the marker that showed where Archer’s Hope Creek emptied into the river.
‘Furl the sail, lads, drop the mast,’ said Souter. ‘Look lively with the oars, we’ve a bit of pulling to do now.’
The sun was setting across the river as the longboat threaded its way past the mudbank that guarded the entrance to the creek. There had been some dredging work here, and the channel was well-marked with straight poles. Now that they were out of the river, they started to lose what little help the last of the flooding tide had given them and they were pulling against the current. The creek wound its tortuous way through swamp and tobacco fields, watched only by egrets and turtles at this late hour. The wind dropped to the faintest whisper. In the stillness, a church bell could be heard three miles away in Williamsburg. Carlisle’s thoughts drifted to the opening verse of a new poem; Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.