The Exile Breed

by Charles Egan

  They worked on. As of habit, Luke counted the number of beds down the side and multiplied it across. Three hundred on this floor alone! Six hundred people on two floors, where there had only been lumber before.

  When the final whistle was blown, Luke sat on a bundle of planks. The other officer sat beside him.

  ‘You’ve been counting have you?’

  Luke looked up in surprise. ‘How did you know?’

  ‘The look in your eyes and the way you were pointing, when you thought there was no one was looking. So what’s the number?’

  ‘Of bunks?’

  ‘What else.’

  ‘Near to six hundred, I’m reckoning.’

  ‘And you could do all that in your head? You’re good. I’d been thinking you were just a simple fellow from Mayo and you reckon like that. Have you schooling?’

  ‘My uncle used to teach us. Not a Government kind of school, you understand, but good enough to reckon numbers.’

  ‘It’s more schooling than I ever had, I can tell you that. Still, I had to learn to get my Mates Ticket. Hard enough it was, and it makes a man know the value of learning.’

  ‘I know what you mean,’ Luke said.

  The officer took out a pipe, tamped the tobacco in, and slowly lit it.

  ‘We educated men must stick together, even if neither of us have been to proper schools. But one thing I must tell you, Luke. I’m the Second Mate, name of Tyler, and as long as you’re on board the ship, you have to call me ‘Mr. Tyler’. Or ‘Sir’ if you prefer. Otherwise call me nothing. It’s not that I want it, but that’s the way that it is. So don’t ever think of calling me ‘Louis’.’

  ‘I understand,’ Luke replied.

  ‘An odd mixture, you might say. ‘Louis’ because my mother was Quebec. French speaking. The Tyler bit is from my father.’

  ‘English, I’d guess.’

  ‘An English-born sailor from one of the Medway towns. Chatham, right beside the docks. He was a tough fellow by all accounts. Ended up in the Workhouse, and so to the Merchant Marine and Quebec. When I was still only nine, he vanished on a voyage. Whether he was drowned or just ran off from my mother, I really don’t know. One way or the other, it finished my schooling.’

  ‘So what did you do then?’

  ‘By the time I was eight, I was working the winter in the forests, and spending the summer on odd jobs. After my mother died, I ended up on the street. That’s where half the Quebec sailors come from, those that don’t come out of the jails.’

  ‘You’ve worked in the forest, Mr. Tyler?’

  ‘I have, though at the age of eight I wasn’t earning much. They wouldn’t let me out cutting the timber in the bush, they just kept me in the caboose shanty, peeling potatoes and the like. So with damned little earnings, when the spring came and the logging was over, I’d make my way back with the other fellows to Quebec. Then one day, I decided to try my hand as a sailor. There’s no future in that though, so I decided to go on for my Mate’s Ticket. Took me long enough too, but I got there in the end.’

  ‘You’ve had a hard life, Mr. Tyler.’

  ‘Not as bad as some, Luke. The poor devils we take to Quebec, they’re the ones that have it worst. They’re the reason that you’re working as you are. It’s almost impossible to get sailors for a wreck like this.’

  ‘A wreck?’

  ‘A wreck is all it is, and none of the sailors in Liverpool, nor Quebec neither, have any wish to be working on her. They’re terrified of fever, and I can’t say I blame them. So, since Press Gangs are out of fashion now, that’s why we’re desperate for men like you. Sharkey would never have taken you, except he knows he has to.’

  ‘It makes sense,’ Luke said. ‘Still, we’re being paid.’

  ‘Aye, ye are. What are they giving you?’

  ‘Two shillings a day.’

  ‘Not so bad, you might think. They didn’t tell you they were Canadian shillings, did they?’

  ‘No…’

  ‘Not quite the same as shillings sterling. Your two shillings are more like a shilling and eightpence when you work out the difference.’

  ‘Not that I’ve much choice, do I, Mr. Tyler? It’s still far better than any wage in Mayo.’

  ‘None of us had much choice, Luke. I’ll tell you one choice we have though, and that’s not to ship out on this wreck again. The moment we hit Quebec, I’m off.’

  After the carpenters had left, and the sailors had gone to their quarters, Luke was alone in the hold except for the huddled group of men, women and children in one corner. He already knew that he would not be allowed to sleep in the sailors’ quarters due to the terror they had of fever being carried by the Irish. He went to the other end of the hold from the Mayo families. There he wrapped himself in his greatcoat, lay down in a soft heap of sawdust, and slept.

  Next day, he worked on, helping the carpenters to swing the heavy beams and floorboards into position to finish building the second floor. Then more carrying timber, upstairs and across to where the bunks were being made. On the third day it was finished. He went to the second floor and found himself a bunk alongside the ladder leading up to the hatch onto the outer deck. Arms aching, he climbed up to the top bunk and lay on it. He knew these were safer, since the mess from men or women in fever could drop down on those below. Using a piece of spare rope he had found, he tied his pack onto his bunk and knotted it well.

  At daybreak loading began. Luke leaned on the rails, watching the crowd of humanity entering the dock and flowing up the gangway into the hold. Tyler came alongside.

  ‘Self-loading cargo,’ he said. ‘Costs a lot more to load the ship at the Quebec end, I can tell you.’

  ‘Sometimes I think you’re a little mocking, Mr. Tyler.’

  ‘Maybe I am, Luke. It’s just the way it is though, isn’t it?’

  Luke went down into the hold. Already fighting had erupted as people fought for the best bunks. Alarmed, he went to his own bunk. His pack was still there. He climbed up, and lay down, his head on his pack.

  There was a tap on his shoulder.

  ‘Luke. For God’s sake, get up.’

  ‘I didn’t know you needed me, Mr. Tyler.’

  ‘Need you! You’re working now, and don’t forget it. Come on.’

  Luke was assigned to one of the bars on the anchor capstan, and heaved hard with the other sailors as the anchor rose.

  The captain had come to supervise the weighing of the anchor. It was the first time Luke had seen him. He saw Luke, and came over to him. ‘New, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes sir.’

  He muttered a few words which Luke could not hear. Then he prodded a finger into Luke’s chest.

  ‘And this is my ship, and don’t you forget it.’

  ‘No sir,’ said Luke. He could smell the rum on the man’s breath.

  After the anchor was secured, Luke was assigned to coiling the ropes on deck. He watched as the docks of Liverpool slipped by on the right, the Wirral peninsula on the left. As soon as they left the Brunswick dock, their place was being taken by another ship. He recognised it at once as another lumber trader. As they passed long lines of other ships, he picked out another seven lumber ships at anchor.

  Most of the passengers stayed below, but there were a few dozen on top. Again, there was the eerie keening from the women. One of the sailors swore in French. The other sailors glared at the women. They too were unnerved by the keening.

  Chapter 2

  Cork Examiner, August 1847:

  Surely the Government will not allow the feeling from the disasters attending the poor Irish in a foreign land to pass away with the miserable deaths of the victims. Will there be no enquiry into the causes, immediate or remote, which produced all this loss of life? Into the modes of transport, the state of emigrant vessels, the abominations of emigrant agents, and all the etceteras which have become and are accessory to the deaths of the Irish poor. Out of the 2235 who embarked for Canada in those wretched hulks, called emigrant vesse
ls, not more than 500 will live to settle in America.

  The voyage of the Centaurus started well enough, with quiet seas, though it was very slow. As Liverpool disappeared astern, they sailed into the Irish Sea, they passed the Fylde Coast on the starboard side. Over the next few days, Luke saw the mountains of Westmoreland. The Isle of Man visible to the west, outlined against the setting sun.

  Past the Kintyre Peninsula to starboard, the Glens of Antrim and Rathlin Island to port, the last they were to see of Ireland.

  The long procession of mountainous Scottish islands to starboard. Islay and Jura. Mull, with tiny Iona at its tip. Tiree and Coll.

  Then the open Atlantic.

  Luke soon discovered what his duties were, and just as important, what they were not. He had been taken on as a swabbie, not as a sailor. The sailors were all Quebecers, and only knew French, which they spoke in their own argot. Luke was glad he was not expected to climb the rigging and furl or unfurl the sails. That was strictly reserved for sailors, and in any case, it would be dangerous for him because he did not understand their speech.

  One of his jobs was cleaning the outside deck timbers with the rough limestone bars of holystone. This meant long hours on his knees scrubbing. He spent time too stuffing oakum between the timbers to keep them watertight, often under the sharp eye of Mr. Starkey.

  His main duty though was manning the bilge pumps, often working two separate stretches of four hours each in a day, between his other duties. He suspected strongly that this was the reason he had been taken on, and it was the hardest. Pumping meant long hours in semi-darkness, pushing and pulling the handles of the pump up and down until his back ached with the effort. The stink was appalling. There was always a sailor on the other handle, but it was a duty that the sailors despised, and the more that Mr. Starkey could keep Luke on the pump, the more gratified the sailors seemed to be.

  Many of the planks in the hull were rotten, and the gaps between them had not been caulked before they left port, nor could they have been unless the ship had been hauled on its sides to expose the bottom of the hull. Always, the water was seeping into the bilge hold to mix with other foul fluids and slops from the ship, though most of the filth from the shit buckets went overboard before it hit the bilge hold. At times, Luke feared that he would contract fever from the bilge, though, as he reflected, the passenger decks were probably more dangerous.

  Working the pump went on all day. During squalls and storms, the pump was manned all night as well. Often, Luke worked at the pump right through the night as the ship pitched and rolled.

  His bunk was a good one, well above the bilge hold. He could never get away from the stink of the hold though, nor the sounds of the people relieving themselves into the buckets, night and day. Every morning they slopped out, and this was a job for the passengers who were working their passage. ‘Sloshers’, the people called then. Every morning they carried the buckets outside and threw the shit and piss overboard. When the sea was rough, they also had to scrub down the passenger decks and scoop the shit into the buckets, before carrying them up. During storms, when the hatches were down, none of this was done and the stench got worse.

  The bunk beneath was occupied by a young man, who never spoke. Instead he turned his head to the hull, and seemed to sleep for most of the day. Luke had seen this kind of misery before, the misery of a man who had already been broken.

  Luke himself spoke to no one, except when necessary, and he told no one of where he was from and where he was going, nor did he ask. There was no point either in talking of conditions on the ship. That would only depress him. In any case, he had little time. Most people were asleep when he left the passenger decks to start work in the mornings, and asleep again when he returned.

  The women’s keening had stopped when Ireland had dropped below the horizon. The only disturbance now was the wailing of babies, and the crazed whine of an old man, all through the night. That apart, the ship was quiet, and he slept well enough.

  Cooking was not easy. At first, he had enough to eat from what he had bought in Liverpool, and he added to it by buying cabbage from the ship’s stores. But the vegetables on board ran out very early, and after that, he never ate anything green.

  The kitchen had a long narrow bin, filled with sand, with a log fire built on top. Often the smoke of the fires forced them out of the kitchen. Luke had been frustrated by this, and also by the time he spent standing in line for the kitchen, especially since he never had enough free time.

  His rations were simple now – porridge with water in the morning, flat bread with butter and smoked meat at mid-day, and sometimes porridge in the evening. Then he began to buy ship biscuits, picking out the weevils, though in the end he ate them too. As time passed, he rationed himself to save money and food.

  He never ate with the sailors, who kept well to themselves.

  There was little enough water for cooking and drinking, but none for washing or shaving. At first, the prickling of his beard irritated him, but as it grew, he became used to it. When it grew too long, he borrowed a Sheffield scissors to cut it back.

  He had one change of clothes, and this helped, but he quickly became rather repulsed with himself. He got used to it though, and slept in his clothes every night, his single blanket wrapped around him, inside his greatcoat so it could not be stolen.

  He watched anxiously for any signs of disease. There was enough sea sickness in the early days, that was for sure, but no obvious evidence of fever then. But that was to change.

  As he made his way to the pump one day, he passed a screaming woman. He saw her head was swollen, and her face was hideously deformed. Her cheeks were red, but the rest of her face had turned white. Her feet were swollen too, and covered with putrid, black spots. He could smell the reek of decaying flesh. Now he knew for the first time that there was fever aboard ship.

  He thought back on the desperate winter days in the mountains, watching people slowly dying from fever. The screaming. The unmistakable stink of gangrene.

  And Alicia’s death too, years before the hunger came.

  A few days later, he saw the ill woman’s corpse being manhandled up onto the outer deck. A priest accompanied it, and it was laid on the deck. He made the form of a cross on the woman’s forehead.

  ‘Per istam sanctam Unctionem…’

  Through this Holy Unction, May the Lord free you from sin, and raise you up on the Last Day.

  Luke went down on one knee. The corpse was wrapped in a shroud, and weights attached. Then it was passed over the side of the ship.

  When all was finished, Luke walked over to the priest.

  ‘It’s started.’’

  ‘It has,’ the priest replied. ‘And more to come before we make land. Her husband has it.’

  Yes, Luke thought. How much further would it spread? How many would survive the voyage?

  Would he?

  There had been many days and nights of wind and rain, but then the first storm came.

  It began with a rising wind, and the sails were lowered. The sailors worked fast as the masts swung from side to side. The passengers were sent below, and the hatches were battened down.

  The wind was still rising, and the rain became torrential. The outer deck flooded, and the rolling of the ship flushed it through the gaps between the hatches and the deck. Seawater poured down into the two passenger decks. Soon the water was ankle deep in the lowest deck, and it sloshed from side to side as the ship bucked and rolled. There was more sea sickness and the screaming of frightened children.

  Luke spent much of that desperate night at the bilge pump. Now there were two men on each handle, working the pump far faster than before, as the water from the decks cascaded into the bilge hold. For some time, it seemed that the water kept rising as the ships timbers flexed before the waves, and water came in through the splits in the ship’s timbers.

  After two desperate hours, Luke was relieved, and staggered back to his bunk. He nibbled on his smoked beef, but i
t was not enough, and for the first time since the winter in the mountains, he felt the bite of hunger.

  He was only able to count the days by the chinks of light coming through a little crack between the cover and the hatch at the back of the ship, where the water sloshed in as the waves hit.

  For four days they ran before it, the sails wrapped tight on the masts, the decks stripped bare, the hatches battened tight. Four days in the darkness, women and children screaming as the ship lurched up and down. Four days living with the foul smell of vomit and shit in the passenger decks, and even worse at the bilge pump.

  Then it was over, and they were in the gentle swell of the North Atlantic. Starkey allowed them outside for the first time. As Luke made his way towards the ladder, he passed another woman screaming on her bunk. He noticed again the reek of decaying flesh. Now he knew for certain that fever was spreading through the ship.

  Within a few days there were other cases, and the woman was showing clear signs of gangrene, and her face and legs were bloated. A week later, she and two more were dead, including the husband of the woman who had died before the storm.

  Now Luke had a new duty. Starkey ordered him to supervise the disposal of the corpses. The sailors had refused to undertake this duty, and even the threat of a flogging had not moved them. They knew full well the dangers of contagion. So did Luke.

  The irony of this struck him. He was now a ganger again, even if it took little of his time. He thought back to the building of famine roads across Croghancoe, supervising people who were desperate for money, but hardly able to work.

  Every morning now, he walked between the bunks. Any corpse found had to be manhandled up the ladders to the outer deck. At first, Luke tried to have this done by the family, knowing that they had been closest to the infection, and not wishing to infect other passengers. This proved to be impossible though.

  The bodies were wrapped in shrouds, and weights attached, before they were thrown into the devouring sea. As the fever killed more, the corpses were thrown into the ocean unweighted.