For the Honor of the Flag: A John Phillips Novel (War at Sea Book 2) (10 page)

The men muttered among themselves, and Phillips believed some of them changed their minds more than once, but in the end, a dozen moved over to the rail. He followed them over and said, “Men, I believe you have gone from the frying pan into the fire. However, you have made your choice and will go aboard Ramillies before the day is over.”

Calling away his gig, he had the boat crew row him over to Ramillies. After the standard welcoming ceremony, Captain Harkins of Ramillies called him aft, where they discussed the exchange. Phillips confessed the semi-mutinous state of his crew, while Harkins admitted he was a hundred men short of a full crew and would do most anything to get some seamen. It seemed many of his crew were landsmen, not much use for anything. He was disgusted that he had to give up ten of his few seamen in exchange for potential mutineers. Phillips offered to bargain. “I have a dozen trained seamen who want to leave the ship. You give me half a dozen seamen plus another six healthy landsmen, and I’ll trade you.”

The deal was made, and Phillips made a quick inspection of men Harkins wished to trade. The men were loaded in Ramillies launch, as well as a few Marines, to make sure all went according to plan. Phillips followed the launch back to the Alacrity in his gig. Once aboard Alacrity, the men from Ramillies were introduced to the purser to see what items must be issued. The men wishing to leave Alacrity got the first taste of their future when Ramillies’ hard horse first lieutenant lit into them, promising a visit to the grating for each. One man Phillips observed was crying as he went down into the boat.

The next few days were devoted to getting the ship ready for sea. The carpenter had the most work to do. With two extra officers on board, he had to remake the wardroom cabins so the new lieutenant of Marines, as well as the new lieutenant foisted on them by Admiral Parker could be accommodated. Then, a yard barge came alongside with two extra nine pounder guns and their tackle and carriages.

During the ship’s French service, it had carried twenty guns, two being removed after being designated a British ship-sloop. Little work was required to refit the extra guns, mainly knocking out the caulked and painted-in gun ports, and fitting the necessary tackle. During this work their new lieutenant, Mister Baker deigned to show his face. He had been expected to do his bit to get the ship ready for sea; right after Admiral Parker informed Phillips the boy would be joining.

However, he had somehow received permission while still on shore to go on leave to visit his mother, and managed to avoid this labor. When he did appear, he arrived in a polished carriage, followed by a large wagon loaded with chests of belongings. An irritated Crawford had his glass on the carriage when it first came into view, suspecting it might be an Admiralty official come to give him grief. Instead, he saw their missing young lieutenant dismount and saunter over to the small shed at the foot of the signal mast. Soon, flags signifying, ‘Request Alacrity send boat’ appeared.

An amused Phillips received the message from Crawford. “Sir, we’d need to be a liner to stow all the gear he has on that wagon.”

“Well, send the jolly boat and the duty mid. Inform that boy he may have two sea chests to come aboard. After all, we are not the ‘Queen Charlotte.”.

When the boy came aboard, he was upset at not being allowed all his gear to be loaded. Much was a present from his mother, and she would doubtless be very upset if he were not allowed to take it aboard. The lad assured Phillips, “Sir, if I am not allowed to take it aboard, I feel I must send the remainder to my Uncle Parker, the Admiral here.”

“Young man, I believe you have hit upon the best solution to the problem. You will tell the mid in the jolly boat to go back ashore and tell the wagoner where to take the gear. After you do that, report to Lieutenant Crawford, who I think, wants you to help the Master in the hold.”

“But sir, I do need to go ashore to bid my uncle goodbye.”

“No problem, youngster. I hereby appoint you signal officer. Just as soon as we hoist our anchor, I will permit you to signal Admiral Parker, ‘Goodbye’.”

The boy was an excellent source of amusement to the officers and many of the crew before the ship sailed. He was full of self-importance, and it was hard for many of the people to keep a straight face when addressing him. The air of despondence among the crew seemed to dissipate, when the men realized officers could be gently chided without savage punishment ensuing. The new Marine officer also was much the same, although being in command of the ship’s Marine complement; he could make his people sweat if he was displeased inordinately.

Eventually, all necessary work had been accomplished, the guard boats dismissed, and the flag gave permission to depart. The cable was wound in, and the Alacrity set sail for the French coast.

As soon as the ship reached the channel, Phillips ordered sail drill to commence. Despite some confusion early on, he found the crew mostly knew what they were doing. Mister Baker surprised him. While he had not yet gained the confidence he would need, no one could fault his knowledge. After the men became more proficient on the sail drill, Phillips switched to gun drill. He had used his own funds to buy powder and shot to drill his men; Admiralty being near with the amount of ammunition allowed for practice.

The longboat pulled out ahead of the ship, dropping off targets, anything that would float and could be easily seen. Mister Crawford had made up the station bill, which specified which man would be assigned to what gun. Afterward however, Phillips had gone over that bill, questioning gun crew men as to their previous experience.

While many captains thought they had done their duty by laying their ship against an enemy, and firing as rapidly as possible into her, there were those that thought accuracy had its importance also, and strived to perfect that art. As a relatively new captain, Phillips was not well acquainted with all that many other captains, but he had heard reputations being discussed, and when gun crew members mentioned shipping with such and such a captain, he was sometimes able to tell himself, ‘Captain So-and-So is a believer in accuracy at long range. Seaman Jones served under the man for three years, some as a gun captain. I will try him as a gun captain myself.’ As best as he could, Phillips tried to assign at least one experienced hand to every gun.

Phillips addressed the men, and told them what they would be doing.  The first stage in their training would entail running the guns out, simulating firing, then pulling the weapons back in simulated recoil, then pretend loading. Later, after any confusion had dissipated, more care would be taken aiming the guns. Next, selected men would crew four of the nine pounders on the starboard side, and fire a few live rounds at targets. Finally, all gun crews would get to fire one round each at targets.

After an hour of running the guns out and back, there was some quiet as experienced men demonstrated the fine points of aiming the big guns. Then, four enormous ‘bangs’ ensued as gunners fired off four of the guns in demonstration.

Finally, all men went back to their assigned gun, and the powder monkeys brought each gun its powder charge. Every gun was loaded, under the eyes of the gun captain, the midshipman in charge of each section, and the two roving lieutenants. As the ship sailed up to each target bobbing in the water, one gun fired. Some of the shots were sadly far off target, but a few either hit their target, or was close enough to have done serious damage, had the target been an enemy ship.

When the firing was completed, Crawford announced it was time to ‘Splice the main brace’. This had nothing to do with maintenance of the main mast’s brace, an important cable meant to support the main mast.

As a reward for their performance, the men were to be issued an extra ration of grog, a mixture of rum, lime juice and water. Actually, although Alacrity had quantities of rum aboard, since she was recently out of port, she was required to issue beer instead of rum until the beer had been expended. Phillips had anticipated the situation, and had purchased his own supply of rum to issue to the men as a reward. When the men found they were to receive rum instead of the watery beer, there was a deafening cheer, probably the first to be heard aboard Alacrity since entering British service.

Alacrity, reporting to the Inshore Squadron commanded at the time by Commodore Smythe along the French coast, found she was to keep a close eye on Brest, observing everything there was to see; making occasional forays along the coast to see what mischief could be inflicted upon the French. Taking departure from the Commodore, Phillips handed the ship over to the sailing master, and went to his cabin.

He had a bundle of signals, orders and the like to become familiar with. Actually, he expected to remain in sight of the Inshore Squadron much of the time, but in case of bad weather, or when going on the occasional foray, it was a good plan to have written instructions to follow to avoid misunderstandings. One of the orders he had been given expressed the desirability of making contact with the local fishing fleet to gather information, newspapers and the like. After making sure he understood his orders, he called in his officers.

“Gentlemen, as you know, we are to observe what we may while close inshore. In addition, we are to attempt to gather what information we can from the local fishing community, or from any other source. Whenever we encounter a fishing boat, we will attempt to purchase fish or whatever other supplies they may wish to sell. It is of upmost importance we treat every fishing boat skipper with courtesy, even if this is not reciprocated. Anything we purchase, we will pay for in cash. Should I not be on deck when speaking a boat, the officer of the deck is instructed to report to me to secure funds for any purchases.

The next afternoon, patrolling along the coast, just within the sight of land the lookout spotted a medium sized fishing boat. As Alacrity approached, it appeared the gaff-rigged cutter was pulling lobster traps. Some faces aboard the craft looked at the ship in alarm, then went on with their work. When the fishermen had pulled their last pot, Phillips handed Mister Baker the speaking trumpet and had him hail the lobster boat. In fluent French the lad asked the crew if they would sell a half dozen lobsters. It turned out the fishermen’s idea of the French language did not quite coincide with Baker’s Parisian variety, however the idea was transmitted, and a basket of angry, snapping lobsters was hoisted aboard by a pair of burly fishermen. Phillips invited the pair to his cabin along with Mister Baker.

The cabin servant had already laid out some mugs and a stoneware jug of dark rum. The men were impressed by the rum, as they were by the pile of silver shillings Phillips pushed in front of them. After passing the time of day, he asked if they had a newspaper they wished to sell. Phillips indicated he was a long way from home, and news was a hard commodity to find. The French spokesman allowed as they might have a few pages of an old paper aboard their boat, which he might sell. After the men had downed a few drinks, Phillips told his guests that in addition to newspapers; livestock and vegetables would gladly be purchased, if the price was right. The man told him that while silver coin from any nation was acceptable, fewer questions would be asked if French coin could be used for payment. On a subsequent visit, the fisherman produced a purse of quarter écu
coins. Phillips bought a supply of these coins with two gold guineas.

A few uneventful weeks after beginning her vigil, a new vessel appeared to assist the surveillance, this being one of the new gun brigs, the HMS Rook. The Commodore being out of sight, and the lieutenant commanding the brig being very junior, Phillips ordered its captain to repair onboard Alacrity. This officer was Lieutenant Adams, a few weeks into his first cruise as a commander. After briefing the young officer to his duties and explaining that he was trying to gain much needed intelligence from the local fishermen, he left the officer with the remainder of his écus to purchase supplies and information. Jokingly telling Adams that he needed to make a cruise to replenish his purse, he made his departure.

Patrolling the French coast east of Brest, Alacrity saw no action for the first few days. Plenty of sail was sighted, but all were able to duck into defended ports that were safe against any incursion that he might be able to mount. One black night though, Phillips had the ship look into a small bay where a sailing barge had ducked the evening before. The master’s chart showed a battery defending the anchorage, but he had no modern information on soundings.

He sent boats in the dark to gather data on depths, but ultimately decided to let the barge go. The bottom of the bay was shallow and uneven. Alacrity would run a grave risk of running aground under the guns of the battery. Phillips remained just outside the bay until the sun began to rise, hoping the barge’s captain might think he had left and resume his voyage. When that did not happen, he ordered the ship out to sea.

A few miles out to sea, the main lookout hailed, a sail in sight to their west. This had a strange rig, which Phillips recognized as a trabaccolo, a craft normally found in the Mediterranean, and which he had seen several examples of there. Alacrity being in the eye of the sun, the stranger sailed right close to her without seeing her danger. Firing a gun woke the trabaccolo’s crew. She too fired a gun; this shot directly at Alacrity, severing her mizzen forestay Phillips ordered the guns run out. Alacrity was already at action stations, as she normally was at dawn. Seeing the display, the stranger let fly his sheets and surrendered.

She hoisted a flag which Lieutenant Baker, his signal officer identified as that of Venice. Leaving the ship in the charge of Lieutenant Crawford, Phillips took Baker and a dozen Marines with him to board the Venetian craft. Boarding the trabaccolo, they were met with a storm of Italian from the captain. Phillips turned to Baker, but he was mystified, also. Finally, Baker tried French out on the Venetian captain which worked. Both men were reasonably fluent in that language.

The Venetian was indignant that he had been stopped and boarded by a British ship. Phillips was angry that his ship had been fired upon by a supposedly neutral vessel and damaged. After the Venetian captain had become overly noisy and disrespectful, to Phillips’ notions, he ordered a couple of Marines to take the man in hand, which they did by offering to pin him to the mainmast with their bayonets. A ship’s mate came forward; having identified himself as speaking a little English, Phillips ordered that worthy to produce the ship’s manifest. An hour later, Baker came before Phillips and announced that the ship had recently sailed from Livorno in Tuscany to Le Havre with a cargo of oil. There, she had picked up a cargo of sawn oak timber consigned to the naval shipyard in Toulon.

With an escort of several Marines, and a pistol in his hand Phillips went below, and found the manifest was correct. The hold was packed solid with freshly sawn ship’s timbers, suitable for use in a shipyard. Phillips called all of the Italian seamen aft and informed them the ship was now a prize, since she was laden with military supplies for France, and since she had fired upon his ship. All crew members were subject to imprisonment aboard the hulks, except for those who might wish to take service in the Royal Navy. There was much chattering among the crew, but in the end, all except the captain volunteered. Most of them he sent aboard the Alacrity, to be replaced by a similar number of his own crewmen. The equivalent of a bosun aboard the prize he left in place on the trabaccolo, and placed one of his master’s mates in charge, with orders to sail her to the nearest practicable British port.

Resuming the cruise, they encountered several small coasters. These were all manned by fervent republicans, only one, a cook, would deign to serve in a British ship of war. Not wanting to deplete his crew by sending them away in small value prizes, Phillips ordered the prizes burned; and the crews, less the cook, Phillips sent ashore in the prize’s boats. The crew grumbled, seeing what they regarded as their prize money go up in smoke.

Standing by the helm, he called for his clerk and dictated a letter to Admiral Lord Bridport, now commanding the Channel Fleet. In his dictation, he explained his actions in burning prizes, emphasizing he wished to conserve his crew so that he would be able to face more important enemies then penny-packet coasters. Instructing his clerk to make a fair copy, he sent him below, knowing at the turn of the watch, the helmsmen, quartermaster, and probably his clerk would have all spread the word of his reasons for burning prizes.