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

7 May 1794

With the extra men Courageous had on board, Phillips was able to put a fair sized crew on the prize. Since she was undamaged, he elected to have her accompany him to the rendezvous with the fleet, in case she might be useful to the admiral. The pair searched for those few ships of the Channel fleet on station for another week in foul weather before the Inconnue, scouting far out to port, spotted the topsails of one of that fleet’s frigates cruising nearby.

Given congratulations for the prize, and then the place of the rendezvous, they finally made contact with the fleet. Flying the signal for ‘Have dispatches’ and coming to the wind, Courageous waited for the ship to approach. Most of the Channel Fleet was safely tucked away in port back in Britain, waiting for better weather. HMS Carysfort, flying a broad pendant, sailed up to Courageous and the commodore told Phillips via a speaking horn to come aboard when the weather moderated. In the meantime, he was to join the squadron in trail with Carysford.

It was two days before Phillips felt it reasonably safe to risk a boat trip to the squadron flagship. He signaled his intentions to Carysford, and received an affirmative from the temporary Commodore, Laforey. Phillips was well-nigh soaked when he clambered up the sides of the flag, and was welcomed aboard. Laforey hustled him into his quarters, and his servant removed his wet outer clothing and wrapped a heavy blanket around him. The commodore pressed a glass of brandy in Phillip’s hand before excusing himself while he read the dispatches.

After a quick perusal, Laforey took the time to reread the documents in a more leisurely manner. Finally, he spoke to Phillips, “So, has Admiral Howe given you any spoken comments on these orders?” 

“Sir, when I left Portsmouth, Admiral Howe was still at the Admiralty. I was given this packet by his flag captain, who told me to get it out to the commodore commanding the ships of the fleet on station. I have no idea what is in the dispatch.”

“Well, Phillips, it seems I have had more recent communication with Lord Howe than you. Lord Howe has left port and has looked into Brest, without discovering the intelligence he is looking for. I am to take you under my command. I also must send a ship to reconnoiter the port of Brest again to ascertain what ships may now be in that harbor.”

“You will take your frigate and reconnoiter the port to see what has transpired since last Admiral Howe looked in. The admiral expects a large convoy of French merchant ships will arrive shortly. They were in Hampton Roads in the Chesapeake some weeks ago. It seems information has recently arrived in London that late last year; a couple of French third rates, with some smaller ships took a large merchant fleet to sea, bound for the French islands in the Caribbean.”

“France is in desperate straits since the failure of the harvest last fall. Many men needed to plant the fields have been taken into the Army, so the import of food is of absolute necessity.”

“The mission of this fleet was to fill up with colonial produce from the French islands, then sail to the Chesapeake Bay, which it has done, to load as much American grain as they can procure. It is anticipated this fleet will return to France this spring.”

“Prior to their arrival, it is expected  Admiral Villaret of the French navy will sail with his fleet of line-of battle ships to rendezvous with the grain fleet, and escort it into port. Admiral Howe needs to have intelligence of whether or not that fleet is still in harbor, while he awaits the grain fleet at sea. He is very anxious to meet with this fleet.”

Laforey added, “My ships on station are few and far apart. It would be convenient to send you to scout Brest and then to locate Admiral Howe and give him this latest information. His fleet should be patrolling in the Atlantic off Ushant.”

“Sir, with just my lone frigate, it will be difficult to find the fleet. Would it be possible to have a few other ships?”

“Phillips, I just do not have any others I can spare. What about that prize I see behind your frigate? Is she badly beaten up?”

“No sir, we found her on our beam at first light a few days ago. We had gone to quarters, and cleared for action. She had not. Her lookouts did not see us. We saw her. When her captain came on deck, he saw us with our ports open and our guns run out. He fired a few guns for the honor of the flag, and then hauled it down. Not a shot was fired against either of us.”

“What about a crew? I imagine she has just a scratch prize crew aboard.”

“Actually, Captain Laforey, she has a fair sized crew aboard. I have a full crew on the Courageous, and the port admiral back at Portsmouth sent aboard a draft of sixty men for the fleet. Of course, those men are the usual sweepings of the press and assizes, and some have been held in prison for months. Few are actual seamen, but many are doing well. I put a few seamen on board the Inconnue from Courageous, and leavened them with a few petty officers.”

“Very well Phillips. You should have sent her into port straight off so that you might have received the best value for her. As it is, I am going to have to order her to accompany you. Perhaps Admiral Howe may buy her into the King’s service. If she is lost or taken by the French, you may incur a bad financial loss. I will give you written orders, which may give you some standing in case you need to bring suit for her value. In the meantime, what sort of people do you need? Perhaps we can make a trade of sorts?”

“Petty officers are what we need, sir. A few more seamen would not hurt either. A junior lieutenant or seasoned midshipman to assist Captain Burns in watch standing duties would not come amiss.”

Laforey called in his first officer. “George, would you hang out the ‘All Captains’ signal? We need to have a conference.”

After the meeting adjourned, Phillips was satisfied. He was to be furnished a lieutenant, albeit a very junior one, as well as a few mids, and some petty officers. No warrants were available, but they received a bosun’s mate, a quartermaster’s mate and a member of HMS Carysford’s sailmaker’s crew. He decided he would send these people, minus the two midshipmen to Inconnue, and send them also one of his own mids, giving the lad a temporary rating as master’s mate. The two mids he was collecting he had not a lot of hope for, but perhaps the two between them could do the job of the man he was sending to the prize. He had to give up a dozen people to Laforey, but made sure he furnished men he could well do without, as he was sure had been done to him.

Most were fresh from gaol, but a few were older hands who really needed to be lashed to a grating, and given a few dozen. The bosun had not been given the excuse to fabricate any cat-o-nine tails thus far, and Phillips was hoping to postpone that task for as long as he could.

Upon leaving the squadron, the two ships sailed easy the first day, to allow the crew of the Inconnue to become settled in, but after that, as senior officer, Phillips put both ships through their paces doing sail and gun drill. Inconnue still had her full allocation of ammunition allotted by the French authorities for her French ‘huit’ (eight) pounders, so she blazed away with abandon. Courageous was forced by Admiralty stinginess to do no more than practice running the empty guns out, with an occasional discharge of blank charges, using powder Phillips had personally purchased for the purpose. He hoped when they arrived at Brest to find some kind of military or naval installation that he could fire his guns at. The admiralty would not cavil at using ordnance on such targets, and the gun crews could obtain much needed practice.

After rounding the Breton peninsula, Phillips sent in the Inconnue at first light to look as far into Brest’s harbor as she possibly could. Since that former French corvette had been so recently captured, it was thought she might escape undue notice by the local authorities. Courageous remained far enough at sea that it was unlikely she would be identified or associated with Inconnue.

The former corvette disappeared in the distance, and was seen no more for that day and much of the next. Phillips was becoming gravely concerned that she might have been taken when, late in the afternoon on the second day, a pair of sails, hull down, appeared in the distance.

Phillips thought young Mullins had the best eyes of his officers, so sent him to the tops with a glass. He soon reported Inconnue was in sight with a merchant brig in company. Another report a few minutes later had a pair of corvettes pursuing them.

Clearing for action as she went, the Courageous ran in to meet her consort. Not wanting her to engage the corvettes before his arrival, Phillips signaled Inconnue to form line astern. He expected Burns would not like that one bit, but there was no overt protest. He did note the ship begin to shorten sail. As the ships converged, one of the French corvettes seemed to doubt the wisdom of approaching a large British frigate that was allied with a fourteen gun sloop. She also began to shorten sail. The other however, appeared to be captained by a regular fire-eater and came right on.

Normally, had Inconnue been a ship under British commission, Phillips would have ordered her to come about and attempt to cripple one of the corvettes. In this case though, he was reluctant to see her damaged severely, since she was a prize that had not yet gone through the prize court formalities, and was not in British commission. If she was damaged or lost, he and his crew might lose what they would otherwise have earned in prize money. Also of course, she did not have a full crew, and would fight at a disadvantage.

Courageous and the leading enemy corvette sailed at each other bows on. At two cables distance, each captain tried to turn to cross his opponent’s bow, so as to rake the other ship. The two did this almost at the same moment, so each of the ships faced the other’s broadside. The difference was the corvette had a total of ten guns on a side, each a French eight pounder. The Courageous however, had eighteen guns on a side, with sixteen of them being eighteen pounder long guns, and another two thirty six pound carronades. One broadside from her could obliterate the thin skinned corvette.

Both ships fired at the same time, and a few of the French eight pounder shot did come aboard Courageous. One seaman in the rigging was knocked off and fell into the sea, never to be seen again. That seaman was the only fatality on Courageous. With little previous practice, the British gunners did not ‘obliterate’ their enemy, but they didn’t need to. Fully half of the eighteen pounder long guns hit the corvette with their heavy iron balls, while the two carronades did fearsome carnage with their individual loads of thirty six pounds of iron grape shot. Both the main and mizzen masts fell at the same time, and the foremast had a deep score in it from a hit.

The other corvette set out for the safety of Brest harbor. Inconnue sailed after her, firing as she went. Phillips ordered that ship back, judging it unlikely she could capture her opponent before reaching Brest.

With time to investigate now, Phillips learned from Burns, in command of Inconnue, that the brig was a British merchantman captured by a French privateer off Cornwall and sent in to Brest with a prize crew. Burns, with no one paying any attention to him had anchored in the Brest harbor among a collection of merchant ships. During the day, his crew had heard and seen the prize crew celebrating their good luck. That night, loading much of the Inconnue’s crew aboard the boats, they cut out the ‘Charity Smith’. The French prize crew was mostly drunk from the rum they had looted from their prize and put up little struggle. However, a few pistols and a musket were fired, and this alerted the authorities. The merchant’s crew was still aboard and set free, with the French prize crew taking their place in the lazarette. She set sail, escorted by Inconnue, being saluted on their way by a battery on shore. The two corvettes were sent after the pair, but it took them a few hours to sort themselves out, which allowed the prey time to get ahead of their pursuers. As it turned out, there were over twenty line-of-battle ships in port, along with a number of frigates and smaller naval vessels.

With no enemy ships now visible, the small fleet set themselves to work making repairs. Along with her cargo of hides and tallow, the brig had a deck cargo of spars. This was fortunate, since the newly captured corvette had lost her main and mizzen, and her foremast was severely damaged. Phillips was at first prepared to set fire to the captured warship, but the seas being relatively quiet, and with timber available, he decided to make what repairs he could. The Republicaine, as the captured corvette proved to be, needed first to have her wounded foremast strengthened. Splints of oak two by fours were tightly bound to the mast. While Courageous’ carpenter went below in the Republicaine to loosen the wedges holding the stub of the mainmast in place on the step, a large block was fixed in place on the fore masthead. A cable ran from the capstan up to the block, then back down to the remnant of the main. The capstan bars were fitted into place and swifted, then the men put their chests to the bars and heaved. After a little initial resistance, the broken stub was pulled out like a bad tooth.

The carpenter did his measuring of the base of the broken mast and dropped into the jolly boat for a trip over to the ‘Charity Smith’ to examine her deck cargo. Selecting two spars that he thought would be the closest to fitting; he had the midshipman in charge of the brig order the huge wood spars hoisted over the side and dropped into the sea. The launch was waiting, and took their burden in tow to the Republicaine. As soon as the biggest timber was aboard, the carpenter, after another examination, started wielding his adze. Chips flew until the carpenter made another measurement and decreed the fit was good enough.

Courageous’ bosun, Mister Fletcher, along with the bosun’s mates of the three ships, had already repaired and laid out in place the various stays and shrouds that would hold the mast in place when it was upright. The cable from the foremast head was fastened to the spar, and the men on the capstan put their muscle to the bars.

As the new mainmast slowly lifted from the deck, men put lines to it, and others tailed onto those lines to keep the load from swinging. By nightfall, the now vertical mast had been dropped down onto its step, and the wedges hammered home. Seamen worked into the night tightening up the standing rigging, and by morning the mast was now secure. The big block on the mizzen had been transferred to the new main, and the work started over.

Phillips had been watching his crew, and found some of those recently inducted felons, were proving to be valuable men. Most, of course, were just able to supply their brawn, under the close supervision of the various petty officers, but a few seemed to be able to actually comprehend their tasks and to think ahead, making the job easier on everyone. He told his clerk to make note of certain of these men. He intended to promote a few from landsmen to ordinary seamen, just to demonstrate to the other landsmen it was possible to advance oneself.

One lad, a fourteen year old former pickpocket, destined to hang until he had been offered his life if he entered the Royal Navy, had begun assisting the sailmaker’s crew with the canvas. After making some initially hesitating climbs aloft, the lad was now scampering around in the tops like a monkey. Should he survive, Phillips intended to make him a topman.

By now, the former captain of the Charity Smith, Mister Wilkins, who had initially vocally proclaimed his delight with the Navy for rescuing himself and his brig was not so sure. Seeing naval crewmen rummaging his brig, taking what they needed for repairs, he became more indignant every hour. After a final bout of listening to the man bellowing that he wanted to know when he would be paid for the spars taken from his ship, Phillips lost his temper. It seemed the deck cargo was a private venture between Wilkins and a few crewmen. The timber was not the property of the ship owners, but of himself and some of his crew.

Phillips temporarily ousted his third officer, Acting Lieutenant Mullins from his tiny dog kennel cabin, and installed Wilkins there, with a Marine standing guard, with instructions to allow the captain to leave only for meals in the wardroom, and necessary visits to the head.

Mister Ackroyd, who had been supervising the repairs aboard the Republicaine assured Phillips she was now ready to sail. The question was now, who was to command her? Ackroyd, since the departure of Burns to the Inconnue, was now his senior officer, and might well be considered for promotion should the admiralty agree with his actions. Phillips decided to put Ackroyd in command of the Republicaine and moved Mullins up to be first officer of Courageous. What to do about the other deck officers for Courageous? He had the two midshipmen he had acquired from HMS Careyford to consider for promotion. He had other mids, but they were too young and inexperienced to consider. He had not paid enough attention to them to decide which was the most useful, but he put them on watch and watch with himself and Mullins. Each mid would pair with either Phillips or Mullins, and stand every other watch. Since there was other necessary ship’s work to be done off watch, this put a big strain on everyone. If one of the midshipmen was halfway useful, he would give him an acting commission as lieutenant and make him second officer. If fates were really kind, he might possibly be able to do the same with the other lad, making him third officer.

Both of these officers-in-training had received quite an education in recent days, and were now much more experienced in repairing battle damage in a ship than they had been earlier. They were both on deck at the moment, so Phillips beckoned them over. He requested them to refresh his memory as to their names. It seemed the eldest, a rather porky looking youth suffered under the name of Landrace. The other answered to Wilson.

He told them they were to learn the trade of deck officer by following himself and Mullins around. Phillips told Landrace to stay with him, while Wilson was to stand watch with Mullins. He reminded them standing watch and watch was difficult but potentially rewarding as to the educational opportunities. He reminded them life might well become easier when they found the fleet. The possibility existed Lord Howe might deign to give them more people.

Before setting sail, Phillips removed the crew from the Charity Smith, and pressed all the seamen into the service. The two mates were offered positions aboard Courageous as RN master’s mates, which were accepted. The men believed the alternative existed of impressment as able seamen. The merchant ship’s captain refused to even discuss matters with the Navy pirates, as he termed them. He remained in his cramped little box as a semi-prisoner.

The seamen removed from the Charity Smith were replaced by an equal number of naval seamen, and put under the command of the new Lieutenant Adams that Commodore Laforey had transferred to Inconnue earlier.

Phillips called the lieutenant to his cabin. “Mister Adams, I realize you are very junior as a commission officer. I am considering giving you the command of the prize, and have you take her to Portsmouth. Would you tell me honestly what your thoughts are?”

“Sir, I appreciate the honor, and will do my best to deliver her safely to Portsmouth.”

“Very well, Mister Adams, I have no idea what will happen with you when you reach port. I would be glad to have you back with me, but expect you may well find yourself on another ship. I am giving you a packet of papers for the port admiral. If it appears your brig will be taken, you will drop those papers over the side.”