John Masters (25 page)

So far, so good—nothing incongruous with that great red face and beak nose of Reynolds'; but Eliott was also a teetotaler, a vegetarian, and, very probably, a homosexual—in this respect resembling his hero Frederick the Great.

The problem facing Eliott—to hold Gibraltar—was shaped by a number of factors, mostly unfavorable. The general war situation ensured that troops could not easily be found to reinforce or relieve his garrison. For several months, indeed, a huge Franco-Spanish fleet stood ready off Brittany to carry French invasion troops into England, and while that threat lasted, the British government could hardly be expected to worry much about Gibraltar. The same bad political situation could at any moment decide the Emperor of Morocco, Gibraltar's nearest source of supply and intelligence, to give up his nominal neutrality. In the immediate neighborhood of the Rock the Spanish were able to dominate, though not totally control, sea communications. Finally, the garrison was under strength (about 5,300 men against the 7,000 Eliott considered necessary).

On the other side of the ledger, the Spanish army, once the finest in Europe, was, like the country itself, in process of decline. Eliott's British and German troops were no braver, but they were much better led. The same applied with even greater force to the two navies (though Eliott's local naval commander, Admiral Duff, must be excluded from this generalization: he was weak, slow, obstinate, and fearful).

And there was the North Front, towering 1,349 feet above the only land approach; the defenses strengthened since the siege of 1727 and further improved by Eliott; the rest of the fortress out of artillery range except from the ist
hm
us, and some of it out of range for any weapon of the time, even from there; a general air of frowning impregnability, which imposed a sense of hopelessness, of futility, in the minds of soldiers sent against it or remaining long under the gray crown of its levanter cloud.

Eliott faced six specific main dangers. Assuming normal competence, the Rock was unassailable by direct land attack, such as that of January, 1705: but a combined attack from sea and land, prompt use of opportunities that might arise in fog, storm, or night, the turning of small mishaps to practical use through a good and rapid spy service—any of these, amounting to good generalship, was the first danger.

Then there was pestilence. Minorca was soon to be lost, not by the defeat of British forces but through blockade, causing the soldiers to go down with scurvy until it was not an army but a charnel house that surrendered to Crillon. Pestilence had already struck Gibraltar several times, and a severe epidemic would obviously be very dangerous.

The third was starvation—and to this the Spanish originally pinned their hopes.

The fourth was treachery—the surrender of the garrison by its own soldiers. As we have seen, this nearly happened in 1761. Some particular discontent or grievance, aggravated by the conditions of a long siege—boredom, over-close contact, discomfort, fatigue, claustrophobia (endemic in Gibraltar at the best of times)—and by the then-current custom of leaving regiments on the same foreign station for inordinate lengths of time, could easily produce a similar situation.

Fifth, there was what might be classified as "disaster," some piece of ill luck which trumps good management. An enemy hit on one of the two major magazines could have rendered the garrison unable to resist. The magazines were well protected, but there is ultimately no protection against chance, stupidity, or carelessness. Again, a very dry winter might have failed to replenish the Rock's subterranean supplies of water, which must have led to capitulation. The chance of Spain's or Royalist France's turning up a Napoleon for command should also be reckoned under this heading.

Sixth and last, but the most likely of all, was the possibility of Gibraltar's being ceded back to Spain in return for some other piece of territory less dear to Spanish pride or more profitable to the British Exchequer.

Armed then with some 663 pieces of artillery; served and defended by 485 artillerymen, 122 engineers and artificers, and 4,775 infantry (5 British and 3 Hanoverian regiments of the line); facing an army of indeterminate size—but larger, and growing until in October it numbered 14,000 men—Gibraltar entered the siege.

June 25:
We met this afternoon in the big room of the house. All the family were there, and all tried to dissuade me from volunteering. Old Micah Benoliel said this quarrel between Christians was none of our business, but I disagreed. If Spain recovers Gibraltar, what would happen to us? My aunt Abigail said my constitution was not strong enough to withstand the rigors of a soldier's life, but I could not agree. The teacher said I would have to eat forbidden foods and disobey the Law. I said it would be for the defense of all Jews here. In the end my cousin Abraham cried, "Gamaliel's right! I also will answer General Eliott's call."

June 27:
A quiet day in the house. My uncle stayed in his counting house, my sister and Abraham visiting the Conquys, only Abigail at home. She asked why I wanted to leave them all. I tried to tell her I felt it was my duty, but she would not be comforted and wept in my arms. She said she had done her best to make me happy since she married my uncle, who has really been a father to Miriam and me since our own parents died. What Abigail says is true, but now that I am a man I have found it hard to treat her as I should. She is only 8 years older than I, so barely 30 now. Abraham teases me that I love her. He does not like her. I suppose it makes some difference that she is the wife of his father but not his mother. I think it is best that I should go away for a time. I was planning to go to Lisbon to study to be a teacher, as my mother always wished for me, but now that is impossible. We are at war, but no one has fired a shot yet.

July 2:
Here I am, dressed in a blue coat, surrounded by snoring soldiers. It is raining, and the only food for dinner was salt pork, which I could not eat. Two of the soldiers vomited over the gun. The sergeant banged their heads together and made them clean it up with their own shirts. They are a rough lot here, half of them still wearing the red coats of the infantry, which General Eliott transferred them from to make the artillery up to strength. The sergeant says I speak English amazing well for a Jew Rock Scorpion. I have told him that when we were young we had for a time a young Jewish lady from England in the house, who taught us the language.

July 5:
Gun drill. The sergeant shouted at us like animals from dawn to dusk. He calls me Gunner Moses. I dropped a cannonball on my foot and everyone laughed. I think a bone may be broken.

July 7
: I told the sergeant I ought to see a surgeon about my foot, which is most painful, but he told me foully to stick it up my a***. We are cultivating a little patch of earth beside the guns. General Eliott has ordered it, and the sergeant has told me to plant something in it that we can eat. "It's Old Von Bugger's orders," (he always speaks of the Governor thus) he shouted, "so plant something, anything, how in thunder should I know what will grow on this stinking Rock?" My sister Miriam came up to bring me a spare shirt. The soldiers spoke coarsely to her until I said she was my sister. Then they turned away, ashamed. When she had hurried off, the sergeant clapped me on the back and shouted, "No offense meant, Moses. We thought she was another Emily." He gestured, and I saw a raggety young woman with blond hair and a pretty face lying under a soldier at the back of the battery, her skirts raised. I turned away, blushing.

July 10:
There is a gun at Wolf Leap at last. We have been three days dragging it up there. I never thought it would be possible, but it was done. The sergeant had a thumb crushed when the gun rolled back against the rock but only swore and wrapped a dirty kerchief about it. The gun looks down on the Spanish forts and the neutral ground between. It was the governor's idea. He came and watched us at work twice, and when I made a suggestion about working out the ranges from the top, he asked my name. I am the only man in the battery who can read or write.... An infantry officer has invented a shell that can burst in the air over the enemy. What ingenuity in a bloody cause. Captain Witham, our captain, has invented a light flare and struts about like a young cockerel. He has a keen face and quick eyes. He called me a damned Jew yesterday and apologized today. The sergeant says he sees I have taken my foot out of my a***.

July 13:
Pointed out an error in the gun drill orders to the sergeant this morning. Received nothing but abuse from him and jeers from the other soldiers for my pains.

July 18:
Had an evening's leave and spent it quietly at home. My uncle sighed to see me sunburned and my hands battered. He told me that Admiral Duff refused to provide stores to finish outfitting the Emperor of Morocco's warships, which the governor had promised him to do here. Mr. Logie, the consul in Tangier, has come over to explain to the admiral the dire consequences for the garrison here if the Emperor should turn his face against us. That country is the only source of many supplies to us, especially fresh fruit and vegetables.... Nahum Conquy has asked for my sister Miriam's hand. My uncle is not very pleased, as he thinks Miriam can do better than that; but she has pleaded—she is twenty-six—and he will not stand in the way. Abigail came in—she will not let me call her mother or even aunt—and begged me to tell them all about my life in the army. I talked for near three hours, and she listened most eagerly, barely taking her eyes from my face. She agrees that the sergeant is no more than a stupid ox. She is a very intelligent woman and understands much that one can hardly put into words. My uncle thinks there will be no firing here, for the Spanish will try to starve us into surrender.

August 10:
The Dons are making a jetty about 50 feet long at the Orange Grove, which is just out of reach of our guns. They are also throwing up a breastwork about a mile from the North Front. Then, the sergeant says, they will make parallels, merlons, traverses, fleches, barbets, curtains, and a hundred other military devices and so creep in zigzag fashion toward us until they are very close. Then they will collect bundles of brush, fill in our ditch, and assault. "Then we'll see how you like the look of cold steel, Moses," he bellowed. But he does not say how the Spanish are to cross the inundations General Eliott has caused to be made across the isthmus, leaving only a causeway barely ten feet wide, which can be swept by grapeshot—or how they are going to climb a cliff over a thousand feet high, if they try to go round our flank.... Mr. Logie the consul has returned to Tangier. The Moorish vessel in which he traveled was searched by a Spanish cruiser, but Mr. Logie hid in a scuttle for 10 hours. The Governor's dispatches to England and some secret codes they had prepared for communication with each other he hid in a loaf of bread, and they were not found. The fair-haired strumpet Emily was at the battery again today. She has blue eyes and smiled at me. I turned my back. In the synagogue we are to pray for deliverance from the hands of Spain.

September 1:
Saw Cousin Abraham today. He is in the infantry and says the soldiers are like animals but kind in a rough way. One relieved himself in Abraham's boots last night, liquid in one, solid in the other.

September 12:
The Governor came to the battery this morning with a large retinue of officers and ladies and a band. The sergeant laid a gun on the enemy works and the Governor presented a slow match to a lady. She put one hand over an ear, closed her eyes, and somehow managed to put the match to the touchhole. The band played
Britons, strike home!
I did not see where the ball hit. It matters not. We are not going to be starved without hitting back. The governor called me out and told them all that I was a volunteer and would not be forgotten if I survived. After they had all gone the sergeant said that Old Von B. has his eyes on me for a bumboy. I can hardly believe that General Eliott, so imposing and manly a figure, should be a victim to such a failing.

September 15:
It is expected that the Dons will soon return our fire, which we keep up. Many civilians are moving south, where they are living in great discomfort above the naval hospital in cloth tents and brushwood shelters. The soldiers call it New Jerusalem, and many of our people have gone there, but not my uncle. Others have left for Morocco and Lisbon, and the Governor does all he can to assist such flights, for he proclaims that he wants no useless mouths in the fortress.

September 16:
At work all day to take up the paving in the streets so that enemy shot and shell will bury itself in the soft earth instead of bouncing off and hurling the paving stones about with as much effect as though they themselves were shards of iron. Teams of 80 men pull the plows through the ground to turn the earth. It is the Governor's idea.

October 2:
Gun drill. It is a waste of time. We all know every movement and could do them in our sleep. Soldiers are brutal people, not fit to live with, nothing fine in their nature. I wish I were in Lisbon.

October 20:
The Dons continue to push forward their parallels. They have three batteries mounted, one of 7 guns and two of 14 each. A privateer has captured a shipload of rice, and the price has dropped to 8 pence a pound. Abigail says that the family eats very little and is hungry. There is no food for civilians at all except what they can buy. Everything that is captured or brought in or smuggled in is sold at auction, by General Eliott's orders, after the military rations have been made up. My uncle buys some and distributes it free to the needy members of the congregation; but Mordecai Anahori and others, Jews and Christians, buy only to hoard, planning to resell when starvation shall have increased the price. In spite of this Abigail gave me an excellent meal and gave me a basket of cold chicken and sweetmeats to take back. I have shared them with the soldiers but shall not tell Abigail.