Ramage At Trafalgar (20 page)

What would daylight reveal? A straightforward situation where a single signal from the
Signal
Book for Ships of War
would tell the
Euryalus
what was going on? Or would it need Popham’s Code, allowing more details? Anyway, from the
Euryalus
the signal would be passed to the next frigate seaward and then on and on, like beacons being lit on a row of hills, until it reached the
Victory
.

For days now the first signal of the day, started on its way to the
Victory
from the
Euryalus
as soon as it was light enough to distinguish the colour of the flags, had been: “The enemy as before”. The enemy, in other words, was still in Cadiz with a west wind (and perhaps no great eagerness to sail!).

The next thing Ramage knew was Orsini banging on his door: it was still dark in the cabin, but an excited Orsini reported that dawn was about to break. Ramage wiped his face with a wet cloth, pulled on his shoes and picked up his hat after dragging on his coat. He felt grubby and greasy, his chin rasping on his stock every time he looked down.

“Morning, sir,” Hill said politely. “Wind due east; we’re half a mile south of the El Diamante Bank in four fathoms, fore and main topsails set.”

“Very well,” Ramage said in reply to this routine report, “keep the lead going.”

A long and wide sandbank thrust out into the
Canal Principal
from the actual sea wall protecting Cadiz harbour. As Southwick had commented, it was a deliberate trap for nosy frigates who did not keep to the north-east of it.

Yes, the sky was turning grey over to the east, above the sand dunes on the east side of the bay. No cloud was obscuring the stars which were beginning to fade. Yes, the outline of Cadiz was getting greyer and softer. He began to make out objects on the deck – the square box of the binnacle, the bulk of the mizenmast, the round-shouldered bulk of the 12-pounders and the carronades…

Yes, there was the breakwater protecting Cadiz harbour, the Muelle de San Felipe, jutting out to the north-east. The church of San Francisco was at the landward end and, further on, two towers and yet another church (Carmen, noted on Southwick’s chart as “Conspicuous”) and the whole city (really a small town) built round the Torre de Tavira, a watch-tower which could see all round the compass.

“General quarters, Mr Hill,” Ramage said quietly and noticed that Aitken and Southwick had come on deck. The lieutenant gave the order which started bosun’s mates hurrying through the ship, their calls twittering as they shouted vile threats to get the men out of their hammocks and standing to the guns. They would greet the dawn, as did every one of the King’s ships in wartime, with guns loaded and run out, as ready to tackle an enemy as greet a friend. The deckwash pumps groaned asthmatically as they ran water over the decks, to be followed by men sprinkling sand. There were distant shouted orders and then the dull rumble as the guns were run out.

“Ship’s company at general quarters, sir,” Hill reported.

“Very well,” Ramage said out of habit, and waited for the hail.

It came first from the lookout on the larboard bow. “See a grey goose at a mile,” he bellowed in the traditional way of greeting daylight – or as much daylight as would allow that feat.

“A short mile,” Ramage commented to Hill. The lookout was unlucky that instead of the usual (before the blockade) empty horizon there was the city of Cadiz, complete with cathedral, towers, castle and long stone mole, all less than a mile away.

“Send the lookouts aloft, but keep the men at general quarters,” Ramage said. The wind was still east; he walked over to the binnacle box drawer and reassured himself that the copy of Popham’s Code was there, along with the
Signal Book
.

Looking at the Mole of San Felipe, he took his telescope from the drawer and pulled the tube until the engraved ring was lined up. He scanned along the mole, shifting to one side so that the foremast was not in the way.

“Come round a point to larboard,” he told Hill: the Mole was obscuring too much of the anchorage. He waited a couple of minutes and then lifted the telescope again. The nearest ships of the Combined Fleet of France and Spain were clearly visible.

He snapped the telescope shut and in a couple of paces, was at the binnacle box drawer, taking out Popham’s Code and flicking over the pages, checking the words (in alphabetical order) and the numbers beside them.

“Orsini,” he snapped, “make to the
Euryalus
the following.

“Telegraphic code flag; then 249 – ‘enemy’, 354 – ‘have’, 864 – ‘their’, 875 –, ‘top’, 756 – ‘sails’, 986 – ‘yards’, 1374 – ‘hoisted’. Got that? Right, get it hoisted as quick as you can.

“Mr Hill, stand by to heave-to the ship. The enemy seem to have called in their gunboats.”

“Yes, sir: I was going to report that as soon as you had finished with the signal.”

The gunboats – boats from the ships of the Combined Fleet with a small gun mounted temporarily in the bow – had regularly patrolled the few hundred yards directly in front of the harbour, looking as threatening as water boatmen on a village pond.

Ramage opened the telescope and looked again. Yes, several of the ships were hoisting in boats, swigging away at staytackles and swinging the boats in to nest them on top of the spare booms and spars. Topsail yards hoisted, along with boats…today, October 19, was going to be the day the Combined Fleet sailed from Cadiz, of that he was sure.

“The signal’s sent and the
Euryalus
has acknowledged, sir,” Orsini reported.

“Ship hove-to on the starboard tack, sir,” Hill reported.

“I’m going below to wash and shave,” Ramage said. “Keep a sharp eye on the
Euryalus
for signals,” he told Orsini. To Hill, he said: “Pass the word the moment there’s any sign of the enemy ships weighing anchor.”

Shaving in cold water – with the ship’s company at general quarters the galley fire had been doused – helped waken him thoroughly: he was too impatient to strop the razor sufficiently, and this morning the soap was reluctant to lather, so that each stroke of the razor seemed as though he was wrenching out each whisker by the roots. With his eyes watering he finally rinsed his face and then combed his hair.

Silkin waited at the door with clean underwear, fresh stockings and newly polished shoes, along with a clean stock. Ramage dressed leisurely. Thus were legends started. The captain had felt greasy and bristly and tired, in no shape to think very clearly after an almost sleepless night, and as soon as the morning’s signal had been sent off he had shaved and changed. But within a month (if they were all still alive by then) the ship’s company would have embroidered the tale so that Captain Ramage was having a leisurely shave while thirty-four ships of the line of the Combined Fleet prepared to sail and give battle with the
Calypso
. Ramage grinned to himself. He had heard many similar stories told about brother captains, and guessed they had similar origins. Anyway, they were a sign that a ship’s company was proud of their captain and the ship, and if it made them fight better, no harm was done. Seamen had keen eyes, and if an officer was a braggart they quickly ignored him, simply obeying orders.

The marine sentry was announcing Orsini.

“Mr Hill’s compliments, sir, but the
Euryalus
has just repeated our signal to the
Sirius
, and one of the enemy has just let fall a topsail.”

Ramage pulled on a stocking. So the signal was already on its way across the fifty miles to Lord Nelson’s fleet, and the enemy were making the first (the first of thousands!) move towards sailing. The significant report would be when the first of them hove up her anchors.

Each ship would have at least a couple of anchors down – that was, apart from any other considerations, the only way of packing so many ships into such a confined anchorage without them swinging into each other. Heavy anchors and a muddy bottom: Ramage could picture the clunking of the pawls on the capstans – and the stench of the mud on the cable, with water similar to sewage being squeezed out of the strands of the rope as it came through the hawsehole…pity the poor fellows down in the cable-tier whose job it was to coil the cables as they passed below.

Finally Ramage was dressed and he went up to the quarterdeck. In the half-hour he had been below it had turned into a fine day: three miles away to the eastward there was the gentle slope of vineyards, and then the land trended southward to the village of Santa Maria at the entrance to a small river and became dunes. They continued on to the marshes and salt-ponds on the other side of Cadiz, separated from the spit by the channel in which most of the Combined Fleet were moored.

He examined Cadiz with the telescope. There was no flag on the Torre de Tavira, but that three-decker there, French (was she Villeneuve’s flagship, the
Bucentaure
?), was making signals. One ship had just started catting her anchors. Another, Spanish, was at short stay and moving ahead slowly as the capstan hauled in the remaining anchor cable. He examined the ship’s masts. There were men out along the fore and maintopsail yards – obviously throwing off gaskets.

Yes – there’s the foretopsail let fall. The breeze is light, not enough to shake out the creases in the canvas. Now they’re bracing the yards sharp up – the captain is anxious to get under way the moment the anchor is aweigh, so that the wind does not drift him sideways on to the mudbank only a few yards on his larboard side.

Ah, the other anchor is breaking the surface, and they’ve let fall the maintopsail. And there goes the maincourse and now the forecourse, and headsails are being hoisted. She’s under way.

“Mr Orsini,” Ramage said briskly, “to the
Euryalus
: make number 370.”

Orsini, out of habit, said: “Number 370, sir, ‘Enemy’s ships are coming out of port, or getting under sail’.”

“Stand by to get under way,” Ramage told Hill. A Spanish three-decker’s broadside as she passed the
Calypso
at close range could reduce the frigate to so much firewood. There was plenty of shallow water on the east side of the bay, or northwards towards Rota, where the
Calypso
could sail but a 74 or bigger would go aground. The frigate’s job was to watch and report to the
Euryalus
, not fight…

The big French ship of the line came out of Cadiz Roads with almost pathetic slowness. The wind soon dropped away to random zephyrs, so that her sails, in billowing curves when she got under way, flattened to hanging curtains of canvas by the time she was abreast of where the
Calypso
had been hove-to.

Ramage had seized the opportunity before the breeze went light to get out to seaward, deciding not to risk being trapped in the bay by the French and Spanish frigates he knew were anchored in Cadiz.

He watched as the Frenchman slowly steered northwards for Rota (at times turning round completely as she lost the wind and was at the mercy of the current) and then saw a second ship get under way and start struggling to get out of the Roads.

The first ship was the
Algésiras
, which his list showed him was the flagship of Rear-Admiral Charles de Magon. When the second ship finally cleared the entrance and then lost the wind for several minutes, turning like a languid dancer, Ramage saw that the name carved across her transom (and heavily gilded: enough to catch the eye at this distance as it glinted in the sun) was the
Achille
.

Although he was making for a position due north of the Castillo de San Sebastián, Ramage’s last glimpse into Cadiz Roads showed him that a French frigate (the
Hermione
, he guessed) had managed to weigh and set sail, but almost immediately must have lost the wind because now her boats were towing her out, hard work against what was now a floodtide.

With the wind falling away and the young flood beginning to carry him out of position, Ramage ordered the
Calypso
to anchor, and the best bower splashed down into four fathoms just short of the El Banquete shoal, a mile north-west of the Castillo. The Spaniards had never opened fire from the castle, but if they started now the
Calypso
might be in trouble: with no wind and having to weigh anchor, the young flood might carry her on to Punta del Nao, a vicious-looking rocky peninsula just north-east of the castle.

But the castle guns remained quiet and the
Calypso
swung at anchor, watching the
Algésiras
,
Achille
and
Hermione
(eventually Orsini had read the name on her stern) struggle up towards Rota, revolving like sunflowers as they lost a puff.

As the men at alternate guns were allowed to go below for a meal and Southwick went through the daily ritual of taking a noon sight (although it was easy enough to take a bearing of the castle, and a vertical sextant angle would give the distance for those unable to estimate it) Ramage watched the
Euryalus
and
Sirius
drift, becalmed.

Well, Ramage commented to Southwick, today the wind was being neutral: it becalmed the Combined Fleet and it becalmed Lord Nelson – although, fifty miles out to the west, the weather might well be different.

But, Ramage wondered, what would Lord Nelson be doing: would he pay any attention to Perez’s report about the Mediterranean and steer south, anticipating that (when he got out of Cadiz) Villeneuve would make for the Strait, or would he steer north to intercept the Combined Fleet on the assumption it was making for the English Channel?

“I’m glad I’m not His Lordship,” Southwick said, apparently thinking on the same lines as Ramage. “Go north or go south…from fifty miles out he’s got to rely on us frigates, but he’s got to make a start now, and that means he has to guess. Like putting all your money on the turn of a card.”

“Yes, betting on whether it’ll turn up red or black.”

“Yes, not odds for a sensible man.”