I suspect that Engels had been drinking again by the way that he stood on the deck but he climbed the mast easily enough. The main reason that I didn’t have him punished for his drinking, he already had scared welts from other captains lashes on his back, was because it never seemed to have an effect on his seamanship. He could climb like a monkey even when he had drunk enough to kill him.
“That cut of the sail isn’t one of ours, Sir, looks Spanish,” Engels shouted down to me, not even needing the glass that the boy held out to him.
“Damn,” I said. There was no way that we would be able to fight them with our tiny ship if they were large enough to be seen at such a great distance. Our main hope was to run and the entire ship knew it.
“What make is she?” I shouted up to Engels, even though I new already that she was far too large.
“Can’t tell for sure, sir, look likes she rates at least a twenty-four.” I knew that commanders were supposed to appear stoic in front of the common sailors, to be a captain was about as close as being a god on the ocean, but I bite my lip for a second anyway. Surely even the common sailors who surrounded me would understand the extreme circumstances we were under. We rated a twelve, a pathetic armament that was only really supposed to defend our ship until a larger ship could come to our rescue. The problem was no one would come to our rescue out here. Then I pulled myself together, if I showed concern then the crew was likely to feed off of my fear and fall into panic, possibly even mutiny.
“What do you think Mr. Levy?” I asked my lieutenant, he had been standing silently by my side this whole time. He was out here like I was, not through stupidity, but because he had angered this past captain. I heard that his last captain had actually tried to shoot him; I had never had any trouble with him, though when he had first come on board I had expected him to be a holy terror.
“Sir?” asked the lieutenant, shocked that I was asking his opinion about anything. I noticed my second lieutenant standing nearby but didn’t try to include him in the conversation, he was stupid, and I learned that early on. He had moved into his current rank through family power but even family power hadn’t been able to advance him farther then second on my ship, which said a lot. I had heard that his father still wrote almost weekly to the Admiral asking about the advancement of his son. The Admiral’s secretary didn’t even pass the letters along anymore, they were instantly destroyed.
“What do you think? Do you think they’ll catch up to us, or do you think that we can outrun them?” I elaborated. My first lieutenant hummed and hawed and I instantly realized what the problem was, he didn’t want to be responsible for the ship’s welfare, he thought I was shoving my responsibilities onto his shoulders. I was quick to assure him otherwise.
“Don’t worry if you’re wrong, I’m not going to blame you, no matter what we decide I’ll take responsibility.” I had a mental image of being dismissed from the service entirely, not just banished to this far corner of the ocean. It might not be an entirely bad thing I told myself, though of course I would still be eligible for the sweep and could end up a common sailor. That wasn’t a nice thought; I promised myself that if I was stripped of rank I would go to the country somewhere and get myself a farm or something.
“Well, sir,” said my first lieutenant reluctantly, “I think they’ll probably catch us. They can carry a lot more sail then we can and probably don’t ride any clumsier in the water.” I nodded my approval of his assessment and he looked relieved, his relief was short lived however because I had another question for him.
“So what do you think we should do? Surrender or fight?” I asked him. “If we surrender we’ll end up in a Spanish prison for the rest of the war, ‘cause you can bet anything you like that
“I can’t decide which sounds worse, sir,” my first lieutenant said. I could now see what could be called a mast over the horizon from the deck, they were a fast ship. By now they had probably noticed us and were looking forward to our capture.
“I say we fight, sir,” said my second lieutenant unexpectedly.
“What makes you say that?” I asked, not dismissively or rudely but with genuine curiosity. It was rare for the man to give any opinion about anything and here he was volunteering one without being asked. Here in this time of extreme stress I was learning things about my lieutenants I had never known from sailing together for over a year. My first lieutenant could smile and my second lieutenant could speak without being spoken to first.
“None of us has anything to lose, right men?” To my total and utter shock my second lieutenant turned and addressed the sailors around us. I realized that during our discussion we had gained an audience and then chided myself. Of course the sailors would be curious what we chose to be their fate, their lives hung in the balance of our decision, my decision I corrected myself. I was still the commander of the ship, even if I had decided to actually include the other officers in the process, which was highly irregular. The entire group of sailors cheered at my second mate’s speech which worried me slightly, we did have something to lose, something that admittedly was important to me, we could lose our lives.
“Are all of you decided then?” I asked. The world had turned upside down, I wasn’t giving orders, this whole thing smacked of revolution and republic but having set down this path by asking my subordinates advice I felt like just going with the flow. Again all of the men cheered and we turned to face the enemy as it approached. I regained command of my own ship from the crew, after a fashion, I shouted to clear for action and beat to quarters but my orders were completely unnecessary. My men were moving before my orders were even out of my mouth.
My tiny ship against a regular frigate was something so ridiculous that only the entirely foolhardily brave would do something like it, either that or the incredibly stupid. I would like to think it was more of the former then the latter but I suspect it was about equal parts of both. As soon as we were within hailing distance and foppish looking officer shouted something to us about surrender but I couldn’t speak Spanish and understood very little so I could honestly say I didn’t get the message.
As soon as my men ran out my guns, this time on my orders, the Spanish ship did the same. I had a mental image of a child with a popgun facing a man with a rifle, the comparison was fairly accurate. Within minutes I was reminded why sand was spread on the deck and the gun deck was painted red, it made the blood so much more bearable, though the limbs that were scattered about and the pile of deformed bodies was gruesome. A cannonball took out an entire gun crew and now I only had eleven guns, I could only hope that I had done half as much damage to their crew, I wanted them to remember us. At this moment my biggest fear was that I would become just another stupid fight that they could forget after a few beers, or whatever it was the Spanish sailors drank. I wanted them to remember me even if it was just to say that they had met a crazy Englishman who hadn’t known when to surrender.
A captain’s main job in situations like this was to stand still and emotionless for the whole crew to see and hope that a cannonball didn’t find him, or one of the snipers that was now raining down bullets on us. Our ship didn’t even have a company of marines so we couldn’t effectively shoot small arms back. There were the navel issue rifles that the sailors could use, but they were all too busy with the ship or the cannons, besides the rifles that the navy issued were more effective for clubbing then shooting.
A cannonball came flying extremely close to me to crash into our mast, the only good part of that is that the mast fell in the opposite direction of me. Without a mast we could no longer run, had we wanted to, and couldn’t maneuver at all. Even if we won this fight, an impossibility, we had no spare spars to jury rig temporary mast, we would be helpless to the waves, this had officially become suicide no matter what.
I suspect that before this I had held some vague notion that we might win this after all but the knowledge we would lose even if we won gave me new strength. The Spanish ship had come close enough to us that all it would take was one more broadside and the bottom would be blown out from under our ship, they would be shooting right into us at point blank range. Again the officer shouted something about surrender but I wasn’t paying attention to him, we didn’t even have a flag flying anymore to lower if we did want to surrender.
My sword found its way into my hand, to this day I have no idea how it managed to be there, but I waved it as I charged. With me came the remainder of my sailors who could still move, I was appalled how few of us there were. I had somewhere picked up a cut on my arm, I had no idea how, I suspected a splinter had hit me but I didn’t remember it. As a pitiful shower rather then a wave, we splattered into the line of defenses on the Spanish deck.
My mind goes totally blank, except for the blurriest memories, fogged by madness and bloodlust at this point. I know people fell before me and I know that friends fell around me, but if I could tell the difference then I don’t know how because I don’t even remember looking at faces at that point. I had heard before that people went battle crazy sometimes but I had never had the opportunity to experience it for myself before. I only came to myself with three swords pressed to my throat and it still took me a while before I stopped struggling.
“Do you surrender?” asked a man in Spanish officer’s clothing in accented English. I didn’t say anything at first, just looked around as much as the swords at my neck allowed, some few survivors from my ship were being guarded farther up the deck where they had clearly given up the fight. The Spanish were already moving the wounded from my ship to theirs, it was obvious that even though I had not officially surrendered the considered completely defeated.
“I surrender,” I said with a sigh and I handed the officer my bloodstained sword, I noticed that he took it with great distaste. Only after I handed over my sword were the swords that were pointed at me withdrawn, as a gentleman surrendering meant that if I were to do anything now I would forfeit my honor. The captain of the Spanish ship now approached, having apparently watched my disarming. He said something to the officer who had taken my surrender who translated for me.
“He says it was very brave and very foolish of you to try to attack our ship. He says that your ship is not worth bringing as a prize of the government
“He would like to know the name of the crazy man who fights like a mad dog,” the officer explained.
“Commander Mathew Witt at your service, sir,” I said, making a slight bow. If I was going to be a prisoner then I was going to at least make a show of being a gentleman about it. At the moment they thought I was a mad dog and that didn’t show
“We will show you and your officers to the accommodations we have set aside for you for your very short stay on our ship,” the Spanish officer told me. Being and officer had its advantages, I reminded myself, even a disgraced officer. They didn’t keep you in the same pit they threw your sailors; you got your very own personal pit, with other people who befitted your station.
The officer had been honest when he had said that my stay on their ship would be a short one. They didn’t have far to travel to drop us at a fort to rot of course, not with Ferrol right there. There myself, and the five men who remained of my command, were deposited. My first Lieutenant, Levy, had died with most of the others; I had seen him fall even before the madness of battle had overtaken me. The second mate and Engels were among the survivors though and that made my imprisonment slightly easier. Because we were both officers, though of different ranks, I shared a cell with the second mate and Engels was allowed to be our servant. He still managed to get drunk I noticed, though not as frequently, but it was a talent that baffled even the Spanish guards much to my amusement.
To be continued...
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