General Putnam must endure that fire without being able to answer it. At two knots that half nautical mile would be covered in fifteen minutes. Each British gun would fire six or seven shots in that time. So at least three hundred shots would beat the General Putnam’s bows, which Captain Waters had reinforced with heavy timbers. Saltonstall knew that some men despised him for letting the General Putnam take that beating, but what sense did it make to sacrifice the largest ship in the fleet? The Warren was the monarch of this bay, the only frigate and the only ship with eighteen-pounder cannons, and it would be foolish to let the enemy cripple her with three hundred round shot before she was capable of unleashing her terrifying broadside.
And what good would this attack do anyway? Saltonstall felt a pulse of anger that he was being asked to do this thing. Lovell should have attacked and taken the fort days ago! The Continental Navy was having to do the Massachusetts Militia’s job, and Lovell, damn him, must have complained to his masters in Boston who had persuaded the Navy Board there to send Saltonstall a reprimand. What did they know? They were not here! The task was to capture the fort, not sink three sloops, which, once the fort was taken, were doomed anyway. So good marines and fine sailors must die because Lovell was a nervous idiot. “He’s not fitted to be elected town Hog Reeve,” Saltonstall sneered.
“Sir?” the helmsman asked.
“Nothing,” the commodore snapped.
“By the mark three!” a seaman called from the beakhead, casting a lead-weighted line to discover the depth.
“We’ve plenty of water, sir,” the helmsman said encouragingly. “I remember from the last time we poked our nose in.”
“Quiet, damn your eyes,” Saltonstall snapped
“Quiet it is, sir.”
The General Putnam was almost abreast of Dyce Head now. The wind faltered, though the ships kept their way. On board the British ships the gunners would be crouching behind their barrels to make sure their aim was true.
“Commodore, sir!” Midshipman Ferraby shouted from the taffrail.
“What is it?”
“Signal from the Diligent, sir. Strange sail in sight.”
Saltonstall turned. There, far to the south, just emerging from a band of fog which half-obscured Long Island, was his guard ship, the Diligent, with signal flags bright at a yardarm. “Ask how many sail,” he ordered.
“It says three ships, sir.”
“Why the hell didn’t you say so the first time, you damned fool? What ships are they?”
“He doesn’t know, sir.”
“Then send an order telling him to find out!” Saltonstall barked, then took the speaking trumpet from its hook on the binnacle. He put the trumpet to his mouth. “Wear ship!” he bellowed, then turned back to the signal midshipman. “Mister Ferraby, you damned fool, make a signal to the other attack ships that they are to return to the anchorage!”
“We’re going back, sir?” Lieutenant Fenwick was driven to ask.
“Don’t you be a damned fool as well. Of course we’re going back! We do nothing till we know who these strangers are!”
And so the attack was suspended. The rebel ships turned away, their sails flapping like monstrous wet wings. Three strange ships were in sight, which meant reinforcements had arrived.
But reinforcements for whom?
From Lieutenant George Little’s deposition to the Massachusetts Court of Inquiry, sworn on September 25th, 1779.:By order of Capt Williams I went with 50 Men on Board the Hamden to man her as I suppos’d to grand Attack the Enem’y About the Same time the Comodore Boats being Imploy’d In Bringing off Loggs to Build a Brest Work on his fore Castle – I have Offten Herd Capt Williams say that from the first Counsell of war that the Comodore being always preaching Terro Against going in the Harbor to Attack the Enemeys Shiping.
From Brigadier-General Lovell’s despatch to Jeremiah Powell, President of the Council Board of the State of Massachusetts Bay, dated August 13th, 1779:I receiv’d your favor of Augt 6th this day wherein you mention your want of intelligence of the State of the army under my Command. . . . The Situation of my Army at present I cannot but say is very critical. . . . Many of my Officers and Soldiers are dissatisfied with the Service tho’ there are some who deserve the greatest credit for their Alacrity and Soldier like conduct. . . . Inclosed you have the Proceedings of five Councils of War, You may Judge my Situation when the most important Ship in the Fleet and almost all the private property Ships are against the Seige.
Chapter Thirteen
A Royal Marine at the taffrail of HMS North fired his musket at the small group of Americans who had gathered at the top of the beach. The musket-ball fluttered close above their heads to bury itself in the trunk of a spruce. None of the Americans seemed to notice, but kept gazing fixedly towards the harbor entrance. A marine sergeant shouted at the man to save his ammunition. “The range is too long, you stupid bastard.”
“Just saying hello to them, Sergeant.”
“They’ll be saying hello to you soon enough.”
Captain Selby, the commanding officer of HMS North, was watching the approaching rebel ships. His view was veiled by wisps of fog and sheets of rain, but he recognized the meaning of the enemy’s furled mainsails. The rebels wanted a clear view forrard, they were ready for battle. He walked along the sloop’s deck, talking to his gunners. “You’ll hit them hard, lads. Make every shot count. Aim at their waterline, sink the bastards before they can board us! That’s the way to beat them!” Selby doubted the three sloops could sink an enemy warship, at least not before the rebels opened fire. It was astonishing how much punishment a ship could take before it began to sink, but it was his duty to sound confident. He could see five enemy ships approaching the harbor entrance and all of them looked bigger than his sloop. He reckoned the enemy would try to board and capture the North and so he had readied the boarding pikes, axes, and cutlasses with which his crew would fight the attackers.
He stopped at the North’s bows beside a great samson post which held one of the seventeen-inch hawsers linking his sloop to the Albany. He could see Captain Mowat at the Albany’s stern, but he resisted the temptation to make small talk across the gap. A fiddler was playing aboard Mowat’s sloop and the crew was singing, and his own men took up the song.We’ll rant and we’ll roar like true British sailors,We’ll range and we’ll roam over all the salt seas,Until we strike soundings in the Channel of old EnglandFrom Ushant to Scilly ?tis thirty-five leagues.
Was it thirty-five leagues, he wondered? He remembered the last time he had beat up northwards from Ushant, the sea a gray monster and the Atlantic gale singing in the shrouds. It had seemed further than thirty-five leagues. He watched the enemy and distracted himself by converting thirty-five land leagues to nautical miles. The numbers fluttered in his head and he forced himself to concentrate. A touch under ninety-one and a quarter nautical miles, say an easy dawn-to-dusk run in a sloop-of-war given a fresh wind and a clean hull. Would he ever see Ushant again? Or would he die here, in this fog-haunted, rain-drenched, godforsaken harbor on a rebel coast? He still watched the enemy. A fine dark-hulled ship led them, and close behind her was the larger bulk and taller masts
