Man Of War

Antrobus looked disappointed, put out, even, as he saluted and took his leave. Peto wished he had been a little less peremptory with him. He had the highest regard for the marines’ offensive spirit.

But then, the entire ship’s complement was possessed of nothing but desire for a battle. The quarterdeck, lately a place for sunny recreation, swarmed with gun-crew; jollies, bristling for some sharpshooting, lined the gangways; and hands danced impatiently about the forecastle carronades. Here was death in twenty different calibres, and every man eager for its issue.

A pigeon walked along the strings of the sauve-tete above the waist. Peto recalled he had not seen netting on a three-decker since Trafalgar . . .

Another quarter of an hour, and then: ‘Dartmouth lowering a boat, sir!’

Was there ever occasion when the quarterdeck listened so intently on a midshipman? Peto shook his head:politics.

Five more minutes: ‘Pinnace sir, from Dartmouth, pulling for the fireship.’

Peto saluted Admiral de Rigny’s flag in the frigate Sirene. As he turned to speak to his signal midshipman, a shot rang out from towards Dartmouth – a musket, perhaps a pistol, but a crack like fork lightning in the silent auditorium of the bay. And then a whole fusillade.

‘Shots from the fireship, sir! She’s firing on Dartmouth’s pinnace,’ called Midshipman Simpson.

Peto leaned out over the weather rail to see how close was the first of the French line-of-battle ships, what support he could expect: but they had fallen well astern of Sirene. ‘Damn me if they haven’t reduced sail too soon!’

He made for the poop for a better view. ‘Who is she, Mr Pelham?’

‘Scipion, sir. And Trident, I think, astern of her.’

‘She is either Trident or Breslau, Mr Pelham,’ replied Peto brusquely. ‘There is no good in being uncertain which.’

‘Ay-ay, sir.’

‘Fireship alight, sir!’ came the voice from the tops again.

Codrington had not said if firing a brulot was to be taken as the hostile act.

‘Dartmouth lowering her cutter, sir.’ Midshipman Simpson’s voice was becoming hoarse, but decidedly less reedy. ‘I believe the shots have struck the pinnace’s crew.’

Peto cursed beneath his breath. He had to admire Codrington’s nerve, but it was like chipping flints atop a powder keg.

Ten minutes crept by. Scipion drifted past, and Trident a hundred yards astern of her, as if pulled by plodding barge horses. Peto, back on the quarterdeck, shook his head. ‘A little bolder, our French friends might be, think you not, Mr Lambe? Our Russian friends press them hard.’ He nodded to the third column of sail fast approaching.

‘I do, sir. T’gallants and royals, at least.’

Peto lowered his telescope, resolved. ‘We are too inactive, Mr Lambe. Lower the cutter. Dartmouth may require assistance towing the brulot clear.’

‘Ay-ay, sir!’

Captain Antrobus came up. ‘Permission to embark my landing party, sir?’

Peto scowled. He did not require prompting to give his orders. Yet from the marines’ narrow perspective, Antrobus was right. He hated evasion – ‘Tirez les premiers’. It was a damned muddle- headed business, this: the government took sides in a war without taking any responsibility for action . . .

He had an idea. ‘Wait for the cutter to get away and then get your men into the boats. The Turks will think you’re to make for Dartmouth, too. Have your men take off their jackets. God knows I detest such skulking, but if the devil drives . . .’

‘Ay-ay, sir,’ said Antrobus, keenly.

‘And show yourself well to us, mind, if you do land. I want no men killed by our guns.’ (He had seen it often enough in the French war, even if Antrobus had not.)

‘Ay-ay, sir.’

‘The recall signal – yellow at the stern. Go to it. And good luck.’

Antrobus saluted, and bustled away.

There was a sudden welter of shots.

‘Shots at Dartmouth’s boats from the fireship, sir!’

The firing increased – an exchange of musketry for several minutes.

‘This may yet begin in a tuppenny-ha’penny fashion,’ said Peto. ‘Fellowes is showing admirable restraint, I would say.’

‘Indeed, sir,’ replied Lambe, his glass trained on Sphacteria, however. ‘And, most curious, still no sign of activity at the fort.’

Peto shook his head. ‘Why would the shore batteries stay idle while the fireships are primed ready? It reeks of a ploy.’

Lambe had no opportunity to answer: two cannon spoke – like the crack of doom.

‘Turk frigate firing a-weather, sir, hard inshore!’ screeched Simpson.

Cannon now roared a good deal closer.

‘Dartmouth answering, sir. And Sirene!’

Smoke and flame suddenly erupted from New Navarin, and a second later came the thunder of her guns.

‘Starboard batteries, open fire!’ snapped Peto.

Fountains of shot from New Navarin played ahead of Trident, before she was obscured by the smoke of Rupert’s broadside.

Sphacteria now belched into life. Shot whistled through Rupert’s rigging, carrying away a spar from the mizzen, and one of the topmen. The captain of the forecastle threw a float over the side, but the man was dead in the water, his neck broken.

‘Mr Lambe, larboard battery, if you please!’

Lambe raised his speaking-trumpet again. ‘Larboard battery, Fire!’

The upper-deck battery roared as one gun, the middle- and lower- a split second later. Pulverized stone thickened the smoke which already wreathed the walls of the fort.

Peto gave but one other order for the moment (the captains of the batteries knew their business, and their targets were obligingly immobile). ‘My compliments to Captain Antrobus, Mr Lambe, and bid him away to the shore.’

‘Ay-ay, sir.’

‘Turkish flagship firing on Asia, sir!’

Peto was strangely relieved:Asia was engaged at last. There could be no doubt about the issue now.

The action spread like a flame along a powder trail. Soon there was continuous cannonading, and smoke enough to fill the anchorage. A ball from Sphacteria struck Rupert by the break of the forecastle, scattering hammocks and showering the waist with splinters. Two marines fell, writhing terribly.

‘Sail, if you please, Mr Lambe. Let us give the Turks a harder mark still.’

The starboard watch hauled up the main-topsail by the clewlines rather than sending more men aloft to furl. In a minute or so, with no wind in the (backed) sail to counter the fore and mizzen, Rupert began to make headway.

‘Bring her up into the wind a point, Mr Veitch.’ It would mean putting half of each broadside off its line, Peto knew, but that should be of no matter now that each gun captain had the range.

The landing party was nearing the shore. He had a mind to recall them, for his guns would have the better of the fort soon enough if the Turks continued to fire so ill, one true hit in all of ten minutes.

Midshipman Simpson called again, even more hoarsely: ‘Two more fireships ablaze, sir!’

Peto made for the poop deck once more: with Rupert turning into the wind he ought to be able to see nearly as well as from the tops.