Marines and sailors rushed forward, first the sailors in one large mob, then Whitehead and his Marines, bayonets quickly fixed, by tens, pressing their attack on the houses ’til they were right up to the walls, jabbing muskets in the windows where the enemy troops were firing, jabbing with their bayonets. Lieutenants Rutland and Grace were sending their sailors down the fronts and backs of the houses they were attacking, finding other windows, then doors which were kicked in, so men with cutlasses and musket butts could rush in. In a furious minute, it was over, and men in French uniforms were being herded out of the houses, hands raised in surrender, being prodded by bayonet points. Lewrie let out a breath in relief after he scanned the ground, and could not see any of his men down. As if to reassure the ship that all was well, Captain Whitehead stuck a white tablecloth on his sword and waved it high in the air, wigwagging back and forth, and Lewrie could almost make out the sound of a “Huzzah!”
There had been several larger volleys beyond the houses, back of the town, the crackly crash of at least one hundred muskets going off in the same second, then silence as a pale pall of spent powder rose and drifted away on the breeze. A party from the 94th came into sight, shoving and prodding about a dozen French soldiers out to the road to join the other prisoners, and the officer in charge of them also performed a great, victorious wave to the ship, On the tip of his sword, he lifted up an enemy shako.
“Think Locri’s ours,” Lewrie said with a smile as he saw his Marines and sailors going into the town, warily, with muskets held low and aimed at every doorway and window, to search every building for more enemy soldiers, on their way to the quays to complete the destruction that the warships had wrought. A small party stayed behind on the road to guard the prisoners, no more than twenty in all, who were forced to sit in the dust with their hands behind their heads.
“There will be a grand trade in souvenirs tonight,” Greenleaf prophecied with a laugh, “once our lads’ve picked the prisoners clean. I’m hoping for an officer’s sword to send home, myself, though it’ll cost me a pretty penny.”
“It’ll cost your family a pretty penny, too, Charles, when the postage comes due,” Lieutenant Farley reminded him.
Lewrie pulled out his sausage again, picked some pocket lint off it, and took several satisfying bites to make up for the breakfast he’d missed. He could hear no more firing, not even a single gunshot from the town, so he felt safe in assuming that all the French … Genoese, really … were eliminated, and almost empty of panicked citizens.
“Deck, there!” a lookout called out. “They’s big fires breakin’ out back o’ th’ town! Acres an’ acres o’ tents are burnin’! An’ our sodjers is a’comin’ back!”
Lewrie pulled out his pocket watch, and had to smile once more, for the 94th had torched the arms and supply depot they’d been assigned to destroy, and it had all been done in a little over an hour since the barges had grounded on the beach. In another hour, they would all be back aboard their transports, and his little squadron would be ready to hoist anchors and put back to sea; and if God was just he could boast in his report of the action that not a man had been wounded or lost!
Feeling smug, he went up to the poop deck for a better view down towards Siderno, to see how Caruthers was faring, and he could not help feeling superior. The gunsmoke from the warships’ broadsides had long ago dispersed, and the smoke from the many burning ships had subsided to thin wisps, so he could finally make out details.
The rowing boats were still shuttling back and forth from the transports to the beaches and back. The ships carrying the third regiment were still pacing up and down the coast, unable to enter the harbour for one reason or another, and he could see the colours of Caruthers’s other two regiments further inland, but the arms and supply depot they were assigned to destroy had yet to be set ablaze; he could almost see faded rows of tents stretched out in long lines, almost a square form, protecting crates, kegs, and loaded waggons from the elements, with tiny red-coated figures among them as if they were taking an inventory before they did their duty, so the totals would impress when their report was submitted to Army superiors!
“Oh, come on, you cunny-thumbed bastards!” Lewrie groused. “Do get on with it! Are ye shoppin’?”
“It would appear that Army work is much like church work, sir,” Lieutenant Greenleaf sniggered. “It does go slow!”
“Damn my eyes, are the brigade’s troops inland of the depot?” Lewrie fumed. “What is he playin’ at? And where’d they get horses?”
Wee, dark brown forms could be seen, mounted men in uniforms of senior officers Lewrie guessed from the hints of gold lace and bright gimp. Other wee mounted figures were dashing about between the depot and the nearest ridge, putting Lewrie in mind of an impromptu steeple-chase on captured mounts, though Don Julio’s spies had not reported any cavalry anywhere along the coast.
“Aha, sir!” Lieutenant Farley exclaimed after a long squint with his telescope. “I think I’ve discovered our signalmen, at last.”
“Where away?” Lewrie snapped.
“Atop a tall house, sir,” Farley said, “just to the left of the town church. See it?”
After a moment, Lewrie spotted it, too. “Aye, I do.”
“Damn my eyes, is he showing Number Ten?” Lieutenant Farley cried in surprise. “Mister Ingham, your signals code book, if you please. Is that Number Ten?”
“Ehm, aye, sir,” the Midshipman said after fumbling through his book. “Enemy in Sight, sir.”
“Enemy in Sight?” Lewrie gawped aloud. “What enemy? There was no reports of more than a company in Siderno, and they’ve surely done for them, by now—”
“Another signal, sir!” Midshipman Ingham interrupted. “Need G … N … R … S. That’s down, and … Gunners? Numeral Two … B … A … T … Repeater. Batt, batteries? H … O … W. God knows what that means, sir.”
“Howitzers,” Lewrie spat. “Show them Understand, then haul it down, and make Unable, and Evacuate. D’ye have t’spell that out?”
“Ehm, how about Unable, then Recall, sir,” Ingham suggested.
“Add Immediate to Recall,” Lewrie ordered, then shouted as if Caruthers could hear him several miles away, “Set the God-damned depot afire and get the Hell out, you shit for brains!”
Ingham hoisted the signal, reported that the shore signal yard had struck theirs, then, a minute later, read out their new hoist as “Enemy in Sight … Need G … N … gunners, sir!”
“What in the world?” Lieutenant Greenleaf puzzled as he directed his telescope back to the beaches and transports for a second. “They are still fetching troops from the ships, sir, as if they have no intention to withdraw. Spoiling for a battle, if you ask me.”
“What do we do, sir?” Lieutenant Farley asked, perturbed. “We can’t just watch them get knackered.”
“No, we can’t, dammit,” Lewrie seethed through gritted teeth. “Repeat our signal, Mister Ingham, and add Advise to it. Do we have a strongly advise?”
“Don’t think so, sir, unless we spell it out,” Ingham replied.
“Advise, Burn, Immediate Recall,” Lewrie fumed.
“Aye, sir,” the Mid said, hustling aft to the flag lockers and halliards. Long minutes later, the shore signal yard replied, and Lewrie could read it from the deck. Unable … Need … G … N … R … S.
“Just God-damn it,” he raged, “and God-damn him!”
He took a deep breath, held it, then let it out in a whoosh, thinking hard. He looked shoreward, and was relieved to see the troops of the 94th formed up on the beach by companies once again, marching by twos down to the barges, ready to re-embark. He could see Colonel Tarrant with the Colours, which were being furled round their poles and re-inserted into their leather cundums. Round the houses where the enemy soldiers had engaged his men, a shambling mob of sailors and a smarter column of Marines were just leaving Locri, and there were new fires in the town. One Marine by the drummer and fifers paraded with a broom held aloft, an old sign of a victorious clean sweep.
“Mister Farley,” Lewrie said, striving for a calmer voice, “I’d admire did you signal the transports to hurry loading their troops, so they can get out to sea at once. Send Recall to our people. But, as soon as the Marines are back aboard, you will take command of the ship, while I will take charge of the armed sailors and our boats.”
“Sir?” Farley asked, puzzled.
“We’ve gunners among our landing party, enough to manage those howitzers Caruthers reported,” Lewrie went on, “a few of the guns, anyway, and … unfortunately, I’m the only person here who knows the first bloody thing about howitzers, and fused explosive shells, so … if I can’t order, or bludgeon that miserable, cack-handed moron to get his people off the beaches, and set fire to that bloody depot, I’ll have to support him … damn his blood!”
At that moment, Locri’s depot, which by then was burning furiously, began to explode when the fires reached the tons of stored powder. Pre-made artillery cartridges lit off, thousands of them together, and cartridges with roundshot attached, those which would propel canister or grapeshot, went flying into the air like a royal fireworks trailing smoke like errant Congreve rockets. Hundreds of thousands of paper musket cartridges flared up yellow-white, crackling like millions of burning twigs or whole cauldrons full of bursting maize kernels, and the ground shook as if God was stomping his feet!
Flaming powder kegs that did not blow up in sympathetic blasts whirled skyward, staves crushed inwards, and tumbling over and over to whirl trails of fire before they exploded high in the air or fell all about, coming down on the seaport of Locri like a bombardment to crash through roof tiles and set the entire town alight.
The crews of the ship and the transports, the sailors on the beach, and the soldiers filing into the boats, stopped to give great cheers, mixed with “Oohs and Ahhs,” though some yelped when kegs and flaming debris fell near the filled boats on their way out.
“Deavers!” Lewrie shouted through the open door to his cabins. “Round up my Ferguson musket, the pair of Mantons, and see if you can find that wood canteen, and fill it with cool tea!”
“Tea, sir?” Deavers called back from within.
“I have to go ashore!” Lewrie took time to explain, “Hurry!”
Vigilance’s boats were coming alongside, and the ship’s Marines were tentatively standing in half-crouches amidships of them, ready and eager to get back aboard. Lewrie went to the bulwarks to shout down.
“Mister Rutland, Mister Grace, keep the sailors and boat crews aboard,” he ordered. “We will be rowing up the coast to the nearest beach where the brigade landed. We’ve more work to do!”
“Aye aye, sir,” Lieutenant Rutland replied, calmly, as if surprises did not faze him; Lieutenant Grace just looked slack-jawed.
Deavers, Dasher, and Turnbow all came boiling out of the cabins with his weapons and accoutrements, and Lewrie hurriedly hung cartridge pouches, priming flasks, and the full canteen over his shoulders.
“The Ferguson and the pistols are loaded, but not primed, sir,” Deavers said, standing back after helping him. “Fourty rounds for the musket are in the black pouch, fourty paper cartridges for your pistols are in the brown one, and both priming powder flasks are full. I put the tea in the canteen, but there wasn’t all that much left, so I topped it up with some ginger beer, sir.”
“Capital, Deavers,” Lewrie said with a forced smile, “I thank you. You lads always do your best for me. Keep Chalky and the bunny happy whilst I’m away. I should be back aboard in a few hours.”
“Thought our job was done, sir,” Dasher said, pointing to the massive cloud of smoke rising above Locri, and the tongues of flame that licked upwards almost as high as the ship’s main top.
“Down the coast, to help the Army,” Lewrie said, going to the nearest boarding nets, waiting for the Marines to finish their scrambles up. “Mister Farley?” he shouted to the quarterdeck. “Once the transports are ready to up-anchor, take Vigilance to sea with them, but fetch-to or re-anchor off the closest beach this side of Siderno, and await our return.”
“Aye aye, sir!” Lieutenant Farley replied, “Ehm … side party?” he called out, unsure if there was a Navy ceremony for a Captain’s departure in such an odd way.
The Bosun, Mister Gore, stepped to the bulwarks on the larboard sail-tending gangway and raised his silver call to his mouth as Lewrie swung a leg over.
“Oh, for God’s sake, Mister Gore,” Lewrie admonished him. “Do save it for when I come back aboard the proper way.”
“Er … aye aye, Cap’m sir,” Gore said, with a nervous cough.
Now, how do I get down this bloody thing? Lewrie wondered as he straddled the bulwark, looking down into the waiting barge below that contained Lieutenant Grace and Midshipman Chenery, armed sailors from the landing party, and oarsmen, all of them looking up expectantly. The starboard rowers held the bottom of the net to tension and steady it, and to keep the barge alongside.
Lewrie’s booted foot sought a square in the net, for a starter, put his weight on the horizontal cross-rope, and he swung the other leg over, fingers groping for hand-holds. The net lay so close to the bulwark that he had to fumble lower before getting firm grips. Then, he found that boot soles would slip right off if he didn’t cock his feet toes-down and catch his boot heels on the supporting rope.
This is harder than it looks, he told himself as he lowered himself a foot or so: It looked good, on paper. Oh, God, please don’t let me fall in the boat and break my damned neck, fall in the water and drown … or look as stupid and clumsy as I think I do!
He couldn’t swim a stroke, he’d never learned, but then most of his crew couldn’t swim, either, and he suspected that his Marines and the men of the 94th were in the same situation.
We haven’t drowned any of them, yet, so … maybe I won’t, he tried to cheer himself; Oh, shit!
It was harder than it looked, for every time he lowered himself his sword hilt or the drag of his scabbard caught on something. So did the butts of the pistols shoved into his coat’s side pockets. So did the cartridge pouches strapped cross his chest, and every time he let go with his left hand to find another rope to grasp, the sling of his musket threatened to slide off his shoulder, and the faint rolling of the ship, the scend of the sea that lifted and dropped the boat, and the tension of the net, that canteen full of tea and ginger beer swung wildly about, spanking him on his buttocks.
He looked down, once, and gave that up as a bad go, for the boat didn’t seem any closer for all his efforts, but the sea did, and if he fell, his weapons and accoutrements would drag him right down.
How long, Oh, Lord! he thought, scrabbling for new hand-holds as he found new places to put his feet, cursing the naval architects who designed ships with so much tumblehome above the gunwales, for the net lay almost flat against the ship’s sides, and the sides of his boot soles were of more avail.
I must be there by now! he assured himself as he passed the last of the pale tan-painted lower gun deck wale. Left foot down, and scrabble, right hand lower, right foot down, and left hand …
The Ferguson rifled musket almost slipped off his shoulder once more, and when he shrugged it back into place, the barrel knocked his hat off. But, a grope with his left foot found something solid under the rough, tarred boarding net, and he dared a peek, discovering that his boot was on the barge’s starboard gunn’l.
“’At’s it, sir, ‘at’s th’ way,” a sailor encouraged, reaching up to steady him as Lewrie stood with both feet on the gunn’l, with the boarding net’s squares sure hand-holds at last. A long stretch of one leg and he was standing on a thwart, his leg muscles trembling. He stumbled to a seat on the after-most thwart by the tiller.
The bow man reached overside and retrieved Lewrie’s hat, shaking water off it, then passed it aft. Midshipman Chenery took it, poured the last water out of it, and handed it to him.
“Your hat, sir,” Chenery said, trying not to laugh.
“Ah, thankee, Mister Chenery,” Lewrie replied, clapping in on his head despite how damp it felt, “Been having fun ashore, have you?”
“Immense fun, sir,” Chenery said with an impish grin. “Wait ’til I write my sister of it,” drawing a warning glare.
“Right, show of hands,” Lewrie said, “How many of you are in a gun crew? Good. We’re going ashore up by Siderno to save the Army from themselves. They’ve found some guns in their depot, and none of ’em know a bloody thing about ’em. Let’s shove off, and row along the coast.”
“Why would the Army need artillery, sir?” Lieutenant Grace asked him as the bottom of the boarding net was let go, the bow man pushed his gaff against the ship to make room for the starboard oarsmen to work, and the barge’s Cox’n ordered larboard oars rigged.
“They sent some scouts out over the nearest ridge and found an enemy force, no idea how big, coming this way,” Lewrie told him, “and they want t’give ’em a bloody nose before they fire the depot. That will take guns, and they didn’t land any.”
The barge was clear of the ship by then, stroking for Siderno, so Lewrie could shout over to Lieutenant Rutland to repeat his explanation.
“Twelve-pounders, sir?” Lieutenant Grace asked. “I believe that’s what the French prefer.”
“Don’t know their calibre,” Lewrie told him, “but they’re not guns, exactly. They’re howitzers. Short, stubby barrels like a wee carronade. They throw fused explosive shot at higher angles than a proper cannon. Where there’s howitzers there must be fused shot, so … that’s what we’re t’play with. There have t’be fuses.”
“How far off are the French, and how much time do we have to figure the guns out, sir?” Lieutenant Grace asked with a furrowed brow.
“That I don’t know,” Lewrie confessed, “but once I see the Brigadier, I’ll know more. And why he hasn’t set the depot alight, and why he wants a battle in the first damned place,” he grimly added.
* * *
Vigilance’s barges slithered onto the sands to the far right of the beach, as close as they could get to Siderno, and the inland road junction where the arms depot sat. Amazingly, boats from the brigade’s transports were still landing soldiers to re-enforce whatever it was that was in Brigadier Caruthers’s head.
Once ashore in the softer sand at the top of the beach, Lewrie took a look round. He could see why the third regiment had not been able to land their soldiers on the quays, for the harbour was choked with sunken, burned-out wrecks, and the waters littered with floating debris. Many had been sunk right along the quays, which were chipped and scarred by roundshot, too.
He looked seaward, and was gratified to see the 94th’s ships standing out to sea, and Vigilance slowly approaching Siderno under reefed tops’ls and jibs, over a mile offshore and feeling her way back to a fresh anchorage closer to the beaches, with leadsmen in the fore chains sounding the depth. No matter what happened, his part of the expedition would get away un-marked.
“No horses for us, it seems,” Lewrie said, pointing inland as an Infantry Ensign cantered by on a rather fine horse. “Let’s go see what the Army wants. Forward!” he called to his men.
It was only half a mile from the coast road and the shattered town of Siderno to the depot. There were some working parties of soldiers there, but the Lieutenant in charge of them informed Lewrie that the regiment proper was out beyond the vast depot, and that was where Brigadier Caruthers could be found.
“When do you set it on fire?” Lewrie asked, waving an arm to take it all in.
“I was told that it would be set afire as we evacuate, sir,” the Army officer said, “but I have no idea when that would be. We are ah, helping ourselves to whatever might be of use to us, at the moment,” he said with a wink.
“Hmph!” was Lewrie’s comment to that.
Once out beyond the last rows of tent-sheltered matériel, it was a brisk five-minute walk to where Lewrie could see the signalling yard standing erect, with the red broad pendant atop it fluttering. A clutch of officers stood round a man on horseback nearby; Caruthers was mounted, and looking rather grand and commanding, sitting stiffly upright in the saddle, and pointing at various things much like commanding generals had been portrayed in paintings of famous battles. Someone in the group spotted Lewrie’s party, said something, and Caruthers reined his horse about to face his approach, a broad grin on his face.
“Ah, you’re here at last, with your gunners!” Caruthers cried out. “Topping!”
“And you’re still here, no matter how daft that is,” Lewrie re-joined, tapping fingers on the brim of his soggy hat instead of doffing it in salute. “Why?”
“There’s a French column coming, and I intend to give them a battle, sir,” Caruthers archly stated.
“How many, how far off are they, and if they’re too strong for you, how do you intend t’get your troops off, and fire the depot? I believe its destruction was the main idea for this expedition in the first place?” Lewrie said, equally arch. “Not offer battle?”
“The enemy, sir,” Caruthers shot back, “consists of at least one regiment of infantry, a troop of cavalry, and a battery of cannon. As you can see, I’ve two of my regiments ready to receive,” he said with a wave of his arm to indicate the troops out half a mile inland below the nearest ridge, sitting or napping on their backs in long lines. “We estimate that they will be coming through that draw atop the ridge in two or three hours … sufficient time for you to emplace the guns we found. I would have all my brigade, but for your Navy clogging the port,” he accused.
“That’s because their orders were to sink, take, or burn every hull in sight, sir, as their part of the operation,” Lewrie replied. “Two or three hours? You expect to waste the rest of the day, fight them round dusk, then get your troops off in the dark? Perhaps if you can do that by the light of the burning depot, you might pull it off, but I doubt it. If you march your men back to the beaches, you might get them all off before the French arrive, but you’d have to start now!”
“I fully expect your ships and their boats would aid in that endeavour, after we’ve bloodied the enemy’s noses … sir,” Caruthers snapped, abandoning genteel conduct, seething, hissing through his teeth.
“My transports, and my boats, are back at sea, sir,” Lewrie told him. “The 94th achieved all their objectives without loss, and their part of the operation is also over. I came here imagining that the French were at your throats this instant. I am not of a mind to hang about for hours so you can re-stage the Battle of Maida, sir.”
“You would sail away and abandon us, sir?” another officer spat.
“You’ve almost fulfilled your orders, sir,” Lewrie turned to say to him. “Fire the depot, get your troops back aboard their ships, and you’ve achieved everything asked of you.”
“There is always something more to be done,” Caruthers snapped, “a golden opportunity discovered that must be exploited.”
“Fine, get yourselves knackered,” Lewrie growled. “Mister Severance?” he called to the signal party. “Head back to the beach and set up to speak to our ship. Nothing more for you to do here.”
“Aye, sir,” Severance said, looking relieved to be freed from the Army.
“And would you abandon us, sir?” Caruthers demanded.
“If you won’t take my advice, Brigadier, there’s not a lot the Navy can do for you,” Lewrie told him. “I could provide fire support to cover your evacuation. My ship’s gunners are hellish-good, but we have only roundshot. Broadsides of eighteen- and twenty-four-pound shot might pin the French on the back side of the ridge whilst you withdraw, but the last thing I wish is to encourage your folly.”
“Let me make this plain, Captain Lewrie,” Caruthers said as he shifted in his saddle, placing both hands on it to lean forwards. “I am senior officer ashore. Your command ends in the shallows along the beach. I order you to remain ashore, and man the guns my men have discovered. If you do not do your utmost to aid me, I shall prefer court-martial charges, no matter how this turns out, and if I do fail, your refusal will be to blame for it! You, alone, sir!”
“That’s grossly unfair, sir!”Lieutenant Grace exclaimed.
“I did not speak to you, puppy!” Caruthers snapped.
He’s got me, Lewrie miserably thought; I should’ve stayed aboard and let him get beaten. No, he’d say I didn’t send him gunners, and he’d see me court-martialled for that! Fuck it. We’re here, so …
“A court-martial could find you reckless, too, sir,” Lewrie told him. “Remember Buenos Aires, and General Whitelocke?”
That stung the man! Whitelocke had been so inept, so foolish, and had lost an entire British army to gauchos and un-trained volunteers, and had been ruled out of any further military service in any capacity as a total incompetent.
“Very well, I will stay, and I’ll man your bloody guns,” Lewrie said in surrender, seething though he was. “I’ll say for the record, though, that you’re a damned, glory-huntin’ fool. Now, where’s the fuckin’ howitzers?”
* * *
There were twelve of them, lined up at the back end of the vast depot, stubby bronze barrels, wooden wheeled carriages, limbers and caissons that held propellant cartridges and explosive shells together as if readied for inspection. On the wide trails behind the barrels sat more boxes for ready-use ammunition. As Caruthers and his staff sat and watched Lewrie and his men inspect them, Lewrie opened one of the boxes to peer inside.
“There’s a plate on the carriage, sir, “Lieutenant Rutland grumbled. “It says, ah … Systeme AN XI … eleven. Fourteen cent-i-metre, whatever the Devil that means,” he said, stumbling over the strange word.
“Dumb-arsed French measurements,” Lewrie scoffed. “I think it’s close to five inches, maybe five and a half? Anyone else know Frog mathematics? No?”
“Maybe higher numbers to measure length make the French think their members are longer,” Lieutenant Grace sniggered.
Lewrie hefted one of the heavy shot from the ready-use box with difficulty, for it felt as if it weighed more than twelve pounds. He turned it over a little to look at the plug in its side.
“Where’s the fuses?” he asked.
“Right there, sir!” Caruthers snapped, jabbing a finger at the plug.
“No, that’s a wood plug t’keep the gunpowder from spilling, and to protect the charge from anything that might set it afire,” Lewrie contradicted. He sat the shell on the trail ahead of the box, pulled the plug, and held it up. “Wood. Solid wood. I’ll ask again. Where’s the bloody fuses?”
“Uh,” was Caruthers’s response.