CHAPTER TWELVE
The Sail Maker
October 25, 1811
A week after the missionary family arrived, Zeb was sitting with the McAllisters at the supper table. He was telling them about some of the strange people who had come out to the Culpeppers’ to talk with the captain about going north with the patrol. A number of merchants arrived at the staging site with armed guards they had recruited from among the boaters down at the docks. Captain Morrison told them that the gold coins they were carrying would be an enormous temptation to men who owed them no loyalty. In spite of the warning, the merchants were usually too impatient for a six-week to two-month wait. They would leave the next morning to head north on the Nashville Road. Captain Morrison doubted they’d ever be seen again.
Zeb told them that Kaintucks heading north on foot now stopped to gather at the Culpepper place until they had at least twenty-five men. They sometimes talked, almost wistfully, about going with the patrol, but it was only possible for those going on horseback.
“I need to do some things in Natchez tomorrow morning,” Zeb said finally. “Is there anything I can get for you while I’m there?”
“I’d like to go with you, Zeb, if you don’t mind,” Hannah said. “Mama wants me to talk with Miss Phillipa about having some town clothes made.” She made a funny grimace. “Can you imagine? She wants to know what girls my age are wearing, and I’m s’posed to bring home some fabric samples from Foley’s General Store.”
“It’s time for you to dress the way other girls do,” her mother said.
“I know. I’ll do it,” Hannah groaned. “I just think it’s funny. With my short hair I’ll look like a boy in his sister’s clothes.”
“Your hair is already growing back. You’ll look fine.”
Hannah fingered her hair. “They cut it about a week before I met Zeb. They thought I looked too Choctaw, so Elizabeth, one of the Mason gang women, took some sheep shears and chopped off the braid. When she tried to even it up, she made it worse. She said it was my fault because I kept yelling and screaming and I wouldn’t hold still.”
Zeb remembered the red switch marks on the backs of her legs. That’s probably how they finally forced her to let them cut it. There is so much she will probably never tell her mother.
That evening after supper, Hannah’s mother sat in her rocker and sewed. Zeb and Dr. McAllister headed to the laboratory, and Hannah sat at the kitchen table, writing in her diary with a quill, rather than the pencil she had used on the road.
“You musta had lot happen today, Miz Hannah,” Zeb heard Sarah observe, “for you to be writin’ so much tonight.”
“It isn’t what happened today, Sarah,” Hannah said. “Something Mama said brought back memories that I want to put down in my diary.”
The next morning Zeb and Hannah left for Natchez.
Zeb hoped no one would recognize him. His hair was cut short—Hannah had seen to that—and he wore his grampa’s broad-brimmed hat. He was now wearing town clothes and a pair of dress boots. They were hand-me-downs, borrowed from Katie Culpepper’s brother, Sean, who had gone East to college.
He was riding Maggie, a small horse he had borrowed from Mr. Culpepper. Hannah was riding one of the Culpepper’s ponies. She wore some of the boy’s clothes she had brought from Yowani. They headed to Natchez, laughing at each other.
They paid the toll and crossed the bridge at Catherine Creek on the outskirts of the city. Then they continued on Jefferson Street.
Zeb thought of all he and his grampa had talked about as they had planned the trip back to Franklin. He looked up. Hannah was watching him, but she didn’t say anything. They had always respected each other’s silences on the trail. He smiled. “Sorry,” he said. “I was thinkin’ about all I hafta do.”
“Me, too,” Hannah said. “I keep thinkin’ about how much I like it here, and then I think of Yowani. Life is so different here.”
Zeb took off his hat and ran his fingers through his hair. It was now about an inch long. “At least when you cut it, you didn’t do it with sheep shears,” he said. Hannah grinned.
They stopped at Foley’s General Store. “I’ll meet you back here in about an hour,” Zeb said. Hannah nodded as she climbed the steps to the door.
As Zeb headed down Silver Street to Natchez Under-the-Hill, the sun had already burned off most of the early morning fog.
He stopped at a Levee Street building on the river side of the road. A sign hung over the door.
HENRY YADKIN
SAIL MAKER
Zeb entered the sail maker’s shop. The morning sun streamed into the big room, and sails and fabric hung from the ceiling in neat rows. Zeb was immediately aware of the not unpleasant musty smell of canvas and hemp rope, and the faint tang of turpentine.
The sail maker, seated at the far end of a table, was pushing a large curved needle up through heavy canvas. He looked up as Zeb’s footsteps echoed softly on the wood floor.
Zeb pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket. “Mr. Yadkin?”
The man nodded. “What can I do for you?”
“Do you ever make tents? I’d like a tent somethin’ like this, in two pieces like an army tent.”
The sail maker looked at the drawing. “A tent about a foot higher and a foot wider than the army-issue tent, with one-foot side walls? It’ll take about a week. And I need a deposit.”
Zeb nodded. He looked around the room.
“I was surprised Natchez has a sail maker. You can’t have many sails to make here.”
The man pulled the thread through the canvas. “Most of my sail making is for the keelboats headed downriver to New Orleans. Those boats need sails to help them get upriver, at least back to Natchez.”
“And the big sails?”
“We do get a few big ships, oceangoing vessels, coming up from New Orleans. It’s usually a difficult journey against that strong current. But this time a’ year there’s often a strong southerly wind.”
Mr. Yadkin paused. I hear they’re building a boat that’s meant to run on steam. It’s supposed to go not only down the Mississippi, but upriver as well!” He shook his head. “I doubt it could make it. But if it did, it sure would change my line of work.”
Zeb stopped at the bank, then went by the Weekly Chronicle. Inside, a man was kneeling on the floor, picking up pieces of type. He looked up as Zeb came in. Zeb stared down at the man. “You!” he said. “You’re the man I saw back at Mt. Locust Inn. Ya told me to look for the bald-headed man!”
The man stood up and squinted at Zeb. “Cut your hair, didn’t you?” he said. “Did you find your grampa?”
Zeb nodded. “Yes, thank you. Sir, when we met, you asked me about my uncle Ira. Do you know him?”
“We were roommates at the University of Virginia. Good friends ever since. He’s the one who told me that Natchez needed a newspaper.”
Zeb kneeled down. “Let me give you a hand with that type.”
“So Ira Hamilton put you to work, did he?”
Zeb nodded, gathering the lead letters in his hands. “I was a printer’s devil for Uncle Ira, but I’m not lookin’ for a job.”
“What can I do for you, then?”
Zeb dropped the type gently into a small wooden box. “Grampa wanted a copy of the newspaper, and he wanted me to ask if you had any news from the Nashville or Franklin area.”
The editor stood and leafed through papers on his desk. “Nope, nothing from Nashville or Franklin,” he said.
“What do you hear about the steamboat bein’ built?”
“Pittsburgh paper says it’ll leave this month. If it ever reaches Natchez, I plan to be on the dock interviewing everybody.”
Zeb left the Weekly Chronicle and went back to Mr. Yadkin’s shop to leave the tent deposit. Now that the haze had lifted from the river, he could see the reefed sails of a few ships through the window of the sail maker’s shop. Those are the first oceangoing vessels I’ve ever seen, he said to himself.
The sail maker put Zeb’s golden eagle in a metal box. “That’s a British merchant ship,” he said, pointing to the tallest one. “I’d stay away from that vessel if I were you. One of the officers and two sailors off that ship came in here this morning to ask about sails, and then they went next door to the ship’s chandler and asked for prices of supplies. But they didn’t seem to be really interested so much in supplies as they were in seeing the dock area. We saw ’em talking with some of the street kids who hang around the docks, and we both got a bad feelin’ about ‘em. Don’t know what they’re up to.”
He paused and stared out the open doors toward the docks. “But there is a possibility. They could be paying some of the locals to form a press gang.”
“What are press gangs?”
“Press gangs look for young men like you, young men who are strong and able.”
“For what?”
“If a press gang caught you, you’d be declared a deserter from the Royal Navy. You’d spend the rest of your life on board one ship or another.”
“A deserter! I could easily prove I was never a British seaman!”
“Who would you prove it to? The people who have pressed you into service?”
Zeb paused. “But why do they do it?”
Yadkin sat back at the table and began sewing again. “Some British seamen are deserting. The conditions aboard ship are terrible. Discipline is extremely harsh, and the men haven’t been paid in months. The Royal Navy, the most powerful in the world, is suddenly weak for lack of adequate ship’s crews.”
“So they round up a lot of Kaintucks who don’t know a thing about ships?”
“Sure. They’re after young men they can train. They also stop our merchant ships on the high seas. They take every able-bodied sailor off those ships, claiming that they’re English deserters. Most of the men they press into service are American men with wives and families back here. It’s caused a lot of grief.”
The sail maker paused. “If you go down to the docks, watch out. You might get far more excitement than you bargained for.”
When Zeb left Mr. Yadkin’s, he could see the top of the masts of the sailing ship over the roof. In spite of the sail maker’s warning, Zeb couldn’t resist taking a closer look at the square rigger.
He didn’t see any reason to be afraid. The ship was anchored in the deep part of the river, some distance from the floating docks. There appeared to be little activity aboard. Several men struggled with their oars against the river current as they rowed a large boat laden with barrels and boxes to the ship.
I wonder, he thought, what it’d be like to go to sea, to be a merchant seaman. They must see some wonderful places.
He wrinkled his nose at the dead fish stink of the docks.
A number of men were standing on the last dock. They seemed to be busy with the boxes and barrels and cloth sacks stacked up for transfer to the ship. Zeb pushed through them and looked over the edge into the well of a boat that was identical to the one being rowed out to the ship. The large rowboat was almost filled, and the crew was about to shove off. The man in charge looked up at him and smiled. “Want to see what a real ship is like? You can go out with us. We’ll bring you back after they unload the cargo.”
Zeb noticed the smirks on the faces of some of the sailors. He had done enough betting on horse races to know that they knew something he didn’t know. As much as he would have liked to see the ship, he decided not to go with them. He shook his head and stepped away from the edge of the dock, backing into one of the men standing there. “Sorry,” he said.
Suddenly, two strong arms wrapped around him from behind, pinning Zeb’s arms to his sides. “Hey!” Zeb shouted. “What’s going on?” When he was lifted off his feet, he kicked wildly. Another man grabbed his legs and tied them together. He was thrown facedown on the dock. Someone knelt on the middle of his back and tied his hands behind him.
A voice from the boat called to the man kneeling on his back. “Not too ruddy tight, man. If ‘e loses a hand, ‘e’s no use to us. We won’t get a farthin’ for ‘im.”
The man slightly loosened the rope around Zeb’s wrists.
The voice from the boat said, “We don’t want to take any of the gentry, either. They can make it a bit difficult for us. That one isn’t dressed like a Kaintuck.”
He called up to Zeb. “What’s your name, lad? Where’re you from?”
Zeb could hardly breathe. “My name,” he croaked, “is Zebulon D’Evereux. Let me go!”
The man kneeling on his back roared with laughter. “Zebulon D’Evereux?” he shouted. Zeb sagged. I know that voice. The man gave Zeb’s side a vicious kick and flipped him over on his back. Zeb looked up into the face of Sergeant Scruggs!
Zeb looked from one side to the other, hoping that some of the other men on the dock would help him. They were all grinning at him. They’re all part of it!
“I never would’ve recognized you,” the sergeant said. He shouted down to the men in the boat, “You can leave. This one’s mine. When I get through with him, he won’t be of no use to nobody.”
When the sergeant pulled his foot back to kick him again, Zeb rolled out of reach and then kicked at the sergeant’s legs with his bound feet. The other men stood by and laughed. The sergeant grinned. “Gonna try to fight me?” He pulled his foot back again.
An explosive crack made the sergeant jump. He whirled around, grasping the back of his leg. Then he bent his knees, crouched, ready to fight, his face in a ferocious grin.
The only thing that makes a noise like that is a whip, Zeb thought. But how can Grampa be down here? Then he heard another familiar voice. “Sergeant! You mess with my partner and you mess with me! You saw how he was ready to fight ya, even tied and bound. That’s what a partner of Lonnie Champ is like. We don’t never give up.”
Zeb rolled on his side. Lonnie Champ stood on the dock coiling a bullwhip. He smiled at Zeb. “I been practicin’. I ain’t as good as yer granddad, but I kin teach the sergeant how ta dance.”
One of the men who had been helping the sergeant began to move toward Lonnie Champ. The flatboat fighter pointed a finger at the approaching man. “I’m a bear!” he shouted. “I’m a alligator! I’m a cottonmouth snake! See that feather there in my hat? I’m cock o’ the walk. No man has ever whupped me, in fair fight or foul, and that includes the sergeant here.” He lowered his voice to a menacing growl. “You take one more step and it’ll be yer last.”
The man stepped back. Lonnie Champ lifted his chin toward Zeb. “You men! Untie my partner, while I deal with the sergeant here.”
A couple of men moved toward Zeb.
Lonnie Champ snapped the whip again and the sergeant howled, holding on to his arm this time. Lonnie pointed toward Levee Street. “You best start runnin’, Sergeant. Don’t worry. I’ll be right behind you. I’m gonna teach you how to dance. Gonna do it every time you mess with my partner.”
The sergeant sidled past Lonnie Champ, watching the whip. When he saw the whip arm move back, he ran off the dock with Lonnie behind him, snapping the whip at his britches.
One of the men in the boat yelled up to the other members of the gang, “Quick, bring ‘im to the edge of the dock and we’ll take ‘im to the ship.”
Zeb heard a noise behind him. He turned his head. It was Mr. Yadkin. “Untie that man,” the sail maker ordered in a low, angry voice that demanded to be obeyed.
The man in charge of the boat shouted, “Don’t listen to that old man. Just sits around all day, sewing sails.”
One of the men on the dock shook his head. “We gotta live here. You don’t. Ain’t nobody wants to get on the wrong side of Lonnie Champ.”
The man in the boat cursed and then ordered the sailors at the oars to get underway. “We best return to the ship and tell the cap’n. He’ll probably pull up anchor,” he said. “That sail maker’ll go for the constable. We’ll be out of business.”
Zeb could hear the man in the boat giving orders. “Shove off.” Then moments later, “On the port side…. Stroke! Now all together, stroke!” Zeb heard the creak and groan of oars in leather oarlocks as the sailors struggled against the current.
The men on the docks untied Zeb and stepped back, watching Mr. Yadkin. He scowled at the three men. “You can go,” he ordered, “but if I see you down at the docks again, I’ll notify the constable. Press gangs are illegal in this country. You will be charged with kidnapping.”
As the men slipped away into the alleys between the riverfront buildings, Zeb stood up and rubbed his wrists. “Thank you, Mr. Yadkin,” he said. “I should’ve listened to you and stayed away from that ship. I can’t believe I was so stupid.”
“You were very lucky, young man.”
“I know. I can’t thank you enough,” Zeb said. He looked back at the dock, shaken. “Why isn’t the government doing anything about press gangs?”
“They say that nothing short of war will stop it. But the U.S. Navy isn’t powerful enough to challenge the Royal Navy.”
As they turned to walk back to the sail maker’s shop, Zeb was suddenly overwhelmed by what might have happened. “Why doesn’t the constable arrest the press gangs? Why doesn’t he go out to the ship right now and force them to release their captives?”
“The constable and his deputy would have no way to force the captain to give up the men,” the sail maker replied. “Look, Zeb, they’ve already got men in the riggin’, gettin’ those sails ready to up-anchor and leave this port.”
Zeb nodded, then looked up the alley where the press gang had gone. “What about the locals workin’ as a press gang? Can’t the constable arrest ‘em?”
“I’m going now to talk to him. I should’ve talked to him earlier about my suspicions. But at least now, I know who the British sailors recruited into the press gang. The problem is getting proof. Those men on the docks can claim they were simply innocent bystanders forced to comply with the British. They did untie you….”
“I sure was lucky,” Zeb said, “that you and Lonnie Champ came along.”
“I’m not so sure it was luck. I got the feeling Lonnie Champ’s been watching out for you. He called you his partner, didn’t he?”
“I guess we are partners,” Zeb said. He thanked Mr. Yadkin again for his help. “Your voice sure sounded different when you told those men to untie me,” he said.
“I was bos’n—the officer in charge of the deck hands—in the Continental Navy and later when the U.S. Navy was formed. You don’t forget how to talk to sailors.”