CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

‘SIR?’ SERGEANT THOMAS looked at him warily.

‘What do you mean you didn’t know who I was?’

The sergeant shuffled his feet. ‘Are you not related to Major-General Lucan, sir?’

Jamie thought fast. He remembered something from his childhood: his father discussing the possibility of an army career with Felix, and telling him that his name would help him up the military ladder, that somewhere in their background were important men, a lord and regimental commander no less; but Felix hadn’t wanted to be a soldier and Jamie was never asked, so nothing else was said, the family estate being more important than clinging to a tenuous link of relationship to a man who, it was rumoured, had been responsible for many deaths during the Irish potato famine.

‘Ah! Cavalry!’ Jamie said. ‘That’s not why I’m here, sergeant. I came at the request of a friend, not the commander.’

He hadn’t actually denied the connection; neither had he confirmed it and he saw the uncertainty in the sergeant’s eyes. ‘What was it you wanted me to do?’

‘Well, sir, you might not want to do it, but we’d be very grateful if you’d come and take a look.’

He led him into the building, which had been made into a makeshift hospital. The entrance hall was crowded with beds and mattresses on the floor and wounded and dying men lying on them. The foul stench was appalling; of blood and spilled guts, a stink of excreta and something else, which he could only imagine was the sweet and sickly scent of death.

But worse than the disgusting smell was the sound. The sound of men moaning, the sudden screams as they battled through their own private hells, and the haunting cries as grown men called out for their mothers.

‘This way,’ Sergeant Thomas said and led him into an anteroom. Here it was quieter, with about fifty men huddled on blankets on the floor or slumped on hard chairs.

‘Who are these men?’ Jamie asked.

‘These fellers are the lucky ones,’ Thomas said. ‘They should be going home in a few days.’

‘They don’t seem lucky to me,’ Jamie observed. Some of the men were head-bandaged, one or two with sightless eyes, others with only one and a half legs.

‘Believe me, they are,’ the sergeant said grimly. ‘There’s worse to come out of that foreign land.’

Jamie looked at him. ‘And what about you? Will you be going out there?’

Thomas clenched his lips together before lifting his right hand. ‘Look at this! Does it look as if I can do any soldiering? I can hold the reins of a horse but I can’t fire a musket.’ His face turned sour. ‘That Major-General of yourn wants only young men, so here’s his excuse for getting rid of me; never mind that I’ve more experience than he’ll ever have, damn his eyes!’

‘I don’t know him,’ Jamie admitted. ‘I’ve only read about him in newspapers. But you’re still doing a useful job. And you’re alive!’

The soldier shook his head and without further comment about his situation said, ‘We’ve got injured men able to walk who can escort this lot home, but the doctors are too busy to come round and say if they’re fit to leave or fit to fight.’ He looked straight at Jamie. ‘Can you do that?’

Jamie blew out a breath. If he had his way he’d send them all home, but that wouldn’t do. The British and the French had made a commitment to support the Turkish Empire against the Russians and needed every able man they could muster. And, he thought, these men joined the army of their own volition. Presumably for queen and country.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I can do that.’

The experience he had been lacking he gained during the next three weeks, and when he had given the men permission to re-join their regiments or return home he worked with the other doctors treating the more badly injured soldiers. By the third week in September, when he was thinking of returning home himself, news began to filter through that the first real battle of the Crimean War had begun, the former hostilities considered to be just a taster of what was to come.

The battle of the Alma began when the British with twenty-six thousand infantry and a thousand cavalry, along with French and Turkish forces, clashed with the Russian Imperial Army near the banks of the River Alma on their march north to Sevastopol. Although considered to be a victory for the Allied forces, over two thousand British men were killed or wounded, and many of these began to be shipped back to Blackwall Dock.

Sergeant Thomas sought Jamie out in the main hospital station on the quayside. ‘You’re needed alongside me, doctor,’ he said. ‘Some of the men I’ve got can be patched up and sent out again. Just a few scratches, that’s all they’ve got. Can’t think why they’ve been sent here.’

Jamie scurried after him. The sergeant always walked at a running pace.

‘Well, I do know why,’ Thomas continued. ‘It’s because Miss Nightingale is busy scrubbing out the Barrack Hospital in Scutari. Apparently she says it’s not a fit place for injured men and they can’t stay there until it’s clean.’

‘Good for her,’ Jamie said. He too had commandeered able-bodied men to clean out the anteroom with hot water and employed local women to wash the dirty bedding. What was the good, he had told them, of bringing sick men into a dirty ward with unclean and bloody blankets. So far, the doctor in charge had not heard about his instructions, and he was fairly sure that once he did he would be ordered to stop at once and get on with treating the patients.

The ship carrying the injured had already docked and was discharging the men. Twenty arrived in the anteroom, brought in under the watchful eye of Sergeant Thomas, who seemed now to have some regard for Dr James, as he called him.

‘Best not to call you Dr Lucan, sir,’ he had said in a muted tone. ‘The name isn’t necessarily given respect around here, only deference.’

Jamie had nodded in quiet understanding. In any case, he wanted to earn approval for himself, not because he was thought to be a relative of an imperious military man.

Ten of the soldiers were treated for their wounds and after a week were sent back to their regiments. Five more were sent to the main hospital as their wounds were more serious than originally thought, which left five with various injuries, one who had been blinded by shot, another with a hole in his head who walked round and round the ward shouting out commands before collapsing in the middle of the night where he was found dead the next morning. Which left three, two who were keen to return to their regiments and ‘finish off them darned Russkies’, and one with a bandaged left foot and a broken right knee from being trampled by a terrified horse.

‘He can go home,’ Thomas said, glancing at the bed as he passed by. ‘He’s of no use to anybody.’

‘You’ll be able to ride again,’ Jamie told the soldier, and thought of Bob Hoskins, the stable lad, who rode as well as anyone with his lame leg. ‘But not yet awhile.’ He looked down at the lad, who was lying in just his grey vest and ripped trousers with his leg in a splint. ‘You can probably re-join once you’re mended.’

‘Thanks very much, sir,’ the youth answered. ‘But if it’s all ’same to you, I won’t bother.’

‘Had enough of fighting?’ Jamie smiled. ‘Can’t say I blame you.’

‘Can you tek a look at me foot, doctor?’ he asked. ‘It hurts like hell, beggin’ your pardon.’

Jamie began to unravel the bloody and dirty bandage. ‘Who did this?’ he asked.

‘Some bloody Russky,’ he was answered. ‘Not at ’Alma – afore that. Copped a stray shot. Then— Ah!’ He grimaced in pain as Jamie carefully peeled the bandage from his festering skin.

‘I meant, who bandaged you up? He did a good job.’

‘One of ’doctors at Scutari. I told him I wanted patching up so I could get back out there and get me own back. I’m not wi’ cavalry,’ he said. ‘Well, I was when I first enlisted, but then I transferred. Light Infantry, 19th Regiment of Foot.’

Jamie examined the soldier’s foot. It was red and swollen and oozing pus, not quite gangrenous, but almost. Another day or two without treatment and he would have been in danger of losing it.

One of the women who did the washing appeared in the doorway and Jamie called her over. ‘Could you bring hot water and clean bandages, please?’

‘Yes, doctor.’ She was a large woman with massive breasts from feeding ten children, and though old enough to be his mother gave him a teasing smile. Dr James was a favourite with the women, not only because he was handsome but because he remembered to say please and thank you and treated them like ladies.

‘So did you get to the Alma?’ he asked the soldier to take his mind off the pain as he applied the hot water. ‘Was it very bad?’

‘Aye, I was in one of skirmishes,’ the lad said through gritted teeth. ‘I’m a corporal – or was. We go ahead of ’main body of ’infantry, sent to harass and delay ’enemy advance, which we did, but then when ’battle began we had to get out of ’way pretty quick or be run down.’ He let out a huff of breath. ‘God, that hurt! Bloody disaster,’ he said.

‘Did you get to know any of the doctors at Scutari?’ Jamie asked. ‘I ask because a friend of mine went out there. I heard he’d died but I can’t imagine why he did or what of.’

The corporal glanced up at him. ‘What was his name? Doctor who took out ’shot and bandaged me foot went sick wi’ dysentery a couple o’ days after. I went in to see some of ’lads afore re-joining ’regiment, but he wasn’t there.’

‘Hunt,’ Jamie said with a sinking sensation. ‘His full name was Dr Gerald Maugham-Hunt. His friends called him Hunter.’

‘Aye, that was him: Dr Hunt. Sorry to hear that; he was a right nice chap, lots o’ banter wi’ lads.’

Yes, he would have had. Jamie paused for a minute. They would all have been equals.

‘Some of ’doctors didn’t agree wi’ Miss Nightingale and her cleaning regime, they didn’t all bother to wash their hands,’ the corporal said. ‘They’d go from one soldier to ’next. But Dr Hunt wasn’t like that and I said to him, he was just like my ma. When we were bairns and had bloody knees, she allus made us go and wash ’dirt off first under ’pump afore she bound ’em up wi’ comfrey.’

As Jamie only half listened, his thoughts being on Hunter, he realized an awareness was seeping into him as the corporal talked. There was something about him that seemed familiar. ‘Where are you from, Corporal? You sound like a Yorkshire man!’

‘I am.’ He grinned. ‘Born ’n’ bred. A country lad, but not from anywhere you’d know.’

‘Try me!’ Jamie said. ‘East Riding, I’d say. Somewhere near the coast?’

‘Spot-on, sir! Place called Holderness, if you know it; at least that was my home, but now my ma and ’rest of ’family have upped sticks and gone to live in Hull.’

It can’t be – it’s not possible. Jamie felt his pulses quicken. Coincidence only, he thought; there are many country people moving into town where the work is; and yet I feel as if I know him. Two brothers, one sometimes surly and antagonistic. The other …

‘You say your mother and family; does that mean you’ve lost your father?’

‘Aye,’ the lad said. ‘He died a few years back. He was an innkeeper, so I reckon Ma thought there’d be more of a living in Hull. They’ve tekken on a public house.’

‘Really? I used to know Hull.’ Jamie swallowed hard. ‘I was at school there. What was the name of it?’

The corporal frowned. ‘Let me think. I haven’t been. They left Holderness after I joined ’military. Ah!’ He put a finger in the air. ‘Maritime! I knew it were summat to do wi’ sea. That’s what it’s called. Maritime.’