“Working up their courage,” Col. Tarrant said to Major Gittings as the surviving French drummers began a marching beat, and the men in those three-deep ranks, now shoulder-to-shoulder again and looking formidable, came on with their muskets held erect close to their left shoulders, bayonets fixed and glinting with dawn light. A shout rose from them, the “Vive l’Empereur!”
“After the mauling the guns gave them, I’m fair amazed that they are still here, sir!” Gittings tried to jape.
“Well, they are, unfortunately,” Tarrant said with a wince of his face, “and now their blood is up. Does Lady Luck go against us, let me say that it had been a pleasure serving with you all these years, Gittings. I trust I’ll see you later,” he said, offering his hand which Gittings took and shook firmly.
“Later, sir,” Gittings replied most formally and gravely before going down the long line of the 94th to take his proper place.
* * *
Down on the beach below the 94th, Lt. Fletcher off the Bristol Lass, and Lt. Rutland, now in command of Coromandel stood talking together apart from their armed sailors, peering up as the drums and the cries of the French infantry rang out.
They were both adventurous men, responsible men, who found it outside their natures to sit safe and snug aboard their ships when the bulk of their crews took risks ashore, trusting young Midshipmen and Sub-Lieutenants to look after them. Now, those senses of responsibility seemed to have landed them in a predicament.
“Too close, now, for Vigilance to continue firing,” Fletcher said. “It’s all up to Colonel Tarrant and his regiment.”
“All on our own, aye,” Lt. Rutland said, grimly nodding in his usual dour manner, “and from what his wounded related, he’s out-numbered. Wish we could get our people back aboard, first.”
“Can’t just cut and run, and leave the Army stranded,” Fletcher replied. “We’d never live it down. Might even be a courts-martial offence, unless Captain Lewrie orders it.”
“Even then, though … his fault?” Rutland objected. “He’s not that sort of poltroon. If I know anything about him, I’d wager he’s trying to lash a raft together so he can come join us.”
“Aye, he’s a prime scraper, no error,” Lt. Fletcher agreed.
They both turned their heads inland again as several men of the 94th known for their shooting skills began to snipe at the French as they came into extreme musket range.
“The French get through the Ninety-Fourth, we’ll be fighting right at the surf line, with the remnants of Tarrant’s soldiers at our elbows,” Fletcher said.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Lt. Rutland slowly said, looking round the line of twenty-four barges drawn up on the sand, and the knots of seamen from each who were now gripping their muskets, or using whet stones from their rucksacks to put a keener edge on their cutlasses, determined to go game to the last. “You’re in command, Fletcher, but let me make a suggestion.”
“All ears,” Fletcher tried to jape.
“Ten men to each barge makes two hundred and fourty armed men,” Rutland told him. “We could wait down here to be swamped, but, do we each take half our lads and tack them onto each end of Tarrant’s line, we might just make a difference. They wouldn’t be so out-numbered.”
“Make a fairer fight, aye,” Fletcher said, nodding agreement with his jaw jutted forward in determination. “Better fight up there than wait to be slaughtered. You men!” he suddenly shouted in his best quarterdeck bawl. “All from the first dozen boats, form up with Lieutenant Rutland. The rest from the other dozen, form on me! We came ashore ready for a fight, and we’re going to join one! Come up, come up, and let’s go kill some Frenchmen!”
* * *
Colonel Tarrant was gloomily studying the approaching French lines, worried that they still had the strength in numbers to wrap round his flanks, out beyond the limits of the low stone walls and the dense shrub when he heard a loud “Huzzah!” and had to turn about to look for the source. His jaw almost dropped open when he saw the packs of sailors coming up from the boats and the beach: scruffy and ill-dressed in slop-trousers and linen shirts, some sporting flat, tarred hats, others in stocking caps with long tassels, cutlasses in their belts, and muskets in their hands. Some wore waist-length blue coats with rows of brass buttons; here and there were Midshipmen with dirks at their sides, or waving curved hangers to urge their men on.
Tarrant had no idea if they could stand and fight like soldiers trained to the work, or break as faint-hearted as civilian militia hastily assembled, but that made no matter; he was welcome for them as the two equal-sized packs trotted to the ends of his line beyond his Light Companies and formed two ragged ranks.
“About eighty yards, do you think, Sar’n-Major?” Tarrant asked his experienced RSM.
“About that distance, sir, yes,” The Sergeant-Major estimated, squinting his eyes and raising a thumb to measure against the height of the French in the front rank.
“Ninety-Fourth!” Tarrant bellowed. “By platoons … fire!”
The muskets of a third of the battalion erupted almost as one, creating that peculiar Chuff! as if they muffled each other’s barks. Then the 94th did what the British Army did best, better than any army in the world, as the second third of the line levelled their muskets and took what aim they could to fire, followed by the last third of the line. And by the time they had fired, the first platoon on the right had reloaded and fired again to make a continual rolling hail of .75 calibre ball at the approaching foe, and no one was chanting “Vive l’Empereur!” anymore.
Col. Tarrant pressed himself between men in the front rank, up against the shrubs and the thigh-high stone wall to see better, and was heartened by what he saw, for the French commander, unsure if his men could do any damage at long musket shot, was still marching his soldiers into that galling fire, muskets still held erect on their left shoulders, and Frenchmen in his first rank were dying; not in great numbers yet, considering the range and the inaccuracy of the smoothbore muskets, but enough to make them shuffle sideways as they marched to shoulder up against their mates.
Tarrant heard the French drums cease over the roaring and the crackling twig noise made by his battalion’s muskets. The French had come to a halt at about fifty yards’ range, and their muskets were at high port as they cocked their locks at last and levelled.
“For what we are about to receive,” Tarrant whispered, “may the Good Lord make us grateful.” He winced as the French fired, hundreds of muzzle flashes, wee clouds of smoke from priming pans and barrels wreathing the enemy.
“Fire!” he heard someone shout over the roaring, and from each end of his line, additional volleys were fired; the Navy was in it at last, waiting for the range to come down to where mostly un-trained sailors could hope to score hits.
French .63 calibre lead balls spanged off the stone wall, and men of his battalion slumped away, some dead, some clawing and grasping at their wounds as they fell. Tarrant heard what sounded like a massive swarm of bees as French balls whipped past and a high buzz! buzz! buzz! They were firing high?
But his men were firing and loading steadily, platoon by platoon, joined now and then by crashing volleys from the Navy on both flanks, and it became a battle of attrition at short range, a matter of who could kill the enemy in greater numbers, first.
* * *
“Oh, bugger this,” Lt. Rutland gravelled. “As thick as a full broadside!” he griped at the vast rising clouds of gunsmoke over both lines which made it harder for his sailors to shoot with any hope of hitting anything. He paced to the left end of his men, noting that the bulk of the French fire was directed at the centre of Tarrant’s troops, not so much upon his half of the armed shore party. And he also noted that there was clearer air out to his left and ahead. He could see that his men, and probably Lt. Fletcher’s men, had extended the line beyond the length of the enemy, and if he could get his men farther out to the left, and align them at right angles to the French line, his fire could be more effective, as effective as a stern rake on an enemy ship!
“Cease fire!” he roared in a voice that could carry from the quarterdeck to the forecastle in a gale. “Cease fire and reload. We are moving out beyond all this damned smoke! Everyone turn to your left! Now, staying in two files, follow me!”
He put himself at the head of the long two files and led them at a trot away from Tarrant’s Light Company. Thirty yards out and they could all see the French line, blazing away almost blind as quickly as they could.
“Follow me, lads!” Lt. Rutland roared again, turning to his right to lead them inland ’til his sailors were looking at the end of the French line, on their right extreme flank, able to look down all three ranks. “Stop here, and turn to your right! Ready to really kill some frog-eating bastards? First rank, level! Fire!”
Rutland had gotten them within fifty yards’ range before they opened fire. Some Frenchmen on the extreme flank spotted them and gave out warning shouts, but it was too late. The end of their line just crumpled as the first volley took at least twenty men down.
“Second rank … fire!” Rutland roared, and more French fell from all three densely packed ranks, and soldiers just beyond began to back away to try and form a second shorter front to refuse their flank, but they were still greatly out-numbered, and a third volley killed more of them and forced them to retreat.
“Ten paces forward!” Rutland ordered to shorten the range.
The French were bunching up, trying to re-form, officers waving swords to direct them, and screaming frantic orders. As they bunched up, though, they were under fire from the Light Company of the 94th, and men fell about as fast as they could be shoved into place.
Rutland’s sailors were now firing from only fourty yards’ range, and they could not miss such a dense block of men. The French were being whip-sawed, first from their flank, then from the main British line. A full quarter of their strength was now forming a new front at right angles to their main fighting line, but the left end of that line was being hammered by the 94th, and that end was being peeled away, casualty by casualty.
“Uh oh,” Lt. Rutland said under his breath, realising that he’d rallied more Frenchmen than he had, ready to open fire on him and his sailors.
* * *
Not so far away, Col. Tarrant noted that the French fire had slackened appreciably, and that something was going on out on the left flank. His batsman, Corporal Carson, came panting back from the Light Company on that flank with a report.
“Those daft sailors are out on the enemy flank, sir, shooting them to pieces, and the French have turned hundreds of men their way.”
“Good God!” Tarrant gasped, bending low to see under all of the smoke, spotted the armed sailors, the French reaction, and felt hope that this gruesome battle could turn his way.
“Ninety-Fourth!” he shouted. “Fix bayonets! Over the wall with you, and re-form ranks!”
The battalion’s fire had to cease as his soldiers reloaded one last round, fixed bayonets, and began to crawl over the top of their wall. Col. Tarrant swung a leg over the wall, threaded his way to the front of the first rank, and drew his sword.
“Ninety-Fourth! Give them the bayonet! Charge!”
A wordless howl, a feral growl came from hundreds of throats as they held their muskets out-thrust from the waist and began to run forward, into enemy fire, with Col. Tarrant in the lead, waving his sword high to urge them on.
The French, in their haste to smother the British with fire, had been firing high and almost un-aimed for some time, slamming their musket butts on the ground to settle the powder charges and balls, firing blindly at a vast curtain of smoke.
Suddenly, out of that smoke pall, hundreds of men in red coats were running at them with bayonets fixed and muskets levelled to skewer them as they tried to reload.
Infantrymen dreaded the burst of spherical shell, the terror of bounding cannon balls that could take off a leg in a twinkling, and they dreaded the hammer blows of lead musket balls that could break bones, pierce lungs, and maim them for life. A quick death with no warning was preferred to the surgeon’s saws.
But, what every soldier in any army feared most was the bayonet, and the French were no different. They wavered, groping for their own bayonets, for loading went faster with them sheathed at their sides, but it was too late for most to arm themselves equal to the hated Anglais, the Biftecs, the Devil Goddamns.
Men in the rear ranks just turned and ran for the rear in blind panic. Some men with loaded muskets fired back, but the French and British lines had only been about fifty yards apart to begin with, and the 94th was on them before they could blink.
Men screamed, back-pedalling into their rear-rank mates, trying to fend off the bayonets with musket butts. More men screamed as they were thrust through their guts, and then it was a manic melee of swung musket butts smashing open French heads, men pinned to the ground with eight inches of steel in their bellies, jack-knifing their legs and arms upwards in Vees to fend off their deaths.
And the French regiment broke, fleeing in dis-organised swarms and trampling over their own officers in their panic-driven haste. A finely uniformed officer on a horse was trying to rally the clumped mass of the refused flank to face the sailors, but someone with his musket loaded shot him in the chest, tumbling him to the ground. That great mass of men, facing two directions at once, saw what was happening to the rest, and began to flee, as well, still being shot down by the sailors’ line as they ran.
When the French ran beyond the reach of an extended bayonet, it was the 94th’s turn to stop and pant for a second, then raise their loaded muskets and shoot more Frenchmen who were the last to break and run, the closest to them, and the easiest targets. They threw up their hands as bullets took them in the back, tripping and falling on their faces, and the field that led inland was littered with shakoes, fine French leather backpacks, muskets and cartridge boxes, canteens, and anything that could be discarded to let them run faster.
And littered with French dead.
“Loot!” someone in Rutland’s lines shouted, and all of them gave out a cheer.
“Hold your places!” Rutland yelled, to little avail.
Sailors began to dash forward to pick over the mass of Frenchmen who had been piled up in windrows where they had tried to re-form and refuse the flank, whooping with joy as pockets were turned out, producing cigarros, pipes and tobacco pouches, coins, wee leather bottles of ratafia or brandy, many rosaries, and the rare pocket watch.
Sailors denied that deposit of potential wealth ran farther out in pursuit of the fleeing French to fall upon those who had been shot dead from behind. They didn’t get far with that excursion, though, for HMS Vigilance was speaking, again, her guns firing in broadsides, and raising great gouts of earth at the panicked French regiment, and the cavalry squadron which had trotted down from the low ridge, and no one wished to be killed by their own artillery.
“Go on, run for your lives, you bastards!” Lt. Rutland yelled with hands cupped round his mouth, then ordered his greedy sailors to the rear before they got killed.
“Junior officers and Mids, keep order here,” he gravelled, then began to walk over to speak with Colonel Tarrant, who was petting and calming the dead French officer’s horse, cooing to it and taking hold of the loose reins to lead it in a small circle to take its mind off its fear.
“Colonel,” Rutland said, touching the brim of his hat in salute.
“Ah, you’re … Rutland, that’s it,” Tarrant said, brightening as he recalled him. “You were one of Lewrie’s officers, I believe.”
“Aye, sir,” Rutland replied, “now in command of Coromandel. My men and I will be returning to the beach, and will be ready to carry your people off as soon as you wish to depart.”
“Ah, yes,” Tarrant said, stroking the horse’s nose, “I suppose we’ve done all we could this morning. Not the result the French wished, is it?” he said, pointing to the field littered with blue-clad dead and moaning, begging wounded. “I and my men owe you a great debt of gratitude for your timely re-enforcement, and your inspired move out to their flank. My report shall give you great credit, as will the able assistance from Sir Alan’s guns.”
“Thank you for that, sir,” Rutland said, chin tucked into his shirt collar, and reddening a bit to be praised.
“May take some time, our evacuation,” Tarrant went on, thinking to saddle up and ride back to his battalion, but decided not, after seeing the blood that streaked the saddle; his white breeches were already soiled enough. “Wounded to care for, that sort of thing?”
“Aye, sir,” Rutland said, turning his head to search for the fallen from his own men, and frowning in concern.
“We may not have burned a single waggon today, but I do think that we may call this engagement a victory, don’t you?” Tarrant said with a wee grin as he let the horse go, gave it a slap on the rump, and watched it trot away towards the distant cavalry squadron.
“You could call it that, sir,” Rutland agreed.