Powder Monkey (14 page)

Later that day I was commandeered by Lieutenant Spencer, along with three other men. ‘Run to the topgallant, lads,' he ordered, ‘and make sail.' The sail, at the
very top of the mast, needed to be let out a few more feet. Then Spencer turned to his nephew, who was also passing by. ‘Mr Neville, accompany these men to the topgallant, and see they carry out my instructions correctly.' I could see the fear in his eyes. ‘Aye aye, Lieutenant,' he said. The four of us swung out on to the rigging and began the laborious climb up to the top. The midshipman followed, scrambling behind us.

I could tell from the way he clung on so desperately that Mr Neville was not used to being in the rigging. As I climbed I was struck by two possible courses of action. I could try to show him up and humiliate him – sweet revenge on an arrogant young officer. Or I could try to help him. As we climbed into the cloudy November sky, the sun came out, and I took this as a sign. I shall be good, I resolved. When we reached the fighting-top platform, I deliberately went through the lubber hole right by the mast, rather than swing over the side of the platform as most seamen did. This, I knew, would make the midshipman feel less of a fool when he went through the hole himself. Then, as we approached the top of the rigging, I let him catch up with me so he would not still be panting up to the topgallant long after the rest of us had arrived there.

I could tell how scared he was by the way he was trying not to look down. As he drew level with me I turned and repeated the advice Joseph had given to me up in the
rigging: ‘One hand for the Navy. One hand for yourself.'

I half expected a dirty look, but instead Neville gave me a grateful smile. ‘Thank you, seaman,' he said. ‘I'm not a regular visitor to this part of the ship.'

We understood each other at once. He knew I knew he was frightened half to death. I knew he was grateful for my help.

The sails were soon let out, and on the way down he seemed to move with much greater confidence. He even started to whistle a jaunty tune.

‘And what's your name?' he enquired. ‘Witchall? Thank you, Witchall, for your kind words.' Then he was off.

There are many things to fear on a ship, aside from the bosun's lash and death in battle. When you lie in your hammock, or spend an idle hour sitting in the sun, your thoughts can wander to any number of catastrophes – not least shipwreck. Most sailors, I discovered, cannot swim – though I could. Neither does the Navy feel it wise to teach them. They could, after all, put this newfound skill to use in escaping from the ship.

I was dreading the prospect of a winter storm. Fill a small glass of water from the village pump and you'll believe it has almost as little substance as air. But fill a bucket or pail and carry it a quarter mile, sloshing and spilling as you stagger, and you realise water is an unruly
and weighty thing. Sea water even more so – with its complement of salt, sand, strands of seaweed and little wriggling creatures. You can tell that when you swim in it. A freshwater river lets you sink like a stone. The sea pushes you up a little. When I was small I used to stand on the beach and stare out at the slow lazy curve of the North Sea horizon, and imagine the power and weight of the sea. Even when it was calm and flat it still filled me with awe. It stretched out to eternity, and yet I could only see the surface. Below lay gradually darkening waters, infinite fathoms deep.

An angry sea is one of the most fiercesome sights in nature. I fear a storm almost as much as I fear battle.

Richard and I were scrubbing the deck in the early morning when we first became aware of an oncoming storm. While we worked, we thought up nicknames for members of the crew. He loved my name for the tattooed thug and his Biblical quotations – Vengeful Tattoos. The Captain we decided to call Lord Mandible, and Edmund Ackersley, whom Richard particularly disliked, was known as By 'Eckersley, after a phrase he often used. Dr Claybourne became Dr Claymore, and Lewis Tuck became Lousey Tucker.

While we talked I noticed the sky was especially dark and foreboding. Dawn came so slowly I wondered if it would ever get light. Up in the heavens, clouds scudded across the sky at high speed, and the wind blew both
warm and cold. Tossed to and fro by the wind, flurries of snow bustled around the ship, a touch of white against the grey sea and grey horizon. Icy spray from the churning sea hit me in the face. I shivered in my meagre clothes and wondered what manner of weather these strange atmospherics would bring.

We'd had some bad weather coming down the Channel, but nothing a sailor would write home about.

‘I saw some storms in the
Franklyn
,' I said to Richard, ‘but I've never seen anything like this before.'

‘You joined the
Miranda
at a bad time of year,' said Richard. ‘At the turn of the seasons, you often get rough weather.'

As the waves grew higher, Lieutenant Middlewych ordered the ship to prepare for the worst. Captain Mandeville was summoned to the quarterdeck. He looked especially haughty on that day – pacing around, flinty-eyed, barking commands at anyone who approached. All hatches were tightly sealed and the topmen raced aloft, to take down most of the yards and furl the remaining sails before the wind grew too high. Only the foretopgallant stayed lowered, to offer the ship some control against the coming tempest.

Surveying the sky again, I began to feel mightily afraid. As Ben passed he said, ‘These ships are built to weather anything. The only thing that'll sink a frigate in
a storm is the shore. If we were near shore, I'd be an anxious man.'

Later that day the helmsmen were ordered to lie to – to point the ship diagonally into the rising sea, to blunt the ferocious onslaught of the waves. The ship was lashed by the rain, which poured over us in sheets, drenching any man who ventured out in it. I thought I had my sea legs, but after a day of this, I began to feel desperately ill. In a flat panic I ran to the side of the ship to vomit, only to have it thrown back in my face by the wind. The stale, acrid stench clung to my hair and shirt until the rain slowly washed it away. All the new men on the ship were floored with seasickness. They looked as pale as spectres. Even the old sea dogs began to complain.

‘It's fish we ought to be, not sailors,' said Ben. ‘Still, no matter. We're safe enough away from the shore.'

‘Not for much longer, we ain't,' said Silas. ‘That's a north-easterly wind – it'll drive us on to the coast in no time.'

At mealtimes we stopped receiving warm food and drink. After an entire day of cheese, grog and ship's biscuits I said, ‘You'd think they'd give us something hot on a lousy cold day like this.'

Ben shook his head. He was not in a good mood and his patience was paper-thin. ‘Now, why d'you think we don't have anything hot to shovel down our throats?
Come on, Sam. You're supposed to be a bright lad.'

I shook my head.

‘Captain's forbidden the cook to use the galley, hasn't he?' said Ben. ‘Y' can't have a fire with the ship lurching around like this. Fire and storm. It's a devilish combination.'

The others warmed to this alarming topic. James chugged half his mug of grog and held forth. ‘A fire can touch off the magazine, and blow everyone to slivers and fragments. If y' ship's on fire y' have to choose between getting burned to death in the flames, or freezing and drowning in the sea.'

So, drained by seasickness, soaked by the cold sea, weak, listless and shaky, we could only shiver in the mess deck. All we had to distract us was our turn on the daily rota at the ship's pumps – churning the winches around, baling out water for an hour a time. By the third day, the pump alone was not sufficient, and we were commanded to form a human chain to pass buckets from the hold. After a dreadful, dreary afternoon of this, we were sent back to the mess deck, and I began to wonder when our torment would end.

On the fourth day Ben told me the storm was driving us towards the coast of northern Spain.

‘Looks like Silas was right. So much for me thinking we were safe out at sea. We've drifted a hell of a way,' he
said. ‘The coast's mostly flat and sandy beaches round these parts, but in weather like this even a harmless-looking beach can still wreck a ship. If we get caught on a sandbank off shore, the waves'll smash the
Miranda
to pieces just as sure as a jagged cliff.'

Soon after, one of the bosun's mates came down to the mess deck. He picked a handful of us at random, including Joseph and me, to go on deck to make more sail. Almost all hands were expected to man the sails whenever necessary, so it was no use protesting I was only a powder monkey.

The moment I came out on to the quarterdeck I began to fear for my life. I had never been ordered to go up the rigging in such bad weather. Rain poured down and winds buffeted all on deck to and fro. Lightning flashed across the sky, followed by the threatening rumble of thunder. No sooner had I walked out into the teeth of the gale than a great wave swept me over like a giant hand, so cold I thought it would stop my heart. Then, as it drained back to the sea in a bubbling torrent through the quarterdeck gun ports, it dragged me with it in its clammy grip, as surely as the tentacle of a giant octopus. Joseph rushed to grab hold of me, otherwise I would certainly have been swept into the swirling cauldron below.

As I staggered to my feet, I was aware that Lieutenant Middlewych was yelling in my face.

‘Up the foremast, Witchall. You too, Neil. We need to set the topgallant.'

I could see a few of the foretopmen already clawing their way up the rigging, fighting every inch of the way. Joseph and I looked at each other, and put a reassuring hand on each other's shoulders.

We both swung out on to the rigging, and began climbing. At once my soaking clothes hung heavy on my arms and legs and made me feel sluggish. Then my teeth started to chatter uncontrollably, and my whole body began to shiver. For a moment, I had to stop to try and bring this shivering under control, lest I fall. Joseph noticed I was in difficulty and he grabbed my arm.

‘You go first, Sam,' he shouted. ‘I'll be right behind you.'

The topgallant was the highest sail on the foremast, and by the time I was halfway up the rigging I could sense my fingers going numb with the cold. Joseph and I reached the topgallant together, and the midshipman up there sent us either side to join men already stretched out to the end of both sides of the yardarm. There we waited for a few short moments, while other men clambered up the rigging to take up the remaining places. Hanging on for dear life from this vantage point, I could see the raging sea all around us. It was a sight not meant for humans. Below me, the waves formed heaving ridges. Then the horizon would drop, as the
Miranda
ploughed
into a trough, and terrifying peaks would loom almost to the height of our yardarm. I felt like I was caught up in a green, living mountain that was trying to devour us.

Those with me in this precarious perch looked so terrified I was sure they thought their last moments had come. One man stared unblinking, straight ahead, his jaw clenched tight in fear and desperation. Another had wrapped his hands around the rope that ran across the top of the sail and then clenched them together in prayer. He was muttering a series of orisons which I could not hear. I looked down the yard to see if I could spot Joseph. He was there, three men down on the starboard side of the mast, hanging on with grim determination. He looked over to me too, with soaking hair plastered down his face, and laughed wildly. That was just like him – to make a jest out of our perilous condition.

Then, a sudden flash of lightning crashed over our heads, turning the grey-green world into black and white. We were all startled and momentarily blinded, but Joseph more than any of us. He lost his footing. When I looked again, I saw him hanging by one hand on the rope that ran beneath the yardarm – his body dangling into the void. The other men on that side of the yard were all swaying precariously – trying to steady their feet on the same rope.

‘Help me up, y' useless lummox,' he shouted to the
man next to him. The fellow was too petrified to move, and just clung tighter to the top of the yard.

‘Help him, you lousy bastards!' I screamed. At that point I think I was more frightened than Joseph.

Joseph reached up and managed to get both hands on the rope. I began to think he was going to save himself. Then he swung his body up to wrap his feet around the rope. The ship lurched alarmingly as it rode another wave, and his frozen hands lost their grip. With a chilling scream he dropped like a stone to the deck. There he lay in a crumpled heap. Utterly still.

The rest of my time up the mast I cannot remember. I suppose we must have let down the sail, then climbed down to the deck. I returned to the mess in a stupor, changed into my second set of clothes, and found a corner to curl up in.

Seeing Joseph alive one instant, and dead the next, I couldn't believe it. One minute he could feel the wind on his face and the rain on his back, smell the salty sea air, laugh, smile and curse; the next his life was snatched away from him. Limbs that would take him from the deck to the topgallant yard in barely a minute and a half would never move again.

That night around the mess table, talk turned to the final thoughts of a dying man. What went through Joseph's mind in that final few seconds of his life? Ben, who had quite a sentimental streak, said it would be his
final farewell to his father, or a last warm hug from his mother before he went off to sea. I kept quiet. I wanted to say this was nonsense. Joseph's mind would be filled with livid terror, as his arms flailed desperately to catch hold of the rigging as it shot past at ever-increasing speed. I hope he didn't think, in those last seconds, of everything he was losing when he left this world.

‘At least a fall is quick,' said Ben, trying to comfort me.

Edmund Ackersley put his tuppence worth in too. ‘Fall's the quickest way to go, I reckon. Even them that's torn in half by chain shot takes a few moments to die. Scream and flail like a scalded cat, they do . . .'