Read Ebook: Yankee Ships and Yankee Sailors: Tales of 1812 by Barnes James Chapman Carlton T Illustrator Zogbaum Rufus Fairchild Illustrator

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Ebook has 737 lines and 60358 words, and 15 pages

"I have missed none of my crew," he said quietly, "and, while grateful for the privilege, I do not desire to make use of it."

"And your answer?" broke in the Lieutenant.

"You will take this letter, that I shall write, to Captain Humphreys, give him my best compliments, and of course inform him that I regret that I can neither avail myself of his courtesy, nor with honor can I permit a search to be made of my vessel."

"As you decide," returned the Lieutenant, sententiously.

For some minutes nothing was heard from the cabin. Barron was busily employed in inditing the epistle, and when it was delivered, the two officers came out together.

The following is a copy of the letter to Captain Humphreys:--

AT SEA, June 22d.

I know of no such men as you describe. The officers that were on the recruiting service for this ship were particularly instructed by my government through me not to enter any deserters from H.B. Majesty's ships. Nor do I know of any being here. I am also instructed never to permit the crew of any ship under my command to be mustered by any other than their own officers. It is my disposition to preserve harmony, and I hope this answer to your despatch will prove satisfactory.

J. BARRON.

The Englishman was escorted to the side, and once in his boat, his crew, as if urged to special exertion, made all haste to gain their ship.

Allen turned and spoke to Benjamin Smith, the First Lieutenant. "I do not like the look of things," he said.

"Nor I," responded Smith, advancing toward the Captain, who had stopped to speak to one of the lady passengers. He saluted his commander, and speaking in a low voice, he suggested the propriety of asking the ladies to retire below, and of clearing ship.

"Tut, tut," replied Barron, carelessly; "you are over-nervous, Mr. Smith. My letter to Captain Humphreys will convince him that our actions are perfectly proper and peaceable, while any movement to prove to the contrary might lead him to suppose that I wished to precipitate some trouble. Nothing will occur, I warrant you."

"Had we not better open the magazines, sir?" asked Captain Gordon, coming up at this moment.

"It is not necessary," Barron returned, and once more joined the ladies.

The peaceful work went on. The crew continued touching up the paint work, and in the sunlight the brass shone brightly. From the galley came the clatter of dishes, and from below came the sound of a sea-song, chanted by one of the men off watch.

Barron called Captain Gordon to him on the quarter-deck. "Captain," said he, "I think that fellow yonder hailed us a moment since; I could not make out what he said however. Perhaps we had better send the men to their stations quietly."

"Very good, sir," returned the Captain, and he strolled forward leisurely, for he, like Barron, suspected no surprise.

Surely he could not be mistaken. The muzzle of one of the forward guns was slewing around to bear upon the ship. Probably they were just exercising; but there! another followed suit, and then three more, as if moved by one command. His face blanched. What could it mean? But one thing! He whirled and saw that Barron had gone below to his cabin. Rushing to the ladies, he grasped them by the arms and having hardly time to make explanations, he hurried them to the companionway.

"Below as far as you can go! Down to the hold!" he cried. "Don't stop; don't talk!"

"Beat to quarters!" roared Lieutenant Smith.

Up from below the men came tumbling. Barron ran from his cabin, with his face as white as death. "To quarters!" he roared, echoing the Lieutenant's order.

Everything was confusion. The men gathered at the useless guns. The belated drummer began to sound the roll. Hither and thither rushed officers and midshipmen. The green hands stood gawking about; some overcome by fear and the suddenness of danger, plunged down the companionway. Where were the matches? Where were the priming horns? Barron turned to go to his cabin for the keys to the magazine. They were locked in the drawer of his heavy desk, and now there came another shot. It struck fair in the bulwarks, and the hammocks and their contents were thrown out of the nettings. Three men were wounded by the shower of splinters. And not a shot was fired yet in return.

"Matches! give us the matches!" roared some of the men at the guns, as they tried to bring their harmless weapons to bear upon the Englishman.

"Here, sir!" cried one of the gunner's mates. "This one's primed, sir. For God's sake, here, sir!"

Covered with blood that had been dashed over him from the body of the man the round shot had killed, Allen ran aft. The ship was full of groans and shrieks and cursing. Forth from the cabin came Barron. He looked an aged, heart-broken man. When he saw the young Lieutenant, he stepped back a pace in horror. The scene of carnage on the deck unnerved him.

"The keys! the keys!" shrieked Allen, almost springing at his commander's throat. "Let us fight, if we must die!"

The thought that flashed through Barron's mind must have been the uselessness of resistance, the terrible death and destruction, and the inevitable loss that would be sure to follow. Almost resting himself upon the group of officers, he raised both hands above his head, the palms open and outstretched.

"Haul down the flag!" he ordered faintly.

"Tell him to come here, and look at this!" cried an old sailor, pointing to one dead body on the deck. "Then will he lower the flag? Give us a chance, for God's sake, to fight like men!"

Barron had hurried into the cabin.

"Send for the officers of the ship." They were all there to a man, except the surgeon, who was busy down below. "Your opinions, gentlemen," he faltered. There was not a sound. Captain Gordon was silent. Tears were rolling down the First Lieutenant's cheeks. He tried to speak, and could not.

"Sir, you have disgraced us!"

It was Allen speaking. To save his life he could not have helped blurting out what he felt to be the truth. Barron spread out his arms weakly, then dropped his head into his hands. It was then presumed that he was wounded also, for blood was running down his wrists. They left him there.

What use the rest of the story? The search was made, four men were taken. All claimed to be Americans; they were prepared to prove it. Captain Humphreys refused to accept the surrender of the vessel. Barron, hitherto known as brave and capable, was dishonored and relieved from all command, was sentenced to five years retirement without pay. Oh yes, the British Admiral was sentenced also. Of course the Board of Admiralty could not recognize such doings. They even made apologies and all the rest of it, and returned two of the men, all there were left, for one was hanged and another died. They sentenced their Vice-Admiral with a smile of covert approval, and they promoted him shortly afterwards.

REUBEN JAMES, ABLE SEAMAN

This is a story that has oft been told before. But in history, if a man becomes famous by one act, and be that act something worth recording, it will stand being told about again. So if this be an old yarn, this is the only apology for the spinning, and here goes for it:--

A few minutes after their retreat, one of the other vessels that, to all appearances, had surrendered, broke away and started up the harbor, scrambling along as fast as she could go. Decatur in his small boat was not far away. There was a mist of battle smoke hanging over the water, and for an instant he did not notice what was going on; but when he did hear what had happened, all the fierce daring in his nature was aroused, and mingled with the anger and desire for revenge, it completely swept him away. He was told that the Tripolitan commander, who had just made his escape, had treacherously risen upon the prize crew sent on board of him, after he had struck his flag, and with his own hands had killed Decatur's beloved brother James. When this news reached him, Decatur did not falter.

"After him!" he cried to his crew. "Put me alongside of him!"

"We'll put you there, sir," said Reuben James, who was at the tiller. And out of the smoke into the plain view of the guns of the battery and also of the American captives, who had viewed the whole affair from the window of their prison, the little boat started in the wake of the felucca, whose force of men outnumbered hers by three to one. They gained at every jump, and in a few minutes they had run their little boat alongside, thrown down their oars, and to a man had scrambled on board the Tripolitan. Decatur had set his eye upon a red-turbaned figure that he knew to be the leader. This man had killed his brother! Almost before the bowman had laid hold of the enemy's gunwale, he had made a flying leap off it and gained the deck. Ignoring every risk, scarcely pausing to ward off the many blows that were aimed at him, he made straight for the man in the red turban. The pirate was armed with a long spear and one of those deadly curved scimitars, sharp as steel can stand it, capable of lopping off a limb at a single stroke; drawing back he aimed a full-length thrust as soon as Decatur confronted him, for he must have read his fate in the determined look on the latter's face. Decatur dodged skilfully and tried to come to closer quarters; but the Tripolitan by great agility succeeded in keeping out of the way, and once more he lunged. This time as Decatur parried his sword-blade broke off at the hilt; dropping it, he laid hold of his enemy's spear, and in the wrestle for its possession, he succeeded in tripping up the Turk, and both fell upon the deck. The red-turbaned one, freeing one hand, drew a dagger from his waist-cloth, and just as he was about to plunge it into the body of the young American, Decatur managed to draw a small pistol, and lifting himself on his elbow, blew off the top of his opponent's head.

Revenge was his. But what about our friend Reuben? The only reason that Decatur had not been killed in the early part of the struggle by the many blows that were aimed at him--for the American boarding party numbered but twelve all told--was the fact that seaman Reuben James was close behind him, warding off blow after blow. Disdaining to protect himself, his right arm was rendered useless, so that he had to shift his cutlass to his left hand. He was slashed seven times about the body. A cut on the shoulder made him drop his weapon, and just at this moment he saw that Decatur was lying upon the deck with his foeman over him. Behind him a sinewy man was aiming a deadly blow directly downward. Reuben James sprang forward. His right arm was useless and his left almost so. There was nothing he could interpose between that deadly blow and his beloved commander but his life! Trying weakly to push back the Tripolitan, he leaned forward swiftly and caught the blow from the scimitar on his own head. It fractured his skull, and he fell insensible to the deck.

But a Yankee sailor is a hard man to kill--in three weeks cockswain James was at his post again. His recovery was no doubt due to his wonderful constitution and his youth.

At Decatur's funeral he wept again, honest fellow, and whenever he came to port he would visit his commander's grave. Reuben was in actual service until the year 1836, when he arrived in Washington for the purpose of obtaining a pension. He was suffering very much at this time from an old musket-shot wound that had caused a disease of the bone of his leg. It was exceedingly painful and becoming dangerous. After consultation the doctors ordered amputation, and as he lay in the hospital the decision was announced to him. With his old indifference to danger, and his reckless spirit, Reuben replied in the following words:--

"Doctor, you are the captain, sir. Fire away; but I don't think it is shipshape to put me under jury masts when I have just come into harbor."

The day after the operation Reuben was very low, and it was thought that he had but a few hours to live. The old sailor himself declared that he had reached the bitter end of his rope, appeared resigned to his fate, and begged the surgeon to "ease him off handsomely while he was about it."

"Reuben," said the doctor, "we have concluded that we will give you a good drink and allow you to name it. What will you have, brown stout or brandy toddy?"

"I s'pose I won't take another for a long time, sir," Reuben responded, with a twinkle in his eye. "So just s'pose you give us both; which one first it doesn't much matter."

He prided himself that he had been in ten fights and as many "skrimedges," and as he was a favorite character, he was allowed to celebrate each in turn as they came around, so his happy days were many. There was one subject to which, however, no one could ever refer--Decatur's sad and untimely end. Always in his heart Reuben bore a deep and lasting love, and an ever-living admiration for the man whose life he had saved; and those friends of the young Commodore always treated the old sailor with the greatest of deference. Had Decatur lived, it is safe to state that wherever he went Reuben would have gone also, and if the latter had not walked bare-headed and weeping at his officer's funeral; and had it been the other way about, with Reuben being put to earth, Decatur would have been there, if possible, hat in hand, to shed a tear of sorrow.

THE MEN BEHIND THE TIMES

Out of the north they came in their grimy, bluff-bowed ships--the men behind the times! Three years away from home; three years outside the movement of human government, of family life, ignorant of the news of the world.

The years 1811 and 1812 were remarkable ones in the annals of the whaling industry; vessels that had been cruising for months unrewarded managed to fill their holds, and now, deep laden, they were returning from the whaling grounds, singly or often in companies of a half-score or more. They were ugly vessels, broad and clumsy, with heavy spars and great wooden davits. They stenched of blubber and whale oil, and they oozed in the warm sun as they labored southward, out of the realms of ice and night into the rolling waters of the Pacific. They buffeted the tempestuous weather of the Horn and climbed slowly northward along the coasts of the Western hemisphere.

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