Privateers and Privateering Part 11

GEORGE WALKER--_continued_

It was towards the end of this year--1745--after a visit to Madeira--where some of the crew got into trouble over a very foolish practical joke, putting a handful of soot in the holy-water fount at a church door--and a short cruise off the Azores, that Walker and his men were called upon to face death in a new form: not amidst the interchange of cannon-shot, the rattle of musketry, the clash of steel, but the gradual encroachment of the sea in a desperately leaky ship, threatening day by day to engulf them.

It was upon this occasion that George Walker displayed the n.o.blest qualities, and by his fort.i.tude, tact, and unwearying exertions kept the ship afloat and saved the lives of all on board.

The story is a thrilling one. The beginning of disaster was on November 12th, when the _Duke of Bedford_ privateer had been for some days in company, and some hard gales had been experienced, the wind again increasing to a gale upon this day, with heavy rain. The mainyard, which should have been held aloft in its place by chain-slings, had been left, through carelessness, hanging by the tackle which was used to raise and lower it--termed the "geers"--and, upon the men being sent up to furl the mainsail, the strap supporting the upper block gave way, and the yard--the heaviest in the ship--came down, with all the men upon it.

Strangely enough, no one was injured or thrown overboard; but the narrator alleges that the shock of the yard falling shook up the ship, so as to open some of her joints. It may as well be pointed out, for the information of the non-professional reader, that no such result had any right to ensue in a ship with any pretension to being decently built; the utmost damage should have been, perhaps, broken bulwarks, and probably some injury to the spar itself. However, whether by coincidence or from the vessel being really so shaky, she commenced, after this, to make water too freely, and two days later alarmingly, so that two pumps constantly going would scarcely keep her clear. The wind and sea increased, the ship laboured more and more, her planks working and seams opening everywhere. She was then off the Azores, some fifteen hundred miles from the Land's End, and Walker steered a course for the south of Ireland, intending to finish the cruise in those waters. On the 17th, however, the water increased enormously, and the officers, thoroughly alarmed, signed a pet.i.tion to Walker to make for the nearest port. After some discussion, and a most disheartening report from the carpenter, he gave his consent, reminding them that his honour and his duty to the owners obliged him to speak every ship he sighted; and recommending them to endeavour in every way to encourage the crew and keep their spirits up.

Vain endeavour! a day or two of constant pumping revealed the fact that all the power available would not keep the water under, and a large number of men had to be kept incessantly baling--dipping up the water in buckets from the hold, pa.s.sing it from hand to hand, and emptying it on the deck, upon which the pumps also discharged, so that the scuppers would scarcely suffice to keep the deck free; water below, water on deck, and a winter gale howling through the rigging, the ship labouring and lurching helplessly under reduced canvas. Almost mechanically the weary crew took their turns at pumping, baling, handling the ship; despair began to grow upon them, and, after a week of toil and slow progress, it came to Walker's knowledge, through some men whom he could trust, that there was a plot to seize the arms, take the boats by force, with as many as they would hold, and leave the rest to perish. He responded with a counter-mine. At a given signal the officers, already disposed near where the arms were kept, suddenly threw every weapon overboard, except a sufficient number to arm themselves, thus turning the tables upon the astonished conspirators, who now imagined that they would receive the treatment they had designed for others; but Walker, humane and sympathetic as he was brave, did not speak an angry word to them: "I sincerely forgive you your folly and rashness," he said, "which came rather from your fears than from deliberate disobedience. If you will now exert yourselves, and stick to the pumping and baling, we shall save the ship; if not, we go to the bottom. And remember, that I have now the power to provide for myself and the officers alone, as you would so selfishly have done for yourselves; but if you stick to us, we will stick to you, to the last."

The crowd of rough, sea-soaked, half-starved, wearied men, swaying on the slippery deck with the motion of the ship, had no words in which to reply to such a speech. Some of them were moved to tears, and when, as an earnest of their goodwill, one or two called for cheers for the captain, their voices, mingled with the dismal howling of the wind and the ominous sound of water surging about below, rang so quavering and feeble, that Walker turned aside to conceal his own emotion.

From that time forward he never left the deck, nor lay down for a week, sleeping as he stood, leaning on the rail.

Every eye was turned to that solitary, dauntless figure. Never a sign of fear or yielding did he show, and when he spoke words of encouragement as they toiled at the pumps, they would look up at him, some with a murmur of blessing and admiration, some with tears in their eyes.

Already six guns had been thrown overboard; in a few days, the gale increasing, nearly all the remainder followed. The anchors were cut away, and also some spars which were superfluous in such a gale; the sails were split by the violence of the wind, the rigging gave out, the masts swaying and threatening to go by the board, and never a sail appeared: not even a foe of superior force, which they would have welcomed in their dire extremity.

At length the word was beginning to be pa.s.sed about that it was useless any longer to toil at the pumps. Nothing could save the ship, and the la.s.situde of despair was settling down upon them. The officers began to share the despondency of the crew, and Walker, looking round for those with whom he would consult, missed them: they had gone below to take eternal leave of one another.

Calling a seaman, Walker sent him aloft, with orders to cry "A sail!"

and then, sending for the drummer, he bade him beat to quarters.

Sudden animation ran through the ship. The men paused in their labour, looking round the horizon; the officers ran on deck, and closed round the captain: "Sir, do you think of engaging?" asked one. "Yes, sir,"

replied Walker, in a low voice. "When I see an enemy so near--your own fears, which attack the hearts of all my other men. I am willing to take my greater part of duty, but you leave too much to my share."

Ashamed, they endeavoured to emulate his fort.i.tude, and this desperate ruse procured another respite from despair, and a night of renewed vigour at the pumps, in the hope of rescue in the morning. But there was no sail, and, though the wind had abated, despair returned; Walker a.s.sured them positively that they would sight land next day, and thus induced them to turn to once more, though he was by no means confident that his word would come true: and when a man ran aft in a sudden panic, or sent by others to tell the news, crying that the ship was just about to sink, his patience gave way for a moment, and he floored the scaremonger with a blow of his fist. "You lie, you villain!" he said; "she told me otherwise, as she rose on that last sea!"

But it was over at last. On the following day the coast of Cornwall was sighted, and in the afternoon the battered and water-logged _Boscawen_ ran into St. Ives. Anchorless, she drifted helplessly, and, in spite of the efforts of the Cornish boatmen, swept past the pier and grounded on a rocky beach, where she instantly parted, her masts falling every way.

All the crew save four were got on sh.o.r.e in safety: Walker remained to see the sick got out of the cabin window, telling his men not to mind about him, as he would presently swim on sh.o.r.e; but two of the townsmen, who had probably heard from some of the seamen what sort of hero was in danger of perishing on the wreck, came out and brought him off.

And that is the story of how George Walker, by sheer undaunted courage and force of will and example, kept his ship afloat and saved his own and over three hundred lives from a horrible end in mid-ocean: the n.o.blest victory he ever won.

When he presented himself before his owners they received him, says the writer, "with marks of esteem, and a joy equal to what had been the claim of the best success." One of the first questions Mr. Walker asked was, whether they were insured? The answer was, "No, nor ever would be in a ship where he commanded"--a remark which, while exceedingly and intentionally complimentary to the gallant Walker, scarcely represents a sound commercial att.i.tude.

Walker's next command was a much more important one, for he was, as already stated, placed in charge of a squadron of privateers, all named after royal personages, and known collectively as "The Royal Family Privateers." The vessels were fitted out at Bristol, and were named:

Guns. Men.

_King George_, George Walker, Commodore 32 300 _Prince Frederick_, Hugh Bromedge, Captain 26 260 _Duke, Edward Dottin_, Captain 20 260 _Princess Amelia_, Robert Denham, Captain 24 150 --- --- 102 970

A formidable force, under such a commander. The _Prince Frederick_, however, got aground in the Bristol Channel, and was compelled to put back and dock: so the three others set forth in company at the beginning of May 1746, and had only been a week at sea when they encountered three French line-of-battle ships, from which Walker escaped in the dark by the ruse of leaving a lantern floating in a cask, while he extinguished all lights and altered his course; but the _Princess Amelia_ parted company and eventually put into Lisbon.

A little later, at Safia, on the coast of Morocco, having chased a small French vessel into the bay, Walker determined to cut her out that night with his boats--an operation not often undertaken by privateers, though numerous feats of the most daring description have been performed in this connection by the Navy. Walker considered, however, that he and his men were fully capable of planning and executing such an enterprise, and, having given detailed directions, he despatched three boats under the command of Mr. Riddle, his second lieutenant, on this dangerous service, about midnight. As is frequently the case with such undertakings, the original plan had to be modified, and they found the Frenchmen very much on the alert. The lieutenant in command was very severely wounded immediately, but nothing would stop Walker's men, and, after a tussle, they carried the vessel and brought her out in triumph.

As she was a smart little craft Walker made her a tender in place of the _Princess Amelia_, naming her _Prince George_ and putting his first lieutenant, John Green, in command. Mr. Green, we are told, would have been sent in charge of the cutting-out expedition, but that he had expressed the opinion that it would be better to wait until daylight.

"Sir," says Mr. Walker, "though I have no reason to doubt your prowess, yet I never will send a man upon an expedition to which he has any objection." He gave him the command, however, of the new tender, displaying his customary fairness of dealing with all his subordinates.

During this eight months' cruise "The Royal Family" made some valuable prizes and put into Lisbon with more than 220,000 to the good, and without a single man having been killed.

Having overhauled and refitted his ships--now increased to six in number by the addition of the _Prince George_ and the _Prince Edward_, a vessel purchased at Lisbon--Walker put to sea again on July 10th, 1747 and in October following occurred the most remarkable action in which he was concerned. He had, before this, lost one of his squadron, the _Prince Edward_, by a very extraordinary accident. Crowding sail to come up with her consorts, being astern, she was suddenly observed to reel, and immediately foundered, going down stern first. The survivors--her captain and two men only--stated that the mainmast had slipped out of the "step" in the bottom of the ship--or more probably had displaced the step by the strain upon it--and the heel of the mast had gone through her bottom, the mast, with all the sails set, falling over the stern.

On October 6th the squadron had been watering in Lagos Bay--that same harbour in which we saw Bernard D'Ongressill so scurvily treated by the Portuguese nearly five hundred years previously--and the _King George_ and _Prince Frederick_, coming out about five o'clock in the morning, leaving the _Princess Amelia_ still at anchor, saw a large sail standing to the northward. Walker made the signal to chase, and sent a small vessel, a recent prize, into the anchorage to hurry up the _Princess Amelia_. The _Duke_ and _Prince George_, having completed their watering earlier, were in sight; but, after chasing for about an hour, for some unexplained reason discontinued--or could not get up.

The chase, seeing she was likely to be hemmed in by the two nearest ships, kept away to the westward, making all sail; and Walker, with his two ships, chased her until noon, when the _King George_ was nearly up with her, the _Prince Frederick_ some distance to the southward. They had not yet disclosed each other's nationality, but Walker realised by this time that the stranger was a very big ship, and he was within gunshot of her, practically alone; and then it suddenly fell a flat calm, and the chase, hoisting her colours, ran out her guns, disclosing herself as a 74-gun ship. The colours, however, hung down in the calm, and it was impossible to tell whether they were Spanish or Portuguese--for the two ensigns were very similar at that time, though they are not so now. After about an hour, during which the _Prince Frederick_ could get no nearer, and Walker and his big opponent were eyeing each other curiously, the latter ran in her lower deck guns, and closed the ports. This looked as though she was a treasure ship, unwilling to fight if she could avoid it; and, as a matter of fact, she was just that; only she had already--after being chased by some English men-of-war--landed her treasure, to the value of some three millions sterling, at Ferrol, and was on her way to Cadiz. However, seeing her somewhat shy, Walker's officers and men were all for fighting; and when a light breeze sprang up about five o'clock, and the big ship again made sail on her original course, the _King George_ at once continued the chase, leaving the _Prince Frederick_, which did not get the breeze so soon, yet further astern.

At eight o'clock, in bright moonlight, Walker was within speaking distance, cleared for action, his men lying down at their quarters. He hailed in Portuguese: no reply. Then he hailed in English, asking her name; in reply, she asked his name, also in English. "The _King George_!" replied Walker, and then came a thundering broadside, dismounting two guns and bringing down the maintopsail yard. Walker's men were on their feet and had their broadside in in a few seconds; and then this ridiculously uneven contest went on, the huge Spanish ship--her name, the _Glorioso_--towering above the other, and both letting drive with guns and small arms for all they were worth. Why the _King George_ was not sunk it is impossible to say. The chronicler of the fight says that the Spaniards did not manage to fire their broadsides regularly but only a few guns at a time, while the _King George's_ men got theirs in with great precision and regularity, and also maintained a very hot fire of musketry, under the control of the Captain of Marines.

This desperate conflict was maintained for three hours, at close range--so close at times that some burning wadding from the Spaniard's guns set fire to the _King George's_ mainsail. The incident, as Sir John Laughton remarks, was unique in naval warfare; there have been instances in which a vessel of vastly inferior force has contrived to maim or delay her big antagonist until a.s.sistance arrived, and so to contribute very materially to her capture, advantage being taken of superior speed and handiness, or circ.u.mstances of wind and sea, and so on; but for a vessel of the _King George's_ size to maintain a close ding-dong action with a 74-gun ship, in fine weather, for this s.p.a.ce of time is entirely unprecedented. Had Walker been in command of a king's ship, he would certainly have been held blameless if he had run away; but running away, even from a vastly superior force, was not, as we have seen, a proceeding which found any favour in the eyes of George Walker; and there was, of course, the strong inducement of the a.s.sumed treasure, which, after all, was not there.

The writer attributes their immunity from destruction and their trifling casualties--one killed and fifteen wounded--partly to the very closeness of the action, the Spanish ship's shot not hitting the hull; and also, to the fact that, probably from the overloading of the guns with several shot, in the hope of knocking a huge breach in the _King George's_ side, the shot came with such reduced force that, when they hit, they did not penetrate. Walker's device of high bulwarks of elm planking, before alluded to, he likewise considers had a share in their miraculous salvation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ACTION BETWEEN THE SPANISH 74-GUN SHIP "GLORIOSO" AND THE "KING GEORGE" AND "PRINCE FREDERICK" OF THE "ROYAL FAMILY" PRIVATEERS]

Walker, he says, "fought and commanded with a calmness almost peculiar to himself"; and his high example conduced to order and discipline even in the thickest of the fight. When the mainsail was set on fire he ordered some hands aloft to extinguish it, and when another man was somewhat officiously following, he called him down. "I have sent men enough aloft for the business, in my opinion; if they fail in their duty, I'll send for you"; such an episode, in the thick of a terrible engagement, is significant, indeed, of calmness and absolute self-possession, which is heroic in its measure.

The action was fought, we are told, so close under Cape St. Vincent that the castle on the Cape repeatedly fired upon the combatants, "as a neutral power commanding peace"; in other words, as a protest against the action being fought in Portuguese waters, within gunshot of the coast.

By half-past ten the _Prince Frederick_ came up to the a.s.sistance of her consort. At this time the _King George_ had received so much damage aloft, that there was no choice but to remain, for she could not have run away. "All our braces and maintopsail yard were shot away, the foremast quite disabled, and the mainmast damaged. We could not work our ship, and bravery became now a virtue of necessity."

There was no mention of striking the colours, however; and half an hour later the _Glorioso_ desisted from action, and retired from the field.

When, at daybreak, Captain Dottin, of the _Prince Frederick_, came on board, his first inquiry was as to whether the commodore was alive; then, seeing the ship's company so nearly intact, and his friends among the officers unhurt, he embraced the gallant commodore in the enthusiasm of his joy and admiration.

Despatching the _Prince Frederick_, with the _Duke_ and _Prince George_, in pursuit of the enemy, Walker set to work to refit; and then a fresh alarm arose, for a large sail was seen approaching from the eastward.

She proved, however, to be a friend, the _Russell_, an 80-gun ship, and Walker lost no time in acquainting her captain with the state of affairs.

Helpless in his dismantled vessel, Walker watched with his gla.s.s the progress of the chase, his own three vessels nearing the Spaniard, with the giant _Russell_ crowding sail to join them; but he could not account for a fourth vessel which now seemed to be in the fight.

The headmost ship, apparently the _Prince Frederick_, now engaged the Spaniard hotly, and Walker, speaking his thoughts aloud to his officers, deplored her captain's unwariness in not waiting for the others to come up; for Dottin was blazing away for all he was worth, and Walker's experience immediately suggested a new danger. "Dottin will fire away all his cartridges at too great a distance, and afterwards be obliged to load with loose powder, by which some fatal accident may happen."

Scarcely had he spoken, keeping his gla.s.s upon the vessel, when simultaneously with the discharge of a broadside a pillar of smoke and flame shot up. "Good heavens, she's gone!" cried Walker. "Dottin and all his brave fellows are no more!" One of the officers suggested that it was merely the smoke of her last broadside. "It's a dreadful truth you tell," replied Walker, still looking through his gla.s.s, "for 'tis the last she will ever give!" And when the smoke cleared away there was no ship to be seen! This terrible incident so affected the ship's company that Walker called the officers aside into the companionway in order to admonish them that they must keep up an air of cheerfulness before the men, who might otherwise be backward in fighting; and while he spoke there was a series of sudden explosions, mingled with cries of alarm.

Running out on deck, they found the crew in a panic, some clinging outside the ship, others climbing out on the bowsprit, in readiness to jump overboard when the ship should blow up. The alarm was caused by a seaman stepping upon a number of loaded muskets, which were covered with a sail, and firing one off, which quickly set the others going, some spare ammunition also exploding; bullets were flying about, the sail was on fire, and the men could not be persuaded to quit their temporary refuge, so completely scared were they by this sudden din, following closely upon the tragic occurrence they had just witnessed.

The captain and officers extinguished the fire, a.s.sisted by the chaplain--"a very worthy gentleman"--apparently of the same type as that excellent parson described in "Midshipman Easy," who rendered such material a.s.sistance under similar circ.u.mstances, and was anxious to ascertain afterwards whether he had allowed his tongue too free play for one of his cloth; he had, but Jack Easy consoled him. "Indeed, sir, I only heard you say, 'G.o.d bless you, my men; be smart,' and so on."

Well, the _Russell_, aided by "The Royal Family," captured the Spaniard, of course, though she made a more stubborn fight than they expected, and the _Russell_ was very short of men. The _King George_, however, had no decisive news on the subject for some days, when, encountering their consort, the _Duke_, what was the joy on board upon learning that the _Prince Frederick_ was safe and sound! The vessel which so unhappily blew up was the _Dartmouth_, a frigate which had come up, hearing the guns, to see the fun. Only seventeen of her crew were picked up by the _Prince Frederick's_ boats; one of them was an Irish lieutenant, O'Brien, who apologised to captain Dottin for his dress: "Sir, you must excuse the unfitness of my dress to come aboard a strange ship, but really I left my own in such a hurry that I had no time to stay for a change." He had been blown out of a port!

It was not until he was introduced to the Spanish captain, on board the _Russell_, that Walker learned that the treasure was safe at Ferrol--a great blow to him and his men; and on arriving at Lisbon he was, to his surprise, confronted by one of his owners, who blamed him severely for venturing the privateers against a man-of-war. Walker very justly replied, "Had the treasure, sir, been aboard, as I expected, your compliment had been otherways; or had we let her escape from us with that treasure on board, what had you then have said?"

Walker was then, in fact, treated very scurvily by the owners, if we are to believe the quite simple and apparently straightforward story of his friend and former officer, and was at the last hustled out of his ship, the _King George_, at Lisbon, by a scandalous subterfuge. Probably avarice was at the bottom of all this sordid business; privateer owners had a very keen eye for the main chance, and did not set too much store by heroism--without profits!

Walker took his pa.s.sage home in the packet, an armed vessel, commanded by an elderly and somewhat timid gentleman. They encountered an Algerine of greater force, and some of Walker's men who were on board were heard to remark that if their captain had commanded he would knock her out of the water; so two English merchants, who were pa.s.sengers, begged the captain to turn over the fighting command to Walker.

This was actually done, and Walker, playing a clever game of bluff, sent the enemy off without firing a shot.

This is the last we hear of Walker at sea. We find him in gaol for debt, but the precise circ.u.mstances which induced his formerly very admiring owners to place him there are not quite clear. As we know, it was no disgrace in those days to be imprisoned for debt, and the process was, indeed, a remarkably easy one. As has already been remarked, it is impossible to believe that George Walker was otherwise than a man of strictest honour and probity: he proved himself almost quixotically so, in fact, for when, upon one occasion, a couple of rich East India ships offered him 1,000 to convoy them safely to Lisbon, he replied that "he would never take a reward for what he thought his duty to do without one"; nor would he accept the smallest present from them, after seeing them safely into port.

According to _The Gentleman's Magazine_, George Walker died September 20th, 1777. Where he was buried does not appear; whether he was ever married or left any family is equally obscure.

One thing, however, is certain: he left behind him the reputation of a very n.o.ble and brave seaman, the idol of his men, the terror of his king's enemies. There is no eulogy which has been engraved upon the tombstones of our naval and military heroes which might not with justice have been included in George Walker's epitaph. So far as his opportunities went, he set an example which could scarcely have been improved upon.