Love At The Helm

Chapter One ~ 1814-1

Chapter One ~ 1814The post chaise set Captain Conrad Horn down in Whitehall outside the Admiralty.

As he walked through the arched entrance, he looked up at the anchor on the pediment over the four Corinthian columns and thought, as he had before, that it was appropriately impressive.

He gave his name to the servant inside the entrance and saw a glint of admiration in his eyes, which Conrad Horn had grown used to since his ship had docked.

It seemed to him as if the cheers that had greeted him were still ringing in his ears.

“Tiger! Tiger Horn! Tiger!” they had yelled as they lined the quayside and manned the yards and there had been applause and congratulations all the way to London.

It still seemed incredible that he had survived what, as a professional sailor, he knew was a voyage when the odds had been stacked heavily against him.

And yet he had succeeded beyond his wildest dreams and the wreckage of French ships that he had left behind him would, he knew, be yet another nail in Napoleon Bonaparte’s coffin.

He saw the servant returning, but before he could reach him, a man in uniform came out of a door in the passage and gave a cry of recognition,

“Conrad! I was hoping to see you.”

He limped towards him and held out his hand, which Captain Horn clasped fervently.

“John! How are you? I have worried about you, but did not expect to find you here.”

“I have been lucky in that they have found a shore job for me, for there is not much chance of my going to sea again.”

“And you will hate that,” Conrad Horn said sympathetically. “At the same time you are still in uniform.”

“I was afraid that I should be rusticated for the rest of my life, but the surgeons pulled me through, or rather it was my wife, who is a better doctor than any of them.”

“That would not be difficult,” Conrad Horn said with a twist of his lips.

There was silence as both men were thinking of the inadequate surgeons on the ships who, shockingly unskilled, were little better than butchers and often caused the death of more men than the enemy.

“We are talking about me when we should be talking about you,” Commander Huskinson said. “You know that you have all my congratulations, Conrad. Your reports have been the most exciting adventure stories I have ever read.”

“I wish you had been with me.”

“I wish I had too,” his friend admitted. “Only you could have inflicted the terror of those night attacks along the coast and only you could have evaded the enemy when you were outnumbered in quite such a brilliant way.”

They both laughed, for it had been almost a boy’s prank by which Captain Conrad Horn had evaded two large enemy frigates in the Bay of Biscay.

His own small frigate The Tiger had already created so much damage to Napoleon’s fleet, which had been so seriously depleted at the Battle of Trafalgar that The Tiger was a marked vessel hunted by every Frenchman and all the Powers in Europe that they had subjected.

The incident that John Huskinson was referring to had occurred at dusk.

Realising that he was not only outnumbered but also outgunned, Conrad Horn had strained his sails all through the night in an attempt to avoid his pursuers.

However, they were there the next day to continue the chase and, when daylight died again, were perilously close to The Tiger.

When it was quite dark, as a last resort, Conrad Horn had played one of his tricks on the enemy.

He had a tub put overboard containing a lantern, leaving the frigates to pursue it all through the night while he abruptly altered course.

When dawn broke the next day, the two French frigates surveyed an empty horizon.

“I wish I could have seen the Froggies’ faces!” Commander Huskinson laughed now and Conrad Horn chuckled with him.

The Tiger had not had to run away another time and the ships they brought home as prizes, besides those that had been sunk, had made Conrad Horn the hero of a country heartily sick of war and wishing only to hear about victories.

The liveried servant was waiting by his side to catch his attention.

“His Lordship will see you now, sir,” he said respectfully.

John Huskinson put his hand on his friend’s shoulder as he urged him,

“Go and receive your congratulations. You are his Lordship’s blue-eyed boy at the moment and I will not spoil the surprise by telling you what sweets he has in store for you.”

“I am glad to have seen you, John,” Conrad Horn said. “Take care of yourself.”

As he walked away, he was thinking not of himself but of the difference he had seen in his friend.

The wounds that had been inflicted on John Huskinson in battle had left him pale, emaciated and very unlike the tall upstanding man he had been before the Battle of Trafalgar.

Conrad Horn sighed.

It always hurt him to think of how many men were not only killed in the battles at sea but crippled and incapacitated for the rest of their lives.

The servant opened an impressive-looking door and announced,

“Captain Conrad Horn, my Lord!”

Conrad Horn entered a large comfortable office overlooking Horse Guards Parade and, as he did so, the First Lord of the Admiralty, Viscount Melville, rose to greet him.

“Welcome home, Horn!” he called out. “And my congratulations and those of everyone in the Admiralty on your brilliant exploits. We are very grateful to you.”

“Thank you, my Lord.”

Viscount Melville resumed his seat at his desk and indicated a chair in front of it.

“Sit down, Captain Horn,” he invited him.

Conrad Horn did as he was told and then waited a little apprehensively for what the First Lord had to tell him.

He knew what he had achieved should result in his being appointed to a larger ship than the small frigate he was commanding at the moment. Besides, it would take at least two to three months to refit The Tiger and make her seaworthy after the last battle she had been engaged in, which had resulted in extensive damage to her bows.

Every ship’s Captain dreamed of the type of ship he would like to command, but very few realised their ambitions and at this particular time in the struggle with France every possible ship that could put to sea was being utilised by the Royal Navy.

Viscount Melville’s opening sentence told Conrad Horn what he already knew.

“There are at the moment, Captain Horn,” he said, “over six hundred ships in commission, manned by over one hundred and thirty thousand men.”

He paused as if to make his announcement more impressive and then went on,

“And until this war is finished, every one of those ships is of vital importance in one part of the world or another.”

Again he paused, but, seeing that there was no reason for him to reply, Conrad Horn merely remained silent.

“We therefore cannot afford to lose any ship from the smallest brig to the largest three-decker,” the Viscount continued, “and naturally our most precious ships of all are those that are new and therefore the most effective.”

There was a hint of excitement in Conrad Horn’s eyes as the First Lord continued,

“You will remember,” he said, “that The Caesar was the first of the new English two-decker eighties to be launched in 1793. Another ship, built at the same time, on very much the same lines but with additional improvements that we had learned from the French, became Admiral Nelson’s flagship after the Battle of the Nile.”

“I remember that, my Lord.”

“It was on this occasion,” the Viscount continued somewhat pompously, “that The Franklin, a new French eighty was captured with their Vice-Admiral and turned out to be so notable a performer under sail, that it was decided to build eight ships to her lines.”

Again he paused and with his eyes on Conrad Horn’s face, said slowly and distinctly,

“One of these is ready to go to sea within the next two weeks.”

“Do you mean, my Lord – ?” Conrad Horn began only to be interrupted as the First Lord interrupted,

“I mean, Captain, that your magnificent performance entitles you to take command of this ship, which has been named by His Majesty, The Invincible.”

Captain Horn stared at the First Lord.

A new ship, a two-decker with forty-two and twenty-four pounders was very much more than he had ever expected.

“How can I tell you how grateful I am, my Lord?” he asked and knew there was an irrepressible note of excitement in his voice.

“Perhaps you should ask me first what your orders are,” the Viscount said with a faint smile.

“I suspect the Mediterranean, my Lord.”

“Then you are mistaken,” the Viscount replied. “You are to sail first, Captain Horn, to Antigua.”

He saw the surprise in the younger man’s face and said,

“We have two reasons for sending you there. The second, which I will explain first, is that you should put a stop to the damage that is still being done to our shipping by American privateers.”

As Captain Horn had been away for three years, this was news to him and, as the First Lord realised it, he explained,

“I expect you heard that during our war with the United States of America, they suffered heavily as a result of the blockades imposed on both sides.”

“I must admit, my Lord, I had not thought of that sort of problem affecting America,” Captain Horn replied.

“I believe the British blockade brought commercial ruin to many American merchants and, if we are honest, Captain, the Americans had grounds for complaint about the high-handed conduct of Royal Naval Captains encountering their vessels on the high seas!”

Conrad Horn frowned.

“In what way, my Lord?”

“The discipline and our conditions of service in the Royal Navy have not unnaturally kept our ships permanently short of seamen, who have sought better conditions and safety from the Press Gangs on American mess decks.”

Conrad Horn pressed his lips together.

He had always loathed the cruelty inflicted by the Press Gangs in forcing men into service with the Navy, usually without even giving them time to say goodbye to their wives and families.

He was also aware that on many ships, although not on his own, the conditions were appalling and the punishments brutal.

“I think that the ill-feeling between our nation and that of the United States,” the First Lord continued, “has steadily increased during the war with France and, because at first, we thought derisively that America with a fleet comprising only seven frigates and a dozen or so sloops would never resort to war, we ignored the danger of their doing so.”

“I heard, of course, my Lord, that President Madison had signed a declaration of war in 1812,” Conrad Horn admitted, “but it was all over last year and I did not realise that it would do us any permanent harm.”

“What we did not expect,” the First Lord went on, “was large numbers of fast privateers, which sailed out of American Ports to prey upon British merchant traffic to and from Canada and the West Indies.”

His voice sharpened as he added,

“They have even sailed across the Atlantic to operate off the English and Irish coasts and as far afield as the North Cape, to harass the traffic to Archangel.”

“They must have had very good ships, my Lord.”

“They did and still have!” the Viscount agreed. “Their super-frigates, faster and better built than ours are manned by more thoroughly trained crews.”

“I had no idea of this, my Lord!” Conrad Horn exclaimed.

“The depredations of American privateers off the coast of Scotland and Ireland for the past three years,” the Viscount said, “produced such apprehension at Lloyds that it is difficult to organise insurance policies underwritten except at enormous rates of premium.”

“I can hardly believe it!”

“You will soon find when you are in those waters,” the Viscount said dryly, “that the American shipbuilders and designers have produced ships with such fine sailing qualities that they can outsail all the frigates and sloops of the Royal Navy, besides the fast West Indian mail packets.”

He paused and then said,

“Food is essential to this island and that is why The Invincible, Captain Horn, must protect our trading routes and rid ourselves of the menace of these independent privateers, who have paid no attention to the peace that now exists between us and the United States.”

“I can only say, my Lord, that I will do my best,” Captain Horn said quietly.

At the same time his heart was singing with joy at the thought of commanding a new ship, a two-decker!