The Wind-Jammers. T. Jenkins Hains
before the Yarmouth was aware of our intentions, but I am not certain whether it was seen or not in the darkness.
Every man was at his post, standing silent and motionless in the dim light of the battle-lanterns, and every gun on the starboard broadside was kept trained on the British frigate.
We drew directly abreast, and a hoarse voice hailed us through the gloom.
“Fire!” came the order clear and distinct from the quarter-deck, and our answer to the hail was the deep rolling thunder of twenty heavy guns, fired almost simultaneously.
Then, as we ran clear of the cloud from our guns, the Yarmouth appeared to burst into a spitting line of flame, and the shot from her answering broadside crashed among us while she disappeared in a storm of smoke.
The scene on our spar-deck was frightful. Men struck by the flying shot or splinters were hurled and pitched about and fell in mangled groups upon the sanded planks.
Then the order came to wear ship, and we paid off rapidly to the northward, to bring our port broadside to bear upon the enemy as she crossed our wake, coming after us in full chase.
We were new and light, and probably able to go two knots to her one, if no accident happened to our sailing gear. Our rigging had not been seriously cut and our spars were sound, so it is hard to tell just how the action would have ended had the fight continued as it commenced.
But there were other matters at hand far more dangerous to us than his majesty’s sixty-four-gun frigate Yarmouth.
As I passed a powder charge to the after starboard gun, I turned and looked across the deck at Robinson and his crew.
Instead of running his gun out and laying it towards the enemy, he and his men quickly shifted the tackles and, slewing it around, trained it down the port broadside through the line of gun crews. As he did so, some thirty men—among whom I recognized the big bald ruffian and his comrades of the ship-yard—rushed down the starboard side, and came aft, yelling and swearing and with their cutlasses swinging in their hands.
They took their places around and behind Robinson’s gun, while one man stepped out and coolly rammed a bag of musket-balls down the muzzle.
“What are you doing?” roared the officer of the deck from the break of the poop.
“Watch me,” said Robinson, quietly; and with that he let off the heavy gun, double charged, along the deck.
The discharge swept the gangway clear of living men, the poor, surprised fellows going down in groups like grass before a scythe-blade. Then, with a roaring yell, the ruffians left the spar-deck to the gun crews and rushed aft in a body, with Robinson and the bald-headed giant at their front.
It was all so sudden no one realized what was taking place. The ship was off before the wind, racing along to the northward through the gloom.
The lanterns of the port battery were smashed or blown out, and the shrieks and groans of the wounded men added to the confusion and terror of the scene. Those men left alive and unhurt on the port side were tailing on to the waring braces.
The officers forward bawled and swore at the bewildered sailors, trying to get them to realize their position, and while they did so the villains were taking the quarter-deck.
It was a short, desperate fight aft, but they had laid their plans so well that every officer was taken off his guard and cut down before even preparing to make a defence. Then the ruffians were masters of the quarter-deck.
I saw the Yarmouth on the port quarter. She loomed dimly through the gloom nearly a mile away, and as I looked I saw the intermittent flashes of her bow-chasers and heard the regular firing.
A shot from one of her long twenty-fours tore past me, and killed a man who was just starting aft to join in the affray on the poop. I thought for an instant that they might know on the Yarmouth what was taking place on board the Randolph, but afterwards I found they knew nothing.
In a few moments the men forward began to see what had happened aft, and they just recovered themselves as Robinson and his crew finished off the last man and were running the ship away to the northward without a thought of engaging the enemy.
So far the villains had been successful, and with another turn of good luck would be masters of a large frigate, fully equipped and provisioned for a long cruise.
Robinson could then have become a wealthy pirate in the West Indian and South American waters, and retired from the sea in a year or two without much danger of being caught, for his vessel was larger and faster than any he would be likely to meet. From the capes of Virginia to the river Plate no vessel of this size had cruised for years, and he would have had a good chance to make a clean sweep before anything caught up with him.
But this turn of luck for him did not occur. When he had finished his deadly work aft and started his men forward, our men rallied, and, led on by the under officers left alive, began to make a stand.
Robinson rushed his men on in a style worthy of a better cause. And the way that great bald ruffian went into our poor fellows was astounding.
They charged up the port gangway in a close body and engaged with pike and cutlass, forcing those before them who were not cut down, until they reached the mainmast. Robinson appeared like a fiend. He roared and yelled to his men to press on, and slashed right and left with amazing power.
The great bald ruffian, who now appeared as his right-hand man, kept close to him, and they went along that deck leaving a bloody path to mark their course.
They cut down and killed or wounded every man who had the hardihood to dispute their way. I saw Robinson strike a gunner a blow that stretched him dead with his skull cleft to the ears, and then, instantly recovering his weapon, he drove it clear through the body of the man next to him.
One officer alone stood before the rush. I do not remember his name, but he commanded the forward battery.
He engaged Robinson for an instant and smote him sorely with his weapon, for, although I could not see the stroke in the gloom, I heard the villain cry out fiercely as if in pain. The next instant the bald man struck the officer to the deck and pressed on harder than ever.
This officer evidently understood the situation to be more desperate than it really was, for, as the crowd of ruffians passed over him, he arose with difficulty and staggered to the hatchway which led to the magazine. I guessed his purpose the instant he disappeared, and I saw him no more.
The fight went on forward for some minute longer, and I was driven to the forecastle by a fierce scoundrel who bore down on me with a reeking cutlass. Then a sudden rally of our men turned my enemy and their rush was brought to an end.
As we were five to one in point of numbers, it now began to look as if we would soon make way against the assault. Some of our men got around in their rear, and we began to close in on them with something like a chance of winning the fight, but it was never fought out.
I saw the big bald man strike furiously at a man near me, and swing his weapon around so fiercely that not one of our men dared get within its reach, although they brought up stubbornly just beyond it. Then Robinson dashed in to where I stood with my loaded musket. I fired blindly and then saw his blade flash up, and I felt my end had come.
At that instant the whole ship shivered and burst into a mass of flame. I felt myself hurled into the air as the deck disappeared under me, and the next moment I found myself in the water.
I looked around me on all sides and saw nothing but the waves that stretched away into the surrounding gloom. I was uninjured and swam easily, thinking that my end must be near, and that I could only prolong my existence by half an hour’s hard struggle.
I was much dazed, but remembered the Yarmouth, and looked about for some sign of her.
Finally I made out a dark object over a mile away, and soon I recognized her standing directly for me. This gave me hope for a short time, and I struck out strongly, thinking it might be possible to gain her