"Well, messmates, the 'Royal George' was a hundred-gun ship; and what we
don't often see now, when I first belonged to her her guns were all
brass. We had brass twenty-four-pounders on our quarter-deck,
forecastle, poop, and main deck, brass thirty-twos on our middle deck,
and brass forty-two-pounders on our lower deck. In the spring of '82,
when we were at Plymouth (about six months before she sunk), it was
considered that the brass forty-twos on the lower deck were too heavy
for her, so they were put on shore, and we had iron thirty-twos instead.
I don't think, myself, it made much difference in the weight of metal,
and we were sorry to part with them. We were a flagship, you know--old
Kempenfelt carrying his blue at the mizzen--and our poop lanterns were
so large that the men used to get inside them to clean them. She was
rather a top-heavy sort of ship, in my opinion, her upper works were so
high--why, we measured sixty-six feet from the keelson up to the
taffrail; but still, with proper attention, there was nothing to fear on
that score.
"Well, it was on the twenty-ninth of August, '82--that's just fourteen
years and about six weeks ago--that we were lying at Spithead, in
company with Lord Howe's fleet of between twenty and thirty sail of the
line: there was the 'Victory,' 'Barfleur,' 'Ocean,' and 'Union,' all
three-deckers, I recollect, close to us. We were in good repair, not at
all leaky, and were to have sailed in two days to join the fleet in the
Mediterranean. We had been paid, in consequence of our being about to
sail foreign; and we had been paid in golden guineas. I think that,
could all the money be collected together, from the pockets of the
seamen, the women, and the Jews, who went down in the ship, it would be
a very pretty fortune even for a duke's daughter."
Here Ben shoved the ale to Turner, who drank a little and proceeded,
while Ben took a swig and passed it round.
"Well, you see, messmates, the first lieutenant had been washing the
decks on the morning before, and the carpenter had been ordered to let
the water in, when it was found that the water-cock, which was about
three feet below the water-line, was out of order, and it was necessary
that it should be repaired. The foreman came off from the dockyard, and
stated that it was necessary that the ship should be careened over to
port sufficiently to raise the mouth of the pipe--which went through the
ship's timbers below--clean out of the water, that they might work at
it; so, between seven and eight o'clock on that morning, the whole of
the larboard guns were run out as far as they could be, and of course
the larboard lower deck ports were open; the starboard guns were also
run in amidships, and secured by the tackles; the shifting over of this
great weight of metal brought the larboard lower deck port-cills just
level with the water; the men were then able to get at the mouth of the
pipe to the water-cock on the starboard side, as it was clean out of
water, and for about an hour they were working away hard at it.
"It was about nine o'clock, we had just finished our breakfasts, and the
hands had been turned up, when the last lighter, with the rum on board,
came alongside. She was a sloop of fifty tons, called the 'Lark,' and
belonged to three brothers, whose names I forget. She was secured to the
larboard side of the ship; and the hands were piped 'clear lighter.'
Some of our men were in the lighter slinging the casks, others at the
yard tackle and stay-falls hoisting in, some in the spirit-room stowing
away. I was in the waist, bearing the casks over, down the hatchway;
none of us thinking that we should never mix our grog out of that
liquor."
"No, I suppose not," observed Anderson; "but we little know what the day
may bring forth."
"That's true as Gospel," said Ben.
"That's a very old saying, that every little helps. I did not think of
it at the time; but, you see, as we were clearing the lighter, almost
all the men were on the larboard side, and that must have brought the
ship down still more to port. Then, again, the water was not so smooth
as it was when we first careened her, and it began to wash into the
lower deck ports, and of course had no escape, so that there was very
soon a good weight of water in the lower deck. There were mice in the
ship, and they were disturbed by the water entering into their quarters,
and the men were catching them, and laughing as they swam about, little
thinking that it was to be a general swim so shortly afterward. But the
carpenter was the first that perceived that there was danger; for again,
you see, the casks of rum, hoisted in, and lying on the decks on the
larboard side, before it could be lowered into the hold, made also a
difference; and so the carpenter went on deck to the lieutenant, who was
officer of the watch, requesting that he would be pleased to order the
ship to be righted somewhat, as she could not bear it; but the
lieutenant gave a very short answer to the carpenter, who then went down
below."
"Who was the lieutenant on deck?" inquired Anderson.
"I don't recollect his right name--he was, I think, the third
lieutenant--he went by the name of 'Jib and Foresail Jack,' for,
whenever he had the watch, he did nothing but up jip and down jib, up
foresail, down foresail, every five minutes, always worrying the men for
nothing. He was not considered as a good officer, but a very troublesome
one. He had a knack of twisting and moving his fingers about as he
walked the deck, and the men were wont to say that 'he must have been a
forty piany teacher.'"
"And where were the captain and first lieutenant?" said Anderson.
"The first lieutenant was at the time busy in the wing, I believe; and
as for the captain, I don't know where he was--but, you know, a captain
seldom interferes in harbor."
"Where was the admiral?" inquired Ben.
"The admiral was in his cabin. I saw the barber, who had been in to
shave him, come out just before she went down."
"What sort of a man was the admiral?" said Anderson.
"He was a thin tall man, upward of seventy years of age, and he stooped
a good deal in his walk."
"Wet your whistle, Jim," said Ben, "for this is a long yarn."
"Well," continued Turner, as soon as he had put down his pot, "the
carpenter came up a second time on the quarter-deck to the lieutenant,
and said to him--
"'If you please, sir, to right the ship, it's my duty to tell you she
will not bear it any longer.' He spoke in a very positive way, as was
his duty; but the lieutenant answered, with an oath--
"'If you think, sir, that you can manage the ship better than I can, you
had better take the command.' I was in the waist at the time, with a
good many more men, and we heard what the carpenter said, and what
answer the lieutenant gave. Indeed, we were all aware of the danger, and
felt very uncomfortable; there were plenty of good seamen on board, who
knew what they were about almost as well as the officers, and certainly
better than the one who had the watch.
"A few minutes afterward (whether it was that he had remained that time
doing nothing, merely because he would not be dictated to by the
carpenter, I know not) the lieutenant ordered the drummer to be called
to beat to quarters, that the guns might be run into their places and
the ship righted. The drummer's name was passed along quick enough, for
we were all alarmed at our situation, for the ship just then heeled over
still more. I jumped down off the gangway as soon as the drummer was
called, and hastened down to my quarters. The drum was not beat, for the
man had not time to get his drum. All hands were now tumbling down the
hatchways as fast as they could to their quarters, that they might run
their guns into their places, and so right the ship. The gun I was
stationed at was the third gun from forward on the starboard side of the
lower gundeck. I said to Carroll, the second captain of the gun, 'I say,
let us try to get our gun out without waiting for the drum, as the
sooner we right the better.' We boused out our gun, which had been run
in amidships; but the ship heeled over so much that, do all we could, it
ran in again upon us, and at the same time the water made a heavy rush
into the larboard lower deck ports. 'The ship is sinking, Carroll!'
cried I. 'Lay hold of the ring-bolt and jump out; we shall all be
drowned!' He made for the ring-bolt, caught it, climbed out of the port,
and jumped into the sea. I presume he was drowned, for I never saw him
afterward. I followed him as fast as I could out of the same port, which
was the one belonging to our gun (the third from forward on the
starboard side), and when I was outside I perceived that all the other
port-holes were crowded as full as they could be with the heads of the
men, all trying to escape, and jamming one another so that they could
scarcely move either one way or the other. I caught hold of the sheet
anchor, which was just above me, to prevent falling back inboard; and
perceiving a woman struggling at the port, I caught hold of her, dragged
her out, and threw her from me. The ship was now lying down so
completely on her larboard broadside that the heads of the men in the
ports disappeared all at once; they all dropped back into the ship, for
the port-holes were now upright, and it was just as if men were trying
to get out of the tops of so many chimneys, with nothing for their feet
to purchase upon. Just after the men fell inboard, there came a rush of
air through the ports, so violent as to blow my hat off. It was the air
from the hold and lower deck, which, having no other vent, escaped as
the water which poured in took up its space. The ship then sunk in a
moment, righting as she went down. I was a good swimmer and diver, and
when she was sinking I attempted to keep above water, but it was
impossible; I was drawn down with the ship until she reached the bottom.
As soon as she grounded, the water boiled and bubbled a great deal, and
then I found that I could swim, and began to rise to the surface. A man
tried to grapple me as I went up; his forefinger caught in my shoe,
between the shoe and my foot. I succeeded in kicking off my shoe, and
thus got rid of him, and then I rose to the surface of the water."
"Take breath after that, Jim," said Ben, handing him the ale.
"I can tell you that I could hardly take breath when I came to the
surface, for my head came up through a quantity of tar, which floated
like fat on a boiler, and it nearly smothered me; for, you see, there
had been one or two casks of tar on the decks, which had stove when the
ship was going down, and the tar got up to the top of the water before I
did. It prevented me from seeing at first, but I heard the guns firing
as signals of distress." Here Turner drank some ale.
"Well," said he, after a short pause, "I may as well finish my story. As
soon as I could clear the tar from my eyes, I saw the main topsail
halyard-block about level with the water's edge about eight or ten yards
from me; so I swam to it and rode on it, holding on by the halyards, and
then I looked about me. The fore, main, and mizzentops were all above
water, as was a part of the bowsprit, and also part of the ensign-staff,
with the flag hoisted--for, you see, messmates, we went down in only
thirteen and a half fathom water, that is, about eighty feet; and, as I
said before, she measured sixty-six feet from the keelson up to the
taffrail; and she grounded as nearly upright as a vessel could; for the
lighter, which was fast to leeward when she went down, caught the main
yard, which helped to right her as she sank--but the lighter went down
with her. Well, as I looked round, I saw the admiral's baker in the
mizzen shrouds, and there was the body of the woman I had dragged out of
the port rolling about close to him. The baker was an Irishman, of the
name of Claridge; and I called out to him, 'Bob, reach out your hand and
catch hold of that woman, I daresay she is not dead.'
"He said, 'She's dead enough; it's no use to lay hold of her.'
"I answered, 'She is not dead.' He caught hold of the woman and hung her
head over one of the rattlings of the mizzen shrouds, and there she
swung by her chin till a wash came and lifted her off, and then she
rolled about again. Just then one of the captains of the frigates came
up in his boat. I waved my hand toward the woman--he stopped pulling,
the men dragged her into the boat, and laid her in the sternsheets.
"'My man,' said the captain, 'I must pick up those who are in more
danger than you.'
"'All right, sir,' said I; 'I'm safe moored here.'
"There was one of our men hanging on the mainstay, and roaring like a
bull, as he tried to climb by it out of the water. Had he only remained
quiet, he would have done well enough. The boat took him off first, and
the others of the people who were clinging about the masts and rigging,
including the baker and myself. It then pulled on board the 'Victory'
with us; and I once more found a good dry plank between me and the salt
water."
"Was the captain and admiral saved?"
"Captain Waghorn was. He could not swim; but one of the seamen held him
up. The admiral was drowned in his cabin. Captain Waghorn tried to
acquaint him that the ship was sinking; but the heeling over of the ship
had so jammed the doors of the cabin that they could not be opened."
"What became of the lieutenant of the watch and the carpenter?"
"The lieutenant of the watch was drowned--and so indeed was the
carpenter. His body was taken up, I believe, by the same boat which
picked up Lieutenant Durham[3]. When I went on board of the 'Victory,' I
saw the carpenter's body before the galley fire--some women were
attempting to recover him, but he was quite dead. There was a strong
westerly breeze, although the day was fine; and the wind made the water
so rough that there was great danger of the boats getting entangled in
the rigging and spars, when they came to take the men off, or more would
have been saved."
[Footnote 3: Afterward Admiral Sir Philip Durham.]
"How many do you think were lost altogether?" inquired Anderson.
"We had our whole complement on board, eight hundred and sixty-five men;
and there were more than three hundred women on board, besides a great
many Jews with slops and watches; as there always are, you know, when a
ship is paid and the men have any money to be swindled out of. I don't
exactly know how many men were saved, but there was only one woman,
which was the one I dragged out of the port. There was a great fat old
bumboat woman, whom the sailors used to call the 'Royal George'--she was
picked up floating, for she was too fat to sink; but she had been
floating the wrong way uppermost, and she was dead. There was a poor
little child saved rather strangely. He was picked up by a gentleman who
was in a wherry, holding on to the wool of a sheep which had escaped and
was swimming. His father and mother were drowned, and the boy did not
know their names; all that he knew was that his own name was Jack; so
they christened him John _Lamb_, and the gentleman took care of him."
"Have you no idea how many men were saved, Turner?"
"I only know this--that the Admiralty ordered five pounds a man to be
given to the seamen who were saved, as a recompense for the loss of
their clothes, and I heard that only seventy-five claimed it; but how
many marines were saved, or other people who were on board, I do not
know; but perhaps, altogether, there might be two hundred or more--for
you see the seamen had the worst chance of being saved, as they were
almost all down in the hold, or on the lower and main decks at their
guns. A few days after the ship went down the bodies would come up,
eight or ten almost the same time--rising to the top of the water so
suddenly as to frighten people who were passing near. The watermen made
a good thing of it; for, as the bodies rose, they took from them their
shoe-buckles, money, and watches, and then towed them on shore to be
buried."
"That lieutenant had much to answer for," observed Ben. "His false pride
was the cause of it all."
"It would seem so--but God only knows," replied Anderson. "Come, my
lads, the beer is out, and it's two bells in the middle watch. I think
we had better turn in. Jack, what's to become of you?"
"Oh, I'll find a plank," said I.
"So you shall, boy, and a bed upon it," replied Ben. "Come and turn in
with me, and don't you dream that the larboard lower deck ports are
open."