[Illustration]
SAILOR BOY
OR
Jack Somers in the Navy
_By_
OLIVER OPTIC
[Illustration]
CHICAGO
M. A. DONOHUE & COMPANY
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. The Victory at Port Royal 9
II. The Dashaway in a November Gale 17
III. The Sailor and the Soldier 25
IV. The Naval Rendezvous 32
V. On Board the Ohio 41
VI. Jack Takes a Lesson in Discipline 50
VII. The Harrisburg 58
VIII. “All Hands, Up Anchor!” 66
IX. “All Hands, Make Sail!” 74
X. “Man Overboard!” 82
XI. The Cockswain of the Captain’s Gig 89
XII. Ship Island 97
XIII. The Boat-Expedition 106
XIV. Jack on the Lookout 115
XV. The C. S. Steamer Wizard 123
XVI. The Shore Battery 132
XVII. Return of the Expedition 140
XVIII. Forts Jackson and St. Philip 147
XIX. Quartermaster Somers 154
XX. The Steamer Middy 162
XXI. Up the River 170
XXII. Jack Ashore 177
XXIII. The Planter’s Mansion 186
XXIV. A Night-Expedition 193
XXV. The Capture of the Kenshaw 201
XXVI. The Union Refugees 209
XXVII. The Conspiracy on Board the Middy 217
XXVIII. The Middy on the Blockade 225
XXIX. The Blockade Runner 233
XXX. On the Suwannee River 241
XXXI. Homeward Bound 251
THE SAILOR BOY;
OR
JACK SOMERS IN THE NAVY.
CHAPTER I.
THE VICTORY AT PORT ROYAL.
“Hurrah for the navy!” shouted John Somers, as he rushed into the
house, threw his cap upon the floor in the entry, and bolted into the
room where the family were just sitting down to supper. “Hurrah for the
navy!”
“What is the matter now, John?” demanded Mrs. Somers, placing the
teapot on the table, and suspending all further proceedings till the
excited young man had told the news.
“‘The army and navy forever! Three cheers for the red, white, and
blue!’” added John, swinging his handkerchief, and singing lustily the
words of the patriotic song.
“Why don’t you tell us what the news is, John? You act just like a
madman when anything has happened.”
“Fort Walker and Fort Beauregard captured! The navy gave ’em fits down
there,” replied John, pulling the “Boston Journal” from his pocket, and
tossing it upon the table, to the imminent peril of the milk pitcher,
which, however, maintained this gravity, in spite of the rude assault.
“Massy sake! I thought the whole Southern consarn had broke down,”
added Gran’ther Greene.
“It will break down and cave in now. Our folks have got a footing in
South Carolina now, and they’ll soon bring the rebels to terms,” said
John, who was fully imbued with the enthusiasm, as well as the spirit
of prophecy, which pervaded the earlier period of the great American
Rebellion. “Let me tell you, gran’ther, the navy has done a big
thing down there. Commodore Dupont will bring ’em to their senses in
double-quick time. Charleston will have to take it next.”
“Eat your supper, John, and talk about it afterwards,” interposed Mrs.
Somers.
“Supper!” exclaimed John: “who can eat with such news as this? Let me
read it to you.”
Mrs. Somers and the rest of the family were quite willing to hear what
the navy had done at Port Royal; and John was permitted to read the
stirring account of the action, which he interpolated with comments
of his own, expressive of his admiration of the flag-officer and the
blue-jackets generally, who had achieved the glorious victory.
“I wish I had been there!” exclaimed John, when he had completed the
reading of the narrative. “How I wish I had been there!”
“You had better eat your supper now,” quietly remarked Mrs. Somers, who
did not seem to relish the turn which the conversation had taken.
“Here I am rotting on the stocks, lying round like a lubber, when the
ship’s in a gale of wind,” said John, as he stuffed half a hot biscuit
into his mouth, apparently to mollify the dissatisfaction with which
he regarded his position.
“Have some apple-sauce, John?” added Mrs. Somers.
The young aspirant for distinction took some apple-sauce, and continued
to eat, for a few moments, with a desperation dangerous to the
well-being of his digestive organs, and which might reasonably have
awakened a fear in the mind of his anxious mother that he would choke
himself to death, instead of being killed by a splinter or a shell
on board a man-of-war. John was silent for a time; but he kept up a
vigorous thinking, and it is doubtful if he could have told whether
he was eating hot biscuit or “salt-horse.” It would not have required
a conjurer, either, to tell what he was thinking about; and the poor
mother, with her husband far away in the rebel country (if, indeed,
he was still living), and one son exposed to the perils of battle
and march, walked mechanically from the table to the closet, as she
proceeded to clear off the table, looking as sad as a vision of sorrow;
and it needed no conjurer to tell what she was thinking about.
She was a patriotic woman; but no doubt she wished the glowing news
from Port Royal had never reached the ears of her son. She had endured
all the agonizing suspense which only the wife of an absent husband
and the mother of an absent soldier-boy can comprehend; and she would
fain keep this remaining son by her side to sustain and soothe her
by his presence. She hoped he was not needed; she tried to persuade
herself that John belonged to her, now that his twin-brother had joined
the army: yet the New England blood in her veins would not let her be
selfish, if the country needed his services.
She knew what John was thinking about, and she knew that the
oft-repeated question was about to be proposed with more emphasis than
ever before: Would she consent to his entering the navy? He had asked
her permission twenty times during the summer and autumn, and she had
as often silenced him by pointing to the work required to be done upon
the little farm. But now the corn and cabbages, the potatoes and the
apples, had all been harvested, and she could no longer detain him upon
the plea that his services were needed at home; for there was hardly
work enough about the place to give Gran’ther Greene, who was now in
better health than usual, the exercise which was needed to keep him
alive.
“Mother, aren’t you ashamed of me?” said John, suddenly dropping
his knife and biscuit, and looking steadily at Mrs. Somers, who was
gathering up the dishes on the other side of the table.
“Ashamed of you, my son? What ails the boy?” exclaimed she, pausing in
her occupation, and gazing at him with all a mother’s pride visible in
her expression.
“Aren’t you ashamed to have a son loafing about home when the navy
is short of sailors? I can hand, reef, and steer, and I know the
mainmast from the jolly-boat. I’ve been one voyage with father in a
square-rigged vessel, and two in a ‘fore-and-after.’ I can make a long
splice, a short splice, an eye-splice, a Turk’s head, or a Jacob’s
ladder. I know where to find the halyards and braces, the clewlines,
buntlines, and gowlines. I know all about it, mother. Now, aren’t you
ashamed to have me lubbering round here like a dandy in a hay-field?”
“No: I’m sure I am not,” replied Mrs. Somers with emphasis. “You have
been a good boy, and worked hard all summer.”
“But I haven’t had anything to do for a week but stow my grub and pick
my teeth.”
“It won’t hurt you to lie still for a week or two.”
“Well, mother, I want to go into the navy; and I think I shall be just
as safe there as I shall at home, and be earning something all the
time, too.”
“I should think you’d rather be at home than off to sea this winter.
Don’t you hear the wind howl outdoors?”
John did hear the wind howl, and he had heard it before, and it did
not disturb his bright vision of life on the wave: on the contrary,
he rather liked its music. He suggested, in reply, that the coast
of South Carolina or the mouth of the Mississippi would be a warmer
and pleasanter place to spend the winter than the cold hills of New
England. While they were debating the question, a loud knock at the
front door interrupted the discussion; and John bolted the balance of
his supper, while his mother went to answer the summons.
“Does Captain Somers live here?” inquired a gentleman at the door.
“Yes, sir, he does; but he is away from home now,” replied Mrs. Somers.
“Won’t you walk in, sir?”
“Thank you: I wish to see his son, John Somers,” added the stranger, as
he followed Mrs. Somers into the little front parlor.
“Yes, sir: I’ll call him,” said she, as she glanced nervously at the
shoulder-straps which the gentleman wore; for the “foul anchor” on them
indicated that he was an officer in the navy.
Leaving the lamp in the parlor, she returned to the kitchen, where
John had just swallowed his second cup of tea, and was at that moment
thinking, that, on board a man-of-war, he should drink his “slops” out
of a tin cup, and not indulge in the luxury of plates, knives, and
forks.
“There’s a gentleman wants to see you, John,” said his mother; and her
heart was full of misgivings, and that foul anchor still haunted her
imagination; and she could not persuade herself that the officer had
not come to carry off her boy, and ship him in the navy.
“Wants to see me?” exclaimed John, who was not in the habit of
receiving many visitors through the front door.
“Yes, and he is an officer in the navy.”
“What can he want of me?”
“Don’t you know who he is, John?” asked the anxious mother, who had
more than half suspected that there was a plot to rob her of her
remaining son.
“I don’t; I haven’t the least idea, mother.”
“Well, don’t keep him waiting, John, whatever he wants; but I hope you
won’t do anything without consulting me?”
“Of course not, mother,” replied John, as he left the room.
Mrs. Somers sat down in a chair near the parlor-door, and tried to hear
what the stranger said; for she was very nervous and uneasy. She could
not make out what the gentleman wanted: so she concluded that the small
lamp she had left in the parlor would not afford sufficient light on
the subject of the meeting; and she lighted a large kerosene lamp, and
carried it into the apartment herself. The conversation did not seem to
be interrupted by her appearance; and she therefore concluded that the
officer and her son were not engaged in any plot or conspiracy against
the peace and comfort of the present head of the Somers Family.
“Madam, perhaps I ought to speak to you as well as to your son about
the object of my visit,” said the officer, as Mrs. Somers deposited the
lamp on the mantel-piece.
“Well, I don’t know, sir,” replied she, fully expecting to hear a
proposition for John to go into the navy that very night.
“Captain Barney sent me after your son,” he continued.
“That was not very kind of Captain Barney,” thought the poor mother,
now fully convinced that John was doomed to the navy; but she did not
say anything.
“I reside in the next town to this, and am at home for a short time on
a furlough. My father was suddenly taken very ill this forenoon; and
about an hour ago, the doctor declared he could not live till to-morrow
morning.”
“I am very sorry,” said Mrs. Somers, beginning to be deeply interested
in the sad story of the stranger; “and, if I can do anything to help
you, I’ll go right over.”
“Thank you: we do not need any assistance at home. My brother is
a captain in the garrison down at Fort Warren, and my father has
expressed a very strong desire to see him. I hastened over to
Pinchbrook to take the cars for Boston; but I was too late. All I could
do then was to take a boat, and go down to the fort. Captain Barney,
who is a friend of mine, offered to let me have his boat; but I don’t
know anything about Pinchbrook Harbor, and must have a skipper. I am
informed that your son is one of the best boatmen in the place, and
knows every rock and shoal in the bay.”
“I think I do, sir,” replied John quietly.
“But it is an awful night to go upon the water,” added Mrs. Somers, as
she glanced at the windows, the loose sashes of which were beating a
tattoo against the frame.
“I know it is a bad night, Mrs. Somers; but I have been afloat in many
a worse one. It is not a pleasure excursion; and I would not ask such
a favor with a less reasonable excuse than that which I have offered.”
“John knows best about such things; and, if he is willing to go, I
shall not object,” added Mrs. Somers.
“Of course I am willing to go, mother. But you are not going yourself,
are you, sir?”
“I feel that I must.”
“I thought you would want to go back to your father.”
“I do; but I am afraid you would not be able to gain admission to the
fort without me.”
“I guess they would let me in.”
“I am afraid not; and if my brother should fail to reach home in time
to see my father, through any neglect of mine, I should never cease to
reproach myself. I will go with you.”
“Dress yourself warm, John, before you go: it is an awful night on the
sea,” added his mother.
Leaving Mrs. Somers with the stranger, John hastened to put on his
“sea-rig,” and in a few moments returned to the parlor, with an
oil-cloth coat on his arm, and a fisherman’s hat in his hand.
“All ready, sir,” said he.
“Ay, ay, my lad,” replied Lieutenant Bankhead, as he rose, and bade
adieu to Mrs. Somers.
“Now be careful, John,” added Mrs. Somers, as she followed them to the
door.
“I’m always careful, mother. Don’t be a bit scared about me,” replied
the young salt confidently.
“I wish that man didn’t belong to the navy,” said Mrs. Somers to
herself as she closed the door: “he will be certain to fill the boy’s
head full of notions afore he gits back, and he’ll be more’n ever for
going. Well, well, it can’t be helped. I hope the poor soldier will
see his father afore it’s too late;” and she resumed her household
duties in the kitchen.