Julian Stockwin - Mutiny

Kydd motioned at random to one of the boats. It responded with alacrity and the woman at the oars made a dextrous alongside. She hoisted a basket of goods to her head and, grabbing the manrope, easily mounted the side, leaving a companion to lie off on her oars. 'An' the best o' the day ter yez.' She bobbed familiarly at the lieutenant. Chubby, and of invincible cheeriness, she submitted to the cursory search with practised ease, then pushed through the gathering sailors to set up position forward for her hot breads, pies and oranges. Others came aboard, some with trinkets, several with ingenious portable workbenches for tailoring, cobbling and leatherwork, and still more with cash-boxes ready to take a seaman's pay-ticket and change it — at ruinous discount — into hard cash.

More crowded aboard. The master-at-arms and ship's corporals were hard put to keep up with the stream. The hubbub grew, and Kydd stepped back for the sanctity of the quarterdeck just as the master-at-arms thrust an arm under a fat woman's dress.

''That f'r yer cat's piss, m' lovely!' he snarled triumphantly. The squeal of indignation faded into the embarrassment of discovery as a knife cut into a concealed bladder and cheap gin flooded into the scuppers.

'Heave her gear overside,' Binney ordered, and to mingled shouts . of protest and derision her tray of gewgaws sailed into the sea. The gin was destined for sale below decks and Kydd suspected from the growing merriment that other sources had already found their way there.

'Sweethearts 'n' wives, sir?' Kydd asked Binney.

'Cap'n's orders are very clear,' Binney replied, with a frown. 'Wives only, no pockey jades to corrupt our brave tars.' The master-at-arms raised his eyebrows but said nothing. Binney turned and left the deck to Kydd. The officers would now retreat to their wardroom and cabin spaces, and in time-honoured fashion the ship would be turned over to the men and their wives of the day.

'They shows their lines,' ordered Kydd. There would be some genuine wives; the rest would carry unimpeachable marriage lines, obtainable for a small fee ashore. But this fiction served to demonstrate to an increasingly prim public ashore that HMS Achilles was taking its responsibility seriously concerning the traffic in women's bodies.

He walked to the side and beckoned the waiting outer circle of watermen's boats. They bent to their oars with a will, the bulwarks lined with sailors lewdly urging them on.

It was as much to reduce numbers aboard as anything, but as practical senior of the watch he had the dubious honour of selecting those allowed to entertain Achilles men. The invading crowd swarmed aboard, modesty cast aside as the women clambered over the bulwarks. It was hard on the watermen; those whose passengers were rejected must return them ashore, a good mile or more and not a sixpence in it for their trouble.

The lucky ones pranced about on the pristine decks. A fiddle started on the foredeck and an impromptu dance began about the foremast. Feminine laughter tinkled, roars of ribaldry surged — the stern man-o'-war lines of Achilles melted into a comfortable acquiescence at the invasion.

Real wives were easy to spot: often with awed children, they bore lovingly prepared bundles and a look of utter disdain, and while they crossed the bulwarks as expertly as their rivals, they were generally swept up in a big hug by a waiting seaman. Some were told, 'Forrard on the gundeck, m' dear,' from a gruff master-at-arms. Their spouses being on duty, there they would find a space between a pair of cannons, made suitably private with a canvas screen, the declared territory of a married couple.

It was nearly six bells; when eight sounded and the evening drew in Cockburn would relieve Kydd, and he could retreat to the gunroom. The midshipman's berth was, however, only too near and it would be a noisy night.

Cockburn came on deck early: harbour watches were a trial for him, the necessary relaxation of discipline and boisterous behaviour of the seamen hard on his strait-laced Scottish soul.

'What cheer, Tarn? Need t' step ashore? Cap'n wants t' get a demand on the dockyard delivered b' hand f'r a new wash-deck pump. Ship's business, o' course, gets you off the ship f'r an hour.'

'In Sheerness?' Cockburn retorted scornfully. Kydd was looking forward to getting ashore and seeing something of the local colour, but Cockburn remained glum.

'Join me in a turn around below-decks afore I hand over the watch,' he said to the young man, trying to draw him out of himself. 'Younker, stand by on the quarterdeck,' he threw at the bored duty midshipman. The rest of the watch were together around the mizzen-mast swapping yarns, a token number compared to the full half of the ship's company closed up at sea.

They strode off forward, along the gangways each side of the boat space. 'Clear 'em off forrard,' Kydd said, to a duty petty officer following, who duly noted in his notebook that the wizened crone and the young child selling cheap jewellery on a frayed velvet cloth should be moved forward to clear the gangways.

The foredeck was alive with cheerful noise. Traders, expert in wheedling, had set out their portable tables and were reluctandy parting with gimcrack brass telescopes, scarlet neckcloths, clay pipes and other knick-knacks that were five times their price ashore.

By the cathead another basket of fresh bread was being hauled up from a boat. Teamed with a paper pat of farmhouse butter and a draught from a stone cask of ale, it was selling fast to hungry seamen.

A cobbler industriously tapped his last, producing before their very eyes a pair of the long-quartered shoes favoured by seamen going ashore, and a tailor's arms flew as a smart blue jacket with white seams and silver buttons appeared.

All appeared shipshape forward, and Kydd grunted in satisfaction. Beyond the broad netting, the bare bowsprit speared ahead to the rest of the ships at anchor.

Cockburn indicated the old three-decker battleship moored further inshore, 'ifo'll never see open water again.' Stripped of her topmasts and running rigging, her timbers were dark with age and neglect; her old-fashioned stern gallery showed little evidence of gold leaf, and green weed was noticeable at her waterline.

'Aye, Sandwich — she's th' receiving ship only,' Kydd answered. Too old for any other work, she acted as a floating prison for pressed men and others.

'Do you know then who's the captain of the sixty-four over there?' Cockburn asked.

'Director} No, Tarn, you tell me!'

'None else than your Cap'n "Breadfruit" Bligh, these five years avenged of his mutiny.' He paused impressively.

Kydd did not reply: in his eyes Bligh should have been better known for his great feat of seamanship in bringing his men through a heroic open-boat voyage without the loss of a single one. He turned abruptly and clattered down the ladder to the open boat-space on the upper-deck.

Sitting cross-legged on the fore-hatch gratings, a fiddler sawed away, his time being gaily marked by a capering ship's boy with a tambourine weaving in and out of the whirling pairs of sailors and their lasses. Some of the women wore ribbons, which the men took and threaded into their own jackets and hats.

Groups gathered near the fore-mast playing dice, perched on mess-tubs; others tried to read or write letters. The whole was a babble of conviviality and careless gaiety.

Kydd looked about: there was drink, mainly dark Kent beer but not hard spirits. So far there was no sign of real drunkenness - that would come later, no doubt. Groups of men, probably from other ships, were in snug conversation at mess tables further aft. Ship-visiting was a humane custom of the service and even if liberty ashore was stopped acquaintances with former shipmates could be pleasantly renewed.