Britannia's Fist: From Civil War to World War: An Alternate History (22 page)

The biggest problem was the poorly designed vent piece that frequently blew out when the gun was fired. As one observer noted, “I believe it occurred more than once that the block [vent piece] found its way into the main top to the discomfort of the men there.” Milne had been unhappy when the Royal Navy purchased one hundred of the 110-pounders without trials, even though the manufacturer had stated that he did not think them suitable for such large calibers and for use at sea. Milne had more reason for his dismay with the guns as their deficiencies manifested, believing them overcomplicated and prone to malfunction in quick firing. He pointedly noted, “Americans won’t look at them.” Even Lord Lyons had noted to Russell that Union authorities relied on the “simplicity and stolidity” of Dahlgren’s guns and had no confidence in breech-loading weapons.
¹⁸

Milne had kept by him the report of Capt. George Hancock of the
Immortalité
, who had toured American ordnance facilities and spoken extensively with Admiral Dahlgren. The report was already eighteen months old but that only added to his disquiet. Even then, the Americans were producing more than thirty of the Dahlgrens a week. Milne had complete confidence in Hancock’s judgment, and when the captain characterized the American guns as the “most efficient weapons of the day,” he took it very much to heart. Dahlgren had devised a method to avoid the great weakness of all guns, the manner in which the trunions, on
which the gun pivoted, were mounted. The shorter American gun carriage allowed the guns to be fired at a greater elevation than comparable British guns. The guns’ soda bottle shape also meant that their center of gravity was not so near the ship’s outer wall and reduced the ship’s rolling, especially in heavy weather. The muzzles also extended beyond the gun ports more than British guns, reducing the chance of igniting the wooden sides of the ship or, when on the upper deck, of setting fire to the rigging. That last danger was the subject of special complaints Milne had made to the Admiralty. Hancock also noticed that the Americans had cut a hole behind each gun up through which powder charges were passed, thus eliminating the frantic rushing up and down the main hatchways of men carrying powder charges.

With all this in mind, Milne was preparing a report to state that although the Armstrong guns were “admirably manufactured and of great precisions,” they were “not suitable for service afloat.” That conclusion was a constant worry for Milne. The Armstrong guns were a large proportion of the station’s guns. He had decided to request that they should be replaced with more reliable muzzle-loaders with particular emphasis on the 68-pounder that British testing had indicated would penetrate the 4.5 inches of side armor of American ironclads at two hundred yards.
¹⁹

The backbone of the fighting power of the station was its ships of the line with their three decks of guns, which seemed from another world, and indeed they were. Most were laid down more than twenty years before. They were typified by HMS
Nile
, Milne’s flagship. She had been laid down in 1839 and converted to screw in 1854. In 1862 she had been up-gunned with sixteen Armstrong guns of various calibers, though she still carried sixty-two of the venerable muzzle-loading 32-pounders.
²⁰

Milne’s war plan had three basic elements: to destroy any American fleet or ship that dared to oppose the Royal Navy; to blockade the Union coast from Cape Henry, Virginia, to Maine; and to conduct powerful raids against coastal targets. He also wanted to seize sites in the vicinity of Martha’s Vineyard as coaling stations. Inherent in this plan was breaking the Union blockade of the South at Charleston and possibly Galveston. The First Lord of the Admiralty, the Duke of Somerset, had written him as the Trent Crisis mounted, “In the event of war I do not send from here any plan of operations as you have probably better means of judging what to do, but the first objective would probably be to open the blockade of the Southern ports and without directly co-operating with the Confederates, enable them to act and to receive supplies.”
²¹

Milne had also expressed a strong desire to control the Chesapeake Bay and make a descent on Washington itself, a tactic that the Royal Navy had used successfully in the War of 1812. An Admiralty report on the feasibility of attacking Northern ports concluded that the “intricacy of the channels and the strength of the forts made such attacks unfeasible.” Except for his pet project to strike at Washington, Milne himself did not favor operations against ports despite an Admiralty assessment that control of New York Harbor would probably end the war. As Milne went over these points with Hall, he explained, “The object of the war can only be to cripple the enemy—that is, his trade and merchant and whaling fleets.” He realized that Great Britain could never truly destroy the North. “No object would be gained if the ports alone are to be attacked, as modern views deprecate any damage to a town. If ships are fired upon in a port the town must suffer; therefore, the shipping cannot be fired upon. This actually reserves operations to vessels at sea.”
²²

Hall countered that the Union had shown no such punctilious regard for civilian lives and private property in its bombardment of Charleston and other Southern coastal towns. Milne was clear on this point. “The usages of civilized nations do no permit such depredations any longer.”

“But, Admiral, would not such a prohibition also prevent an attack on Washington?

Milne replied, “That will not be a problem. Once the river forts are suppressed, the city is at our mercy.”

Hall could only look into his teacup at the rebuff.
²³

Milne glided over the issue and went on. “Seizing coaling stations at Martha’s Vineyard is vital to maintaining a blockade of the North, but they do not have the advantage of fully functioning ports when the North Atlantic winters will limit communication with Halifax. Bermuda, our winter headquarters, and Nassau, are too far away to sustain a blockading fleet. For that reason, I believe we must support the Army’s plan to capture Portland. Colonel Wolseley is correct in his conclusion that for the Army to wait to receive an American attack would be fatal. A rain of blows is the only thing that will keep the Americans from conquering Canada. I am reminded of something my father said back in 1817. ‘We cannot keep Canada if the Americans declare war against us.’
²⁴

“We must also have a more southern base on the American shore. I was thinking of the American Navy’s forward operating base at Port Royal, south of Charleston, which they have conveniently prepared. Wolseley recommended the four thousand–man garrison of Barbados as a landing force to occupy it once we seize it.

“Like the Army in Canada, we too in the Navy have our own vulnerabilities that are best defended with offensive operations. We have no dry docks able to handle our ships of the line. We have had to depend on the American naval yards for emergency repairs in the past. Although we have a ready supply of coal in Nova Scotia, the best coal must still be brought from Wales. You know, Hall, I have another worry. Our base in Bermuda is woefully defended. My recommendations to London have fallen on deaf ears.”

Milne stood up and began to pace before the great windows. “We must plan for the long war, Hall, if our initial strike does not bring the Americans to their senses. I fear that if that first blow fails, we will only have roused these people to even greater efforts.

“What was feasible in 1861 is fraught with problems today. The strength of this station to undertake such an operation teeters, Hall, teeters on the jagged edge of adequacy. I cannot recommend to the Admiralty that it be attempted with the forces we have. If such an issue ever arises, I would insist on powerful reinforcement. We must have all four of our broadside ironclads and a good part of the Channel Squadron itself. We shall also require the naval siege train, the ‘Great Armament,’ that was assembled for the capture of Sebastopol.”

He stopped pacing. “I think such a war will make us long for the French as enemies.”
²⁵

Governor Oliver Morton was a happy man as he raised a glass of wine. “Gentlemen, I toast the good Sergeant Cline.” Sharpe was happy to comply, as was Col. Henry Carrington, the officer detailed to be the Copperhead catcher in Indiana. Cline’s raid on Bowles’s farm and the recovery from his barns of all the Springfield rifles stolen the last month had been a signal success in a difficult and shadowy fight against disloyalty.

Sharpe had sent Cline immediately out from Washington to report to Colonel Carrington. A week later, several companies of Cline’s old regiment, the 3rd Indiana Cavalry, had followed. Sharpe had secured their detail to his bureau for special operations. This regiment had what was called “personality.” Unlike most Union cavalry regiments it had never had to go through long periods of training simply to learn how to ride; its volunteers were already accomplished horsemen and owned their own horses and equipment. Hooker had put them to good use when he
commanded a division in an almost independent command on the Eastern Shore of Maryland earlier in the war. Always eager for intelligence, Hooker had called on the services of Lafayette Baker, who was glad to train the regiment in aspects of counterespionage. They responded with such enthusiasm that on one occasion they captured a Confederate sloop loading contraband supplies on the Chesapeake Bay, earning the title of “Hooker’s Horse Marines.”
²⁶

With a crack unit like the 3rd at his disposal, Colonel Carrington approved Cline’s suggestion to clean out Bowles’s nest. Now Bowles was safely in prison without the protection of habeas corpus, his band was dead or captured, and his farm no longer served as a locus of subversion. Morton was in a very good mood. Sharpe thought it a good time to hand him a letter from General Meade. He requested a promotion to captain for Cline. Morton read it and huffed. “Captain! He thinks I hand out captains’ commissions like candy. Why, sir,” he said with a slight twinkle in his eye, “those are scarce as hen’s teeth.” He paused, “But I have a surplus of commissions to major at hand. While Captain Cline is a pleasant alliteration, I think Major Cline would be far more useful to our cause.”

Sharpe had every reason to be as positive as Morton. He had set up his bureau successfully. McPhail was in Washington, assembling a staff. He had secured the detail of his “Horse Marines” for very special operations, and he had personally attended to the lancing of a festering boil in a state important to Lincoln for the sustenance of the war effort.

On the train the next morning he let his thoughts range in a stream of consciousness, which he had come to learn could be most useful at finding new perspectives. The Washington Arsenal came to mind, that complex of weapons munitions and storehouses and assembly factories on the southern tip of Washington where the Potomac and Eastern Branch rivers met. He had been intrigued by Lincoln’s references to the coffee mill gun, and a few inquiries had revealed that all fifty the President had encouraged McClellan to buy were there. He paid a visit and found them in a shed, all neatly lined up and oiled, and looking with their hoppers very much like the coffee mills that Lincoln had named them after.

He had put in a requisition for ten of them and had been turned down flat by Ripley. Sharpe had stormed into Ripley’s office. The old man had actually lied to his face that there were no coffee mill guns stored at the Arsenal. “I was there three days ago and saw them with my own eyes!”

Caught in a bold-faced lie, Ripley blamed an administrative oversight. Then finding another argument, he said, “But in any case, you are not authorized such weapons in your present capacity.”

Sharpe tossed away any pretense at courtesy. “Listen to me, you lying old fraud, I have the authority of the President of the United States, and I will not hesitate to use it to make sure you are issuing rations on a Sioux reservation in Minnesota by next week.” Ripley blinked and signed the authorization.

Sharpe issued them to his old regiment, the 120th NY, now safely a part of the garrison of Washington. He had raised this regiment in Ulster and Greene counties back home, and no colonel in the Army retained a more paternal concern. They had bled badly at Gettysburg but had earned a reputation for stubbornness. He was proud of them, but what was more useful at this time was that he knew they were reliable and returned his devotion. Though assigned officially to the garrison, they were considered to be at his disposal. He arranged for them to replace the military guard at the White House and to train with the coffee mill guns at one of the firing ranges. He could rely on their acting commander, Maj. John Tappen, to run a taut outfit. Tappen was a first-class fighting man and held the respect of the men. He and Sharpe had been company commanders together when they marched off to save the capital in the first days of the war in their old militia regiment, the 20th NY State Militia Regiment. It would take him a few more weeks to get the 20th swapped out with another regiment gone soft in the Washington forts. Sharpe was a man of strong and even sentimental loyalties, and these were strongest with the two regiments he had served with. In fact, when he raised the 120th, he deliberately chose that number to reflect the old 20th, even though that put the new regiment behind in seniority. Sharpe was a Hudson Valley man who trusted his Ulster and Greene County compatriots first and foremost.
²⁷

The train jolted and brought him back to the purpose of his visit in the West. There was far more to do. He had intended to visit Major Generals Grant and Rosecrans, who commanded the two major armies in the Western Theater; brief them on his organization; and set up the military intelligence staffs that he had created for the Army of the Potomac. Unforeseen events had intervened. Grant was in New Orleans, disabled by an accident in which the vicious horse he had been riding had fallen on him. Rosecrans was also unavailable. He was marching into battle.