The Power and the Glory (7 page)

“All hands, ready about! Stations for stays!” Wadsworth shouted the orders to eight crewmen on deck who were standing by to tack. High above, on footropes beneath the single yardarm, four other sailors had clawed in the topsail and lashed it to its spar.

“Ready! . . . Ready! . . . Helm's a-lee!” Wadsworth shouted the signal to let fly the head sheets. Smoothly, deliberately,
Elizabeth'
s bow swung into the wind.

“Haul taut! Mind the boom!”

With the sloop momentarily in stays, and with her three foresails and mainsail jouncing about in the lighter breeze close to a lee shore, sailors in the bow secured the foresail sheets to larboard as others amidships heaved on the mainsheets and boom to force the gaff-topsail up into the wind, using that wide spread of canvas like a giant weathervane to help coax the sloop's bow off the wind to leeward. In an admirable span of time
Elizabeth
lay on a comfortable starboard tack, her stout cutwater knifing through the bay's light chop.

“I'm going below, Mr. Wadsworth,” Richard said to his mate. “Please inform me when you have Baltimore in sight.”

“Aye, Captain,” Wadsworth replied. “It won't be long now.”

 

FROM A DISTANCE Baltimore appeared not unlike Boston, although its population of 20,000 was smaller. Structures of various sizes—made
mostly of wood with deeply canted, shingled rooftops, but a few, those of the wealthy, of imported red brick—held sway along a complex of narrow, intersecting cobblestone streets rising up from the waterfront atop small hills under the dominion of a much larger hill to the south. As in Boston, water dominated the visual senses of those arriving by boat: the sparkling blue of the great bay, an inner harbor affording excellent anchorage, the many rivers and streams. The broad and deep Patapsco provided a waterway through the heart of Baltimore much as the Charles did in Boston, while myriad other waterways meandered among the wheat fields and pastures and orchards to the north and south. These swift-flowing streams drained the Tidewater and powered the local millstones that in earlier years had provided the wherewithal to feed General Washington's army. Also as in Boston, white church steeples dominated within the city limits and long stone warehouses lined the quays. The latter stored the local produce of farmers and millers and fishermen that would either be sold outright at nearby Lexington Market, an area of retail commerce not unlike Faneuil Hall in Boston, or shipped off to some other port.

The city formed an imposing panorama, but that was not what commanded Richard's attention as
Elizabeth
coasted inward from the outer reaches of Baltimore Harbor under mainsail and jib. He focused his glass instead on an area he estimated to be a mile downriver and to the east of Baltimore proper, down to where the Patapsco joined forces with a smaller river—Harris Creek, he recalled from Truxtun's correspondence. There, across a narrow span of water from what the chart identified as Whetstone Point, secured broadside to him alongside a sturdy wooden structure providing dockage for the David Stodder Shipyard visible in the immediate background, lay USS
Constellation
.

“Bring her fifty feet off her beam, Mr. Wadsworth,” he said, the calm in his voice belying his inner excitement. “See that schooner there under sail? We'll drop anchor where she is now.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Richard again lifted the glass to his eye. He saw no activity on board the frigate, though he could hear the distant rasp of saws, the ringing of hammers and caulking mallets, the pounding of iron on anvils—sounds emanating either from on board the ship or beyond in the shipyard, he couldn't tell which. He placed the glass back in its becket by the binnacle and walked forward, his senses stirred by the very sight of her.

She was far from sea-ready. Only two of her three masts had been
stepped, and those just the lower ones on her mizzen and mainmast: two black spars rising up aft and amidships, bereft of yards or rigging or topmasts or shrouds. Forward of the mainmast was blank space: nothing to see there beyond a rounded iron smokestack jutting up over the bulwarks like a crooked black finger pointing forward. Nor had the jib boom been adjoined to the bowsprit. One day the stubby thumb jutting out from the ship's stem would be a long, thin, graceful arm pointing skyward at a forty-five-degree angle. The fact that the bowsprit shrouds and bobstays were in place suggested that day might come soon.

As
Elizabeth
came abeam of
Constellation
, Richard's gaze swept down the frigate's entire length. She was painted black except for a broad white stripe running along her gun-port strake. Her rounded bow boasted a fine sweep, her stern a jaunty undercut. But what impressed Richard most was her sheer size. She was a fifth rate, a frigate, but really she was a hybrid between a traditionally built Royal Navy frigate and a ship of the line. Except that this ship, just as he had observed on
Constitution
in Boston, had a flush deck: no raised quarterdeck, no forecastle, no substantial deck structure of any kind marred the perfection of her lines.

His view was temporarily lost as
Elizabeth
swung into the wind. His own ship's single quadrilateral sail began to dance about as she came to a virtual stop in the face of the gentle breeze.

“Away anchor!” Wadsworth shouted. In short order, both jib and mainsail were doused and furled to their booms and the sloop was bobbing at her ease upon the sun-jeweled water of the Chesapeake.

“Shall I lower away your gig, sir?”

“Yes, do, Mr. Wadsworth. I'm going below. You may arrange shore leave for the men in two shifts. Later today I plan to have my first look around town. You're welcome to join me if you're so inclined.”

“I'd be delighted, Mr. Cutler. Thank you.”

When Richard reemerged on deck, he looked every bit the prosperous merchant in buff-colored knee-length trousers, stockings, and waistcoat, and a pure white cotton shirt and linen neck stock. The pale green sea coat he wore over this ensemble added an extra layer of warmth against the morning chill, and a black ribbon kept his shoulder-length blond hair tidy under a beaver-felt tricorne hat. Without fanfare he climbed down a boarding ladder into the waiting gig and took position on the after thwart. Two oarsmen on the starboard side eased off from
the sloop's hull as the two on the larboard side backed oars to turn the gig about.

“Good luck, Mr. Cutler,” a crewman named Avery called out from the sloop. His hail was taken up by others.

Richard shifted in the stern sheets to turn his head aft. “Thank you, lads,” he called back. He raised his hat high in salute, then brought his gaze back to the ship lying directly ahead, made even more majestic by his perspective at sea level. She now seemed the mightiest of sea creatures contemplating with disinterest the tiniest of water bugs.

The gig coasted in aft of
Constellation
, toward a ladder leading up from the waterline to the wooden platform. As Richard clambered up the ladder, he glanced over at the plain glass windows on the frigate's stern. He saw no ornately carved balconies or large tortoiseshell glass windows as he had seen on many European men-of-war and on
Bonhomme Richard
. This frigate, he mused, was not built to coddle her officers.

When he reached the top rung of the ladder, he cupped a hand at his mouth. “Shove off, lads,” he shouted down to the gig. “I'll find my way back or signal to be picked up.”

No one was there to greet Richard. Nor did anyone pay him much attention as he slowly strolled along the quay beside the frigate. He could hear activity on board her and saw plenty of it in the vast shipyard beyond, with its clusters of mast and boat sheds, joiner's and blacksmith's shops, lofts housing sawyers, sail-makers, coopers, rope-makers, woodcarvers, and glaziers. Closer to him, not far from where he was at the moment, he noted several of the ship's spars submerged in a shallow, man-made pond, being properly seasoned before they were hoisted on board ship and stepped into place. He noted, too, the line of square gun ports cut out of her hull, the ports themselves raised up on their tricing tackle to allow free flow of air across the gun deck. That the square holes were void of black muzzles came as no surprise to him. He knew of only two foundries capable of manufacturing naval cannon within the sixteen states that now constituted the United States.

Unchallenged at the entry port, Richard walked up
Constellation'
s long gangway and stepped onto her weather deck. There he found a tall, stocky man dressed casually in olive-colored breeches, silver-buckled shoes, and a heavy knitted jersey. His back to Richard, he was talking in animated tones to two others, shipyard workers, presumably, and judging by the way he kept jabbing his finger at them, he was none too pleased with whatever it was they were discussing. Richard held
back until the two men had been summarily dismissed and the older man wheeled around with a look of disgust.

“Excuse me, sir,” Richard said, approaching him. “Can you tell me if Captain Truxtun is on board? And if so, where I might find him?”

The man stopped short and regarded Richard with a wary eye. “Who inquires?”

“My name is Richard Cutler, sir. I have come to Baltimore from Boston at Captain Truxtun's request.”

The man's stern facial features relaxed into a smile. “By Jove! Is that your sloop out there?” He pointed at
Elizabeth
riding at anchor fifty feet away.”

“She is, sir.”

“Well damme, Mr. Cutler,” the man exclaimed, “that was handsomely done, the way you brought her in. I have always maintained that seamanship is best demonstrated by the way a vessel is brought to or from her anchorage. You, sir, measured up.” He stressed those last four words as if they bestowed the highest possible praise for a sea captain.

“Thank you, sir. I am fortunate to have a good crew.”

The smile disappeared. “Fortunate? I think not, sir. Fortune has little to do with shaping a ship's crew. I maintain that a ship should be judged not by her crew but by her officers, who make her crew what it is—or is not—and whose first duty is to inspire confidence of leadership among the crew. Do you not agree?”

“I cannot disagree,” Richard said, puzzled by this turn of conversation. Then, with a flash of awareness, he said, “May I presume, sir, that
you
are Captain Truxtun?”

The man offered Richard his hand. “You may, Mr. Cutler, you may. Welcome on board.”

Richard felt the firm grip. “I apologize for being so casual, Captain. I did not recognize your rank.”

“I did not find you casual, Mr. Cutler; nor could you have possibly recognized my rank in this garb. I assure you I
do
have a proper uniform, which is about all I have as captain of this ship. Why it takes so damnably long to get anything done around here is utterly beyond me. Here I am, appointed master and building superintendent of
Constellation
, and I can do nothing, absolutely nothing, to hurry things along. I got more done a damned sight more quickly when I was a privateer captain, I can assure you of that. McHenry wants this ship ready for sea come March. March? Ha! What a lark! Our secretary of war has a keen sense of humor, wouldn't you say, Mr. Cutler, from what you
have observed here on deck?” Truxtun's sweeping gesture encompassed the ship from bow to stern. “And among the things you
won't
find anywhere on board is her crew. That's because we don't yet have a crew. Though it shouldn't take long to man and employ this ship once we set about recruiting.”

“I understand your frustration, Captain,” Richard said. “If it's any consolation, what you just described applies equally to
Constitution
. It took the Hartt Shipyard I don't recall how many months just to get southern oak for her planking and frame. And her masts have yet to be floated down from Maine.”

“So I've heard,” Truxtun said, the anger in his voice easing. He shook his head as he added, “That southern oak had damned well better prove its worth. We've spent a king's ransom in time lost harvesting it. Not to mention lives lost to malaria in those stinking Georgia swamps. Horrible way to die, shivering and sweating and lying there helpless in your own vomit and shit.”

“Yes sir,” Richard said, because there was nothing else to say. Several awkward moments ticked by.

“Well, Mr. Cutler,” Truxtun said, “enough of that depressing talk. What say you and I tour this ship? It won't be a long tour, I assure you. There's not much to see yet.” He beckoned over a carpenter's mate plying his trade by the capstan abaft the mainmast. “Be a good lad,” he said to the disheveled young fellow freckled in sawdust and smelling of it, “and send word to Mr. Sterrett. I believe you know him. I noticed you two talking together yesterday.”

The lad nodded eagerly. “It's as ye say, Cap'm. I do know Mr. Sterrett. He lives up yonder off Philpot Street. He goes to worship service at the Methodist Meetin' House, same as me.”

“Well that's fine, just fine. I'd be much obliged if you'd tell him that his captain requests his presence on board ship. You may advise him that Mr. Cutler has arrived from Boston. This is for your trouble.” He pressed a silver coin into the young man's palm.

The lad brightened at the sight of the coin. “Thank ye kindly, Cap'm. I'll be back with Mr. Sterrett quick as kiss me hand, or my name ain't Thad Joe Wilkins.”

“Who is Mr. Sterrett?” Richard inquired as the lad raced away. He and Truxtun began walking forward toward the main hatchway, a large rectangular hole amidships. That hatchway by itself defined a major difference between British and American naval architecture. On board every Royal Navy frigate of Richard's acquaintance, the weather
deck remained open to the gun deck below, save for a narrow gangway running along each side of the ship that connected the forecastle to the quarterdeck. On
Constellation
, the deck was flush from stem to stern, the only open access belowdecks afforded by the rectangular hatchway. The rest of the spar deck was heavily planked, save for a much smaller hatchway forward and another one aft, before what appeared to be a skylight cut in abaft the mizzenmast to provide light and ventilation for the captain's cabin.