Chapter X Destroyer “No. 1” Meets Her Fate
To Release Ping Sang—Trapped—“No. 1” Disabled—A Gallant Deed—Sinking—Poor “No. 1” Disappears
Mr. Glover’s Narrative is now continued
The three days after Captain Helston had been shot (his coxswain told me he probably would have been killed but for Dr. Fox) were most exciting. Then things calmed down and became rather monotonous. We were not allowed ashore after sunset, however. Captain Helston did not want anything to happen to us midshipmen, and that was a nuisance, for we missed any amount of fun—dances and things.
Our gun-room people played the Strong Arm’s gun-room at Socker in the Happy Valley, and knocked “the hide and hair” off them; and this was some consolation, for they had been rather uppish. We also had a picnic in the sailing pinnace to Deep Bay, which was jolly good fun, although we all got wet through coming back, and that ass Dumpling dropped the bread into the water whilst he was wading ashore with it.
I had been sent back to the Laird from “No. 3”, and Tommy Foote (Toddles) from “No. 1”, and on New Year’s eve we were having a bit of a jamberee in the gun-room—we had asked for half an hour’s extra lights—when Jeffreys, our Sub-Lieutenant, was sent for by the Commander.
We thought it was because of the row we were making, but he came back and told Tommy to get his things ready and stand by to go aboard “No. 1” at daybreak.
“No. 1” went off in the morning, but was back again in time for seven-bell tea. Tommy hadn’t much to tell. They’d run over to Macao, and Mr. Pattison, the Skipper, had given a letter to a Chinaman who had come alongside as soon as they anchored.
That was all, and nothing more happened for seven or eight days, whilst we had to grind at school, mathematics and torpedo theoretical rot and other things.
But then there were more rumours, and one day we heard that all Hopkins’s gear was being packed—you remember him, the Yankee secretary who had been under arrest ever since leaving Colombo—we often wondered why.
Tommy Foote was sent again to “No. 1”, and when next morning Mr. Pattison came aboard for final orders, he was evidently to take Hopkins with him.
You bet your life I was dead keen to go with Tommy and see the fun, for there was evidently something in the wind; so I asked Mr. Pattison to take me too. You see I had rather a pull over him, for he was very sweet on my cousin Milly; so he asked the Commander and off I went.
We steamed out through the West Channel, and Tommy and I thought we were bound to Macao again, but we were wrong, and it turned out that our destination was a small island about sixty miles away, at least I should think it was that distance, for we were doing about fifteen knots, and it took us four hours before we ran into a narrow little harbour between high cliffs, anchoring some ten cables from shore.
There wasn’t a sign of a living thing, and we waited and waited, whilst Mr. Pattison kept on looking at his watch. He told us then that we were going to exchange Hopkins for the old Chinese gentleman who had been kidnapped.
“Why! is Hopkins one of the pirates?” we both asked, somewhat disappointedly, for he was hardly our idea of a pirate, and we rather liked him, he was so amusing.
“I only knew it myself this morning,” Mr. Pattison told us.
Well, presently a sampan came wriggling out from behind a small headland, and when it arrived alongside there was a fat little man sitting in it gorgeously dressed.
I didn’t tell you that we had brought a man named A Tsi with us; but this man recognized him immediately as Ping Sang. The fat old chap climbed nimbly over the side and shook hands all round, so pleased was he to be safe again.
Hopkins was brought on deck, and apparently he and Ping Sang knew each other, though they only glared like two cats, and he climbed down into the sampan, Mr. Pattison taking no notice of him whatever.
However, Tommy and I stepped forward and shook him by the hand. I don’t quite know why, but expect it was because we wanted to say that we had shaken hands with a real pirate. He seemed quite pleased.
His bags and boxes were so numerous that the sampan had to make two trips, and this delayed us nearly an hour, Mr. Pattison fuming with impatience, and steam blowing off from the escape pipes.
Directly the sampan had shoved off with its last load, we weighed and secured the anchor and were off back to Hong-Kong.
We thought our work was over for the day, but were mightily mistaken, for as we came to the mouth of the harbour, there, to our dismay, steaming gently towards us, were the three Patagonian destroyers, and behind them a cruiser painted dark green from mast-head to water-line, very much like the Strong Arm, only not so big. And they were, all of them, between us and Hong-Kong.
I never felt so scared in my life. Tommy went as white as a sheet, and even Mr. Pattison turned a bit yellow.
He swore terribly and cursed them for treacherous hounds—it was just about the neatest trap you ever saw in your life—and ordered the helm hard a-port.
Round we went, clear of the harbour mouth, and heading south as if we were going to run away; but if the people in the Patagonians thought we were going to do so they were jolly well mistaken; it was only to get up full speed and clear to quarters, which we did in a brace of shakes, the men as keen as mustard.
Tommy had to go down on deck and take charge of the two for’ard 6-pounders, but Mr. Pattison ordered me to stay on the bridge with him. The helm was put hard a-starb’d, we swung round like a top, and headed straight for them.
The destroyers seemed at first to be making straight for us too, but almost immediately turned off to starboard and ran into the little harbour we had just left. The signalman sang out, as they showed their sides to us, that they had no guns aboard, so that explained their flight.
We were now rushing down on the cruiser, going at quite twenty knots, and wondered whether she would open fire. We were not long left in doubt, for we were not more than eight hundred yards from her when we saw two little spurts of flame from under her bows, and then more from her fore-top, and the little shells whistled past and burst in the sea behind us.
I know I ducked my head, and rather thought Mr. Pattison did so too.
Then we began firing from the 12-pounder on the bridge and from Tommy’s 6-pounders as fast as we could, and what with the noise of the guns going off so close to me and the whistling of the enemy’s shells, I felt quite dazed, and it was no use to bob or duck, because the air seemed full of them.
Mr. Pattison startled me to life again by sending me aft with a message to the Sub. As I ran down the ladder two holes suddenly appeared in the after funnel, and a cloud of smoke burst out with a roar close to the after steering-shield. I must confess I stopped running, absolutely in a funk, and my legs would hardly hold me up. It was only for a second, though, and I ran aft just as hard as I could. The shelter screen was all bent and twisted, and in front of it were two of the after 6-pounder gun’s crew lying on their faces, and blood was oozing from under them and running along the deck. I just managed to give the message to the Sub, who was bending over them, and then I was horribly sick.
I don’t remember how I got back to the bridge, but just as I did so—and now we were not a hundred yards from the cruiser—a shell burst on the fo’c’stle close to the port anchor, and pieces came tearing through the canvas screen round the bridge with a horrid shrieking noise. Looking down I saw that one of the securing chains had been smashed, and that the anchor was now half over the side, hanging by one small chain.
Mr. Pattison saw it too, and tumbled down to the fo’c’stle, shouting to me, “Keep her as she is, and run along her starboard side as close as you can go.”
I knew what he was going to do. If that last securing chain carried away, the anchor would go overboard, and even if the cable held at the stopper and did not run out, we might swerve right across the cruiser’s bows and be cut in half.
We were right up to her now, and through her bow-gun ports I could see the men round the small quick-firers, but the mere fact of having a job to do prevented me from feeling frightened. Another second and we were alongside her fo’c’stle, not twenty feet away, and their small guns fired point-blank at us as we rushed past her side. I remember dimly noticing Mr. Pattison lying on his stomach on the fo’c’stle lashing the anchor for dear life. My ears were ringing and painful, my head seemed to be splitting, but I had enough common sense left to see that the stern of the cruiser seemed to be swinging into us.
She must have put her helm over, and meant to crush us as her stern swung round.
I yelled to the quarter-master at the wheel to “hard a-starboard”, for she would be into us before we could clear her. I could just see his face as he stood on the steering platform below, and he heard me, but shook his head grimly and put the helm over to port. Our bows were already flying past her quarter-deck, and I saw at once that he was right and I was wrong, for our stern immediately began to swerve outwards.
It was a terrible moment, for she was swinging into us faster than we were swinging away from her.
She must strike us and I thought all was over, and gripped hold of the bridge rails, waiting for the bump.
Another second—there was a crash! We heeled right over to port till I saw the lee gunwale a-wash, and, oh horrors! the two men lying on the deck aft slipped overboard with shrieks of agony and fear. I saw our stern crumple like tissue-paper. We grated along, separated, righted ourselves, and were flying away.
Mr. Pattison jumped up to the bridge, yelling to “’midships the helm”, but it would not move, and was jammed hard over.
All the men aft had been knocked off their feet, and I saw them scrambling up again as Mr. Pattison rushed aft, and all crowded round the crumpled stern.
We were now steaming in a circle, and our broadside was exposed to the cruiser, which commenced firing very rapidly again.
Then I saw the men aft jump clear of the rudder chain, the rudder swung amidships, and, thank God! we darted away; but something must have happened to the engines, for we were not going nearly so fast.
This has taken a long time to write, but probably did not last fifty seconds. It seemed a lifetime.
Directly we were clear Mr. Pattison came for’ard and took charge.
They had unshackled the steering chain, he told me, and the rudder had swung amidships. The starboard propeller had been smashed in the collision, and, with only the port screw working and the helm almost useless, we struggled along in a very erratic manner, our bows now going round to starboard and now falling off to port.
Shells were shrieking all round us, but going wild, probably because we were swerving so much from side to side.
To avoid exposing the men, Mr. Pattison ordered all those on deck to take shelter under the fo’c’stle, leaving only himself on the bridge and the quarter-master at the wheel.
I was sent with the necessary orders, and for the first time noticed Ping Sang and A Tsi standing on deck near the for’ard torpedo-tube quite unconcerned; but I hustled them for’ard, and everybody, even the Sub, Tommy, and I, had to crowd down below, and did not see what happened during the next five minutes, though they were evidently making better shooting, for we heard several small explosions where shells must have struck.
All at once there was a muffled roar and the hissing noise of escaping steam.
We three jumped on deck and saw a great hole in the deck near the base of the foremost funnel, and clouds of steam and smoke pouring from it.
We opened the manhole cover to the for’ard boiler compartment, more steam and smoke came swishing out, and in the middle of it crawled out a stoker, with his face and arms terribly scalded. He just managed to pull himself out, and, yelling with pain, would have thrown himself overboard, had not the Sub caught him and hurled him to the deck, where he lay writhing and shrieking.
Tommy and I peered through the manhole to see if anyone else was alive, but the Sub shoved us aside, and, with a heaving-line lashed round him, and holding an old oilskin in front of his face, crawled down. His name was Harrington—I must tell you it, because this was the pluckiest thing Tommy and I ever saw.
We took charge of the heaving-line, and he half-stumbled or was half-lowered down into the steam.
When he got down the ladder and put his feet into the water we could hear swishing about, he gave a great cry of pain—it must have been nearly boiling—but he did not hesitate, and we could dimly see him groping about on the bottom plates, and could also see that the water was rapidly rising, and was quickly over his knees.
He called out in a squeaky voice for another rope, and lashed it to something, which we two and some men who came to help hoisted up.
It was another of the stokers, but such a sight as I shall never forget. He was quite dead, and half the flesh was torn from one shoulder and from one side of the face.
As we hauled him on deck his skin seemed to come away with his clothes wherever we touched him.
Oh, it was a most fearful sight!
Tommy and I were roughly pushed away by an old petty officer, and the body was covered with a tarpaulin.
We could not keep our eyes off that heap, and should have fainted in another second had not Harrington himself appeared out of the manhole with his face just like beef and bleeding, and his hands like turkeys’ claws.
He fell down on the deck, and as I knelt down he said in a hoarse whisper; “My feet, my feet! For God’s sake undo my boots!”
We unlaced them, and oh, the terrible pain it was to him to take them off! and though we cut his socks with a knife, the skin all came off with them. He had fainted by that time.
Then I heard Mr. Pattison’s voice, and Tommy rushed aft and brought some brandy and a pillow, and we propped his head up and poured a little brandy down his throat, though it was difficult to do it, because his tongue was so swollen.
They covered him with a blanket, but he was a huge man, and his two raw feet stuck out at the end. I shall never forget them.
All this terrible time I had noticed nothing else, but now, looking over the side, I saw that the destroyer was only going very slowly, and that there was a big hole at the water-line, where that last shell had come aboard, and water was pouring in.
No shells seemed to be coming our way now, and looking towards the island I saw the cruiser steaming away from us without firing, and, hurrah! hurrah! two great splashes of water leapt up, one after the other, close to her stern, and boom! boom! came the reports of heavy guns from the north.
“Hurrah! hurrah!” shouted Tommy, “there’s the Strong Arm.”
You can imagine what a relief it was and what we felt.
We yelled and shouted like mad things, and even Harrington had strength enough to raise his head and wave his arm, though he could not make as much noise as a mouse.
It was indeed the Strong Arm firing her foremost guns, and making a great bow wave as she steamed towards us.
“Out collision mat!” shouted Mr. Pattison, and the order was yelled down the fo’c’stle and everyone came rushing out, got a line round the destroyer’s bottom, made it fast to the collision mat, and hauled it over the great rent in the side.
It took three or four minutes to do this, and by that time the deck seemed quite close to the water, and the stern seemed even lower. The Strong Arm was now drawing up rapidly.
Then I was sent with a couple of men to screw down the hatch covers leading to Mr. Pattison’s cabin and the ward-room, and by the time we had done it the deck was a-wash.
The starboard engine had stopped by now, and we lay wallowing with a horrid log-like jerky motion whilst the men tried to get a tarpaulin over the hole in the stern, but did not seem to do any good.
The boats were next got into the water. They were full of holes, but by stuffing their jumpers into the shot holes in the whaler and by bailing hard, they just managed to keep her afloat. The collapsable Berthon boats were quite useless, being pierced in half a dozen places, and the dinghy was smashed to smithereens.
There was only the whaler for fifty men. This meant that most of us would have to take our chance of hanging on to an oar or wooden grating till the Strong Arm could pick us up.
By the time we had lowered Mr. Harrington (the Sub) and the scalded stokers into the whaler our stern was quite under the water, and we were heeling over to starboard, till fittings, not secured to the deck, began sliding down, and the sea came over the foot of our deck stanchions. We could actually feel poor old “No. 1” sinking under us—a horrid sensation.
“Scramble on deck, boys! All up from below!” was shouted down the engine-room and stokehold hatches, and everybody began taking off their boots and jumpers.
This gave me a very creepy feeling.
Steam was roaring out of the escape-pipe, and we all anxiously looked first at Mr. Pattison, expecting him to give the order to jump, and then towards the Strong Arm, wishing she would come along faster.
Mr. Pattison was hanging on to the bridge rails—the bridge had a tremendous slant—to keep himself upright, and the signalman hoisted a signal that we were sinking.
The Strong Arm came rushing up, firing fast from her bow guns, and for one horrid second I thought she would not see our signal in the excitement of chasing the cruiser.
Tommy and I were hanging on to the torpedo-tube aft with our feet in water, and I heard him gasp, with a very white face, “She’s going on”; but a moment later we saw her boats’ crews clambering over the nettings into their boats, and raised a mighty cheer of relief as she slowed down abreast of us. Her boats were lowered with a run and a splash, and came pulling over to us as hard as men could pull, and as they arrived alongside our men were ordered to scramble on board them.
We had a row as to who should jump first, for Tommy said that he belonged to the destroyer and I was only a passenger, so that he ought to be the last to leave; but I said that as I was senior to him—I was two places above him passing out of the Britannia—it was my duty to see him get into the boat first.
We had to cling to the torpedo-tube to argue it out, for the deck was now so steep we couldn’t stand on it.
“Get into the boats you young idiots!” shouted Mr. Pattison. “Why are you keeping the boats waiting, you lop-eared sons of Ham?”
So we settled the matter by both jumping at the same time. I was jolly glad that I did not let him have his own way.
Just as we had all shoved off, Mr. Pattison being the test to leave, we heard a cracking noise—a bulk-head must have given way—“No. 1” almost righted herself—her bows came out of water and pointed higher and higher, till they were almost upright. There she stayed while you could have counted fifteen or sixteen, and then slowly slipped down out of sight.
There was just a little swish as the sea rushed in to cover her, two of her capstan bars came shooting out of the water, and poor old “No. 1” had disappeared. I felt rather snuffy, and I knew Tommy did too. We soon were aboard the Strong Arm, and down in the gun-room they all crowded round and asked questions. It was not till then that I discovered that my cap was missing, and found too that my hair was all matted together with blood.
Tommy searched and found a cut about an inch long, and felt rather annoyed, I think, that he himself hadn’t anything to show.
You can imagine I felt jolly proud to have been wounded, though it did rather take the gilt off the ginger-bread not to have known it at the time. It was probably a piece of the shell that smashed the anchor-securing chain.
It must have delayed the Strong Arm nearly an hour, to stop her engines alongside “No. 1” and to get all of us aboard, and by that time the pirate cruiser was only a cloud of black smoke on the horizon, with the three little destroyers which had again come out of the bay steaming after her at full speed.