Sea Fever: The True Adventures That Inspired Our Greatest Maritime Authors, From Conrad to Masefield, Melville and Hemingway by Sam Jefferson

Author:Sam Jefferson [Jefferson, Sam]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: Nonfiction, Sea Stories, History
ISBN: 9781472908827
Publisher: Adlard Coles
Published: 2015-03-12T00:00:00+00:00

So the ship was saved and Marryat’s bravery was once more displayed to all. In 1812 he was sent home from America in order to sit his examination for commission as lieutenant. In January of the following year he was appointed second lieutenant aboard HMS Espiegle, commanded by Captain Taylor and bound for the Americas. Marryat made haste from his father’s home to Spithead, where he observed his new ship ‘a most beautiful vessel. She mounted 18 guns, and sat on the water like a duck’. It was a proud moment for Marryat; the reward for many years of danger and hardship, but his elation was to be short lived. Even as he surveyed his new vessel he noted with surprise that she flew a pennant signifying that punishment was being carried out aboard. On alighting her deck, he found that one of her crewmembers was receiving an extremely severe flogging for what he discovered was a minor offence, and he eyed Captain Taylor with concern. His worries proved to be well founded, for the skipper soon proved himself a crass, uncouth bully and tyrant. What must have grated most with Marryat was that he was a coward, as demonstrated shortly after arrival on the opposite side of the Atlantic, when Taylor, through a mixture of bad seamanship and indolence, completely failed to catch the USS Hornet, a sloop of war which attacked and sank the HMS Peacock within sight of the Espiegle. Taylor was ashore at the time and delayed his departure to such an extent that he seemed to deliberately allow the Hornet to escape. When the Espiegle finally started out in apparent pursuit of the Hornet, it was soon clear that the course set meant the two vessels were actually slowly diverging away from each other. On this occasion, Marryat felt he had to speak up and asked Taylor if he should consider changing course; he was told in no uncertain terms to hold his tongue.

Shortly after this, Marryat again found himself in the drink rescuing another hapless colleague who had fallen in the water. Unfortunately for Marryat, the Espiegle was moving at pace when the incident happened and Captain Taylor handled her clumsily in his reluctant efforts to retrieve both crewmember and second lieutenant. By the time a boat arrived, Marryat had been compelled to let the drowning seaman slip from his grasp and was all but finished himself, having resigned himself to death when he was fished out. Shortly after the Espiegle’s arrival in Barbados, Marryat was invalided out of the ship after bursting two blood vessels in his lungs. This was doubtless a result of the overexertions he had endured during his failed rescue attempt, but it did at least mean he escaped from the tyranny and incompetence of Captain Taylor. Marryat was doubtless delighted when, shortly after his departure, Taylor was court martialled and dismissed due to his brutal treatment of his crew and the complete failure of his half-hearted pursuit of the Hornet.

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