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Training artillerymen had not been as easy. But there were farm boys who knew about horse handling and harnessing, and they had fleshed out the ranks. A hard core of Irish-American gu
This had been done. Before going out to attend parade, General Meagher stood in the doorway of his tent and watched the men drilling in the endless rain. They persevered. Nearby a company was erecting new tents; one of the tents, sodden with water, collapsed on the soldiers working below it. They emerged dripping — and laughing at their misfortune. Morale was fine. Soon these men would be tested in battle. General Sherman, the General of the Armies, had sent word by the weekly packet to Galway that he and General Robert E. Lee would be arriving in Ireland very soon, directly by warship to Dublin. Sherman would explain what was needed. Meagher remembered clearly what he had said at their last meeting in the War Department in Washington City, some months ago.
“You must build me an army, Francis, one that will fight and follow where you lead. If war does come, why, yours will be the most vital role in guaranteeing our victory. You will be joined by American forces, but your men must be ready to fight as well. You will have losses, that ca
They will be ready, Meagher thought, nodding his head. They will be ready.
The storm was clearing, dark clouds racing by overhead. The sun broke through to the south, sending a sudden shaft of gold to illuminate the landscape. An omen, he thought. A good omen indeed.
Blown across England by the prevailing westerly wind, the storm that had lashed Ireland had now reached the English Cha
There were a few sideways glances from some of the men drinking there, but no real interest. Strangers were common here at the dockside.
“Beer,” he said to the landlord when he walked over to serve him.
“Pint? Half-pint?”
“Big vun.”
“A pint it is, then.”
Foreign sailors were no novelty here. The landlord put the glass down and pulled some pe
“I look for pilot,” he said in a guttural voice, in thickly accented English.
“You’ve come to the right place, my old son,” the landlord said, putting a polish onto a glass. “That’s Trinity House just a few yards away. All the pilots you want in there.”
“Pilots here?”
“My best customers. That table against the wall, pilots to the man.”
Without another word, the newcomer took up his glass and clumped across to the indicated table. The men there looked up, startled, when he pulled up a chair and dropped into it.
“Pilots?” he said.
“None of your bleeding business,” Fred Sweet said. He had been drinking since early morning and was very much the worse for wear. He started to rise, but the man seated next to him pulled him back down.
“Try next door. Trinity House. All you want there,” he said quietly. The newcomer turned to him.
“Want pilot name of Lars Nielsen. He my brodersøn, what you say… nephew.”
“By george — it looks like our friend here is related to old Lars. Always thought he was too mean to have any family.”
“Took a collier to London yesterday,” one of the other drinkers said. “Depending on what he gets coming back, he could be here at any time now.”
“Lars — he here?” the big stranger asked.
After many repetitions he finally understood what was happening. “I vait,” he said, pushing back from the table and returning to the bar. He was not particularly missed by the pilots.
The handful of change on the bar was much smaller by many pints by late afternoon. Lars’s uncle drank slowly and steadily, and patiently, only looking up when a newcomer entered the bar. It was growing dark when a gray-bearded man stumped in, his wooden leg thudding on the floorboards. A ragged cheer went up from the pilots in the room.
“You got company, Lars,” someone shouted.
“Your family wants the money back you stole when you left Denmark!”
“He is as ugly as you are — you must be related.”
Lars cursed them out loudly and savagely and stomped his way to the bar. The bearded man turned to look at him.
“What you staring at?” Lars shouted at him.
“Jeg er deres onkel, Lars,” the man said quietly.
“I never saw you before in my life,” Lars shouted in Danish, looking the other man up and down. “And you sound like you’re from København — not Jylland. My family are all Jysk.”
“I want to talk to you, Lars — about money. Lots of money that could be yours.”
“Who are you?” Lars said suspiciously. “How do you know me?”
“I know about you. You’re a Danish sailor who has been a pilot here for ten years. Is that correct?”
“Ja,” Lars muttered. He looked around the barroom, but no one was paying them any attention now that they were speaking Danish.
“Good. Now I will buy you a beer and we will snakker like old friends. Lots of money, Lars, and a trip back to Aarhus as well.”
They talked quietly after that, their heads close together over the beer-stained table. Whatever was said pleased Lars so much that his face cracked into an unaccustomed smile. They ordered some food, a large quantity of meat, potatoes, and bread, which they consumed completely. When they had finished, they left together.
The next day Lars Nielsen did not report for duty at Trinity House. Then the word got out that he had told the landlord at the pub that he had come into an inheritance and was going back to Denmark.
No one missed him in the slightest.
LET BATTLE BEGIN
In ones and twos the big ships had come from America, convoyed the entire way by United States armorclads. The transports were many and varied, a few of them even wooden sailing ships that had been fitted out with steam engines. Some of these converted ships had limited bunker space, so all of the convoys made a stop at St. John’s, Newfoundland. The seaport there was empty now of any British ships; the locals gave the Americans a warm welcome. After this landfall, the convoys had sailed far to the north in the hope of avoiding British patrols; this plan had succeeded. Only a single British warship had been encountered, which fled the field at the sight of the bigger warships. Their route took them north, almost to Iceland, before they turned south to the rendezvous in Galway. When the arriving ships had unloaded their cargo, mostly munitions, to go by train to Dublin, the now empty ships had moved out to anchorage in Galway Bay. By late spring the bay was dark with ships, more than had ever been seen there before. They stayed peacefully at anchor, awaiting their orders.
These were not long in coming. USS Avenger herself, the victor of the Battle of the Potomac, brought the final commands. One morning she steamed majestically up the bay to dock at Galway City. Avenger was now commanded by the veteran Captain Schofield, since the aging Commodore Goldsborough had taken his long-deserved retirement. She also had a new first lieutenant, a Russian of all things, a Count Korzhenevski, who had actually gone to the British Naval Academy. Schofield’s first suspicions of this unusual arrangement soon gave way to appreciation, for the Count was a willing and able officer.