The captain came to me, and taking me by the hand was so affected that he was scarcely able to speak. “Archer, I am happy beyond expression, to see you on shore but look at our poor Phoenix.” I turned about but could not say a single word; my mind had been too intensely occupied before; but everything now rushed upon me at once, so that I could not contain myself, and I indulged for a full quarter of an hour in tears.
The resourceful bluejackets first entrenched themselves and saved what arms they could find in the ship, for this was no friendly and hospitable coast. They were on Spanish soil, and it was not their desire to be marched off to the dungeons of Havana as prisoners of war. Tents and huts were speedily contrived, provisions rafted from the wreck, fires built, fish caught, and the camp was a going concern in two or three days. Archer proposed that the handy carpenters mend one of the boats and that he pick a crew to sail to Jamaica and find rescue. This was promptly done and he says:
In two days she was ready and I embarked with four volunteers and a fortnight’s provisions, hoisted English colors as we put off from the shore and received three cheers from the lads left behind, having not the least doubt that, with God’s assistance, we should come and bring them all off. Had a very squally night and a very leaky boat so as to keep two buckets constantly baling. Steered her myself the whole night by the stars and in the morning saw the coast of Jamaica distant twelve leagues. At eight in the evening arrived at Montego Bay.
This dashing lieutenant was not one to let the grass grow under his feet, and he sent a messenger to the British admiral, another to the man-of-war, Porcupine, and hustled off to find vessels on his own account. All the frigates of the station were at sea, but Archer commandeered three fishing craft and a little trading brig and put to sea with his squadron. Four days after he had left his shipwrecked comrades he was back again, and they hoisted him upon their shoulders and so lugged him up to Sir Hyde Parker’s tent as the hero of the occasion. The Porcupine arrived a little later, so there was plenty of help for the marooned British tars. Two hundred and fifty of them were carried to Jamaica. Of the others “some had died of the wounds they received in getting on shore, some of drinking rum, and a few had straggled off into the country.”
Lieutenant Archer was officially commended for the part he had played, and was promoted to command the frigate Tobago after a few months of duty on the admiral’s staff. You will like to hear, I am sure, how he wound up the long letter home which contained the story of the last cruise of the Phoenix.
I must now begin to leave off, else my letter will lose its passage, which I should not like, after being ten days at different times writing it, beating up with a convoy to the northward, which is a reason that this epistle will never read well, for I never sat down with a proper disposition to go on with it. But as I knew something of the kind would please you, I was resolved to finish it; yet it will not bear an overhaul, so don’t expose your son’s nonsense. You must promise that should any one see it beside yourself, they must put this construction on it—that it was originally intended for the eyes of a mother only—as upon that supposition my feelings may be tolerated. You will also meet with a number of sea terms which if you do not understand, why, I cannot help you, as I am unable to give a sea description in any other words. I remain His Majesty’s most true and faithful servant and my dear mother’s most dutiful son.
CHAPTER X
THE ROARING DAYS OF PIRACY
In Bristowe I left Poll ashore,
Well stocked wi’ togs an’ gold,
And off I goes to sea for more,