But Evans had the experience his ship did not. An 1863 graduate of Annapolis, he had been wounded late in the Civil War, at Fort Fisher. His previous commands included the armored cruiser New York and the battleships Indiana and Iowa. TheIowa was his during the battle of Santiago. Had the Spanish war lasted longer, there was talk of giving him a cruiser squadron to send against the mainland of Spain. The Alabama was not supposed to have been his, but the sudden illness of Captain Brownson had given him an unexpected opportunity for independent command, and he had relished it.
A powerfully built man, Evans was clean shaven in a time of beards and bushy mustaches, and he parted his thinning brown hair directly down the middle. With his strong demeanor and colorful vocabulary, he could intimidate as well as charm. He liked everything about his navy except his small marine contingent. He considered them useless mouths on his ship and quietly urged that the Marine Corps be abolished. In his midforties, he was considered a man with a future.
At Guantanamo they had received a coded message directing theAlabama to the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. So totally unexpected was this order that Evans had it decoded several times before accepting it as true. Canadian waters? He had hoped someone knew just what the hell they were up to.
He hadn’t planned to be anywhere near Saint Augustine, but one of his crewmen had been badly hurt in a gun-loading accident and needed help that was well beyond the scope of his medical officers. Besides, Evans had rationalized, it would be a grand opportunity to pick up some additional supplies and the latest news of the war. Perhaps someone would cancel the puzzling orders to make for Canada.
And now they heard the sound of guns. His crew had been bending and peering over their weapons for what seemed an eternity while lookouts tried to make visual sense of what they were hearing.
“Mr. Lansing, anything?”
Heavy guns could only mean the presence of the Germans. Yet in what strength? Was the Alabama being led to a slaughter? Running away was anathema to Evans, but so was running aground. Thus they prudently kept their speed agonizingly slow.
“Captain, the lookouts say they can now see the horizon.”
Evans smiled thinly. “Well, that confirms we are still on this earth!”
There were a few forced chuckles. The captain had made a joke. When Capt. Robley Dunglison Evans made a joke, regardless of the circumstances, you laughed. The lookouts in their cramped platforms above had the best view. There was a school of thought that held that the captain belonged up there as well, but Evans disagreed. Although the view might be somewhat better, the command apparatus was here, on the navigating bridge, twenty feet below, where half a dozen officers and men were jammed into the little lookout post.
Ship-to-ship communication was either by semaphore or Morse flashes, or even the new wireless, but messages were sent throughout the ship by different means. First, there were speaking tubes, which became useless when several people tried to speak at the same time, or when it was windy and the air distorted the sound. Second, there were the recently installed electric telephones, but their signals were weak, scratchy, and often overwhelmed by the sound of the guns. That is, when they worked at all. That left the tried and true means of sending messengers or shouting out commands and hoping they were heard. A wise captain used all means and hoped the men understood exactly what they were supposed to be doing.
“Sir, the lookouts can make out two, no, make that three ships off our starboard side. They, damnit, they are firing into the town!”
Evans pondered. “Are we making much smoke?” Like all major warships, theAlabama burned coal, and the finger of black smoke usually pointed skyward, giving away her presence long before she could actually be seen.
“No, sir. Very little.” The mist was also doing them a favor by keeping the smoke down on the ship and not letting it rise to the sky.
“And what do the lookouts make them out to be?”
“They say cruisers. One heavy and two smaller and all in line, Captain.”
“Very well. Maintain speed and steer in the direction of the enemy ships. Let the lookouts guide us. I mean to run down that line.”
Evans stood tensely by his chair and drummed his hand on the armrest. Three cruisers. The Alabama had a primary battery of four 13-inch guns in two turrets of two guns each, one forward and one aft. There was a secondary battery of fourteen 6-inch guns in single mounts, with seven on each side of the ship. From what he recalled reading of German cruisers, no one of them could be a match for the Alabama. But three of them? The challenge was exciting. If fate smiled, he could wipe out an entire German squadron.
He straightened up. By God, the mist was clearing! He could see the dim shapes of the enemy. “What range?”
“Four thousand yards and closing. Sir, they are coming toward us at very slow speed. They may even have stopped. The heavy cruiser is closest.”
Stopped? Not damn likely, thought Evans, but without anyone to prevent them from shelling the town, they were likely moving as slowly as he and enjoying their day’s work. “Fire when ready, Gridley. I want the big guns on the heavy. Divide the secondary on the other two.”
Lansing smiled. The Gridley comment was an old joke. Within seconds, the ship shook as the forward twin thirteens belched fire at the lead German cruiser, with the smaller 6-inch guns quickly joining in the chorus, blinding them all with the lingering smoke.
The smoke cleared quickly and Evans could see that the lead cruiser was obscured by splashes. Misses, he cursed. “Goddamnit! What the hell’s wrong with our gunners?”
Lansing looked up from his speaking tube. “Lookouts report no hits, sir.”
Evans cursed again in frustration. Surely all the practice had not been wasted. Or were they firing short in fear of hitting the town behind? He pounded his chair with his fist. Probably the gunners were just nervous. Let them work it out. The big guns fired again, silencing him, and the bridge was again blanketed by the stinking smoke cloud. He gave orders to turn the ship so that the rear turret could also be brought to bear, even though that meant widening the distance slightly. It made no sense to have half of his biggest guns unavailable.
“Hit!”
Evans strained to see. Yes, smoke was pouring from the front superstructure that housed the lead enemy cruiser’s bridge. He chilled, thinking of the bloody carnage that smoke hid. The bridge was where his German counterpart held sway. Only now there was a good chance the German had been blown to bits. Evans didn’t even hear the rear turret fire.
“Hit!”
Again Evans pounded the chair with his fist, this time with relief and satisfaction. One of the lead German’s two funnels had collapsed, and smoke was pouring from her innards, including clouds of white that indicated her boilers had been penetrated. She was now immobile. A cruiser’s armor could not stop a 13-inch shell weighing eleven hundred pounds and traveling at more than two thousand feet per second. Cruisers were meant to fight other cruisers, not battleships.
“Sir, lookouts identify her as the German cruiser Freya. She has two 8.2-inch guns and a half dozen 6-inchers. Sir, she also has torpedoes.”
“Thank you, Mr. Lansing. Let the lookouts watch for torpedo wakes.” Evans watched spellbound as his ship passed down the line of three Germans. Their return fire had been slow, very slow indeed. He suspected that virtually all the lookouts had been watching the shore bombardment and not looking to their rear. The smaller German guns were, so far, firing wildly. He tried, but failed, to feel some sympathy for them, tried to visualize their reactions as they saw theAlabama emerging from the mist at such close range and with so little time to react.