On the Head of a Pin (15 page)

“Nay, there's only a handful. We'll soon rout 'em out.”

Within a few hours, a marginally coherent version of these rumours distilled into a widely circulated edition that gave a reasonably accurate description of events. It appeared that a group called the Patriot Hunters, the same Americans who had been conducting small raids along the border over the last few months, had somehow managed to commandeer enough ships to bring a force of five hundred of them across the river. They had hoped to surprise the British garrison at Fort Wellington by mounting a foray on Prescott during the night hours. Repulsed, grounded, and then freed from the mudflats that had prevented their return to Ogdensburg, they opted to use the river's current to take them closer to the Canadian shore. Here, at the tiny village of Newport, they had managed to land some of their troops.

The Hunters had expected, apparently, in that way that all Americans seemed to have, that Canadians would rise up and join them, eager to dispel the yoke of British rule, a plan that was sadly lacking in any understanding of the politics of Upper Canada or the views of its people. Local support failed to materialize; in fact, locals offered nothing but armed opposition, preventing the force from making any progress inland. Pinned to the shore, they took refuge in the solid stone of an old windmill, its rubble walls built on a rise of ground, giving them a commanding view of the countryside around it. The 83rd British Regiment at Fort Wellington, bolstered by several bands of militia, was marching out to the attack.

Beyond this general summation of confirmed events, it was difficult for anyone to know what was happening at any given moment. Rumours took flight, circled and came to ground again with the regularity of a flock of starlings.

Lewis knew that he should set out for Brockville. He had meetings waiting for him there. But he was reluctant to leave until he had at least set into motion an investigation of the murder he had discovered. He also felt that he might make himself more useful by staying in Prescott. A field hospital of sorts had been established in one area of the blockhouse, and he went along to offer his assistance in whatever capacity was needed. It wasn't long before they found plenty for him to do.

The first attack on the windmill was violent and bloody. There was little cover in the surrounding fields and from their vantage point the Hunters could simply pick their attackers off one by one. The garrison soon filled with wounded — Lewis estimated well over fifty of them in the first rush — and he was put to work bathing wounds and applying bandages, tending the injured, and comforting the dying.

“We're sitting ducks as long as they're in that bloody tower,” one militiaman muttered as Lewis cut away the sleeve of his coat. The shot had carried away the fleshy part of the man's upper arm, mercifully missing the bone, but the wound was bleeding profusely. He packed it with wads of bandaging and told the man to hold it in place until the surgeon could have a look. That could be some time, he figured, for there were far more grievous wounds that would need attention first.

He moved among the casualties, trying to judge which men were in urgent need and which could make do with his inexpert attentions. He tried to direct those who could still walk, or could safely be carried, to one side of the room, away from the screams of those whose mangled limbs were being sawn off and discarded cavalierly into a bucket on the floor, or whose intestines had exited in a stinking mass from gaping wounds in their bodies. The days of warring were over for these men, he knew; indeed, their very lives could well be done, for the prospect of recovery from such assaults to flesh was surely in question, no matter what the surgeon did.

It was different for the men who were merely bleeding or had suffered clean fractures of the bone or blackened burns from the powder. They would be patched up and given small time to heal before they were sent to fight again. They huddled together in the corner Lewis had cleared for them, muttering about the folly of a frontal assault on an impregnable position. He knew that following orders was a soldier's duty, no matter what he thought of those orders, but he wondered that any of them could return to battle knowing that a moment's time was enough to turn them into duplicates of the mutilated bodies that lay across the room. He had seen war himself once, and he had drunk for fifty days to forget what he had seen.

There were civilian casualties, too, here and there among the soldiers — farmers and labourers who had been caught in the invasion, or who had grabbed their guns and rushed heedlessly to stop the invaders.

One old man with a broken foot told Lewis that a woman and her two children had hidden themselves in one of the buildings near the windmill, but had been shot as they attempted to flee the battleground — whether by the Americans or by the British, he didn't seem to know.

A young boy whose ear had been sheared off from his head claimed that he had watched from a field away as a wounded British soldier was beaten to death and mutilated while he lay helpless on the ground. Lewis dismissed this report when the boy added that the Americans had eaten the body.

There were other wounded, too, who he judged would not usefully claim a medic's care until others had been attended to; those who were so close to dead already that it was a wonder that they had been carried in at all and not left simply to expire where they lay. Their fates were in the hands of God, for no mortal surgeon's skill could ever be enough to repair them. One man had part of his skull blown away, and when Lewis removed the blood-soaked bandage, he could see the grey folds of brain underneath, flecked with bits of shot and pieces of grass. The man continued to take deep shuddering breaths, but Lewis knew that these would soon cease. Gently he wrapped the wound in a clean piece of cloth and moved to the next stretcher.

He worked through the night, sponging, cleaning, bringing water, and carrying away urine. The flow of incoming wounded trickled to a halt, and the toll of the first assault counted: thirteen dead, and seventy wounded. The next day was a repeat of the same tasks again and again until the hours floated away from him into a dream of blood and shattered bone.

Then came the hardest time, but a time when he felt most useful. Gangrene would set in for many of the amputees in the following days, he knew, but those with wounds to the body seemed in the most danger of succumbing within a few hours. These men called for him, seeking the comfort of his words as they stood at the gate between life and death.

He was praying with one of these, a young soldier who's left side appeared to be nothing but swathes of bandage, not realizing that he was praying aloud until he heard a voice behind him join in. He finished the prayer and turned; it was Morgan Spicer.

“Morgan, what are you doing here?”

“The same as you. I've come to make myself useful.” He was holding a white basin, the kind used to catch vomit and excrement. “I think under the circumstances, their physical comfort is on a par with their spiritual needs. Otherwise, they seem to go untended.”

“I agree,” Lewis said, “and I'm glad of your assistance. I had no idea you were in this area.”

He shrugged. “I was on my rounds when I heard the news. I thought I might as well come here, for no one will answer a knock at the door anymore. They're all convinced they're about to be murdered by Yankees. Either that or they've packed up and gone somewhere else.”

Yes, they would have, Lewis thought. Gathered their families and set off to seek the protection of stout walls and stone buildings. He wondered if the Catholic family had done that as soon as they'd laid their boy in the earth.

“I think we can do more good here, anyway. Some of these lads won't live through the night.”

“There will soon be a lot more,” Spicer said. “The steamers have gathered on the river.”

He had almost forgotten the cause of all this suffering, and had neglected to ask for details of events, grateful only that there had been an end to the arrival of fresh stretcher-loads of bodies that needed cleaning or staunching or cutting.

As the day wore on, they could hear the muffled rhythm of shell hitting stone as the British fired at the old windmill, hoping that, at best, they could do enough damage to force the Americans to surrender, at worst that they could drive them into the open so that they could be picked off by waiting guns. The ordnance was too light, however, and the solid old stone walls withstood the attack. Several of the outbuildings caught fire, though, and burned unattended, sending clouds of choking smoke into the air.

“Surely it can't go on much longer,” Lewis said as they worked to a low murmur of moans from the wounded men. “I doubt the Americans expected a siege. They've got to be running low on ammunition.”

The question on everyone's mind was whether or not reinforcements would arrive from Ogdensburg across the river — that like-minded Americans, hearing that the invaders were holed up and desperate, would come rushing to their aid.

“They say that it was Bill Johnston who pulled the ships off the sandbar,” Spicer reported. “Now he's in Ogdensburg raising another army.”

It was no surprise to anyone that the pirate was involved, or that he had managed to insert himself into yet another attack on British soil. If he was successful in recruiting more soldiers, the advantage would be with the Americans. There were not enough British and militia troops to hold an army at the river while the first American force used the strategic location of the windmill to pepper their flanks. Others were sure that any reinforcements would be used for another attack on Prescott, while the British were occupied at the mill. If they took Fort Wellington, they would control the river.

And then, on the third day, three hundred fresh troops arrived from Kingston to bolster the British ranks. Lewis steeled himself for the sight of more stretchers, but the garrison doctor chased him away, “At least for a few hours,” he said. “Find some food and get some sleep. We can manage here tonight, but I'd surely like to see you again tomorrow. I doubt anything will happen until then, as the new troops are still moving into position.”

Lewis went looking for Spicer, intending to share whatever accommodation he could scare up, but found the boy fast asleep under a table in the cookhouse. He considered crawling under the table to join him, but discarded the notion. He was too old and too weary to sleep on the hard stone floor, and he desperately wanted a breath of air that wasn't laden with the smell of blood.

He could scarcely walk as he left the building, he was so tired, and he would have to do some walking yet to find someone willing to give him a bed. He was jostled as he made his way down the muddy street — the taverns were doing a roaring business with those too old or too useless to have joined the militia, and drunks staggered into the streets when their money was gone. He narrowly avoided a roistering group of men who had brought their own whiskey in earthenware jugs, and when he turned, he came face to face with Isaac Simms.

“Isaac, I thought you would be gone long since.”

“There's no point in leaving. No ships can get to the wharf. I'll have to wait until this nonsense is finished.”

There was no traffic on the river now, the flow of goods held up by the battle. “And what about you?” Simms asked. “I thought you'd have gone home.”

“I'm just trying to make myself useful with the wounded, but I'm that tired that I can hardly see. I've had only a few snatches of sleep and if I'm going to be of any more use, I need a night's rest.”

He could see Simms hesitating, and then he remembered their last parting. It seemed to Lewis that their disagreement over the dying Catholic boy had taken place months ago, although when he stopped and counted up, he realized that it had been only a few days. He wondered if he could prevail upon the man to share whatever arrangements he had in his peddler's wagon, but when the offer was not forthcoming, he decided to let the moment pass. He'd find somewhere else.

“You don't happen to know any of the local Methodist families?” he asked.

Simms shook his head. “Not my line of business, to ask the convictions of those I sell to, I'm afraid.”

“Is there a tavern nearby, do you know, that sells something besides beer and whiskey?” He was becoming aware that it had been a long time since he'd eaten anything hot, and he had a sudden craving for a bowl of stew, beef maybe, or even lamb, although it was his least favourite meat. Or a pot pie with potatoes and onions, redolent with gravy and covered with a golden pastry. He avoided taverns as a rule because of the rowdy nature of their patrons, but he was willing to make an exception for one that served reasonable fare.

“You won't find much at the taverns. They're doing too brisk a business with liquor. There is an inn down the way, though. You might do better there.”

Simms seemed willing, at least, to walk along with him.

“You'll be on your way as soon as shipments arrive again, then?” Lewis asked as they walked, more to make conversation than anything else — an attempt to dispel the awkwardness that lay between them.

“Yes, my brother-in-law arranged to have a bale of cotton goods sent down from Montreal. But for the battle, I'd have picked it up and left long since. I hope this nonsense is over soon.”

They had reached a large house that had been converted into a combination hotel and tavern.

“I think you'll find something here,” Simms said, “and at not too bad a price. Take care, Lewis.” And with that, the peddler tipped his hat and strode away.

“Stew? My goodness me, no. We ain't seen anything as fan
–
cy as stew in many a day. All I've got is pork and pritters.”

Salt pork and mealy potatoes — but at least it was served up piping hot along with the landlady's apologies.

“It's just that hard to get anything to cook just now,” she said. “If I could get it, I could sell it, though. There are so many who have come into town in case the Americans break out of the windmill and go tearing through the countryside.”