Richard Castle and the USS Santa Barbara
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: Except for the true parts, this is fiction. Rating: K, mostly. Time: The turn of the 20th Century.
"Our consulate in Hong Kong is a mess. Huntington is now sick and can't even manage the gibberish he had been sending us. We need that damned coal and we need it now. Oh, and he has an assistant, a Mr. Burnes, who seems to be as big an idiot as Huntington." He pulled some papers from the inside of his jacket. "These authorize you to use our funds in Hong Kong to purchase coal, assuming you can't find out where that cretin Huntington has sent the coal he allegedly bought for us. How soon can you sail?"
"I need to re-coal, sir. We just had enough in Marviles City to get us here. I only have a few tons left. Not nearly enough to get us to Hong Kong."
"I'll have you coaled by this evening, Captain. If you look at your orders, you'll see you have permission to buy coal for your ship. Go ahead and fill your bunkers full. Any questions?"
"None, sir."
Several hours later, Miss Beckett was back.
"Miss Beckett, I have some bad news for you. I'll have to leave you here. The coal that was supposed to come here is lost somewhere and now I really have to go to Hong Kong."
She smiled at him.
"That's actually good news. I finally found someone who admitted to being responsible for my school supplies." A frown crossed her face. "If it weren't for the fact that the man is an officer, I'd say that Seaman Orlovsky somehow intimidated him. But, it seems that all my supplies were somehow sent to Hong Kong. If I could travel there with you, I'd be grateful."
"Certainly."
Hong Kong, British Crown Colony
April 2, 1899.
Castle was infuriated. He'd spent almost the whole day at the US Consulate in Hong Kong dealing with Mr. Burnes. Mr. Burnes only qualification for his job seemed to be that his uncle was a US Congressman, something that he advised Castle of repeatedly. Despairing of ever getting anything useful from the Consulate, he left to go back to the ship.
He was no sooner aboard than Ensign de Kalb pointed at something on the dock.
"Carriage coming this way, sir. We're the only ship at the dock, so he must be looking for us. A very nice team of matched greys he has, if I may say so."
The carriage came to a stop and an older gentleman jumped out.
"Is the captain aboard?" he called.
"I'm Captain Richard Castle, USN. May I be of assistance?"
"Actually, I can be of assistance to you, Captain. I'm Sir George Demming. May I come aboard?"
Castle knew that Sir George was one of the richest and most powerful men in Asia. He'd begun as a young seaman and had worked, fought and cheated his way to his present position. He did have an awful grandson, but Castle wasn't about to hold that against the man.
"Come aboard, sir. We'll go to my cabin."
As they walked towards the stern of the ship, Demming spoke.
"I'd like to thank you for not telling the world about my idiot grandson, Thomas."
"I understand he'll cause no more troubles now, sir."
"Hah! You don't know the young moron. He managed to get some horrible social disease from a woman of dubious virtue. Gina something or another is her name. He has pustules all over and…" Sir George stopped. "Enough said about him."
They had reached Castle's cabin.
"I have some information about the coal shipment that fellow Huntington arranged to send to Manila. He chartered one of my ships, the SS Pacific Trader to carry the coal to Manila."
"That's a relief, sir."
"No, it isn't, I'm afraid. The ship's captain, Captain Winslow, took the Pacific Trader further up the Pearl River to recruit some Chinese for the engine room. Coal heavers, you know. And they were taken by pirates."
"Damn!" Castle swore. "We'll never find them."
Sir George smiled.
"I think you will. I have an excellent intelligence service. The ship was taken by a rascal called Chen Do. He used to be an officer in the Imperial Chinese Guangdong Fleet. He may still be, in fact. That way the Chinese government can deny he's one of theirs while he does the Empress' bidding. His headquarters are on the Island of Hainan. He has a half a dozen steamships or one sort or another, none built as warships and poorly armed, but he has several thousand men and many seagoing junks. The Pacific Trader will be taken there. Will you go after her?"
"Just as soon as I can buy some coal, sir."
"Don't worry about that, young man. You're going after one of my ships. I already have coal headed this way along with every Chinese coolie I could find to load it."
When Sir George had left, Castle sent for Lieutenant Franklin.
"Has Miss Beckett returned yet?"
"No, sir. I don't believe so."
"Check with the officer of the deck and make sure. We're headed into combat and will have to leave her here. Send someone to the Port Captain's office with a note for Miss Beckett telling her that we've had to leave. Take enough money from the ship's funds so that she can get back to Manila."
Sir George was as good as his word and in no time the ship was swarming with men delivering coal to the Santa Barbara. In less than six hours the ship was headed south.
USS Santa Barbara
South China Sea
Evening, April 2, 1899.
There was a light tap on Castle's door.
"Come in." he said, looking at the charts of Hainan Island. When he looked up, his jaw dropped in shock.
"Miss Beckett! What are you doing here?"
"I was hoping we'd have dinner but if you're busy, I can eat in my cabin."
"No. You can't be here. I mean, I thought you were in Hong Kong. We're going into combat. How did you get aboard, anyway?"
"I found that all of the school supplies that had been mistakenly sent to Hong Kong were sent back to Manila two days ago, so I decided to come back to the ship."
"But the officer of the deck said you hadn't come back aboard." Castle spluttered.
"Oh, that. The streets were crowded and quite filthy, so I took one of those little boats…A sampan. That's what they call them. The boat was rowed by this tiny little boy who looked like he'd hardly eaten in days, while his father…I suppose it was his father, smoked a pipe of opium right in front of me. Anyway, I didn't want to make the little fellow row me all the way to the dock, so I told him to drop me by…What do they call the doors in the side of the ship where the smaller guns are?"
"The smaller guns are in casemates, Miss Beckett, they have armored steel shutters. My God! You didn't pull yourself up on the side of the ship, did you?"
"Oh, no. Some kindly sailors made a loop in a rope and pulled me aboard. I was rather tired, so I went to my cabin to take a nap. Is there something wrong?"
"Miss Beckett, pirates have taken the collier that was supposed to deliver our coal to Manila. They're headed for Hainan Island where I intend to take the ship back. But I cannot have you aboard during combat."
"I hope you don't intend to throw me overboard, Captain."
"What? Of course not. I would never do such a thing. However, as soon as we run into a merchant ship heading to somewhere safe, I'll put you abord her and the Navy will pay your passage."
The Santa Barbara ran into no merchant ships headed anyplace and Miss Beckett stayed aboard.
About fifty miles from Hainan Island, Castle began stopping small fishing vessels and other small ships to try to gather intelligence about what awaited him there. None of the Chinese seemed to speak English, nor any other language that the ship's company had.
As Castle was trying to interrogate a Chinese fisherman, with no success at all, a familiar voice began speaking to the man in what Castle assumed was Chinese. It was Miss Beckett.
The man returned a snarling reply to Miss Beckett, who snapped back at him and began a long tirade in Chinese. The man spoke very politely to Miss Beckett and then paddled off.
"What did he say?" Castle demanded.
"He said that Chen Do is at Haikou, the closest port to the mainland of China. He has four steamships of one sort or another and a dozen large war junks. He has many thousands of men. I don't know how many, the man just said, "Many, many."."
"He didn't seem willing to talk at first. What did you say to change his mind?"
Miss Beckett blushed.
"Um, I'm afraid I lied. I told him you were the evil Captain Castle, the White Devil, and that you had several families of fishermen being roasted on your boilers for your dinner."
"I hope that rumor doesn't get spread around." Castle thought for a moment. "How did you learn Chinese, especially the local dialect?"
"I had some students in New York who were from this part of China. I told you, I have a talent for languages."
USS Santa Barbara
South China Sea, off Hainan Island
Evening, April 4, 1899.
"They're coming out to meet us." Castle said. "Which is good. They can't outgun us, so they'll have to try to board us. If the battle is in the open ocean, we have the advantage. We're faster and more maneuverable."
"According to the lookout, they have four steamers and a dozen war junks, all sail powered, it appears. They've put the steamers in the middle of a line of battle and six junks on each wing. I imagine that they hope we'll close with the steamers so that the junks can close and board us. We will not allow any of their ships to get that close." He smiled coldly. "But I want to make them think that's what we'll do."
"Mr. Franklin, have you made all the preparations I asked for?"
"Yes, sir." Franklin replied. "Every man aboard has been issued with a rifle and ammunition and engineering has fire hoses that'll shoot scalding water at anyone who gets too close. All of our guns are manned and our Marines and all naval personnel not needed to fight the ship and keep the boilers going are on deck and ready to shoot anyone."
Castle turned away from his officers on the bridge to Miss Beckett.
"Miss Beckett, to be safe, I'd like you to…"
"If I may, Captain, I'd feel safer here on the bridge with you, and I'd like a rifle. You know I can shoot."
Castle thought for a moment. If they were swarmed by thousands of Chinese pirates, no place would be safe and the bridge would be as safe as any.
"All right. You stay here, Miss Beckett." He turned to Ensign de Kalb. "Mr. de Kalb, go to the arms locker and get a rifle and ammunition for Miss Beckett."
Castle looked at his assembled officers.
"I want you all to know that I could not ask for a better crew with which to go into battle. Now, go to your stations, and raise our battle flag."
Ships commonly wore their largest flag when going into battle. This went back to the days of fighting sail when the close action and the clouds of powder smoke sometimes made it difficult to tell which ship was which. However, when the largest US flag that Santa Barbara had was raised, the crew cheered loudly.
TBC