Rescue on the River Read online

  Walter nudged Patrick. “Get ready to salute,” Walter said. “Here comes the major.”

  Patrick noticed the extra decorations on the shoulders of the man’s uniform. Patrick raised his right hand in a salute to the major.

  “Walter,” said the major, “you and the other drummer catch up with the men.”

  Patrick realized he was “the other drummer.”

  “Yes, sir, Major,” Walter said. “Then what?”

  The major frowned. “Watch what happens there, of course,” he said. “Then come back and give a report.”

  Patrick gulped. They would have to cross the river to follow the men. The ships’ cannons couldn’t protect an open rowboat.

  The major added, “Take cover in the marshes by the shore if you hear shots.”

  “Yes, sir,” Walter said. He saluted the major.

  Patrick did the same.

  Walter smiled at Patrick. “We’re going to get in on some of the fun.”

  The boys quickly climbed into a rowboat and rowed to shore. The river was calm. Patrick listened for gunfire. He only heard the ca-ca-ca of birds and an occasional bloop of a fish in the water.

  Patrick and Walter got out of the rowboat. They pulled it onto the shore. Slowly they climbed to follow the other Union soldiers.

  The climb was hard at first. Large trees blocked them. Their branches pricked Patrick’s skin. The rotten-egg smell filled Patrick’s nostrils.

  Patrick listened closely. He could barely hear the other Union men climbing. He finally reached the edge of the bluff behind Walter.

  Slowly they sneaked toward the trenches. But he was surprised. No one was fighting.

  Patrick peeked around a large tree. The Union soldiers stood at the top of the cliff. From the lookout point, the river could be seen for miles each way.

  The captain of the group picked up a gray blanket off the ground. “It’s still warm,” he said. “The enemy was just here.”

  Patrick was glad the captain’s men had taken the bluff without a shot. He hurried to Walter’s side.

  “Captain,” Walter said, saluting the man. “We’re here to bring word to the ships.”

  “Good,” the captain said.

  One of the soldiers pointed toward open land. “What’s that?” he asked.

  Patrick squinted to see in the distance. Confederates were retreating. One, two, three, four . . . Patrick saw five men riding away.

  The captain motioned for half his men to follow them. The other soldiers guarded the bluff.

  “Tell Colonel Montgomery what you saw. He needs to know,” the captain said to Walter. “Some of us are going after the Confederates on foot. We don’t want them sending for help. If they bring artillery to the lookout points, the enemy will sink our ships.”

  “Yes, sir,” Walter said.

  The captain pointed at Patrick. “You come with us. You can take a message by foot to Tar Bluff once we know where the Rebels are.”

  “Yes, sir,” Patrick said.

  Patrick looked at Walter. Walter gave him a nod and a smile. Then Patrick hurried after the captain.

  Beth stood on the deck of the Adams. She placed a ladle across a barrel full of sweet, clean water. She had just helped Harriet fill the soldiers’ canteens.

  A company of soldiers was leaving in rowboats. Their mission was to take control of the area at Tar Bluff. If they weren’t successful, enemy soldiers could stop the mission. The Volunteers wouldn’t be able to free the slaves.

  “Can I get a refill?” a familiar voice asked Beth. Walter held out his plate-sized canteen.

  Beth was surprised to see Walter on the Adams. She picked up the ladle and dipped it in the water. She filled Walter’s round canteen.

  Harriet and others moved closer to Walter. “Did you just talk with Colonel Montgomery? What happened on Fields Point?” Harriet asked.

  “The Confederate soldiers fell back,” Walter said. “The captain has secured Fields Point and has left several men there. He’s chasing the Confederates on foot. He doesn’t want them warning the other Rebels. He’s taken a messenger with him to send word.”

  “Good,” Harriet said.

  Beth saw a gleam of hope in her eyes.

  “I hope we seize Fields Point and Tar Bluff,” Harriet said. “If we do, the raid will go even better than planned. And no shots have been fired. That’s a miracle.”

  The Adams started to move back into the center of the river. The Weed followed.

  “Are we going to leave the soldiers behind?” Beth asked.

  “We’ll be back for them,” Harriet said. She left with a wave and headed toward the colonel.

  “When will we come back for them?” Beth asked.

  “We’ll come back this way on our way home,” Walter said. He turned to Beth and shook his head. “I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

  “For what to happen?” Beth asked.

  “I took Patrick to the Weed, not the Sentinel,” he said.

  Beth smiled. “But that’s good news,” she said.

  “It would be,” Walter said. “But we were both sent as messengers to Fields Point. Patrick is still out there. He’s all alone, and he’s headed to Tar Bluff. That area is behind enemy lines.”

  The Chase

  The captain crept toward a thick bush near a grove of trees. Patrick followed. They were not far from Fields Point. The captain raised a finger to his lips and whispered, “Shhh.”

  Patrick nodded. He and the captain were spying on the Confederate leader and his messenger. The other Union soldiers kept following the retreating Confederates.

  Patrick peeked between the bright-green leaves.

  The Confederate officer was talking to a young soldier. Their two horses were several feet away. The boy looked close to Patrick’s age. He wore a gray uniform. The boy’s flat-topped hat tilted forward on his head.

  The officer said something to the boy. Patrick leaned forward to listen. But he couldn’t hear what they were saying.

  The boy hurried to the horse. He put a foot into the stirrup and mounted the horse.

  The Confederate officer swatted the horse’s backside. The animal took off at a run.

  The captain rushed toward the Confederate officer. The man disappeared into the grove of trees.

  Only the officer’s horse remained. Patrick grabbed its reins to keep it from running away.

  The captain yelled at Patrick, “Go after the messenger!”

  He tossed Patrick a map. “Forget about Tar Bluff. Don’t let that boy reach the Confederate base. He will warn the enemy, and our raid will be spoiled. The lives of all those on our ships may depend on you.”

  Patrick stuffed the map in his jacket pocket. He put a foot in the stirrup and swung his leg over the saddle.

  The captain started after the officer again. But then he turned. “If you don’t catch him, warn the colonel,” he said. Then he disappeared into the trees.

  Patrick grabbed the reins in one hand. With the other, he clenched a fistful of the horse’s mane.

  Patrick dug his heels into the horse’s flanks. “Giddyap!” he shouted. Then he slapped the reins across the horse’s neck.

  The horse bolted into the shadow of the trees.

  Patrick could see the Confederate messenger in the distance. He was riding at a gallop.

  Patrick slapped the reins again. “Hiyaa!” he shouted.

  They raced through the trees. Patrick’s horse dodged tree trunks and thick roots. He gripped the saddle with his knees to stay on.

  Suddenly the sunlight shone brighter. He’d reached a dirt road.

  The Confederate messenger’s horse sprinted farther ahead on the dirt-packed path.

  Patrick leaned forward in the saddle. “Come on, girl,” he whispered in the horse’s ear. “You can do better than this. People are depending on us!”

  Beth watched as the soldiers quietly climbed Tar Bluff. They made it to the trenches on top.

  Harriet stood by Beth and Walter.
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br />   “There’s only one road that goes to the plantations from here. Enemy soldiers at Tar Bluff can stop ships on the river. They can stop people on the road with cannon fire or guns,” Harriet said. “I hope we can take control of Tar Bluff. If we don’t, we won’t be able to help free any slaves.”

  The three waited and watched. Silence. Once again, no shots were fired. Perhaps there wouldn’t be any fighting at all on this raid.

  At least that’s what Beth hoped.

  Beth scoured the landscape. She looked up and down the bluff. She scanned the shoreline. There was no sign of Patrick, no sign of the enemy.

  Finally Beth saw a Volunteer on top of the bluff. But he disappeared over the ridge.

  Montgomery started shouting orders from across the deck. The Adams was on the move again.

  Beth hurried to Walter’s side. She said, “Shouldn’t Patrick have been at Tar Bluff by now? Or did you mean we’d pick him up here on our way home?”

  Walter was silent for a moment. Then he said, “By foot it’s only a mile. Patrick had plenty of time to get here. Unless he met the enemy.”

  The Cannons

  Patrick felt as if he’d been riding for an hour. The Confederate messenger was getting farther ahead. Patrick didn’t know how to make his horse go faster.

  Streams of smoke filled the sky to the east. He heard the echo of rifle shots from the same direction. A battle was going on near the river.

  The land between Patrick and the river looked like a shallow pond. Orderly rows of green plants grew in the water. Nearer to Patrick, an enormous garden covered the land.

  Is this a plantation with a rice field? Patrick wondered. He could see slaves of all ages wading in the pond. They were bent over in ankle-deep water. There were trenches between the rows of plants for water to go through.

  The men were shirtless. Their backs glistened with sweat. The women wore light-colored fabric draped around their bodies and heads. Their dresses were pulled above their knees so the fabric wouldn’t get wet.

  Children followed the women. Babies clung to their mothers’ backs or were carried by older children.

  No one seemed to notice Patrick.

  He urged his horse on. It followed the messenger to the west, down a wide, graveled road. Patrick saw a sign that said Stocks Road. He pulled back the reins.

  “Whoa,” he said.

  A flag was flying from the top of a large building. But it wasn’t the Union flag.

  Patrick had seen this flag before in books. It had a red background with a blue X from corner to corner. It was the Confederate flag.

  He was riding straight toward the enemy headquarters.

  Beth watched the Weed drop off soldiers to raid a plantation. That ship was going to remain there to support those troops.

  The Adams continued to the Heyward plantation. The deck held a mix of Volunteers and white soldiers.

  Beth and Harriet stood next to a covered barrel. They were using it as a table. They helped soldiers fill paper cartridges of ammunition with gunpowder.

  Beth nodded toward the white soldiers. “Are they a part of the Volunteers?” she asked.

  “No,” Harriet said. “They are the Third Rhode Island Heavy Artillery regiment. They are trained to fire the cannons.”

  Beth carefully poured gunpowder onto a small piece of paper. Then she rolled it. Harriet twisted the ends to seal the gunpowder inside. Then Harriet carefully handed the cartridge to a soldier.

  Walter paced the deck. He was practicing his drumming. His sticks made a rat-a-tat-tat on his round drum.

  Suddenly there was a bang. Then another. The sound was coming from a distance.

  “That’s rifle fire,” Harriet said. “Lord, have mercy. The Union boys are being fired at.”

  “More likely our men are firing at the slave owners, Miss Harriet,” Walter said. “Those South Carolina Volunteers are tough soldiers.”

  Beth could see smoke billowing on the horizon. “What’s burning?” she asked.

  “Everything,” Harriet said. “The orders were to take everything the men can carry. Then they are to burn the rice stores, as well as food, barns, bridges, and houses. But Union soldiers are leaving the slave houses alone.”

  “Why?” Beth asked. “All the slaves will be free.”

  Harriet put a hand on Beth’s head. “I wish that were so, child,” she said. “But the ships have room to take only six or seven hundred people. The Sentinel was to take more, but it ran aground.”

  Walter added, “Many will be left behind. The Heyward plantation alone has several hundred slaves.”

  Several hundred? Beth thought. Her hopes sank. How would she and Patrick find Kitch? She was stuck on the ship, and Patrick was missing.

  She quickly bowed her head and prayed, Please, God, help us find Sally’s brother. It seems impossible. Only You can make it possible. Amen.

  “Harriet,” Montgomery called. He motioned for her to go into the wheelhouse. Beth continued working.

  “What’s the meeting about?” she asked Walter.

  “They’re probably talking about the attack,” he said. “They need to know the layout of Heyward’s plantation and the causeway.”

  “What’s a causeway?” Beth asked.

  The Adams rounded a curve in the Combahee River. Walter pointed to a long land bridge.

  The causeway was narrow, the width of a country lane. There were no trees, nothing to hide behind. The Confederate soldiers and plantation overseers would see anyone coming.

  The Second South Carolina Volunteers will need to cross the land bridge, Beth thought. They’ll be in great danger.

  The Adams docked near the end of the causeway. Soldiers worked to lay planks of wood between the ship and the land.

  The colonel and Harriet came out of the wheelhouse.

  Montgomery shouted orders. About sixty Volunteers headed to the causeway.

  Walter said, “I get to go ashore with this group of Volunteers.” Walter waved and picked up his drum. He hurried after the soldiers.

  Beth prayed for the Volunteers to be safe. They started to march across the causeway, two men abreast. Walter was at the end, beating his drum.

  The crack of a rifle shot filled the air.

  Beth scanned the plantation to see where it had come from. She saw a white man with a rifle in the rice field.

  None of the soldiers seemed to have been hit. The Volunteers kept marching to the beat of Walter’s drum. They marched straight into enemy territory.

  “Gunner, prepare to fire at that rifleman,” shouted Montgomery.

  The artillery regiment sprang to life.

  The gunner squatted behind the cannon. He adjusted the height of the barrel.

  “Load,” shouted the gunner.

  One soldier opened the ammunition box. Another carried the cone-shaped shell. He placed the shell in the mouth of the cannon. The next man pushed the shell down the barrel with a rod.

  “Ready,” shouted the gunner.

  One man fiddled with something on top of the cannon.

  “Fire,” shouted the gunner.

  Another soldier pulled a string.

  BOOM!

  The cannon shot sailed overhead and landed in the rice field.

  The enemy dropped his rifle and ran.

  “Yay!” Beth cheered. The troops also cheered.

  The first of the Volunteers stepped off the causeway. The rest soon followed. They fanned out into a rice field.

  Harriet asked the colonel, “Is it time to blow the whistle?”

  Montgomery nodded and shouted, “Call the slaves to freedom!”

  The Raid

  Boom!

  Patrick’s heart sank. The explosion came from the river. He didn’t know if the cannon fire was from the Union ships. It could be from the Confederate artillery. Either way, it wasn’t good.

  Boom!

  The slaves in the field stopped their work. They stood and shouted to one another. Children ran to women and were comforted wi
th hugs.

  Patrick knew what he had to do. He couldn’t stop the messenger. And he couldn’t warn Montgomery about the Confederate troops.

  But he could tell the slaves to flee to the ships.

  A shrill whistle filled the air.

  Patrick urged his horse into the rice fields. He reached a young woman with a small child in a sling that stretched across her shoulders.

  “Run to the river,” Patrick told her. “Union ships are on the Combahee. They’ll take you to freedom.”

  She shook her head. It seemed she didn’t understand.

  Patrick wished Walter were there to speak her language.

  “Freedom,” Patrick shouted. He pointed toward the river. “Run!”

  A man on horseback rode toward them through the fields. He had a whip in his hand.

  Crack!

  “To the woods,” the man on horseback shouted at the slaves.

  Some of the field workers started to follow him.

  The slave woman’s face grimaced in fear. She lifted the sling with the child off her shoulders. She thrust the child at Patrick.

  “Freedom,” she said with an odd accent.

  Patrick took the sling and the child with tight, black curls. He quickly looped the sling over his shoulder.

  “Go!” the woman said. Her voice was husky. There were tears in her eyes.

  Patrick snapped the reins.

  The child in his arms shrieked in terror.

  The horse bolted toward the river.

  Beth saw the slaves at the Heyward plantation stream toward the river. Old men with knobby knees and women with gray hair. Young children with knapsacks on their backs. Barrel-chested men. Teens. Women with babies on their shoulders and in their arms.

  Most of them carried rice pots, chickens in cages, or sacks of food. One woman carried two young pigs, a black one and a white one.

  The slaves hurried along the causeway or toward the river. Those at the river’s edge seemed confused. They didn’t move toward the empty rowboats.