Trouble on the Voyage

By Bob Barton

A tiny speck imprisoned in a world of white… This is an exciting adventure novel told through the eyes of eleven-year-old ships boy Jeremy. It is both history and fiction. The merchant ship Henrietta Maria has been trapped in the ice of Hudson Strait for two months. It is August 6, 1631, when she finally breaks free to search for a northwest passage. The crew knows that it must leave Hudson Bay by early October to avoid being caught in the ice for the winter. The ship is leaking badly and the crew is ravaged by scurvy. Finally, Captain James announces that they cannot make it back to Hudson Strait before freeze-up. With half the crew suffering from scurvy and even lacking boots, will anyone survive in this cold and desolate place?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dundurn
• Release date: Sep 1, 2010
• ISBN: 9781459716551

Bob Barton

Bob Barton has published many childrenÂ’s books, including The Bear Says North and Poetry Goes to School. He is the recipient of many literacy and arts awards. Barton has two grown children and lives with his wife in Toronto.

Book preview

The journal of Jeremy, ship’s boy

May 1, 1631

My father was killed on the River Thames. Mother said that pirates shot him. And that’s all I can tell you, Jeremy. There’s nothing more to be said.

At first I didn’t take in what she was saying. I was thinking about how frightened she looked. Later, I thought Mother might have managed to give me more information. Father was away at sea for weeks at a time, so we rarely saw him. I longed to ask her whether he missed us during the nights and days he was on duty far from home and why he had to be away so often, but it almost seemed that she didn’t want any more mention of Father’s name.

I was nine when Father died, but even then my memories of him weren’t very clear. What I do remember were his piercing dark eyes and heavy eyebrows, his booming laugh, the boisterous men who called at our house to see him and the fierce quarrels Mother had with him after they left. I don’t ever remember him raising his voice in anger at us children.

I have one memory of Father that troubles me. I try not to think about it, but it steals unbidden into my mind. One day Father lurched out of the Three Mariners Inn with some loud, quarrelsome seamen. I think I was six at the time. We hadn’t seen Father for days. I called out to him and started to run in his direction, but Mother yanked me back and hurried me home. I cried all the way. Finally she knelt, held me close and calmed me down. Then she said, Jeremy, your Father has important business to carry out. You will see him later.

I couldn’t help but notice that her eyes did not look at me directly as she spoke. Her smile was strained.

It was at that moment, deep down, that I began to feel there was something secret and strange about my Father.

Later, I found a silver button from Father’s uniform behind his chest of drawers. Mother let me keep it. I have it on a string around my neck.

But forgive my lack of wit and skill, for I am telling things all out of order. It begins like this. Our King, Charles I, desired to know if there was a passage through Hudson Bay to Cathay and the South Seas. The Bristol Society of Merchant Venturers decided to satisfy His Majesty’s desires. They caused a ship to be specially built for the mission and hired Captain James to take command.

Captain James handpicked a crew of twenty men and two boys. The boys are my brother, Will, age thirteen, and me, Jeremy, age eleven.

I am the ship’s boy. I think that means that everyone can order me around, but my first responsibilities are to Cook.

Cook has a red face and his ears stick out from under his cap. I don’t say this to be unkind. My ears stick out too. Mother says that when I was a baby, she tied a scarf around my ears while I was sleeping in the hope that this would flatten them. Mother knows good remedies for what ails folk. This wasn’t one of them.

Cook is also what Mother calls a chatterbasket. Once his mouth is in motion he jabbers, he hums, he jests, he sings and he’s loud. He doesn’t care who hears him. He has taken to calling me Jemmyboy. To make matters worse, he sings it out in a voice so shrill it could grate carrots. I was cross with him at first, then I noticed his funny crooked grin and I realized that he was just trying to bring a smile to my sad face. He knows without me saying it that I don’t want to be on this ship.

Shortly after Father’s death, Mother went to work for our Vicar at the old church. She makes his meals, tidies his quarters and helps out with church business. That’s how I got here. The Vicar is second cousin to Captain James. He wrote on our behalf to enquire if the Captain knew of any crews needing ship’s boys. Captain James wrote back explaining his mission and requested that Will and I report to him in Bristol. He also agreed to give Mother an advance on our wages. I cried when she broke the news.

You must be brave, Jeremy, she sighed. I don’t earn enough at the old church to manage. I need your help, and this is also the best course for Will.

I want more than ever to be home with Mother and my little sister Clara, but I know I’m of greater use to them here. Yet I’m puzzled by Mother’s words. She didn’t say that what I was doing was best for her and Clara. She said it was the best course for Will. What’s Will got to do with this anyway?

Cook and I work in the galley, which is located midships, in the hold. The galley consists of a brick oven built directly onto the ballast. It holds an iron cauldron above the firebox. All of our food is boiled in this cauldron. There are four large soaking tubs beside the oven and boxes containing firewood and coal.

My job is to keep a steady supply of firewood and coal on hand and to fetch all the supplies Cook needs for our meals.

The hold is all jumbled up with spare sails and sailcloth, timber, tools, cables, spare anchors, coal, firewood, the carpenter’s chest, the surgeon’s chest and all of our food. At first it was all a hotch-potch to me. Oatmeal and dried split peas are stored in barrels aft, salt beef and salt pork in four-pound chunks are kept in barrels in the stern. Wicker baskets of dried salt fish are stored beside the meat. Bread is in the bread room in the bow, and the spirits room is beside it.

It took a bit of getting used to, but I finally figured out how to fetch what was needed without running my legs off. Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays are flesh days. Twenty-four hours before Cook needs it, either salt pork or salt beef must be in the soaking tubs. Boiled split peas are always served with boiled pork, and porridge accompanies boiled beef. I fetch them on the day Cook needs them. All other days, Cook serves potage, which is oatmeal thickened in meat broth. Boiled fish is available every day, so there’s always some soaking and some boiling.

I am kept very busy in the galley. By midday I’m tired down to my bones and every muscle aches. On the other hand, it is better to be busy: I forget to think about home. I yearn to be home in Erith, my village. Erith is a small huddle of buildings tucked in a bend of the River Thames far from the foaming waves and roaring sea winds. Marshes border the east of the village. To the west, there’s a forest of chestnut trees. Beyond that it’s all farmland, meadows for grazing and fields of cabbage and potatoes. There are some stalls in the market place and a few inns down by the river. Mother threatened to pin my ears behind my neck if I ever went near the inns, especially the Three Mariners.

I’m warning you, Jeremy, she’d say, and her face would become quite grave. The inns are thick with rogues and thieves.

I know Will is having a harder time on board than I am. He has almost a man’s strength, and when Captain James met him, he decided that Will would be an apprentice seaman and not a ship’s boy like me. This means that Will is learning to furl and unfurl sails, stand watch in the crosstrees, push the heavy capstan bars to winch in the anchor and handle an oar in the longboat. He’s dead tired at the end of his shift, and his grumpiness makes me ill at ease. So too is some of the talk he’s hearing from the men.

Last night, as he was wrapping himself in his blankets, he whispered in my ear. Want to hear something strange? Captain James is the only person aboard this ship who knows how to get us where we’re going.

What?

That’s the talk.

I felt my stomach grow cold, and all other feeling drained away.

Who told you this, Will?

He held a finger to his lips. Sh! Keep your voice down—Brian Blount. Blount says the Captain turned his back on crew what had ever sailed in Arctic waters. And he refused to hire anyone who had ever sailed with any other member of the crew.

This is wondrous strange! I whispered. What would happen to us if Captain James got sick or died? How would we survive? I took fright at the thought of it.

But Will didn’t answer. His back was to me and his head was already buried in his blankets.

Sometime during the night, I awoke trembling from a dream about a ship lost in a rolling and boiling sea.

May 8, 1631

We departed Bristol Harbour five days ago bound for the north Atlantic and Hudson Bay. Screaming gulls slid down the wind in our wake. A lone cormorant stepped from its rocky perch and flapped its ragged wings furiously as it flew across the bow.

The ship was sailing all fine down the Bristol Channel when violent squalls hit us halfway. I was on my way to the soaking tubs with an armload of dried salt fish when the ship was lifted high then dropped down low and lifted high and dropped down low. I was flung over some stacked timbers. I don’t know where the fish landed. Every time I tried to pick myself up, I was thrown down again. I tried desperately to right myself against a pile of folded sails but ended up splayed across the Lieutenant’s boots. I struggled to get up, but my legs were limp as seaweed.

The Lieutenant is a crosspatch, surly and sullen. He prowls about the ship, puffed up, proud and pompous. He looks us up and down with a cold fishy eye, sorting us out, sizing us up, seeking the slightest sign of trouble. I lay there and gaped at him, wondering if he got the scar over his right eye in a swordfight. Why I was thinking about his scar at a time like this, I’ll never know.

I have never been to sea, and the wild tossing made me seasick. I opened my mouth to beg his pardon and vomited on his boots. He looked at me funny, as if he didn’t know whether to curse me or kick me where I lay. Then without saying a word he hoisted me onto his shoulder with a single swing of his long arms and half carried, half dragged me up to the main deck. He pressed me against the carved wooden heads of the ship’s rail while I vomited again and again. Even when nothing came up, I retched and retched. I must have passed out after that, for when I awoke, I was rolled up in my blankets too weak to move. My sides ached from the terrible retching. My stomach ached from the endless pitching. My jaw ached from stretching my mouth so wide.

At some point, I’m not even sure if it was the same day, Will stopped by to see me. He tilted his head to one side like a curious dog and said, What happened to you? You’re as pale as snail slime.

I fear the sea has had my guts for garters, I moaned.

Shall I get you something to eat, Jeremy? You’ve got to get your strength back.

In my mind I pictured a stringy lump of meat in my wooden bowl. My stomach began to feel dizzy. I almost gagged.

Will took a blanket from under his arm and threw it over me. I’ve brought you one of my blankets. This should help you to stop shivering.

Then he sat down beside me.

Have you heard any more talk about the voyage, Will?

Nothing much. Nothing I haven’t already told you. Then he turned to me suddenly. Wait, there is something. He leaned over and whispered hoarsely. Captain James didn’t hire any crew with wives and children or sweethearts. He said something about the Arctic being a wild and dangerous place and that he needed men who could concentrate on the dangers and not be worrying about things at home.

As he disclosed what he knew, I smelled trouble. I felt a hollow feeling beneath my ribs. Before I could speak my thoughts, Will jumped up. Jeremy, I have to get back on deck. Oh, good news, Captain’s taking us into Milford Haven to make repairs to the rigging. The calmer waters will help you feel better.

No, I thought. Running away from this ship is the only way I’m going to feel better.

That was three days ago. Yet somehow through all of these seasick, frightening days, I clenched my teeth and struggled to carry out my duties for Cook. I can’t believe how wobbly my legs are yet. My mouth tastes like the bottom of a parrot’s cage, and my breath still stinks.

May 15, 1631

We felt the long rollers of the Atlantic Ocean today. Cook gave me a few minutes off to go up to the main deck.

Get yourself a lung full of sea air, Jeremy. It will do you a world of good.

I stepped out of the companionway into a thick blanket of fog, and it wet my face and wet my clothes. I didn’t move. It was all very strange. Everything beyond the ship was silent. Yet here on deck, although I could see nothing, I could hear the creak and strain of the sails, the rattle of the ratlines and the hiss of spray against the bow.

Gusts of wind gradually thinned the fog from thick grey to white and wispy. Even then, I couldn’t see a