Chesapeake (124 page)

Captain Jake had enjoyed Christmas and was sleeping soundly this first Monday after the New Year, but at three o’clock in the morning his daughter Nancy shook him by the shoulder and whispered, ‘Daddy! Time to sail.’ He muttered a protest, then sat bolt upright. ‘What time?’ he asked, and she replied, clutching her nightgown about her throat, ‘Three.’

He leaped from bed, climbed into five layers of protective clothing, then went into the next room, where he kissed his two other children as they slept. His wife was already in the kitchen brewing a pot of coffee
and pouring out a quart of milk for him to take to the boat. She also had some strips of bacon and a handful of onions to be delivered to Big Jimbo for that day’s stew.

Through the dark streets of Patamoke, Captain Jake headed for the wharf, and as he approached the swaying masts of the oyster fleet, he saw converging on the waterfront a score of men dressed like himself, each bringing some item of special food. They moved like shadows in the frosty air, grunting hellos as they met, and when Jake reached the
Jessie T
he was pleased to see that Big Jimbo was already aboard, with a fire well started.

‘Brung you some milk,’ he said, half throwing his parcel onto the swaying table. The cook grunted some acknowledgment, then reached for a bucket of choice oysters that had been set aside for this occasion. Placing a well-worn glove on his left hand, he began shucking the oysters, tossing the meat into one pan while pouring as much of the liquor as possible into another. ‘Things look good,’ Captain Jake said as he deposited his gear and went on deck.

Mate Caveny was prompt, and while he and the captain cleared the deck, the three Turlock crewmen came aboard, stowing their gear forward in the mean quarters. ‘Cast off!’ Jake called, and when his lines were clear and his two sails aloft, his skipjack began its slow, steady movement out to the center of the river, then westward toward the bay. Three hours later the sun would begin to rise, but for the present they would be in darkness.

It was very cold on deck. A brisk wind swept in from the bay, coming as usual out of the northwest, bitter cold from Canada. Captain Jake stayed at the wheel, standing before it and moving it with his left hand behind his back. The Turlocks patrolled the deck, while Caveny stayed below helping the cook.

Past Peace Cliff they went and into the channel north of Devon Island. Blackwalnut Point appeared in the dim light, while ahead lay the great bay, its waters ruffled by the heavy wind. It was cold, dark and wet as the tips of waves broke off to become whipping spray that cut the face.

But now Big Jimbo rang his bell, and all but the youngest Turlock moved below; he watched the wheel, standing in front of it, as the captain had done.

In the cramped cabin below, Big Jimbo had prepared one of his best he-stews, and when crackers were broken over the bottom of their bowls and the rich mixture poured in, the men’s faces glowed. But as in most skipjacks, no one moved a spoon until the cook had taken his place at the small table and reached out his large black hands to grasp those of Captain Turlock and Mate Caveny, whose free hands sought those of the two crewmen. The circle thus having been completed, the
five watermen bowed their heads while Captain Turlock uttered the Protestant grace:

When he finished, all the men said ‘Amen,’ but they did not relax their hands, for it was now Tim Caveny’s responsibility to intone the Catholic grace:

Again the men said ‘Amen,’ but still they kept their hands together, for in addition to the two formal graces, it was the custom aboard the
Jessie T
for Caveny to add a personal prayer, and in his rich Irish accent he now asked God for special attention:

‘Amen,’ the watermen whispered, and spoons dipped into the golden-flecked stew.

They needed prayers, for their work was both hard and dangerous. When Captain Jake felt that the
Jessie T
was properly positioned over the invisible beds, he ordered Caveny and the three Turlocks to drop the two dredges, one port, one starboard, and when these iron-pronged collectors had bounced over the bottom long enough, he tested the wires holding them, calculating whether the load was adequate, and when he was satisfied, he ordered the dredges hauled aboard.

Now the muscle-work began. Port and starboard stood two winches, powered by hand, and around the drum of each, the wire leading to its dredge was wound. Then the men, two to a winch, began turning the heavy iron handles, and as the drums revolved, the lines holding the submerged dredges were hauled aboard. Danger came when the iron prongs of the dredge caught in rock, reversing the handle and knocking
out men’s teeth or breaking their arms. Few watermen ever worked the oyster bars without suffering some damage from reversing handles; one of the younger Turlocks carried a broad scar across his forehead—‘I like to died from bleedin’. Lessen I had a head like rock, I be dead.’

When the dredges finally climbed aboard, dripping with mud and weed, their cargo was dumped on deck, except when the load was simply too dirty to work; then the men engaged in a maneuver that almost jerked their arms from their sockets. Alternately lowering the dredge into the sea a few feet, and yanking it back, they sloshed the great net up and down until the mud washed free. Only then were they allowed to bring it aboard with its load of oysters and shells.

Quickly the dredges were emptied onto the deck, then thrown back for another catch. As soon as they were back in the water, the watermen knelt on the deck to begin the sorting, and with deft hands well scarred by the sharp edges of oysters, they picked through the mass of dead shell and weed, isolating the living oysters which represented their catch. Their fingers seemed to dance through the debris, knowing instinctively whenever they touched a good oyster; with curious skill they retrieved each one, tossing it backward toward the unseen piles that mounted as the day’s dredging progressed.

It was a custom aboard the skipjacks for each of the four men sorting the catch to throw his oysters into the corner of the boat behind him; this distributed the weight of the catch evenly across the deck of the boat, fore and aft, port and starboard. When the long day ended—dawn till dusk, six days a week—the
Jessie T
was usually piled high with oysters, yet riding evenly in the water because of the planned way they had been stowed.

Toward the end of each day Captain Jake, who did none of the sorting, began to look for a boat flying a bushel basket high from its mast. This was the buy-boat, and there was usually one in the vicinity. When it came alongside, the men aboard the
Jessie T
had to work double-fast. Into the iron measuring bucket dropped onto their deck by a boom from the buy-boat they shoveled their catch, and each time the iron bucket rose in the air and returned to the buy-boat, depositing the oysters into its hold, Tim Caveny at the railing would cry ‘Tally one!’ then ‘Tally two!’—and so on until the fifth bucket, when he would shout ‘Mark one!’ Then he would begin again with ‘Tally one!’

At dusk he would report to his crew, ‘Twenty-two and three.’ This meant twenty-two marks plus three tallies, or one hundred and thirteen bushels. And each man would then calculate what that day’s work had brought.

The
Jessie T
worked on shares. The skipjack itself received one third, divided evenly between the two owners, Jake and Tim, but they had to pay for the food, the cordage, the dredges. The captain received a third,
which again he had to split with Caveny, who could just as easily have served as leader. And the four crewmen split the remaining third among them, except that Big Jimbo was recognized as such a superior cook that he received a little extra from everyone.

His position was anomalous. The four Turlocks hated Negroes and never hesitated in voicing their disgust. ‘Goddamned spades killed my cousin Captain Matt—one of them gets out of line with me, he’s dead.’ They often made this threat in the presence of Big Jimbo, indicating they knew damned well he was descended from the murderer; but the cook himself was prized as a friend, as a most willing helper on deck and as the best galley-man in the fleet. ‘When you sail
Jessie T,
man, you eat. Our nigger can outcook your nigger ever’ time.’

The extraordinary contribution of Big Jimbo was demonstrated one gray February morning when the men were at breakfast, with the youngest Turlock at the wheel. The skipjack was heeling to starboard, so that the dishes on the crowded table were sliding, and Captain Jake called up through the cabin door, ‘All okay up there?’

‘All’s fine!’ the man at the wheel shouted back, but soon thereafter he cried in some alarm, ‘Cap’m! Very dark clouds!’ And then immediately, ‘I need help!’

Captain Jake started for the ladder, but Ned Turlock, one of the three crewmen, beat him to it. With a hearty bound, the young man leaped up the four steps and made the deck just in time to be struck in the face by the flying boom, which had been swept across the deck by a change in the storm’s direction. Ned was knocked into the turbulent water and was soon far aft of the skipjack without a lifebelt, but Captain Jake, taking command of the wheel, swung the boat about while everyone worked the sails in an effort to bring it under control.

As soon as the skipjack steadied and was on a course that might bring her near the thrashing waterman, who was struggling to stay alive, Big Jimbo tied a rope about his waist, then asked Tim Caveny to fashion a kind of harness, with smaller ropes lashing him about the shoulders and holding him to the main rope. When this was tested, the big cook checked to be sure that the loose end of the rope was secured to a mooring cleat, and then, without hesitation, plunged into the deep, icy waters. His arms thrashed wildly as he tried to stabilize himself, and one of the Turlocks cried, ‘Hell, he cain’t swim neither,’ and Captain Jake growled, ‘Niggers cain’t never swim. Watch him with the hook.’

Big Jimbo, kicking his feet and flailing his arms, moved closer to the drowning man, but the force of the waves and the irresistible movement of the skipjack prevented him from making the rescue, and it seemed that Ned Turlock must drown. But on deck Captain Jake was willing to take great risks, so in the midst of the furious squall, he brought his boat around, almost capsizing it, and headed on a tack that would intercept his cousin in the water.

With a giant embrace, Big Jimbo caught the exhausted man, clutched him to his bosom and pressed water from his lungs as the men aboard the
Jessie T
pulled on the rope to drag the two men aboard. At supper that night, after the oysters had been sold and the profits calculated, the six watermen joined hands as Caveny poured out their thanks:

When the prayer ended, everyone had objections: ‘The forty days and forty nights were Noah and the ark, not Jonah.’

‘They were both a long time,’ Caveny said. ‘I thought Ned was gone.’

‘Last week you said St. Peter was our patron saint.’

‘A fisherman needs all the help he can get,’ Caveny said.

‘You should of finished the last bit.’ And Captain Jake misquoted, ‘“Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his brother.”’

‘I didn’t forget. I just thought Ned might take it unkindly, bein’ told he was brother to a nigger.’

With the near-drowning of Ned Turlock, the suspicion that the
Jessie T
might be a bad-luck boat gained so much credence that Captain Jake found it difficult to enroll a crew. One cynic at the store reminded the men, ‘Like I told you, that skipjack was doomed from the start. Its centerboard is out of whack. Side-assed, you might say.’

And one of the Turlock boys who sailed in it confided, ‘Thing you really got to watch is Captain Jake. In the fall, when arsters is plentiful, he pays his crew a salary. Come winter, when they ain’t so many arsters, he smiles at you like an angel and says, “Boys, better we work on shares this time.” I ain’t sailin’ with him no more.’

When an Eastern Shore skipjack found itself unable to enroll a crew, it was traditional for the captain to make the big decision, which Captain Jake now did: ‘Caveny, we sail to Baltimore.’

With only Ned and Big Jimbo to help, they headed across the bay, past Lazaretto Light, past Fort McHenry, where the star-spangled banner had flown that troubled night, and into one of the finest small anchorages in the world, Baltimore’s inner harbor. Its merit was threefold: it lay right in the heart of the city; it was surrounded by hotels and stores and warehouses immediately at hand; and it was so protected by their tall
buildings that no storm could imperil a ship docked there. Also, it was a joy for any ship’s cook to enter this harbor, because on the waterfront stood the huge McCormick Spice Company, its odors permeating the area, its shelves crammed with condiments the cooks sought.

As the
Jessie T
approached her wharf in the corner formed by Light Street, where the white steamers docked, and Pratt Street, where the skipjacks tied up and the saloons clustered, Captain Jake warned his companions to be especially alert. ‘We may have to pull out of here in a hurry,’ he said. ‘Jimbo, you guard the boat while Tim and me goes ashore to tend to our business.’