Robert pulled his gray hat tighter over his long black hair in the flowing wind and bitterly decided that this was no lake, it was an ocean. Stress, not age, colored his hair with iron streaks, yet his beard remained youthful and full, as great as the beards of dashing Confederate Generals. His long nose and narrow face seemed designed to cut wind like a man who belonged in the cavalry. This severity belied the kindness of the man, a trait set aside until this damnable business of war was over.
“Coal Island ahead,” the deep voice of Captain Marsh came from the ship’s wheel, easily intruding on Robert’s thoughts. Years of shouting orders in the wind had given the sailor a voice as rough as gravel.
Looking forward, past bow spirit, Robert could see a smudge of color touching the horizon.
“How can men live out here?” Robert walked aft, pushing his hands into the pockets of his gray coat, gold filigree of his rank still stitched to the sleeves, the single gold star of a major on the collar.
“They cannot.” Marsh clapped his rough hand on a spoke of the ship’s wheel with pride. “My Tulip will keep you sustained,”
Robert could only nod and pray the captain was true to his word. Yet he had to admit as he looked about the ship’s deck that Robert liked the care given the brig. All wood surfaces are polished and ropes coiled neatly on the deck and pristine sails catching the wind. Even the brig’s crew wore well-tended clothes.
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"I believe so,” Robert conceded the point with a slight smile.
Captain Marsh seemed content to continue the conversation as he watched the island grow slowly in the distance. “This lake is not like an ocean. This is vicious water. It hates men.” The captain’s deep voice rumbled with certainty.
“Surely all sailing is dangerous.”
“Aye Major, just as is war.” Marsh tilted his head, turning his gaze on the prisoner with a measuring eye. “We fight to survive in each, do we not?”
“Absolutely Captain,” Robert nodded.
“The water is near freezing all year long,” the captain waved his hand at the lake. “Heavy wind drives the waves to amazing heights. During winter, ice covers it all and the slightest wind drives the ice to destruction on the windward shore.”
There was more to this man’s concern, Robert understood as they rolled easily to the movement of the ship. He regarded the captain with piercing gray eyes. “Please tell me what you must, Captain.”
“I have seen too many men claimed by this hell-spawned bitch of a lake and I have pulled frozen prisoners from rafts. I have seen men I have delivered to that island lay on this deck within a month’s time, their skin blue and water filling their bellows.” Marsh paused almost apologetically. “When they tell you escape is impossible, you must believe them.”
There was too much sincerity and concern in the man for Robert to ignore the warning. Without replying, Robert walked forward, glum in his thoughts. For the prisoners on the ship, their capture at Gettysburg had only been an interlude in the horror that life presented. Every man dreamed of the reward they had earned for conscripted toil, the release from the hell. They would all want to escape Coal Island.
With no means to discern the hazards of the future, Robert could only try to save as many of his men as possible. He could only hope that the butcher’s bill would become a memory; that it would cease to be a roll call of death for the men he knew and admired.