Chapter 6

We, or maybe that was I, were very lucky with no Indian encounters for the rest of the trip to San Diego, which was the end of the run as far at this wagon train was concerned. Mr. Anderson wanted me to make the trip with him next year, and I took that as quite a compliment. However, I was still on my hunt for a place to settle down, so I had to turn him down. At least, we parted as friends.

San Diego turned out to be a disappointment for me. There were no jobs that I was interested in, and, especially, there were no women who were interested in me. Oh, well, all I could do was to keep moving. For lack of a better place to go, I headed for Los Angeles. There was a stagecoach that ran from San Diego to Los Angeles, but it was not much in the way of luxury. I still had some money, so I decided to take a boat ride to Los Angeles. Ed Cooper was deathly afraid of the ocean, so I left him in San Diego.

Naturally, I didn’t want to waste money, so I signed up for a deck passage. That meant that I did not have a cabin, but slept and did everything else on the main deck while trying to stay out of the way of the working crew. The only time I went below deck was to eat. I ate the same food as the crew, and everything was so greasy that I had trouble with seasickness the first day and a half. The greasy food was fine if you were working all the time, but I wasn’t, so I had all of the bad reactions of so much grease.

The ticket was cheap because we stopped at every equivalent of a “wide place in the road.” At least, that gave me a few minutes ashore a couple of times a day, so I was able to learn a little about living in California as I made the trip. I did vow not to take such a trip ever again if I could avoid it, but I must say that it was educational.

On the second day, we were making our longest trip between stops, so we were pretty far from shore. I’m not sure what that had to do with anything, but that was when we were hit by pirates. Fortunately, I had both shotguns handy when we were attacked, and I was able to use the long shotgun before the pirate made contact with us. After that, I switched to the sawed-off shotgun, and that was a terror for the pirates.

All of the pirates were using clubs and cutlasses, and so were the crew of our little schooner. Only the captain of our boat had a pistol, and that was a measly Colt Navy revolver with virtually no stopping power. I was the only person with a decent weapon in my sawed-off shotgun, and the buckshot I was using was almost always good for one hit-one man down.

I really had no idea how best to fight the pirates, but I had been told earlier by one of the crew that the pirates never took men as prisoners, so if they won the battle, death in one form or another was all I had to look forward to. Therefore, I was damned well going to put up the best fight that I could.

I was near the railing when the pirates first tied up to us, so I had clear shots at them as they rushed the railing to board our boat. There were 12 pirates and only six of our crewmen to fight them, so the outcome was a foregone conclusion if I could not put up a good fight.

I had such an advantageous position by the railing that I did not have to move. As soon as a pirate showed himself, I fired. The only time of grace they had was when I was reloading, and that was only a few seconds. I immediately settled into a routine of BANG, BANG, reload, BANG, BANG, reload. Only one pirate managed to reach our deck, and he was quickly dispatched by three of our sailors.

We were still attached to the pirate boat, also a schooner, when the last of the attacking pirates were killed. The captain came running up to me and said, “Mr. Adams, thank you for saving us all. We would all be going through a painful death if it were not for your quick action. Now I need to ask you for some more help.

“There should be at least four more pirates aboard their boat, and we need to clean them out. Are you willing to lead a group of our men aboard the pirate boat to do so. Your shotgun is sure to beat any weapon that they might have at their disposal.”

“Sure, I’ll be happy to do what I can to help. The problem is that I know nothing about boats, so I will need an experienced hand to show me what to do.”

“That’s no problem. I’ll send Amos Arthur, my first mate, to be your guide. He is a good man in a fight, so you may find a lot of use for him.”

Amos picked two men to accompany us, and we boarded the pirate boat. I had my sawed-off shotgun and the others had cutlasses and clubs, one in each hand. Amos led the way, and I was right behind him. The other two were to guard our rear. If I yelled “DUCK!”, they were to drop to the floor. I didn’t want to shoot one by accident.

We did a quick run through of the hiding places on the main deck and found no one there, so we were now committed to going down into the bowels of the schooner. Amos was first in line, and I was right behind him with my hammers cocked and ready to put my finger on the trigger if it seemed appropriate.

This area was effectively one room, and it was used for practically everything. Hammocks were swinging from supports along the two sides of the room, and what looked like the loot from previous raids was piled in the middle of the floor. Some of those piles were boxes that ran all the way to the overhead, and that was where we expected to find men hiding.

We decided to split up into one man staying with me, and the other one sticking to Amos. I took the left aisle, and Amos took the right one. We coordinated our march down the aisles, and behind each pile of boxes, we found a pirate hiding. Well, maybe it was better to say that he found us, because the pirate came boiling out from behind the stack of boxes waving his cutlass and screaming what I swear was supposed to be a war cry.

The first one charged out on Amos’ side. Amos was expecting him and neatly chopped his head off before the pirate could do any damage. I was able to see enough of that to get the idea, so I was ready when a pirate jumped out on my side. The man with me was behind me, and that left me complete freedom to shoot. I put one hogload into the pirate’s gut, and that was the end of him. The big problem was the God-awful noise made by the shotgun being fired. We were all going to have trouble hearing for at least an hour, but there was no question that the shotgun did its job. I reloaded before taking another step.

The next pirate out showed up on my side, and I repeated my shot with the hogload. The result was the same, and I reloaded. I could tell that the crewman with me was happy with the result of my shooting, but his ears were hurting from the noise.

The last pirate we found came out to face Amos, so the noise level was not nearly as bad, but the result was still one dead pirate. Amos was sure that was the last pirate, but we did a thorough search just to make sure. Amos sent me back to report to Capt. James while he and the two crewmen threw the dead men over the side.

The captain put aboard a prize crew to sail the pirate boat in parallel with us to Los Angeles where the prize boat and the loot were sold. Capt. James awarded me two shares of the prize money, the same that he got, while the crew and Amos got one share.

Except for my two shares, this was the normal splitting of the prize money, and nobody complained. Several of the crew commented to me that I well deserved the two shares that I got. My part amounted to just over $16,000, and that was enough to make me a very rich man as long as I stayed out of gold country, where hen eggs were going for $5 each.

Just like in San Diego, there was nothing for me in Los Angeles until word got around of my adventure with the wagon train and on the boat from San Diego. I could usually get a glass of beer in any saloon where I told my story, and that made the telling worth the effort.

There was a freight hauler who was having trouble with Indian raiders as he hauled goods from the port at Los Angeles to various towns around the neighborhood. This man wanted to hire me to guard his wagons. I told him that I would take the job, but I was going to need help. He was agreeable with that, so I hired two men to act as guards.