User:SteveBaker/ch1

Pistols at Noon
Wimbledon Common, 12th Sept, 1840, Noon.

September in London is a time of change - summer gives way to autumn, a million leaves on a million trees in Wimbledon Common turn to bronze and gold. A fine day for a man with time on his hands to take a friends' chestnut mare for a gallop, to get the blood racing and to taste the warmth of the noon-day air before it cools and crispens and hardens to winter. At a trot, take the slight rise that is all that remains of the Iron Age hill fort known as Caesar's Camp. Mind wanders. Wonder why it is so named, there is no evidence that Caesar had encamped there. Consider drafting a stern letter to that chap Colby over at the Ordnance Survey about getting the name changed. So many concerns for a man of substance - for who else will keep the place tidy and pay attention to the proper naming of things?

Crest the hilltop and take in the sweeping view of the commons stretched out ahead. A pastoral scene, something that Turner would be proud to commit to canvas. Pick up to a gallop on the down-slope - feel wind in hair and the exertion of horse-flesh and man in perfect harmony.

Yet not all is well in this place and time - there is unease - as if history is about to turn on a hair.

Soon, horse and man grow thirsty - a memory from the past of a horse trough near a windmill comes to mind - glance around from the saddle and there - to the north, over the meadow and through a stand of trees. The blades of a mill turning slowly in the freshening breeze to grind flour from wheat or perform some other work of man. In deference to borrowed horse, a rising trot over a half mile will take him there neatly and allow beast and man to slake their thirst and relax for a while before turning for home. A rub-down in a cosy urban stable with nose-bag of oats for one and the smoking room of a wood-panelled gentlemans' club for the other.

In the words of Blackwood's Edinburgh magazine Vol LXVIII: "That to engage in a duel, which cannot be declined without infamy, and which is not occasioned by any offence given by the party whose conduct is under discussion, whether he accepted or sent the challenge, though contrary to the law of the land, is an act free from moral turpitude."

Though perhaps lacking moral turpitude, a duel is not a pretty affair, no matter how dressed up with seconds and intermediaries and rules of etiquette. Death by duelling constitutes a willful murder and my be prosecuted accordingly. Lord Cardigan had been insulted - publicly, in letters to the press, over matters of whether porter or moselle should be served in the mess hall of the 11th Light Dragoons. Worse, the instigator was a mere Lieutenant whom he'd rightly reprimanded for ordering porter for a guest in defiance of orders. Demands for apology had resulted in demands for admission of facts before apology could be tendered. Refusal to admit all facts in order to deny untruth make apology impossible. Enough then. Damn him to hell. Send a challenge - it is accepted - and hence, a 'meeting'.

The age where an actual gauntlet could be dropped, or a face lightly slapped with a white silk glove were gone. A note inscribed on a visiting card and passed through a mutual friend courteously demands satisfaction via pistols. By the windmill on Wimbledon Common. September 12th at noon. Perhaps dawn would be more traditional - but you really can't expect a gentleman to rise at such hour merely to swat at an annoying insect.

Thus we find the noble Earl of Cardigan with Captain Douglas as his second facing off against Lieutenant Harvey Tuckett with Captain Wainwright at his side. Sir James Anderson (surgeon), stands in attendance with black bag in hand. Brief preliminaries - neither side wishing to back down despite threat of a half inch lead ball to the gut. Pleas from Douglas and Wainwrite for reason and compromise go unheard. At this point, some men might take a shot of brandy from engraved silver flasks to stiffen nerves and resolve - but these two prefer a clear head and a straight shot of another kind.

Each man brings his own pistols - no formal selection from a matched pair of prissily engraved toys, these men are soldiers and their chosen weapons are machines made for killing, nothing more. Fine rules of duelling etiquette are not laid out - each man knows what is to be done. No high drama of standing back to back and counting out ten paces - the two men merely stroll to a distance that they both appear to accept - stand sideways-on to present a fractionally smaller target, and wait while the seconds retreat to a safe distance. There they stand, awaiting the sign to kill.

To try to kill. A pistol is not a precision tool. Even though Cardians' weapon has illicit rifling to spin the ball and make it fly true and a dangerous hair trigger to make weapon discharge with the smallest possible pressure of index finger so to avoid disturbing aim. Even though he is considered a fine shot, a dozen yards is a fair distance for a pistol. It is hard to stare down the barrel of a loaded pistol without some disquiet. Even the man who would go on to charge an entire brigade of light cavalry into the teeth of Russian artillery must be permitted the slightest of barrel-shifting tremor under such circumstances.

Wainwright speaks some formal words that he believes should be spoken at such times. Perhaps a final plea to settle this matter without blood-spill? Perhaps a prayer for the loser to head heavenward while winner is damned to hell? Perhaps a statement of how many shots may be fired. It matters not at all because neither combatant hears them through intense focus on the issue in hand. Now they must fight hand-tremble, breathing and heartbeat to keep weapon pointed at trembling, breathing, heart-pumping target. Await on their own hair triggers the command to set flint to steel and spark to gunpowder so compression of gasses may propel .52 calibre leaden ball along ballistic trajectory.

Lacey embroidered kerchief is dropped, it barely touches the grassy meadow as two shots ring out - both men wonder how they are still alive. Trusty seconds quickly move in to provide more loaded pistols and more words of unfelt confidence. The business of aim and dropped kerchief is repeated. This time Tuckett crumples as smoke clears and drifts over the meadow. A pistol ball smashed through rib and lodged near spine.

The fate of the new owner of this particular small leaden sphere is of some interest to the future. How the balls' former owner survives his trial in the House of Lords certainly should be of concern to the six hundred and seventy unsuspecting men who will come under his command fourteen years hence. But it is not those matters which twist history today - and the fates of poor Tuckett and bold Lord Cardigan may be left for another tale.

If not that, then what happened in those brief moments to change the future of the world?

As the Wimbledon miller, his wife and son, looked on from the windmills' gallery, the first ball loosed by Tuckett passed a clear foot over Cardigans' head. Advice given by Wainwright - which he had gleaned from an early 18th century guide to dueling - strongly recommended aiming for the torso, that presenting the larger target. Sadly, in the heat of that moment, or perhaps from overconfidence in his aim or long military habit - this had been forgotten by Tuckett who aimed for the head, and paid the price for doing so.

But consider this:

Suppose a ripple in time, the smallest quantum event, deflects the barrel of Tucketts pistol by the breadth of a hair? Not enough to allow him to win the duel and perhaps save Tennyson the bother of writing his epic poem of the heroism and foolishness in the Crimea. Just enough to make a small coincidence happen.

...ripple...

The ball misses Cardigan, travels on, slowing to seven hundred feet per second, glances from the bough of an unsuspecting oak tree and with most of its power now spent, merely nicks the hindquarters of a certain borrowed chestnut mare, trotting quietly through the trees in search of that half-forgotten water trough.

The rider is William - Lord King, 8th Baron Ockham, Viscount, Earl of Lovelace, and newly titled Lord-Lieutenant of Surrey, and for him, matters were to take a turn for the worse. No matter how accomplished a horseman; a rearing, panic-stricken mare may still bring skull in violent contact with stout tree limb, cause a fall from the saddle and permit iron-shod hooves to be applied to vulnerable parts of rider with the force of a thousand pounds of descending horse. Protection from a daintily embroidered waistcoat and silk-lined riding jacket not withstanding - this is not a good thing.

Stunned, broken, damaged - we must allow that William lives a while longer - but with all of the post-duel confusion, he lies unnoticed for several hours. Alas, though one of the best surgeons in London stands just a hundred feet away and medical help arrives to save poor Tuckett - Lord King meets his end in unconscious peace in that stand of noble oaks spilling lifes' blood on England's blessed turf. Though never destined to be a great figure of history, William's premature departure sends a tsunami of change throughout the length and breadth of the history of our world.

The mare soon calms down, loses interest and strolls off to find a particularly lush outcrop of grass with which to console herself for a sore rump, then to be found sometime later by a passing groom and returned to her owner. There is concern. A search party sets out to discover Lord King lying peacefully, flesh cold, mind stilled, heart stopped - no glorious death - no drama of a duel or heroic battlefield struggle. A simple riding accident suffices to seal his fate and overturn that of us who survive him.

Runners are sent forth to inform the King household: The Earl of Lovelace has met his end in a riding accident in Wimbledon Common. A trusted friend of the family must now be dispatched to locate his widow, the Countess Ada of Lovelace and break terrible news as best he may.