The Gun Ketch (Alan Lewrie Naval Adventures)

419 Pages·2006·1.44 MB·English

by  Dewey Lambdin

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It’s 1786 and Alan Lewrie has his own ship GG
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at last, the Alacrity. Small but deadly, Alacrity e

prowls the waters of the Caribbean, protecting Auu
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British merchants from pirates. But Lewrie is still
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the same old rakehell he always was. Scandal w
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soon sets tongues wagging in the Bahamas as ie

the young captain thumbs his nose at propriety NKK
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and makes a few well-planned conquests on land a
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before sailing off to take on Calico Jack Finney, Adee
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the boldest pirate in the Caribbean. e
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Grand, satisfying . . . Fans as well as new- urecc
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comers will relish Lambdin’s unerring depiction #hh
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of Navy politicking, the niceties of Nassau society
. . . and, in fact, all the rich details of late-18th-
century life at sea and shore.”
—Publishers Weekly
Recommended . . . Lambdin’s work is compa-
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rable to that of masters such as C. S. Forrester.”
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—Library Journal
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“You could get addicted to this series. ww
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Easily.”
—New York Times Book Review
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Dewey Lambdin is a self-proclaimed “Navy iiyy
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brat” and a sailor since 1976. He has worked as

a director, writer and producer for television and
advertising. Besides the Alan Lewrie series, he is
also the author of What Lies Buried: a novel of
old Cape Fear. He lives in Nashville, TN.
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$17.95 US ISBN 13: 978-1-59013-129-9 The
$24.95 CAN 51795
The Alan Lewrie Naval Adventures #5
McBooks Press
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www.mcbookspress.com 9 781590 131299 PPrreessss
Gun Ketch
The
The Alan Lewrie Naval Adventures
The King’s Coat
The French Admiral
The King’s Commission
The King’s Privateer
The Gun Ketch
H.M.S. Cockerel
A King’s Commander
Jester’s Fortune
King’s Captain
Sea of Grey
Havoc’s Sword
The Captain’s Vengeance
A King’s Trade
Troubled Waters
The Baltic Gambit
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The

Dewey Lambdin
The Alan Lewrie Naval Adventures #5
McBooks Press, Inc.
Ithaca, New York
Published by McBooks Press, Inc. 2006
Copyright © 1993 by Dewey Lambdin
First Published in the U.S.A. by Donald I. Fine, Inc., New York
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or any portion
thereof in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without the
written permission of the publisher. Requests for such permissions should be
addressed to McBooks Press, Inc., ID Booth Building, 520 North Meadow St.,
Ithaca, NY 14850.
Cover painting by Dennis Lyall.
Cover design by Panda Musgrove.
ISBN: 978-1-59013-129-9
1-59013-129-0
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lambdin, Dewey.
The gun ketch / by Dewey Lambdin.
p. cm. — (The Alan Lewrie naval adventures ; #5)
ISBN-13: 978-1-59013-129-9 (trade pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 1-59013-129-0 (trade pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Lewrie, Alan (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Great Britain–History,
Naval—18th century—Fiction. 3. Caribbean Area—Fiction. 4. Sea stories.
I. Title. II. Series: Lambdin, Dewey. Alan Lewrie naval adventure series ; no. 5.
PS3562.A435G86 2006
813’.54--dc22
2006014820
All McBooks Press publications can be ordered by calling toll-free
1-888-BOOKS11 (1-888-266-5711). Please call to request a free catalog.
Visit the McBooks Press website at www.mcbooks.com.
Printed in the United States of America
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either
the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance
to actual events, locales, organizations or persons, living or dead, is entirely
coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or publisher.
To my mother,
Edda Alvada Ellison Lambdin.
Her generous support and unagging
encouragement never wavers, even if
she does think that Alan Lewrie is a
trie “lewd” sometimes.

FOREWORD
For those readers unfamiliar with the preceding installments in the
adventurous (some would say “reprehensible, nefarious, venal, Just
Like a Man, rakehellish squanderings of a—ruling-class pig” . . .
and, mind you, this chronicler has heard it all at one time or an-
other—but they’re all Politically Correct or smugly moral carpers,
so who the bloody hell cares what they think?) life of our heroic,
if somewhat lazy Alan Lewrie, Royal Navy, allow me to fill you in
on some of the highlights of his curriculum vitae.
Epiphany Sunday, 1763: Born a bastard. (Now there’s auspicious
onset for you!) St. Martin-in-the-Fields Parish, London, of Elisabeth
Lewrie, son of Sir Hugo St. George Willoughby, Captain of the 4th
Regiment of Foot, The King’s Own. Mother died soon after, and
the infant was raised in the Poor House, employed as an oakum-
picker and flax-pounder, which showed his nautical bent before
he was out of “nappies” in support of H.M. Dockyards.
1766: Rescued by his father (since he had discovered that the
last viable Lewrie heir to a positive flood of guineas was none
other than our lad Alan) and raised as a gentleman in St. James’s
Square.
There followed the usual hellish childhood, and a disappoint-
ing series of schools in which Alan Lewrie excelled at both his
studies, and the inventive (some would say inspired) creation of
mayhem, one example of which in 1779 resulted in the total de-
molition, by use of explosives, of the faculty stables and coach
house at Harrow.
1780: Arranged to be caught in bed with his half sister Belinda
Willoughby so he could be exiled, and never know that he was on
the verge of being the last male Lewrie, due that aforementioned
golden shower of “yellowboys,” and shoved into the Royal Navy as
a midshipman before he could even learn to say “Jack Ketch.”