He looked around and almost smiled with satisfaction. It had been a running fight with the Navy Department, but he had finally got what he wanted. They had complained about the price, but in the end had given in. Now he had a completely integrated shipyard, every unit of which he had designed himself. From this immense stone-walled drydock, right through to the foundries, plate-shops, machine shops, steam hammers, drills and steam engines. All of the equipment for handling the massive amount of iron needed to build this new leviathan of the seas.
A totally new design, of course. Twice as large as the Avenger, it had two turrets, each mounting two 12-inch cannon, one forward and one aft. A belt of armor ran along the waterline, and there were armored decks over the engines, the boilers, and the magazines. Armor around the base of the turrets as well. As well as the two main batteries there were a variety of small guns along the sides. This would be a seagoing ship that could patrol the oceans of the world and dread naught from any other vessel of war. Particularly the British. Locked in his safe was a report sent to him by the Navy Department. He had not questioned its accuracy, although he had no idea how it had been obtained. It contained details of three British ironclads now under construction. All the same, all compromises, all built on a modified design of Warrior. They would be no match for his Virginia, that he was sure of. He also had details on a larger ship that had already been launched, HMS Conqueror. An improvement on the others — but still not good enough. Should she come up against the Virginia he had no doubts as to the outcome.
“There is something else,” Davis said. “There are two gentlemen in the office who want to see you.”
“I am too busy.”
“They are from the government, sir. They said that it was important.”
Muttering at this interruption of his work, Ericsson went down to the office. One of them he recognized, for he knew him far too well. Litwack was his name and he represented the US Treasury and was the channel by which Ericsson received his funding. There was always a battle over money whenever they met.
“Mr. Ericsson,” Litwack said, stepping forward, “This is Mr. Frederick Douglass, of the Freedmen’s Bureau.”
Ericsson nodded perfunctorily at the tall Negro, a striking-looking man with a great beard and a towering mass of hair. He shook his hand briefly, since he had no racial prejudice — any hatreds he might have had were directed against the stupidity of the people he had to deal with. He turned back to Litwack.
“What is it this time? You are here about funding?”
“No, not this time. It is Mr. Douglass of the Freedmen’s Bureau who has some questions for you.”
“I know nothing about your Freedmen’s. I am an engineer…”
“Then you had better learn right now,” Douglass said in an irritated grumble. Ericsson turned, angrily, to face him, but Douglass spoke before he did.
“The Freedmen’s Bureau was founded to see that the laws passed by Congress are carried out to the letter of those same laws. It is one thing to free slaves, another thing altogether to see that they have gainful employment once they are freed. How many Negroes exactly are there in your apprentice program?”
“What is this man talking about?” Ericsson shouted furiously. “I have my work to do. I know nothing of politics nor do I care nothing.”
“I assure you — that is not the case.” Douglass raised his voice even louder to drown out the angry Swede. “One war has ended, the war between the states. But a new war is just beginning. By law the slaves have been freed. This has been done. Slave owners have received compensation for what they so foully considered property. But this has been only the first step along the road to freedom. If former slaves can labor only in the cotton fields, as they
have in the past, they will not have the economic freedom that they are guaranteed as free men. They need the skills, the trades that they have been denied for so long. The South is now undergoing an industrial revolution. There are machine shops, factories and shipyards, as well as the trainyards, that are now being built in the new South. They will bring prosperity to the South — and independence to their workers. The Negro who brings home his weekly pay is dependent on no man. That is right and just. The freed Negro must be part of that process. That is the law! The Federal government paid out the funds that were needed to build this new dockyard. It is here not only to build the ships of war, but to follow the new policy of industrial development in the South. Skilled machinists and fitters have come here from shipyards in the North, to train apprentices in their skills. Do you know how many of these apprentices you have in your program?”
Ericsson threw his hands into the air, exasperated beyond belief.
“This has nothing to do with me, I tell you. I am an engineer and my job is to build machines. I have never heard of these new laws nor do I care about them in the slightest.” He turned to his dockyard manager. “Davis — do you know anything about this?”
“I do, sir. I have the figures here.” He took a grubby piece of paper from his pocket. “As yet there are only forty-three men who have entered this program. But there will be one hundred and eighty apprentices in all when recruitment is finished.”
“And how many of them will be Negroes?” The question boomed out into the sudden silence. Davis mopped at his streaming face, looked around helplessly. “Tell me!” Douglass insisted.
The dockyard manager looked at the piece of paper again, then crumpled it in his sweaty palm. Finally, almost in a whisper, he said, “I believe… that there are no Negroes enrolled at the present time. To the best of my knowledge, that is.”
“I thought so!” Douglass’s words were like thunder. “When this dockyard agreed to accept Federal funding — it also agreed that one quarter of all apprentices were to be of the Negro race. That means you will enlist forty-five of them at once.” He took a thick envelope from his inside jacket pocket and passed it over to the hapless manager. “Before coming here I took the precaution of stopping at the local office of the Freedmen’s Bureau. Their address is on this envelope. Inside is a list of names of fit and able men who are available and desirous of work. Consult them. You have one week to get a list of these forty-five individuals to Mr. Litwack here. If they are not on his desk at that time all funding for this shipyard will be halted until that information is supplied.”
“Can he do this?” Ericsson shouted at the quavering Davis.
“Y-yes…”
“Then I see no problem. Do it at once. My building program shall not be delayed for a single instant.”
“But, Mr. Ericsson, there are… problems.”
“Problems? I don’t want any problems. Hire the men as has been agreed.”
“But, sir, it is the other trainees. They refuse to work side by side with niggers.”
“That is not a problem,” Ericsson said. “Make all of the apprentices black men. Surely the artificers of the North will be happy to train them.”
“I’ll see… what I can do.”