Book 1 · Chapter 17

If the Martians had only wanted to destroy things, they could have wiped out the entire population of London on Monday, as people scattered throughout the surrounding counties.

Not just along the road through Barnet, but also through Edgware and Waltham Abbey, and along the roads eastward to Southend and Shoeburyness, and south of the Thames to Deal and Broadstairs - the same panicked crowd poured out.

If you could have floated above London that June morning in the blazing blue sky, every road heading north and east from the tangled maze of streets would have looked dotted black with fleeing people, each dot a human agony of terror and exhaustion.

I’ve gone into a lot of detail in the last chapter about my brother’s account of the road through Chipping Barnet, so you can understand how that mass of black dots looked to someone involved. Never before in history had so many people moved and suffered together.

The legendary hordes of Goths and Huns, the biggest armies Asia has ever seen, would have been nothing compared to that current.

And it wasn’t an organized march; it was a stampede - a gigantic and terrifying stampede - without order and without a clear destination, six million unarmed and unprepared people driving headlong. It was the beginning of the collapse of civilization, the slaughter of mankind.

Directly below, the balloonist would have seen the network of streets, houses, churches, squares, gardens - already abandoned - spread out like a huge map, and blotted out in the south. Over Ealing, Richmond, Wimbledon, it would have looked as if some giant pen had flung ink across the chart.

Steadily and relentlessly, each black blot grew and spread, branching out this way and that, banking against rising ground, then pouring swiftly over a crest into a new valley, just like a blob of ink spreading across blotting paper.

And beyond, over the blue hills south of the river, the Martians moved around calmly and methodically, spreading their poisonous cloud over one area and then another, blasting them again with their steam jets when they were done, and taking control of the conquered territory.

They didn’t seem to be aiming for total annihilation so much as for complete chaos and the destruction of any resistance. They blew up any gunpowder they found, cut every telegraph line, and wrecked the railways here and there. They were crippling humanity.

They didn’t seem to be in a hurry to expand their operations, and didn’t go beyond the central part of London all that day. It’s possible that a lot of people in London stayed in their houses throughout Monday morning. It’s certain that many died at home, suffocated by the Black Smoke.

Until around midday, the Pool of London was an incredible sight. Steamboats and all kinds of ships were there, tempted by the huge sums of money being offered by fleeing people. It’s said that many who swam out to these vessels were pushed off with boathooks and drowned.

Around one o’clock in the afternoon, the thinning remnant of a cloud of the black vapor appeared between the arches of Blackfriars Bridge.

At that, the Pool became a scene of mad confusion, fighting, and collisions, and for some time a crowd of boats and barges jammed in the northern arch of the Tower Bridge, and the sailors and lightermen had to fight fiercely against the people who swarmed onto them from the riverfront.

People were actually climbing down the piers of the bridge from above. When, an hour later, a Martian appeared beyond the Clock Tower and waded down the river, nothing but debris floated above Limehouse.

I need to tell you about the fifth cylinder falling. The sixth star fell at Wimbledon. My brother, keeping an eye on the women in the carriage in a meadow, saw the green flash of it way beyond the hills.

On Tuesday, the little group, still trying to get across the sea, made their way through the crowded countryside toward Colchester. The news that the Martians now controlled all of London was confirmed. People had seen them at Highgate, and even, it was said, at Neasden.

But they didn’t come into my brother’s view until the next day. That day, the scattered groups started to realize they really needed food. As they got hungry, the idea of owning things just disappeared. Farmers were trying to defend their barns, storage buildings, and crops with weapons.

A lot of people, like my brother, were looking eastward, and some desperate people were even going back toward London to find food. These were mostly people from the northern suburbs, who had only heard rumors about the Black Smoke.

He heard that about half the government had gathered at Birmingham, and that huge amounts of powerful explosives were being prepared to use in automatic mines across the Midlands.

He also heard that the Midland Railway Company had replaced the desertions from the first day of panic, had started running trains again, and was sending trains north from St. Albans to ease the traffic in the home counties.

There was also a sign in Chipping Ongar saying that there were a lot of flour stores available in the northern towns and that bread would be distributed to the starving people nearby within twenty-four hours.

But this news didn’t stop him from the escape plan he’s made, and the three kept going eastward all day, and didn’t hear any more about the bread distribution than just that promise. And, to be honest, nobody else heard anything more about it either.

That night, the seventh star fell, hitting Primrose Hill. It fell while Miss Elphinstone was watching; she took that duty in turns with my brother. She saw it.

On Wednesday, the three people on the run - they had spent the night in a field of young wheat - reached Chelmsford, and there a group of the residents, calling themselves the Committee of Public Supply, took the pony as food, and wouldn’t give anything in exchange for it except the promise of a share the next day.

Here, there were rumors of Martians at Epping, and news of the destruction of Waltham Abbey Powder Mills in a failed attempt to blow up one of the invaders. People were watching for Martians from the church towers.

My brother, very luckily for him as it turned out, chose to push on to the coast right away instead of waiting for food, even though all three of them were really hungry.

By midday, they passed through Tillingham, which, strangely enough, seemed totally quiet and empty, except for a few sneaky looters looking for food. Near Tillingham, they suddenly saw the sea, and the most amazing crowd of ships of all kinds that you can imagine.

After the sailors couldn’t go up the Thames any further, they made their way to the Essex coast, hitting up Harwich, Walton, and Clacton, then moving on to Foulness and Shoebury to rescue people. They were spread out in a huge, curved line that disappeared into the fog towards the Naze.

Close to the shore were tons of fishing boats - English, Scottish, French, Dutch, and Swedish - along with steam launches from the Thames, yachts, and electric boats.

Further out were bigger ships: a bunch of dirty coal carriers, sleek merchant ships, cattle boats, passenger ships, petroleum tankers, and general cargo vessels. There was even an old, white transport ship, and nice, white and gray liners from Southampton and Hamburg.

Across the blue coast, along the Blackwater, my brother could just make out a dense crowd of boats haggling with people on the beach, a swarm that stretched almost all the way to Maldon. About two miles out was an ironclad, riding really low in the water, almost like a shipwreck to my brother.

This was the ram Thunder Child. It was the only warship he could see, but way off to the right, across the smooth sea - it was a totally dead calm that day - a plume of black smoke marked the next group of ironclads from the Channel Fleet.

They were lined up, steam ready, across the Thames estuary during the Martian invasion, watching, but unable to stop it. Seeing the sea, Mrs. Elphinstone freaked out, even though her sister-in-law had been reassuring her.

She’d never left England before, she’d rather die than be friendless in a foreign country, and all that. She seemed to imagine that the French and the Martians would be pretty similar. She's been increasingly anxious, scared, and down during the two-day trip.

All she wanted was to go back to Stanmore. Things were always good and safe at Stanmore. They’d find George at Stanmore... It was a huge struggle to get her down to the beach, but eventually, my brother managed to get the attention of some guys on a paddle steamer from the Thames.

They sent a boat and made a deal for thirty-six pounds for the three of them. The steamer, these guys said, was headed to Ostend. It was around two o’clock when my brother, having paid their fares at the gangway, found himself safely aboard the steamboat with his group.

There was food, but it was crazy expensive, and the three of them managed to grab a bite to eat on one of the seats at the front.

There were already a couple of dozen passengers already on board, some of whom had spent their last money to get a spot, but the captain hung around off the Blackwater until five in the afternoon, picking up even more passengers until the decks were dangerously packed.

He probably would have stayed longer if it hadn’t been for the sound of guns that started around that hour in the south. As if in response, the ironclad out at sea fired a small gun and hoisted a bunch of flags. A jet of smoke shot out of her funnels.

Some of the passengers thought the firing was coming from Shoeburyness, but then they noticed it was getting louder. At the same time, way off in the southeast, the masts and upper parts of three ironclads started rising out of the sea, surrounded by clouds of black smoke.

But my brother’s attention quickly went back to the distant firing in the south. He thought he saw a column of smoke rising out of the distant gray haze.

The little steamer was already chugging eastward of the big line of ships, and the low Essex coast was looking blue and hazy, when a Martian appeared, small and faint way off down the muddy coast from the direction of Foulness.

At that, the captain on the bridge yelled with fear and anger about how late they were, and the paddles seemed frozen with his terror.

Every single person on board stood at the edges of the boat or on the seats and stared at that distant shape, taller than the trees or church towers inland, and moving forward with a slow, weird imitation of a human walk.

It was the first Martian my brother had seen, and he stood, more amazed than scared, watching this giant move deliberately towards the ships, wading farther and farther into the water as the coast faded away.

Then, way off beyond the Crouch, came another, striding over some short trees, and then yet another, even farther off, wading deep through a shiny mudflat that looked like it was hanging halfway between the sea and the sky.

They were all heading towards the water, as if to stop the many ships that were packed between Foulness and the Naze. Even though the little paddle-boat’s engines were working hard, and foam was flying from the wheels behind her, she was moving away from the Martians with terrifying slowness.

Looking northwest, my brother saw the big line of ships already panicking as the Martians got closer; ships passing behind each other, another turning from side to front, steamships whistling and blasting out steam, sails being let out, small boats rushing back and forth.

He was so caught up in this and the creeping danger to the left that he didn’t notice anything out at sea. And then a sudden movement of the steamboat (she had suddenly turned to avoid being hit) knocked him headfirst from the seat he was standing on.

There was shouting all around him, people trampling over each other, and a cheer that seemed to be answered faintly . The steamboat lurched and rolled him over onto his hands.

He jumped to his feet and saw to the right, and not a hundred yards from their tilting, pitching boat, a huge iron thing like the blade of a plow tearing through the water, throwing it on either side in massive waves of foam that splashed towards the steamer, sending her paddles flying in the air, and then sucking her deck almost to the waterline.

A spray of water blinded my brother for a moment. When his eyes were clear again he saw the monster had passed and was speeding towards the land. Big iron parts rose out of this headlong rush, and from that two tall smokestacks projected and blasted a smoking cloud of fire.

It was the torpedo ram, Thunder Child, speeding straight towards the threatened ships.

Holding onto the railing to keep his footing on the heaving deck, my brother looked past this charging giant at the Martians again, and he saw the three of them now close together, and standing so far out to sea that their tripod legs were almost completely underwater.

Seen like that, far away, they looked far less scary than the huge iron thing that the steamer was pitching helplessly behind. It seemed they were staring at this new enemy with surprise. Maybe, to their brains, the giant was like them.

The Thunder Child didn’t fire a gun, but simply sped straight towards them. It was probably her not firing that let her get so close to the enemy. They didn’t know what to make of her. One shell, and they would have sent her to the bottom right away with the Heat-Ray.

She was speeding so fast that in a minute she looked halfway between the steamboat and the Martians - a shrinking black shape against the disappearing flat line of the Essex coast.

Suddenly, the lead Martian lowered his tube and fired a canister of black gas at the ironclad. It hit her left side and bounced off in an inky jet that rolled away towards the ocean, a huge cloud of black smoke billowing out. The ironclad sped away from it.

To the people watching from the low-riding steamer, with the sun in their eyes, it looked like she was already among the Martians. They saw the skinny figures separating and rising out of the water as they retreated towards the shore, and one of them raised the camera-like generator of the Heat-Ray.

He pointed it downwards at an angle, and a blast of steam shot up from the water at his touch. It must have sliced through the ship’s metal side like a white-hot poker through paper. A flash of flame burst through the rising steam, and then the Martian stumbled and staggered.

In a moment, he was cut down, and a huge wave of water and steam shot high into the air.

The Thunder Child’s guns roared through the smoke, firing one after the other, and one shot splashed close by the steamer, bounced towards the other flying ships to the north, and smashed a small boat into pieces. But nobody really noticed that.

At the sight of the Martian falling, the captain on the bridge yelled incoherently, and all the crowded passengers on the steamer’s back shouted together. And then they yelled again.

Because surging out beyond the white chaos came something long and black, flames streaming from its middle, its vents and smokestacks spewing fire. She was still alive; it seemed the steering gear was working and her engines were running.

She headed straight for a second Martian, and was only a hundred yards away when the Heat-Ray locked on. Then with a huge crash and a blinding flash, her decks and smokestacks shot upwards.

The Martian reeled from the force of the explosion, and in another moment, the flaming wreckage, still driving forward with incredible speed, had struck him and crushed him like cardboard. My brother shouted involuntarily. A boiling mass of steam hid everything again. "Two!" yelled the captain.

Everyone was shouting. The whole steamer from end to end rang with wild cheering that was picked up by the crowds of ships and boats heading out to sea. The steam hung over the water for many minutes, hiding the third Martian and the coast.

All this time, the boat was paddling steadily out to sea and away from the fight. When the confusion cleared, a drifting cloud of black vapor appeared, and nothing of the Thunder Child could be seen, nor could the third Martian be spotted.

But the ironclads out at sea were now close and heading towards the shore past the steamboat.

The little vessel continued to beat its way seaward, and the ironclads slowly moved back towards the coast, which was still hidden by a swirling bank of vapor, part steam, part black gas, mixing in a strange way.

The fleet of refugees was scattering to the northeast; several small boats were sailing between the ironclads and the steamboat.

After a while, before they reached the sinking cloud bank, the warships turned north, then abruptly turned around and disappeared into the thickening haze of evening to the south. The coast grew faint, and finally vanished among the low clouds gathering around the setting sun.

Then suddenly, out of the golden haze of the sunset came the rumble of guns, and a line of dark shadows moving. Everyone rushed to the rail of the steamer and peered into the blinding light of the west, but nothing was clear. A mass of smoke rose and blocked out the sun.

The steamboat pushed on through an unbearable suspense.

The sun dipped behind grey clouds, the sky going all kinds of dark and moody. The evening star flickered into view. It was super late when the captain yelled and pointed. My brother squinted, trying to see.

Something shot up into the sky out of the grey - zoomed upwards, really fast, into the bright space above the clouds to the west. It was flat, wide, and huge, like, seriously big, and it curved around in this massive swoop.

It got smaller, sank slowly, and then just disappeared back into the dark mystery of the night. And as it flew, it rained down darkness all over the land.