Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period Part 40

[Footnote 3: Nicholas Trott, LL.D., attorney-general of Bermuda 1696-1697, the first attorney general of South Carolina 1698-1702, chief-justice 1702-1709, 1713-1719, a learned lawyer, and a great power in the politics of the province so long as the rule of the proprietors continued. He was the first vice-admiralty judge, having commissions as such from both the king and the proprietors. He is often erroneously identified with his cousin the governor (1693-1696) of the Bahamas, the Nicholas Trott of docs. nos. 63 and 64.]

Whereas by an Act of Parliament made in the Twenty-Eight year of Henry the Eight Int.i.tuled for Pirates It is among other things Enacted That all Treasons, Felonies, Robberies, Murthers and Confederacies thereafter Committed in or upon the Seas or in any other Haven, River, Creek or Place where the Admiral or Admirals have or Pretend to have power, Authority or Juridiction, Shall be Inquired, Tryed, heard, determined and Judged in such s.h.i.+res and Places in the Realm as shall be Limitted by the Kings Commission or Commissions to be directed for the same in like form and Condition as if any such Offence or Offences had been Committed or Done in and upon the Land, and such Commissions shall be had under the Kings Great Seal Directed to the Admiral or Admirals or to his or their Lieutenant, Deputy and Deputies, and to three or Four such other Substantial persons as shall be named or appointed by the Lord Chancellor of England for the time being from time to time and as often as needs shall require, to hear and Determine such Offences after the Common Course of the Laws of England Used for Treasons, Felonies, Robberies, Murthers and Confederacies of the same Done and Committed upon the Land within the Realm of England, And it is further Enacted That such Persons to whom such Commission or Commissions shall be Directed or four of them at the least shall have full power and authority to Inquire of such Offences and of every of them by the Oaths of Twelve good and Lawfull Inhabitants in the s.h.i.+re Limited in their Commission in such like manner and form as if such offence had been Committed Upon the Land within the same s.h.i.+re, And that every Indictment found and presentd before such Commissioners of any Treasons, Felonies, Robbery, Murthers, Manslaughters or such other Offences Committed or done in and upon the Seas or in and upon any other River or Creek Shall be Good and Effectual in the Law, and if any Person or Persons happen to be Indicted for any such Offence done or thereafter to be done upon the Seas or any other place above Limitted That then such Order, Process, Judgement and Execution shall be used had Done and made to and against every such person or Persons so being Indicted as against Traitors, Felons and Murtherers for Treason, Felony, Robbery, Murther or such Offences done upon the Land as by the Law of this Realm is Accustomed, and that the Tryal of such Offence or Offences if it be Denied by the Offender or Offenders shall be had by Twelve Lawfull men Inhabited in the s.h.i.+re Limited within such Commission, which shall be Directed as is aforesaid, and no Challenge or Challenges to be had for the Hundred.

And such as shall be Convict of any such Offence or Offences by Verdict, Confession or Process by Authority of any such Commission shall have and Suffer such pains of Death, Losses of Lands, Goods and Chattels as if they had been Attainted and Convicted of any Treasons, Felonies, Robberies or other the Like said Offences done upon the Land,[4] Which said Act for Pirates with Several other Acts of Parliament of the Kingdom of England are made of Force in this Province by of Act of a.s.sembly Int.i.tled an Act to put in Force in this Province the several Statutes of the Kingdom Of England or South Britain therein particularly mentioned, duely Ratified in open a.s.sembly the Twelth Day of December in the year of our Lord One Thousand Seven Hundred and Twelve, In which said Act of a.s.sembly Amongst other things It is Enacted That the Honble Governor and the Council of this Province for the time being shall have all the power and Authority relating to the Execution of the therein Enumerated Statutes as by the same or by any other the Laws of England are Given to the Lord Chancellor or the Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England as the said Act of a.s.sembly, reference being there unto had, will more fully appear.

[Footnote 4: Thus far quoting, correctly, sect. 2 of 28 Henr. VIII.

ch. 15.]

Now Know yee, That we, reposing especial Trust and Confidence in the Ability, Care, Prudence and Fidelity of you the said Nicholas Trott, Thomas Howard, Charles Hart, Thomas Broughton, Arthur Middleton, Ralph Izard, Philip Daws, William Cuthbert, Allen Archer and Samuel Brailsford or any four of you, the said Nicholas Trott to be one, have const.i.tuted and Appointed and by these presents Do Const.i.tute and Appoint you to be Our Commissioners in South Carolina for Examining, Enquiring of, Trying, Hearing and Determining and Adjudging, according to the directions of the said act of Parliament as made of force in the said province of South Carolina, all Treason, Piracies, Robberies, Felonies and Murthers Committed in or upon the Sea or within any Haven, River, Creek or place where the Admiral or Admirals have power, authority or Jurisdiction, And to Do all things necessary for the hearing and final Determination of any Cases of Treason, Piracy, Robbery, Felony or Murther Committed on the Sea or where the Admiral hath Jurisdication, and to Give Sentence and Judgement of Death and to Award Execution of the Offenders so Convicted and Attainted, And we hereby direct, Impower and require you our said Commissioners to proceed, Act, Examine, hear, adjudge and Determine in all things as fully and amply to all Intents and purposes within this province of South Carolina as any Commissioners in the Kingdom of England Impowered by Commission under the Broad Seal pursuant to the said Statute of the Twenty Eight of Henry the Eight for Pirates or any the like Commissioners in any of the British Plantations in America can or may lawfully doe, perform and Execute, And we do hereby Require and Command all our Officers and all other Persons whatsoever in anywise concerned to take notice of this our Grant and give all due Obedience to your said Commissioners in the Execution of the several powers herein Granted you, as they will Answer the Contrary att their Perils.

Witness our Deputy Governor and our Deputies at CharlesTown in South Carolina And Given under the Publick Seal of the said Province of South Carolina This First day of November In the Third year of the Reign of our Lord George, by the Grace of G.o.d of Great Britain France and Ireland King, Defender of the faith etc. And in the year of our Lord One Thousand Seven hundred and Sixteen.

ROBERT DANIEL.[5]

GEORGE LOGAN.

FRA. YONGE.

SAM: EVELEIGH.

[Footnote 5: Governor Edward Craven, sailing for England in April preceding, had left Col. Robert Daniel deputy governor in his stead.

The other signers were deputies of individual proprietors.]

THE PIRATES OF THE _WHIDAH_.

_107. Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute. May [5?], 1717._[1]

[Footnote 1: Ma.s.s. Archives, vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a. Cyprian Southack was a notable sea-captain and pilot. For a number of years he commanded the naval vessel of Ma.s.sachusetts, so that it was the natural course for the governor to send him in pursuit of pirates who suddenly appeared on the Ma.s.sachusetts coast. In 1711 he had commanded a vessel in the unfortunate expedition against Quebec under Sir Hovenden Walker, and the admiral had stayed at his house during his long detention in Boston. He was also the most noted map-maker of his time in New England; in 1694 King William had admitted him to kiss his hands and had given him a gold chain of 50 for his map of Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and the St. Lawrence region (_Acts. P.C.

Col._, II. 264). The governor whom he addresses was Samuel Shute, governor 1716-1727. The ending of the War of the Spanish Succession (1713) had as usual caused a large revival of piracy, many privateers turning to that trade. The career of the _Whidah_ and of Capt. Samuel Bellamy can be made out from the depositions which follow. On April 26, in a heavy gale, she had come ash.o.r.e on the sands of Cape Cod, in what is now Wellfleet, and all on board but two men (see doc. no. 114) were drowned. More than a hundred of the pirates thus perished. Of those who escaped wreck, in the smaller vessels, several, who had const.i.tuted the prize crew of the _Mary Anne_ (doc. no. 109), were captured, tried, and executed (doc. no. 112). The story is told in _The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy_, etc. (Boston, 1718), and by Mr. John H. Edmonds in the _Boston Sunday Globe_ for Oct. 22, 1916.]

CAPE COD HARBOUR[2] May [5?] 1717

[Footnote 2: Southack had come across from Boston into the inner side of the Cape.]

_Maye itt Plea.s.s Your Excellency_

_Sir_, may 2 at 1 After noon I Came to Anchor here, finding Serveral Vessells, Visseted them and on board one of them found a Yung man boling[3] to the s.h.i.+p the Pirritt[4] Took 26 April in South Channell, Saileing from Nantaskett the Day before at 3 After noon. April 26 Pirritt s.h.i.+p Took a Sloop in South Channell, Lading with West India Goods, Sloop or Master I no not as Yett.[5] at 7 After noon the Pirrett s.h.i.+p with her Tender, being a Snow a bout Ninty Tuns they Took in Lat.i.tude 26, 15 Days agoe,[6] maned with 15 of Pirritts men, wine s.h.i.+p and Sloop all to Gather Standing to the Northward. at 12 Night the Pirritt s.h.i.+p and wine s.h.i.+p Run a Sh.o.r.e, the Snow and Sloop Gott Off Sh.o.r.e, being Sen the Next morning in the Offen.[7]

[Footnote 3: Belonging. Spelling was not one of the captain's many accomplishments. For facsimiles of his handwriting, see _Memorial History of Boston_, II. liv, 98.]

[Footnote 4: Pirate. The South Channel lies in the southern portion of Nantucket Sound, south of the great shoal known as the Horse-shoe. The s.h.i.+p here alluded to was the pink _Mary Anne_; see doc. no. 109.]

[Footnote 5: The _Fisher_; see doc. no. 111.]

[Footnote 6: See the last part of doc. no. 108. A snow was a small vessel like a brig except for having a supplementary third, or trysail, mast.]

[Footnote 7: Seen; offing. The local legend, as recounted by the minister of Wellfleet in 1793, was that the captain of the snow, ordered by Bellamy to precede the _Whidah_ with a light at his stern, under promise of receiving the snow as a present if he should pilot him safely into Cape Cod Harbor, purposely "approached so near the land, that the pirate's large s.h.i.+p which followed him struck on the outer bar: the snow being less [in draft] struck much nearer the sh.o.r.e". Rev. Levi Whitman, in Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc., _Coll._, III. 120. But the evidence in doc. no. 111 is to the contrary.]

Sir, 29 April Came to Anchor sum Distance from the Pirritt Rack[8]

s.h.i.+p, a Very Great Sloop. After Sending his boat to the Pirrit Rack Thay Came to Saile and Cha.s.sed serveral of Our fis.h.i.+ng Vessells, then stod in to Sea which I belive to be his Cunsatte.[9]

[Footnote 8: Wreck.]

[Footnote 9: Consort.]

May 2 at 2 After noon I sent Mr. Little and Mr. Cuttler to the Rack.

they Got their that Night and Capt[10] watch till I Came the Next morning. at my Coming their I found the Rack all to Pices, North and South, Distance from one a Nother 4 Miles. Sir, whear shee Strock first I se one Anchor at Low water, sea being so Great Ever sence I have ben here, Can not Come to se what maye be their for Riches, nor aney of her Guns. she is a s.h.i.+p a bout Three hundred tuns. she was very fine s.h.i.+p. all that I Can find saved Out of her, is her Cables and som of her sailes, Cut all to Pices by the Inhabitances here.

their has ben at this Rack Two hundred men at Least Plundring of her.[11] sum saye they Gott Riches Out of the sand but I Can not find them as yett. Sir, what I shall Gett to Gather will be to the Value of Two hundred Pounds. If Your Excellency Plea.s.s to send the sloop to Billingsgatt[12] for itt, is Carted Over Land to that Place. Sir, here has been 54 whit men and 4 Negros Come a sh.o.r.e Ded from the Rack. If their be aney News by the Pirritts at boston[13] whear the money is, I humbley Desier Your Excelleny menets[14] of what Place in the s.h.i.+p itt was in, for I am in Great hops. whare the Anchors are the money is I fancy, and weather Per mett I have Got a whale boat to fish for itt and Things for that service.[15]

[Footnote 10: Kept.]

[Footnote 11: "Wrecking" was still an important industry in the world.

Indeed, as late as 1853, in this very neighborhood (Nauset Light), Emerson records in his _Journal_, VIII. 399, "Collins, the keeper, told us he found obstinate resistance on Cape Cod to the project of building a lighthouse on this coast, as it would injure the wrecking business".]

[Footnote 12: Wellfleet Bay.]

[Footnote 13: Those already in prison.]

[Footnote 14: Minutes.]

[Footnote 15: Rev. Mr. Whitman says (1793), "At times to this day, there are King William and Queen Mary's coppers picked up, and pieces of silver, called cob money [see doc. no. 62, note 15]. The violence of the seas moves the sands upon the outer bar so that at times the iron caboose of the s.h.i.+p, at low ebbs, has been seen." _Ubi sup._ In 1863 she was quite visible. Another reporter tells us that "For many years after this s.h.i.+pwreck, a man of a very singular and frightful aspect used every spring and autumn to be seen travelling on the Cape, who was supposed to have been one of Bellamy's crew. The presumption is that he went to some place where money had been secreted by the pirates, to get such a supply as his exigencies required. When he died, many pieces of gold were found in a girdle which he constantly wore." Th.o.r.eau, _Cape Cod_, ed. 1914, p. 192. On one of Southack's maps, a narrow waterway across Cape Cod is marked with the legend, "The Place where I came through with a Whale Boat, being ordered by the Governm't to look after the Pirate s.h.i.+p _Whido_, Bellame Command'r, cast away the 26 of April, 1717, where I buried One Hundred and Two Men Drowned". This map, with this legend, is reproduced at the back of Miss Mary R. Bangs's _Old Cape Cod_ (Boston, 1920). The western initial portion of this waterway still exists, in the town of Orleans, and is known as "Jeremiah's Gutter". See A.P. Brigham, _Cape Cod and the Old Colony_, pp. 80-82.]

Sir, here is One Caleb Hopkines, Senr., of freetown, which has Dun a Great Dell of Damage to Your Excellency Officers in Doeing their Duty.

I Pray Your Excellency would send a Order for his Coming to boston in Order to Answare what I shall Aledge aganst him.

Sir, Yr Excellency Most Obed. serv'tt

CYPRIAN SOUTHACK.

_108. Examination of John Brown. May 6, 1717._[1]

[Footnote 1: Suffolk Court Files, no. 11945, paper 5; a fragment.]

The Substance of the Examinations of John Brown, etc. Taken by order of His Excellency the Governour on Munday the 6th of May 1717.

John Brown being interrogated saith, that he was born in the Island of Jamaica, is 25 years old and unmarried. About a year agoe he belonged to a s.h.i.+p commanded by Captain Kingston, which in her voyage with Logwood to Holland was taken to the Leeward of the Havana by two Piratical Sloops, one commanded by h.o.r.n.ygold[2] and the other by a Frenchman called Leboose,[3] each having 70 men on board. The pirats kept the s.h.i.+p about 8 or 10 daies, and then having taken out off her what they thought proper delivered her back to some of the men, who belonged to her. Leboose kept the Examinate on board his Sloop about 4 months, the English Sloop under Hornigolds command keeping company with them all that time. Off Cape Corante[4] they took two Spanish Briganteens without any resistance, laden with cocoa from Ma[l]aca.

The Spaniards, not coming up to the pirats demand about the ransom, were put ash.o.a.r and their Briganteens burn'd. They sailled next to the Isle of Pines, where meeting with three or four English Sloops empty, they made use of them in cleaning their own, and gave them back. From thence they sailled in the latter end of May to Hispaniola, where they tarried about 3 months. The Examinate then left Leboose and went on board the Sloop commanded formerly by h.o.r.n.ygold, but at that time by one Bellamy, who upon a difference arising amongst the English Pirats because h.o.r.n.ygold refused to take and plunder English Vessels, was chosen by a great majority their Captain, and h.o.r.n.ygold departed with 26 hands in a Prize Sloop, Bellamy having then on board about 90 men, most of them English. Bellamy and Leboose sailled to the Virgin Islands and took several small fis.h.i.+ng boats, and off St. Croix a French s.h.i.+p laden with flower and fish from Canada, and having taken out some of the flower gave back the s.h.i.+p. Plying to the Windward the morning they made Saba[5] they spy'd two s.h.i.+ps, which they chased and came up with, the one was commanded by Captain Richards,[6] the other by Capt. Tosor, both bound to the bay. Having plunder'd the s.h.i.+ps and taken out some young men, they dismist the rest and Tosors s.h.i.+p and made a man of War of Richards's, which they put under the command of Bellamy, and appointed Paull Williams Captain of the Sloop. Next day they took a Bristol s.h.i.+p[7] commanded by James Williams from Ireland laden with provisions, and having taken out what provisions they wanted and two or three of the Crew let her goe. Then they parted with their French consort at the Island of Blanco[8] and stood away with their s.h.i.+p and Sloop to the windward pa.s.sage, where in the latter end of February last they met with Captain Laurence Prince in a s.h.i.+p of 300 Ton called the _Whido_, with 18 guns mounted, and fifty men, bound from Jamaica to London, laden with Sugar, Indico, Jesuits bark and some silver and gold, and having given chase thre daies took him without any other resistance than his firing two chase guns at the Sloop, and came to an anchor at Long Island.[9] Bellamy's crew and Williams's consisted then of 120 men. They gave the s.h.i.+p taken from Captain Richards to Captain Prince, and loaded her with as much of the best and finest goods as she could carry, and gave Captain Prince above twenty pounds in Silver and gold to bear his charges. They took 8 or 10 men belonging to Captain Prince; the Boatswain and two more were forced, the rest being volunteers. off Petteguavis[10] they took an English s.h.i.+p hired by the French, laden with Sugar and Indico, and having taken out what they had occasion for, and some of the men, dismist her. Then they stood away for the Capes of Virginia, being 130 men in Company, and having lost sight of the Sloop the day before they made the land, they cruised ten daies, according to agreement between Bellamy and Williams, in which time they seized three s.h.i.+ps and one Snow, Two of them from Scotland, one from Bristol, and the fourth a Scotch s.h.i.+p, last from Barbadoes, with a little Rum and Sugar on board, so leaky that the men refused to proceed further. The Pirats sunk her. Having lost the Sloop they kept the Snow, which was taken from one Montgomery, being about 100 Ton, and manned her with 18 hands, which with her own Crew made up the number of 28 men; the other two s.h.i.+ps were discharged being first plundered. They made[11]

[Footnote 2: Benjamin Hornigold was a pirate captain of some fame; he soon after this surrendered to the governor of Bermuda, and "came in"

under the king's proclamation of Sept. 5, 1717, which offered pardon to those pirates who should surrender within a given time. Charles Johnson, _General History of the Pyrates_ (second ed., London, 1724), I. 35, 70, 71; II. 274-276.]

[Footnote 3: _Id._, I. 35, 184.]

[Footnote 4: Cape Corrientes, near the southwestern point of Cuba.]

[Footnote 5: A small Dutch island, east of St. Croix, and between St.

Martin and St. Eustatius.]