Peter the Great
Very prominent among the early regular buccaneers was a Frenchman who
came to be called Peter the Great. This man seems to have been one of
those adventurers who were not buccaneers in the earlier sense of the
word (by which I mean they were not traders who touched at Spanish
settlements to procure cattle and hides, and who were prepared to fight
any Spaniards who might interfere with them), but they were men who came
from Europe on purpose to prey upon Spanish possessions, whether on land
or sea. Some of them made a rough sort of settlement on the island of
Tortuga, and then it was that Peter the Great seems to have come into
prominence. He gathered about him a body of adherents, but although he
had a great reputation as an individual pirate, it seems to have been a
good while before he achieved any success as a leader.
The fortunes of Peter and his men must have been at a pretty low ebb
when they found themselves cruising in a large, canoe-shaped boat not
far from the island of Hispaniola. There were twenty-nine of them in
all, and they were not able to procure a vessel suitable for their
purpose. They had been a long time floating about in an aimless way,
hoping to see some Spanish merchant-vessel which they might attack and
possibly capture, but no such vessel appeared. Their provisions began to
give out, the men were hungry, discontented, and grumbling. In fact,
they were in almost as bad a condition as were the sailors of Columbus
just before they discovered signs of land, after their long and weary
voyage across the Atlantic.
When Peter and his men were almost on the point of despair, they
perceived, far away upon the still waters, a large ship. With a great
jump, hope sprang up in the breast of every man. They seized the oars
and pulled in the direction of the distant craft. But when they were
near enough, they saw that the vessel was not a merchantman, probably
piled with gold and treasure, but a man-of-war belonging to the Spanish
fleet. In fact, it was the vessel of the vice-admiral. This was an
astonishing and disheartening state of things. It was very much as if a
lion, hearing the approach of probable prey, had sprung from the thicket
where he had been concealed, and had beheld before him, not a fine, fat
deer, but an immense and scrawny elephant.
But the twenty-nine buccaneers in the crew were very hungry. They had
not come out upon those waters to attack men-of-war, but, more than
that, they had not come out to perish by hunger and thirst. There could
be no doubt that there was plenty to eat and to drink on that tall
Spanish vessel, and if they could not get food and water they could not
live more than a day or two longer.
Under the circumstances it was not long before Peter the Great made up
his mind that if his men would stand by him, he would endeavor to
capture that Spanish war-vessel; when he put the question to his crew
they all swore that they would follow him and obey his orders as long as
life was left in their bodies. To attack a vessel armed with cannon, and
manned by a crew very much larger than their little party, seemed almost
like throwing themselves upon certain death. But still, there was a
chance that in some way they might get the better of the Spaniards;
whereas, if they rowed away again into the solitudes of the ocean, they
would give up all chance of saving themselves from death by starvation.
Steadily, therefore, they pulled toward the Spanish vessel, and
slowly--for there was but little wind--she approached them.
The people in the man-of-war did not fail to perceive the little boat
far out on the ocean, and some of them sent to the captain and reported
the fact. The news, however, did not interest him, for he was engaged in
playing cards in his cabin, and it was not until an hour afterward that
he consented to come on deck and look out toward the boat which had been
sighted, and which was now much nearer.
Taking a good look at the boat, and perceiving that it was nothing more
than a canoe, the captain laughed at the advice of some of his officers,
who thought it would be well to fire a few cannon-shot and sink the
little craft. The captain thought it would be a useless proceeding. He
did not know anything about the people in the boat, and he did not very
much care, but he remarked that if they should come near enough, it
might be a good thing to put out some tackle and haul them and their
boat on deck, after which they might be examined and questioned whenever
it should suit his convenience. Then he went down to his cards.
If Peter the Great and his men could have been sure that if they were to
row alongside the Spanish vessel they would have been quietly hauled on
deck and examined, they would have been delighted at the opportunity.
With cutlasses, pistols, and knives, they were more than ready to
demonstrate to the Spaniards what sort of fellows they were, and the
captain would have found hungry pirates uncomfortable persons to
question.
But it seemed to Peter and his crew a very difficult thing indeed to get
themselves on board the man-of-war, so they curbed their ardor and
enthusiasm, and waited until nightfall before approaching nearer. As
soon as it became dark enough they slowly and quietly paddled toward the
great ship, which was now almost becalmed. There were no lights in the
boat, and the people on the deck of the vessel saw and heard nothing on
the dark waters around them.
When they were very near the man-of-war, the captain of the
buccaneers--according to the ancient accounts of this adventure--ordered
his chirurgeon, or surgeon, to bore a large hole in the bottom of their
canoe. It is probable that this officer, with his saws and other
surgical instruments, was expected to do carpenter work when there were
no duties for him to perform in the regular line of his profession. At
any rate, he went to work, and noiselessly bored the hole.
This remarkable proceeding showed the desperate character of these
pirates. A great, almost impossible task was before them, and nothing
but absolute recklessness could enable them to succeed. If his men
should meet with strong opposition from the Spaniards in the proposed
attack, and if any of them should become frightened and try to retreat
to the boat, Peter knew that all would be lost, and consequently he
determined to make it impossible for any man to get away in that boat.
If they could not conquer the Spanish vessel they must die on her decks.
When the half-sunken canoe touched the sides of the vessel, the pirates,
seizing every rope or projection on which they could lay their hands,
climbed up the sides of the man-of-war, as if they had been twenty-nine
cats, and springing over the rail, dashed upon the sailors who were on
deck. These men were utterly stupefied and astounded. They had seen
nothing, they had heard nothing, and all of a sudden they were
confronted with savage fellows with cutlasses and pistols.
Some of the crew looked over the sides to see where these strange
visitors had come from, but they saw nothing, for the canoe had gone to
the bottom. Then they were filled with a superstitious horror, believing
that the wild visitors were devils who had dropped from the sky, for
there seemed no other place from which they could come. Making no
attempt to defend themselves, the sailors, wild with terror, tumbled
below and hid themselves, without even giving an alarm.
The Spanish captain was still playing cards, and whether he was winning
or losing, the old historians do not tell us, but very suddenly a
newcomer took a hand in the game. This was Peter the Great, and he
played the ace of trumps. With a great pistol in his hand, he called
upon the Spanish captain to surrender. That noble commander glanced
around. There was a savage pirate holding a pistol at the head of each
of the officers at the table. He threw up his cards. The trick was won
by Peter and his men.
The rest of the game was easy enough. When the pirates spread themselves
over the vessel, the frightened crew got out of sight as well as they
could. Some, who attempted to seize their arms in order to defend
themselves, were ruthlessly cut down or shot, and when the hatches had
been securely fastened upon the sailors who had fled below, Peter the
Great was captain and owner of that tall Spanish man-of-war.
It is quite certain that the first thing these pirates did to celebrate
their victory was to eat a rousing good supper, and then they took
charge of the vessel, and sailed her triumphantly over the waters on
which, not many hours before, they had feared that a little boat would
soon be floating, filled with their emaciated bodies.
This most remarkable success of Peter the Great worked a great change,
of course, in the circumstances of himself and his men. But it worked a
greater change in the career, and possibly in the character of the
captain. He was now a very rich man, and all his followers had plenty of
money. The Spanish vessel was amply supplied with provisions, and there
was also on board a great quantity of gold bullion, which was to be
shipped to Spain. In fact, Peter and his men had booty enough to satisfy
any sensible pirate. Now we all know that sensible pirates, and people
in any sphere of life who are satisfied when they have enough, are very
rare indeed, and therefore it is not a little surprising that the bold
buccaneer, whose story we are now telling, should have proved that he
merited, in a certain way, the title his companions had given him.
Sailing his prize to the shores of Hispaniola, Peter put on shore all
the Spaniards whose services he did not desire. The rest of his
prisoners he compelled to help his men work the ship, and then, without
delay, he sailed away to France, and there he retired entirely from the
business of piracy, and set himself up as a gentleman of wealth and
leisure.