us to any further stay, since we did not care whether we got any more
gold or no; that we were indeed the first men he ever met with in his
life that said they had gold enough, and of whom it might be truly said,
that, when it lay under our feet, we would not stoop to take it up. But,
since he had made us a promise, he would not break it, nor press us to
make any further stay; only he thought he ought to tell us that now was
the time, after the land-flood, when the greatest quantity of gold was
found; and that, if we stayed but one month, we should see thousands of
savages spread themselves over the whole country to wash the gold out
of the sand, for the European ships which would come on the coast; that
they do it then, because the rage of the floods always works down a
great deal of gold out of the hills; and, if we took the advantage to
be there before them, we did not know what extraordinary things we might
find.
This was so forcible, and so well argued, that it appeared in all our
faces we were prevailed upon; so we told him we would all stay: for
though it was true we were all eager to be gone, yet the evident
prospect of so much advantage could not well be resisted; that he was
greatly mistaken, when he suggested that we did not desire to increase
our store of gold, and in that we were resolved to make the utmost use
of the advantage that was in our hands, and would stay as long as any
gold was to be had, if it was another year.
He could hardly express the joy he was in on this occasion; and the fair
weather coming on, we began, just as he directed, to search about the
rivers for more gold. At first we had but little encouragement, and
began to be doubtful; but it was very plain that the reason was,
the water was not fully fallen, or the rivers reduced to their usual
channel; but in a few days we were fully requited, and found much more
gold than at first, and in bigger lumps; and one of our men washed out
of the sand a piece of gold as big as a small nut, which weighed, by our
estimation--for we had no small weights--almost an ounce and a half.
This success made us extremely diligent; and in little more than a month
we had altogether gotten near sixty pound weight of gold; but after
this, as he told us, we found abundance of the savages, men, women, and
children, hunting every river and brook, and even the dry land of the
hills for gold; so that we could do nothing like then, compared to what
we had done before.
But our artificer found a way to make other people find us in gold
without our own labour; for, when these people began to appear, he had
a considerable quantity of his toys, birds, beasts, &c., such as before,
ready for them; and the English gentleman being the interpreter, he
brought the savages to admire them; so our cutler had trade enough,
and, to be sure, sold his goods at a monstrous rate; for he would get an
ounce of gold, sometimes two, for a bit of silver, perhaps of the value
of a groat; nay, if it were iron and if it was of gold, they would
not give the more for it; and it was incredible almost to think what a
quantity of gold he got that way.
In a word, to bring this happy journey to a conclusion, we increased our
stock of gold here, in three months' stay more, to such a degree that,
bringing it all to a common stock, in order to share it, we divided
almost four pound weight again to every man; and then we set forward
for the Gold Coast, to see what method we could find out for our passage
into Europe.
There happened several remarkable incidents in this part of our journey,
as to how we were, or were not, received friendly by the several nations
of savages through which we passed; how we delivered one negro king
from captivity, who had been a benefactor to our new guide; and now our
guide, in gratitude, by our assistance, restored him to his kingdom,
which, perhaps, might contain about 300 subjects; how he entertained us;
and how he made his subjects go with our Englishmen, and fetch all our
elephants' teeth which we had been obliged to leave behind us, and to
carry them for us to the river, the name of which I forgot, where
we made rafts, and in eleven days more came down to one of the Dutch
settlements on the Gold Coast, where we arrived in perfect health, and
to our great satisfaction. As for our cargo of teeth, we sold it to the
Dutch factory, and received clothes and other necessaries for ourselves,
and such of our negroes as we thought fit to keep with us; and it is to
be observed, that we had four pound of gunpowder left when we ended our
journey. The negro prince we made perfectly free, clothed him out of our
common stock, and gave him a pound and a half of gold for himself, which
he knew very well how to manage; and here we all parted after the most
friendly manner possible. Our Englishman remained in the Dutch factory
some time, and, as I heard afterwards, died there of grief; for he
having sent a thousand pounds sterling over to England, by the way of
Holland, for his refuge at his return to his friends, the ship was taken
by the French and the effects all lost.
The rest of my comrades went away, in a small bark, to the two
Portuguese factories, near Gambia, in the latitude of fourteen; and I,
with two negroes which I kept with me, went away to Cape Coast Castle,
where I got passage for England, and arrived there in September; and
thus ended my first harvest of wild oats; the rest were not sowed to so
much advantage.
I had neither friend, relation, nor acquaintance in England, though it
was my native country; I had consequently no person to trust with what
I had, or to counsel me to secure or save it; but, falling into ill
company, and trusting the keeper of a public-house in Rotherhithe with a
great part of my money, and hastily squandering away the rest, all that
great sum, which I got with so much pains and hazard, was gone in little
more than two years' time; and, as I even rage in my own thoughts to
reflect upon the manner how it was wasted, so I need record no more; the
rest merits to be concealed with blushes, for that it was spent in all
kinds of folly and wickedness. So this scene of my life may be said to
have begun in theft, and ended in luxury; a sad setting-out, and a worse
coming home.
About the year ---- I began to see the bottom of my stock, and that
it was time to think of further adventures; for my spoilers, as I call
them, began to let me know, that as my money declined, their respect
would ebb with it, and that I had nothing to expect of them further than
as I might command it by the force of my money, which, in short, would
not go an inch the further for all that had been spent in their favour
before.
This shocked me very much, and I conceived a just abhorrence of their
ingratitude; but it wore off; nor had I met with any regret at the
wasting so glorious a sum of money as I brought to England with me.
I next shipped myself, in an evil hour to be sure, on a voyage to Cadiz,
in a ship called the ----, and in the course of our voyage, being on the
coast of Spain, was obliged to put into the Groyn, by a strong southwest
wind.
Here I fell into company with some masters of mischief; and, among them,
one, forwarder than the rest, began an intimate confidence with me,
so that we called one another brothers, and communicated all our
circumstances to one another. His name was Harris. This fellow came to
me one morning, asking me if I would go on shore, and I agreed; so we
got the captain's leave for the boat, and went together. When we were
together, he asked me if I had a mind for an adventure that might make
amends for all past misfortunes. I told him, yes, with all my heart; for
I did not care where I went, having nothing to lose, and no one to leave
behind me.
He then asked me if I would swear to be secret, and that, if I did not
agree to what he proposed, I would nevertheless never betray him. I
readily bound myself to that, upon the most solemn imprecations and
curses that the devil and both of us could invent.
He told me, then, there was a brave fellow in the other ship, pointing
to another English ship which rode in the harbour, who, in concert with
some of the men, had resolved to mutiny the next morning, and run away
with the ship; and that, if we could get strength enough among our
ship's company, we might do the same. I liked the proposal very well,
and he got eight of us to join with him, and he told us, that as soon as
his friend had begun the work, and was master of the ship, we should
be ready to do the like. This was his plot; and I, without the least
hesitation, either at the villainy of the fact or the difficulty of
performing it, came immediately into the wicked conspiracy, and so it
went on among us; but we could not bring our part to perfection.
Accordingly, on the day appointed, his correspondent in the other ship,
whose name was Wilmot, began the work, and, having seized the captain's
mate and other officers, secured the ship, and gave the signal to us.
We were but eleven in our ship, who were in the conspiracy, nor could we
get any more that we could trust; so that, leaving the ship, we all took
the boat, and went off to join the other.
Having thus left the ship I was in, we were entertained with a great
deal of joy by Captain Wilmot and his new gang; and, being well prepared
for all manner of roguery, bold, desperate (I mean myself), without the
least checks of conscience for what I was entered upon, or for anything
I might do, much less with any apprehension of what might be the
consequence of it; I say, having thus embarked with this crew, which at
last brought me to consort with the most famous pirates of the age, some
of whom have ended their journals at the gallows, I think the giving
an account of some of my other adventures may be an agreeable piece
of story; and this I may venture to say beforehand, upon the word of a
pirate, that I shall not be able to recollect the full, no, not by far,
of the great variety which has formed one of the most reprobate schemes
that ever man was capable to present to the world.
I that was, as I have hinted before, an original thief, and a pirate,
even by inclination before, was now in my element, and never undertook
anything in my life with more particular satisfaction.
Captain Wilmot (for so we are now to call him) being thus possessed of a
ship, and in the manner as you have heard, it may be easily concluded
he had nothing to do to stay in the port, or to wait either the attempts
that might be made from the shore, or any change that might happen among
his men. On the contrary, we weighed anchor the same tide, and stood out
to sea, steering away for the Canaries. Our ship had twenty-two guns,
but was able to carry thirty; and besides, as she was fitted out for
a merchant-ship only, she was not furnished either with ammunition or
small-arms sufficient for our design, or for the occasion we might have
in case of a fight. So we put into Cadiz, that is to say, we came to an
anchor in the bay; and the captain, and one whom we called young Captain
Kidd, who was the gunner, [landed,] and some of the men who could best
be trusted, among whom was my comrade Harris, who was made second mate,
and myself, who was made a lieutenant. Some bales of English goods were
proposed to be carried on shore with us for sale, but my comrade, who
was a complete fellow at his business, proposed a better way for it;
and having been in the town before, told us, in short, that he would buy
what powder and bullet, small-arms, or anything else we wanted, on his
own word, to be paid for when they came on board, in such English goods
as we had there. This was much the best way, and accordingly he and the
captain went on shore by themselves, and having made such a bargain
as they found for their turn, came away again in two hours' time, and
bringing only a butt of wine and five casks of brandy with them, we all
went on board again.
The next morning two _barcos longos_ came off to us, deeply laden, with
five Spaniards on board them, for traffic. Our captain sold them good
pennyworths, and they delivered us sixteen barrels of powder, twelve
small rundlets of fine powder for our small-arms, sixty muskets, and
twelve fuzees for the officers; seventeen ton of cannon-ball, fifteen
barrels of musket-bullets, with some swords and twenty good pair of
pistols. Besides this, they brought thirteen butts of wine (for we, that
were now all become gentlemen, scorned to drink the ship's beer), also
sixteen puncheons of brandy, with twelve barrels of raisins and twenty
chests of lemons; all which we paid for in English goods; and, over and
above, the captain received six hundred pieces of eight in money. They
would have come again, but we would stay no longer.
From hence we sailed to the Canaries, and from thence onward to the
West Indies, where we committed some depredation upon the Spaniards for
provisions, and took some prizes, but none of any great value, while I
remained with them, which was not long at that time; for, having taken a
Spanish sloop on the coast of Carthagena, my friend made a motion to me,
that we should desire Captain Wilmot to put us into the sloop, with a
proportion of arms and ammunition, and let us try what we could do; she
being much fitter for our business than the great ship, and a better
sailer. This he consented to, and we appointed our rendezvous at Tobago,
making an agreement, that whatever was taken by either of our ships
should be shared among the ship's company of both; all which we very
punctually observed, and joined our ships again, about fifteen months
after, at the island of Tobago, as above.
We cruised near two years in those seas, chiefly upon the Spaniards;
not that we made any difficulty of taking English ships, or Dutch,
or French, if they came in our way; and particularly, Captain Wilmot
attacked a New England ship bound from the Madeiras to Jamaica, and
another bound from New York to Barbados, with provisions; which last was
a very happy supply to us. But the reason why we meddled as little with
English vessels as we could, was, first, because, if they were ships
of any force, we were sure of more resistance from them; and, secondly,
because we found the English ships had less booty when taken, for the
Spaniards generally had money on board, and that was what we best knew
what to do with. Captain Wilmot was, indeed, more particularly cruel
when he took any English vessel, that they might not too soon have
advice of him in England; and so the men-of-war have orders to look out
for him. But this part I bury in silence for the present.
We increased our stock in these two years considerably, having taken
60,000 pieces of eight in one vessel, and 100,000 in another; and being
thus first grown rich, we resolved to be strong too, for we had taken a
brigantine built at Virginia, an excellent sea-boat, and a good sailer,
and able to carry twelve guns; and a large Spanish frigate-built ship,
that sailed incomparably well also, and which afterwards, by the help
of good carpenters, we fitted up to carry twenty-eight guns. And now we
wanted more hands, so we put away for the Bay of Campeachy, not doubting
we should ship as many men there as we pleased; and so we did.
Here we sold the sloop that I was in; and Captain Wilmot keeping his
own ship, I took the command of the Spanish frigate as captain, and my
comrade Harris as eldest lieutenant, and a bold enterprising fellow
he was, as any the world afforded. One culverdine was put into the
brigantine, so that we were now three stout ships, well manned, and
victualled for twelve months; for we had taken two or three sloops from
New England and New York, laden with flour, peas, and barrelled beef and
pork, going for Jamaica and Barbados; and for more beef we went on
shore on the island of Cuba, where we killed as many black cattle as we
pleased, though we had very little salt to cure them.
Out of all the prizes we took here we took their powder and bullet,
their small-arms and cutlasses; and as for their men, we always took the
surgeon and the carpenter, as persons who were of particular use to
us upon many occasions; nor were they always unwilling to go with us,
though for their own security, in case of accidents, they might easily
pretend they were carried away by force; of which I shall give a
pleasant account in the course of my other expeditions.
We had one very merry fellow here, a Quaker, whose name was William
Walters, whom we took out of a sloop bound from Pennsylvania to
Barbados. He was a surgeon, and they called him doctor; but he was not
employed in the sloop as a surgeon, but was going to Barbados to get a
berth, as the sailors call it. However, he had all his surgeon's chests
on board, and we made him go with us, and take all his implements with
him. He was a comic fellow indeed, a man of very good solid sense, and
an excellent surgeon; but, what was worth all, very good-humoured and
pleasant in his conversation, and a bold, stout, brave fellow too, as
any we had among us.
I found William, as I thought, not very averse to go along with us, and
yet resolved to do it so that it might be apparent he was taken away
by force, and to this purpose he comes to me. "Friend," says he, "thou
sayest I must go with thee, and it is not in my power to resist thee if
I would; but I desire thou wilt oblige the master of the sloop which I
am on board to certify under his hand, that I was taken away by force
and against my will." And this he said with so much satisfaction in his
face, that I could not but understand him. "Ay, ay," says I, "whether
it be against your will or no, I'll make him and all the men give you
a certificate of it, or I'll take them all along with us, and keep them
till they do." So I drew up a certificate myself, wherein I wrote that
he was taken away by main force, as a prisoner, by a pirate ship; that
they carried away his chest and instruments first, and then bound his
hands behind him and forced him into their boat; and this was signed by
the master and all his men.
Accordingly I fell a-swearing at him, and called to my men to tie his
hands behind him, and so we put him into our boat and carried him away.
When I had him on board, I called him to me. "Now, friend," says I, "I
have brought you away by force, it is true, but I am not of the opinion
I have brought you away so much against your will as they imagine.
Come," says I, "you will be a useful man to us, and you shall have very
good usage among us." So I unbound his hands, and first ordered all
things that belonged to him to be restored to him, and our captain gave
him a dram.
"Thou hast dealt friendly by me," says he, "and I will be plain with
thee, whether I came willingly to thee or not. I shall make myself
as useful to thee as I can, but thou knowest it is not my business to
meddle when thou art to fight." "No, no," says the captain, "but you may
meddle a little when we share the money." "Those things are useful to
furnish a surgeon's chest," says William, and smiled, "but I shall be
moderate."
In short, William was a most agreeable companion; but he had the better
of us in this part, that if we were taken we were sure to be hanged, and
he was sure to escape; and he knew it well enough. But, in short, he
was a sprightly fellow, and fitter to be captain than any of us. I shall
have often an occasion to speak of him in the rest of the story.
Our cruising so long in these seas began now to be so well known, that
not in England only, but in France and Spain, accounts had been made
public of our adventures, and many stories told how we murdered the
people in cold blood, tying them back to back, and throwing them into
the sea; one half of which, however, was not true, though more was done
than is fit to speak of here.
The consequence of this, however, was, that several English men-of-war
were sent to the West Indies, and were particularly instructed to cruise
in the Bay of Mexico, and the Gulf of Florida, and among the Bahama
islands, if possible, to attack us. We were not so ignorant of things as
not to expect this, after so long a stay in that part of the world; but
the first certain account we had of them was at Honduras, when a vessel
coming in from Jamaica told us that two English men-of-war were coming
directly from Jamaica thither in quest of us. We were indeed as it were
embayed, and could not have made the least shift to have got off, if
they had come directly to us; but, as it happened, somebody had informed
them that we were in the Bay of Campeachy, and they went directly
thither, by which we were not only free of them, but were so much to the
windward of them, that they could not make any attempt upon us, though
they had known we were there.
We took this advantage, and stood away for Carthagena, and from thence
with great difficulty beat it up at a distance from under the shore for
St. Martha, till we came to the Dutch island of Curacoa, and from thence
to the island of Tobago, which, as before, was our rendezvous; which,
being a deserted, uninhabited island, we at the same time made use of
for a retreat. Here the captain of the brigantine died, and Captain
Harris, at that time my lieutenant, took the command of the brigantine.
Here we came to a resolution to go away to the coast of Brazil, and from
thence to the Cape of Good Hope, and so for the East Indies; but Captain
Harris, as I have said, being now captain of the brigantine, alleged
that his ship was too small for so long a voyage, but that, if Captain
Wilmot would consent, he would take the hazard of another cruise, and
he would follow us in the first ship he could take. So we appointed our
rendezvous to be at Madagascar, which was done by my recommendation of
the place, and the plenty of provisions to be had there.
Accordingly, he went away from us in an evil hour; for, instead of
taking a ship to follow us, he was taken, as I heard afterwards, by
an English man-of-war, and being laid in irons, died of mere grief
and anger before he came to England. His lieutenant, I have heard, was
afterwards executed in England for a pirate; and this was the end of the
man who first brought me into this unhappy trade.
We parted from Tobago three days after, bending our course for the coast
of Brazil, but had not been at sea above twenty-four hours, when we were
separated by a terrible storm, which held three days, with very little
abatement or intermission. In this juncture Captain Wilmot happened,
unluckily, to be on board my ship, to his great mortification; for we
not only lost sight of his ship, but never saw her more till we came
to Madagascar, where she was cast away. In short, after having in this
tempest lost our fore-topmast, we were forced to put back to the isle of
Tobago for shelter, and to repair our damage, which brought us all very
near our destruction.
We were no sooner on shore here, and all very busy looking out for a
piece of timber for a topmast, but we perceived standing in for the
shore an English man-of-war of thirty-six guns. It was a great surprise
to us indeed, because we were disabled so much; but, to our great good
fortune, we lay pretty snug and close among the high rocks, and the
man-of-war did not see us, but stood off again upon his cruise. So
we only observed which way she went, and at night, leaving our work,
resolved to stand off to sea, steering the contrary way from that which
we observed she went; and this, we found, had the desired success, for
we saw him no more. We had gotten an old mizzen-topmast on board, which
made us a jury fore-topmast for the present; and so we stood away for
the isle of Trinidad, where, though there were Spaniards on shore, yet
we landed some men with our boat, and cut a very good piece of fir to
make us a new topmast, which we got fitted up effectually; and also we
got some cattle here to eke out our provisions; and calling a council of
war among ourselves, we resolved to quit those seas for the present, and
steer away for the coast of Brazil.
The first thing we attempted here was only getting fresh water, but we
learnt that there lay the Portuguese fleet at the bay of All Saints,
bound for Lisbon, ready to sail, and only waited for a fair wind. This
made us lie by, wishing to see them put to sea, and, accordingly as they
were with or without convoy, to attack or avoid them.