THE GENESIS AND GROWTH OF THE ARCH PIRATE MYTH
Kidd’s expedition having originated in the desire of the government to
placate the East India Company, it is only reasonable to surmise that
the Company received some early official intimation of what was being
done on their behalf. To what extent they were informed officially of the
details of the government scheme is of comparatively small importance.
The great wealth at their disposal and the prodigality with which they
expended their secret service money in those days, leave no room for
doubt that at a very early stage of the proceedings they made themselves
acquainted with the essential facts. Their factories were exposed to
imminent danger from the irritation of the Great Mogul at the continuous
robbery of his subjects’ goods by English-speaking seamen on his coasts.
The Company must have taken the keenest interest in the measures designed
for the repression of this piracy. With their practical knowledge of
the difficulties to be encountered, it is unlikely that they at any
time regarded the adventurers’ project as a very promising one. When
they heard of the failure of the Admiralty to protect Kidd’s carefully
selected crew from the press gang, and realised that the bulk of the
ship’s company would have to be got from New York, it is impossible that
they can have entertained any illusions as to the probability of its
success.
Kidd’s crew was pressed at the Nore on the first of March, 1696. By one
of the curious close coincidences of date which speak for themselves
in this case more convincingly than any words can do, the Company on
the following day addressed a petition to the Admiralty, praying to be
allowed to take the business of dealing with the pirates into their
own hands. In this petition they urged that “Your Lordships will please
to empower the petitioners’ ships and officers to seize and take all
pirates infesting those seas within the limits of the Company’s charter
and likewise empower them to erect a Court of Admiralty in those parts.”
This proposal except for a very excusable technical error contained in
it, which if not corrected, would have enabled the Company, instead of
the Admiralty, to create a Court of Admiralty, was not unreasonable. It
was referred by the Admiralty to their judge, Sir Charles Hedges, who
promptly reported in the following terms on the steps necessary to carry
it into effect: “That the more regular way will be for your Lordships
to take a Commission under the Great Seal of England giving power to
the Lord Admiral or Commissioners for executing the office of High
Admiral to grant commissions to any of the Captains of the East India
Company’s ships for the taking of the ships of pirates, wherein it shall
be expressed what parts or shares the King shall see fit to reserve to
himself or bestow upon the Captors and Company.”
“That your Lordships may be pleased to erect a Vice-Admiralty at Bombay
or any other place that shall be thought expedient in the same manner as
is done in the West Indies, which being established by a commission in
the ordinary form, that will be sufficient to empower such Vice-Admiralty
there, to proceed against ships as fully as any Vice-Admiralty in England
or the High Court of Admiralty can do.”
Why no action was taken on this proposal of the Company as modified by
Sir Charles Hedges, is not clear. Possibly the Admiralty hesitated to
hand over to the captains of the Company’s ships work which they thought
more properly belonged to the King’s navy, and which when the French
war was ended was very soon performed by Captain Warren’s squadron.
Possibly they felt a delicacy in doing anything that might diminish the
great ministers’ chances of gain from Kidd’s adventure. What seems to
have happened is that the Company’s petition was officially shelved for
nearly four years, when Captain Warren having in the meanwhile been sent
out with five men-of-war to suppress the pirates, it was referred to
the committee of the House of Commons, who had then been appointed to
consider further the large question of the state and condition of the
trade of England, by whom, if considered at all, it would have to run the
gauntlet of many implacable enemies of the Company, and in particular of
certain ardent protectionists of that day who never missed an opportunity
of holding forth on the injuries to which English industries were exposed
by the importation by the Company of Indian silks, calicoes, and muslins.
Apart, however, from any question of the probable success of Kidd’s
expedition, or the desirability of giving the Company a free hand to
deal themselves with the pirates, the terms of the grant of the spoil to
the adventurers, with which the Company had evidently made themselves
familiar, were calculated to place them in a very awkward position with
the Great Mogul. What they had to protect themselves against, was a
summary expulsion from his dominions; and they must have realized that
even if Kidd succeeded in catching his pirates, it would be a very
unsatisfactory reply to the demands of that great potentate for the
immediate restitution of the stolen properties, to assure him that the
thieves had been carried to England, where it was to be hoped that some
of them might in due course be convicted, and possibly hung; but that
the stolen goods had in the meanwhile been appropriated by some of the
King’s great ministers. It was not impossible that the next demand of
the Great Mogul might be that these great gentlemen together with such
of the directors of the Company as had acquiesced in this arrangement
should at once be handed over to him to be dealt with according to their
deserts. It is not, therefore, surprising to find that on the twentieth
of August in that year, whilst Kidd was still at New York trying to
pick up his crew, the Company presented a further petition to the Lords
Justices, praying that “such of the species of gold, silver and jewels as
have already been or shall hereafter be seized in the custody of any of
the pirates or any other persons who cannot make a legal title thereunto,
may not be disposed of, but put into the possession of the Company, in
order to be preserved for the use of the proprietors in India, that the
Government may see that His Majesty as well as the Company have done
their utmost endeavours to seize the said pirates and to make restitution
to the persons injured so far as it is in their power.”
In taking this course the Company must have realized that it would be
very distasteful to the King and his four great ministers, who were
proposing themselves to appropriate the bulk of the spoil. But they
also knew that these great men had placed themselves hopelessly in the
wrong; and that there were plenty of their enemies in the House of
Commons who would be only too eager to expose the scandal, when the
time came for them to do so. This consideration seems to have had some
weight with the Lords Justices, and prevented them from shelving this
petition as unceremoniously as the Admiralty had done the former one.
Anxious to appease the Company, and at the same time to safeguard the
rights of the adventurers, they decided at a meeting at which the Duke
of Shrewsbury, one of the adventurers, was present, to send a peremptory
but guarded dispatch to the governors of all the American plantations,
requiring them “to take all possible care, and use all due means for
the seizing and apprehending all such pirates and sea robbers and such
as may be reasonably suspected for the same, either by reason of the
great quantities of gold and silver of foreign coins they usually have
with them, or by other probable circumstances; and to cause them to be
straightly imprisoned, and their ships, goods, and plunder to be kept
in safe custody; until upon returning to us a full account of the said
persons, ships, goods and plunder, with the evidence relating to them,
His Majesty’s pleasure shall be known and signified concerning them.”
Amongst the signatories to this despatch the name of the Earl of Romney,
another of the adventurers, appears.
As might have been expected, this dispatch produced little if any
practical result. During the next two years the Company continued to
receive repeated reports of the depredations of the pirates, and the
excitement created thereby amongst the natives of India, who had in
some cases seized the Company’s factories and put the factors in irons.
Meanwhile the absence of any news from Kidd had not unnaturally aroused
the suspicions of the Company. Culliford, the captain of one of their
own East Indiamen, the _Moca Frigate_, had run away with their ship
from Madras and joined the pirates; and it may have seemed to them
by no means improbable that Kidd with his American crew had done the
like. At length they received some vague intimation, confirming their
suspicions; and in August, 1698, they informed the Lords Justices “that
they had received _some_ information from their factories in the East
Indies that Kidd had committed several acts of piracy, particularly in
seizing a Moors’ ship called the _Quedagh Merchant_.” As they produced
no evidence from their informants at Kidd’s trial in support of these
allegations, although they had ample time and opportunity for obtaining
it during his two years’ imprisonment, it is not unfair to assume that
the information which they received on this occasion was not such as they
cared to submit to an English Court of Law. But such as it was, the Lords
Justices did not hesitate to act at once upon it, and to assume without
further inquiry not only that Kidd was guilty, but that he was already
a notorious pirate. On the twenty-third of November, 1698, whilst Kidd
was stranded at Madagascar, they sent the following circular to Rear
Admiral Benbow, and the governor of every American Colony: “The Lords
Justices having been informed by several advices from the East Indies
of the notorious piracies committed by Captain Kidd, and of his having
seized and plundered divers ships in those seas, as their Excellencies
have given orders to the commander of the squadron fitted out for the
East Indies that he use his utmost endeavours to pursue and seize the
said Kidd, if he continue still in those parts, so likewise they have
commanded me to signify their directions to the respective governors of
the Colonies under His Majesty’s obedience in America, that they give
strict orders and take particular care for apprehending the said Kidd
and his accomplices, whenever he or they shall arrive in any of the said
plantations, as likewise that they shall secure his ship and all the
effects therein, it being Their Excellencies’ intention that right be
done to those who have been injured and robbed by the said Kidd, and that
he and his associates be prosecuted with the utmost rigour of the law.
You are to be careful, therefore, to observe the said directions, and if
the said Kidd or any of his accomplices be seized within the provinces
under your government, you are forthwith to transmit an account thereof
hitherto, and take care that the said persons, ships and effects be
secured, till His Majesty’s pleasure is known concerning them.”
It would appear from the wording of this extraordinary and unjustifiable
circular that the great men, who had sent Kidd out, had by this time
abandoned hope of getting any gain out of their adventure, and that their
main desire now was to clear themselves of the suspicion that they were
conniving at the alleged piracies of the distinguished officer, whom
they had induced against his own misgivings to enter their service, and
who now was steadfastly doing his best for them in the face of grievous
difficulties at the other end of the world. It may well be that at this
time they believed him to be guilty. It may even be that they continued
in this belief when report after report came to hand of the piracies of
other English seamen in the East, notwithstanding the marked absence
in those reports of any mention whatever of Kidd or of the _Adventure
Galley_. Whether they continued to believe in his guilt after his own
narrative had been made a Parliamentary paper, and he had been examined
before the House of Commons on it, is a very different question. Neither
they nor the Company were represented at the trial, nor was any evidence
then tendered on their behalf. It was their interest to make Kidd their
scapegoat; and the interest of the Company that some one, guilty or
not, the higher in rank the better, should be publicly hung in infamy,
as a warning to mariners engaged in the Eastern piracy. It was nobody’s
interest in England that Kidd should be acquitted, unless as a condition
for such acquittal he could be induced to make compromising revelations
against his employers. And this, as will be seen, he resolutely refused
to do in the face of strong temptation.
To return now to his relations with Bellamont, who though appointed
Governor of New England as far back as June, 1695, had not apparently
started for America until more than two years afterwards; and had
profitably employed the interval in obtaining further favours from the
government. Not contented with the pension of five hundred pounds
per annum which had apparently been given him on his dismissal by the
late Queen, in 1693, from his post as her Receiver General, he seems
to have succeeded in May, 1696, in obtaining a further grant of one
thousand pounds a year out of the forfeited estates of Lord Kilmeare,
and in March, 1697, to have been made colonel of a regiment of foot. In
the following June it was announced that he would at last start to his
government in the _Deptford_ frigate, but he delayed his departure until
October, by which time he had succeeded in extracting from the Treasury
a further sop in the shape of “twelve thousand pounds, paid him in mault
lottery tickets.”[11]
On the first of July, 1699, Kidd, as already mentioned, landed at Boston,
relying on Bellamont’s word and honor, and assurance that he believed
that the two French passes, which had been handed to him by Emmot,
would justify the seizure of the two prizes taken, and that he made no
manner of doubt that he could obtain the King’s pardon for Kidd and for
the few men left who had continued faithful. It is easy to understand
the relief the old man must have felt in setting foot in a civilized
country once more after all his troubles, with the knowledge that he
had served his employers so well, and the expectation that he would now
receive recognition and reward for all he had gone through on their
behalf. Towards the end of his voyage his wife and family from New York
had come on board, having been informed of his whereabouts by his old
friend Emmot; and all of them were probably looking forward to a warm
reception on their landing. If so, they were soon disillusionized. The
Governor declined to see Kidd except in the most formal manner and in
the presence of witnesses. The truth was that he had placed himself in a
very awkward position with the home authorities by inducing the King’s
ministers to embark in this unlucky adventure, and that he and they
had long since come to the conclusion that the safest course to take
to exonerate themselves from the consequences was to make a scapegoat
of Kidd. Bellamont had been playing a very double game, not only with
Kidd, but also with his own council. His own admissions in his letters
written to the authorities in England before the end of that month, leave
no doubt on this point. His consignment of Kidd to gaol was a foregone
conclusion; and the only difficulty he had to get over, and it was an
insuperable one, was how to do this with some appearance of decency. At
the time when with specious promises he was persuading his victim to
come to Boston, he was well aware that it was his duty to arrest him
immediately on his landing there, in pursuance of specific instructions
from England, which he had carefully concealed from his council. The
letter to Kidd with all its assumed belief in Kidd’s innocence, and his
own solemn assurances on his word and honour that he could obtain the
King’s pardon for him and his men, was a trap laid for Kidd without
the knowledge of his council, to whom he had submitted the letter for
approval. His intention throughout had been to get hold of Kidd and
send him to England, to be dealt with there in such manner as might
be most convenient to the government. In his letters he has not only
confessed this, but has even found it necessary to excuse himself to his
superiors and give the reasons which he considered justified him in not
arresting Kidd the moment he landed. “It will not be unwelcome news to
your Lordships,” he writes, “that I secured Captain Kidd last Thursday
in the gaol of this town. I thought myself secure against his running
away, because I took care not to give him the slightest umbrage of my
design of seizing him. Nor had I, until the day I produced my orders from
the Court to arrest Kidd, communicated them to anybody. But I found it
necessary to produce my orders to my Council to animate them to join
heartily in securing Kidd. Another reason why I took him not up sooner,
was that he had brought his wife and family hither on the sloop with him
who (_sic_) I believed” (poor wretch!) “he would not readily forsake.” At
the same time whilst thus excusing himself for not arresting Kidd more
promptly, Bellamont seems to have felt that some explanation was called
for to justify his arresting him at all. “Your Lordships may observe,” he
writes, and it requires a very microscopical scrutiny of his hypocritical
letter to observe it, “that the promise made Kidd in my letter of a kind
reception, and promising the King’s pardon for him, was conditional, that
is, provided that he was as innocent as he pretended to be. But I quickly
found sufficient cause to suspect him to be very guilty by the many lies
and contradictions he told me.” What these lies and contradictions were,
he is very careful not to say. Kidd’s own narrative, corroborated by
the depositions of several of his crew, are perfectly intelligible and
straightforward documents, far more intelligible and convincing than
Bellamont’s lame reasons for thinking him guilty. The first of these was
that Kidd had communicated in the first instance with his old friend
Emmot, who Bellamont says was “a cunning Jacobite and my avowed enemy.”
The second reason assigned is, “I thought he looked very guilty.” It is
not improbable that poor Kidd was taken aback by his cold reception; but
it is safe to assume that whatever his demeanor had been, it would have
been regarded by the Governor as a sure sign of his guilt. Sometimes
during his examination he seems to have been cheerful and breezy. With
what result? The Governor reports, “Kidd did strangely trifle with me
and the Council three or four times that we had him under examination.”
Finding that his jocular efforts were not appreciated, Kidd not
unnaturally became grave. But the result was still unsatisfactory. “He
being examined two or three times by the Council and also some of his
men, I observed,” says Bellamont, “that he seemed much disturbed.” The
last time he was under examination, his appearance seems again to have
changed, but still, as ever, for the worse. Probably by this time he had
grown restless and restive. “I fancied,” Bellamont writes, “he looked
as if he were upon the wing and resolved to run away.” But after all,
the chief offence for which the poor man was at last consigned to gaol,
was not committed by him, but by his evil genius, Livingstone, who asked
Bellamont to return him the bond he had entered into for Kidd’s good
behaviour. “I thought,” says Bellamont, “this was such an impertinence
that it was time for me to look about me and secure Kidd.” On this last
point the version of the anonymous person of quality is substantially the
same as Bellamont’s. “Above all,” he writes, “Livingstone’s behaviour,
who was come to Boston, and very peremptorily demanded from the Earl
the delivery of the bond which he had entered into for Kidd’s honest
performance of his duty in the expedition (as if that was to be taken for
granted) gave the Earl of Bellamont good reason to conclude that no time
was to be lost. Therefore he caused Kidd to be seized with divers of his
crew.” A lamer set of reasons for throwing a faithful subordinate into
gaol it would have been difficult for the most unintelligent official to
concoct.
The reply of the Lords Justices to Bellamont’s letters was the
dispatch of a man-of-war, the _Rochester_, to bring back Kidd and his
fellow-prisoners to England. This ship set sail before the end of
September; but came back to Plymouth in November for repairs. Her return
led the opposition to believe that the sending of her out had been merely
a pretence, and it was alleged that a great number of other ships that
had gone out in her company had been able to proceed on their voyage and
to reach New England safely. The wildest rumours were in circulation.
The prevailing popular opinion seems to have been that the four great
ministers had sent Kidd out in the _Adventure Galley_ to commit acts of
piracy on their behalf; and that they had naturally selected for this
purpose a past-master in the art of piracy. Some would have it that
Somers, to prevent unpleasant disclosures, had already set the great
seal to his pardon. Evelyn, in his diary of the third of December, says:
“They” (_i. e._, Parliament) “called some great persons in the highest
offices in question for setting the Greate Seale to the pardon of an
arch pirate, who had turned pirate again, and brought prizes to the
West Indies, expecting to be connived at on sharing the spoil.” Burnet,
writing in much the same strain, says, “It was maliciously insinuated
that the privateer turned pirate in confidence of the protection of those
who employed him, if he had not secret orders for what he did.” It is
difficult to say whose reputation suffered more at this juncture--Kidd’s
by his association with the four unpopular ministers, or the four
unpopular ministers, by their association with Kidd.
On the completion of her repairs, the _Rochester_ set sail again from
Plymouth for New York. She carried a letter from the Lords Justices
to Bellamont, approving his zeal and conduct in the whole affair, and
requiring him to put the pirates and their goods on board of her. The
delay in bringing Kidd to England, whether designed or not, was most
unfortunate for him and most opportune for the ministers. The opposition
seem to have had some inkling that Kidd’s return was being purposely
delayed with the object of enabling the government to deal with him
without consulting Parliament. To allay these suspicions, a certificate
was produced signed by all the officers of the _Rochester_, from which,
according to Bellamont’s apologist, it appeared that they had proceeded
on their course to America “as far as their ship was able to bear the
beating of the sea and then resolved to return to England.” “When they
were returned to England,” he says, “by a like certificate they affirmed
the same thing, and that the result was taken merely for securing the
ship and the company’s lives.” “The captain,” he adds, “by his letter to
the Secretary of the Admiralty says they were got 500 leagues before they
met the storms. And orders being sent by the Admiralty to Mr St Lo, the
Commissioner of the Admiralty at Plymouth, to examine into the truth of
the matter, he certified the Lords of the Admiralty that in pursuance of
their commands he, with the assistance of the officers of the Yard, had
made a thorough survey of the ship and (mentioning the several particular
defects) they unanimously found there was a necessity for her coming
back.”
These official assurances by no means satisfied the Commons. On the
sixteenth of the following March they presented an address to the King,
praying that Kidd might not be tried, discharged, or pardoned until the
next session of Parliament, and that Bellamont might be required in the
meantime to transmit over to England all commissions, instructions, and
other papers taken with or relating to him.
The King’s reply to this address was communicated to the House on the
eighth of April, 1700, by Mr. Secretary Vernon, who informed the Commons
that he had presented the address to His Majesty, and that His Majesty
had commanded him to acquaint the House that His Majesty having received
an account of the arrival of Captain Kidd in the Isle of Lundy, by a ship
which the Lords of the Admiralty had sent to fetch him, which was bound
for the Downs, His Majesty had ordered a yacht to be sent to the Downs
in order for the bringing of him up, and that the commissioners of the
Admiralty were likewise directed to send their marshal to take him into
custody.
This reply, so far from appeasing the opposition, seems to have added
fuel to the flame of their indignation. Why could not the King assent at
once to their address? Why had the _Rochester_ gone out of her course
to the Isle of Lundy, unless it were to defer the bringing home of
Kidd until Parliament had risen? Accordingly, a few days afterwards, a
further resolution was moved that “An humble address be presented to His
Majesty to remove John, Lord Somers, Lord Chancellor of England, from his
presence and counsels for ever.” The motion was defeated by a majority of
one hundred and sixty-seven to one hundred and six. But the fact that one
hundred and six members voted for it, shows the bitterness of the party
feeling against Somers, and the widespread suspicions of his honesty that
prevailed amongst his political opponents. It need hardly be said that
these suspicions were not allayed by the well-timed arrival of Kidd and
his fellow-prisoners in London on board the King’s yacht, on the very
day after Parliament had risen. The result of this second curious close
coincidence of date which has occurred in the course of this narrative,
was that Kidd had arrived too late to be examined by the members of the
House. He was therefore privately examined by the Admiralty officials,
sent to Newgate, and ordered to be kept a close prisoner.
The desire of the House of Commons that Kidd should not be tried,
discharged, or pardoned until the next session of Parliament was
most unfortunate for him, because it necessitated his being kept in
confinement with his fellow-prisoners at Newgate for more than a year.
But it cannot be regarded as unreasonable, seeing that the necessary
documents relating to him had not yet been laid before the House; that
time was required for the collection of evidence against him from
abroad; and that such of the facts relating to him and his employers as
had already been disclosed, afforded some ground for suspecting that
the four inculpated ministers were far from blameless. It is the one
satisfactory feature in this very unpleasant case, that no discredit
attaches to the action of the House of Commons in respect of its
treatment of Kidd, either in this session or the next.
On the sixth of March in the following year (1701), the House, having
reassembled, ordered that the examinations of Kidd and all papers
relating to him, transmitted by the Earl of Bellamont (who, it may be
mentioned, was now dead), be laid before them by the Admiralty. On
the next day, they were presented; and it was ordered that such of
them as came from the Admiralty sealed up, be opened, and the private
examinations of Captain Kidd before the Admiralty were accordingly opened
and read. It appeared from them that Kidd had denied that he had ever
seen Shrewsbury or Somers; or had heard more of them than that they were
two of his owners; that he admitted that Bellamont had introduced him to
the Earl of Orford, and that Colonel Hewetson had carried him to the Earl
of Romney, which was all he knew of them.
The papers delivered up by the Admiralty related not only to Kidd,
but also to atrocities which had been committed in the East Indies by
pirates, who had nothing to do with him, and which had apparently been
mixed up with his narrative, with the object of obscuring the case and
creating a prejudice against him. The Commons appointed a committee to
sort them, and to report to the House which of them related to Kidd.
On the twenty-seventh of March this committee reported that they had
done this; and their chairman, Sir Humphrey Mackworth, delivered them
in at the clerk’s table, divided into two parcels, one containing the
papers relating to Kidd, and the other the papers that did not relate
to him. Then Kidd’s private examinations before the Admiralty were again
read; and Kidd, being brought in by the keeper of Newgate, was called
in. A petition from Cogi Babba, which had been presented to the House,
was also read. This petition is noteworthy as being the only complaint
to the House made by those who were alleged at his trial to have been
plundered by him. It purported to be presented by Cogi Babba, on behalf
of himself and other Armenians, inhabitants of Chalfa, the suburb of
Spahow, and subjects to the King of Persia. It merely set forth that the
petitioners had freighted a ship called the _Karry Merchant_ (better
known as the _Quedagh Merchant_--and referred to in the French pass as
_Cara Marchand_), from Surat to Bengal, where the petitioners loaded her
at prime cost to the value of four hundred thousand rupees, besides forty
thousand rupees, the cost of the ship, which was all taken and carried
away by Captain Kidd, on the ship’s returning to Surat about February,
1697; and it merely prayed that Kidd might be examined touching the
premises, and the petitioners relieved concerning the same.
After the reading of these papers Kidd was examined and withdrew, and was
remanded to Newgate; and it was decided that the House would the next day
take into consideration the patent, commission and instructions to Kidd,
which they did with the result that a motion was made that the grant
passed under the Great Seal by Somers to Bellamont and others of the
goods to be taken from the pirates before their conviction was illegal
and void. The question being put, one hundred and eighty-five members
voted in favour of the motion and one hundred and ninety-eight against it.
The House then decided that Kidd should be put on his trial in the
ordinary course; and on the sixteenth of April, about three weeks before
it took place, being informed that he had sent to the Admiralty that he
might have the use of his commission and some other papers at his trial,
ordered that “the said Commission and _such other papers as Captain Kidd
desires_ be delivered by the Clerk of this House to the Secretary of
the Admiralty.” Had this order been complied with, and the papers been
accessible to Kidd or his legal advisers, he would have had a complete
answer to the charge of piracy brought against him. For they included
the precious French passes, which had justified his seizure of his two
prizes.
CHAPTER FIVE