schooners of war, Greyhound and Beagle. They left Thompson's Island
June 7, 1823, under the command of Lieuts. Kearney and Newton, and
cruised within the Key's on the south side of Cuba, as far as Cape Cruz,
touching at all the intermediate ports on the island, to intercept
pirates. On the 21st of July, they came to anchor off Cape Cruz, and
Lieut. Kearney went in his boat to reconnoitre the shore, when he was
fired on by a party of pirates who were concealed among the bushes. A
fire was also opened from several pieces of cannon erected on a hill a
short distance off. The boat returned, and five or six others were
manned from the vessels, and pushed off for the shore, but a very heavy
cannonade being kept up by the pirates on the heights, as well as from
the boats, were compelled to retreat. The two schooners were then warped
in, when they discharged several broadsides, and covered the landing of
the boats. After a short time the pirates retreated to a hill that was
well fortified. A small hamlet, in which the pirates resided, was set
fire to and destroyed. Three guns, one a four pounder, and two large
swivels, with several pistols, cutlasses, and eight large boats, were
captured. A cave, about 150 feet deep, was discovered, near where the
houses were, and after considerable difficulty, a party of seamen got to
the bottom, where was found an immense quantity of plunder, consisting
of broadcloths, dry goods, female dresses, saddlery, &c. Many human
bones were also in the cave, supposed to have been unfortunate persons
who were taken and put to death. A great many of the articles were
brought away, and the rest destroyed. About forty pirates escaped to the
heights, but many were supposed to have been killed from the fire of the
schooners, as well as from the men who landed. The bushes were so thick
that it was impossible to go after them. Several other caves are in the
neighborhood, in which it was conjectured they occasionally take
shelter.
In 1823, Commodore Porter commanded the United States squadron in these
seas; much good was done in preventing new acts of piracy; but these
wretches kept aloof and did not venture to sea as formerly, but some
were taken.
Almost every day furnished accounts evincing the activity of Commodore
Porter, and the officers and men under his command; but for a long time
their industry and zeal was rather shown in the _suppression_ of piracy
than the _punishment_ of it. At length, however, an opportunity offered
for inflicting the latter, as detailed in the following letter, dated
Matanzas, July 10, 1823.
"I have the pleasure of informing you of a brilliant achievement
obtained against the pirates on the 5th inst. by two barges attached to
Commodore Porter's squadron, the Gallinipper, Lieut. Watson, 18 men, and
the Moscheto, Lieut. Inman, 10 men. The barges were returning from a
cruise to windward; when they were near Jiguapa Bay, 13 leagues to
windward of Matanzas, they entered it--it being a rendezvous for
pirates. They immediately discovered a large schooner under way, which
they supposed to be a Patriot privateer; and as their stores were nearly
exhausted, they hoped to obtain some supplies from her. They therefore
made sail in pursuit. When they were within cannon shot distance, she
rounded to and fired her long gun, at the same time run up the bloody
flag, directing her course towards the shore, and continuing to fire
without effect. When she had got within a short distance of the shore,
she came to, with springs on her cable, continuing to fire; and when the
barges were within 30 yards, they fired their muskets without touching
boat or man; our men gave three cheers, and prepared to board; the
pirates, discovering their intention, jumped into the water, when the
bargemen, calling on the name of 'Allen,' commenced a destructive
slaughter, killing them in the water and as they landed. So exasperated
were our men, that it was impossible for their officers to restrain
them, and many were killed after orders were given to grant quarter.
Twenty-seven dead were counted, some sunk, five taken prisoners by the
bargemen, and eight taken by a party of Spaniards on shore. The officers
calculated that from 30 to 35 were killed. The schooner mounted a long
nine pounder on a pivot, and 4 four pounders, with every other necessary
armament, and a crew of 50 to 60 men, and ought to have blown the barges
to atoms. She was commanded by the notorious Diableto or Little Devil.
This statement I have from Lieut. Watson himself, and it is certainly
the most decisive operation that has been effected against those
murderers, either by the English or American force."
[Illustration: _The Pirates fire into Lieut. Kearney's boat, while
reconnoitering the shore._]
"This affair occurred on the same spot where the brave Allen fell about
one year since. The prize was sent to Thompson's Island."
A British sloop of war, about the same time, captured a pirate schooner
off St. Domingo, with a crew of 60 men. She had 200,000 dollars in
specie, and other valuable articles on board. The brig Vestal sent
another pirate schooner to New-Providence.
THE ADVENTURES AND EXECUTION OF CAPTAIN JOHN RACKAM.
This John Rackam, as has been reported in the foregoing pages, was
quarter-master to Vane's company, till the crew were divided, and Vane
turned out of it for refusing to board a French man-of-war, Rackam being
voted captain of the division that remained in the brigantine. The 24th
of November 1718, was the first day of his command; his first cruise was
among the Carribbee Islands, where he took and plundered several
vessels.
We have already taken notice, that when Captain Woods Rogers went to the
island of Providence with the king's pardon to such of the pirates as
should surrender, this brigantine, which Rackam commanded, made its
escape through another passage, bidding defiance to the mercy that was
offered.
To the windward of Jamaica, a Madeira-man fell into the pirate's way,
which they detained two or three days, till they had their market out of
her, and then they gave her back to the master, and permitted one Hosea
Tidsel, a tavern keeper at Jamaica, who had been picked up in one of
their prizes, to depart in her, she being bound for that island.
After this cruise they went into a small island, and cleaned, and spent
their Christmas ashore, drinking and carousing as long as they had any
liquor left, and then went to sea again for more. They succeeded but too
well, though they took no extraordinary prize for above two months,
except a ship laden with convicts from Newgate, bound for the
plantations, which in a few days was retaken, with all her cargo, by an
English man-of-war that was stationed in those seas.
Rackam stood towards the island of Bermuda, and took a ship bound to
England from Carolina, and a small pink from New England, both of which
he brought to the Bahama Islands, where, with the pitch, tar and stores
they cleaned again, and refitted their own vessel; but staying too long
in that neighborhood, Captain Rogers, who was Governor of Providence,
hearing of these ships being taken, sent out a sloop well manned and
armed, which retook both the prizes, though in the mean while the pirate
had the good fortune to escape.
From hence they sailed to the back of Cuba, where Rackam kept a little
kind of a family, at which place they stayed a considerable time, living
ashore with their Delilahs, till their money and provisions were
expended, and they concluded it time to look out for more. They repaired
their vessel, and were making ready to put to sea, when a guarda de
costa came in with a small English sloop, which she had taken as an
interloper on the coast. The Spanish guard-ship attacked the pirate, but
Rackam being close in behind a little island, she could do but little
execution where she lay; the Dons therefore warped into the channel that
evening, in order to make sure of her the next morning. Rackam finding
his case desperate, and that there was hardly any possibility of
escaping, resolved to attempt the following enterprise. The Spanish
prize lying for better security close into the land, between the little
island and the Main, our desperado took his crew into the boat with
their cutlasses, rounded the little island, and fell aboard their prize
silently in the dead of the night without being discovered, telling the
Spaniards that were aboard her, that if they spoke a word, or made the
least noise, they were all dead men; and so they became masters of her.
When this was done he slipped her cable, and drove out to sea. The
Spanish man-of-war was so intent upon their expected prize, that they
minded nothing else, and as soon as day broke, they made a furious fire
upon the empty sloop; but it was not long before they were rightly
apprised of the matter, when they cursed themselves sufficiently for a
company of fools, to be bit out of a good rich prize, as she proved to
be, and to have nothing but an old crazy hull in the room of her.
Rackam and his crew had no occasion to be displeased at the exchange, as
it enabled them to continue some time longer in a way of life that
suited their depraved minds. In August 1720, we find him at sea again,
scouring the harbours and inlets of the north and west parts of Jamaica,
where he took several small crafts, which proved no great booty to the
rovers; but they had but few men, and therefore were obliged to run at
low game till they could increase their company and their strength.
In the beginning of September, they took seven or eight fishing boats in
Harbour Island, stole their nets and other tackle, and then went off to
the French part of Hispaniola, where they landed, and took the cattle
away, with two or three Frenchmen whom they found near the water-side,
hunting wild hogs in the evening. The Frenchmen came on board, whether
by consent or compulsion is not certainly known. They afterwards
plundered two sloops, and returned to Jamaica, on the north coast of
which island, near Porto Maria Bay, they took a schooner, Thomas
Spenlow, master, it being then the 19th of October. The next day Rackam
seeing a sloop in Dry Harbour Bay, stood in and fired a gun; the men all
ran ashore, and he took the sloop and lading; but when those ashore
found that they were pirates, they hailed the sloop, and let them know
they were all willing to come on board of them.
Rackam's coasting the island in this manner proved fatal to him; for
intelligence of his expedition came to the governor by a canoe which he
had surprised ashore in Ocho Bay: upon this a sloop was immediately
fitted out, and sent round the island in quest of him, commanded by
Captain Barnet, and manned with a good number of hands. Rackam, rounding
the island, and drawing round the western point, called Point Negril,
saw a small pettiaga, which, at the sight of the sloop, ran ashore and
landed her men, when one of them hailed her. Answer was made that they
were Englishmen, and begged the pettiaga's men to come on board and
drink a bowl of punch, which they prevailed upon them to do.
Accordingly, the company, in an evil hour, came all aboard of the
pirate, consisting of nine persons; they were armed with muskets and
cutlasses, but what was their real design in so doing we will not
pretend to say. They had no sooner laid down their arms and taken up
their pipes, than Barnet's sloop, which was in pursuit of Rackam's, came
in sight.
The pirates, finding she stood directly towards them, feared the event,
and weighed their anchor, which they had but lately let go, and stood
off. Captain Barnet gave them chase, and, having advantage of little
breezes of wind which blew off the land, came up with her, and brought
her into Port Royal, in Jamaica.
About a fortnight after the prisoners were brought ashore, viz. November
16, 1720, Captain Rackam and eight of his men were condemned and
executed. Captain Rackam and two others were hung in chains.
But what was very surprising, was the conviction of the nine men that
came aboard the sloop on the same day she was taken. They were tried at
an adjournment of the court on the 24th of January, the magistracy
waiting all that time, it is supposed, for evidence to prove the
piratical intention of going aboard the said sloop; for it seems there
was no act or piracy committed by them, as appeared by the witnesses
against them, two Frenchmen, taken by Rackam off the island of
Hispaniola, who merely deposed that the prisoners came on board without
any compulsion.
The court considered the prisoners' cases, and the majority of the
commissioners being of opinion that they were all guilty of the piracy
and felony they were charged with, viz. the going over with a piratical
intent to John Rackam, &c. then notorious pirates, and by them known to
be so, they all received sentence of death, and were executed on the
17th of February at Gallows Point at Port Royal.
Nor holy bell, nor pastoral bleat,
In former days within the vale.
Flapped in the bay the pirate's sheet,
Curses were on the gale;
Rich goods lay on the sand, and murdered men,
Pirate and wreckers kept their revels there.
THE BUCCANEER.
THE LIFE AND EXPLOITS OF ANNE BONNEY.
This female pirate was a native of Cork. Her father was an attorney,
and, by his activity in business, rose to considerable respectability in
that place. Anne was the fruit of an unlawful connexion with his own
servant maid, with whom he afterwards eloped to America, leaving his own
affectionate and lawful wife. He settled at Carolina, and for some time
followed his own profession; but soon commenced merchant, and was so
successful as to purchase a considerable plantation. There he lived with
his servant in the character of his wife; but she dying, his daughter
Anne superintended the domestic affairs of her father.
During her residence with her parent she was supposed to have a
considerable fortune, and was accordingly addressed by young men of
respectable situations in life. It happened with Anne, however, as with
many others of her youth and sex, that her feelings, and not her
interest, determined her choice of a husband. She married a young sailor
without a shilling. The avaricious father was so enraged, that, deaf to
the feelings of a parent, he turned his own child out of doors. Upon
this cruel usage, and the disappointment of her fortune, Anne and her
husband sailed for the island of Providence, in the hope of gaining
employment.
Acting a part very different from that of Mary Read, Anne's affections
were soon estranged from her husband by Captain Rackam; and eloping with
him, she went to sea in men's clothes. Proving with child, the captain
put her on shore, and entrusted her to the care of some friends until
her recovery, when she again accompanied him in his expeditions.
Upon the king's proclamation offering a pardon to all pirates, he
surrendered, and went into the privateering business, as we have related
before: he, however, soon embraced an opportunity to return to his
favorite employment. In all his piratical exploits Anne accompanied him;
and, as we have already recorded, displayed such courage and
intrepidity, that she, along with Mary Read and a seaman, were the last
three who remained on board when the vessel was taken.
Anne was known to many of the planters in Jamaica, who remembered to
have seen her in her father's house, and they were disposed to intercede
in her behalf. Her unprincipled conduct, in leaving her own husband and
forming an illicit connexion with Rackam, tended, however, to render her
friends less active. By a special favor, Rackam was permitted to visit
her the day before he was executed; but, instead of condoling with him
on account of his sad fate, she only observed, that she was sorry to see
him there, but if he had fought like a man he needed not have been
hanged like a dog. Being with child, she remained in prison until her
recovery, was reprieved from time to time, and though we cannot
communicate to our readers any particulars of her future life, or the
manner of her death, yet it is certain that she was not executed.
THE ADVENTURES AND HEROISM OF MARY READ.
The attention of our readers is now to be directed to the history of two
female pirates,--a history which is chiefly remarkable from the
extraordinary circumstance of the softer sex assuming a character
peculiarly distinguished for every vice that can disgrace humanity, and
at the same time for the exertion of the most daring, though brutal,
courage.
Mary Read was a native of England, but at what place she was born is not
recorded. Her mother married a sailor when she was very young, who, soon
after their marriage, went to sea, and never returned. The fruit of that
marriage was a sprightly boy. The husband not returning, she again found
herself with child, and to cover her shame, took leave of her husband's
relations, and went to live in the country, taking her boy along with
her. Her son in a short time died, and she was relieved from the burden
of his maintenance and education. The mother had not resided long in the
country before Mary Read, the subject of the present narrative, was
born.
After the birth of Mary, her mother resided in the country for three or
four years, until her money was all spent, and her ingenuity was set at
work to contrive how to obtain a supply. She knew that her husband's
mother was in good circumstances, and could easily support her child,
provided she could make her pass for a boy, and her son's child. But it
seemed impossible to impose upon an old experienced mother. She,
however, presented Mary in the character of her grandson. The old woman
proposed to take the boy to live with her, but the mother would not on
any account part with her boy; the grandmother, therefore, allowed a
crown per week for his support.
The ingenuity of the mother being successful, she reared the daughter as
a boy. But as she grew up, she informed her of the secret of her birth,
in order that she might conceal her sex. The grandmother, however,
dying, the support from that quarter failed, and she was obliged to hire
her out as a footboy to a French lady. The strength and manly
disposition of this supposed boy increased with her years, and leaving
that servile employment, she engaged on board a man-of-war.
The volatile disposition of the youth did not permit her to remain long
in this station, and she next went into Flanders, and joined a regiment
of foot as a cadet. Though in every action she conducted herself with
the greatest bravery, yet she could not obtain a commission, as they
were in general bought and sold. She accordingly quitted that service,
and enlisted into a regiment of horse; there she behaved herself so
valiantly, that she gained the esteem of all her officers. It, however,
happened, that her comrade was a handsome young Fleming, and she fell
passionately in love with him. The violence of her feelings rendered her
negligent of her duty, and effected such a change in her behaviour as
attracted the attention of all. Both her comrade and the rest of the
regiment deemed her mad. Love, however, is inventive, and as they slept
in the same tent, she found means to discover her sex without any
seeming design. He was both surprised and pleased, supposing that he
would have a mistress to himself; but he was greatly mistaken, and he
found that it was necessary to court her for his wife. A mutual
attachment took place, and, as soon as convenient, women's clothes were
provided for her, and they were publicly married.
The singularity of two troopers marrying caused a general conversation,
and many of the officers honored the ceremony with their presence, and
resolved to make presents to the bride, to provide her with necessaries.
After marriage they were desirous to quit the service, and their
discharge being easily obtained, they set up an ordinary under the sign
of the "Three Shoes," and soon acquired a considerable run of business.
But Mary Read's felicity was of short duration; the husband died, and
peace being concluded, her business diminished. Under these
circumstances she again resumed her man's dress, and going into Holland,
enlisted into a regiment of foot quartered in one of the frontier towns.
But there being no prospect of preferment in time of peace, she went on
board a vessel bound for the West Indies.
During the voyage, the vessel was captured by English pirates, and as
Mary was the only English person on board, they detained her, and having
plundered the vessel of what they chose, allowed it to depart. Mary
continued in that unlawful commerce for some time, but the royal pardon
being tendered to all those in the West Indies, who should, before a
specified day, surrender, the crew to which she was attached, availed
themselves of this, and lived quietly on shore with the fruits of their
adventures. But from the want of their usual supplies, their money
became exhausted; and being informed that Captain Rogers, in the island
of Providence, was fitting out some vessels for privateering, Mary, with
some others, repaired to that island to serve on board his privateers.
We have already heard, that scarcely had the ships sailed, when some of
their crews mutinied, and ran off with the ships, to pursue their former
mode of life. Among these was Mary Read. She indeed, frequently
declared, that the life of a pirate was what she detested, and that she
was constrained to it both on the former and present occasion. It was,
however, sufficiently ascertained, that both Mary Read and Anne Bonney
were among the bravest and most resolute fighters of the whole crew;
that when the vessel was taken, these two heroines, along with another
of the pirates, were the last three upon deck; and that Mary, having in
vain endeavored to rouse the courage of the crew, who had fled below,
discharged a pistol amongst them, killing one and wounding another.
Nor was Mary less modest than brave; for though she had remained many
years in the character of a sailor, yet no one had discovered her sex,
until she was under the necessity of doing so to Anne Bonney. The reason
of this was, that Anne, supposing her to be a handsome fellow, became
greatly enamored of her, and discovered her sex and wishes to Mary, who
was thus constrained to reveal her secret to Anne. Rackam being the
paramour of Bonney, and observing her partiality towards Mary,
threatened to shoot her lover; so that to prevent any mischief, Anne
also informed the captain of the sex of her companion.
Rackam was enjoined to secrecy, and here he behaved honorably; but love
again assailed the conquered Mary. It was usual with the pirates to
retain all the artists who were captured in the trading-vessels; among
these was a very handsome young man, of engaging manners, who vanquished
the heart of Mary. In a short time her love became so violent, that she
took every opportunity of enjoying his company and conversation; and,
after she had gained his friendship, discovered her sex. Esteem and
friendship were speedily converted into the most ardent affection, and a
mutual flame burned in the hearts of these two lovers. An occurrence
soon happened that put the attachment of Mary to a severe trial. Her
lover having quarrelled with one of the crew, they agreed to fight a
duel on shore. Mary was all anxiety for the fate of her lover, and she
manifested a greater concern for the preservation of his life than that
of her own; but she could not entertain the idea that he could refuse to
fight, and so be esteemed a coward. Accordingly she quarrelled with the
man who challenged her lover, and called him to the field two hours
before his appointment with her lover, engaged him with sword and
pistol, and laid him dead at her feet.
Though no esteem or love had formerly existed, this action was
sufficient to have kindled the most violent flame. But this was not
necessary, for the lover's attachment was equal, if not stronger than
her own; they pledged their faith, which was esteemed as binding as if
the ceremony had been performed by a clergyman.