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From the
very earliest days of history there have been pirates,
and it is, therefore, not at all remarkable that in
the early days of the history of this continent, sea
robbers should have made themselves prominent; but the
buccaneers of America differed in many ways from those
pirates with whom the history of the old world has made
us acquainted.
It was very seldom that an armed vessel set out from
an European port for the express purpose of robbery
in American waters. At first, nearly all noted buccaneers
were traders. But the circumstances which surrounded
them in the new world made them pirates, whose evil
deeds have never been surpassed in any part of the globe.
These unusual circumstances and amazing temptations
do not furnish an excuse for the exceptionally wicked
careers of the early American pirates; but we are bound
to remember these causes or we could not understand
the records of the settlement of the West Indies. The
buccaneers were fierce and reckless fellows who pursued
their daring occupation because it was profitable, because
they had learned to like it, and because it enabled
them to wreak a certain amount of vengeance upon the
common enemy. But we must not assume that they inaugurated
the piratical conquests and warfare which existed so
long upon our eastern sea coasts.
Before the buccaneers began their careers, there had
been great masters of piracy who had opened their schools
in the Caribbean Sea; and in order that the condition
of affairs in this country during parts of the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries may be clearly understood,
we will consider some of the very earliest noted pirates
of the West Indies.
When we begin a judicial inquiry into the condition
of our fellow beings, we should try to be as courteous
as we can, but we must be just; consequently a man's
fame and position must not turn us aside, when we are
acting as historical investigators.
Therefore, we shall be bold and speak the truth, and
although we shall take off our hats and bow very respectfully,
we must still assert that Christopher Columbus was the
first who practised piracy in American waters.
When he sailed with his three little ships to discover
unknown lands, he was an accredited explorer for the
court of Spain, and was bravely sailing forth with an
honest purpose, and with the same regard for law and
justice as is possessed by any explorer of the present
day. But when he discovered some unknown lands, rich
in treasure and outside of all legal restrictions, the
views and ideas of the great discoverer gradually changed.
Being now beyond the boundaries of civilization, he
also placed himself beyond the boundaries of civilized
law; robbery, murder, and the destruction of property,
by the commanders of naval expeditions, who have no
warrant or commission for their conduct, is the same
as piracy, and when Columbus ceased to be a legalized
explorer, and when, against the expressed wishes, and
even the prohibitions, of the royal personages who had
sent him out on this expedition, he began to devastate
the countries he had discovered, and to enslave and
exterminate their peaceable natives, then he became
a master in piracy, from whom the buccaneers afterward
learned many a valuable lesson.
It is not necessary for us to enter very deeply into
the consideration of the policy of Columbus toward the
people of the islands of the West Indies. His second
voyage was nothing more than an expedition for the sake
of plunder. He had discovered gold and other riches
in the West Indies and he had found that the people
who inhabited the islands were simple hearted, inoffensive
creatures, who did not know how to fight and who did
not want to fight. Therefore, it was so easy to sail
his ships into the harbors of defenceless islands, to
subjugate the natives, and to take away the products
of their mines and soil, that he commenced a veritable
course of piracy.
The acquisition of gold and all sorts of plunder seemed
to be the sole object of this Spanish expedition; natives
were enslaved, and subjected to the greatest hardships,
so that they died in great numbers. At one time three
hundred of them were sent as slaves to Spain. A pack
of bloodhounds, which Columbus had brought with him
for the purpose, was used to hunt down the poor Indians
when they endeavored to escape from the hands of the
oppressors, and in every way the island of Haiti, the
principal scene of the actions of Columbus, was treated
as if its inhabitants had committed a dreadful crime
by being in possession of the wealth which the Spaniards
desired for themselves.
Queen Isabella was greatly opposed to these cruel and
unjust proceedings. She sent back to their native land
the slaves which Columbus had shipped to Spain, and
she gave positive orders that no more of the inhabitants
were to be enslaved, and that they were all to be treated
with moderation and kindness. But the Atlantic is a
wide ocean, and Columbus, far away from his royal patron,
paid little attention to her wishes and commands; without
going further into the history of this period, we will
simply mention the fact that it was on account of his
alleged atrocities that Columbus was superseded in his
command, and sent back in chains to Spain.
There was another noted personage of the sixteenth century
who played the part of pirate in the new world, and
thereby set a most shining example to the buccaneers
of those regions. This was no other than Sir Francis
Drake, one of England's greatest naval commanders.
It is probable that Drake, when he started out in life,
was a man of very law abiding and orderly disposition,
for he was appointed by Queen Elizabeth a naval chaplain,
and, it is said, though there is some doubt about this,
that he was subsequently vicar of a parish. But by nature
he was a sailor, and nothing else, and after having
made several voyages in which he showed himself a good
fighter, as well as a good commander, he undertook,
in 1572, an expedition against the Spanish settlements
in the West Indies, for which he had no legal warrant
whatever.
Spain was not at war with England, and when Drake sailed
with four small ships into the port of the little town
of Nombre de Dios in the middle of the night, the inhabitants
of the town were as much astonished as the people of
Perth Amboy would be if four armed vessels were to steam
into Raritan Bay, and endeavor to take possession of
the town. The peaceful Spanish townspeople were not
at war with any civilized nation, and they could not
understand why bands of armed men should invade their
streets, enter the market place, fire their calivers
(early form of rifle), or muskets, into the air, and
then sound a trumpet loud enough to wake up everybody
in the place. Just outside of the town the invaders
had left a portion of their men, and when these heard
the trumpet in the market place, they also fired their
guns; all this noise and hubbub so frightened the good
people of the town, that many of them jumped from their
beds, and without stopping to dress, fled away to the
mountains. But all the citizens were not such cowards,
and fourteen or fifteen of them armed themselves and
went out to defend their town from the unknown invaders.
Beginners in any trade or profession, whether it be
the playing of the piano, the painting of pictures,
or the pursuit of piracy, are often timid and distrustful
of themselves; so it happened on this occasion with
Francis Drake and his men, who were merely amateur pirates,
and showed very plainly that they did not yet understand
their business.
When the fifteen Spanish citizens came into the market-place
and found there the little body of armed Englishmen,
they immediately fired upon them, not knowing or caring
who they were. This brave resistance seems to have frightened
Drake and his men almost as much as their trumpets and
guns had frightened the citizens, and the English immediately
retreated from the town. When they reached the place
where they had left the rest of their party, they found
that these had already run away, and taken to the boats.
Consequently Drake and his brave men were obliged to
take off some of their clothes and to wade out to the
little ships. The Englishmen secured no booty whatever,
and killed only one Spaniard, who was a man who had
been looking out of a window to see what was the matter.
Whether or not Drake's conscience had anything to do
with the bungling manner in which he made this first
attempt at piracy, we cannot say, but he soon gave his
conscience a holiday, and undertook some very successful
robbing enterprises. He received information from some
natives, that a train of mules was coming across the
Isthmus of Panama loaded with gold and silver bullion,
and guarded only by their drivers; for the merchants
who owned all this treasure had no idea that there was
any one in that part of the world who would commit a
robbery upon them. But Drake and his men soon proved
that they could hold up a train of mules as easily as
some of the masked robbers in our western country hold
up a train of cars. All the gold was taken, but the
silver was too heavy for the amateur pirates to carry.
Two days after that, Drake and his men came to a place
called "The House of Crosses," where they killed five
or six peaceable merchants, but were greatly disappointed
to find no gold, although the house was full of rich
merchandise of various kinds. As his men had no means
of carrying away heavy goods, he burned up the house
and all its contents and went to his ships, and sailed
away with the treasure he had already obtained.
Whatever this gallant ex chaplain now thought of himself,
he was considered by the Spaniards as an out and out
pirate, and in this opinion they were quite correct.
During his great voyage around the world, which he began
in 1577, he came down upon the Spanish-American settlements
like a storm from the sea. He attacked towns, carried
off treasure, captured merchant vessels, and in fact
showed himself to be a thoroughbred and accomplished
pirate of the first class.
It was in consequence of the rich plunder with which
his ships were now loaded, that he made his voyage around
the world. He was afraid to go back the way he came,
for fear of capture, and so, having passed the Straits
of Magellan, and having failed to find a way out of
the Pacific in the neighborhood of California, he doubled
the Cape of Good Hope, and sailed along the western
coast of Africa to European waters.
This grand piratical expedition excited great indignation
in Spain, which country was still at peace with England,
and even in England there were influential people who
counselled the Queen that it would be wise and prudent
to disavow Drake's actions, and compel him to restore
to Spain the booty he had taken from his subjects. But
Queen Elizabeth was not the woman to do that sort of
thing. She liked brave men and brave deeds, and she
was proud of Drake. Therefore, instead of punishing
him, she honored him, and went to take dinner with him
on board his ship, which lay at Deptford.
So Columbus does not stand alone as a grand master of
piracy. The famous Sir Francis Drake, who became vice
admiral of the fleet which defeated the Spanish Armada,
was a worthy companion of the great Genoese.
These notable instances have been mentioned because
it would be unjust to take up the history of those resolute
traders who sailed from England, France, and Holland,
to the distant waters of the western world for the purpose
of legitimate enterprise and commerce, and who afterwards
became thorough going pirates, without trying to make
it clear that they had shining examples for their notable
careers.
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