A General History of the Pirates

as to get refreshments themselves, and wait an opportunity to dispose of their cargo; therefore ’twas resolved to make the best of their way to Santa Cruz, a small island in the latitude of 18, 30, N. ten mile long, and two broad, lying southeast of Puerto Rico, belonging to the French settlements. Here they thought they might lie privately enough for some time, and fit themselves for further mischief. They met with a sloop by the way, which they took along with them, and in the beginning of the year 1716⁠–⁠17, they arrived at their port, having a ship of 20 guns, a sloop of eight, and three prizes, viz. another ship of 20 guns, a sloop of four guns, and another sloop last taken; with this little fleet, they got into a small harbour, or road, the N. W. part of the island, and warp’d up two creeks, which were made by a little island lying within the bay; (I am the more particular now, because I shall take leave of the gentlemen, at this place.) They had here bare 16 foot water, at the deepest, and but 13 or 14, at the shallowest, and nothing but rocks and sands without, which secured them from wind and sea, and likewise from any considerable force coming against them.

When they had all got in, the first thing they had to do, was to guard themselves in the best manner they could; they made a battery of four guns upon the island, and another battery of two guns on the north point of the road, and warp’d in one of the sloops with eight guns, at the mouth of the channel, to hinder any vessels from coming in; when this was done they went to work on their ship, unrigging, and unloading, in order to clean, where I shall leave them a while, till I bring other company to ’em.

In the month of November, 1716, General Hamilton, Commander in Chief of all the Leeward Caribbean Islands, sent a sloop Express to Captain Hume, at Barbados, commander of His Majesty’s ship, Scarborough, of 30 guns, and 140 men, to acquaint him, that two pirate sloops of 12 guns each, molested the colonies, having plundered several vessels. The Scarborough had bury’d twenty men, and had near forty sick, and therefore was but in ill state to go to sea: however, Captain Hume left his sick men behind, and sailed to the other islands, for a supply of men, taking 20 soldiers from Antigua; at Nevis, he took 10, and 10 at St. Christopher’s, and then sailed to the island of Anguilla, where he learned, that some time before, 2 such sloops had been at Spanish Town, otherwise called, one of the Virgin Islands: accordingly, the next day, the Scarborough came to Spanish Town, but could hear no news of the sloops, only, that they had been there about Christmas, (it being then the 15th of January.)

Captain Hume, finding no account could be had of these pirates, designed to go back, the next day, to Barbados; but, it happened, that night, that a boat anchor’d there from Santa Cruz, and informed him, that he saw a pirate ship of 22 or 24 guns, with other vessels, going in to the north west part of the island aforesaid. The Scarborough weigh’d immediately, and the next morning came in sight of the rovers, and their prizes, and stood to them, but the pilot refused to venture in with the ship; all the while the pirates fir’d red hot bullets from the shore. At length, the ship came to an anchor, alongside the reef, near the channel, and cannonaded for several hours, both the vessels and batteries: about four in the afternoon, the sloop that guarded the channel, was sunk by the shot of the man-of-war; then she cannonaded the pirate ship of 22 guns, that lay behind the island. The next night, viz. the 18th, it falling calm, Captain Hume weigh’d, fearing he might fall on the reef, and so stood off and on for a day or two, to block them up. On the 20th, in the evening, they observed the man-of-war to stand off to sea, and took the opportunity to warp out, in order to slip away from the island; but at twelve o’clock they run aground, and then seeing the Scarborough about, standing in again, as their case was desperate, so they were put into the utmost confusion; they quitted their ship, and set her on fire, with 20 Negroes in her, who were all burnt; 19 of the pirates made their escape in a small sloop, but the captain and the rest, with 20 Negroes, betook to the woods, where ’twas probable they might starve, for we never heard what became of ’em afterwards: Captain Hume released the prisoners, with the ship and sloop that remained, and then went after the two pirate sloops first mentioned.

III

Of Captain Teach Alias Blackbeard

Edward Teach was a Bristol man born, but had sailed some time out of Jamaica in privateers, in the late French war; yet though he had often distinguished himself for his uncommon boldness and personal courage, he was never raised to any command, till he went a-pirating, which I think was at the latter end of the year 1716, when Captain Benjamin Hornigold put him into a sloop that he had made prize of, and with whom he continued in consortship till a little while before Hornigold surrendered.

In the spring of the year 1717, Teach and Hornigold sailed from Providence, for the main of America, and took in their way a billop from the Havana, with 120 barrels of flour, as also a sloop from Bermuda, Thurbar Master, from whom they took only some gallons of wine, and then let him go; and a ship from Madeira to South Carolina,