[Contents]CHAPTER IISOME BUCCANEERS AND THEIR WAYS“Now, having learned why the buccaneers were so called and how they came into existence, we’ll take up a more interesting matter, and I’ll try to tell you something of the men themselves, of the most famous buccaneers and of their deeds,” continued Mr. Bickford.“Certain famous buccaneers’ names are almost household words—such as Morgan, Montbars, L’Ollonois and your friend Captain Kidd, who, as I said, was no buccaneer—but others, who did even braver and more terrible things and were the most noted of buccaneers in their day, are almost unknown to the world to-day. Among these was Pierre Le Grand, Brasiliano, Bartholomew Portugues, Sawkins, Sharp, Davis, Red Legs, Cook, Dampier, Mansvelt, Prince Rupert and many others.”“But you’ve forgotten Drake and Hawkins and Blackbeard,” put in Jack.[15]“None of those men were buccaneers,” his father declared. “Drake and Hawkins were privateers—Drake being Admiral of Queen Elizabeth’s navy—and won their fame in the destruction of the Spanish Armada. Later they attacked and took towns on the Spanish Main and destroyed Spanish ships, but they were neither pirates nor buccaneers. In fact, they were both dead before buccaneers became of any importance as sea rovers. On the other hand, Blackbeard was an ordinary pirate—a sea robber who made no attempt to discriminate between friend and foe and scuttled and robbed ships of his own countrymen as readily as those of other nationalities. But as he was an interesting character and was among the last of the important or dangerous pirates of the Caribbean I will tell you something of his life and career later.“The first buccaneer to rise to any fame was Pierre Le Grand, or as he was oftener called, Peter the Great, a native of Dieppe in Normandy. Le Grand’s first and only achievement, and the one which brought him fame, was the taking of the Vice Admiral of the Spanish fleet near Cape Tiburon in Haiti. With a small boat manned by twenty-eight of the rough buccaneers Le Grand[16]set forth in search of prizes and cruised among the Bahamas, but for many days saw no ship. Provisions were running low, his men were grumbling and he had about decided to give up in despair when they sighted a huge Spanish ship which had become separated from the rest of the convoy. Setting sail they headed for the vessel and at twilight were very close. In order to force his men to their utmost, Le Grand ordered one of his crew to bore holes in the bottom of the boat and then, running their tiny craft alongside the Don, and armed only with swords and pistols, the buccaneers swarmed over the sides of the doomed ship. Taken absolutely by surprise, for the Spaniards had not dreamed that the handful of ragged men in a tiny sail boat intended to attack them, the crew of the ship, nevertheless, resisted stoutly. But they were ruthlessly cut down and while some of the buccaneers drove the Spaniards across the deck, others with Le Grand at their head, dashed into the cabin where the unsuspecting Vice Admiral was enjoying a quiet game of cards with his officers.“As Le Grand leaped across the room and placed his pistol at the Admiral’s breast thedumbfounded[17]Spaniard exclaimed, ‘Lord bless us! Are these devils or what?’Money of the buccaneers’ timesMoney of the buccaneers’ times1.Pieces of eight2.Doubloon3–4.Cross money5.CastillanoCruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they sawCruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw“But he soon realized that whatever they were his ship was in their hands and that he and his men were prisoners. Le Grand, however, was neither a brutal nor a bloodthirsty wretch, as were many of his successors, and, having impressed as many of the Spanish seamen into his service as he required, he set the others, including the Admiral and the officers, ashore, and set sail with his prize for France. So great was the booty he secured by this one coup that he gave up buccaneering and settled down in France for life.“But his deed fired the buccaneers on Tortuga with dreams of easily acquired prizes and riches, and soon a host of the rough hunters and woodsmen were cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw. Indeed, many, unable to secure sailboats, actually went a-pirating in tiny dugout canoes, and so daring and reckless were they that, despite their handicaps, they took two huge galleons laden with plate within the first month, as well as many smaller vessels. Now that they had seaworthy ships and plenty of wealth at their disposal they became[18]bolder and bolder, and were soon not only cruising the Caribbean Sea, and taking ships, but were attacking the fortified and wealthy towns along the Central and South American coast with success. And let me mention here that it was very seldom that the buccaneers made use of the larger ships in their piratical raids. The smaller vessels were faster, they were more easily handled, and when necessity arose they could slip through narrow, shoal channels through which the Spanish men-of-war could not follow. The buccaneers’ vessels seldom carried over six guns, many had but two or three, but they swarmed with men armed to the teeth, and the buccaneers depended far more upon a dashing attack and hand-to-hand fights than upon cannon fire.”“Excuse me, Dad,” interrupted Jack, “but are there books that tell all these things?”“Yes, Jack,” replied Mr. Bickford. “And the best and most complete is a book called ‘The Buccaneers of America.’ It was written by a buccaneer, a man named Esquemeling, who took part in nearly all the most famous of the buccaneers’ raids and served with Morgan, L’Ollonois and many other buccaneer chiefs. His own history is almost as interesting as that of any of the men of whom[19]he wrote. He was a Hollander by birth, but went to Tortuga as a clerk for the West India Company of France. The company, however, found that although the buccaneers were quite willing to purchase goods it was quite another matter when it came to paying for them, and as a result, the West India Company abandoned their agency in Tortuga and gave orders that all their goods and chattels on the island should be sold for what they would bring. This included servants of the company as well, and Esquemeling found himself sold for a slave for thirty pieces of eight. His master was a cruel, tyrannical man and abused his Dutch slave shamefully, although offering to let him buy his freedom for three hundred pieces of eight. Esquemeling, however, as he says himself, ‘was not master of one in the whole world.’ Finally Esquemeling became weak and ill from abuse and inadequate food, and his cruel master, fearing the man would die and he would be out of pocket and without a slave as well, disposed of the sick Hollander for seventy pieces of eight. His new master was a surgeon and a kindly man and, having doctored Esquemeling and restored him to health and strength, at the end of a year he gave him his liberty, exacting only the promise[20]that Esquemeling should pay him one hundred pieces of eight when in a position to do so. Being, as he himself says, ‘at liberty but like unto Adam when he was first created, that is, naked and destitute of all human necessities,’ and with no means of earning a livelihood, Esquemeling threw in his lot with the buccaneers and he remained with them for a number of years. Being by profession a clerk, Esquemeling kept the logs and accounts of the buccaneers and also a journal of his own in which he recorded all the details and events of his adventurous life. His work is, in fact, the only authentic account of these men, and his quaint phraseology and droll remarks are very amusing. I have the book here, boys, and you’ll find it more interesting and absorbing than any story or fiction of the buccaneers that ever was written.“The first buccaneer of note with whom Esquemeling sailed was Bartholomew Portugues, so called as he was a native of Portugal. Portugues left Jamaica in a small ship of four small carronades with a crew of thirty men, and went cruising off Cuba. A few days later he met a heavily armed galleon bound to Havana from Cartagena and at once attacked her. Although[21]the Spaniard carried a crew of over seventy, in addition to passengers, and was armed with twenty heavy cannon, yet Portugues assaulted the Dons without hesitation and after a desperate battle in which nearly fifty Spaniards were killed and wounded, the buccaneers took the galleon with a loss of only ten men killed and four wounded. Owing to contrary winds Portugues could not return directly to either Tortuga or Jamaica and so set sail for Cape San Antonio at the western extremity of Cuba. There he made necessary repairs to his prize and secured a supply of fresh water. As they were setting sail the buccaneers were surprised by three great Spanish ships and, greatly outnumbered, were taken prisoners and stripped of the booty they had so recently secured, a treasure of over ten thousand pieces of eight, in addition to valuable merchandise. We can imagine the chagrin of the buccaneers at this turn of fate and no doubt they gave themselves up for lost. But luck was with them. Two days after they had been made prisoners a great storm arose, the vessels became separated and the one containing the buccaneers was driven to Campeche in Yucatan. When the residents learned that Portugues and his fellows[22]were captives on board there was great rejoicing, and the authorities sent off to the ship demanding that the buccaneers be delivered to them. After a consultation, however, it was decided safer to leave the prisoners aboard and in preparation for a general hanging a number of gibbets were erected on shore. These were in plain view of the buccaneers, and Portugues resolved to make a desperate effort to escape and to cheat the expectant Dons of the grewsome spectacle. He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and, having plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floats, he waited patiently for darkness. But the sentry, who hitherto had been a careless, sleepy fellow, was unusually alert, and seeing this, Portugues seized a knife which he had surreptitiously obtained and, to quote Esquemeling, ‘gave him such a mortal stab as suddenly deprived him of life and the possibility of making any noise.’ Then the buccaneer captain leaped into the sea and aided by his extemporized water-wings managed to gain the shore. But his troubles had only begun. At once the hue and cry of his escape was raised, and for three days Portugues concealed himself in a hollow tree without food while the Dons searched all about. At last, abandoning[23]their hunt, the Spaniards returned to the town, and Portugues set out afoot for the Gulf of Triste, where he hoped to find other buccaneers to aid him in rescuing his comrades.“It is almost impossible to imagine what this meant or the seemingly insurmountable hardships the buccaneer captain deliberately faced, and it is also a most striking example of the faithfulness of the buccaneers to one another, which was one of the chief causes why they were so successful. Remember, Portugues was unarmed, for he had left the knife in the sentry’s back, he was without food, he had been half starved by his captors, and yet he calmly set out on a one hundred and fifty mile tramp through the jungle and along the jagged rocks of the seacoast; through a country infested by mosquitoes and stinging insects, by savage hostile Indians, and through swamps reeking with malaria. Every settlement and town had to be avoided, as they were all filled with his enemies, the Spaniards, and throughout that long and terrible journey the buccaneer subsisted entirely upon the few shellfish he found along the shore and upon the roots of forest herbs.“Moreover, several large and many small rivers crossed his route and not being able to swim his[24]case seemed hopeless. But while searching about the banks of the first large stream, looking for a possible ford, he found an old plank with a few large spikes in it. After tremendous efforts he managed to withdraw these nails and with infinite patience whetted them against stones until he secured a sharp knifelike edge. Just think of that, boys, when you read of modern hardships endured by men left to their own resources in a forest. Imagine rubbing a ship’s spike back and forth upon a stone until it has been transformed into a knife!“But the preparation of the nails, incredible as it sounds, was not the worst of his labors. With these crude implements the buccaneer actually hacked off branches of trees, cut vines and pliant reeds and with these constructed a raft with which he crossed the stream. At every large river he repeated the work and eventually arrived safely at the Gulf of Triste fourteen days after escaping from the ship. Here, as he had expected, he found a buccaneer vessel with a captain whom he knew and, telling of his comrades’ plight, he begged the captain to lend him a boat and twenty men to go to his men’s rescue. This the captain gladly did, and eight days later, Portugues was back at Campeche.[25]So small was the boat that the Spaniards never dreamed that its occupants were enemies or buccaneers, but thought it a craft from shore bringing off cargo, and they watched it approach without the least fear or preparations for defense.“Thus the buccaneers completely surprised the Dons and after a short, sharp struggle were in possession of the ship and had released the imprisoned buccaneers—or rather most of them, for the Dons had hanged a few.“Realizing that other Spanish vessels might appear and attack him with overwhelming force at any time, Portugues at once set sail in the ship wherein he had so long been a helpless captive, and once more in possession of his booty with vast riches in addition. Steering a course for Jamaica he was off the Isle of Pines when the fickle fate which always followed him once more turned her back and the ship went upon the reefs of the Jardines. The ship was a total loss and sunk with all her treasure, while Portugues and his comrades barely escaped with their lives in a canoe. Although they managed to reach Jamaica without misfortune, luck had deserted Portugues for all time and while he tried time after time to recoup his fortunes all his efforts were in vain.[26]He became an ordinary seaman and was soon forgotten.“Another buccaneer whose exploits were as remarkable as Portugues’ and whose most notable exploits also took place in Yucatan, was a Dutchman who was nicknamed Rock Brasiliano, owing to his long residence in Brazil. As an ordinary mariner he joined the buccaneers in Jamaica and soon so distinguished himself by his bravery and resourcefulness that when, after a dispute with his captain, he deserted the ship, he was chosen chief by a number of his fellows and, securing a small vessel, he set forth to capture a prize. Within a few days he seized a large Spanish ship with a vast treasure aboard which he carried into Jamaica in triumph. This exploit at once brought him fame and men flocked to his service. But, unlike Portugues, who seems to have been a very decent and respectable sort of rascal, Brasiliano was a drunken, brutal scallawag. As Esquemeling says, ‘Neither in his domestic or private affairs had he good behavior or government over himself.’ When drunk, as he always was when ashore, his favorite amusement was to race up and down the streets, beating, stabbing or shooting all whom he met, very much as our Western[27]‘bad men’ used to ‘shoot up’ a town in the old days.“Moreover, Brasiliano was unspeakably bloodthirsty and cruel. Whenever he captured Spaniards he put them to the most horrible tortures, and in order to force them to reveal the hiding places of their treasures he would flay them alive, tear them limb from limb or roast them on spits over slow fires. As a result, he became a feared and dreaded man, and the mere mention of his name caused the Dons to shudder and to huddle within their stockades. Nevertheless Brasiliano was a brave, a resourceful and a most remarkable man and performed some most noteworthy exploits. On one occasion he was cruising off the coast of Yucatan when a violent storm drove his ship upon the rocks, and he and his men escaped with only their muskets and a slender stock of ammunition. They landed on a desolate, uninhabited stretch of coast midway between Campeche and the Gulf of Triste and, quite undeterred by their plight, commenced an overland march towards the Gulf exactly as Portugues had done. But they had not proceeded far when they were surprised by a cavalcade of over one hundred Spanish horsemen. Despite the fact that[28]the buccaneers numbered less than thirty, yet they had no thought of either retreat or surrender, but at once prepared to meet the oncoming cavalry. Expert marksmen as they were, a Don fell for every bullet fired and for an hour the handful of buccaneers kept the Spaniards at bay until, finding the cost too heavy, the cavalry retreated towards the town. Killing the wounded and stripping the dead of their arms and equipment, the buccaneers continued on the journey mounted on the horses of the dead Dons, the total loss of Brasiliano’s forces being but two killed and two wounded. Quite encouraged by their success, the buccaneers approached a little port and saw a boat lying at anchor in the harbor and protecting a fleet of canoes that were loading logwood. With little trouble the buccaneers captured the canoes and with wild shouts and yells bore down upon the little gunboat. The Spaniards aboard, terrified at sight of the buccaneers, surrendered after a short fight, but, to the buccaneers’ chagrin, they found scarcely any provisions on their prize. This did not trouble them long, however, and promptly killing the Spaniards’ horses they dressed them, salted the meat and, thus equipped, sailed forth to capture more vessels. In this they[29]were highly successful, and in a few weeks Brasiliano sailed into Port Royal with nearly one hundred thousand pieces of eight and much merchandise. But the buccaneers invariably wasted all their hard-won money recklessly. It was not uncommon for one of them to spend several thousand pieces of eight in a single night of drinking, gambling and carousing and so, within a few days, Brasiliano and his men were forced to go to sea again. Having had good fortune at Yucatan, he set sail for Campeche, but fifteen days after his arrival on the coast he was captured with several of his men while spying on the city and harbor in a canoe. They were at once cast into a dungeon to await execution, but Brasiliano was by no means at the end of his resources. By some method he managed to secure writing materials and composed a most wonderful letter purporting to be written by another buccaneer chief and in which the supposed author threatened dire reprisals on any Spaniard captured by the buccaneers if Brasiliano and his men were harmed. This epistle was delivered to the Governor—though how on earth Brasiliano managed it no one knows—and His Excellency, having had plenty of experience with buccaneers, was so frightened at its contents[30]that he at once liberated his prisoners, only exacting an oath that they would abandon buccaneering. Then, to insure their keeping their promise, he sent them as sailors on a galleon bound for Spain. With their wages from the trip they at once returned to Jamaica and, regardless of pledges, were soon harassing and murdering the Dons right and left.“But neither Portugues or Brasiliano could compare in cruelty, daring, bloodthirstiness or rascality with Francis L’Ollonois. In his youth L’Ollonois was transported to the West Indies as a bond servant, or virtually a slave, and, winning his freedom, made his way to Tortuga and joined the buccaneers.“So unspeakably cruel and bestially inhuman was this Frenchman that even his fellow buccaneers sickened of his ways and Esquemeling speaks of him as ‘that infernal wretch’ or ‘that despicable and execrable pirate.’ For a time after joining the Brethren of the Main, L’Ollonois served as a common seaman, but his courage and reckless daring soon brought him to the attention of Monsieur de la Place, the governor of Tortuga, who was heartily in sympathy with the buccaneers. The governor therefore provided L’Ollonois with[31]a ship and outfitted him, the agreement of course being that La Place should have a share of the booty taken. Within a very short time L’Ollonois had taken several vessels and immense riches, while his awful cruelties made him a dreaded and famed character throughout the Caribbean. Indeed, so merciless was he that the Dons, rather than surrender to the monster, would leap into the sea or blow out their own brains, knowing that quick death by any means was preferable to the tortures they would endure at L’Ollonois’ hands. His first disaster occurred when his ship was wrecked on the coast of Yucatan. The men all escaped, but were immediately attacked by the Spaniards, who killed the greater portion of the buccaneers and wounded L’Ollonois. Seeing no means of escape the captain smeared himself with blood and sand and crawling among the dead bodies lay motionless. The Dons were completely fooled and, not recognizing L’Ollonois and thinking him merely a dead sailor, left the field after a brief search for the buccaneer chief, whereupon he made for the woods and lived upon roots until his wounds healed. Then, having stolen garments from a Spaniard whom he killed, the rascal walked calmly into Campeche. Here he conversed with[32]several slaves and, promising them liberty in return for their services, he succeeded in getting a large canoe and with the slaves to help he reached Tortuga in safety. In the meantime the Spaniards were rejoicing at thought of the dread L’Ollonois being killed, for his men, who had been made prisoners, told the Dons that he had fallen in the battle.“His next raid was on the town of Cayos in Cuba, and word of his approach was sent post-haste to the governor at Havana. We can readily imagine the amazement and terror of His Excellency when this dreaded buccaneer, who was supposed to be safely dead at Campeche, bobbed up alive and well at Cuba. At first the governor could not believe it, but nevertheless he dispatched a ship with ten guns and with a crew of eighty to attack the buccaneers and commanded the captain not to dare to return unless he had totally destroyed the pirates. In addition, he sent aboard a negro as a hangman with instructions that every buccaneer taken alive should be hanged, with the exception of L’Ollonois, who was to be brought alive to Havana. No doubt the governor wished to make sure of the buccaneer chieftain’s death this time, but fate decreed otherwise. Instead[33]of trying to escape, the buccaneers, when they learned of the warship coming to attack them, set forth in two canoes and unexpectedly bore down on the Spanish ship as she lay at anchor in the Estera River. It was two o’clock in the morning when they drew near the doomed vessel, and the watch, seeing the canoes and not dreaming that they contained buccaneers, hailed them and asked if they had seen any pirates. To this the buccaneers replied that they had seen no pirates or anything like them. The watch thus satisfied was turning away when the canoes dashed close and the buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails. Taken completely by surprise, still the Dons put up a gallant fight and for some time the battle raged desperately. But, as usual, the buccaneers, though but twenty-one all told, triumphed and drove the surviving Spaniards into the hold. Then, stationing his men by the hatchway with drawn swords, L’Ollonois ordered the prisoners to come up one at a time, and as fast as they appeared his men struck off their heads. The last to appear was the negro hangman who begged piteously for mercy, but L’Ollonois, after torturing him to confession of various matters, murdered him like the rest. Only one man was spared[34]and to him L’Ollonois gave a note addressed to the governor in which he informed His Excellency of the fate of his men and assured him that he would never give quarter to any Spaniard and only hoped to be able to torture and kill His Excellency as well.He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floatsHe managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floatsThe buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s railsThe buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails“With the ship captured from the Spaniards, L’Ollonois cruised along the Spanish Main, took several ships and returned to Tortuga with the idea of fitting out a large company of ships and boldly attacking the Spanish towns and cities, as well as their vessels. The fleet he gathered together consisted of eight ships, the largest carrying ten guns, and with six hundred and sixty buccaneers. But long before they reached the South American coast they were flushed with success. Near Porto Rico they captured a ship of sixteen guns laden with cacao and with treasure consisting of forty thousand pieces of eight and over ten thousand dollars’ worth of jewels, and near the island of Saona they took the payship of the Dons and obtained nearly four tons of gunpowder, many muskets and twelve thousand pieces of eight. It would be tiresome to describe in detail their arrival at Maracaibo, their taking of the forts and their capture of the town. The Spaniards[35]resisted valiantly, but were beaten back and then commenced a series of orgies, of cruelties and of inhumanities which are almost without an equal. The people, as soon as they realized the town would fall to L’Ollonois and his freebooters, took to the outlying country, and these refugees the buccaneers hunted down and dragged before their chief. In order to make them confess where they had hidden their valuables—although L’Ollonois had already obtained vast plunder—they were put on the rack, broken on the wheel, cut to pieces, flayed alive and subjected to every cruelty and torture the corsairs could devise. For fifteen days the buccaneers occupied the town and butchered and tortured the inhabitants until, convinced that no more loot could be secured, they left Maracaibo, sailed up the Lake and took the town of Gibraltar. Here they were ambushed and many killed, but in comparison to the losses of the Dons the buccaneers suffered little, losing but forty men killed and about fifty wounded, while over five hundred Spaniards were killed and several hundred taken prisoners. Many of the captives died from starvation or illness under the buccaneers’ treatment, many more were butchered for pure sport and hundreds were put to the torture.[36]Then, not satisfied, L’Ollonois threatened to burn the town unless he was paid ten thousand pieces of eight and when this was not instantly forthcoming he actually set fire to the place. However, the money being eventually paid, the buccaneers had the decency to aid the inhabitants in putting out the conflagration, for, oddly enough, they usually kept to their promises, and after eighteen days set sail for Maracaibo again. Here they demanded a payment of thirty thousand pieces of eight under penalty of having the town destroyed, and the poor harassed and cowed Dons managed to raise the sum and with heartfelt thanks saw the fleet sail away. When Tortuga was reached and a division of spoils made it was found that over two hundred thousand pieces of eight had been taken in addition to immense stores of silks, gold and silver plate and jewels.“Hardly had he landed when L’Ollonois prepared for another raid and with seven hundred men set sail with six ships for Honduras. Here the beastly buccaneer chief tortured and killed and robbed to his heart’s content, but finding comparatively little loot and thinking the inhabitants had secreted their wealth, he became mad with fury and outdid all his former inhuman acts. On[37]one occasion, when a prisoner insisted that he did not know the route to a certain town, L’Ollonois slashed open the fellow’s breast with his sword, tore out his still throbbing heart and bit and gnawed at it with his teeth, as Esquemeling says, ‘like a ravenous wolf,’ and threatened to serve the other prisoners in the same manner unless they showed him the way to San Pedro. This they did, but the Spaniards had placed ambuscades and the buccaneers were compelled to fight savagely every inch of the way. Finally the Dons agreed to deliver the town if the buccaneers would grant quarter for two hours, but no sooner was the time up than L’Ollonois hurried his men after the people, robbed them of what they had and slaughtered them without mercy. But L’Ollonois was too bestial and cruel even for his own men. A short time after the sack of San Pedro, dissensions arose and the party divided, the majority of the buccaneers leaving with Moses Vanclein to raid the coast towns of Costa Rica and Panama. From that time on L’Ollonois had nothing but ill luck and soon afterwards his ship was wrecked off Cape Gracias à Dios. With the remains of the wreck, the buccaneers set to work to construct a small boat, and to sustain themselves, planted[38]gardens. For six months they were marooned until the boat was completed, and L’Ollonois, with part of his crew, set out for the San Juan River in Nicaragua. But fate had turned against him which as Esquemeling naïvely remarks, ‘had long time been reserved for him as a punishment due to the multitude of horrible crimes which in his wicked life he had committed.’ Attacked by the Spaniards and their Indian allies, he was forced to retreat with heavy loss and, still hoping to retrieve his fortunes, headed southward for the coasts of Darien. And here the villain met with the end he so richly deserved. He was taken by the savage Indians of the district, was torn to pieces while alive and his limbs cast into a fire. Finally, that no trace or memory of him might remain, the savages scattered his ashes in the air.”[39]
[Contents]CHAPTER IISOME BUCCANEERS AND THEIR WAYS“Now, having learned why the buccaneers were so called and how they came into existence, we’ll take up a more interesting matter, and I’ll try to tell you something of the men themselves, of the most famous buccaneers and of their deeds,” continued Mr. Bickford.“Certain famous buccaneers’ names are almost household words—such as Morgan, Montbars, L’Ollonois and your friend Captain Kidd, who, as I said, was no buccaneer—but others, who did even braver and more terrible things and were the most noted of buccaneers in their day, are almost unknown to the world to-day. Among these was Pierre Le Grand, Brasiliano, Bartholomew Portugues, Sawkins, Sharp, Davis, Red Legs, Cook, Dampier, Mansvelt, Prince Rupert and many others.”“But you’ve forgotten Drake and Hawkins and Blackbeard,” put in Jack.[15]“None of those men were buccaneers,” his father declared. “Drake and Hawkins were privateers—Drake being Admiral of Queen Elizabeth’s navy—and won their fame in the destruction of the Spanish Armada. Later they attacked and took towns on the Spanish Main and destroyed Spanish ships, but they were neither pirates nor buccaneers. In fact, they were both dead before buccaneers became of any importance as sea rovers. On the other hand, Blackbeard was an ordinary pirate—a sea robber who made no attempt to discriminate between friend and foe and scuttled and robbed ships of his own countrymen as readily as those of other nationalities. But as he was an interesting character and was among the last of the important or dangerous pirates of the Caribbean I will tell you something of his life and career later.“The first buccaneer to rise to any fame was Pierre Le Grand, or as he was oftener called, Peter the Great, a native of Dieppe in Normandy. Le Grand’s first and only achievement, and the one which brought him fame, was the taking of the Vice Admiral of the Spanish fleet near Cape Tiburon in Haiti. With a small boat manned by twenty-eight of the rough buccaneers Le Grand[16]set forth in search of prizes and cruised among the Bahamas, but for many days saw no ship. Provisions were running low, his men were grumbling and he had about decided to give up in despair when they sighted a huge Spanish ship which had become separated from the rest of the convoy. Setting sail they headed for the vessel and at twilight were very close. In order to force his men to their utmost, Le Grand ordered one of his crew to bore holes in the bottom of the boat and then, running their tiny craft alongside the Don, and armed only with swords and pistols, the buccaneers swarmed over the sides of the doomed ship. Taken absolutely by surprise, for the Spaniards had not dreamed that the handful of ragged men in a tiny sail boat intended to attack them, the crew of the ship, nevertheless, resisted stoutly. But they were ruthlessly cut down and while some of the buccaneers drove the Spaniards across the deck, others with Le Grand at their head, dashed into the cabin where the unsuspecting Vice Admiral was enjoying a quiet game of cards with his officers.“As Le Grand leaped across the room and placed his pistol at the Admiral’s breast thedumbfounded[17]Spaniard exclaimed, ‘Lord bless us! Are these devils or what?’Money of the buccaneers’ timesMoney of the buccaneers’ times1.Pieces of eight2.Doubloon3–4.Cross money5.CastillanoCruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they sawCruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw“But he soon realized that whatever they were his ship was in their hands and that he and his men were prisoners. Le Grand, however, was neither a brutal nor a bloodthirsty wretch, as were many of his successors, and, having impressed as many of the Spanish seamen into his service as he required, he set the others, including the Admiral and the officers, ashore, and set sail with his prize for France. So great was the booty he secured by this one coup that he gave up buccaneering and settled down in France for life.“But his deed fired the buccaneers on Tortuga with dreams of easily acquired prizes and riches, and soon a host of the rough hunters and woodsmen were cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw. Indeed, many, unable to secure sailboats, actually went a-pirating in tiny dugout canoes, and so daring and reckless were they that, despite their handicaps, they took two huge galleons laden with plate within the first month, as well as many smaller vessels. Now that they had seaworthy ships and plenty of wealth at their disposal they became[18]bolder and bolder, and were soon not only cruising the Caribbean Sea, and taking ships, but were attacking the fortified and wealthy towns along the Central and South American coast with success. And let me mention here that it was very seldom that the buccaneers made use of the larger ships in their piratical raids. The smaller vessels were faster, they were more easily handled, and when necessity arose they could slip through narrow, shoal channels through which the Spanish men-of-war could not follow. The buccaneers’ vessels seldom carried over six guns, many had but two or three, but they swarmed with men armed to the teeth, and the buccaneers depended far more upon a dashing attack and hand-to-hand fights than upon cannon fire.”“Excuse me, Dad,” interrupted Jack, “but are there books that tell all these things?”“Yes, Jack,” replied Mr. Bickford. “And the best and most complete is a book called ‘The Buccaneers of America.’ It was written by a buccaneer, a man named Esquemeling, who took part in nearly all the most famous of the buccaneers’ raids and served with Morgan, L’Ollonois and many other buccaneer chiefs. His own history is almost as interesting as that of any of the men of whom[19]he wrote. He was a Hollander by birth, but went to Tortuga as a clerk for the West India Company of France. The company, however, found that although the buccaneers were quite willing to purchase goods it was quite another matter when it came to paying for them, and as a result, the West India Company abandoned their agency in Tortuga and gave orders that all their goods and chattels on the island should be sold for what they would bring. This included servants of the company as well, and Esquemeling found himself sold for a slave for thirty pieces of eight. His master was a cruel, tyrannical man and abused his Dutch slave shamefully, although offering to let him buy his freedom for three hundred pieces of eight. Esquemeling, however, as he says himself, ‘was not master of one in the whole world.’ Finally Esquemeling became weak and ill from abuse and inadequate food, and his cruel master, fearing the man would die and he would be out of pocket and without a slave as well, disposed of the sick Hollander for seventy pieces of eight. His new master was a surgeon and a kindly man and, having doctored Esquemeling and restored him to health and strength, at the end of a year he gave him his liberty, exacting only the promise[20]that Esquemeling should pay him one hundred pieces of eight when in a position to do so. Being, as he himself says, ‘at liberty but like unto Adam when he was first created, that is, naked and destitute of all human necessities,’ and with no means of earning a livelihood, Esquemeling threw in his lot with the buccaneers and he remained with them for a number of years. Being by profession a clerk, Esquemeling kept the logs and accounts of the buccaneers and also a journal of his own in which he recorded all the details and events of his adventurous life. His work is, in fact, the only authentic account of these men, and his quaint phraseology and droll remarks are very amusing. I have the book here, boys, and you’ll find it more interesting and absorbing than any story or fiction of the buccaneers that ever was written.“The first buccaneer of note with whom Esquemeling sailed was Bartholomew Portugues, so called as he was a native of Portugal. Portugues left Jamaica in a small ship of four small carronades with a crew of thirty men, and went cruising off Cuba. A few days later he met a heavily armed galleon bound to Havana from Cartagena and at once attacked her. Although[21]the Spaniard carried a crew of over seventy, in addition to passengers, and was armed with twenty heavy cannon, yet Portugues assaulted the Dons without hesitation and after a desperate battle in which nearly fifty Spaniards were killed and wounded, the buccaneers took the galleon with a loss of only ten men killed and four wounded. Owing to contrary winds Portugues could not return directly to either Tortuga or Jamaica and so set sail for Cape San Antonio at the western extremity of Cuba. There he made necessary repairs to his prize and secured a supply of fresh water. As they were setting sail the buccaneers were surprised by three great Spanish ships and, greatly outnumbered, were taken prisoners and stripped of the booty they had so recently secured, a treasure of over ten thousand pieces of eight, in addition to valuable merchandise. We can imagine the chagrin of the buccaneers at this turn of fate and no doubt they gave themselves up for lost. But luck was with them. Two days after they had been made prisoners a great storm arose, the vessels became separated and the one containing the buccaneers was driven to Campeche in Yucatan. When the residents learned that Portugues and his fellows[22]were captives on board there was great rejoicing, and the authorities sent off to the ship demanding that the buccaneers be delivered to them. After a consultation, however, it was decided safer to leave the prisoners aboard and in preparation for a general hanging a number of gibbets were erected on shore. These were in plain view of the buccaneers, and Portugues resolved to make a desperate effort to escape and to cheat the expectant Dons of the grewsome spectacle. He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and, having plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floats, he waited patiently for darkness. But the sentry, who hitherto had been a careless, sleepy fellow, was unusually alert, and seeing this, Portugues seized a knife which he had surreptitiously obtained and, to quote Esquemeling, ‘gave him such a mortal stab as suddenly deprived him of life and the possibility of making any noise.’ Then the buccaneer captain leaped into the sea and aided by his extemporized water-wings managed to gain the shore. But his troubles had only begun. At once the hue and cry of his escape was raised, and for three days Portugues concealed himself in a hollow tree without food while the Dons searched all about. At last, abandoning[23]their hunt, the Spaniards returned to the town, and Portugues set out afoot for the Gulf of Triste, where he hoped to find other buccaneers to aid him in rescuing his comrades.“It is almost impossible to imagine what this meant or the seemingly insurmountable hardships the buccaneer captain deliberately faced, and it is also a most striking example of the faithfulness of the buccaneers to one another, which was one of the chief causes why they were so successful. Remember, Portugues was unarmed, for he had left the knife in the sentry’s back, he was without food, he had been half starved by his captors, and yet he calmly set out on a one hundred and fifty mile tramp through the jungle and along the jagged rocks of the seacoast; through a country infested by mosquitoes and stinging insects, by savage hostile Indians, and through swamps reeking with malaria. Every settlement and town had to be avoided, as they were all filled with his enemies, the Spaniards, and throughout that long and terrible journey the buccaneer subsisted entirely upon the few shellfish he found along the shore and upon the roots of forest herbs.“Moreover, several large and many small rivers crossed his route and not being able to swim his[24]case seemed hopeless. But while searching about the banks of the first large stream, looking for a possible ford, he found an old plank with a few large spikes in it. After tremendous efforts he managed to withdraw these nails and with infinite patience whetted them against stones until he secured a sharp knifelike edge. Just think of that, boys, when you read of modern hardships endured by men left to their own resources in a forest. Imagine rubbing a ship’s spike back and forth upon a stone until it has been transformed into a knife!“But the preparation of the nails, incredible as it sounds, was not the worst of his labors. With these crude implements the buccaneer actually hacked off branches of trees, cut vines and pliant reeds and with these constructed a raft with which he crossed the stream. At every large river he repeated the work and eventually arrived safely at the Gulf of Triste fourteen days after escaping from the ship. Here, as he had expected, he found a buccaneer vessel with a captain whom he knew and, telling of his comrades’ plight, he begged the captain to lend him a boat and twenty men to go to his men’s rescue. This the captain gladly did, and eight days later, Portugues was back at Campeche.[25]So small was the boat that the Spaniards never dreamed that its occupants were enemies or buccaneers, but thought it a craft from shore bringing off cargo, and they watched it approach without the least fear or preparations for defense.“Thus the buccaneers completely surprised the Dons and after a short, sharp struggle were in possession of the ship and had released the imprisoned buccaneers—or rather most of them, for the Dons had hanged a few.“Realizing that other Spanish vessels might appear and attack him with overwhelming force at any time, Portugues at once set sail in the ship wherein he had so long been a helpless captive, and once more in possession of his booty with vast riches in addition. Steering a course for Jamaica he was off the Isle of Pines when the fickle fate which always followed him once more turned her back and the ship went upon the reefs of the Jardines. The ship was a total loss and sunk with all her treasure, while Portugues and his comrades barely escaped with their lives in a canoe. Although they managed to reach Jamaica without misfortune, luck had deserted Portugues for all time and while he tried time after time to recoup his fortunes all his efforts were in vain.[26]He became an ordinary seaman and was soon forgotten.“Another buccaneer whose exploits were as remarkable as Portugues’ and whose most notable exploits also took place in Yucatan, was a Dutchman who was nicknamed Rock Brasiliano, owing to his long residence in Brazil. As an ordinary mariner he joined the buccaneers in Jamaica and soon so distinguished himself by his bravery and resourcefulness that when, after a dispute with his captain, he deserted the ship, he was chosen chief by a number of his fellows and, securing a small vessel, he set forth to capture a prize. Within a few days he seized a large Spanish ship with a vast treasure aboard which he carried into Jamaica in triumph. This exploit at once brought him fame and men flocked to his service. But, unlike Portugues, who seems to have been a very decent and respectable sort of rascal, Brasiliano was a drunken, brutal scallawag. As Esquemeling says, ‘Neither in his domestic or private affairs had he good behavior or government over himself.’ When drunk, as he always was when ashore, his favorite amusement was to race up and down the streets, beating, stabbing or shooting all whom he met, very much as our Western[27]‘bad men’ used to ‘shoot up’ a town in the old days.“Moreover, Brasiliano was unspeakably bloodthirsty and cruel. Whenever he captured Spaniards he put them to the most horrible tortures, and in order to force them to reveal the hiding places of their treasures he would flay them alive, tear them limb from limb or roast them on spits over slow fires. As a result, he became a feared and dreaded man, and the mere mention of his name caused the Dons to shudder and to huddle within their stockades. Nevertheless Brasiliano was a brave, a resourceful and a most remarkable man and performed some most noteworthy exploits. On one occasion he was cruising off the coast of Yucatan when a violent storm drove his ship upon the rocks, and he and his men escaped with only their muskets and a slender stock of ammunition. They landed on a desolate, uninhabited stretch of coast midway between Campeche and the Gulf of Triste and, quite undeterred by their plight, commenced an overland march towards the Gulf exactly as Portugues had done. But they had not proceeded far when they were surprised by a cavalcade of over one hundred Spanish horsemen. Despite the fact that[28]the buccaneers numbered less than thirty, yet they had no thought of either retreat or surrender, but at once prepared to meet the oncoming cavalry. Expert marksmen as they were, a Don fell for every bullet fired and for an hour the handful of buccaneers kept the Spaniards at bay until, finding the cost too heavy, the cavalry retreated towards the town. Killing the wounded and stripping the dead of their arms and equipment, the buccaneers continued on the journey mounted on the horses of the dead Dons, the total loss of Brasiliano’s forces being but two killed and two wounded. Quite encouraged by their success, the buccaneers approached a little port and saw a boat lying at anchor in the harbor and protecting a fleet of canoes that were loading logwood. With little trouble the buccaneers captured the canoes and with wild shouts and yells bore down upon the little gunboat. The Spaniards aboard, terrified at sight of the buccaneers, surrendered after a short fight, but, to the buccaneers’ chagrin, they found scarcely any provisions on their prize. This did not trouble them long, however, and promptly killing the Spaniards’ horses they dressed them, salted the meat and, thus equipped, sailed forth to capture more vessels. In this they[29]were highly successful, and in a few weeks Brasiliano sailed into Port Royal with nearly one hundred thousand pieces of eight and much merchandise. But the buccaneers invariably wasted all their hard-won money recklessly. It was not uncommon for one of them to spend several thousand pieces of eight in a single night of drinking, gambling and carousing and so, within a few days, Brasiliano and his men were forced to go to sea again. Having had good fortune at Yucatan, he set sail for Campeche, but fifteen days after his arrival on the coast he was captured with several of his men while spying on the city and harbor in a canoe. They were at once cast into a dungeon to await execution, but Brasiliano was by no means at the end of his resources. By some method he managed to secure writing materials and composed a most wonderful letter purporting to be written by another buccaneer chief and in which the supposed author threatened dire reprisals on any Spaniard captured by the buccaneers if Brasiliano and his men were harmed. This epistle was delivered to the Governor—though how on earth Brasiliano managed it no one knows—and His Excellency, having had plenty of experience with buccaneers, was so frightened at its contents[30]that he at once liberated his prisoners, only exacting an oath that they would abandon buccaneering. Then, to insure their keeping their promise, he sent them as sailors on a galleon bound for Spain. With their wages from the trip they at once returned to Jamaica and, regardless of pledges, were soon harassing and murdering the Dons right and left.“But neither Portugues or Brasiliano could compare in cruelty, daring, bloodthirstiness or rascality with Francis L’Ollonois. In his youth L’Ollonois was transported to the West Indies as a bond servant, or virtually a slave, and, winning his freedom, made his way to Tortuga and joined the buccaneers.“So unspeakably cruel and bestially inhuman was this Frenchman that even his fellow buccaneers sickened of his ways and Esquemeling speaks of him as ‘that infernal wretch’ or ‘that despicable and execrable pirate.’ For a time after joining the Brethren of the Main, L’Ollonois served as a common seaman, but his courage and reckless daring soon brought him to the attention of Monsieur de la Place, the governor of Tortuga, who was heartily in sympathy with the buccaneers. The governor therefore provided L’Ollonois with[31]a ship and outfitted him, the agreement of course being that La Place should have a share of the booty taken. Within a very short time L’Ollonois had taken several vessels and immense riches, while his awful cruelties made him a dreaded and famed character throughout the Caribbean. Indeed, so merciless was he that the Dons, rather than surrender to the monster, would leap into the sea or blow out their own brains, knowing that quick death by any means was preferable to the tortures they would endure at L’Ollonois’ hands. His first disaster occurred when his ship was wrecked on the coast of Yucatan. The men all escaped, but were immediately attacked by the Spaniards, who killed the greater portion of the buccaneers and wounded L’Ollonois. Seeing no means of escape the captain smeared himself with blood and sand and crawling among the dead bodies lay motionless. The Dons were completely fooled and, not recognizing L’Ollonois and thinking him merely a dead sailor, left the field after a brief search for the buccaneer chief, whereupon he made for the woods and lived upon roots until his wounds healed. Then, having stolen garments from a Spaniard whom he killed, the rascal walked calmly into Campeche. Here he conversed with[32]several slaves and, promising them liberty in return for their services, he succeeded in getting a large canoe and with the slaves to help he reached Tortuga in safety. In the meantime the Spaniards were rejoicing at thought of the dread L’Ollonois being killed, for his men, who had been made prisoners, told the Dons that he had fallen in the battle.“His next raid was on the town of Cayos in Cuba, and word of his approach was sent post-haste to the governor at Havana. We can readily imagine the amazement and terror of His Excellency when this dreaded buccaneer, who was supposed to be safely dead at Campeche, bobbed up alive and well at Cuba. At first the governor could not believe it, but nevertheless he dispatched a ship with ten guns and with a crew of eighty to attack the buccaneers and commanded the captain not to dare to return unless he had totally destroyed the pirates. In addition, he sent aboard a negro as a hangman with instructions that every buccaneer taken alive should be hanged, with the exception of L’Ollonois, who was to be brought alive to Havana. No doubt the governor wished to make sure of the buccaneer chieftain’s death this time, but fate decreed otherwise. Instead[33]of trying to escape, the buccaneers, when they learned of the warship coming to attack them, set forth in two canoes and unexpectedly bore down on the Spanish ship as she lay at anchor in the Estera River. It was two o’clock in the morning when they drew near the doomed vessel, and the watch, seeing the canoes and not dreaming that they contained buccaneers, hailed them and asked if they had seen any pirates. To this the buccaneers replied that they had seen no pirates or anything like them. The watch thus satisfied was turning away when the canoes dashed close and the buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails. Taken completely by surprise, still the Dons put up a gallant fight and for some time the battle raged desperately. But, as usual, the buccaneers, though but twenty-one all told, triumphed and drove the surviving Spaniards into the hold. Then, stationing his men by the hatchway with drawn swords, L’Ollonois ordered the prisoners to come up one at a time, and as fast as they appeared his men struck off their heads. The last to appear was the negro hangman who begged piteously for mercy, but L’Ollonois, after torturing him to confession of various matters, murdered him like the rest. Only one man was spared[34]and to him L’Ollonois gave a note addressed to the governor in which he informed His Excellency of the fate of his men and assured him that he would never give quarter to any Spaniard and only hoped to be able to torture and kill His Excellency as well.He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floatsHe managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floatsThe buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s railsThe buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails“With the ship captured from the Spaniards, L’Ollonois cruised along the Spanish Main, took several ships and returned to Tortuga with the idea of fitting out a large company of ships and boldly attacking the Spanish towns and cities, as well as their vessels. The fleet he gathered together consisted of eight ships, the largest carrying ten guns, and with six hundred and sixty buccaneers. But long before they reached the South American coast they were flushed with success. Near Porto Rico they captured a ship of sixteen guns laden with cacao and with treasure consisting of forty thousand pieces of eight and over ten thousand dollars’ worth of jewels, and near the island of Saona they took the payship of the Dons and obtained nearly four tons of gunpowder, many muskets and twelve thousand pieces of eight. It would be tiresome to describe in detail their arrival at Maracaibo, their taking of the forts and their capture of the town. The Spaniards[35]resisted valiantly, but were beaten back and then commenced a series of orgies, of cruelties and of inhumanities which are almost without an equal. The people, as soon as they realized the town would fall to L’Ollonois and his freebooters, took to the outlying country, and these refugees the buccaneers hunted down and dragged before their chief. In order to make them confess where they had hidden their valuables—although L’Ollonois had already obtained vast plunder—they were put on the rack, broken on the wheel, cut to pieces, flayed alive and subjected to every cruelty and torture the corsairs could devise. For fifteen days the buccaneers occupied the town and butchered and tortured the inhabitants until, convinced that no more loot could be secured, they left Maracaibo, sailed up the Lake and took the town of Gibraltar. Here they were ambushed and many killed, but in comparison to the losses of the Dons the buccaneers suffered little, losing but forty men killed and about fifty wounded, while over five hundred Spaniards were killed and several hundred taken prisoners. Many of the captives died from starvation or illness under the buccaneers’ treatment, many more were butchered for pure sport and hundreds were put to the torture.[36]Then, not satisfied, L’Ollonois threatened to burn the town unless he was paid ten thousand pieces of eight and when this was not instantly forthcoming he actually set fire to the place. However, the money being eventually paid, the buccaneers had the decency to aid the inhabitants in putting out the conflagration, for, oddly enough, they usually kept to their promises, and after eighteen days set sail for Maracaibo again. Here they demanded a payment of thirty thousand pieces of eight under penalty of having the town destroyed, and the poor harassed and cowed Dons managed to raise the sum and with heartfelt thanks saw the fleet sail away. When Tortuga was reached and a division of spoils made it was found that over two hundred thousand pieces of eight had been taken in addition to immense stores of silks, gold and silver plate and jewels.“Hardly had he landed when L’Ollonois prepared for another raid and with seven hundred men set sail with six ships for Honduras. Here the beastly buccaneer chief tortured and killed and robbed to his heart’s content, but finding comparatively little loot and thinking the inhabitants had secreted their wealth, he became mad with fury and outdid all his former inhuman acts. On[37]one occasion, when a prisoner insisted that he did not know the route to a certain town, L’Ollonois slashed open the fellow’s breast with his sword, tore out his still throbbing heart and bit and gnawed at it with his teeth, as Esquemeling says, ‘like a ravenous wolf,’ and threatened to serve the other prisoners in the same manner unless they showed him the way to San Pedro. This they did, but the Spaniards had placed ambuscades and the buccaneers were compelled to fight savagely every inch of the way. Finally the Dons agreed to deliver the town if the buccaneers would grant quarter for two hours, but no sooner was the time up than L’Ollonois hurried his men after the people, robbed them of what they had and slaughtered them without mercy. But L’Ollonois was too bestial and cruel even for his own men. A short time after the sack of San Pedro, dissensions arose and the party divided, the majority of the buccaneers leaving with Moses Vanclein to raid the coast towns of Costa Rica and Panama. From that time on L’Ollonois had nothing but ill luck and soon afterwards his ship was wrecked off Cape Gracias à Dios. With the remains of the wreck, the buccaneers set to work to construct a small boat, and to sustain themselves, planted[38]gardens. For six months they were marooned until the boat was completed, and L’Ollonois, with part of his crew, set out for the San Juan River in Nicaragua. But fate had turned against him which as Esquemeling naïvely remarks, ‘had long time been reserved for him as a punishment due to the multitude of horrible crimes which in his wicked life he had committed.’ Attacked by the Spaniards and their Indian allies, he was forced to retreat with heavy loss and, still hoping to retrieve his fortunes, headed southward for the coasts of Darien. And here the villain met with the end he so richly deserved. He was taken by the savage Indians of the district, was torn to pieces while alive and his limbs cast into a fire. Finally, that no trace or memory of him might remain, the savages scattered his ashes in the air.”[39]
CHAPTER IISOME BUCCANEERS AND THEIR WAYS
“Now, having learned why the buccaneers were so called and how they came into existence, we’ll take up a more interesting matter, and I’ll try to tell you something of the men themselves, of the most famous buccaneers and of their deeds,” continued Mr. Bickford.“Certain famous buccaneers’ names are almost household words—such as Morgan, Montbars, L’Ollonois and your friend Captain Kidd, who, as I said, was no buccaneer—but others, who did even braver and more terrible things and were the most noted of buccaneers in their day, are almost unknown to the world to-day. Among these was Pierre Le Grand, Brasiliano, Bartholomew Portugues, Sawkins, Sharp, Davis, Red Legs, Cook, Dampier, Mansvelt, Prince Rupert and many others.”“But you’ve forgotten Drake and Hawkins and Blackbeard,” put in Jack.[15]“None of those men were buccaneers,” his father declared. “Drake and Hawkins were privateers—Drake being Admiral of Queen Elizabeth’s navy—and won their fame in the destruction of the Spanish Armada. Later they attacked and took towns on the Spanish Main and destroyed Spanish ships, but they were neither pirates nor buccaneers. In fact, they were both dead before buccaneers became of any importance as sea rovers. On the other hand, Blackbeard was an ordinary pirate—a sea robber who made no attempt to discriminate between friend and foe and scuttled and robbed ships of his own countrymen as readily as those of other nationalities. But as he was an interesting character and was among the last of the important or dangerous pirates of the Caribbean I will tell you something of his life and career later.“The first buccaneer to rise to any fame was Pierre Le Grand, or as he was oftener called, Peter the Great, a native of Dieppe in Normandy. Le Grand’s first and only achievement, and the one which brought him fame, was the taking of the Vice Admiral of the Spanish fleet near Cape Tiburon in Haiti. With a small boat manned by twenty-eight of the rough buccaneers Le Grand[16]set forth in search of prizes and cruised among the Bahamas, but for many days saw no ship. Provisions were running low, his men were grumbling and he had about decided to give up in despair when they sighted a huge Spanish ship which had become separated from the rest of the convoy. Setting sail they headed for the vessel and at twilight were very close. In order to force his men to their utmost, Le Grand ordered one of his crew to bore holes in the bottom of the boat and then, running their tiny craft alongside the Don, and armed only with swords and pistols, the buccaneers swarmed over the sides of the doomed ship. Taken absolutely by surprise, for the Spaniards had not dreamed that the handful of ragged men in a tiny sail boat intended to attack them, the crew of the ship, nevertheless, resisted stoutly. But they were ruthlessly cut down and while some of the buccaneers drove the Spaniards across the deck, others with Le Grand at their head, dashed into the cabin where the unsuspecting Vice Admiral was enjoying a quiet game of cards with his officers.“As Le Grand leaped across the room and placed his pistol at the Admiral’s breast thedumbfounded[17]Spaniard exclaimed, ‘Lord bless us! Are these devils or what?’Money of the buccaneers’ timesMoney of the buccaneers’ times1.Pieces of eight2.Doubloon3–4.Cross money5.CastillanoCruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they sawCruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw“But he soon realized that whatever they were his ship was in their hands and that he and his men were prisoners. Le Grand, however, was neither a brutal nor a bloodthirsty wretch, as were many of his successors, and, having impressed as many of the Spanish seamen into his service as he required, he set the others, including the Admiral and the officers, ashore, and set sail with his prize for France. So great was the booty he secured by this one coup that he gave up buccaneering and settled down in France for life.“But his deed fired the buccaneers on Tortuga with dreams of easily acquired prizes and riches, and soon a host of the rough hunters and woodsmen were cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw. Indeed, many, unable to secure sailboats, actually went a-pirating in tiny dugout canoes, and so daring and reckless were they that, despite their handicaps, they took two huge galleons laden with plate within the first month, as well as many smaller vessels. Now that they had seaworthy ships and plenty of wealth at their disposal they became[18]bolder and bolder, and were soon not only cruising the Caribbean Sea, and taking ships, but were attacking the fortified and wealthy towns along the Central and South American coast with success. And let me mention here that it was very seldom that the buccaneers made use of the larger ships in their piratical raids. The smaller vessels were faster, they were more easily handled, and when necessity arose they could slip through narrow, shoal channels through which the Spanish men-of-war could not follow. The buccaneers’ vessels seldom carried over six guns, many had but two or three, but they swarmed with men armed to the teeth, and the buccaneers depended far more upon a dashing attack and hand-to-hand fights than upon cannon fire.”“Excuse me, Dad,” interrupted Jack, “but are there books that tell all these things?”“Yes, Jack,” replied Mr. Bickford. “And the best and most complete is a book called ‘The Buccaneers of America.’ It was written by a buccaneer, a man named Esquemeling, who took part in nearly all the most famous of the buccaneers’ raids and served with Morgan, L’Ollonois and many other buccaneer chiefs. His own history is almost as interesting as that of any of the men of whom[19]he wrote. He was a Hollander by birth, but went to Tortuga as a clerk for the West India Company of France. The company, however, found that although the buccaneers were quite willing to purchase goods it was quite another matter when it came to paying for them, and as a result, the West India Company abandoned their agency in Tortuga and gave orders that all their goods and chattels on the island should be sold for what they would bring. This included servants of the company as well, and Esquemeling found himself sold for a slave for thirty pieces of eight. His master was a cruel, tyrannical man and abused his Dutch slave shamefully, although offering to let him buy his freedom for three hundred pieces of eight. Esquemeling, however, as he says himself, ‘was not master of one in the whole world.’ Finally Esquemeling became weak and ill from abuse and inadequate food, and his cruel master, fearing the man would die and he would be out of pocket and without a slave as well, disposed of the sick Hollander for seventy pieces of eight. His new master was a surgeon and a kindly man and, having doctored Esquemeling and restored him to health and strength, at the end of a year he gave him his liberty, exacting only the promise[20]that Esquemeling should pay him one hundred pieces of eight when in a position to do so. Being, as he himself says, ‘at liberty but like unto Adam when he was first created, that is, naked and destitute of all human necessities,’ and with no means of earning a livelihood, Esquemeling threw in his lot with the buccaneers and he remained with them for a number of years. Being by profession a clerk, Esquemeling kept the logs and accounts of the buccaneers and also a journal of his own in which he recorded all the details and events of his adventurous life. His work is, in fact, the only authentic account of these men, and his quaint phraseology and droll remarks are very amusing. I have the book here, boys, and you’ll find it more interesting and absorbing than any story or fiction of the buccaneers that ever was written.“The first buccaneer of note with whom Esquemeling sailed was Bartholomew Portugues, so called as he was a native of Portugal. Portugues left Jamaica in a small ship of four small carronades with a crew of thirty men, and went cruising off Cuba. A few days later he met a heavily armed galleon bound to Havana from Cartagena and at once attacked her. Although[21]the Spaniard carried a crew of over seventy, in addition to passengers, and was armed with twenty heavy cannon, yet Portugues assaulted the Dons without hesitation and after a desperate battle in which nearly fifty Spaniards were killed and wounded, the buccaneers took the galleon with a loss of only ten men killed and four wounded. Owing to contrary winds Portugues could not return directly to either Tortuga or Jamaica and so set sail for Cape San Antonio at the western extremity of Cuba. There he made necessary repairs to his prize and secured a supply of fresh water. As they were setting sail the buccaneers were surprised by three great Spanish ships and, greatly outnumbered, were taken prisoners and stripped of the booty they had so recently secured, a treasure of over ten thousand pieces of eight, in addition to valuable merchandise. We can imagine the chagrin of the buccaneers at this turn of fate and no doubt they gave themselves up for lost. But luck was with them. Two days after they had been made prisoners a great storm arose, the vessels became separated and the one containing the buccaneers was driven to Campeche in Yucatan. When the residents learned that Portugues and his fellows[22]were captives on board there was great rejoicing, and the authorities sent off to the ship demanding that the buccaneers be delivered to them. After a consultation, however, it was decided safer to leave the prisoners aboard and in preparation for a general hanging a number of gibbets were erected on shore. These were in plain view of the buccaneers, and Portugues resolved to make a desperate effort to escape and to cheat the expectant Dons of the grewsome spectacle. He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and, having plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floats, he waited patiently for darkness. But the sentry, who hitherto had been a careless, sleepy fellow, was unusually alert, and seeing this, Portugues seized a knife which he had surreptitiously obtained and, to quote Esquemeling, ‘gave him such a mortal stab as suddenly deprived him of life and the possibility of making any noise.’ Then the buccaneer captain leaped into the sea and aided by his extemporized water-wings managed to gain the shore. But his troubles had only begun. At once the hue and cry of his escape was raised, and for three days Portugues concealed himself in a hollow tree without food while the Dons searched all about. At last, abandoning[23]their hunt, the Spaniards returned to the town, and Portugues set out afoot for the Gulf of Triste, where he hoped to find other buccaneers to aid him in rescuing his comrades.“It is almost impossible to imagine what this meant or the seemingly insurmountable hardships the buccaneer captain deliberately faced, and it is also a most striking example of the faithfulness of the buccaneers to one another, which was one of the chief causes why they were so successful. Remember, Portugues was unarmed, for he had left the knife in the sentry’s back, he was without food, he had been half starved by his captors, and yet he calmly set out on a one hundred and fifty mile tramp through the jungle and along the jagged rocks of the seacoast; through a country infested by mosquitoes and stinging insects, by savage hostile Indians, and through swamps reeking with malaria. Every settlement and town had to be avoided, as they were all filled with his enemies, the Spaniards, and throughout that long and terrible journey the buccaneer subsisted entirely upon the few shellfish he found along the shore and upon the roots of forest herbs.“Moreover, several large and many small rivers crossed his route and not being able to swim his[24]case seemed hopeless. But while searching about the banks of the first large stream, looking for a possible ford, he found an old plank with a few large spikes in it. After tremendous efforts he managed to withdraw these nails and with infinite patience whetted them against stones until he secured a sharp knifelike edge. Just think of that, boys, when you read of modern hardships endured by men left to their own resources in a forest. Imagine rubbing a ship’s spike back and forth upon a stone until it has been transformed into a knife!“But the preparation of the nails, incredible as it sounds, was not the worst of his labors. With these crude implements the buccaneer actually hacked off branches of trees, cut vines and pliant reeds and with these constructed a raft with which he crossed the stream. At every large river he repeated the work and eventually arrived safely at the Gulf of Triste fourteen days after escaping from the ship. Here, as he had expected, he found a buccaneer vessel with a captain whom he knew and, telling of his comrades’ plight, he begged the captain to lend him a boat and twenty men to go to his men’s rescue. This the captain gladly did, and eight days later, Portugues was back at Campeche.[25]So small was the boat that the Spaniards never dreamed that its occupants were enemies or buccaneers, but thought it a craft from shore bringing off cargo, and they watched it approach without the least fear or preparations for defense.“Thus the buccaneers completely surprised the Dons and after a short, sharp struggle were in possession of the ship and had released the imprisoned buccaneers—or rather most of them, for the Dons had hanged a few.“Realizing that other Spanish vessels might appear and attack him with overwhelming force at any time, Portugues at once set sail in the ship wherein he had so long been a helpless captive, and once more in possession of his booty with vast riches in addition. Steering a course for Jamaica he was off the Isle of Pines when the fickle fate which always followed him once more turned her back and the ship went upon the reefs of the Jardines. The ship was a total loss and sunk with all her treasure, while Portugues and his comrades barely escaped with their lives in a canoe. Although they managed to reach Jamaica without misfortune, luck had deserted Portugues for all time and while he tried time after time to recoup his fortunes all his efforts were in vain.[26]He became an ordinary seaman and was soon forgotten.“Another buccaneer whose exploits were as remarkable as Portugues’ and whose most notable exploits also took place in Yucatan, was a Dutchman who was nicknamed Rock Brasiliano, owing to his long residence in Brazil. As an ordinary mariner he joined the buccaneers in Jamaica and soon so distinguished himself by his bravery and resourcefulness that when, after a dispute with his captain, he deserted the ship, he was chosen chief by a number of his fellows and, securing a small vessel, he set forth to capture a prize. Within a few days he seized a large Spanish ship with a vast treasure aboard which he carried into Jamaica in triumph. This exploit at once brought him fame and men flocked to his service. But, unlike Portugues, who seems to have been a very decent and respectable sort of rascal, Brasiliano was a drunken, brutal scallawag. As Esquemeling says, ‘Neither in his domestic or private affairs had he good behavior or government over himself.’ When drunk, as he always was when ashore, his favorite amusement was to race up and down the streets, beating, stabbing or shooting all whom he met, very much as our Western[27]‘bad men’ used to ‘shoot up’ a town in the old days.“Moreover, Brasiliano was unspeakably bloodthirsty and cruel. Whenever he captured Spaniards he put them to the most horrible tortures, and in order to force them to reveal the hiding places of their treasures he would flay them alive, tear them limb from limb or roast them on spits over slow fires. As a result, he became a feared and dreaded man, and the mere mention of his name caused the Dons to shudder and to huddle within their stockades. Nevertheless Brasiliano was a brave, a resourceful and a most remarkable man and performed some most noteworthy exploits. On one occasion he was cruising off the coast of Yucatan when a violent storm drove his ship upon the rocks, and he and his men escaped with only their muskets and a slender stock of ammunition. They landed on a desolate, uninhabited stretch of coast midway between Campeche and the Gulf of Triste and, quite undeterred by their plight, commenced an overland march towards the Gulf exactly as Portugues had done. But they had not proceeded far when they were surprised by a cavalcade of over one hundred Spanish horsemen. Despite the fact that[28]the buccaneers numbered less than thirty, yet they had no thought of either retreat or surrender, but at once prepared to meet the oncoming cavalry. Expert marksmen as they were, a Don fell for every bullet fired and for an hour the handful of buccaneers kept the Spaniards at bay until, finding the cost too heavy, the cavalry retreated towards the town. Killing the wounded and stripping the dead of their arms and equipment, the buccaneers continued on the journey mounted on the horses of the dead Dons, the total loss of Brasiliano’s forces being but two killed and two wounded. Quite encouraged by their success, the buccaneers approached a little port and saw a boat lying at anchor in the harbor and protecting a fleet of canoes that were loading logwood. With little trouble the buccaneers captured the canoes and with wild shouts and yells bore down upon the little gunboat. The Spaniards aboard, terrified at sight of the buccaneers, surrendered after a short fight, but, to the buccaneers’ chagrin, they found scarcely any provisions on their prize. This did not trouble them long, however, and promptly killing the Spaniards’ horses they dressed them, salted the meat and, thus equipped, sailed forth to capture more vessels. In this they[29]were highly successful, and in a few weeks Brasiliano sailed into Port Royal with nearly one hundred thousand pieces of eight and much merchandise. But the buccaneers invariably wasted all their hard-won money recklessly. It was not uncommon for one of them to spend several thousand pieces of eight in a single night of drinking, gambling and carousing and so, within a few days, Brasiliano and his men were forced to go to sea again. Having had good fortune at Yucatan, he set sail for Campeche, but fifteen days after his arrival on the coast he was captured with several of his men while spying on the city and harbor in a canoe. They were at once cast into a dungeon to await execution, but Brasiliano was by no means at the end of his resources. By some method he managed to secure writing materials and composed a most wonderful letter purporting to be written by another buccaneer chief and in which the supposed author threatened dire reprisals on any Spaniard captured by the buccaneers if Brasiliano and his men were harmed. This epistle was delivered to the Governor—though how on earth Brasiliano managed it no one knows—and His Excellency, having had plenty of experience with buccaneers, was so frightened at its contents[30]that he at once liberated his prisoners, only exacting an oath that they would abandon buccaneering. Then, to insure their keeping their promise, he sent them as sailors on a galleon bound for Spain. With their wages from the trip they at once returned to Jamaica and, regardless of pledges, were soon harassing and murdering the Dons right and left.“But neither Portugues or Brasiliano could compare in cruelty, daring, bloodthirstiness or rascality with Francis L’Ollonois. In his youth L’Ollonois was transported to the West Indies as a bond servant, or virtually a slave, and, winning his freedom, made his way to Tortuga and joined the buccaneers.“So unspeakably cruel and bestially inhuman was this Frenchman that even his fellow buccaneers sickened of his ways and Esquemeling speaks of him as ‘that infernal wretch’ or ‘that despicable and execrable pirate.’ For a time after joining the Brethren of the Main, L’Ollonois served as a common seaman, but his courage and reckless daring soon brought him to the attention of Monsieur de la Place, the governor of Tortuga, who was heartily in sympathy with the buccaneers. The governor therefore provided L’Ollonois with[31]a ship and outfitted him, the agreement of course being that La Place should have a share of the booty taken. Within a very short time L’Ollonois had taken several vessels and immense riches, while his awful cruelties made him a dreaded and famed character throughout the Caribbean. Indeed, so merciless was he that the Dons, rather than surrender to the monster, would leap into the sea or blow out their own brains, knowing that quick death by any means was preferable to the tortures they would endure at L’Ollonois’ hands. His first disaster occurred when his ship was wrecked on the coast of Yucatan. The men all escaped, but were immediately attacked by the Spaniards, who killed the greater portion of the buccaneers and wounded L’Ollonois. Seeing no means of escape the captain smeared himself with blood and sand and crawling among the dead bodies lay motionless. The Dons were completely fooled and, not recognizing L’Ollonois and thinking him merely a dead sailor, left the field after a brief search for the buccaneer chief, whereupon he made for the woods and lived upon roots until his wounds healed. Then, having stolen garments from a Spaniard whom he killed, the rascal walked calmly into Campeche. Here he conversed with[32]several slaves and, promising them liberty in return for their services, he succeeded in getting a large canoe and with the slaves to help he reached Tortuga in safety. In the meantime the Spaniards were rejoicing at thought of the dread L’Ollonois being killed, for his men, who had been made prisoners, told the Dons that he had fallen in the battle.“His next raid was on the town of Cayos in Cuba, and word of his approach was sent post-haste to the governor at Havana. We can readily imagine the amazement and terror of His Excellency when this dreaded buccaneer, who was supposed to be safely dead at Campeche, bobbed up alive and well at Cuba. At first the governor could not believe it, but nevertheless he dispatched a ship with ten guns and with a crew of eighty to attack the buccaneers and commanded the captain not to dare to return unless he had totally destroyed the pirates. In addition, he sent aboard a negro as a hangman with instructions that every buccaneer taken alive should be hanged, with the exception of L’Ollonois, who was to be brought alive to Havana. No doubt the governor wished to make sure of the buccaneer chieftain’s death this time, but fate decreed otherwise. Instead[33]of trying to escape, the buccaneers, when they learned of the warship coming to attack them, set forth in two canoes and unexpectedly bore down on the Spanish ship as she lay at anchor in the Estera River. It was two o’clock in the morning when they drew near the doomed vessel, and the watch, seeing the canoes and not dreaming that they contained buccaneers, hailed them and asked if they had seen any pirates. To this the buccaneers replied that they had seen no pirates or anything like them. The watch thus satisfied was turning away when the canoes dashed close and the buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails. Taken completely by surprise, still the Dons put up a gallant fight and for some time the battle raged desperately. But, as usual, the buccaneers, though but twenty-one all told, triumphed and drove the surviving Spaniards into the hold. Then, stationing his men by the hatchway with drawn swords, L’Ollonois ordered the prisoners to come up one at a time, and as fast as they appeared his men struck off their heads. The last to appear was the negro hangman who begged piteously for mercy, but L’Ollonois, after torturing him to confession of various matters, murdered him like the rest. Only one man was spared[34]and to him L’Ollonois gave a note addressed to the governor in which he informed His Excellency of the fate of his men and assured him that he would never give quarter to any Spaniard and only hoped to be able to torture and kill His Excellency as well.He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floatsHe managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floatsThe buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s railsThe buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails“With the ship captured from the Spaniards, L’Ollonois cruised along the Spanish Main, took several ships and returned to Tortuga with the idea of fitting out a large company of ships and boldly attacking the Spanish towns and cities, as well as their vessels. The fleet he gathered together consisted of eight ships, the largest carrying ten guns, and with six hundred and sixty buccaneers. But long before they reached the South American coast they were flushed with success. Near Porto Rico they captured a ship of sixteen guns laden with cacao and with treasure consisting of forty thousand pieces of eight and over ten thousand dollars’ worth of jewels, and near the island of Saona they took the payship of the Dons and obtained nearly four tons of gunpowder, many muskets and twelve thousand pieces of eight. It would be tiresome to describe in detail their arrival at Maracaibo, their taking of the forts and their capture of the town. The Spaniards[35]resisted valiantly, but were beaten back and then commenced a series of orgies, of cruelties and of inhumanities which are almost without an equal. The people, as soon as they realized the town would fall to L’Ollonois and his freebooters, took to the outlying country, and these refugees the buccaneers hunted down and dragged before their chief. In order to make them confess where they had hidden their valuables—although L’Ollonois had already obtained vast plunder—they were put on the rack, broken on the wheel, cut to pieces, flayed alive and subjected to every cruelty and torture the corsairs could devise. For fifteen days the buccaneers occupied the town and butchered and tortured the inhabitants until, convinced that no more loot could be secured, they left Maracaibo, sailed up the Lake and took the town of Gibraltar. Here they were ambushed and many killed, but in comparison to the losses of the Dons the buccaneers suffered little, losing but forty men killed and about fifty wounded, while over five hundred Spaniards were killed and several hundred taken prisoners. Many of the captives died from starvation or illness under the buccaneers’ treatment, many more were butchered for pure sport and hundreds were put to the torture.[36]Then, not satisfied, L’Ollonois threatened to burn the town unless he was paid ten thousand pieces of eight and when this was not instantly forthcoming he actually set fire to the place. However, the money being eventually paid, the buccaneers had the decency to aid the inhabitants in putting out the conflagration, for, oddly enough, they usually kept to their promises, and after eighteen days set sail for Maracaibo again. Here they demanded a payment of thirty thousand pieces of eight under penalty of having the town destroyed, and the poor harassed and cowed Dons managed to raise the sum and with heartfelt thanks saw the fleet sail away. When Tortuga was reached and a division of spoils made it was found that over two hundred thousand pieces of eight had been taken in addition to immense stores of silks, gold and silver plate and jewels.“Hardly had he landed when L’Ollonois prepared for another raid and with seven hundred men set sail with six ships for Honduras. Here the beastly buccaneer chief tortured and killed and robbed to his heart’s content, but finding comparatively little loot and thinking the inhabitants had secreted their wealth, he became mad with fury and outdid all his former inhuman acts. On[37]one occasion, when a prisoner insisted that he did not know the route to a certain town, L’Ollonois slashed open the fellow’s breast with his sword, tore out his still throbbing heart and bit and gnawed at it with his teeth, as Esquemeling says, ‘like a ravenous wolf,’ and threatened to serve the other prisoners in the same manner unless they showed him the way to San Pedro. This they did, but the Spaniards had placed ambuscades and the buccaneers were compelled to fight savagely every inch of the way. Finally the Dons agreed to deliver the town if the buccaneers would grant quarter for two hours, but no sooner was the time up than L’Ollonois hurried his men after the people, robbed them of what they had and slaughtered them without mercy. But L’Ollonois was too bestial and cruel even for his own men. A short time after the sack of San Pedro, dissensions arose and the party divided, the majority of the buccaneers leaving with Moses Vanclein to raid the coast towns of Costa Rica and Panama. From that time on L’Ollonois had nothing but ill luck and soon afterwards his ship was wrecked off Cape Gracias à Dios. With the remains of the wreck, the buccaneers set to work to construct a small boat, and to sustain themselves, planted[38]gardens. For six months they were marooned until the boat was completed, and L’Ollonois, with part of his crew, set out for the San Juan River in Nicaragua. But fate had turned against him which as Esquemeling naïvely remarks, ‘had long time been reserved for him as a punishment due to the multitude of horrible crimes which in his wicked life he had committed.’ Attacked by the Spaniards and their Indian allies, he was forced to retreat with heavy loss and, still hoping to retrieve his fortunes, headed southward for the coasts of Darien. And here the villain met with the end he so richly deserved. He was taken by the savage Indians of the district, was torn to pieces while alive and his limbs cast into a fire. Finally, that no trace or memory of him might remain, the savages scattered his ashes in the air.”[39]
“Now, having learned why the buccaneers were so called and how they came into existence, we’ll take up a more interesting matter, and I’ll try to tell you something of the men themselves, of the most famous buccaneers and of their deeds,” continued Mr. Bickford.
“Certain famous buccaneers’ names are almost household words—such as Morgan, Montbars, L’Ollonois and your friend Captain Kidd, who, as I said, was no buccaneer—but others, who did even braver and more terrible things and were the most noted of buccaneers in their day, are almost unknown to the world to-day. Among these was Pierre Le Grand, Brasiliano, Bartholomew Portugues, Sawkins, Sharp, Davis, Red Legs, Cook, Dampier, Mansvelt, Prince Rupert and many others.”
“But you’ve forgotten Drake and Hawkins and Blackbeard,” put in Jack.[15]
“None of those men were buccaneers,” his father declared. “Drake and Hawkins were privateers—Drake being Admiral of Queen Elizabeth’s navy—and won their fame in the destruction of the Spanish Armada. Later they attacked and took towns on the Spanish Main and destroyed Spanish ships, but they were neither pirates nor buccaneers. In fact, they were both dead before buccaneers became of any importance as sea rovers. On the other hand, Blackbeard was an ordinary pirate—a sea robber who made no attempt to discriminate between friend and foe and scuttled and robbed ships of his own countrymen as readily as those of other nationalities. But as he was an interesting character and was among the last of the important or dangerous pirates of the Caribbean I will tell you something of his life and career later.
“The first buccaneer to rise to any fame was Pierre Le Grand, or as he was oftener called, Peter the Great, a native of Dieppe in Normandy. Le Grand’s first and only achievement, and the one which brought him fame, was the taking of the Vice Admiral of the Spanish fleet near Cape Tiburon in Haiti. With a small boat manned by twenty-eight of the rough buccaneers Le Grand[16]set forth in search of prizes and cruised among the Bahamas, but for many days saw no ship. Provisions were running low, his men were grumbling and he had about decided to give up in despair when they sighted a huge Spanish ship which had become separated from the rest of the convoy. Setting sail they headed for the vessel and at twilight were very close. In order to force his men to their utmost, Le Grand ordered one of his crew to bore holes in the bottom of the boat and then, running their tiny craft alongside the Don, and armed only with swords and pistols, the buccaneers swarmed over the sides of the doomed ship. Taken absolutely by surprise, for the Spaniards had not dreamed that the handful of ragged men in a tiny sail boat intended to attack them, the crew of the ship, nevertheless, resisted stoutly. But they were ruthlessly cut down and while some of the buccaneers drove the Spaniards across the deck, others with Le Grand at their head, dashed into the cabin where the unsuspecting Vice Admiral was enjoying a quiet game of cards with his officers.
“As Le Grand leaped across the room and placed his pistol at the Admiral’s breast thedumbfounded[17]Spaniard exclaimed, ‘Lord bless us! Are these devils or what?’
Money of the buccaneers’ timesMoney of the buccaneers’ times1.Pieces of eight2.Doubloon3–4.Cross money5.Castillano
Money of the buccaneers’ times
Cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they sawCruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw
Cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw
“But he soon realized that whatever they were his ship was in their hands and that he and his men were prisoners. Le Grand, however, was neither a brutal nor a bloodthirsty wretch, as were many of his successors, and, having impressed as many of the Spanish seamen into his service as he required, he set the others, including the Admiral and the officers, ashore, and set sail with his prize for France. So great was the booty he secured by this one coup that he gave up buccaneering and settled down in France for life.
“But his deed fired the buccaneers on Tortuga with dreams of easily acquired prizes and riches, and soon a host of the rough hunters and woodsmen were cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship they saw. Indeed, many, unable to secure sailboats, actually went a-pirating in tiny dugout canoes, and so daring and reckless were they that, despite their handicaps, they took two huge galleons laden with plate within the first month, as well as many smaller vessels. Now that they had seaworthy ships and plenty of wealth at their disposal they became[18]bolder and bolder, and were soon not only cruising the Caribbean Sea, and taking ships, but were attacking the fortified and wealthy towns along the Central and South American coast with success. And let me mention here that it was very seldom that the buccaneers made use of the larger ships in their piratical raids. The smaller vessels were faster, they were more easily handled, and when necessity arose they could slip through narrow, shoal channels through which the Spanish men-of-war could not follow. The buccaneers’ vessels seldom carried over six guns, many had but two or three, but they swarmed with men armed to the teeth, and the buccaneers depended far more upon a dashing attack and hand-to-hand fights than upon cannon fire.”
“Excuse me, Dad,” interrupted Jack, “but are there books that tell all these things?”
“Yes, Jack,” replied Mr. Bickford. “And the best and most complete is a book called ‘The Buccaneers of America.’ It was written by a buccaneer, a man named Esquemeling, who took part in nearly all the most famous of the buccaneers’ raids and served with Morgan, L’Ollonois and many other buccaneer chiefs. His own history is almost as interesting as that of any of the men of whom[19]he wrote. He was a Hollander by birth, but went to Tortuga as a clerk for the West India Company of France. The company, however, found that although the buccaneers were quite willing to purchase goods it was quite another matter when it came to paying for them, and as a result, the West India Company abandoned their agency in Tortuga and gave orders that all their goods and chattels on the island should be sold for what they would bring. This included servants of the company as well, and Esquemeling found himself sold for a slave for thirty pieces of eight. His master was a cruel, tyrannical man and abused his Dutch slave shamefully, although offering to let him buy his freedom for three hundred pieces of eight. Esquemeling, however, as he says himself, ‘was not master of one in the whole world.’ Finally Esquemeling became weak and ill from abuse and inadequate food, and his cruel master, fearing the man would die and he would be out of pocket and without a slave as well, disposed of the sick Hollander for seventy pieces of eight. His new master was a surgeon and a kindly man and, having doctored Esquemeling and restored him to health and strength, at the end of a year he gave him his liberty, exacting only the promise[20]that Esquemeling should pay him one hundred pieces of eight when in a position to do so. Being, as he himself says, ‘at liberty but like unto Adam when he was first created, that is, naked and destitute of all human necessities,’ and with no means of earning a livelihood, Esquemeling threw in his lot with the buccaneers and he remained with them for a number of years. Being by profession a clerk, Esquemeling kept the logs and accounts of the buccaneers and also a journal of his own in which he recorded all the details and events of his adventurous life. His work is, in fact, the only authentic account of these men, and his quaint phraseology and droll remarks are very amusing. I have the book here, boys, and you’ll find it more interesting and absorbing than any story or fiction of the buccaneers that ever was written.
“The first buccaneer of note with whom Esquemeling sailed was Bartholomew Portugues, so called as he was a native of Portugal. Portugues left Jamaica in a small ship of four small carronades with a crew of thirty men, and went cruising off Cuba. A few days later he met a heavily armed galleon bound to Havana from Cartagena and at once attacked her. Although[21]the Spaniard carried a crew of over seventy, in addition to passengers, and was armed with twenty heavy cannon, yet Portugues assaulted the Dons without hesitation and after a desperate battle in which nearly fifty Spaniards were killed and wounded, the buccaneers took the galleon with a loss of only ten men killed and four wounded. Owing to contrary winds Portugues could not return directly to either Tortuga or Jamaica and so set sail for Cape San Antonio at the western extremity of Cuba. There he made necessary repairs to his prize and secured a supply of fresh water. As they were setting sail the buccaneers were surprised by three great Spanish ships and, greatly outnumbered, were taken prisoners and stripped of the booty they had so recently secured, a treasure of over ten thousand pieces of eight, in addition to valuable merchandise. We can imagine the chagrin of the buccaneers at this turn of fate and no doubt they gave themselves up for lost. But luck was with them. Two days after they had been made prisoners a great storm arose, the vessels became separated and the one containing the buccaneers was driven to Campeche in Yucatan. When the residents learned that Portugues and his fellows[22]were captives on board there was great rejoicing, and the authorities sent off to the ship demanding that the buccaneers be delivered to them. After a consultation, however, it was decided safer to leave the prisoners aboard and in preparation for a general hanging a number of gibbets were erected on shore. These were in plain view of the buccaneers, and Portugues resolved to make a desperate effort to escape and to cheat the expectant Dons of the grewsome spectacle. He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and, having plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floats, he waited patiently for darkness. But the sentry, who hitherto had been a careless, sleepy fellow, was unusually alert, and seeing this, Portugues seized a knife which he had surreptitiously obtained and, to quote Esquemeling, ‘gave him such a mortal stab as suddenly deprived him of life and the possibility of making any noise.’ Then the buccaneer captain leaped into the sea and aided by his extemporized water-wings managed to gain the shore. But his troubles had only begun. At once the hue and cry of his escape was raised, and for three days Portugues concealed himself in a hollow tree without food while the Dons searched all about. At last, abandoning[23]their hunt, the Spaniards returned to the town, and Portugues set out afoot for the Gulf of Triste, where he hoped to find other buccaneers to aid him in rescuing his comrades.
“It is almost impossible to imagine what this meant or the seemingly insurmountable hardships the buccaneer captain deliberately faced, and it is also a most striking example of the faithfulness of the buccaneers to one another, which was one of the chief causes why they were so successful. Remember, Portugues was unarmed, for he had left the knife in the sentry’s back, he was without food, he had been half starved by his captors, and yet he calmly set out on a one hundred and fifty mile tramp through the jungle and along the jagged rocks of the seacoast; through a country infested by mosquitoes and stinging insects, by savage hostile Indians, and through swamps reeking with malaria. Every settlement and town had to be avoided, as they were all filled with his enemies, the Spaniards, and throughout that long and terrible journey the buccaneer subsisted entirely upon the few shellfish he found along the shore and upon the roots of forest herbs.
“Moreover, several large and many small rivers crossed his route and not being able to swim his[24]case seemed hopeless. But while searching about the banks of the first large stream, looking for a possible ford, he found an old plank with a few large spikes in it. After tremendous efforts he managed to withdraw these nails and with infinite patience whetted them against stones until he secured a sharp knifelike edge. Just think of that, boys, when you read of modern hardships endured by men left to their own resources in a forest. Imagine rubbing a ship’s spike back and forth upon a stone until it has been transformed into a knife!
“But the preparation of the nails, incredible as it sounds, was not the worst of his labors. With these crude implements the buccaneer actually hacked off branches of trees, cut vines and pliant reeds and with these constructed a raft with which he crossed the stream. At every large river he repeated the work and eventually arrived safely at the Gulf of Triste fourteen days after escaping from the ship. Here, as he had expected, he found a buccaneer vessel with a captain whom he knew and, telling of his comrades’ plight, he begged the captain to lend him a boat and twenty men to go to his men’s rescue. This the captain gladly did, and eight days later, Portugues was back at Campeche.[25]So small was the boat that the Spaniards never dreamed that its occupants were enemies or buccaneers, but thought it a craft from shore bringing off cargo, and they watched it approach without the least fear or preparations for defense.
“Thus the buccaneers completely surprised the Dons and after a short, sharp struggle were in possession of the ship and had released the imprisoned buccaneers—or rather most of them, for the Dons had hanged a few.
“Realizing that other Spanish vessels might appear and attack him with overwhelming force at any time, Portugues at once set sail in the ship wherein he had so long been a helpless captive, and once more in possession of his booty with vast riches in addition. Steering a course for Jamaica he was off the Isle of Pines when the fickle fate which always followed him once more turned her back and the ship went upon the reefs of the Jardines. The ship was a total loss and sunk with all her treasure, while Portugues and his comrades barely escaped with their lives in a canoe. Although they managed to reach Jamaica without misfortune, luck had deserted Portugues for all time and while he tried time after time to recoup his fortunes all his efforts were in vain.[26]He became an ordinary seaman and was soon forgotten.
“Another buccaneer whose exploits were as remarkable as Portugues’ and whose most notable exploits also took place in Yucatan, was a Dutchman who was nicknamed Rock Brasiliano, owing to his long residence in Brazil. As an ordinary mariner he joined the buccaneers in Jamaica and soon so distinguished himself by his bravery and resourcefulness that when, after a dispute with his captain, he deserted the ship, he was chosen chief by a number of his fellows and, securing a small vessel, he set forth to capture a prize. Within a few days he seized a large Spanish ship with a vast treasure aboard which he carried into Jamaica in triumph. This exploit at once brought him fame and men flocked to his service. But, unlike Portugues, who seems to have been a very decent and respectable sort of rascal, Brasiliano was a drunken, brutal scallawag. As Esquemeling says, ‘Neither in his domestic or private affairs had he good behavior or government over himself.’ When drunk, as he always was when ashore, his favorite amusement was to race up and down the streets, beating, stabbing or shooting all whom he met, very much as our Western[27]‘bad men’ used to ‘shoot up’ a town in the old days.
“Moreover, Brasiliano was unspeakably bloodthirsty and cruel. Whenever he captured Spaniards he put them to the most horrible tortures, and in order to force them to reveal the hiding places of their treasures he would flay them alive, tear them limb from limb or roast them on spits over slow fires. As a result, he became a feared and dreaded man, and the mere mention of his name caused the Dons to shudder and to huddle within their stockades. Nevertheless Brasiliano was a brave, a resourceful and a most remarkable man and performed some most noteworthy exploits. On one occasion he was cruising off the coast of Yucatan when a violent storm drove his ship upon the rocks, and he and his men escaped with only their muskets and a slender stock of ammunition. They landed on a desolate, uninhabited stretch of coast midway between Campeche and the Gulf of Triste and, quite undeterred by their plight, commenced an overland march towards the Gulf exactly as Portugues had done. But they had not proceeded far when they were surprised by a cavalcade of over one hundred Spanish horsemen. Despite the fact that[28]the buccaneers numbered less than thirty, yet they had no thought of either retreat or surrender, but at once prepared to meet the oncoming cavalry. Expert marksmen as they were, a Don fell for every bullet fired and for an hour the handful of buccaneers kept the Spaniards at bay until, finding the cost too heavy, the cavalry retreated towards the town. Killing the wounded and stripping the dead of their arms and equipment, the buccaneers continued on the journey mounted on the horses of the dead Dons, the total loss of Brasiliano’s forces being but two killed and two wounded. Quite encouraged by their success, the buccaneers approached a little port and saw a boat lying at anchor in the harbor and protecting a fleet of canoes that were loading logwood. With little trouble the buccaneers captured the canoes and with wild shouts and yells bore down upon the little gunboat. The Spaniards aboard, terrified at sight of the buccaneers, surrendered after a short fight, but, to the buccaneers’ chagrin, they found scarcely any provisions on their prize. This did not trouble them long, however, and promptly killing the Spaniards’ horses they dressed them, salted the meat and, thus equipped, sailed forth to capture more vessels. In this they[29]were highly successful, and in a few weeks Brasiliano sailed into Port Royal with nearly one hundred thousand pieces of eight and much merchandise. But the buccaneers invariably wasted all their hard-won money recklessly. It was not uncommon for one of them to spend several thousand pieces of eight in a single night of drinking, gambling and carousing and so, within a few days, Brasiliano and his men were forced to go to sea again. Having had good fortune at Yucatan, he set sail for Campeche, but fifteen days after his arrival on the coast he was captured with several of his men while spying on the city and harbor in a canoe. They were at once cast into a dungeon to await execution, but Brasiliano was by no means at the end of his resources. By some method he managed to secure writing materials and composed a most wonderful letter purporting to be written by another buccaneer chief and in which the supposed author threatened dire reprisals on any Spaniard captured by the buccaneers if Brasiliano and his men were harmed. This epistle was delivered to the Governor—though how on earth Brasiliano managed it no one knows—and His Excellency, having had plenty of experience with buccaneers, was so frightened at its contents[30]that he at once liberated his prisoners, only exacting an oath that they would abandon buccaneering. Then, to insure their keeping their promise, he sent them as sailors on a galleon bound for Spain. With their wages from the trip they at once returned to Jamaica and, regardless of pledges, were soon harassing and murdering the Dons right and left.
“But neither Portugues or Brasiliano could compare in cruelty, daring, bloodthirstiness or rascality with Francis L’Ollonois. In his youth L’Ollonois was transported to the West Indies as a bond servant, or virtually a slave, and, winning his freedom, made his way to Tortuga and joined the buccaneers.
“So unspeakably cruel and bestially inhuman was this Frenchman that even his fellow buccaneers sickened of his ways and Esquemeling speaks of him as ‘that infernal wretch’ or ‘that despicable and execrable pirate.’ For a time after joining the Brethren of the Main, L’Ollonois served as a common seaman, but his courage and reckless daring soon brought him to the attention of Monsieur de la Place, the governor of Tortuga, who was heartily in sympathy with the buccaneers. The governor therefore provided L’Ollonois with[31]a ship and outfitted him, the agreement of course being that La Place should have a share of the booty taken. Within a very short time L’Ollonois had taken several vessels and immense riches, while his awful cruelties made him a dreaded and famed character throughout the Caribbean. Indeed, so merciless was he that the Dons, rather than surrender to the monster, would leap into the sea or blow out their own brains, knowing that quick death by any means was preferable to the tortures they would endure at L’Ollonois’ hands. His first disaster occurred when his ship was wrecked on the coast of Yucatan. The men all escaped, but were immediately attacked by the Spaniards, who killed the greater portion of the buccaneers and wounded L’Ollonois. Seeing no means of escape the captain smeared himself with blood and sand and crawling among the dead bodies lay motionless. The Dons were completely fooled and, not recognizing L’Ollonois and thinking him merely a dead sailor, left the field after a brief search for the buccaneer chief, whereupon he made for the woods and lived upon roots until his wounds healed. Then, having stolen garments from a Spaniard whom he killed, the rascal walked calmly into Campeche. Here he conversed with[32]several slaves and, promising them liberty in return for their services, he succeeded in getting a large canoe and with the slaves to help he reached Tortuga in safety. In the meantime the Spaniards were rejoicing at thought of the dread L’Ollonois being killed, for his men, who had been made prisoners, told the Dons that he had fallen in the battle.
“His next raid was on the town of Cayos in Cuba, and word of his approach was sent post-haste to the governor at Havana. We can readily imagine the amazement and terror of His Excellency when this dreaded buccaneer, who was supposed to be safely dead at Campeche, bobbed up alive and well at Cuba. At first the governor could not believe it, but nevertheless he dispatched a ship with ten guns and with a crew of eighty to attack the buccaneers and commanded the captain not to dare to return unless he had totally destroyed the pirates. In addition, he sent aboard a negro as a hangman with instructions that every buccaneer taken alive should be hanged, with the exception of L’Ollonois, who was to be brought alive to Havana. No doubt the governor wished to make sure of the buccaneer chieftain’s death this time, but fate decreed otherwise. Instead[33]of trying to escape, the buccaneers, when they learned of the warship coming to attack them, set forth in two canoes and unexpectedly bore down on the Spanish ship as she lay at anchor in the Estera River. It was two o’clock in the morning when they drew near the doomed vessel, and the watch, seeing the canoes and not dreaming that they contained buccaneers, hailed them and asked if they had seen any pirates. To this the buccaneers replied that they had seen no pirates or anything like them. The watch thus satisfied was turning away when the canoes dashed close and the buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails. Taken completely by surprise, still the Dons put up a gallant fight and for some time the battle raged desperately. But, as usual, the buccaneers, though but twenty-one all told, triumphed and drove the surviving Spaniards into the hold. Then, stationing his men by the hatchway with drawn swords, L’Ollonois ordered the prisoners to come up one at a time, and as fast as they appeared his men struck off their heads. The last to appear was the negro hangman who begged piteously for mercy, but L’Ollonois, after torturing him to confession of various matters, murdered him like the rest. Only one man was spared[34]and to him L’Ollonois gave a note addressed to the governor in which he informed His Excellency of the fate of his men and assured him that he would never give quarter to any Spaniard and only hoped to be able to torture and kill His Excellency as well.
He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floatsHe managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floats
He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their necks with the idea of using them as floats
The buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s railsThe buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails
The buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails
“With the ship captured from the Spaniards, L’Ollonois cruised along the Spanish Main, took several ships and returned to Tortuga with the idea of fitting out a large company of ships and boldly attacking the Spanish towns and cities, as well as their vessels. The fleet he gathered together consisted of eight ships, the largest carrying ten guns, and with six hundred and sixty buccaneers. But long before they reached the South American coast they were flushed with success. Near Porto Rico they captured a ship of sixteen guns laden with cacao and with treasure consisting of forty thousand pieces of eight and over ten thousand dollars’ worth of jewels, and near the island of Saona they took the payship of the Dons and obtained nearly four tons of gunpowder, many muskets and twelve thousand pieces of eight. It would be tiresome to describe in detail their arrival at Maracaibo, their taking of the forts and their capture of the town. The Spaniards[35]resisted valiantly, but were beaten back and then commenced a series of orgies, of cruelties and of inhumanities which are almost without an equal. The people, as soon as they realized the town would fall to L’Ollonois and his freebooters, took to the outlying country, and these refugees the buccaneers hunted down and dragged before their chief. In order to make them confess where they had hidden their valuables—although L’Ollonois had already obtained vast plunder—they were put on the rack, broken on the wheel, cut to pieces, flayed alive and subjected to every cruelty and torture the corsairs could devise. For fifteen days the buccaneers occupied the town and butchered and tortured the inhabitants until, convinced that no more loot could be secured, they left Maracaibo, sailed up the Lake and took the town of Gibraltar. Here they were ambushed and many killed, but in comparison to the losses of the Dons the buccaneers suffered little, losing but forty men killed and about fifty wounded, while over five hundred Spaniards were killed and several hundred taken prisoners. Many of the captives died from starvation or illness under the buccaneers’ treatment, many more were butchered for pure sport and hundreds were put to the torture.[36]Then, not satisfied, L’Ollonois threatened to burn the town unless he was paid ten thousand pieces of eight and when this was not instantly forthcoming he actually set fire to the place. However, the money being eventually paid, the buccaneers had the decency to aid the inhabitants in putting out the conflagration, for, oddly enough, they usually kept to their promises, and after eighteen days set sail for Maracaibo again. Here they demanded a payment of thirty thousand pieces of eight under penalty of having the town destroyed, and the poor harassed and cowed Dons managed to raise the sum and with heartfelt thanks saw the fleet sail away. When Tortuga was reached and a division of spoils made it was found that over two hundred thousand pieces of eight had been taken in addition to immense stores of silks, gold and silver plate and jewels.
“Hardly had he landed when L’Ollonois prepared for another raid and with seven hundred men set sail with six ships for Honduras. Here the beastly buccaneer chief tortured and killed and robbed to his heart’s content, but finding comparatively little loot and thinking the inhabitants had secreted their wealth, he became mad with fury and outdid all his former inhuman acts. On[37]one occasion, when a prisoner insisted that he did not know the route to a certain town, L’Ollonois slashed open the fellow’s breast with his sword, tore out his still throbbing heart and bit and gnawed at it with his teeth, as Esquemeling says, ‘like a ravenous wolf,’ and threatened to serve the other prisoners in the same manner unless they showed him the way to San Pedro. This they did, but the Spaniards had placed ambuscades and the buccaneers were compelled to fight savagely every inch of the way. Finally the Dons agreed to deliver the town if the buccaneers would grant quarter for two hours, but no sooner was the time up than L’Ollonois hurried his men after the people, robbed them of what they had and slaughtered them without mercy. But L’Ollonois was too bestial and cruel even for his own men. A short time after the sack of San Pedro, dissensions arose and the party divided, the majority of the buccaneers leaving with Moses Vanclein to raid the coast towns of Costa Rica and Panama. From that time on L’Ollonois had nothing but ill luck and soon afterwards his ship was wrecked off Cape Gracias à Dios. With the remains of the wreck, the buccaneers set to work to construct a small boat, and to sustain themselves, planted[38]gardens. For six months they were marooned until the boat was completed, and L’Ollonois, with part of his crew, set out for the San Juan River in Nicaragua. But fate had turned against him which as Esquemeling naïvely remarks, ‘had long time been reserved for him as a punishment due to the multitude of horrible crimes which in his wicked life he had committed.’ Attacked by the Spaniards and their Indian allies, he was forced to retreat with heavy loss and, still hoping to retrieve his fortunes, headed southward for the coasts of Darien. And here the villain met with the end he so richly deserved. He was taken by the savage Indians of the district, was torn to pieces while alive and his limbs cast into a fire. Finally, that no trace or memory of him might remain, the savages scattered his ashes in the air.”[39]