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           THE LIVES AND ADVENTURES
                   OF SUNDRY
               NOTORIOUS PIRATES

                [Illustration]




                   PIRATES


 _With a _Foreword_ and sundry _Decorations_ by_

                C. Lovat Fraser


                [Illustration]


                  _NEW YORK:_
         ROBERT M. McBRIDE AND COMPANY
                     1922




_First American Edition_

_Printed in the United States of America_

_Printed in Great Britain by Billing and Sons, Ltd., Guildford and
Esher._




[Illustration: CAPTAIN AVERY]




[Illustration]

CONTENTS


                                                        PAGE
    Foreword                                             vii

    The Life of Captain Avery                              1

    Captain John Rackham, and his Crew                    17

    Captain Spriggs, and his Crew                         29

    Captain Edward Lowe, and his Crew                     37

    Captain George Lowther, and his Crew                  51

    Captain Anstis, and his Crew                          65

    Captain John Phillips, and his Crew                   77

    Captain Teach, _alias_ Blackbeard                     87

    Major Stede Bonnet and his Crew                      101

    Captain William Kid                                  117

    Captain Edward England, and his Crew                 135

    Captain John Gow, _alias_ Smith, and his Crew        145




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS


    Captain Avery                             _frontispiece_

    Captain John Rackham                   _facing page_  19

    Captain Edward Lowe                          "        39

    Captain Teach                                "        89

    Major Stede Bonnet                           "       103

    Captain William Kid                          "       119

    Captain Edward England                       "       137

    Captain John Gow                             "       147




[Illustration]

FOREWORD


Time, though a good Collector, is not always a reliable Historian.
That is to say, that although nothing of interest or importance is
lost, yet an affair may be occasionally invested with a glamour that
is not wholly its own. I venture to think that Piracy has fortuned in
this particular. We are apt to base our ideas of Piracy on the
somewhat vague ambitions of our childhood; and I suppose, were such a
thing possible, the consensus of opinion in our nurseries as to a
future profession in life would place Piracy but little below the
glittering heights of the police force and engine-driving. Incapable
of forgetting this in more mature years, are we not inclined to deck
Her (the "H" capital, for I speak of an ideal), if not in purple and
fine linen, at least with a lavish display of tinsel and gilt? Nursery
lore remains with us, whether we would or not, for all our lives; and
generations of ourselves, as schoolboys and pre-schoolboys, have
tricked out Piracy in so resplendent a dress that she has fairly
ousted in our affections, not only her sister profession of "High Toby
and the Road," but every other splendid and villainous vocation. Yet
Teach, Kid, and Avery were as terrible or grim as Duval, Turpin, and
Sheppard were courtly or whimsical. And the terrible is a more vital
affair than the whimsical. Is it, then, unnatural that, after a lapse
of nigh on two centuries, we should shake our wise heads and allow
that which is still nursery within us to deplore the loss of those
days when we ran--before a favouring "Trade"--the very good chance of
being robbed, maimed, or murdered by Captain Howel Davis or Captain
Neil Gow? It is as well to remember that the "Captains" in this book
were seamen whose sole qualifications to the title were ready wit, a
clear head, and, maybe, that certain indefinable "power of the eye"
that is the birth-right of all true leaders. The piratical hero of our
childhood is traceable in a great extent to the "thrillers," toy
plays, and penny theatres of our grandfathers. Here our Pirate was, as
often as not, a noble, dignified, if gloomy gentleman, with a leaning
to Byronic soliloquy. Though stern in exterior, his heart could (and
would) melt at the distresses of the heroine. Elvira's eyes were
certain to awaken in his mind the recollection of "other eyes as
innocent as thine, child." In short, he was that most touching of all
beings, the Hero-cum-Villain. And it was with a sigh of relief that we
saw him at the eleventh hour, having successfully twitted the
"Government Men" and the Excise (should he have an additional penchant
for smuggling), safely restored to the arms of the long-suffering
possessor of the other eyes.

Alas! this little book mentions no Poll of Portsmouth, nor does it
favour us with a "Yeo, heave, oh!" nor is there so very much "cut and
thrust" about it. It was written in that uninspiring day when Pirates
were a very real nuisance to such law-abiding folk as you and I; but
it has the merit of being written, if not by a Pirate, at least by one
who came into actual contact with them. I am not at all sure that
"merit" is the right word to use in this instance, for to be a Pirate
does not necessarily ensure you making a good author. Indeed, it might
almost be considered as a ban to the fine literary technique of an
Addison or a Temple. It has, however, the virtue of being in close
touch with some of the happenings chronicled. Not that our author saw
above a tithe of what he records--had he done so he would have been
"set a-sun-drying" at Execution Dock long before he had had the
opportunity of putting pen to paper; but, as far as posterity was
concerned, he was lucky in his friend William Ingram--evidently a
fellow of good memory and a ready tongue--"who," as our author states
in his Preface, "was a Pirate under Anstis, Roberts, and many others,"
and who eventually was hanged in good piratical company on the 11th
of June, 1714.

The actual history of the little book, the major part of which is here
reprinted, is as follows:

Its full title is "The History and Lives of all the most Notorious
Pirates and their Crews," and the fifth edition, from which our text
is taken, was printed in 1735. A reproduction of the original
title-page is given overleaf.

As a matter of fact, the title is misleading. How could a book that
makes no mention of Morgan or Lollonois be a history of _all_ the most
notorious Pirates? It deals with the last few years of the seventeenth
century and the first quarter of the eighteenth, a period that might
with justice be called "The Decline and Fall of Piracy," for after
1730 Piracy became but a mean broken-backed affair that bordered
perilously on mere sea-pilfering.

[Illustration: THE

HISTORY _and_ LIVES

Of all the most Notorious

PIRATES,

AND THEIR

CREWS;

From Capt. AVERY, who first settled at _Madagascar_, to Captain _John
Gow_, and _James Williams_, his Lieutenant, _&c._ who were hang'd at
_Execution Dock_, _June_ 11, 1725, for Piracy and Murther; and
afterwards hang'd in Chains between _Blackwall_ and _Deptford_. And in
this Edition continued down to the present Year 1735.

Giving a more full and true Account than any yet Publish'd, of all
their Murthers, Piracies, Maroonings, Places of Refuge, and Ways of
Living.

The Fifth Edition.

Adorned with Twenty Beautiful CUTS, being the Representation of each
Pirate.

To which is prefixed, _An Abstract of the Laws against Piracy_.

LONDON: Printed for _A. Bettesworth_ and _C. Hitch_, at the _Red Lyon_
in _Pater-noster-Row_; _R. Ware_, at the _Sun_ and _Bible_ in
_Amen-Corner_; and _J. Hodges_, at the _Looking-glass_ on
_London-bridge_. 1735.]

A little research into the book's history shows us that it is
consistent throughout, and that it is a "piracy," in the publisher's
sense of the word, of a much larger and more pretentious work by
Captain Charles Johnson, entitled, "A General History of the Pyrates
from their first Rise and Settlement in the Island of Providence to
the Present Time; With the Remarkable Actions and Adventures of the
two Female Pyrates Mary Read and Anne Bonny."

This was published in London, in 8vo., by Charles Rivington in 1724. A
second edition, considerably augmented, was issued later in the same
year, a third edition in the year following, and a fourth edition--in
two volumes, as considerable additions in the form of extra "Lives,"
and an appendix necessitated a further volume--in 1725.

This two-volume edition contained the history of the following
Pirates: Avery, Martel, Teach, Bonnet, England, Vane, Rackham, Davis,
Roberts, Anstis, Morley, Lowther, Low, Evans, Phillips, Spriggs,
Smith, Misson, Bowen, Kid, Tew, Halsey, White, Condent, Bellamy, Fly,
Howard, Lewis, Cornelius, Williams, Burgess, and North, together with
a short abstract on the Statute and Civil Law in relation to
"Pyracy," and an appendix, completing the Lives in the first volume,
and correcting some mistakes.

The work evidently enjoyed a great vogue, for it was translated into
Dutch by Robert Hannebo, of Amsterdam, in 1727, and issued there, with
several "new illustrations," in 12mo. A German version by Joachim
Meyer was printed at Gosslar in the following year, while in France it
saw the light as an appendix to an edition of Esquemeling's "Histoire
des Avanturiers," 1726.

But little is known of the author, Captain Charles Johnson, excepting
that he flourished from 1724 to 1736, and it is more than probable
that the name by which we know him is an assumed one. It is possible
that his knowledge of Pirates and Piracy was of such a nature to have
justified awkward investigations on the part of His Majesty's
Government.

There is one thing that we do know for certain about him, and that is
that the worthy Captain's spelling, according to the pirated version
of his book, was indefinite even for his own day. He was one of those
inspired folk who would be quite capable of spelling "schooner" with
three variations in as many lines. In this edition the spelling has
been more or less modernized.

Lastly, it is to be remembered that the ships of this period,
according to our modern ideas, would be the veriest cockle-shells, and
so that we should know what manner of vessel he refers to in these
pages, I had recourse to a friend of mine whose knowledge of things
nautical is extensive enough to have gained for him the coveted "Extra
Master's Certificate," and who was kind enough to supply me with the
following definitions:


[Illustration: SLOOP.

A vessel rigged as a cutter, but with one head-sail only set on a very
short bowsprit.]


[Illustration: SCHOONER.   TOPSAIL SCHOONER.

Two-masted vessels, fore and aft rigged, sometimes having square
topsails on the fore-mast.]


[Illustration: BRIGANTINE.

A two-masted vessel, square rigged on fore-mast.]


GALLEY.

A large vessel rowed by oars and sometimes having auxiliary sail of
various rigs.


PINK.

Probably a small, fast vessel used as a tender and despatch boat for
river work.


[Illustration: SNOW.

A two-masted vessel with a stay, known as a "Horse," from the
main-mast to the poop on which the trysail was set. Sometimes a spar
was fitted instead of a stay. The rig was most likely of a brig
(_i.e._, a two-masted ship, square sails on both masts), and the
triangular trysail set on the stay in bad weather or when hove to.]

    C. L. F.




[Illustration]

THE LIFE OF CAPTAIN AVERY


He was the son of _John Avery_, a victualler near _Plymouth_, in
_Devonshire_, who in a few years was grown as opulent in his purse as
in his body, by scoring two for one; and when he had so done, drinking
the most of the liquor himself. By which means, and having a handsome
wife, who knew her business as well as if she had been brought up to
it from a child (which, indeed, she mostly was, her mother keeping the
House before she married _Mr. Avery_), they soon became very rich and
very able to give credit to a whole ship's crew upon their tickets,
which in those days were sold for less than half their value.

Having but one child (afterwards the Captain), they at first resolved
to bring him up a scholar, that he might advance the dignity of the
family. But instead of learning his book, he was taught by such
companions that he could soon swear to every point of his compass,
which was a very diverting scene for the Boatswain and his crew, who
were then drinking in the kitchen, having just received ten pounds
apiece short allowance money on board the _Revenge_, every farthing of
which they spent before leaving the house.

But as soon as their money was spent, they were all like to have been
imprisoned by their Landlady for a riot, as she called it, so they
were soon glad to sheer off, and he thought himself happiest that
could get first aboard. Indeed, it would have been happy for them if
they had, for the ship was unmoored and gone to sea; which put the
Boatswain and his crew swearing in earnest, and not knowing what to
do, they resolved to return to their Landlady, _Mrs. Avery_, at "the
Sign of the _Defiance_." But she shut them out of doors, calling them
a parcel of beggarly rascals, and swearing that if they would not go
from the door she would send for the Constable; and notwithstanding
all the entreaties and tears of her only son, who was then about six
years of age, she could not be prevailed upon to let them in, so they
were obliged to stroll about the street all night. In the morning,
spying the ship at anchor, being driven back by contrary winds, they
resolved to make