Under the Bloody Flag

by John C Appleby

  Although the growth of privateering drew on the strength of localized piracy, it was shaped by deeper undercurrents which linked predatory overseas commercial expansion with anti-Spanish hostility. Commercial and religious rivalries lent new direction to seaborne depredation, with far-reaching consequences for the development of piracy and privateering. Merchants and shipowners in the provincial ports of the south and south-west played a key role in what was to become a prolonged, intermittent assault on Spanish trade and shipping. The leading figures in this rising tide of organized plunder during the 1540s included William Hawkins of Plymouth and Robert Reneger of Southampton, both of whom had extensive trading interests in the Iberian Peninsula. Hawkins was one of the pioneers of English commercial enterprise in the Atlantic, developing interests in the Brazil and Guinea trades during the 1530s. Reneger was also involved in the Brazil trade. The character of this expansion was inherently aggressive, attracting not just prominent provincial traders but also ambitious adventurers of dubious reputation, such as Thomas Wyndham, who were tempted into the illicit spoil of Iberian shipping during the 1540s. Wyndham was a naval commander with experience of serving aboard private ships-of-war, including one owned by Lord Russell. The anti-Spanish interests of these adventurers were shared by a younger generation of courtiers, particularly Sir Thomas Seymour, who were part of an increasingly powerful group of evangelical, if not Protestant sympathisers.62 Several of Seymour’s captains came to the attention of the council during these years for their attacks on ships belonging to the Emperor’s subjects, Flemish as well as Spanish.

  Drake’s Island and Plymouth Sound, Devon. Formerly known as St Nicholas’ Island, it acquired the name of Drake’s Island during the later sixteenth century. The island was fortified in 1549 to defend the port against overseas attack. As well as the link with Drake, Plymouth was the home of the Hawkins family. (Author’s collection)

  The prospect of richer Iberian prizes, laden with cargoes of American treasure, lured English raiders into the Atlantic, laying the foundations for the emergence of long-distance plunder. Reneger’s seizure of the San Salvador, off Cape St Vincent, laden with gold, sugar and pearls valued at 19,315 ducats, provoked a crisis in relations with Spain, but it also demonstrated the attraction of this kind of enterprise. On his return to England, Reneger informed the Privy Council of the incident and placed some of the plunder in the Tower of London. In June 1545 the Imperial ambassador in London complained that Reneger, instead of ‘being punished like a pirate, was treated like a hero’. Furthermore, he warned that ‘the English mean to seize everything they meet at sea as French and then refer claimants to the Admiralty’.63 Within weeks Reneger was reported to have seized a French vessel laden with Spanish commodities, returning from the Levant.

  Although reports that the King intended to recall privateers and halt the issue of commissions of reprisal were premature, the council tried to limit the danger of indiscriminate plunder by instructing officials in provincial ports, like Bristol, to take bonds of adventurers not to attack the subjects of the Emperor. However, these instructions did little to reduce the volume of complaint to the council from Spanish and Flemish merchants whose vessels continued to be seized by English raiders of varying legality. Early in July 1545 the council issued orders for the release of three Spanish vessels brought into Plymouth by the King’s ships. Later in the month, William Hawkins was imprisoned at the council’s command during the course of a bitterly contested dispute over the ownership of plundered commodities, which were eventually restored to their Spanish owners.64

  The problem of disorderly depredation, while showing no sign of abating during 1545, was an inescapable consequence of the conduct of the war at sea. Faced with fighting an expensive conflict on two fronts, the regime was compelled to rely on private adventurers to undertake various duties at sea which were subsidized by the returns from plunder. But the difficulty in implementing this strategy was underlined by the lukewarm, if not indifferent, response from the east-coast ports to the council’s persuasions in 1544. After further negotiations, by February 1545 Shrewsbury informed the council that the port of Hull was prepared to send out six vessels at its own charge. According to Shrewsbury the ships would perform a combination of public and private duties, enabling the Hull men to keep open their trade while frustrating the enemy. Their success might also encourage others. Indeed, within a few weeks officials in Newcastle indicated that they were willing to send out two ships.65

  Though these arrangements were intended to alleviate the pressure on the King’s Navy, the main priority of private adventurers was profit. During April and May 1545 ships of Hull seized neutral vessels from the Low Countries and elsewhere on the grounds that they were carrying Scottish cargoes. John Dove, one of the leading adventurers in Hull, plundered several vessels from Pomerania and Denmark, as well as a Flemish ship reportedly carrying Scottish goods and a passenger bearing letters from the Pope. Several weeks later a vessel of Bremen was forced into Newcastle by bad weather, where it was plundered of provisions and tackling by John Iven of Hull. The plunder amounted to less than £10 in total, but it included a range of useful accessories such as an anchor and cable; a compass and lead line; eight bow staves, five axes and a sword; ten hats and two caps; four pairs of shoes and one pair of boots; a doublet and a pair of hose. Yet the actions of men-of-war along the east coast failed to contain the spread of Scottish depredation. By April 1545 Scottish privateers, who were using bases in Normandy and Brittany, were reported to have taken plunder from the English, valued at between 30,000 and 40,000 crowns.66

  In a further attempt to encourage and organize private enterprise at sea, the King issued a proclamation in April 1545, appointing ‘John of Calais’ as the captain of ‘Ships of Marque’, with the power to levy recruits on both sides of the Channel ‘as shall offer themselves to serve at their own adventure’.67 Soldiers, servants and apprentices were ineligible for service without a special licence from their masters or captains. But the proclamation had a limited impact. Shortly after its publication the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Sir Anthony St Leger, informed the council that John Hill seized two French prizes off the Irish coast; however, like many others he seems to have been operating independently of government control, though he was seeking a commission to levy men and provisions. His request was supported by St Leger whose brother, Robert, had a ship furnished for war which he intended to send out in consort with Hill.68

  The uneasy relationship between the early Tudor regime and private adventurers encouraged the growth of aggressive spoil at sea, blurring the distinction between legal and illegal plunder. At the same time it contained inherent weaknesses which were demonstrated during the crisis of July 1545, when a French naval force sailed into the Solent after raiding Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight. The regime struggled throughout the summer to assemble a fleet off Portsmouth. Orders were sent to the ports of the south-west recalling adventurers from the sea and for a press of all mariners, but they met with a tardy response. A varied force of vessels from the region reached Portsmouth by early August; nonetheless, there were complaints that many had failed to respond to demands from London. Moreover, some of those already at Portsmouth abandoned the service. The Lord Admiral complained that many were ‘wholly given to pillage and robbery’.69

  Although the King came under pressure from the council to make peace with France, the war lingered on until June 1546, becoming increasingly disorderly at sea during its closing stages. The seizure of Spanish and Flemish ships persisted, despite the concern of Henry and his diplomatic representatives. Scattered reports and complaints to the council demonstrate the extent of these attacks. Despite the emphasis of such evidence on the unruly and uncontrolled nature of the war at sea, privateering, loosely defined and regulated, was an organized business based on extensive networks of suppliers for the provisioning and fitting out of men-of-war. It was heavily concentrated in the port towns of the south and south-west, and Calais on the other sid
e of the Channel. While provincial shipowners and traders were deeply involved in the business, it attracted the interest of some London merchants as well as officials and courtiers, including the Lord Admiral, John Dudley, Viscount Lisle, who had extensive interests in shipping. Under the shadow of the wars with France and Scotland, the regime had called into being a voluntary force of seaborne predators which it could neither control nor direct effectively.

  During 1545 the council instructed privateers to use the Emperor’s subjects in a ‘gentle sort’, but shipping from the Low Countries and Spain continued to bear the brunt of English aggression at sea.70 Throughout the summer the council was forced to intervene in cases of spoil, in response to complaints from Flemish, Iberian and other neutral traders. Early in June it ordered the return of a lading of canvas plundered by Freeman of Calais out of a ship bound for Flanders; later in the month it issued orders for the restoration of the Mary of Dunkirk which had been brought into Plymouth. Despite this, and other interventions, the council was unable to stop the seizure of neutral shipping at sea.

  The persistence of such unruly depredation invited retaliation. In September 1545 the council heard complaints concerning the detention of a Chester ship in Spain. Several months later it received a petition from Robert Thorne of Bristol on behalf of Walter Roberts, the captain of a local ship, who had been driven by bad weather into San Sebastián with five French prizes, where he was arrested and imprisoned by officials of the inquisition. The arrest of English ships in Spanish ports complicated the council’s efforts to prevent attacks on Iberian vessels. In any case the disciplining of disorderly captains was occasionally tempered by public and private circumstances. In December 1545 George Butshed was freed from a long spell of imprisonment, for unruly spoil at sea, after ‘shewing himself very repentant for his lewdness committed by rage of youth without due consideracion, and promessing to be hereafter of honest behavour’.71

  During the later stages of the conflict the council was faced with a growing number of cases concerning irregular spoil which were essentially piratical in nature. In January 1546 it established an inquiry into the seizure of a Flemish ship, taken by English adventurers and reportedly sold in Ireland. A few weeks later it faced complaints about the plunder of a Spanish ship off Plymouth. In this case the council acknowledged that the attack was piracy; those involved, who had been taken, were to be handed over to the deputy of the Lord Admiral for punishment. At the end of March it ordered the arrest of John Thompson following complaints of the plunder of several Flemish vessels laden with pepper and other goods valued at 40,000 ducats. Several weeks later it investigated reports of the robbery of two Spanish ships by a Falmouth vessel, the captain of which ‘was said to keep an inn there and to be blemished in one eye’.72 According to the governor of Calais, ‘every Spaniard, Portugall or Fleming that comes from the South is robbed by our adventurers, some calling themselves Scots and some with vizers’.73

  In response to the growing volume of complaint, in April 1546 the council issued instructions to officials in the Cinque Ports and in the south-west to detain men-of-war in port and to recall those at sea. It also ordered the arrest of several of the leaders involved in the spoil of neutral shipping in the Channel, including William Trymel of Rye and John Thompson, one of the western adventurers based in Calais. In May, Trymel was committed to the Tower, under instructions from the council that he was to be denied any visitors. But the regime found it difficult to apply an effective remedy to the problem of illicit plunder and piracy, not least because of the increasing number of ‘wandering freebooters’ of varying nationalities who were operating in the Channel.74

  As the activities of Trymel and Thompson indicated, English rovers used local ports as bases for their raids, exploiting the potential of Calais as a cross-Channel haven, while disposing of plunder in markets scattered across the coastal regions of southern England and Ireland. As during the 1450s and 1460s there was a lively, informal trade in plundered cargoes which supported piracy and privateering. Plunder brought into Ilfracombe and Barnstaple by Thompson and Trymel was purchased by local merchants, including Roger Worthe, John Hollond, Henry Cade, Robert Cade and John Shapter (alias Butler), who re-sold part of it to ‘sundry other gentilmen and others farre under the just valewe of the same’.75 On investigating the case, the council ordered the restoration of the stolen goods. It also commanded those purchasers who had acquired the goods below their market value, to pay an additional sum of two shillings for every pound of pepper, cloves or sugar to the owners, partly to dissuade men of their status from dealing in pirates’ plunder.

  Despite the order recalling men-of-war, the regime continued to allow adventurers to put to sea on lawful voyages of reprisal. In May 1546 the King licensed John Frencheman of Rye to set out for the North Sea with two small vessels and a row boat on condition that he ‘behave well towards the King’s subjects and friends and … register all prizes at the first English port’.76 Later in the month the council issued a licence to Henry Golding, captain of the Bark Ager, for a similar voyage with two pinnaces of Plymouth manned with eighty men. Yet the inability of the regime to control the activities of such vessels was exposed by the disorderly depredations committed by ships-of-war sent out by members of Henry’s increasingly divided and factionalized court, including the Lord Admiral and the Seymour brothers who were uncles of the King’s son and heir. One of the Lord Admiral’s vessels, under Captain Richard Gray, seized a Flemish prize laden with sugar and wines off the coast of Barbary, with the assistance of a ship of Sir Thomas Seymour, under the command of Richard Hore, an experienced sea captain. Hore led an expedition across the Atlantic in 1536, apparently with the purpose of exploring the region beyond Newfoundland. According to a later account, however, the expedition ran out of provisions, leading some of the company to resort to cannibalism; in harrowing circumstances, Hore and the survivors returned to England aboard a French vessel which they seized in exchange for their own ship. Another of Seymour’s captains, Robert Bruse, came to the attention of the council for his attacks on neutral shipping in the Channel. Following the plunder of a merchant of Antwerp, the council issued orders for Bruse’s arrest in June 1546. In addition Seymour’s brother, Edward, 1st Earl of Hertford, was also involved in cross-Channel raiding and pillaging. During May 1546 he informed the King that one of his vessels had brought in three small prizes laden with victuals, after a brief cruise along the coast of France.77

  As Lisle predicted, the attack on neutral trade and shipping provoked angry protests from the Emperor’s subjects. However, it was the council, not the ageing King, which increasingly had to deal with the problem. Although some cases of spoil were passed on to the High Court of Admiralty, the diplomatic and political implications of the plunder of neutral traders compelled the council to take a leading role in handling complaints and resolving disputes, in an effort to limit the damage of English excesses at sea. Thus it sought to restore illegally plundered cargoes; it issued orders for the arrest of unruly captains, such as Bruse; and it ordered the investigation of suspected cases of piracy.

  The pressure of such business consumed more of the council’s time during the final months of the war. Towards the end of May 1546 it instructed the Lord Admiral to recall two adventurers, Robert and John Bellyne, who were allegedly attacking vessels of Flushing. At the same time it dealt with complaints against John Malyne of Calais, who was ordered to appear before the council on charges of piracy and spoil following the disposal of plundered commodities in Ireland. Several days later it issued letters of assistance for the recovery of goods taken by English adventurers out of a Spanish vessel. The following month it issued orders for the arrest of various rovers or pirates who had seized a vessel of Lübeck off the coast of Cornwall, and set the master and company adrift in the ship’s boat. By mid-June it was investigating complaints against an English captain who was accused of selling booty in Cork with the connivance of the mayor.78

  Much of this
maritime activity was in the form of petty marauding by small vessels carrying a variety of armaments, which produced modest returns from the plunder of shipping in local waters, as is suggested by several cases dealt with by the High Court of Admiralty during the latter part of the war. In April 1546, for example, a small man-of-war, the Mary Anne, plundered a Spanish ship off Dursey Head of wines and other goods which were owned by Frenchmen. According to the master of the Mary Anne, the proceeds of the spoil amounted to £100. Out of this total the purser retained £18 for the owners of the ship to purchase victuals; the remainder was divided among the ship’s company. The master’s own share amounted to 13s 4d in cash, and included a sword, crossbow and a pair of horns. A few months later another Spanish vessel, the Sancta Maria del Guadeloupe, laden with iron and woad for various merchants of Chester, was attacked by a small ship under the command of Michael James. The English assaulted the Spanish ‘very fiercely with guns and arrows’, plundered the cargo and left the ship four leagues from land.79 Though the Spanish sailed on to Waterford, within sight of the harbour they were approached by another small vessel, manned by a group of rovers led by Leonard Sumpter. When the latter got within gun shot of the Sancta Maria the crew apparently fled in fear for their lives, taking with them some of the iron. Sumpter seized the abandoned ship, carried it off to Penarth in south Wales and subsequently claimed it as a casualty of the sea.