The restoration of peace during the summer of 1546 failed to halt the disorder at sea, which continued to claim the attention of the council. In July it ordered the return of a French prize taken since the peace by John Frencheman of Rye. In August John Donne of Rye, captain of the Dooe, was imprisoned in the Marshalsea for seizing cloth out of a Spanish vessel. Later in the year John Thompson was still reportedly robbing Spanish ships in the Channel. Early the following year the accomplices of Cornelius Bellyne of Calais were executed for plundering Flemish vessels. Bellyne remained at sea, and was reported to be robbing the Flemish daily.80
The disorganization of the war at sea created profound difficulties for the Henrician regime. But they were a consequence of the military weaknesses of the early Tudor state which led it to promote privateering as a means of sharing the cost of the maritime conflict with private enterprise. The confusion between public and private interests that followed from this strategy was compounded with the spread of illegal and legal depredation. In effect the war at sea produced a varied pattern of indiscriminate and disorderly spoil. Small-scale, opportunistic raiding, involving short-distance voyages into the Channel and its approaches, including the North Sea and the Irish Sea, remained a characteristic feature of the conflict. But it was accompanied by the emergence of longer-distance venturing into the eastern Atlantic, which was larger in scale and ambition. Inevitably the emergence of Atlantic privateering and piracy was focused on the spoil of Iberian trade. The vulnerability of Spanish and Portuguese commerce during these years was underlined by the plunder of four Portuguese vessels in the harbour of Munguia by English adventurers during March 1546. The English seized a rich haul of sugar, and carried off one vessel laden with oil, ivory, pepper and other commodities of great value. However, the boldness of the attack provoked unease and disunity among the raiders. The master of the John of Kingswear was derided by some of the company as a coward who was more suited to keep sheep than to be a master of a man-of-war.81
Although these private actions of plunder provoked widespread complaint, they were supported by leading officials and courtiers in a way that served to sanction the activities of men such as Reneger and Wyndham. Under these conditions the predatory activities and ambitions of the English were re-shaped and re-directed during the 1540s with profound consequences for their subsequent development. The scale and intensity of the disorder at sea unavoidably confused the distinction between piracy and privateering. Although piracy was overshadowed, if not obscured, by the spread of disorderly plunder, it did not disappear from the waters of the British Isles. But the kind of opportunistic and localized piracy which flourished during the 1530s, and which persisted in some regions, seems to have been displaced by competing forms of licensed and unlicensed privateering. In some cases the change was little more than cosmetic. The war created more opportunities for small-scale rovers to exploit, as demonstrated by the attack on the John of Middelburg in the harbour of St Aubin, in Jersey, during July 1546. At the same time, the economic potential of privateering provided an opportunity for larger-scale venturing to flourish, organized in a more business-like fashion by merchants and shipowners. Moreover, some of this venturing was sustained by an extensive and illicit commerce in plundered commodities. Shore-based networks of supporters were essential to the maintenance and elaboration of English depredation during these years. Merchants such as Thomas Edmunds of Scarborough, who purchased goods ‘under very suspicious circumstances … for much less and smaller sums and prices than they were worth’, provided markets for rovers, in concealed transactions that took place in unusual conditions, sometimes at night and usually involving a rapid re-sale to hinder detection.82 By these and other means the appeal of maritime depredation was widely and deeply scattered during the 1540s.
Notes
1. Sir G. Warner (ed.), The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye: A Poem on the Use of Sea–Power 1436 (Oxford, 1926), pp. 32, 41–2; M. Opp. enheim, A History of the Administration of the Royal Navy and of Merchant Shipp. ing in Relation to the Navy from 1509 to 1660 (London, 1896, repr. Aldershot, 1988), pp. 15–18; D. Loades, The Tudor Navy: An Administrative, Political and Military History (Aldershot, 1992), pp. 25–8; Rodger, Safeguard of the Sea, pp. 145–7.
2. I.F. Grant, Highland Folk Ways (London, 1961), pp. 253–5; Rev. J. MacInnes, ‘West Highland Sea Power in the Middle Ages’, Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness, 48 (1972–74), pp. 529–45; Rodger, Safeguard of the Sea, pp. 166–8; Orkneyinga Saga: The History of the Earls of Orkney, trans. H. Palsson and P. Edwards (London, 1978), pp. 215–6 for an account of a ‘good Viking trip’ which indicates the early significance of feasting, plunder and gifts. For raiding and the persistence of piracy into the early seventeenth century see A. I. Macinnes, Clanship, Commerce and the House of Stuart, 1603–1788 (East Linton, 1996), pp. 33–5, 64–5, 68.
3. A.L. Rowse, Tudor Cornwall: Portrait of a Society (London, 1941), pp. 108–9; F.E. Halliday (ed.), Richard Carew of Antony: The Survey of Cornwall (London, 1953), pp. 210, 226–7.
4. C.L. Kingsford, Prejudice and Promise in Fifteenth Century England (Oxford, 1925, repr. London, 1962), pp. 87–102. For earlier examples see Calendar of Inquisitions Miscellaneous (Chancery): Volume VII 1422–1485 (Woodbridge, 2003), pp. 27–8, 38, 89–91, 93–6, 124–5, 131–4; C.F. Richmond, ‘The Earl of Warwick’s Domination of the Channel and the Naval Dimension to the Wars of the Roses, 1456–1460’, Southern History, 20–21 (1998–99), pp. 6–14.
5. CPR 1476–85, pp. 146, 355–6, 517–8, 545.
6. CPR 1476–85, p. 79.
7. CPR 1476–85, pp. 78–9, 356, 370–1.
8. CPR 1476–85, pp. 493–4; Kingsford, Prejudice, pp. 105–6.
9. CPR 1476–85, p. 520.
10. Kingsford, Prejudice, pp. 105–6; S. Cunningham, Henry VII (London, 2006), pp. 261–2.
11. CPR 1485–94, pp. 105, 108; Tudor Proclamations, I, pp. 25–6.
12. G. Connell–Smith, Forerunners of Drake: A Study of English Trade with Spain in the early Tudor Period (London, 1954, repr. Westport, CT, 1975), pp. 38, 58.
13. CPR 1494–1509, pp. 44, 61; Tudor Proclamations, I, pp. 44–5. The Magnus Intercursus of 1496 also included provision for dealing with piracy and reprisals in a diplomatic way. C.H. Williams (ed.), England under the Tudors 1485–1529 (London, 1925), pp. 254–5; Loades, Tudor Navy, pp. 46–7.
14. CPR 1494–1509, p. 290.
15. LP 1509–14, I, pp. 289, 593, 599, 605; I.F. Grant, The Social and Economic Development of Scotland before 1603 (Edinburgh, 1930), pp. 342–3.
16. LP 1509–14, I, pp. 593, 605; II, p. 1425.
17. LP 1515–18, I, pp. 221–2; II, pp. 1118, 1124, 1182–4, 1232, 1374–5; J.A. Williamson, Maritime Enterprise 1458–1558 (Oxford, 1913), p. 365.
18. LP 1515–18, II, pp. 1374–5; LP 1519–23, I, p. 91; Tudor Proclamations, I, p. 131.
19. LP 1509–14, I, p. 718 (the petition was dated 1513).
20. LP 1509–14, I, p. 718.
21. NAW, I, pp. 160–71; D.B. Quinn, England and the Discovery of America, 1481–1620 (London, 1973), pp. 163–8.
22. LP 1515–18, I, p. 72; LP 1519–23, I, pp. 75, 131; II, p. 1392. As the King’s lieutenant in Ireland, Surrey also responded vigorously to the threat from pirates, Brewer et al. (eds.), Carew Manuscripts, I, pp. 11, 20.
23. LP 1524–26, p. 791; LP 1526–28, pp. 1627, 1852, 1886; LP 1529–30, pp. 2172, 2257, 2264; M. St Clair Byrne (ed.), The Lisle Letters, 6 vols. (London, 1981), I, pp. 183–4, 396–7.
24. LP 1529–30, pp. 2650–1, 3193; LP 1534, p. 447.
25. LP 1531–32, pp. 14, 190, 198, 424–5, 707.
26. LP 1531–32, pp. 424–5; Byrne (ed.), Lisle Letters, I, pp. 258, 545, 663.
27. LP 1533, pp. 54, 66–7, 75, 110, 129, 175.
28. LP 1533, p. 512; LP 1534, pp. 85, 135, 535, 587; LP 1535, I, pp. 75, 87, 89, 175; Byrne (ed.), Lisle Letters, II, pp. 72–4, 101–2, 111, 189. The report of Broode’s execution indicated that it was for trea
son rather than piracy.
29. LP 1535, II, pp. 291, 354, 365, 377; HCA 1/33, f. 9.
30. LP 1535, II, p. 354; LP 1537, I, p. 274; LP 1540–41, pp. 446, 448; H.A. Lloyd, The Gentry of South–West Wales, 1540–1640 (Cardiff, 1968), pp. 161–2.
31. LP Addenda, I, part 1, p. 339; Byrne (ed.), Lisle Letters, II, pp. 112–3.
32. LP Addenda, I, part 1, pp. 339–40.
33. G.R. Elton (ed.), The Tudor Constitution (2nd edition, Cambridge, 1982), pp. 158–9; P. Williams, The Tudor Regime (Oxford, 1979), pp. 244–5.
34. LP 1537, I, pp. 339, 421, 525; II, pp. 81–2, 90, 167; HCA 1/37, ff. 1, 9, 16v–9v; HCA 1/33, ff. 16–9v; Byrne (ed.), Lisle Letters, IV, p. 293.
35. LP 1536, II, pp. 115, 122, 442–3; LP 1537, II, pp. 225–6.
36. LP 1537, II, pp. 159, 220–1, 224, 305; Byrne (ed.), Lisle Letters, IV, pp. 273–6, 367, 415. Pirates were also active off the coast of Kent and the Isle of Wight, D. Childs, The Warship Mary Rose: The Life and Times of King Henry VIII’s Flagship (London, 2007), p. 151.
37. Byrne (ed.), Lisle Letters, V, pp. 38, 55; LP 1538, II, p. 158.
38. LP 1538, p. 61; HCA 1/33, ff. 60–70v and for the rest of this paragraph.
39. Select Pleas, I, pp. 73–4. Pirates and rovers used stones, fireworks and a variety of small weapons, G.V. Scammell, ‘European Seamanship in the Great Age of Discovery’, MM, 68 (1982), p. 368 reprinted in Ships, Oceans and Empire: Studies in European Maritime and Colonial History, 1400–1750 (Aldershot, 1995).
40. LP 1538, p. 431; LP 1539, I, pp. 365, 436; II, p. 43. About the same time, a Breton ship was attacked by pirates off the Scilly Isles, and members of the company were bound and cast overboard, HCA 1/33, ff. 47–8.
41. HCA 1/33, ff. 41–5.
42. Byrne (ed.), Lisle Letters, V, p. 387; LP 1539, I, p. 97.
43. HCA 1/33, ff. 16–8v.
44. LP 1539, I, pp. 27, 105, 111, 127.
45. LP 1539, I, pp. 436, 455, 477; HCA 1/33, ff. 47–8.
46. Connell–Smith, Forerunners, p. 140; HCA 1/33, ff. 10–11.
47. R.G. Marsden (ed.), ‘Voyage of the Barbara to Brazil, A.D. 1540’ in Naval Miscellany II (Navy Records Society, 40, 1912), pp. 3–66.
48. LP 1540, pp. 365, 502; LP 1540–41, pp. 21, 70–1, 160, 165; R.K. Hannay (ed.), The Letters of James V (Edinburgh, 1954), pp. 401–2, 407, 413.
49. LP 1540–41, p. 493; Hannay (ed.), Letters, pp. 401, 430–1, 407, 413.
50. LP 1542, pp. 343, 369–70, 456, 531. (Hereafter referred to as council).
51. LP 1544, II, p. 337.
52. LP 1543, I, pp. 186, 189, 231, 239; Connell–Smith, Forerunners, pp. 130–2; Rodger, Safeguard of the Sea, pp. 182–4.
53. LP 1543, I, pp. 199, 231, 282, 287; APC 1542–47, pp. 108–10, 112, 115. In 1522 Fletcher was described as one of the ‘wisest masters within the town of Rye’, C.S. Knighton and D. Loades (eds.), Letters from the Mary Rose (Stroud, 2002).
54. LP 1543, I, p. 245; II, p. 3; Connell–Smith, Forerunners, pp. 134–6; ODNB, ‘Sir John Russell’.
55. LP 1545, I, p. 622.
56. Select Pleas, I, pp. 139–41.
57. LP 1544, II, p. 177; J.A. Williamson, Sir John Hawkins: The Life and the Man (Oxford, 1927), pp. 9–19.
58. LP 1544, II, p. 337; Oppenheim, Administration, p. 88; Knighton and Loades (eds.), Letters, p. 108.
59. LP 1544, I, pp. 122, 128.
60. LP 1544, II, pp. 337, 359, 361–2, 370–1, 379.
61. APC 1542–47, p. 123; LP 1544, II, p. 456; Tudor Proclamations, I, pp. 345–6. On the damage to fishing see W.G. Hoskins, The Age of Plunder: The England of Henry VIII 1509–1547 (London, 1976), pp. 185–7.
62. APC 1542–47, pp. 158, 176–7, 187–8; Williamson, Maritime Enterprise, pp. 265–8, 270–5; Williamson, Hawkins, pp. 26–30; Connell–Smith, Forerunners, pp. 137–8.
63. LP 1545, I, pp. 454–5, 533–5; Williamson, Maritime Enterprise, pp. 272–3; Connell–Smith, Forerunners, pp. 141–52.
64. LP 1545, I, pp. 460, 612; APC 1542–47, pp. 220–1.
65. LP 1545, I, pp. 105, 130, 145; G.V. Scammell, ‘War at Sea under the Early Tudors: Some Newcastle upon Tyne Evidence’, Archaeologia Aeliana, 38 (1960), pp. 95–6.
66. LP 1545, I, pp. 234, 245, 331; Select Pleas, I, pp. 136–7.
67. Tudor Proclamations, I, p. 348; Loades, Tudor Navy, p. 130.
68. LP 1545, I, p. 636; CSPI 1509–73, pp. 72, 74; HCA 1/34, ff. 22–2v, 26v, 30–1v.
69. LP 1545, I, pp. 631, 653; II, pp. 3, 66, 153; Williamson, Maritime Enterprise, pp. 392–3. It has been argued that cheaper iron ordnance aided the spread of piracy after 1544, P. E.J. Hammer, Elizabeth’s Wars: War, Government and Society in Tudor England, 1544–1604 (Basingstoke, 2003), p. 80.
70. APC 1542–47, pp. 206, 208, 210–11.
71. APC 1542–47, pp. 275, 282. The arrest of Irish shipping in Spain also led to demands for reprisals against Spanish and Flemish ships, CSPI 1509–73, p. 72.
72. LP 1546, I, pp. 203, 229, 289–90, 371, 378.
73. LP 1546, I, p. 275.
74. LP 1546, I, pp. 371, 373; APC 1542–47, pp. 363–4, 383, 386, 402–3.
75. APC 1542–47, pp. 427–30; HCA 1/34, ff. 19–22; A.K. Longfield, Anglo–Irish Trade in the Sixteenth Century (London, 1929), pp. 157–8, 179.
76. LP 1546, I, p. 360; APC 1542–47, p. 398.
77. LP 1546, I, pp. 363, 471, 490, 519, 539, 662, 697–8; II, p. 55; APC 1542–47, pp. 438–9, 441; NAW, I, pp. 207–15 for Hore.
78. LP 1546, I, pp. 454, 667; APC 1542–47, pp. 431–2, 452, 455–6.
79. Calendar, pp. 3–4; Connell–Smith, Forerunners, pp. 165–8; G.V. Scammell, ‘War at Sea under the Early Tudors– Part II’, Archaeologia Aeliana, 39 (1961), pp. 180–1 for a description of a small man–of–war.
80. LP 1546, I, p. 698.
81. LP 1546, I, p. 497; APC 1542–47, p. 446; Connell–Smith, Forerunners, pp. 158–63.
82. Select Pleas, I, pp. 141, 236–7.
2
Pirates and Rebellious Rovers during the 1540s and 1550s
English piracy and disorderly depredation remained a persistent problem during the period from the end of Henry VIII’s war with France to the closing years of the reign of his daughter, Mary I, when renewed conflict with the French led to the loss of Calais. The intervening years were a profoundly difficult period for the Tudor regime, which was marked by weak royal rule, religious rivalries and mounting economic and social tension. International conflict, social unrest and rebellion created a fertile environment for seaborne plunder in many parts of north-west Europe, undermining the ability of rulers to deal with the threat of lawlessness at sea, while commercial crisis and change, including the decline and disruption of the fishing trades in England, helped to expand the recruiting grounds for piracy and privateering. To a considerable degree the maintenance of English plunder during these years was an elaboration of patterns of activity that were established during the 1520s and 1530s. Consequently piracy and other forms of maritime depredation varied in intensity and scale. Casual, opportunistic and locally based spoil remained a widespread and persistent menace, but it was overlaid by more organized enterprise, especially within a region linking the West Country and south Wales with southern Ireland. The combination of domestic weakness and external threat encouraged the spread of disorderly plunder, but in a way which reflected a broader shift in English overseas relations. The rapid growth of anti-Spanish hostility promoted predatory venturing to the coasts of Spain and Portugal, where richer prizes were readily available. At the same time, the activities of an ill-assorted group of rebellious rovers and privateers, operating from bases in France against the Marian regime, indicated that under certain conditions piratical enterprise could acquire a political purpose that was also patriotic and popular.
Piracy, sea roving and privateering during the later 1540s and 1550s
The mid-Tudor regimes struggled to contain the spread of maritime disorder during the later 1540s and 1550s. A
lthough Henry VIII had created one of the largest navies in Europe, it struggled to deal with the spread of small-scale depredation. For much of the period English, Scottish and French rovers remained active in the Channel, indulging in indiscriminate petty spoil. The haphazard and apparently erratic nature of such activity conceals subtle distinctions between different types of sea roving, which ranged across a spectrum of dubious legality. Although piracy and privateering continued to be confused, officially the state sought to maintain a clear distinction between legitimate and illegitimate plunder, partly in response to overseas complaint, but also in order to retain a lawful means of redress and reprisal. Nonetheless, privateering was becoming an established expedient for waging war at sea, though it was difficult to regulate effectively. As the experience of the 1540s indicated, inexorably it led to the growth of disorderly plunder and piracy.
Undercover, or in the guise, of lawful depredation, piratical activity grew increasingly organized and purposeful. One of the most striking developments of the later 1540s and 1550s was the emergence of a group of pirate captains who appear to have made a career out of plunder. Such men, including John Thompson, Henry Strangeways and Richard Coole (or Cole), formed a loose network of rovers and pirates, though they were as much potential competitors as partners. These groups of rovers operated in fairly well-defined hunting grounds, supported by an informal exchange economy, that is almost hidden from view, in markets on either side of the Irish Sea, encouraging the use of temporary bases in southern Ireland. Though publicly proclaimed as notorious pirates, men like Thompson were capable of skirting the boundaries between illegal and legal enterprise, serving as captains of pirate ships and men-of-war. While the activities of these ‘head pirates’ were sustained by a favourable social and economic environment, their survival also owed much to the weaknesses of the mid-Tudor monarchy.1
Under the Bloody Flag Page 7
