The Whydah

by Martin W. Sandler

  Before the largest crowd ever to have been packed into the huge courtroom, the charges against the accused were read. “So it is,” proclaimed one of the court officials, “that . . . Simon Van Vorst, John Brown, Thomas South, Thomas Baker, Hendrick Quintor, Peter Cornelius Hoof, and John Shuan, To the High displeasure of Almighty God, in open Violation of the Rights of Nations and Mankind, and in Contempt and Defyance of His Majesty’s good and wholesome Laws aforesaid, Willfully, Wickedly, and Feloniously . . . Perpetrated and Committed on the high Sea sundry Acts of Piracy and Robbery.”

  The court official also made clear just what the penalty would be if any or all of the pirates were found guilty of the crimes of which they were accused. “That such Persons,” he declared, “as shall be . . . found Guilty of Piracy, Robbery & Felony committed in, or upon the Sea or in any Haven, River, Creek or Place where the Admiral or Admirals have Power, Authority or Jurisdiction, by their own Confessions, or their Refusing to Plead, or upon the Oath of Witnesses . . . shall be Executed and put to Death.”

  With the charges read and the penalty for these crimes made clear, each of the accused was asked to state how he pleaded. After each proclaimed himself to be not guilty, it was time for the king’s Advocate, known only as Mr. Smith, to make his case. He began by reminding the court of what a singularly horrendous crime piracy was. Piracy, Smith declared, involved “Treason, Oppression, Murder, Assassination, Robbery and Theft.” It was, Smith stated, carried out “in remote and Solitary Places, where the weak and Defenceless can expect no Assistance nor Relief.” That stated, Smith then informed the court that he would be introducing a number of witnesses whose testimony would prove that “the Prisoners are all and each of them Guilty.”

  THE TRIAL of the Whydah pirates drew huge interest throughout the American colonies, but particularly in Boston, where the proceedings took place. It was about much more than the guilt or innocence of the men who stood before the court. In becoming pirates, the men of the Whydah, like almost all of their counterparts, declared themselves to be their own men, above all authority. The British government regarded the trials and executions of any pirates they could catch as important opportunities to demonstrate to the public and all other pirates that true authority lay with the king, the government, and the Church.

  Sam Bellamy and his men terrorized the shipping lanes in an era that placed great value on rituals. And in its determination to demonstrate its authority, the British government followed three procedures in dealing with the pirates they apprehended: the trial itself, sermons directed at the accused pirates, and the execution of all pirates convicted of their crimes.

  The purpose of the trial was to reveal that pirates were subhuman creatures and the enemies of mankind. It was designed to be great theater. Court officials explained the nature of the pirates’ crimes and argued that their crimes exceeded all other transgressions and that the pirates needed not only to be convicted, but also to receive the harshest punishment possible. The Puritan Church regarded pirates as the worst of all sinners and ensured that, as pirate historian Philip Gosse has written, constant sermons were directed at the convicted, so that “almost every hour between the passing of the sentence and the carrying out of the execution was devoted to the spiritual salvation of the condemned.”

  As the author Andrew Harken Hall has observed, “The struggle for authority between pirates and the government ended in the hanging of the pirate and then the public display of his corpse.” This final ritual was designed to hammer home the message that there were brutal consequences to being a pirate. “Thus we see what a disastrous Fate, ever attends the Wicked,” wrote Daniel Defoe in his General History of the Pyrates. “’Tis to be hoped that the Examples of these Deaths . . . warn others from the same Shipwreck and Ruin for the Future.”

  Though many pirates met this fate, their legends survived long after them, and the romantic way in which they were regarded by so many still lives with us today.

  Smith’s first witness was Thomas Fitzgerald, who had been a mate aboard the wine-carrying Mary Anne. He testified that Bellamy and his men “all Armed with Mosquets, Pistols and Cutlasses” had “forcibly taken Command” of that ship. Fitzgerald then described how the Whydah’s pirates plundered the large cargo of wine and stole “some Cloaths which belonged to the Ship’s Company.” He made specific mention of how pirate Simon Van Vorst had threatened to break the cook’s neck “if he would not find Liquor” for the marauding pirates.

  One of the next to testify was Thomas Checkley, who had been a sailor aboard the merchant ship Tanner, which had been captured by the Whydah in March 1717. Checkley testified that, despite anything the accused might say about being forced to become pirates, he had seen firsthand that Captain Bellamy and his men “forced no Body to go with them” and “would take no Body against their Wills.” As an example, Checkley described how his shipmate John Shuan had “declared himself to be now a Pirate” and “went up and unriggd the Main top-mast by order of the [Whydah] pyrates.”

  There then followed other individuals, all of whom swore that they had been eyewitness to the fact that each of the accused was a member of the Whydah’s crew and, as such, had performed the types of crimes with which they were charged. When these witnesses completed their testimony, the pirates were told to step forward and asked “what they had to say for themselves.”

  Before the trial had begun, the accused had decided that their only chance of saving themselves was to claim that they were not really pirates at all but had been forced, on pain of death, by Sam Bellamy to serve aboard his ships. Among the pirates who testified was Thomas Baker, who stated that after he had been captured and (according to him) forced to become a pirate, “he attempted to make his escape at Spanish Town” when the Whydah docked at what was then the capital of Jamaica. According to Baker’s testimony, “the Governour of that Place seemed to favour his design, till Capt. Bellamy and his Company sent the Governour word that they would burn & destroy the Town” if the governor helped Baker escape.

  Thomas South swore that, as a member of a crew of a ship that had sailed from Bristol, England, he was captured by Bellamy and “threatened to be put upon a desolate Island, where there was nothing to support him” unless he became a member of the Whydah’s pirate crew. Peter Cornelius Hoof also testified that he had been taken aboard the Whydah against his wishes and told by its crew that “they would kill him unless he would joyn with them in their Unlawful Designs.” Hendrick Quintor also swore that he had been captured by Bellamy, who, after agreeing to release Quintor when they reached the coast of Venezuela, changed his mind, causing Quintor to be “unavoidably forced to Continue among the Pyrates.”

  After others of the accused had offered similar testimony, His Majesty’s Advocate Smith responded to the pirates’ claims. And, from his first remarks, it was clear that he had absolutely no sympathy for them. “Their pretence of being forced out of the respective Ships and Vessels they belonged to, by Bellamy . . . if it [is] true, can never excuse their Guilt,” he declared, “since no case of Necessity can justify a direct violation of . . . Law, and give one the liberty of Sinning.” Besides, continued Smith, “That [the accused] acted freely and by their own choice is most plain and obvious.”

  When Smith concluded his remarks, the court was adjourned in order to give the judges time to decide upon a verdict. In late October 1717, the proceedings were reconvened, and Governor Shute, in his role as president of the court, read its verdict. “The Court,” declared Shute, “having duly considered the Indictment & the Proofs of the several articles contained therein, together with your Defences, Have found you Simon Van Vorst, John Brown, Thomas Baker, Hendrick Quintor, Peter Cornelius Hoof and John Shuan, Guilty, of the Crimes of Piracy, Robbery and Felony, as is set forth in the Indictment, And do therefore Adjudge and Decree, That you Simon Van Vorst, John Brown, Thomas Baker, Hendrick Quintor, Peter Cornelius Hoof, and John Shuan, shall go hence to the Place from whence you came, and from thence you sh
all be carryed to the Place of Execution, and there you and each of you, shall be hanged up by the Neck until you & each of you are Dead; And the Lord have Mercy on your Souls.”

  Then Governor Shute, in an announcement that probably shocked the large courtroom crowd, declared that the judges had concluded that Thomas South had, in fact, been forcibly taken from his ship and “compelled utterly against his Will to joyn with the Pirates.” The Court, Shute announced, had found him not guilty.

  South would not be the only pirate to escape the hangman’s noose. After receiving testimonials on his behalf, the judges held a separate trial for Thomas Davis. Written statements from the captain and crew members of the merchant ship St. Michael left no doubt that Davis, like Thomas South, had been forced into piracy by Sam Bellamy. Like South, Thomas Davis was found not guilty.

  The Whydah’s young Miskito Indian pilot, John Julian, also escaped the hangman. In fact, he never appeared in court. Although the records are not totally clear, it appears that he was taken out of jail and sold into slavery before his fellow pirates were tried. Some records state that the man who bought Julian was John Quincy, the great-grandfather of U.S. president John Quincy Adams. Other records indicate that Julian was eventually sold to another man and that he made several attempts to escape. These records indicate that on one of these attempts, Julian killed a bounty hunter who was trying to catch him and that he was executed in 1733.

  November 15, 1717, was the date set for, as one Boston newspaper expressed it, “the Execution of these Miserables.” Accompanied by dozens of sheriffs and other officials, the condemned pirates were led out of the jail and marched through the streets of Boston to the harbor and Scarlett’s Wharf. At the front of the procession was the admiralty marshal, holding above his head what was called the silver oar, the symbol of the Admiralty Court’s jurisdiction over crimes that took place at sea.

  It was a long, slow march, made longer by the fact that the streets leading to the wharf were packed to overflowing with spectators who had been lining up since early morning to witness the solemn procession as it passed by. Walking every step of the way with the prisoners was Cotton Mather, once again ceaselessly urging the pirates to confess their crimes. Even when they reached the wharf and were rowed across Boston Harbor to the hanging place in Charlestown, Mather pleaded with the pirates to confess.

  The title page from a sixty-four-page volume written by Cotton Mather that included the sermon he preached to the condemned Whydah pirates and his remarks to them on their way to be executed.

  Finally, standing before the gallows, each of the pirates, in a final, desperate attempt to save their lives, did confess. It did them no good. As each man was hanged, the enormous crowd that had gathered to watch the spectacle let out a mighty roar. Staring at the six bodies swaying in the wind, Cotton Mather exclaimed, “Behold, the End of Piracy.” He was not completely correct, but he was close.

  Long after everyone had left the hanging place, the bodies kept swaying in the wind. And they kept on swaying — for days, for weeks, for months, and remarkably, for years, until they finally decayed and were gone. The sight was a gruesome warning to anyone who would even consider becoming a pirate.

  EVEN AS Thomas Davis and John Julian were helping farmer Samuel Harding scavenge through the remains of the ship that had been their home, news of the wreck was spreading. Within a day, it reached Boston, where Governor Samuel Shute received a handwritten note from a Cape official, stating, “The Pyrate Ship commanded by Capt. Samuel Bellamy, was Shipwreckt [on the shore of Eastham] whereof about 130 Men were drown’d and none saved except two Men, an English Man and an Indian that were cast on Shore. . . . A great many Men have been taken up Dead near the Place where the Ship was cast away.”

  Shute immediately thought of another Province of Massachusetts Bay governor, Sir William Phips, who, prior to becoming governor, had made himself famous by recovering a fortune from a Spanish treasure ship that had sunk in Florida waters and had made himself rich from the percentage of the gold and silver he received as a result of his accomplishment. Under British law, Shute, as a government official, would not be able to personally keep anything recovered from the wreck, but he knew he would be certain to gain enormous favor from the king. He faced a major challenge in acting quickly enough to prevent Cape Cod farmers and other locals from carrying off all the treasure. Fifty-five-year-old Cyprian Southack, an acclaimed naval commander and mapmaker, was just the man for the job.

  As well as being a treasure hunter and governor, William Phips was a ship’s carpenter, a ship’s captain, and a major general.

  BEFORE HE EVEN ARRIVED on Cape Cod, Cyprian Southack, appointed by Massachusetts colonial governor Samuel Shute to prevent the looting of the Whydah wreck, was a man already known for his seamanship and for his mapmaking skills. Born in 1662, Southack followed in the footsteps of his father, a British naval lieutenant. He was only ten years old when he assisted his father in the Battle of Southwold Bay between British and Dutch naval forces off the coast of England in 1672.

  In 1685, at the age of twenty-three, Southack was sent by the British Admiralty to the Province of Massachusetts Bay, where, as captain of the armed ship Province Galley, he took part in a long series of battles and expeditions against the French for control of North America. As captain of the Province Galley, Southack was also charged with guarding the Massachusetts coastline against pirates.

  None of these activities represented his true passion. Cyprian Southack’s great love was making maps. At that time, maps of the long New England coastline were rare and inaccurate. Southack committed himself to producing maps that became invaluable to mariners sailing the Eastern seaboard, particularly from New England to Nova Scotia. The maps that Southack drew were arguably the most accurate of their time, so much so that for at least half a century after he died they were used to navigate the New England coast.

  Southack is known to have produced at least twenty detailed maps of areas along the New England coast. His greatest cartographical contribution was a publication that came to be used almost as a bible by mariners. Called The New England Coasting Pilot, it contained eight maps alongside more than one hundred descriptive notes from Southack’s voyages up and down the New England coast.

  The notes reveal Southack’s interest in providing mariners with more than just navigational information. Along with indicating navigational hazards, water depths, and tides and currents, they also mark fishing grounds, places containing timber for masts and shipbuilding, and fish-drying sites. Cyprian Southack was not a modest man, and he was not above naming some of the locations he mapped after himself. For example, in his map of Maine, Monhegan Island is called “Southacks Island or Monhegan,” and the present Chedabucto Bay in Nova Scotia was named Southacks Bay. Southack was also not averse to citing his personal accomplishments on the maps. Thus, in indicating the location of the Strait of Canso between Nova Scotia and Cape Breton Island, he added the notation that in 1690 he became the first Englishman to sail through it.

  He may have been immodest, but Cyprian Southack was certainly one of the most important mapmakers in colonial America. And one map that he drew after arriving on Cape Cod would become instrumental in the discovery of the ship known as the Whydah.

  The title page of Cyprian Southack’s guide to the waters off of the northeastern United States and southeastern Canada.

  At ten o’clock on the morning of May 1, 1717, Southack, along with several militiamen assigned to him, boarded the British sloop Nathaniel and headed to Cape Cod and the site of the Whydah wreck. His orders were clear. He was to attempt to recover and bring back to Boston “Money, Bullion, Treasure, Goods and Merchandizes taken out of the said Ship.” He was also to take into custody any pirates who might be hiding out after surviving the wreck.

  What should have been a quick, uneventful sea journey from Boston to Cape Cod did not go well. Shortly after Southack sailed out of Boston Harbor, pirates stole more than eighty pounds of his su
pplies. He was further delayed by headwinds that battered his small vessel. Finally on May 2, 1717, he reached Cape Cod Harbor (now called Provincetown Harbor), where he sent two of his men ahead to obtain horses and ride to the wreck site so that they could secure the beach as soon as possible. The men reached the site at seven that evening, but it had been six days since the Whydah had gone down. By this time, anything from the ship that had lain strewn along the beach had been carted off and hidden in local barns, cellars, and attics.

  Meanwhile, Southack and the other eight men of his party, eager to join their two companions at the wreck site, waited in Provincetown. Relying on an old map that showed a natural canal that crossed Cape Cod and ended at Nauset Harbor, a few miles from where the Whydah had met its fate, Southack and his men obtained a whaleboat, lugged it to the canal, and began to row. The canal had grown shallower since their map was drawn, and it was not long before their boat hit bottom. They proceeded to create poles out of nearby ash trees, place the poles horizontally directly beneath the heavy whaleboat, and, by gripping the ends of the poles, carry the vessel a great distance, until they reached water deep enough to allow them to row again. Finally they arrived at Nauset Harbor, only to encounter more problems. The ocean was churned up with large waves, and it took every ounce of energy that the nine men had left to row the whaleboat through the heavy seas. Fourteen hours after they had left Provincetown, they reached what Southack would later refer to as the “Pirritt Rack” (pirate wreck).

  After suffering such an ordeal just to reach the wreck, Southack could not have been more disappointed at what lay before him. For four miles, all that could be seen scattered along the beach were shattered pieces of the Whydah that had washed ashore. That and the bodies of more than one hundred dead pirates. Southack was also handed a report from a Justice Doane, a local official who had been among the first on the scene. According to Doane, “there had been at least 200 men from Several places at 20 miles distance plundering the Pirate Wreck of what came ashoar.”