But the sea-weary buccaneers were fated not to set foot upon the right little, tight little isle. Within Carlisle Bay lay H. M. S. Richmond, and Sharp, glimpsing the war-ship, promptly squared his battered yards and headed for Antigua.
A dozen or more of the men, among them Ringrose, landed here—eventually to make their way in safety to England—while The Most Blessed Trinity, with men working ceaselessly at her wheezing pumps, bore away for Nevis. Here, two years after Jamestown had sunk beneath the waves, the wraith-like galleon with her lawless crew came to rest, and the great “sea artist,” having accomplished his harebrained undertaking, turned his battered old hulk over to his fellows and, well laden with riches, sailed for England arrayed in all the gorgeous finery of some murdered grandee.
Thus ended this most remarkable voyage, this greatest of buccaneer adventures; a cruise unequaled [[160]]in the annals of the sea; the longest, bloodiest, and most successful pirate raid of history.
No doubt, like Red Legs, Sharp settled down in some quiet nook and spent the remainder of his life as a respected squire or gentleman farmer in Sussex or Surrey; for nothing seems to be known of him after he arrived in England, and, having been tried for and acquitted of piracy, he dropped out of sight. But Basil Ringrose, to whom we are indebted for the log of The Most Blessed Trinity, and who, as navigator, was mainly responsible for the safe consummation of her voyage, was far too restless a soul to be content with English lanes and hedgerows and a vine-clad thatched cottage. Once more taking to the buccaneer’s life, he joined a pirate ship bound for the South Seas, and met death off the coast of Mexico after again rounding the Horn.
It was not at all unusual for a pirate to give up the sea and, under an assumed name, live quietly upon the fruits of his labors, with his past quite unsuspected by his neighbors, but it was rarely indeed that an honored and respected gentleman took suddenly to pirating.
Such, however, was the case with a certain Major Stede Bonnet, a rich and finely educated citizen of Barbados and a pillar of the church. [[161]]
He was a gentleman most highly thought of, a leader of Barbados society, and apparently one of fortune’s favorites. But it seems that there was a fly in the major’s ointment in the person of a nagging, quarrelsome Mrs. Bonnet.
In fact, so unbearable did the major’s life become that at last he decided to choose the less of two evils. Having purchased a sloop, fitted her with guns, assembled a crew, and named his acquisition The Revenge, Major Bonnet bade a thankful farewell to his wife and, on a dark night in 1716, sailed forth from Bridgetown Harbor, bound a-pirating.
Oddly enough, although the gallant if henpecked officer knew nothing whatsoever of seamanship, he seems to have been a somewhat successful and lucky pirate,—albeit a humane one, for it was he who rescued the marooned members of Blackbeard’s crew from their desert isle,—and The Revenge, cruising off our Atlantic coast, took prizes right and left.
In a short time Bonnet’s name was one to conjure with, and a mere mention of it brought terror to the hearts of shipping-men and sailors in every port from Salem to Savannah, while so bold did he become that he had the effrontery to make Gardiner’s Island, in Long Island Sound, his headquarters [[162]]at various times. For a space, too, he joined forces with the redoubtable Teach, better known as Blackbeard, but the partnership was rather unfortunate, for the scoundrelly Teach robbed the major of his ship and most of his possessions.