In the wake of the buccaneers

by A. Hyatt Verrill

Meanwhile, all but a handful of the citizens had fled to the outlying country-side, leaving the hated British monarchs of all they surveyed, and we can easily picture the beruffled and begemmed pirate peer strutting about with the queen’s glove still in his broad hat, vastly pleased with himself for his prowess—as, in truth, he well might be. Not only had he succeeded where the greatest of England’s sea-fighters had signally failed, and secured vast treasure, but he saw in San Juan a glorious spot for a stronghold from which to make remunerative raids against the neighboring Spanish colonies and Spanish shipping.

But the dispossessed and robbed Porto Ricans had an ally that Cumberland had not taken into account, which, all unseen and unsuspected, was approaching, and which with all his courage and resources he could not overcome or even hold at bay. Before he realized it, the enemy was upon him: the deadly Yellow Jack had entered his camp [[185]]by stealth, and like wildfire the plague spread among his hapless men. Within the fortnight Cumberland’s force had been reduced one half; daily men died, raving and inhuman, their faces a ghastly yellow, eyes starting from their hollow sockets, their frames shaken and wasted by fever. Brave fighters though they were, the British were terrified by this enemy they could not fight; and, hastily packing his few surviving men upon his ships, the glove-plumed knight sailed away from the town he had won, never to return.

Perhaps it was the knowledge of Drake’s failure, or the story—with hair-raising embellishments, like as not—of Cumberland’s plague-stricken force that discouraged the buccaneers. They no doubt reasoned that a spot strong enough to repulse the famous Drake held little promise for their ruffianly if brave and hardy crews. At any rate, there is no record of their having made a serious effort to take San Juan; and while, from time to time, some particularly ambitious or daring pirate exchanged a few rounds of shot with the garrison of the Morro, and raided outlying towns, the buccaneers never accomplished anything of note and never looted enough treasure from the Porto Ricans to pay for the ammunition wasted and the blood spilled in their attempts. In fact, even the best of [[186]]them, such as Morgan, Montbars, Lolonais, Sharp, and other notorious leaders, looked upon this island as too hard a nut for them to crack and confined their depredations to more promising fields.

But one attempt of the buccaneers to raid Porto Rico, though not San Juan, is well worth mentioning; for not only was it disastrous to the pirates, but it gives an excellent idea of their methods and persistence. As a matter of fact, it was in the first instance an accidental invasion, for Monsieur Ogeron, the buccaneer governor of Tortuga, having set forth at the head of a fleet, in a flag-ship named for himself and manned by five hundred pirates, had no intention of molesting the island, but was bound for the island of Curaçao, where he hoped to wrest town and treasure from the Dutch. Fate, however, interfered seriously with Monsieur’s plans. Running into a storm, his new flag-ship was driven ignominiously upon the rocky Guandanillas close to the western shore of Porto Rico.

Fortunately,—or, rather, unfortunately, as it turned out,—his men all managed to reach dry land in safety, only to fall into the hands of their enemies the Spaniards on the following day. Thinking that as usual the buccaneers had landed on a piratical raid, the Dons fell upon the castaways [[187]]tooth and nail, and killed a large proportion of the five hundred before they realized that they were dealing with unarmed, shipwrecked men. When at last they discovered that their hated enemies were quite incapable of defending themselves, they bound the buccaneers securely and marched them inland, meanwhile feeding them so sparingly on scraps from their own meals that the pirates were barely kept alive. Ogeron, crafty old rascal that he was, pretended to be a half-witted fellow, and his men stoutly maintained, when questioned, that their leader had been drowned—an excellent example of the buccaneers’ faithfulness and loyalty to one another. Their captain, being looked upon as a fool and harmless, was left free and was treated far better than his comrades by the soldiers, who found much amusement in his capers and drolleries. Among the pirates was a French surgeon who was also left unbound in order that he might practise his profession among the Dons. So the medico and the governor put their heads together, and, having acquired a hatchet, slipped into the bush and managed to reach the shore. Their intention was to fell trees and construct a craft and then, putting to sea, gain Tortuga and rally their friends to attack Porto Rico and rescue the captive crew. [[188]]

Such an undertaking, which would have appeared impossible to most men, did not daunt the resourceful pirates. Having managed to secure a quantity of small fish, which they killed near shore with their hatchet, and having kindled a fire by rubbing two sticks together, they dined heartily, and the following day proceeded to fell trees for their boat. Fortune, however, smiled upon them, and before the first tree was cut they spied a large canoe, in which were two men, making directly toward them. Hiding in the bushes until the canoe was pulled upon the beach, the two buccaneers discovered that the occupants were harmless fishermen, one a mulatto, the other a Spaniard. Leaving the white man in charge of the boat, the colored fisherman picked up calabashes and, all unsuspecting of the danger lurking in the underbrush, made his way toward a spring. This was the buccaneers’ opportunity: they leaped upon the mulatto, and to quote Esquemelling, “discharged a great blow on his head with the hatchet and soon bereaved him of life.” The Spaniard, alarmed at the noise, tried to escape, “but this he could not perform so soon without being overtaken by the two and there massacred by their hands.” Now in possession of a seaworthy craft, the buccaneers set sail for Samana Bay in Santo Domingo, where [[189]]there was a lair of their associates. Here Ogeron made a most eloquent speech to his fellow buccaneers, and persuaded them to join him in a raid on Porto Rico, partly for loot and partly to rescue his ill-fated men, who had so inadvertently fallen into their enemies’ hands.

But Ogeron’s luck seems to have deserted him once and for all, for the expedition was a failure. The buccaneers were surprised by the watchful Spaniards, a large number of the pirates were slain, and while Ogeron escaped with a few of his fellows, the raid was abandoned and they “hastened to set sail and go back to Tortuga with great confusion in their minds, much diminished in their number and nothing laden with spoils, the hopes whereof had possessed their hearts.”

The unfortunate survivors of the shipwreck were taken to San Juan and, in a chain-gang, were forced to labor at building the great fortress of San Cristobal; while at night they were closely guarded in dungeons by their captors, who had a wholesome fear of the buccaneers and knew this handful of maltreated prisoners was quite capable of wreaking vengeance unless kept under lock and key. As Esquemelling puts it, “by night they shut them up close prisoners fearing lest they should enterprise upon the city. For of such attempts the Spaniards [[190]]had had divers proofs on other occasions which afforded them sufficient cause to use them after that manner.”

That manacled, overworked, half-fed captives could commit any great damage among the armed Spaniards in a city of thousands of inhabitants may seem incredible; but as their chronicler says, the Dons had had “divers proofs” on other occasions and they took no chances. Indeed, each time a ship left port they packed some of the prisoners off to Havana, to labor on the fortifications there; and they also transported some of them to Spain, taking good care to disperse them far and wide. But the buccaneers seem to have had a supernatural ability to find one another; and, notwithstanding all the precautions of the Spaniards, the deported ones, again to quote Esquemelling, “soon after met almost all together in France and resolved among themselves to return again to Tortuga with the first opportunity should proffer … so that in a short while the greatest part of these Pirates had nested themselves again at Tortuga where after some time they equipped a new fleet to revenge their former misfortunes on the Spaniards.” Of such stuff were these adventurers made, and after a few such “divers proofs” we can scarcely blame the Dons if they promptly killed all pirates who [[191]]fell into their hands. Unquestionably, the only good pirate was a dead pirate.

Departing from Porto Rico, with far more interesting places ahead, we coasted along the southern shores of this island of “Boriquen” from which Ponce de Leon set forth in search of his fountain, and, only stopping at Ponce overnight, sailed onward toward Santo Domingo.