The boys' book of buccaneers

by A. Hyatt Verrill

“Following their Indian guides, the buccaneers divided into six companies and entered the jungle. The very first day their hardships began. So impenetrable was the forest that it was necessary to hew a way every yard, there were rivers to cross, swamps to wade through, and clouds of mosquitoes made life miserable. The first day four men gave up and returned to the coast, but the others, of whom, as I have said, Dampier was a member, kept doggedly on. Through pouring rain, climbing precipitous mountains, swimming rivers, the buccaneers proceeded on their way and at the close of the second day had covered nearly eighteen miles. Often, as Ringrose tells us, they were obliged to cross the same river over and over again, but at noon of the third day they came to a village of the wild Kuna Indians. Ringrose and Dampier describe the Indians very well, speaking particularly of the painted wooden crowns, the red caps and the gold nose rings worn by the chiefs, exactly as they are to-day. The Indians were friendly, they supplied the buccaneers fruit and provisions, and the footsore corsairs spent the day resting in the Indians’ huts. On the tenth of April a river large enough to be navigable by canoes was reached, and Captains Sharp, Coxon, Cook [[137]]and Ringrose, with seventy men, embarked in fourteen dugouts. But they soon found that gliding down the Chukunaque River was by no means a relief from the overland tramp. Fallen trees and bars filled the stream; at every few yards the buccaneers were compelled to haul their craft bodily over the obstructions, and, being separated from their comrades, they began to fear the Indians intended to cut them off and betray them to the Spaniards. On April 13th they reached the junction of the Tuira and Chukunaque Rivers, and in the afternoon of the same day they were overjoyed to see their missing companions who had come through the jungle in safety. Throughout this awful trip, Dampier had preserved his writings in his ‘joyente of bamboo,’ carefully jotting down, despite all difficulties, his observations of bird and animal life, notes on plants and descriptions of the Indians and their lives. But the difficulties of the crossing were practically over. In sixty-eight canoes the three hundred and twenty-seven men embarked with fifty Indians and swept swiftly down stream towards unsuspecting El Real. Camping a scant half mile above the town, the buccaneers prepared to attack at dawn and were awakened by the drums of the [[138]]garrison. Priming their pistols and muskets, the buccaneers marched on the village, which was surrounded by a twelve-foot palisade, but the corsairs made short work of this and took the town with a loss of but two men wounded. Within were two hundred and sixty men, but the buccaneers soon learned, to their chagrin, why no resistance had been made. The gold, brought from the mines, and, which they had hoped to gain, had been taken the day before to Panama—a treasure of three hundred pounds of bullion—and there was utterly nothing worth taking in the place, which was a mere outpost of straw and palm-thatched huts. Unlike Morgan and his fellows, Sharp and his men treated the Dons humanely and even prevented their Indian allies from butchering the captives, a diversion they had started the moment they had entered the place. Disappointed at their ill luck, the buccaneers were more than ever determined to attack Panama, and, choosing Captain Coxon as commander, the buccaneers, deserted by all but three Indians, prepared for the most hazardous venture ever attempted. Cut off, as they were, from retreat by the long journey through the jungle, in a hostile country, without provisions or ships, yet these fearless, indomitable men were [[139]]about to hurl themselves upon the most strongly fortified town on the Pacific, and attack a city of thousands with less than three hundred and twenty men, for twelve of their number had left and had gone back with the Indians after taking El Real.

“On April 17, 1680, the buccaneers embarked in thirty-six canoes and slipping down river with the ebb tide entered the great Gulf of San Miguel. Soon the party became separated, and Ringrose’s canoe was wrecked. Without food or clothing other than the few rags on their bodies and with no shoes on their feet, the buccaneers set forth afoot. By good fortune they met Indians, secured canoes, and, sending their prisoners back free, they continued on their way. The very next night, seeing fires on shore, the weary fellows thought they had found their missing comrades and hastily landed, only to fall into the hands of a party of Spaniards. But here the humane actions of the buccaneers were rewarded. The Dons, learning who their captives were, and hearing from a prisoner how the British had saved them from massacre by the Indians, fed and clothed the buccaneers and gave them their liberty.

Dampier wrote his journal during lulls between battles

Piraguas. It was in boats like these that the earlier buccaneers captured their first Spanish ships

“The next morning, to every one’s unspeakable [[140]]delight, the other parties were met. Several small sailboats were also captured, and now, once more well equipped and confident, the entire party gathered at Chepillo Island and prepared for their descent on Panama, about thirty miles distant. And here, too, the buccaneers suddenly, for ‘reasons which I can not dive into,’ as Ringrose puts it, threw aside their former humanity and ordered the Indians to butcher the few remaining Spanish prisoners. Luckily, the captives managed to escape, however, and only one was killed. Rowing stealthily along the shores under cover of the night, and drenched by torrential rains, the buccaneers came at dawn within sight of the city to find two great ships and three smaller men-of-war anchored in the bay and ready to resist the buccaneers. Here were unexpected troubles. They had counted on taking the place by surprise, on being led into the city by a captive whose life they had saved, and, instead, their presence was known and five powerful armed ships swarming with Spaniards were prepared for them. And, to make matters worse, a large part of their men were absent. During the night and the storm they had become separated, the largest of the boats, in command of Captain Sharp, had put [[141]]into outlying islands for water, and the heavier piraguas were far astern of the lighter canoes. These, five in number and with one piragua, contained but sixty-eight out of the three hundred odd buccaneers, and these were weary with their long row and in no condition to fight. But there was no time for indecision. The three Spanish war vessels were already bearing down upon the buccaneers, and although so near that Ringrose says they feared they would be run down, yet the English fell to their oars and, pulling desperately into the wind, evaded the Dons’ ships and got to windward. Realizing that the sooner they struck the better, the buccaneers turned their boats and, pulling directly towards the huge Spanish ships, picked off the helmsmen and the gunners with their muskets. With their vessels aback, unable to maneuver, the Dons were, for the moment, helpless, and while their broadsides threw round shot and chain shot among the buccaneers and killed a number, the light swift boats were hard targets to hit, and before a second broadside could be fired they were under the vessels’ side where the cannons could not reach them. Then the battle raged thick and fast. Picking off the Dons whenever they showed their heads above the bulwarks, cutting [[142]]sheets and braces with their shots, the buccaneers forced their tiny craft under the warships’ sterns, jammed the rudders, and, sinking their own craft to make sure the men must do or die, they swarmed up ropes, chains and quarter galleries onto the Spaniards’ decks.

“Ringrose and his party attacked the Admiral’s ship, and leaping over the bulwarks cut down the Admiral, swept like demons among the Spanish crew, cutting, slashing, shooting and converting the decks to a bloody shambles. Not until two-thirds of the crew were killed did the Dons surrender, however. With the flagship in their hands, Captain Coxon took charge and at once sent two canoes of buccaneers to aid Sawkins, who had thrice been beat back from the decks of the other warship. Hardly had the reënforcements arrived when two explosions took place on the ship and in the confusion the buccaneers swarmed onto the ship’s deck and took the vessel without resistance, for not one Spaniard was left alive and uninjured aboard! But on every ship the slaughter was terrific. Of the original crew of eighty-six on the flagship, only twenty-five men remained alive and only eight of these were able to stand. Indeed, even Ringrose and his fellows, hardened to slaughter [[143]]and bloodshed as they were, were amazed at the butchery they had wrought, and, in their journals, Ringrose and Dampier state that ‘blood ran down the decks in whole streams and not one place upon the ships was found that was free of blood.’ And yet this victory, this awful carnage, had been carried out by sixty-eight buccaneers in frail canoes and small boats, truly a most marvelous feat of daring and bravery, and, more remarkable yet, the buccaneers’ losses amounted to but eighteen killed and twenty-two wounded!

“With the two men-of-war in their possession the buccaneers at once sailed for the big galleons, but, to their surprise, found them absolutely deserted, every member of their crews having been placed aboard the warships in their attack upon the buccaneers. But before deserting their ships the Dons had made every effort to prevent any possibility of their falling into the buccaneers’ hands. The largest galleon, which was called the Santissima Trinidad (Blessed Trinity) had been set afire and scuttled, but the buccaneers’ victory was so rapidly won that they reached her in time, extinguished the fire, stopped the leak and transferred their wounded to her. The battle had begun soon after sunrise and by noon the last [[144]]shot had been fired, the fleet was in the hands of the buccaneers, and the standards of Sawkins, Sharp, Coxon and the others were floating from the mastheads in place of the gold and scarlet banners of Spain.

“Never in the annals of the buccaneers had such a victory been won; never had there been a sharper, bloodier battle, and even the captive Spanish captains were loud in their praise and admiration of the valor of the English. ‘Captain Peralta declared,’ says Ringrose, that ‘surely you Englishmen are the valiantest men in the world, who designed always to fight open whilst other nations invented all ways imaginable to barricade themselves and fight as close as they could, and yet, notwithstanding, you killed more of your enemies than they of you.’