Pirate tales from the law

by Arthur M. Harris

December soon marked a change in the very ordinary luck which had so far attended the Adventure’s enterprise. A Moorish ketch in this month fell to them, and, rather unusually, after a fight in which one of the pirates was wounded. An inconsequential affair it was at that, her capture being effected by a handful of men from the ship’s boat. The captors ran her ashore and emptied out of her thirty tubs of butter as the principal gain. The ketch was then turned adrift.

All hands no doubt wished each other a happy and prosperous New Year as 1698 came over the horizon of time. But January was to step along quite a little before even a trifle was scavenged from the sea. This was a Portuguese, out from Bengal, and laden with butter, wax and East Indian goods. She was taken in without any trouble, and a prize crew put on her to keep her in company with the Adventure.

And now a disturbing matter arose for the captain. He was pursued by seven or eight Dutch ships, until he was obliged to call off his prize crew and abandon the Portuguese ship. It was disturbing, not because the captain was afraid of the seven or eight Dutch sail, but it must have indicated to him that his unlawful operations had not been disguised as well as he had wished. He saw then that word had got about the Indian ports that he was a pirate. His suspicions were correct; not only was the truth penetrating to India; it was also on its way to England, where a great shock was to befall all those concerned with King William’s trusty and well-beloved mariner. Not the least so interested was to be that genteel nobleman, Earl Bellamont, Governor of the Province of New York, whose political enemies, airing the arrangement with Kidd, began to accuse him openly of having a good big finger in the piratical pie.

Thus far off all sorts of trouble were brewing for Captain Kidd as he beat about the spicy coast of India.

V

But a most momentous turn of fortune was impending. And it was high time. The pirates were thoroughly fed with butter; out of almost every capture they had taken butter, until it was butter, butter and nothing but butter. The Adventure promised to become a sort of floating grocery store, specializing on butter, with coffee a strong second, while, for those with a fancy for dreams, liberal quantities of opium could be passed over the counter.

Bellamont and Company had not gone to considerable expense just to corner the butter market of the East Indies, nor to interfere seriously with the dairy and grocery businesses of those regions. Had they been in receipt of monthly reports from their peculiar partner away out there, they would have been both surprised and disappointed and very properly grieved.

The butter era was about to end sharply. The Quedagh Merchant did that.

A comparatively large ship she must have been when Kidd first saw her lumbering along, loaded down to capacity. As soon as he spotted her, out from the locker came the French flag again, and as a French ship he drew quickly alongside. Probably the usual round shot across the bows brought her up. If so that was the only demonstration of violence which marked the taking of one of the richest ships that ever a pirate gloated over.

As soon as the Merchant braced back, Kidd sent a boat from his ship to her with orders to bring the captain to him. The boat came back with an old Frenchman grumbling and puzzled in the stern. The skipper of the Merchant naturally thought a Frenchman should represent them to a French ship of unknown but threatening attitude. This old man, however, had not been long in talk with the pirate chief before he confessed that he was not the master of the Quedagh Merchant, but her gunner. Whereupon Kidd sent the boat off again for the real commander.