The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century

by Clarence Henry Haring

Secondary Works

Of the secondary works concerned with the history of the buccaneers, the oldest are the writings of the French Jesuit historians of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Dutertre (Histoire générale des Antilles. Paris, 1667-71), a chronicler of events within his own experience as well as a reliable historian, unfortunately brings his narrative to a close in 1667, but up to that year he is the safest guide to the history of the French Antilles. Labat, in his "Nouveau Voyage aux Isles de l'Amerique" (Paris, 1722), gives an account of eleven years, between 1694 and 1705, spent in Martinique and Guadeloupe, and although of little value as an historian, he supplies us with a fund of the most picturesque and curious details about the life and manners of the people in the West Indies at the end of the seventeenth century. A much more important and accurate work is Charlevoix's "Histoire de l'Isle Espagnole ou de S. Domingue" (Paris, 1732), and this I have used as a general introduction to the history of the French buccaneers. Raynal's "Histoire philosophique et politique des établissements et du commerce européen dans les deux Indes" (Amsterdam, 1770) is based for the origin of the French Antilles upon Dutertre and Labat and is therefore negligible for the period of the buccaneers. Adrien Dessalles, who in 1847 published his "Histoire générale des Antilles," preferred, like Labat and Raynal, to depend on the historians who had preceded him rather than endeavour to gain an intimate knowledge of the sources.

In the English histories of Jamaica written by Long, Bridges, and Gardner, whatever notice is taken of the buccaneers is meagre and superficial, and the same is true of Bryan Edwards' "History, civil and commercial, of the British colonies in the West Indies." Thomas Southey, in his "Chronological History of the West Indies" (Lond. 1827), devotes considerable space to their achievements, but depends entirely upon the traditional sources. In 1803 J.W. von Archenholz published "Die Geschichte der Flibustier," a superficial, diffuse and even puerile narrative, giving no references whatever to authorities. (It was translated into French (Paris, 1804), and into English by Geo. Mason (London, 1807).) In 1816 a "History of the Buccaneers in America" was published by James Burney as the fourth volume of "A chronological History of the Discoveries in the South Seas or Pacific Ocean." Burney casts but a rapid glance over the West Indies, devoting most of the volume to an account of the voyages of the freebooters along the coast of South America and in the East Indies. Walter Thornbury in 1858 wrote "The Buccaneers, or the Monarchs of the Main," a hasty compilation, florid and overdrawn, and without historical judgment or accuracy. In 1895 M. Henri Lorin presented a Latin thesis to the Faculty of History in Paris, entitled:—"De praedonibus Insulam Santi Dominici celebrantibus saeculo septimo decimo," but he seems to have confined himself to Exquemelin, Le Pers, Labat, Dutertre and a few documents drawn from the French colonial archives. The best summary account in English of the history and significance of the buccaneers in the West Indies is contained in Hubert H. Bancroft's "History of Central America" (ii. chs. 26, 28-30). Within the past year there has appeared an excellent volume by M. Pierre de Vaissière describing creole life and manners in the French colony of San Domingo in the century and a half preceding the Revolution. (Vaissière, Pierre de: Saint Dominigue. (1629-1789). Paris, 1909.) It is a reliable monograph, and like his earlier volume, "Gentilshommes campagnards de l'ancienne France," is written in a most entertaining style. De Vaissière contributes much valuable information, especially in the first chapter, about the origins and customs of the French "flibustiers."

I have been able to find only two Spanish works which refer at all to the buccaneers. One is entitled:

Piraterias y agresiones de los ingleses y de otros pueblos de Europa en la America espanola desde el siglo XVI. al XVIII., deducidas de las obras de D. Dionisio de Alcedo y Herrera. Madrid, 1883. 4º.

Except for a long introduction by Don Justo Zaragoza based upon Exquemelin and Alcedo, it consists of a collection of extracts referring to freebooters on the coasts of Peru and Chili, and deals chiefly with the eighteenth century. The other Spanish work is an elaborate history of the Spanish navy lately published in nine volumes by Cesareo Fernandez Duro, and entitled:—

Armada espanola desde la union de los reinos de Castilla y de Aragon. Madrid, 1895.

There are numerous chapters dealing with the outrages of the French and English freebooters in the West Indies, some of them based upon Spanish sources to which I have had no access. But upon comparison of Duro's narrative, which in so far as it relates to the buccaneers is often meagre, with the sources available to me, I find that he adds little to what may be learned on the subject here in England.

One of the best English descriptions of the Spanish colonial administration and commercial system is still that contained in book viii. of Robertson's "History of America" (Lond. 1777). The latest and best summary account, however, is in French, in the introduction to vol. i. of "La traite négrière aux Indes de Castille" (Paris, 1906), by Georges Scelle. Weiss, in vol. ii. of his history of "L'Espagne depuis Philippe II. jusqu'aux Bourbons" (Paris, 1844), treats of the causes of the economic decadence of Spain, and gives an account of the contraband trade in Spanish America, drawn largely from Labat. On this general subject Leroy-Beaulieu, "De la colonization chez les peuples modernes" (Paris, 1874), has been especially consulted.

The best account of the French privateers of the sixteenth century in America is in an essay entitled: "Les corsairs français au XVI^e siècle dans les Antilles" (Paris, 1902), by Gabriel Marcel. It is a short monograph based on the collections of Spanish documents brought together by Pacheco and Navarrete. The volume by E. Ducéré entitled, "Les corsairs sous l'ancien regîme" (Bayonne, 1895), is also valuable for the history of privateering. For the history of the Elizabethan mariners I have made use of the two works by J. S. Corbett: "Drake and the Tudor Navy" (Lond. 1898), and "The successors of Drake" (Lond. 1900). Other works consulted were: