The Real Captain Kidd: A Vindication

by Cornelius Neale Dalton

“But here I must take notice of a remarkable (and I hope a most lucky) accident which then did happen,” (it may be doubted whether the reverend gentleman would have considered it so lucky if it had befallen himself) “which was this, that the rope by which Captain Kidd was ty’d broke, and so falling to the ground he was taken up alive, and by this means had opportunity to consider more of that Eternity he was launching into. When he was brought up and ty’d again to the tree, I desired leave to go to him again, which was granted. Then I showed him the great mercy of God in giving him unexpectedly this further respite, that so he might improve the few moments left now so mercifully allowed him in perfecting his Faith and Repentance. Now I found him in much better temper than before. But as I was unwilling, and the station also very incommodious and improper for me to offer anything to him by way of question, that might have perhaps discomposed his spirit, so I contented myself to press him to embrace (before it was too late) the Mercy of God now again offered him upon the easy conditions of Stedfast Faith, True Repentance and Perfect Charity, which now he did so fully and freely express, that I hope he was hearty and sincere in it, declaring openly that he repented with all his heart, and dy’d in Christian Love and Charity with all the world” (as he had repeatedly said before). “This he said, as he was on the top of the ladder (the scaffold being now broken down) and myself halfway on it, as close to him as I could, who having for the last time prayed with him, left him with a greater satisfaction than I had before, that he was penitent.”

From the later account above referred to which purports to be “The only True Account of the Dying Speeches of the Condemned Pirates,” and is possibly a revised edition of the earlier account by Paul Lorrain, we learn that “all the prisoners were conveyed from Newgate to the execution dock in Wapping by the officers of the Admiralty and others, carrying the Silver Oar before them according to the usual custom:” that Kidd’s “behaviour in Newgate after condemnation was not so serious and devout as became a person under his circumstances, but whether it proceeded from an heroick temper in not seeming to be in any way terrified or afraid on the approaches of death (tho’ in a violent manner) he being naturally of an undaunted mind and resolution, or from a conceited hope of obtaining a reprieve, there being great endeavours tho’ in vain used for that purpose, is yet unknown.”

The author of this account also informs us that Kidd “could hardly be brought to a charitable reconciliation with those persons, who were evidences against him alleging that they deposed many things that were inconsistent with truth and that much of their evidence was by hearsay: and in the general part of his discourse seemed not only to reflect on them but on several others, who instead of being his friends as they professed, had traitorously been instrumental in his ruin!” “He further declared that as to the death of William Moore, his gunner, the blow that he gave him, it was in a passion, as being provoked by him to do so, but not with an intention of any manifest injury, much less to kill or murder him. Nay, he was so far from bearing any malice against him, that he freely gave £200 for his ransom, and further said that all his sailors knew he always had a great love and respect for him; adding that if any one concerned in his tryal had acted contrary to the dictates of his or their own conscience he heartily forgave them, and desired that God would do the like.” “He expressed abundance of sorrow for leaving his wife and children without having the opportunity of taking leave of them, they being inhabitants in New York. So that the thoughts of his wife’s sorrow at the sad tidings of his shameful death was more occasion of grief to him than that of his own sad misfortunes.” “He desired all seamen in general, more especially Captains in particular to take warning by his dismal unhappiness and shameful death and that they would avoid the means and occasions that brought him thereto, and also that they would act with more caution and prudence, both in their private and public affairs by sea and land, adding that this was a very fickle and faithless generation.” (He had undoubtedly found it so.) “After he had ended his discourse to the people, he spent the rest of his time in Prayer and other pious and Godly exercises with the Ordinary of Newgate and other ministers: and at last seemed very devout and penitent, expressing his hearty sorrow for his manifest transgressions, especially the unhappy and sudden death of William Moore his gunner—but would not call it murder to the very last, esteeming it rather an accidental misfortune than a murder by reason that there was but one blow given and that in passion without any premeditated malice.”

No reference is made in this account to Kidd’s being “inflamed with drink.” It is clear from it that whether or not he had been given a drop of whiskey on his way to execution, he was to the end in the full possession of his faculties.

The only member of his crew who was hung with him was poor Darby Mullins, the remainder being at the last moment reprieved. Why Mullins, who had surrendered himself to the Governor of East Jersey along with two others, relying on the King’s proclamation, was selected as Kidd’s fellow-sufferer, is not clear. It is true that he was an Irishman, and in the opinion of the chaplain in a better frame of mind to meet his death than any of his companions: but neither of these circumstances in itself seems quite a satisfactory justification for hanging him. He had no doubt joined Culliford, unquestionably by far the most guilty of all the seamen implicated, but for whose presence at Madagascar, when the Adventure Galley arrived there, Kidd in all probability would have been able to bring his prizes home before the hue and cry had been raised against him. But Culliford, though indicted for several piracies about the same time as Kidd, apparently escaped scot free, having been clever enough to save his neck by surrendering to the right persons under the King’s proclamation, and to secure the services of a counsel who did not fail to put in an appearance on his behalf, when his case came on for hearing; the result of which was that “his case” (according to a note in the State Trials) “being particular and argued by Counsel he was respited.”

To come now to the last painful incident in this disgraceful tragedy. The day after Kidd’s corpse had been hung aloft in chains on the gallows, Somers dared at last to break the silence he had so long maintained and to put in his reply to the Articles of Impeachment brought against him by the Commons. The allegations he had to meet were that in the grant of the goods of the pirates to the co-adventurers, the name of Samuel Newton, one of the Grantees, had been “used in trust and for the sole benefit of” himself: that “the grant manifestly tended to the obstruction of trade and navigation, the great loss and prejudice of merchants and others, His Majesty’s subjects, and the dishonour of the King and his Kingdom:” and that “by procuring and passing it,” he had been guilty of a notorious breach of his duty. In his reply he was forced to admit that Newton had been named in the grant, “by and in trust for him,” and was apparently unable to give any excuse whatever for this discreditable deception. He pleaded that the grant “did not in any way tend to the obstruction or discouragement of trade or navigation, or to the loss or prejudice of His Majesty’s subjects, nor to the dishonour of His Majesty or His Kingdom.” He denied (and the denial implied what would be considered in these days a very low estimate of official honesty) that the passing of the grant was any breach of duty, inasmuch as it “was formed as a recompense to the grantees, who at their own charge had provided and fitted out the said Ship” (the Adventure Galley) to enable Kidd “to execute the powers in the said grant mentioned, whereby the public might have received great benefit had the said William Kidd faithfully discharged the trust reposed in him by His Majesty and the Grantees, which he failing to do, the owners of the said ship had lost their expenses, and had not received any benefit from the grant.”

As a matter of fact, it may well be doubted whether any of the grantees, excepting Kidd and Livingstone, lost any part of their expenses. As has already been shown, one of the conditions on which their legal advisers had been careful to insist had been that if the prize moneys were insufficient to make good the full amount advanced by the grantees, other than Kidd and Livingstone, the deficiency was to be made good by Kidd and Livingstone, both of them men of substance. We have seen with what eagerness, and with what disastrous results to Kidd, Livingstone had endeavoured to get his bond restored to him by Bellamont. That Kidd’s estate of itself, notwithstanding the fact that he was unable in Newgate to get funds for his defence until the night before his trial, was sufficient to have covered any loss sustained by the great men, who had exploited him, is clear from the fact that of his effects forfeited to the Crown, six thousand four hundred and seventy-one pounds were afterwards given by Queen Anne towards the establishment of Greenwich hospital.[14] But whether or not these great men found it inconvenient to reclaim their one thousand pounds apiece, it is impossible to doubt that when making this cruelly unjust charge of faithlessness against Kidd the day after his death, Somers was fully acquainted with the essential facts of the case. It is incredible that he had not read Kidd’s narrative, the depositions of his men, and Bellamont’s correspondence, and that he was not cognizant of all the proceedings at Kidd’s trial, the keeping back of the French passes by the Admiralty officials: the failure of Kidd’s counsel to put in an appearance on the critical day when he was tried for piracy; the break-down of the most material parts of the King’s evidence; and the manner in which the trials had been conducted throughout by the Lord Chief Baron. It is to be feared that he not only knew all this, but that his was the unseen master hand that had held the strings, which had been so skilfully and ruthlessly manipulated as to bring about Kidd’s death so opportunely by the verdicts of London juries. If this be so, what is to be said of the Whig historians, who have dealt with Kidd’s case? Is it possible to believe in the face of indisputably recorded facts, that Somers really was the immaculate politician of his day depicted for us by Macaulay, “whose integrity,” we have been assured, “was ever certain to come forth bright and pure from the most severe investigation”? In the foregoing pages an attempt has been made, it is believed for the first time, to allow the personages who took part in this melancholy business to speak for themselves, so far as the extant records permit. Hitherto by a conspiracy of silence, their voices have been hushed, and the facts of the case studiously suppressed or perverted by eminent advocates, who have thought it necessary, if the memories of Somers and his colleagues were to be cleansed from the stigma which clung to them in their own day from the part they took in it, that Kidd’s reputation should be blackened, and that he should be depicted as a villain of the deepest dye, whom, on account of his unexceptionable antecedents, these great men were fully justified in employing, but whose character underwent so rapid a deterioration after he had once come into contact with them, that he betrayed them for the purpose of enriching himself with spoils, of which as a matter of fact he stood in little need and which he made no effort to secure for himself. He has been represented by Macaulay not only as a rapacious pirate, but also as a monster of cruelty, who for his own ends depraved his crew and led them into every kind of wickedness. To quote but one passage from Macaulay’s indefensible and inexcusable travesty, “With the rapacity he had the cruelty of his odious calling. He burnt houses: he massacred peasantry. His prisoners were tied up and beaten with naked cutlasses, in order to obtain information about their concealed hoards. One of his crew, whom he had called a dog, was provoked into exclaiming in an agony of remorse, ‘Yes, I am a dog: but it is you that have made me so.’ Kidd in a fury struck the man dead.”

These accusations have obtained ready credence; but their absurdity will be evident to any one who will take the pains to examine the records. There is no reason whatever for believing that Kidd was cruel or rapacious. The only ground for suggesting that “he massacred peasantry” is the one case, when his cooper’s throat having been cut by the natives, he retaliated by ordering one native to be shot. This was the only time when it was ever alleged in his own day that he had burnt houses: and we have it on the authority of Palmer, the King’s evidence against him, that on this occasion Kidd had given express orders to his men to spare the houses that had white flags hoisted on them, because their inmates had helped to water his ship. The episode on the strength of which Macaulay accuses him of causing his prisoners to be beaten with cutlasses, in order to extort from them information as to their concealed hoards, has already been explained. The men in question were not his prisoners. He allowed them to proceed peacefully on their voyage, and their ship was not taken from them. Kidd never went on board of her, much less did he give directions to his crew to ill-use them. Questioned as to whether any gold had been taken from them, Palmer freely admitted that he did not see any. Asked further by Kidd, whether it was not the case that a parcel of rogues had gone on board and done the deed complained of, he virtually admitted that it was so by making no reply. In the matter of cruelty there is a marked difference between the reported doings of Kidd and of the pirates of whom the East India Company were repeatedly complaining. In these complaints mention is often made of the outrages committed: but in the case of Kidd the Company made no complaint of similar misdeeds. From all that can be learned of him, he seems to have been a kind-hearted man. There is no reason to doubt the truth of his dying statement that he had paid two hundred pounds for his gunner Moore’s ransom, probably on the occasion when the natives had cut his cooper’s throat. One of the reasons which led Bellamont to employ him is stated by Bellamont’s apologist to have been Kidd’s well-known affection for his wife and family, which was also relied on by Bellamont as being strong enough to prevent him from attempting to escape by forsaking them on his return. And we have it on the record of a witness who certainly had no bias in his favour that his chief solicitude in Newgate after he had been sentenced to death was for them and not for himself.

The suggestion that Moore, when knocked on the head by Kidd, was “in an agony of remorse” for acts of piracy which Kidd had led him to commit, is almost too ludicrous to call for comment. It is absolutely clear from the evidence of every witness of the occurrence that so far from Kidd having led Moore astray, Moore had vainly endeavoured to induce Kidd to become a pirate, and that it was his failure to succeed in this endeavour that led to the altercation which ended in his death.