LOLONOIS’ FIGHT WITH THE SPANIARDS.
The expedition being ready, Lolonois proceeded to a port in Hispaniola to take in provisions, and afterwards to Matamana, on the south coast of Cuba, where he intended to rob the poor turtle-hunters of their canoes. They captured as many as they wanted, to the sorrow of their owners, but to their own satisfaction, as they were always useful in shallow waters, and the port to which they were directing their course came under that category. Hence they steered for the Cape Gracias a Dios, and being at sea were becalmed for a long while, and were carried by the currents into the Gulf of Honduras. The ship which carried the commander of the expedition could not keep up with the rest, and what was worse, they were running short of provisions, so that they were obliged to send their canoes to the river Xagua, where there were a number of Indians, whom they first killed. After that, as a mere matter of secondary importance, they thought it no harm to carry off the hogs, hens, and millet, of their settlements, which were found in abundance. They resolved further to remain there till the bad weather was over, and pillage all the villages and towns on the coast of the gulf, but were not particularly successful till they came to Puerto Cavallo. Here the Spaniards [pg 26]had two storehouses, where they kept the produce of the country till the arrival of their ships. There was then in the port a Spanish ship of twenty-four guns and sixteen pedreros, or mortar-pieces. This ship was immediately seized by the pirates, and the two storehouses burned with all the rest of the houses there. Many of the inhabitants were made prisoners, and they committed upon them the most inhuman cruelties that ever heathens invented, putting them to the cruellest tortures they could devise. “It was the custom of Lolonois that, having tormented persons not confessing, he would instantly cut them in pieces with his hanger, and pull out their tongues, desiring to do so, if possible, to every Spaniard in the world. It often happened that some of these miserable prisoners, being forced by the rack, would promise to discover the place where the fugitive Spaniards lay hid, which not being able afterwards to perform, they were put to more cruel deaths than they who were dead before.
“The prisoners being all dead but two (whom they reserved to show them what they desired), they marched hence to the town of San Pedro, or St. Peter, ten or twelve leagues from Puerto Cavallo, being three hundred men whom Lolonois led, leaving behind him Moses Van Vin, his lieutenant, to govern the rest in his absence. Being come three leagues on his way, they met with a troop of Spaniards, who lay in ambuscade for their coming; these they set upon with all the courage possible, and at last totally defeated. Howbeit, they behaved themselves very manfully at first, but not being able to resist the fury of the pirates, they were forced to give way and save themselves by flight, leaving many pirates dead in the place, some wounded, and some of their own party maimed by the way. These Lolonois put to death without mercy, having asked them what questions he thought fit for his purpose.”
There were still some five prisoners not wounded; these were asked by Lolonois, if any more Spaniards remained farther on in ambuscade? They answered there were. Then, being brought before him one by one, he asked if there was no other way to the town but that? this he did to avoid those ambuscades, if possible. But they all constantly answered him they knew none. Having asked them all, and finding they could show him no other way, Lolonois grew outrageously passionate, so that he drew his cutlass, and with it cut open the breast of one of those poor Spaniards, and pulling out his heart began to bite and gnaw it with his teeth, like a ravenous wolf, saying to the rest, “I will serve you all alike if you show me not another way!” The poor wretches promised to show him another way, but averred that it was a most difficult route. He tried it and found that they were right. He was so exasperated that he swore the horrible oath—Mort Dieu, les Espagnols me le payeront! Next day he kept his word, for meeting an ambuscade of Spaniards, he attacked them with such fury that few remained to tell the tale. The Spaniards hoped by these ambuscades to destroy the pirates in detail. Later he met another and a stronger party, more advantageously placed, but the pirates attacking them with much vigour, and using fire-balls in great numbers, forced the remnant to flee leaving the larger part killed and wounded. There was but one path that led to the town, and this was very well barricaded, while the settlement was surrounded by planted shrubs of a prickly and pointed nature, probably something of the cactus variety. The Spaniards, posted behind their defences, plied the pirates with their artillery, and were answered with showers of fire-balls; the latter were [pg 27]for the present unable to advance. A second attack was made, the pirates’ orders being not to fire until very close to the enemy; and in this they were successful, as every shot told. The conflict continued raging till night, when the Spaniards hoisted the white flag and desired to parley, the only conditions they required being that the pirates should give the inhabitants quarter for two hours. This was a ruse to enable them to carry off and hide their valuables. Granting this request, the pirates marched into the town, and continued there the two hours without committing the least outrage; but the time past, Lolonois ordered that the inhabitants should be followed, robbed of all they had carried away, and made prisoners. They had succeeded, however, knowing the country, in making such good use of their time that the pirates could only capture a few sacks of indigo. Having remained there a few days, committing all kinds of outrages and stealing all they could, they returned to the coast, rejoining some of their companions, who had been engaged in robbing the poor fishermen of the coast, and others who came from Guatemala. A vessel from Spain was daily expected to arrive off this river, and they left two canoes to attack her, whilst they went over to some islands on the other side of the gulf to careen and cleanse their ships and obtain provisions, they knowing well that turtle abounded. They also made a number of ropes and nets from the rind of the macoa-tree, and obtained a quantity of a kind of bitumen or pitch, useful on board ship. In short, these islands would seem to supply nearly all that was required for the seaman’s use.
The pirates, having been in the gulf three months, received advice that the expected Spanish ship had arrived, and hastened to the spot where she lay unloading her merchandise. They had previously sent away some of the boats to seek for a smaller vessel, also expected, richly laden with plate, indigo, and cochineal. Meanwhile the ship’s crew, expecting an attack, had prepared for a good defence. Her armament consisted of forty-two guns, and she had on board one hundred and thirty well-armed men. Lolonois simply laughed at all this, and assaulted them with great courage. His own ship had but twenty-two guns. The Spaniards behaved excellently, and forced the pirates to retire momentarily, but Lolonois was still equal to the occasion. Taking advantage of the dense smoke caused by the bad powder of those days, he again attacked the ship, boarded her from all sides, and forced the Spaniards to surrender. They were considerably chagrined to find that their fight had been almost for nothing—piratically considered—for they found on board little more than fifty bars of iron, a small parcel of paper, and some earthen jars of wine.
Lolonois now called a council of war, and stated that he was bound for Guatemala. A division of opinion immediately arose, and he was especially opposed by some of the men who were but “green hands” in the art of piracy, and who had expected long ere this to have become wealthy, or, as the chronicler puts it, had expected “that pieces of eight were gathered as easy as pears from a tree.” Many of these immediately seceded and left the fleet, returning home as best they might. Another section averred that they would rather starve than return without plenty of prize money. The major part did not approve of the proposed voyage, and separated from Lolonois and his adherents. Their ring-leaders, Moses Vanclein and Pierre le Picard, on the voyage home, pillaged a town in Costa Rica, but only gained some seven or eight pounds of native gold.
Lolonois, thus deserted by the larger number of his companions, remained alone in the [pg 28]Gulf of Honduras, where all suffered severely from want of provisions. Roast monkey was their main sustenance. At last, near Cape Gracias a Dios, his ship struck on a sandbank near the little island, one of the group named De las Puertas, and although they threw overboard the guns, iron, and other weighty things on the ship, she stuck fast, and no art could remove her. They were forced to break her up, and build themselves a boat to get away. The islands were inhabited by some Indians, who are described as being very tall and nimble, running as fast as a fleet horse, and enormously strong; “at diving also,” says the chronicler, “they are very dexterous and hardy. From the bottom of the sea I saw them take up an anchor of six hundred-weight, tying a cable to it with great dexterity, and pulling it from a rock.” Their arms were of wood, and in place of iron points crocodiles’ teeth were often used. They had plantations of bananas, potatoes, and other fruits and vegetables. They occasionally indulged in cannibalism. Two of the men, a Frenchman and a Spaniard, went into the woods, where they lost themselves. A party of Indians pursued them. They defended themselves with their swords, but were at last forced to flee; the nimbler of the two, the Frenchman, escaped, but the Spaniard was taken. Some days after, twelve well-armed pirates, conducted by the above-mentioned Frenchman, reached the place where the Spaniard had been left. Here they found the evidences that the Indians had camped and made a fire, and at a small distance discovered a man’s bones well roasted, and with shreds of flesh, ill scraped off, adhering to them. A human hand, with but two fingers remaining, was also found, and they could only conclude that these were the last of the poor Spaniard, as he was never heard of again.
Their boat was now finished, and they determined to make for the river of Nicaragua. She could not hold the number, and to avoid disputes they cast lots who should go or stay. Lolonois and half his men embarked in the long-boat and in the skiff which they had before, the other half remaining ashore. At the river of Nicaragua that ill-fortune assailed the pirate leader which of long time had been reserved for him as a punishment due to the multitude of horrible crimes committed in his wicked and licentious life. Here he met with both Spaniards and Indians, who, jointly setting upon him and his companions, were killed on the place. Lolonois with those that remained alive, had much ado to escape aboard their boats; yet, notwithstanding this great loss, he resolved not to return to those he had left at the Isle of Puertas without taking some boats such as he sought. To this effect he determined to go on to the coasts of Carthagena; but “God Almighty,” says Esquemeling—“the time of His divine justice being now come—had appointed the Indians of Darien to be the instruments and executioners thereof. These Indians of Darien were esteemed as bravoes, or wild savage Indians, by the neighbouring Spaniards, who never could civilise them. Hither Lolonois came (brought by his evil conscience that cried for punishment), thinking to act his cruelties; but the Indians, within a few days after his arrival, took him prisoner, and tore him in pieces alive, throwing his body limb by limb into the fire, and his ashes into the air, that no trace or memory might remain of such an infamous, inhuman creature. One of his companions gave me an exact account of the tragedy, affirming that himself had escaped the same punishment with the greatest difficulty. He believed also that many of his comrades who were taken in that encounter by those Indians were, as their cruel captain, torn in pieces and burnt alive. Thus ends the history, the life, and miserable death of that infernal [pg 29]wretch Lolonois, who, full of horrid, execrable, and enormous deeds, and debtor to so much innocent blood, died by cruel and butcherly hands, such as his own were in the course of his life.” Those that remained on the island De las Puertas waiting for their companions’ return were later taken off on the ship of another pirate. The united crews, now in number 500, made for the river at Gracias a Dios, which they entered in canoes. They took little provision, expecting to “find”—in the pirate’s meaning, steal—plenty ashore. In this they were disappointed, for the Indians had got notice of their coming, and had fled. They were thus reduced to extreme necessity and hunger, and a few green herbs formed their only sustenance. After a laborious search in the woods for food, during which time they were reduced to eat their own boots and the leather sheaths of their swords and knives, and at which period they also vowed to sacrifice any Indians they might meet to appease their own appetites—which, fortunately for the Indians, did not happen—their courage oozed out, and they returned to the ships. The greater part of them subsequently perished from hunger and exhaustion, or in the same manner as had their commander Lolonois not long before.
And now to the deeds of another famous freebooter, “who,” as Esquemeling says, “may deservedly be called the second Lolonois, not being unlike or inferior to him either in achievements against the Spaniards or in robberies of many innocent people.” The notorious pirate Captain Morgan now appears upon the scene.