Captain Pound, meanwhile, in no way distressed by Hawkins’ desertion, was busily at work robbing vessels in the vicinity of the Cape. On Saturday evening, Sept. 28, 1689, he sighted a small sloop and gave chase and brought her to anchor under the Cape. She was from Pennsylvania. Not having any salt pork on board she was allowed to go and Pound sailed back over the shoals hoping for better luck in Vineyard Sound. At “Homes his Hole” he found the sloop “Brothers Adventure,” of New London, Conn., John Picket, master, just coming out, having been forced in by bad weather. She was bound for Boston and was loaded with the very provisions that Pound had been in search of and a boat’s crew of armed men soon induced Captain Picket to come to anchor beside the pirate sloop. The loot amounted to thirty-seven barrels of pork, three of beef and a good supply of pease, Indian corn, butter and cheese. Having at last obtained the provisions so necessary for a southern voyage, Captain Pound anchored in Tarpaulin Cove while the rigging was overhauled and everything made shipshape for the intended voyage to “Corazo”—Curacao, the Dutch colony near the South American coast. The Netherlands were then at peace with England and there Pound could refit before going out to prey upon French shipping out of Martinique. He lay in Tarpaulin Cove for two days and was nearly ready to set sail when a sloop appeared off the anchorage and steered directly for him. Pound at once came to sail and stood away with the sloop in hot pursuit.
ARMED SLOOP NEAR BOSTON LIGHTHOUSE IN 1729
From the only known copy of a mezzotint by William Burgis, published Aug. 11, 1729, and now in the possession of the United States Lighthouse Board
It was now less than two weeks since that Sunday morning when Captain Pound had chased a small ketch into Martha’s Vineyard harbor. The island at that time was a part of the colony of New York and as soon as the pirate was gone, Matthew Mayhew, the local Governor, sent a messenger, riding post, to inform the Governor and Council at Boston of the presence of the pirate so that shipping bound westward might be warned of the danger. The Council did more than that for it commissioned Capt. Samuel Pease, late commander of the Duke of Courland’s ship “Fortune,” two hundred tons and twelve guns, to go to sea at once in the sloop “Mary,” with a crew of twenty able seamen in search of the pirate. Benjamin Gallop was commissioned lieutenant and the “Mary” was supplied with a barrel of powder, fifty pounds of small shot, and cartridge papers and match. Captain Pease was instructed to endeavor to take the pirates by surprise if possible and “to prevent ye sheding of blood as much as may bee.”[53]
The Council meeting was held on Monday, Sept. 30th and the “Mary” sailed from Boston that evening every man on board being a volunteer. When Captain Pease reached Cape Cod he learned that Pound had gone westward so he sailed on, over the shoals, expecting to find him at Tarpaulin Cove. On Friday morning when off Woods Hole, a canoe came out with the information that the pirate was at Tarpaulin Cove:—
“Upon which Wee presently gave a great shout, and the word was given to our men to make all ready which was accordingly done, the wind being SSE, and blew hard. Quickly after we were all ready we espied a Sloop ahead of us. We made what saile we could, and quickly came so neere that we put up our Kings Jack, and our Sloop sailing so very well we quickly came within Shot, and our Captain ordered a great Gun to be fired thwart her fore foot. On that a man of theirs presently carryed up a Red flagg to the top of their maine mast and made it fast. Our Captain then ordered a musket to be fired thwart his forefoot. He not striking we came up with him and our Captain commanded us to fire on them which accordingly we did, and also called them to strike to the King of England. Captain Pounds standing on the quarter deck with his naked sword in his hand flourishing, said, come aboard, you Doggs, and I will strike you presently or words to that purpose. His men standing by him with their Guns in their hands on the Deck, he taking up his Gun, they let fly a volley upon us, and we againe at him. At last wee came to Leeward of them, supposing it to be some Advantage to us because the wind blew so hard and so our weather side did us good. They perceiving this gave severall Shouts supposing (as we did apprehend) that we would yield to them. Wee still fired at them and they at us as fast as they could loade and fire and in a little space we saw Pounds was shot and gone off the deck. While we were thus in the fight two of our men met with a mischance by the blowing up of some gun powder which they perceiving by ye smoke (we being pretty near them) gave severall shouts and fired at us as fast as they could. Wee many times called to them, telling them if they would yield to us we would give them good quarter, they utterly refusing to have it, saying ‘Ai yee dogs, we will give you quarter by and by.’ We still continued our fight, having two more of our men wounded. At last our Captain was much wounded so that he went off the deck. The Lieutenant quickly after ordered us to get all ready to board them which was readily done. Wee layed them on bord presently and at our Entrance we found such of them that were not much wounded very resolute, but discharging our Guns at them, we forthwith went to club it with them and were forced to knock them downe with the but end of our muskets. At last we queld them, killing four and wounding twelve, two remaining pretty well. The weather coming on very bad and being desirous to get good Doctors or Surgeons for our wounded men, we shaped our Course for Rhode Island and the same night we secured our Prisoners and got in between Pocasset and Rhode Island. The next day being Saturday, the fifth of October we got a convenient house for our wounded men, got them on shore and sent away to Newport for Doctors who quickly came and dressed them. Our Captain being shot in the arm and in the side and in the thigh, lost much blood and continued weak and faint, and on Friday after, being the eleventh day of October, he being on board intending to come home, we set saile and were come but a little way before he was taken with bleeding afresh, so that we came to an anchor againe and got him on shore to another house on Rhode Island side, where he continued very weake. In the afternoon he was taken with bleeding again and with fits. He continued that night and losing so much blood, on Saturday morning, the twelfth of October, departed this life. We buried him at Newport, in Rhode Island, the Monday following. That Monday at night we set saile from Rhode Island and arrived at Boston on Saturday the 18th of October with fourteen Prisoners. The Bloody Flag was not put above Pounds his vessell before we fired at them.”[54]
The prisoners were duly lodged in Boston’s new stone gaol which had a dungeon in it, walls four feet thick, and all kinds of irons to keep them there. The “treasure,” including the sloop, was appraised at £209.4.6. As the owners of the sloop declined to pay the salvage ordered on her, she was condemned to her captors. Captain Pease left a widow and four orphans. In December they were “in a poor and low condition” and the General Court passed a bill providing for a “collection” in the several meeting houses for their relief. The wounded pirates were doctored by Thomas Larkin, whose bill for attendance amounted to £21.10.0. Pound had been shot in the side and arm “& Severall bones Taken oute.” Thomas Johnson lost part of his jaw; Buck had seven holes in one of his arms; Griffin lost an eye and part of an ear; Siccadam was shot through both legs; and Browne, Giddings, Phips, Lander and Warren had various wounds.
Pound and Hawkins and the rest of their company lay in prison until January 13, 1690, before they were brought to trial. Hawkins had been examined by the aged Governor Bradstreet and the Magistrates on October 4th and Pound had given his version of their doings the day after he had been placed in gaol. Hawkins was tried first,—on January 9th, and found guilty at one session of the Court. Pound and the rest of the indicted men were brought to trial on the 17th and found guilty of felony, piracy and murder and Deputy-Governor Thomas Danforth pronounced sentence of death, that they “be hanged by the neck until they be dead.” Pound, Hawkins, Johnson and Buck were ordered to be executed on January 27th.
Samuel Sewall, the diarist, rode into Boston a little before twelve o’clock on the day of the trial having spent the night at Braintree. It had been a cold ride and a snowstorm was threatening. After dinner he went to the Town House where the Court was sitting and then in company with the Reverend Cotton Mather, went to the gaol to visit the condemned prisoners. Mr. Mather never failed to attend to this detail of his professional work and Pound and the others were thereupon counseled and prayed with. Mr. Waitstill Winthrop, one of the magistrates who had tried the pirates, was not satisfied with the verdict or sentence and immediately after the trial bestirred himself to obtain for them a reprieve. He went about obtaining the signatures of influential persons and finally headed a committee that went before the Governor and petitioned that reprieve be granted. Sewall records in his diary that he was one of those who called on the aged Governor and asked that Pound and Buck be respited, and he further relates that Mr. Winthrop, Col. Samuel Shrimpton, one of the magistrates, and Isaac Addington, the clerk of the court, followed him to his house with another petition asking that Hawkins be reprieved. Sewall signed it and the Governor granted the reprieve barely in time to save Hawkins’ neck for he was on the scaffold and ready to be turned off when the order reached the sheriff. “Which gave great disgust to the People; I fear it was ill done”—writes Sewall. “Some in the Council thought Hawkins, because he got out of the Combination before Pease was kill’d, might live; so I rashly sign’d, hoping so great an inconvenience would not have followed. Let not God impute Sin.”[55] And so it happened that the only entertainment found by the crowd that had gathered to see the hanging was the turning off of Thomas Johnson, “the limping privateer.”
