Captain William Kidd and Others of the Buccaneers

by John S. C. Abbott

Maracaibo was emptied of its population. All had sought refuge in the forest, with speed to which terror lent wings. The aged, the sick had fled. Even the dying were carried away. And it is stated without denial that the ship, the Oxford, which took the lead in this enterprise, belonged to Charles II., King of England. This royal buccaneer had equipped it, had manned it, and was to share in the spoil. And he rewarded the demoniac leader of this demoniac gang with the honors of a baronetcy; and appointed him governor over one of the most important colonies of Great Britain. Such scenes were enacted only two hundred years ago. Surely the world has made some progress.

The fugitives had taken with them everything they could carry. There were no carriage roads in those parts. But there were many narrow mule-paths, leading in various directions. On pack-mules and horses much treasure had been removed. Two days had elapsed since the alarm had resounded through the streets, “The pirates are coming.”

The houses were empty. The doors were left wide open. The chambers were stripped of everything valuable. Nearly all the gold and silver and jewels had of course disappeared. There were some houses of much elegance in the place, sumptuously furnished. The pirates rushed through the streets, searching for the richest palaces for their barracks. The churches they wantonly defiled and converted into prison-houses. Not a vessel or a boat was left in the port. All had been used, by the terrified fugitives, to escape far away upon the wide lake beyond.

Morgan, chagrined at the loss of so much anticipated treasure, instantly dispatched one hundred fleet-footed men to pursue the encumbered and heavily laden refugees, along all the trails. Scarcely any provisions could be found in the town. The fugitives had taken the wise precaution to destroy what they could not carry away. The little fort which guarded the harbor was merely a half-moon rampart facing the water, and mounting but four cannon. These works the Spaniards had of course abandoned.

The men who had been dispatched in pursuit of the Spaniards returned the next evening. They brought with them thirty prisoners, and fifty mules laden with valuables. The prisoners were feeble men and women of the poorest class. The owners of the richly laden mules, seeing the approach of the pirates, had abandoned all, and outstripped the pursuers in their flight. The unhappy captives were put to the torture, but nothing could be wrested from them.

This Morgan, subsequently Sir Henry Morgan, governor of Jamaica, suspended his prisoners by the beard; hung them up horizontally by cords bound around their toes and thumbs; placed burning matches between their fingers; scourged them; twisted cords around their heads till their eyes burst from their sockets, and perpetrated other enormities too horrible to be mentioned.

“Thus,” writes Esquemeling, “all sort of inhuman cruelties were executed upon these innocent people. Those who would not confess, or who had nothing to declare, died under the hands of those tyrannical men. These tortures and racks continued for the space of three whole weeks; in which time they ceased not to send out daily parties of men to seek for more people to torment and rob: they never returned home without booty and new riches.”

In one of these excursions they captured two negro slaves, who were faint for loss of food. They were both put to the torture, to compel them to reveal where their master was concealed. One, the elder of the two, endured the horrible torment without a word, and almost without a groan, till death came to his release. The other captive, a young man, just emerging from boyhood, bore up bravely until the agony became utterly unendurable. He then offered to lead them to his master. The wealthy Spaniard was soon taken, and with him the exultant pirates seized thirty thousand dollars in silver.

In such days of disaster and woe, families, flying into the wilderness, would cling together. Morgan had gradually captured one hundred of the most prominent families. He had also acquired an unexpectedly large amount of plunder, in silver, gold, bullion, and rich merchandise.

Captain Picard was very exultant in view of the success of the enterprise which he had suggested and guided. He now urged that they should advance upon the city of Gibraltar. It will be remembered that this place was at the head of the lake, about one hundred miles south from Maracaibo. Morgan embarked his prisoners and all of his plunder on board his fleet and spread his sails for this new enterprise.