The ships and sailors of old Salem

by Ralph Delahaye Paine

“The men in the water then consulted together what they should do, concluding it certain death to return to the ship; and they determined it would be the safest to swim on shore, and secrete themselves in the jungle; but as they approached it they observed the beach about Qualah Battoo lined with natives, and they proceeded more to the westward and landed upon a point called Ouj’ong Lamah Moodah nearly two miles distant from the ship. On their way they had divested themselves of every article of clothing, and they were entirely naked at the time they landed.

“As it was not yet dark, they sought safety and seclusion in the jungle, from whence they emerged as soon as they thought it safe, and walked upon the beach in the direction of Cape Felix and Annalaboo, intending to make the best of their way to the latter place, with the hope of meeting there some American vessel. At daylight they sought a hiding-place again in the bushes, but it afforded them only a partial protection from the scorching rays of the sun from which, being entirely naked, they experienced the most dreadful effects. Hunger and thirst began also to make demands upon them; but no food could anywhere be found. They tried to eat grass, but their stomachs refused it. They found a few husks of the cocoanut, which they chewed, endeavoring to extract some nourishment from them but in vain.

“They staid in their hiding-place the whole of this day, and saw Malays passing along the beach but were afraid to discover themselves. At night they pursued their journey again, during which they passed several small streams, where they slaked their thirst but obtained no food. About midnight they came to a very broad river, which they did not venture to cross. The current was very rapid, and having been thirty-six hours without food of any kind, they did not dare attempt swimming it. Here, then, they were put completely hors de combat; they found for want of food their energies were fast giving way, and still they believed their lives depended on not being discovered.

“Since further progress towards Annalaboo appeared impossible, they resolved to retrace their steps, endeavor to pass Qualah Battoo in the night without being discovered and reach the hospitable residence of Po Adam, at Pulo Kio. They accordingly took up their line of march towards that place, and reached, as they supposed, the neighborhood of Cape Felix by the morning, when they again retreated to the jungle, where they lay concealed another day, being Wednesday, the day of the recapture of the ship, but at too great distance to hear the firing. At night they again resumed their journey, and having reached the spot where the Malays landed in so much haste when they deserted the ship, they found the beach covered with canoes, a circumstance which aroused their suspicions but for which they were at a loss to account.

“They now concluded to take a canoe as the most certain way of passing Qualah Battoo without discovery, and so proceed to Pulo Kio. As they passed the roads, they heard one of the ship’s bells strike the hour, and the well-known cry of ‘All’s Well,’ but fearing it was some decoy of the natives, they would not approach her but proceeded on their way, and landed at Pulo Kio, secreting themselves once more in the jungle, near the residence of Po Adam until the morning, when four naked and half-famished white men were seen to emerge from the bushes and approach his fort with feeble steps. As soon as recognized they were welcomed by him with the strongest demonstrations of delight; slapping his hands, shouting at the top of his lungs, and in the exuberance of his joy committing all kinds of extravagances. They now heard of the recapture of the ship, and the escape of the boat’s crew on shore, who, it had never occurred to them, were not already numbered with the dead.

“Having refreshed themselves (being the first food they had tasted in seventy-two hours), they were conveyed by Adam and his men on board the James Monroe in the pitiful condition of which we have before spoken.

“In the course of the latter part of the same day, another canoe, with a white flag displayed, was observed approaching the fleet from the direction of Qualah Battoo, containing three or four Chinamen who informed us that four of our own men, two of whom were wounded, one very severely, were at their houses on shore, where their wounds had been dressed and they had been otherwise cared for; and that we could ransom them of the Rajahs at ten dollars each. To this I readily agreed, and they were soon brought off to the ship in a sampan, and proved to be Charles Converse and Gregorie Pedechio, seamen, Lorenzo Migell, cook, and William Francis, steward.

“Converse was laid out at full length upon a board, as if dead, evidently very badly wounded. The story of the poor fellow was a sad one. He, with John Davis, being the two tallest men in the ship, were on the stage over the side when she was attacked. Their first impulse was, to gain the ship’s decks, but they were defeated in this design by the pirates who stood guard over the gangway and making repeated thrusts at them. They then made a desperate attempt to pass over the pepper-boat, and thus gain the water, in doing which they were both most severely wounded. Having reached the water, Converse swam round to the ship’s bows and grasped the chain, to which he clung as well as he was able, being badly crippled in one of his hands, with other severe wounds in various parts of his body. When it became dark, he crawled up over the bows as well as his exhausted strength from the loss of blood would permit, and crept to the foot of the forecastle stairs, where he supposed he must have fainted, and fell prostrate upon the floor without the power of moving himself one inch further.

“The Malays believing him dead, took no heed of him, but traveled up and down over his body the whole night. Upon attempting to pass over the boat, after being foiled in his endeavor to reach the ship’s decks, a native made a pass at his head with his ‘parrung,’ a weapon resembling most a butcher’s cleaver, which he warded off by throwing up his naked arm, and the force of the blow fell upon the outerpart of his hand, severing all the bones and sinews belonging to three of his fingers, and leaving untouched only the fore finger and thumb. Besides this he received a kreis wound in the back which must have penetrated to the stomach, for he bled from his mouth the most part of the night. He was likewise very badly wounded just below the groin, which came so nearly through the leg as to discolor the flesh upon the inside.

“Wonderful, however, to relate, notwithstanding the want of proper medical advice, and with nothing but the unskillful treatment of three or four shipmasters, the thermometer ranging all the time, from 85 to 90 deg., this man recovered from his wounds, but in his crippled hand he carried the marks of Malay perfidy to his watery grave, having been drowned at sea from on board of the brig Fair America, in the winter of 1833-4, which was, no doubt, occasioned by this wound which unfitted him for holding on properly while aloft.