Captain John Crane, 1800-1815

by Thomas Wallace Knox

The order was obeyed; and in a little while we hove-to within a hundred yards of the object I had sighted, and which proved to be a boat. Here we lowered the gig with the mate and a crew, and just as it struck the water we saw two heads rising above the gunwale of the strange craft. Then two more appeared; and it was evident that we had rescued four castaways by my discovery. The boat and its inmates were soon at the side of the Aurora, the men were brought on deck, the boat was hoisted in and secured, and our ship filled away on her course.

They were part of the crew of an American ship from Boston to Calcutta. She had foundered two days before, and the crew had taken to the boats with the intention of making Cape Town; and we afterwards learned that the other boats were picked up near that port. Judge of my surprise and satisfaction when I found that one of the men we rescued was the son of Samuel Bickford, the man at whose house David and I were entertained on our first night away from home, as told in the second chapter of this narrative. Certainly I had repaid his hospitality which I had never forgotten. In fact, I was thinking about it not more than five minutes before I saw the speck on the water.

When we reached the Straits of Sunda it was whispered around that we might have an affair with the pirates that infest this region. The captain had all the guns carefully overhauled and made ready for work; and for a week or more the crew of each gun had been trained so as to know what to do. We carried the same armament as did the Washington, about which I have already told the reader. The arm-chest was brought up, and the guns and pistols which it contained were cleaned and prepared for service; and the men who claimed to be most efficient with these weapons were detailed to handle them in case their use became necessary. In fact, we got ourselves all ready to meet the pirates, and some of the younger sailors were rather disappointed when we passed safely into the China Sea without encountering any of them.

These Malay pirates are a great pest and annoyance to mariners; and I wonder that the civilized nations do not band together and wipe them out of existence. But I've already wondered why they don't do the same thing with the Algerine pirates; and I suppose I may keep on wondering about these things for the rest of my life.

In one respect the Malays are worse than the Algerines. When the Malays capture a ship they kill everybody on board, sparing neither age nor sex; while the Algerines rarely kill anybody, except in actual fighting, reserving their prisoners to sell them into slavery. Whether this mercy is due solely to their cupidity or for other reasons I am unable to say.

I said we did not encounter any Malay pirates; but we should have done so, had it not been for a wind that came up one afternoon. We were becalmed in a channel, about six miles wide, between two islands. It was a dead calm, and the only motion there was on the ship was given to her by the current that carried us along perhaps half a mile per hour. While we lay there we saw a long boat, full of men, pulling along the coast of one of the islands, and disappearing among the trees that fringe the shore.

Presently we saw the same boat, with two others of similar size and appearance, coming out from among the trees and steering in our direction. There seemed to be about forty men in each boat, twenty of them rowing or paddling, and another twenty standing or sitting idle.

The captain ordered everything to be made ready to give them a warm reception. The two guns on our starboard side were loaded with canister shot, and made ready for business. The long gun amidships was loaded in the same way; and it was the captain's intention to give the fellows all three of those guns in succession, as soon as they got within easy range. The small arms were brought up and distributed, and the men who held them were stationed near the ship's bow to resist the Malays in case they came near enough to board the Aurora. These Malay pirates always board a ship over the bows. They're as active as monkeys, and go nearly naked; and sometimes they grease their bodies all over, so that it's difficult to hold them if you attempt to capture them.

I felt my heart beat fast as I saw these scoundrels coming towards us, as the word had been passed around that all our lives would be taken in case of the capture of the ship. I think the boats were about half way from the land to the ship when I noticed a ripple on the water astern of us, and at the same instant heard the captain give an order to brace around the yards.