Salt Water: The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman

by William Henry Giles Kingston

From the evidence brought out in court, it appeared that Delano, late master of the William brig, belonged to New York, in the United States of America. Though of most respectable parents, at an early age he had taken to evil courses, and was at length compelled to leave his native city for some notorious act of atrocity. His plausible manners, however, enabled him after a time to get command of several merchantmen in succession. One after another, they were cast away under very suspicious circumstances. The underwriters suffered, and the owners built larger and finer vessels, while he had evidently more money than ever at command. It now appeared, by the evidence of one of the prisoners who had sailed with him, that one at least he had purposely cast away, for the purpose of obtaining the insurance, she being insured for a far larger amount than she was worth. After this he got into the employment of a highly respectable firm in Liverpool, and sailed in command of a fine brig for the Mediterranean. Here was a good opening for making an honest livelihood; but such a course did not suit the taste of Delano. Several of his crew, brought up in the slave-trade, or as smugglers, were ill-disposed men; others were weak, ignorant, and unprincipled, and were easily gained by his persuasions to abet him in his evil designs. Finding, after they had been some time at sea together, that neither his mates nor his crew were likely to refuse joining in any project he might suggest, he boldly proposed to them to turn pirates; and not only to plunder any vessels they might fall in with, whose crews were unable to offer resistance, but, by putting them out of the way, to prevent all chance of detection. They waited, however, till they got into the Mediterranean, and they there fell in with a fine brig, out of London, laden with a valuable cargo. They surprised and overpowered the crew, whom they confined below, while they plundered her of everything valuable. Some of her crew had recognised them. To let them live would certainly lead to their own detection; so they scuttled the ship, and remained by her till she sunk beneath the waves, with the hapless people they had plundered on board. Then they went on their way rejoicing, and confident that no witnesses existed of their crime. They knew not of the Eye above which had watched them; they thought not of the avenging witness in their own bosoms. In the wildest revels and debauchery they spent their ill-gotten wealth. This time they were true to each other, and if any one suspected that their gold was obtained by unfair means, it was found impossible to prove anything against them. It was before this, I believe, that Delano had attempted to carry out some smuggling transaction at Malta, and had been thrown into prison; on being liberated from which, ruined in fortune, he had taken to the desperate courses I have described. He next got command of the William brig, in which he was joined by four of his old crew. Two were put in by the owners,—the carpenter and another man. He would willingly have sailed without them. He was also joined by an old comrade, Bill Myers, who had just lost his cutter off Portland. He had no fears of finding any opposition to his projects from his scruples. The William lay alongside the Helen, which vessel was taking in a rich cargo. He easily excited the cupidity of his crew by pointing it out to them. His own vessel had a cargo of very inferior value—chiefly, I believe, of earthenware. The William sailed a short time before the Helen. He first proposed the plan of plundering her to the four old pirates. They did not offer the slightest objection, but expressed their doubts whether all the crew would join them.

“They must be made to do it,” answered Delano, fiercely.

Myers at once acceded to Delano’s proposal. Charles Adams was the next to join them. They now felt themselves strong enough to talk openly of their project. Each man boasted of the deeds of atrocity he had committed with impunity, especially of their last act of piracy, and of the mode in which they had spent the proceeds of their crime. They told tales of the buccaneers of old—of the adventures of pirates in their own day, of which they had heard, and of some with which they were acquainted—of the hoards of wealth they had acquired. When they found that these stories had not sufficient effect with some of their shipmates, they applied to Delano, and liquor was freely served out. Most of those who had before resisted now consented, in their drunken state, to join in the proposed scheme. The most persevering and eager tempter was the mate. If he could not persuade, he laughed away the scruples of the more honest or more timid.

“Detection! nonsense!” he exclaimed. “Who can ever find it out? Who can know it, unless you go and talk of it yourselves? What’s the reason against it? Let’s be men! Let’s be above such folly! If they go to the bottom—why, a gale of wind and a started butt might easily send them there; so, where’s the difference? In one case, their rich cargo would go with them; now, you see, shipmates, we shall get it. So, hurra for the black flag, and overboard with all scruples!”

Now, however glaring the folly and wickedness of such reasoning may appear to us, it seemed very tempting and sensible to the miserable men to whom it was addressed. The carpenter only, and another man, refused to drink, or to participate in any way in the project. They could not, however, turn the rest from their intentions. The treacherous mode in which the Helen was taken possession of, I have already described. The carpenter alone held out; the other man pretended to join them, with the hope, it appeared, of saving the lives of their prisoners. When they had mastered the crew of the Helen, the pirates jeered and laughed at them, as they were removing the cargo, and, bound as they were, even kicked and struck them, and treated them with every indignity. They then compelled the carpenter to accompany them on board with his tools, and, holding a pistol at his head, made him bore holes in the ship’s bottom. No one appeared to have been wilder or more savage than Adams. Having completed this nefarious work, as they thought, effectually, the pirates left their victims to their fate. They would certainly have returned to remedy their mistake, and to send the Helen more speedily to the bottom, when they caught sight of a ship of war in the distance. They watched impatiently, but still the Helen floated. At length the strange sail drew near, and, fearful of being found by her in the neighbourhood of the plundered vessel, they stood away under every stitch of canvas they could set. Scarcely had the deed been committed, than each began to fear that the other would betray him; and, as if oaths could bind such wretches effectually, they all agreed to swear, on crossed swords, that they would never divulge what had occurred. They compelled the carpenter and the other honest man to join them in their profane oath, threatening to blow out their brains forthwith, if they refused. It seems strange that men guilty of such crimes should make use of the sign of the cross to confirm their oaths, and call God especially to witness their misdeeds. What extraordinary perversity such is of reason! Yes; but are not those we mix with every day guilty of similar wickedness and madness, when in their common conversation they call on the name of the most high God to witness to some act of folly, if not of vice, of extravagance, of cruelty, or senselessness?

The pirates sailed first for Leghorn, where they sold part of the plundered cargo, and spent the proceeds in a way to excite much suspicion. They then sailed for the island of Sardinia; but they there found that they were already suspected. Nothing could be more foolhardy than their visit to Malta, where the crew spent their money in rigging themselves out in gold chains, silk waistcoats, and green coats. How their conduct should not have excited suspicion, I cannot say; but it does not appear that the people with whom they dealt thought anything was wrong. It is one of the numberless examples to prove that criminals are deprived even of ordinary wisdom. Delano, however, saw, from the way his crew were behaving, that if he remained long at Malta, they would inevitably bring destruction on themselves. Having, therefore, got them on board, he sailed for Smyrna. On the voyage Myers tried to induce them to plunder other vessels; but none they could venture to attack fell in their way. Their rage against Myers was excessive when they found that he had attempted to blow them up, and that he had done so doubtless for the purpose of getting possession of a considerable amount of treasure which had been left on shore in the hands of an agent of Delano’s. I afterwards heard that he had in all probability succeeded, as the agent had stated that he had presented an order from Delano for its payment about the very moment we were taking possession of the brig, and, as he thought, being blown into the air. Search was made for him throughout Smyrna before we left the place, and continued for some time afterwards; but the last accounts had brought no intelligence of him, and it was concluded that he had escaped in disguise.

During the greater part of the trial, Delano had maintained his confidence and composure; but at length the evidence of his own people, and the master and crew of the Helen, became so overwhelming that he lost all hope, and, overcome by the most abject fear, sunk down, and would have fallen, had he not been supported. Recovering himself a little, he broke forth into earnest petitions that his life might be spared. He made the most trivial and weak excuses for his conduct, utterly unlikely to avail him anything. He declared that he had been led on by Myers; that his crew had forced him to consent to the piracy; that he had endeavoured to dissuade them from it, and that the fear of death alone had induced him to consent. Nothing he could say could, of course, alter the decision of his judges; and he, with six of his companions, was condemned to be hung at the fore-yard-arms of the William, then lying in Quarantine Harbour. It was dreadful to hear the shriek of despair to which Delano now gave vent.

“Mercy! mercy! mercy!” he cried. “Oh, spare my life! I am unfit to die! Send me to toil from day to day in chains, with the meanest in the land; but, oh, take not away that which you cannot restore!”

“Let him be removed,” said the judge of the court; and he was borne away, still crying out for mercy.

The miserable man, who had never shown mercy to others, still besought it for himself. The other prisoners said not a word in their defence. One only voice was heard when all others were hushed in the court. It was solemn, though hollow and weak.