The Hanging of Six Pirates

by Laura Nelson

On November 15^th, 1717, six men were hanged for piracy in Boston, Massachusetts. They were: Hendrik Quintor, Peter Cornelius Hoof, John Shuan, John Brown, Thomas Baker, and Simon Van Vorst.

On April 26, 1717 the above-named men (plus a man named Thomas South, who went aboard unarmed and later was acquitted at trial as a forced man,) were sent to take charge of the Mary Anne. This ship was a type of wooden sailing ship called a pink. The ship had just been taken by the pirate Captain Samuel Bellamy. Their orders were to take over operation of the ship and to send back her captain and several crew members with the ship's papers. Each one went aboard armed with pistols and cutlasses.

Sam Bellamy ordered them to follow the pirate flag ship the Whydah Galley to a location on Cape Cod. Once there, he intended to plunder the Mary Anne for the more than 7,000 gallons of Madeira wine that they had discovered was in her hold.

During the course of the afternoon, the pirates plundered the ship, helping themselves to some wine they found in one of the cabins and various items of the crew's clothing. Eventually, they were ab;e to remove a heavy cable that was blocking the hatch and that was when they discovered the barrels of Madeira.
 

As the day wore on, a storm rolled into Cape Cod. It would be one of the worst storms in the area's history. It was preceded by dense fog and thunder and lightning.

An Arctic gale from Canada was colliding with a warm front moving northward from the Caribbean. “According to eye witness accounts, gusts topped 70 miles [113 kilometers] an hour and the seas rose to 30 feet [9 meters.]¹

As they made their way North, Sam noticed that the Mary Anne was falling behind the Whydah. He hollered for them to keep up. One of the pirates responded that he would “make sail until she couldn't sail anymore.” A lamp was lit and hung from the stern of the Whydah to help them stay on course.

Yet the Mary Anne, with her increasingly drunken crew, eventually fell so far behind that they lost sight of the Whydah. They eventually went aground on a beach near the town of Wellfleet, MA. To prevent the Mary Anne from breaking up any further, Thomas South, who was a carpenter, cut down the mainmast.

The pirates and the remaining original crewmen of the Mary Anne went into the hold and spent the night there. One of the pirates, unnamed, asked one of the crewmen to read from the Common-Prayer Book, which he did for an hour.

In the morning, the pirates and crewmen found that they were far enough ashore that they could walk from the ship onto the beach. There they spent the morning eating some sweetmeats that they had found in someone's chest and washing them down with more wine. Eventually a local, Thomas Cole, happened upon them and came across in his canoe to rescue what he thought were ordinary mariners who had been shipwrecked. He took them to his house. There one of the crewmen of the Mary Anne finally blurted out that these men were pirates and members of Sam Bellamy's crew.

The pirates left, planning on making their way to Rhode Island, which at that time was a known pirate haunt.

On their way there, they stopped at a tavern in Eastham, MA for refreshment. There they were apprehended by the local law and held in Barnstable jail overnight. The next day they were put on horseback, along with 2 survivors of the wreck of the Whydah, Thomas Davis and John Julian. By this time they had of course learned of the demise of the Whydah, and were despondent over the loss of their friends and their treasure.

Once in Boston they languished in its foul, dark jail until their trial on October 18, 1717. But not all of them got to go to trial. Sometime between April and October John Julian disappeared from the jail. He is reported to have been sold under the name of Julian The Indian to John Quincy of Braintree, MA.² Just to make things interesting, John Quincy's grandson, President John Quincy Adams, became a staunch abolitionist.³

Thomas Davis was tried separately from the pirates who had been on the Mary Anne. The court believed his claim that he was forced to go along with the pirates because he was a carpenter and was acquitted. The remaining seven were charged with piracy and robbery. The potential penalty was death by hanging.

All of them pleaded not guilty and asserted their defense that they were forced men. Thomas South was the only one the court believed and was acquitted. The other six were found guilty and sentenced to death.

“Cotton Mather – minister of Boston's Old North Church – was in the courtroom to hear the testimony and verdicts. A fire-and-brimstone preacher and prolific writer, Mather had entered Harvard at the age of 12 and had preached his first sermon at the age of 16. He was personally committed to persuading the pirates to repent. Throughout their months in jail, Mather regularly met with Bellamy's men. On November 15, accompanied by Cotton Mather, the condemned men were rowed across the harbor to Charleston, where their gallows had been set up at the water's edge.”⁴

Hangings in 1717 were public entertainments. In the days before television and movies, and when a large segment of the population was illiterate, entire families (including children) would turn out to watch the spectacle.

In those days, pirate's bodies were not buried after they were hanged. They were instead covered in tar and placed inside a gibbet⁵, then hung out in public where sailors coming and going from the harbor could see them and be warned against becoming involved with pirates.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Clifford, Barry, and Kenneth J Kinkor with Sharon Simpson, Real Pirates, The Untold Story of the Whydah from slave ship to pirate ship, National Geographic, Washington, D.C.

Kinkor, Kenneth J, “Black Men Under the Black Flag,” in Bandits at Sea: A Pirate Reader, edited by C.R. Pennell, New York University, 2001.

“The Trials of Eight Persons Indited For Piracy” in British Piracy in the Golden Age, edited by Joel H Baer (2:289-319) Pickering and Chatto, 2007.

ENDNOTES

1Donovan Webster, “Pirates of the Whydah” in National Geographic Magazine (May 1999.) http:www.nationalgeographic.com/whydah/story.html

2Kinkor, Kenneth J, “Black Men Under the Black Flag,” in Bandits at Sea: A Pirate Reader, edited by C.R. Pennell, New York University, 2001, p 203

3“John Julian – Only Free At Sea” at Pirates of the Whydah, National Geographic. In February 1839, John Quincy Adams successfully represented the slaves from the Amistad rebellion. More information can be read at the National Archives web site: http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/amistad/ http://www.nationalgeographic.com/whydah/ax/frame4.html

4Clifford, Barry, and Kenneth J Kinkor with Sharon Simpson, Real Pirates, The Untold Story of the Whydah from slave ship to pirate ship, National Geographic, Washington, D.C., p 136

5A gibbet is an iron cage that encases the body. The bodies would be left on display until they had completely decomposed.

The published versions of "Peter Cornelius Hoof and Me" and "John Julian - The Teenage Pirate" can be viewed at: www.CindyVallar.com/PeterHoof.html and www.CindyVallar.com/JohnJulian.html.

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The Crewmen

John Julian – The Teenage Pirate

by Laura Nelson

There were only two known survivors of the wreck of the Whydah Galley, commanded by Sam Bellamy, in April, 1717: Thomas Davis, 22, a carpenter, and John Julian, 16, a pilot. Listed in the majority of historical records as a Cape Cod Indian, further research by the team which is recovering artifacts from the wreck site of the Whydah has revealed that he may have actually been a Miskito Indian from the region of Nicaragua and Honduras in South America.

There is not a lot of recorded information about John, but he does appear to have been one of the earliest members of Sam Bellamy's crew. At the time of the wreck of the Whydah, history records him as being about 16 years old. Since Bellamy had been operating as a pirate for nearly two years at the time, John was probably about 14 or 15 when he joined up with the pirates.

According to William Dampier, who interacted with the Moskito [sic] Indians circa 1687, “Their chiefest employment in their own country is to strike fish, turtle, or manatee... For this they are esteemed and coveted by all privateers; for one or two of them in a ship will maintain 100 men; so that when we careen our ships we choose commonly such places where there is plenty of turtle or manatee for these Moskito men to strike; and it is very rare to find privateers destitute of one or more of them when the commander or most of the men are English.” (Dampier, locations 878-93.)

So it can be surmised that somewhere in his travels along the coast of South America, Sam Bellamy also interacted with some Miskito Indians, and that was how John Julian came to be a member of their crew.

In addition to their fishing skills, Dampier also says that, “They are very ingenious at throwing the lance, fishgig, harpoon, or any manner of dart,” (Dampier, locations 878-93), skills which would have been very valuable to a pirate. Dampier also goes on to comment that “They often come with the seamen.” (Dampier, locations 909-23.) So that it is apparently not uncommon for Miskito Indians to join fishing and privateering crews of their own will. So John was simply following a tribal tradition when he took up with Sam Bellamy. He had survival and weapons skills and knowledge of the local bays and coast, making him a prime addition to Bellamy's crew.

So at 16 years old John set out to travel the known world of the time and learned what it was to have a vote in matters that directly affected his life and to be accepted as a man and be judged for his abilities as a sailor and a pilot, not for the color of his skin.

While sailing with Bellamy, he traveled to such places as the Gulf of Honduras, Portobello, Panama, Baya Honda, Cuba, Cape Corrientes and the Isle of Pines, Puerto Rico and the north coast of Haiti, St. Croix and La Isla Blanquilla, Venezuela. (Real Pirates, pgs. 52-58.)

Along the way he would participate in capturing and plundering of ships and experience what it meant to dress in fine clothes and have a pocket full of money. He would also have had his name or initials or mark on a treasure chest full of booty.

There is no historical record mentioning John again until after the wreck of the Whydah Galley on April 26, 1717. Nine pirates were arrested and put on horse-back to be taken to Boston Gaol after the wreck. There were the seven who survived the wreck of the prize ship Mary Anne: Hendrick Quintor, Thomas South, Peter Cornelius Hoof, John Shuan, John Brown, Thomas Baker, and Simon Van Vorst. Numbers eight and nine were John and Thomas Davis. There also is not any specific information available about how John was captured.

But unlike his comrades, John did not stand trial for piracy. “Like many other captured black and Native American pirates, the 16-year-old Miskito Indian was separated from his mates and sold into slavery,” (Real Pirates, pg. 137) The generally accepted story is that he was sold to John Quincy (the grandfather of John Quincy Adams of Amistad Fame), as “Julian the Indian.”ⁱⁱ

So after having learned what it was to be treated and respected as a man, you can imagine what it must have been like for him when his prison guards and probably some others showed up at his cage to announce he was being taken away to be sold into slavery.

He must have fought, he must have screamed. Perhaps they had to knock him on the back of the head to keep him quiet until they reached the auction blocks. Did his former shipmates try to rescue him, or holler for the to stop? It's possible, but there would have been very little they could have done to stop them, being prisoners themselves. Or perhaps they had simply been in jail so long that they no longer had the spirit to speak up or fight.

And what was it like for him on the auction block? People shouting out prices as though he were livestock. In that era, he would have been seen as pretty much just that: property to be bought and sold. Did he stand quietly on the auction block, or did someone have to stand by him to keep him restrained while the bidding went on?

Being sold into slavery was a common fate for men of color who were captured off of pirate ships. In 1722, the 75 black members of Bart Roberts' crew were sold into slavery. (Real Pirates, pg. 146)

Not surprisingly, John is reported to have not made a very good slave. Imagine growing into manhood as someone's property; how many nights did he spend lying awake in his hut or shack in someone's slave quarters remembering the days of freedom and democracy as a pirate, or his days of freedom in his boyhood in his native land?

There is a newspaper blurb reporting his upcoming execution. He is said to have killed a bounty hunter while trying to escape. In the blurb, he is described as an unhappy criminal. If this is the same John Julian, he found freedom by dying.

It was a scene that would play itself out over and over for almost 200 more years in the United States: the slave with the indomitable spirit who runs away from his Master to seek a life as a free man and a human being instead of someone's property.

And what about the man who bought him? Why buy such an obviously strong-willed youngster? Did he believe that he was so dominating and John so young that he could beat the spirit out of him as was done to Kunta Kinte to make him accept his white man's name of Toby in Roots? Or did he truly believe that John, being colored, would simply accept his situation and position in life and give in?

After his execution, his body was turned over to “several young Students in Physick, Surgery, etc.” and thereafter dissected as a learning exercise.ⁱⁱⁱ

Bibliography

Dampier, William, A New Voyage Round the World, reprinted 1937 and published by A and C Black, Ltd., Amazon Kindle DX edition. (Chapter 3 in the print edition.)

Clifford, Barry, and Kenneth J. Kinkor with Sharon Simpson, Real Pirates, The Untold Story of the Whydah from slave ship to pirate ship, National Geographic, Washington, D.C.

iWww.nationalgeographic/whydah/com/realpirates Expedition Whydah/Biographies of the Pirates

iiWww.nationalgeographic/whydah/com/realpirates Expedition Whydah/Biographies of the Pirates

iiiThe Boston Newsletter, on March 30, 1733

The Prisoners

Thomas

His name was Thomas, and he was a prisoner on board the Whydah on the night of April 26, 1717 when it ran aground in a storm and was lost with only 2 survivors.
Thomas' ship was the Mary Anne, which was captured by Sam Bellamy in the Whydah earlier on the day of its destruction. When the seven pirates came on board to take charge of her, Thomas was one of the four crewmen sent with Captain Crumpstey to the Whydah as prisoners. Sam demanded to see the Captain's papers, then sent the men below. Their captivity would guarantee the good behavior of the remaining crewmen left behind on the Mary Anne.
He was a simple mariner, with a wife he loved, who was pregnant with their first child. This trip was supposed to be a short one for Thomas. He wasn't going across the water but only to the next port, so that he could be home with his wife for the birth of their child.
While held prisoner on the Whydah, Thomas and the others could feel the change in the weather, could hear the shouts as they grew more desperate to survive the storm. When the ship struck ground, they were tossed around the same as the others, and had no chance to save themselves.
Thomas is another from the sailors and pirates on the Whydah whose soul has been stuck since that night. By telling even this much of his story he is also being helped to get stronger so it can move forward and go on.
Thomas' wife in that time was his soul mate. He was one of the first of the pirates I ever "spoke" to. He begged to talk to me because by telling his story I was freeing him to rejoin his soul mate. He was so plaintive that I couldn't turn down his request to talk.

What this blog is about

This blog is not here to publish "pretty" stories about pirates. If you are looking for Johnny Depp or Errol Flynn, you're in the wrong place. Not all pirates were forced. A vast majority of the men who became pirates chose the piratical lifestyle. (But being forced to join did happen.)They committed crimes and performed atrocities. So please do not enter this blog expecting a pretty read. I am not going to hide or varnish over what these men and  even women did. I just want you to enter the realm of the Whydah pirates fully informed.