The proclamation ran on for several pages, with the usual ornate qualifications and stylistic flourishes typical of such documents. But the very last line contained a striking proviso. The offer of clemency applied to every single royal subject who had turned to piracy, except one: Henry Every.
Acknowledgments
Almost a decade and a half ago, I published a book called The Ghost Map, about a cholera epidemic in London in 1854. Like most of my books it jumped across multiple disciplines—from microbiology to urban planning to sociology. But, unlike most of my books, it had what the Hollywood people call a “through-line”: a central, more or less linear, narrative that the book rarely strayed far from. There was a killer loose on the streets of London and a (medical) detective on the case. Wherever the commentary happened to take you, you never deviated far from that main arc.
Somehow, despite its grim subject matter—or perhaps because of it—The Ghost Map slowly developed a meaningful readership over the years since it was published. And so in a way, the idea for this book first came out of the many conversations I had with the readers of The Ghost Map during that period. There was something in the structure of that book that drew readers in, something that kept them turning the pages. This book was an attempt to get back to a variation on that structure after a long absence: in this case, a pirate loose on the open sea, and an entire planet trying to find him. So it seems right to begin an acknowledgments by thanking those readers for reminding me how fun it is to write a book with single thread.
The story of Henry Every is similar to that of The Ghost Map in that it has been the subject of much academic scrutiny while remaining a story that most lay readers know close to nothing about. That is a particularly fortuitous place to find yourself as an author, building on a foundation of exemplary scholarship. I have tried to pay tribute to that work and commentary in the preceding pages—to make this a book not just about what happened in the story of Henry Every and the Fancy, but also a book about the debate about what happened. So a special thanks is warranted to the scholars and friends who shaped this book with their work, suggestions, and in some cases close reading, particularly Philip J. Stern, Douglas R. Burgess, David Olusoga, Joel Baer, Soma Mukherjee, Chris Himes, Mark Bailey, Stewart Brand, and Adam Fisher. I would also like to acknowledge my long-ago mentor from graduate school, Edward Said, who first got me thinking about how much the institutions of the West were shaped by their encounters with the “Orient.” I wish he were still around to read this book, if only to see that I finally managed to get rid of most of the poststructuralist jargon that used to annoy him so much back in those grad school days.
I am also grateful to Joe Davies for some last minute research deep in the stacks in London. Thanks as well to the many institutions whose archives were essential to writing this book: the India Office Records at the British Library; the National Archives of the United Kingdom; the National Maritime Museum; the Docklands Museum; and the New York Public Library.
My editor Courtney Young was so devoted to figuring out the best structure for this book that she briefly converted her workspace into one of those “crazy-walls” from films like The Usual Suspects, visualizing all the different ways the chapters could be organized. She helped me work through some of the thorniest issues that the subject matter presented and kept an invaluable eye on the narrative pacing of the book. Once again, Kevin Murphy did a masterful job shepherding this book from an unruly early manuscript into a much more presentable form. My longtime publisher Geoffrey Kloske was as creative and flexible as always in getting this book to print. With one exception, my partnership with Geoff has lasted longer than any other in my publishing career: here’s hoping that we have many more productive years together.
That one exception is my agent, Lydia Wills, who has worked with me for almost twenty-five years now. This is the thirteenth book that we have worked on together. That number should speak for itself, but in case it doesn’t: Lydia has been a guiding light for my entire career, the person who got me thinking about the long arc of a “career” in the first place. I’m also delighted to have had help with this project and others from the good folks at Endeavor, particularly Ari Emmanuel, Jay Mandel, Sylvie Rabineau, and Ryan McNeily.
I am grateful to my family for tolerating my long—occasionally interesting—digressions about seventeenth-century piracy over dinner. (Special thanks to my son Dean for suggesting “Libertalia” as a chapter title.) This book is dedicated to my wife, Alexa Robinson, whose lifelong passion for nautical history made her an ideal early research assistant for this book, before more important matters took precedent. And as always, she was a brilliant line editor, even if she took a little too much pleasure in mocking my “landlubber” phrasings at a few points. This one is for you, Lexie.
Marin County, CA
July 2019
Notes
INTRODUCTION
how to make an explosion: Parker, p. 63.
Some of the first differential equations: Steele, p. 360.
1. ORIGIN STORIES
“They found seldom less aboard”: Turley, p. 23.
“Wandering scholars seeking alms”: Quoted in Dean, p. 60.
Given that this memoir: Defoe, The King of Pirates, loc. 65–67.
2. THE USES OF TERROR
“They were dragged”: D’Amato, loc. 1095–1097.
“His majesty is gone forth”: Egerton and Wilson, plates 37–39, lines 8–23.
While they lacked the armies: See Hitchcock and Maeir for a nuanced comparison of the Sea Peoples and the pirates of the “Golden Age.”
“terrorism and not royalty”: Quoted in https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-28-02-0305.
In a letter written just: For more on the evolution of terrorism, see https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/history-of-the-word-terrorism.
François L’Ollonais was reported: Leeson, pp. 113–14.
In one later version: Ibid., p. 112.
Unparallel’d Cruelty: The full description bears repeating, if only to remind the modern reader that tales of seemingly gratuitous violence have a long history: “After whipping [the boy], [he] pickled him in Brine; that for nine Days and Nights he tied him to the main Mast, his Arms and Legs being all the Time extended at full Length; that not content with this, he had him unty’d, and laid along upon the Gangway, where he trod upon him, and would have had the Men done the same, which they refus’d; by which being exasperated as thinking, which indeed he might very well do, that they pitied him, he kick’d him about as he lay, unable to get up, and stamp’d upon his breast so violently, that his Excrement came up involuntarily from him; which he took up, and with his own Hands forc’d it several Times down his Throat; that the poor miserable Creature was eighteen Days a dying, being cruelly allowed Food enough to sustain Life, and keep him in Torture all that Time; that he was severely whipp’d every Day, and particularly the Day he died; that when he was in the Agonies of Death, and speechless, his inexorable Master gave him eighteen Lashes; that when he was just expiring, he put his Finger to his Mouth, which was took for a Signal of desiring something to drink, when the Brute, to continue his Inhumanity to the last, went into the Cabbin for a Glass, which he pissed in, and then gave it him for a Cordial; that a little, ’twas believed, went down his Throat; upon which pushing the Glass from him, he that Instant breathed his last; and God in Mercy put an End to his Sufferings, which seemed to cause an Uneasiness to the Captain for not continuing longer.” Quoted in Turley, pp. 10–11.
“To prevent captives from withholding”: Leeson, pp. 111–12.
3. THE RISE OF THE MUGHALS
“Should there be rain”: Anonymous, “The Bolan Pass,” pp. 109–12.
From 1 CE to 1500 CE: Maddison, loc. 7583–7584.
“which produce a kind of wool”: Quoted in Yafa.
What made Indian cotton unique: For more on the w
orld-historical impact of dyed fabric—valuable purely for its aesthetic properties—see Johnson, Wonderland, pp. 17–30.
The result was a fabric: Yafa, p. 28.
“There were in India trees”: Strabo’s writings on India are excerpted at https://www.ibiblio.org/britishraj/Jackson9/chapter01.html.
the Greek historian Strabo: “Wine, bronze, tin, gold, and various manufactured articles were shipped up the Nile to Coptos and moved overland to Red Sea ports at Myos Hormos or Berenice. Manned by Egyptian Greeks, they sailed through the Gulf of Aden to India by two major routes—to the north around Gujarat and to the southwest coast at Kerala or further south to Ceylon (see Casson 1989). They brought back spices, pepper, jewellery, and cotton goods. They were able to buy Chinese silks, mirrors, and other goods which had come overland to India. The Indian trade was financed in substantial part by export of silver and gold. The volume and dating of Roman coins found in India provide an indication of the locus and changing intensity of commerce.” Maddison, loc. 3884–3891.
“They shall eat every fourth”: Quoted in Gopalakrishnan, 2008.
“The Hindus believe”: Al-Biruni, pp. 10–11.
Three years later: “In 1012 it carried him to Thanesar, Harsha’s original capital due north of Delhi. Anandapala, whose kingdom was now reduced to a small corner of the eastern Panjab and whose status was little better than that of a Ghaznavid feudatory, tried to intercede. He offered to buy off Mahmud with elephants, jewels and a fixed annual tribute. The offer was refused, Thanesar duly fell, and ‘the Sultan returned home with plunder that it is impossible to recount.’ ‘Praise be to God, the protector of the world for the honour he bestows upon Islam and Musulmans,’ wrote al-Utbi.” Keay, loc. 4472–4476.
Mahmud’s greed: In 1018, Mahmud’s forces reached the sacred temple of Mathur, which they promptly “burned with naphtha and fire and levelled with the ground.” An even worse fate awaited the temple of Somnath, near the coast of the Saurashtra peninsula. “After stripping it of its gold,” the historian John Kealy writes, “he personally laid into it with his ‘sword’—which must have been more like a sledgehammer. The bits were then sent back to Ghazni and incorporated into the steps of its new Jami Masjid (Friday Mosque), there to be humiliatingly trampled and perpetually defiled by the feet of the Muslim faithful.” Kealy, loc. 4456.
If ever there were an uprising: Braudel, p. 232.
4. HOSTIS HUMANI GENERIS
in Van Broeck’s account: Van Broeck, pp. 3–4.
“In return for this legal protection”: Konstam, loc. 553–558.
“Privateers in time of War”: Johnson, A General History of the Pyrates, p. 2.
“legitimate trade, aggressive mercantilism”: Burgess, pp. 21–22.
“Drake’s colossal success”: Ibid., pp. 27–28.
5. TWO KINDS OF TREASURE
“such liberties of traffique”: Foster, p. 61.
“I told him that my comming”: Ibid., p. 82.
“Of chaires of estate”: Ibid., p. 102.
“He is exceeding rich”: Ibid., p. 104.
“India had long been”: Keay, loc. 6673–6684.
“earls and dukes, privy councilors”: Baladouni, p. 66.
6. SPANISH EXPEDITION SHIPPING
“I have nowhere met”: Quoted in Charles Rivers Editors, loc. 28.
In August 1693: There is some ambiguity in the historical record over when and where the Expedition left England. The historian of piracy Angus Konstam, for instance, has them departing from Bristol in June, not London in August. See Konstam, loc. 4290–4291.
At the other end: “Based on a sample of 169 early-eighteenth-century pirates Marcus Rediker compiled, the average pirate was 28.2 years old. The youngest pirate in this sample was only 14 and the oldest 50—ancient by eighteenth-century seafaring standards. Most pirates, however, were in their mid-twenties; 57 percent of those in Rediker’s sample were between 20 and 30. These data suggest a youthful pirate society with a few older, hopefully wiser, members and a few barely more than children. In addition to being very young, pirate society was also very male. We know of only four women active among eighteenth-century pirates.” Leeson, p. 10.
7. THE UNIVERSE CONQUEROR
“much derangement”: Keay, p. 214.
“the essential nature of Hinduism”: J. F. Richards, The Mughal Empire, p. 152.
According to Khafi Khan: Ibid., p. 223.
“Beholding the dispersion”: Ibid., p. 224.
“Mountain after mountain”: Ibid., p. 244.
8. HOLDING PATTERNS
“We constantly drank our urine”: Turley, p. 16.
“For we had nothing”: Ibid., pp. 17–18.
“Take a hard egg”: Quoted in Preston, pp. 29–30.
By the time he returned: Turley, p. 14.
9. THE DRUNKEN BOATSWAIN
“Is the drunken boatswain”: All direct quotations from the mutiny are taken from the transcript of the Every gang trial, published by Everingham in 1696.
10. THE FANCY
“I. Every man shall”: Johnson, A General History of the Pyrates, p. 116.
“the supream Power”: Leeson, p. 29.
“For the Punishment of small Offences”: Johnson, A General History of the Pyrates, p. 213.
According to eighteenth-century pirate: Leeson, pp. 59–60.
J. S. Bromley wrote: Quoted in Baer, “Bold Captain Avery,” p. 13.
“Pirates constructed a culture”: Redicker, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, p. 286.
They were also advancing populist values: These egalitarian values extended to the everyday interactions onboard. According to Johnson’s General History, “Every Man, as the Humour takes him . . . [may] intrude [into the captain’s] Apartment, swear at him, seize a part of his Victuals and Drink, if they like it, without his offering to find Fault or contest it.” Johnson, A General History of the Pyrates, p. 180.
11. THE PIRATE VERSES
“Being An Account of John Jewster”: These quotations are from the English Broadside Ballad Archive, maintained at http://ebba.english.ucsb.edu. Note that “Murderers Lamentation” uses the archaic “Mutherers” word in the original. I have translated it into the modern word “murderer” for legibility here.
“Our Names shall be”: This is the ballad in its entirety:
Come all you brave Boys, whose Courage is bold,
Will you venture with me, I’ll glut you with Gold?
Make haste unto Corona, a Ship you will find,
That’s called the Fancy, will pleasure your mind.
Captain Every is in her, and calls her his own;
He will box her about, Boys, before he has done:
French, Spaniard and Portuguese, the Heathen likewise,
He has made a War with them until that he dies.
Her Model’s like Wax, and she sails like the Wind,
She is rigged and fitted and curiously trimm’d,
And all things convenient has for his design;
God bless his poor Fancy, she’s bound for the Mine.
Farewel, fair Plimouth, and Cat-down be damn’d,
I once was Part-owner of most of that Land;
But as I am disown’d, so I’ll abdicate
My Person from England to attend on my Fate.
Then away from this Climate and temperate Zone,
To one that’s more torrid, you’ll hear I am gone,
With an hundred and fifty brave Sparks of this Age,
Who are fully resolved their Foes to engage.
These Northern Parts are not thrifty for me,
I’ll rise the Anterhise, that some Men shall see
I am not afraid to let the World know,
That to the South-Seas and to Persia I’ll go.
&n
bsp; Our Names shall be blazed and spread in the Sky,
And many brave Places I hope to descry,
Where never a French man e’er yet has been,
Nor any proud Dutch man can say he has seen.
My Commission is large, and I made it my self,
And the Capston shall stretch it full larger by half;
It was dated in Corona, believe it, my Friend,
From the Year Ninety three, unto the World’s end.
I Honour St. George, and his Colours I were,
Good Quarters I give, but no Nation I spare,
The World must assist me with what I do want,
I’ll give them my Bill, when my Money is scant.
Now this I do say and solemnly swear,
He that strikes to St. George the better shall fare;
But he that refuses, shall sudenly spy
Strange Colours abroad of my Fancy to fly.
Four Chiviligies of Gold in a bloody Field,
Environ’d with green, now this is my Shield;
Yet call out for Quarter, before you do see
A bloody Flag out, which our Decree,
No Quarters to give, no Quarters to take,
We save nothing living, alas ’tis too late;
For we are now sworn by the Bread and the Wine,
More serious we are than any Divine.
Now this is the Course I intend for to steer;
My false-hearted Nation, to you I declare,
I have done thee no wrong, thou must me forgive,
The Sword shall maintain me as long as I live.
12. DOES SIR JOSIAH SELL OR BUY?
The Spanish Expedition investors: Baer, “Bold Captain Every,” p. 12.
The wealth creation: Robins, pp. 48–49.
“The East India Stock”: Defoe, Anatomy of Exchange Alley, p. 14.
“The mint was there”: Wright, p. 38.
“marble seraglios”: Ibid., p. 101.
“Was it not on account”: Ibid., p. 112.
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