The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1882-06-08
Pirates of the Past.

Pirates of the Past.
As the archipelago east of Greece had
sheltered the hordes of the Turkish
corsairs, so the many islands, crooked
channels, reefs hidden from all but the
local pilots, small harbors and abund-
ant food of the Antilles, made the West
Indies the safest place in the world for
pirates to pursue their work. To these
new and wild regions, in the sixteenth
century, had focked bad men and ad.
venturers from all over the world.
When the wars and their chances of
plunder died out after the campaigns
led by Curtez, Pizarro, Balboa and the
rest of the Spanish conquistadores,
many ruffians seized upon vessels by
force, or stole them, and turned into
robbers Of the sea. As a rule they had
farms and families on some island, and
only went freebooting portion of the
year, at first. The large island of Hayti,
or st. Domingo, was then settled by
colonists who were Of three distinct
classes-farmers, hunters and cattle
men. The last class of men spent their
time in the wild interior of the island,
capturing, herding or killing wild
cattle, They came to the settlements
| only now and then to get supplies, and
then returned to the wilderness for
! several months of absence again. Final
| ly, war having arisen between this
and other islands, the trade of the
cattle-men was destroyed, and large
numbers of them joined the freebooters,
| who then became extremely numerous
and formidable; and so largely was this
due to their new friends that they lost
their old name and were known by the
name of the e-hunters-Buccan-
neer.
St. Domingo became the headquarters
of tho buccaneers, but several small
islands were also owned and controlled
by them. They were made up of men
of all nations, but were chiefly Span
iards, Dutch and negroes They were
thousands in number, possessed large
! fleets of ships and boats, we'll armed,
and had their regular chief and under
officers. The most noted of these
chiefs, perhaps, was Morgan, who was
an Euglishman.
They had two methods of work. One
was to patrol the sea in the track Of
vessels bound to and from Europe and
Brazil or Spanish America, and seize
them. Very often the crews were will
ing, or were compelled to join the
pirates; but sometimes all were killed
or carried into slavery. Merchant ships,
therefore, all went heavily armed in
those waters, and many were the bloody
battles fought.
This work, however, employed only a
portion of the buccaneers, and was
too uncertain means of wealth to suit
them. They would. therefore, equip II
great fleet, enlist men under certain
strict rules as to sharing the spoils, and
sail away to pillage some coast. There
was hardly an island in the West Indies
from which, in this way, they did not
extort immense sums of money under
threat OF destruction of the people. The
mainland also suffered from the
marauders. Great cities, like Carta-
gena in Venezuela, Panama on the
Isthmus, Merida in Yucatan, and
Havana, Cuba, were attacked by armies
of buccaneers numbering tens of
thousands of men. Sometimes their
Notifications held good, and the enemy
was beaten back; but sooner or later all
these cities, and others, smaller, were
captured, burned or partially burned,
and robbed of everything valuable that
they contained.
"Why did the citizens not hide their
Wealth." They did; but the buccan-
neers put to the most dreadful tortures
men, women, children, slaves-every-
body-until they would tell where
their money and jewels were buried. 1t
is sickening to read of the crimes and
suffering committed by these wickedesu
OF men. For years and years they
were the terror Of the whole Car
ribbean region. Nor did their enormous
riches do them particle of real good,
for they wasted it all, the moment they
got home. in wild rioting, so that the
spoils earned by months of hardship,
and exposure, and wounds, and danger
of death, would be spent in week of
carousing. Before the end of the CEN
tury, however, the combined naval
forces OF all the nations interested in
She commerce of the new world broke
the power of the buccaneers and their
depredations ceased. Their story is one
of the widest, most romantic, but most
terrible pictures in the history of the
world Wide AOdhe.