Note 1 — THE PIRATES OF THE WHIDAH.

Mass. Archives, vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a. Cyprian Southack was a notable sea-captain and pilot. For a number of years he commanded the naval vessel of Massachusetts, so that it was the natural course for the governor to send him in pursuit of pirates who suddenly appeared on the Massachusetts coast. In 1711 he had commanded a vessel in the unfortunate expedition against Quebec under Sir Hovenden Walker, and the admiral had stayed at his house during his long detention in Boston. He was also the most noted map-maker of his time in New England; in 1694 King William had admitted him to kiss his hands and had given him a gold chain of £50 for his map of Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and the St. Lawrence region (Acts. P.C. Col., II. 264). The governor whom he addresses was Samuel Shute, governor 1716-1727. The ending of the War of the Spanish Succession (1713) had as usual caused a large revival of piracy, many privateers turning to that trade. The career of the Whidah and of Capt. Samuel Bellamy can be made out from the depositions which follow. On April 26, in a heavy gale, she had come ashore on the sands of Cape Cod, in what is now Wellfleet, and all on board but two men (see doc. no. 114) were drowned. More than a hundred of the pirates thus perished. Of those who escaped wreck, in the smaller vessels, several, who had constituted the prize crew of the Mary Anne (doc. no. 109), were captured, tried, and executed (doc. no. 112). The story is told in The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy, etc. (Boston, 1718), and by Mr. John H. Edmonds in the Boston Sunday Globe for Oct. 22, 1916.