Note (return) — Chapter IV

It was while Watts was governor of Tortuga, if we are to believe the Jesuit, Dutertre, that the buccaneers determined to avenge the treachery of the Spaniards to a French vessel in that neighbourhood by plundering the city of St. Jago in Hispaniola. According to this historian, who from the style of the narrative seems to be reporting the words of an eye-witness, the buccaneers, including doubtless both hunters and corsairs, formed a party of 400 men under the leadership of four captains and obtained a commission for the enterprise from the English governor, who was very likely looking forward to a share of the booty. Compelling the captain of a frigate which had just arrived from Nantes to lend his ship, they embarked in it and in two or three other boats found on the coast for Puerta de Plata, where they landed on Palm Sunday of 1659.191 St. Jago, which lay in a pleasant, fertile plain some fifteen or twenty leagues in the interior of Hispaniola, they approached through the woods on the night of Holy Wednesday, entered before daybreak, and surprised the governor in his bed. The buccaneers told him to prepare to die, whereupon he fell on his knees and prayed to such effect that they finally offered him his life for a ransom of 60,000 pieces of eight. They pillaged for twenty-four hours, taking even the bells, ornaments and sacred vessels of the churches, and after refreshing themselves with food and drink, retreated with their plunder and prisoners, including the governor and chief inhabitants. Meanwhile the alarm had been given for ten or twelve leagues round about. Men came in from all directions, and rallying with the inhabitants of the town till they amounted to about 1000 men, marched through the woods by a by-route, got ahead of the buccaneers and attacked them from ambush. The English and French stood their ground in spite of inferior numbers, for they were all good marksmen and every shot told. As the Spaniards persisted, however, they finally threatened to stab the governor and all the other prisoners, whereupon the Spaniards took counsel and retired to their homes. The invaders lost only ten killed and five or six wounded. They tarried on the coast several days waiting for the rest of the promised ransom, but as it failed to arrive they liberated the prisoners and returned to Tortuga, each adventurer receiving 300 crowns as his share of the pillage.192