CHAPTER EIGHT
Conspirators Below
Copyright 2004, all Rights Reserved
New York city, in late July of 1696, as Kidd searched for crewmen, was anxious with warfare rumors and bread shortages. Insatiable merchants had exported nearly all of the region's prized flour, leaving local bakers with little to heat. One historian wrote that the scarcity had gotten so severe that the City Council approved a regulation forbidding the home baking of biscuits or even cookies.
Men flocked to join up Kidd’s privateering expedition-- from an ousted previous sheriff, English Smith, to an indigent woodcutter Irishman named David "Darby" Mullins. At least half a dozen cabin boys applied. In times of combat, these adolescents would act as the “powder monkeys”, running the obstacle course of the slippery teeming deck to lug scoops of gunpowder from the powder magazine to the firearm crews.
Kidd's crew ran the breadth of colonial manhood and boyhood, from rough ex-pirates to pale landsmen such as Kidd's brother-in-law, Samuel Bradley, a very well heeled young man. He had of late turned twenty-one and inherited a fat estate as well as quite a few pieces of Manhattan real estate. Kidd, who had only just a very young daughter, felt an extraordinary liking for Sam Bradley. Twelve-year-old Richard Barleycorn from Carolina would serve Captain Kidd as a valet. Another, Robert Lamley, age fourteen, probably the son of a Southwark prostitute, tended to the ship's cook, Abeel Owens.
Kidd, who had sailed the East Coast and Caribbean for years, indubitably knew the scalawag repute of gunner William Moore. When Moore was eighteen years old, he had been detained in New York for the unimaginable act of attacking his captain, and kept in jail the rarely long period of nearly two years. More often than not, prisoners would die in that period. The system in Barbados had also locked him up in the early 1690s for an unstipulated charge and refused him bail as he admitted to his cellmate that he intended to "desert to the French" For some reason, though, Kidd in fact wanted an aggressive gunner.
Moore loaded a number of cannons with gunpowder but no canon balls and fired off salutes to the conurbation of New York the day they first set sail. The cannons at Fort William bellowed an identical reply. The Adventure moved out past Sandy Hook, that smuggler's tryst in the Jerseys, and out into the waves of the Atlantic. The skyline of Manhattan with its windmill and two church steeples faded into the distance. Kidd was just beginning his voyage to Madeira, a Portuguese island famed for its wine. From there, he intended to head around the tip of Africa to the Indies where pirates such as Captain Avery preyed on treasure-laden Moslem ships.
His assignment was to pursue pirates -- men who would rather die than yield. He traveled in a single ship manned with a desperate crew, some of whom were previously pirates themselves. As a private man of war, the Royal Navy profoundly distrusted him. He was a Scot with an English and Dutch crew. On the colossal oceans of the world, he would begin searching for five famed European pirate ships, several of them carrying associations and acquaintances of his own crew. He had a one-year time limit and a number of the nearly all-powerful men of the world waiting for him to return. It would be a fool's chore but Kidd had his ulterior purpose for this enterprise. Only one man knew Kidd’s true intent and that man was now three thousand miles away from the swaying galleon at sea.
The Adventure was a vessel of formidable speed, one of the last remaining warships that still carried an oaring hull. The men had been at sea for many months with nothing to show for it—no women, no exotic lands, and surely no pieces-of eight. All were restless and easily upset. Seven of the crew’s brightest men had assembled below decks in the mess hall. A treasonous act was being considered.
Moore sat in the corner of the dank cabin embracing his stein of ale. He had started his sousing since the sun had begun to set. He knew what was happening. Treason was a crime of disloyalty to one's nation. Any person who reneges on an oath of loyalty or a pledge of allegiance, and in some way willfully cooperates with an enemy, is considered to be a traitor. And Moore had plenty of experience with disloyalty. But there he sat; hungry, poor, destitute—these were not traits that inspired courage.
The English Statute of Treasons was established in 1350 and distinguished high treason from petty treason. Petty treason was the murder of one's lawful superior, such as when a wife killed her husband, or a servant his master. High treason covered acts that constituted a serious threat to the stability or continuity of the state, including attempts to kill the king, to counterfeit coins or to wage war against the kingdom. Moore, wreaking of alcohol and now losing his visual acuity considered whether or not this was a case of petty treason or high treason. Maritime laws of England held its ships at sea tantamont to the soil of the motherland and their captains as viceroy of the King—the King pro tem. In either case, he knew the punishment for treason was often extended as an especially cruel death. The law was used in England to suppress any resistance to government policy. But these men were not in England.
“A Captain, when good, is entitled to the consideration which we accord to a pirate who keeps Church between crimes; when bad, he is entitled to none at all,” said a young Darby Mullins. His voice was hushed for they all thought Captain Kidd suspected something.
“I am not a pirate!” stated Richard Barleycorne, a slender and lanky young man who had lost his mother to typhus. He was a tough and agile person and one that stood true. The elders in the now muggy and stale cabin would forgive his naiveté.
“The average man will bristle if you say his father was dishonest,” responded Abeel Owen, “but he will brag a little if he discovers his great-grandfather was a pirate.” The men snickered to this truth. Barleycorne considered what this meant: The men were unyielding. Pirate or privateer, they were fraught and Kidd was showing them no guarantee. The Law might hold this murderous plan as treasonous but the scarcity from which most of these men came from propelled them into action.
James Howe, a bespeceled navigator who’d been whittling away at a small wooden flute he’d been working on since the Adventure set sail stepped up: “How will we signal the men?”
Moore shouted, “You don’t!” They’ll ruin it for us all. We have to kill him ourselves and hope the crew doesn’t skewer us.” The men were now growing tired of Moore’s drunkenness. Nichlos Churchill, the strongest of them all whispered “Hold your tongue low, mate. You needn’t be so bold.” In a moment of thoughtless haughtiness, Moore dropped his stein, pushed back the crate he was seated on and rushed to Churchill only to be stopped by the others.
“I’ll be as bold as I wish. There ain’t no man a tellin’ gunman Moore how to hold his tongue. Had I me blade…” said Moore in what was a mild stupor. James Howe, a steersman in training peeked out the cabin door on the lookout. He returned to the gathering with “I think Moore’s right,”
“You’re damn right, I’m right,” continued the gunman. We snuff out the man and get rid of his putrid remains. Tell the Admiralty that he was washed overboard whilst battening down the main sail in last week’s storm. He’d been logging the weather conditions for weeks up to it. It’ll make perfect sense. We’ll be commended, by Jove!” reasoned Moore.
“It’s the only way we’ll ever get back home”, suggested Hugh Parrot, the First Mate’s tyro. “The Captain won’t even tell the First Mate what we’re doing on this journey. Why is he so secret? What is this obsession he’s linked us all to?”
“Shut yer hole!” commanded Barleycorne, “Confounded fools. You’ve all been on many a voyage wherein the Cap’n does not reveal the true intent of the embarkment. It’s not reason to kill a man.” A silence fell amidst them. The youths veracity rang true within them all, less Moore, perhaps. Finally, Churchill claimed, “He’s right. We must wait—keep our heads low.”
A cacophony of male voices was approaching the cabin. Howe shushed the lot. Three of them slowly walked out of the cabin holding lit candles. The sun had set and the eerie darkness that was characteristic of the Adventure’s galley demanded luminescence. The approaching men passed by the cabin of sedition. Eventually, as to not raise any suspicion, all the men disbanded from the meeting, less Moore who had returned to his crate.
“You’re all fools. A pox on all of ya!” he said as he lost balance and fell over into a state of unconsciousness.
CHAPTER NINE
Chapters
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21 & 22, 23, 24, 25, Epilogue
Conspirators Below
Copyright 2004, all Rights Reserved
New York city, in late July of 1696, as Kidd searched for crewmen, was anxious with warfare rumors and bread shortages. Insatiable merchants had exported nearly all of the region's prized flour, leaving local bakers with little to heat. One historian wrote that the scarcity had gotten so severe that the City Council approved a regulation forbidding the home baking of biscuits or even cookies.
Men flocked to join up Kidd’s privateering expedition-- from an ousted previous sheriff, English Smith, to an indigent woodcutter Irishman named David "Darby" Mullins. At least half a dozen cabin boys applied. In times of combat, these adolescents would act as the “powder monkeys”, running the obstacle course of the slippery teeming deck to lug scoops of gunpowder from the powder magazine to the firearm crews.
Kidd's crew ran the breadth of colonial manhood and boyhood, from rough ex-pirates to pale landsmen such as Kidd's brother-in-law, Samuel Bradley, a very well heeled young man. He had of late turned twenty-one and inherited a fat estate as well as quite a few pieces of Manhattan real estate. Kidd, who had only just a very young daughter, felt an extraordinary liking for Sam Bradley. Twelve-year-old Richard Barleycorn from Carolina would serve Captain Kidd as a valet. Another, Robert Lamley, age fourteen, probably the son of a Southwark prostitute, tended to the ship's cook, Abeel Owens.
Kidd, who had sailed the East Coast and Caribbean for years, indubitably knew the scalawag repute of gunner William Moore. When Moore was eighteen years old, he had been detained in New York for the unimaginable act of attacking his captain, and kept in jail the rarely long period of nearly two years. More often than not, prisoners would die in that period. The system in Barbados had also locked him up in the early 1690s for an unstipulated charge and refused him bail as he admitted to his cellmate that he intended to "desert to the French" For some reason, though, Kidd in fact wanted an aggressive gunner.
Moore loaded a number of cannons with gunpowder but no canon balls and fired off salutes to the conurbation of New York the day they first set sail. The cannons at Fort William bellowed an identical reply. The Adventure moved out past Sandy Hook, that smuggler's tryst in the Jerseys, and out into the waves of the Atlantic. The skyline of Manhattan with its windmill and two church steeples faded into the distance. Kidd was just beginning his voyage to Madeira, a Portuguese island famed for its wine. From there, he intended to head around the tip of Africa to the Indies where pirates such as Captain Avery preyed on treasure-laden Moslem ships.
His assignment was to pursue pirates -- men who would rather die than yield. He traveled in a single ship manned with a desperate crew, some of whom were previously pirates themselves. As a private man of war, the Royal Navy profoundly distrusted him. He was a Scot with an English and Dutch crew. On the colossal oceans of the world, he would begin searching for five famed European pirate ships, several of them carrying associations and acquaintances of his own crew. He had a one-year time limit and a number of the nearly all-powerful men of the world waiting for him to return. It would be a fool's chore but Kidd had his ulterior purpose for this enterprise. Only one man knew Kidd’s true intent and that man was now three thousand miles away from the swaying galleon at sea.
The Adventure was a vessel of formidable speed, one of the last remaining warships that still carried an oaring hull. The men had been at sea for many months with nothing to show for it—no women, no exotic lands, and surely no pieces-of eight. All were restless and easily upset. Seven of the crew’s brightest men had assembled below decks in the mess hall. A treasonous act was being considered.
Moore sat in the corner of the dank cabin embracing his stein of ale. He had started his sousing since the sun had begun to set. He knew what was happening. Treason was a crime of disloyalty to one's nation. Any person who reneges on an oath of loyalty or a pledge of allegiance, and in some way willfully cooperates with an enemy, is considered to be a traitor. And Moore had plenty of experience with disloyalty. But there he sat; hungry, poor, destitute—these were not traits that inspired courage.
The English Statute of Treasons was established in 1350 and distinguished high treason from petty treason. Petty treason was the murder of one's lawful superior, such as when a wife killed her husband, or a servant his master. High treason covered acts that constituted a serious threat to the stability or continuity of the state, including attempts to kill the king, to counterfeit coins or to wage war against the kingdom. Moore, wreaking of alcohol and now losing his visual acuity considered whether or not this was a case of petty treason or high treason. Maritime laws of England held its ships at sea tantamont to the soil of the motherland and their captains as viceroy of the King—the King pro tem. In either case, he knew the punishment for treason was often extended as an especially cruel death. The law was used in England to suppress any resistance to government policy. But these men were not in England.
“A Captain, when good, is entitled to the consideration which we accord to a pirate who keeps Church between crimes; when bad, he is entitled to none at all,” said a young Darby Mullins. His voice was hushed for they all thought Captain Kidd suspected something.
“I am not a pirate!” stated Richard Barleycorne, a slender and lanky young man who had lost his mother to typhus. He was a tough and agile person and one that stood true. The elders in the now muggy and stale cabin would forgive his naiveté.
“The average man will bristle if you say his father was dishonest,” responded Abeel Owen, “but he will brag a little if he discovers his great-grandfather was a pirate.” The men snickered to this truth. Barleycorne considered what this meant: The men were unyielding. Pirate or privateer, they were fraught and Kidd was showing them no guarantee. The Law might hold this murderous plan as treasonous but the scarcity from which most of these men came from propelled them into action.
James Howe, a bespeceled navigator who’d been whittling away at a small wooden flute he’d been working on since the Adventure set sail stepped up: “How will we signal the men?”
Moore shouted, “You don’t!” They’ll ruin it for us all. We have to kill him ourselves and hope the crew doesn’t skewer us.” The men were now growing tired of Moore’s drunkenness. Nichlos Churchill, the strongest of them all whispered “Hold your tongue low, mate. You needn’t be so bold.” In a moment of thoughtless haughtiness, Moore dropped his stein, pushed back the crate he was seated on and rushed to Churchill only to be stopped by the others.
“I’ll be as bold as I wish. There ain’t no man a tellin’ gunman Moore how to hold his tongue. Had I me blade…” said Moore in what was a mild stupor. James Howe, a steersman in training peeked out the cabin door on the lookout. He returned to the gathering with “I think Moore’s right,”
“You’re damn right, I’m right,” continued the gunman. We snuff out the man and get rid of his putrid remains. Tell the Admiralty that he was washed overboard whilst battening down the main sail in last week’s storm. He’d been logging the weather conditions for weeks up to it. It’ll make perfect sense. We’ll be commended, by Jove!” reasoned Moore.
“It’s the only way we’ll ever get back home”, suggested Hugh Parrot, the First Mate’s tyro. “The Captain won’t even tell the First Mate what we’re doing on this journey. Why is he so secret? What is this obsession he’s linked us all to?”
“Shut yer hole!” commanded Barleycorne, “Confounded fools. You’ve all been on many a voyage wherein the Cap’n does not reveal the true intent of the embarkment. It’s not reason to kill a man.” A silence fell amidst them. The youths veracity rang true within them all, less Moore, perhaps. Finally, Churchill claimed, “He’s right. We must wait—keep our heads low.”
A cacophony of male voices was approaching the cabin. Howe shushed the lot. Three of them slowly walked out of the cabin holding lit candles. The sun had set and the eerie darkness that was characteristic of the Adventure’s galley demanded luminescence. The approaching men passed by the cabin of sedition. Eventually, as to not raise any suspicion, all the men disbanded from the meeting, less Moore who had returned to his crate.
“You’re all fools. A pox on all of ya!” he said as he lost balance and fell over into a state of unconsciousness.
CHAPTER NINE
Chapters
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21 & 22, 23, 24, 25, Epilogue
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