Anson George
A Voyage Round the World
CHAPTER III
A SHORT NARRATIVE OF WHAT BEFEL THE "ANNA" PINK BEFORE SHE JOINED US, WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE LOSS OF THE "WAGER," AND OF THE PUTTING BACK OF THE "SEVERN" AND "PEARL," THE TWO REMAINING SHIPS OF THE SQUADRON
On the first appearance of the Anna pink, it seemed wonderful to us how the crew of a vessel, which came to this rendezvous two months after us, should be capable of working their ship in the manner they did, with so little appearance of debility and distress. But this difficulty was soon solved when she came to an anchor; for we then found that they had been in harbour since the middle of May, which was near a month before we arrived at Juan Fernandes: so that their sufferings (the risk they had run of shipwreck only excepted) were greatly short of what had been undergone by the rest of the squadron. It seems, on the 16th of May, they fell in with the land, which was then but four leagues distant, in the latitude of 45° 15' south. On the first sight of it they wore ship and stood to the southward, but their fore top-sail splitting, and the wind being W.S.W., they drove towards the shore; and the captain at last, either unable to clear the land, or, as others say, resolved to keep the sea no longer, steered for the coast, with a view of discovering some shelter amongst the many islands which then appeared in sight: and about four hours after the first view of the land, the pink had the good fortune to come to an anchor to the eastward of the island of Inchin; but as they did not run sufficiently near to the east shore of that island, and had not hands enough to veer away the cable briskly, they were soon driven to the eastward, deepning their water from twenty-five fathom to thirty-five, and still continuing to drive, they, the next day, the 17th of May, let go their sheet-anchor. This, though it brought them up for a short time, yet, on the 18th, they drove again, till they came into sixty-five fathom water, and were now within a mile of the land, and expected to be forced on shore every moment, in a place where the coast was so very high and steep, too, that there was not the least prospect of saving the ship or cargo. As their boats were very leaky, and there was no appearance of a landing-place, the whole crew, consisting of sixteen men and boys, gave themselves over for lost, apprehending that if any of them by some extraordinary chance should get on shore, they would, in all probability, be massacred by the savages on the coast: for these, knowing no other Europeans but Spaniards, it might be expected they would treat all strangers with the same cruelty which they had so often and so signally exerted against their Spanish neighbours. Under these terrifying circumstances, the pink drove nearer and nearer to the rocks which formed the shore; but at last, when the crew expected each instant to strike, they perceived a small opening in the land, which raised their hopes; and immediately cutting away their two anchors, they steered for it, and found it to be a small channel betwixt an island and the main, that led them into a most excellent harbour, which, for its security against all winds and swells, and the smoothness of its water, may perhaps compare with any in the known world. And this place being scarcely two miles distant from the spot where they deemed their destruction inevitable, the horrors of shipwreck and of immediate death, which had so long and so strongly possessed them, vanished almost instantaneously, and gave place to the more joyous ideas of security, refreshment, and repose.
In this harbour, discovered in this almost miraculous manner, the pink came to an anchor in twenty-five fathom water, with only a hawser and a small anchor of about three hundredweight. Here she continued for near two months, and here her people, who were many of them ill of the scurvy, were soon restored to perfect health by the fresh provisions, of which they procured good store, and the excellent water with which the adjacent shore abounded. As this place may prove of the greatest importance to future navigators, who may be forced upon this coast by the westerly winds, which are almost perpetual in that part of the world, I shall, before I enter into any farther particulars of the adventures of the pink, give the best account I could collect of this port, its situation, conveniencies, and productions.
The latitude of this harbour, which is indeed a material point, is not well ascertained, the pink having no observation either the day before she came here, or within a day of her leaving it. But it is supposed that it is not very distant from 45° 30' south, and the large extent of the bay before the harbour renders this uncertainty of less moment. The island of Inchin lying before the bay is thought to be one of the islands of Chonos which are mentioned in the Spanish accounts as spreading all along that coast, and are said by them to be inhabited by a barbarous people, famous for their hatred of the Spaniards, and for their cruelties to such of that nation as have fallen into their hands; and it is possible too that the land, on which the harbour itself lies, may be another of those islands, and that the continent may be considerably farther to the eastward. The depths of water in the different parts of the port, and the channels by which it communicates with the bay, are sufficiently marked. But it must be remembered that there are two coves in it, where ships may conveniently heave down, the water being constantly smooth; and there are several fine runs of excellent fresh water which fall into the harbour, some of them so luckily situated that the casks may be filled in the long-boat with an hose. The most remarkable of these is the stream in the N.E. part of the port. This is a fresh-water river, where the pink's people got some few mullets of an excellent flavour, and they were persuaded that in a proper season (it being winter when they were there) it abounded with fish. The principal refreshments they met with in this port were greens, as wild celery, nettle-tops, etc. (which after so long a continuance at sea they devoured with great eagerness); shell-fish, as cockles and muscles of an extraordinary size, and extremely delicious; and good store of geese, shags, and penguins. The climate, though it was the depth of winter, was not remarkably rigorous, nor the trees and the face of the country destitute of verdure, whence in the summer many other species of fresh provisions, besides these here enumerated, might doubtless be found there. Notwithstanding the tales of the Spanish historians in relation to the violence and barbarity of the inhabitants, it doth not appear that their numbers are sufficient to give the least jealousy to any ship of ordinary force, or that their disposition is by any means so mischievous or merciless as hath hitherto been represented. With all these advantages, this place is so far removed from the Spanish frontier, and so little known to the Spaniards themselves, that there is reason to suppose that by proper precautions a ship might continue here undiscovered a long time. It is moreover a post of great defence, for by possessing the island that closes up the harbour, and which is accessible in very few places, a small force might secure this port against all the strength the Spaniards could muster in that part of the world, since this island towards the harbour is steep too, and has six fathom water close to the shore, so that the pink anchored within forty yards of it. Whence it is obvious how impossible it would prove, either to board or to cut out any vessel protected by a force posted on shore within pistol-shot, and where those who were thus posted could not themselves be attacked. All these circumstances seem to render this port worthy of a more accurate examination; and it is to be hoped that the important uses which this rude account of it seems to suggest may hereafter recommend it to the consideration of the public, and to the attention of those who are more immediately entrusted with the conduct of our naval affairs.
After this description of the place where the pink lay for two months, it may be expected that I should relate the discoveries made by the crew on the adjacent coast, and the principal incidents during their stay there; but here I must observe, that, being only a few in number, they did not dare to detach any of their people on distant searches, for they were perpetually terrified with the apprehension that they should be attacked either by the Spaniards or the Indians; so that their excursions were generally confined to that tract of land which surrounded the port, and where they were never out of view of the ship. Though had they at first known how little foundation there was for these fears, yet the country in the neighbourhood was so grown up with wood, and traversed with mountains, that it appeared impracticable to penetrate it: whence no account of the inland parts could be expected from them. Indeed they were able to disprove the relations given by Spanish writers, who have represented this coast as inhabited by a fierce and powerful people, for they were certain that no such inhabitants were there to be found, at least during the winter season, since all the time they continued there, they saw no more than one Indian family, which came into the harbour in a periagua, about a month after the arrival of the pink, and consisted of an Indian near forty years old, his wife, and two children, one three years of age and the other still at the breast. They seemed to have with them all their property, which was a dog and a cat, a fishing-net, a hatchet, a knife, a cradle, some bark of trees intended for the covering of a hut, a reel, some worsted, a flint and steel, and a few roots of a yellow hue and a very disagreeable taste which served them for bread. The master of the pink, as soon as he perceived them, sent his yawl, who brought them on board; and fearing, lest they might discover him, if they were permitted to go away, he took, as he conceived, proper precautions for securing them, but without any mixture of ill usage or violence, for in the daytime they were permitted to go where they pleased about the ship, but at night were locked up in the forecastle. As they were fed in the same manner with the rest of the crew, and were often indulged with brandy, which they seemed greatly to relish, it did not at first appear that they were much dissatisfied with their situation, especially as the master took the Indian on shore when he went a shooting (who always seemed extremely delighted when the master killed his game), and as all the crew treated them with great humanity; but it was soon perceived, that though the woman continued easy and chearful, yet the man grew pensive and restless at his confinement. He seemed to be a person of good natural parts, and though not capable of conversing with the pink's people, otherwise than by signs, was yet very curious and inquisitive, and shewed great dexterity in the manner of making himself understood. In particular, seeing so few people on board such a large ship, he let them know that he supposed they were once more numerous; and to represent to them what he imagined was become of their companions, he laid himself down on the deck closing his eyes, and stretching himself out motionless, to imitate the appearance of a dead body. But the strongest proof of his sagacity was the manner of his getting away, for after being in custody on board the pink eight days, the scuttle of the forecastle, where he and his family were locked up every night, happened to be unnailed, and the following night being extremely dark and stormy, he contrived to convey his wife and children through the unnailed scuttle, and then over the ship's side into the yawl; and to prevent being pursued, he cut away the long-boat and his own periagua, which were towing astern, and immediately rowed ashore. All this he conducted with so much diligence and secrecy, that though there was a watch on the quarter-deck with loaded arms, yet he was not discovered by them till the noise of his oars in the water, after he had put off from the ship, gave them notice of his escape; and then it was too late either to prevent him, or to pursue him, for, their boats being all adrift, it was a considerable time before they could contrive the means of getting on shore themselves to search for their boats. The Indian, too, by this effort, besides the recovery of his liberty, was in some sort revenged on those who had confined him, both by the perplexity they were involved in from the loss of their boats, and by the terror he threw them in at his departure, for on the first alarm of the watch, who cried out, "the Indians!" the whole ship was in the utmost confusion, believing themselves to be boarded by a fleet of armed periaguas.
The resolution and sagacity with which the Indian behaved upon this occasion, had it been exerted on a more extensive object than the retrieving the freedom of a single family, might perhaps have immortalized the exploit, and have given him a rank amongst the illustrious names of antiquity. Indeed his late masters did so much justice to his merit as to own that it was a most gallant enterprize, and that they were grieved they had ever been necessitated, by their attention to their own safety, to abridge the liberty of a person of whose prudence and courage they had now such a distinguished proof. As it was supposed by some of them that he still continued in the woods in the neighbourhood of the port, where it was feared he might suffer for want of provisions, they easily prevailed upon the master to leave a quantity of such food as they thought would be most agreeable to him in a particular part where they imagined he would be likely to find it, and there was reason to conjecture that this piece of humanity was not altogether useless to him, for, on visiting the place some time after, it was found that the provision was gone, and in a manner that made them conclude it had fallen into his hands.
But, however, though many of them were satisfied that this Indian still continued near them, yet others would needs conclude that he was gone to the island of Chiloe, where they feared he would alarm the Spaniards, and would soon return with a force sufficient to surprize the pink. On this occasion the master of the pink was prevailed on to omit firing the evening gun; for it must be remembered (and there is a particular reason hereafter for attending to this circumstance) that the master, from an ostentatious imitation of the practice of men-of-war, had hitherto fired a gun every evening at the setting of the watch. This he pretended was to awe the enemy, if there was any within hearing, and to convince them that the pink was always on her guard, but it being now represented to him that his great security was his concealment, and that the evening gun might possibly discover him and serve to guide the enemy to him, he was prevailed on to omit it for the future; and his crew being now well refreshed, and their wood and water sufficiently replenished, he, in a few days after the escape of the Indian, put to sea, and had a fortunate passage to the rendezvous at the island of Juan Fernandes, where he arrived on the 16th of August, as hath been already mentioned in the preceding chapter.
This vessel, the Anna pink, was, as I have observed, the last that joined the commodore at Juan Fernandes. The remaining ships of the squadron were the Severn, the Pearl, and the Wager store-ship. The Severn and Pearl parted company with the squadron off Cape Noir, and, as we afterwards learnt, put back to the Brazils, so that of all the ships which came into the South Seas, the Wager, Captain Cheap, was the only one that was missing. This ship had on board a few field-pieces mounted for land-service, together with some cohorn mortars, and several kinds of artillery stores and pioneers' tools intended for the operations on shore. Therefore, as the enterprise on Baldivia had been resolved on for the first undertaking of the squadron, Captain Cheap was extremely solicitous that these materials, which were in his custody, might be ready before Baldivia; that if the squadron should possibly rendezvous there (as he knew not the condition they were then reduced to), no delay nor disappointment might be imputed to him.
But whilst the Wager, with these views, was making the best of her way to her first rendezvous off the island of Socoro, whence (as there was little probability of meeting any of the squadron there) she proposed to steer directly for Baldivia, she made the land on the 14th of May, about the latitude of 47° south; and the captain exerting himself on this occasion, in order to get clear of it, he had the misfortune to fall down the after-ladder, and dislocated his shoulder, which rendered him incapable of acting. This accident, together with the crazy condition of the ship, which was little better than a wreck, prevented her from getting off to sea, and entangled her more and more with the land, insomuch that the next morning, at daybreak, she struck on a sunken rock, and soon after bilged and grounded between two small islands at about a musket-shot from the shore.
In this situation the ship continued entire a long time, so that all the crew had it in their power to get safe on shore; but a general confusion taking place, numbers of them, instead of consulting their safety, or reflecting on their calamitous condition, fell to pillaging the ship, arming themselves with the first weapons that came to hand, and threatening to murder all who should oppose them. This frenzy was greatly heightened by the liquors they found on board, with which they got so extremely drunk that some of them, falling down between decks, were drowned, as the water flowed into the wreck, being incapable of raising themselves up and retreating from it. The captain, therefore, having done his utmost to get the whole crew on shore, was at last obliged to leave the mutineers behind him, and to follow his officers, and such as he had been able to prevail on, but he did not fail to send back the boats to persuade those who remained to have some regard to their preservation, though all his efforts were for some time without success. However, the weather next day proving stormy, and there being great danger of the ship's parting, they began to be alarmed with the fears of perishing, and were desirous of getting to land; but it seems their madness had not yet left them, for the boat not appearing to fetch them off so soon as they expected, they at last pointed a four-pounder, which was on the quarter-deck, against the hut, where they knew the captain resided on shore, and fired two shot, which passed but just over it.
From this specimen of the behaviour of part of the crew, it will not be difficult to frame some conjecture of the disorder and anarchy which took place when they at last got all on shore. For the men conceived that, by the loss of the ship, the authority of the officers was at an end, and they being now on a desolate coast, where scarcely any other provisions could be got except what should be saved out of the wreck, this was another unsurmountable source of discord, since the working upon the wreck, and the securing the provisions, so that they might be preserved for future exigences as much as possible, and the taking care that what was necessary for their present subsistance might be sparingly and equally distributed, were matters not to be brought about but by discipline and subordination; and the mutinous disposition of the people, stimulated by the impulses of immediate hunger, rendered every regulation made for this purpose ineffectual, so that there were continual concealments, frauds, and thefts, which animated each man against his fellow, and produced infinite feuds and contests. And hence there was a perverse and malevolent disposition constantly kept up amongst them, which rendered them utterly ungovernable.
Besides these heart-burnings occasioned by petulence and hunger, there was another important point which set the greatest part of the people at variance with the captain. This was their differing with him in opinion on the measures to be pursued in the present exigency: for the captain was determined, if possible, to fit up the boats in the best manner he could, and to proceed with them to the northward, since having with him above an hundred men in health, and having gotten some fire-arms and ammunition from the wreck, he did not doubt but they could master any Spanish vessel they should encounter with in those seas, and he thought he could not fail of meeting with one in the neighbourhood of Chiloe or Baldivia, in which, when he had taken her, he intended to proceed to the rendezvous at Juan Fernandes; and he farther insisted that should they light on no prize by the way, yet the boats alone would easily carry them thither. But this was a scheme that, however prudent, was no ways relished by the generality of his people; for, being quite jaded with the distresses and dangers they had already run through, they could not think of prosecuting an enterprise farther which had hitherto proved so disastrous. The common resolution therefore was to lengthen the long-boat, and with that and the rest of the boats to steer to the southward, to pass through the Streights of Magellan, and to range along the east side of South America till they should arrive at Brazil, where they doubted not to be well received, and to procure a passage to Great Britain. This project was at first sight infinitely more hazardous and tedious than what was proposed by the captain; but as it had the air of returning home, and flattered them with the hopes of bringing them once more to their native country, that circumstance alone rendered them inattentive to all its inconveniences, and made them adhere to it with insurmountable obstinacy; so that the captain himself, though he never changed his opinion, was yet obliged to give way to the torrent, and in appearance to acquiesce in this resolution, whilst he endeavoured underhand to give it all the obstruction he could, particularly in the lengthening the long-boat, which he contrived should be of such a size, that though it might serve to carry them to Juan Fernandes, would yet, he hoped, appear incapable of so long a navigation as that to the coast of Brazil.
But the captain, by his steady opposition at first to this favourite project, had much embittered the people against him, to which likewise the following unhappy accident greatly contributed. There was a midshipman whose name was Cozens, who had appeared the foremost in all the refractory proceedings of the crew. He had involved himself in brawls with most of the officers who had adhered to the captain's authority, and had even treated the captain himself with great abuse and insolence. As his turbulence and brutality grew every day more and more intolerable, it was not in the least doubted but there were some violent measures in agitation, in which Cozens was engaged as the ringleader: for which reason the captain, and those about him, constantly kept themselves on their guard. One day the purser, having, by the captain's order, stopped the allowance of a fellow who would not work, Cozens, though the man did not complain to him, intermeddled in the affair with great bitterness, and grossly insulted the purser, who was then delivering out provisions just by the captain's tent, and was himself sufficiently violent. The purser, enraged by his scurrility, and perhaps piqued by former quarrels, cried out, "A mutiny," adding, "The dog has pistols," and then himself fired a pistol at Cozens, which however mist him: but the captain, on this outcry and the report of the pistol, rushed out of his tent, and, not doubting but it had been fired by Cozens as the commencement of a mutiny, he immediately shot him in the head without farther deliberation, and though he did not kill him on the spot, yet the wound proved mortal, and he died about fourteen days after.
However, this incident, though sufficiently displeasing to the people, did yet, for a considerable time, awe them to their duty, and rendered them more submissive to the captain's authority; but at last, when towards the middle of October the long-boat was nearly compleated, and they were preparing to put to sea, the additional provocation he gave them by covertly traversing their project of proceeding through the Streights of Magellan, and their fears that he might at length engage a party sufficient to overturn this favourite measure, made them resolve to make use of the death of Cozens as a reason for depriving him of his command, under pretence of carrying him a prisoner to England, to be tried for murder; and he was accordingly confined under a guard. But they never intended to carry him with them, as they too well knew what they had to apprehend on their return to England, if their commander should be present to confront them: and therefore, when they were just ready to put to sea, they set him at liberty, leaving him and the few who chose to take their fortunes with him no other embarkation but the yawl, to which the barge was afterwards added, by the people on board her being prevailed on to return back.
When the ship was wreckt, there were alive on board the Wager near an hundred and thirty persons; of these above thirty died during their stay upon the place, and near eighty went off in the long-boat and the cutter to the southward: so that there remained with the captain, after their departure, no more than nineteen persons, which, however, were as many as the barge and the yawl, the only embarkations left them, could well carry off. It was the 13th of October, five months after the shipwreck, that the long-boat, converted into a schooner, weighed, and stood to the southward, giving the captain, who, with Lieutenant Hamilton of the land forces, and the surgeon, were then on the beach, three cheers at their departure: and on the 29th of January following they arrived at Rio Grande, on the coast of Brazil; but having, by various accidents, left about twenty of their people on shore at the different places they touched at, and a greater number having perished by hunger during the course of their navigation, there were no more than thirty of them remaining when they arrived in that port. Indeed, the undertaking of itself was a most extraordinary one; for (not to mention the length of the run) the vessel was scarcely able to contain the number that first put to sea in her, and their stock of provisions (being only what they had saved out of the ship) was extremely slender. They had this additional misfortune besides, that the cutter, the only boat they had with them, soon broke away from the stern, and was staved to pieces; so that when their provision and their water failed them, they had frequently no means of getting on shore to search for a fresh supply.
After the long-boat and cutter were gone, the captain, and those who were left with him, proposed to pass to the northward in the barge and yawl: but the weather was so bad, and the difficulty of subsisting so great, that it was two months from the departure of the long-boat before he was able to put to sea. It seems the place where the Wager was cast away was not a part of the continent, as was first imagined, but an island at some distance from the main, which afforded no other sorts of provision but shell-fish and a few herbs; and as the greatest part of what they had gotten from the ship was carried off in the long-boat, the captain and his people were often in extreme want of food, especially as they chose to preserve what little sea provisions remained, for their store when they should go to the northward. During their residence at this island, which was by the seamen denominated Wager's Island, they had now and then a straggling canoe or two of Indians, which came and bartered their fish and other provisions with our people. This was some little relief to their necessities, and at another season might perhaps have been greater: for as there were several Indian huts on the shore, it was supposed that in some years, during the height of summer, many of these savages might resort thither to fish: indeed, from what has been related in the account of the Anna pink, it should seem to be the general practice of those Indians to frequent this coast in the summer time for the benefit of fishing, and to retire in the winter into a better climate, more to the northward.
On this mention of the Anna pink, I cannot but observe how much it is to be lamented that the Wager's people had no knowledge of her being so near them on the coast; for as she was not above thirty leagues distant from them, and came into their neighbourhood about the same time the Wager was lost, and was a fine roomy ship, she could easily have taken them all on board, and have carried them to Juan Fernandes. Indeed, I suspect she was still nearer to them than what is here estimated; for several of the Wager's people, at different times, heard the report of a cannon, which I conceive could be no other than the evening gun fired from the Anna pink, especially as what was heard at Wager's Island was about the same time of the day. But to return to Captain Cheap.
Upon the 14th of December, the captain and his people embarked in the barge and the yawl, in order to proceed to the northward, taking on board with them all the provisions they could amass from the wreck of the ship; but they had scarcely been an hour at sea, when the wind began to blow hard, and the sea ran so high that they were obliged to throw the greatest part of their provisions overboard, to avoid immediate destruction. This was a terrible misfortune, in a part of the world where food is so difficult to be got: however, they persisted in their design, putting on shore as often as they could to seek subsistance. But about a fortnight after, another dreadful accident befel them, for the yawl sunk at an anchor, and one of the men in her was drowned; and as the barge was incapable of carrying the whole company, they were now reduced to the hard necessity of leaving four marines behind them on that desolate shore. Notwithstanding these disasters, they still kept on their course to the northward, though greatly delayed by the perverseness of the winds, and the frequent interruptions which their search after food occasioned, and constantly struggling with a series of the most sinister events, till at last, about the end of January, having made three unsuccessful attempts to double a headland, which they supposed to be what the Spaniards called Cape Tres Montes, it was unanimously resolved, finding the difficulties insurmountable, to give over this expedition, and to return again to Wager Island, where they got back about the middle of February, quite disheartened and dejected with their reiterated disappointments, and almost perishing with hunger and fatigue.