Pirate Hunter: The Life of Captain Woodes Rogers by Graham A Thomas

Author:Graham A Thomas
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Bisac Code 1: HIS037060
ISBN: eBook ISBN: 9781844682850
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Published: 2009-04-20T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

Bad Blood

Bad blood had been brewing for some time between Captain Dover and Rogers. Rogers never forgave him for his cautiousness at Guayaquil which, he believed, cost them a massive fortune. As they left the port of Seguro that bad blood once again started to flow.

Rogers was now prostrate and in misery from the wounds to his jaw and to his ankle. A new commander had to be appointed for the Batchelor (Encarnación) and Captain Dover was selected by the majority for this post, utterly against Rogers’s wishes. As before, his selection was based on his having the largest investment in the ships and because he was President of the Council, not because he had the necessary experience. But Rogers’s protests this time did not go unheeded. In his journal he wrote about ‘how it was now after taking this rich prize our great misfortune to have a paper war amongst ourselves’. Rogers had a very low opinion of Dover, as he stated plainly: ‘Owing to his violent temper, capable men could not well act under him, while as a Dr of physick he was incapable as a seaman himself.’ Rogers should know. He was very likely the recipient of Dover’s treatment, which we can only guess at.

Peace was declared between the two sides when Rogers’s first lieutenant, Robert Frye, and William Stretton were appointed to take sole charge of the Batchelor, the new name for the recently acquired galleon which they had renamed (after one of the backers of the expedition) and refitted as best they could at Puerto Seguro. Both these men were to have sole charge of the navigation and running of the ship, while Selkirk and another man were appointed as chief mates, which left Captain Dover in charge of everything else.

Thirty good men were sent across from the Duke, twenty-five from the Dutchess with thirteen from the Marquis to man the Batchelor, along with thirty-six Manila Indians referred to by Rogers in his journal as ‘Lascarrs’, and some prisoners to make up the full complement of 110 men for this large ship.

It was now 1710: the fleet set sail from Cape San Lucas in California on 11 January, heading for the island of Guam. This leg of their voyage was to take them fifty-eight days at sea, a distance of roughly 6,300 miles averaging 108 miles a day at about four and a half miles an hour. Could we in our fast and disposable society spend fifty-eight days at sea going at such a slow speed when our aircraft can do it in a few hours? That is something very few of us will ever know. But they did it, and for most of that part of the voyage Rogers lay on his back, too weak to stand. Nothing of any interest was recorded in his journal on leaving Puerto Seguro at Cape San Lucas except for several deaths of wounded and sick men.

On 14 February Rogers gathered the officers together ‘in commemoration of the most ancient custom of choosing valentines….

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