The Republic of Pirates: Being the True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down Read Online Free Page A

brought the ship off the wind, while others hauled the sails into place. Slowly, the
Charles
pulled out of the harbor, under the guns of the fort, and into the open Atlantic.
    A few miles out of port, Avery went below decks to speak with Captain Gibson, who was ill and bedridden, and the second mate, Jonathan Gravet, both of whom were now under guard in their respective cabins. By their accounts, Avery treated them with courtesy and even offered Gibson command of the
Charles
if he joined their conspiracy. He refused. Avery nonetheless promised to let both men go ashore come morning in one of the boats, along with any other men who wished to leave. Avery gave Gravet three parting gifts: a coat, a waistcoat, and his own commission as first mate. Gravet later recalled that Gibson's steward, William May, "took me by the hand and wished me well home and bid me remember him to his wife."
    In the morning, Gibson, Gravet, and fifteen other men got into one of the
Charles II
's launches and rowed off toward the mainland. "I am a man of fortune, and must seek my fortune," Avery told Gibson before they parted.
    ***
    Later that day, Avery held a general meeting of the ship's company: eighty-five men in all, each of them there voluntarily except for the ship's doctor, whose services they were unwilling to part with. Avery proposed a new and better way of providing for themselves and their families: They would raid ships and settlements as originally planned, only not in the Caribbean, and not for the profit of Houblon. Instead they would sail for the Indian Ocean, where they would go after the richly laden merchantmen of the Orient and keep the plunder for themselves. He'd heard that the island of Madagascar would make a perfect base of operations; located off the southeastern coast of Africa it had no European presence, hundreds of miles of secluded coastline, and natives who would happily trade food and other necessities. When it was all over, Avery told them, they could quietly slip back into England with their riches.
    Avery must have been persuasive because the men agreed to his plan and appointed him as their captain. Collectively they laid out an equitable scheme for sharing future plunder. While on most privateering vessels, the captain got between six and fourteen shares to the ordinary seaman's one, Avery would receive only one extra share, his mate an extra half. They would make all major decisions democratically, except during combat, when Avery's command would be absolute. They also voted to rename the ship: From here on out she would be called the
Fancy.
    They spent the month of May sailing down the Atlantic, stopping at the island of Moia in the Cape Verde Islands, 350 miles off the West African coast. Moia was a depressing place, a treeless island baking under the tropical sun. It was frequented by mariners for its expansive inland salt ponds, salt being the main food preservative of the era. In the bleak cove that served as Moia's harbor, they found three English merchant ships loading salt the natives had piled for them on the beach. Faced with the
Fancy's
overwhelming firepower, the captains surrendered without a fight. Avery relieved them of provisions and an anchor to replace the one he'd left on the bottom of La Coruna harbor, but politely gave them a receipt for everything he had stolen. Less thoughtfully, he forced nine members of their crew to join his pirate band, probably because they, like the doctor, had special skills required to keep the
Fancy
operational.
    Avery apparently regretted looting English ships in time of war. A few months later he wrote an open letter to all English shipmasters, in which he told them they had nothing to fear from the
Fancy
and her men. "I have never as yet wronged any English or Dutch [vessels]," he wrote, "nor ever intend to whilst I am Commander." He signed it "As yet an Englishman's Friend." One can see why Avery would become a hero to the poor and downtrodden, a sort of