J.S. Bromley - Corsairs and Navies, 1600-1760

CORSAIRS AND NAVIES
1660 - 1760
Sebastian le Prestre de Vauban. By Rigaud (Girandoti)
CORSAIRS AND NAVIES
1660 - 1760
J.S. BROMLEY
THE H A M B L E D O N PRESS
LONDON AND RONCEVERTE
Published by The Hambledon Press 1987 102 Gloucester Avenue, London NW1 8HX (U.K.) 309 Greenbrier Avenue, Ronceverte WV 24970 (U.S.A.) ISBN 0 907628 77 8 Jean Bromley
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Bromley, J.S. Corsairs and navies, 1660-1760 1. Privateering - History I. Title 910.4'5 D27
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bromley, J.S. (John Selwyn) Corsairs and navies, 1660-1760 Collection of the author's essays. English and French Includes bibliographical references. 1. Privateering - History - 17th Century Addresses, essays, lectures. 2. Privateering - History - 18th century Addresses, essays.'lectures. 3. Naval history, Modern - Addresses, essays, lectures. I. Title V47. B76 1987 359.4'09'032 85-30584
Printed and bound by Billing and Sons Ltd., Worcester
CONTENTS Acknowledgements List of Illustrations Preface John Bromley, Historian by John McManners and John Roberts Publications of J.S. Bromley 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720: Liberty, Equality and Fraternity among Caribbean Freebooters Colonies at War A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, British CnsulGeneral at Algiers, 1694-1712 The North Sea in Wartime, 1688-1713 The Importance of Dunkirk Reconsidered, 1688-1713 Jacques-Winoc Plets, armateur en course (c. 1650-1716) Quelques reflections sur le fonctionnement des classes maritimes en France, 1689-1713 The Jacobite Privateers in the Nine Years War Les equipages des corsaires sous Louis XIV, 1688-1713 The Loan of French Naval Vessels to Privateering Enterprises, 1688-1713 The French Privateering War, 1702-13 Projets et contrats d'armement en course marseillais, 1705-1712 The Trade and Privateering of Saint-Malo during the War of the Spanish Succession Duguay Trouin: The Financial Background vii ix xi xv xxii 1 21 29 43 73 103 121 139 167 187 213 243 279 297
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15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
French Traders in the South Sea: The Journal of Lieutenant Pitouays, 1706-1709 The Channel Island Privateers in the War of the Spanish Succession Le commerce de la France de l'Ouest et la guerre maritime, 1702-1712 Some Zeeland Privateering Instructions: Jacob Sautijn to Captain Salomon Reynders, 1707 Les corsaires zlandais et la navigation scandinave pendant la Guerre de Succession d'Espagne The Profits of Naval Command: Captain Joseph Taylor and his Prizes Prize Office and Prize Agency at Portsmouth, 1689-1748 The Second Hundred Years War
325 339 389 407 435 449 463 495 505
Index compiled by Cecilia Dolley
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The articles reprinted here appeared first in the following places and are reprinted by the kind permission of the original publishers. 1 History from Below: Studies in Popular Protest and Popular Ideology in Honour of George Rude, edited by Frederick Krantz (Concordia University, Montreal, 1986), pp. 301-20. History of the English Speaking Peoples, 60 ( 1970), pp. 1921-7. Spolecznstwo Gospodarka Kul tura: Studia ofiarowane Maranowi Malowistowi w Czterdziestolecie Pracy Nankowej (Warsaw, 1974), pp. 45-58. Bijdragen en Mededelingen Betreffende de Geschiedenis der Nederlanden, xcii (1977), pp. 270-99. This appears here for the first time. Revue des Amis du Vieux Dunkerque, xvii (1983), pp. 61-77. Les Cahiers de Montpellier, 6 ( 1982), pp. 11 -29. Statesmen, Scholars and Merchants: Essays in EighteenthCentury History Presented to Dame Lucy Sutherland, edited by J.S. Bromley, A. Whiteman and P.G.M. Dickson (Oxford, 1973), pp. 17-43. Les Hommes et la Mer dans l'Europe du Nord-Ouest de l'Antiquit nos jours, edited by A. Lottin, J-C. Hocquet and Stephane Lebecq, Revue du Nord, numero 1 special hors srie (1986), pp. 303-22. Les Marines de guerre europenes XVII-XVIIF sicles, edited by M. Acerra, J. Merino and J. Meyer (Presses de l'Universit de Paris-Sorbonne, 1986), pp. 65-90. Historical Essays Presented to David Ogg, edited by H.F. Bell and R.L. Ollard (London, 1963), pp. 203-31. Revue d'histoire conomique et sociale, I (1972), pp. 74-109. Transactions of the Socit Guernesiase, xvii ( 1964), pp. 631-47 The Mariner's Mirror, 71 (August, 1985), pp. 259-85.
2 3
4 5 6 7 8
10
11 12 13 14
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Acknowledgements
15 16
17 18
19 20
21 22
Revista da Universidade de Coimbra, xxvii (1979), pp. 147-60. Transactions of the Sacete Guernesiase, xiv ( 1950), pp. 44478; A People of the Sea, edited by Alan Jamieson (Methuen, London, 1986), pp. 136-47. Annales du Midi, Ixv (1953), pp. 49-65. William HI and Louis XIV: Essays by and for Mark A. Thomson, edited by J.S. Bromley and R. Hatten (Liverpool, 1968, pp. 16289. Le Navire et l'economie maritime du Nord de l'Europe, edited by M. Mollat (Paris, 1961), pp. 93-109. Wirtschaftskrfte und Wirtschaftswege II: Wirtschaftskrfte in der Europischen Expansion. Festschrift fr Hermann Kellenbenz, edited by J. Schneider (Stuttgart, 1978), pp. 52944. Hampshire Studies, edited by J. Webb, N. Yates and S. Peacock (Portsmouth, 1981), pp. 169-99. Britain and France: Ten Centuries, edited by D. Johnson, F. Crouzet and H. Bdarida for the Franco-British Council (London, 1980), pp. 164-72,374.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Sebastian le Prestre de Vauban John Selwyn Bromley, 1913-1985 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 The Caribbean and Atlantic Seaboard View of Dunkirk The English and Dutch fleet bombarding Dunkirk, 21 September, 1694 Barques Longues Corvette, Barque and Brigantine Duguay Trouin Title page of the Journal of Lieutenant Pitouays Plan of the Bay of Valparaiso Louis Alexandre de Bourbon, Com te de Toulouse Privateers in action Frontispiece xiv 23 72 102 120 166 296 330 334 388 448
PERMISSIONS Giraudon (Frontispiece, 9); Presses de la Cit (6).
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PREFACE
A proper modesty usually restrains authors from setting forth the circumstances surrounding the genesis of their works, but the reader of a posthumous publication may perhaps expect a word of explanation. The initiative for this present collection came not from John Bromley, but from a longstanding friend and fellow historian who persuaded him during his last illness to assemble the scholarly contributions made over thirty-five years in some more accessible and permanent form. It was an inspired suggestion, for though John's offprints were much prized by their fortunate recipients, not least because some of his choicest pieces appeared in publications unlikely to claim the attention of his more insular contemporaries, few even among his closest colleagues suspected that a roll-call of his publications would run to forty titles. Despite his declining physical powers, John devoted himself wholeheartedly to the task of preparing these for publication. To give the volume a greater coherence he decided to include only those articles concerned with what he called 'the Private War at Sea'; having settled the subject matter, he proceeded to determine the precise sequence of the contents and to choose, with characteristic care, a title which would leave no doubt about the cargo. Even then he found the energy to select the illustrations and to make recommendations about the index. Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760 has been published almost exactly in accordance with John's instructions, the only change being the removal of his introductory essay to the facsimile edition of John Baltharpe's The Straights Voyage on the grounds that it stood uneasily apart from Baltharpe's text. Corsairs and Navies is John's historical testament; though we must regret that his inexhaustible quest for answers and his unstinted generosity to fellow scholars have robbed us of the monograph he was preparing on the French corsairs and European commerce between 1688 and 1713, the present volume, together with his research files,1 now in the care of the National Maritime Museum, go some way to alleviate that loss. Always punctilious in his courtesies, John left precise informations,
These files include Professor Bromley's papers and many microfilms. The Department of Printed Books and Manuscripts at the National Maritime Museum has prepared a list of these for consultation by researchers.
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Preface
neatly written on a used envelope, concerning the dedication and the acknowledgements. He wished to place on record his gratitude for the generous help he received from the trustees of the Leverhulme Trust Fund, who awarded him an emeritus fellowship in 1978, and from the British Academy, which made him a grant towards the costs of microfilming French archives. John also recalled his debt of gratitude to the Oxford History Faculty as well as to 'countless friends'. The many archivists in record offices in this country and abroad, who rendered him services over the years will find in the footnotes that their help has not gone unrecognized. Many friends of John contributed in one way or another to the appearance of this volume. Particular thanks are due to Brian and Cecilia Dolley, Jack Simmons, Stevan Pavlowitch, John McManners, John Roberts, Simon Groenveld and Patrick Crowhurst. It is a matter of special satisfaction that the University of Southampton showed its appreciation of the Emeritus Professor of Modern History's many contributions to the academic community by making a subvention towards the costs of this publication. Finally, John left strict orders that his comprehensive debt to his wife Jean should be registered here. It is my pleasant duty to discharge this heartfelt wish, for without her constant support and encouragement historians would have been deprived of these dazzling glimpses into the cosmopolitan world of the privateer. Alastair Duke Southampton 26 April 1987
To the Memory of the late RICHARD PARES, Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford
JOHN SELWYN BROMLEY
(1911-1985)
JOHN BROMLEY, HISTORIAN
This volume of selected articles and essays by John Bromley is dedicated, sadly, to his memory. Had one time to identify and collect the materials, another volume could be produced consisting of pages scattered in the works of others which, in reality, were partly his. He was a generous soul; he would lend money to a hard-up research student as cheerfully as he would push Richard Pares in his wheelchair to the Parks at Oxford to watch the cricket (eavesdroppers on their conversation being dazzled by the display of eighteenth-century lore). More than this - a generosity whose folly only a practising historian can appreciate - his vast store of archival gleanings was freely set at the disposal of others, and his original ideas and inspirations were there for the asking to anyone who consulted him. How much of the volume of the New Cambridge Modern History which he edited is really his, in addition to the chapters which bear his name? He corrected, improved and added to everyone's work, year after year, until final publication. One contributor who submitted a draft referring to the noise made by the late-seventeenth-century printing presses received learned advice from John about the best specific word, and 'clatter' became the agreed answer which went into the text. Then rather later, an editorial letter arrived offering a splendid additional paragraph with footnote references to works in Dutch and Portuguese, an opportunity to go bravely in borrowed plumes which was gratefully accepted. This addition, in the end, never got into print; four years later, in a final exercise in compression, John humbly asked permission to remove it - having entirely forgotten his own authorship. The sad news of John Bromley's death had an international resonance. Spanish, Dutch, French, Polish and American scholars expressed their sense of loss. He had advised so many people, corrected so many typescripts, suggested so many avenues of research, attended so many conferences in so many places. More especially was he known and well regarded by the French and the Dutch. That familiar figure emerging from the Palais Soubise at the end of the day, floppy Basque beret rakishly askew and briefcase swinging as he sauntered away, was a marvellous ambassador - to some French historians the first demonstration that there really were Englishmen who could be trusted with their country's history. The Dutch admitted him a Commander of the Order of
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Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760
Orange-Nassau, a distinction which greatly pleased him. One of his friends likened him to Jean Le Clerc, the 'facteur de la Rpublique des Lettres', the indispensable go-between among the Protestant intellectuals from various nations who found refuge in Holland in the late seventeenth century. It was a fair comparison, for John, knowing everybody and sharing in so many intellectual ventures, was promoting the cause of history without seeking acclaim for himself, and it was a history free from national prejudices and, indeed, from national perspectives altogether. In his writing he gave unstinted praise to two kinds of men, and one of the categories consisted of those whose achievements were self-consciously supra-national, contributions to Europe. On this ground, Louis XIV (whose warlike pride would otherwise have been intolerable) was respected as the figurehead of the brilliant civilisation of France which dominated and brightened the style and imagination of contemporary Europe, and William III is described as achieving true greatness only because he was one of the few who had 'a sense of the European commonweal'. In the world of international historical scholarship, the universal admiration for John was sometimes qualified (if that is the word) by saying he was a 'perfectionist - hence, the magisterial, definitive book that was in him would never be published. The word 'perfectionist' needs interpretation. His sophisticated Inaugural Lecture (1961) is revealing for what it omits as for what it says. Nowhere does the new professor defend history as an intellectual discipline suited to teaching the bureaucrats and business men of the future the art of analysing complex problems and the skills of lucid prose writing, or as a fund of knowledge for politicians and diplomats - the standard arguments of academics for the public funding of the Arts. On the contrary, he seeks disciples coming to him out of'disinterested intellectual curiosity'. Nowhere does he put forward the fashionable relativist view of each age writing its own version of the past in the light of its peculiar, immediate insights. Rather, he talks of the expansion of the area of agreed certainty, the identification of long-term factors, the interpretation of 'collective, therefore representative events', the link up with sociology, art, linguistics and musicology on the way to total comprehension of 'civilisations', vast Toynbee-inspired units of study in which Churches and States are 'only the most important manifestations'. To those who knew John well, beneath the crackle of the epigrams lurked something akin to aesthetic despair. His affection for his students and his yearning to get 'behind the beards and the boogie-woogie' to understand them was matched by his realisation that so many of them were on an unenthusiastic cliche-ridden pilgrimage towards the 'false glitter' of a mere degree. Disinterested curiosity was a commodity in short supply. The goal, the total understanding of civilisations lay far ahead in a distant future; the only way to the truth of things is to build a 'vast infrastructure of
John Bromley, Historian
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indispensable pedantry'. Without massive support from that infrastructure, John himself would never generalise. Had he believed that each generation composes its own history and been willing to write provisionally, he might have overcome his temperament, and become the Braudel of the North Atlantic. Temperament was, of course, the essential reason why he felt unable to venture into wide-ranging hypotheses and confident generalisations. He was too sensitive, too conscious of all the nuances and, above all, he was obsessed - no other word is strong enough - with the Truth. It was so in his life; although he was religious and admired the Anglican Liturgy, for years he taught at Keble College without a Fellowship because he refused to take an archaic oath. It was so in his writing. Anyone who submitted a typescript to him for comment - as so many did - would reflect ruefully afterwards that the best epigrams had been cancelled because 'the word is too strong', 'the evidence doesn't quite go that far'. In an early essay on the 'Decline of Absolute Monarchy in France, 1683-1774', a masterpiece of historical synthesis, he insisted on beginning with 'Were it not for one very important proviso', which reduced his dramatic opening sentence to the tentative. And his concluding paragraph (on medieval survivals in the France of the Enlightenment), which deserves to be anthologised for all students of style as a model of evocative writing, was one he himself wanted to omit; he told the editors of the volume that he had written it only because he supposed it was the sort ofthing they liked. They had to be very firm to prevent him suppressing it. What we have missed because of John's severe self-limitation of scope may be guessed from a reading of his introduction to Volume VI (16881725) of the New Cambridge Modern History. Injudicious paragraphs he sketches the contributions of the guerre de course to the fortunes of both sides in the great war, the switch of power from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, the vast profits of the South American market, the 'deadly holeand-corner skirmishing in North America' where the shape of the distant future was being determined. His synthesis would have been global, as aware of the significance of the collapse of the Mughal Empire as of the decline of Portugal, and finding everywhere strange linkages, like that between 'the high summer of piracy' from Madagascar to the Red Sea and the manipulations of'respectable circles in New York and Boston'. This is an adumbration of the great book he did not write. Instead, he devoted a lifetime of minute research to contributing to the 'indispensable infrastructure' - though how far removed from 'pedantry' is the series of brilliant, learned and sharply-etched cameos that came from his pen! His choice of theme in the infrastructure, however, may seem to require some special further explanation. Psychologically and emotionally, it has been said, he was destined to study the eighteenth
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century. The wide-ranging interest he showed in 'manners'; his cosmopolitanism, the sense he diffused of not only the cultivated but the self-cultivated mind, all suggested affinities with the age at the centre of his professional concern. But what aspect of the century would he turn to? His diversions from the archives were literature, provided it was not harshly satirical, with correspondence and memoirs as favourites if the writers observed the courtesies; art, especially painting in its more subtle forms; and music of the gentler Romantic kind. Everything suggested that his eighteenth century would be that of the Enlightenment, of baroque shading off into rococo, of the age of Reason phasing off into sensibilit - he would write of culture, the arts and patronage, of the history of ideas, of the conduct of intelligent diplomatic negotiations and the manoeuvres of sophisticated courtiers. Yet this aesthete, this gentle scholar who went to labyrinthine lengths in his correspondence and conversation to avoid letting slip a single wounding word, chose to study the clash of hardened fighting men, some of them brutal characters who lived by rapine. Perhaps opposite called to opposite, the imagination swinging to 'the dangerous edge of things'. But there is a simpler explanation of the apparent paradox. Privateers and pirates, in a strange sense, were a supra-national group, belonging to the confraternity of the oceans. Even those who were official commerce raiders and - maybe - dedicated patriots, were conscious of their independence of the regular naval forces and of their individual freedom of action on the high seas. They provided John with a cosmopolitan subject of study, one in which the powers of Western Europe were involved in a pattern of diplomatic, commercial and, indeed, lawless activities. It was a theme after his own heart, even if at first glance one would have assumed he would deal with cultural and artistic exchanges between the nations, rather than warlike ones. And there was a final argument to turn the balance of choice. Here was a theme which, above all else, involved stories of courage, and the courageous were the other category of men to whom John gave unstinting praise. Significantly, Charles XII of Sweden, quixotic and foolish, was his hero, on Dr. Johnson's ground: 'Were Socrates and Charles the Twelfth of Sweden both present in any company, and Socrates to say, "Follow me and hear a lecture in philosophy" and Charles, laying his hand on his sword, to say, "Follow me and dethrone the Czar", a man would be ashamed to follow Socrates . . . Mankind reverence those who have got over fear, which is so general a weakness. ' Hesitant, erudite and sensitive, this most peaceable of historians was glad to recount the stories of men of action, men of courage. For some the jump of imagination involved in concentrating on the privateer theme would have been too difficult to contemplate, but the obligation of the historian to enter with sympathy into minds and societies utterly alien was one which John could fulfil with ease, naturally
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and instinctively. To an almost inhibiting degree, he could understand life-styles totally different from his own, to the point where he found it almost impossible to pass a simple, ruthless judgement against anyone. A friend who worked with him on an abortive project for a text book on eighteenth-century European history wanted to condemn Louis XIV's warlike ambitions, the Polish noblemen's stupid constitutional arrangements, the disorganised barbarism of the Barbary Regencies: to no avail -John always had defences and explanations. In a remarkable article, he described the bustiers of the Caribbean as dirty, blasphemous and debauched, but he admired their code of distributive justice - their merit awards, allowances for special responsibilities, compensation for the crippled, their solemn funeral rites, their recognition of matelotage, the bond of individual friendship. The title 'Liberty, Equality and Fraternity among the Caribbean Freebooters' is not sardonic, and the essay begins: 'Two societies, two conceptions of justice, collaborated and collided when French forces stormed Cartagena of the Indies in May 1697'. 'Two societies'? France, the heartland of European civilisation, and a gang of cut-throats in steamy jungles and on tropical seas: there was no anomaly in setting them in parallel. If a Time Machine had transported John back to meet the subjects of his researches, how would he have reacted? Two antithetical pictures, both convincing, come to mind. One would be his fastidious repulsion against any hint of violence or cruelty; the other would see him seated on a coil of rope or on a tavern bench talking endlessly with the riff-raff of the Western ocean. Historians, said the Inaugural Lecture, must be 'lovers of life', and his love of life, all life, was as evident in his recreation of the past as in his administration, teaching and friendships in the present. He had time for, and an interest in, everyone. His love of people was associated with a wide-eyed admiration for the technical artefacts men make and use as extensions of themselves; to him, they were as revealing about mankind as philosophy, poetry and other intellectual creations. The sea fascinated him (in encouraging a friend to take a professorship in Tasmania, he said: 'You will live in a seaport; that's always a bonus' - and he himself went to Southampton soon afterwards). But it was not a preoccupation with the ocean as a scenic background, dark with storms or in sunlit calm, but with the sailing ships that plied upon it, with their delicate patterns of mast and rigging and their multifarious mysterious tackle - things of beauty, the supreme expression of human ingenuity and teamwork. In these essays we meet all sorts of craft: the majestic ships of the line with everything from 40 to very near a 100 guns, and the wherries and flutes that watered and provisioned them, the corvettes or barques longues with their six to eight guns, the /regates a bombes for rapid sailing, the sloops and yachts, flyboats and pinks, barques and brigantines, ketches, hoys and galliots. Through the pages resound litanies of the names of ships, everyone savoured as if
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the author himself was the captain on the bridge or the armateur on the quayside seeing it off: Le Sauvage, La Railleuse, La Roue de Fortune, L'Esprance de Nantes, L'Ange Gardien, the Southsea Castle and England's Frigott . . . . He knew what stores they had to carry for repairs, and rejoiced to find them complete with dry tar, tallow, sulphur, parchment skins, 'tolles noiailles' for mending sails and 'estamines' for new flags. Their crews were his old friends and he knew all their appointed tasks: captains, mates, pilots, prizemasters, pursers, surgeons, chaplains and the bossemans in charge of anchors and grappling. He could interpret the 'lingua franca' of the North Sea, which enabled Dutch, English and Scandinavian seamen to serve together, he could mediate in the disputes over 'gunnage and tunnage' and 'pluntrage'. John Bromley was the comprehensive historian of all the irregular forces scouring the high seas in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century: English, Dutch, French (and the Jacobite raiders launched by James II in exile), the buccaneers of the West Indies and the Barbary corsairs. But to describe him as the historian of privateering and leave it at that would be to do him an injustice. He was concerned with the politics, war plans and economic designs of the various governments involved in the guerre de course, and if his imagination was supremely captured by ships and sailors, his interests and sympathies extended to the people of the seaports who fitted out the vessels and welcomed them home. The irregularly paid workers of the dockyards with their varied expertise, the amateurs who furnished the vessels, the corn-factors, oil men, chandlers, sword cutlers, rope-makers, barrel hoopers and all others who provisioned and equipped them, the subscribers leagued together under their dpositaires, procurers or directeurs who contributed the finance, 'a popular privateering conspiracy . . . a homogeneous community' extending from the very rich to artisans and widows; these were the subjects of his study. To resurrect these folk, he haunted the Archives Nationales in Paris, and roamed the coastal areas of France, reading in the archives of all the maritime Departments, and in the municipal collections, Chamber of Commerce papers and capitation registers of the ports: Brest, Dunkirk, Le Havre, Saint-Malo, Rochefort, Toulon, Marseille, Bayonne, Bordeaux. The existence of an archival source he had not seen worried him; if only one could plunge into the uncalendared morass of the files of the Parlements and other law courts to unearth more details about the rules for sharing out the spoils of war! His last article, written with the knowledge that death was only weeks away, is a fine example of his comprehensive expertise - ranging from Versailles and the considerations of high strategy to the tall granite houses and narrow streets of Saint-Malo where calculating citizens were clubbing up to finance privateers. There was always in John a tension between his revulsion against the cruel deeds of his raiders and his admiration for their courage and seamanship: 'zig-zagging from coast to
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coast as the winds dictated, joining and parting company from sunset to sunset, infiltrating convoys before dawn . . . anchoring in dead water on the Dogger Bank or judging the tidal caprices of the Pentland Firth'. But in this last essay the central figure is Duguay Trouin, who commanded his first vessel at the age of eighteen, who had compassion on the drowning and on prisoners of war, who was guided into battle by his inner voice, and made honour his guiding star and cared for 'la gioire' more than riches. It was fitting that John, himself facing imminent death with quiet courage, should have chosen to invoke, in the last pages he wrote, the memory of this chivalrous figure, one of'those who have got over fear, which is so general a weakness'. John McManners John Roberts Oxford, 1987
PUBLICATIONS OF J.S. BROMLEY
1950 'The Channel Island Privateers in the War of the Spanish Succession', Sacete Guemesiase XIV, pp. 444-478. 1953 'Le commerce de la France de l'Ouest et la guerre maritime, 1702-1712', rmales du midi LXV, pp. 49-65. 1959 'Quelques remarques sur Edmund Burke et le Revolution franchise' in Hommages offerts a M. le doyen Etienne Gros, ed. P. Guiral (Aix-enProvence), pp. 205-10. 'Introduction' to John Baltharpe, The Straights Voyage (Luttrell Society reprint), pp. vii-lii. 1960 (With E. H. Kossmann) ed., Britain and the Netherlands, Papers delivered to the Oxford-Netherlands Historical Conference 1959, (London). 1961 'Les corsaires zlandais et la navigation scandinave pendant la Guerre de Succession d'Espagne' in Le navire et l'economie maritime du nord de l'Europe, ed. M. Mollai (Paris), pp. 93-109,
1962 History and the Younger Generation (Southampton).
1963 'The French Privateering War, 1702-1713' in Historical Essays 1600-1750 presented to David Ogg, ed. H. E. Bell and R. L. Ollard (London), pp. 20331.
1964 'The Trade and Privateering of Saint-Malo during the War of the Spanish Succession', Transactions of the Socit Guemesiase XVII, pp. 631-47. (With E. H. Kossmann) ed., Britain and the Netherlands. II. Papers delivered
Publications of J.S. Bromley to the Anglo-Dutch Historical Conference 1962, (Groningen).
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1968 'Some Zeeland Privateering Instructions: Jacob Sautijn to Captain Salomon Reynders, 1707' in William HI and Louis XIV: Essays 1680-1720 by and f or Mark A. Thomson, ed.J. S. Bromley and R. Hatten (Liverpool), pp. 162-89. (With E. H. Kossmann) ed., Britain and the Netherlands in Europe and Asia. Papers delivered to the Third Anglo-Dutch Historical Conference, (London). 1970 'Introduction' in New Cambridge Modern History VI The Rise of Great Britain and Russia, 1688-1725 ed. J. S. Bromley (Cambridge), pp. 1-36; reprinted 1971. (With R. D. Hussey), 'The Spanish Empire under Foreign Pressure, 1688-1715', ibid., pp. 343-80. (With A. N. Kurat), 'The Retreat of the Turks, 1683-1730', ibid., pp. 608-47. Reprinted in A History of the Ottoman Empire to 1730, ed. V. J. Parry et al., (Cambridge, 1976), pp. 178-218. (With A. N. Ryan), 'Navies, 1660-1720', ibid., pp. 790-833. 'The Decline of Absolute Monarchy, 1683-1774' in France: Government and Society, cd. J. M. Wallace-Hadrill and J. McManners, 2nd. edition (London), pp. 134-60. 'The Later Stuart Navy' in History of the English Speaking People LVI, pp. 1801-4. 'War on the High Seas, 1689-97', ibid., LX, pp. 1921-27. 'Colonies at War, 1701-13', ibid., LXIII, pp. 2026-29. 1971 (With E. H. Kossmann) ed., Britain and the Netherlands IV Metropolis, Dominion and Province. Papers delivered to the Fourth Anglo-Dutch Historical Conference, (The Hague, 1971). 1972 'Projets et contrats d'armement en course marseillais, 1705-1712', Revue d'histoire conomique et sociale, I, pp. 74-109.
1973
'Lucy Stuart Sutherland' in Statesmen, Scholars and Merchants: Essays in Eighteenth-Century History presented to Dame Lucy Sutherland, ed. J. S. Bromley, A. Whiteman and P. G. M. Dickson (Oxford), pp. vii-xv. 'TheJacobite Privateers in the Nine Years War', ibid., pp. 17-43. 'In the Shadow of Impressment: Friends of a Naval Militia, 1844-1874' in War and Society. Historical Essays in Memory ofj. R. Western, ed. M. R. D. Foot, (London), pp. 183-97; 320-24.
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1974 'A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, British Cnsul-General at Algiers, 16941712', in Spolecznstwo Gospodarka Kultura: Studia oarowane Marianowi Malowistowi w Czterdziestolecie Pracy Nankowej (Warsaw), pp. 45-58. 1975 'The Importance of Dunkirk (1688-1713) Reconsidered' in Course et piraterie: Etudes presentees a la commission internationale d'histoire maritime a l'occasion de son XVe colloque internationale . . . San Francisco, aot 1975 ed. M. Mollai et U. Bonnel (Paris), pp. 231-70. (With E. H. Kossmann) ed., Britain and the Netherlands V Some Political Mythologies. Papers delivered to the Fifth Anglo-Dutch Historical Conference, (The Hague). 1976 The Manning of the Royal Navy: Selected Public Pamphlets, 1693-1873, ed. with an introduction for the Navy Records Society (London). 1977 'Away from Impressment: the Idea of a Royal Naval Reserve, 16961859' in Britain and the Netherlands VI War and Society, ed. A. C. Duke and C. A. Tamse, (The Hague), pp. 168-88. 'The North Sea in Wartime, 1688-1713', Bijdragen en mededelingen betreffende de geschiedenis der Nederlanden, XCII, pp. 270-99. 1978 'The Profits of Naval Command: Captain Joseph Taylor and his Prizes' in Wirtschaftskrfte und Wirtschaftswegell Wirtschaftskrfte in der europischen Expansion. Festschrift fur Hermann Kellenbenz, ed. J. Schneider (Stuttgart), pp. 529-44. 1979 'The Rise and Fall of the Dutch Republic', Historical Journal XXII, pp. 985-95. 'French Traders in the South Sea: the Journal of Lieutenant Pitouays, 1706-1709', Revista de Universidade de Coimbra, XXVII, pp. 147-60. 1980 'The Second Hundred Years War' in Britain and France: Ten Centuries, ed. D. Johnson, F. Crouzet and H. Bdarida (London), pp. 164-72; 374. 1981 'Britain and Europe in the Eighteenth Century', History, LXVI, pp. 394412. 'Prize Office and Prize Agency at Portsmouth, 1689-1748' in Hampshire
Publications of J. S. Bromley
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Studies, ed. J. Webb, N. Yates and S. Peacock (Portsmouth), pp. 169-99.

1982 'The British Navy and its Seamen after 1688: Notes for an Unwritten History', in Charted and Uncharted Waters ed. S. Palmer and G. Williams (London), pp. 148-63. 'Quelques reflexions sur le fonctionnement des classes maritimes en France, 1689-1713', Les cahiers de Montpellier, VI, pp. 11-29. 1983 'Jacques-Winoc Plets, armateur en course (c. 1650-1716)' Revue des amis du Vieux Dunkerque, XVII, pp. 61-77. 1985 'Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720: Liberty, Equality and Fraternity among the Caribbean Freebooters' in History from Below, Studies in Popular Ideology in Honour of George Rude, ed. F. Krantz (Montreal), pp. 301-20. 'Duguay Trouin: the Financial Background', The Mariner's Mirror, LXXI, pp. 259-85. 'The Loan of French Naval Vessels to Privateering Enterprises, 16881713' in Les marines de guerre europennes, XVH-XVHIe sicles, ed. M. A cerra, J. Merino et J. Meyer (Paris), pp. 65-90. 1986 'Les equipages des corsaires sous Louis XIV (1688-1713)' in Les Hommes et la Mer dans l'Europe du Nord-Ouest de l'Antiquit a nos jours, ed. A. Lottin, J-C Hocquet et S. Lebecq (Lille), pp. 302-22. 'A New Vocation: Privateering in the Wars of 1689-97 and 1702-13' in A People of the Sea: the Maritime History of the Channel Islands, ed. A. G. Jamieson (London), pp. 109-47.
l OUTLAWS AT SEA, 1660-1720: LIBERTY, EQUALITY AND FRATERNITY AMONG THE CARIBBEAN FREEBOOTERS Two societies, two conceptions of justice, collaborated and collided when French forces stormed Cartagena of the Indies in May 1697. For their commander, the baron de Pointis, a naval captain in the mould of Drake, this bloody if strategically pointless success fulfilled a long-postponed design "that might be both honourable and advantageous", with ships lent and soldiers (but not seamen) paid by the King, who in return would take the Crown's usual one-fifth interest in such "preis de vaisseaux", the remaining costs falling on private subscribers, in this case no less than 666 of them, headed by courtiers, financiers, naval contractors and officers of both pen and sword.' According to Pointis, peace rumours restricted the flow of advances and the expedition, nearly 4,000 strong when it sailed out of Brest, was weaker than he had planned, especially if it should prove difficult to use the ships' crews ashore. At St Domingue, however, the experienced governor Jean Ducasse, who had risen by his own business abilities from relatively humble origins in Beam, had orders to place another thousand men at the baron's disposal, in locally armed frigates and sloops. Some of these seasoned warriors were garrison soldiers, others militiamen and small settlers; there were also 180 negroes, some free and others lent by their owners with a promise of manumission if the enterprise went well. But the majority, at least 650 and probably more, wereflibustiers, freebooters whom Ducasse had called from the sea and detained for months pending the late arrival of the squadron. With their long, light muskets known as boucaniers--from their original use by those earlier huntsmen who smoke-dried their meat (boucane) Indian-fashion--these were crack marksmen, well able to board ships or Spanish trenches, if not ramparts, with little use for artillery. According to the careful historian, Fr Charlevoix, who had access to government records as well as to the manuscripts of a fellow Jesuit, Le Pers, who was serving on the Coast of St. Domingue at the time, Ducasse's contingent, amounting in the end to more than a fifth of the whole force, acquitted themselves with their usual audacity and resourcefulness. 2 Even Pointis, in his Relation, praised the negroes. The flibusiiers, however, were "a troop of Banditti... idle Spectators of a great Action ... this Rabble ... that base Kind of Life", gifted only with "a particular Talent at discovering hidden Treasures". He had resented having "to court them in the most flattering Terms". They, in their turn, were quick to object to "le baton haut" of naval officers, as happened again when Le Moyne d'Iberville brought his last privateering armament to Martinique in 1706.' It was because they would serve immediately only under a man they knew, preferably one whom they had elected,
that Governor Ducasse himself joined the expedition. Even so, they would have sulked in the woods had he not obtained from Pointis some prior agreement about sharing the plunder. A notice was accordingly posted at Petit Goave--by this date as much the principal privateering base of the Coast as the island of Tortuga had been in the earlier decades of "la flibuste"--announcing simply that the St Domingue contingent would participate "homme par homme" with the crews of His Majesty's ships. Ducasse took this vague undertaking to mean that his men would share in the booty in the same proportion as their numbers bore to those from France. Pointis, mindful of the claims of his shareholders but entirely overlooking the modest investors of the Coast, allowed this assumption to rest until he was ready to embark the booty, provisionally estimated at not more than nine million in livres tournois. Ducasse and his followers, who had not been allowed into the counting-house where the gold and silver and precious stones had been collected, suspected that it would add up to twice as much; in any case, they expected over two million for themselves. Word came back, for the two leaders were no longer on speaking terms, that they were entitled to 160,000 livres tournois in silver crowns or pieces of eight, as their proper proportion of what was due to the French crews a tenth of the first million and a mere thirtieth of the rest. This worked out at twenty-five crowns a man instead of an anticipated 1500 or 1600, including three months' wages. The freebooters' answer was to return to the city, against the appeals of Ducasse, and sack it all over again. They came away with enough precious metal to distribute a thousand crowns to each man by weight, as their custom was, before sailing, but also with fabrics and other merchandise which they would later have parted with for much less than they were worth. Four of their larger ships were soon intercepted by the British navy, the cargo of the Cerf Volani allegedly being sold in Jamaica for IOO,000.4 The quarrel between Pointis and Ducasse reverberated for years. A royal arrt awarded the flibustiers something near seventeen per cent of the ultimate net sum available for distribution, but it was remitted to St Domingue in goods, piecemeal, and much of this "masse de Carlâgennes" never reached its intended destination, partly because it passed through dishonest hands but also because many of the tropical claimants had dispersedjor died.5 It was precisely the flight of its warriors that every good governor of St Domingue, thinly populated and exposed to attack from many quarters, most feared; and Ducasse too had a substantial personal stake in the masse or stock out of which the tropical investors should recover their outlay. Nevertheless, the "perfidy" of Pointis rankled most in that he had caused the governor to break faith with his prickly following. 6 He had already experienced their stubborn refusal to go to sea whenever they had money to spend, and their strong preference for the occasional Spanish prize over regular cruising against the English or Dutch, as distinct from tip-and-run descents on Jamaica for slaves. Moreover, they were still grumbling that they had not received justice after Ducasse's own attack on Jamaica in 1694. Beeston, governor of Jamaica, referred to this when reporting the state of mutiny which preceded the departure for Cartagena "they to fight and the great only to take away the money from them."7 This feeling about "the great" marks the whole history of seventeenth-century privateering in the West Indies, and indeed finds echoes among the pirates, properly so called, documented by Defoe. "They were poor rogues", said some, of those
Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720
strung up at Cape Coast in 1722, "and so hanged, while others, no less guilty in another way, escaped."8 The resentments of pirates, generally recruited from merchantmen, were most specifically directed at the despotism of shipmasters: after seizing a ship, "Captain Johnson" tells us, "the Pirates began to take upon themselves the distribution of justice, examining the men concerning their master's usage of them, according to the custom of other Pirates".' On privateers, impeccably commissioned by a sovereign prince, a kind of class consciousness revolted against the larger shares of prize and plunder allotted to the officers, often numerous because crews were not under naval discipline; and there was sometimes distrust of the owners as well, usually entitled in France and Britain to two-thirds of the net takings, though there was no rule about this and it looks as if such "gentlemen adventurers" came to be contented with half at a later date. The well-known cruises of Woodes Rogers and George Shelvocke into the Pacific, respectively in 1708-11 and 1719-22, provide rich evidence of both attitudes, and are especially relevant here because they carried old campaigners from "the Jamaica [buccaneering] discipline". They evidently drew on what William Dampier, himself a buccaneer from 1679 to 1688 and chief pilot to Rogers, calls "the Law of Privateers", meaning in effect what in St Domingue was known as "the Custom of the Coast" a corpus of practices which also left a strong mark on those of the common pirates, many of whom originated in the Caribbean after the proclamations of peace in 1697 and 1713, and sometimes while formal hostilities continued between their princes. Shelvocke's account largely consists of his encounters with mutineers. Their first petition, moderately worded by comparison with what was to come, he described as "needless tautologies, insignificant expressions, and dull confusion". It referred to the treatment of Rogers's two crews, who carried their "Case" against the Bristol owners to the House of Lords, though in vain."' The agreements Shelvocke had to make at sea defining and dividing plunderthose articles in a prize to which the captors had sole claim, such as the personal possessions of prisoners--follow almost word for word those made by Woodes Rogers and his fellow captain, Stephen Courtney, whose grand stroke was to surrender "the whole Cabin-Plunder", that is, the contents of "the Great Cabbins" of captured shipmasters and often therefore the best of the pillage. Their object was to prevent both indiscriminate plunder and its concealment by securing every man's interest. To do so they had to extend their definition well outside the limits (all above deck, roughly) recognised in European courts and eventually to shut their eyes to the embezzlement of "Arms, Chests, Knives, Roman Relicks, Scizzars, Tobacco, loose Books, Pictures, and worthless Tools and Toys, and Bedding in use...". Shelvocke's chief enemy, William Betagh, his captain of marines, wanted to go much further "to oppose the owners having a part of any thing but what was upon freight, or mentioned in bills of lading"." Cheating the owners by excessive pillage was inherent in privateering. Thanks to "riflinge", Elizabethan "owners and victuallers" may have received less than half the value of their prizes, instead of the nominal two-thirds; and the armaieurs of Louis XIV's numerous corsairs never ceased to complain of pillage, and of the laxity of the courts in repressing it. Temptation mounted when wages were substituted for shares, for then a ship's company was entitled in France only to a tenth of the prize money in place of a third, the same as in the navy. The naval bureaucracy preferred wages ("a la solde") to shares ("a la part") in privateers, because of the
tricks and delays for which the directors of armaments were notorious; but "a la part" remained the prevailing system at Dunkirk and St Malo, if not in Provence. Rogers's "undertakers" neatly combined wages and shares, wages halving a man's share whatever his rank. There was no universal method and no uniform tariff of shares, though Trinity House had long ago tried to establish one.12 At St Malo the company's portion was distributed by a panel of ship's officers in the light of performance, but at Calais and probably Dunkirk shares were allotted before sailing, as was the English practice, where all depended on the negotiating strength of owners, officers and seamen in each case. Thus Woodes Rogers was to enjoy twenty-four shares in his company's third, the master and surgeon ten each, and so on down the scale to the sailor at two and a half, the landman at one and a half. Exactly the same sub-division was observed in their agreements about plunder; Rogers exchanged his "Cabin Plunder" for an extra five per cent on his shares. These were high in proportion to the sailor's; at Calais, for example, a captain got only four or six times the "lot" of a matelo!. " But Rogers was about to cruise for as many years as a small Calais corsair would be away for months; the investment, risks and objectives were in no way comparable. Nevertheless, his company alleged that the officers "could not possibly in a Privateer deserve what they were allow'd in proportion to the rest". Shelvocke's boatswain called them all '"Blood-suckers". The syndic of St Malo implied as much of some of his own captains. 14 That Shelvocke was on the British navy's half-pay list would not have worked in his favour either. Naval officers were notoriously avaricious about prize-money, which engendered constant friction between them. One who knew them well told King William in 1699 that some commanders kept their men out of their money for years, "until not a man concerned was to be found", while James Vernon, a secretary of state and prize commissioner, considered that this particular fraud contributed to desertion and piracy. 15 Although their codes of punishment were wide apart, harsh treatment in navy and merchant navy alike fed these animosities. In the latter, however, arbitrary and even savage conduct by a master was less likely to be corrected by other officers or the employer. There was a great gulf fixed between shipmasters, with their powers and responsibilities and prospects, and even their first mates. The powers and responsibilities were as old as the Laws of Wisby and Olron, themselves only compilations of earlier decisions or customs; masters were responsible to their owners for the offences of their crews, a member of whom had little right to defend himself against the boss's physical blows, while any refusal of duty might forfeit all title to wages. Once he had signed articles, a seaman's life was no longer his own. Meanwhile, the privileges and social position of masters had gone forward by leaps and bounds, at least in England. In the late seventeenth century a body of attorneys is said to have lived on encouraging seamen's claims against them. 16 It is essential to keep this background in mind if we are to understand the originality of the Caribbean freebooters in dealing with plunder, and indeed freebooting itself. However, it would be wholly erroneous to suppose that "flibustier", alias "buccaneer", necessarily implies a seaman. This "fanciful kind of inversion" itself implies that the English were confused by the interchangeability of flibusiier and boucanier, who in the opinion of James Burney, still the best of their English historians, "are to be considered as the same character, exercising sometimes one,

17
sometimes the other employment". Charlevoix, steeped in the "socit des ordres", was distinguishing functions rather than men in describing them as separate "corps", as he did also the settlers (habitants) and their indentured white servants (engages) in that "Rpublique des Aventuriers" which preceded royal government in St Domingue and long lived side by side with it. It was all a matter of less or more, the gens du metier (without fixed property unless or until they settled down, as some did) and the part-timers, who might also be settlers or traders rather than huntsmen a dying profession long before 1700.'8 What flibustier and boucanier most obviously had in common was their accuracy with small arms, the principal weapon of the privateering barques or sloops, which called for the minimum of seamanship. Fr Labat, who sometimes sailed with them and counted some of their captains among his friends, attributes their preference for a simple sail-rig to a dislike of work in the first place; Pointis' sailors were "ngres blancs" to them.'11 In any case, "roving on the account" included land operations, all the way from Trinidad to Campeche and ultimately the Spanish Pacific coasts as well. Sir Henry Morgan's ransom of Panama in 1671, to recall only the most famous of these episodes, was the reward of sound military tactics as well as tough marching by a miscellaneous Anglo-French force which knew how to draw itself up "in the form of a tertia"; in Cuba earlier, says Esquemeling, "the Pirates marched in very good rank and file, at the sound of their drums and with flying colours".2" Their standard method of levying contributions from coastal villages, under threat of burning, is reminiscent of the Thirty Years War. In Dampier's and other contemporary narratives there is mention of "the forlorn", the European soldiers' term for the advance guard, also known among the freebooters as the "enfants perdus". :i Their habit of assuming noms de guerre was also common with those impoverished noblemen and others who made a profession of war in mercenary armies; and we know that privateering captains from Europe could often be described, like Nathaniel Butler of the Old Providence Company, as "an ancient soldier at sea and land". 22 Even more evocative of the European military background, ignored by our buccaneering historians, was the role assigned to the quartermaster, the second man to the freebooter captain and elected like him, but more especially entrusted with the interests of "les garcons", above all in the distribution of booty, "une espce de procureur pernicieux qui rgie leurs comptes", as an unkind planter official put it. This "trustee for the whole", as Defoe described him, enjoyed the chief authority also on pirate vessels, except in chase or action: among the Caribbean privateersmen, "his opinion is like the Mufti's among the Turks". 2 ' Such a magistracy can have had little to do with the humble role of quartermasters at sea, who were petty officers ranking only a shade above the ordinary seaman. This fact may well have rendered his title agreeable, and it is true that seagoing quartermasters took charge of boats during disembarkations; but, as an infallible sign of "the Jamaica discipline", he resembles those officers who saw to the billetting, feeding, clothing and accounts of a body of troops, once known as harbingers, highly respectable and well enough remunerated for their duties to be worth the attention of commissioned officers.24 Freebooters -- a "softer" word than "pirates" and not yet common robbers -got their name from an old tradition of soldiers serving for booty only, like those privateersmen who signed "on the old pleasing account of no purchase no pay [a la
pan]"." Even after 1700, while pay mutinies remained "so endemic that they were almost condoned" in Europe, "plentiful campaigns" meant good plunder.^ The prospect of loot was a friend to the recruiting sergeant, conjuring up that dream of sudden wealth which was also a powerful if illusory inducement to many a West Indian immigrant, thanks to travellers' tales and the eloquence of those who traded in indentured servants. To illustrate the lure f pillage to officers as well as men, we need look no further than the restlessness of the land forces engaged in Cromwell's Western Design when it was at first proposed to "dispose of all Preys and Booties... towards the carrying on of the present Service", many officers, on the contrary, "coming in hopes of Pillage into a country where they conceiv'd Gold as plentiful as Stones". Venables and Penn wished to meet this pressure, in effect, in much the same way as the ibustiers managed their booty, by throwing all into a common stock, with fierce penalties on concealment and a view to distribution "according to every Mans quality and Merit". There was no reference to special recompenses for the loss of limbs or eyes, characteristic of privateering and piratical charter parties, but the generals referred to David's military law (1st Sam. xxx. 24) "to give equal share to every person of the Army though not present in the Action". 27 Whether or not Levelling teachings came to the West Indies in 1655, we can be certain that the Civil War experience abundantly did and Irish experience long before that, especially through its victims. So, too, through Dutch and French, the pitiless, sauve-qui-peut mentality of the long Continental strife, as we see it through the eyes of Simp/icissimus. Whether any significant number of our Caribbean freebooters had endured the tyranny and rapacity of military commanders there is no means of telling, but in nothing were these "pay-grabbers" and "military enterprisers" more distrusted than in the sharing of loot. What is of even more interest for present purposes, military workforces showed talent in organizing their mutinies, under elected leaders the Ambosat or electo of the sixteenth century. 2 " We shall never know the individual buccaneer, not even most of the captains, with anything like the intimacy which the devotion of George Rude has recovered for participants in urban riots, or even as well as we know the leading figures in Warwick's and Pym's Old Providence Company. This is because buccaneering proper, unlike the long history of earlier privateering and armed trade in the Caribbean, was by definition locally based and early West Indian records are scarce. It is conventionally dated from about 1640, from the use of Tortuga, with its comfortable anchorage and strong natural defences, by bands of rovers from the recently settled British and French islands in the outer chain of the Antilles, as distinct from earlier occupation by the boucaniers who hunted hogs and cattle for barter with vessels from Normandy, which frequented those parts well before 1600.29 Under the suggestive name of Association Island, Tortuga had also been briefly taken over by the Old Providence Company in the 1630s. There is no need to recapitulate the early vicissitudes of this privateering nursery, except to stress the brutality of Spanish attempts to expel the intruders. Like the harsh treatment of prisoners laterthough these were more usually treated as convicts than pirates it was enough to feed the flames of hispanophobia, so harsh a characteristic of some of the earlier ibustiers as to afford their marauding an ideology of sorts. Tortuga, alternately dominated by French and English leaders, always elected but sometimes tyrannical, until formally adopted by the French Crown in 1657,
received several increments of Huguenots, beginning with the fall of La Rochelle: St Domingue itself, with its English and especially Dutch elements, offered them a more attractive asylum than the more strictly governed Martinique.10 Whether Montbars of Languedoc, soaked in Las Casas, or the merciless L'Ollonais (of Sables) were of Protestant origin is unproven, but two other leaders particularly feared by the Spaniards, Roche Brasiliano and Laurens de Graaf, were Dutchmen. Calvinism, it is true, did not flourish in the West Indies, as the example of Providence Island (Santa Catalina) showed, and such traces of religion as we find among theflibustiers were Roman: Ravenau de Lussan, referring to one of the many discords which marred their collaboration with the British in the South Sea (after 1680), expresses shock at the iconoclasm of the buccaneers, who were yet capable of sabbath observance "by command and common consent" under Captains Sawkins and Watling. Ravenau, a Parisian and an example of the gentleman adventurer in debt, was shrewd enough to see that Creole hatred of impiety rubbed off on French Catholics." Walking off with the altar candlesticks, on the contrary, was necessary to "la bonne guerre" and we are not obliged to believe Labat's assertion that the Martinique privateers always donated captured church ornaments to sacred uses.': Spanish churches were also regularly used as the corps de garde for prisoners and pillage, apart from the intrinsic value of their contents. The aggressors had their own share of superstition, however, and there were good and able men among them, like the incomparable Dampier and his "ingenious Friend Mr Ringrose"." If the ideological bitterness of the sixteenth century was receding, it is hardly credible that the Freebooters could have acted so fiercely towards Spanish Creole civilians without the moral self-righteousness conferred, in their turn, by Spanish atrocities and intolerance, real or mythical. It was still what the Elizabethans called a war of reprisals: "our Men", wrote Dampier, "were very squeamish of plundering without Licence", even if it meant getting one from an Asian prince in the faraway Philippines. This was in 1686, several years after the supply of French or Portuguese commissions had dried up." In the violent, mobile West Indian scene the freebooters necessarily suffered heavy casualties. Losses were particularly heavy following the grand exodus to the Pacific in the 1680s, so much so as to create anxiety for the security of Jamaica and St Domingue when the islands were divided by the Nine Years War. Yet, so long as Spain was the enemy, their forces soon built up again. Ducasse once remarked that thzflibuste renewed itself every ten years.' 5 A reliable analysis of 1706, admittedly from Martinique, which succeeded where St Domingue failed in organizing a prosperous cruising war against English and Dutch, breaks in down into three human elements: a sprinkling of young men from the best families; impoverished settlers "et des engages qui ne veulent point s'assujetir au travail de la terre"; and ("la plus forte de la flibuste") deserters from merchantmen, hiding behind their noms de guerre, Sailors from Europe, however, needed time to become acclimatized and there is evidence that they did not take to the staple diet of the freebooters, manioc. Morgan in 1680, when he had turned King's evidence, told London that buccaneering tempted "white servants and all men of unfortunate and desperate condition".' 7 Pointis saw them as seamen deserters or else vagabonds sent out to work in the plantations: "at the End of the Term of Servitude, some Body lends them a Gun, and to Sea they go a Buccaniering". 18 As an excellent intendant of Martinique pointed out, the engag, though he served shorter articles than his British counterpart,
usually wanted to go home after eighteen months: the habit of hard work had to be acquired, and there were also bad masters who underfed and worked them beyond their strength." The blacks were said to be better treated, unless the bond-servant exercised some skill as artisan, in which case he was more like a European apprentice, though earning higher wages. But artisans too joined the freebooters, "We had Sawyers, Carpenters, Joyners, Brickmakers, Bricklayers, Shoemakers, Taylors, &c.", says Dampier.40 Because they frequently adapted prizes for their own use, and were as often wrecked, the buccaneers set a high value on carpenters, as on surgeons or apprentice surgeons. Paid off with a few hundred pounds of tobacco at the end of his articles, the engage had not the means to set up planter, as the English often had before Barbados and the Leewards filled up; but even there, as is well known, the "sugar revolution" (1640-60) spelt doom to the small planter. Captain William Jackson, who "kept the Indies in an uproar", could have manned his ships threefold at Barbados in 1642, on the basis of no purchase no pay, "every one that was denied entertainement reputing himselfe most unfortunate"."" Jackson and his "vice-admiral", both old Providence hands, armed ships in England, but increased their tleet to seven in Barbados and St Christopher, with an additional 750 men. Can we doubt that the obscure beginnings of a Caribbean-based privateering industry are connected with the mid-century decades of growing displacement and indebtedness, when the struggle for existence, among those who survived the appalling mortality rate of immigrants, quickened movement from island to island? In these conditions a bond-servant might change masters many times, as bankrupt planters swelled the ranks of runaways and derelicts, naturally disposed to soak the wealthy Spaniard. The plight of the British has been movingly described by Carl and Roberta Bridenbaugh, who consider that from 1640 the "parent islands" contained "the greatest concentration of poverty-stricken freemen in any of England's dominions before 1776", boom or slump. 42 The parent islands of the French reached demographic saturation somewhat later, but their social experience was not dissimilar. In both cases, of course, the run of" first-generation immigrants were men and women without resources, buying their passage by selling themselves to a known or more often unknown settler. Some would have borne the scars of pressures and oppressions, if not persecutions, at home. More than half the population of the British West Indies in 1650 were Irishmen, the latest arrivals soldiers from Drogheria; Barbados alone received thousands of war prisoners before the transportation of felons began in 1655. Numerous anabaptists came out with Penn and Venables in that year. J ' Gabriel Debien's patient combing of the "actes d'engagement" in the notarial minutes of La Rochelle, Nantes and Dieppe points to a preponderance of daylabourers, textile workers and other ruraux making for the islands, and not least St Domingue, where one might become a "valet de boucanier"; many sailed in the winter months, when jobs were relatively scarce.4" Although we are now more vividly aware of seasonal and other kinds of vagabondage along French roads and rivers, it seems significant that so many came from areas affected by peasant risings against the royal fise and the proliferation of crown agents, not to mention plunder by unpaid soldiers, in the 1630s; the Croquanis of Saintonge, Angoumois and Poitou,
the Nu-Pieds of Normandy. These violent events would not have been soon forgotten. Emotive, visceral, spontaneous gestures they may have been, devoid of revolutionary content: nevertheless, large assemblies of aggrieved taxpayers had shown a capacity for self-organization, the constitution of "communes", election of deputies and promulgation of Ordonnances: "L'assemble du Commun peuple, le Conseil tenant, a est ordonn ce qui s'ensuit...". Revealing, indeed startling, is the image they had of themselves as forgotten men, "comme si on ne songeait a nous que comme des pieces perdues".45 Well might Mazarin fear the contagion of English example in 1647.46 Two years later republican placards appeared in Paris, also a major source of West Indian immigrants, often from the building trades. The presence of a substantial, literate working-class lite among the emigrants is fully established. A rector of Kingston was to say that in the Jamaica of 1720 there were not six families of "gentle descent": tavern-keepers, tailors, carpenters and joiners called themselves Colonel, Major, Captain, Honourable or Esquire. 47 So respectable a picture may be corrected, however, by the critical comments of the priest who sailed with an ill-fated party for Cayenne in 1652: "toutes sortes de personnes...enfants incorrigibles...gens qui avoient fait faillite. ..Plusieurs jeunes dbauchez...des Moines Apostis...Et le pire de tout, quantit de femmes...". They had not got far before their "General" accused them of aiming at "un corps de Republique, voulant y establir des Presidents, Conseillers...un Parlement".'"1 A president, councillors and other officers were certainly elected for the baptismal ceremonies, followed by protracted drinking, when newcomers to the tropics crossed the Line. Charlevoix has it that these mysteries were held in St Domingue to release a man from all antecedent contracts. 49 Even there life was never so simple, but for some decades it preserved in exaggerated forms that libertarianism which in some degree splintered all the English colonies, as was demonstrated from the start in the radical politics of Bermuda and Barbados. A governor of Jamaica, within ten years of conquest, could describe his people as "generally easy to be governed, yet rather by persuasion than severity"; as late as 1692, Ducasse wrote of "cette colonie n'ayant est forme que selon le caprice de chaqu particulier, elle a subsiste dans le dsordre"; not a man, said another, "qui ne se croie plus que nous officiers du Roy".5" The early history of "the Coast" was stamped by a series of revolts, especially against French monopoly companies, from the time when Governor d'Ogeron (1665-75), "whom nature had formed to be great in himself", began "to establish the regularity of society upon the ruins of a ferocious anarchy". 51 The supreme embodiment of this impatience of authority, this drive to absolute freedom, was la ibuste, in Jamaica "roving on the account". Dampier, who called it "the other loose roving way of Life", notes that "Privateers are not obliged to any Ship, but free to go ashore where they please, or to go into any other Ship that will entertain them"." The authorities agree on their self-will, caprice, dislike of work; on their disordered and unwashed clothing, their habit of singing while companions tried to sleep and shooting to make a noise; on their blasphemies and debaucheries. So long as they had cash to spend, it was difficult to persuade them to the sea. In this they resemble the typical picaro, willing to lose everything on the throw of a dice, then begin all over again; and the picaresque novel, though seldom set in the New World, contains
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some profound truths about it. Living from day to day, at the mercy of events, the picaresque rogue is seldom his own master for long, yet living on his wits he can assert his independence and turn the table on masters no more virtuous than himself.51 There was more than this, however, to the libertinism of the buccaneers. They were not merely escaping from bondage. In their enterprises at least, they practised notions of liberty and equality, even of fraternity, which for most inhabitants of the old world and the new remained frustrated dreams, so far as they were dreamt at all more than we usually suppose, perhaps. The first such notion was familiar enough to Croquants and Levellers: the right to be consulted. Elizabethan seamen, according to Monson, had claimed a say in the conduct of their voyages and freedom to adopt at sea a casual privateering consort unpremeditated agreements which owners might disown. 54 Both were standard features of buccaneering practice. Before ever a ship's company left on the account, however, articles had to be agreed regarding future dividends, captains and quartermasters elected. Later might follow "consults" about consortship with other companies encountered, or about tactics, especially in tight situations. Thus L'Ollonais "called a council of the whole fleet, wherein he told them he intended to go to Guatemala. Upon this point they divided into several sentiments But the major part of the company, judging the propounded voyage little fit for their purpose, separated from L'Ollonais and the rest."55 Far from base, especially on the far side of the Isthmus of Darien, such secessions were commonplace. After the death of Richard Sawkins, "the best beloved of all our company or the most part thereof", records the scholarly Basil Ringrose, Captain Sharp "asked our men in full council who of them were willing to go or stay, and prosecute the design Captain Sawkins had undertaken, which was to remain in the South Sea...". 56 Those who stayed later deposed Sharp and subsequently reinstated him. So even when captains only consulted each other, they must have kept a finger on the pulses of their followings. Morgan seems only to have taken counsel with "the chiefest of his companions", but he had a record of success which removed all obstacles. 57 No doubt this and a reputation for personal valour go far to explain the election of other leaders. Yet powers of verbal persuasion must always have been requisite, another quality Morgan had in abundance. Governor Nathaniel Butler of Old Providence noted in his diary how Captain Parker "and his two Counsellors being obstinate to their owne Endes, went about to satisfie", with words, a starving crew which "in temperate way desired to know what he meant to doe with them" and buccaneers could be far more intractable than that. 58 It is unlikely that they could have been ruled by the methods of terror and delation attributed to Tuscan captains in the Levant by one who sailed with them in the 1690s.^ As late as 1708, the Board of Trade in London thought that the "ill practices too frequently committed" by Bermudian privateers (clearly influenced by the Jamaica discipline) could be prevented if captains enjoyed "the sole command... whereas, as we have been informed, every seaman on board a privateer having a vote, it is not in the captain's power...". 60 The balance between privateering democracy and dominant personalities is hard to strike, and commanders certainly enjoyed absolute power in action; but in this as in other respects there is a strong indication of the consolidation of a body of regulatory customs among the freebooters in the survival of references to them into
Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720 11 the Spanish Succession War. In 1706 the "gouverneur par interim" on the Coast, Charitte, in writing home, used such phrases as "les charteparties qui se font aux Isles Francoises" or simply "charteparties de l'Amrique". He was referring to the distribution of booty and provision for the maimed. The principles are the same as those briefly described by Esquemeling and Charlevoix for an earlier period.61 No text of a "chasse-partie", as it was known (neatly translated by Burney as a "chasing agreement"), has come to light before 1688. It does not restate the basic egalitarian principle, "a compagnon bon lot", presumably because this could be taken for granted; it is an agreement between Captain Charpin and Mathurin Desinarci?, "quartier maistre de l'quipage" and deals expressly with a very few departures from that rule, in defining the captain's dividend--ten lots and first choice of any captured vessels--and those of two surgeons, who in addition to the usual allowance for their chests were to keep captured instruments "qui ne seront point garnys d'argent". 6 Pillage included "or, argent, perle, diamant, musq, ambre, sivette, et toutes sortes de pierreries" as well as "tous balots entammez entre deux ponts ou au fond". That this was clarified is a sure sign that their ship, St Roze, was not owned by captain and crew. The typical privateer seems usually to have been the crew's common property or that of their leader, in which case he was awarded extra shares. Morgan's captains in 1670 drew the shares of eight men for the expenses of their ships, besides their usual allotment, which Esquemeling elsewhere states as "five or six portions to what the ordinary seamen have".*1' It is to be noted that the largest part of the outlay in a European privateer consisted in victuals, arms and cash advances to the crew. None of these items counted for much or at all with the freebooters, who contributed each man the essential weaponry and often also his provisions, so far as they did not rely on what they shot or fished, gathered or seized; with a week's supply of food to start off with, the only big capital item was the ship and this itself might well be a cheap prize. Only a frigate would call for such resources as those of the royal officers on the Coast (usually also planters) could supply, and they might invest with the object of stimulating the "course aux ennemis", especially governors who shared the admiralty tenth in prizes. M At the same time there was nothing to stop settlers from taking out an interest, and we have to allow for the debts piled up by freebooters with inn-keepers and others; the cabaretiers gave credit to the flibustiers in 1690, for example, to buy victuals, allegedly at inflated prices. 65 In St Domingue privateering retained the approval of the community long after it had begun to be opposed by a powerful interest in Jamaica, the Spanish traders. In 1709 Choiseul Beaupr, a governor who set himself to revive the waning course, claimed credit for restoring the classical "a compagnon bon lot", which meant that the chief fitter-out agreed with the ship's company for a certain number of lots amounting to never more than an eighth of the produce of a cruise, in place of his usual third in metropolitan France, twothirds. 66 As an interesting Guernsey charter party of 1703 suggests, this difference of a third may be accounted for by the fact that the crew provided their own food and drink; in earlier times, when armateurs were divided into owners and victuallers, armaments, including trading voyages to the Caribbean, had been split into thirds, so that "tiercement" in France came to be a synonym for whatever was owing to a crew. On the other hand, the buccaneering sloop was so cheap that it could have
12
been mainly the cost of victualling that fell on the fitters-out, whether ship's company or not, allowing "victualling" to include such items as powder, lanterns and "menus ustensiles".67 The freebooters allowed "extraordinary shares" to other ship's officers besides the captain, but on a narrow scale; "the Master's Mate only two", says Esquemeling, "and other Officers proportionable to their employment". On a small sloop or brigantine they were not numerous. Defoe's pirates, who drew directly on the model of the freebooters, offered a bonus only to half a dozen officers, even captain and quartermaster receiving only twice (or less) the common dividend. 6 * This was what they called "a free ship, that is, they agreed every man should have an equal share in all prizes".69 Labat's friends among the freebooting captains received only a present in addition to the equal dividend when their ship was common property, though it might be substantial enough to multiply his dividend three or (bur times; otherwise the only special beneficiaries, rateably, were the quartermaster, surgeon and pilot. 7 " But the freebooters liked to make merit awards. Morgan offered fifty pieces of eight for "entering the first any castle, or taking down the Spanish colours"; Rogers, twenty "to him that first sees a Prize of Good Value, or exceeding 50 Tuns in Burden", and "a good Suit of Clothes to be made for each Man that went up the River above Guiaquil[i/cJ". His owners had already agreed to a scale of compensation for widows and those "so disabled as not to get a Livelihood", as well as further rewards for "Whoever shall in Fight, or otherwise, signalize himself", notably in boarding. 7 ' Time had passed since it was possible to assert that English privateers could not afford to take care of their wounded or the relatives of their dead, and since the mercenary soldier's wage was expected to cover the cost of his injuries. 72 The shipowners' duty to provide for a sick seaman is at least as old as the Laws of Olron, but awards to the disabled originated much later. The mutual benevolent fund created by Drake and Hawkins in 1590, the Chatham Chest, marked a giant step forward for seamen, although its resources fell far below the claims made on it in wartime: by 1675 it was granting disability pensions for war wounds, "in its historic condition of insolvency". 71 At about that date the French government blazed a similar trail for its troupes de terre, and it was the first, though not until 1703, to set up a state fund for granting half-pay to men disabled in private armaments at sea, with small lump-sums for widows. The idea was born of a small tax on prizes levied in Brittany for the redemption of Barbary slaves, and its extension opposed by the Dunkirk owners, who pointed to the traditional responsibility of its magisrrat for finding public employments, short of the "maison des pauvres"; even at St Malo there were many claims for unpaid nursing expenses in the admiralty court. 74 Against this background it is not surprising that Esquemeling, who qualified as a surgeon at Amsterdam a year after his book was first published there, makes much of the smart money awarded in the chasse-parties for the loss of limbs and eyes. As with all such articles, there was room for variety, and doubtless evolution: an eye worth only a hundred piastres even in Morgan's grand scale--1800 crowns for the two hands as against 600 for one and 1500 for both legs--equated with a t h u m b or index finger at 300 in Labat's account, in which the wearing of a cannula had gone up to as much as an arm (600 ecus, without distinction between right and left). Defoe's pirates offered 600 dollars (about 150) to a cripple, according to the three
13
sets of articles he came by about the same as the governor of St Domingue offered for its defence in 1709, with the alternative of a life annuity. 7 5 There is clear evidence of custom at work in these tariffs, except that the freebooters had no thought for pensions. That would have contradicted their mentality, which was to distribute dividends on the first possible occasion. Nor was there anything like a hospital on the Coast until 1710, when Choiseul created one for soldiers andibustiers, partly to be funded by the lots of those killed without heirs."1 But there were captured slaves. Negroes, though sometimes freed when they could be replaced, served as slaves until they could be sold. After money, plate and precious stones, they were the most easily convertible booty. Indeed, the crippled freebooter might elect to take a slave in lieu of 100 pieces-of-eight. Indeed, that might prove a sounder pension than any annuity with up to six slaves in return for a wooden leg, a retired freebooter might set up planter, though he would need to be a good husband of his shares, as some were. 77 Charlevoix tells us that the practice was for cruises to go on until enough had been earned to pay for the lamed and wounded first charge on the common stock. There were other prior charges, including the claims of owners or victuallers ashore (if any) and the admiralty tenth, payable in Jamaica from the start and on the Coast by the 1690s, to judge by the disputes of Ducasse with the governor-general in Martinique. 7 * Given a flexible attitude to plunder, which by definition belonged to the captors exclusively, and the sale of prize goods in neutral islands, especially Danish St Thomas, it is unlikely that these tithes were ever surrendered in full. But no doubt whatsoever hangs over the basic rule of the common stock. All our authorities refer to this, or to the punishment of theft, at the least by forfeiture of shares, at worst by marooning. The articles drawn up in 1697 for d'Iberville's projected Mississippi expedition describing his Canadians as flibusiiers, interestingly enough--impose both penalties, unless "selon le voi" the offender deserved shooting: the same with the pirates' articles. Woodes Rogers preferred to get agreement to a fine of twenty times the value for concealing plunder worth more than half a crown, besides loss of shares, the original penalty: that the terms were stiffened suggests trouble in the intervening year, but also that it was reprobated by the majority. It means something that Dampier never accused his fellows of the "many hundreds of little deceitful Acts" which he noticed among Dutch seamen in the Far East; in his "new voyage" of 1683-91, moreover, he reports only one case of theft, the offender being condemned "to have three Blows from each Man in the Ship...". 7 " Cheating would self-evidently be least tolerable under the system of "a compagnon bon lot", virtually a Rousseauistic contract rooted in self-interest. By this device the freebooters' democracy may be thought to have achieved an objective which eluded most commanders on land or sea, "everybody thinking they have a right to get what they can".8" "Captain Johnson", who enjoyed exposing the hypocrisy of his readers, noted the paradox: "For these men whom we term, and not without reason, the scandal of human nature ...when they judged it for their interest., .were strictly just."1" It is reasonable to assume that an outraged sense of justice, besides a cut in expectations, played its part in the Cartagena affair, and for that matter in the "obloquies and detractions" which drove Morgan to leave most of his followers behind when he sailed home from the Isthmus in 1671.'2
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Defoe relates with gusto a mock trial conducted by a crew of Caribbean pirates under the greenwood tree about 1720 a parody of English institutions typical, apparently, of these outlaws. 81 But freebooter justice was deeply flawed in its own turn. We need not make too much of the fact, so much deplored by the earliest historian of the Coast, the Dominican Pre du Tertre, that they were apt to be selfappointed judges in their own cause;84 nor perhaps of acknowledged cruelties to Spanish civilians, which seem to have been largely confined to the extraction of information and of ransoms manners in which they had little to teach European privateersmen, and nothing to European war lords. As Ducasse wrote after his descent on Jamaica in 1694, "Nous avons fait la guerre en gens dsintresss, ayant tout brul"; at Cartagena, thought Charlevoix, ibeflibustiers showed more ruse than violence, much of it feigned." A calculated terrorism, as distinct from gratuitous cruelty, was inherent in this type of banditry, approximating most nearly to the "haiduk" variety in Eric Hobsbawm's classification.1"1 Among the pirates proper, examples of sheer brutality are not hard to find; they made a point of recruiting prisoners, the freebooters in the end released them; but even the pirates, it was said, were most to be feared in the first flush of success. The test of fraternity is how they treated each other. The freebooters' care for their sick and their solemn funeral rites are indications of that.* 7 Farther, Esquemeling remarks that, among themselves, the buccaneers "are very civil and charitable... if any wants what another has, with great liberality they give it to one another". 87 Liberality, indeed a generosity "mieux qu'en aucun lieu du monde" (as Labat says of their hospitable customs), was as characteristic of the flibustiers as intemperate drinking, and neither trait was perhaps without a touch ofthat ostentation which to them would stamp a gentleman "ce sont des diners eternels"."* But if high spending was a rule of "la bonne flibuste", as it was a habit of the European picaro, so was gambling. What Bartholomew Sharp called "Confusion and strong Contests among the Men" were a necessary consequence of their "Consults", but drink and gaming engendered faction. A buccaneer would wager the clothes off his back. "The main Division", says Dampier of Swan's men at Mindanao in 1687, "was between those that had Money and those that had none." A little earlier, Sharp himself, wishing to go home with "almost a thousand pound", had been supported by the thrifty and turned out by those "scarce worth a groat", who were for staying in the South Sea."1' Ravenau de Lussan had an even sorrier tale to tell of his return across the Isthmus in 1688: "Eighteen of those whom the luck of the play had most despoiled had determined to massacre those who were rich...". To save their heads, but also to solve a problem of portage, "the rich" shared again with "the poor", on condition of receiving back a half or two-thirds after reaching St Domingue.*1 No wonder d'Iberville, Rogers, and the pirate John Phillips, to mention but a few, treated gambling as an abuse only less heinous than theft, or that Sawkins cast the dice overboard.91 Fraternity "on the account", therefore, under stress of monotony and rum, might be less apparent than in times of danger or dividend distribution. Was it anything more than the camaraderie of the camp or the sociability of the village? "Pebble-Smasher" and "Never-Fail" were only variants of "Chasse-Mare" or "Passe-Partout", and of a thousand other such familiar vulgarities as helped cement the fellowship of military "chambers" and the inescapable collectivity of country communities.'' 2 Gildsmen were supposed to be brothers too and George Rude has
15
taught us not to underrate the solidarity of the shop-floor, of the mentality common to masters and men among the sans-cu/oties. One could also invoke Professor Mousnier's "socit des fidlits" for the seventeenth century, although his examples of total devotion are all of high-born men.1" Further down the scale, however, out on the Coast, there was the well-established institution of matelotage, first among the boucaniers, who shared any property they had with their "mess-mate" and might bequeath it to him: when the early habitants combined to cultivate a plot, "Is s'amatelotaient'V 4 What is less well known, something like matelotage prevailed among the log-cutters of Campeche and Honduras, the "Baymen" whose "Trade had its Rise from the decay of Privateering"." An anonymous but intelligent visitor to those parts in 1714-15 noted that they were hard drinkers and very quarrelsome, but t h a t neighbours lived in common, under two elected governors and a short compendium of laws "very severe against theft and Encroachments". 96 Forty years earlier, Dampier noticed there how "every Man is left to his choice to carry what he pleaseth, and commonly they agree very well about it". And on Saturdays at least they hunted. 9 7 It looks as though "the Custom of the Coast", originally that of the boucaniers, being rooted in the wilderness and doubtless subject to Carib, Cuna and other Indian influences, possessed an extraordinary power of survival in suitable circumstances. But between Coast and Bay we need look for no stranger agency than the freebooters themselves. The code survived even while its adherents might fail it, as is true of any social group. Among "fellow adventurers" as impulsive as the Brethren of the Coast it would be surprising to find consistency of conduct, especially with English and Dutch admixtures of differing backgrounds. And yet the outlines of a fairly homogeneous portrait can be put together. That Captain Andreas who called one morning on the Scots in Darien, and who claimed Swan and Davis as "his particular Friends", stands forth as a recognizable type: "He (as generally those People are) is of a small Stature. In his Garb affects the Spaniard as alsoe in the Gravity of his carriage. He had a red loose Stuff coat on with an old halt and a pair of Drawers, but noe Shoes or Stockins.'"" The skills of a Rude could uncover a crowd of such forgotten men.1'1' There are sources still to be mined, especially Spanish, and short of them ample room for new perspectives. The freebooters astonished the world in their day and have attracted some sensational literature since. Sadly, very little has come from professional historians. As Una said to Puck in one of Kipling's stories, "pirates aren't lessons". But did she wish they were? And why not?
NOTES
I. An Authentiek und 'anicular Account of the taking of Carthagena by the i'rench... Bv the Sieur Pointis (London, 1740: a lute edition of the 1698 translation of the Relation tic êxpedition tie Carthagene, Amsterdam, I69X), p. 1; [Paris,| A[rchives] Nationales), Marine B4/I7, t'os. 404-5; B[ibliothcque| N[ationale], Thoisy 91, p. 515. There isa modern narrative of this expedition in N.M. Crouse, The I'rench Struggle for the West Indies 1665-1713 (New York, 1943), ch. viii.
16
2. P. F.-X. de Charlevoix, Hisloire de I'Isle Espagnole de S. Domingue, 4 vols. (Amsterdam, 1733), iv, 123 f'f. 3. Account, pp. 42-3, 62, 69; AN, Colonies] C8A/16, Vaucresson, 10 May 1706. 4. Ibid., C9A/3, Cos. 303 ff., 370 IT.; Anon, An Answer to Mr. Paschal's Letter... (London, 1702), p. 5; Charlevoix, iv, 106, 150 ft'. 5. Ibid., pp. 167-8; AN, Col. C8A/I2, fos. 190 ff.; C9A/8, f.337 v ; BN, Thoisy 91, pp. 515-32. 6. AN, Col. C9A/4, fos. 272-4. 7. Charlevoix, iv, 44-5, 105, 110; C[alendar of] S[iale\ P[apen;\ Colonial Series], 1696-7, p. 403. 8. Captain Charles Johnson, A Genera! History of the... Pirales, ed. A.L. Hayward (London, 1926), p. 252. For Defoe's authorship, see J.R. Moore, Defoe in the Pillory (Bloomington, 1939), pp. 126-88. 9. Ibid., 304. 10. G. Shelvocke, A Privateer's Voyage Round the World (London, "Travellers Library" edn., 1930), pp. 43-6; The Manuscripts of the House of Lords, new ser. vol. xii (London, 1970), pp. 235-6. 11. Woodes Rogers, A Cruising Voyage Round the World, ed. G.E. Manwaring (London, 1928), pp. 22-3, 114-6, 170-1, 206-7; Shelvocke, p. 114. 12. K . R . Andrews, Elizabethan Privateering (Cambridge, 1964), pp. 39-44, 167; Oxford, Bodleian Library, Rawl. A 171, fos. 63-4; AN, Marine G 144 and B 3/115, Ib. 532. 13. Rennes, Arch. Dep. llle-et-Vilaine, fonds de notaires. Pilot and Vercoutre-Le Roy (actes d'engagement): Arras, Arch. Dp. Pas de Calais, 13 B 156, 13 Feb. and 2 March 1694; Capt. Edward Cooke, A Voyage to the South Sea, 2 vols. (London, 1712), sig. b4r"Vl 14. Rogers, p. 173; Shelvocke, p. 40; AN, Marine B3/115, fos. 544-8. 15. The Sergison Papers, ed. R.B. Merriman (London, Navy Ree. Soc., 1950), pp. 8-9; G.P.R. James, Letters Illustrative of the Reign of William ill, 3 vols. (London 1841), ii, 187. 16. C. Molloy, OeJui-e Martimo. 5th ed. (London, 1701), pp. 220-4; R. Davis, The Rise of the English Shipping Industry (London, 1962), pp. 149-54. 17. History of the Buccaneers of America (London, Unit Library ed., 1902), p. 40. In 1657 the first of Jamaica's governors refers to "buckaneers" as "French and English that kill cattle" in Hispaniola: "Edward D'Oyley's Journal, Part 2", Jamaica Hist. Rev., xi (1978), 69. 18. Charlevoix, iii, 11, 54-67; P. Constantin, "Jacques Yvon sieur des Landes (1645-1698), Lieutenant du roi a Saint-Domingue", La Province du Maine, xxxvi-vii (Laval, 1957), 7-48. 19. Nouveau Voyage aux Isles de I'Amcrique. 2 vols. (The Hague, 1724), 1, ii, 77; Charlevoix, iv, 137. 20. CSP Col. 1669-1674, p. 202; John Esquemeling, The Buccaneers of America, ed. W.S. Stallybrass ("Broadway Translations", London, n.d.), p. 131. 21. Cf. Defoe's description of seamen as "Les Enfants Perdus, the Forlorn hope of the World", An Essay upon Projects (London, 1697), p. 124. 22. F. Redlich, The German Military Enterpriser and his Work Force, 2 vols. (Wiesbaden, 1964), i, 117; A.P. Newton, The Colonising Activities of the English Puritans (New Haven, 1914), p. 252. 23. AN, Col. C9A/9, to. 217; Johnson, pp. 184-5, 400. 24. C.G. Cruickshank, Elizabeth's Army (Oxford, 1966), p. 49; R.E. Scouller, The Armies of Queen Anne (Oxford, 1966), p. 66. 25. Shelvocke, p. 30; Redlich, i, 134; M. Pawson and D. Buisseret, Port Royal Jamaica (Oxford, 1975), p. 29. 26. Scouller, pp. 130, 267.
17
27. The Narrative of General Venables, ed. C.H. Firth (Camden new ser. no. 60, 1900), pp. 1416. 28. Redlich, i, 135; G. Parker, The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road 1567-1659 (Cambridge, 1972), pp. 188-90. 29. See K.R. Andrews, The Spanish Caribbean: Trade and Plunder 1530-1630 (New Haven, 1978), esp. pp. 181-7. 30. G. Debien, Les Engages pour les Amules 1634-1715 (Paris, 1952), pp. 188-9; Newton, pp. 103-10, 192-3, 211-16, 279-82; cf. Charlevoix, iii, 46. 31. I have used the translation of'his "Journey to the Southern Sea from 1685 to 1686" in M. Besson, The Scourge of the Indies (London, 1929): see pp. 115-16. CI'. Basil Ringrose's journal in Esquemeling, pt iv, p. 398. 32. Nouveau Voyage, I, i, 75-6. Louis XIV did his best to return the church treasures taken by Pointis: AN, Marine B 4/18, 1'os. 348-65. It should be recalled that Spanish American churches were "the place of all publiek Meetings, and all Plays and Pastimes are acted there also": William Dumpier, A New Vorage Round the World, ed. Sir A. Gray (London, 1927), p. 93. 33. Ibid., p. 189. Dampier's veracity can be checked by reference to Ringrose's journal (and vice versa) till the latter's death in 1686. 34. Ibid., p. 211. Jamaican commissions were no longer obtainable after 1670, when many buccaneers resorted to S t Domingue. Conversely, some of the flibustiers served in Jamaican privateers during the Spanish Succession War. See generally A.P. Newton, The European Nations in the West Indies 49-I6S8 (London, 1933), pp. 286 ff., and C.H. Haring, The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century (New York, 1910). Cf. the design of Capt. Nathaniel North's men, "not intending to Pirate among the Europeans, but honestly and quietly to rob what Moors fell in their way, and return home with clear consciences...". 35. AN, Col. C9A/4, fo. 446 (15 Oct. 1698). 36. Ibid., C8A/16, "Mmoire sur l'tat prsent des Isles. Remis par Mr Mithon et Mr de Vaucresson... son arrive", IO May 1706; ibid., 8, fo. 75, Blnac to Pontchartrain, Martinique, 23 March 1694. 37. CSP Col. 1677-1680, p. 565. 38. Account, p. 10. 39. AN, Col. C8A/IO, tbs. 350-3, Robert to Pontchartrain, I I July 1698. 40. New Voyage, p. 240. Cf. C. and R. Bridenbaugh, No Peace Beyond the Line: The English in the Caribbean 1624-1660 (New York, 1972), pp. 106, 118-20. Half a dozen types of engagement are described by G. Debien in "L'migration poitevine vers l'Amrique au XVIIi.' sicle", Bulletin de la Socit des Antiquaires de l'Ouest, ser. 4, t. ii (1952), pp. 27330. 41. The Voyages of Captain William Jackson, 1642-1645, ed. V.T. Harlow (Camden 3rd ser. no. 34), p. 2; cf. Newton, Colonising Enterprises, pp. 267-8, 315-17. 42. Op. eil., p. 113. 43. bid., pp. 17, 102-3, 196; A.P. Watts, Une Histoire des colonies anglaises aux Antilles (Paris, s.d. |I925|), p. 134. 44. Debien, Engages, ch. v. 45. R. Mousnier, Fureurs paysannes (Paris, 1967), pp. 72, 90, and review by R. Mandrou in Rev. Hist., ccxlii (1969), 29-40. 46. C. Hill, Puritanism and Revolution (London, 1958), p. 136. 47. Debien, Engages, pp. 109, 131; L. Lewis, "English Commemorative Sculpture in Jamaica", Jam. Hist. Rev., ix ( 1972), p. 12. 48. A. Biet, Voyage de la France Equinoxiale en I'lsle de Cayenne (Paris, 1664), pp. 8, 56f.
18
49. Charlevoix, iii, 55. 50. Sir Charles Lyttleton, quoted by F. Cundall, The Governors of Jamaica in the Seventeenth Century (London, 1936), p. 19; P. de Vaissire, Saint-Domingue (Paris, 1909), p. 55. 51. Raynal, A Philosophical and Political History of the Settlements and Trade of the Europeans in the East and West Indies. 8 vols. (London, 1783), vi, 125-6. 52. New Voyage, pp. 30, 238. 53. F.W. Chandler, Romances of Roguery: An Episode in the History of the Novel (New York, 1961), esp. pp. 47 ff., and A. Valbuena y Prat, 7 Novela picaresca espano/a (Madrid, 1956), pp. 14 ff. 54. The Naval Tracts of Sir William Monson, ed. M. Oppenheim, 5 vols. (Navy Ree. Soc., 190214), ii, 247; English Privateering Voyages to the West Indies 1588-1595, ed. K.R. Andrews (Hakluyt Soc., Cambridge, 1959), p. 162. 55. Esquemeling, p. 112. 56. Ibid., pp. 333-4. 57. Ibid., p. 130. 58. [London,] B[rit.] L[ibrary], Sloane MS. 758, entry for 25 Aug. 1639. 59. W. Hacke, A Collection of Original Voyages ( 1699), pt iv (Roberts); cf. AN, Col. C8A/6, fos. 446v-7. 60. Quoted by H.C. Wilkinson, Bermuda in the Old Empire (Oxford, 1950), p. 24. 61. AN, Col. C9A/7, fos. 322-3. 62. AN, Col. C9A/2, fo. 357, Isle a Vache, 18 Feb. 1688. 63. Esquemeling, pp. 60, 177. Charlevoix (iii, 68) grants the captains only a double lot. 64. Ducasse's running quarrel with Blnac, the governor-general at Martinique, who claimed the dixieme, suggests not only that it was a useful source of income, but that the disposal of prizes was now coming under official control, although Danish St Thomas remained a favourite mart for them: see (e.g.) AN, Col. C9A/2, fos. 322, 328-9, 362, 418-20, 471. Ducasse lost this battle in 1696 (7e/V/., 3,fo. 231), but in 1702 the Amirai de France awarded half his tenths to the governors of both islands (ibid., 6, fo 13ov). Governor d'Ogeron's more direct involvement in the flibuste should be clarified by the edition of his correspondence now being prepared by M. Michel Camus. 65. ibid.. 2. fo. 130. 66. Ibid.. 8, fo. 394. 67. 1 am most grateful to Dr Alan Jamieson of University College, London, for communicating a copy of the charter party of the Defiance of Guernsey, possessed by the Priaulx Library; it is impossible to be sure that it was typical of the numerous Channel Island privateers of the time. For illuminating examples of tiercemenls see C. Brard, Documents relalifs a la marine normande et a ses armements aux XVIc el XVIle sicles pour les Antilles, le Brasil el les Indes (Rouen, 1889), pp. 11-25. 68. Esquemeling, p. 60; Johnson, pp. 184, 274, 307. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. Ibid., pp. 535-6. Nouveau Voyage, I, i, 74-5. Esquemeling, p. 178; Rogers, pp. 23, 171; Cooke, i, sig, b4. G. St Lo, England's Safety (1693), in Somers Tracts,' ii (1814), 72; Redlich, i, 122. J.J. Keevil, Medicine and the Navy. 2 vols. (Edinburgh, 1957-8), ii, 135-6. Arrt du Conseil. 31 March 1693, text in Citoyen Lebeau, Nouveau Code des frises. 3 vols. (Paris, an VII), i, 137, 273-5; AN, Marine B4/25, fos. 410-11; H. Buffet, Repertoire itumcrique de la sous-srie V B: Amiraut de Saint-Malo (Rennes, 1962), pp. 188-206.
!9
75. Esquemeling, pp. 60, 177-8; Labal, I, i, 75; Johnson, pp. 184, 274, 307; AN, Col. C9A/8, fos. 402-3. I have found only one French agreement, probably of 1702, offering compensation for disablement, but the sums are well below West Indian rates e.g., 150 livres tournois, or roughly thirty-eight piastres, for an eye ( A N , Marine B4/23, fo. 134). 76. AN, Col. C9A/9, fo. 51; cf. ibid. 2, fo. 204. 77. The phrase is Dampier's, New Voyage, p. 246. Cf. Pawson and Buisseret, p. 31 ; G. Debien, Une Plantation de Satnt-Domingue: La Sucrerie G a baud du For!. 1690-1802 (Cairo: Institut Francais d'Archeologie Orientale, 1941), p. 34; Labat, II, 237. 78. Charlevoix, iii, 68; AN, Col. C8A/6, fo. 407 (on provisions, 1691). On admiralty tenths see H.J. Crump, Colonial Admiralty Jurisdiction in the Seventeenth Century (London, 1931 ), p. 105, and supra, n. 64. 79. P. Margry (ed.), Dcouvenes el tablissemenis ilex Francais dans l'Ouest et dans le Sud de l'Amtrique Septentrionale, 1614-1754. pt iv (Paris' 1880), p. 17; Johnson, pp. 182-3, 274, 307; Rogers, pp. 22, 206; Dampier, pp. 195, 219. 80. Sir C. Wager to Admiralty, 1727, cit. R.G. Marsden (ed.), Documents Relating lo Law and Custom of the Sea, 2 vols. (Navy Ree. Soc., 1915-16), ii, 266. Cf. T. Hesketh, A Discourse concerning Plunder (London, 1703), arguing, with reference to the plunder of St Mary's and of the Vigo galleons in 1702, that booty belongs to him who takes it; and more generally, F. Redlich, De Praeda Militari: Looting and Booty 1500-ISIS (Wiesbaden, 1956). 81. Op. cit., p. 545. 82. Esquemeling, pp. 222-3: pace D. Pope, Harry Morgan's Wa\ (London, 1977), p. 246, the charge was supported by Morgan's surgeon-general, Richard Browne, in CSP Col. 6691674, p. 252. 83. Johnson, pp. 259-60. Cf. the parody of Lords and Commons, ibid., pp. 166-8. 84. Histoire generali' des Antilles habites par les Francois, 4 vols. (Paris, 1667), i i i , 151. 85. AN, Col. C9A/3, fo. 47; Charlevoix, iv, 163-4. 86. Bandits (London, 1969), esp. pp. 50, 62-4. 87. Charlevoix, ni, 246-7. Ravenau de Lussan suggests a care for sick comrades reminiscent of the Yugoslav partisans: Besson, pp. 98, 137, 147. Dampier, p. 155, notes the willingness of his companions to stay behind on one of their inarches to protect "a stout old Greyheaded Man, aged about 84, who had served under Oliver...". Cf. Lionel Wafer, A New Voyage and Description of he Isthmus of America, ed. L.E. Elliott Joyce (Hak. Soc., Oxford, 1938), p. 5: "There had been an Order made among us at our first Landing, to kill any who should flag in the Journey. But this was made only to terrify any from loitering, and being taken by the Spaniards; who by Tortures might extort from them a Discovery of our March." The wounded Wafer owed his life to the kindliness of the "wild", unconquered Cuna Indians of the Isthmus, indispensable allies of the buccaneers. 88. Esquemeling, p. 61; Labat, I I , 244, 249. 89. Hacke, pt ii (Sharp), p. 14; Dampier, p. 252; Esquemeling, pp. 273, 341, 398. 90. Besson, p. 153; cf. Charlevoix, iii, 243. 91. Margry, iv, 17; Rogers, p. 207; Johnson, p. 307; Ringrose, apud Esquemeling, p. 398. 92. On the sharing of possessions and profits by the half-dozen men who composed a camera in the Army of Flanders, see Parker, p. 177; and Cruickshank, p. 114, for Elizabethan cameradas. Debien, Engages, pp. 136-7, offers a rich selection of nicknames in France. 93. Les Institutions de la France sous la monarchie absolue, i (Paris, 1974), pp. 85-9. 94. Charlevoix, i i i , 55; Labal, I, i, 75; Debien, Galbaud du Fort, p. 33; Burney, p. 41. Cf. London, Public Record Office, A d m i r a l t y 1/3930, Paris, 28 Oct. 1701, reporting a new Line of Battle: "the Prompt is in the midst of them as being Matelot, or assistant to the Vice-Admirall." 95. Dampier, p. 163.
20
96. BL. Add. MSS 39, 946, Ib. 10V-
97. Dampier, Voyages and Discoveries, ed. C. Wilkinson (London, 1931), p. 181. 98. Papers Relating to the Ships and Voyages of the Company of Scotland Trading to Africa and the Indies 1697-1707, ed. G.P. Insh (Scottish Hist. Soc., 3rd ser., 6, Edinburgh, 1924), p. SI. 99. Some freebooter captains, mostly English, are to be found in P. Gsse's The Pirates' Who's Who (London, 1924), which draws on a narrow range of well-known sources. Gosse at least considered t h a t more of them deserved a place in the Dictionary of National Kit/graph \:.
COLONIES AT WAR The Succession War was won in Europe, but the succession itself included the greater part of the Americas - the world's principal source of silver and what were regarded as underdeveloped markets awaiting some livelier touch than the arrival of a fleet every two or three years from Cadiz. From their forward bases in Curacao and Jamaica, Dutch and English smugglers already traded slaves and manufactures to the coastal populations of what are now Venezuela and Colombia. The Portuguese, besides contraband exchanges between Brazil and Buenos Aires, usually held the Asiento - as in 1696-1700 - to supply three thousand five hundred Negroes a year for Spanish American mines, shipyards, and plantations. Since fulfilment of this contract required depots and agents ashore, it was valued for its incidental commercial opportunities. When the French Guinea Company obtained it in August 1701, London and Amsterdam saw clear proof that a Bourbon Spain would be run in French interests. It was a cause of war, and in 1713 an English Asiento, for the unprecedented period of thirty years, was regarded as a prize of peace. As this was optimistic, so were the Allies too pessimistic about the dominance of Versailles over Madrid. Commercial and colonial disputes bulked large in the friction between these two courts. The Asiento itself proved a disappointment. It contained a novel provision to admit slaves at Buenos Aires, but as this outflanked the established control of Panama and Lima it was bitterly contested. Not for three years was the Company allowed to set up its own warehouses in any Spanish colonial port; never was it allowed to enter the profitable tobacco and cocoa trades. Its captains and factors, not always scrupulous, met with obstruction from pedantic officials in the Indies and occasional mob violence. Meanwhile the French sugar islands ran short of labour, while the French navy had to guarantee the safe-conduct of Spanish convoys, the first of which met with disaster in Vigo Bay; later, in 1708 and 1711, English squadrons were to destroy some of the "galleons" coming out of Cartagena. In return for these escort services, the Council of the Indies declined to admit the French merchants at Cadiz to a legal share in the cargoes of the convoys. Nor would it accept the French presence in St Domingue by agreeing to a boundary on Hispaniola, the Spanish side of which afforded refuge to deserters from the French. Nevertheless the Spaniards had a greater grievance. It was difficult
22
Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1 760
enough to search armed French ships for contraband in the Caribbean. On the less frequented coasts of the Spanish Pacific the armed traders of St Malo were generally welcomed. Following a reconnaissance in 16991701, Jeanjourdan of Paris and Noel Danycan of St Malo, financiers who enjoyed protection at court, sent two ships to the South Sea and another to Canton. The China voyage was a dead loss andjourdan withdrew; but Danycan used the privileges of their combined companies to send two more ships to Chile and Peru in 1703, when other St Malo capitalists began to join in. Two years later, three of their ships returned with silver worth half a million sterling; three others realised a net profit of 350 per cent in 1706, when there were five more sailings. By 1708 it was being said in Parliament that this spectacular business had removed the larger privateers from the English Channel. In reply to Spanish protests, Louis XIV more than once undertook to stop the South Sea expeditions, but he needed their money. By 1714 well over a hundred vessels had delivered perhaps two-thirds of Peruvian silver production into Breton harbours. The over-trading evident by then was compensated in a few cases by going on to Canton, where the English had started a successful factory. Meanwhile the wealth and energy of St Malo spilled over into the Red Sea coffee trade, and it took over the undertakings of the French East India Company at Pondicherry, ready to occupy Mauritius in 1715. Collaboration between the Bourbon kings was also poisoned by the Pensacola question. The Spanish garrison in Pensacela Bay was established in 1698 as a precaution against foreign interest in the Gulf of Mexico, which had been stimulated by La Salle's Mississippijourney and by the explorations of peltry-traders from Charleston in the Tennessee country, down to the Alabama River. Menaced by an English and Protestant pre-emption of the lower Mississippi, Louis XIV was persuaded to safeguard the missions and fur-trade of New France by sending Iberville, the Canadian corsair, to fortify the delta in 1699. By 1702 this effort amounted to little more than a village at Mobile and a weak fort on the delta itself. The war nearly led to the abandonment of the colony, which had difficulty in feeding itself and was cut off for years at a time from metropolitan aid. As early as 1701 Louis XIV asked his grandson to let him have Pensacola, much better situated for navigation and defence. He never got it. Spain feared for the security of the vital Florida sea-passage and of Mexico itself. Even an ailing Louisiana, which could explore for minerals in the west, threatened Spanish interests in North America too, recently revived by the Jesuit missionary drive into Lower California. Nascent Louisiana spelled more immediate competition for the five thousand English and Huguenots of South Carolina, who had alliances with the Creek and Chickasaw Indians south of the Appalachians. Whereas the northern frontier of the British settlements had been ablaze
The Caribbean and Atlantic Seaboard
24
in the previous war, there was now a southern frontier problem also. Besides skilled diplomacy among these Indians and their tribal enemies, Iberville could hope to supply firearms to the bow-and-arrow Appalache of the Spanish missions in Florida, which had already endured slaving raids from the north. He conceived a vast plan of conquering Carolina and Virginia, beginning with a Franco-Spanish attack on Charleston. It was to prevent this that in 1702 Governor Moore besieged St Augustine, tough centre of the Spanish coastal garrisons in Florida. After eight weeks, relief arrived from Havana and Moore's frontiersmen withdrew, having lost their ships and cost their province 8,000 which it could ill afford. Moore's next expedition, early in 1704, had to pay for itself with slaves and plunder from the Appalache missions of western Florida. Executed by fifty whites and a thousand Indians, this campaign achieved and inspired widespread destruction of Spanish authority in Florida, besides undermining the frontier policy of Louisiana, already weakened by poverty of funds for Indian presents and cheap goods for sale. Nor were the Carolinians unprepared for retaliation. An attack on Charleston by five French privateers with Spanish troops, in 1706, failed miserably. So, however, did two English attempts to take Pensacela in the following year, with the aid of the Alabama Indians, and again in 1712, when the Carolina Assembly sent an expedition to burn the Choctaw villages around Mobile. Despite their precocious strategic vision, the Carolinian leaders were quarrelsome and they were up against a master of forest diplomacy in Le Moyne de Bienville, the saviour of Louisiana after the death of his brother Iberville in 1706. He was able to exploit Indian resentments of the cheating and brutality practised by Charleston traders. Anglo-French competition among Amerindian tribes also supplies a clue to wilderness hostilities farther north. Here another able diplomatist, Governor Callires of New France, had procured the neutrality of the five Iroquois nations whose villages divided the French of Montreal from northern New York, with its rival fur-market at Albany. The Iroquois, under Dutch or English influence, were historic enemies of Canada; it was now axiomatic at Quebec not to provoke them. Other tribes it could control. Governor Vaudreuil used his Indian allies, all Christian converts, no longer against New York, but to harass frontier townships between the Connecticut River and the coast of Maine. The notorious massacres at Deerfield (1704) and Havcrhill (1708) formed part of the terror lurking in the woods around many English border settlements and on the trails between them. The raiders, organised and led by French Canadians, preferred ransoms to scalps, but captives sometimes died on the march or were absorbed into the Abenaki tribes south-east of the St Lawrence. Not all would participate, and some expeditions failed because the Indians deserted. They understood the advantages of English trade at a
Colonies at War
25
time when there was a glut of furs in European markets and Canada faced economic ruin. The real object of the raids was to embitter the English against the Abenaki, while offering the latter plunder instead of trade. Throughout the war envoys shuttled between Quebec and Boston, usually to discuss prisoner exchanges but in 170506 neutrality also. This possibility broke on the refusal of Versailles, which sanctioned the scalping-parties, to let British vessels enter the St Lawrence or fish in Acadian waters (though a contraband trade persisted between Montreal and the Iroquois). The commercial aggressiveness of Boston was also to blame. By 1707, in the hands of Governor Dudley, an imperialist of the Carolina type, Massachusetts was returning to a strategy which had failed in 1690: the idea of an expedition to Quebec which should destroy the French threat more effectively than any number of reprisal raids overland. A step in this direction was taken when a thousand militiamen were sent to capture Port Royal on the eastern side of the Bay of Fundy, mainstay of the French hold on Acadia and base of the privateers which harried New England's shipping at an alarming rate: Samuel Vetch, an energetic Scottish trader who now took the lead in advocating large schemes of conquest at French and Spanish expense, called it the Dunkirk of North America. In 1707 the Massachusetts expedition achieved nothing, but in London next year Vetch employed his familiarity with the St Lawrence to interest the Junto, particularly Lord Sunderland, in a Scottish Canada. In April 1709 he was back in Boston, in the company of Colonel Nicholson, a forceful soldier with long experience of colonial government. They brought letters from the Queen promising four thousand troops for the "glorious enterprise". All that summer New England and New York were astir with preparation for the overthrow of French North America. Twelve hundred militiamen and regulars under Nicholson would move from Albany to Montreal, preceded by an advance guard at the foot of Lake Champlain and Indian scouts farther afield: of the Five Nations, only the Snecas, neighbours of Canada's "Praying Indians", now remained neutral. Enlistment, billeting, provisioning (at controlled prices), distribution of arms, hire of transports and of whaleboats for landing craft - it was all a considerable effort of organisation and investment for the colonies ofthat day. Only the Quakers of Pennsylvania and New Jersey hung back; unruly Rhode Island and New York's factions displayed a rare unanimity. By July, colonial troops, well drilled and punctually paid, stood by in readiness for the English reinforcements. These never arrived. In October it was learned that they had been diverted to Portugal - early in June. The indifference thus shown towards the "great design" by the British government, under Marlborough's influence, reflects the primacy of European strategy. Though willing to hurt each other overseas, Britain
26
and France were not yet at war for colonial stakes. These had been entirely ignored by William III: the Peace of Ryswick left all but one of the fortified posts in Hudson Bay in French hands. In 1702 some parliamentary opinion, mainly Tory, favoured a maritime war, though it had in view the Spanish Indies, where a vast Creole rising was optimistically expected and where the Grand Alliance treaty provided that the English and Dutch should keep any conquests they might make. Yet the striking power of their navies was reserved mainly for the Mediterranean, in subordination to the armies. Only with the Tory election victory of 1710, and the desire to be rid of Marlborough, did "blue-water" strategy revive. It was assisted by pressure from an American delegation, headed by Nicholson and accompanied by four Mohawk chiefs - a stroke of publicity in court and town alike. The immediate result was a modest version of the Great Design. Nicholson returned to Boston with four hundred Marines and two fifty-gun battleships. Augmented by three cruisers on American station and fifteen hundred militiamen, this force easily overawed the small garrison of Port Royal on October 1. For 1711 the new government withdrew seven regiments from Flanders for service under Jack Hill, brother of Mrs Masham, and ordered Sir Hovenden Walker to see them to Boston with eleven warships. To preserve secrecy they went out under-victualled - an additional strain on colonial resources. This caused wrangling over merchants' bills, friction between officers and civilians; but by midAugust the squadron was in the St Lawrence, with sixty transports carrying seven thousand troops. Then everything went wrong. There was fog in the Gulf and the pilots lost their way. On the night of August 20, Walker was roused in his night-gown by an importunate landsman who "saw Breakers all round us". When the Admiral thought he was approaching the south shore of the river, strong currents and an easterly wind had carried his vanguard among the reefs of Egg Island. Weeks later visiting fishermen found the wreckage of seven transports, and corpses in British clothes. Only a provident shift of the onshore gale had spared the greater part of the fleet. For the rest of his life Walker was haunted by the decision to turn back as he had turned back from Guadeloupe after a landing there in 1703. While Quebec offered thanks to the Virgin, Nicholson disbanded the large force he had assembled near Lake Champlain for striking at Montreal. As the future of New France hung thus in the balance, London and Versailles were negotiating the preliminaries of a peace which should restore Hudson Bay and Newfoundland to English control, besides confirming the transformation of Acadia into Nova Scotia. In these respects the Peace of 1713 was in striking contrast with Rywsick. Even Walker's failure did not prevent the total recovery of Hudson Bay,
Colonies at War
27
though the only fighting there was the defence of the Company's remaining outpost, Fort Albany, against a hundred Canadians. The French paid more attention to Newfoundland. The cod-fleets from Brittany and Normandy were much reduced in wartime, but privateers abounded on the Banks. The French twice captured St John's, in 1706 and 1709. With Indian and Canadian reinforcements, Auger de Subercase, the defender of Port Royal, destroyed other English settlements as far north as Bona vista - ironically destined to become the southern limit of the French Shore at Utrecht. The previous French headquarters at Placentia was never overcome, though twice the object of half-hearted naval attention. England's only real success occurred in 1702, when Commodore Leake burned half a dozen settlements and their fishing vessels, besides keeping twenty-two prizes. Operations in these latitudes were connected with the Antilles, the other principal zone of colonial privateering. The ubiquitous Martinique corsairs cruised up to Acadia; Yankee skippers knew their Caribbean. Lacking legitimate Spanish prey now, the freebooters of St Domingue shifted their ground to Martinique, into which sixty prizes were taken even in the eighth year of war, besides others into Danish St Thomas, a booming neutral prize market. Some thirty "Martinicos" were usually at sea, small enough to escape pursuit in shoal waters. They kept food prices down when provisions from France failed, and they captured many Negroes. Port Royal in Jamaica was the main British privateering base, as also the only British naval dockyard in these seas, but Jamaican privateering was handicapped by the island's strong interest in smuggling with the Spanish Main. Martinique maintained six times as many prisoners of war, some of whom joined its corsairs. Though relatively well protected by a naval squadron, Jamaica lived in fear of enemy descents. The more exposed Leeward Islands suffered terrible damage. The French settlers on St Christopher capitulated in 1702, never to return; but a thousand freebooters looted it in 1706, before proceeding to ransom Nevis under Iberville, who had brought an armament from France intended for Carolina and Virginia but who soon afterwards succumbed to yellow fever at Havana. Parliament voted an inadequate 100,000 to compensate the planters of Nevis. In 1712 the pillage of Montserrat and Antigua was the prelude to attacks on Dutch Surinam, St Eustatius, and Curacao by Rene Cassard. He had already taken toll of Santiago in the Cape Verde Islands, on his way from Toulon with fifteen hundred troops. Three years earlier Sao Tom in the Bight of Benin had been ransomed by privateers from St Malo. Lesser forces, usually from Martinique, sufficed to ransom the British fort on the Gambia River on three occasions. The cost of such commando raids, sometimes followed by pitched battles and chaotic accounting, might exceed the value of prizes and
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ransoms. In the streets and round the bay of Rio de Janeiro in 1711, however, Duguay Trouin achieved the most remunerative and spectacular "descent" of the war. It was Bolingbroke's bargaining at Utrecht that obtained for Brazil a frontier with French Cayenne on the Oyapok instead of the Amazon, and a frontier on the Plate River hitherto disputed by Spain. The Succession War thus possessed a real colonial dimension. If the fighting was on a smaller scale than later, it was astonishingly widespread and often cruel. On both sides there were Americans, like Iberville, Moore, or Vetch, capable of the strategic vision of a Pitt, even though their home governments as yet preferred to settle the main issue on the Continent of Europe. Overseas, Britain gave priority to her trade convoys. The French displayed more initiative, but never enough to controvert Blenheim and Ramillies. Yet their colonial losses at the peace table, which except for Acadia and St Kitts had not been British conquests, were economically light enough. Their cod-fishery survived, while the British hardly made more of the Asiento than they had done. During the war, British colonial trade managed better. Afterwards, in the Antilles, beloved by statesmen and economists, the French advance was sensational. And in 1715 the Board of Trade itself referred anxiously to French North America: circling from Quebec to the Mississippi delta, might it one day "drive us down to the sea coast again and thence back to Old England our native hive"?
A LETTER-BOOK OF ROBERT COLE, BRITISH CONSUL-GENERAL AT ALGIERS, 1694-1712 Few areas in the history of the early modern world remain as obscure as the so-called Barbary Regencies of the Ottoman empire, geographically so close to Europe and for several centuries a disturbing if diminishing factor in its life, whether one thinks of the intervention of their corsairs, outside as well as within the Mediterranean, or of the diplomatic competition between the sea-powers at Tripoli, Tunis and Algiers. In all the attention given recently to Habsburg Spain, for instance, one misses the long-continued guerrilla-style raids of the Moors on the coasts of Valencia and Andalusia, or for that matter any clear statement of the functions of the Spanish p r e s i d i o s at Oran and elsewhere; likewise, there can be no real study of British Gibraltar which fails to explore its economic relations with the Maghreb. Even the well-trodden historiography of Louis XIV's later wars still lacks the modest but real presence of North Africa, which supplied food to the Christian belligerents at critical moments and where the inaval power of Algiers became at intervals a subject of keen contest between English and French diplomacy. As events were to show, the decade of the 1680s in effect marked the close of open warfare between Barbary and at least two of the leading Christian powers. The British peace treaty of 1682 with the City and Kingdom of Algiers was renewed at intervals, with minor emendations in 1700, 1703 and 1716. The third (and highly destructive) French bombardment of Algiers, in 1688, was followed by the treaty of 1694, which more or less satisfactorily settled the outstanding problem of the captive slaves on both sides. These epoch-making settlements nevertheless required careful nursing, partly because of the ruthless nature of Anglo-French rivalry at the Turkish courts, and even more because European hostilities not infrequently created incidents involving Islamic
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property or passengers at sea, to say nothing of minor breaches of the treaties, such as non-observance of the passport system laid down by that of 1682. Algerian opinion was hypersensitive to injustices real or apparent. But of course it was also highly mobile, like the political structure itself. Although by 1709 the Dey was strong enough to get rid of the last traces of visible control from Istanbul, in the person of the Pasha, real power had come to lie with the janissary militiamen, who elected and disposed of deys at their pleasure: in the twenty years following 1689 there were no less than six of these displacements. As Shaaban Dey, who held office for the unusually long period of six years (168995), wanned the French government, "II faut aussi faire reflexion que c'est ici une Rpublique de gens de guerre, lesquels vous vous asservir ez par les bonts que vous aurez pour eux" 1. Exactly why the Militia could be described as "un animal horriblement farouche" is a problem that calls for deeper study than it has yet received. It is one that dominates the whole history of the Ottoman empire after 1683 compounded of military defeat, religious xenophobia, economic distress and social protest. In North Africa, however, the element of humiliation at Christian hands hardly seems to arise; after the French bombardments of the 1680s the most resounding event to occur between Christian and Muslim was the capture of Oran from the Spaniards in 1708. The almost chronic condition of war between the Barbary States themselves had nothing to do with Innocent XFs Holy League of 1684, though it was reopened only a year later with Mezzomorto's resumption of Algerian interference in Tunisian politics. Between 1685 and 1705 Tunis was three times besieged (and in 1694 occupied) by Algerian armies. Shaaban Dey's sensational success at Tunis in 1694, moreover, was accomplished at a time when the Algerians had repeatedly to send armies west and south-west against the hordes of the restless sultan of Morocco, Muley Ishmael; somewhat like that of Poland, it was the classical situation of Algeria to be caught between two other (and wealthier) powers. The real meaning of these constant expeditions and bloody engagements is far from clear, ibut at least it needs to be more widely recognised that the Maghreb was in turmoil throughout the European conflicts of 16881714. The internal instability of Tunis and Algiers alike in these years was bound up with this fact, far more than with the failing authority of Istanbul. For more reasons than one, therefore, it should be clear that the mere preservation of friendly relations with Barbary depended on re1 To Seignelay, 10 May 1690, in E. P l a n t e t (ed.), Correspondence des Deys d'Alger avec la cour de France 15791833, vol. I, Paris 1889, p. 239.
A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1712
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sident diplomats of exceptional finesse, intimate local knowledge and certain cash resources. They were never men of more than consular standing; but from 1683 the British crown, which had had a more or less continuous record of consular representation at Algiers since 1585, raised the status of its representatives at both Algiers and Tripoli to that of "Agent and Consul General". Until the nineteenth century these were to be the only British consuls directly remunerated by the crown. Their allowances of 600 a year, together with "extraordinary" expenses, were paid out of the Civil List, like those of the regular diplomats, with whom the two consuls-general also shared the privilege of a personal chaplain. Such an exceptional status reflects the political importance of posts which could not be financed out of levies on shipping {consulage), for neither Algiers nor Tripoli were places of great commerce, even for the French, who had such substantial interest in the trade of Tunis 2. For the unusually long and eventful period 16941712 the British Agent and Cnsul-General at Algiers was Robert Cole, who had been taken captive thither at some date not later than 1678 and who died intestate there on 13 November 1713 without having returned home. There are a few references to him in the well-known publications of Joseph Morgan 3, at one time his chancellor, who describes him as "that highspirited Gentleman, that true Lover of his Country" and "a great Favourite of the A l g e r i n e s " , so deep in their attack on Oran that the Spaniards tried to prevent decent burial of his corpse four years later. Otherwise he is known almost entirely from such official dispatches to the Secretaries of State in London as have survived in the Public Record Office, very unequally distributed over the years and about half of them confined to 171012; there are less than forty in all down to 20 June 1706, after which there is a lacuna (roughly coincident with Lord Sunderland's tenure of the southern secretaryship) until 13 April 17104. The main interest of these dispatches, which often duplicate each other for fear of non-arrival, was summarized not long
D. B. H o r n , The British Diplomatic Service 16891789, Oxford 1961, pp. 236245. 8 A Complete History of Algiers (2nd edn. London 1731), preface, and Several Voyages to Barbary, London 1736, part II, p. 134. Cf. Sir G o d f r e y F i s h e r , Barbary Legend: War, Trade and Piracy in North Africa, 14151830, Oxford 1957, pp. 2817 and (for the list of consuls) p. 307. London Gazette, no. 5284. 4 Sftate] P[apers] 71/3 and 71/4. There are also two early letters (16847) in the Bodleian Library at Oxford (Rawlfinson] A. 189, fos. 137, 4168) to the earl of Dartmouth, as admiral, and one of 1707 to Bishop Compton of London (ibid., C 984, fo. 165), acknowledging the arrival of a chaplain. All Souls College, Oxford, possesses a letter of 1 Feb. 1681 from Cole to Francis Baker (consul at
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ago by the late Sir Godfrey Fisher. They contain a good deal of political news (in the spirit of Charles IPs valuation of consuls as "intelligencers"), details of shipping incidents (rarer than might be expected before 1710), proposals for revision of the passport system, an occasional list of Barbary rovers, and painful requests for the payment of the consul's "extraordinaries" or even his arrears of salary. A constant refrain in this correspondence is the difficulty of conducting it at all in time of war, at any rate until Britain really dominated the western Mediterranean, which was not before 1705. Cole fears that his news will be stale by the time it reaches England, if it does so at all, and he complains of waiting too long for advices from home, which in any case might be intercepted by the French. He was largely dependent on communications with Leghorn (Livorno) and these, such as they were, were normally in French bottoms "a very uncertain conveyance" in war-time. Ships carrying letters to or from him were liable to confiscation in a French port, along with their cargo. In 1695 he judged it absolutely necessary to buy his own settee "to run backwards and forwards with advices to Leghorn, [the] Fleet and other parts"; but she was captured next year by the French 5. He also hired a brigantine, but could not man her. More than once he took the risk of employing Algerine corsair captains, with some of whom he was on close personal terms, hoping they would meet an English cruiser. Since English naval appearances were rare at Algiers, it was hard enough to communicate even with the fleet. Some packets for the commanders in 1695 were returned "adrift" from Genoa. On another occasion he risked one for Admiral Rooke by an English merchant house at Tetuan "and so far it may hapjpen for Spain." A direct passage to Malaga or Cartagena was seldom obtainable. In these circumstances letter-writing was bound to be opportunistic and anything up to a year might elapse before a correspondent received an answer. On 10 and 12 February 1695 Cole replied to letters variously written between June and October of the previous year. Most of them had reached him (with one from Leghorn dated 3 November) on 24 November 1694. "Long look'd for come at last", he wrote to a London friend on 10 March 1695: "I received yours of the 27 July on 24 November and [was] pleased to see you then amongst the land of the living." These uncertainties, like the uneven character of the Public Record Office files, lend interest to the discovery of a manuscript letter-book
Tunis, but then in London), ences of the Divan on such 5 S. P. 71/3, pp. 639, 650, 1696. A settee (s i t e a) was showing that Cole was already admitted to the audioccasions as the reception of a French envoy. 677: to Shrewsbury, 10 Sept. and 12 Dec. 1695, 26 Aug. a small two-masted, lateen-rigged vessel.
A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1 712
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kept by Cole at intervals between 29 August 1694 and 2 May 1701, formerly in the possession of the late Sir Bruce Ingram and purchased by me in 1967. It is a substantial ledger-type volume, measuring 42,5 X 27,5 cm., bound in sheepskin and containing 138 unnumbered folios in excellent condition, 49 of which are blank. Some letters are undated and others, as noted by Cole himself, are slightly out of sequence6. They cover two short periods, the second of which happens to be one of the gaps in the State Papers Foreign: 29 August 1694 1 February 1696 and 10 March 1700 2 May 17017. In all, there are copies of nine dispatches to various Secretaries of State which are not to be found in the Public Record Office, in addition to a number of letters addressed to naval commanders on the Mediterranean Station, one of whom, as Captain John Neville, had been acting consul at Algiers in 16823. There are several letters to Richard Yard of the Treasury, one to Josiah Burchett and another to William Bridgeman of the Admiralty, and one to Lord Paget as ambassador to the Porte. About a dozen entries concern the British consuls at Tripoli, Tunis, Leghorn and Alicante; but Cole also had correspondents at Tetuan, Cadiz, Lisbon and Coimbra, as well as at Marseilles in peace-time. Together with his London correspondence notably with Sir Thomas Vernon, Alexander Cairns, Samuel Nash, John and Francis Newland this group of letters sheds a little welcome light on economic conditions at Algiers, as also on Cole's own trading activities. Finally, there are a few revealing family letters: to his wife Mary, who refused to share his loneliness; to his brothers Thomas and Lawrence, Customs collectors at Cowes and Portsmouth respectively; to "Sister Grove", wife of Robert Grove, bishop of Chichester, and to "Sister Per" with her daughter, "Niece Betty". Because of their close friendship, which aroused jealousy among his relatives, Cole's exceptionally full and frank letters to Thomas Baker and his wife always addressed as "my Patrona" fall into the family caErasures and an occasional blank for a date suggest that some are really drafts rather than copies; two are superscribed "did not goe" and one folio has been cut out. None appear to be in Robert Cole's own (clear) hand, unlike many of his letters in the State Papers; he sometimes refers to his screvan" or scrivener, and this may at times have been one of the two nephews Benjamin and Wyndham, who lived with him on and off from 1696 at latest. This being so, I have not scrupled to modernize the highly erratic spelling and punctuation. References are to the Letter-Book unless otherwise stated. It is now in the Bodleian Library. 7 The gaps in a letter-book containing so many blank pages are hard to explain otherwise than as a failure of office organization. Cole sometimes wrote his letters "at the gardens"; on another occasion he admits that a copy was made on loose paper and since lost. Yet he was careful to send duplicates and even triplicates, on different dates. An intermittent but painful illness, which took a new turn in January 1696, might explain some failures in his record-keeping.
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tegory, although they contain much that Baker was expected to pass on to political and official circles at home. Baker was Cole's immediate predecessor (and instructor) at Algiers (16904), which he quitted as late as March 1695, after discharging a special peace mission to Tripoli8. He evidently enjoyed the confidence of the Algerian authorities, who were in the habit of nominating both British and French consuls 9. Cole acknowledged that he owed his office to Baker's influence and he continued to rely on it for obtaining his arrears of salary when the Bakers had moved to London. Cole's own (temporary) successor, Thomas Thomson, was even to allege that Baker "was partner with him in the salary" 10, a suspicion which derives no support from their intimate correspondence but which could have been fostered by Baker's handling of the consul's accounts in England. Both had an interest in the cargo of the P e l e g r i n a pink, which sailed from Amsterdam for Algiers in December 1700, a trading venture to which the consul pinned high hopes, having sent his nephew Wyndham to Europe for the purpose; as supercargo, Wyndham insured the voyage at Amsterdam and sent the policies to Baker, who had been instrumental in enabling the young man to kiss the hand of King William. Besides "the infallible rules" which guided Cole's conduct at Algiers, Baker also introduced him to the house of Nash, whose interests at Tetuan later involved him in "a world of trouble", and perhaps to other business correspondents. They frequently executed small commissions for each other. A postscript of 10 March 1701, for example, begs Baker to procure
He had been consul there from 1676, the year of Sir John Narborough's treaty of peace with Tripoli, until 1686, when he became briefly Clerk of the Checque at Deptford dockyard. He was a protg of Lord Nottingham, but occupied no office more important than that of a Commissioner for Registering Seamen after 1695. His brother Francis had been consul at Tunis for twelve years in the last two reigns, according to a letter from Thomas of 7 Sept. 1694, requesting (vainly) that Francis might now be appointed at Tripoli. 9 Many examples in E. P l a n t e t, op. cit. The first entry in the Letter-Book is a translation of a letter from Haji Shaaban Dey to King William III, 26 April 1694, requesting the favour of Cole's appointment as one in whom the whole Divan, including the Aga of the Janissaries, have full confidence because of the extraordinary experience he hath gained in this country." 10 S. P. 71/4, fo. 240: to Dartmouth, 3 Dec. 1712. This insinuation is to be found much earlier, with other scurrilous remarks on Baker and Cole, in the anonymous letter-book of "a Merchant at Algiers" (Bodleian, Rawl. A. 343, fo. 136) for 16926, which can now be identified as the work of John Butler, an impecunious and malicious man who lived for a time with Baker. Butler claimed that Baker first offered him the consulate for a consideration of 100 p.a. in return for seeing to the payment of the salary in London "and with all because he was the person that raised it to 600 a year". Elsewhere (fos. 73,75) he hints that Cole never intended to return to England because he was not free to do so.
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28 yards of cloth for the Dey, including seven of "not too light a green". To his "most cordial friends" Cole entrusts a horse and saddle for King William "which you will know how to present and improve I hope to my interest" (22 August 1700); in March 1701 he mentions six other Barbs, probably from "such pretty horses as I am master of" and ready for sending were it not for British customs duty "so please to advise with Mr. Marshall about a man of war's touching here to carry them off about July" n. In addition to purchases and gifts for Mrs. Baker green and crimson damasks, a white petticoat, a carpet, wine, ostrich e ggs Cole looked after a tavern rented for her in Algiers, possibly out of kindness to a slave: wine being discouraged by Islamic law, it was the public ("Beylic") slaves who kept the taverns when they could raise the money to do so 12. The consul's letters to his Patrona, one of which is full of distressing private emotion, display an intimate frankness towards political personalities: "By gar, Madam, I shall be glad when it comes to the turn of you know who... I cannot forbear asking of questions. Why has my Lord Jersey been so long Secretary something he does that won't bear water or too great a favourite?" In November 1700, when this was penned, Jersey was still the Secretary of State to whom Cole was answerable. As must be second nature to anyone living in a Muslim country, he took pains to oblige many people with small favours. The duke of Albemarle, the earl of Abingdon, and Sir George Rooke were among the personalities for whom he reserved mares. Having sent ten sheep to Rear-Admiral Neville, "in which pray eat my health", he later fears a "darkness between us". At the same time (August 1694) he presents Russell, Commander-in-chief of the Mediterranean fleet, with a damascened gun and scimitar and in April 1695 tells him that "Your sashes are preparing and so is your embroidered handkerchief". He was hurt when Commodore Aylmer failed to acknowledge some tigerskins and when five years later, as admiral, Aylmer showed some unaccountable "disgust" after being his guest: "I cannot endure the thoughts of any of His Majesty's captains or other of his subjects going from hence with laments of a poor entertainment or a cold kitchen, esteeming the reputaThis was the great period for the introduction of Barb and Arab sires in the breeding of English race-horses, described by G. M. Trevelyan as not the least of Lord Treasurer Godolphin's great services: England in the Reign of Queen Anne, vol. I, London 1930, pp. 184185. It is interesting that Cole usually sent a Barbary mare. 12 See M o r g a n , Several Voyages, I, 45. Cf. J o s e p h P i t t s , A True and Faithjul Account of the Religion and Manners of the Mohammetans (Exeter, 1704), p. 17: "But tho' Wine be forbidden, yet there is no Punishment for those that drink it; notwithstanding none use to drink it but the Rascality."
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tion of my post far beyond a little expanse..." Cole's liberality he took pride in bottling his own wines was on this occasion not beyond sending the bill to Jersey: "...since I am the sole house on the place I could not avoid entertaining great numbers of that fleet, which lay daily on me a charge, my Lord, too great and heavy for me to bear..." It may well have been this particular claim which in June 1700 caused William III personally to find the consul's bill unreasonable 13. Details of Cole's "extraordinaries" may be read in the Calendar of Treasury Books. Except for postage and the cost of clothing and feeding "delivered-up men" (the occasional redeemed slave or prisoners handed over by the French consul), together with Exchequer fees and the like, these items concern presents to Turkish office-holders or benefactors 14. They were mostly small for example, 86 aspers "to Ishmael Hogga. favourite secretary, at circumcising his son, a caftan" or 21 piastres to Mustapha, his new dragoman although the customary gifts to a new dey, his marriages or the birth of a son, could be expensive, as was the celebration of Mustapha Dey's rout of the Tunisians in 1700: on successive nights then Cole received "all the ladies of the first rank, all which I entertained magnificently with fireworks, dancing on a stage and music both Moorish and Christian, with throwing in the square rich perfumes and sending 'them custard, cheesecake, sweetmeats and other toys". With Mustapha Dey (17005, known to the Turks as "Upright Whiskers") Cole enjoyed the kind of intimacy at which he always aimed but which was hard to maintain for long in the circumstances of the time: "The Dey is a very kind neighbour, I share very often with him in his presents from the Alcaides and others out the country; he has frequently made me his returns of thanks for my care of his house in his absence." 15 At the worst of times Shaaban Dey was "a greedy monster" Cole had his friends at court. Ibrahim Delli Dey (170910, "the Fool") was to tell him that he had lived too long in Algiers and knew too much 16. We can believe him when he writes to Secretary Vernon: "It's a truth undeniable that without the punctual payment of my Extras, the interest [that] with so much difficulty I have got in this government cannot be kept on foot." And to Yard of the Treasury: "I do aver that interest purchased by such small sums goes further than any reasons that can be given to this rugged government
To Baker, 10 March 1701; the letter to Jersey is undated but belongs to 1700. Cf. Calendar of Treasury Books, vol. XV, 25 June 1700. 14 Ibidem, XIII, 3402, and XV, 1789, prints bills dated at Algiers on 2 March and 6 October 1697. They are expressed in dollar aspers, worth 3s. 6d. sterling ; n London and slightly less than two plate dollars or piastres in Algiers. 15 To Baker, 29 Sept. 1700. 16 S. P. 71/4, fo. 91: Cole to Dartmouth, 13 April 1710.
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in matters of dispute." The French consul, Durand, frequently made the same point17. Curiously enough, he and Cole each considered the other better supplied with funds. Cole particularly cultivated the corsair captains and the officers of "the King's House," where prize business was conducted and new slaves sold, after one in eight had been selected for the public service and the rest exhibited in the market-place. An undated letter to Baker, apparently written early in 1696, claims that "I have a very good understanding with all the captains, who come very frequently and freely for my table, where we never fail to sacrifice bottles to your lady's health, being very fresh in the memory of your friends." His "great friend", he adds, is Abderhaman Hogga (Khoja), who figures as captain of the G o l d e n O r a n g e T r e e , 32 guns, in a list of the Algerian navy compiled on 4 September 1694 a total of fifteen ships (and 406 guns), with four more and a galley on the stocks. Few of the captains (r a i s) were renegades by this date, but one of them, commander of the H a l f M o o n , 22 guns, appears to be that "Mustapha, English renegade, well-wisher to us" mentioned in a letter to Neville of 20 October 169418. Cole's "particular good friend" in the King's House in 1700, Mustapha Khoja, is described as "the honest Turk" and "favourite screvan [iscrdvener]" a description applied three years earlier to Ishmael Khoja. The rapid turnover of officials in the flux of Algerian politics added to the consul's difficulties. In November 1700 "my friend in the King's House, Mustapha Hogga, has broke his heart, with what apprehensions I knew not... his successor must be made my friend, which will cost money... The bowstring in my time, though Shaaban Hogga was a bloody man, was never so much in use as now..." 19 The consul's frequent interventions in the King's House were chiefly occasioned by the arrest of Englishmen found by the corsairs on vessels with whose flags Algiers was at war, or by the bringing up of English vessels themselves. In the first category only men working for wages
To Vernon, 10 March 1701; to Yard, 29 Sept. 1700. Cf. S. P. 71/4, fo. 40, to Vernan, 11 Sept. 1702: "It's not to be supposed that the bare name of a Salary and Extras can keep on foot our Interest here." For Durand, see P l a n t e t , op. cit, t. I, 555 n. 18 Both Abderhaman Khoja and this Mustapha Rais reappear in a French list of 1686 (Bodleian, Rawl. A. 189, fo. 209), which gives a total of 29 ships and 910 guns. In neither is Mustapha described as a renegade, but following his name in the 1694 list are the words "was B urn as [?Burns]," which identifies him in the 1686 list. The decline of the Barbary fleet is evident from these figures. In 1676 it had totalled 43 ships and 2,210 guns, excluding brigantines and galleys (ibidem, A. 185, fo. 277). 19 To Baker, 14 Nov. 1700.
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faced the risk of enslavement and Cole, rightly or wrongly, was usually successful in arguing that they were passengers. In fact, the number of British captives was few indeed in his time, after Baker in 1695 had taken home 45 of them all that then remained in Tripoli, Tunis ani Algiers "except one that refused his liberty." 20 In May 1701, however, it was necessary for the Admiralty to forbid naval officers from conniving at the escape of slaves. This was in response to pressure from Cole himself, who had been led into "a labyrinth of trouble" by the abduction of a renegade, Shaaban a l i a s Child, on board Commodore Munden's squadron a breach of promise made worse by the fact that Shaaban's ransom price was as much as 2,000 piastres 21. Moreover, Cole and Munden had only just negotiated an agreement with the Dey to release ships and their crews found in future without the requisite passports, freight being paid even on the confiscated cargoes22. The "gripeing of slaves" weakened the influence which Cole had procured with the Dey for punishing infringements of the Articles of Peace and Commerce by Algerians. Worse, it set at risk "the sinews of th2 good understanding we have with this government." His best friends were saying that "under pretence of friendship His Majesty's captains come hither to rob them of their estates."23 Six years earlier he had been much embarrassed by a former servant of his, John Butler, "by reason of his constant dealing and intriguing with slaves, a thing wholly to be avoided by any man who would live easy and reputably here." 24 The consul's pleading had often to be exerted on behalf of British shipowners and masters who neglected to obtain an Admiralty pass in accordance with Article IV of the 1682 treaty. This was sometimes because they wished to conceal their intention of sailing southward from French privateers, but Cole always resisted the term "Mediterranean" passes "a proper name for them When a chain can be stretched from Gibraltar over. You know, Sir, the Algereens rove the seas over..." 25 He feared that the British naval presence in the Straits
S. P. 71/3, pp. 609 ff., Baker to Shrewsbury, 20 Feb. 1695. To Baker, Munden, and Jersey, 14 Sept. 1700; to Vernon, 10 March 1701. In 1688 the British Government offered at last 300 piastres as the market price of an escaped shipwright. 22 S. P. 71/4, fo. 19, Articles signed by the Government of Algier, 17 Aug. 1700. They are printed, after the terms of the 1682 treaty, as an appendix to M o r g a n's History of Algiers. 28 To Baker, 8 Feb. 1701. 24 S. P. 71/3, p. 617, to Shrewsbury, 19 Feb. 1695. On 14 March Cole added that Butler had been "intrinsic" with the French consul and his dragoman, an English renegade to whom he was considerably in debt. This and other references are confirmed by Butler's letterbook in the Bodleian Library. 25 To Admiral Rooke, 12 Feb. 1695.
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would encourage the laxity of merchantmen . Indeed, he had a poor opinion of the passport system altogether, feeling that it gave the Algerines a large advantage and "an unaccountable authority", that it lined private pockets and bred incidents, whereas there were better means of establishing British ownership such as were used in the cases of vessels deserted by their crews on the appearance of a corsair 27. Passes were particularly deceptive in time of war, when British crews carried a high proportion of foreigners, so that the authenticity of a pass might be questioned. Early in 1696, in fact, he was able to obtain the Dey's agreement, against fierce opposition from the corsairs, to suspend the system, which in the Cole-Munden agreement of 1700 was prorogued until September 1701; and in 1703 special provision was made for plantation vessels and British prizes. But Cole failed to get admiralty passes abolished and in 1710 had much trouble arising out of the issues of passes by the Governor of Gibraltar, which were not valid and were stopped at his instance in 1711: "the unhappiness is that poor men, whilst they are made to believe the validity of such passes, think themselves secure, and by this means are unexpectedly brought into captivity." He hoped to supply Gibraltar himself, in conjunction with British merchants in Algiers and Oran 2S. By that time Cole could describe himself "as Chief Contractor for Corn" to the forces of Charles III in Catalonia. Evidently the years had brought some success in business. In the period covered by the Letter-Book he seems to have been the only regular British merchant in Algiers, for Butler's speculative transactions were fitful and he enjoyed no credit in London. The dey claimed in April 1694 that it was five years since a British merchantman had appeared voluntarily there. However that may be, Cole's partner in Algiers, Samuel Robertson, went home in 1693, still claiming a debt of 1,260 piastres owed by Cole, Butler told his friends in London that this was therefore the time to
To Sir Thomas Vernon, 12 Feb. 1695. In 1702 the Dey forbade his captains to enter the English Channel (S. P. 71/4, fo. 41), which his predecessor in 1687 had refused to do (Bodleian, Rawl. A. 189, fo. 137). 27 S. P. 71/3, pp. 63840, to Shrewsbury, 10 Sept. 1695. As an example of the problem created by desertion, see ibidem, pp. 6759, to Shrewsbury, 26 Aug. 1696. Cf. S. P. 71/4, f os. 1245, to Dartmouth, 14 April 1711: "The Dey but chiefly the captains are very stiff in adhering to the Letter of the Treaty... out of an apprehension of frauds... and because being ignorant of the Christian Charracter they are not able to distinguish when a pass is authentiek." The captains insisted that the majority of the crew of a British vessel ought to be British, though the Dey was willing to compromise at 50%. Even this was more than Britain was willing to guarantee in war-time. 28 Ibidem.
26
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break into a trade hitherto engrossed !by Cole and Robertson. On 16 February 1695 Cole was writing to Alexander Cairns, a new partner in London, about raising a cargo for the care of "our house" 29. In April his letters30 fear "a sequester of my salt" and the loss of six chests of wine on a Livornese settee seized by the French; he also acknowledged a receipt from Messrs. Sollicoffer and Alphusua of Leghorn for ten barrels of red herring, prize goods from Algiers. In August 1700 he was asking for two blank counterparts of admiralty passes as he sometimes bought prizes "for my own proper account" 31. By then he was proposing to invest as much as 1,000 "in a small cargo I propose from London hither", with Thomas Baker and Samuel Nash each going shares for 500: Nash was to charter a vessel on condition that the master "shall serve me to any port in the Straits to the westward of this place, Cadiz or Lisbon as we shall agree" 32. On 27 December he asks Nash to advise "whether I cannot have from England in a foreign bottom iron, pilchers [pilchards], butter, salmon, red and white herring, two 14-inch cables, and said vessel to touch at Cadiz or Alicante to take in 20 or 30 quintals of poor jack [cod]." On 10 March 1701 he was thanking Baker for advancing 1,100 to Wyndham Cole at Amsterdam for the return cargo of the P e l e g r i n a , a pink "above 220 tons" which had sailed from Algiers via Marseille, after the original idea of sending her to Alexandria with rice and freight had been given up owing to the season. Wyndham was expected to bring iron and deals from Holland, as well as a housekeeper ("with a side saddle if she be a horsewoman"); but the consul was on tenterhooks about his unexplained delays, fearing that the price of iron at Algiers, where Swedish was selling at 22 piastres per quintal ("a brave price"), would fall once the Turkish ships returned from the Levant33. On other occasions the consul acted as a factor, charging
This follows a passage in which Cole says that, some gentlemen having let him down, he has "one that will be concerned 1000 which I shall be able in a short time to get together [and] possibly may find some other that will come in as much more, which will be cargo enough or as -much at least as at first shall require till the concerned shall find themselves treated fairly and with advantage." The evidence for the breakdown of Cole's partnership with Robertson is in Bodleian, Rawl. A. 343, fos. 3 and 6: cf. Calendar of Treasury Books, X (pt. 1), 135. 30 To Mrs. Cole and Thomas Baker, 14 and 20 April. 81 To Burchett, secretary of the admiralty, 22 Aug. 1700. The request was ignored. 32 Cole reported to Nash from time to time on the affairs of "your house at Tetuan," which traded with Algiers. On 10 March 1701 he tells Nash that he has been overstocking Mr. Spencer there. Cole also corresponded with Antonio Bacher,' who had a business in Tetuan. 83 To Wyndham Cole, 27 Dec. 1700. The quintal at Algiers was "the greater quintal" of 175 (not 150) Ib. An earlier letter to Sir Thomas and Mr. Thomas Ver29
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5% commission and brokerage in addition to 2% consulage. When he had "no advantage" in a lading, a present of sweetmeats was not enough 34. In his advice to other merchants, Cole stresses the unpredictability of the market in Algiers and the violent price fluctuations there; it was a "barren place" for exports and yet difficult as a rule to obtain cash for imports. Powder and shot and naval stores were usually a good market, but difficult to come by when the European powers were at war; rice too was fairly safe (its exportation being contraband), as were Swedish iron, superfine wool, sponges, Tunis caps and D j erba fruit; salt "is never very dear here, but always money to be got by it"; oils were uncertain 3S. Sugar depended, like some other commodities, "upon hits of prizes", since the Algerine corsairs regularly hung off Portuguese coasts; in 1700 the arrival of a prize with 25,000 deal boards "so that this place is supplied for some years" made Cole regret that he had just ordered 6,000 deals from Holland 36. According to Butler, the 1694 expeditions to Tunisia, which removed a large portion of the Turkish aristocracy, (brought a "deadness" upon business at Algiers. On the other hand, a war indemnity in ready coin could touch off a boom: cloth was in good demand after the victory over Murad Bey in 1700 37. The consul
non of London says that he is to take their commissions for Cairo before leaving, but strongly discourages them from sending a vessel themselves to Algiers. There are other references in the Letter-Book to Alexandria voyages, no doubt also connected with pilgrimages to Mecca. On 27 Dec. 1700 Cole is awaiting a ship from Alexandria belonging to the Vernons (whom he advises to send him only cloth fit for Egypt), while the Neptune brigantine (Henry Thomas) at Algiers has just been offered a freight to Alexandria; earlier she had intended to go in ballast to Smyrna and there lade for home. The Pelegrina reached Algiers on 9 April 1701, but Wyndham was back in London early in 1703 (S. P. 71/4, fo. 49). 84 On 14 Nov. 1700 he tells Emanale! and Antonio Vaz, of Coimbra, that a gift of sweetmeats and snuff was not enough to reward his service in obtaining a corn cargo for them at Tabarca; in writing the same day to John Freemantle and Company of Lisbon, he says he expected 20 piastres, "there 'being an old English proverb that it's merry in the trade when beards wag all." The export of corn was formally prohibited by Muslim law, so that influence was required to obtain a licence. 85 Much of this advice is contained in a letter of 24 Jan. 1701 to John Goddard, the new consul in Tunis. The price-currents sent by Butler to his correspondents in 16934 {Bodleian, Rawl. A. 343, fos. 32 and 64) list also spices, ginger, cochineal, indigo, cotton wool and yarn, black and white beads, lead and redlead, nails and quicksilver. 86 To the Vernons, undated. 87 To the Vernons, 3 Sept. 1700: "...but send none but what fit for Alexandria." Cf. 12 Feb. 1695 to same (when Shaaban Dey had just made himself master of Tunis): "Cloth is greatly wanted, so as all northern goods." For Butler's comment on the slump in Algiers in December 1695, cf. Bodleian, Rawl. A. 343, fo. 111.
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advised his correspondents never to send too great a quantity of anything and sometimes to send piastres rather than goods. In this he was not altogether disinterested, since he could dispose of plate dollars at 6/o profit in exchange for aspers. If goods were sent in a French ship, moreover, he would not make use of his interest; there would be no consulage for him 33. Similarly, he would discourage correspondents from sending cargoes that might compete with his own ventures: "I'll christen my own child first." There was of course nothing as yet improper in Cole's commercial activities as such, although the French Crown was already trying to forbid private trade to its consuls and in 1684 the British government had been advised that, in the special circumstances of Algiers, it was incompatible with the public service 39. Cole's official salary was supposed to compensate for poor consulage income; but even had that allowance and his "extras" been more punctually paid, he had a gentleman's way of life to maintain and nieces to think of; he was not to know that he would die in harness. His correspondence leaves no doubt of a strong sense of public service; in any case, to the end, he was afraid of earning rebukes from London and understood perfectly the ease of incurring them in Algiers, where there were gossiping enemies enough 40 . He leaves the impression of a sensitive man, not without compassion for the innocent or at times for himself, as when defaulting shipmasters expected him to get them out of trouble or when he had to put up with violent words from the Turkish authorities. "Sir," he wrote to his partner Cairns as early as 1695, "my misfortune hath ever been to be concerned with sharping, shirking, tricking fellows, which hath made me thus unhappy in my declining years."
To Daniel Newland and Robert Cross, of Alicante, 4 Oct. 1700. Both Captain John Neville and Samuel de Paz, a Tangier merchant, advocated a high salary but only two-thirds of what Cole received so as to discourage consular trading, implying that Consul Martin had weakened his public position by accepting prizes on credit from "a subtil, cunning people" who were apt to demand full payment just when he had some public request to make of them (Bodleian, Rawl. A. 257, fos. 2157). Cf. Y. D e b b a s c h , La Nation /raneis en Tunisie, 15771835, Paris 1957, pp. 185194. 40 Cf. his advice to Wyndham Cole (at Leghorn), 3 April 1701: "...you have abundance of eyes over you, therefore once again have a care, for every little false step in you will be taken notice of to your prejudice..." Cole hoped that his nephew would eventually succeed him in the consulate, but Wyndham, the son of Lawrence and Elizabeth Cole of Portsmouth, died on 16 July 1706, according to a certificate written by Robert Cole and interleaved in his Letter-Book.
39 38
THE NORTH SEA IN WARTIME, 1688-1713 Introducing extracts from the king-stadholder's correspondence with Heinsius, Leopold von Ranke observed that 'brought together in anything like completeness and sufficiently elucidated, it would be a history of the age'1. Anyone who has broken the seal of the confidential letters of Marlborough and Godolphin to each other between 1701 and 1710 must feel likewise2. And yet how much remains to be elucidated! How recall the once passionate drama in such dead questions as the Protestant Succession or the Barrire? Louis XIV, especially if we have pro-French inclinations, has become so much less threatening than the Jacobin crusade or the Napoleonic tyranny; indeed, the more we have been taught of the party strife in countries opposed to him, the more sympathetic do we risk becoming to the rationality and courtesies, if also at times the despair, that inform the correspondence of the Great King's servants. When the political quarrelling is analysed, much of it is found to revolve round personal, local or at best domestic issues which strike us as trivial by comparison with the foresight and single-mindedness of a William III. His stature, like that of Godolphin, is increased by the trouble they caused him, so that we can admire the man without fully sharing his inspiration. But correspondingly, historical justice to the troublemakers - particularly perhaps to the Dutch vredesvrienden (peace party) - requires that fuller account be taken of the relentless, day-to-day pressure of two long wars on civilian life. 'War-weariness' is too often a historian's deus ex machina, a phrase empty of living content, supported at best by reference to crushing taxes, the alarming growth of public borrowing, strategic or diplomatic stalemate, the distortion of international traffic. My purpose now is to address your minds to this last element, which had moral besides economic implications. The North Sea, with its crowded shipping lanes of great antiquity, is intimately known to us and I need not spend time describing the tightly woven tapestry of the
* Revised from a lecture delivered to the general meeting of the Nederlands Historisch Genootschap on 8 October 1976 at Utrecht. I am deeply grateful to Prof. dr. J. C. Boogman and to drs. G. N. van der Plaat for assistance in preparing the text for publication. 1. A History of England (6 vols., Oxford, 1875) VI, 277. 2. See Henry L. Snyder, ed., The Marlborough - Godolphin Correspondence (3 vols., Oxford, 1975).
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trades which united it. Enough to remind you that its shores embraced Europe's two greatest ports at this time, Amsterdam and London, and that over threequarters of England's shipping tonnage, as well as most of Scotland's, was owned on the coast which faces yours. In our economy it had much greater relative importance still than it was to have as the eighteenth century, with the expansion of colonial trade, wore on. And in the period I have chosen it linked two allies whose most sustained effort through two long wars was made in the Spanish Low Countries, with all that this implies for the safe passage of troops, supplies, remittances and not least of vital correspondence. It happened that these, like all the trades and fisheries of the area, were continuously threatened by the presence in our midst of the naval base of Dunkirk, with its old experience of warfare on commerce and the most belligerent of French corsairs, at a time when the guerre de course was prosecuted with as much vigour and optimism as the submarine wars of our own century. For these reasons alone, the North Sea, a dangerous one at all times, can offer us some sort of case-study of the impact of war, so much neglected by the economic historians. In studying it, moreover, we are able to take account of the role taken by the neutral shipping of Denmark and Sweden, especially when there was no licit trading with the enemy. This was extremely important during the Nine Years War, and again in 1703-1704, when William III and his political heirs managed to impose an unprecedented embargo on Dutch trade with France, thereby dislocating Holland's 'mother commerce' with the Baltic. Not only that: William began by attempting also to prohibit all Scandinavian trade with France an act of economic warfare more audacious, I believe, than anything of its kind before the age of Napoleon. So we shall need to look a little beyond the North Sea, into the Baltic and the Bay of Biscay, if we are to judge the impact of twenty years' life- and-death struggle upon those who lived around it. First, a necessary word of caution. War, we know, works with paradoxical effects on an economy, stimulating sectors concerned with military supplies and protecting others from normal competition3, while tending to create scarcities, raise costs, and alter the preferences of investors almost from year to year. At the same time, a total war economy was unthinkable in this period of limited State power, even if William took certain steps towards it, as in initiating the treatment of corn as contraband when the French were starving in 1693. Indeed, the business and personal lives of Europeans stood to be more direly affected by a bad harvest - or a run of poor harvests such as afflicted Scotland in the 1690s - than by war itself. Within terms of the incidence of war itself, London prices in those years reflect both the national debt and the contrary (deflationary) action of a drain of capital
3. For examples (e.g. in metallurgical production) in this period, see A. H. John, 'War and the English Economy, 1700-1763', Economic History Review, 2nd ser. VII (1954-1955) 329-344.
The North Sea in Wartime, 1688-1713
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to the Continent, which in turn enabled English exporters to cash their bills more quickly from the remittance specialists than from foreign customers, while it contributed in the Dutch Republic to a price-rise4. That Dutch prices nevertheless followed a downward path in 1702-1708 but rose sharply in 1709-1710, as did the English, perhaps tells us more about the state of the harvests than that of the war, although we must allow something for the course of events in the Baltic, where the repercussions of Tsar Peter's victory at Poltava were combined from 1709 with a visitation of the plague to make trading conditions more difficult than they had been since 1700, the first year of those northern hostilities to which historians too often attribute a kind of blanket effect, with insufficient regard for the tides of war : these short-term fluctuations are concealed by the habit of taking decennial averages5. As a general index to the pressure of war on the United Provinces, the activity of the specie trade seems preferable to the controversial evidence of prices, despite the fact that it must tell us something about all the belligerents and in particular which side Spain was on. Measured by the metal reserves of the Bank of Amsterdam, the Spanish Succession War exerted a much harder strain than all but the last two years of its predecessor. Still more significant, for the leading centre of international payments, the scale of discounting, though not always of the total balances or the number of account-holders, follows closely the curve of the metal reserves6. Moreover there is a broad concordance between this and the Amsterdam shipping figures. Here, since I do not wish to weary you with statistics, let us be content to notice a marked dip for the first two or three years of each war and another one as the wars drag to a finish; but with the difference that the second and longer war shows a more depressed profile, unrelieved by any striking recovery such as occurred in 16931695. What figures we have for English ports show a rather different pattern : a truly
4. J. Keith Horsefield, British Monetary Experiments, 1650-1710 (Cambridge, Mass., 1960) 5-12; D. W. Jones, 'London Merchants and the Crisis of the 1690s', in P. Clark and P. Slack, edd., Crisis and Order in English Towns 1500-1700 (London, 1972) 322-327 ; N. W. Posthumus, De geschiedenis van de Leidsche lakenindustrie, II (The Hague, 1939) 1001, 1010, 1142. 5. Yearly numbers of ships (both ways) paying Sound tolls, according to N. E. Bang and K. Korst, Tabeller over Skibsfart og Varetransport gennem 0resund, 1661-1783 ..., I (Copenhagen, 1930)42-55: 1700 = 2,866; 1701 = 3,193; 1702 = 2,828; 1703 = 2,415; 1704 = 2,994; 1705 = 2,821; 1706 = 2,913; 1707 = 2,524; 1708 = 2,664; 1709 = 2,296; 1710 = 1,413; 1711 = 1,600; 1712 = 1,626; 1713 = 2,293; 1714 = 2,466; 1715 = 1,561; 1716 = 1,236; 1717 = 1,091; 1718 = 1,309; 1719 = 1,943; 1720 = 2,417. 6. J. G. van Dillen, Bronnen tot de geschiedenis der wisselbanken, II (The Hague, 1925) 985; cf. the graph at p. 392 in idem, Mensen en achtergronden (Groningen, 1964). The figures are conveniently printed in The New Cambridge Modern History, VI (Cambridge, 1970) 902.
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sensational drop in the Nine Years War but a more modest one later, also with a tendency to recover towards the end of each war7. Unless Amsterdam's trade was considerably more vulnerable to privateering attack than England's - I will look into this later - the explanation of this broad contrast is likely to be found in what was happening to the city's Baltic connections. We can hardly fail to be impressed by the drastic decline in Dutch sailings through the Danish Sound during the Nine Years War8. Only in 1700 were they affected by the outbreak of the Great Northern War, so the decline is most likely attributable to the virtual cessation of Holland's complementary trade with western France in wines, brandies and salt. What is harder to interpret are the still lower levels of these sailings in the next war, after 1705, when an open trade with the French ports (under passes issued by Versailles) was resumed on a large scale until 1710, at the end of which year the French government stopped it, at some cost to its own exporters, in order to force the Republic to make a separate peace. What contrivances Dutch merchants adopted for maintaining some shadow of this almost essential traffic I hope to study in more detail on a later occasion. It is clear enough, however, that many of them 'coloured' cargoes to France during the years of prohibition on board neutral ships, if they did not also own the ships themselves. To understand this, I must next turn briefly to the Scandinavians themselves. The fact is that the northern neutrals moved into the carriage of French salt, wines and brandies for themselves, on a wholly unprecedented scale, from 1691, after the Allies had abandoned the attempt to bring them into their own blockade - so much so that the Danes by 1695 were said to be losing their taste for Rhenish and even beer9. The clearance of two hundred Swedish bottoms from Bordeaux alone in the two wine-years 1703-1705 may come as a surprise to anyone who supposes that the war in Poland absorbed all Sweden's shipping resources. During the 1690s these had increased to 'no less than 750 ships'10. Like the Swedish, the
7. Graphs for convoyen and licenten, incoming vessels and lastgeld in Algemene Geschiedenis der Nederlanden, VII (Utrecht, 1954) 313; table of English clearances in Ralph Davis, The Rise of the English Shipping Industry (London, 1962) 26. 8. Bang and Korst, Tabeller, I, 38 ff., 147 if.; cf. 10-yearly averages tabled in A. M. van der Woude, Het Noorderkwartier (A. A. G. Bijdragen, XVI; 3 vols., Wageningen, 1972) II, 383. 9. Oscar Albert Johnsen, Innberetninger fra denfranske legasjon i Kjobenhavn vedrerende Norge 1670-1791,1 (Oslo: Norsk Historisk Kjeldeskrift-Instituut, 1934) 201-202. Cf. Bang and Korst, Tabeller, I, 30 if. for figures of ships out of French ports (expressed as 3-year averages). If only because of Danish and Swedish holdings on the Elbe, to say nothing of Norway and Gothenburg, their figures understate the Nordic trade with France. For example, departures from Bordeaux alone (admittedly far the most important) in the wine-year (1 Oct. - 30 Sept.) 1704-1705 totalled 36 for Denmark, 33 for Norway, 119 for Sweden, and 9 for Danzig: C. Huetz de Lemps, Geographie du commerce de Bordeaux a la fin du regne de Louis XIV (Paris-The Hague, 1975) 63. Cf. my article, 'Le commerce de la France de l'ouest et la guerre maritime, 1702-1712', Annales du Midi, LXV (1953) 49-65, where the statistics relate to calendar years; see below, pp. 389-406. 10. E. F. Heckscher, An Economic History of Sweden (Cambridge, Mass., 1954) 113-114.
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Norwegian and Danish marines had long been stimulated, at Dutch expense, by the English Navigation Acts ; but the Nine Years War imparted a much stronger boost: Danish tonnage virtually doubled between 1688 and 1696, while the Norwegian expanded nearly threefold11. These merchant fleets entered the French trade in"strength, moreover, just when they were called upon to carry a much higher proportion of timber, naval stores, iron and copper to their principal markets in the Texel, Thames, Humber, Tyne and Forth12. The wars of the Grand Alliance presented them with an unprecedented opportunity. Almost the only point on which the Northern Crowns co-operated, although by no means without friction, was to provide each a warship, two or three times a year, for their joint convoys to Dunkirk and beyond. In the winter of 1693-1694 Jean Bart himself came to the rendezvous at Flekkr0 ('Vlecker' on the old Dutch maps, at the entrance to Christiansand sound), and there are indications that Danish corn-shippers would have liked more such escorts, even if there were runners who preferred to sail under Ostend colours and get themselves captured, collusively, by Dunkirk privateers - a method which sometimes suited the Holsteiners and the Danish communities on the Elbe, at Glckstadt and Altona (and Swedish Stade on the opposite bank), which were subject to Imperial law and consequently to the avocataria prohibiting trade with France13. I have no French figures for the Nine Years War, but in the eighteen months June 1703-December 1704, there were entered at Bordeaux alone no less than 66 vessels from Stockholm and 42 from other ports under Swedish domination, 41 from Copenhagen, 45 from Norway, and 29 from the little ports of Slesvig-Holstein. By 1712 (again without Dutch competition) these last, to the number of 53, are virtually the only Scandinavian survivors in the Gironde - sad testimony now to the maritime hostilities, outside as well as within the Sound, between the Northern Crowns14. Just when the French Crown embarked on an extremely rigorous economic blockade of the United Provinces at the end of 1710, the Northern marines had at last begun to cripple each other.
11. Respectively, 23,799 and 40,319 laester in 1696: J0rgen H. P. Barfod, Danmark-Norges Handelsflade 1650-1700 (Kronborg, 1967) 86-87, 160-197. Cf. Bengt Lorentzen, Bergen og Sj0farten, I (Bergen, 1959) 245; P. J. Charliat, ed., 'Mmoires indits de thor M0hlen a la cour de France', Ber gens - Historiske Forening, XXXIII (1927) 11 ; Wilhelm Keilhau, Norway and the Bergen Line (Bergen, 1953) 35-36. 12. R. Davis, The Rise of the English Shipping Industry (London, 1962) 334-336; B. Bothius and E. F. Heckscher, Svensk Handelsstatistik 1637-1737 (Stockholm, 1937) Iv; T. C. Smout, Scottish Trade on the Eve of Union 1660-1707 (Edinburgh, 1963) 153-161. 13. Under conventions dated 10 March 1691 and 27 March 1693: see G. N. Clark, The Dutch Alliance and the War against French Trade 1688-1697 (Manchester, 1923) 103-105; Charliat, 'Mmoires indits', 314; Johnsen, Innberetninger, 75, 99,106-107,129-139,164, 196. 14. Bordeaux, Archives) D (partementales de la) Gironde, 6B 124 and 125: 'Lettres de mer', 28 June 1703 - 24 Dec. 1704 and 6 Nov. 1711-12 Nov. 1712. Cf. Huetz de Lemps, Geographie, 63, for departures 1703-1705: Swedish total 198; Danish-Norwegian 128; Slesvig-Holstein 52.
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I have emphasised this Scandinavian intervention in the Biscay trade not only as a comment on the failure of the king-stadholder's precocious conception of economic warfare, but because without it - and that of the Hanseatics - the privateers of south-east England, Zeeland and even Dunkirk would have had a poorer time of it and spared all the belligerent powers a sequence of diplomatic embarrassments, not to mention the fierce rows which blew up between The Hague and Middelburg over the 'political' suspensions ('surcheances') of prize cases in 1703-1705, before Zeeland valour was bought off by a doubling of the premium awarded for capturing enemy warships on any sea15. Although most of the arrested neutrals, with or without their cargoes, were released in the end, the interruption of their voyages could be prolonged, expensive and embittering, not least when princes and their ministers had a stake in the cargoes, as was true of all Danish ministers, or when the privateers exploited technical faults in passports approved by them16. When corn was unilaterally added by the Maritime Powers to the contraband list, in 1693 and 1709, arrested cargoes were taken out and paid for ; but often, in other cases, on the plea of just cause of seizure, owners failed to recover costs and damages17. In the Nine Years War, not least whenever there was a harvest failure in France, the English navy took a big hand. In fact, the High Court of Admiralty had far more neutral cases to try than even the Conseil des Prises, while in this respect the prize business of the admiralty at Middelburg, for all the embarrassment it created at
15. I may refer to my article 'Les corsaires zlandais et la navigation scandinave pendant la guerre de la succession d'Espagne', in M. Mollai, ed., Le navire et V economie maritime de V Europe, below, pp. 43548. These disputes did not reach flash-point in the time of the king-stadholder, though he complained of the Zeelanders and sometimes cancelled their commissions. 16. Ibidem, 93-95. The many ambiguities surrounding the authenticity of Danish passes are conveniently summarized by Hugh Greg, the British charg d'affaires at Copenhagen 1692-1701, in P(ublic) R(ecord) O(ffice), SP 75/23, fos. 16-22, 28-31; cf. copy of his 'present thoughts' (early 1694) in Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Rawl. A 345, fos. 245-250, containing an analysis of Danish obligations under the traite provisionnel of 30 June 1691, as modified by Van Amerongen's seven 'elucidations and amplifications' before ratification of the Convention on 25 December. D'Usson de Bonrepaus, French ambassador at Copenhagen 1693-1697, expressed admiration for Amerongen's cleverness, in a retrospective 'Relation des negotiations d'Usson de Bonrepaus', Archives des Affaires Etrangres, Danemark 36, fos. 24-26 v. Cf. S. P. Oakley's unpublished London Ph.D. thesis, 'William III and the Northern Crowns during the Nine Years War' (2 vols., 1961) especially ch. vi-vii. 17. 'Just cause of seizure' occurs frequently in the judgements of the Conseil des Prises. The English attitude to demands for compensation was stated by the Admiralty judge Sir Charles Hedges (PRO, SP 75/23, fo. 127 v.): 'That the Crown of England is not answerable for the actions of the Privateers ... where the parties who pretended to be injured... shall prosecute them for satisfaction'. Instead, complainants too often resorted to diplomatic protests: half a dozen examples in PRO, SP 75/23, fos. 106,109, 112. If the captor was a naval ship, on the other hand, the Privy Council might order release of a prize before it came into court at all: ibidem, fos. 109V-110: 'The Arms of Frederickshall', Olafsen, and 'The Gilded Unicorne', Tortensen, both discharged by the Prize Officers.
49
The Hague, looks modest enough by comparison with either18. There is no parallel to Admiral Rooke's seizure of an entire Swedish convoy of 90 sail in 1697; and as many Swedes had been awaiting judgment in London in March 1694, when also the Dutch held 50 and the French 3019. This is an untypical year because so many of the Allies' interceptions in 1694 were cornships, while at the same time the States General were freely arresting Danes in Dutch harbours by way of reprisals for the stopping of a score of'Great Flyboats' at Elsinore20, so let me also mention a list of 71 claims put in by Christian von Lente, Danish Resident at The Hague, on 21 May 1693 to the British government; although it is true that 34 of these vessels were restored or discharged, Lente omitted 61 others which had been confiscated - a total of condemnations in London to date, therefore, of 98, mostly with the cargoes21. With others still to come22 - and with the Dutch abandoning for Denmark, though not for Sweden, their old principle of 'free ships, free goods' - it does not look as if the judicious d'Usson de Bonrepaus, looking back on his disappointing embassy to Copenhagen (1693-1697), was exaggerating all that much when he wrote that the Maritime Powers had arrested nearly all Danes bound to France in these years23. This, he thought, they owed to the 'elucidations' cleverly added by Van Amerongen to their Convention with Denmark of 1691, renewed in 1696 and far more oppressive than the earlier treaties of the Maritime Powers with Sweden, which Stockholm refused to revise: for instance, Danes, but not Swedes, would be protected only when carrying to an enemy port - and this directly there and back goods that 'do really belong and without any Collusion belong to real Danish subjects, living without the bounds of the Empire, and sworn to ... '. Thus, strictly, the Swedes could carry Danish goods, but not vice versa; and foreign masters,
18. Infra, n. 114. The admiralty board admitted that it might err under pressure of business: Algemeen Rijksarchief, The Hague (ARA), Staten Generaal, Admiraliteitsarchieven 2525, 26 March 1704. 19. Clark, Dutch Alliance, 113-114. 20. The circumstances are detailed by Greg, PRO, SP 75/23, fos. 270-282. The London Gazette, no. 2949 (12 Feb. o.s. 1694), reported the seizure of between 30 and 40 Danish ships at Amsterdam. On cornships taken into Dover by English privateers, cf. ibidem nos. 2937-2938 (1 and 5 Jan. o.s. 1694). 21. PRO, SP 75/23 fos. 101-113, 248-249; 34 names in Lente's list appeared on a similar one presented by Scheel, Danish Resident in London, on 9 May o.s. 1692 (on which a copy of Hedges's comments is in the Bodleian Library, MS. Rawl. A 345, fos. 297-301), but not in Scheel's list of 15 ships of 4 Jan. o.s. 1692/1693 (SP 75/23, fos. 3-4). Cf. Hedges to Nottingham, 26 May o.s. 1692, London, British Library (Reference Division), Add. MS. 9764, fos. 19-29. 22. The notes by Owen Wynne in Codrington Library, Oxford, Wynne MSS. LR2 E23, for July 1694 to Oct. 1695, sum up the arguments of the parties in dispute: on 27 July 1694, when 39 Danes were restored (some upon bail and time to prove property), the Danish Resident was present in court. 23. 'Relation Bonrepaus'.
50
owners and freighters, to comply with the Convention, would have to take an oath to reside in Denmark-Norway, with their families, for ten years24. Diplomacy in the northern capitals in this period had a dramatic quality all its own, but clearly the twin realm was much more vulnerable than Sweden to pressure from the Maritime Powers, as we are again reminded by their dictation of a settlement over Gottorp at Altona in 1689 and Travendal in 170025. At Stockholm they had to rely on Bengt Oxenstierna, the powerful if greedy chancellor, to resist a strong French party and to thwart Danish initiatives there for an armed neutrality. When the Maritime Powers sought a new commercial treaty with Sweden, they got nothing better than a renewal of the 1661 treaty with England, and that not until 1693, with a promise to compensate for ships and goods taken up26. This harsh contrast is the more ironical when mercantilist Sweden's high-handed treatment of foreign merchants is compared with poor Denmark's dependence on them. Bonrepaus had not lived six months in Copenhagen before remarking that fresh meat was served in only a dozen houses there27. The city's economic build-up belongs to the eighteenth century. As yet agricultural produce, with cattle and horses on the hoof, from Jutland or Holstein, was about all the country had to export. Its trade deficit with Europe was balanced by Norway's sawn and mast timber, skins, stockfish and trainoil, with some inferior tar and copper; in wartime too, Bergen's shipowners developed an entrepot traffic in wines and brandies. But the sister-realm herself was chronically short of credit. Scottish and Dutch skippers bought most of their supplies for cash at the loading-places ; English importers more often paid in bills but extended long credit and bore all shipping charges - in the case of timber always a high proportion of the total landed cost28. Until the great debacle of 1710 in the North, it is true, Norway's (and especially Bergen's)
24. Greg's 'thoughts', Bodleian Library, MS. Rawl. A 345, fo. 249. He does not regard as essential the ambassadorial 'recommendatory letters' for which the Convention provided ; Bonrepaus admitted his incapacity to issue these 'lettres d'accompagnement' on any sound basis, but the Danes pressed for them (Johnsen, Innberetninger, 81-82,144 if., 177-178, 210). 25. See Preben Torntoft, 'William III and Denmark-Norway, 1697-1702', English Historical Review, CCCXVIII (1966) 1-25; R. M. Matton, Charles XII of Sweden (London, 1968) 21-22, 60-63.86,99-118,125-139. 26. Clark, Dutch Alliance, 101-106, 112-113; cf. 'Relation Bonrepaus', fos. 27-29, and Greg's dispatches in PRO, SP 75/23, fos. 243-250. 27. Johnsen, Innberetninger, 91. 28. Smout, Scottish Trade, 154-158; J. Le Moine de l'Espine, Le ngoce d'Amsterdam, in Lucas Jansen, De koophandel van Amsterdam (Amsterdam, 1946) 382; H. S. K. Kent, 'The AngloNorwegian Timber Trade in the Eighteenth Century', Economic History Review, 2nd ser. VIII (1955-1956) 67-69. De l'Espine mentions other Dutch exports, but most of these depended on the existence of a French and Spanish trade with the United Provinces. The Scots might take corn when they had it; the Orkneys relied on the Norwegian market to take their surplus (Smout, Scottish Trade, 51, 75, 81, 154). Kent, 'Anglo-Norwegian Timber Trade', 71, gives figures of deal imports to London and the outports, respectively 16,500 and 11,000 Hundreds in 1700; 16,000 and 7,500 in 1706; but only 10,000 and 4,000 in 1710.
51
earnings from freights and charterparties enjoyed a wartime boom, thanks to the new openings in Biscay, the increased carriage of its English trade, and some substitution for Dutch carriers. On the other hand, timber exports were not what they had been ca. 1650; the fisheries suffered from poor catches in the 1690s; and well before the great fire of 1702 destroyed the Kontoir at Bergen, J0rgen thor M0hlen's famous industrial enterprises had come to grief in his West Indian ventures and an issue of paper notes which he could not honour, magnate as he was29. How in all these circumstances was Denmark-Norway to finance its expanding French trade? The corn shipped to France in time of dearth was handled with advances from Paris or Rouen by a few Copenhagen merchants whose very names tell a tale: de la Sablire, Pallados, Samuel Teixeira, Jacob Abensoer . . . Fallacies and Teixeira were correspondents of an operator called Alvarez at Danzig ; Abensoer, who also contracted for gunpowder and naval stores, came to Copenhagen in 1691 from Altona and represented Polish interests there at a time when he had six ships condemned by the prize court in London30. Such men, doubtless scenting the enormous potential of the neutral carriers, owned ships in partnership with Theodor Balthasar von lessen, head of the Tyske Kancelli (1688-1700), and others of the Danish court; their ships and cargoes appear in the prize courts of all the belligerents31. But were they always the true owners? Bonrepaus, who did his best to encourage their French connections, tells us in a pregnant passage32:
J'ay dcouvert de quelle manire cela se fait. Un Hollandois ou un Hambourgois vient dans une ville de Dannemark, et spose par une obligation simule qu'il a prest une somme a un marchand danois ; cette somme est employee a l'achapt d'un vaisseau, de marchandises ou autres choses qui leur conviennent, sous le nom d'un Danois qui fait ensuitte le serment que le tout luy appartieni et est pour son compte; mais avant que le chargement parte, il fait une retrocession a l'estranger qui luy a prest cette somme, moyennant quelque petit intrest qu'il conserve dans ce chargement que l'estranger luy donne, tant en consideration de ce qu'il luy a preste son nom, que pour l'engager a rclamer le vaisseau, en cas qu'il soit pris par les corsaires fran9ois.
29. Keilhau, Norway, 38; F. N. Stagg, North Norway (London, 1952) 99 if. Johnsen prints thor M0hlen's fantastic proposals in 1699 for a European trading company to be financed by the French government (Innberetninger, 244-251,259-261,264-265); cf. Charliat, 'Mmoires indits', 314. 30. PRO, SP 75/23, fos. 104-105; cf. Johnsen, Innberetninger, esp. 44, 48, 62-64, 68-69, 74. Details of other merchants in ibidem, 101,114,117,119,131,138,140,152,172,173,177. Bonrepaus listed 21 Copenhagen merchants trading with France, one of whom (Edinger) also worked for the Allies: Charliat, 'Mmoires indits', 318 ff. 31. For claims of lessen and Reventlow (the chief minister) from the French see Johnsen, Innberetninger, 99, 108, 116, 145-146, 176; and from the English, PRO, SP 75/24, fo. lllv. Cf. Add. MSS. 24107, fo. 138 on the release of 'a small parcel' of wines, etc. claimed by Jessen and Count Joachim Ahlfeld: 'I think it is a respect due to their quality' (Hedges to Trumbull, 15 Oct. o.s. 1697). 32. To Pontchartrain, 30 Sept. 1693 : Johnsen, Innberetninger, 98.
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It might be amusing to know more about the mechanism of these fictitious sales : to know for instance how far the well-worn insurance tracks to Amsterdam and Hamburg facilitated them, or bottomry bonds for the ships33. As Bonrepaus also observed, the 1691 Convention, by confining Danish trade with France to Danish subjects, forced them in effect to lend their names and flag to the enemy34. They could neither have financed this trade alone nor dispense with the accumulated business knowledge and connections ot the Dutch and Hamburgers at their French destinations, least of all Bordeaux, where even the more strongly placed Swedes had no consul till 170535. That is a cardinal date in this story, marking a resumption of the Franco-Dutch traffic for the first time in these wars - at the rate of 2,000 vessels a year according to the authoritative Conseil de Commerce in Paris. My own count of the French passports utilized suggests a much lower overall figure36, but it is high enough to imply an immense demand on the neutral carriers over the years when the Dutch were forbidden. When the Dutch did return to Bordeaux in strength, moreover, they came from all parts of Holland and also from Zierikzee, although hardly at all from Middelburg and Vlissingen, for whose capers Biscay steadily remained a favourite cruising-ground37. Even then, as the Sound registers indicate 38, there
33. One-eighth of 'The Jung Frow Hellena', a Swede condemned as Dutch on 23 Oct. o.s. 1695 (Wynne MSS., LR 2 E. 23), was alleged to have been mortgaged to an Amsterdammer. 34. 'Relation Bonrepaus', fo. 25. 35. Paris, A(rchives) N(ationales), F12 51, fo. 402v. : Conseil de Commerce, proces verbal, 5 May 1705. 36. Ibidem, 51, fo. 399 (21 April 1706) and 54, fo. 158 (23 March 1708); Amales du Midi, LXV (1953) 66. The totals for Bordeaux, La Rochelle and Nantes (easily the most important of French ports for this trade, for Dunkirk was still forbidden) are as follows: 1705 = 402; 1706 = 691; 1707 = 747; 1708 = 729; 1709 = 512; 1710 = 303; 1711 = 108. It still needs to be said that trading with the enemy did not depend solely on Dutch policy; no French passports were accorded during the year before the 'interdiction' of 1 June 1703, nor immediately after its lifting on 1 June 1704, and they were revoked by Ordonnance of 19 Nov. 1710, nominally to revive the course (AN, F12 55, fo. 182). On the passport system at Bordeaux see Huetz de Lemps, Geographie, 67-93. 37. AD Gironde, 6B 81 to 85 ('registre des passeports'):
1704
Northern Holland and ZuiderZee Southern Holland 'Holland' Zeeland 11
1705
71 141 36 70
1706
108 162 179 54
1707
199 193 11 86
1708
299 124 3 77
1709
103 83 4 50
1710
65 78 29
The Conseil de Commerce rejected the rumour that some of these ships gave information to the capers (AN,F12 51, fo. 85v.). 38. Bang and Korst, Tabeller, I, 30 if. The Conseil de Commerce liked a degree of competition, but the neutrals were given special favours such as the remission of tonnage duty. On 28 July 1705 it was ruled that the Danes might come in vessels bought from the enemy after the outbreak of war: Citoyen Lebeau, Nouveau code des prises ... (3 vols. Paris, an VII) I, 290-291.
53
was room for the Scandinavians - until the great debacle of 1710. Significantly, however, the fact that they were coming in 1710 in mere driblets was used as an argument for revoking the passports of the Dutch, who would now be unable to fall back on a Scandinavian disguise and so find themselves that much more in a hurry to make peace39. Earlier French rules concerning the neutrals showed full awareness of wolves in sheep's clothes40. One wolf was Hamburg, whose role almost throughout these wars was formally that of a belligerent, doing its best to be treated as a sheep. Its local politics could be stormy. The Senate, always under strong pressure from the burghers and reluctant to publish the Imperial avocatoria prohibiting trade with the enemy, twice dragged its feet for over a year after the Empire had gone to war - and made little effort to enforce the avocatoria when they had been published. Hamburgers were trading with hostile Spain and pressing for French passports even before the Emperor followed the States General in lifting the Allies' Interdiction of 1703-170441. But this time, unlike 1689-1697, the French were slow to co-operate: it was said that the Hamburgers would mask Dutch ships, or bring Baltic produce of high value which was not allowed to the Dutch. Their merchant fleet in 1706 was estimated at 400 vessels - twice as many as Bremen and Lbeck combined42. When permission was eventually given to Hamburg in 1706, it was for light ships only, to come in ballast and subject to securities which the Hamburgers, suggestively, had tried to avoid. With the renewed embargo on the Dutch some of these restrictions were relaxed by 1711, when the three Hansa cities between them loaded 32 ships at Bordeaux, rising to 77 in 171243. However, the indications are that a great deal of
39. AN, F12 55, fo. 185 : this was a heavy price for the French to pay - the whole prosperity of a wide area between Loire and Gironde, and its fiscal resilience. 40. 'Reglements' of 17 Feb. 1694 and 23 July 1704: Lebeau, Nouveau Code, I, 188-189, 283-289; concerning the Danes in particular, ibidem, 281-282, 290-291. 41. Britain gave approval on 23 November 1705, but did not mention Spain, with which she was now resuming trade herself: PRO, SP 82/21, fos, 30, 158, 208; SP 82/22, fo. 22 (Wich to Harley, 17 July, 30 Sept., 14 Dec. 1705, 6 March 1706). AN, F12 51, fos. 235v. (23 Jan. 1704), 333 (10 June 1705), and Marine B7 230 (Nov. 1703). 42. AN, F12 51, fos. 351, 396v., 416: the figures are those of Abbe Bidal, the French envoy who stayed on at Hamburg throughout this war, although in 1691 he had had to leave, much to the displeasure of Louis XIV. 43. Ibidem, fos. 420, 425-426 (14 and 21 July 1706); cf. Marine B7 225 (Bidal to Pontchartrain, 30 June, 3 July, 1702). Departures from Bordeaux under Hanseatic flags are recorded in AD Gironde, 6B 82 to 86 as follows: 1706 1707 1711 1712 1708 1709 1710 1 Hamburg 10 17 15 7 41 9 Lbeck 2 1 9 19 Bremen 4 5 2 1 6 17 1 16 20 12 8 77 32 The 1711-1712 figures would have been higher had the Hanseatics been allowed to buy Dutch ships and employ Dutch crews.
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the earlier Danish-Swedish commerce with France (and at times Spain) was on Hanseatic account, an outstanding example being the predominantly Hamburger interest in the Swedish convoy arrested by Rooke in July 169744. To understand this we need only remember the Swedish and Danish territories on the lower reaches of Elbe and Weser, particularly the little towns of Altona, Glckstadt and Stade on the difficult estuary of the Elbe, where it was often necessary to unload cargoes into lighters for transport up to Hamburg. Swedish passports were readily available from the royal representatives at Stade (and for that matter in Swedish Pomerania). At Danish Glckstadt and Altona, described in 1691 as owning a mere half dozen ships of their own, it was said that over two hundred borrowed their flag45. Any connection with these places, or with Stade, created a prima j"ade suspicion in the prize courts ; indeed, for the belligerents, it was entirely a diplomatic question whether all Danish and Swedish possessions in the Empire should not be treated as falling within its jurisdiction, and therefore subject to the avocatoria as the captors of prizes argued46. In this as in other ways, French policy usually showed more consideration for the Swedes. An ordonnance of 23 January 1704 ruled that all Denmark's dependencies in Germany (but not Sweden's) were to forfeit their neutrality47. Sweden's client, the duke of Holstein-Gottorp, who by 1704 was paying off his grievance against the Maritime Powers by aiding French capers at Heligoland48, was sometimes treated as a 'prince neutre', sometimes not, his position being further complicated by his possessions in Slesvig, which included the key ports of Husum and Tonnang (Tonningen) and lay outside the avocatoria, whereas Holstein itself did not; as if to make doubly sure of its safety, a Tonnang vessel might arm itself with papers from the innocent duchy of Slesvig. But even that was no sure protection, as the number of Slesvig vessels belonging to Flens-
44. Clark, Dutch Alliance, 114; cf. Bodleian Library, MS. Rawl. B 383, fo. 534, and Johnsen, Innberetninger, 75, 230. 45. Martangis, French ambassador at Copenhagen, 12 June 1691: Johnsen, Innberetninger, 34. Cf. ibidem, 77 for the belief at Versailles that Altona, 'presque un faubourg d'Hambourg, fait a prsent tout le commerce de cette ville': the writer (6 April 1693) was almost certainly Pontchartrain, of all French ministers the one who had most to do with prizes. In a report of 4 Jan. 1692/1693 on 15 arrested 'Danes', Hedges notes 9 of Altona and Glckstadt. Of 7 ships which were the subject of the Swedish envoy's complaint to the States General in 1696,4 came from Stade: ARA, Admiraliteitsarchieven 2519, 18 Jan. 1696. The dispatches of Sir Paul Rycaut (British Library, Reference Division, Add. MSS. 19515 and 37663 and Lansdowne 1153 C and D) are illuminating on the abuse of Danish passports by Hamburgers 1689-1693. 46. AN, Marine C4 262, fos. 146-147, and 267, fos. 298v.-300v. : cases of 'Le Cavalier de Riga' (1696) and 'Le Bien Arrive' (1704). 47. Lebeau, Nouveau code, I, 283-284; AN, F12 54, fo. 123. But the French had deprived Stade of its neutrality in 1694-1697. 48. PRO, SP 82/21, fos. 28, 208 (Wich to Harley, 13 May 1704, 14 Dec. 1705).
55
burg, Sonderborg and Apenrade in the prize records of London and Middelburg attest49. In Slesvig they doubted whether the English lawyers fully grasped the solemn meaning of the river Eider50, and one can understand that even a well-meaning caper might fall into confusion about the legal status of any point on these coasts at any particular time. However, they very well knew that the whole area was under the economic dominion of Hamburg, which indeed handled a large part of England's exports to Denmark51, besides the general commission business it performed for British exporters, particularly after 1689, when the Merchant Adventurers lost their monopoly, with its Hamburg staple. The Conseil des Prises naturally gave short shrift to such a case as the 'Galre de Tonningue', whose owner was described as a citizen of Tonnang but an 'homme de ngoce' of Hamburg; though he had indeed assumed the citizenship of Hamburg to assist restoration of the galley when it was in English hands, he now maintained that he had had the whole Hamburg cargo transported to Tonnang for shipment52. Holstein ships, like so many others, might fetch coal and salt from Newcastle, or export pipestaves to Cadiz, but whale products had more obviously to do with the Hamburg fishery, discouraged as this became from French attacks53. Like the Elbe navigation, Danish or Swedish, the seagoing vessels of Slesvig-Holstein were frequently manned by Hamburgers, whether or not they owned the ships: and a Hamburg shipmaster would naturally suggest a Hamburg owner54. The same applies to the many neutral ships which carried a Dutch master, usually one who had taken out burgersbrieven at some Baltic port. Of course, we must
49. For Zeeland see ARA, Admiraliteitsarchieven 5654, 17 Oct. 1703, 'Lijste van de Pretense Deensse en andere Neutrale Schepen' sent by J. Nachtegaal to St. Gen. ; for Husum, cf. ibidem 2524, 6 June 1703, etc. 'De Hope van Apenrade' was there till 1707. 50. PRO, SP 82/21, fos. 41 (John Scarlett, Husum, 26 June 1704) and 162 (Wich to Harley, 28 July 1705). 51. Ibidem 104/4, Memorial concerning Trade between Denmark and Hamburg, 1702. 52. AN, Marine C4 269, fos. 248-249 (17 Oct. 1706). 53. E.g., cargo of 'Anna Katharina' of Husum, F. Petersen : PRO, H(igh) Qpurt of) A(dmiralty) 32/48. Although the cruises of Duguay-Trouin to the Arctic in 1702-1703 were only moderately successful, the destruction of the enemy's whale fishery remained a fixed objective at Versailles. Dutch sailings to Greenland slumped from 208 in 1703 to 130 in 1704 and an average of 125 from 1705 to 1714, according to the figures in Gerret van Sante, Alphabetische Naam-Lyst van alle de Groenlandsche en Straat-Davissche Commandeurs .,. (Haarlem, 1770); cf. Van der Woude, Het Noorderkwartier, II, 427. Wich at Hamburg, 13 June 1704, refers to 'the loss of the Greenland fishery', for which the Hamburgers bought 30 Danish passports in 1694: PRO, SP 82/21. fo. 36; cf. L. Brinner, Die Deutsche Grnlandfahrt (Berlin, 1913) 228-230. 54. French prosecutors made much of this : e.g., among the confiscations, cases of 'L'Esprance' of Glckstadt and 'La Marguerite' of Altona in AN, Marine C4 257, fos. 234v.-235, and 259, fo. 89v.; cf. ibidem 261, fo. 82, 'St. Pierre' of Lbeck, whose master obtained Stade citizenship. Examples of abuse of Slesvig and Holstein papers in ibidem 266, fos. 27v.-28v., 'Fortune de Toningue', and 267, fos. 173v.-174, 'Armes d'Husum'.
56
allow for some who lived there before the wars, like so many of the Scottish55, but the majority were recent arrivals, even if they did not always take their wives with them56; they would have understood Karl Pietersen, of Ameland, who confessed that he lived at Stade, as shipmaster and owner, 'seulement pour naviguer avec plus de scurit'57. The formalities were so simple that an Irishman, who was established master of a Swedish vessel at Amsterdam, received there not only a royal passport and flag but the freedom of Stockholm58 ; and indeed there are instances of Dutch masters taking control of a neutral vessel at Amsterdam itself, including one who had taken oath before the ambassador at The Hague in 1680 to acquire Stockholm citizenship but not been there since59. J. J. Kuiper, master of the 'Juffrouw Anna' of Karlskrona - Dutch-built like so many other neutral vessels - had the honesty to depose that 'il demeure o il se trouve', but that his owner's father lived in Amsterdam60. While there can be no doubt that war stimulated a certain migration of owners and masters from belligerent to neutral countries, thus adding to the Nordic melting-pot, it is clear that neutrals found it hard to obey the direct-voyage rule imposed by the belligerents. In peace, when ships were free to pick up cargoes according to circumstances, their capacity was already under-utilized61. War accentuated some of the causes - slow turnround and voyages in ballast - while introducing rigidities of its own. Thus a French destination was no protection against French corsairs for neuters which called at enemy ports en route for, say, Bourgneuf or Bordeaux. But since Britain and the Republic on the whole absorbed far more Baltic commodities than the French wanted, a call at Newcastle or Amsterdam, Rotterdam or London, whence cargo or ballast to Bourgneuf or Bordeaux, was better economics than a single voyage outward in light cargo or ballast. So the direct-voyage rule to or from France, though it was prescribed by the Convention of the Maritime Powers with Denmark as well as by French law, was
55. E.g., Alexander Gill at Stockholm (ibidem 264, fo. 82, 'Etoile du Jour'); Alexander Moncrieffat Danzig (ibidem 266, fo. 105, 'Pelican Dor')56. E.g., the masters of 'St. Pierre' and 'Fortune', both of Stockholm (ibidem 257, fo. 157, and 275, fos 43-44), and Willem Tuissen, at Stade (ibidem 266, fo. 108v.-109, 'Dauphin'); Bowe Janssen, at Danzig, had left two children in the Vlie (ibidem 275, fo. 84, 'St. Pierre'); cf. the master of 'Les Armes de Stettin', who was born in Edinburgh and lived at Emden (ibidem 267, fo. 172). On the general practice in Sweden, see the case of 'Neptune' of Carlshaven (Karlshamn)', Claes Backer, PRO, HCA 32/47. 57. Ibidem 261, fo. 18v., 'St. Pierre'. 58. Ibidem 259, 14v.-15v., 'Faucon Jaune', Jacob Gait. 59. Ibidem 261, fos. 112-113, 'Comte de Vrede', Claessen; cf. bidem, fos. 70-71, 'Dauphin Blanc', 135-137, 'Demi-Lune', and 262, fo. 142, 'Fortune Dore' of Danzig. Tuissen (supra, n. 56) took over at Rotterdam. 60. Ibidem 264, fo. 66, 'Demoiselle Anne'. 61. See R. Davis, 'Merchant Shipping in the Economy of the Late Seventeenth Century', Economic History Review, 2nd ser. IX (1956-1957) 59-73.
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frequently flouted62; many were the neutrals caught straying from the course implied in their bills of lading, with or without the weather conniving63. Crews, indeed, were sometimes hired at Dutch ports of call. However, if Scandinavian sails were frequently worked by Dutch seamen, one might equally call attention to the number of Scandinavians in Allied service, despite the militia obligations which kept many of them from emigrating: in 1691 it was claimed that the Maritime Powers employed 8,000 Danes and Norwegians, though this was a French guess64. A kind of lingua franca of the North Sea could make it difficult to distinguish them from the Dutch seamen. It is astonishing how many neutral skippers were unable to produce in court a bill of sale for their foreign-built ships, unless it were a defective one - for instance, with no price stated. It could happen that the buyer's indenture had been mysteriously left with the Dutch seller, which would delay trial, although I have come across only one case of a master, a Holsteiner, lamely agreeing 'qu'il ne connoist pas particulirement les propritaires de son vaisseau'65. Nevertheless, the prize courts often released a ship when they condemned the cargo. So far as this is not evidence of diplomatic courtesy - what the Zeelanders called 'politique Resolution' - it implies genuine changes of ownership. Cargoes, of course, were an entirely different matter. While charterparties were exceptional, bills of lading often covered goods freighted on enemy account, occasionally being sent even overland66. During the years of prohibition, the prize court at London confiscated friendly as well as enemy cargoes on board the neutrals, while usually restoring the ship itself67. The
62. E.g., PRO, HCA 32/65, 'St. John', Blom, and 'Juffrouw Regina', Giese, both of Stockholm; ibidem 64, 'Juffrouw Catharina' of Flensburg, whose master received his pass by post to Amsterdam; ibidem 86 (1), 'White Bear' of Stockholm, whose master received orders at Elsinore to accept cargo at Amsterdam before going on to Bordeaux, where he was laded by Philip Vandenbranden, a 'Flanderkin' ; and ibidem 77 for the case of T. Hielman, master of the 'Patience' of Karlshamn, bound for Bordeaux, who received orders at Amsterdam to exchange his Karlshamn pass for one sent by his owners to Amsterdam. Cf. Huetz de Lemps, Geographie, 70. I have come across a number of such cases for 1696 in AD Gironde 6B 123 ('Lettres de mer'). 63. E.g., AN, Marine C* 259, fo. 104, 'Comtesse de Samsoe'; 261, fos. 47v.-48v., 'Amiti'; 262, 84V.-85, 'Cheval Marin Dor'. 64. Johnsen, Innberetninger, 64, 73. 65. AN, Marine C* 262, fo. 170, 'St. Nicolas'; ibidem fo. 145v., 'Libert de Stade'; ibidem 269, fo. 209v., 'Pigeon Bleu'. 66. E.g., ibidem C* 255, fo. 192, 'Roy de Danemarck'; PRO, HCA 32/54, 'Copperberg', Mandahl; ibidem 11, 'St. Peter' of Arendal. The 'Koperberg' had been freed by the States General on 21 June 1704: ARA, Admiraliteitsarchieven 5655, 18 June. 67. E.g., PRO, HCA 77, 'Princess Hedwig Sophia', 'Pellican', 'Patientia', and 'Patriarch Abraham', all of Stockholm ; 85, 'Vreede' of Flensburg. The last four were laden in 1704 at Bordeaux by Hendrick Lutkens, alternately described as a Hamburger and a Dutchman; the 'Vreede' also by a Hollander, D. Devisch (wines, brandies, plums, molasses), for Hamburg or Emden. Although the 'Pellican's' cargo was for carriage to Hamburg, the mate, a Hamburger, explained in court that delivery would not necessarily be taken there; the master of the 'Patriarch' (who lived at Stettin)
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court at Middelburg added to its sins by doing the same 68. Some cargoes to France had a British taint, but these were usually found in bonafide (though under British law illicit) Irish bottoms for which the French, needing salted beef and pork for the Antilles (and with Irish Jacobites well established as business houses at Nantes and elsewhere), poured out passports69. England herself at this time was more interested in her Iberian trade, sometimes covered by false Spanish papers. These subterfuges, generically known to contemporaries as lorrendraijerij (anglice 'lorendrayery') and based on the closely knit trading communities of the northern seas, at a time when mercantilist economics and economic warfare were driving artificial political wedges into them, present an awkward commentary on the trade statistics of the day. For instance, is it certain that Dutch commerce with the Baltic, or the numbers of Dutch skippers passing that way70, as distinct from Dutch shipping paying toll at the Sound, contracted so much during the 1690s? The tolls paid by English ships would be a poor indication of the nation's unprecedented demand for iron, masts and naval stores, even allowing for the development of its Archangel trade after 1699, when the Muscovy Company lost its monopoly. That Dutch traffic to Archangel then multiplied still further is indeed a pointer to a shortfall of tar, hemp and potash from Baltic sources71 : and yet it was in 1708 that the Dunkirkers, highly expert in the scrutiny of ships' papers, could claim that the
claimed that his orders were for delivery at Emden 'if he came into the North Sea there by contrary winds, but better still for Stockholm'. The 'Uhlostadt' of Stockholm cleared thither at Bordeaux, and later escaped confiscation at Brest on the strength of it, but her true bills were for Emden : ibidem 85. The Consell de Commerce thought that half the Dutch passports (which it authorized itself) were on French account: AN, F12 54, fo. 158,23 March 1708. 68. See the 'Lijste van de Pretense Deensse etc.' in ARA, Admiraliteitsarchieven 5654, 17 Oct. 1703: 'Juffrouw Margarita', 'Vijf Gebroeders', 'Concordia'. The captors allege that the first and last were disguised for Sonderborg by Arnoldus van Leeuwen, a substantial Dordrecht merchant who had obtained the citizenship of Sonderborg (after failing at Flensburg); the 'Hope', Christiansen, a Holsteiner sailing from Harlingen, was accused of trading from Bordeaux to Hamburg; cf. the 'Landgrave von Hesse Cassel', Bilbao to Hamburg (ibidem), 69. Ibidem, 'Propheet Daniel' (Bordeaux to Dublin) and 'Henry and Mary' (Viana to Limerick, allegedly on French account). Cf. PRO, HCA 32/77, 'Prince Frederick', with an English supercargo who owned half the lading from Bordeaux to Copenhagen. Passports were accorded to Irish vessels from Bordeaux alone, 1704-1712, at an average rate of 41 a year, rising from 26 in 1704 to 75 in 1712. In the same period Scottish passes totalled 101 : most of them were issued in 1704-1707, between the passage of the Edinburgh parliament's Wine Act and that of the Union. In 1702-1703 and 1703-1704 numbers involved were only 7 Irish and 6 Scots (Huetz de Lemps, Geographie, 62). The Scots were of course well placed to make use of the constant passage of Norwegian ships to France. France was short of lead, produced in the Lanarkshire hills (Smout, Scottish Trade, 8, 10, 225), and in 1706, when the Union looked likely, the Rouen Jacobite Arbuthnot proposed passes for 20 Scots ships a year to bring it (AN, F12 51, fos. 422v.-423). 70. Cf. Van der Woude, Het Noorderkwartier, 377, 388. 71. See J. M. Price in New Cambridge Modern History, VI, 841-844. Amsterdam alone increased its importation of Archangel tar from 18,000 tons in 1698 to 60,000 tons in 1713.
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Swedes alone were carrying half the enemy's trade72. If we add the 'pretense Deensse', such an estimate may not be too fanciful. But the risks of 'lorendrayery' contributed, along with higher wartime wages and insurance rates, to the cost of freights, normally borne by belligerent merchants. I would suggest that its techniques, as well as its costs, helped to thin out the number of these in some trades, not necessarily involving contraband or naval contracts. There indeed, in the dealings of the English Navy Board with its Baltic suppliers, 'the tritons swallowed the minnows completely'73. But elsewhere, in the prize courts, a few names recur in connection with fraud and collusion : Peter Abestee of Copenhagen, J. P. Heublein of Stockholm, C. J. Mohrsen of Bergen, Andrew Vanderhagen at Amsterdam, Abraham Vanderhagen of Zierikzee, Peter van Arken of Ostend, Derijck Robijn of Dunkirk, Stephen Creagh at London, Daniel Denis at Bordeaux - besides those whom we have met already. The list could with some trouble - for the prize documents make miscellaneous and difficult reading - be lengthened and include members of the consular establishments. There are signs, too, that shipbrokers (courtiers) played a part in the supply of ad hoc documents to the practitioners of free trade, like that John Danielson of Middelburg who 'procured' Jacob Hies from Ostend to be a burgher and next day produced his burgersbrief, Middelburg pass and States pass, for a trip to Bourgneuf74. In Dunkirk at least, some brokers promoted privateering armaments75. Their wartime role would be worth closer investigation. The 'lorrendraijerij comme on 1'appelle'76 was not only practised on 'runners', sailing without convoy, for convoys were highly vulnerable too. Besides the disadvantages of convoys when they came to market, even one of thirty sail (let alone one of three or four hundred) would have its stragglers. The Dunkirk capers, in particular, were trained to insinuate themselves like pickpockets in a crowd, especially as they learned to join forces in a manner to which most privateers were recalcitrant; quite often, too, they attached themselves to the naval squadrons
72. AN, F12 54, fo. 123. Admittedly they had an axe to grind : the Conseil des Prises, which took decisions by majority vote, was showing undue tenderness to Swedes. On the other hand, Bonrepaus, in his 'Relation', fo. 30, had found the Conseiltoo inflexible in sentencing Danes. 73. John Ehrman, The Navy in the War of William HI 1689-1697 (Cambridge, 1953) 60. 74. For Van Arken, PRO, HCA 32/92 (1), 'Hope de Middleborough'. Cf. J. Olsenkemp, master of the 'Charles de Stromstatt', who shortly before leaving Amsterdam handed his passport 'suivant 1'usage ordinaire ... au nomm Cornelle Dolt, courtier de tous les Maitres des Vaisseaux de Nations Etrangres', and later received a different one, 'qu'il a pris sans y faire reflexion': AN, Marine C* 269, fo. 204. 75. F. Morel and P. Struve are so described in the roles de capitation for 1708 : Dunkirk, Archives Municipales, srie 236. In the same year the intendant refers to N. Thiberg as 'courtier jure et aubergiste': AN, Marine B3 155, fo. 151. 76. ARA, Admiraliteitsarchieven 2524, 11 Aug. 1703.
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which got out of Dunkirk every year (though sometimes late) until 1710, well primed with information77. It is true that, even more rapidly than the diplomatic couriers brought news of enemy movements to Versailles and the French ports, advices reached London and the Dutch admiralties from Flanders or Dunkirk itself that Jean Bart, or St. Pol or Forbin, was at sea; messages flew to the outports and put the whole North Sea on the alert, keeping convoys in harbour or causing them to alter course78. But given a few hours' start, on a spring tide by night, the French cruisers could elude the Allied blockading squadrons, whose ships were dirtier, slower and not well provisioned for a long chase. How baffling this was is best gathered from the 'proceedings' of these squadrons - by no means uniformly a failure as an annual summer blockade, though they did subtract twenty or thirty men-of-war from the Confederate fleet - as narrated by Josiah Burchett, who as secretary of the Admiralty had the task of adapting English naval dispositions to the forays of Bart and his successors79. What happened when the convoys had to defend themselves, often heroically, was conscientiously recorded by Jhr. De Jonge80, but many lesser episodes were reported to the amiraut at Dunkirk81. In spite of sensational losses, which wrung angry letters from the king-stadholder to Heinsius besides bringing deputations to The Hague from Amsterdam and arousing storms in the Westminster parliament, notably in 1693, we can see how well the convoys on the whole performed their duty82 ; there was no parallel in the North Sea to the case of the 'Smyrna convoy' in 1693, unless it was Forbin's razzia towards Archangel in 1707, but this was more spectacular than profitable83. At
77. For movements at the Sound, Marstrand and Flekkro, see Johnsen, Innberetninger, passim; cf. Henri Malo, Les corsaires dunkerquois et Jean Bart (2 vols, Paris, 1913-1914) II, 175, 215, 226-227. Thus the French embassy at Copenhagen obtained advance notice of Dutch sailings through Danish sources at The Hague, or from Danzig: Johnsen, Innberetninger, 46, 85. On 23 July 1697 Bonrepaus reported the arrival of 400 sail at Elsinore under two Dutch escorts, which turned for home two days later with 50: ibidem, 239. Cf. J. C. de Jonge, Geschiedenis van het Nederlandsche zeewezen (5 vols, Zwolle, 1869) IH, 495. 78. A notable example was Bart's summer campaign in 1696: Malo, Jean Bart, II, 312-313. Cf. Josiah Burchett, A Complete History of the most Remarkable Transactions at Sea (London, 1720) 549-551, 636-640, 660-661. 79. On the difficulties of obtaining prompt Dutch co-operation, ibidem, 437, 440, 550, 637. 80. De Jonge, Nederlandsche zeewezen, III, 264, 337-340, 407-417, 499-506, 714-715; IV, 31-32, 78-83. 81. There is a series of these 'declarations de capitaines', with gaps for certain years, in AN, Marine C4, 252, 258, 263,268,272-273,276; the 'declarations' for 1710-1711 are now in the naval archives at Cherbourg. 82. Ranke, History of England, VI, 289, 291 ; De Jonge, Nederlandsche zeewezen, III, 377-379, 414, 507; F. A. Johnston, 'Parliament and the Protection of Trade 1689-1694', The Mariner's Mirror, LV1I (1971) 399-413. 83. See H. Malo, La grande guerre des corsaires: Dunkerque 1702-1715 (Paris, 1925) 71-73, 82; cf. Mmoires du comte de Forbin (2 vols., Amsterdam, 1748) 239-252. For the loss of a large part of the Anglo-Dutch convoy to Smyrna, etc. in 1693, see De Jonge, Nederlandsche zeewezen, III, 349-362.
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least during the Nine Years War the joint Danish-Swedish convoys had more to fear, and in 1703-1705 as much from privateers perhaps as from the Confederate navies. The periodical uproar in the English parliament, while it was fed by stories of poor convoy discipline and graft, owed more to miscarriages at sea in general, of which, shocking as they were, hugely inflated figures were bandied about. Hence cruisers were as important as convoys. As the Admiralty Lords put it,
the Trade cannot be secured by Convoys and Cruizers only, but by a sufficient number of Shipps to he employed both as Convoys and Cruizers, and not to be taken therefrom by any other service8*.
By tacking three clauses to a money bill in 1694, the Commons succeeded in setting aside 43 ships, over and above 'convoys to remote parts', for trade protection: they did the same in more explicit form in 1708, prescribing no less than nine cruisers for the northeast coast of Great Britain alone, which shows some tenderness for Scottish resentments of long standing85. One may compare this proportion of nearly one half of the total British 3rd to 6th rate ships in commission in February 1708 with the numbers allocated to trade protection by the Dutch navy in 1696, when it was still powerful: rather more than a third of the comparable rates - 35 out of 93. If we include 'convoys to remote parts' the English allocation is higher still86. After 1702, of course, the defensive emphasis in Dutch policy became stronger, on sea as well as land, revenues and the naval establishment finally contracting together until in 1710 there was scope only for the force in the Mediterranean and the squadron that sailed out every year to meet the returning East-India fleet near the Orkneys, with results only too clearly written in the French prize judgements87. When we look closely at the employment of English cruisers and convoys, nevertheless, we notice how over-stretched they were. A convenient official account for 1694 shows that less than half the cruisers were engaged in North Sea work. Of these, most were concentrated off the Dutch coasts - between Zeeland and Dover early in the year, then in the Broad Fourteens between Texel and Maas - with a
84. Bodleian Library, MSS. Rawl. A 450, fo. 30, copy of letter from Admiralty to Secretary Trenchard, 11 Sept. o.s. 1693. 85. 5 and 6 Will, and Mary, c.l, ss. Ixix-lxxii; 6 Ann., c. 65. Cf. Johnston, 'Parliament', and Smout, Scottish Trade, 67. 86. De Jonge, Nederlandsche zeewezen, III, 746-749: as measured by gunpower, the proportion was just over a quarter. Cf. the lists in J. H. Owen, War at Sea under Queen Anne (Cambridge, 1938) app. B. 87. The whale-fishery traditionally looked after itself, but in 1703 four escorts were reported to Duguay-Trouin at Jan Mayen island: Le Nepvou de Carfort, Histoire de Du Guay Trouin (Paris, 1922) 224; cf. A. Bijl Mz., De Nederlandse Convooidienst 1300-1800 (The Hague, 1951) 92-95.
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view to intercepting French cornships; only a dozen were plying, intermittently, between Tynemouth and the Downs, several of these being detached to guard the mackerel and herring fisheries off Yarmouth and the North Foreland in summer and autumn88. On the other hand, the majority of English short-haul convoys are to be found in the North Sea: up and down the east coast itself, in 1694 (but not always) as far as the Forth, and shepherding the crowded trafile (not forgetting His Majesty's person - eight warships for each crossing) to Holland, Hamburg, Elsinore and Gothenburg - from the Forth, Tyne, Humber, Yarmouth roads, and Thames; the recently established packets between Harwich and Den Briel sailed without convoy (and sometimes fell into enemy hands)89. Various combinations were possible - thus the relatively strong Gothenburg convoy could see the Hamburg trade within fifty miles of Heligoland - and to these we have to add the recoprocal services provided by the United Provinces to Leith, Hull and so on, besides the Dutch fishery guardships moving between Orkney and the Dogger Bank, or off Yarmouth, according to season. It all begins to resemble a map of the London Underground until we recollect the caprices of the winds, the unpredictable timetables, the scarcity of escorts (and in England of crews to man them)90, the many places struggling to keep their transport moving without benefit of convoy - so numerous as to make one ask whether the whole system may not have worked to the advantage of the greater terminals and junctions. To perceive something of the political repercussions of wartime losses, we need some idea of who the losers were. Here, since I face an audience which may not be familiar with the coaling staithes of Northumberland or the drowned valleys of Suffolk, I may claim a privilege like that historian of the English Channel who announced: 'The scope of this book is the English shore of the Channel'91. At this
88. House of Lords Manuscripts, new ser. /, (1693-1695) (London, 1903 ; reprinted 1965) 474-483. Half a dozen were 'off Dunkirk' where the blockading squadron fluctuated in strength, the Dutch usually watching the east channel and the English the west. On the fiasco of the September bombardment and the smoke-machines invented by Mr. Meesters, see Burchett, Complete History, 502-504, 527-529; there was a second attempt in August 1695. Cf. Malo, Jean Bart, II, 267-292. 89. See J. R. Bruijn, 'Postvervoer en Reizigersverkeer tussen de Lage Landen en Engeland ca. 1650-ca. 1870', in P. W. Klein and J. R. Bruijn, ed., Honderd Jaar Engelandvaart (Bussum, 1975) esp. 33-37. There are details in Kenneth Ellis, The Post Office in the Eighteenth Century (London, 1958), who notes the increased volume of official correspondence in wartime; cf. a charming evocation in Charles Wilson, Holland and Britain (London, s.a.) 35-38. In 1693 the French government offered a premium for their capture. Of several packets taken into Dunkirk in 16911693, at least one was the Dutch (Malo, Jean Bart, II, 207, 242 n., 248); during the next war, several appear in the Dunkirk prize jugements and in the captains' declarations, but it is not certain which service they were operating - most probably the Dutch. 90. See (e.g.) House of Lords MSS. 1693-1695, 494; Ehrman, The Navy, 109-120; J. S. Bromley, The Manning of the Royal Navy: Selected Public Pamphlets 1693-1873 (London, Navy Records Society, 1976 for 1974) xxv-xxix, 1-70. 91. James A. Williamson, The English Channel: A History (London, 1959) 13.
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time England's coastal still exceeded her foreign-going tonnage and nearly threequarters of it was on the east coast. It was easily dominated by the colliers - of Whitby, Scarborough, Lynn, Yarmouth, Ipswich, Rochester, etc. - shuttling between Tyne or Tees and the Thames, where coal prices could be politically sensitive. Besides fuel, London obtained much of its food by this route, thanks to a vigorous use of the rivers, especially those which collect into the Humber; thus Cheshire hams and cheeses came to London from Hull, though with more difficulty than Kentish or East Anglian grain92. Only the little ports of Kent, however, were now wholly subservient to the monstrous growth of the capital93. Tyneside, while rivalled by Sunderland and Leith as a coal exporter, was an industrial centre producing salt, glass, bricks, iron or steel tools and heavy forgings, heavily reliant on Sweden; in 1686 nearly as many ships cleared from Newcastle to 'nearby' Europe as from London94. Hull's industrial hinterland, too, between Ouse and Trent, gave it not only a coastal traffic in its own right but a growing volume of imports from Scandinavia and of exports to Holland95. The Bounty Act of 1689 boosted its corn exports, and still more those of East Anglia, when harvests were good. Eastern and even western Scotland, despite a prolonged economic crisis in this period, maintained multiple links with Scandinavia, Hamburg, Bremen and Rotterdam (and Aberdeen with Veere); Scotland also had the unusual distinction during the wars of increasing its share of the herring market beyond the Sound96. Most of Scotland's imports from England came in coasters, especially from London ; but manufactured and entrepot goods also arrived from the United Provinces, which had a strong stake in Scottish shipowning, notably at Bo'ness97. Before noticing wartime losses it is pertinent to recollect that the characteristic vessels in these trades - the flyboats and pinks, the barques and brigantines, the ketches and hoys - were extremely numerous and of small tonnage: barely 80 tons
92. Davis, Shipping Industry, 33; T. S. Willan, The Early History of the Don Navigation (Manchester, 1965) 5. For the cargoes moving between London and the outports in 1683, see idem, The English Coasting Trade 1600-1750 (Manchester, 1938) 204-207. 93. And Chatham dockyard, which explains the considerable imports of Baltic timber and naval stores at Rochester, besides much activity at Ramsgate. The Thames estuary between Rochester and Whitstable was famous in the Netherlands for its oysters. See D. W. Chalklin, SeventeenthCentury Kent (London, 1965) esp. 170-178. 94. Edward Hughes, North Country Life in the Eighteenth Century (London, 1952) 12-13, 61, 159; idem, Studies in Administration and Finance 1558-1825 (Manchester, 1934) 406-408; T. S. Ashton, Iron and Steel in the Industrial Revolution (Manchester, 1924)21,55,110;S. Middlebrook, Newcastle upen Tyne: Its Growth and Achievement (Newcastle, 1950) 88, 109; Davis, Shipping Industry, 211. Cf. Willan, Coasting Trade, 206. 95. Gordon Jackson, Hull in the Eighteenth Century (London, 1972) 7-10,26-32, 51-54, 335-341. 96. Smout, Scottish Trade, 153-166,185-194,223. Some of Glasgow's trade to Holland went out into the Forth, where Bo'ness was the key point, but it already had direct contacts with Scandinavia; its vessels also carried Ulster produce (ibidem, 144-145). 97. Ibidem, 55-56. For trade with England and the Netherlands, ibidem, ch. ix.
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on average in the clearances for Holland and Germany (London included) in 1715-1717, and about 30 tons for Flanders, although the average collier had an estimated capacity of 140 tons in 1702, when there were nearly 1,300 of them - perhaps a superfluity, though incidentally not confined to the transport of coal98. This is the one clear case, apart from the slavers, in which the master and other shipowners, whoever they were", owned also the cargo between loading and delivery; but it is true in general that many merchants were shipowners, often freighting their own ships on their own account as well as chartering or freighting others. Master mariners were often merchants too, or on the way to becoming merchants. Many small vessels were entirely owned by them and so represented a sizeable part of their savings ; buying a ship was a way of rising to be shipmaster. In parallel, a fresh fisherman's capital was locked up in his boat and gear. The recent expansion of English tonnage generally had indeed imposed a huge strain on the nation's capital stock - Sir William Petty, the pioneer statistician, estimated it at no less than ten per cent, exclusive of real estate. Of course shipowners divided their risks, as freighters and insurers did, thus limiting their losses but making it the more likely that they would not escape some. The London insurance market was still immature: it could not cope with such a disaster as overtook the 'Smyrna convoy' in 1693, and later it was claimed that the failures of underwriters in these wars had run to f2,000,0001 . Above all, shipowning itself was still so unspecialized an occupation that a great many investors were at risk. They embraced hundreds of ancillary dealers and craftsmen, such as victuallers, distillers, brewers, vintners, ironmongers, fishmongers, cheesemongers, bakers, salters, apothecaries, warehousekeepers, packers, corn-factors, oil-men, shipchandlers, shipwrights, ropemakers, sailmakers, gunmakers, compass-makers, coopers, joiners, painters, blacksmiths, turners, sword cutlers, upholsterers, glaziers, haberdashers and even barbers101. What is less obvious, English ship98. Davis, Shipping Industry, 209-211; T. S. Ashton and J. Sykes, The Coal Industry of the Eighteenth Century (Manchester, 1929) 199-200; cf. Willan, Coasting Trade, 16. Some colliers already exceeded 400 tons. Besides being switched to the Baltic trade, they are found in the prize records carrying coal, fish, bottles, etc. simultaneously: e.g., 'John and Marian' of Yarmouth (AN, G5 253, 21 March 1712). On the question of a superfluity, see Hughes, North Country Life, 173, 203-204. Ashton and Sykes, 249, tabulate coal exports from the Tyne 1700-1710, showing troughs in 1702,1706-1707,1710 (when there were disturbances among keelmen and shipmasters). 99. Hughes, North Country Life, 162 ff., 201, shows that some parts in ships were held by mineowners. 100. Davis, Shipping Industry, 127, and 'Merchant Shipping in the Economy of the Late Seventeenth Century', 71 ; C. Wright and C. E. Fayle, A History of Lloyd's (London, 1928) 42-51. 101. All prominently represented in PRO, HCA 25/14-20: letter of marque bonds, 1702-1708; giving security for the good behaviour of a privateering captain (or more commonly of an armed merchantman) these could, and as a rule probably did, imply an interest in the armament. At Dunkirk, the principal armateurs (dpositaires) are almost interchangeable with their 'cautions'. On English shipowning generally see Davis, Shipping Industry, ch. v.
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owning extended far beyond the quaysides and counting houses, thanks to the exceptional protection afforded by the law to this type of partnership and to the ease of moving in or out of it102. If it is true that merchant groups were as a rule identified with particular trades, and also as either importers or exporters, evidence is now accumulating that landowners from Kent to Scotland shipped cargoes at their own risk and sometimes held parts of the ships as well ; they too have their nimbus of corn-dealers, brewers, maltsters, and so on103. Whatever the extent of these interests, so much agricultural produce was lifted coastwise, in any case, that even Members of Parliament for inland shires shared the alarms aroused by miscarriages at sea104. Only by recognizing such facts as these - and their echoes in a noisy journalism is it possible to understand British insistence, from 1706 onwards, in making the destruction of Dunkirk a sine qua non of a European peace settlement. Godolphin found it curious that the States General should have resisted this, even if only to use it as a bargaining point in the early Barrier negotiations : as he wrote to Buys, 'in this we cannot doubt of your concurrence, since that place is equally pernicious to the trade both of Holland and England105'. There were grounds for that assumption in the series of plakkaten (1697-1704) awarding a differential premium for enemy warships captured or destroyed in the North Sea: even when the Zeelanders, on 28 July 1705, obtained equal rates beyond the Straits of Dover, as a trade-off for no longer molesting neutral shipping in any trade permitted to Dutch nationals, it was stipulated that privateers must first cruise for a fortnight between Shetland and Dover. While this compulsion is enough to remind us that the Zeelanders - in my view the most formidable privateers on any side in these wars (though fewer than thirty at sea on average for 1702-12) - preferred to operate outside the North Sea, the premiums awarded in 1703-1705 suggest that they found plenty to do here: a total of fl. 638,825 for 113 awards. Although the figure jumped to fl. 927,950 in 1707 and to fl. 706,700 in 1708, for 71 and 56 awards respectively - reflecting the fact that the Channel Soundings, Biscay, the Iberian coasts and the Mediterranean were more remunerative cruising-grounds - there are indications that captures of
102. Ibidem, 102-104. 103. D. W. Jones, 'London Merchants', 326; Chalklin, Kent, 171-172; Smout, Scottish Trade, 72-76. Dr. Smout has argued (ibidem, 272) that the increasing interest of the Scottish nobility in export trade was a major reason why they supported the Union. 104. Johnston, 'Parliament', 403. 105. According to Burchett, Complete History, 435, its destruction by bombardment was considered as early as 1691. From May 1706 Godolphin repeatedly urged Marlborough to attack it and on 14 June wrote to him that 'If wee can't gett Dunquerk by arms, wee must not now think of peace without a condition to demolish it and spoyl the harbour': Snyder, Marlborough Godolphin Correspondence, 563, 570, 587. The demolition was proposed to Buys on 3 Sept. 1706 (ibidem, 666). Cf. J. G. Stork-Penning, Het Grote Werk. Vredesonderhandelingen gedurende de Spaanse successie-oorlog 1705-1710 (Groningen, 1958) 272-275.
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French corsairs in the North Sea increased again in 1710-17II106. On the other hand, I have identified only 33 Zeeland privateers condemned to Dunkirk for the whole of the Spanish Succession War - rather more than ten per cent, say, of those commissioned1 7. Analysis of the sentences handed out by the Conseil des Prises during this war sheds further light on Godolphin's assumption. As against 340 British (including at least 38 Scottish) prizes, no less than 387 Dutch were brought into Dunkirk, while the number of Dutch vessels ransomed is nearly twice the British: 411 compared with 226 (including some 50 Scots). Furthermore, the value of the Dutch ransoms is three times the British: fl. 945,415 (say, 94,000) compared with 32,580 (Scottish 5,980). But this is not all, for on the enemy side the Dunkirkers did not have the North Sea to themselves. Contrary to my own earlier supposition, the small privateers of Calais, which were numerous, were at least as active in the North Sea as in the English Channel, and not merely in the Straits of Dover, where operations could be inhibited by the naval rendezvous in the Downs. If they took fewer Scottish prizes than did the Dunkirkers, they ransomed rather more : 68 against 50, to an approximate value of 6,250, and mostly after 1706. Within the North Sea alone their British ransoms as a whole numbered 371, over twice as many as their Dutch ransoms (171), although here the respective values were approximately equal: 33,900 and fl. 333,750 (say 33,000)108. The
106. Figures collected from ARA, Admiraliteitsarchieven 2524-2526, 2438, 2528-2533; awards declined to 26 in 1710 but rose to 47 in 1711 (ibidem 2536-2537), although by these dates, if not already by 1707, the awards were in arrears, so that they become a less reliable index of year-toyear activity: see 'Some Zeeland Privateering Instructions: Jacob Sautijn to Captain Salomon Reynders' in Ragnhild Hatten and J. S. Bromley, ed., William III and Louis XIV ( 1968), below, chapter 18, pp. 407-34. The plakkaten of 31 May 1697,6 June 1702,28 July 1705 and the ampliatie (doubling in 1704 of premiums for the North Sea only), with various elucidations, will be found in C. Cau's Groot Placaet-Boeck (The Hague, 1658-1796) IV, 217-219, 1268-1269; V, 300-315. 107. AN, G5 234-255, 'Dpouillement des jugements de prises juin 1702 a dec. 1713'. What follows is based on this source. A few of the prizes or ransoms declared at Dunkirk were the work of Calaisien corsairs; equally, the Dunkirkers occasionally declared their prizes at Calais. Both occasionally used Ostend (1702-1706) or Nieuwpoort, as well as Le Havre: these have been allocated to Dunkirk and Calais respectively. The Dunkirk figures also include a small number of prizes taken to Brest and Cadiz. The Calais figures refer only to actions known to have occurred in the North Sea; there were perhaps as many more in the English Channel. 108. The British figure is more likely to be an under-estimate since it excludes a number of cases where the place of capture remains undetermined. Ransom figures are occasionally expressed in livres tournois, which I have converted at 15 to 1 sterling; 12 and 16 It were rates quoted in declarations to the Dunkirk amiraut on 5 Sept. 1696 and 18 Oct. 1707 (AN, Marine C4 263 and 272). Dutch ransoms are usually given in florins, or 'argent de banque d'Hollande', occasionally as 'livres d'Hollande', which means florins too, not vl. There are a few references to ecus and to huis d'or (read as 4 and 20 livres). Most ransom figures include a small sum (usually 5 or 50 fl.) for the capitarne preneur. At Dunkirk this was known as pluntrage, representing a valuation of the captured captain's personal belongings and sometimes those of his officers and crew as well: see Arch. Mun. Dunkerque, 202, no. 9 (5 Aug. 1744). By ordonnance of 2 Dec. 1693 (Lebeau, Nouveau
67
number of British prizes taken into Calais (126) also exceeded the Dutch (86), apart altogether from what were taken in the Channel. When contemporaries referred, therefore, to the ravages of the Dunkirkers, they were including, whether they knew it or not, a substantial fraction of damage attributable to the men of Calais, and this relatively at British expense. The Calaisiens, moreover, willing to ransom for such tiny sums as 6 (a Scottish ferry boat), not infrequently got their ransoms paid on the spot or from the shore without troubling to take a hostage : so far as British coasts were concerned, they displayed a peculiar readiness to pry into bays and estuaries. If we combine the depredations of Calais and Dunkirk, the crude totals of losses by British and Dutch are roughly equal: 466 and 473 prizes, 597 and 582 ransoms, respectively. Yet the average Dutch ransom (fl. 2,190 or 219) was twice the value of the British ( 111). Can the same be said of the prizes? No firm conclusion can be drawn from the evidence available. The British losses to the Calais corsairs within the North Sea consisted very largely of colliers, cornships, and other coastal or fishing vessels; and Dunkirk's record would look less impressive if I had not included in it some prizes taken in the Channel (off Beachy Head or even in the Soundings), mainly from the Iberian, Mediterranean and overseas trades the majority, it is true, bound to (less commonly from) London. However, we are comparing British and Dutch losses, not the performances of Calais and Dunkirk. So there is some significance in the fact that only a round forty Dutch ships were intercepted by the Dunkirkers when bound to or from southern Europe (mainly Lisbon), Guinea, Angola, Surinam and the West Indies, whereas British losses on these hauls, tojthe Dunkirkers alone, were half as many again109. It is more surprising that the Dutch lost fewer than sixty vessels out of the fleets trading with Archangel, Norway and the Baltic, the British about thirty: a tribute to the convoy system. As a rule, these last cargoes - worth less as a rule than those from southern Europe and considerably less than the tropical commodities - were a debit to northern Holland, especially Amsterdam, whose overall losses in 1702-1713 might be reckoned at less than eighty voyages, including a few ransoms110. Only a dozen
code, I,186-187) the maximum ransom was 10,000 livres and the minimum 1,000, refusal of which led to sinking: since we are dealing here primarily with losses, I have included such rare cases in the prize totals. 109. To Dunkirk only: Mediterranean, 6; Spain and Portugal, 27; Azores, Canaries, 6; Guinea, 2; West Indies, 14; other colonies, 9; East Indies, 2. Some of these were of course taken outside the North Sea, in one case off Cape Clear, while another 21 prizes were intercepted off the south coast of England. 110. In 1702 the 'Esperance' and the 'Jeune Estienne et Andre', bound from the Baltic to Amsterdam, were ransomed for 1,200 and 3,900 florins ; the former was from Danzig in grain (AN, G5 235, fo. 1); in 1709 a Scot bound to Danzig paid 250 (ibidem 248, 1 July). Given the rough manners of the captors and the fatigues of going hostage, it cannot be assumed that these vessels and cargoes were worth a lot more to their owners.
68
voyages were to or from Portugal and the Mediterranean, perhaps a couple from the West Indies, and one in ballast to the East; on these hauls Rotterdam and the Zeeland ports experienced more disappointments111. Relatively, the outstanding victim was the versatile Zierikzee : forty ships taken prize - from Norway, Hamburg, Tyneside, Scotland, Ireland and Portugal - in timber, coal, lead, butter, fruit, wines, coffee, shrimps and salmon, not to mention oysters from Rochester and Falmouth and its own fishing vessels, mostly with cod. To this we must add thirty or forty Zierikzee ransoms, nearly all ex-fishery, at prices ranging between fl. 1,250 and fl. 2,400. It was, in fact, the herring and cod fisheries of Zierikzee and, above all, of the Maas ports that accounted for the bulk of all Dutch ransoms - Maassluis in particular, with fifty laden fishing vessels carried off to Dunkirk in addition (compared with nine of Vlaardingen)112. The cost of this one war to the fisheries of the Maas towns alone might be conservatively computed at fl. 1,250,000. No great sum perhaps for Amsterdam to reckon with? So was it because the privateering war was felt most acutely on the Maas and in Zeeland that the great city apparently cared so little for the demolition of Dunkirk? The hypothesis might be strengthened if we knew more, first, about the relative stake of southern Holland and Zeeland in the trade with the British Isles and, second, about that of northern Holland in the cargoes carried by neutral and Hanseatic shipping. Both Hamburg and Stade in this war suffered severely from the Dunkirkers, the Norwegians and Danes less so than in the previous war113. Was it only for diplomatic reasons that Zeeland's interference with all these did not endear that province to the Hollanders? As during the first half of the Nine Years War, foreign envoys (including the Imperial ambassador) had some sharp words for the alleged malpractices of Middelburg and Vlissingen during the earlier years of its
111. The total losses of Middelburg and Vlissingen, excluding privateers but including half a dozen slavers, were approximately 15 in each case, compared with Rotterdam's 23. 112. But Vlaardingen lost 10 to the Calaisiens, Maassluis 14 and Zierikzee 11. Delfshaven and Schiedam suffered lightly at the hands of French corsairs; nor was Dunkirk responsible for the decline of the herring fishery of Enkhuizen, noticed by Van de Woude, Het noorderkwartier, 403. By international convention, the fresh fishermen were left alone, so long as they carried no salt or barrels: see (e.g.) ARA, Admiraliteitsarchieven 2756, letters of 31 July 1702 and 12 March 1703 from Vergier at Dunkirk. But in this something depended on local agreements: thus in 1708 the Amsterdam admiralty is found proposing the same freedom for the Texel fishery as the Zeelanders enjoyed with Dunkirk (AN, F12 54, fos. 163v.-170). Breaches were sufficiently frequent to give rise to an Anglo-French treaty between the belligerents in May 1708, renewed in 1710, though complaints from both sides continued till the end of the war. No such treaty was made with the Dutch, because they wanted it to extend to their cod and herring fisheries. 113. 34 Hamburgers were taken to Dunkirk and two were ransomed; but there were also 21 prizes allegedly belonging to Stade and 29 Swedes. Cf. 19 Norwegians, 7 Danes (but only one of Glckstadt and none of Altona in this war), a dozen Holsteiners and 11 Danzigers. All five of the prizes flying the flag of Brandenburg were alleged to be on Dutch account, as was one bound to Emden and several to Hamburg. Bremen lost seven vessels captured and three ransomed, mostly trading with London; one Lbecker was ransomed, as were two of Rostock.
69
successor; but the dozen privateers of Dover and the Cinque Ports, which throve entirely by arresting Scandinavians and Hanseatics in the Straits, were more obnoxious still. In the years 1703-1705 (before the bottom dropped out of their business when the Dutch opened their licensed trade with France), with the help of the navy, these privateers brought up no less than 37 Danes, 36 Norwegians, and 75 Swedes, together with 18 of Slesvig-Holstein - figures which aroused turmoil in the colleges of commerce at Copenhagen and Stockholm114, and which enable us to see Zeeland's fifty odd arrests in clearer perspective115. In the Nine Years War, again in 1703-1705, neutrals had less to fear from Dunkirk itself. Dutch partowners or freighters, with their strong interest in Scandinavian bottoms, must have been aware of that. Perhaps they also understood that the notorious 'Nest of Pyrates'116 was not without troubles of its own. As reflected in the reports of the Dunkirk captains, there were ten mediocre campaigns for every successful one: long is the tale of sprung masts and parted cables, of guns and boats jettisoned in flight, of strikes and mutinies. Prize crews were grudgingly spared and many captures proved ephemeral, the Ostend capers habitually recovering them around the banks during the Nine Years War117 and again after the capitulation of Ostend in July 1706; subsequently the French caught 31 of them. But here is a warning not to equate interceptions with the far lower numbers of prizes condemned. So is the action of the admiralty courts of Bergen and Christiansand in sometimes restoring prizes taken by Dunkirkers in Norwegian waters or simply brought in there without good reason, although Bonrepaus used his influence to get these cases reconsidered at
114. PRO, SP 75/25, Vernon to Hedges, 9 June, 15 Sept., 27 Oct. o.s.; SP 95/16, Jackson to Hedges, 27 Aug. 1704, enclosing a protest from 49 Stockholm burghers, complaining of excessive legal costs, 'unheard of and unreasonable Interrogatorys', pillage and damage to cargoes, so that these were often 'hardly worth the freight and custom afterwards'. The figures have been collected from the prize papers in HCA 32/45-92. Not all these prizes were restored quoad navem or quoad bona, or both: ibidem 47/21 and 48/6. Cf. G. N. Clark, 'Neutral Commerce in the War of the Spanish Succession and the Treaty of Utrecht', British Year Book of International Law (1928) 69-83; but it is erroneous to state that these ships were detained only when outward bound (ibidem, 72). 115. For all the national and international fuss they aroused, I can find in the minutes of the Zeeland admiralty board traces of not more than fifty neutral and Allied cases in 1703-1705, the period of crisis. Some were admittedly protracted and releases often occurred only after a composition out of court between the parties. While the board favoured this procedure, it was alive to the danger of collusion. It was disciplined, like the captors themselves, by the 'Placaat noopende de Commissievaarders' of 28 July 1705 in Cau, Groot Placaet-Boeck, V, 306-310), which reserved the grant of commissions to the States General: summary in my chapter on Jacob Sautijn, William III and Louis XIV, 170-171. 116. Defoe's Review, no. 52, 27 July o.s. 1708 (New York, Facsimile Text Soc., 1938, V, 20). 117. In a letter from Dunkirk to Valincour, secretary to the Conseil des Prises, 16 June 1696, Vauban assessed the number at two out of three.
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Copenhagen: no business, he said, gave him so much trouble118. In fortified harbours like Bergen, the amtmann might send his soldiers on board a prize and there would be friction ; alternatively, the captors might seduce Norwegian magistrates and merchants with cheap prize goods, which in turn paid for fresh provisions or a refit 119 . This might be contrary to Denmark's Convention of 1691 with the Maritime Powers, who eventually (in 1701) applied enough pressure to stop the practice120, with the result that the Dunkirkers henceforward were to find it harder to pay their bills : a diplomatic success that has not received due recognition, and one that well illustrates how effectively the writ of Copenhagen now ran in Norway, try as might the King of Denmark and Norway to be all things to all powers. In the Spanish war, the corsairs were more discreet, making less use of their Norwegian refuges and avoiding fortified harbours, though partly perhaps because they then sailed more frequently into the English Channel121. This shift certainly made for better dividends at Dunkirk, especially at the height of the privateering war in 1707122. Nevertheless, the turnover among its promoters, the depositares (boekhouders) was high. There were at least 127 of them between 1688 and 1697, but few stayed the course for long and there were bankruptcies among those who did123.
118. Johnsen, Innberetninger, 184 and passim. 119. Bergen was the best market ; in 1693, according to Bonrepaus, there was competition there to buy them (ibidem, 94). For a summary of violent incidents, see AN, Marine B3142, fos. 318-319. 120. Ibidem, 181-182, 192, 215, 221. Article iii of the Treaty of Odense (20 Jan. 1701) between Denmark and the Maritime Powers forbade the King's 'ports and rivers' to all warships other than convoys. The Convention of 1691 had gone no further than prohibit the taking of prizes on the coasts. Denmark tried unsuccessfully to neutralize the entire Kattegat and a belt 5 or 6 leagues wide between Lindesness and Trondheim; the coast of Jutland was dangerous enough to neutralize itself to a distance of 4 or 5 German leagues (Johnsen, Innberetninger, 38-39, 52). 121. AN, Marine C* 268, 272-273, 276 ('dci, de capitaines'). Forbin's violation of territorial waters near Vard0 in 1707 and Admiral Norris's seizure of cornships in the Kattegat, in 1709, greatly embarrassed the Danish Court : Johnsen, Innberetninger, 279-284,287-289 ; PRO, SP 75/27, Pulteney to Boyle 13 and 20 July 1709. 122. I have attempted a provisional assessment in a paper contributed to Michel Mollai and Ulane Bonnel, edd., Course et piraterie: tudes presentees a la Commision Internationale d'Histoire Maritime a I'occasion de son XVe colloque international ... San Francisco, aot 1975 (Paris: Ed. du Centre Nat. de la Recherche Scientifique, 1975, in roneo) 231-270. Bonrepaus considered that the habit of visiting Norway favoured the pockets of captains to the prejudice of their investors: Johnsen, Innberetninger, 170. See below, pp. 435-48. 123. Notably Jacques Plets and Guillaume Taverne, brother of Nicolas, who was far and away the most successful of all Dunkirk annateurs, remaining in the business throughout the wars; Jan Rycx, his associate in over 50 armaments down to 1695, fades out at this point. A dozen insolvencies are minuted in AN, G516*, 'Estat de ce qui est deub au greffe de l'Admiraut de Dunkerque', 26 March 1702. The dpositaires are precisely known for the periods Sept. 1688-June 1689 and Feb. 1690-May 1695 from surviving actes de caution in AN, Marine C4 253, 255,257, 259; otherwise their names have to be gleaned from the 'declarations des capitaines', a series with gaps for Sept. 1689-March 1693, Jan.-Oct. 1695, May 1702-July 1703, Oct. 1704-Feb. 1707. The functions of a dpositaire resembled those of a Dutch boekhouder, for which see J. R. Bruijn, 'Kaapvaart in de tweede en derde Engelse oorlog', Bijdragen en Mededelingen betreffende de Geschiedenis der Nederlanden, XC (1975) 408-429.
71
Although the majority are described as 'rnarchands' in the capitation rolls, and a few were members of the magistracy, they include an assortment of innkeepers, brewers, apothecaries, surgeons, brokers, naval officers, pursers, shipmasters, ship's carpenters and sailmakers, notaries and commis des traites. Even the men of substance among them were constantly complaining - of the high wages and flightiness of seamen, of their king's tolerance of enemy traders, and the obstructiveness (or worse) of their local amiraut, with which they conducted a running quarrel124. But what captains! In fighting quality, Mattheus de Wulf, Cornelis Meijnne, Crombrugghe and Simoens, Saus and Baeteman, the Glasson brothers, the Bart family, and a hundred others, were opponents worthy of the Zeelanders, in some cases related to them and schooled like them (through Jean Bart) in the tradition of De Ruy ter. What seamanship, what patience and ruse and sometimes bullying - chasing a hundred sail for every ten visited and searched (if not boarded with cutlass and small arms), zig-zagging from coast to coast as the winds dictated, joining and parting company from sunset to sunset, infiltrating convoys before dawn, scrutinizing like learned doctors the papers of the innocent and guilty alike, bargaining for ransoms and setting fire to the obstinate, removing here a few barrels of butter or herring and there a spare sail or cable, pillaging the money and personal possessions of passengers, anchoring in dead water on the Dogger Bank or judging the tidal caprices of Pentland Firth. At times, as in 1695-1696, the nimbler ones penetrated the inland waters of the Dutch Republic and notably between the Wadden islands and the Friesland shore, notwithstanding the death penalty placarded by the States General on 24 February 1696125; in 1708 we find the Amelanders seeking neutral status126. Evidently, the 'nuisance value' of the capers, if that is all it was, is not to be calculated in terms of prizes and ransoms alone. It will bear repeating, lastly, that so long as the French king's base in the North Sea, on which he spent so much, sheltered even a modest naval squadron, no Zee124. AN, G 5 16* and MarineB 3 60, fos. 68-75; 81, fos. 12-13,43,55,69,264-265; 133, fos. 14-15; 142, fos. 629-634. 125. De Jonge, Nederlandsche zeewezen, III, 465-466. Examples from 1696, post-dating the plakkaat, in AN, Marine C* 263, fos. 71-72, 75, 116 (all 'dans les Wattes'); for 1695, ibidem 258, fo. 115 ('entre Vlie et Texel'), 144v.-145 ('devant Zelande'), 208v.-209 ('proche d'Amelandt'), 234v. ('dans les baes de Flessingues'); and for 1704, ibidem 268, fos. llv.-16 (Ems), 153 ('rivire de Mildebourg'), 223 ('dans la Mense'). Cf. ibidem, fo. 237, for a petition of several merchants of Colchester, asking that Capt. Jan Tilly be kept prisoner till the end of the war, 'attendu que ledit capitarne Tilly a tousjours fait le commerce des huiltres en temps de paix avec eux et par consequent qu'il a une entire connoissance des endroits de la rivire de Londres o ils ont des bastimens ...'. The specialist in these exploits was the eccentric Louis le Mei, for whom see Malo, Grande Guerre, 178-203. 126. AN, F12 54, fo. 137.
72
lander and no Englander would ever be free from the nightmare of a 'descent', especially while Scotland's allegiance hung in the balance. That the alarms of 1696 and 1708 came to nothing should not mislead us. Rumours of preparations long preceded them and it was anyone's guess what their objective was. When Forbin came out with the Pretender in 1708, there was a run on the Bank of England, not for the first time; but panic too in Zeeland and Rotterdam127. Men waited for the new or the full moon, and kept an anxious eye on their weathercocks.
127. Sir John Clapham, The Bank of England (2 vols, Cambridge, 1944) I, 62; Snyder, Marlborough-Godolphin Correspondence, II, 1028; Stork-Penning, Het grote werk, 145, 184-185.
View of Dunkirk at the end of the reign of Louis XIII
5
THE IMPORTANCE OF DUNKIRK RECONSIDERED, 1688-1713 From Pierre Faulconnier to Emile Coornaert,1 Dunkirk and Maritime Flanders have been fortunate in their historians, more so perhaps than most other maritime regions of France, but they have never studied its trade and privateering in the systematic quantitative manner recently devoted by Professor Jean Delumeau and his pupils at St.-Malo. If this were possible, would the city of Jean Bart retain quite that pre-eminence as a corsair base which it has been customary to take for granted, at least during the years 1688-1713, before Vauban's fort and harbour works (incomplete even in 1702) were demolished at the Peace of Utrecht? Some extraordinary claims have been made by historians, as (for instance) that the Dunkirkers took 6,436 prizes in the Nine Years War of 1688-97, and that the gross value of their take in the War of the Spanish Succession exceeded 82 million livres or even 6m. sterling. It is supposed that they had as many as a hundred privateers at sea simultaneously at certain times, and that all this, though of vital importance to the English, was comparatively unimportant to the Dutch, who had not insisted on the demolition during the 1706 peace negotiations or later.3 In an essay written twelve years ago, I attempted in a rough and ready way to measure the privateering activity of the French coasts between 1702 and 1713.4 Excluding ransoms, recaptures, and releases, the records of the Conseil des Prises give the following results, out of nearly 4,550 prizes: Brittany 1,282; Dunkirk (with Nieuport and till 1706 Ostend) 993; Calais to Granville 785; western Mediterranean (principally
Faulconnier, Description historique de Dunkerque, 2 vol., Bruges, 1730; Coornaert, La Fiandre frartfaise de langue flamande, Paris, 1970. 2 A. de Saint-Lger, La Fiandre maritime et Dunkerque sous la domination franose (16591789), Paris-Lille, 1900, p. 390; Henri Malo, La Grande guerre des corsaires: Dunkerque (1702-1715), Paris, 1925, p. 126; G. N. Clark, 'War Trade and Trade War, 1701-1713', The Economic History Review, 1st series, vol. 1, p. 263. In his Review, no. 81 (12 Dec. 1704), p. 338, Defot alaready claimed that D. had 'cost this Nation above 5 Millions'. ' Malo, op. at., 127; G. van den Haute, Les Relations anglo-hollandaises au debut du XVIII'side, Louvain, 1932, p. 298; Roderick Geikie and Isabel A. Montgomery, The Dutch Barrier 1705-1719, Cambridge, 1930, p. 9. Cf. [Jonathan Swift], Some Remarks on the Barrier Treaty between Her Majesty and the States-General, London, 1712. 4 "The French Privateering War 1702-13", Historical Essays 1600-1750 presented to David Ogg, ed. H. E. Bell and R. L. Ollard, London, 1963, below, pp. 213-41. 5 Paris. Archives Nationales, G 5 234-255, Dpouillement des jugements des prises.
1
74
Marseille and Toulon) 684. By comparison, the number condemned to ports between Sables d'Olonne and the Pyrenees was no more than 191. When a methodical count can be made of vessels and cargoes sold abroad, we may expect it to improve the performance of the Breton ports and of Marseille - Toulon far more than that of Dunkirk, whose privateering was largely concentrated in the North Sea, with less freedom to sell in foreign ports. This was almost entirely so during the Nine Years War; from 1706, perhaps a year or so earlier, when the Dunkirk frigates came out more regularly into the Channel, as far as the Scillies or even Cape Clear, at least during the winter months, more of their prizes were sent into Calais or Le Havre but it was rare for them to sail south of Ushant, whereas the Iberian coasts were of course a major cruising-ground of the Malouins. It also seems very likely that the Malouin contribution to the Breton total will loom far larger, when full analysis can be undertaken, than the mere 374 prizes brought into St.Malo itself (though it exceeds the combined figure for Marseille and Toulon), for many of their armaments (notably those of the Trouin brothers) were based on Brest, where 506 prizes were condemned; Nantes was less important than Morlaix, but both had close connections with St.-Malo. For this reason, the accounts of the Admiral's tenths which have survived for the period 15 December 1705 to 31 December 1706 must underrate St.-Malo by comparison with other ports.6 Here are the leading figures in descending order: Dunkirk: Toulon: Brest: St.-Malo: Cadiz: Morlaix:
293, 634 199, 572 162, 694 134, 323 79, 828 73, 033
11. 6s. 2d. for 11. 6s.,8d. for 11. 2s. for 11. Is.,6d. for 11. 18s..3d. for 11. 5s..3d. for
154 items 94 items 51 items 71 items 19 items 30 items
An 'item' could of course mean a ransom or part of a cargo, not necessarily the whole produce of a vessel and cargo: even so, the variations from place to place in the average value of an item work in favour of St.-Malo. If there is not much difference in average value between St.-Malo and Dunkirk themselves, it is still true that Malouin captures would have contributed substantially, and the Dunkirkers very little, to the results of Brest, Cadiz and Morlaix, which show much higher averages. This clearly implies that the Malouin prizes were more valuable on average than those of Dunkirk for the year in question. The same is likely to be true for earlier years, if not for the later ones (for
6
Ibid. G 5 281.
The Importance of Dunkirk Reconsidered, 1688-1713

7
75
Malouin privateering results declined steeply after 1706). . St.-Malo, with Brest, was better placed for living off Anglo-American commerce as well as the trades of southern Europe (including Spain in 1688-97 and Portugal in 1703-13). Very few such prizes entered Dunkirk in 1707, even though this was its peak year of the war as measured in numbers of prizes and ransoms: PRIZES AND RANSOMS ADJUDICATED AT DUNKIRK 1702-13 (Source: Arch. Nat. G5 234-255)
1702 1703 1704 1705 1706 1707 1708 1709 1710 1711 1712 1713
p. 28 81 82 98 83 137 86 90 66 86 74 48 959
R.
14 60 61 46 73 102 78 94 61 62 61 14 726
TOTAL 42
141 143 144 156 239 164 184 127 148 135 62 1,685
NUMBERS OF PRIZES AND OF RANSOMS ADJUDICATED AT DUNKIRK
See graph in J. Delumeau et al., Le Mouvement du port de Saint Malo 1681-1120: hilan statistique, Paris, 1966, p. xvi (reproduced from Hist. Essays presented to David Ogg, p. 218). Cf. J. S. Bromley, "The Trade and Privateering of Saint Malo during the War of the Spanish Succession", below, pp. 279-95.
76
These are provisional figures and they certainly underestimate the performance of Dunkirk, especially from 1706/7 when there is evidence of Channel cruising between October and April and later of one or two sallies as far south as Cape St. Vincent;8 against this, Ostend was by then in enemy hands. Nevertheless, the totals for 1707-8 and 1711 are higher, particularly for ransoms, than those which can be compiled from the lists supplied every week or two in port correspondence with the minister of marine, as the prizes came in:9 PRIZES BROUGHT INTO DUNKIRK (R = Ransoms)
YEAR BRITISH DUTCH SWEDES AND OSTENDERS HAMBURGERS
10 + R1
OTHERS
4 6
TOTAL
1707 1708 1711 (to 18 Nov. only)
44+R16 29 + R24 35 + R25
47 + R40 20 + R29 24 + R16
8 7
3 4
108 +R57 67 + R53 74 + R41
108 + R65
91 + R85
25 + R1
10
15
249 + R151
It will be evident that ransoms bulk large in the Dunkirk tally and it should be possible in due course to provide a fairly exact enumeration of them. The controleur Vergier, who looked after a prize business for the intendant (and who became president of the Chamber of Commerce in 1700), reported their amounts, which can often be checked against those reported by the captors - sums seldom exceeding 3,000 Hires orflorinsor the equivalent in sterling, converted at a usual rate of 15 livres in the ransom bills, although in 1708 alone there were one or two English and Dutch ransoms in excess of 200 or 3000 fl. The controller's totals for 1707 and 1708, when reduced to livres, are respectively 133,700 and 111,470, to which should be added up to 5 per cent for the 'chapeau' of the privateering captain and sometimes the 'plontrage' for his officers and crew (both being customary claims to the personal effects of their opposite numbers among the prisoners), not to mention the frequent requisition of victuals, tackle and instruments of which the captor found himself in need. Since the victims were nearly always fishing vessels or small coasters, even these small sums must have been felt as a hardship, not only to the hostages. Hundreds of Dutch, English and not least poor Scottish shipmasters suffered in their pockets (many more than once), hundreds of other seamen in their persons; masters refusing ransom had
On 1 Dec. 1708, 4 leagues off the Cape, Capt. J. Pour (or Poer) effected "une socit verhalle pour le restant de leur course" with Capt. C. Saus and N. Baeteman: Arch. Nat., Marine C4 273, declaration dated 2 March 1709. 9 Ibid., Marine B3 142, 154, 151, 191. The lists of "prises amenes" in ibid. 165 are unfortunately missing for MayJune and Oct.Dec. 1709.
8
77
to watch their property destroyed. Dunkirk's pre-eminence in this line of business would have had an effect on foreign opinion in this respect, therefore, out of all proportion to the value of ransoms to their recipients, after deduction of the admiralty tenth and/rais des justice. We should recall this when contemporary London journalists refer to 'that nest of pirates'. From time to time Vergier sent the minister a rough guess of the value of a prize recently brought in. Such estimates were unusually frequent in 1711. Together with the ransoms, they add up (for ten and a half months only) to 1,731,240 livres. Since these were estimates before trial we may safely take it that this is the gross value and that it would comfortably exceed 2m. livres if it were complete. It is reasonable to compare with this figure one which is more certainly known, that for 1706, which can be placed at rather more than ten times the Admiral's tenth (293,634 livres) as various prize accounts show.10 Faulconnier in fact records a total of 30,500,000 livres for 1702-12 inclusive, 'sans y comprendre les Btimens ennemis que nos Armateurs ont menez en France et en Espagne, o ils ont t vendus', by comparison with 22,167,000 livres for the previous war.11 It is tempting to accept these figures. Not only did he derive them from the records of the Dunkirk Amiraut, but his total for the number of prizes (1,665) is remarkably close to the figure derived from the judgments of the Conseil des Prises. If he is right, we get an annual average for the Nine Years of War of nearly 2.5m, and for 1702-12 (ten and a half years) of nearly 3m. These figures consist with what we can ascertain independently for 1706 and 1711 so long as they are read as the gross and not the net product - i.e. before deducting the tenth and other outgoings which could add up to a good deal. Even allowing some addition for prizes sold elsewhere, they do not leave much room for Henri Male's 82m, which was achieved by treating Faulconnier's sum total as if it were merely the produit net.12 Nor would Saint-Lger's 6,436 prizes for the 'War of the League of Augsburg' now appear anything but fanciful unless they were very small prizes indeed. Instead of Sir George Clark's 'six millions sterling' for 1702-13, we should be thinking of something like 2m.
Ibid. B3 178, fos. 122-30. Description. II, 101, 166. He clearly refers to sales - i.e. gross product. 1 Op. at., p. 126. Male's assertion is not in this instance founded on any precise source. Even if he were justified in reading Faulconnier's figures AS produit net, instead of produit brut, it would still be impossible to follow his summary method of converting one into the other. For a like robust calculation see his Corsaires Dunkerquois et Jean Bart (1662-1702), 2 vol., Paris, 1913-4, II, 418-9. In converting Malo's figure for 1702-13 into sterling, Sir George Clark has somewhat overvalued the livre tournois, which the Dunkirk ransom bills in 1704 fixed at 16 livres to 1 and in 1707-8 at 15 11.; the rate used between London and the Channel Islands in 1702-8 was 14 11., but as many as 18 11. were being quoted by Nov. 1712.
11 10
78
How much of this was at British expense it is still impossible to say. The table based on Vergier's lists for 1707-8 and 1711 certainly does not suggest a striking British preponderance in the sheer number of vessels taken, although it betrays a clear Dutch lead in the suffering of ransoms, thanks to their vulnerable herring and cod fisheries. On the other hand, a very high proportion of the Dutch prizes were also fishing vessels codfishers returning to the Maas or Zierikzee from the Dogger Bank or Iceland, herring busses to Schiedam or Vlaardingen from the British coasts, sometimes arrested 'devant leurs filets'. The length of Britain's east coast of course afforded a much wider invitation to intercept coasters (caboteurs), the strong tides and shallows of the Dutch coast a corresponding deterrent; but many barques longues and chaloupes from Dunkirk made nothing of entering the Scheldt or even the dangerous 'Watten' behind the Frisian islands, an obvious trap for the fishing of Ems, Weser and Elbe or of Holstein, despite its risks.13 The Dunkirkers habitually zigzagged across the North Sea, 'de coste a coste' according to weather or intelligence, perhaps via the Dogger. More Dutch than British victims were also privateers themselves and thus usually without cargoes, although any prize in their possession might also fall to the new captors: a scrutiny of the rapports des capitaines, which survive for Dunkirk over six separate periods amounting in all to half the waryears,14 shows that combats were of regular occurrence, which is far from the impression I formed when reading in the Malouin reports, admittedly a somewhat hasty reading. The Malouins had the Channel Islanders at their threshold, but the Dunkirkers had the Zeelanders and (except for 1702-6) the Ostenders. This was a major circumstance for the course of Dunkirk. Time and again captains or prizemasters report the loss of their prizes on nearing home, even to the small Ostenders, which seldom carried as many as ten guns. After the placaeten of 28 July 1705 all Dutch privateers were required to cruise for a fortnight between Shetland and the Straits of Dover before sailing further afield. The fighting quality of Middelburg and Flushing was enhanced by the 'praemie' (gun-money) awarded from 1697 for the capture or destruction of enemy ships of war. It is significant that the rate was doubled on 20June 1704 for the North Sea only, and that this 'ampliatie' was only extended beyond those waters a year later on
13 Striking examples in the rapports of Louis Le Mei dated 12 April 1696 and 21 Aug. 1703, Arch. Nat. Marine C4 263 and 268. On the navigational risks see always the novel by Erskine Childers, The Riddle of the Sands, London, 1903. 14 Nov. 1688-Aug. 1689; April 1693-Dec. 1694; Oct. 1695-Feb. 1697; July 1703Sept. 1704; March 1707-Jan. 1710; July 1712-May 1713. Unimportant before 1695-6, the Islanders greatly extended the intensity and range of their operations in 1702-11, when 608 prizes (incl. ransoms and recaptures) were taken into Guernsey (177 commissions) and 151 into Jersey (64 commissions): see below, pp. 339-87.
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condition that the North Sea cruising requirement had been fulfilled. 6 Like the fearsome placaci of February 1696, imposing death on enemy privateersmen who entered the binnenstroomen (inland waters) without a protecting fleet, these measures must be seen as a tribute to Dunkirk, and (less so) to Calais, for no other enemy privateers were conspicuous in the North Sea. The premiums recorded in the Zeeland Admiralty archives at The Hague17 give us some idea of the number of French warships and privateers thus taken or destroyed inside and outside the North Sea:
703
Number of awards: Total sum in ns: 28 203,000
1704
45 211,850
1705
40 223,975
1707
71 927,950
1708
56 706,700
It may be noted in passing that the year 1707, when premiums reached their maximum - only 26 were paid in 1710 and 47 in 1711 also saw the highest total of Dunkirk prizes. Unfortunately, the Dutch records do not always make it clear where a warship was taken or destroyed. Since the Zeelanders were also very active in Biscay and beyond, it would be misleading to suppose that this kind of remuneration was achieved entirely, or even mainly, at the expense of Dunkirk. But there was, of course, another though spasmodic obstacle to the free departure and entry of its larger warships - the Anglo-Dutch summer blockade, an almost annual affair from 1692, accompanied by bombardments in 1694-5. It was still British doctrine in 1708 that 'the blocking up Dunkirk with a squadron' was more effective than 'the strength of every particular convoy', though 'the Dunkirk squadron' might also take time off to escort convoys; after the 'alarm' of Forbin's expedition to the Forth in 1708, there was talk of trying to choke the harbour-mouth or the channels. These measures should not be written off as total failures. Had it been so, a blockade costing the British and Dutch fleets twenty or thirty line-of-battle ships would not have persisted. And, weather permitting, they did contain the more heavily armed Dunkirk warships. In July 1697, Jean Bart mounted the tower of St. Eloi daily to observe the blockade: to slip out, he needed to make up to twelve leagues unseen - and the nights were too short. Conversely, in August 1691, de Mricourt's squadron could not get in because it could only enter the channels enle and with most sails furled, to say nothing of having to anchor in the violent currents of the banks in an onshore wind and so without freedom to manoeuvre in the face of attack; only vessels
16 J. S. Bromley, "Some Zeeland Privateering Instructions: Jacob Sautijn to Captain
Salomon Reynders, 1707", William III and Louis XIV: Essays 1680-720 by and for Mark A. Thomson, ed. R. Hatten and J. S. Bromley, below, pp. 407-34. 17 Algemeen Rijksarchief, Admiraliteits 2524 et seq. and 2438.
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drawing little water could cross the banks even at high tide.18 What the battleships of the 'Maritime Powers' could not accomplish was to some extent open to the small and nimble capers of Ostend, which hovered round the Dunkirk shoals even in winter. In March 1690 already, the naval minister was informed that 'il a est pris et repris par les Ostendois, dans la rade et a la vue de ce port, pour plus de 2 millions d'effets . . ,'19 Except in 1702-6, they specialized in picking up Dunkirk prizes as they neared home, like the birds of Herodotus who lived off the food in the crocodile's teeth. These tactics, favoured by geography, were facilitated by the Dunkirkers' own tendency to rely on weak prize crews. Vauban went so far as to claim that two prizes in three were lost in this way.20 Let this at least warn us not to equate the losses and inconveniences suffered by the enemy with the prizes actually sentenced to the Dunkirk captors. They were clearly very much greater, even if the original owners recovered their property on paying salvage to the recaptor. Vauban thought that the Ostenders would only be driven off if there were a naval squadron to cruise regularly among the banks, or between Thames and Maas. The galleys stationed at Dunkirk from 1702, or their brigantines and chattes, afforded only spasmodic protection of local waters. The two frigates built and armed by the Chamber of Commerce in 1704, and commanded by two veteran corsairs, Cornil Saus and Nicolaes Baeteman (a Catholic Zeelander by origin), won golden opinions from the intendants for their gallantry in counter-privateering and were rewarded with medals and swords by the king, but this 'terreur des Zelandois' could only cover its costs by commerce warfare. Thus, after taking part in Forbin's expedition to the Forth in 1708, they were equipped to harry the convoys passing between Holland, Hamburg, England and Ireland; before the year was out, they were sending prizes into Cadiz and Corunna. From spring 1709, now in more powerful ships hired by a private armament from the king ('au cinquime des prises pour le Roi'), the Auguste (56) and Blackball (50), they were back to North Sea work and again early in 1711, when Saus was on the lookout for the crossing of the duke of Marlborough. By the end ofthat year he was in poor health, but 'Niela' Baeteman was still at sea in 1712. l He had first commanded a Dunkirk frigate, the Fantaisie, in 1692, for the privateering owners Jan Rycx and Nicolas Taverne. Saus had served this partnership
18 Arch. Nat. Marine B3 63, fos. 36v-7, and 97, fos. 50-1. J. H. Owen, War at Sea under Queen Anne 1702-708, Cambridge, 1938, pp. 66-7, 268-70. 19 Ibid. B3 62, fo. 59, Sieur de Caux - Pontchartrain, 12 March 1690. 20 To Valincour (secretary to Amirai de France and to Conseil des Prises), 16 June 1696, ibid. B 3 95, fo. 497v. 21 Ibid. B3 132, fo. 432; 133, fo. 48; 155, fo. 74; 165, fo. 17V; 191, fos. 7, 31, 49, 559. Cf. Malo, La grande guerre, pp. 204-16.
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since 1689, first in an 8-ton chaloupe, then in a 45-ton baroque longue, finally graduating to a frigate in 1691; altogther he was commissioned on thirteen occasions before June 1695 (always with Taverne after the bankruptcy of Rycx in 1694).22 Saus, a seaman and warrior with the stamp of Jean Bart, had a long and successful career as a corsair, with more public spirit than most. Nevertheless, as he appears in the port letters of 1705-11, he endured many disappointments. Trusted as he was by the intendant Duguay, he could not always obtain the naval vessel he wanted from the minister Pontchartrain. Established captains were particular on this subject and it was one of several reasons for the prolongation of negotiations between their financial backers and the navy whenever a king's ship was to be hired. In the Spanish Succession War especially, this was regular practice, encouraged, at times urgently, by the navy itself; but more than one group of promoters, and often more than one captain, might have eyes on the best sailers. Saus did not always get what he wanted, and like all the Flemish seamen his feelings could be easily hurt by the French administrators. In addition, these more substantial armaments could be held up for months by the bargaining that went on between promoters and Crown - a fascinating theme at Toulon and Brest as well, but too large to discuss here. Heroes like Saus and Baeteman would have little to fear from mutinies, but they would not necessarily find it easy to recruit speedily, even when an agreement with the Crown included a clause promising use of the levees under the Inscription Maritime. In spite of such an undertaking in April 1711, Saus went to sea four months later seriously undermanned - 200 short out of 1,200 needed: the intendant blamed the commissaries at Abbeville and Dieppe, above all the intendancy of Le Havre, for this shortfall.23 Nor was Saus immune to the usual problem of deserters whenever his ships entered harbour. This was doubtless less of a problem, however, than it was for the Malouins, whose privateers had many more opportunities to call at other French (and later, Spanish) ports. It is true that the Dunkirkers made much use of the Norwegian fjords, especially in the Nine Years War, for repairs and refreshments. In the early days they tried to sell prizes there; but this practice soon gave rise to diplomatic embarrassment and some violent incidents at Flekker and Christiansand in 1693-4, with the result that it was allowed only when distress could be proved, and fortified harbours came to be avoided. Nonetheless, in 1707, Forbin was armed with letters to
22 Amiraut de Dunkerque, actes de caution, in ibid. C4 252-3, 255, 257, 259 (with a gap from Aug. 1689 to end Jan. 1690); for Rycx, see Malo, Jean Bart, II, 357-8. 23 Arch. Nat. Marine B3 191, fos. 270-1, 426. I have discussed the value of the Inscription Maritime for privateering in "Projets et contrats d'armement en course marseillais 1705-1712", below, pp. 243-78.
82
Norwegian merchants in case he needed to sell prizes there.24 The armateurs constantly complained that their seamen deserted before sailing after accepting advances in cash. Jean Bart, writing in 1690, could remember a time when they were to be had in plenty for 8, 9, or 10 'escus sur la main': now they were asking at least 21 or 22, 'disans que c'est bon march vendr leur libert, craignant tout a fait les prisons de nos ennemis o ils patissent beaucoup et sont fort long temps sans tre echangez'.25 Not only had this fear dried up the traditional flow of immigrants, but it was stimulating an outflow to Ostend, which had no prisons and enjoyed reciprocal treatment therefore at Dunkirk. However, the advances did not fall when swift exchanges of prisoners were arranged with the admiralty colleges of Zeeland and Holland. Detention there became so brief that the Dunkirk seamen were accused by their employers in 1708 of giving themselves up too easily to the enemy, and thus of being in a position to collect further advances for another armament on return home. By that date 30 ecus was the going rate and cases were quoted of a seaman accepting advances for four different ships at a time; on average, for four engaged you obtained two. Apparently, the Amirauts took no steps to punish this cheating. Bitter as they were about it, employers had no alternative but to entice men away from each other. In 1696 the intendant Cberet said that they were offering up to 40 or 50 ecus - a rate also experienced at St.-Malo.26 In theory, unless there had been a contract with the Crown, these men should normally have been Flemings only, the French being subject to conscription. It is clear that they were capable of evading it in order to serve with the capres, just as English seamen avoided the pressgangs for the potentially higher rewards of privateering, regarded by some contemporaries, including King William III, as a source of naval weakness. This is why French naval officers sometimes asked for a temporary stop on the departure of the capres, too. It is not clear how far the port authorities connived at their taking French matelots. Lempereur, as commissaire de marine at Dunkirk, denied that he did so,
24
Besides sundry references in the declarations des capitaines, see "Memoire touchant les prises que les Vx. du Roy ont autrefois mens en Nordvegue" [1707], Arch. Nat. Marine B3 142, fos., 318-9; for Forbin, ibid. fo. 225. Cf. Oscar Albert Johnsen (ed.), Rapports de la legation de France a Copenhague (correspondence consulaire) relatifs a la Norvge, I (Oslo, 1934), 71-4, 78, 166-70, 209, 273, 279, 286. 25 Arch. Nat. Marine B3 60, fos. 68-75, "Memoire au reguard de la Course a Dunkerque", 6 Jan. 1690, signed by Jean Bart, Charles Elinck, Remer Brijs, Nicaise Cornelissen and four others; cf. ibid., fos. 3-7 for the supporting views of the intendant J.-B. Patoulet. 26 Ibid. B3 154, fos. 17-18 (22 Jan. 1708); B3 93, fo. 197 (20 Sept. 1696); B3 115, fo. 545, "Memoire present a Monseigneur de Pontchartrain touchant la course par les sindicq de St.-Malo au nom de tous les armateurs" (undated).
83
claiming that he could tell a Frenchman amid two hundred Flemings; but his letters from St.-Malo in the next war show that he did his best to get round the rules, a common compromise being to bind the corsair to return the men so lent by February, in time for naval service if required. It was alleged that Provengaux found it easy to pass themselves off as Italians or Spaniards, although the Malouin crew-lists show that it was a very marginal occurrence there.27 All this certainly made for bad blood between navy and privateering promoters. Because of their frontier situation, however, the navy had to handle the Flemings gently. They would not readily serve under French officers. This fact, together with the exemption of the Flemings from conscription, was of course a special asset to the Dunkirk course, not shared by St.-Malo or even to the same extent by Marseille, despite the foreign element in its population. Viewing the course as always from his experience at Dunkirk, Vauban wanted to attract more foreigners, claiming in 1693 that they once built up a seagoing population of 6,000, of whom as many as three-quarters would be at sea at any one time. He must have been recollecting the great days of 1672-9, when Jean Bart made his reputation as a corsair. Bart himself, however, had put this figure at 4,000 - enough to man forty privateers in his opinion whereas in January 1690 it had fallen to no more than 500. Was he right? Unfortunately, the commissions for the preceding six months are missing, but those recorded between 13 October 1688 and 12 June 1689, a total of 46, are mostly for small vessels - barques longues, corvettes, shallops, even a tartan - several of which were commissioned twice. Frigates (of widely differing tonnages), along with a few flyboats and 'navires', are as numerous for the closing months of 1688, but not for the first half of 1689, since autumn was the best time to arm against enemy convoys and frigate campaigns lasted longer:29
DATE OF REGISTRATION NO. OF COMMISSIONS 70-300TX. 6-40TX.
1688 (13 Oct. -31 Dec.) 1689(31Jan.-12June)
1 =tx 1750 ( 3 _6(= 390 tx.) 19
13(=358tx.) 14(=234tx.) 27
Ibid. B3 68, fo. 83 (27 Jan. 1692); Trans. Soc. Guernesiaise, XVII (1964), 637-9. Vauban's views as reported by Patoulet, lOJuly 1693, in Arch. Nat. Marine B3 75, fos. 68v-9; Bart's in mem. cited above, note 25. 29 Ibid. C4 252. The registrations of commissions at Dunkirk from 1 Feb. 1690 to the end of 1694 tend to be concentrated in the months of Sept.-Oct. and again April-June. Duguay urged the minister on 13 June 1708 to hasten the allocation of royal frigates to private armateurs on the ground that October and November "sont des mois d'or pour la course de ce pays cy" (ibid. B3 154, fo. 364).
28
27
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There are at this date no indications of the size of the crews, but from later evidence in the declarations des capitaines we may infer that the larger vessels carried one man for every ton, whereas the ratio was nearer two to one in the case of the lightly armed barques and chaloupes, which clearly relied more on boarding with cutlass and firearms than on gunpower - a 10-ton shallop would only carry a couple of stone-throwers (pierriers). But even a frigate would not campaign for more than three months, so that complements must to some extent have included the same individuals. It is unlikely that the crews much exceeded 2,000 men in all during the winter of 1688-9. Of these some three hundred would have been raised from 'France' for the two royal frigates commanded by Jean Bart; as a rule, there would also have been a minority of landsmen (volontaires) and boys (mousses), who accounted for between an eighth and a tenth of any naval or privateering crew, and sometimes a higher proportion of soldiers. Allowing for casualties and the slow operation of prisoner-exchanges at this date, Bart's estimate of 500 seamen may not have been unduly pessimistic by January 1690, especially if he meant it to refer only to able seamen. Since he was trying to prove a case and was a natural laudator temporis acti, we should probably not err very far if we merely doubled it. At all events, the absence of any large armaments during the first half of 1689 could well imply a scarcity: in raising up to 2,000 men of all kinds in the closing months of 1688, Dunkirk's existing resources (over and above trade requirements) had been strained to the utmost. If we cast forward to the beginning of the next war, or rather to the second half of 1703 (when figures are available from captains' reports),30 we find a higher proportion of frigates and this time with the numbers of all crews. Eliminating the navy and double counting, we have a total of 2,212 men and boys for 30 vessels (1,969 tx.), and an average crew of 77. This becomes 108 for March - December 1707, when the course of Dunkirk attained its peak: 3,770 men and boys for 35 vessels (tonnages, however, not always stated).31 Average gunpower has also nearly doubled (17:9), although it did not stay as high in subsequent years, when it oscillated between 13 and 15. Sixteen of these privateers now carry 18 to 26 guns, few less than 12. These were magnitudes hitherto more characteristic of St.-Malo which, for the whole of 1707, however, commissioned no more than twelve frigates of 18-30 guns. For St.-Malo, as it happens, a large number of crew-lists survive for these years, whereas we have none for Dunkirk. They yield
Ibid. C 4 268. Ibid. C 4 272: boys are sometimes separately enumerated. H. Malo gives details of tonnage, guns and crews of Dunkirk privateers in listing the captains, with their successive commands, at the end of his books; but there are too many gaps in the sources (unstated) for these to be exhaustive.
31 30
The Importance of Dunkirk Reconsidered, 1688-1713 the following comparison:32

1703 1704 1705 1706 1707 170H 1709
17W
85
1711
No. ofprivateers Tx. (average) Crew (average)
32 50 165.2 115.6 119.1 91.1
54 133.5 95.9
24 24 153.9 127.0 114.0 95.9
28 28 34 36 168.4 100.4 80.0 91.5 129.3 83.8 77.6 85.3
These figures are not such as to make the less satisfactory calculations for Dunkirk look unrealistic. Malouin seamen themselves were subject to the Inscription Maritime and in fact regarded as the best available to the intendant at Brest; but they constituted only a third of the crews, the rest coming from other parts of Brittany and Normandy, or even further afield, and containing a high proportion of soldiers and volunteers - as much as a quarter in 1705, the peak year, when the total force (subject to an element of double counting) exceeded 5,000 officers and men. Even an incomplete set of crew-lists suggests a force of 3,000 to 4,000 in other years, though it is known that manpower resources were under strain by 1705 because of heavy losses to the enemy and later also because of the South Sea armaments in which St.-Malo took the lead. 3 Our general conclusion must be that Dunkirk's manpower resources for privateers were never higher than 4,000, including landsmen, boys, soldiers, and probably a number of captives (upon whom pressure was certainly exerted in Brittany), 34 though this was obviously a game that two could play; we do not know whether the Flemings of Dunkirk ever took service with the Zeelanders, but it seems unlikely that none ever did so. Apart from this, we can be sure that Dunkirk recovered its men from Dutch captivity far more quickly than did St.-Malo from England: so the same force could be stretched further. In addition it does not seem unreasonable to postulate a doubling of the available seagoing manpower between 1688 and 1707, or that the increment mostly came from other French ports as trade and naval employment diminished. The population of the town certainly increased quite rapidly during the Nine Years War, somewhat more slowly after that - to 14,274, according to the dnombrement of March - April 1706.35 It is an index of growing prosperity, but it excludes the floating population drawn to any frontier place under wartime conditions. It would include some of the privateering officers among the chefs defamilie, but by no means all: of the captains, about four in five at most are described as 'bourgeois de
Trans. Soc. Guernesiaise, XVII (1964), note 33. Cf. the lists in Anne Morel, La Guerre de course a St.-Malo (1681-1715), Paris, Acadmie de Marine, n.d., pp. 174-240. 33 See below, pp. 285-8. 34 J. S.Bromley, "The Jacobite Privateers in the Nine Years War", Statesmen, Scholars and Merchants; Essays . . . presented to Dame Lucy Sutherland, ed. A. Whiteman et al., (1973); below, pp. 143-4. This chapter discusses Jacobite armaments at Dunkirk as well as St.-Malo. 35 Faulconnier, Description, II, 130; cf. ibid. 96, 104, 109 for 1685 and 1695-6.
32
86
Dunkerque' or 'demeurant en cette ville' in the commissions recorded for 1690-5, but in their rapports captains quite frequently give the address of their principal amateur- in Dunkirk the 'depositaire' - as their place of domicile. A few are known to have taken service at St.-Malo or elsewhere at other times. Flemish names always preponderate among them, in the proportion of about two Flemings to one French (often a naval officer), leaving aside some of uncertain origin and a few who were plainly British Jacobites.36 Assuming a manpower limitation of 4,000 and an average crew of 100, and accepting Vauban's estimate that only three-quarters of the nonnaval seamen would be away at any one time, we should not expect more than thirty corsairs to have been at sea simultaneously. This is exactly the figure expected by the intendant Duguay for October 1706 and also the one he gives as actual at the end of 1707, apart from nine naval vessels armed en course; he implies that there had never been more. So much for Henri Male's claim that there might be as many as a hundred out at a time.37 He is nearer the truth in asserting that the typical caper would sally forth several times a year. In due course it should be posible to establish this from the declarations des capitaines, provided allowance is made for losses and for relches at Dunkirk itself in the course of a single campaign of two or three months. The declarations also show that completely fruitless cruises were common enough, while those yielding no more than a ransom or two were still more numerous. Nevertheless, both the declarations and the count of prizes suggest that the momentum gained in 1707 was fairly well maintained down to the end of the war, despite the disincentive to investment always created by peace negotiations and despite the British occupation on 19 July 1712, which did not interfere with continued campaigning against other enemies who had not accepted the Cessation of Arms: there were 135 prizes and ransoms sentenced in 1712 (and 62 in 1713), compared with 148 in 1711. Between 1 July 1712 and 20 May 1713 no less than 31 dpositaires were still active, as compared with 40 named in the declarations of March-December 1707 but only 15 in those of July-December 1703. Of these, five names recur in 1707 and three as late as 1712: Matthew Harries or Harris (a Jacobite), Gaspard Bart (younger brother of Jean, 1663-1726), and Nicolas Taverne (whose family was later ennobled).3 Taverne had been arming privateers throughout two wars, ever since October 1688, at first with his brother Guillaume but soon also with Jan
36 For Robert Dunbar see T. C. Smout, Scottish Trade on the Eve of Union 1660-1707, Edinburgh-London, 1963, pp.. 68-70, 208. 37 La grande guerre . . ., p. 127. 38 A. Lesmaries, Jean Bart: ses origines et ses proches, Dunkerque, 1933, pp. 171, 183, 189, 200.
87
Rycx, before the latter went bankrupt in 1698. Between 18 October 1688 and 13 May 1695 one combination or other of this trio handled 73 privateering armaments out of a total of 413; Nicolas himself directed 22, mostly medium-sized frigates but graduating in 1694 to the Soleil Dor, 30 guns.39. As it was rare for any depositane to continue in this business for more than three or four years, if indeed as long as that, the case of Nicolas Taverne is the clearest demonstration imaginable that it could sometimes pay off; nor did he tire of it, unlike Danycan de Lpine and other successful promoters at St.-Malo, which indeed can produce no comparable example of such perseverance. He was regarded by the intendant of Flanders, Le Blanc, as a man of good faith. This was more than contemporaries usually had to say of Jacques Plets, who was frequently associated with another prominent armateur of the Nine Years War, Jean-Baptiste Bart, but a bankrupt by 1700 and still burdened with creditors in 1711. Perhaps this is why he was a notorious donneur d'avis, constantly ready with grandiose schemes for the ears of the court; his son-in-law, Jean Moisnet, cuyer conseiller secrtaire du Roi', raised the finance for St. Pol's expensive but disappointing naval armament at Dunkirk in 1704. Plets had wide knowledge of foreign trade, however, as well as imagination and broad views: so it is possible that he exercised some real influence on the course even after his sensational bankruptcy (which may or may not have been due to privateering speculations).40 These qualities were certainly needed if the course was ever to be more than petty larceny, commingled as that might be, and often was, with extreme audacity in the enemy's bays and estuaries. Reading the
Arch. Nat. Marine C4 252-3, 255, 257, 259. These registrations may be compared with those for St-Malo in A. Morel, op, at., pp. 106-73, and for Marseille in Arch. Dep. Bouches-du-Rhnc IX B 3 and 4:
DUNKIRK ST-MALO MARSEILLE TOTAL
39
1688 1689 1690 1691 1692 1693 1694 1695

40
29 31 ( 6 months) 50 (11 months) 37 (9 months) 37 89 89 62 ( 6 months) 394
10 30 33 37 52 51 49 71 333
? 19 34 27 36 20 26 19 181
39 80 117 101 125 160 164 152 938
Journal de Jean Doublet de Honeur, ed. C. Brard, Paris 1883, 175-6; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Rawlinson A 326, fo. 131v; Arch. Nat. Marine B3 127, fos. 75 V 6, Lcmpereur, 18 Feb. 1706; ibid. B3 203, Le Blanc, 7 Jan. 1711. On 22 Sept. 1707 Plets produced a projet for attacking the Dutch India fleets both outward and homeward when they met at Capetown in the spring; failing that, Forbin was to imitate the exploits of Maurice of Nassau in Brazil (ibid. B3 142, fos. 567-72).
88
reports of the captains, one is indeed struck by the Dunkirkers' habit of hanging on the skirts of convoys and, better still, getting among them during the night. This is why some contemporaries thought so highly of the smaller privateers, which also of course enjoyed the advantage of being able to sail close inshore - for those coastwise cutting-out tactics in which the Channel Islanders excelled. Vergier thought that the capers of 612 guns did most damage, with least risk of ruining their owners.41 More powerful privateers were needed to tackle the big Anglo-Dutch convoys - from Archangel, from the Baltic, from Hamburg, from America or the Indies. So was good timing and information: in this respect the French corsairs were kept primed with intelligence reaching the naval ministry - more than could be said for the British admiralty, but then privateering was hardly there the great national institution which the French made of it in this period. A third requirement was willingness to join forces. On this point the rapports leave a strong impression that agreements between captains at sea to sail in company or en socit till the end of a current month, for a fortnight, ten weeks, or till the end of their campaign - were not only a commonplace but honestly adhered to, even after separation by weather or the chase. Such undertakings usually provide for the interests of a privateer which was to be given the unrewarding job of escorting the joint prizes home. The Conseil des Prises had of course to judge disputes between them, but my present view is that these were not disputes between partners to a cruising contract. In short, one has the impression that the captains, many of them, shared a high degree of solidarity, especially among the Flemings. This could well prove to have been a salient feature of the Dunkirk course. Some of them, like Saus and Baeteman, were capable of regular squadron warfare. Except for the peculiar case of Marseille, whose galleys certainly featured in privateering armaments, Dunkirk was unique among French privateering bases in being also a naval arsenal. This was why it had been, and still was, the object of so much public expenditure and engineering skill. Had it been otherwise, it would hardly have occupied its privileged niche in the treaties of Utrecht. Its only European parallel was Middelburg, where privateering and naval requirements also competed very much to the disadvantage of Zeeland's contribution to the Dutch fleet after 1702.42 There were occasions when the Dunkirk naval officers, trying to complete their complements, wanted an embargo on the departure of capers, unsuccessfully. More commonly,
41 Ibid. B3 120, fo. 73, 17 May 1703: " . . . nous avons observ dans la derniere guerre et dans celle cy que ce ne soni pas les gros bastiments qui out fait en ces mers le plus de tort aux ennemis. Au contraire ils ont presque tons ruin leurs armateurs . . . " 42 J. C. de Jonge, Geschiedenis van het Nederlandsclie Zeewczen. 3rdedn., Zwolle 1869, III, 569-73, 611-12.
89
the authorities desiderated their subordination to the purposes of the navy - a purpose achieved for the Scottish expedition of 1708, when no less than 19 privateering frigates were attached to Forbin's squadron of nine battleships.43 Eight privateers, too, had obeyed his signals off Beachy Head on 13 May 1707 in falling on a Downs convoy and hauling off twenty merchantmen - colliers, cornships, etc. which were the daily stuff of their activities, if just the sort of'maigres richesses' to arouse the chevalier's contempt for so many prizes. But this kind of 'following' was usually fortuitous. Corsairs had everything to gain from the support of naval cruisers, which drew the enemy's attention to themselves; but their relatively small gunpower greatly limited their claims on the fruits of any combined operations, much as the government wished them to work with the navy. 45 It was through the loan of naval vessels to private armateurs that this could best be achieved, even though some of the commands might have to go to naval officers. The whole matter of these arrangements requires deeper research. Meanwhile it may safely be asserted that the promoters of them at Dunkirk did not always come from the business community. They were not infrequently naval officers; the sieur Gavois was an crivain on the Brest establishment, the sieur Lambert a 'lieutenant d'artillerie et de galiotte' at Dunkirk. In 1710 a major proposal came from the king's proctor at the Calais admiralty, Ponthon.46 It is possible that promoters like these were able to capture the savings of members of the privateering interest, leading members of whom certainly took part in financing the two Chamber of Commerce frigates; but so far I have found only half a dozen regular depositares who negotiated for the hire of a naval ship. Jacques Plets, it is true, busied himself with strategic schemes for the Chevalier St. Pol's disastrous armament of 1704, but the director here was his son-in-law, a Paris financier, and Moisnet's principal Dunkirk associate was Jacques Voille, who held the office of Trsorier de France at Bourges and was director-general of naval victuals for Flanders and Picardy, by 1707 also agent for the Trsorier General of the galleys. These two, with Anne-Henry Delezat and Charles Bougier ('intresse aux affaires du roi'), held the mast contract for Brest in the name of Simon Coulange. Their company underwrote the shares in St. Pol's armament, whose outfit cost 355,000 livres, and was left with a
Listed in Faulconnier, II, 146. Memoires du conte de Forbiti, chefd'escadre (1656-1710), ed. J. Boulenger, Paris 1934, p. 205; cf. Arch. Nat. Marine C4 272, deci, of "Messire Claude de Forbin", 24 May 1707. 45 Ibid. B 75, fos. 112-14, "Memoire touchant les armements en course a Dunkerque par M. de Luzancay", 26 Dee. 1693; B3 122, fo. 436, Barentin, 14 Aug. 1703; B3 127, fo. 115, Duguay, 23 July 1705; B 3 191, fo. 322, Duguay, fos. 312-15. 46 Ibid. B 3 127, fo. 250V; B3 133, fos. 440V, 445; B 3 154, fos. 40-2; B3 177, fos. 332V, 433.
44 43
90
good many still on its hands when St. Pol sailed in July; it was hoped to make up the balance of public subscriptions out of prizes. Owing to the complex liquidation of this affair, which has been summarized by Henri Malo, we have for once a list of the shareholders, among whom Voille himself was much the largest, followed by Baren tin, intendant of Flanders.47 It is possible that the Dunkirkers withheld their confidence in this case because of Plets's association with it. As Duguay wrote to Pontchartrain, 'la premire chose que le Public demande en ces sortes d'affaires c'est de sgavoir qui luy rendra compte de l'armament'; it needed someone like Voille with an established reputation in Paris.48 What the marine intendant seems to me to be implying is that it was no good looking to local finance for an enterprise of this magnitude, involving six warships with an aggregate strength of 120 guns and 1,380 officers and men. The 66 subscribers included four from Brussels besides the Elector of Cologne, then at Namur; the duchesses de la Fert and de Ventadour; the marquis de Beringhen, premier cuyer ('Monsieur le Premier'), and Coursy, governor of Valogne; the Presidents Vigneron and Bonjounier; Bourdelin, conseiller au Chatelet, and 'M. le juge fermier-gnral'. Most noticeable is the presence of high naval personnel: Bgon and Robert (the intendants of Rochefort and Brest), Le Vasseur of Toulon, Le Brun of Dieppe, Bigot de la Mothe of Brest (with the marchale and comtesse de la Mothe), the Chevalier de la Pailleterie of the Marseille galley fleet, and the directeur des vivres at Brest, Albus. There are others from Le Havre, Brest, La Rochelle and Bordeaux. Was some official pressure used, as in the familiar case of the state's colonial companies? Are we in the presence of croupiers connected with Moisnet's financial enterprises? No one needs to be reminded of the navy's dependence on the traitants 'financiers'. Henri Malo, followed by Charles de la Roncire, launched the notion that there was a strong court interest in privateering investment.49 We can hardly avoid supposing that courtiers influenced the decisions of the Pontchartrains, father and son, as ministers of marine - for example, in the choice of captains of the larger corsair armaments or of the ships for them. But that they were in any way significant investors remains to be proved. Whatever may be true of such enterprises as those of Seignelay in 168890, my own view to date is that the great mass of routine privateering was financed in the ports, and for the most part selffinancing. Such information as we have from the actes de socit of St.Malo, Grande Guerre, pp. 29-38; cf. Arch, Nat. Marine B3 132, fos. 388-98, and B3 133, fos.. 78-100, 415, 434, 455, 480-4. 48 Ibid. B3 123, fo. 63. 49 Malo, Jean Bart, II, 177; La Roncire, Histoire de la marine fran$aise, 3rd edn., Paris 1932, VI, 161-2.
47
91
Malo, incomplete as they are, suggests as much; nor is the list of owners necessarily extensive, two to ten subscribers being fairly characteristic.50 In analysing the shareholders in the privateers of Marseille, I occasionally encountered the names of naval personnel not only from Toulon but also Rochefort, together once with that of Du Trousset de Valincour (secretary of the Amiral de France), but few names of courtiers: so far as that analysis went, it showed that the numerous investors were predominantly local people. Dunkirk was not a business centre in the same class, but armateurs should have been easily capable of financing its medium-sized frigates, to say nothing of smaller vessels: no figures of cost have been found here, but at Marseille in 1709-12 a 10-gun barque could be bought, equipped, manned and provisioned for less than 25,000 livres, a 4-gun pink for less than 15,000.51 A few ransoms might not cover more than half such a layout, but it did not need many mediocre prizes to do so. A successful house like Bart or Taverne could well afford to stand losses of this magnitude. In fact, Vergier's list of'prises amenes' for 1711 shows an average rough estimation of 27,000 livres, omitting ransoms and two exceptional prizes worth respectively 100,000 ecus and 250,000 livres. On this scale, three prizes estimated at 100,000 livres were good business after a fortnight's cruising, though Vauban could describe them as not very considerable.5 The capers could easily keep going on what Forbin despised as 'grosses marchandises' - the coal, oil, wool, corn, fruit, fish, potash, tiles, planks, metals and naval stores that make up so many of the standard North Sea cargoes53 - and there was always a chance of something more exciting. The question of course remains: what sort of market existed for prize goods? To a large extent, they helped to feed, clothe and build Dunkirk and its neighbourhood, sometimes when Baltic commodities were in short supply. But its warehouses were often crammed and its harbour choked with sometimes useless vessels. A great deal was sold into the Spanish Netherlands when the course of war permitted; the French
Arch. Dp. Ille-et-Vilame, Amiraut de St.-Malo, 9 B 167-8 (for 1702-13). Rev. D'Hist. Econ. et Soc., L (1972), pp. 83-6, 98-103. 52 Arch. Nat. Marine B3 191; for Vauban, ibid. B3 138, fo. 425. 53 Such cargoes were also fairly typical of the neutral vessels (mainly Swedes and Danes) arrested on suspicion of enemy ownership or for other reasons, especially in 1693-7 and 1704. The analysis of the sentences (jugements) registered in the Marine C4 series is a delicate matter, if only because parts of a ship as well as of cargoes might be condemned and the remainder released; there were also many appeals. Provisionally, for 1690-7, I estimate that 102 such vessels were condemned (and usually their cargoes as well, on the legal basis of robe d'ennemi) and 91 were released (but not necessarily with all their cargoes). Condemnations again exceeded releases in 1702-6 and particularly so in 1710-12. The Dunkirk captains were highly skilled at spotting defective ships' papers and often obtained a verdict of just cause of seizure when such prizes were released. This question requires fuller consideration elsewhere.
51 50
92
Atlantic ports shipped their exports to Flanders through Dunkirk; it is significant that when Ostend was lost, the Dunkirkers had considerable property invested there. As theirs was a free port, no duties were payable as a rule: some goods, including sugar and stockfish, had begun to be taxed on entry in 1690-2, but these franchises were restored in 1700.54 On the other hand, duties were payable on entry into the Kingdom and some goods prohibited there; but there was an important frigate trade (always resistant to proposed convoys) to other French ports, particularly Nantes, and in the Succession War to Cadiz, with a commission 'en guerre et merchandises'. However, the Chamber of Commerce itself, in 1707, named the enemy as providing 'le mouvement au capital que nous employons ensuitte a armer contr'eux'.55 Better still, the enemy paid cash, as he did for ransoms. Knowing what we do of the chronic dearth of hard coin in France, especially during the years after 1706, no stronger argument for the guerre de course could have been put forward. Unlike the Malouins and the Marseillais, or for that matter the flibustiers, Dunkirk was poor in piastres but it drew a steady income in 'argent d'Hollande'.
Faulconnier, II, 113-19; Arch. Nat. Marine B3 133, fo. 403V. Ibid. B3 142, fos. 629-34. The revocation on 19 Nov. 1710 of the passports issued in large numbers to the Dutch creates a problem: on these see my article "La France de rOuest et la guerre maritime (1702-1712)", below, chapter 17, pp. 389-406. Jean Meyer, "La Course: romantisme, exutoire social, realit conomique", Annales de Bretagne, 78 (1971), pp. 307-44.
55
54
PRIZES BROUGHT INTO DUNKIRK, 1707 (Source: Archives Nat., Marine B3 142)
EST. VALUE HONTH
VESSEL TONNEAUX FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
OR RANSOM
CAPTOR(S)
Jan.
flute
450
Hamburg
Hamburg
London
textiles metals timber as above

cod cod corn masts + deals spices cacao metals packet copper
(R) 50, 000 ecus
2 corsairs (C)
Jan. Jan. Jan. Jan. Jan. Jan. Jan.
pink dogger ? dogger

flyboat flyboat
250 50 50 150 500 250
Engl. Dutch Hamburg Dutch Scots Danish Dutch
Hamburg fishery Hamburg

fishery
London Maas Maas Lisbon Lisbon Lisbon
~ Vaisseau du Ri arm en course (V. duR.) C R. 3000 florins"! 2C i AA 000 AAA f WO, J francs
2C C of Calais 300,000 fl. V. duR. &C.
pinnace
London ? Holland Amsterdam
Jan. Jan. Jan. Feb.
ketch
flyboat
frigate (22 guns) frigate (16g.)
60 80 3/400 250
Engl. Dutch Engl. Dutch
Dover Amsterdam Canaries Leghorn
Ostend Scotland London Middelburg
]
150,000 livres
c
V. du. R. + 3C
2C
oil rice silks marble fruit
MONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
EST. VALUE OR RANSOM
CAPTOR(S)
(R)
Feb.
galliot
160
90
Prussian
Konigsbg.
London
Feb.
frigate (7g.)
?
Engl. Engl.
Portugal ? coastal Gibraltar Portugal Cork
London
?
Feb.
Feb.
hemp potash wool wines fruit ? wines (Fayal) as above butter hides tallow staves
R. 70 sterling (=1050/i fres)
C C C 3C
packet (10g.) bark frigate (10g.)
120 40 150
Engl. Engl. Ostend
London London Ostend
Feb. Feb.
Feb.
frigate (2g.)
100
Engl.
coastal (deserted in Downs)

fishery
Feb. Mar. Mar. Mar.

Mar. Mar.
dogger dogger frigate pink frigate (10g.) frigate

fri gate(20g.)
50 50 100 80 50 100
Dutch Dutch Ostend Engl. Ostend Dutch Lisbon
fishery Limerick Lisbon
Maas Maas Ostend London corsair Flushing tobacco
cod cod butter fruit
R.1500/iVre5
V. duR. + C
C
3C
J" ( i n d - l o f Nieuport)
Lisbon Middleburg
salt fruit fruit sugar dyewood
Mar.
Dutch
2V. duR. + 2C
MONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
CAPTOR(S)
(R)
Mar. Mar.
bark frigate
50 50
Engl. Ostend
Portugal Ireland
(deserted off Beachy Head) Ostend
Mar. Mar. Mar.
? slaver dogger bark

80 50
Dutch Dutch Dutch
Middelburg fishery Ireland
Guinea Maas Holland
Mar. Mar. Mar. Mar. Mar. Mar. Apr. Apr.
bark 2 fishing vessels frigate (18g.) frigate (10g.) brigantine dogger dogger frigate
50 200 100
Scots Dutch Engl. Engl. Engl. Dutch Swedish Dutch
Ireland ? fishery p ? Portugal Ireland Staden Flushing
wines teintures butter hides tallow metals cloth cod butter hides meat butter
C C
100, 000 ecus V. du. R.
+C C C
C C 2C 2C C C C 2C
Holland ? p London
p
R.3000/Vr
55 30 100
Lisbon Genoa Leghorn
Apr. Apr.
packet (10g.) frigate (22g.)
80 150
Engl. Engl.
London Leghorn
Ireland London
Apr.
packet (10g.)
90
Engl.
Leghorn
London
wines fruit hides (untanned) corn gunpowder groceries hides metals ballast wine oil silks as above
V. duR.
5C
dONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO

(U)
CA1 J TOR(S)
Apr. Apr. Apr. Apr.
dogger frigate (12g.) bark(4g.) frigate
75
150 80 150
Dutch Engl. Engl. Engl.
fishery
Virginia Portugal Carolina
Maas London London London
cod tobacco wines dyewoods rice dyewoods sugar tobacco tar
100,000 livres
2C C. of Nantes C
Apr.
May
4 small vessels frigate (log.) frigate (18g.) brigantine bark brigantine frigate (8g.) fishing boat packet (4g.) frigate (18g..)
120
Engl. Dutch Dutch Engl. Engl. Engl. Dutch Dutch Engl. Swed.
R.1000 fruit & almonds tobacco sugar & confitures rice oil raisins corn general cargo mackerel staves (recapture) cod ballast sugar tobacco 'bois des Indes' fruit tobacco brazilwood wine fruit
Lisbon Venice London London London Nantes fishery Dover Lisbon
Holland Amsterdam Lisbon Ne w Engl. New Engl. Rotterdam Maas Ostend Staden (? Hamburg) Staden (? Hamburg)
May May May May May May May May
28 50 80 50 110 25 50 250
V. duR. +5C - (incl. 2 Malouins)
V. duR. C V. duR.
2C
May
frigate (8g.)
150
Swed.
MONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
CAPTOR(S)
(R)
June June June June June June June June July July July July July
frigate (18g
Engl. Engl. Dutch Dutch

10
Alicante Gib.
p
London
p
2 small vessels frigate (20g ) flyboat boat 4 small vessels small vessel small vessel dogger frigate (log ) dogger (6g ) small v. frigate
wines piastres ?
oil
2C
R.1150
200
Genoa Bordeaux (French pass) fishery ? fishery

? p
Holland
2C 2C
C (ofNieuport) C 2C C
70 170 150
Dutch Dutch Dutch Engl. Swed. Dutch Dutch Dutch Swed.
p ? p
rice ? wines (recapture) fresh fish ?
R.5350fl.
R. 4000 francs
Flushing
p
Lisbon corsair Amsterdam

p
corn wool, etc. corn flax wool linens muslins copper ? recapture ? ~| , h ?
2C
~
-C of Le Havre R.1200/iVr_ 200,000/iVrtt"

2C
? fishery Staden (? Hamburg)
Lisbon
July July Aug. Aug. Aug.
3 small vessels long bark (45-) 2 small vessels 3 small vessels ?
Dutch French Engl. Dutch Engl.
R.4500fl.
C
Calais
p p p
corsair
p p p
R. 10,000 livres R.180
2C
Faucon exStDomingue
vlONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
CAPTOR(S)
(R)
Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Sept. Sept. Sept.
Sept.
dogger 3 fishing vessels dogger ftyboat 4 small vessels frigate (8g. ) 2 small vessels fishing vessel fishing vessel dogger 4 small vessels p boat(6g.) frigate (24g) packet (6g. )
50
50 300 120
Dutch Dutch Dutch Dutch Dutch Scots Engl. Dutch Dutch Dutch Dutch Swed. Dutch Engl. Engl.
fishery ? fishery fishery Amsterdam fishery Danzig

p
?
? p
cod
Norway Edinburgh
p p p
40 80 20 200 160
fishery fishery fishery ? fishery (? Hamburg) Flushing Newcastle E. Indies
Maas p Stockholm corsair naval escort to colliers London
? herring ballast herring iron bars tow (filasse) 1 cod herring cod ? cloth, etc.
R.9000hVr _ R. 10,000 livreT
C C. of St.-Malo C
_ C of Nantes (Cassard) R.310 R.2000fl. ~
c
C C C of Calais
C royal galleys
R.10,250fl.
Sept. Sept. Sept. Sept.
frigate (16g -) 10 small vessels 1 small vessel flyboat
150
Dutch Dutch Dutch Scots
Rotterdam ? fishery ? fishery Danzig
Bergen p p London
saltpetre muslins pepper cinnamon gums dyewoods ballast ? 1 linen

potash strugeion
2V. duR.
R.16,250/iVre5 R.3000fl.
3C C C 3C
MONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
CAPTOR(S)
(R)
Sept. Sept. Oct. Oct. Oct.
long bark (10g.) galliot smack galliot (2g.) long bark (2g.)
25
100 100
80
Dutch Engl. Dutch Dutch Engl.
Middelburg Newcastle Amsterdam Amsterdam Hamburg
corsair Portsmouth London London ? Topsham ('Apson') London Portsmouth Falmouth Dublin Middelburg London London Guinea (truck) Flushing Dublin
Oct. Oct. Oct. Oct. Oct. Oct. Oct. Oct. Oct.
pink smack
p
120 80
120 90 100 100 40 35 40
Engl. Dutch Genoese Dutch Hamburg Hamburg Dutch Dutch Dutch
Hamburg ('Kesmaden') Lisbon Surinam Hamburg Hamburg Flushing Ireland Rotterdam
coal staves staves iron & zinc wool staves fine linen thread staves salt sugar
oil
3C C
~~| h- royal galleys 1

C
~~l _)r
3C 3C C C 3C
frigate (4g.) galliot smack packet (5g.) (? slaver) long bark (2g.)
hoy
Nov. Nov. Nov. Nov.
dogger small vessel pink(8g.) pink
70 200 45
Dutch Engl. Engl. Engl.
Ireland ? Virginia Newcastle
Rotterdam p London London
linens muslins staves copperplates ironmongery butter vinegar flax seed merceries butter ? tobacco coal salt barley
_
V. du R.
R.70
~~| J~
3C C
MONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
CAPTOR(S)
(R)
Nov. Nov. Nov.
dogger flyboat(6g.) pink(4g.)
50 400
200
Dutch Engl. Engl. Dutch Dutch Engl. Engl. Swed.
Ireland Archangel Archangel

?
Bruges London Hull

?
Nov. Nov.
Nov. Nov. Nov.
? pink
pink pink frigate (22g.)
70 70 70 200
Ireland Newcastle Newcastle Hamburg
Rotterdam London London Lisbon (? Cadiz, Marseilles) Amsterdam

?
butter masts hemp tar hemp ? butter tallow coal coal cloth
2C
R.4100fl. C 2C 200,000/iVre5 C
Nov. Nov. Nov. Nov.
flyboat(16g.) small vessel bark flyboat(2g.)
420
40 750
Dutch Scots Scots Dutch
Surinam ? coaster ? Perth Lisbon
Hamburg Rotterdam
Nov. Nov. Dec.
buss long bark frig. (20g)
80 35 250
Dutch Engl. Dutch
Libourne Lisbon Leghorn
Rotterdam London Rotterdam
Dec.
dogger (10g.)
200
Dutch
Lisbon
Rotterdam
sugar ? herring salt wool hides chestnuts fruit oil rice marble gallnuts goatshair, etc. fruit
180,000/;Vre5~l_ R.70 J~ V. du R. 4C (incl. 1 ofCalais) C C 200,000/11^5" ~ _ 3C
dONTH
VESSEL
TONNEAUX
FLAG
ORIGIN
DESTINATION
CARGO
OR RANSOM
CAPTOR(S)
(R)
Dec.
frig. (10g.)
160
Engl.
Leghorn
London
oil
V. duR.
Dec. Dec. Dec. Dec. Dec. Dec.
ketch pink(5g.) bark bark small vessel small vessel
40 70 35 100
Engl. Engl. Engl. Engl. Dutch Engl.
Lisbon Faro Lisbon Viana

\ 7. C" fishery
London London London London

"t ? ?
anchovies fruit 'balots' fruit fruit fruit fruit vin de Fayal

? p
A f\t\ i R AOOlwres R. 300
C C C
3C (incl. 1 ofNieuport)
C
f*
? coaster
View of the English and Dutch fleet bombarding Dunkirk, 21 September 1694
6
JACQUES-WINOC PLETS, ARMATEUR EN COURSE (c. 1650-1716)
On souhaiterait mieux connaltre les notables du Dunkerque de nagure. L'histoire hroque, qui n'est pas forcment la lgende, a voulu que nous soyons plus a l'aise avec nombre de ses capitaines, surtout corsaires, qu'avec ceux qui les armrent, eux-mmes beaucoup plus rarement qu' Saint-Malo anciens capitaines. Ne se nourrit-on pas de stereotypes quand on veut citer tel ou tel armateur ? Mais a fortiori il doit s'agir de toute une hirarchie, toujours changeante, de forts et de faibles, d'hommes honntes et d'tres ambigus, de Flamands et de Francais, sans oublier quelques Jacobites : en fait, toute une gamme socio-professionnelle, partant des ngociants et des grossiers pour arriver aux cabaretiers et aux maltres de mtier. Si ce monde d'entrepreneurs a su prsenter une fa$ade/ quasi-monolithique a propos des anciennes franchises, ou des rivalits avec d'autres ports, il serait naf de ne pas en attendre maints dsaccords personnels, voire des factions et mme des tratrises. Farmi ces courants peu agrables au patriotisme local, la carrire de Jacques Plets (ou Pletz) nous offre une lumire relativement brillante. Tout au long du crpuscule louis-quatorzien, ce personnage equivoque projeta son ombre a travers comptoirs et tribunaux, soit comme armateur installa rue Saint-Jean, soit comme donneur d'avis, cloitr dans sa maison neuve, place Royale. II est de bonne regle de commencer par ce qu'on peut tirer des genealogies de Pierre Daudruy. Le 8 septembre 1680, la demoiselle Jeanne-Magdeleine de Brier (1661-95), de bonne souche magistrale, pouse le f Is de Winoc Pletz, chevin, et de Marie Sachmoorter. Jacques-Wnoc tait dj avocat ; devenu conseiller a l'Hotel de Ville en 1677 il tait destin a l'chevinage en 1687-8 (1). L'anne de la mort de Jeanne-Magdeleine, il avait trois fils de mo ins de 14 ans et une filie qui pousera le sieur Anne-Henry Lezat, plus tard Messire de Lezat, avocat auprs de l'Amiraut de Dunkerque vers 1707 (2). En deuximes noces, entre 1697-1701, Jacques Plets s'attache encore au Magistrat, en prenant pour femme Marie Tugghe, veuve de Josse Nicolas Meulebegq, ancien bourgmestre dont la familie tait lie aux Coppens et aux Faulconnier, done aux plus illustres families de la ville (3). Cette formation juridique et ces attaches plutt de robe n'interdisaient en rien de s'adonner au ngoce, lequel tirait a merveille profit des dons de l'avocat, n'tait-ce que pour persuader les timides dtenteurs de fonds en sachant interpreter un contrat : ('intendant Barentin fera tat plus tard des subtilits ordinaires du sieur Plets pour former des difficults (4). Daudruy qualifie notre
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avocat de doyen des marchands , ce qui parat assez exact pour les annes 1690, a condition pourtant de ne pas le considerar comme leur porte-parole ; et le marchal Vauban se rfre a une conversation qu'il avait tenue avec Plets, Taverne et ses associs, qui sont les principaux armateurs de ce lieu (5). Au lendemain de la guerre de la Ligue d'Augsbourg, on attribue a Plets une vingtaine de navires ; une escadre de cinq corsaires lui avait cot une mise-hors de 300,000 l.t. (6). Mais que son succes dans le ngoce ait precede la guerre apparali bien, du fait qu'il fut un des premiers a armer contre les Hollandais en octobre 1688 ; lorsqu'elle enregistra la commission du Cheval Marn , capitarne Pierre Bart, fregate de 300 tonneaux, alors a Marseille, contrairement a tous ses rglements, l'Amiraut ne demanda a personne d'en certifier la caution, la solvabilit du sieur Plets estant notoirement connue (7). Il est a remarquer, en effet, que Plets ne cautionna que trs rarement, et conformment a ('usage, les armements dont il fut le dpositaire -c'est-dire le comptable et, le plus souvent, l'armateur principal et encore moins les autres : circonstance qui en dit long sur un certain talent a cerner ses obligations. L o il s'inscrit comme dpositaire, il se contente, contrairement a un Nicolas Taverne ou un Jean-Baptiste Bart, de certifier un autre. C'tait bien Bart, cousin du chevalier et lui-mme dpositaire trs actif, qui cautionna les armements Plets en 1693. En rgie gnrale, un tei service comportait un intrt, une part, dans l'armement. Qui done a voulu s'associer avec Plets comme caution ? Avant Bart, il y avait eu Jan Puydt, matre tonnelier, et Guillaume Henry, chevin de 1693 lorsque la ville dut racheter la mairie de l'Etat ; et aprs, Jean-Baptiste Gottro, crivain de capre et dpositaire, lui, de quatre armements en course Ie 16 juin 1695, dont les cautions furent toutes certifies par Plets, peut-tre Ie principal intresse (8). Les actes de caution nous faisant dfaut aprs cette date, nous ig norons si l'troite liaison Plets-Gottro s'est poursuivie ou non. Probablement pas, puisque les associations d'affaires avec Jacques Plets ne duraient pas longtemps, nous Ie verrons. Remarquons que Ie dnombrement de cette anne 1695 met Gottro dans la vingtime classe (sur vingt-deux) a capiter, avec les apprentis marchands et les clercs de notaire, tand is que Plets s'y trouve dans la onzime, avec les marchands faisant commerce en gros , soutenu par trois valets et deux servantes (9). Faut-il suggrer qu'un dpositaire n'tait pas toujours Ie plus intresse, bien qu' Dunkerque en 1710 on ait pu lancer cette plaisanterie : si 1'on voit briller queJqu'un, J'on ne doute pas qu'il est ou qu'il a est dpositaire ? (10). Il est vrai que le dpositaire tait celui qui se chargeait de la vente des prises, et qui souvent en achetait pour les revendr a meilleur prix ; dans l'ensemble, les depositares furent les grands gagnants de la guerre de course. Tout de mme, parfois, un commanditaire savait commander au commandit. A Dunkerque, en 1695, il n'y avait gure qu'une vingtaine d'imposes dans la classe de Plets, dont seulement trois autres grands armateurs en course : les frres Taverne, Guillaume et Nicolas, et le chevalier Jacques Graldin, jacobite, mort en 1696. Avec eux, les deux autres dpositaires les plus actif s Jan Rycx, marchand puis notaire, associ de Guillaume Taverne, et J.B. Bart- s'y trouvent dans les classes seize et dix-huit. Parmi eux, Plets ne s'est li -d'aprs ce"que Ton
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sait faute d'actes de propriet qu'avec Bart et Nicolas Taverne, Ie seul en France a armer tout au long des guerres de la fin du grand rgne. L'ai Mance Plets-Taverne nous est rvle au moment ou elle prend fin, en fvrier 1696, dans une lettre au secrtaire d'Etat Louis de Pontchartrain, ou Plets se plaint des menees et dtours de Taverne, qui venait de lui faire plusieurs requisitions devant l'Amiraut fondees sur des chimaires (11). Triste moment, car ils avaient partag l'armement de cinq frgates ensemble, moiti-moiti, se constituant ainsi une petite escadre, formation chre a Taverne et une des r a sons de sa russite tonnante, comme le fut aussi le bon choix de ses capitaines. Le 30 mai 1693, cette escadre avait pris trois btiments richement chargs a Lisbonne, dont 'Amiti , construction hollandaise, pavilion sudois, matre Robert Jeff ray, cossais (12). D'o le drame qui en dcoula. L'Amiti et sa cargaison tant condamnes par le Conseil des Prises, on poussa les cris habituis en pays neutre et on actionna la machine diplomatique. Sur appel, le Conseil Royal decida la mainleve du btiment et des dix-douzimes de s cargaison : seuls Jeff ray et deux autres devaient y perdre. Mais puisqu'il y avait eu juste cause de saisie, l'arret ne r est t u a pas le fret, que pourtant, selon Jeffray, les preneurs taient convenus de lui payer : et le leur ayant demand, ils avoient respondu qu'il estoit en effet acquitt, et que le sieur Palmquist, agent du Roy de Sude auquel ees matres s'addressent ordinairement, l'a recue . De Madrys, intendant de Fiandre, se renseigna a ce propos. Il apprend qu'un des amateurs nomm Plets avoit promis au sieur de Palmquist.. . de payer le fret de ces marchandises, que le sieur Palmquist s'est plaint depuis qu 'on luy avoit manqu de parole. . . On m'assure aussi que le sieur Plets a nie a l'audience de l'Amiraut avoir ren promis. . . (13). Ayant lu domicile a Dunkerque chez Les Trois Poissons d'Hot lande , le 22 mai 1694 Jeffray assigne Taverne a confirmer qu'il avait repu une quittance de Plets pour sa part du payement de ladite somme de 12,400 l .t. Le sergent de l'Amiraut interroge Taverne chez lui, rue Saint-Louis, la journe mme et entend que Palmquist estoit un fripon . Tout de mme, le 14 juin 1695, Taverne paya le fret et remit Jeffray en possession de son btiment. Pourquoi cette volte-face ? La supplique qu'adresse Taverne a l'Amiraut le 7 octobre 1695 nous claire : ayant avanc 12,750 l.t. a Plets pour le fret, ce que ledit mai tre n'a ren d recevoir. . . le suppliant auroit plusieurs fois requis ledit sieur Plets de luy renare et restituer son argent, ce qu 'il demeure en faute de faire (14). Voici les chimaires allgues par ce dernier, qui riposta en accusant son co-armateur de lui avoir vol jusqu' 12,000 l.t. en sucre provenant de 'Amiti . Que Taverne veut bien reconnatre que j'ay rest pour luy un bon compaignon et vray amis (sic), tout ceJa est bon mais c'est un compie qu'il me fault (15). Plets fut-il coupable de mauvaise foi ? Plus tard ('intendant Le Blanc louera la bonne foi de Taverne, tandis que Duguay, intendant de la marine, plutt admirateur de Plets, avouera qu'on l'accuse a la vrit^de n'estre pas fidelle dans ses compes (16). On se souvient d'un episode racont a sa fagon picaresque par Jean Doublet lors d'une audience avec Jrme de Pontchartrain, rcemment nomm secrtaire d'Etat a la Marine, en survivance de son pre :
Sa Grandeur. . . m'arrta en me disant : Tenez, voil ce qu'on m'a crt de
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vaus maisj'ay est inform du contraire, gouvernez-vous toujburs sagement . Et il me laissa la lettre. Je ne sorty pai de l 'antichambre sans la lire et j'en rus surpris du contenu. Elie toit du Sf Plets, grand armateur, qui crvoit faux mesme jusque centre Jes ntendants et J'faf major. Je gardayla dite lettre et partis pour Paris, o je ne fus que les deux jours, et pris ma route pour Calais. Et entre Calais et Graveline courant la poste, je passay proche d'une chaize d'o l'on me souhaitoit le bon jour et comme je me portois. J'arestay a la portire et fus trs surpris de voir Plets me faire sy bon accueil, me demandant des nouvelles. Je desceis de cheval et donnay a mon postilln la bride, et dis a celuy de la chaise : Arreste . Je dis en frappant de mon fouet : Comment coquin, avez-vous os me parier ? . Etredoublant mes coups du manche du fouet et des bourades du bout je l'obligeay de mettre pied a terre, et luy dis de tirer son pe. Il se jeta a genoux disant : Que vous ai-je fait ? Je ne suis pas homme d'pe . Je luy prsente un pistolet et il Ie laissa tomber. Je Ie fis soufer et je le blessay un peu a la lvre d'en haut et me promif de ne s'en pasplaindre. Cette soire-la, sa chaise s'tant embarrasse dans les dunes et les portes de la ville se trouvant fermes, Ie pleureur. . . fut coucher dans la basse ville (17). Tout de mme, ne cdons pas trop vite a la pudeur choque de Doublet. Si Plets a crit contre les ntendants il ne fait ren d'extraordinaire ; pour Versailles, qui n'est jamais rassasi d'informations, la delation, on Ie sa t, t a it toujours un moyen de controle voulu. La Marine, elle, profitait aussi des renseignements que pouvait lui offrir tei ou tei ngociant qui disposali d'un rseau de correspondants a l'tranger. Jrome de Pontchartrain exprimera plus tard ses remerciements pour les nouvelles que lui fournit Jacques Plets, comme Jacques Omaer, deux fois bourgmestre, l'avait fait pour ses prdcesseurs (18). Plets restart toujours bien place pour recevoir les nouvelles du Nord. A Copenhague, puis a Christiansand, il entretenait pendant la guerre de la Ligue d'Augsbourg son propre commis , Nicolas Rmy, frre d'Omaer, souvent appel consul frangais par les corsaires auxquels il rendait mille services : jeune homme trs intelligent , dit Bonrepaus, envoy francais a Copenhague, qui fait tirer par Rmy sur Dunkerque les dpenses encourues en Norvge par Jean Bart (19). Plets tait profondment engag dans la fourniture a la Marine de marchandises du Nord, ce qui lui valait des relations avec Dantzig (Gdansk) et la Sude aussi bien que la Norvge. De Gdansk, les Dunkerquois fournissaient mme le port de Brest en mats et cables, en acier et fer blanc, comme d'ailleurs en tmoigne le Journal de Doublet. L, en 1693, Plets fit construir l'Aventurier Fortun , 200 tx, destin a la course (20). Son adjudication pour la mature remontait peut-tre au debut de la guerre et dura au moins jusqu'en juillet 1696, lorsque Claude Thibeaudeau offrii de la remplacer sur le mme pied : 400 l.t. pour toutes sortes de mts, de 16 a 24 palmes (21). Se trouvait-il en difficults ? Dj, en avril 1692, ('intendant Patoulet l'accusait, avec d'autres, de s'y ntresser seulement pour en recevoir les avances royales, sans aucun dsir de /burnir ce en quoy ils s'engagen (22). Pour satisfaire a ees obligations Plets eut recours a l'achat de marchandises de prises en 1689 et 1693, lesquelles n'taient pas payees
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Ie 24 aot 1694 il voulait troquer une cargaison contre d'autres marchandises (23). Autant de signes avant-coureurs d'un crdit surmen ? On n'achetait pas en pays scandinave, on le sait, sans y porter vins, eaux-devie, et sel. Pendant un temps, Plets s'obligeait a fournir aussi a la Marine vins et eaux-de-vie, a meilleur prix (crit ('intendant Ceberet) que les autres (24). Or, Dunkerque trafiquait en France en utilisant ses frgates corsaires, jusqu' confondre course et commerce dans une seule campagne. C'tait bien, on va le voir, une formule chre a Plets, qui savait aussi mlanger course et commerce dans le Nord. Il fallait toutefois s'assurer le concours des equipages. Le 24octobre 1695, celui du corsaire Le Leopard Dor , 16 canons, capitarne Jacob Vriesche, refuse de repartir pour Bordeaux avant un carenage et en plus deux mois d'avance de salaires. Mme son de cloche le 12 dcembre 1696, lorsque Andre Bart, capitaine de la Sainte Marie , 30 canons, declare <( qu'ayant engag son equipage pour faire la course pendant qua ire mois, ei ensuitte aller en France y charger desmarchandises , il a du relcher aprs deux mois et demi (25). Moins banal, ce rapport du capitaine Cornelis Meynne, qui revient Ie 9 aot 1694 avec 24 malades, ayant perdu son crivain : toutes ces maladyes proviennent de la mauvaise bire. . . pleine de vers et puante (26). Rien ne nous autorise nanmoins a croireque notre armateur se rvlait plus parcimonieux que ses contemporains, qui rclamaient tous, y compris Jean Bart, contre les grosses avances qu'il fallait payer aux equipages corsaires en temps de guerre. Fait plus inquitant, sinon entirement surprenant : ('intendant Ceberet arrive de Rochefort en 1696 comme successeur de Patoulet se plaint que Plets ait engag des matelots classes. II y a Ia violation de promesse. Or, la probit de Ceberet tait teile que le clbre Robert Challes, mauvaise langue, s'en extasi dans son Journal (27). Et Ceberet, que Plets appela mon ancien bon ami , lui avait permis de faire construir deux barques longues dans Ie bassin naval ; l avait renouvel son bail pour les fours de la Marine, et pris part a un de ses armements (28). Malgr ('injure, ('intendant ne voulut pas poursuivre le coupable eri justice. Pourquoi pas ? Par peur de ruiner ses armements dans une conjoncture (octobre 1696) o Plets tenait a la mer cinq frgates (contre quatre de Taverne), doni la dpense doit monter a plus de 300,000 livres (29). Evalues seulement par son effort comme dpositaire d'armements en course -mais c'est la meilleure mesure a notre disposition les annes 1695 et 1696 en reprsentent l'apoge : au moins 19 armements, contre 16 en 1693-94,4 en 169192 et encore 4 en 1688-89 (30). Mais ce n'est pas compier la participation de Plets aux armements Taverne en 1693-94, lesquels, ajouts aux siens, pourraient bien totaliser son investissement maximum dans la course. Pour 1697 nos documents font dfaut, mais il est probable que Plets a continu a armer. L'intendant Duguay dira en 1710, lors des pourparlers de Geertruidenberg, que plusieurs armateurs avaient t pris au dpourvu par la proclamation de la paix de Ryswyck (31). L'anne 1698, a Dunkerque, fut l'anne des banqueroutes. Ecoutons Ceberet, le 16 novembre : Les magistrats de cette Ville, voyant que les Banqueroutes
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arivoient journellement, ont reconnu que I'usage estah/y de n'arester aucun Bourgeois qui se tenoient (sic) dans leurs maisons aprs avoir fait banqueroute estoif d'une dangereuse consequence et se sont decides a l'abolir (32). Une quinzaine de jours plus tard, afin que I'interest du Roy ne priclitast point dans cette faillite , le controleur de la marine, Pajot, mit les scells sur les effets de Jacques Plets (33). A en juger par une lettre de Dunkerque du 4 janvier 1700, le Magistrat avait du renoncer a ('abolition de ('usage estably : Je vous ai ci-devant pare du sieur Plets, fameux Banqueroutier. Ses crediiteurs ne peuvent avoir aucune raison de Juy ; ils ont obtenu de l'Esvque une excommunication qu's ont fait attacher a sa porte, i l ne peut pJus sortir de sa maison jusques ce qu ' aye satis fait (34). Au mois de juin 1704 il fut reduit a demander un sauf-conduit du ministre de la Marine, et ce ne fut pas accorda. En 1708cependant il dut a ('intervention de Pontchartrain un arrt de sursis contre les poursuites de ses cranciers, <( afin d'estre en estat de faire conter ses debiteurs, qui se metoienf au nombre de ses cranciers ; et deux ans plus tard, malgr une forte opposition locale, ses affaires furent voques devant ('intendant de Fiandre (35). On commence a voir la justesse d'un mot du controleur Vergier : entre ses mains les affaires ne prennent jamais de fin (36). Nous ne possdons a ce jour que quelques traces de ce labyrinthe. Il est sur qu'en 1702 il devait encore 18,872 l.t. en diximes de prises que Plets a realises pour l'Amiral de France, ce qui laisse supposer un gros revenu minimum provenant de la course d' peu pres 180,000 l.t., rien que pour la periode 1691-95. En plus, 17,920 l.t. lui restaient a payer aux propritaires de plusieurs prises r end u es sur appel, la dernire en 1699. Le 26 mars 1703, Plets et J.B. Bart devaient encore 4,395 l.t. a l'Amiraut de Dunkerque. Le receveur de Monseigneur l'Amiral note complaisamment que Ie dixime serait satisfait en saisissant un navire que Plets avait achet (sans payer) a Jacques de Nouges, celui qui allait se montrer le plus implacable de tous les cranciers en s'opposant a toute evocation par le Conseil du Poi (37). Cela ne veut pas dire que Plets ait chapp a tous ses cranciers. Dj en dcembre 1698, Ie Lieutenant-Bailli Ie condamne a payer 1,226 l.t. a Jean Franchois pour livraison de briques pour la construction de deux maisons, dont une occupe par l'endett ; et en aout 1703, encore en rapport avec deux distinctes maisons , un total de 3,418 l.t. est vers a Jean Beys et Jean-Baptiste Baudry. (La maison rue Saint-Jean avait t laisse en heritage a la mort de sa premire femme en 1695 a leur fils Jacques, lui-mme condamne en 1707 a en cder un sixime a Pierre Houckaert, ainsi qu'un sixime de toute une grande maison cour caves et magazins appendances et dependances occupe par e Sieur Jacques Plets et les magazins par le Roy , Place aux Herbes) (38). Les dettes de Plets an avec Ie roi furent peut-tre soldes par la mise des scells effectue par la Marine en dcembre 1698, car on n'en parle plus, exception faite de la saisie de l'Elphant Dor au Havre, en janvier 1709, episode pourtant difficile a interpreter : le produit de la vente de celui-ci, dont Plets tait l'ancien proprie-
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taire, fut remis au Trsorier de la Marine, ainsi que 8000 l.t. lui appartenant et alors aux mains des sieurs Feray et Le Chibellier (39). Le fameux Banqueroutier avait eu l'astuce de mettre couverf Ja plupart de ses effets sous Ie nom de Delezat son gendre . C'est ce qui ressort d'une lettre adresse a l'Amiral de France par dix-neuf armateurs de grand poids Ie 12 septembre 1710 (40). lis craignent les procds du Procureur du Roi, Jean Porquet de Belledalle, qui les traite comme des Ngres , les exclut des interrogators, mprise leurs mmoires, ignore les formalits quand il exerce les fonctions de juge : il deviendra le maistre de nos fortunes (41). Mais comble de malheur, pendant ses absences il substitue Delezat, homme dangereux et suspect. . . en tirement dvou au sieur de BeiJedaJJe , grace auquel Plets connatrait les points forts et les points faibles des prises sujettes a reclamations , et des prises masques qui entretenaient la course : les preneurs done se plaignent d'etre a la misricorde de leur debffeur qui conduit l'esprit de Delezat et qui ne manquerait pas de se venger d'eux, d'autant plus que presque toufte Ja ville se trouve en engagement par sa banqueroutte (42). Ce cauchemar s'explique au fond par l'espce d'effroi qu'a pu semer Jacques Plets dans le cceur des bourgeois. L'intendant Duguay l'a pleinement ressenti : on le craint parce qu'il a de l'esprit plus qu'un autre. . . (43). Mais comment croire qu'il ait l'oreille de son gendre alors qu'ils se sont brouills publiquement ? Delezat se serait oppose a l'arrt de sursis en 1708 en des termes qui choquent le ministre : pleins d'invectives en sorte qu'il s'carte entirement de la defference et du respect qu'il doit a son beau-pre, ce qui me fait justement mfier de la validit de ses raisons (44). Les armateurs l'avouent eux-mmes : Delezat so 11 ic ita it des proces de ville en ville et de province en autre, a plaider avec Jacques Plets son beau-pre. . . Il n'y a pas de termes assez durs ny agravantes o Us s'en soni servis pour se faire des reproches J'un J'au tre sur des malversa tions et friponneries. . . . On remarque que Delezat se trouve inserii dans les roles de capitation des 1704, place Royale, a cte de son beau-pre, mais qu'il n'y est plusen 1708. La querelle remonte, il n'y a pas de doute, a l'armement malencontreux du Chevalier Saint-Pol Hcourt en 1704, seule fois o l'escadre de Dunkerque fit appel aux fonds prives, eri l'occurrence a la compagnie Simon Coulange, dj constitue pour la fourniture de mts a ('arsenal de Brest. La proposition vint en effet de Delezat, agissant pour luy et les sieurs Voile, Bougis et Moisnet, ses associs a l'entreprse (46). Saint-Pol fit voile avant mme que la mise de fonds en fut garantie : seules 149 actions furent payees sur 344. La reticence du public fut attribue par Lebigot de Gastines, intendant de marine, a la confiance qu'a du placer dans ('experience de Jacques Plets le dpositaire generai Jean Moisnet, traitant a Paris ; dans la liste des actions .payees ne figure qu'un seul nom de souche dunkerquoise - au sieur W i noe k Pletz une action de 1000 l.t. De plus, le seul des associs Coulange a y figurer fut Matre Jacques Voille, directeur general desvivresde la Marine en Fiandre et Picardie (et Trsorier de France a Bourges), procureur de Moisnet sur piace. La situation restant ainsi au moment du depart de Saint-Pol,
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la Compagnie se fit elle-mme garant de gurante autres actions, dont Delezat se reserva la moiti ; au del, Moisnet se chargea de tout l'vnement . En realit, on misait sur les prises a venir. Sauf Voille, homme facile et bon , estime Barentin, intendant de Fiandre Maritime, ces associs dans l'armement ont trouv Ie secret de faire partir l'escadre sans avoir dbours un sol. . . (47). Saint-Pol rentr, ayant fait des prises values plus tard a 260,000 l.t. produit net contre un passif de 317,349 l.t. (48) I a fallu ('intervention de Barentin, lui-mme propritaire de six actions, pour y voir clair. On commence par liminer les non-valeurs, en rduisant le total des actions effectives a 200 sur 344 : ce dsordre est venu de la facilit qu'on a eu d'couter la proposition d'un armement de la part de gens qui n'avoient aucun fond ni crdit . . . quoque j'en aie ren trouv a redire dans la conduite du sieur Moisnet je ne scai s'il auroit eu ta de facult a rduire le nombre des actions s'il avoit eu un profili considerable a faire sur I'armement, et je suis persuade qu'en ce cas l il n'auroit pas manqu de rempJir de noms en J'air les actions qu 'il a rendu en Wane. . . pour estre partag entre Jes actionnaires. . . . Enfin, Barentin trouv Moisnet bien plus sage que le sieur Plets, non seulement dans le discours. . . . C'est Plets qui fit obstacle a la restructuration. A Barentin d'y ajouter un souppon : sur requisition d'un marchiano de Dunkerque, Moisnet, en visite sur les ordres du ministre, avait t arrt pour avoir endoss des lettres de change tires sur Lubert, trsorier de marine, et on pense aux agissements de Plets ce mystre d'inquit dans la vee de recommander le Sieur Moisnet pour seuret de l'vnement du compie de l'armement . L'intendant dut emmener Moisnet hors de la ville dansmon carrosse (49). Plets, certes, ne voulait plus dissociation avec Moisnet. Intresse secret dans la compagnie Coulange (50), il constitua avec Lezat une societ nouvelle pour se charger de l'excution du traite fait au nom de Coulange. .. aprsqu'ils en auront excJu Ie Sieur Moisnet , sans que les chanvres dj fournis ou a fournir soient dduits de ce que Moisnet devait a l'ancienne compagnie, c'est-a-dire 91,000 l.t. C'est prcisment la somme pour laquelle les cautions de Simon Coulange, y compris Delezat, seront poursuivies en 1707, avec beaucoup de vivacit , en raison des dniers avances par la Marine. Le 7 janvier 1706, Moisnet fut remplac a la tte de la nouvelle compagnie, maintenant connue sous Ie nom de Courtois, par un ngociant de bonne reputation, Jean Spycket, membre fondateur de la Chambre de Commerce. A la mort de Spycket en 1708, le march Courtois devait a la Couronne 160,000 l.t. pour Dunkerque et 200,000 l.t. pour d'autres ports, malgr le monopole de certaines fournitures, y compris le cuivre, qu'on lui avait confr a la fin de 1707. Il est a remarquer que Pontchartrain avait revis le contrai dans ce sens parce que les cautions s'taient rvles dans l'impossibilit de le remplir (51). Dans une perspective comparable, on comprend mieux pourquoi la Marine passa contrai avec Plets en 1706 encore pour des cargaisons de mats, matriaux et planches. Tout en profitant de ses correspondants dans le Nord, il sut se pourvoir d'une trs bonne caution, Pigault de Vertesalle, le plus sage homme d'icy et le plus ais , selon Duguay, rcemment revenu a Dunkerque comme intendant
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de marine, tres mpressionn aussi par les connaissances de Plets en matire de commerce. Vertesalle, estima-t-il, tait pret a cautionner Plets en tout et par tout (52). Il n'y a gure de doute que Vertesalle fut concerne par le traite que fit Plets en Sude, au nom de Leonard Madrenes , pour deux cargaisons de mats a destination de Toulon. En 1709, a Vertesalle de rclamer ce qu'on lui doit a Brest. Plus spcialement, de 1706 a 1709, il s'occupait sous son propre nom de la fourniture des galres a Dunkerque, ayant t procureur-fond de son prdcesseur, Pierre Mestdaghe (53). Le trio Plets - Vertesalle - Mestdaghe se revele d'ailleurs dans Ie pret de deux vaisseaux du roi, Le Mignon et La Licorne . Emprunts par la compagnie Coulange en 1704, ces vaisseaux renforcent en 1705 l'escadre du lieutenant de Beaujeu, dont le dpositaire est bien Vertesalle. L'intendant se defend d'avoir permis cette combinaison par complaisance envers Plets ; en effet, Mestdaghe est dpositaire de l'armement du Mignon et de La Licorne , mais la liquidation des comptes va trainer jusqu'en 1709 a cause des remboursements demandes par Plets (54). Or, Mestdaghe avait traite sur le pied du cinquime royal non seulement des prises mais aussi du fret. Les espions britanniques nous nforment que l'escadre Beaujeu fit effectivement un voyage en Norvge en novembre 1705, et que les vaisseaux de Mestdaghe repartirent pour la Sude au mois de janvier suivant (55). Mestdaghe avait demand, d'ailleurs vainement, que le Ro paye les avances aux equipages ce qui sent de loin son fameux banqueroutier. On entrevoit l'astuce de son ide maitresse : nourrir la course au moyen du commerce, en commergant de par le Roi. Le soir merne du depart de Saint-Pol, la compagnie Coulange proposa un deuxime armement, encore de six vaisseaux, a la fois pour croiser dans le Nord et pour assurer la livraison de mats, planches, chanvres, goudron et brai gras : proposition sortie de la tte de Plets, dont le gnie a toujours est de commancer beaucoup d'entreprses et de n'en finiraucunes . (56) II en est ainsi de Gastines, mais une anne plus tard son successeur elabora un pro jet soumis par le capitarne Thomas Trucq, un Provencal, seulement pour l'emploi de La Licorne mais sur le mme pied que le traite Coulange. Il s'agissait d'une course de deux ou trois mois dans le Nord, o on chargerait des marchandises propres pour le service des arsenaux de Sa Majaste , a destination de Brest, en passant naturellement par le Nord de l'Ecosse ; de Brest, on apporterai des marchandises de France a Dunkerque, et on recommencerait. Ce rev s'croule avec le refus du ministre d'approuver les retours a Dunkerque, dont l'appas faisoit seul la suret de fonds qu'on vouloit y employer ; les bureaux craignaient la perte presque certame de ce navire (57). Eclairons eet appas . Evidemment chagrin, I'intendant Duguay reprend tout de suite une vee que le sieur Plets avoit centre les fiottes d'Arcngel : premire esquisse de la razzia que va accomplir le comte de Forbin dans la Mer Blanche deux ans plus tard, et pour laquelle Pontchartrain avait marqu du goust au dbut de 1705 (58). A ce moment l Plets confia a l'ordonnateur Lempereur un secret pour expdition de Kola qu'il gardait comme levier pour obtenir du ministre le sauf-conduit te l lerne nt souhait. Lempereur, qui garde
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Ie secret mais qui se mfie des propos de Plets, se defend de tomber dans une pareille vision : comme pour les fournitures de Toulon, U n'en faudra pas moins que le Roy fasse la premire avance de cet armement (100,000 l.t.), dont Plets cherche une moiti de I'intret pour lui-mme et ses amis (59). Duguay, personnage peu aim a Dunkerque et mpris par le controleur Vergier, se montre plus accueillant. Pourvu que Monseigneur se decide a temps, le projet ne coterait pas un sol au Roi. Ce grand naif explique : le sieur Plets compte trouver les fonds ncessaires a cette entreprise par le moyen des seis qu'il attirer icy pour le compte du Roy et dans le profit de la vante. . . (60). Voil son secret , jalousement cach. A dire vrai, l'alchimie de notre armateur rsidait en ceci : comment raliser des entreprises qui, elles, se rvlent mrement peses ? On sait qu' l'poque les projets d'armements en course pullulaient. Ceux de Pots se distinguent pourtant par une envergure et une prvoyance qui lui permettent d'etre consider comme un des grands stratges de la petite guerre. On se demande s'il aurait pu influencer la pense du marchal Vauban dans ce domaine : il ne leur aurait pas manqu d'occasions, assez frquentes peut-tre, de discuter a propos du champ de bataille. Toujours est-M qu'il fut bien apprci dans les bureaux : J'attends toujours les projets auxquels vous travalez pour la campagne prochaine (lui crit Jerome de Pontchartrain), tchez de les finir le plusost qui sepoura (61). (Rappelons-nous que Pontchartrain lui avait cherch un sauf-conduit en 1704 : ce fut le Roy qui le refusa.) Le ministre s'impatientera quelques jours avant le retour de Forbin de l'Arctique, en septembre 1707, tout en remerciant Plets de l'avoir tenu au courant des mouvements du comte prs des cotes norvgiennes, et trs probablement de la decision de celui-c de passer a Brest. Ce serait tout a fait invraisemblable que cette croisire ne ft en rien redevable au projet d'enlever les flottes d'Archangel , dat du 21 janvier 1705, qui se trouve aux archives de la Marine sous la plume de Plets (62). On en voulait a son secret et il n'y avait pas eu d'armement priv, mais en revanche on aurait utilise ses donnes precises sur la force et le comportement des convois ennemis anglais, hollandais, hansatiques aussi ainsi que sur la region de Kola, o on trouverait toutes les facilites pour ledchargement des prises et des prisonniers (qu'on dpcherait a Arkhangelsk), sans oublier de faire du troc avec les Lapons ; on saurait mme ramener un certain nombre des prises, au lieu de les brler, en engageant (par crit, souligne-t-il) des elements fortement scandinaves comme equipages. L'essentiel serait que I'escadre arrive vers Kola au devant des convois pour leur prparer le guet-apens, en les attendant Tun aprs l'autre . D'o necessit absolue de se premunir des dernires informations sur les departs : Plets disposait de son propre courrier avec la Hollande (Saint-Pol, en quittant le port en 1704 s'tait comport conformment a ees informations) (63) et il tait normal qu'un observateur dunkerquois se glisse a Londres. Et c'est pourquoi I'escadre devrait viter des combats en faisant route vers le Nord. Voil justement Terreur de Forbin. En appareillant, il ne sut pas rsister a la tentation de tomber sur un convoi qui se dirigeait vers la Manche, ce qui lui valut un combat assez rude et le retour au port ; en ressortant, il brla encore des prises (64). Lorsqu'il arriva sur Kilduin, les Anglais taient dj disperses
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et il n'en prit qu'une vingtaine ; ensuite l trouva Ie convoi hollandais par hasard, non en mer russe mais bien dans une rade norvgienne, o on avait eu le temps d'emprter a terre ce qu'il y avoit de plus prcieux . Trs peu d'argent (contrairement aux assurances de Plets) et, somme toute, un coup rate, non sans susciter des embarras avec la cour de Danemark (65). Mais le projet de 1705 ne fut lui-mme qu'une revision du Mmoire d'une Entreprise contre les Ennemis , dat du 17 fvrier 1693 a Paris et sign Plets (66)? L, il ne proposait pourtant qu'un armement compos de deux vaisseaux du Poi avec quatre frgates fournies par les particuliers, tandis qu'en 1705 il envisage dix vaisseaux, ce que furent effectivement les forces de Forbin. Cette difference reflte l'essor remarquable du trafic ennemi avec Arkhangelsk. En 1705, Plets sgnale un convoi moyen hollandais de 50 navires, et surtout 70 a 80 navires anglais, au lieu d'une vingtaine pour chaqu convoi en 1693 ; les convois hansatiques sont de l'ordre de 20/24 au lieu de 15/19 ; et les vaisseaux d'escorte -les convois propres a l'poque accrus en proportion, au moins jusqu' Trondheim. On ne s'attendrait pas qu'un chef aussi fanfaron que le comte de Forbin fit mention d'un sieur Plets dans ses Mmoires, o il laisse plutt l'impression d'avoir lui-mme congu le projet d'Arkhangelsk : Je formai divers projets que je retournai en diffrentes manieres. Enfin je m'arrtai a ceui-ci, comme plus profitable au Ro, et comme pouvant me faire plus d'honneur (67). D'autre part, Plets sut bien prendre la mesure du comte en rdigeant Ie projet endoss par lui a Dunkerque Ie 22 septembre 1707, et attendu par le ministre : Projet de l'armement de l'escadre de Monsieur Ie marquis (sic) de Forbin pour la campagne prochaine 1708 a excuter au cap de Bonne Esperance (68). Selon La Touche, premier commis aux bureaux de la Marine, le Cap de Bonne Esperance avait figur dans Ie dessein du chevalier Desaugiers etl'auroit fait s'il avoit pu trouver assez de fonds chez les particuliers pour un aussy grand armement (69). Celui-ci aurait demand une forte escadre, y compris de nombreux vaisseaux de charge pour assurer Ie ravitaillement ainsi que le transport de plusieurs centaines de soldats. Desaugiers avait appareill a Brest en mars 1706 avec quatre btiments et neuf mois de vivres : l'escadre de Rio de Janeiro , qui allait longer les cotes du Brsil et puis se diriger vers l'Ile Sainte-Hlne. En ('occurrence, il prit quatre navires appartenant a la Compagnie nerlandaise des Indes, dont deux dans les parages de Sainte-Hlne : prises estimes proviso rement a cinq millions l.t. environ (70). Cette aventure retentissante aurait allch Jacques Plets. Bien que le Sud-Atlantique ft trs loign de son domaine, il se mit a l'tudier. Dans son mmoire, il mentionne qu'il possed une copie de l'histoire de Maurice de Nassau, munie de cartes. Pourquoi ne pas l'imiter ? On se demande ce qu'il savait de l'ge d'or de la course zlandaise. Au moins, le prince Maurice evoque l'Angola aussi bien que le Nord-Este du Brsil, d'o partaient les flottes de Pernambouc et de Bahia, riches en produits tropicaux et tout rcemment en mtaux prcieux. Duguay-Trouin ira les chercher, aux Azores, en 1708, trois ans avant le ranconnement de Rio de Janeiro, projet dont on semble entrevoir le mrissement ds la croisire de Desaugiers.
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Notre Plets ne nglig pas les cotes du Brsil. On y ferait une tentative, que cependant il ne precise pas, en cas d'echec au Cap. L, on essaierait de faire d'une pierre deux coups, comme a Kola, tant entendu que la flotte de la compagnie nerlandaise a destination des Indes relche au Cap vers le dbut du mois d'avril, pour attendre les retourschepen : on aborde ra t la premire en rade, en se protgeant du fort, avant d'appareiller a la recherche de ces derniers. Aucune reference aux Indiamen anglais qui faisaient relche au Cap en temps de guerre, pas plus qu'aux dtails si convaincants dans le projet de Kola. Seulement un calcul sobre des forces requises : 18 vaisseaux, deux frgates a bombes (plus rapides que les galiotes), deux flutes pour porter les provisions de rechange. Et un trait saillant qui marque l'auteur : on rentrerait en France a Toulon, a Ja frontiere des estis de J'ItaJie , o se vendent au meilleur prix les marchandises de l'Orient. Mais il faut penser au pire. Comme dit La Verune, lieutenant du port a PortLouis, qui va lui-mme projeter la croisire du Cap une anne plus tard, on doit avoir plus d'un objet, parce qu'iJ pourro/t arriver que par des vens contraires, de calme, de mauvais temps, ou d'un combat avec des forces suprieures, on ne pourroit pas arnVer temps a la croisire. . . (71). A dfaut du Cap, La Verune passerait aux Indes, toujours sans negliger les flottes du Brsil au retour. Plets ferait passer l'escadre de Forbin au Brsil mme et parait y concevoir une entreprise a terre. S'ensuit tout un programme d'ventualits. Rebutes au Brsil, on aurait encor le temps, en mettant toutes voiles dehors, d'atteindre les Mes Shetland pour y guetter les reourschepen, mauvais voiliers , a la fin de mai. C'tait beaucoup tenter en deux mois, mais teile tait la nature active du banqueroutier, qui poursuit en indiquant les vieilles cibles des pcheres -de la baleine, de la morue, du hareng au cas o on raterait tout le reste. Etrange lgret ? Mais du point de vue stratgique, on aurait pu de cette fagon tromper les forces navales de l'ennemi : dix-huit vaisseaux frangais, estime Plets, en auraient distrait quatrevingts de l'ennemi. Ce fut bien la conception vaubanienne de la grande course. Naturellement, on n'oublierait pas d'en masquer les prparatifs sous de fausses nouvelles et a Plets de devancer Cassard en suggrant, mais fictivement, le Curagao et le Surinam. On sait que tout cela fut ruin par la malheureuse expedition d'Ecosse en 1708, expedition que I'intendant Duguay avait souhait masquer en rpandant queJques bruits d'entreprises sur le Brazil, Riojaneiro, Ste HeJenne, Ja Jamaque, etc. . . , jusqu' acheter bien eher des pilotes en pays ennemis (72). Tout de mme, Forbin esprait adopter le programme de Plets a la fin de sa campagne d't. La Touche, dans un mmoire du 16 juillet 1708, s'y rfre comme s'il tait de Forbin lui-mme ; le ministre en avait parl au roi. Monseigneur pourrait Ie ressusciter si Dieu voulait que Ie comte fasse une campagne heureuse, en amarinant des prises assez importantes pour financer l'armement du Cap. Il est vrai que le roi s'est montr peu enclin a loigner l'escadre du Nord hors des mers qu'elle connaissait a fond (73). II est vrai aussi que les premiers cornmis de la Marine participaient aux armements en course importants (74). II n'y a gure de doute que ('esprit projeteur de Plets, renforc par une
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connaissance intime des traf ics du Nord, ait influence de nombreux projets et de nombreuses campagnes, au moins a Dunkerque. Oe Gastines, qui ne l'aimait pas trop, taxa d' informes et mal digrs les mmoires Que Je sieur Plets nous en voy e sur les croisires qu'il estime que edit sieur de St Pol doit teir pendant sa course. Je ne puis asses m'tonner qu'il s'ingre si imprudamment de vous douer de sa teste des avis aussy confus que ceux l, sans la participation d'aucun de ses amateurs ny de Mr de St Poi ny de moy. Il leur semble a tous qu'il veut se renare maistre d'une affaire o U n'a d'autre part que celle qu'ils luy ont bien voulu dormer par consideration, car vous sqavez bien, Monseigneur, que ses affaires ne sont pas en estat qu'il puisse prendre un interest considerable dans aucune entreprise. Il nous avoit leurr d'abord d'un dessein qu'il avoit sur les navires hollandois de la Compagnie des Indes Orientalles, mais je voy bien. .. qu'il n'a aucune veeparticuliere et qu'il faut s'en teir aux bonnes croisires ordinaires... (75). Irritation passagere ? Une dizaine de jours plus tot, ('intendant venait de soutenir la requte du reclus pour un sauf-conduit parce que nous avons tout a fait besoin de la presence du sieur Plets pour finir cet armement, il y travaille toujours du mieux qu'il peut mais ce sera tout autre chose quand il poura aller partout en libert (76). Pas de sauf-conduit, mais plus tard, nous l'avons vu, un arrt de sursis et ('evocation de son bilan. Cette deuxime grace c'est ('intendant Le Blanc qui nous le dit le roi la lui avait accorde en consideration de ses services (77). Etrange banqueroute ! Pendant sa retraite, Plets continuait d'etre capite a 100 l.t., parmi les plus imposes, avee les grossiers, les brasseurs, les grands baillis. D'entre les dpositaires en course, il n'y avait que Nicolas Taverne, Gaspard Bart (frre du chevalier), Edouard Gough, Roger Herefort et Pigault de Vertesalle qui payaient encore plus. Des 1711, aprs que la Fiandre se soit abonnee au dixime, impt nouveau, les taux de capitation furent augmentes, souvent doubles, de sorte que Plets se trouve capite a 200 l.t. et Taverne, au sommet de la pyramide, a 600 l.t. (78). L'anne suivante, voici Plets tax a 10,000 francs pour un armement entrepris par l'ami Beaujeu, mais qui avorta finalement il est vrai (79). Habile manceuvrier, spculateur jusqu'au bout des doigts, d'une manire ou d'une autre, il ne savait pas s'loigner de ('odeur des poudres. Il s'en mla mme aprs ('installation de la garnison anglaise. Voici ce que dit Duguay I a-dessus le 31 aoCit 1712 : II ne recxxit point, dit-ii, de decision de son amy a ce sujet et ne veut pas s'ouvrir desonprojet (80). Veritable pitaphe. C'est Duguay, personnage lui-mme discutable si Con veut, qui nous paralt avoir su le mieux rsoudre le paradoxe de cette carrire nigmatique. On le craignait, il n'tait pas fidele dans ses comptes, et pourtant : II a des ve'es et des expedients d'une estendue marveilleuse. Il possed en perfection tous les commerces du monde, personne n'est pJus propre que luy a establir des correspondances dans les pays estrangers, et a les entretenir. Vous pouvs m'en croire, je m'y connois autant que qui ce soit. Il faudrait un homme comme cela pour memore dans ia Chambre de Com-
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merc de cette ville, au lieu des esprits bornes qui Ja composent, et pour chef une personne qui. . . put en habile scuJpteur dgrossir ce qu'iJ y auroit de trop vaste dans ses projets, car pour faux us ne sont ren moins. . . (81).
Ne ressentons-nous pas la frustration effarante d'un homme capable et dconsidr auprs de la plupart de ses concitoyens, d'esprit tenacement ambitieux, voire dominateur, qui s'puise en voulant diriger des forces qu'il ne pouvait plus commander ? Il n'a jamais montr d'aptitude a tre un bon collaborateur. Tmoignait-il trop ouvertement qu'il tait conscient de sa supriorit ?
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-NOTES(1) P. Daudruy, Families de la marine dunkerquoise (Dunkerque, 1979), p. 270 ; Archives Municipales de Dunkerque (AMD), srie 35, f. 232 v, 265. (2) AMD, 276, no. 13, Archives Nationales G5 - 16 - 4 (lettre du 12 sept. 1710a l'Amirai de France). (3) AMD, 65, f. 137. (4) Arch. Nat. Marine (ANM), B3 - 132, f. 392. (5) Ibid. B3 - 95, f. 498 v. (a Valincour, 16 juin 1696). (6) Ibid. 101, f. 27 v. ;B3 - 93, f. 207 v. (7) Ibid. C4- 252, 14oct. (8) Ibid. 252, 253, 255, 257, 259, passim. (9) AMD, 276, no. I ; cf. A. de Boislisle, Correspondance des Controleurs Gnraux des Finances avec les Intendants des Provinces, III (Paris, 1897), app. 10. (10) Archives de la Chambre de Commerce de Dunkerque, Recueil des procsverbaux des sances, t. 11, p. 264. ( 1 D A N M . B 3 - 9 3 , f. 330-3. ( 12) Ibid. C 4 - 2 5 7 , f. 256 v. - 8. (13) Ibid. B 3 - 9 2 , f. 344, 351. (14) Ibid., f. 348. (15) Ibid. 93, f. 332. ( 16) Ibid. 203, f. 222 ; 133, f. 76. (17) Journal du corsaire Jean Doublet de Honfleur (d. C. Brard, Paris, 1883), p. 175. Doublet, dont la chronologie parfois fait rever, renvoie eet incident au lendemain de la succession de Jrme de Pontchartrain a la Marine, ce qui ne lui arriva que le 6 septembre 1699 ; il doit s'agir de la survivance de la charge de son pre, agre le 27 dcembre 1693, date qui s'accorderait avec la visite de Plets a Paris et l'arrt du conseil du 28 janvier 1694 concernant l'Amiti. (18) ANM, F2 - 27, f. 969 ; pour Omaer, Bibliothque Nationale, Ms. Clairambault 886, f. 11. (19) Ibid., f. 3 ; Rapports de la legation de France a Copenhague (correspondance consulaire) relatifs a la Norvge 1670-1791, t.i. (ed. O.A. Johnsen, Oslo, 1934), p. 100, 195,211,221. (20) ANM, C4-258, f. 106 v . - 7 . (21) Ibid. B3-93, f. 127. (22) Ibid. 68, f. 24 v. (23) Ibid. 81, f. 55, 256. (24) Ibid. 101, f. 27 v. Ceberet ajoute que le contrai pour les planches avait t avantageux a Sa Majest. (25) Ibid. C4 - 263, f. 3 v., 155. (26) Ibid. 258, f. 191 v. (27) Journal d'un voyage fait aux Indes Orientales (Rouen, 3 t., 1721) i, 52.
1l8
(28) ANM, B3 - 93, f. 226, 333 ; 101, f. 27 v. (29) Ibid. 93, f. 207,226. (30) Ibid. C4 - 252, 253, 255, 257, 259. (31) Ibid. B3- 177, f. 150. (32) Ibid. 101, f. 60. (33) Ibid. f. 84 (4 dcembre 1698). (34) Oxford, Bodleian Library, Ms. Rawlinson A 326, f. 131 v. (35) A N M , B 3 - 123, f. 43 v. ; F2 - 30, f. 772 ; B3 - 203, f. 222-3. (36) Ibid. 166, f. 82. (37) Arch. Nat. G5-16-4 (Estat des prises. . . dont les comptes sont encore a rendre , Estat de ce qui est deub au Greffe de l'Amiraut de Dunkerque ). Cf. AMD, 65, f. 91 : Raulin, receveur des droits de r am irai, avait obtenu le 18 nov. 1698 la saisie de deux maisons de Plets en satisfaction de 8,600 l.t. de dettes, avec interets et dommages.
(38) Ibid. f. 122, 201, 251. Plets an habitait encore la rue Saint Jean en novembre 1698, le soir de sa banqueroute, mais il y occupait une des quatre maisons, nouvellement construites attnantes a la proprit de sa femme, laquelle comprenait cinq magasins ; il avait encore une maison qui servait au Bureau de Traites, aussi avec magasins et une dependance voisine occupe par le Lieutenant General de l'Amiraut, Charles de la Motte Cost (ibid. f. 91) : autant de liens avec les pouvoirs ! Le 3 mars 1701 Plets fut condamn a payer 993 l.t. de la part de sa femme, veuve Meulebecq, dette hrite de son pre en sa qualit de marguillier (ibid. f. 137). (39) A N M , B 3 - 168, f. 6. (40) Arch. Nat. G5 - 16-4. (41) Ibid. (lettre des armateurs a Son Altesse Serenissime, 18 sept. 1710). (42) Ibid. (lettre du 12 sept., signe par Jean Omaer, Marc Lombart, Bernard Coppens, Nicolas et Jacobus de Bonte, Matthieu Harries, Jean Brussell, Jaspart Bart, Edouard Gough, De Nougues, Jacques Lievens, Jean Franchois, Louis Langhet, Nicolas Taverne pre et fils, Pierre Dufour, Charles Bonjean, Jean Mannessier et Jean Vandenbrouck). (43) ANM, B3- 133, f. 76. (44) Ibid. F2 - 30, f. 772 (Pontchartrain a Daguesseau, 12 septembre 1708). (45) Arch. Nat. G5 - 16 - 4 (lettre du 12 sept. 1710) ; AMD, 236, nos. 4-8. (46) ANM, B3-123, f. 20- Cf. le raccourcide cette affaire, bien trop sommaire, dans Henri Malo, La Grande Guerre des Corsaires (Paris, 1925), p. 29-38. (47) ANM, B3-132, f. 388-404. (48) Ibid. 133, f. 80-94, 480-4. (49) Ibid. 132, f. 388-93. (50) Ibid. 155, f. 497. (51) Ibid. 127, f. 18-20 ; 133, f. 6 ; 142, f. 432 ; 155, f. 496 v. ;F2-27,f. 1246 v., 1322V., 1432V. ; ibid. 31, f. 924 v. (52) ANM, B3-142, f. 641 ; 133, f. 76. (53) Ibid. 142, f. 56 v. ; 166, f. 13-16, 223-8 ; F2-34, f. 8. (54) Ibid. B3-123, f. 127 v. ; 133, f. 75 v. ; 165, f. 128-34 ; 166, f. 82^.
Jacques-Winoc Plets
119
(55) Ibid. 127, f. 250 v. ; Londres, Public Record Office, Admiralty 1-3931 (17 nov. 1705,23janv. 1706). (56) ANM,B3-123,f. 62-4. (57) Ibid. 127, f. 120-2, 131. (58) Ibid. f. 136. (59) Ibid. f. 366, 371. (60) Ibid. f. 136. (61) Ibid. F2-27, f. 969. (62)Ibid.B4-28, f. 64-8. (63)Ibid.B3-123,f. 64. (b^) Mmoires du comtc de Forbin (Amsterdam, 2 t., 1748) ii, 228-40. (65) Ibid. 240-51,284-9. (66) ANM.B4-14, f. 278-9. (67) Mmoires, ii, 219 ; il est suivi par H. Malo, op. cit. p. 70. (68) ANM,B3-142,f. 567-72. (69) Ibid. 163, f. 679. (70) Ibid. B4-31, f. 229-49 ; H. Dherin, flans l'Atlantique (Paris, 1912), p. 43-53. (71) ANM,B3-163, f. 677 v-8. (72) Ibid. 142, f. 523. (73) Ibid. 163, f. 679. (74) E.g. l'arment de Dandennes, 1696 , G. Symeox, The Crisis of French Sea Power 1688 1697 (LaHaye, 1974), p. 241. (75) ANM, B3-123,f. 43 v. (76) Ibid. f. 32. (77) Ibid. 203, f. 223. (78) AMD, 236, nos. 1-11. (79) ANM, B3-191,f. 12. (80) Ibid. 204, f. 118. (81) Ibid. 133, f. 75 v-6.
Barques Longues
QUELQUES REFLEXIONS SUR LE FONCTIONNEMENT DES CLASSES MARITIMES EN FRANCE, 1689-1713 Les praticiens de l'histoire maritime n'ont pas assez insiste sur les ressources humaines dont disposaient le grand ngoce, le cabotage, la pche et la course au cours des guerres du XVIIIo sicle, lorsque les armes navales ont pes de facn plus forte, bien que fort variable, sur eux. Se sont-ils vus forces a utiliser quantit de garcons, de vieux, d'infirmes, de mutiles, de gagne-deniers des ports, et mme de paysans, en remplissant ainsi le role que leur attribuait l'administration d'lever les novices, au prix d'affaiblir leurs defenses centre les ennemis de la mer? A cette intention, grace a la nette supriorit de la documentation franchise, ne devrions-nous pas entreprendre des analyses systmatiques des roles d'quipages et des matricules des gens de mer? Vers la fin de cette communication, tres provisoire,1 je vais aborder un petit peu quelques documents de cette espce. Mais une premire tache s'impose. Il s'agit de l'efficacit des commissaires et des commis des classes dont dpendaient la leve et la distribution des matelots, et partant, la tenue prcisment de cette documentation essentielle.2 Dire que l'ordre des classes, comme l'avaient concu Colbert et Seignelay, n'a plus t observ sous Ie ministre des Pontchartrain, ce n'est que de leur propre aveu; mais est-ce tout dire sur le Systeme des classes? Un historien de la British Navy saurait peut-tre l'apprcier d'autant mieux qu'il n'est que trop conscient de l'anti-systme de la "presse" navale, avec tout ce que cela comportait pour l'expdition des armements, la sant, l'ordre public, et tout simplement pour la justice humaine, sans oublier les libertes consacres par la Revolution de 1688. Des 1694, en effet, des officiers britanniques commencaient a vanter l'Inscription Maritime, que le ministre Robert Walpole, en 1740, voulut mme introduire en
1 Prsente au colloque franco-britannique organise par M. Paul Butel a Bordeaux en 1976. Je tiens a lui offrir encore ici mes remerciements. Queje remercie aussi M. Rene Pillorget pour son aide en rdigeant le texte francais. 2 La meilleure analyse des functions des officiers des classes demeure celle de Marc Perrichet, "Contribution a l'histoire sociale du XVIII o sicle. L'administration des classes de la marine et ses archives dans les ports bretons", Rcv. d'hist. con. et soc., 1959, n l, 89112.
l22
Angleterre.3 Pour procder a une tude comparative de deux "anciens rgimes", ou plutot des systmes de valeurs que reprsentaient l'absolutisme monarchique, d'une part, et la monarchie dite constitutionnelle de l'autre, on ne saurait mieux faire que tenter de saisir sur le vif la marche des classes, ici regrettablement au cours d'une periode assurment trop restreinte mais qui prsente l'avantage de se trouver a la suite de celle a laquelle sont consacres les seules tudes plus ou rnoins dveloppes dont nous disposons.4 Il convient de commencer en accompagnant Pierre Arnoul, intendant general de la Marine "ayant l'inspection des classes", dans Ie voyage qu'il fit sur les cotes, de Toulon au Havre, en 1693, c'est--dire a un moment ou tout l'avenir de l'arme navale se trouvait remis en question dans l'esprit du roi, aprs la deception de La Hougue. Les lettres que Ie ministre recevait de son intendant generai ne contenaient pas, en effet, quoi que ce soit de tres rassurant; elles ont pu peser, peut-tre, sur l'ultime decision que Ton sait.5 Arnoul sgnale beaucoup de faits bais et d'ailleurs prvus dans l'ordonnance fondamentale d'avril 1689: ainsi la disparition d'un certain nombre de matelots lors des rassemblements a bord.6 (Notons-le au passage, rien de plus "britannique" dans ce fait que la complicit des cabaretiers l-dedans). Mais il faut attacher plus d'importance aux dfauts concernant l'organisation elle-mme qui sont souligns par Arnoul. Parfois confusion dans les registres, surtout a Brest, o les autorits avaient t dbordes par les grandes leves des annes precedentes. Manque d'uniformit dans la tenue des matricules. Liaison imparfaite entre bureau des armements et commissaires des diffrents dpartements, ou entre ces derniers eux-mmes. II apparat qu'il y avait encor normment a faire, notamment pour tablir des tapes sur les routes utilises pour l'acheminement des recrues; pour "perfectionner" le paiement des soldes; pour mieux composer les equipages; pour mieux faire connatre les domiciles des matelots (ainsi pour la Gironde, Arnoul propose l'institution d'un syndic des matelots dans chaqu paroisse); enfin pour mieux armer les commis et "crivains" du roi contre l'appui qu'apportaient aux deserteurs les autorits paroissiales - par exemple, dans le vaste dpartement de Cherbourg, ou
3 Je renvoie a mon edition, The Manning of the Royal Navy: Selected Public Pamphlets 1693-1873 (Londres, Navy Records Society, 1974), et surtout a Daniel A. Baugh, British Naval Administration in the Age of Walpole (Princeton, 1965), ch. 4. Cf notre article, "Away from Impressment: The Idea of a Royal Naval Reserve, 1696-1859", in Britain and the Netherlands, t. VI (ed. A. C. Duke and C. A. Tamse, La Haye, Nijhoff, 1977), pp. 16888. 4 Eugene L. Asher, The Resistance to the Maritime Classes (Berkeley and Los Angeles, Univ. of California Publications in History, vol. 56, 1960); Rene Mernain, Matelots et soldis des vaisseaux du roi: leves d'hommes du dpartement de Rochefort, 1661-1690 (Paris, 1937). 5 (Paris,) A (rch.) N (at.) M (arine), B3 78. 6 A.N.M., B3 61, fo. 217, Arnoul a Seignelay, Brest, 28 avril 1690.
Le Fonctionnement des Classes Maritimes, 1689-1713
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elles "protgent souvent des matelots . . . leur font battre leurs bleds, et les retirent mesme chez eux pour dbiter leurs boissons".7 A tout prendre, nanmoins, il ne semble pas, d'aprs les dpches d'Arnoul, que le Systeme ait deja manifest de tres graves insuffisances, ni que la qualit des officiers des classes, si souvent critiques par les armateurs, laissait tellement a dsirer. Concernant ces officiers, les dpches font tat de certains caprices, voire mme de trop de passion dans l'exercice de leur autorit, ce qui exigerait, selon Arnoul, l'tablissement de rglements plus prcis, l'essentiel tant toutefois, de ne pas les changer trop souvent.8 L'impression dominante qui ressort de cette correspondance serait plutot l'incapacit des matelots a repondr a des besoins aussi divers-quoique pas forcment simultanes, cela va de soi-que ceux du commerce, des corsaires et de la marine de guerre, y compris ceux des galres, auxquelles Marseille fournissait un millier de "matelots de rambade" chaqu t. On sait que les armements de Tourville ne purent tre realises qu'en fermant les ports, premire dfaite pour le Systeme des classes, mais aussi remde souverain. On souhaiterait une tude dtaille de ce procd, qui montrerait jusqu' quel point il fallut recourir a l'empirisme. Et comment furent utilises les premires Compagnies Franches, creation de 1690? Elles furent certainement plus tard d'un bon rendement, comme en Angleterre, o de soldats marines on faisait parfois de vrais matelots, foremastmen. II serait bien surprenant aussi que les vainqueurs de Bveziers n'aient pas enrol un certain nombre de "novices", voire d'invalides et d'trangers, dont les proportions durent s'accrotre tout naturellement a mesure que les guerres se prolongeaient.9 L'intendant Arnoul se demande frquemment comment attirer davantage de novices et de mousses. Pour augmenter le nombre des premiers, il jette les yeux en amont des grands fleuves, "dans Ie fond des rivieres". Il tablit le Systeme des classes en Vivarais et en Dauphin; il institue un "crivain principal" a Tours "pour assujetir . . . toute l'tendue de la Loire"; il remarque que les laboureurs-pcheurs du Languedoc devraient tre inscrits sur des listes et faire ensuite un apprentissage chez des patrons de barques; il faudrait encore tenter d'attirer les bateliers vers la mer en leur garantissant, a bord des btiments de commerce, des pensions equivalentes a celles des mutiles de guerre, ainsi que leur rachat en cas de capture par les Barbaresques. D'autre part, il serait souhaitable que les patrons paient chaqu novice "a peu prs sur le mesme pied d'un bon matelot . . . a la charge toutefois qu'il sera oblige de servir trois ans le
A.N.M., B3 78, fo. 312, Mmoire fait a Cherbourg sur les classes, 21 octobre. Ib. fo. 262V, Brest, 28 septembre. 9 "L'tat general de tous les officiers mariniers, matelots, novices et mousses e t c . . . au mois de janvier 1698" (A.N.M., B5 3) cotnprend 10,801 invalides sur un total de 88,977, sans compter 268 trangers.
8 7
124
mes me patron". Les corsaires, eux, devront composer les deux tiers de leurs equipages de novices et de personnes n'ayant fait qu'un seul voyage; menie chose en ce qui concerne les responsables de navires a destination des Hes, dans la proportion du quart ou du tiers.10 Quant aux mousses, "il faut aller tous les ans dans chaqu paroisse se faire donner un extrait du registre des baptmes des enfants nez douze ans auparavant. . . ensuite aller par les maisons demander aux pres et aux mres compte de leurs enfants . . . questionner les pres et les mres (sic) qui ne seront point matelots . . . A l'gard de ce que les pres et les mres nommeront pour morts, il faudra . . . leur demander o ils auront t enterrez . . ."- 1 Les roles des mousses ne ngligeront pas non plus les hpitaux des grandes villes. Et comme les orphelins, on devra assujettir aux "classes", au moins dans le Cotentin, "ceux qui demandent l'aumosne . . . ou qui n'auront ni profession ni terre a labourer", trait qui evoque bien la pratique anglaise.12 Aux yeux de l'intendant, il s'agit essentiellement de former plus de marins par la pratique des voyages au long cours, du cabotage et de la pche - la marine royale ne devant jamais incorporer les "gens de rivire" avant qu'ils aient fait plusieurs campagnes de teile sorte. De cette facon les patrons-pcheurs de Provence et leurs prudhommes agiraient en vritables commis aux classes. On saurait en plus restreindre les reticences des munitionnaires et des Messieurs des Gabelies, toujours peu disposes a se laisser prendre des hommes. L'intendant recommande aussi une astuce, ne plus inserire sur les listes les fils de bourgeois des ports, car ceux-ci n'aimeraient pas entendre proclamer leurs noms, le dimanche au prne, mls avec ceux des "gens de la lie du peuple", quoique par ailleurs ils n'avaient a formuler aucune objection centre le fait que leur fils s'en aille en mer.13 Constituer des ppinires de marins devait tre une tache de longue haleine. Pierre Arnoul, la guerre continuant, ne se fait pas d'illusion en ce qui concerne la "rotation" du service: il en espre, tout au plus, pour les classes, une anne libre sur six. Second chec du Systeme, si Ton veut. Mais Arnoul souhaite, a la difference du ministre, que ceux qui serviront pendant l'hiver soient libres l't suivant, a moins qu'ils ne preferent revenir "par inclination pour le capitarne":14 l il exprime un souci bien rare en Angleterre, mais que Ton retrouve a maintes reprises dans les correspondances des intendants de marine: sant des matelots, secours a leurs families. De mme, "il faut qu' l'avenir les matelots autant qu'il se pourra ne seront point changez de vaisseaux, mais au cas que cela arrivast il faudra faire leur compte nouveau sur une colonne differente de leur
10
11
12 13 14
A.N.M., B3 78, fo. 328V, Mmoire fait au Port-Louis sur le fait des classes, 31 aot. Ib. fo. 327. Ib. fo. 282, Cherbourg, 21 octobre. Ib. fo. 228, Nantes, 25 aot. Ib. fo. [ ] (Saint-Malo, 14 octobre) et 295 (Le Havre, 4 novembre).

15
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carton autant de fois qu'il aura est change de vaisseau". Ce petit dtail n'est pas du pdantisme: on peut mieux l'apprcier si l'on a quelque idee des souffrances qui ont dcoul de ces turn-overs, d'un vaisseau a un autre, oprs dans la marine britannique, improvisation de l'hiver 1691-1692, a la fois consequence et cause de desertions, et pourtant eriges dsormais en veritable Systeme. Rien de plus admirable, en comparaison, que cette "Instruction pour le commissaire du bureau des matelots au port de Rochefort", signe de la main du roi, qui rgie strictement les remplacements, ordonne la remise des fonds aux dpartements avant le retour des vaisseaux, et insiste sur la tenue d'un rpertoire alphabtique des marins au moyen du "grand registre", o seront exactement inscrits les services de chacun, ainsi que toutes les sommes payees tant a sa familie qu' lui-mme.16 Une instruction semblable, en 46 articles, en date du 20 mai 1695, et sans doute reiterative, destine au commissaire du bureau de Marseille au port de Toulon, tmoigne de cette volente a la fois d'exaction et d'humanisation du service.17 A la lumire d'une comparaison avec son homologue britannique, on apprcie mieux le role crucial jou par Ie corps des crivains dans la marine francaise. Il s'agissait d'un cadre de gens de mtier capables de servir soit en mer, soit dans les bureaux; d'hommes dontles fonctions sur les navires dpassaient largement celles des pursers anglais, qui ne disposaient d'ailleurs pas d'une aide comparable a celle des commis francais et qui se trouvaient moins indpendants des officiers majeurs, dont ils ressentaient la supriorit de rang sinon sociale. Serait-il possible de faire part de quelques impressions concernant la qualit de certains d'entre eux - les commissaires et les commis des classes - sous l'intendance de Pierre Arnoul, entre 1692 et 1710? Le faire sans entrer dans le dtail des paroisses, fondement du Systeme, et sans savoir jusqu' quel point ce personnel s'est trouv atteint par l'rection de ses fonctions en offices, en 1704, comporte quelques risques. Voici au moins quelques observations sur les achats des offices dans les ports du Levant. Pour conserver sa situation, des 1704, tout commissaire ou commis dut alors trouver, selon l'importance ou l'agrment de son dpartement ou quartier, une somme variant entre 15,000 et 30,000 livres. Et ceci cut lieu en mme temps qu'une lgere multiplication des quartiers - subdivisions territoriales des vingt dpartements - pourtant dj trop nombreux dans Ie Midi, selon l'intendant de Vauvr, qui voulait, pour le dpartement de Toulon, en 1704, les rduire de 28 a 21.18 S'il apparat que la plupart des commissaires ont pu acheter leurs charges, parfois grace a des emprunts, et qu'il y eut des changes de postes au sein
15 16 17 18
Ib. fo. 331, Port-Louis, 31 aot. Ib. fo. 335-51, Versailles, 31 dcembre 1693 (copie). A.N.M.,B 3 91,fos. 114-21. Ib. 125, fos. 229-31, 256, Toulon 11 mai et 5 juin 1704.
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du corps, il est tout aussi vident que quelques officiers sans tre du tout rompus au mtier s'y introduisirent alors. Ainsi Daniel de Lry, 22 ans et fils d'un secrtaire du roi, devenu commissaire des classes a Toulon a la place du vieux sieur Catelin, "us par les fatigues continuelles et Ie dsagrment de sa fonction", mais fort estim de Vauvr, qui l'avait prsent en vain au ministre pour le poste d'inspecteur general.19 Il est certain que les intendants firent tout ce qui tait en leur pouvoir pour conserver leurs anciens subordonns. Mais Vauvr n'eut alors que vingt "proposants" pour 29 charges de commis de quartier "et meme", crivait-il, "je n'espre pas trouver des marchands pour celles de Beaucaire, Bziers, Carcassonne, Le Saint Esprit, Tournon et Valence".20 Douze ans plus tt, Francois-Roger Robert, alors commissaire general a Toulon et plus tard intendant de Brest, avait regrett la separation du bureau des classes et du dpartement de Toulon, runis depuis vingt ans entre les mains du sieur Catelin, qui "cnoist parfaitement tous les matelots, leurs pres et mres et enfans, il scait toutes leurs demeures, il conoist de mme jusqu'aux mousses, et il y a quantit de jeunes gens qu'il mesnage . . . Les matelots d'un autre cote sont si accoutumez a son manege qu'il leur suffit de scavoir qu'il les cherche pour qu'ils se rendent aussytost auprs de luy, estant persuadez qu'ils ne pourront pas luy eschaper . . .".2 Vauvr chante pareillement les louanges du sieur Magny, crivain principal a Martigues, dpartement toujours des plus difficiles: "Comme il a fait des campagnes avec moy, il a appris a connoistre les matelots, la manire de les gouverner et les claircissements qui sont ncessaires dans la tenue des registres et des rolles pour les dcharges et les dcomptes".22 C'tait galement pour cette raison que Duelos, cuyer et commissaire a Marseille, demandait que l'on prolonge les services du sieur Arnaud, commis qui avait su "dterrer" les matelots "dans tous les quartiers de la ville et des bastides". Selon Duelos, a Marseiile, chacun des cinq quartiers avait besoin, pour lui seul, d'un commis." On sent tout le poids de ces arguments lorsque l'on considere les multiples references aux desertions et parfois a de vritables mutineries. Ds avril 1691, des soulvements se produisent a Toulouse et a Agde, parce que des dcomptes, ncessaires pour le paiement de la solde, ne sont pas encore arrivs du Ponant. Les resistances autour de l'tang de Berre, si bien mises en relief par Eugene Asher et Rene Pillorget, sont souvent mentionncs dans les correspondances de Toulon et de
Ib. fo. 280, 13juillet. Ib. fo. 282, mme date. 21 Ib. 71, fo. 523, Toulon, 15 novembre 1692. Cf. Brest, A(rch. de la) M(arine), IE 454, p. 408: Robert, 30 mars 1705, sur le depart du sieur Marn, qui s'entend a gouverner les matelots "et les contenter". 22 A.N.M., D3 71, fo. 190V, 8 mai 1692. 23 Ib. 66, fos. 564v-5 (27 dec, 1691), et 71, fo. 706 (9 janvier 1692).
20 19
Le Fonctionnement des Classes Martimes, 1689-1713
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Marseille. L'crivain s'y trouvait continuellement aux prises avec le maire et les consuls de Martigues, avec les officiers des salins, avec le cur, avec les voisins des deserteurs: "II serait bien ncessaire, Monseigneur, pour viter le reclement des meubles des matelots, qui leur donne occasion de se cacher, que le Roy expediast une ordonnance qui condamme . . . les habitans . . . qui les retireront chez eux, ou recevront leurs meubles dans les temps des leves . . ,".24 Les habitants de Saint-Tropez jouissaient d'une reputation tout aussi mauvaise. Us avaient menace de mort le commis Anastazy, pendii des cornes et des entrailles devant sa porte; portant atteinte d'une manire encore plus grave au prestige de la marine, le comte de Grignan, commandant militaire a Saint-Tropez, l'avait fait arrter: exemple deplorable, tant donne que les employs des classes "sont obligez . . . de refuser toutes sortes de personnes qui s'intressent pour dgager les matelots de service".25 A Narbonne, le commissaire Du Tillet se plaignait a la fois des traitants des seis, qu'il accusait d'une "affectation pour de certains matelots dans la vue de s'en servir a d'autres commerces pour leur utilit particuliere", et des fuyards, "les frais qu'on a fait les autres annes par garnisons n'tant pas capables . . . de rduire a l'obissance les matelots qui ont quelque chose, lesquels aiment mieux se sacrifier que de servir . . .". 6 Ceux-ci s'enfuyaient dans les montagnes du Roussillon, exactement comme les mariniers du Rhone se sauvaient dans le Vivarais, "pays difficile, o les leves ont est faites brusquement par le sieur Du Molard, subdelegu de Monsieur de Basville", qui n'aimait gure ses penibles functions et qui avait fourni des hommes "tels qu'il les a trouvs . . . sans s'attacher a leur profession, pour faire plus de dilligence". Au mois d'aot 1695, deux dtachements languedociens avaient refuse de s'embarquer a Agde; galement une sorte de "mutinerie" avait eu lieu prs d'Arles, o des matelots du Vivarais avaient frappe un prtre qui cherchait a empcher le pillage de son jardin.27 Les mentions de semblabes dsordres sont moins nombreuses dans la correspondance de Brest, a l'exception toutefois des grves qui apparaissent dans le port mme, ds janvier 1705, parmi les ouvriers trop peu pays, "gens ramassez qui n'ont que le fruit de leur travail". En dehors d'elles, je n'ai trouv que la mention d'une bagarre a Etables en 1706, survenue a l'occasion d'une leve d'hommes opre par le commis de SaintBrieuc.28
Ib. 95, fo. 201, Vauvr, 11 novembre 1696. Cf. R. Pillorget, "Une erneute de gens de mer (Martigues, 16 aout 1670)", Actes du 93 Congrs National des Sodts Savantes, Tours, 1968 (Paris, 1971), pp. 313-324. 25 Ib. 91, fos. 286v-7 (Vauvr, 4 dcembre 1695), et fo. 339 (Robert, 28 Janvier 1694). 26 Ib. 66, fos. 588-95, Du Tillet, Narbonne, 15 et 16 fvrier 1691. 27 Ib. 91, fos. 280, 210V Vauvr, 27 novembre et l septembre 1695. 28 Brest, A.M., IE 454, pp. 1-8 et 457, pp. 251-252: Robert, 2 Janvier 1705, 22 septembre 1706.
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II n'en reste pas moins que 1'intendant maritime a Toulon ne s'lve gure contre ses officiers, du moins auprs du secrtaire d'Etat. Il n'en est pas de merne de celui de Brest, notamment de Robert, des 1704. Il se plaint en particulier du sieur Benech, commis a Saint-Brieuc, qu'il accuse de paresse; les dpches de Saint-Malo s'en plaignent galement.29 Plus souvent 1'intendant Robert s'en prend au retard des leves opres en Normandie, ainsi qu' la mauvaise quali t de ces recrues. De Granville lui vient un laboureur non inscrit dans les classes, victime de la vengeance d'un Chirurgien protg par un certain sieur Duhallier, lequel agit a la piace du sieur Boizelry Noel, commis des classes, presque toujours absent. En 1708, Robert demande a Pontchartrain de donner directenient ses ordres aux commis normands, et mme de les menacer d'une inspection.30 Le ministre, de son cte, trouve a redire au comportement du commissaire de Lon-Cornouailles, qui a neglig d'informer ses commis qu'il fournit des matelots aux corsaires: s'il est vrai que Pontchartrain jeune reprimande tout son personnel, Robert, qui ne manquait pas de jugement, le rejoignit ici - il fallut rappeler au commissaire qu'il devait obliger les armateurs a embarquer davantage de novices.31 Plus gnralement, Robert adressait deux reproches a ses dpartements. D'une part, les commis ne se donnaient pas assez de peine pour arrter les fuyards; mais il y avait penurie d'archers, surtout a partir de l'rection de leurs emplois en offices. D'autre part, les commissaires commettaient des inexactitudes dans leur fourniture d'hommes aux armateurs et tout particulirement aux corsaires.32 A Saint-Malo, comme auparavant a Dunkerque, le commissaire Lempereur avait a se dfendre frquemment contre cette acusation. C'tait, crivait-il, "une imagination" de croire qu'il ne savait pas distinguer les classes "travests en Flamands", eux-mmes exempts, quoiqu'il ait t tromp par des Provencaux dguiss en Italiens; selon lui, les matelots trouvaient des moyens de s'embarquer en dehors du port. Il n'en tait pas dupe. A SaintMalo, il se vanta d'avoir su classer en une seule anne 200 "trangers" en leur demandant une caution, incitation puissante au manage; d'ailleurs on ne peut pas renvoyer les Provencaux comme des galriens.33 Lempereur avait certes l'excuse que son dpartement avait t "fort dpcupl par le nombre infmy de matelots qui se sont perdus a la mer ou qui ont pry dans les prisons": les Anglais gardaient plus de deux mille "Malouins" au printemps de 1705, anne ou ils en rendirent 2,577 (contre
Ib. IE 454, p. 589, 27 avril 1705; A.N.M., B3 123, fo. 471 (Saint-Sulpice, SaintMalo, 16 mars 1704). 30 Brest, A.M., IE 459, pp. 256-257 (15 aot 1707) et 460, pp. 586-588 (14 mai 1708). 31 Ib. IE 53, p. 30 (Pontchartrain, 6 avril 1707) et 457, p. 583 (Robert, 11 avril 1707). 32 E.g., ib. 453, p. 457 (15 octobre 1704), et 454, pp. 645-647 (6 mai 1705). 33 A.N.M., B3 68, fo. 83 (Dunkerque, 27 janvier 1692); 135, fos. 253, 286 (SamtMalo, 26 septembre et 31 octobre 1706); 195, fo. 358 (Saint-Malo, 11 novembre 1711).
29

34
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2,170 en 1706). On le comprend aussi lorsqu'il appelle les armateurs malouins "des testes de fer que rien ne peut vaincre"; mais a diverses reprises il prend leur parti, de bon coeur (dit-il) sans intrt personnel; son indulgence pronte aux matelots, fait du bien a l'tat et au commerce. On lui reprocha de ne pas se montrer assez sevre a l'gard des corsaires qui ne rendalent pas le bord aux dates convenues par leurs soumissions, aim de concilier les armements du roi avec ceux des particuliers. Voici sa rponse: "Ceux qui s'en dispensent sont ordinairement les plus honntes gens de la ville, et aux qui (sic) j'ay le plus de liaison, et il n'est ny naturel ny gure possible que je commence par eux a faire des exemples. Et cependant il faudra bien y venir". Mais que pouvait faire un simple commissaire de marine en face des instances d'un Danycan de Lpine ou d'un Piedcourt, conseiller de commerce, mme si son intendant tait pleinement conscient de ce que cotaient en bons matelots les "dcouvertes" en Mer du Sud?35 Duelos, commissaire cuyer, dut galement se purger devant le ministre de ses complaisances a l'gard des ngociants marseillais, "leurs manieres n'y devant gure engager".36 Sous cette double pression de la marine et des particuliers, les commissaires doivent se multiplier pour donner satisfaction aux uns et aux autres. A Saint-Malo, on attend un retour de cartel pour combler une leve; la perte de plusieurs corsaires, phnomne de plus en plus frequent vers 1705, menace de ruiner la reputation du commissaire auprs de ses suprieurs. A Toulon, a Marseille, mme refrain en ce qui concerne les retours du Levant et du Cap Ngre. lei toutefois la grande plaie est constitue par l'migration temporaire, sinon toujours volontaire. En 1691, dj, on parlait du "nombre tres considerable de matelots francais dans l'arme navale de Venise", alors en guerre contre le Sultan; le consul a Salonique en mentionna une centaine en 1701; en 1704, a Vauvr de recommander de ne plus envoyer les frgates du roi dans le golfe de Venise a cause des fuites survenues l-bas depuis trois ans. Au moins deux cents fuyards a Istanbul, a Smyrne et dans 1'archipel en 1691, plus de six cents 1'annee suivante "et des meilleurs qui n'en reviendront point si vous n'envoyez deux frgates pour les prendre, sans compter ceux dont on n'a point les noms . . . "3 En 1696, le chevalier du Palais, alors commandant du convoi pour Smyrne, reût une liste de ces "libertins" pour les demander aux consuls; mais a Toulon le controleur crut que trois
34 Ib. 128, fo. 379 (Pelsaire, Saint-Malo, 4 avril 1705), et 145, fo. 281 (Saint-Malo, Compte de l'change des prisonniers de guerre francais, 29 septembre 1707). 35 Ib. 157, fo. 334 (lOoctobre 1708); 195, fo. 15 v (25janvier 1711); 145, fo. 150 v (29mai 1707); 135, fo. 271 (lOoctobre 1706); Brest, A.M., 1E456, p. 551, Robert, 12juillet 1706. 36 A.N.M., B3 96, fo. 361V Marseille, 30Janvier 1696. 37 Ib. 66, fo. 435V Robert, Toulon, 23 septembre 1691; Marseille, (Arch, de la) Chambre de Commerce, B6 fo. 164, registre des deliberations, 10 novembre 1701; A.N.M., B3 125, fo. 166, Vauvr, 23 mars 1704. 38 Ib. 71, fo. 134, Vauvr, 30 mars 1693.
13 O
mois de chasse dans les les seraient ncessaires pour les retrouver. On y enverrait Isnardon, "estant celuy d'ici qui entend le mieux mener les btiments de rames" et d'ailleurs "sachant la manire de les trouver et les surprendre avec les felouques ou autres petits btimens . . . d'Ille en Ule la nuit dans leurs habitations".39 A part les fuyards de Martigues - fort nombreux a Livourne en 1703, au point de faire suggrer par Vauvr un ordre du grand due au gouverneur d'en "faire fermer les portes et les faire prendre dans les cabarets" - les marins de Cassis et de La Ciotat avaient reputation d'etre aussi libertins que bons matelots, "mme forts sujets a sa disbander pour commerce du Levant". Selon Duelos, le controle des congs y laissait a dsirer; il n'y avait de commissaire que le bon Catelin, lequel rsidait a Toulon; le 9 mai 1696, une ordonnance dfendit aux patrons d'embarquer pour l'Italie des hommes qui ne se trouvaient pas dans les roles d'quipage. De plus, les consuls francais dans les ports italiens s'avraient capables de donner des congs pour le Levant, ce qui entranait pour leurs bnficiaires une absence prolonge jusqu' six mois.40 Il est vrai, au contraire, que les consuls devaient entretenir les matelots "disgracis", tres nombreux a cause des corsaires et en particulier de ce flau qu'taient les Zlandais, qui dbarquaient leurs prisonniers n'importe ou. II y en avait a Malte, a Zante, en Sicile, en Cors, en Sardaigne, aux Baleares, en Catalogne, a Livourne, et tout particulirement a Genes, grace sans doute au cabotage universel des Gnois. En principe, selon l'Ordonnance de 1689 et un rappel a l'ordre par ordonnance du 4 avril 1696, on devait les rembarquer (aprs quarantaine) pour la France et de preference au lieu de leur classement. Ceci donnait naissance a un tas de problmes, a commencer par la discipline en pays tranger, o il n'tait pas exclu que le "disgraci" sache gagner sa vie. "Tous les jours", crit le consul Riencourt de Livourne, "ils nous causent de nouveaux dsordres", et il se plaint fort de cette besogne: il y avait des ingrats qui se cachaient lejour de l'embarquement aprs avoir recu trois mois de subsistance gratuite. Assez souvent aussi il y avait penurie de barques francaises pour le voyage de retour, ou bien les patrons neutres imposaient un prix exager; et au fr et a mesure que les remises de fonds se rarfiaient aucun patron ni consul n'tait sur d'etre rembours. Plutt que d'attendre quatre ou cinq ans une ordonnance de l'intendant de marine, Riencourt en 1712 s'adresse a la Chambre de Marseille, dont il reconnait la promptitude.41 On s'y trouve aux
Ib. 95, fos. 225, 233, Le Vasseur, 19 avril 1696. Ib. 121, fo. 155V et 91, fo. 200, Vauvr, 15 avril 1703, 25 aot 1695; 71, fo. 524, Robert, Toulon, 15 novembre 1692; 95, fo. 399, Duelos, Marseille, 21 mai 1696. 41 Marseille, A.D. Bouches-du-Rhne, Amiraut IX B3 fos. 824v-5, ordonnance du 4 avril 1696; Ch. deComm., B6, fo. 93vReg. des dlib., 3septembre 1699, K 3, Riencourt, Livourne, 21 janvier et 9 septembre 1709, 8 septembre 1712. Cf. ib. K 95, Aubert, Genes, 15 octobre 1710; K 153 (Meritan, Cagliari, 4 dcembre 1689) et 154 (idem, 16 avril et 13 juillet 1695); K 165, Poggi, Corse, 22 aot 1711.
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antipodes des changes plus ou rtioins rguliers des prisonniers ponantais contre des Anglais, Espagnols, Hollandais; tel ou tel Dunkerquois, prisonnier a Flessingues, rentra chez lui en 48 heures. Les indications equivoques du commissaire Lempereur annoncent une certaine dispersion de Mridionaux par tout le Nord. Un examen des roles d'quipages des corsaires malouins nous en fournit une ide plus precise, dans la mesure o Ton peut leur faire confiance.42 En confrontant les roles de 1702 (23 armements, 2,025 hommes) avec ceux de 1711 (36 armements, 2,804 hommes) nous effleurons le flux et le reflux de la guerre autant que le dynamisme de la cit corsaire, grand marche d'hommes: Provenance 1702 1711 Guyenne-Gascogne 9 28 Bayonne - Saint Jean de Luz 3 8 Languedoc 8 Martigues 5 Marseille 3 57 Toulon 12 Autres Provencaux 3 7 Nice, Mentn 3 Genes 18 16 Livourne l 6 Venise 5 Autres ports d'Italie 3 Grece 2 Malte 7 Espagne 1 25 Portugal 2 5 40 (1,97 % total) 197 (7,02 % total) Bien sur, dans ces rles il ne s'agit pas entirement de matelots. Il y a souvent un assez fort complement de soldatesque - 24 par corsaire en 1705 - que Ton distingue mal des "volontaires", aventuriers de bonne naissance. D'autre part, la proportion des officiers mariniers par rapport aux matelots peut dcevoir, car elle ne constitue qu'une expression de la concurrence, a couteaux tires entre armateurs. ainsi que l'tait l'inflation des avances de solde: en 1703, on y compte 960 officiers mariniers contre 1,566 matelots, tandis que deux ans plus tard cette proportion se trouve pratiquement renverse- 1,636 contre 1,187-. Constatons que, pour les
Brest, A.M., Saint-Servan Pc33 et 34. Dans les 36 roles malouins de 1711 on trouve 68 Dunkerquois, 31 Rochelais et 31 Parisiens, sans parier des 34 Irlandais, 8 Hollandais, 6 Danois, 2 Suisses, 8 Ngres, etc. J'cn ai esquiss une premire analyse dans un article, "Trade and Privateering at Saint-Malo during the War of the Spanish Succession", ci-dessous, 279-95.
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armements royaux de Brest, on limitait les premiers au sixime de Pquipage et qu'il y en avait souvent un surplus. L, en tout cas, les cartons des matricules se remplissaient surtout de marins de Saint-Malo et de Saint-Servan, ages de 20 a 48 ans pour la plupart; tres peu de Mridionaux et seulement une vingtaine de Normands dans une tranche de 228 noms reclasss en 170S.43 Mais voici des surprises. Parmi ceux-ci, 19 seulement firent plus de deux campagnes pour le roi et 58 n'en firent aucune; le plus actif pourtant en fit neuf des 1692 jusqu'en 1708 (et quatre encore avant 1727). Il est a craindre que les mentions de voyages, en course ou au long cours (y compris Terre-Neuve), entrepris pour les particuliers, soient fautives; mais telles qu'elles sont, elles indiquent que la bonne moiti de ees classes, jusqu'en 1730, ne firent que trois voyages au plus (et 93 d'entre eux un ou deux voyages seulement); il n'y en a que 19 qui firent dix voyages ou plus, sans que les mentions de mort, "rest aux lies", etc. soient frquentes. L'opinion voulait que Jean le Matelot, une fois marie, ne pouvait subsister trois mois, ou mme une quinzaine de jours, sans chercher un emploi marin:44 ce sondage semble la contrarier, tout en escamotant le petit cabotage et les peches ctires. Contribue-t-il ainsi a mieux expliquer le phnomne des desertions? Celles-ci restent naturellement difficiles a prciser. On a la certitude que le matelot pay de ses avances, et "parfaitement" pay aprs avoir desarm, demeura bien plus loyal: et c'est le contraire, tout le monde le sait, qui s'est pass pendant la plus grande partie de la guerre de Succession d'Espagne. Tout en notant, de temps en temps, la docilit des leves brestoises, l'intendant Robert arrive vers la fin de 1705 a envisager une perte de vingt pour cent, y compris malades et malingres: calcul qui commente autant l'efficacit du personnel des classes que les fatigues de la route, surtout en hiver? A Toulon, a la fin de 1695, la marge de "non valeurs" ne fut que de huit pour cent.45 La lecture des simples mesures que prit Robert par rapport aux armements des Trouin frres tonne parfois. En juillet 1704, la reputation de Duguay-Trouin ne le protege gure contra la mauvaise humeur des matelots, qui preferent de loin le corsaire particulier a cette espce d'armement semi-royal, qui ne leur offre qu'une solde lgrement suprieure a celle du roi; le 25 aot, le grand capitarne reste en rade par peur des desertions, lesquelles se
Brest, A.M., C4 17, matricule des gens de mer 1708-30, Gille Allaire aJean Martin. Cf. ib. C4 5, 6, 11 et 12 P (enregistrements des effectifs, Saint-Malo 1698-1702) o sont distingues parmi les effectifs de 1702 (1) ceux qui le furent en 1697 et (2) les nouveaux enregistrements: sur un total de 1,309 (a comparer avec Saint-Servan, 732, et Canale, 429), 586 enregistrements nouveaux. 44 A.N.M., B366, fo. 23, Comted'Estres, chefd'escadre, Toulon, septembre 1691; Brest, A.M., 1E458, p. 1,088, Robert, 20juin 1707. 45 Ib. 454, pp. 882-3 (23 dcembre 1705); A.N.M., B391, fo. 295, Vauvr, 4dcembre 1695. Cf. M. Giraud, "Crise de conscience et d'autorit a la fin de rgne de Louis XIV", rmales E.S.C., T anne (1952), 172-190.
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poursuivcnt au mois de septembre jusqu' coter fort eher au sieur de la Barbinais-Trouin en courses d'archers; Fequipage de Y Auguste se disperse "en foule" - "jamis un equipage si peu affectionn", dit Robert, qui pourtant conseille Duguay, bien capable de frapper durement ses gens, de s'y montrer "extrmemcnt circonspect et pos" en matire de punition.46 En mai 1707, contre le gr de l'intendant, Duguay ne russit pas a appareiller sans prendre une portion des equipages de DuquesneMosnier, dont des Toulonnais qui avaient servi depuis l'automne precedent "abattus, extenes"; ils attendirent la fin d'octobre, aprs avoir sub de durs combats, avant de revenir a terre a Robert de complimenter leur docilit.47 En 1709, il fut reduit a donner a Duguay une proportion excessive de soldats, a cause des retards dans les leves, attribus a la negligence des commissaires, moins enthousiastes (a cru Robert) pour ce genre d'armements que pour ceux du roi. Tout cela pse lourdement sur les armateurs. Trouin de la Barbinais, une anne plus tt, avait refuse d'armer avant de se rassurer sous cette rubrique: on sait les prodiges qu'il fit pour ranimer sa socit, plus d'une fois dcourage, a bout de ressources.48 Pour l'expdition a Rio, il fallut la fermeture de certains ports, malgr un complement exceptionnel de soldats et en consequence une diminution du nombre des matelots requis.49 Entre eet effort marginal de la Guerre de Succession, lorsqu'en Bretagne il avait fallu toute la virtuosit d'un Robert pour mener les choses a bien, et l'exprience des annes 1689-1693, le contraste est frappant. Assurment, ces premires annes furent marquees par une extreme rigueur, ici et l par la violence sans doute. Mais c'tait l'heure des flottes entires; mme aprs La Hougue, en mai 1693, Tourville sortit de Brest avec 71 vaisseaux et 71,130 rationnaires, alors que l'effectif total du royaume en 1690, selon "l'tat general", n'atteignit que 55,790 officiers mariniers et matelots, y compris sept milliers d'exempts (matres de barque, pilotes, etc.). Il y avait toujours, certes, un complement important de soldats: la creation des Compagnies Franches est de 1690 mme. En plus, nous risquons constamment de sous-estimer le nombre de non-marins et d'mvalides qui pouvaient servir utilcment a bord des navires a voiles, sans mentionncr les mousses de moins de 18 ans, souvent aussi tiles qu'un matelot. Tout de mme, a ce niveau, on touchait a la paralysie du commerce. L'observation du Code de la Marine ne put tre maintenue strictement. A ce moment-la on fut bien aisc
Brest, 1E 453, pp. 15 (14 juillet), 246 (25 aout), 329 (15 septembre), 378 (24 septembre), 473 (17 octobrc). 47 Ib. 458, pp. 701-703, 725, Robert, 25 avril, 2 mai; 459, p. 625, 19 octobre; 465, pp. 474, 535-537 (l l et 27 mai 1711). 48 Ib. 462, pp. 397-398, 463-464, Robert, 11 et 25 mars 1709; 460, p. 531, 30 avril 1708. 4l) Ib. 465, pp. 474, 535-537, Robert, 11 et 27 mai 1711. 511 V. Bruii, Cerr maritimes de la France: piirt de Toulon (2 t., Paris, 1861) l, 96-98; Mcmain, op. rif., p. 130.
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Corsairs and Navies, J 660-1 760
d'emprunter quelques dizaines d'hommes au prince de Monaco.51 Ce n'est pas tout dire. Qu'aurait-il pu se passer a dfaut absolu du Systeme? Voici un trait qui en demontre une certaine valeur, une tres grande valeur aux yeux d'un historien britannique, accoutum a l'anarchie des press-gangs. Tout simplenient, on a su transferer du Levant au Ponant, des annes de suite et par terre, plusieurs milliers de recrues: 4,000 en 1691, 2,200 en 1692, bien plus en 1693, plus de 5,000 encore a l'automne de 1694, cette fois-ci des Ponantais desarmes a Toulon aprcs Ie sige de Barcelone, ou Tourville s'est rendu avec 53 vaisseaux. De Vauvr fut particulirement content des mesures prises a cette dernire occasion, lorsqu'il envoya des dtachements d'un millier d'hommes chacun, a trois journes d'intervalle, sur la route de Lyon a destination de la Normandie, de la Picardie, et mme de la Fiandre, tandis que d'autres suivaient le canal du Midi en direction de Bordeaux, de Rochefort et de la Bretagne; il fallut aussi "charroyer" leurs hardes.52 Or, en cette occasion, on ne trouve aucune mention de dsordres: seuls quelques officiers mariniers bretons, ivrognes, se trouvent a Agde sans argent, indication qu'on leur avait donne la "monnaie de conduite" et que les "tapes", si chres a Arnoul, centre dit en ceci par le ministre, ne furent pas partout prpares. Mais a cette occasion les brigades ou les compagnies rentraient chez elles: faire marcher des escouades de Provencaux vers Rochefort ou Brest, pour les campagnes a venir, ce fut bien autre chose, et pourtant ces masses d'hommes arrivrent en grande partie a bon port, c'est vident. Pour les reunir, certes, les commis avaient prouv les difficults ordinaires - fuites de bateliers, disputes avec les voituriers de sel, retards dus aux ftes, aux dlais de fonds, aux commis inexpriments mais presque pas de libertinage, parat-il, sur les routes. Sur deux milliers de Pro vene, aux envoys au Ponant en mars 1692, treize deserteurs seulement. En 1691, ce furent plutt les commandants a Rochefort qui risqurent de semer le dsordre, en voulant puiser dans les dtachements destines a Port-Louis et a Brest: faute grave, parce que les roles y avaient t dpches, done le trsorier de Rochefort ne pourrait absolument pas savoir combien on avait dj pay comme avances.53 C'tait vritablement une tache exigeante que de mettre au point ces roles, d'en faire parvenir des copies aux autres ports et aux paroisses d'origine, et tout spcialement de faire attention a payer leurs avances aux leves avant leur depart: tache qui suscite de l'admiration. Assurment, il y a eu des contretemps, comme en 1691 a Toulouse et a Agde, ou des classes se sont excuses de leur mauvaise volente "sur ce qu'ils n'estoient pas payz de leurs dcomptes de Ponant"; mais l'explication fournie par
A.N.M., B3 78, fo. 167V Arnoul, Aix, 24 avril 1693. Ib. 61, fo. 391, Robert, 31 dcembre 1690; 66, fos. 116-117, idem, 8 avril 1691; 71, fos. 133, 183V Vauvr, 30 mars et 4 mai 1692; 84, fos. 216-57, novembre 1694. 53 Ib. 66, fos. 116-117.
52 51
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le commissaire general ne semble pas mensongre: "Tous les dcomptes arrivez de Ponant avant la leve pour les armements de ce port, et pour envoyer ces matelots en Ponant, ont est payez dans tous les dpartements . . .; a l'gard des dcomptes arrivez pendant que l'on faisait lesdites leves on en a pay le plus que l'on a p . . . mais comme il toit impossible de travailler en diligence a toutes ces leves . . . et de payer en mesme tenis les dcomptes qui arrivoient, il est rest quelques dcomptes a payer aprs les leves faites, et on travaiile a les payer depuis le 31 mars . . . L'on n'y perd pas un moment". Par la suite, les trsoriers du Ponant refusrent de recevoir l'argent que voulaient leur donner des Provencaux l-bas pour le faire parvenir a leurs families; mais ce problma, apparemment, fut vite regl. Robert s'emploie aussi a ce que les families recoivent "l'argent des bardes de leurs parents morts".54 Celui qui parie fut plus tard eet intendant de Brest, si intelligent, qui a toujours fait preuve d'une conscience extrmement soucieuse de la sant des marins qui rendent le bord, et qui a su apprcier en realiste tout l'importance pour le marin d'un sjour, mme bref, dans le foyer contraste clatant s'il en fut avec les pratiques contemporaines en Angleterre. Ces operations de grande envergure mriteraient une tude lente et paisible. On sait dj que la marine britannique, qui dpendait trop du bon vouloir des autorits civiles, n'aurait pas t capable de les raliser. De mme les douaniers anglais furent loin d'etre comptents pour surveiller de pres les departs et les arrives des equipages retenus par les particuliers. Qu'un Duelos ou un Lempereur ait su plaire aux ngociants, cela se voit; en France nanmoins on ne pouvait pas se dispenser d'agrer les roles ni de prter l'oreille aux importunits navales. En effet, ees commissaires se sont vertus, en jongleurs experimentes, a satisfaire tout le monde, en attendant un retour de navire avant de donner un cong, en distribuant des petits paquets d'hommes, en mettant ici un novice et l un invalide, car (comme dit notre Lempereur) "avec une jambe ou mesme un bras de moins, les officiers mariniers ne laissent pas d'estre en tat de servir . . .". ~ II n'est pas sans intrt d'interroger les roles d'quipage a eet gard. A en juger par ce qui en reste pour SaintMalo pendant la guerre, dite de la Ligue d'Augsbourg, la pche de TerreNeuve survcut largement grace aux matelots de 50 ans et plus, aux invalides, aux novices et aux volontaires, aux mousses, encadrcs bien entendu par un certain nombre d'officiers mariniers rompus au mtier.56 Par exemple, en 1694, Ie Plateren 'Argouge, 250 tonneaux, 45 matelots "tous invalides, enfans de familie et gens non classes", en sus de 19 novices, 11 mousses, 6 officiers majeurs, 12 officiers mariniers. Ou
54 55 56
Ib. fos. 118-119, 8 avril 1691. Ib. 195, fo. 83, Saint-Malo, 18 mars 1711. Brest, A.M., Saint-Servan Pc 331.
136
prenons 1'equipage du Pierre-Marie, destin a Saint-Domingue en 1693: 200 tonneaux, 7 officiers majeurs, 13 officiers mariniers, 24 matelots, 19 volontaires et soldats, 8 mousses, 6 passagers. Puisque ces rles sont mieux conserves pour l'anne 1696 (quand aussi la grande pche reprit un peu), en voici la structure humaine de 25 terreneuvriers (en omettant quelques corsaires): Officiers majeurs Officiers mariniers Classes Invalides et vieux Novices Volontaires Mousses 59 192 269 283 226 12 162
Ajoutons que parmi les invalides il se trouve des estropis et mme des borgnes, mais ce sont en general des "vieux et infirmes": une teile categorie de 41, appartenant a l'Ange Gardien, 400 tonneaux, est ge en moyenne de 56 ans. Doit-on remarquer que l'Ordonnance de 1689, qui parat tout prvoir, ne met pas de limite suprieure a Tage d'un classe, quoique l'opinion commune de tous les pays entendait qu'un marin de 50 ans est un marin puise? La revue des Classes du royaume date dejanvier 1698 comprend 10,801 invalides, aussi nombreux presque que les 11,341 mousses et plus nombreux que les novices (8,968 dont la moiti "sans service").57 Qu'on se rende compte enfin de ce que signifient ces revues priodiques o on dnombre pour chaqu dpartement 5 pour Toulon, 7 pour Rochefort, 6 pour Brest et 2 chacun dependants du Havre et de Dunkerque - non seulement les grandes categories, mais o sont aussi distingues les six categories d'officiers mariniers (canonniers, calfetiers, charpentiers, etc.) et les cinq echelons de matelots, ranges suivant leurs soldes (de 10 a 15 livres par rnois). Il s'agit l des "tats fixes"; mais il y avail aussi, deux fois par an, en principe, les "tats variables" o sont indiques les navires o les classes se trouvent. L'Amiraut de Londres, par centre, n'a pas eu la moindre statistique de ses gens de mer, mme thoriquement disponibles, avant l'anne 1835. Il est vrai qu'un rapprochement de ces "tats" d'une anne a l'autre revele une rigidit douteusc dans divers dpartements -bon indice sans doute des scrupules relatifs des officiers des Classes.58 A partir de la correspondance des ports, pourtant, on commence a connatre les meilleurs d'entre eux - et il
A.N.M., B3 3: grand total de 88,977 mais seulement "effectifs", d'o il faut encore dduire5,692 "capitaines, maitres et patrons", exempts. 58 A titre d'exemple, A.N.M., G extrait generai, dat de 1689, des revues faites en 1686 et 1687.
57
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y en avait d'excellents. On y entrevoit galement les "dependances" juges "difficiles", qu'il s'agisse de petits ports ou surtout d'un quelconque arrire-pays. II reste a accompagner les comrnis au fond des paroisses, dans les cabarets, a bord des bateaux o ils interrogeaient les patrons, a la porte de l'glise o ils affichaient leurs listes, dans les families o Ton accordait des "avances". Rien de tout cela ne s'est droul en Angleterre, a part des interrogatoires de patrons, de cabaretiers, et de qui que ce soit qui semblait avoir une peau de marin.
THE JACOBITE PRIVATEERS IN THE NINE YEARS WAR AN effect, if only a side-effect, of recent studies of British politics during the generation after 1688 has been to reinstate the Jacobites, and not merely Jacobitism, as a counterrevolutionary force which William III and Walpole had to take more seriously than the Whig historians did. Yet historians have overlooked the brief but sensational career of the corsairs launched by James II in exile, in a war which ended without disproving Vauban's thesis that the correct strategy against the Maritime Powers at sea was to attack their commerce by means of 'une guerre de nier subtile et drobe', waged for the King at private expense.1 The commissioning of privateers was, of course, a demonstration of regal authority and as such had perplexing repercussions in the English courts. It was also potentially lucrative and we know that some Jacobite captains like Robert Dunbar took many prizes, though it is not yet possible to count them. A list of the armaments themselves has still to be compiled. In 1692 James commissioned a score of captains and in 1693 procured French commissions for as many more; after that the sources, always fragmentary, become more elusive, but leave no doubt that the Jacobite course continued till late in the war, on a diminishing scale. An attempt to piece the scattered evidence together, despite the loss of the Irish admiralty records, may shed a little light, not only on the behaviour of a shadow government and a by no means negligible aspect of its impact on the British public, but also on the seventeenth-century Irish migration, which has still to receive the study it deserves. During the battle for Ireland James made only a late and hesitant use of the privateering weapon. Remembering the
'Mmoire sur la course', in R. d'Aiglun (ed.), Vauban: sa familie et ses crits (2 vols., Paris-Grenoble, 1910), i. 457.
1
140 Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760 Dutch Wars as Lord High Admiral, he may have disliked it, as William III certainly did. At first, with an eye at this stage perhaps to English supplies or susceptibilities, he annoyed his French allies by discouraging the presence on Irish coasts of corsairs from St. Malo; at the end of 1689, a valuable French prize carried into Limerick and only partially condemned there was also a cause of friction. In a letter of 20 July N.S. to his representative d'Avaux,2 Louis XIV implies that he had already had to urge James to commission privateers against the English and Dutch
et tirer d'eux par ce moyen une partie de sa subsistance ; et si centre mon opinion il ne l'avot pas encore fait, ne manquez pas de luy conseiller de ma part et de luy dire qu'il ne peut pas esperer de ramener ses sujets qu'en leur faisant ressentir tous les maux que la rebellion entraisne avec soy, et que c'est aussy le sentiment de tous ceux qui sont le plus affectionnez a ses interests.
About this time James did issue his commission to Peter Nagle, but he was already captain of a French frigate, 'given to the King of England', and was back in Brest by February 1690. On 30 April we have Tyrconnel writing to Queen Mary Beatrice from Dublin:3
1 wonder why wee may not have half a score of frigats to attend this coast. I am sure they would not bee soe usefull any where else. Would to God wee had those frigats of St. Malo's, if wee can have noe others, for to see this Kingdome all surrounded with sea, without soe much as a cockboat to attend it, is somewhat extraordinary.
J. Hogan (ed.), Les Negotiations de M. le comte d'Avaux en Mande, i68Q-go (2 vols., Dublin, Irish Manuscripts Commission, 1934), i. 415; cf. ibid. 626-9, 640-1, 647-8. Dates in this chapter are given in Old Style unless otherwise indicated as N.S. ; in both cases the year is taken to begin on i Jan. 3 Analecta Hibernica, no. 4 (Oct. 1932), p. 121 (letter-book of Richard Talbot). Cf. Hogan, pp. 575, 641. Nagle did not return to Ireland. He was clearly in French service and his frigate had only been 'given' to James in the sense of being allocated to the Irish service. Louis XIV had promised three frigates 'qui navigueroient continuellement sur les costes d'Irlande', but there was difficulty in providing them. Archives du Port de Brest, i E 16, letters of Seignelay dated 18 Feb. and 5 March N.S. 1690; ibid., i E 426, fos. 163-4, 206, Desclouzeaux to Seignelay, 27 Feb. and io March, and i E 428, fos. 222-3, same to Pontchartrain, 13 and 27 Nov. N.S. 1690.1 am much obliged for these references to M. Philippe Henrat, archivist of the port of Brest. Nagle's appointment to command the Badine frigate in Nov. 1690 was soon cancelled (ibid, i E 17, fos. 207, 227), but he was commissioned as captain of the Marin privateer on 23 Feb. 1695 by James II (H.M.C., Stuart MSS. i (1902), 97).
2
The Jacobite Privateers in the Nine Years War
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The Breton corsairs certainly needed no special encouragement to cruise off western Ireland, with so much Dutch shipping moving north-about Scotland and the American convoys coming home within sight of the Blaskets ; the Irish campaign offered an opportunity, indeed, to gain a familiarity with the soundings and landmarks that enabled the Bretons in later years to come and go much as they liked thered'Avaux reports them charting the Shannon estuary and bay of Galway. But St. George's Channel, of much more direct importance strategically in 1689-91, involved greater risk of capture. Pressure was needed before the authorities could engage private armateurs to fit out fifteen corsairs at Brest and St. Malo, in July 1690, for a month's cruise under naval command in St. George's Channel. The results were poor. One was captured; four did nothing on hearing of James's return to Brest after the Boyne; two others used the same excuse to indulge in some profitable Atlantic privateering; of those that got to Ireland, three merely took cargo to Limerick.4 It is interesting, however, that four of the captains were later to cruise on James's account, and that two of them, Antoine and Raymond (Rmond, Redmond) Graldin (Geraldine), belonged to 'the old and gentle family of Giraldin of Gurteen, County Kilkenny', long since established in Brittany and related to James Geraldine of Dunkirk, who himself hired a French frigate, the Sorcire, to cruise in St. George's Channel at this juncture, with instructions from the minister to pick up half her crew in Ireland.5 By 1691 fleeting traces of 'King James's privateers' begin to occur in the correspondence of the time, and a commission to one Nicholas Roche, given at St. Germain on 29 June N.S., has survived among the Admiralty prize papers.6 A British
[Paris, Archives Nationales,] Marine B3 60, fos. 252, 263, 270, 308, 323-5 (Du Guay to Bonrepaus, 3 and 12 July, 22 Nov., 13 Dec. N.S. 1690); ibid., B2 73, fo. 615 (Seignelay to Louvigny, 27 June N.S. 1690). 5 R. Hayes, Biographical Dictionary of Irishmen in France (Dublin, 1949), p. 106; Marine B2 73, fo. 612 (Seignelay to Patoulet, 24 June N.S. 1690). The Sorcire was diverted to Edinburgh and her captain's secret mission there is described in C. Brard (ed.), Journal du corsaire Jean Doublet de Honfleur (Paris, 1883), pp. 155 sqq. 6 Printed in R. G. Marsden (ed.),Law andCustom of the Sea (2 vols., Navy Records Society, 1915-16), ii. 139-40. It is short and vague, merely permitting Roche (of whom nothing else is known) 'to fitt out... in order to privatier and seaze the ships of all persons whatsoever, onely excepted the subjects of those who are in freindship and allyance with us, or of such as have our royal protection and passeport, or of the Duke of Tyreconnel, our lieuftenant general and general governor of our
4
142
prisoner of war at Port Louis mentions two months later that he is boarding in the house of Walter Ding, lieutenant of'a pinke frigott of King James'.7 Captain George St. Lo, himself a prisoner at Brest and Angers in 1689-91, claimed in 1693 *na^ 'there are three privateers belonging to King James that were set out of Ireland when he was there, that are manned with English and Irish'.8 Although St. Lo makes this admission in a context intended 'to confute a popular mistake among us, that the French have abundance of our seamen in their service', there is no evidence that he seriously underestimated the number of Jacobite privateers before 1692. What he overlooked was 'the flight of the wild geese' after the Capitulation of Limerick on 3 October 1691. The scenes following that treaty have been pitilessly described by Macaulay, who allows that the great majority of Sarsfield's army elected to depart for France, though some deserted on the road to Ginkel's ships at Cork; he omits the additional 10,000 Irish taken on" the Shannon in Chteaurenault's fleet. The latest historian of the Irish campaign puts the number of soldiers alone at 12,000 and remarks on the astonishing arrangement whereby an 'army in being . . . was to be transported at William's expense to a hostile country where they were to be used in an attempt to restore William's rival to the throne'.9 The terms of this honourable surrender were interpreted by the refugees, intelligibly enough, to mean that they were as free to serve their exiled king by sea as on land. Even of those who belonged to the Irish regiments (which were not absorbed by the French army until after 1697), not all were professional soldiers; many were militiamen. For them the temptation to fall sickif indeed not really sowould have been especially strong, as it was for James Brillan, a Kilkenny tailor who 'not
Kingdom of Ireland'. This may be compared with the more precise commission issued in 1694 to Edmund French and printed in H.M.C., Stuart MSS. i. 92-3, and with the official French translation of James's commission to John Jordan at Morlaix in 1692, printed by H. Bourde de la Rogerie in Collection des inventane! sommaires des Archives dpartementaks antrieures a 1790: Finistre, t. iii (Paris, 1902), pp. 261-2. ' Arundel Castle, Aylward Papers 19, Andrew Cratey to John Aylward, i Sept. N.S. 1691. I am grateful to His Grace the Duke of Norfolk and to his archivist, Mr. Francis W. Steer, for access to these papers (referred to below as AY). 8 England's Safety (1693), reprinted in Somers Tracts, vol. ii (1814), pp. 53-4. J. G. Simms, Jacobite Ireland 1685-91 (1969), p. 258.
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being able to endure the Feild was received into the late King James's service at sea'. Hugh Stokes, a real soldier from Meath, procured his officers' leave after several months in the army to visit friends at St. Malo, who advised him to go to sea. In the circumstances, it is not difficult to recognize the truthfulness of William Daile of Dublin, even when under examination by an Admiralty advocate as a preliminary to indictment for high treason: he fell sick at Brest
whilst the Army marched up into Normandy, and after his Recovery the Examnate being very poor and not able to get his bread he did about the month of September last enter himselfe aboard a French Privateer called the St. Joseph.10
Since the privateers relied much on their musketry and always carried a high proportion of soldiers, such men made welcome recruits, and in any case there were also plenty of necessitous Irish seamen knocking about the Breton ports. So long as the French navy continued to compete for men, as it did long after La Hogue, the corsairs faced a continuing crisis of recruitment. Needy immigrants, free of the conscription, were advised to address themselves to the local commissaire de marine, who could always put them in touch with a corsair captain if they had not already encountered one. Thus Constantine Doherty 'to get a Livelyhood applyed himselfe to the Sea Affaires', while James Lynch, finding himself in St. Malo 'without either money or friends', met with Thomas Tully, captain of the Prince de Galles, a privateer manned almost entirely by Irishmen when taken in 1693. Under examination for their liberty, however, prisoners were tempted to deny any initiative on their part. Francis Keagher, a boy from Galway, 'happened to get to St Maloe? and there he met with some privateersmen who carried the Exanimate on board . . . the Prince of Wales ... to sweep the decks and to have only his victualls for his service'. Morris Dessett, a joiner of 24, claimed that he had been pressed on board, though 'the Examnate had never served at sea before', after Tully's men had made him drunk in a Nantes tavern.11 According to St. Lo, pressure was early brought on English prisoners at Dian by the Duke of Berwick, Henry Fitz-James,
P.R.O., H[igh] C[ourt of] A[dmiralty] (Oyer and Terminer examinations), 1/52, fo. 152; cf. ibid., fos. I5OV, i58v. 11 Ibid., fos. I54v-i55, 159, 168, i75-6y.
10
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and Sir William Jennings to join the French sea-service. St. Lo denies its efficacy, but we can certainly trust the admission of Roger Harding in 1694, if not that he was a genuine prisoner or that he was 'forced' on board the Prince of Wales, at any rate that he joined this privateer at the instance of'one Mr. Stafford [sic] who is an Englishman and a Commissioner at St Maloes for the late King James . . .'I2 For Thomas Stratford, until his bankruptcy late in the war, was James's prize agent in Brittany. As both Jacobite prize agent and a leading promoter of privateers at Dunkirk, Sir James Geraldine told John Beer, a Dorset mariner who had somehow been driven to 'Gallice Cliffe' and arrested as a spy, that he must be lieutenant of a privateer. In the same year, 1696, the naval commissary at St. Malo advised Francis Cavanagh, a discharged soldier anxious to go home with the English prisoners, 'that he had a double shallop fitting out for . . . two months and that if the Examnate would serve in her he would be very kind to him . . .'I3 The immigrant in distress could easily approach one or other of the Franco-Irish business houses whose origins go back to the Cromwellian exodus,14 They were already prominent in some French ports, it might be with an interest like John Aylward's in the historic export trade in Breton linens to Cadiz, or more likely in the Irish provision trade, which in turn was a cornerstone of the French West Indian economy; a few had already taken to banking operations, like Aylward himself and his brother-in-law John Porter of Rouen, named 'consul' there for the exiled James as early as i68g.15 By the 16903 these families had forged numerous domestic and business links with the French as well as with one another. Already the same names occur in more than one centre: thus, besides their rela St. Lo, p. 53; H.C.A. 1/52, fo. i67v. 13 H.C.A. 1/53, fs- I 9~ 21 - I*1 '692 Geraldine had been accused of embarking some Irish 'par force' on one of his own privateers, Les Jeux, and then of failing to pay them; two years later the naval intendant at Dunkirk had orders to arrest some Irish on passage for Holland, to serve in similar frigates (Marine B3 68, fo. ioov, Patoulet to Pontchartrain, 13 Oct. N.S. 1692; Marine B3 99, fos. 497^498, Pontchartrain to Patoulet, i Sept. N.S. 1694). 14 See R. Hayes, Old Insh Links with France (Dublin, 1940), Appendix, for details from parish registers at Nantes, St. Malo, etc. 's AY 42 and 69; Stuart MSS. i. 46. I suspect that J.-B. Artus (Arthus), listed by H. Lthy in La Banque Protestante en France (2 vols., Paris, 1959-61), i. 76, was a member of the Arthur family in Paris, who discounted bills for Aylward's circle: the deformation of foreign names in France is notorious.
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tive in Dunkirk, the Geraldines of St. Malo had a branch in Nantes, where such compatriots as Luc O'Shiell and the Walsh dynasty were to create some of the great fortunes of the eighteenth century; the Walshes were already active in St. Malo and Bordeaux.16 Something in the style of Herbert Liithy's 'banque Protestante', in reverse and in miniature, the FrancoIrish operated a business network that embraced the Netherlands and Spanish Europe as well as the British Isles and West Indies. Family ties with Ireland itself, and also with London, of course did much to sustain a vigorous contraband trade, under French passports, in wartime; but family solidarity, as we know, long remained a major ingredient of commercial success in peace as well. It is harder to evaluate the sentimental ties which are of such significance for Jacobitism. At the time of the second migration the Franco-Irish still tended to marry within their own community, and there were Irish chapels transcending social distinctions.17 John Aylward's correspondence refers more than once to inter-Irish litigation, but gives an overwhelming impression of warm hearts and some culture. In 1704, perhaps not for the first time, the Malouin Irish 'parmi lesquels il y a beaucoup d'honnestes gens'were to ask the French government to stop the pillage of Irish coasts by corsairs and to distinguish the Catholics from other prisoners.18 It has recently been stressed that the Malouin Irish were themselves among the first to arm corsairs on the outbreak of war in the eighteenth century, and it is legitimate to suppose that religious and dynastic fidelities were among their motives.19 Privateering was almost a badge of the true Jacobite in St. Malo. This could well have been true of Nicolas Graldin the younger, who in 1691 armed a medium-sized corsair, the Soleil, was knighted by James II in 1700, and was described by James III to Bolingbroke in 1715 as apprehending 'trouble on account of all the mouvements he has given himself on my account'.20 His relatives, Raymond and Antoine, were among the ten captains commissioned at St. Malo in 1688; Richard
For some of the more successful Irish families, cf. J. Meyer, La Noblesse bretonne au xvme siede (2 vols., Paris, 1966), ii. 1034-49. 17 Ibid., pp. 1039 and 1031 n. 18 Marine B3 123, fo. 544, Saint-Sulpice to Pontchartrain, 9 July N.S. 1704. 20 Meyer, ii. 1035. Stuart MSS. i. 148, 466-7.
16
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Graldin appears as such in 1691, Andre in ioga.21 Other Irish namesButler, Murphy, Walsh, White, etc.figure prominently among the Malouin captains of the Nine Years War, a few of them, like Patrice Lambert, doing well enough to become armateurs. The most frequent armateurs were Frangois Browne, James's 'vice-consul' at Brest by 1695, and Georges Kennedy,22 though neither was so audacious as Walter Cruice, another Irish Malouin, who in 1692 journeyed to Nantes to raise more money for three armaments all at once. One of these, the Reyne Marie of Brest (Gapt. Richard Power), cost the unusually large sum of 56,000 livres and her total loss in December, after a four-hour engagement off the Scillies, must have contributed to the bankruptcy of Cruice and his partner Richard Morphy of Brest in 1693, when their second privateer, the Prince de Galles (Thomas Tully), surrendered off lie de Batz. In Nantes itself, much less of a corsair base and as yet less 'Irish' than St. Malo, we know of privateers commanded by Patrick Lincoln (Le Le'vrier, 1693), who appears as one of Kennedy's captains in 1697, and Walter Harold (1695); the Sarseld, for which Terence Dermott received a Jacobite commission in 1692, was armed by Dominique Knowles at Nantes in 1691 ; and Captain Jean Jourdan (L'Esperance de Nantes, 1695) is probably the John Jordan who registered James IFs commission with the amiraut of Morlaix in 1692.23 Lists of shareholders are harder to come by, but we know that a substantial Irish one at Nantes was Edward Lucker, at least in 1692-3, while others invested in Malouin armaments: the sixteen owners of Le Co'tquen in 1693 included Graldin father and son of Nantes as well as three of their family (and Patrick Fitzgerald) of St. Malo, not to mention the captain, Richard
21 Anne Morel, La Guerre de course a St-Malo, 1681-1715 (Paris, Acadmie de Marine, n.d.), pp. 106 sqq. 22 Stuart MSS. i. 97. According to Mile Morel's admittedly provisional list, Browne armed five times in 1693-7more often than any other Franco-Irishman except Kennedy (7 armaments 1695-7). That Browne's privateering was successful is implied by his frequent armaments in 1702-9, compared with Kennedy's reappearance only in 1712. 23 AY 69, John Porter toAylward, i4.JuneN.S. i6g3;H.C.A.i /52, fos. I54v-i55, 179V; Stuart MSS. i. 69; Raoul Ottenhof, 'La Course et les prises a Nantes, 16881697' (thesis in typescript for Diplome d'tudes Suprieures, Rennes, 1961), pp. 26, 29, 74. I am grateful to the author and to Professor Jean Delumeau for allowing me to see this thesis. For Jordan at Morlaix, cf. B. de la Rogerie, iii. 2, 5, 261-2.
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Geraldin.24 We also have a list of shareholders in one of Browne's privateers, UEspion of St. Malo (Jacques Walsh) in 1695, showing that Browne himself held a half-share, with the captain and Philippe Walsh each going one-sixteenth and Patrice Lambert one-thirty-second ; the remainder was held by four French subscribers, including Nicolas Magon, constable of the city and ecuyer, as to a quarter.25 Did more such lists survive, it is hardly to be doubted that we should find, conversely, an Irish presence in armaments directed by native Frenchmen. The only other French privateering base with a known and constant Jacobite interest was Dunkirk. Operations here had naturally more to do with Scotland, including the supply of the Jacobite garrison on Bass Rock in the Forth until its surrender in June 1694, after it had been weakened by the famine in France. As the reports of the Dunkirk captains massively demonstrate, the east coasts of Scotland and England were their habitual cruising-ground. They included one notable Scot, Robert Dunbar, the terror of coastal skippers between Leith and Moray Firth, who had escaped from Scotland while a prisoner on parole.26 From July 1692 till June 1696 Dunbar sailed regularly for James Geraldine (Giraldin, Girardin), whose other captains included Dominique Masterson, Jean Gassgref, Andre Bryan, and Antoine Fitzgerald. Masterson, who came from the Aran Islands and had carried some of James's Scottish officers to Dunkirk after La Hogue, followed Dunbar's (indeed the Dunkirk) practice of taking prizes into Norwegian ports and was arrested by the governor of Bergen in the winter of
Ottenhof, pp. 14 n., 29-30, 73-4. In 1693 Lucker and William Clear each held quarter-shares in La Fidele, 80 tons. M. Ottenhof has drawn on two notarial etudes at Nantes, but there are none for St. Malo. 25 Rennes, Archives dpartementales d'Ille-et-Vilaine, 9 B 167 (Actes de vente et de socit), fos. 62V-04.1 am deeply obliged to Mile Anice Bellion for this reference. Unfortunately this series records only a limited number of privateering contracts. 26 T. C. Smout, Scottish Trade on the Eve of the Union (Edinburgh, 1963), pp. 6870, 208. For the capture and defence of the Bass Rock, see Sir Charles Petrie, The Jacobite Movement (1932), pp. 85-6; cf. Stuart MSS, i. 85-6, for James II to Captain Michael Middleton, 19 March N.S. 1694, lamenting the scarcity of provisions. The obligatory declarations des capitaines registered by the Dunkirk amiraut for most of 1689, 1693-4, and 1696 are in Marine C4 252, 258, 263. With two brief gaps down to June 1695 and a complete gap thereafter, the Dunkirk commissions are registered ibid. 252-3, 255, 257, and 259.
24
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1692-3: his release under French diplomatic pressure led to strong but unavailing British protests.27 He then took service at St. Malo, as Cassgref did more brieflyin his case with Nicolas Graldin. Masterson's privateer, La Roue de Fortune, was driven by the weather into Galway early in 1695; Cassgref was captured by four Guernsey corsairs on an armed trading voyage from Bordeaux a little later. Nothing much is known of Fitzgerald, but Bryan took a number of prizes, usually in company with other Dunkirkers, sometimes including Dunbar, in 1695-7. Like Cassgref, however, he ended up in the employment of Jacques Pleits, the most outstanding Dunkirk depositane (armateur] of the period.28 Before he died in June/July 1696, Geraldine himself was responsible for at least sixteen armaments, beginning with the celebrated Jean Doublet as captain of La Princesse in 1688. By 1693 ne âc^ received King James's knighthood. His financial success is clearly implied by his ability in January 1695 to arm a naval third-rate, Le Fortun (56 guns), under another renowned corsair captain, Beaubriand Levesque of Granville. This he did in partnership with Nicolas Graldin of St. Malo. Next month, off Cape Clear, Le Fortun took part in a lucrative attack on an American convoy, sinking England3s Frigott (54) with the loss of 130 lives.29 The Fortune, though far the biggest, was not the only naval vessel armed by Geraldine of Dunkirk. In 1690 he had been concerned with two frigates of 24 guns, La Serpente and La Sorciere, commanded by Carel de Keyser and by Doublet and 'accorded for the service of the King of England'. Masterson's first privateer, Les Jeux, was a naval fifth of 30 guns, accorded in 1692 strictly for the relief of the Bass Rock, although the intendant Patoulet acknowledged that she could not be trusted to confine her privateering to opportunities arising on the direct route: ''esperance flatteuse de la course est trop
O. A. Johnsen (ed.), Innberetninger fra denfranske legasjon i Kjebenhavn (correspondance consulaire) vedrerende Norge 1670-1791, vol. i (Oslo, 1934), pp. 88-9, 109; P.R.O., S.P. 75/23, fos. 28, 47, 321. 28 Morel, pp. 128-9, 132-3, 138-9; H.C.A. 32/35 (i) and 32/44 (i); [Oxford, All Souls College, Codrington Library,] Wynne MS. LR. 2 E. 23; Marine C4 263, fos. 5-6, i32v, I37V, i68v. Geraldine's recent death was mentioned by the intendant Geberet to Pontchartrain on 11 July 1696 (ibid., B3 93, fo. 148). 29 Marine G4 259; C. de la Morandire, Histoire de Granville (Bayeux, 1947), pp. 124-5; H.C.A. i/ss, fo. 327
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attrayante.'30 Le Sauvage and La Railleuse, commanded by Dunbar in 1693-4, were both light frigates lent by the French Crown, the former remaining under Geraldine's direction when Dunbar transferred to La Railleuse. Geraldine's first agreement for the latter (28 April 1694), nominally for a single campaign, gave rise to some suspicion when in fact she made two ; but he was allowed a second lease in October on somewhat onerous conditions.31 The new captain of Le Sauvage was neither Irish nor Scottish but a true Dunkirker, Ferdinando Danemberg.31 Nevertheless, he cruised in 1694 on King James's 'account' and was not the only French captain to do so. Geraldine's strictly Jacobite commissions, whether issued by James II or Louis XIV or the Admiral of France, can be distinguished by the manner of their registration at the Dunkirk admiralty. Contrary to normal practice, he was required to produce neither a deposit nor anyone to 'certify' his solvency on these occasions. Such was not the case with Roger Hereford, the only other British name among the Dunkirk dpositaires in this war (from 1690) and a prominent one, concerned in at least a score of armaments, though more often as surety than depositane. In 1715 James III instructed Bolingbroke to address Ormonde's accounts to him under cover to Hereford, then described as a banker at Dunkirk.32 Yet Hereford, who launched two privateers in August and November 1692, did not obtain James IFs commissions even
Marine C4 253. For Les Jeux, ibid., Ba 83, fo. 542 (Pontchartrain to Brodeau, 15 March N.S. 1692) and B3 68, fo. 17 (Patoulet to Pontchartrain, 5 April N.S. 1692). 31 Marine C4 259 and F2 14, fo. 472 (Pontchartrain to Jean Pettier de la Hestroye, i Dec. 1694). James's commissions to Peter Nagle and Philip Walsh on 23 Feb. N.S. 1695 seem to have involved two royal frigates, Le Marn (28) and La Trmpense (12), for which Richard Graldin and Andrew White respectively received his commission later in that year (Stuart MSS. i. 97, 103-4). The loan of naval ships to private armateurs was a common practice in France, though the contract terms vary; by the Ordomance of 6 Oct. N.S. 1694 the Crown, in return for a fifth of the net prize proceeds, supplied the ship fully equipped, bore the cost of repairs and replacement of stores, and took the risk of losing it. Geraldine's (second) agreement of 4 Oct. N.S. 1694 allowed the French Crown a quarter of the net proceeds and he obliged himself to restore the ship (including 'provisions') in the same state as he found her; a copy of the notarial act is in Marine B3 81, fo. 198. Naval warships accorded to the 'King of England' after 1691 implied such an arrangement, James merely receiving the Admiral's tenths. 32 Stuart MSS. i. 466. Neither Geraldine nor Hereford is found arming at Dunkirk in the next war, when the name of Matthew Herries (or Harris) figures prominently.
30
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while these were in vogue. Here, then, appears an ostensibly Jacobite privateering promoter who did not operate technically on King James's account. On the other hand, Geraldine's privilege of forgoing the usual deposit (15,000 livres] was explicitly related to the three commissions he obtained from St. Germain on 24 April and 3 July N.S. 1692; he had not enjoyed it previously, but he continued to do so when he took out French commissions later on, because his armaments were still 'pour le compte du Roy d'Angleterre'.33 This contrast between Geraldine and Hereford implies a fundamental distinction between Jacobite privateering armateurs, since it would be rash to assume that Hereford was the only one not to work on James's 'account'a term which conveys the precise meaning that James was entitled to the prize tenths that were ordinarily a highly valued perquisite of the Amirai de France, at this time the Comte de Toulouse, one of Louis XIV's bastard sons. The correspondence between the Earls of Melfort and (from August 1694) Middleton with Phlypeaux de Pontchartrain, the naval minister and ControllerGeneral, shows that the exiled court cared deeply when James's tenths were inadvertently assigned to Toulouse. They were no doubt regarded by Louis XIV himself as a potentially useful supplement to James's pension, for they were continued to him even when his privateers cruised under French commissions in 1693 and later. On 18 February N.S. 1692, a week after the short and simple letter giving James the power to commission privateers on French soil, all the Ponantine amirauts (for the Mediterranean ports were not involved) were instructed to allocate the dixime to James, unless he abandoned it to the armateurs themselves, on prizes legitimately taken under his commission.34 Between 13 February and 20 March 1692 James granted nine commissions en course. On 13 February he had already commissioned Thomas Stratford to be his consul at Brest 'or any other port of Brittany, and also to be receiver of the tenths', at a salary of eighty louis d'or p.a. On i January N.S. 1694 (confirmed on i March N.S. 1695), evidently to
The commissions were registered at Dunkirk (in English) on 16 May, 14 June, and 7 Oct. for Captains Nicholas Walsh (a further indication of Geraldine's links with St. Malo), Masterson, and Dunbar: Marine C4 255. Only for Le Fortune was 34 there a surety. Marine F2 io, fos. gi v , ioi v .
33
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stimulate vigilance, Stratford was accorded i o per cent of the king's tenths in lieu of salary and expenses. The Stuart papers preserve no trace of a comparable appointment at Dunkirk before June 1694, when John Constable was made agent and receiver under the direction of Sir James Geraldine, who was then commissioned comptroller of all prize accounts in Dunkirk and 'all other ports in Picardy and Normandy'.35 Geraldine's administration raised no eyebrows at St. Germain, but on 24 August N.S. 1695 Sir William Ellis was commissioned 'Comptroller General of the revenue from prizes' and instructed to require a sight of Stratford's books, comparing them with relevant prize inventories in St. Malo and elsewhere, examining all concerned with the produce of prize sales and reporting 'what arrears are due, and why not paid in [to the King's Treasurer], what part thereof is desperate, and how it came to be so . . .' Ellis quickly discovered a debt of 14,233 livres, for recovery of which a decree was obtained in the Chtelet of Paris, though James subsequently took pity on Stratford's indigent condition.36 With so many ports to watch into which prizes might be brought, poor Stratford had a more difficult task than Geraldine, who had mainly only to keep himself in order and had taken care of the king's interest before his formal comptrollership, with which Ellis was expressly told not to meddle: by the time Ellis became James's receiver-general 'in any port of France', on 19 March 1697, Geraldine had been eight months in his grave.37 Stratford's revised instructions of i March N.S. 1695 reveal very clearly the interest of St. Germain in prizes. On the delivery of a commission, he was to take security for the tenths and for fulfilment of the instructions attached to it, which themselves make the usual stipulations about the custody of papers and cargo till lawful judgement in the French courts; Stratford was to nominate 'an inspector or crivain' on board,
35 Stuart MSS. i. 69, 88, 97-9. When Constable was made clerk of the kitchen in ordinary, in June 1695, he was replaced as prize agent by Louis Raulin, receiver for the Admiral of France: ibid. 102-3. Geraldine was described as 'agent there for the late King James' in a letter of July 1691 to Nottingham: H.M.C., Finch MSS. iii. 375. 36 Stuart MSS. i. 105-6, 122. 37 Ibid. 122. As late as 12 March N.S. 1694 Stratford was ordered to receive some tenths at Boulogne (ibid. 85). Prizes were not necessarily brought into their captors' port of armament, although government and armateurs normally preferred this, for better control over the captains and crews.
l52
giving each a seal, and to take further security if it was desired to transport prize goods coastwise, and to solicit inventories and appraisements from the amirauts of any perishable cargoes sold before adjudication. He could appoint 'fit deputies' (though he was to act with his vice-consuls at St. Malo and Brest) and make small presents to the French port officers, whom he was also to provide on demand with pilots for the English and Irish coasts'not exceeding one person on each vessel'. He was of course to gain what intelligence he could from returning corsairs, sending it with any prints and papers to 'the Principal Ministers'. And he was to correspond constantly with one of James's Secretaries of State.38 Since their prizes had to be judged at Versailles or Fontainebleau, on the evidence of documents prepared by the local amirauts, King James's privateers were expected to conform with the steadily evolving rules governing the French course; it was in his interest that they should. Yet Jacobite practice followed its own path in certain respects. The tolerance allowed to Sir James Geraldine in the matter of his deposit has already been noticed. A more surprising variation, which caused confusion then as it does now, was the development of blank commissions at St. Germain. Those sent out early in 1692, together with a few others known to us from 1694-5, conform with French practice in stating the names of captain and ship ; so do those which Melfort obtained from Pontchartrain in 1693. Late in 1694, however, ten blank commissions (with brief or more ample instructions as the case might be) were delivered at St. Germain to Robert Brent for dispatch to the ports, probably for use by Stratford, whose own instructions of 1694-5 ordered him to 'give from time to time an exact account of how the blanks in each commission are filled'. It looks as if Stratford was none too communicative, for in August 1695 Ellis was 'to require from him an exact account of how he has disposed of commissions, blank and others', as well as of 'what they have produced'.39
38 Stuart MSS. i. 97-9. Cf. ibid. 93, for standing instructions to a Jacobite privateer (reprinted in Marsden, ii. 152-3). 39 Stuart MSS. i. 93-4, 98, 105-6; cf. ibid. 92-3, 97, 103-4, 106 (giving names and on p. 104 noting a change in the armateur's choice of captain). The last blank commission was dated 29 July N.S. 1696 (ibid. 118). In June 1693 Bonrepaus at Copenhagen had noted this defect in Jacobite commissions, but he may refer to the copies given to prizemasters: Johnsen, 89 n.
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When James II 'agreed' to substitute French commissions for his own, in February 1693, Melfort would name both ship and captain to Pontchartrain, who unquestioningly transmitted the document within a few days to him.40 It soon became necessary for Melfort to indicate the port of armament as well, for the admiralty of St. Malo made difficulties about registering commissions signed by Toulouse or his secretary, Valincour, the reason being that until March 1695 there was still an Admiral of Brittany in the person of the governor, Ghaulnes, who drew a substantial income from prize tenths there. The difficulty was surmounted by commissions from Louis XIV himself, and these were duly recorded in Pontchartrain's entrybook as being 'pour le compte du Roy d'Angleterre'that is, any tenths would be payable to James by private treaty with the promoters. In practice, even without allowing for the shortcomings of the prickly office-holders of the sieges d'amiraut, this arrangement was far less patent than the diximes derived from James's own commissions. In June 1693 Stratford was complaining about further obstruction at Brest and Morlaix, and in August all the admiralties had to be told to allow James's tenth. A list of his privateers was circulated and in future the prize sentences of the royal council were to make special mention of his right.41 An apology to Middleton on 4 August N.S. 1694 shows that the council had omitted to do this on a number of occasions, however, and it would not reopen closed cases'des affaires consommes qui ne mritent pas qu'on change la disposition des arrests'.42 Pontchartrain promised better for the future, but in the following months the sentences of three important prizes taken by Dunbar and Danemberg reserved the tenths to Toulouse. This time the matter was put right on appeal, 'Sa Majest estant informe que les frgates
Pontchartrain to Valincour, 4 and 26 Feb., n and 25 March N.S. 1693, Marine F2 n, fos. 45v, 135"", I5OV, 216. Ibid., fos. a 13,221v, 484^485, and F2 12, fos. 8sv-86 : Pontchartrain to Melfort, 18 and 25 March, 17 June, 12 Aug. N.S. 1693. The commissions entered in Marine F2 n and F2 12, passim are confined to Brittany and to 1693; by contrast, there are two exceptional Dunkirk entries (20 Jan. and 17 Feb. 1694) in ibid., F2 13, fos. 7O v ~7i, 151, but no Breton ones. A slightly incomplete list of thirteen French commissions (all but one traceable to 1693) in the Royal Library at Windsor (Stuart MSS., Miscellaneous, vol. 18) was most kindly transcribed for me by Mr. Robert Mackworth-Young and has been used by gracious permission of Her Majesty the Queen: cf. Stuart MSS. i. 69. * Marine F2 14, fos. 6iv-6a.
40
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qui ont fait ces prises ont est armes pour le compte du Roy d'Angleterre'.43 This disappointing experience was doubtless one reason, if not the main reason, why James reverted to his own commissions en course. Although Jacobite privateers remained free to cruise under French commissions, Pontchartrain's letter to Middleton of 4 August 1694 restored James IFs power to issue his own. It was assumed, as always, that the crews would be 'uniquement formez d'Irlandois et autres ses sujets'. Evidently this condition was becoming difficult to fulfil, however, judging by a further letter to Middleton on 25 August N.S., allowing the crews to be composed 'd'autres trangers que de ses sujets'a gloss of more value at Dunkirk than elsewhereand promising an order forbidding James's 'subjects' from serving other corsairs.44 The High Court of Admiralty archives record no British capture of a Breton privateer after July 1694 with any large number of men whose enemy nationality could be seriously challenged, as had been the case with the Prince de Galles (Tully) in 1693, or with the Soleil (Robert Walsh) and the Fortune (Daniel Macdonald), taken in June-July i6g4-4S After that date, indeed, the only bunch of English-speaking privateersmen to fall into English hands was the crew of a 'two-and-twenty-oar barge', the Loyal Clancarty of Boulogne (Thomas Vaughan), seized after a chase over the Goodwin Sands in June 1695. The Sainte-Marie of Dunkirk, an open boat with two guns arrested in the Downs in June 1697, had an English captain and two other British subjects, but was armed by the sieur Marsilliac, a surgeon without apparent Jacobite associations.46 The few other such cases
43 Arrt of i April N.S. 1695, ibid., F* 15, fo. 239, and C4 259, fo. 242V: Saint Andre de Stockholm, Pigeon Blanc, and Marie de Consbach. 44 Marine F2 14, fos. 107-8. 'Subject' was evidently a courtesy, for the navy's claim on some of James's subjects was expressly reserved. Conscription did not apply to Dunkirk, where there were many foreigners. Since the Jacobite privateers, like others, had to submit a crew-list before sailing, a study of the Malouin roles d'equipage in the naval archives at Brest may throw further light on this point. The crew of Jordan's Saint Nicolas was almost entirely Irish (B. de Ia Rogerie, iii. 261). Much later, the French government was prepared openly to allow the recruitment of French seamen 'pour achever leurs equipages' (Pontchartrain to Middleton, 13 April N.S. 1695, Marine Bz 107, fos. iiov-m). H.C.A. 1/52, fos. i54v-i55, i?7, 185-?46 Vaughan's (French) Commission is in H.C.A. 1/13, fo. no; cf. H.C.A. 1/53, fos. 4v-5, 30-1. For his trial see F. Hargrave, A Complete Collection of State-Trials, 4th edn., vol. v (1777), cols. 17-39.
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examined by the High Court of Admiralty in the later years of the war only concerned individuals, one of whom, David Creagh, turned king's evidence against Vaughan. With this negative background47 there is the fact that no more letters to James's Secretaries of State occur in Pontchartrain's prize entry-book after August 1694. The blank commissions that followed, together with the disorder in Stratford's affairs, also suggest that Jacobite privateering was now waning, despite Geraldine's activity at Dunkirk and the loan of two royal frigates in 1695 to Jacobites at St. Malo.48 Why did King James first abandon and then resume the commissioning of privateers? On neither occasion does he seem to have acted under pressure from the French court, although Bonrepaus at Copenhagen drew attention to the embarrassment created by the appearance of a Jacobite commission in the territorial waters of a state which recognized 'the prince of Orange' as king. James himself valued the power to commission, whether regiments or corsairs. It was a mark of his status and a means of rallying the morale of his supporters. He would have abandoned it for privateers, if not under French persuasion, then for good reasons of his own. That he had had one is hinted at in the very letter of August 1694 in which the power was restored. After observing darkly that his king perfectly well understood why his own commissions had been used, Pontchartrain adds these startling lines:49 . . . et pour empescher le prince d'Orange de continuar a faire punir comme rebelies ceux qui feront la course sous ses commissions et obliger a les traiter comme prisonniers de guerre Sa Majest trouvera bon que le Roy d'Angleterre punisse aussy comme rebelles
Ibid, and H.C.A. 1/53, fos. 3 (Creagh), 9 (John Murphy), 19-21 (John Beer, Francis Cavanagh). Creagh served on the Geraldine corsair, Le Fortun (Levesque), and Murphy was a prizemaster from a privateer whose name he professed not to know: it was La Notre-Dame des Bonnes Nouvelles, Capt. Thomas Foramby of St. Malo, a successful corsair who cruised as far as Madeira; he may have been a Jacobite, for in 1697 he commanded Le Chne-Royal (H.C.A. 1/14, fo, 62; B. de la Rogerie, p. 9; Morel, pp. 146-9, 158-9, 164-5). Beer was taken in the Louis of Dieppe, Cavanagh in UieLevrette of St. Maloneither of them Jacobite privateers. But the Irish evidence is negative only because it has been lost. As late as 1696 Nottingham mentions the capture of corsairs with James's commission: H.M.C., Finch MSS. iv. 446 (to Blathwayt, 6 Sept. 1696). 48 Above, n. 31. 49 Marine F2 14, fos. 6iv-6a. For Bonrepaus, see Johnsen, p. 89.
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les Anglois et autres qui seront pris naviguant sous pavilion du prince d'Orange, pourveu que l'excution s'en fasse dans les vaisseaux en mer et non dans les ports . . .
Absolutely no evidence of such drastic punishment has come to light; had it occurred, the Whig press must surely have relished it. Whoever made this desperate proposal, the French were careful to stand aside, for three weeks later Middleton was told that the prisoners of Jacobite corsairs, even of those sailing under French commissions, were not to be 'gardez' on French soil but left entirely to James's disposition. That this directive really meant something is certainly implied in a further letter to Middleton of 2 November 1695, in which James is said to have agreed to release prisoners 'retenus dans les prisons flottantes'not the method used by the French themselves for the custody of prisoners of war.50 Their release now, at the request of the French government, may argue that Jacobite privateering was foreseen as an encumbrance to the DijkveltCallires peace parleys resumed in the previous June. However that may be, Pontchartrain's letters strongly suggest that James's use of French commissions had not achieved the object of preventing some dire punishments in England. To these we must now turn. The renewal of James's privateering commissions followed the first of a series of state trials in London, held in accordance with Henry VIH's 'Acte for punysshement of Pyrotes and Robbers of the Sea', which was intended to facilitate convictions for crimes performed at sea by transferring these cases from the admiralty to the common law and a jury: although the admiralty judge was included in the bench and the civilian advocates could prosecute and defend, the procedure in Oyer and Terminer for the Admiralty disregarded the Roman rule of evidence 'testis unus testis nullus'an advantage not altogether forfeited in January 1696 by the passing of the Trial of Treasons Act when an indictment was for high treason itself and not for piracy, since the Act did not necessarily require two lawful witnesses to the same overt act of the same treason. In the Admiralty Sessions which concern us here, nine privateersmen were indicted for piracy and many more for high treason,
s Marine F* 14, fos. 107-8 (Pontchartrain to Middleton, 25 Aug. N.S. 1694) and Bz 109, fos. 3i8v-3ig (same to same, 2 Nov. N.S. 1695); cf. ibid. 107, fo. in.
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the majority while the Treason Bills were still being fought.51 The earlier trials, in February and November-December 1694, and again in December 1695, can therefore properly be featured in the background to the prolonged parliamentary struggle over the later Treason Bills of 1693-5. The piracy charges of February 1694, in particular, aroused public controversy at a time when common piracy was reviving. Yet to indict for 'High Treason on the High Seas' one of James IPs privateersmen, if he could be proved to be a British national, was itself more controversial than indicting a Jacobite plotter or wouldbe assassin at home, for the accused could colourably argue that they were lawfully commissioned by a government-inexile or by its ally. They could claim to be treated as prisoners of war, as captured Jacobite soldiers were, especially if they had been with Sarsfield at Limerick and there allowed the honours of war. During the aftermath of the Revolution many British consciences would have been susceptible to the contention of John Golding and others in a petition to the Lords Justices after their conviction in February 1694:
That in Case of any Invasion and Dispossession ensueing thereupon, the Subjects of these Realms are not bound to abide within these Realms, and submit, and become Subjects to the Dispossessor, at the peril of Treason, but may Lawfully still attend their King's fortune, and service, if the[y] chuse so to doe. That the possession of these Kingdoms obtained through any Invasion does not, either alter the possession of, or Right to the Subject's Allegiance. For that allegiance is a Naturall Relation, and follows the Natural Person of the King, and is not incident or appurtenant to a place, like a Villein to a Mannor . . .s2
It will be noticed that the petitioners make no claim to be French subjects, although at least two of them had first tried this plea in court,53 as most of their successors did, usually with better success.
The trials were held under Commissions of Oyer and Terminer dated 4 Jan. 1694., II Feb. 1695, 25 Sept. 1696; H.C.A. 1/63, fos. 29-31. Their course may be followed in outline through the entries for H.C.A. 1/13-15 in vol. 45 of the List and Index Society (1969). For the civilian one-witness rule which gave rise to 28 Hen. VIII, c. 15, cf. Sir W. Holdsworth, History of English Law, ix (1926), 203-9, 229-35. " Bodl., MS. Rawl. A. 84, fos. 177^178. 53 Wynne MS. LR. 2 E. 23: notes of the trial at the Marshalsea on 26 Feb. 1693/4 m an unfoliated commonplace book, which I attribute to Owen Wynne admitted to Doctors' Commons on 22 Jan. 1694.
51
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When Golding offered a petition for reading in court before the Commissioners of Oyer and Terminer, which included some of the Privy Council and Admiralty who had already made up their minds, Chief Justice Treby directed the grand jury to reject it'the one half was impertinent and the other half made against him'. Bills for high treason were found against Golding, the 55-year-old captain (or second captain) of the Soleil of St. Malo, John Goold, a Limerick transportee who had joined that privateer for a livelihood, and Thomas Jones, another young survivor from Limerick who had volunteered aboard the Saint Joseph of Brest (captain Raymond Graldin, killed in the course of her capture). Golding and Jones were executed between low and high water mark at 'Redriff' (Rotherhithe) Stairs on 5 March 1694. Goold was discharged from prison on 17 September 1696, along with four other young IrishmenJohn Ryan, Richard Chivers, John Sangster, and Constantine Dohertywho had also been sentenced to death, but in their cases for piracy. None of them had anything to do with the Soleil or Saint Joseph, both of which carried French commissions 'by the permission and consent of King James'. They were caught as members of prize crews on the Elizabeth of Plymouth and the Mary of Teignmouth, taken by the Jacques (Philippe Walsh) and the Grand Prieur (Richard Butler), and on the Happy Return of Bideford, taken by the Saint-Aaron (Jacques Walsh) and the Providence (Patrice Lambert). With them had been Darby Collins and Patrick Quidley, who were executed on 5 March 1694 as felons, by a compromise as it were between justice and humanity.54 What distinguished these six pirates was that they had all belonged to privateers with King James's commission, described by Justice Rookby as 'a void Commission'.55 By contrast, as Treby, L.C.J., said at Captain Vaughan's trial in November logo,56 'acting by virtue of a commission from the French King will excuse them from being Pirates, tho' not from being Traitors to their own
s+ Wynne MS. LR. 2 E. 23 and H.C.A. 1/52, fos. 147-53, '59> l64, i6sv; MS. Rawl. A. 84, fos. 171-2. Cf. London Gazette, nos. 2953, 2955. ss Wynne MS. LR. 2 E. 23. 56 Full text in Hargrave, State-Trials, 4th edn., vol. v, cols. 17-39. J- S. Clarke (ed.), The Life of James the Second (2 vols., 1816), ii. 527, is technically wrong in saying that Golding was hanged as a pirate, but recognizes that drawing and quartering for high treason was an added punishment in the eyes of the law.
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State . . .' From James's point of view, however, the executions of Golding and Jones meant that French commissions afforded no special protection, unless it were the marginal difficulty that high treason could only be preferred against a British subject and that this might be a hard fact to prove. Here, then, could well have been another reason why James resumed his freedom to commission privateers himself.57 Collins and Quidley were, in fact, the only Jacobite mariners to be hanged as pirates. It is true that on 12 July 1697 Captain Gerard Bedford and two companions from the Sainte Marie de Dunkerque were attainted of piracy, but this was a special case ; they had seized a fishing vessel in English territorial waters and their commission had been made out for a different captain. As allegedly British subjects, they were accused of high treason as well. Once again it was decided not to execute the whole group: John Oldfield was selected for the gallows on the ground that 'the butcher who fired the musket was the least deserving of mercy', as the Admiralty Commissioners recommended to the Lords Justices, who seem to have been divided in opinion. By then the war had ended, however, and Oldfield was reprieved 'till his Majesty's returne into England'. King William, reported to have said that 'privateers ought to be hanged' and (by the Jacobites) to have approved Golding's execution, pardoned Oldfield 'absolutely' in 1699 and Bedford in lyoi. 58 The earlier 'pirates' had been captured in October-November 1692, shortly before the first great Commons debate on shipping 'miscarriages', already computed by several speakers at 1,500 ships and 3 million. There was another debate a year later, when Sir Thomas Clarges wondered 'whether we shall save England or Flanders'.59 Such was the nervous atmosphere in which the first Admiralty Sessions took place. In between these dates, moreover, while Admiralty management came under strong criticism, a drama of high principle disturbed the quiet
57 The convictions of Golding, Goold, and Jones were also a defeat for Louis XIV, who had promised to reclaim the Irish taken under his flag and later to consider if anything could be done for those taken under James's (Pontchartrain to Melfort, 22 Jan. N.S. 1693, Marine B2 89, fo. 2O4V). s Cal. S.P. Dom. 1697, pp. 273, 292, 319; H.C.A. 1/53, fos. 30-4; ibid. 1/14, fos. 78, 80, 85, 99-103, 147-8, and 1/15, fo. 29. William's remark is in H.M.C., Finch MSS. iii. 191 (Sydney to Nottingham, 3 Aug. 1691); cf. Clarke, ii. 527. 59 Cobbett, Parliamentary History, v. 726-7, 776.
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waters of Doctors' Commons. It began with a letter of 20 May 1693 from the Admiralty Commissionerswho had been joined on 15 April by that ferocious Jacobite-hunter Lord Falkland reminding Dr. William Oldys (Oldish), their advocate-general, that he had not yet replied to their 'Question . . . whether their Majesties' subjects taken serving under the late King James's commission ought not to be prosecuted as pyrats'. Beginning with Sir Thomas Pinfold, the king's advocate-general, all the Crown counsel agreed with Oldys in 'thinking it no ways advisable'. When he was nevertheless ordered to prosecute, Oldys refused. In September, with Pinfold and four other civilians, he appeared before the Secretaries of State and three more Lords of the Council, including Falkland, who lost his temper: Pray, Doctor, let us deal more closely with you, for your reasons are such as amount to high treason. Pray what do you think of abdication? Dr. Oldys. My Lords, that is an ensnareing and odious question. However it may be, I think of the abdication as you doe. For since it was voted, it binds at least in England. But these gentlemen were in a forreign countrey, and knew nothing of it ; and though King James be no king here, yet the colour of authority remaining, and the common acceptation of him as king there, excuses them, as I said before . . . For adopting this stand, 'Dr. Oldys was removed from his place and Dr. Littleton was put in'.60 Littleton had taken the line, in short, that 'King James was now a private person . . . and those that adhere to him are not enemies but rogues . . . no privateers but pirates'. He was supported by that formidable Whig (and later deist) polemicist Dr. Matthew Tindall, who next year attacked his 'Jacobite' colleagues in a 36-page pamphlet of some celebrity.61 Written in the bullying tone of the left-wing doctrinaire, it makes one essential point, likely to make a strong impression in 1694:
Marsden, ii. 143-8. Cf. two identical manuscript accounts of this episode in Rawl. A. 479 and A. 84, fos. 158-69. There is an attractive account of Oldys in D.N.B., s.v. his son William, the antiquary; the elder Oldys bequeathed his library to Doctors' Commons. 61 Essay concerning the laws of nations and the rights of sovereigns . . . With reflections upon the arguments of Sir. T. P. and Dr. 01. (1694, two edns.).
60
161
There is no way of making a Titular King weary of granting such Commissions, as long as he can find People willing to accept and act by them. Nothing can oblige him, who runs no risque of losing any thing, but may get a considerable Booty by what his Privateers take, as well as disturb and molest his Enemies, to forbear granting such Commissions . . . Therefore Nations have no other way to hinder the disturbing their Commerce, but by using the utmost Rigor against such as accept his Commissions . . .
Nevertheless, Tindall entirely ignores the fact that the Jacobite privateers, as Oldys knew, were subject to the maritime law of France.62 He prefers the abstract hypothesis that no king could punish the subjects of another on his own soil, and then disposes of any nonsense about the duty of obedience to a government which can no longer provide protection. As for Absolute Obedience, which 'naturally tends to introduce gross Ignorance and Superstition', the promotion of such a doctrine 'is a much greater crime than the encouraging any Rebellion whatever'. This inflated little work ends with a nasty swipe at poor Dr. Newton, who before the Privy Council had desired time to consider: 'Dr. N. said it was against his conscience . . . to have a Hand in Blood. I suppose with this tacit Reserve, except it were in hopes of being Advocate of the Admiralty, whose business it is . . ., to have a Hand in Blood.' Newton, a protg of Somers, duly succeeded Littleton as Judge Advocate and went on to a diplomatic career in Italy. Oldys, who henceforth practised as an ordinary advocate, was briefed for the defence of Captain Vaughan and John Murphy, both executed for high treason at the end of 1696. Two of Vaughan's men, Richard Kearney and Charles Macarthy, had been executed a year earlier,63 but Vaughan had escaped from prison and later there was evidently some difficulty in establishing his nationality. The principal witness to his Galway origin was David Creagh, himself a prisoner in Newgate who turned king's evidence and became the subject of a scandalous ballad;
'2 Pontchartrain's letters of 1694-5 (above, pp. 155-6) declined punishment of British prisoners, not of their captors. 'a Francis Early, also of the Loyal Clancarty, was attainted with Lt. Kearney, but pardoned in 1696. Murphy was from a different privateer (above, n. 47) and it is not clear why he was executed, except that he had no friends to appear for him and could get no papers from France: H.C.A. 1/14, fos. 27, 46. Cf. Cal. S.P. Dom. 1696, p. 3, and London Gazette, no. 3235.
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his brother Christopher, a merchant of Watling Street, accused him of blackmail.64 The court made short work of Oldys's attempt to invoke the evidential rules of the civil law in order to retract Vaughan's unfortunate boast to his captors, out on the Thames flats, that he was an Irishman and 'my intent was to burn the Ships at the Nore'. It was also ruled that the Trial of Treasons Act, in requiring two lawful witnesses to overt acts, did not apply to evidence of nativity. But Oldys had the last though futile word, in recalling the old civilian objection to treating the grand jury as witnesses ex vicinato to a crime committed on the high and open seas. Like Vaughan, nearly all Jacobite privateersmen claimed to be of French birth, even if they had since returned to Ireland and could not speak French, and very few were in fact attainted. The position down to 28 March 1696 was thus summarized by Hedges in advising Shrewsbury against the inclusion in the seacartel of a Captain Walsh, lately attainted at an Admiralty Sessions in Ireland:65
At the sessions of the admiralty held in February 1693 [4] five persons were condemned for treason in the same circumstances as Walsh now is; two were executed, and the other three are remaining in the Marshalsea.66 At the sessions in November 1694, five were condemned, and these are now in. Newgate . . . At the sessions in December last three were condemned, and of these two were executed and the other is in the Marshalsea. This last person was brought in guilty by the jury's mistake, and it was believed would have the king's pardon.
The Judge of Admiralty here refers to the executions of Golding, Jones, Kearney, and Macarthy. Apart from Vaughan, Murphy, and Walsh, no others afterwards suffered the supreme penalty. Of the few condemned, for high treason or piracy or both,
*+ Hargrave, v. 31; H.C.A. 1/13, fos. 102-9; Col. S.P. Dom. i6g6, pp. 435-6, 453-4, 480's Ibid., p. 104. Was this Robert Walsh, for whom James II procured a French commission in 1693 and whose ship, the Soleil of St. Malo, was taken off Cape Clear in June 1694? He does not appear among the other examnales in H.C.A. 1/52, fos. 185-7, but may have been captured ashore; unhappily, the Irish admiralty records were destroyed in 1920. Walsh was apparently executed: H.M.C., Buccleuch MSS. ii (Part i), 319. 66 This statement conflicts with Wynne MS. LR. 2 E. 23, which accounts for three traitors (of whom Goold was still in custody) and six pirates (of whom two had been executed and four remained in custody). Hedges omits the pirates.
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before and after this letter, we have a record of pardon in many cases between September 1696 and May 1701, the last being that of John Noake, son of a former proctor in the Norwich consistory, who had had 'little more to say for himself than that he was a chevalier of fortune' and had been taken as one of Dunbar's prizemasters.67 Sentenced with him in November 1694 but pardoned in December 1699 were William Jennings of Middlesex, son of the Jacobite exile, and Colonel Daniel Macdonnell of Ulstereasily confused with the Dubliner Daniel Macdonnell, captain of the 4-gun Fortune of Dunkirk, who received sentence on the same occasion but no pardon until 1701. These were all in a sense distinguished prisoners. It is more difficult to understand why James Brassell, a simple mariner from Laughlin Cleere's Princesseto which Colonel Macdonnell claimed to have been attached in order to purge himself of a murderwas convicted with these others in November 1694, for he was not the only prisoner who 'spoke both English and French' in a crew of 100, only seven of whom were even tried; his name figures in a list of over seventy against whom no evidence could be found on 15 October previously.68 Of the whole thirty-one tried on 23 November, twenty-three were acquitted and two delivered by proclamation. A week later, allegedly for want of evidence, the AttorneyGeneral ordered a Noli prosegui for the seventeen men of Tully's Prince de Galles against whom charges had been broughtout of a crew numbering forty-eight British names. All of the acquitted, who claimed to be French, though of Irish parentage, were on the same day ordered to be detained for exchange as prisoners of war.69 Since these men had been caught cruising under French commissions, it would have been necessary but difficultas we can see from the report of Vaughan's trialto prove them British subjects. In this respect indictments for high treason were technically less straightforward than those for piracy. In either case the course of justice might be impeded by the absence of witnesses on the side of the captors, who were all in the navy,
6? Wynne MS. LR. 2 E. 23 records the proceedings at the Old Bailey on 23-4 and 30 Nov. 1694. I have found no detailed record of the Sessions in Dec. 1695. 68 H.C.A. 1/52, fos. I78v-i82; ibid. 1/29, fo. 36, and 1/13, fo. 47. 6 <> Ibid., fos. 47-63; Wynne MS. LR. 2 E. 23.
164
and by the dislike of the common law judges for the written evidence produced in these Admiralty sessions by the civilian advocates.70 Apart from these technical difficulties, it seems possible that the leniency shown in the Sessions of November 1694 may reflect fears for the fate of Huguenots taken prisoner at Gamaret in the previous June: they had just been transferred to the chateau of Nantes 'sur l'avis que Sa Majest a eu qu'on avait pendu en Angleterre quelques Irlandois pris sur mer'.71 It may be significant that the Noli prosegui for Tully's men was issued upon order-in-council. However that may be, the government's attitude had hardened by September 1696, when Blathwayt ordered that the cartel should not be extended even to Frenchmen if they were found to be serving on privateers with James's commission; any British were to be prosecuted. At this very moment, nevertheless, the pardons begin: Ryan, Chivers, Sangster, and Dohertyall attainted of piracytogether with Goold of the Soleil and Early of the Loyal Clancarty.72 It is of some interest, too, that King William's government in Britain never went so far as a Dutch Placaet of February 1696, imposing the death penalty on enemy privateers who should come within the buoys without a protecting fleet, although many of the captured Jacobite privateersmen had compounded their offence by taking prizes 'within the jurisdiction of the Admiralty of England'.73 As time went on, it is possible to discern a shift in the attitude of the lawyers themselves. At Vaughan's trial, Justice Holt conceded that Jacobites cruising under the French king's commission became Gallici subditi who could wage war on all his enemies except their own countrymen. Hedges, who agreed that no sovereign could commission his subjects to fight one another (much less when divested of his regal power), at least differed from his common law colleagues when he admitted in March 1696 that persons comprehended within the Capitulation of Limerick 'might have some reason to sue for your
Of. Wynne MS. LR. a E. 23 for the resistance of Treby and Rookby to the reading of admiralty examinations in the Sessions of Feb. 1694. 71 Marine B2 100, fo. 263 (Pontchartrain to Middleton, 22 Oct. N.S. 1694). 72 H.M.C., Finch MSS. iv. 453 (Blathwayt to Nottingham, 12 Sept. 1696); H.C.A. 1/13, fo. 121, minutes of Sessions, 17 Sept. 1696. 7 s C. van Bynkershoek, Quaestionum juris puJblici libri duo (ed. J. B. Scott, 2 vols., Oxford, 1930), u. 99.
70
165
Majesty's mercy'74a view that would have spared Golding. In the next century English law was to accept the principle that enemy character attaches to English subjects living on enemy territory, just as William's declaration of war had exempted the French Protestants in England.75 The problem was sharply and tragically brought to public attention by the Jacobite privateers, and its solution anticipated by the scholarly and courageous Dr. Oldys, whose imaginative understanding preferred to rely on the 'errour' of simple-minded Irish emigrants rather than on the right of a deposed king to wage war as to which there can never be a single opinion.
7
75
* Cal. S.P. Dom. 1696, p. 104. Cf. Holdsworth, xii (1938), 99-101, 142-8.
Corvette, Barque and Brigantine
9
LES EQUIPAGES DES CORSAIRES SOUS LOUIS XIV, 1688-1713 Parier de la course c'est toujours courir le risque de se disperser parmi des entreprises trs diverses, de grande ou de petite taille, conduites par des chefs de Statut social extrmement vari, qu'il s'agisse d'officiers de marine ou de simples loups de mer commandant des embarcations de forc bizarrement inegale allant de la chaloupe arme a la flibustire et jusqu'aux fins voiliers de quarante canons et plus. A la mer, o nous devons surtout observer nos gens, tout se passe en forme de clichs qui resistent a une histoire structure : c'est le maquis. Il existe enfin une multiplicit de ports corsaires, chacun avec sa propre hydrographie, son propre march d'arrire-pays pour l'coulement des marchandises de prise, sa navigation traditionnelle plus ou moins apte a nourrir le corsaire et son armateur. Mme en nous limitant aux mers du Nord pendant l'poque classique de la petite guerre , nous avons affaire a une bonne douzaine de ports, sans compter les intrusions intermitientes des Basques vers l'Arctique et l'Atlantique de l'ouest. La preponderance de Dunkerque et de SaintMalo s'affrme, comme prvu. Sur ce point la lgende historique n'a pas menti. Mais de toute evidence, l'activit remarquable de Calais, d'ailleurs confirmee par de trs nombreux actes de propriet, reste encore a voquer ; Boulogne ne la surpasserait que bien plus tard. La presence aussi de Dieppe, de Cherbourg et de Morlaix-Roscoff peut surprendre, surtout par rapport au role apparemment efface (mais depuis longtemps soulign par les historiens) de Nantes. Il faut dire pourtant que nous privilgions ici les mers europennes, en masquant quelques initiatives nantaises, malouines ou brestoises au loin (cotes d'Afrique, Antilles, Ocean Indien) et qu'il convieni de laisser dans l'ombre. Aujourd'hui notre com-
168
munication est plutt consacre aux mers troites (Narrow Seas), qui vont de la raer du Nord (avec son ouverture sur l'Arctique) jusqu'aux mers d'Irlande (avec extension vers les cotes ibriques). Ces dernires, on le sait, taient le terrain d'lection des corsaires bretons, ce qui explique en partie la grande vulnrabilit des Malouins, les plus exposes a la force navale ennemie. A la latitude de l'Ecosse ou de la Norvge, les Dunkerquois avaient moins a craindre. Les Calaisiens et les Havrais, parfois lis aux armateurs dunkerquois, frquentaient aussi ces latitudes, mais surtout la Manche, o venaient de plus en plus, au fil des temps, les Dunkerquois eux-mmes. Autrement il ne s'agit que de la Manche et essentiellement de la navigation ctire anglaise : vocation prdestine, facilement rentable, de tout petits corsaires de la Picardie et de la Normandie, rarement montes de plus de huit canons, a moins qu'on ne voyaget en guerre et marchandises (ce qui n'est pas a considrer ici). Un armateur de Guernesey, dont la course precoce se nourrissait de petit cabotage francais, mais dont les btiments corsaires avaient t souvent construits en France, demanda, en 1712, a l'un de ses capitaines de lui trouver quelque jolly coursere de Callez a achetter, sur toute chose qui n'excde pas plus de six canons... '. Une teile barque ou corvette de 38 tonneaux environ, aurait t arme d'une cinquantaine d'hommes ; une chaloupe a quatre canons et de vingt tonneaux, en demandait une quarantaine ; et on ne mprisait pas la petite chaloupe de cinq tonneaux, arme d'un seul canon (ou de pierriers) mais d'une vingtaine d'hommes forts, munis de fusils, pistolets, sabres, demi-piques et grenades 2 . Done, un rapport tonneaux/hommes d'au moins 4/5, souvent de 1/2, parfois de 1/4. Une tactique qui ressemble a celle de la bonne flibuste, teile qu'on l'avait dcrite au Pre Labat :
Que le canon de leur Corvette toit plus par crmonie que par ncessit, puisqu'ils n'employoient presque jamais que les deux pieces de chasse quand ils battoient un vaisseau par l'avant ou par l'arrire, leurs fusils leur sffisant pour le dsoler, jusqu' ce que leurs Capitaines jugent a propos de sauter a l'abordage 3 .
Type de course aussi qui impose des conditions de vie particulirement dures, mme si la campagne ne dure qu'un mois ou deux (a six canons une barque pontee en ferait trois) et qu'on ne tombe pas aux mains des Anglais, ce qui vaudrait une detention moyenne de six mois environ, parfois (mais pas toujours) dans une gele peu salubre. Voici ce que les Espagnols, puis les Anglais, appellaient le picaron. Il est de tous les temps. A notre poque, il fleurissait aussi bien dans la Manche qu'aux Antilles. D'apparence mediocre voire plbienne, il jouissait des suffra1. Guernsey, Greife, mss. de Sausmarez, M. de Sausmarez au capi. Chabosseau, 13 mars 1712. 2. A.D. Pas-de-Calais, 13 B 39. 3. Voyage du Pre Labat aux Isles de l'Amrique (2 t., La Haye, 1724), 1, 73.
Les Equipages des Corsaires sous Louis XIV, 1688-1713
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ges des gentilhommes bretons, de soi-disant marchands banquiers de Morlaix ou de Roscoff et surtout des commercants de Calais, ou on savait en lancer vingt a trente a la raer chaqu anne (et vers la fin des guerres deux fois plus), parfois en mlangeant course et contrebande 4 . Bien sur, cette espce de piraterie ne fut pas mconnue dans les deux cits corsaires du Ponant, surtout pas a Dunkerque, encore tres attache a la barque longue traditionnelle (mais maintenant pontee), ainsi qu' la fregate de dix a trente canons. Il est vrai que les capitaines dunkerquois en fin de course font mention de trois fois plus de frgates que de barques, mais les frgates risquaient beaucoup moins d'etre captures et elles furent plus souvent rarmes. Toujours est-il qu'en plus des barques longues (ou corvettes), il s'y trouvait une minorit de capitaines qui s'aventuraient en petites chaloupes, en gallotes, en brigantins et de plus en plus en dogres. La moiti environ (47%) de l'armee corsaire dunkerquoise ne montait que huit canons ou moins ; et presque 16% de l'ensemble n'en avait pas plus de trois de 1702 a 1713. A ce niveau, Ie rapport tonneaux/hommes passe de 1/3 pour les brigantins, a 9/10 pour les dogres ; quant a la barque longue, on peut l'estimer a 3/4, Compte tenu de la fragilit de nos donnes, la fregate lgere devient presque aussi exigeante au cours de la Guerre de Succession, lorsque les Dunkerquois tendaient a en renforcer les batteries 5 . Elle arrive a un equipage beaucoup plus important que celui de la fregate malouine mais bien entendu, Saint-Malo tait capable d'en armer de plus fortes en canons. A 1'exception de l'escadre royale, laquelle n'est pas prise en consideration ici, Dunkerque n'armait gure au-dessus de 250 tonneaux (voir tableau 1).
Tableau 1 Taille des equipages des frgates corsaires : Dunkerque et Saint-Malo (moyennes) Tonneaux Dunk erque (1688-1697) (1702-1713) Saint Malo (1688-1697) (1702-1713)
60- 90
100-150 160-200 220-300
74 102 163 165
92 154 186 172
70 101 136 166
82 95 129 166
Sources : Arch. Nat. Marine C4 252, 258, 263, 268, 272-273, 276; Cherbourg, Arch. Marine 3 P 9/12 et 13; A. MOREL, La guerre de course a Saint-Malo (Paris, Acad. de Marine, s.d.), pp. 106-243, table corrige et amplifie par d'autres sources, notamment par les roles d'quipage du dpartement de Saint-Servan conserves aux Archives de la Marine a Brest, PC 33 et 34.
En comparaison avec sa sceur bretonne, dont la vocation corsaire rivalisait avec le commerce et la pche au long cours, la cit flamande pouvait s'adonner plus spontanment a la course, d'autant plus que la conscription maritime ne touchait pas encore les Flamands. Au cours de ces
4. A.D. Pas-de-Calais, 13 B 36 a 39. Inventaire sommaire dei Archines dpartementale* antrieures a 1790: Finislre, III, 1-25.
5. A.N. Marine C* 252, 258, 263, 268, 272-3, 276.
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annes, le pouvoir, certes, avait bien des arriere-pensees a propos de ce privilege; l'armement de l'escadre royale sous Jean Bart, Saint-Pol ou Forbin, a pu trainer en longueur ; cependant il fallait mnager les Flamands, gens dont on ne fait pas ce que Ton veut et qui n'aimaient absolument pas servir sous les officiers francais ; de plus, dans les PaysBas espagnols limitrophes et en Hollande, il ne manquait pas d'offres d'emploi pour le matelot aguerr, que ce soit a Ostende, Flessingue ou Middelbourg6. En temps de guerre, leur concurrence tait a craindre, et elle aurait jou sur la solde que devaient payer les armateurs dunkerquois, ainsi que le fait carrment remarquer l'intendant Demadrys a la fin de 1697, si bien que les conditions plus avantageuses du service corsaire a Dunkerque avaient, dit-il, attira grand nombre de matelots de ees pays-l ; depuis la paix, ils se sont retires chez eux, en laissant les Flamands domicilies en France, souvent encombrs de grandes families, pas tellement nombreux 7 . Pour apprcier la portee de cette reflexin, il suffit de se reporter a un mmoire du 7 janvier 1690, sign par huit armateurs de Dunkerque, dont Jean Bart, tous outrs par l'esprit d'insubordination des matelots:
Ces animaux-l, qui, sans aucune raison, vous quittent et vous laissent l au milieu de votre armement [disent] qu'ils ne viennent pas icy pour qu'on trouve a redire a leur conduite... Puisque les villes portuaires [disent ees armateurs] ne sauraient tirer d'elles-mmes, pour le peu de navigation qu'on veuille faire, le nombre de matelots qui leur est ncessaire.
(exemples : Hambourg, Lbeck, etc.) elles vivent grace a l'immigration de cette espce d'oyseau passager de tout pays sans tre d'aucun , done de la grande libert et du gain apparent qu'elles peuvent leur offrir. Dunkerque, comme on l'a vu, aurait eu besoin de 4 000 matelots au cours des annes suivant 1670, et ne disposait, en fait, que de 5008. Si pessimiste qu'apparaisse ce dernier chiffre, il doit mettre en garde Ie chercheur. Replace dans le contexte d'une course dunkerquoise tres endette et mme dangereusement endette envers les trangers, qu'il s'agisse des equipages et parfois mme des capitaines, dont quatre au moins venaient de Nieuport, il ne manque pas d'ouvrir certaines perspectives. Au dbut de la guerre de Succession d'Espagne, Ie controleur Vergier attribue certains dsordres au caractre hybride des equipages, formes de matelots de toutes les nations de l'Europe, attirs par le libertinage et par l'esprit de pillage. En 1710, un mmoire sur les abus a corriger dans la course fait grand cas du nombre excessif des matelots originaires de pays neutres et mme de Zlandais. Ce qui lui valut cette tonnante rponse de la Chambre de Commerce: les Danois (c'est-6. Ibid., B 7 62, fai. 194-5; B ;f 93, fol. 10, 25; 100, fol. 355; 142, fol. 32; 163, fol. 247-8; 165, fol. 438-9; Dunkerque, Chambre de Commerce, 'procs-vcrbaux des sances (copie dactylographie), 6 (6 mai 1705). Cf. E. SUE, Histoire de la Marine franfaise, V (1837), 384. 7. A.N. Mar, BÎOO, fol. 355-356. 8. Ibid., 60, fol. 68-74.
171
dir les Norvgiens) Sudois et autres trangers sont les meilleurs matelots que nous ayons dans nos equipages 9 . En presence d'un tei va-et-vient, il apparali bien difficile de se rendre compie de ce qu'tait le march du travail maritime dans les Flandres. D'aprs mes calculs, il semble que l'on soit parvenu a entretenir entre 3 000 et 4 000 gens de mer a la disposition de la course tout a fait indpendamment des pcheurs. Certes, cette progression pouvait connaitre des arrts et des reculs. En 1694, par exemple, on sgnale l'exode de 800 matelots ne trouvant plus d'occupation icy a cause des mois creux de l 'hiver et des difficults de subsistance et davantage encore a cause des mauvais traitements. Dj, en 1693, selon l'intendant Patoulet, la course qui fleurissoit autresfois ne fait a prsent que languir faute d'hommes. D'accord avec Vauban, Patouler se fit l'avocat d'une veritable politique d'immigration, exactement comme Jean Bart et comme les armateurs en 1690'. Il ne semble pas que le ministre ait souhait encourager l'enrlement en bonne et due forme. Le brassage humain, consequence de la guerre, dut simplement le faciliter, en fournissant les dchets des armes toutes proches ; deserteurs et prisonniers, doni on connat un certain nombre de cas individuels et picaresques ". L'agence principale du recrutement corsaire fut bien le cabaret. Le trafic d'exportation des prises, sujettes a des lenteurs juridiques et souvent revendues a l'ennemi, tait accompagn, selon Vergier, d'un nombre infini des matelots de toutes nations dont nos ngociants et nos armateurs se (servaient)... ' 2 . Il en est qui atteignent souvent Dunkerque a pied; c'est ainsi que la plupart reviennent des prisons de Middelbourg, de Rotterdam et d'Amsterdam. On pouvait mme tre de retour en une quinzaine de jours, grace aux accords passs entre les diffrentes Amirauts accords qui ne connurent qu'un echec grave, en 1696. Bel exemple de cette grande libert, si chre a Jean Bart, et a laquelle pensrent en premier lieu les auteurs de mmoires de 1690. Avantage que ne partagrent gure les Malouins, destines le plus souvent a subir la stricte arithmtique du cartel franco-britannique, un homme pour un homme, un officier pour un officier. Les sources ne permettent aucune evaluation de la proportion des trangers dans les equipages dunkerquois. Tout au plus pourrait-on l'estimcr a un bon tiers. A Nantes, au cours des annes 1694-1697, mais d'aprs des donnes ne portant que sur un petit nombre d'armements, il tait dj de 10% environ et Nantes n'est pas une ville-frontire ". On trouve des trangers un peu dans toutes les fonctions, et souvent parmi
9. Ibid., B 4 23, fol. 114-117; Dunkerque, Ch. de Commerce, p.-v. 11 (8 janvier 1710). 10. A.N. Mar. B', fol. 12 V , 264-265 ; 59, fol. 347 ; 75, fol. 68-69. 11. Voir Amiable Renegade : The Memoirs of Captain Peter Drake, 1671-1753, (d. P. Jordan-Smith, Stanfort Univ. Press, I960), pp. 86-90. 12. A.N. Mar. B 3 154, fol. 270. 13. R. OTTENHOF, L a course et les prises a Nantes pendant la guerre de la ligue d'Augsbourg (D.E.S. d'Hist. Universit de Rennes, 1961), pp. 53-62.
17 2
les officiers mariniers : le Chef-d'oeuvre de Roscoff en compie 23 sur 48, en 1693, et Ton trouve mme, a Saint-Malo, un capitarne qui est un Vnitien. A lire la correspondance du port, aux Archives de la Marine, la cit corsaire apparai! grouillante d'trangers qui sont parfois, en fait, des Provencaux dissimulant leur origine. En 1705, le commissaire va jusqu' crire : l'quipage des corsaires est compos d'trangers 14 . Phrase excessive, comme l'est d'habitude la prose des commissaires. En fait, a l'exception des nombreux Irlandais rfugis en Bretagne aprs 1691, mais qui servent plus volontiers comme soldis, les trangers demeurent, a Saint-Malo, loul a fait minoritaires, du moins dans la mesure ou les roles d'quipage que j'ai pu analyser (seulement pour 1702 et 1711, cf. tableau 2) ont quelque valeur reprsenlative '5. Les Irlandais eux-mmes semblent tmoigner certaine aversin a l'gard de la course, aprs que l'on ait traite de forbans, a Londres, quelques-uns de leurs camarades.
Tableau 2 Provenance des equipages corsaires malouins 721711 Bretagne Saint-Malo / Saint-Servan Autres lieux Canale - Cap Frehel (surtout la Ranee) Cap Frehel-Lannion Finistre Morbihan Nantais Intrieur (Rennes, Fougres, etc.) Normandie Coutances, Saint-L et environs Avranches et environs Granville, Carteret Cherbourg, Valognes et environs Calvados Le Havre, Honfleur Rouen Dieppe Ailleurs Picardie, Artois, Boulonnais Dunkerque Para Orlanais, Touraine, Anjou, Maine Vendee, Poitou, Aunis, Saintonge Guyenne - Gascogne Bayonne, Pays Basque
955 375 59 19 20 24 35
l 487
910 309 294 101 57
62 70
l 736
68 13 42 10 25 22 12 11 13
214 14 13 15 31 31 14 3
108 42 101 71 39 63 21 14 14
473 23 113 34 27 60 56 12
14. Bib!. Nat., Ms. Nouv. acq. fr. 10570, p. 67 bis; A.N. Marine B3 128, fol. 350. 15 Voir mon article, The Jacobite Privateers in the Nine Years War, in Statesmen, Scholars and Merchants (reed. A. Whiteman, Oxford, 1973), ci-dessus, pp. 139-65.

Provence (surtout Marseille) Ailleurs en France Colonies Antilles (y compris Ngres ) Canada, Acadie, Terreneuve Etranger Irlande (domicilies en France exclus) Angleterre Espagne Fiandre espagnole Portugal Savoie Italie (surtout Genes et Venise) Malte Grece Suisse Danemark - Norvge Sude Hanse Provinces-Unies Indtermins TOTAUX (23 + 36 armements respectivement) Pourcentages : Bretagne Normandie Reste de la France Colonies Etranger Indtermins Source : Brest. Archives Marine PC 33, 34. 7 10
173
94 33
138
2 3
486
23 1
5
5 2 1 10 2 2 18 O O O 6 1 2 O
49 178 2 071
24
34 O 25 2 5 2 34 9 2 3 7 4 2 1
130 221 3070
71,8% 10,3% 6,6% 0,2% 2,4% 8,6%
56,5% 15,4% 15,4% 0,6% 4,2% 7,2%
En examinant le tableau 2, on constate immdiatement que ce sont bien Saint-Malo et Saint-Servan qui ont fourni la plupart des corsaires la vieille ville trois fois plus que sa jumelle en dpit d'un dclin relatif a mesure que les annes passaient ce qui se retrouve d'ailleurs, dans toute la contribution bretonne. Le pourcentage de l'apport normand augmente, sans compenser toutefois ce dclin, qui se trouve compens finalement par un afflux d'hommes d'autres parties de la France, et par un certain nombre d'trangers. L'intrieur du royaume y figure essentiellement comme fournisseur de soldats ou de volontaires de jeunes gentilshommes qui offraient leur service sans recevoir de solde ; le bureau des classes evoque la soldatesque et sa presence a peu prs constante a bord des navires corsaires francais ce qui montre trs bien le role capital que joue l'abordage dans sa tactique, et ce qui devrait mettre en garde contre un mythe par lequel on voudrait faire croire que Ton cherchait a
174
tout prix a viter le combat. Il apparati en effet que les Malouins haussrent sur leurs navires la proportion de la soldatesque, a mesure que les matelots se rarfiaient, ainsi en 1705, alors que les departs pour les mers du Sud prenaient un essor sans precedent : 961 matelots, selon les donnes de Dahlgren, suivis par 850 en 1706 et par 762 en 1707 ' 6 . En mme temps, des appels taient lances depuis Brest, dans le dessein d'quiper les escadres de Duguay-Trouin, escadres de plus en plus importantes. II est vrai aussi que le total des Malouins, victimes des corsaires britanniques, apparali particulirement important entre 1703 et 1705 39 pertes contre 23 en 1706-1708. Sans doute la conjugaison de ees facteurs contribue-t-elle a expliquer le ralentissement tres marqu du rythme des armements de corsaires malouins des l'anne 1706 : chute d'un tiers dans es dlivrances des lettres de marque, qui sont encore une bonne soixantaine en 1704 et en 170S' 7 . Mais en 1705, sinon en 1704, l'effort d'armement en course n'est pas accompli sans une dilution massive des gens de guerre (voir tableau 3). Pour une moyenne de 20,5%, on dnombrait 16 equipages o la proportion atteignait ou dpassait un tiers du total. Cela est-il possible ? ne pourrait-on pas penser que la rubrique soldatesque inclurait un certain nombre de matelots novices, qui ne seraient jamais distingues dans les roles des corsaires de la guerre de Succession d'Espagne alors qu'ils l'taient dans ceux que nous possdons pour les annes 1695-1696?
Tableau 3 : Structure des equipages corsaires malouins (en %) (\nnee Nombre de roles Equip, brut Majors Mariniers Matelots Soldis & volont. Mousses 3 813 10,4% 30,7% 44,5% 7,6% 6,4% 32 1703 20,5% 5,3% 5 179 14,0% 31,3% 28,9% 54 1705 p 10,7% 3 070 1711 20 11,57o 31,0% 47,0%
Source : Bresl, Arch. Mar. Pc 33, 34 (pour les autres annes, les roles trop souvent conforident officiers mariniers et matelots ; pour 1704 et 1707 il y en a peu).
Ces derniers, bien qu'ils ne concernent pour la plupart que le voyage de Terre-Neuve et surtout la pche, peuvent apporter des claircissements sur ce que veut dire le commissaire de Gastines en 1697 lorsqu'il parle de seize corsaires qui se prparent a aller en mer avec des gens ramassez... Je crois qu'il leur sort du monde de dessoubs terre 18 . Farmi les roles de 1696 anne, on s'en souvient, de la razzia d'Iberville sur Terre-Neuve il en est qui concernent des bailments fortement armes en guerre en mme temps qu'en marchandises, y compris plusieurs anciens corsaires, dont deux armes par Danycan, qui s'intresse au projet d'Iberville. En raison de l'importance de l'entreprise, il n'est pas sur16. E.VV. DAHLGREN, Voyages francais a destination des Mers du Sud avant Bougainville, Nouvelles Archives des Missions Scienlifiques, XIV (1907), 423-468. 17. Anne MOREL, La guerre de course a Saint-Malo (Acad. de Marine, s.d.), pp. 188-241. 18. Brest, Arch. Mar. PC 33(1); A.N. Mar. B3 97, fol. 308, 316v-75; cf. ibid. 123, ibi. 615 (Pelsaire, 25 octobre 1704).
175
prenant d'y trouver nombre de matelots des classes. Mais a cote d'eux, on relve la presence de novices, de mousses, de vieux, d'invalides, de malingres, et de pocrins, aussi nombreux que les autres , sinon majoritaires. L'Ange Gardien, avec vingt officiers mariniers et 31 autres hommes des classes, est quipe de 41 invalides, vieux et infirmes, ainsi que de 17 novices et de 18 mousses. Parmi les vieux, 14 ont 60 ans et plus ; l'un d'eux a 70 ans. La Marie-Franfoise, avec ses 36 hommes des classes, porte 17 novices, 15 mousses, 34 vieux, invalides et pocrins. Les invalides comprennent deux estropis d'une jambe, deux tombes du haut mat, trois incommodes de la vue... de la mchoire... d'une cuisse, outre un boiteux et un hernieux. Seuls les armements de Danycan prsentent un autre caractre. Gomme un ou deux autres armateurs en course, qui vantaient leurs relations a la Cour, il avait dj pronte des graces du ministre, en se fournissant en matelots des classes de facon justifie peut-tre '9. A en juger par le nombre des lettres de marque, la petite guerre malouine atteint son apogee en 1695-1696. Nul doute que ce ne soit la carence en hommes qui freine son expansion. Sur ce point, il n'est pas ncessaire d'couter les commissaires successifs. Chez les notaires, les cahiers d'engagements demeurent vides durant des mois. Us confirment pleinement les plaintes de ces commissaires, excedes par les demandes qui leur taient adresses. L'un d'eux, Lempereur, reagii avec exasperation en 1706, lorsqu'il recoit une demande de Nantes d'un certain Montaudouin, qui avait auparavant recrut des equipages basques tendant a obtenir l'autorisation d'armer en course a Saint-Malo. Ceci, alors qu'une dizaine d'armements malouins ne pouvaient tre equipes 20 . Ce serait une erreur de croire que la situation se trouvait clarifie par 1'abandon de la ligne de bataille. La guerre d'escadres demeure une grande dvoreuse d'hommes, ou plus prcisment d'hommes des classes car elle se fait avec des vaisseaux prts par le roi et equipes au moyen des leves, en plus des vaisseaux emprunts par les compagnies privilgies. D'ailleurs, le roi continu d'armer lui-mme. Ainsi, le commissaire des classes a Saint-Malo dut oprer deux leves de 400 hommes chacune en 1704, pour Toulon 21 . Plus les equipages s'affaiblissent en matelots, plus se trouve fort le besoin d'encadrement. On constater sur le tableau 3 que la proportion des officiers mariniers, a bord des navires malouins, demeure constante. Mais ce n'est l qu'une moyenne. En fait, il y a bon nombre de navires corsaires dont les officiers sont plus nombreux que les matelots. Parfois, ils sont Ie doubl, surtout a partir de 1705, et mme parfois plus. En 1708, Ie Don-du-Saint-Esprit en compterait 82, contre 17 matelots, sur un equipage de 174 hommes ; le Fortun^ sur 135 (dont seulement 17 mate19. Ibid., B3 82, fol. 6 V , 35 V , 76-77 v , 90, 115. 20. Ibid., 135, fol. 172 ; G 144, Mmoire pour facilitcr et diligenter a Saint-Malo les armements en course, 9 aot, 1702, par Saint-Sulpice. 21. Ibid., B3 128, fol. 362.
176
lots); en 1709, la Marguerite, bon navire corsaire, 93 sur 164 (dont 24 matelots). Mme la proportion de 30% semble excessive. Les roles releves par le docteur Corre, a Brest, pour les annes 1692-1696, indiqueraient plutt une proportion normale de 20% en dpit de deux exceptions indiquant 30% et, cas exceptionnel, le Chef d'OSuvre, de Roscoff, 44%. Comparons avec le Midi: une douzaine d'armements de La Ciotat, entre 1702 et 1712, d'une importance comparable a celle de SaintMalo, n'atteignent qu'une proportion de 20% en moyenne, et jamais plus que 25 ou 26%. Il est vrai que sont exclus des calculs les officiers d'ustencilles commis aux vivres, maitres d'hotel, cuisiniers, boulangers, tonneliers en generai le quart ou le cinquime du nombre des mariniers. Proportion plus forte, semble-t-il, qu' Saint-Malo, o les roles distinguent ces gens de fond de cale avec moins de prcision22. Les dduire de la statistique malouine ne modifierait gure nos conclusions. Comment interpreter ce gonflement de mariniers de manoeuvre, de pilotage, de cannonage, de charpentage, de calfatage, de voilerie? Il est possible que le fait s'explique par la richesse de Saint-Malo en officiers de ces spcialits, ville fort differente a eet gard de Nantes. Les revues opres par les commissaires des classes en janvier 1698 (cf. tableau 4) apparaissent rvlatrices, en dpit des rserves qu'appellent ces tats gnraux trop peu tudis.
Tableau 4 : Etat general des classes de la dependance du port de Brest, 1698 Nantes Vannes Brest Saint-Brieuc Saint-Malo Cherbourg Departements 469 324 1 087 374 1 354 Officiers mariniers 132 2 098 1 594 2 722 2 503 2 847 1 264 Matelots 1 210 594 1 177 Novices 862 309 296 1 090 877 Mousses 740 732 289 167 701 771 1 177 405 Invalides 339 553 60 358 Capitaines, matres, patrons 366 101 174 245 5996 4 795 6479 TOTAL Source : Archives Nationales Marine, B53. 5056
5 444
2 586
Par ailleurs, une surabondance de mariniers, par rapport aux matelots classes, pouvait causer des embarras a la marine royale. Teile apparali la situation a Rochefort en 1692 lorsque Pontchartrain an crit a Bgon : Si vous n'estimez pas a propos de les faire servir de simples matelots a la grande paye, il faut que vous en donniez deux pour trois matelots sur les vaisseaux. Suivant l'intendant Desclouzeaux, en donner deux pour trois constitue bien une pratique courante a Brest. Il reproche a Des Grassires, inspecteur general, d'en donner homme pour homme 23 . Il
22. B,N., Ms. Nouv. acq. fr. 10570, p. 67 bis; A.D. Bouches-du-Rhne, X B 2 et 3. 23. M.-T. de MARTEL, Etude sur ie recruitment des mattlots et soldis des vaisseaux du Roi dans Ie ressort di l'mtendance du port de Rochefort 1691-1697 (Vincennes, 1982), p. 78 n. ; Brest, Arch. Mar. I E 465,
p. 238.
111
est vrai que le dpartement de Brest se trouve lui aussi amplement pourvu en mariniers. Rien ne semble garantir qu'un marinier aura droit d'etre employ selon sa spcialit. Mais assurment l'employer comme matelot, merne avec une grande paye reviendrait a provoquer son mcontentement, ainsi qu'en tmoignent les documents manant du dpartement de Marennes, pepinire de mariniers, en 1692. C'est d'ailleurs a ce moment-l que les mariniers de La Tremblade prennent toutes les places, au grand mcontentement de ceux des autres quartiers, qui se trouvent prives d'avancement. De temps a autre, le commissaire, a Saint-Malo, avoue qu'il accorde des officiers mariniers de rebut aux corsaires24. Seraient-ce des vieux et des invalides? il n'est pas rare de relever des hommes ags sur les roles des Terre-Neuviers de 1695-1696. Et en ce qui concerne les invalides, le commissaire Lempereur semble insister, en 1711, sur le fait que parmi eux, ce sont surtout les officiers que Ton utilise.
Avec une jambe, ou mesme un bras en moins, les officiers mariniers ne laissent pas d'estre en estat de servir, et c'est d'ailleurs l'usage que les armateurs qu'ils ont servy continuent a les employer, quoyqu'ils ne sont propres a rien, et on en use de mesme pour les marys des nourrices 25 .
A vrai dir, ce qui se comprend peut-tre pour les boiteux ou les unijambistes ne peut Ttre aussi facilement pour les incommodes de la veue ou pour les estropis d'un bras. En tout cas, les premiers, on ne peut qu'incliner a le penser, devenaient un spectacle assez banal a bord des corsaires. Il est possible que ce fait explique pourquoi en 1698, au lendemain d'une guerre de neuf ans, il y a 1 354 mariniers et 2 847 matelots inscrits contre seulement 405 invalides le terme invalide exprimant ici un Statut, un droit a la demi-solde royale, plutt que 'incidence des combats sur les gens de mer. En dernire analyse, on relve, c et l, des indications montrant qu'il existait un surplus d'officiers mariniers dans les dpartements de Saint-Malo et de Brest, indications sensibles a mesure que sont effectus les armements royaux et quasi-royaux. Il ne convieni cependant pas d'exagrer. Car une toute autre explication de ce gonflement peut tre apprhende. Je l'avais depuis longtemps soupconne lorsque je trouvai, aux Archives municipales de Dunkerque, des copies de mmoires rdigs en 1756, en vue de corriger les abus de la course, et envoys par l'auteur anonyme au ministre. Parmi eux, il en est un qui cherche a fixer le nombre des officiers mariniers sur les capres : 6 sur un corsaire d'environ 40 hommes, 14 sur un autre de 81 a 100, 17 sur un de 101 a 150 hommes, etc... 2 t l . Au lieu de 47 ou 49 dans des equipages totalisant 169 et 166 hommes, a considrer deux corsaires malouins de 1705, on n'aurait du en engager que 20.
24-, Martel, p. 79; A.N. Mar. B 3 82, fol. 6 V , 26; 89, fol. 200. 25. Ibid., 195, fol. 83. 26. Dunkerque, Arch. Mun. 202, pice 33.
178
Notre auteur, pourtant, ne parle que des excs ayant eu lieu a Dunkerque pendant la guerre de 1744; excs bien modestes selon ses exemples, car le contingent de mariniers n'y est jamais suprieur a 20% o a 25% si on y comprend les officiers non-mariniers, c'est--dire d'ustancilles. Mais il ajoute que Ton a connu pourtant des equipages qui comptrent autant d'officiers mariniers que de matelots, ce qui fait un tort considerable au surplus de l'quipage par l'augmentation des parts des prises, capable de produire un dcouragement general, d'o il resulte un prejudice infini aux armateurs . Pourquoi eet abus ? parce que des capitaines pour engager des matelots a quitter les corsaires avec lesquels ils sont desja engages, leur donnent des grades d'officiers mariniers... . lei, on entre dans le domaine des avances, a Saint-Malo comme a Dunkerque. Le loup de mer, en principe, s'engage soit a la solde, soit a la part, c'est--dire avec le droit, pour les officiers et pour les equipages, de partager un tiers du revenu net des prises a l'exception du cas tres spcial du tiers biscayen au lieu du dixime que comporte selon la pratique navale le salaire celui-ci tant toujours nettement au-dessus des taux navals. A Toulon, a Rochefort et a La Rochelle regne le salaire. En pays basque, a Dunkerque et a Saint-Malo, en general, mais pas exclusivement, la part. A Marseille, les deux systmes coexistent mme le tiers biscayen n'y est pas inconnu mais avec tendance a une predominance du salaire. En mme temps, 1'usage compte, pour beaucoup. Les bureaux de la Marine en sont venus en 1702 a prfrer le salaire, et avec eux la plupart des intendants et commissaires des ports avec l'exception de Vergier a Dunkerque, selon une enqute lancee au debut de la guerre de Succession d'Espagne". Ces opinions, done, traduisent les lecons de la guerre precdente. Au salaire, on pouvait objecter que le matelot ainsi rtribu ne s'intresserait plus aux prises saufen cas de pillage et que les volontaires ils font souvent toute la forc de l'armement, dit Louvigny d'Orgemont, intendant a Brest le mpriseraient comme une retribution de mercenaire ; et enfin, que le dernier payement, au retour de la campagne, pourrait ne pas tre assure, faute de prises. A l'oppose, le Systeme de la part peut tre utilise par des armateurs peu honntes, qui savent profiter de la simplicit non seulement du matelot, mais des co-intresss. Autre argument que les intendants pourraient invoquer : les liquidations souvent prolonges des prises, ainsi que la vente des parts de matelots a des cabaretiers ou autres, qu'une ordonnance royale du 20 juin 1689 ne russit pas a supprimer. Mais surtout le Systeme de la part se revele dfectueux a cause des gages operes avant le depart, c'est--dire les avances sur les parts de prises eventuelles, avances qui doivent en tre dduites, et qui supposent qu'il y en aura... ce qui est loin d'etre sur. On lit ainsi dans le preambule du reglement du
27. A.N. Mar. G 144.
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25 novembre 1693, demeur d'ailleurs lettre morte, mais concu dans le dessein de porter remde au Systeme : S.M. ayant t informe que les avances considerables que les matelots exigent des armateurs qui quipent des vaisseaux pour la course en mettent beaucoup hors d'tat d'entreprendre des armaments, par la crainte de s'engager dans une dpense excessive, dont il est fort incertain qu'ils puissent s'indemniser, et donnant souvent occasion de refuser de combatir et d'obliger leurs.capitaines de rentrer dans les ports avant la fin de la course pour laquelle ils se sont engages ; et voulant y pourvoir, et en mme temps ter aux matelots tout pretexte de se plaindre du retardement qu'apportent les armateurs au paiement des parts qui leur reviennent dans les prises, elle a ordonn et ordonne ce qui suit... 2 8 . Il convieni d'examiner d'un peu plus pres les griefs des armateurs, d'aprs le tarif inspir par un groupe d'armateurs malouins : aux matres, par exemple, 150 livres tournois ; aux mousses forts qui ont navigu, 27 ; aux nouveaux mousses, 18. Ce reglement ou tarif de Saint-Malo correspond a un veritable paroxysme des difficults du march du travail, en 1693, les matelots exigeant 50 a 80 ecus 150 a 240 livres d'avances. Somme dj tres loigne de celles qui ont t presentes par l'ordonnance et reglement du 27 novembre 1689, qui a voulu limiter les loyers des meilleurs matelots a 45 livres tournois 29 . Trs vite, le matelot a percu ce loyer comme un salaire: 50, 60, 80 ecus valent, selon lui, un mois de course interpretation qui traduit fort mal l'intention du lgislateur 30 . En fait, les rglements d'avances n'expriment pas un terme essentiellement parce que l'avance, en soi, ne reprsente rien qu'une avance sur une part des prises a venir done, une garantie de recompense minimale, payee en monnaie. II reste tout de mme que les armateurs malouins, qui taient aussi a l'origine du reglement de 1689 par l'intermediaire de Pomereu, intendant en Bretagne concevaient leurs tarifs en les calculant par mois : un mmoire sign en leur nom par le syndic de la ville parie de cinq escus d'avance par chacun mois aux meilleurs [matelots] 31 . On voit comment il fut difficile aux contemporains, une fois pos le problme d'un tarif, de se dgager de la conception du salaire. En effet, les avances s'appellent des gages a vrai dire plutt une gageure pour 1'armateur qui esprait s'en rembourser sur les parts de prises. Le reglement de 1693 interdit de stipuler ce que seront les parts, tout en mentionnant des maxima pour les majors et les mariniers, les volontaires, les soldats et les mousses. Quant aux matelots, ils doivent recevoir a proportion de leur travail et capacit : ce qui revient, en pratique, a
28. Citoyen LEBEAU, Nouveau Code des Prises (3 t., Paris, an vii), i, 128-129, 178-186. 29. Ibid., pp. 132-133. 30. A.N. Mr. B 3 75, fol. 222 V . 31. Ibid., 59, fol 356-364 ; 115, fol. 545 (une main postrieure a dat de 1701 le mmoire sign par De Bricourt Heartault, syndic en 1690).
180
laisser aux officiers majors de le determiner, une fois la campagne termine. Dans ces conditions, plutt que d'accepter le plafonnement de ses avances sans garantie de part, le matelot prfr servir au mois et c'est bien l la mode a Saint-Malo, au debut de 1693, a tel point que les armateurs en demande l'interdiction formelle32. Ceux-ci, en effet, preferent le Systeme de la part a condition que les avances soient raisonnables : mieux vaut payer deux ou trois mois de course, en attendant qu'ils soient pongs par les prises, que quatre ou six mois, payables de toute facn, qu'il y ait des prises ou non. En fait, on revient au Systeme de la part, mais au prix d'avances des plus fantaisistes. En 1695, un simple novice reôit jusqu' trente ecus d'avances. Mme son de cloche a Dunkerque, ou les avances du matelot progressent de 21 ou de 22 cus en 1690 a 30 ou 35 en 1694, et jusqu' 40 ou 50 en 1696 : niveau plus bas que Ie Malouin, bien que comparable peut-tre aux salaires de 10 a 12 par mois que payaient parfois les Dunkerquois 33 . Pour la guerre de Succession d'Espagne, a partir des donnes dont nous disposons, Ie taux des avances n'atteint jamais les niveaux de la guerre precdente. Un sondage dans les actes d'engagement malouins de 1704 a 1709 suggre que les meilleurs matelots recurent alors entre 23 et 33 ecus, avec certaine tendance a la hausse a mesure que les annes de guerre s'coulaient. A Dunkerque, on donna 10 a 12 cus au commencement des hostilits, 30 a 35 en 1705, 20 a 30 suivant Ie temps de la course en 171134. Il fallait aussi accorder des demi-avances lorsque l'on prolongeait de deux mois une course de quatre, extension normalement prvue dans les actes d'engagement. Ce n'tait pas l toute la corruption du Systeme. Observateurs beats, les commissaires attribuent a l'invidualisme des armateurs Ie renchrissement des avances. Rien n'est capable de leur faire avoir de l'intelligence et du concert sur cela, crit M. de Gastines. Daneyean, qui possed un art tout particulier pour engager ce monde, donne plus que Magon de la Lande... 35 . En consequence, des corsaires demeurent deux mois, voire quatre dans le port, a demi-quips. Les capitaines embauchent sans scrupules des hommes dj engages par d'autres. A Calais, ce dsordre est venu a une teile extrmit qu'un matre allant a rclamer son matelot 11 coure risque d'en estre tu. Bref, au dire de l'intendant Duguay, l'engagement devient une bagatelle. Pour quatre engagements, on trouve deux matelots. Le matelot impuny en fait mestier . Pour essayer d'empcher les doubles avances , on en arrive, a Dunkerque, a dernander au matelot de se faire cautionner par un habitant domicili dans la ville mais ceci ne semble pas avoir donne de grands rsultats 36 .
32. Ibid., 82, Col. 90-91. 33. Ibid. 60, fol. 72 ; 81, fol. 12 V , fol. 201-202 V ; 93, fai. 197 ; Dunkerque, Ch. de Commerce, p.-v. 3, p. 69. 34. A.D. Ille-et-Villaine, 4E, 17 (Et. Vertoutre), cahiers d'engagement des corsaires Due de M>(1704), Empereur(n05), Ambilieux(nOI), Saint-Charles( 1709) ; Dunkerque, Ch. de Comm., p.v. 3, pp. 69 f. et 6, pp. 104-105 ; A.N. Marine B 3 191, fol . 419-427. 35. Ibid., B3 75, fol. 224. 36. Ibid., F 342, fol. 75 v -76 ; B3 165, fol. 415M16 ; Dunkerque, Ch. de Commerce, p.-v. 3 (5 aol 1702); B.N., ms. fr. 6800, fol. 255-260.
Les Equipages des Corsair es sous Louis XIV, 1688-1713
181
Les desertions en masse, demeurent des exceptions. Il s'en produit en revanche presque a chaqu relche, ainsi que l'attestent les rapports des capitaines dunkerquois 37 . Hmorragie qui cote beaucoup aux armateurs en frais d'archers et de remplacements. D'ailleurs, les fuyards ne sont pas forcment les plus modestement rtribus. Farmi eux, on trouve des matres, des pilotes, des contre-matres, et rnrne des majors. Il se peut que tel navire se trouve sans charpentier, sans matre-voilier, sans deuxime ou troisime Chirurgien. Faits que l'on se trouve tent de mettre au compte des grosses avances percues par les hommes. Mais il semble bien que la duret du mtier, le surpeuplement des navires corsaires, la longueur des campagnes, la rigueur ou le caractre explosif de certains capitaines aient aussi leur part de responsabilit. Les equipages se plaignent souvent d'un mauvais traitement. L'intendant Robert, de Brest, reproche mme a Duguay-Trouin une svrit trop grande : en 1704, de son escadre comme d'ailleurs de celle de Saint-Pol, selon ChateauRenault, il y eut une fureur de desertions. Un autre des grands capitaines malouins, Beauvais Lefer, ayant perdu 150 hommes, propose en 1708 que les deserteurs, ruine des armements, soient punis dans la course de la mme manire et avec la mesme formalit que ceux pour le service du Roy 3 8 . Les capitaines savent bien que la justice des Amirauts n'a rien de semblable a celle d'un Conseil de guerre. Le remboursement des avances, le carean pendant trois jours, ou un mois de prison, sanctions ultimes, ne dissuadent gure. Et d'ailleurs les armateurs, qui reprochent toujours aux officiers d'Amiraut leurs vacations exorbitantes et leurs prtentions pdantesques, voire certame partialit en faveur du matelot, ne tiennent gure aux poursuites judiciaires moins encore aux procs criminis, susceptibles d'etre evoques devant les Parlements. C'est ce que peut craindre un capitarne qui pche par excs d'autorit. Les capitaines corsaires, dont l'autorit dcoule essentiellement de leurs qualits personnelles, ainsi que de leur reputation en matire de prises, savent bien que la mutinerie couve toujours a bord, surtout aprs un ou deux mois de course infructueuse. On sait que les equipages corsaires ne voulaient absolument pas de subordination navale. Au cours de la discussion qui aboutit a la redaction du reglement de 1693, Pettier de la Hestroye, lieutenant general de l'Amiraut a Dunkerque, avait attir 1'attention sur le problme des rebellions et sur ce que les Anglais appellent le round robin, placet entour de signatures en rond, afin d'en dissimuler les auteurs. Pire, il arrive que Ton coupe les cables, que l'on lve les ancres, que l'on se rende matre du gouvernail, pour forcer le capitaine a entrer dans le port, avant 1'expiration du temps contractuel d'une course 39 . G raccourcissement de la campagne envisage est bien
37. Ubi cit. supra, n. 5. 38. A.N. Mar. B 3 126, fol. 309-310; 163, Col. 406V ; Brest, Arch. Mar. IE 481, fol. 378, 429, 473-476. 39. A.N. Mar. B4, fol. 350-2.
182
le motif le plus ordinaire des mutineries, avec le refus de combatir ou le refus d'un equipage de prise de se dfendre dfaillances qui furent facilement attribues aux avances excessives. Assez banal aussi apparali le refus de travailler au dsarmement encore une obligation inserite dans l'acte d'engagement et le refus de sortir de nouveau aprs une relache. Mme des capitaines en renom a Dunkerque, Mathieu de Wulf et Jan Simoens ne croisent pas facilement. D'autre part, il est vident qu'un manque de confiance dans le capitaine peut aussi jouer un rle. Les hommes du capitaine Schrijver refusent le combat aprs avoir dit plusieurs fois qu'ils ne prtendoient pas se battre pour un capitaine de six semaines. Un petit capitaine irlandais a moins encore de prestige et d'autorit, si l'on en croit ce que rapporte Ie capitaine Magdaniel, a propos d'une rvolte survenue pres d'Ameland, dans les Watten. Le chef crie :
A moy, a moy, enfans, Je suis capitaine, nous ferons la course en forbans... Bougre d'Anglais, rends nous ta commission, et si tu raisonnes, nous te jetterons a la mer... .
Gas extreme, si l'on veut, mais les rapports donnent a penser que Ie mcontent ne se fit pas scrupule de parier hautement a son capitaine, comme ce matelot du Fidele qui voulut soulever ses camarades en disant ... qu'il y avoit assez longtemps qu'il estoit esclave dans son bord 40 . Il convient de ne pas exagrer la frequence de pareus incidents. Ay ant parcouru attentivement toutes les declarations des capitaines dunkerquois qui nous sont parvenes elles recouvrent dix ans, sur vingt ans de guerre je n'ai relev qu'une cinquantaine d'incidents plus ou moins graves, desertions a part. La plupart tmoignent d'une volente de resistance passive. Il est rare que le capitaine soit menace en personne. On semble d'accord sur le fait que toute mutinerie commence avec Faction d'un ou de plusieurs intrigants, souvent des officiers mariniers. Et tout compte fait, les documents attestent massivement la competence des capitaines en tant que chefs de bande. Ajoutons que les Flamands ne voulaient pas de capitaines francais, mme pas d'un Duguay-Trouin, et surtout pas d'un commandant naval, jug incapable de commander une barque ou une chaloupe, o se trouvent des matelots accoutums au froid, au chaud, a la pluie, a coucher sur la dure, et a vivre de biscuit et d'eau de vie. Pour cela, mieux vaut une espce de forban, illettr, mais bon camarade 41 . A Dunkerque, les fils de familie, parfois des adolescents bien imprudents comme ceux de Saint-Malo, ne pouvaient russir. De mme, a la difference des dynasties malouines de gens de mer, le capitaine dunkerquois devient rarement armateur. A coup sur, en ce qui concerne les capitaines, on ne saurait parier de groupe social. A Dunker4-0. Ibid., C64272 (Schrijver, 26 juin 1707); 273 (Simoens, 11 avril 1709); Cherbourg, Arch. Mar. 3P9/12, fol. 20-2 (Magdaniel, 8 fv. 1710). 41. A.N. Marine B3165, fol. 480; Colonies C 9A7, fol. 167, (capt. Tristram, aux Antilles, 1704-1705, a Dunkerque 1708).
Les Equipages des Corsair es sous Louis XIV
183
que, pour la periode en question, on se trouve en presence de plus de 400 personnages, d'origines et de responsabilits trs heterogenes, qu'il s'agisse de Pierre Maisonneuve, Bayonnais et voleur de grand chemin ; de Louis Le Mei, transfuge hollandais illettr, dont l'audace a t clbre par Henri Malo, mais capable d'un mauvais commerce ; ou de Cornil Saus, longtemps commandant de l'escadre dite de la Chambre de Commerce, esprit peu facile a gouverner , mais des plus honorables, couvert de blessures, et dsireux de lguer sa fortune aux pauvres orphelins42. Plus de 400 capitaines de corsaires malouins peuvent tre aussi dnombrs, mais ils ne sont pas toujours de bonne souche bretonne ou irlandaise. De Saus et de son confrre Nicolaes Baeteman, originaire de Zelande mais lev de jeunesse a Dunkerque, l'intendant Duguay relve deux traits: ils n'ayment pas la rade... ils ne sont pas pillards 43 . La premire de ces deux vertus apparali beaucoup plus rare que la seconde dans l'ensemble des capitaines, qu'ils appartiennent a la marine de guerre ou qu'ils soient corsaires. Tout au long des deux guerres, le pillage, ce grand flau de la course, ne cesse de susciter la colere des armateurs, des ministres et des intendants de la marine. Une chicane qui augmente tous les jours, ainsi le qualifie le reglement du 31 aot 1710, qui instaure, contre ce flau, susceptible aussi bien de semer des jalousies a bord que de nuire aux interets des armateurs, des fermiers, de 1'Amiral de France et du roi, un certain nombre de procdures nouvelles : interrogations plus rigoureuses devant les amirauts, traductions devant le conseil des prises, mais a vrai dire, grave lacune, sans que soient prvues des peines afflictives 44 . Si Ton en croit Henri d'Aguesseau, membre, prcisment, du conseil des prises au cours de cette periode, les corsaires pillent les prises sans aucune retenue 45 . Ils ne payent pas toujours ce dont ils s'emparent, pour repondr aux ncessits du moment, sur les navires neutres qu'ils ne capturent pas : poudre, cordages, avirons, instruments de navigation, vivres surtout. Les btiments ainsi ranconns en souffrent, videmment, mais le pillage, parfois mentionn dans les rapports, est justifi par d'imprieuses ncessits. Il existe aussi le butin legitime, la robe taille du matelot, ce que Ton appelle en Fiandre le pluntrage, du nerlandais plunje, usage profondment enracin. Tous droits assez gnralement reconnus pour donner lieu a des proces devant l'amiraut lorsque tel ou tel officier demande sa part de pillage, ou mme a un article spcial dans le contrai d'armement, tel celui d'un document nantais qui prvoit que tout le pillage... sera apport au pied du grand mat pour tre partag par gales
42. A.N. Mar. B3133 (28 avril 1706); H. MALO, La Grande guerre des corsairts : Dunkerque J 7021715 (Paris, 1925), pp. 178-203. 43. A.N. Mar. B3 133, fol. 36V. 44. Lebeau, I, 350-353. 45. A.N. Mar. F2 37, f. 380.
184
46
portions . Cette conception de la masse, si chre aux flibustiers, se retrouve dans un mmoire anonyme et non dat, relatif aux fruits du pillage, qui avantage dans une certaine mesure ceux qui ont particip a l'abordage, mais qui n'en met pas moins l'accent sur le caractre commun de la victoire ; le butin doit tre partag par l'crivain sur le pont suprieur, et Ton ne doit done pas attaquer a la hache, individuellement, les coffres, les armoires et les ballots 47 . Commentaire vocateur des codes maritimes qui, depuis 1543, ont dfendu qu'on rompe coffres, bailes, bougettes, malles, tonneaux et autres vaisseaulx. Le reglement de 1693 stipule que l'crivain prendra l'ordre du capitaine pour aller a bord se saisir des clefs, mettre le sceau sur les coutilles, chambres, coffres, armoires, ballots, tonneaux et autres choses fermant a clef ou emballes, sans en excepter le coffre du capitaine pris.... Or, l'usage donnait au capitaine preneur au moins le precipui de ce qui pourrait se trouver dans la chambre du capitaine du navire captur ; mais le reglement le limite dsormais a 500 cus 48 . De mme, l'quipage preneur aurait droit aux hardes et aux coffres de l'quipage du navire captur. En vertu du code du pluntrage, le Chirurgien du navire preneur recevait le coffre de son confrre du navire pris ; le pilote, la ligne de sonde ; l'aumnier, la cloche ; et mme les mousses, les girouettes? En outre, au moins dans le Ponant, les officiers armes en course a Dunkerque, le capitaine recevaient les menes armes, comme fusils, pistolets et sabres. A Saint-Malo, a Brest, galement les poudres trouves sur les navires captures 49 . Toutefois, ce qui apparat surprenant, a lire les textes, c'est l'absence de tout effort srieux, de la part du lgislateur, pour limiter le pluntrage ou plunje du matelot. En 1744, l'Amiraut de Dunkerque fait appel aux anciens capitaines de ce port qui ont fait la course... pendant les precedentes guerres, aux fins de savoir ce qui s'observoit alors a l'gard du pluntrage. Car les corsaires de 1744 pretendent tendre ce droit au dla de toutes les bornes . On se trouve alors tres loin de l'dit de 1543, qui noncait fort nettement, dans son article 30: Nulle chose pourra estre dicte pilliage qui excede la valleur de dix escus 50 . Mesurer l'ampleur du pillage sera toujours impossible. Les rapports de mer se montrent, a ce sujet, d'une grande discretion. Il est possible de tirer des renseignements, mais forcment sporadiques, des jugements de prises et des correspondances ministerielles. Peut-tre trouverait-on quelques dtails supplmentaires dans les archives judiciaires, surtout dans celles des Parlements. Bien entendu, ce qui est important, ce n'est pas seulement le pillage en soi, mais aussi la manire dont ses auteurs en dis46'. R. OTTENHOF, ubi di. supra, p. 102. 47. A.N., Ms. Rosambo 260 AP 52, pice 4. 48. J . M . PARDESSUS, Collection de Lois Maritimes anlrieures au XVIII' stde (6 t., Paris, 1828-1845), IV. 304 : l'article 37 de l'Edit sur PAmiraut de 1584 reproduit l'ari. 24 de l'dit de 1543. Lebeau, I, 185. 49. Brest, Arch. Mar. I E 481, p. 546; 485, p. 100; 493, p. 104. 50. Dunkerque, Arch. Mun. 202, pice 9.
Les Equipages des Corsaires sous Louis XIV
\ 85
posaient. Selon l'Amiral ou plus exactement selon son secretaire Valincourt, bien renseigne en matire de prises c'tait prs des ports que se droulait la majeure partie du pillage51. Etait-il possible, par ailleurs, de faire de la contrebande sans la connivence du capitaine ? on porte parfois certaines accusations centre les officiers des amirauts, dont la promptitude et la vigilance devraient constituer l'essentiel du controle. L'amiraut du Havre, dit-on, pour attirer pratique dans Ie port, se montre tres coulante en cette matire52. Mais il est certain que les officiers ne peuvent se transporter a bord d'une prise, pour en faite l'inventaire, qu'aprs un certain laps de temps. Us doivent d'abord entendre le rapport du capitaine, lequel ne le redige pas immdiatement aprs son arrive. En fait, si chacun porte a terre ce qu'il a pu piller, c'est lui qui en est responsable53. Il arrive, il est vrai, que des officiers ayant fait des prises ou les ayant conduites au port, recoivent des gratifications pour n'avoir eu aucun pillage. Du Bacage, capitaine de la Dauphine, qui a Le Havre pour port d'attach, tmoigne d'une si grande honntet, a propos de certaine quantit de poudre d'or qu'il a prise, qu'il mrite, aux yeux de l'intendant Robert, un brevet du roi... 5 *. Mais les cas de dsintressement exemplaire sont rares. Souvent les officiers des navires sont eux-mmes des pillards. Un ordre de l'Amiral du 20 avril 1697 le donne a penser : il tablit un crivain sur tous les vaisseaux qui vont en course , charg de faire prcisment les fonctions saisies des papiers de prise, fermeture des coutilles, etc. qui avaient t attribues, par l'ordonnance de 1681 (III, IX, 16) au capitaine ayant fait la prise 55 . Mais le point important ici reside dans Ie fait que le pillage en mer apparat, dans une large mesure, toler. Les Mmoires de Forbin et de Duguay-Trouin, pour s'en teir a eux, en conviennent, et il y aurait beaucoup a dire sur Jean Bart 56 . Faiblesse ou politique ? Il va de soi que le capitaine ne peut se porter garant de tout ce qui peut se passer au cours d'un abordage. Ainsi, les passagers et les passagres, s'il s'en trouve a bord, ne peuvent qu'tre dpouills. D'autre part, avant l'attaque, il fallait bien animer l'quipage, ne serait-ce que pour le distraire de eet enni qui fait germer l'esprit de sedition, ainsi qu'en tmoigne ce passage de Duguay-Trouin :
J'avais crois plus de deux mois, et n'avais plus que pour quinze jours de vivres. J'tais d'ailleurs embarrass de prisonniers et de soixante malades. Mes officiers et tout l'quipage, voyant que je ne parlis pas de relcher, me reprsentrent qu'il tait temps d'y penser... Quand je me vis presse, j'assemblai tout mon equipage,et
51. A.N. Mar, B3 163, fol. 220.
52. Ibid., 168, fol. 23. 53. Ibid., 90, fol. 306-313.
54. Ibid., 142, fol. 484v-485 ; Brest, Arch. Mar. I E 481, pp. 409, 526.
55. Lebeau, I, 238-243.

56. B.N., Ms. fr. 22801, fol. 225.
186

apres l'avoir bien harangue, je les engageai, moiti par douceur, moiti par autorit, a m'accorder encore huit jours de croisire, les assurant que nous ferions fortune et que je leur accorderais le pillage.
En l'occurence, le pillage fut trs grand 57 . La mme anne 1693, dans le mmoire dj cit, Pettier de la Hestroye voit clair lorsqu'il explique la chasse aux grandes avances pratique par les matelots par le peu de part qu'ils esprent ensuite dans les prises58. Mme pay ponctuellement et non pas en billets de monnaie, le tiers des matelots s'avere modique, car la moiti en revient a 1'etatmajor, sauf cas exceptionnel, done alatoire. Selon De Gastines, la Marie Pontchartrain de Saint-Malo aurait du faire 100 000 ecus de prises pour qu'un contremaltre ait a gagner plus que ses 60 ecus d'avances. Mesure a cette chelle, la repartition d'une prise relativement belle, liquide a 583 970 livres tournois net, n'offre aux 150 officiers mariniers et matelots du Chasseur que 97 328 livres tournois, a partager entre eux d'aprs leurs qualits, mrite et service 59 . En revanche, il tait permis d'esprer quelque chose a vendr chez soi grace au pillage, ne serait-ce qu'une corde de rechange, un rouleau de tabac, quelques petites bagatelles de mercerie. Ecoutons le comte de Forbin, qui a compris mieux que personne la place occupe par Tappai du butin dans l'art de commander en mer : Vous tueriez le matelot et le soldat que vous ne l'empcheriez pas d'emporter quelque chose ; je dois vous repondr, Monseigneur, que ce n'est pas l le plus grand mal, car comme le matelot et soldat est oblige de cacher ce qu'il peut prendre, si ce n'est or, argent, ou diamant, tout le reste est peu de chose 60 . Ce peu de chose , bien entendu, apparati tout relatif. Selon d'autres, y compris le controleur Vergier, bon connaisseur de la mentalit dunkerquoise, l'esprit du pillage reste le grand motif de ceux qui s'embarquent sur un corsaire. Sans libertinage, pas de course.
57. 58. 59. 60.
Vif de Monsieur Du Guay-Trouin tenie de sa main (ed. Bossard, Paris, 1922), pp. 59-60. A.N. Mar. B414, fol. 350. Ibid., B375, fol. 242; B.N., Ms. fr. nouv. acq. 10570, pp. 152-155. A.N. Mar B*32, fol. 94.
10
THE LOAN OF FRENCH NAVAL VESSELS TO PRIVATEERING ENTERPRISES, 1688-1713

The mutual interdependence of fighting and trading navies, so characteristic of the middle ages, was bound to be relaxed, except for the purposes of naval manning and the transport of armies, as the warship developed her own special gunnery, tactics and construction. The advent of the line-of-battle solemnized a parting of ancient ways so far as materiel was concerned, although it did not altogether put an end to the conscription of merchant shipping even for warlike purposes ; in 1795, for instance, the British navy requisitioned fourteen East Indiamen. We are less well informed about the chartering of naval vessels to private or semi-public enterprise. In general, the higher ratio of crew to tonnage of the developing seventeenth-century warship tended to rule it out of commercial freights, but it might still have its uses in dangerous waters, especially for the carriage of lowbulk, high-value cargoes, to say nothing of the carriage of specie. The Royal Navy lent four ships to the East India Company in 1662, five to the Royal African Company between 167* and 168* (though essentially for policing interlopers), as well as to the Guinea Company in 1663 (1). The overseas trading companies of France were of course even more dependent on the State, perhaps the most striking example of naval participation in trading ventures being the sporadic fleets of the Compagnie des Indes Orientales during the war of 1688-97 : they sailed under naval commanders and half the ships were the King's (2). One of their stated objects was to take prizes. In that respect the affairs of the Compagnie des Indes Orientales fit neatly into the naval policy of these years, 'la Course se faisant pour le bien de l'Estat'. This sort of phrase amounted to a clich in the correspondence of the time. Vauban's celebrated advocacy of the guerre de course was preaching to the converted ; it was all a question of more or less emphasis on squadronai warfare, of naval squadrons giving countenance to a host of privateers, in place of a high-seas battlefleet. Like William III, in his rough handling of the Scandinavians, Louis XIV's ministers possessed a thoroughly mature understanding of the possibilities of economic warfare. It was, after all, only an extension of Colbertism, if not Colbertism itself. No sooner had war been declared on the Dutch than Seignelay himself led 'la cour et la ville' in subscribing to the private armament of royal frigates at Dunkirk, with some collaboration from Louvois and Colbert de Croissy, and (what is less well known) of three more powerful vessels at Toulon, to act as a squadron (3). His investments were profitable and his zeal for 'la course' continued unabated till his death. The full
188
extent of his commitment, together with that of his dependants, may never be known, but there were others at Brest and in 1690 two more armaments at Toulon 'pour le ministre', significantly confided to two naval officers, Gineste and Grenonville, who remained throughout these wars prominent capitaines armateurs, successful corsairs who knew how to rally other investors (4). Even more striking as testimony to the State's early response to private warmaking, and of its willingness to lend its ships for that purpose, were the Ordinances of 8 and 20 November 1688, by which the King first abandoned his claim to one-third of the prizes taken by such armaments (as practised earlier and most recently reasserted by a Reglement of 5 October 1674) and then relieved the private investor of making good the cost of repairs, replacement of stores, cleaning and re-rigging his ships on their return to the dockyard ; the King, moreover, 'desirant exciter ses sujets a entreprendre l'armement d'un grand nombre de ceux de ces vaisseaux qu'elle veut bien donner pour courre sus sur les ennemis de son Etat', would bear the risk of total loss and meet the port pay of his officers serving therein (5). This generosity, intended for the duration of the war, did not long survive the death of Seignelay. One of the first acts of his successor was to forbid the loan of ships mounting over W guns (obviously to conserve the line-of-battle, although most of the 4th rates fell below this establishment) and to require the replacement of 'consommations' - a broad term embracing 'agrs et apparaux ordinaires, armes, canons, poudres, munitions et ustensiles ncessaires' - as well as to restore the ships "radoubs et en tat de naviguer' (6). His Majesty would still carry the risk of loss and see to the 'appointemens ordinaires du port1 of the officiers ntretenos and gardes-marines, but otherwise the concessions of 20 November 1688 were revoked. So, on 6 October 1694, was the renunciation of 8 November 1688 : henceforward the King was to enjoy a fifth of the net produce of any prizes - that is, after deduction of the admiralty tenth, legal expenses, warehousing and so on (7). This was not the same, of course, as a fifth of the net profit to the armateurs or undertakers, but it was nevertheless more generous than the traditional third and, further, was introduced as an equitable compensation for relieving the armateurs of their obligation to restore a vessel in as good condition as when they borrowed it ; from now onwards the King would assume the costs of restoration and replacements, besides paying the officers as before. The preamble to this Ordonnance, which was evidently intended to reconcile the interests of the public and private sectors, is most suggestive : it refers to the 'difficult et contestation' to which replacements had given rise and which, 'pour le plus souvent', the armateurs had evaded 'sous diffrents pretextes', although they had been required in 1691 to sign an inventory of all a ship's furniture. One source of dispute could well have been that this Reglement of 5 December permitted payment in lieu of replacement, that it was then for the port authorities to estimate what was due, and that both the amount and medium of payment could be matter of argument (8) ; in later years the reckoning of the royal cinquime, and especially of debts charged against it, could prove troublesome. More puzzling is the alleged ability of contractors to elude all or part of this particular obligation. It is true, however, that many of their armaments enjoyed Court backing.
The Loan of French Naval Vessels
189
This tended, in my view, to diminish as the long years of war dragged on, most certainly in the Spanish Succession war. The enthusiasm of courtiers for privateering ventures, as distinct from the pressurising of the great by ministers to subscribe to a few major enterprises, never again reached the pitch it attained in Seignelay's lifetime. The elder Pontchartrain, according to Chamillart in 1694, was unwilling to hand over the King's ships to private adventurers, and a few months later the chevalier de Cotlogon was telling him that he and the Amirai de France would need to follow Seignelay's example if the disillusionment of naval officers at Toulon was to be overcome. It is certainly remarkable that so many of the 'prets <fe vaisseaux' in these early years occurred at Toulon, where the intendant Girardin de Vauvr, had outstandingly close connections with the Court and was always himself an active promoter of armements en course, as was Marshall d*Estrees : omitting contracts for war against the Algerines, which gave a certain continuity to these loans at Toulon, no less than 19 vessels, ranging from 3rd rates like the Ferme and Prudent to a mere felucca, were hired out between 1688 and 1694, some of them several times (9). None of the other dockyards could compare with this rate of lending before 1695. At Rochefort the practice scarcely got under way until 1695, but one of the first loans there was that of the Francois, 40 guns to the Trouin brothers. It is significant that from 1690 Trouin de la Barbinais had an agent in Paris, Gabriel Henry la Vasseur, matre des comptes, 'pour obtenir du Roi des vaisseaux pour la Course', and that in 1692, when he armed the Favorite, 'fregate du roi', 28, he was acting for the marquis de Cavoye (10). So far as Court influences, difficult to trace, played a part in this kind of enterprise, it would have been chiefly in bringing pressure to bear on the naval bureaux to obtain the grant of a particular ship for a particular commander. It was Vauban's belief that certain armaments were favoured by Court interest. The due de Gramont, who prided himself on being the 'director' of the Basque 'corsariat', complained in 1693 that the minister was according vessels 'a tous les courtisans qui vous en demandent', such as the marquis de Cavoye, grand marchal des logis and an ally of Seignelay's, who knew nothing of the sea and yet 's'estoient eriges en corsaires'. He further mentioned the comte de Gramont, to whose 'gens' the intendant of Dunkirk also referred, though it is not clear whether they were his agents or he theirs. In 1706-8 the due rfAumont, premier gentilhomme de la chambre but also governor of Boulogne, was co-armateur of the Tigre, 32, with the eminent Dunkirk merchant, Jean Spycket. There was plenty of competition even in the worst years of the Succession war, when the navy had come to depend more on private undertakers than in 1688-97. Already having to console the indispensable Cornil Saus for offering his favourite frigate to another party in 1709, the intendant of Dunkirk suddenly exclaims against an intervention from the highest quarters : 'Mais voil Mr. De1 Bonnivet pour qui Monsieur Daguesseau vous demande la Prothe et la Victoire... . The Malouins, we know, vaunted their 'relations en cour', no doubt in return for favours sought. Danycan de Lespine in 1693 had a commander foisted on him for one of his own privateers : Thomas Avice, sieur de Vaujoyeux and mousquetaire du roi, without sea experience, who cultivated 'les relations les plus fines avec toutes les puissances' and obtained a captain's brevet from 'ses amis des bureaux' (11). A certain tenderness for persons breathes in a begging letter from Claude de Beauquaire at Toulon, later a chef rfescadre, in 1709 : '3e compte Monseigneur que vous m'accorderez cette grace, puisque vous m'avez donne ce btiment pour me mettre en estat de pouvoir continuer un certain train de vie que fay accoutum de mesner' (12).
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Nevertheless, allowing that certain officers were better courtiers than others and that some of them negotiated in person at Marine headquarters, it would be a gross error to stress the political factor in the allocation of ships. What counted for most was an officer's record for 'bonnes actions' ; in 1702 subalterns were forbidden to seek promotion by bribery (13). Experience of the course itself was a strong recommendation ; after all, the ship sailed at the King's risk. With that, furthermore, went the ability to attract private finance. As Vauvr wrote in 1697, 'II me. paroist, Monseigneur, qu'en donnant le commandement de l'Entreprenant a Mr. de Champigny, vous ne e destinez plus pour 1'armement de course, et effectivement il a est malheureux, et cela n'attireroit pas la confiance pour de nouveaux fonds. Si vous le remplaciez par Mr. des Augiers il est acredit... Vous scavez, Monseigneur, que pour russir a la course, il faut des capitaines qui l'ayent faite1. Vauvr added a warning that not all suitable officers were attracted to privateering : 'II et est bon pour les y exciter de donner la pension de St Louis a Mr. du Quesne Mosnier'. They had the impression, like Grenonville, that the King did not recognize such service, however distinguished, with the same eye as his own direct service (1*). What drove Grenonville into it was to be the motive of many others later : lack of naval employment, if not downright destitution. 'Ce serait une occasion pour faire susbsister nos officiers qui ne trouvent plus cTauberge', wrote the intendant Duguay from Dunkirk in 1710, when landlords were chasing bad debtors out of their inns. But the effect began to be felt with the reduction of the naval budget in 169*f. In 3uly, over two months before the introduction of the cinquime - which itself may reflect the new situation - the intendant of Brest notes as a fresh fact that 'quantit de gens me proposent cParmer en course'; and the pace quickened next year, so much so that the years 1694-7 have been designated by one historian as 'The Crisis of the Main Fleet and the Shift to the Guerre de Course'. At this time the main proposals came from senior officers, but in the following war it was their humbler colleagues who were to predominate j fireship captains, artillery officers, enseignes de vaisseaux, officers of the Garde de la Marine. For a young officer, such a command came to be one of the few available openings 'pour s'instruire dans son mtier et pour tcher de se faire valoir par de bonnes actions' (15). The owners of wholly private armaments did not look kindly on naval officers, moreover, so their best hope was to try to form a socit for arming a royal vessel, were it only a corvette or even a canot. These arguments, which occur frequently in the port correspondence, especially after 1707, extended to the whole tat major of a ship on lease, and the minister did his best to fulfil them : 'Sa Majest a estim plus juste que des officiers fussent employez par preference sur ses vaisseaux et ne restent point intiles dans les ports pendant que des passagers qui ne le sont point les monteroient. Us n'ont point rfautre occasion de servir et ceux qui ne sont point du corps de la marine pourroient proffiter de toutes celles qui se prsentent'. An extreme case was furnished in 1708 at Toulon by the chartering of the Galathe frigate to the chevalier de Beaujeu, who manned her entirely with youthful gardes de la marine to counteract the demoralizing effects of inactivity and poverty. On this occasion the minister was able to override the promoters' wish that the command be given to a sieur rfHugouis, who had raised the money - 'il a beaucoup rfamis et rfintrigues dans ce pays' - and to whose supersession the subsequent loss of the Galathe was attributed (16).
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The King never altogether surrendered his right to nominate the officers of the ships he lent - a prerogative indeed protected by the fact that even at the worst times he continued to pay the 'appointements de terre' of the officiers entretenus and gardes so employed, leaving the contractor to meet the difference between port and sea pay as well as the cost of their table ; in other words, the King was lending his officers. One officer he always chose and paid in full because of his special character as an agent theoretically independent of the captain : for it was the duty of the ecrivain 'de rendre compie de tout ce qui se passera' during the navigation, including the consumption of stores supplied by the royal dockyards, the distribution of victuals (strictly according to naval scales), and the safeguard from pillage both of the cinquime and (from 1703) of the 'liard par livre' on prize sales for the relief of wounded privateersmen. But otherwise it is rare to find a traite in which the King explicitly reserves the power to select the officers ; he preferred evidence of capacity in the commanders with whom he contracted and then to leave the choice to them, although in the case of a squadron, like that of Jacques Cochart of Le Havre in 1709, he might insist on naming the other captains. In 3uly 1695 the armateurs of two 50-gun frigates at Brest awaited Monseigneur's list in order to pass the contract in the captain's name - ultimately that of Jacques Dandennes - but the 'Articles and Conditions' accorded to Dandennes two months later, before he sailed, provided for his choice of the other officers. A slightly earlier contract with the marquis de Nesmond, Lieutenant General of the Fleet and the most exalted naval personage ever to command en course in this period, neatly embodies the compromise which came to be standard practice : 'Le Commandement de ces frgates sera donne par ledit Sr. de Nesmond a des officiers de Sa Majest entretenus, et approuvs par Elle' (17). Another passage makes it clear that 'Commandement1 here means the entire tat major ; it may even include a nucleus of warrant officiers as well, the officiers mariniers entretenus, whose port pay was sometimes underwritten by the King in later contracts (18). (Any experienced corsair understood the critical importance of the master and his mates, of pilots, prizemasters, and the bossemans in charge of anchors and grapplings). It was mere common sense for the King to leave the commanders he chose freedom to appoint their own subalterns, provided face were saved by some such formula as 'sous Ie bon plaisir de la cour' - in practice, the approval of the intendant. Nevertheless some contractors, as time went on, found it desirable to assert this freedom positively ; and when they did so, it could encroach on the other guarantee laid down in Nesmond*s traite - namely, that his officers should all be members of the naval establishment. Normally such a choice would be expected of the commandants en course, mostly naval men themselves with friends and dependants in the Grand Corps. But this is to overlook two countervailing facts. First, a few of them, by definition oustanding practitioners of the corsair's art, were admitted to the Corps from private practice and naturally adhered to some of their old companions. Secondly, it was not always easy for the professional officer to avoid 'les chicanes du commerce' - to borrow a term frequently on the lips of naval intendants - if he were to raise capital for his enterprise by forming a socit rfarmement. The induction of a private corsair to 'le sacre Colege de la Marinne' (19) was much more than a tribute to his achievements ; if that had been all, a medal or sword of honour, a gratification or pension would have sufficed. The bestowal of
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naval rank, however,, was a sheer necessity if such a figure was to command the obedience of regular officers and therefore to be encouraged to employ them, or indeed to command the navy's own soldiers. The 'armement Riojaneiro' of 1711 furnishes an excellent illustration : for this Duguay Trouin obtained not only a brevet for six corsair captains, but the temporary promotion of three naval officers to the grade of capitaine de vaisseau 'pour imposer aux officiers et aux troupes' : an unheard-of concession indeed, but one which might make all the difference to his success (20). Equally, since the corsair captain was usually a strong individualist not reared from boyhood in the naval hierarchy, he would not take easily to the regular duties and discipline of the arme navale : this was said of one of the best of them, Cornil Saus's 'bras droit', Nicolaes Baeteman, for whom the intendant Duguay of Dunkirk could propose only an honorary brevet, for use on special occasions. Saus himself, 'de familie matelotte' and schooled by 3ean Bart, commanded the so-called Chamber of Commerce Squadron, originally founded by the Chamber, from 170^ till the end of the war, after privateering since 1689 : one of the truly great corsair captains, but one 'qui a ses creatures et ses fantaisies dans lesquelles il se renferme sans vouloir entendre de raison', hypersensitive and in poor health by the time he obtained his brevet in 1706 : a unique case where the motive of advancement was probably to overcome his desire to retire from the sea. Apart from Jooris van Grombrugghe (capitaine de brOlot 1692), the other 'officiers bleus' promoted from the corsariat were all Bretons : Duguay Trouin, La Moinerie Miniac, Cassard, and Beaubriand Levesque, who had moved from Granville to St Malo. It is significant that none came from the Midi, where the most successful corsairs, with a few exceptions, were professional naval officers ; they possessed, after all, whether or not they had served in Malta, a continuing tradition of privateering against Barbary. But was their exclusiveness more marked than elsewhere, too ? Cassard, an outsider at Toulon, once refused to accept a garde-marine who had told him to his face that it was not for persons like him, 'sans caractere', to command gentlemen. At Dunkirk in 1711, it needed a royal letter to make Francois Bart, capitaine de fregate, serve under Saus - and the latter's promotion to be capitaine de vaisseau ; but this difficulty was no more than the familiar one of professional rank (21). The first hint that an officer might wish to acknowledge the interest of his civilian sponsors in the structure of his command comes from Etienne-Nicolas de Grandpr, later a prominent capitaine-armateur at Toulon but in 1693 a fireship captain at Brest, when he asked for Beauvais Lefer, 'jeune homme des meilleures families de St Malo', as captain of one of two royal vessels, on the ground not only of proven skill as a corsair but also : 'c'est que luy et ses parens fourniront une somme considerable pour l'armement... 3e ne laisse pas d'etre regarde toujours comme tranger et serois bien aise d"avoir un de leurs parents qui soit tmoin de tout ce qui se feroit, en cas qu'on fit des prises considerables'. (There is here a hint, too, that the presence of the sieur de Beauvais might head off one of those numerous lawsuits between co-armateurs for which the Articles and Conditions later provide royal arbitration). Years later, in 1708, when he in turn proposed to arm two royal vessels, he insisted that the captain and officers be named by his intresses ; so too did another Malouin magnate, Chapdelaine, when contracting for the Superbe, 56, at Lorient. The Marseillais, who increasingly figured in the armaments of Toulon, distrusted the navy more than the Malouins, who did so much for Brest ; they disliked paying for convoys because the commanders were
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too prodigal with their money. In 1710 Grandpr explicitly protected his choice of officers in his agreement with them. Cassard, himself a substantial investor, took the same precaution (22). They were prudent. A few months afterwards, J.-B. de Benoist, presented with the minister's order to choose at least three of his officers himself, had to confess that this threatened a rupture with his backers at Marseilles, 'attendu que ses armateurs lui avaient donne un certain nombre cPofficiers capables et experimentes a condition que l'on ne mettrait point d"autres officiers au dessus rfeux et qui sont intresses a l'armement'. With their usually meagre resources, it was now rare for officers to contribute to the cost of an armament unless they were promised employment by it ; thus members of the Petit Corps made it a condition of their subscriptions to two galleys in 1710, leaving the authorities no choice since they were the only investors (23). Some commanders of course enjoyed a greater ascendancy over their principals than others. Thus Saus compared well with Francois Bart, although it was said that he found it easier to deal with them once the contract of lease had been signed by Pontchartrain (instead of the intendant merely). But even Saus was unable to overcome the objection of his armateurs to the employment of naval officers when his group was in competition for the Graf ton, 66, and Auguste, 56, in 1712 : these were accorded to Bart, himself a naval officer, on condition that he select only 'officiers de marine' (24). Their distress had become more acute when the navy ceased to finance the Dunkirk Squadron after 1709 ; only in 1704 had this been hired out and the experience proved disastrous (25). Forbin proposed that it be united with Saus's ships and both placed under naval command. Pontchartrain agreed, but Saus's armateurs promptly withdrew, and so did those of the chevalier de Goudrin when the minister vetoed his command of three of Forbin's vessels, fearing the renewed appointment of Forbin or Tourouvre as soon as they had committed their money. As Duguay had warned the minister in 1707, hoping for agreement about captains between his controleur and the armateurs of two 8-gun royal corvettes, 'chaqu socit a le sien en ce pays cy auquel elle renonce difficilement, et Ton n'y confie pas volontiers son bien aux officiers du Roy'. This followed minister's rejection of Duguay*s first list of commanders for the corvettes (and two 20-gun frigates) on the ground that they were not well enough known : corsair captains 'dont la capacit sera reconnue' would be preferable - a rare admission that the success of a cruise and the security of His Majesty's property preceded any other consideration. The intendant himself felt that 'nos messieurs ne sont pas propres a faire une longue course dans ces sortes de btimens non plus que dans les chaloupes, il y faut des matelots accoutums au froid, au chaud, a la pluie, a coucher sur la Dure, et a vivre de Biscuit, et cTeau de vie'. And he well knew the obstinacy of the Flemings, 'gens rfhabitude' whose instinct was to distrust anything offered to them and who disliked being associated with 'plus grands seigneurs qu'eux' (26). Nearly all the armateurs were Flemish, individualists quick to take umbrage and much given to petitioning. They did not as a rule care to sign on even French sailors. Few French captains succeeded in mobilising their funds. In two such cases, both of 1705, where we know the terms of the loan, each stipulates free choice of subalterns ; that of the chevalier de Beaujeu specifies that they and their commanders shall be 'entretenus ou non entretenus'. It is hard to believe that the navy ever did better than that with its loans to the Flemings, who had to be 'caressed* (27).
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The Dunkirk shipping interest showed a strong preference for Flemish seamen, who disliked service under French naval officers. They were still free from naval conscription, although it was several times proposed to include them in these years. It was used to bring men from Picardy and Normandy for the Dunkirk squadron, including Saint-Pol's privately financed armament of 1704, which however was organised from Paris and left severely alone by the native Dunkirk interest (except the bankrupt intriguer Jacques Plets). Otherwise the Classes Maritimes were drawn upon only by Beau jeu in 1705, with two 4th rates and two frigates to man, and in 1711, when Saus was allocated a much stronger squadron than previously: six vessels headed by the Grafton, 68, requiring nearly 3000 men (28). It is true that in 1696 Vauban reported privately to Valincour, secretary to the Admiral of France, that Plets and Micolas Taverne wanted tohirefromthenavy so that they might use the class system as a cheap method of manning, but nothing came of this ; Taverne, the most successful armateur en course of the whole period in all of France, never in fact chartered a royal ship. Vauban's hint reflects the very high cost of privateering recruitment by that date : at Dunkirk the average seaman's cash advance before sailing had mounted from 21/22 ecus in 1690 to 40/50 in 1696, and the rise was even more pronounced at Saint-Malo (29). The levy of crews by the commissaires des classes circumvented this obstacle, everywhere and loudly resented by the owners of privateers, in two ways. First, although private resources had still to find cash to pay advances (and conduct money to the ports), these were now based on the navy's own pay-rates ; even augmented by a fourth or fifth, as the traites usually stipulated, this was a very considerable saving on the cost of manning 'de gr a gr', a process of individual bargaining in which the King refused to interfere. The second and less obvious advantage of embarkation 'par autorite" was that the crews could be assembled with some regard to prospective sailing-dates, thus sparing employers the expense of subsisting men (and the risk of losing them by desertion, debauchery and sickness) over the several months otherwise needed to complete a complement. It is true that the intendant Robert, who thought that the correct time for the arrival of the levees at Brest was the careening of their destined ships, had cause to complain of a relative lack of zeal for semi-private armaments on the part of the commissaries : those of Duguay Trouin, a notable beneficiary of the King's protection, could no longer be maintained 'si on n'en fait pas les leves avec la mme exactitude que pour Ie propre service du roy'. As Duguay himself was convinced, it was impossible to man two 'vaisseaux de force', let along a squadron, without the use of the royal authority : it was in 1703, needing over 900 men for his two 2nd rates of 66 guns (reduced to 58) that he had first recruited 'par ordre du ro' (30). By 1708 the levee was accorded to Jacques Cochart and Jacques Graton, both at Le Havre, with the loan of a single light frigate in each case ; and pari passu to Chapdelaine de l'Aumosne, who was building the Superbe, 56, at Lorient. Such generosity was of necessity less forthcoming during the previous war. D'Estres had asked for its partial use in manning a squadron of four ships in 1693 : 240 seamen to be paid at naval rates 'a la reserve de ceux qui seront choisys par les Capitaines et armateurs qui feront leurs conditions comme Is estimeront a propos' (31). It is doubtful if the resulting pay differentials would have made for a happy company had his scheme - an enterprise on Buenos Aires been accepted. In any case, with a high-seas fleet still in being and the class system itself then in the throes of reform, even this modest demand was impracticable. The first levies for chartered ships were granted in 1695.
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At first the charter parties provided for pay at naval rates 12 to 15 livres monthly for an ordinary seaman, an economy which the private adventurers would have been glad to retain. It was successfully negotiated by Le Moyne d'Ibernile for his Caribbean expedition of 1705, and conceded to the Trouin brothers as late as 1708-9, when their funds came under severe strain. But from 1703 they had had to pay 'le quart "augmentation' (32). The Ordinance of 1 3uly 1709, which abolished the royal share in prizes, expressly promised the continuation of the levies (as if the two had previously been linked in the mind of authority) on condition that the seamen's pay in such cases should be one-fifth above naval rates - 5 per cent less. In addition, crews were entitled to the standard naval tenth of any prize money - a fifth, from 1695, if they were sailing to the East Indies - 'par precipui' and of course payable in cash. But this, besides being contingent on prizes, was subject to long delays that often vexed the minister. If some very large booty was anticipated, moreover, the entitlement was reduced to a thirtieth of any excess money over and above a million livres : the arrangement made both by the baron de Pointis in 1696 for Cartagena and by Duguay Trouin for Rio de Janeiro, but first negotiated in April 1696 by Colbert de Saint-Mar at Rochefort for an unsuccessful expedition whose destiny is unknown (33). On the other hand, some of the crews of Saint-Pol's squadron in 1704, when it was privately financed, were apparently engaged 'a la part', which was the custom there, although it does not appear in such other Dunkirk contracts as we have nor in the proposals of Saint-Pol's undertakers. This implied a third of the prize money but no wages. Cash advances on this basis soared well above the advance of two or three months' naval wages and were a stronger attraction for mariners than a small and highly speculative stake in prize money. The Saint-Pol case was clearly an exceptional one and can only have referred to a minority of his crews, which were largely provided by the commissaires des classes. Because advances 'a la part1 bore no relation to any establishment or table, but were the product of individual bargains, they were not compatible with conscription, as Duguay Trouin once pointed out (34). In 1704 Vice Admiral Chteaurenault was inclined to impute 'a fury of desertions' from the squadrons of Duguay and Saint-Pol (then at Brest) to the differential between advances 'a la part', which were also the usual practice at St Malo, and naval rates. It was agreed that wholly private corsairs offered more advantages. Robert feared that the desertion rate from the King's chartered ships would discourage private capital from arming them at all, unless naval penalties were applied. Under a Reglement of 1693 desertion from privateers could be quite severely punished, but it assumed voluntary enlistment and the vice-admiralty courts (Amirauts) were unwilling to apply the penalties to deserters 'embarques par autorit'. By 1707 Duguay's need to subject his crews to naval discipline was still more evident and Robert proposed an order making desertion a crime triable before a Conseil de Guerre. On his winter visit to Versailles Duguay obtained this, but it was a special concession to his distinguished services, facilitated no doubt by the fact that all his commanders were naval officers ; no others would have been trusted with a court-martial (35). Others asked for it - Beauvais Lefer in 1706 for La Moinerie Miniac - but so far as is known the only other commanders of hired ships to receive this grace were Marquze de Rocquemadore, for three ships to the East Indies in 1711, and Cassard, for his West Indian forays in 1712 (36).
l96
Besides their military value, marines had their uses in preserving discipline among seamen. Most corsairs carried soldiers, some of the hired squadrons a great many ; for the attack on Rio de Janeiro Duguay mustered two thousand, so many that the seamen were reduced below complement. The King agreed to lend his troupes de la marine to the commanders of his chartered ships - always provided they were naval officers - on condition that, like the sailors, they were fed at the undertakers' expense, but not necessarily paid by them as the sailors invariably were. For major armaments involving operations ashore - Pointis (1697), Duguay (1711), Cassard (1712) - they received standard sea pay ('solde ordinaire') from the King, although Jacques-Francois Duclerc in 1710 was unlucky in this respect as in his final destiny : like Saint-Pol in 1704 and the comte de Blnac in 1711, though theirs were not amphibious expeditions, he had to fund this considerable expense himself. Iberville's Caribbean contract was a compromise : the King was to contribute port pay only - that is, half-pay for the ordinary soldier. In the same year (1705) Beaujeu at Dunkirk came to much the same arrangement ; he would pay the difference (4 1. 10 s.) between the King's land and sea pay, in this case for all sea-officers as well as the soldiers, but in view of the King's outlay on half-pay at sea his share in prizes was to exceed his fifth by the proportion this would bear to the whole cost of armament - in the event, and additional shareholding of 10/11,000 livres (37). This was in striking contrast with the trend recently established by the minister, who stood out whenever he could for an augmentation of the 'taux du Roy' (9 livres a month) whether the King was meeting this basic pay or not. He did so for all Duguay's armaments from 1707, but until 1711 the investors had to pay a supplement equivalent to fifty per cent - more than the increase they paid on naval wages ; in 1703, when they bore the whole sea pay, the increase had been identical, 'un quart en sus'. Robert persuaded Desaugiers to accept the same rate for his St Helena enterprise in 1706, though the chevalier was clever enough to make the soldiers' augmentation depend upon a profit. Other Brest armateurs - Moinerie Miniac in 1707 and 1710, Villers Sainte Croix in 1711 settled for pay and a half, all to be met by them. This may be compared with the 'tiers en sus' for the hundred soldiers requested by Nicolas Parent, bound for West Africa in 1708 : in fact, the norm set by the minister according to the compiler of the 'Principes sur la Marine de M. de Pontchartrain fils', although this is the only contract in which I have found it. In having to pay only at the King's rate, therefore, Duclerc in 1710 and Blnac in 1711 were reaping a concession. But did their soldiers accept it ? When the chevalier de Beauve and his Nantais associates tried to avoid the augmentation in 1710, his soldiers refused to embark and they had to find 'un quart en sus' (38). Despite so many adjustments in favour of hardpressed armateurs, Pontchartrain had no choice but to stand firm on one point, new enough in 1704 for Duguay to dispute it, though vainly : the payment to the captains of the navy's compagnies franches, the marine companies up to 100 strong, of three ecus for every man killed or wounded or deserted (39). This was because the captains, not the state, had to pay for replacements. Soon the clothes and arms of casualties were to be written into the contracts too. By comparison with seamen and soldiers, the lot of many dockyard workers, with wages often long in arrears by 1704, came to be a harsh one. It is not too much to say that the hiring-out of naval ships provided, towards the end of this period, nearly all the employment there was in the dockyards, from some of which there was a sizeable drift of labour after 1712, Brest alone losing 500 families.
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Many workers there had been sacked by January 1707, when there was only a fortnight's work in a month ; their credit with the bakers, themselves unable to pay the peasantry, was already strained by the end of 1704 and there was a strike in the new year, another in September 1706, both apparently under pressure from the mothers of large families who at times laid the intendant under siege, as did the wives of unpaid crews. Distress was all the greater, thought Robert, as the Brest arsenal relied on 'gens ramassez qui n'ont que le fruit de leur travail' (40). Contraction of work in the other dockyards was only a matter of time and degree, the early shortage of cash and credit as dire. In September 1705 Vauvr had to tell the minister that he could not limit cash payments, as requested, to the gardesmarines, the navy's soldiers, day-labourers and seamen on half-pay : 'il y a beaucoup de dpenses imprvues... qui ne peuvent se payer en lettres de change', including the claims of sea and dockyard officers, the hospitals, the families of soldiers and seamen 'dont on connat les pressans besoins'. Three years later wages in the Toulon workshops were over seven months in arrear, and in 1711 Vauvr reported that the town had lost a quarter of its inhabitants : 'Enfin on ne peut guere compter que sur les Vaisseaux qui ont est employs en course et pour le commerce'. In 1710 these reached the enormous number of 26 and 20 respectively, the latter armed usually 'en guerre et marchandises' and so free to cruise for prizes in the intervals that accompanied loading in the Levant ; a list dated September 1705 shows that there were then 15 ships leased for 'la course', at a time when it was still unusual to lease for trade. Duguay at Dunkirk, in December 1706, was equally forthcoming : 'Car enfin nous n'avons d*argent comptant ici que par le moyen du cinquime... nos atteliers n'iroient sans eux' - that is, the 'armateurs au cinquime1 (41). Naval intendants often took the initiative in promoting such armaments, particularly in negotiating funds for the mise-hors. Vauvr had always been a passionate believer in the strategic value of privateering and a considerable investor in it. Yet it would be unduly cynical to suppose he only acted for personal profit. He knew very well the virtue of pump-priming by high naval personel, how far Seignelay"s example had spread through the Grand Corps. Desclouzeaux at Brest made this point in July 1694, when he received many proposals to take out an interest, ostensibly owing to his reputation as an emblem of luck in the armaments he prepared for Seignelay. Pontchartrain forbade his commissaries to do so, at least partly on the ground that it would prejudice the impartial enforcement of the traites, but later he relented, though the ban on investment in common corsairs remained. Desclouzeaux was a shareholder in the enterprises of Gennes, Dandennes and Pointis in 1695-7, Vauvr also in the two last (42). Robert denied any interest until 1704, and then promised not to abuse it ; that the provision of work came first with him is not to be questioned. More suspicion rests on Duguay of Dunkirk, who was accused of accepting free shares (protecting him from loss) through his corrupt secretary ; but this story could have been concocted by his Flemish enemies, claiming that unlike the French they offered no such bribe in the competition for ships. He was certainly a strong advocate of hiring-out, which he proposed in 1706 for the royal squadron itself during its idle winter. His chief motive seems to have been the real need for hard money to meet his arsenal's expenses (43). Prize money derived from the royal fifth was credited to a dockyard's
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'recettes extraordinaires' and remained there if it was the port of armament. Subject to delays in the liquidation of prizes, it served on occasion, however inadequately, to meet the most pressing payments. An exceptional haul like that of Desaugiers in 1706 was worth 451,192 livres to Brest ; thus Robert could predict that prize money would take care of debts to the contractors of stores and victuals in 1707, though not of wages ; next year he took 20,000 livres from some Trouin prizes to buy bread for his workers. Indeed, intendants and commissaries sometimes got into trouble with their minister (and with eacn other) for raiding this fund before captor crews had been paid off or for disposing of it when it should have been remitted, as the rules required, to the original port of armament, where the account had to be rendered and struck - a requisite of sound book-keeping which made the cinquime a trouble to administer, especially as the minister insisted on up-to-date details of every prize while captors might send them into different harbours. Consuls, at Leghorn for instance, might also be rebuked for recouping their advances to the navy out of the royal share in prizes sold abroad. The minister more than anybody had an interest in speeding up prize judgments, and Pontchartrain fils complained bitterly of delays both in the vice-admiralty courts and the Council of Prizes ; one of the disadvantages of the lending system (as Vauvr lamented) was that it caught the King in the staid habits of the amirauts, whereas strictly naval captures were more promptly judged in first instance by the intendants of marine (H). The intendants were also directly held to ensure the best sales for prizes in which the King had an interest. Until an Arrt of 9 July 1709 they were handicapped by the long list of prize goods saleable only on condition of export. Any important sale at Toulon was made known, at Genoa and Leghorn as well as Lyon. Dutch as well as Flemish bidders appeared at Dunkirk. At Brest, Desclouzeaux and Robert had to exert themselves to create a market, attracting Dutch buyers and on one occasion even representatives of the English East India Company. To prevent a sale falling flat, the intendants were not beyond negotiating with private men, even at the expense of promising a hemp contract or other quid pro quo. Resisting pressure to transfer an important sale to Nantes, Robert claimed in 1707 that so far none had taken place at Brest without 'un grand concours de marchands venant des villes les plus loignes' ; he found his Jewish bidders 'des meilleurs acteurs dans ces assemblees pour faire valoir les marchandises'. The suppliers of naval stores were also useful in forcing up prices, though their participation could recoil on the King, always heavily in debt to them; it was numbers of small Brestois merchants who did most to boost sales, pushing up prices in Robert's experience by a third to a half. (Thanks to them in part, Forbin's Muscovy prizes realized 590,000 livres against an estimate of 350,000, though the intendant also took credit for having sold them in assorted lots, no longer graded according to quality (45)). Unfortunately, their capital was largely held in the form of navy bills, which the minister refused to accept, although he agreed to bills of exchange up to nine months discount and even, in May 1707, to accept billets de monnaie as to one-third ; a royal declaration of 18 October, however, stipulated payment in cash, half of it payable in three months. As early as 170* bills of exchange offered by purchasers were discounted at 2 per cent loss, later at a heavier discount if not protested, while the discount periods lengthened. Thus Robert added disputes about the media of payment to the cares of setting up a good sale. For all his pains he asked the court for a pension, as
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Desclouzeaux had once asked for reimbursement of his heavy travelling expenses (*6). The royal cinquime, for all the burden of administration it entailed, proved a diminishing asset wll before the Ordinance of 1 3uly 1709 withdrawing it from prizes taken after 1 August. Instead, the King would now lend his ships 'dans 1'etat auquel ils se trouveront', leaving the contractors to careen, refit, supply what spare stores were necessary, and pay the dockyards before sailing for what little they might still be able to provide. In the beginning, the assumption had been that the ships would be handed over fully ready for the sea : as the contract of 25 duly 1696 with Pointis for ten vessels and three auxiliaries expressed it, His Majesty 'fera remettre tous bastimens carennez et en bon estat avec leurs fournitures, rechanges, agrez, apparaux, canons armes et munitions ncessaires pour une campagne de neuf mois'. Even at this stage, however, a warning note was struck at Rochefort, where Colbert de Saint-Mar was required to accept three ships rigged and armed 'dans l'estat o ils sont', which may have meant much or little. Some allowance must be made for differences in the changing resources of the several arsenals, as also for the general rule, however flexible it may have been in practice, that what was available for a vessel depended primarily on her own 'magasin particulier de dsarmement' - a condition explicitly applied at Dunkirk as late as 3uly 1712, although in this case the King agreed to replace defective masts. Dunkirk in 1705 was still able to provide the materials needed for refitting the Tigre, 30, although the cash shortage was directly reflected in the contractor's undertaking to advance all costs of labour, these to be cast up monthly, certified by the intendant, and credited to the putative royal fifth, on which they would have first claim. A year or so later, the armateurs of the Sorlingues, 28, had also to advance the cost of ballast, cables and other stores not available in the dockyard, 'jusqu'a des poulies, des aiguilles et autres minuties, en sorte que les avances a reprendre sur le cinquime va (sic) a prs de dix mille livres' ; at this rate, they warned, there would soon be few takers, though they had no objection to bearing temporarily such 'menus fraix' as the hire of wherries for watering or even the casks themselves. Of course these advances, both for materials and labour, soon threatened to mount to almost the entire cost of a refit. At Le Havre in 1708 Cochart was not only to advance the cost of labour 'charpentiers, tonneliers, calfats, forgerons, voiliers, cordiers, charons, armuriers, ferblantiers, peintres, et autres' - for fitting out the Gentille, 20, but ' 'l'achat des marchandises indispensables... tant pour la navigation que pour son entretien pendant la campagne et pour la guerre' : the list of purchases extends from 'toilles noiailles pour les voiles, toiles blanches ou estamines pour les pavilions' to dry tar, tallow, sulphur, shovels, crates, mangers, parchment skins and surgical instruments (47). At first for labour costs only but soon also for timber, there were excellent precedents for all this in the many contracts awarded to armateurs en course for building vessels, usually 'frigates', in the royal dockyards. The reduction of the naval budget made facilities as well as ships available. It is a mistake to suppose that the running-down of the fleet in 1694-5 of itself released any considerable number of cruisers combining strength with 'finesse de voile'. The navy list of 1689 contained only fifty ships of the 4th and 5th rates, eighteen of them described as mediocre sailors and ten as 'trs fin' (but one of these also as
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'faible'), together with twenty-six light frigates (eight of them 'fines voilires' or 'trs fines') and a mere ten corvettes or barques longues ; only two 4ths and five 5ths were added (unless by capture) before 1695, but six more in each class from 1695 to 1699. In 1702 all but three of the navy's twenty-one home-built frigates, and all eleven of its corvettes, had been constructed since 1689, mostly after 1694. It is not too much to attribute almost the whole of the increment between 1694 and 1698 to the King's shipbuilders working with privately financed labour, especially at Brest ; and this would be generally true of the seventeen ships, from the 24-gun Embuscade to the 64-gun Achille, completed in all the royal yards in 1704 (48). In addition, commanders might ask for some adaptation of an existing ship, as the chevalier de Norey did for the stern of the Trident, 56, and the chevalier de Sabrn Bagnols for the Pendant, 58, in this case fore and aft 'afin de le rendre plus lger et meilleur voilier', in 1710 ; and permission to go ahead was only given on the understanding that the entrepreneur restore such vessels 'jusqu' leur entire perfection si le Conseil de Construction le juge ncessaire', immediately on return from cruising. Even on new ships there might have to be some rectifications on the expiry of the contract of armament. Duguay Trouin was allowed figureheads 'a 1'anglais' only on condition of supplying French sculptures when the ships were finally handed over to the navy (49). An arsenal's building committee was a powerful one, but in the construction of a new cruising vessel commanders exercised a degree of supervision over the shipwright. Thus Jacques Parent was ordered to Le Havre by Pontchartrain himself to supervise the maltre constructeur of the Galathe, 30, in 1708. Four years earlier, when two vessels and a frigate were ordered at Brest for Duguay Trouin, he objected to the minister's choice of Louis Hubac as one of the builders in preference to Elie jeune, whom he wanted both for the frigate and one of the stronger ships ; a compromise was negotiated by the conseil de construction. Is it too much to postulate that corsair captains, in their close contacts with the royal dockyards in this period, influenced the design of French warships, so much admired later on by their English rivals ? It looks also as if it was in discussion with the master shipwright , himself an entrepreneur, that it was settled whether the work should be paid for 'par marche ou par journee', for the contracts themselves leave this choice to the undertakers, who seem in general to have preferred day-wages to fixed-price tenders. In one case, however, the King paid the labour costs while the undertaker supplied the timber, but Jean Saupin in 1696 was still what he had been for several years, the chief timber contractor at Brest (50). The contracts for building and cruising - single documents, of which there were perhaps as many as sixty by 1708, when they appear to have come to an end were exceedingly generous to the armateurs. Not only were they to recover their advances out of the royal fifth, but they were covered against the risks of loss on these were there to be no prizes at all. Following the precedent set by Nesmond's traite of 13 June 1695, the King undertook to replace any such ship lost at sea before the advances had been amortized by prizes ; and if hostilities ended before this had been achieved, the loan would be extended for trading purposes until the advances were recouped out of the cinquime of freights so earned. Curiously, the Nesmond contract says nothing about the length of the lease ; but two other contractors in the same year, Grenonville and Dandennes, procured
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leases for two years. In the following war it was regularly for three years. It is true that the King might, as he quite often did, requisition these ships for his own service before the lease had expired, but careful note was kept of the years or months still owing to the lessee and the navy showed scruple on this point. In at least one case the minister dismissed the captain before his time was up : he was the chevalier Damon, who built the Ruby, 56, at Lorient in 1703 and had the mortification of seeing another appointed to command next year, under orders to join the Brest squadron for Toulon, a vessel which he cherished 'comme une maitresse' ; but it is almost certain that he was compensated if the Ruby was not returned to him. What of course the navy could not guarantee, though some armateurs expected it, was to replace a lost ship with one of equal strength or one 'a leur choix' ; nor would it pay for repairs and refits during the life of the lease, as requested by the very exigent Breton nobleman-captain, Dubois de la Motte, in 1708 (51). From these arrangements it was clearly only a step, as the dockyards became more and more depleted of stores, to drawing on private credit for making the King's ships fit for the sea - and then falling back on the royal fifth to cancel it. This was obviously a fair-weather solution. It worked perfectly well if the undertakers were entitled to recover (say) 6.000 livres out of a fifth amounting to over 15,000 to take the outcome of the 1707 campaign of two Dunkirk frigates : but what if there were no prizes, or too few ? There was no other security for the repayment, only the King's uncertain equity, of which the traites say nothing. On rare occasions a 'grace' was indeed extended, as to Nesmond in 1695 : in consideration of his huge expenses, 'pour cet armement seulement', he was to cover them before the King took any share, then it would be 25 per cent instead of 20. No fifth was payable by Beaubriand Levesque when he secured the contract to supply Plaisance in 1697 and intended to combine this mission with cruising and fishing, but then such contracts attracted no freight either ; and the 1 fifth was remitted for borrowed ships required, in 1709, to cruise 'exclusively for corn ships, enemy or neutral (52). But when Duguay Trouin claimed this privilege in 1707, in the event of an unrewarding campaign, he was told that the minister had offered it only on condition of a cruise to the whaling-grounds, which was no longer intended. This dusty answer is the more interesting in the light of other concessions made to the greatest corsair of the day, who strained the patience of his principals but pleased the minister by giving priority to attacks on enemy convoys and therefore warships ; from 1705 the fifth was no longer exacted on warships captured by him of 50 guns or over - a concession also granted to Beauvais Lefer - and in 1708, after his heroic combat with H.M.S. Cumberland, his socit was even reimbursed its outlay on pay and victuals. On the other hand, it was not within the discretion of Pontchartrain to confer the greatest favour of all: a lifting of the rules governing the marketing of prize goods (53). The abolition of the fifth in 1709 - one of a series of measures intended to reanimate the cruising war, only nine days behind sweeping cuts in the list of prize goods whose consumption was forbidden in France - was variously received. At Toulon, where the bills for refitting may have been higher than elsewhere and certainly bore hard on the officer class which supplied so much of the investment as well as leadership there, Vauvr had already been pressing for its reduction to ten per cent or less - enough to compensate the King for the wear-and-tear on
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what he provided. But the Malouin capitalists who hired the ships of Brest were horrified. Although the Ordinance of 1 July was silent on the point, prior notice to the dockyards made clear that in future the navy would be 'giving' its ships armed only with their munitions de guerre : everything to do with their navigation, from cables and anchors to spare yards and tar, if supplied by the dockyard, would have to be promptly paid for. To Trouin de la Barbinais, already at his wits' end to finance a second campaign in that year of dear food and tight credit, this was the straw to break the camel's back. He was only able to proceed when the minister consented to an armament 'au cinquime', as he again did for the Rio de Janeiro armament, this time with the further concession that the fifth should be levied on profits only, 'les proffits clairs', not on the prize proceeds, which had always been calculated after deduction of the admiral's tenth and other charges but took no account of the adventurers' other outgoings. Somewhat similar terms were accorded to Duclere for his Brazilian expedition, even to the extent of furnishing him with necessaries from the magazines in the West Indies, the King also to reimburse the armateurs for munitions supplied by them to any ship that might be lost, assuming there were no prizes to pay for these. But Ponchartrain resolutely turned down a proposal from the count of Toulouse, Amirai de France and a generous investor in Duguay's Brazilian venture, thai the King reimburse the armateurs for any advances in fitting-out not covered by prizes. Nor had he allowed even the Trouin brothers to arm the Amazone, 2, in 1710 otherwise than in conformity with the new Ordinance. One understands why the shrewd Flemings inserted two new articles in the draft contract for Saus in 1711 : the five vessels were to be handed over 'avec tous les agres et apparaux contenus dans les inventaires de leurs derniers armements', while the armateurs should supply what 'surplus' they themselves judged best, with the advice and approval of the capitaine du port and no one else (54). Armaments 'au cinquime' did not entirely disappear. Besides the examples of Duguay and Duclere already noted, concessions were made to Cassard in 1712 and to Marquze de Rocquemadore in 1711, this last for an East Indies cruise in which the King's fifth would only be levied after the adventurers had secured a profit of one million livres : of this sum, W0,000 livres were reserved for reimbursement of advances and the King would levy ten per cent on the remaining 600,000. Both of these overseas expeditions were of course exceptionally costly in men and victuals, but the same hardly applied to an abortive project negotiated in 1712 between Joseph Maillet of Marseilles and his Chamber of Commerce, which was for counter-privateering against the ubiquitous Zeelanders in the Mediterranean : here the King was to enjoy 25 per cent of any prizes. The circumstances again were exceptional, for it was difficult to persuade 'le ngoce' to commit their money and an agreement with a minority of the Chamber to levy ad hoc duties on imports from other parts of the Mediterranean was rejected by the majority (55). Otherwise requests to arm on the old basis were vetoed and the new policy, apart from some initial tenderness to the Trouin brothers, seems to have been consistent enough. Since, however, its ostensible purpose was to revive 'la course', it is worth asking why it was pursued when some armateurs disliked it. The answer can only be that it was also in the navy's own interest. First, any materials the dockyards could still supply would now bring in ready money. This in itself is enough to
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explain why there were no new building contracts ; the cost of timber alone killed one such proposal. It also explains why private capital now looked askance at ships which, because they were large or in poor condition, or both, would be relatively expensive to refit - good examples being the Mercure, 60, and the Jason, 58, at Brest. Contrary to the minister's wishes, it proved possible to get these two to sea again only on condition of a two-year lease, and this for trading purposes (56). Secondly, it is to be inferred that in the past the navy had, on occasions, to produce money of its own in order to reimburse the advances of the private adventurer when these were not fully covered by the fifth on prizes. There are random references to such debts in the port correspondence, notably one by Barbinais Trouin when he deplored the disappearance of the cinquime (57). But now the position was reversed, for the King would retain the stores, tackle and any refitting for which the armateur had paid. Nevertheless, the prize fifth was to reappear in one other type of armament besides the squadrons bound on distant missions, particularly at Toulon. The circumstances of war in the Mediterranean gave an important role to the armed merchantmen. Convoys were always a subject of delicate negotiation with the Marseillais, who were expected to bear a large portion of the cost, and of exasperating disputes after they had returned. In any case, the echelles were so numerous and scattered that ships had to be detached to collect cargoes from them ; in the Greek Archipelago they had to run the gauntlet of the Zeeland privateers. Moreover, it was assumed that the vessel armed en guerre et marchandise might herself find opportunities of acting as an escort. The disette of 1709 gave a considerable impetus to this kind of armament at Toulon, quite distinct from the compulsion laid on corsairs to concentrate on grain prizes, for which also the passages of Genoese and other neutral corn-carriers provided ample opportunity. Where grain was in question during a famine the navy demanded no quid pro quo for the loan of a ship, just as it sacrificed the fifth on corn prizes. On other cargoes it levied one-fifth of the freight - in the Midi, of the nolis. But if the trader was at the same time armed as a corsair, the fifth on prizes might accompany the cinquime du fret even after 1709, as the cases of the Diamant, 53, and the Fleuron 56, illustrate. This was an arrangement insisted upon by the authorities, and yet it did not apply if trade was to be secondary to cruising, as was proposed by the chevalier de Norey in 1711 : he was to cruise for three months 'moyennant la permission de faire ensuite son chargement en Levant, et d*en payer le cinquime du nolis'. Pontchartrain disliked using a good cruiser in this way, however, even if the captain could be trusted to stick to a promise in writing - the 'sousmission' required of all who commanded hired naval ships. The chevalier Dieud, who proposed a similar formula, was told that any post-cruise trading would only be allowed if hostilities came to an end during the life of a cruise (58). Rocquemadore's contract prohibited trading in the East Indies unless peace were declared before he sailed, in which event he was to settle matters with the Compagnie des Indes. Also in June 1711, Blnac was given permission to turn his three vessels over to a slaving voyage if peace 'intervened* before he set sail, paying the Asiento Company the standard licence fee per head and the King a fifth of the profits 'de ce commerce et du fret' - a ministerial correction of the draft agreement, negotiated at Rochefort, which had specificaly ruled out any royal interest (59). Evidently, a fifth of the freight was not always judged sufficiently remunerative to the crown even though, like the cinquime des
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prises, it entitled the King to benefit afterwards by the residue of stores and tackle which the contractor had provided. The Dunkirk contract for the lease of the Nyade frigate, 18, for a Newfoundland voyage in 1711 stipulated a fifth share of the catch as well as of freight and prizes, whereas in 1709 it had been hired simply 'au cinquime du fret'. By 1710, too, there are signs of the government moving over to freight charges measured by the ton per month. Such charges were for the full freight and well above commercial rates by 1713, when the minister was keen to lend for trading purposes - and preferably those ships which were most in need of a refit (60). By then, except for a slaving voyage, so prominent a feature of the later deals, it was too late. The dockyards, as we have seen, suffered accordingly. However the successes and failures of the guerre de course may be judged, the massive impression made by all these contracts of hire (although I have come across texts of no more than forty of them, far fewer than are mentioned in the arsenal dispatches) is that they worked on the whole to the advantage of government. As Vauvr reflected late in the War of the Spanish Succession, the cruising war, which he identified with the King's ships, 'fait subsister les ouvriers du port et les officiers mariniers et matelots du dpartement. Elle conserve les Vaisseaux qui y sont employs et pargne leur entretien dans le port'. On other coasts, it is true, the seamen could as readily find employment, and sometimes greater rewards, in wholly private corsairs ; but the 'pret des vaisseaux' did something to preserve order in recruitment and thereby continuity in the administration of the maritime classes. Although the minister could not always impose his wishes in the nomination of officiers majors of whom there were over a thousand in 1710, a great many (except among the 152 capitaines des vaisseaux) at least saw sporadic service, quite a number of them as regular commanders often drawn from the more junior ranks, who thus improved the chances of promotion denied to them in the King's direct service (61). Many senior officers, it is true, were not well suited to the command of cruisers and even those who took part in it doubted whether private employment of this kind was properly valued at Court, though their successes were noticed in the Mercure and Gazette de Paris, while Pontchartrain fils took care to bring them to the King's personal attention. As Mahan observed, the loan of royal ships and officers 'imparted for the time a tone and energy to privateering that it cannot always have' (62). It partook of the older tradition of the Knights of Malta. Economically, if a cruise did well, the navy earned hard money ; if poorly, it had only to repay the contractors their advances in fitting-out, mainly the cost of dockyard labour, and not even that after the abolition of the cinquime. Up to sixty vessels, including a few 3rd Rates, were added to the establishment. Nor were many naval ships lost to the enemy. It was an article of faith that the virtue of these armaments was to combine private and public interest. The Ordinances of 1694 and 1709, in their different manner, imply as much. The spectacular profits of the expeditions to Cartagena (1696), St Helena (1706), and Rio de Janeiro (1711) demonstrated it. So did the long careers of Grenonville, Gineste and others at Toulon, the successes of Nesmond, Beaubriand Levesque and Duguay Trouin in 1695-7, those of Saus from 1704, or of Le Mei, La Moinerie Miniac and Gouyon Miniac in the later years. But a number of expensive armaments were loss-makers, notably that of Duclere in 1710 : the armateurs were still facing suits for debt in 1719. The affairs of
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Iberville's 1705 Caribbean foray took much longer to disentangle ; the ransom of Nevis, which featured in Anglo-French diplomacy at least until 1737, was never paid (63). Trouin's backers were disillusioned by the beginning of 1708, itself another profitless year, as was 1709 ; La Barbinais, his brother and financial broker, was to die a poor man in 1736. Many armateurs never borrowed a King's ship, and as time went on a preference for small armaments developed among those who did ; Vauvr himself, by 1710, was advocating 'plusieurs armaments mediocres de fins voiliers' in the light of the ruin of recent strong ones, which were only justified when it was necessary to attack convoys ; Robert agreed that 'les armements mediocres donnent ordinairement plus de profit que les armements considerables' (64). It will be a long time before it may be possible to strike the balance of overall loss or gain. Meanwhile, however, some of the attractions of chartering royal vessels are worth emphasis : more powerfully gunned ships, if desired, than were available to the private sector, and the facilities of the arsenals for outfitting and building ; some protection in the trial and sale of prizes ; the use of the levees for manning and of the dockyard suppliers for naval stores and above all for victualling, at the navy's prices. How sensitive a business the victualling was appeared dramatically in the collapse of an ambitous armament in 1709, headed by the comte de la Luzerne with the support of Samuel Bernard (no less) and of his fellow banker dean Nicolas, who as Parisians had to send a delegate to superintend preparations at Brest. Unfortunately, they thought they could buy provisions more cheaply than the navy, and a network of agents was created independent of the munitionnaire des vivres. The result was chaotic accounting and, for this or some other reason, the cancellation of the armament. On this episode the intendant was scathing (65). For the ultimate failure of the cruising war many reasons can be given. One of them naturally suggests itself : could not the loan system have been used to better strategic effect ? In the nature of the case, of course, nothing like a central direction of the effort was remotely practicable, for such warfare was bound to be opportunistic, depending not only on wind and weather but on intelligence of enemy movements, so far as these did not follow a seasonal pattern of trade. Yet the ministry certainly did not fail in advising the ports of what intelligence it had, particularly about fleets and convoys ; and all commanders were expected to keep it posted with their own news as occasions availed. All the larger commitments were the subject of argument at court. The minister certainly vetoed some of the numerous 'projets' by which he was bombarded. To the end he retained the formal right to approve the cruising plan behind a loan : in 1709, after the Ordinance, the intendant Duguay remarks that armateurs now lack only 'la permission de choisir leurs croisires, ainsy que leurs capitaines'. But compromise on both points was often the price of raising private funds ; when private capital had built a ship for the navy, it alone decided how it should be used for three years, unless she was meanwhile requisitioned. The Articles and Conditions (save for overseas adventures) are silent on objectives and it is to be assumed that they were not a common source of conflict ; after all, the armateurs themselves habitually left to their captain's discretion where he might see best to cruise, while his radius of action was more or less defined by his base. There was as a rule some understanding with the intendant, although Vauvr had to admit that he could only try his best to make
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sure that the half dozen squadrons he had at sea in 1705 did not poach on each other's grounds. The case of Cochart and Graton at Le Havre in 1707 is also suggestive, for Pontchartrain had signed their agreement before asking where they proposed to cruise and refresh (66). More eloquent of the navy's weakness in imposing a strategy of its own was its partial failure to prevent its ships sailing alone. It preferred those bidders who would arm two or three to cruise in company, and no occasion was able to deny a ship to a syndicate unless it took another, as happened to the Nantais principals of Beauve in 1710, when they were hard put to fund both the Achille, 62, and the Dauphine, 56. At Toulon the practice of consortship, two or three in company, was indeed well established, but at Brest, the intendant could do no more than seek to persuade different armaments to combine forces, which he was not wholly unsuccessful in doing, especially in reinforcing Trouin's small squadron (67). These were indeed a model of what the minister desired and, since Duguay was in the habit of discussing his plans with Pontchartrain, go some way to explaining the exemptions, 'dedommagements' and other signs of the royal pleasure extended to him. But there was or.ly one Duguay Trouin and it must be said that he strained his investors very hard, unlike the underestimated Cornil Saus of Dunkirk.
NOTES 1. The Diary of Samuel Pepys (ed. R. Latham and W. Matthew, 11 v. London, 1970-83), ii, 228 ; iv, 368, 432 ; ix, 66, MO. K.G. Davies, The Royal African Company (London, 1957), pp.106-7, 114-5. H. Furber, Rival Empires of Trade in the Orient 1600-1800 (Minneapolis, 1976), pp.118-20 ; on prize problems see the extracts of correspondence between the Company and the intendant Ceberet of Jan. 1690 in Arch. Nat. Marine C7 97. The commissions of Jean Bart and Antoine Selingues as commanders of the Railleuse, 16 guns, and the Sorcire, 24, were registered at Dunkirk on 6 and 29 Nov. 1688 (AN, Mar. C4 252) ; Bart soon moved to Les Jeux (usually but wrongly cited as Les Yeux), 30, while Forbin took over the Railleuse and Selingues exchanged the Sorcire for the Serpente, 26 (ibid. 23, 25 and 29 April 1689, declarations des capitaines). H. Malo, Les Corsaires Dunkerquois et Jean Bart (2 v. Paris 1914), ii, 178 adds the Tempte, 28. The Toulon vessels armed in 1688 were the Ferme, 60 (de Septmes), the Aquiln, 52 (Chabert) and the Fidele, 48 (Des Francs), Seignelay's personal subscription amounting to 30,000 l.t. and that of the intendant Girardin de Vauvr to 25,000 l.t. ; the King himself contributed 25,000 l.t. ; other investors included Bonrepaus, intendant general de la marine, and the three principal commis M. Begon, Latouche and Salaberry (Toulon, Arch. Mar. 2 Ql). On 9 May 1689 Seignelay told Patoulet, intendant at Dunkirk, that he was increasing his share in the Railleuse and Les Jeux from one-half to two-thirds, leaving Patoulet to dispose of the remainder (E. Sue, Histoire de la Marine frangaise, V837), 141.
2.
3.
207
it. Bibl. Nat. Ms. fr. 22801, f.27v. Seignelay was also involved in a slaving venture at La Rochelle in 1689, but the Bretonne did not belong to the navy : 'Tous les commis de Monseigneur le Marquis de Seignelay, ses gentilhommes et sa chambre se trouvent intresses a eet armement qui a est fort malheureux' (AN, Mar. B7 62, f.13-18, kindly communicated by Prf. Lionel Rothkrug). 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. Citoyen Lebeau, Nouveau Code des Prises (3 v. Paris, an VII), i, 109, 112. The printer has misdated the Ordonnance of 8 Nov. Ibid, i, 143-4 : Reglement of 5 Dec. 1691. Ibid, i, 193-4. Thus the armateurs of the Hercule wished to pay for part of her consommations in lead and tobacco : Brest, Arch. Mar. I E 468, p.68. BN, Clairambault 875, f. 102 ; Arch. Mar. Toulon, 2 Q 2. The experience of d'Estrees in arming royal vessels went back to 1676, for his expedition to Dutch Guiana : Sue, iii (1836), 407. Royal vessels were also hired out against Genoa in 1684-5 : ibid, iv, 409 ('Principes sur la Marine de M de Pontchartrain pre'). Du Trousset de Valincour, secretary to the Amirai de France (the comte de Toulouse) and the Conseil des Prises throughout the period, considered that the 'gens de la cour et de la ville' were most open to subscriptions at the start of a war : Arch, du Ministre des Affaires Etrangres, Mem. et Doc. fr. 2021, f.47.
10. Arch. Mar. Rochefort, 1 Ql 2 ; BN, Thoisy 91, f.680, and Ms. fr. Nouv. Acq. 10570, pp.51-6. 11. AN, Rosanbo APP 52, no.3 ; Mar. B3 79, f.185 ; 81, f.19 ; 155, f.493 ; 165, f.371 ; AD Ille-et-Vilaine, 2 ED 9 (fonds Danycan). I am grateful to the marquis de Rosanbo for permission to consult some of his papers in microfilm. 12. AN, Mar. B3 172, f.573. 13. Dangeau, Journal, ix, 62-3 (11 Dec. 1702). Cf. Begon to Villermont, Rochefort, 3 April 1696, promising to do what he can for a sieur Binaud : 'mais cela ne suffit pas dans ce temps cy ou les moindres employs sont brigus par toutes sortes de personnes, ainsi il seroit bon de faire encore agir quelqu'un qui eust du crdit auprs du ministre et qui luy en parlasi fortement' : BN, Ms. fr.22806, f.18. 14. AN, Mar. B3 99, f.242 ; 84, f.143 v. In 1704 Crombrugghe at Dunkirk was reported to have declined a command in a privately-financed armament : 'comme il cherche a s'avancer il vent servir le Roy1 (ibid. 123, f.125). Some officers feared derogation : Sue, v, 340.
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15. Ibid. 165, f.292, 509 ; Brest Arch. Mar. I E 467, p.252, and 492, p.435-6. Cf. G. Symcox, The Crisis of Prend Sea Power 1688-1697 (The Hague, 1974), pp.143-220. 16. AN, Mar. B3 161,'f.436-48. 17. AN, Mar. F2 32, f.28 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, IE 468, p.162 ; AN, Rosanbo 260 AP 52, p. 12 bis ; Mar. B4 15, f.349-50. Symcox, p.245-8, prints the text of Nesmond"s contract of 13 June. In the Brest correspondence oif was cited as a model. 18. E.g. a Rochefort agreement of 27 June 1711 with the comte de Blnac : AN, Mar. B4 35, f.150-1. In a project of 1693 the marchal cTEstres stipulated that his four captains must be free to reject any of the officiers mariniers allotted to them, and that others chosen by the captains and armateurs should be paid differential wages as they thought fit : ibid. B3 79, f.50-1. 19. BN, Ms. fr. 22806, f.67 v, Binaud-Villermont, 4 Aug. 1696. 20. AN, Mar. B4 35, f.214. 21. Ibid. B3 133, f.36 v, 383 v, 440 ; 165, f.371 ; 172, f.583 ; Malo, La Grande Guerre des Corsaires (Paris, 1925), p.214. 22. AN, Mar. B4 16, f.141 ; B3 163, f.405-6, and 160, f.144 ; AD Bouches-duRhne, Amiraute de Marseille IX B4, f.652-3, and 5, f.31-2 ; A.M. de Boislisle, Corresp. gen. des contrleurs-gnraux avec les intendants de province, iii (1897), 75-6. Cf. 3.S. Bromley, 'Projets et contrats cfarmement en course marseillais, 1705-1712', below, pp. 243-78. 23. AN, Mar. B3 188, f.43 ; AD B.-du-R. IX B4, f.654. 24. AN, Mar. B3 204, f.57, 79v, 194 ; B4 36, f.11-15. Saus's draft traite rfarmement of 29 April 1711 (ibid. B3 191, f.270-1) had insisted on free choice of officers. 25. For Saint-Pol and the Compagnie Coulange see Malo, La grande guerre, p.2932, 36-8, and my article, 'Jacques-Winoc Plets, armateur en course', above, pp. 109-10. 26. AN, Mar. B3 142, f.351 ; 155, f.75 ; 165, f.309, 363-4, 480 ; F2 27, f.849 v, 853; 33, f.361 v - 2. 27. Ibid. B3 97, f.159 v ; 154, f.40-2 ; 164, f.150 ; C4 269, f.142. Cf. Sue, v, 384. 28. Malo, La Grande Guerre, pp.203-16, summarizes the history of Saus's armaments. 29. AN, Mar. B3 95, f.498 v. I have discussed the rise in these avances in a paper read to the Colloque international de Boulogne-sur-Mer (15-17 June 1984), to
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be published in the conference proceedings : Les Hommes et la mer dans l'Europe du Nord-Ouest de l'Antiquit a nos jours. Above, chapter 9, pp. 167-86. 30. Arch. Mar. Brest I E 490, p.397, 463 ; AN, Mar. B3 163, f.686-7. 31. Ibid. B4 33, f.78-91 ; B3 160, f.144 ; 79, f.50-1. 32. BN, Ms. fr. Nouv. Acq. 9294, f.112-3 ; AN, Mar. B4 33, f.275-85, and 34, f.769 ; B2, f.132. CF. Arch. Mar. Brest I E 488, p.26, 204-7, 315, 794. 33. Lebeau, i, 339-40, 194-5 ; AN Mar. B4 17, f.404-5 (Pointis) ; B2 114, f.123-4 (Saint-Mar); Sue, v, 300-3 (Trouin). 34. Arch. Mar. Brest IE 483, p.468-71 ; AN, Mar. B3 123, f.20-1, 189 ; 163, f.686. 35. Ibid. B3 126, f.309 ; Arch. Mar. Brest 481, p.260, 329-32, 392 ; 487, p.735-7 ; Le Nepvou de Carfort, Histoire de Du Guay Trouin (Paris, n.d.), p.325. 36. AN, Mar. B3 163, f .405-6 ; B4 35, f .348-9 ; V. Brun, Guerres maritimes de la France : Port de Toulon (2v. Paris, 1861), i, 131. 37. For Pointis, AN, Mar. B4 17, f.405-6 ; Duguay, Sue v, 300-3 ; Cassard, Brun i, 131 ; Duclerc, AD Charente-Marit. B 5709 ; Blnac, Arch. Mar. Rochefort 2 P 21 ; Saint Pol, Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 492, p.305-7 ; rflberville, BN, Ms. fr. Nouv. Acq. 9294, f.112-3 ; Beaujeu, AN, Mar. C4 269, f.142, B3 142, f.163. For non-commissioned officers and soldats gardiens, shore pay might slightly exceed sea pay (ibid. C3 12, pice 12). 38. For Duguay 1703, AN, Mar. B2 166, f.132 ; 1707-8, ibid. B4 33, f.275, and 34, f.76 ; 1709, Nepvou de Carfort, p.346 ; for Desaugiers, Arch. Mar. Brest 484, p.403 and 486, p.151 ; La Moinerie, ibid. 487, p.403-5, and Ste Croix, ibid. 493, p.1116 ; Parent, AN, Mar. F2 29, f.432-3 ; Beauve, Arch. Mar. Brest I E 492, f.305-7, 391. Cf. Sue, v, 379. One contract, that with rflberville for his Hudson's Bay enterprise of 1694, is unique : he was to pay advances to his crews, but the king would make up the balance of their pay unless the furs and other loot from the English forts exceeded in value double the adventurers' stake (Arch. Mar. Rochefort, I R 42). 39. Often expressed, however, as 36 or merely 30 livres ; Cochart in 1709 offered 30 1. and was ordered to pay 50 1. (AN, Mar. F2 32, f.304). 40. M. Giraud, Histoire de la Louisiane franeaise, i (Paris, 1953), 236-7 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 481, p.149, 253, 721 ; 482, p.821 ; 483, p.1-8, 13, 24, 56 ; 485, p.220, 536 ; 486, p.3-4, 173, 859, 889 ; 488, p.21, 82, 211, 687. 41. AN, Mar. B3 131, f.359 ; 133, f.575 ; 174, f.7 ; 200, f.82 ; B4 29, f.243 ; Brun, i, 128. 42. Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 467, p.252, 298-9 ; 468, p.143-4 ; 469, p.233 ; Lebeau, i, 176, 195-6 ; Symcox, p.238, 240 ; AN, Mar. B4 15, f.74.
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43. Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 480, p.144 ; 488, p.796 ; AN, Mar. B3 133, f.575 ; 142, f.605 ; 154, f.364 ; 177, f.177-81. 44. Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 481, p.276, 338-40 ; 486, p.748-9 ; 487, p.421-4 ; 488, p.32-4, 52, 82 ; AN, Mar. F2 28, f.396-8 ; 33, f.19, 366 ; 34, f.29 v-30, 111 ; 37, f.412, 454-66 ; B3 138, .245. 45. Lebeau, i, 150-1, 208-11, 231-2, 256-64, 267-73, 340-3 ; AN, Mar. B3 84, f.371, 457v ; 95, f.286 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 468, p.51, 403, 557, 577 ; 469, p.56, 437 ; 470, p.3, 266, 319 ; 471, p.19-21, 35 ; 486, p.198, 463-4, 484, 552, 839-40, 1121-3 ; 487, p.727, 782, 821, 1056, 1091-2 ; 488, p.22-5, 406, 442. 46. Ibid. 58, p.ll, 18 ; 469, p.56 ; 481, p.500, 540 ; 486, p.1030 ; 487, p.54, 892, 1023, 1072-5 ; 488, p.285-6, 442. 47. Lebeau, i, 339-40 ; AN, Mar. B4 17, f.404 ; B2 114, f.123 ; B4 36,-f.ll ; 33, p.77-82 ; B3 154, f.40, 319-20 ; 167, f.358. 48. Ibid. G 9 (1689), p.1-20 ; G 11 bis (1698), f.1-12 ; G 13 (1702), f.1-10 ; G 13 bis (1704), f.14. The 1704 list runs as follows, the figures denoting guns established (though captains often reduced them for the sake of trim) : Brest Port Louis Toulon
40 40
Dunkirk
26 26 ? 24 ? 24
Le Havre Bayonne
24 24 24
64 56 50 42 50 28 40 ? 24 (flGte)
While the Breton yards stand out, it could happen that a ship was built in a yard remote from her port of armament, as was the case of the frigate Galathe (Jacques Parent) in 1708 : she sailed from Rochefort, but was built at Le Havre, where resided one of her chief armateurs, Duval d'Esprmesnil, the others being nantais (AD Loire-Atlantique, C 689, mmoire of Veuve Montaudoin et al. versus de Prmesnil). On building at Brest and Toulon see Symcox, pp. 196-9, 245-8 ; but his listing is avowedly incomplete. Desclouzeaux refers as a rule to 'frigates' in his correspondence. 49. Arch. Mar. Toulon, 3 A2, f.40, 43-5 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 480, p.104, 231. 50. AN, Mar. F2 29, f.342 v ; B2 114, f.128-30 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 480, p.33-4. 51. Symcox, 196-7, 245-8 ; BN, Ms. fr. 22814, f.73 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 489, p.228-32 ; AN, Mar. B4 23, f.205. Villers de Sainte-Croix proposed to build a 54-gun vessel at Brest in 1709, but no more is heard of it : Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 490, p.400-1. 52. AN, Mar. B3 166, f.92-4 ; 174, f.19, 31 ; Al 32, no. 33 ; F2 33, f, 138, 177, 218 v, 272 v, 275, 363 ; BN, Ms. Fr.22806, f.29.
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53. Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 486, p.1023-5, 1113 ; 487, p.735-7 ; 488, p.26, 204-7, 315-8, 868-9 ; 491, p.94 ; Nepvou de Carfort, 243-4, 325. 54. AN, Mar. B3 174, f.31 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 491, p.91-9, 112-3, 136-8, 220-6, 742 ; Nepvou de Carfort, p.344-7 ; Sue, v, 300-3 ; AD Charente-Maritime, B 5709 ; AN, Mar. B4 35, f.197-8 ; B3 191, f.270-1. 55. Brun, i, 131 ; AN, Mar. B4 35, f.348-9 ; F2^58,^f.57 v - 9 ; Marseille, Arch, de la Chambre de Commerce, registre des deliberations, B7, f.36v - 9 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 492, p.618, 678-9. 56. Ibid. I E 491, p.153-4, 181 ; 492, p.538-9 ; 493, p.877, 1052-3. 57. Ibid. 486, p.44-5 ; 491, p.94 ; AN, Mar. B3 178, f.140. 58. Ibid. 186, f.154, 179, 238 ; 200, f.126, 270 v, 275, 425, 445. AN, Mar. B4 35, f.348-50. 59. Ibid. f. 150-1, 348-9 ; Arch. Mar. Rochefort, 2 P 21. Blnac's terms differ strikingly from those accorded to the Chevalier de la Sauvage at Rochefort in November 1714 for a slaving voyage in the Indien, 44, for he was to pay the King freight calculated at 7 livres per ton per month and this would be payable up to the day of loss if she met a misadventure ; her tonnage measurement was agreed at 460. A contract for the Milfort, 28, in 1711 had been cancelled when the armateurs refused to pay any freight if the vessel were lost : Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 492, p. 144. This must be one reason for the substitution of the commercial type of freight invoicing in lieu of the fifth. 60. AN, Mar. B3 178, f.9 ; F2 33, f.364 ; Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 495, p.275, 371-2. In 1710, at Dunkirk, the Tigre, 32, was let at 8 iivres : the Compagnie d'Afrique paid the same at Toulon, which it considered much too high : AN, Mar. B3 177, f.335 ; 200, f.232 v. Rocquemadore, were he to trade in the East Indies, was to pay freight at 2000 livres monthly for the Eclatant, 70, and Pendant, 50, but half as much for the Adelaide frigate. 61. AN, Mar. G 18, f.24 v, 35 v. The list includes 52, mainly enseignes, serving in the colonies but counted as 'a la mer'. The total of 1041 may be compared with 952 in 1702 and 1053 in 1704, but whereas there were 376 at sea when the lists were made out in 1702, and 674 in 1704, only 245 were so described in 1710 : ibid. G13, f.31, 37, and G 13 bis, f.38. The figure for 1710 contrasts strongly with the 808 at sea in 1696, out of a total of 1138 : ibid. G i l , f.34, 39. This difference reflects the decline of the cruising war as well as that of the navy itself. 62. A.T. Mahan, The influence of Sea Power upon History 1660-1783 (5th edn., London, 1890), p.185. 63. Arch. Mar. Rochefort I E 92, p.531 ; Arch* Aff. Etr., Correspondance Politique, Angleterre 394, f.338-9 ; Cf. M. Giraud, Louisiane franchise, i, 104-16.
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6. Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 88, p.26 ; 89, p.371 ; AN, Mar. B 33, f.285 ; 3, f.8 v ; C7 93 ; B3 189, f.71. 65. Arch. Mar. Brest I E 90, p.15-29, 3-55, 66-71. 66. AN, Mar. B3 165, f.333 ; 12, f.32 ; 131, f.363 ; B 29, f.23 ; F2 27, f.1309. 67. Arch. Mar. Brest, I E 90, p.90-1, 852 ; 92, p.l, 90, 966-7.
11
THE FRENCH PRIVATEERING WAR, 1702-13 AMONG the massive, miscellaneous, and insufficiently appreciated prize papers of the High Court of Admiralty, in the Public Record Office, there survives a note to David Strang, London merchant, dated Lisbon, 15 February 1706, about his ship Abraham: 'Dear Uncle', it runs, '. . . 'tis ill news of poor Captain King . . . who has been four times taken and retaken about six leagues from Lisbon.' The Abraham had been first lost to a French privateer, recaptured by a Zeelander, then retaken by three French privateers, and recaptured again by one of Queen Anne's men-of-war.1 After that her case is lost to sight, but it was not unusual and will serve to strike the note of common war-time experience on seas where rode not only the privateering hosts of France and the maritime powers, but Biscay and Galician privateers, Catalans and Majorcans, Maltese and Corsicans, the Savoyards of Oneglia and Finale, Neapolitans and Ostenders (who in 1706 perforce changed sides), to say nothing of the continued vitality of Caribbean ibustiers and of the Algerine corsairs, whose flag, whether legitimately flown or cunningly assumed by others, explains why so many Mediterranean vessels were found without a soul on board. Much might also be feared from a character who, though commonly called a privateer, is better described as an armed tradercommissioned as the French term had it, en guerre et marchandises, sometimes deliberately 'pour faire la course en chemin faisant'. His business was with transportation or fishing, but he often went more powerfully armed than most privateers.
P.R.O., H.C.A. 32/49: prize papers, Abraham,]. King. Unless otherwise stated, dates are given in new style.
1
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Nearly all the West India and slaving ships of Nantes, for example, and the codfishers of Saint-Malo and Bayonne were of this breed; and so, apparently, except for the Channel Islanders, were most of the English vessels for which more than fifteen hundred letters of marque were issued from June 1702 to August I7I2,1 notably for Mediterranean and African voyages. Even when the great powers had concluded their hostilities, indeed especially then, open piracy was not confined to the Indian Ocean and the slaving coasts. It is never easy to assess the economic impact of war. We are still at a stage where each war, each belligerent country, and perhaps each of its main trades, seem to demand separate notice. The task is doubly difficult when wars occur in an expanding world economy, such as was that of the late seventeenth century, and accepted judgments on the direct and still more on the indirect effects of the European wars of 16891714 are likely to require revision as more quantitative information comes to light. For a period when European and above all colonial economies were highly sensitive to fluctuations in seaborne commerce, such inquiries may well include a more thoroughgoing effort than has yet been made to assess losses and gains by capture at sea. The crude numbers of these, in European waters at least, can with patience (and a fair approximation to accuracy) be extracted from the records of the prize courts, which also yield much detailed information about the composition and ownership of the ships and cargoes condemned (in part or whole) as good prize, or sold pending judgment, or simply ransomed at sea. Even when the estimated ('appraised') or actual auction price of every prize ship and cargo is unknown, other sources may be available for ascertaining the gross yield of prize sales, year by year, for certain
The precise figure was 1540, as compared with 490 for the Nine Years War: Letter of Marque Declarations in P.R.O., H.C.A., 26/1-3 and 13-21. The small-scale but intensive privateering of Jersey and (especially) Guernsey bears many resemblances to that of Calais and the lesser French bases: see my article, 'The Channel Island Privateers in the War of the Spanish Succession', below, pp. 339-87.
1
The French Privateering War, 1702-1713

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ports. If all this tells us more about activity in the privateering business itself than about its success in dislocating the map of commerceso palpably subject to fluctuation from other causes and in any case still so far from being statistically understood even in time of peacewe can reasonably retort that privateering deserves study for its own sake, whether as a field for speculative investment which could bring windfall profits and so finance other enterprises, or as an outlet for resources otherwise dammed up by war, or humbly as an expression of local poverty. At different times and places, over many centuries, privateering has been all these things and more. Thus for Flushing and Middelburg the commissievaart of the wars of William III and Marlborough remained what it had been throughout the Dutch War of Liberation, at once a principal means of livelihood and the focus of an intense provincial patriotism, often to the detriment of the Dutch navy. In France, the later wars of Louis XIV are remembered as the apogee of the guerre de course, the heroic age of Jean Bart and the chevalier de Forbin of Dunkirk, Rene Duguay Trouin of Brest and Saint-Malo, Jean Doublet of Honfleur, Jacques Cassard of Nantes and Marseilles, the d'Iberville brothers of La Rochelle and Hudson's Bay and the nursling Louisiana. These names have ministered to national pride when those of Jean Ango's captainsDrake's true predecessors and peers in the Habsburg-Valois strugglehave unjustifiably been forgotten, in part no doubt because these last were often Protestants or pirates or purely private officers, or because England and not Spain had become the mortal enemy in French naval circles. Another reason may be suggested. Louis XIV's ' grande guerre de course' was a good deal more than a privateering war waged by syndicates of private individuals for private profit. Naval ships and personnel took part in it. Some of the most notable armaments were led by commanders of the king's own choice, to attack objectives of his choosing. They were
A readily accessible series, for the Zeeland ports, is to be found in G. N. Clark, The Dutch Alliance ana the War against French Trade, 1689-1697 (1923), p. 148.
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organised in close collaboration with his naval intendants, who supervised the fitting out of fourth-rates and frigates, drawing on masts, stores, and victuals in the royal arsenals, making full use of the standing machinery of the inscription maritime for recruitment of sailors and of the compagnies /ranches de la marine for the sizeable proportion of soldiers required, at the same time keeping the secretary of state for the navy informed of every step in the whole elaborate process, much as if the enterprise were wholly the king's business, except that working capital came from private pockets and articles of agreement were negotiated with the directeur or principal armateur of the syndicate that provided it. In such cases, it was the king's ships and guns which were at risk and he took a fraction (usually a fifth) of the net proceeds of any prize; crown influence might also be decisively exerted to procure the most advantageous sale of prize cargoes; and a big attraction of these arrangements to the private armateur was that they enabled naval discipline to be imposed on the seamen, who were notoriously prone to decamp with an advance of wages and to force the premature closure of a cruise. These prts de vaisseaux became increasingly common in the years of acute financial distress in France, from 1707 onwards, when unemployed naval officers themselves took the initiative in proposing armaments and negotiating subscriptions for them, when the naval authorities saw their ships rotting in harbour and their dockyard labour melting away for lack of wages and bread,1 when the only hope of offensive action was an appeal to the profit motive of a speculative generation. Nevertheless, the system of royal partnership, of which instances are recorded as early as i68p,2 was not the mere product of necessity. It also implied a positive strategic plan for the application of naval power to the special circumstances of bringing two world trading powers to their knees. By 1695 it was argued, notably by Marshal Vauban, in his
For an account of this distress see M. Giraud, 'Crise de conscience et d'autorit a la fin du regne de Louis XIV', Amales (E.S.C.), ye annee (1952), pp. 172-90. 2 Henri Malo, Les Corsaires durikerquois et Jean Bart, 2 vols. (Paris, 19131914), u, I77-8.
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often-quoted Memoir e sur la Caprerie of 30 November,1 that the correct way to do this was by the systematic destruction of the enemy's sea-borne commerce. In itself, of course, this was neither a very new nor a peculiarly French notion; but it was plausible to argue that the war potential of the English and Dutch depended very much more than did that of the French on the maintenance of overseas trade, and from this argument Vauban and others drew a ruthless inference for naval policy. A navy, they argued, was good only for the protection and destruction of commerce unless" it enjoyed such a mastery of the seas that it could transport troops wherever the higher military strategy required. By 1695 it seemed evident enough that the French navy no longer justified its keep in this last respect. Accordingly, why not spend it in small change by deploying its manpower and such of its units as were suitable chiefly vaisseaux of forty-eight to twenty-eight guns, light frigates, and galleysin order to place privateering on a firmer and more scientifically organised basis? The use of small but fast-sailing squadrons, under enterprising commanders like Jean Bart (in whom Vauban discerned the fighting qualities of a De Ruy ter), against carefully selected objectives, could do more than inflict economic losses on a scale for which French oceanic commerce hardly offered similar scope to the enemy: they might force him to adopt ruinously expensive measures for the defence of his life-lines. The geographical distribution of French ports, in relation to the focal zones of enemy trade in the North Sea and Channel Soundings, seemed destined by Providence to invite such a strategy; from Brest, in particular, profitable sallies could be launched whatever the set of the wind. And all this with every prospect of more than covering the costs of armament, into which it would not be difficult to attract private capital. Above all, in the thought of Vauban, who had seen something at first hand of the Dunkirk 'capers', the development of a quasi-naval course would encourage many
It is printed in Rochas d'Aiglun, Vauban. Sa familie et ses cr'.*. Ses oisivets et sa correspondance: analyse et extraits, 2 vols. (Paris-Grenoble, 1910), i, 454-61.
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more wholly private armaments, upon which was bound to fall the main task of harrying enemy trade in detailin ' une guerre libre et de caprice qui se fait pour le Roi aux dpens des particuliers'but which in themselves were unequal to the enemy's cruisers, seldom willing to risk their crews in combat, and rather quickly wound up in default of early successes. Vauban's classical exposition of privateering as a war-winner undoubtedly found ready acceptance in some naval circles as well as at court. This was not simply because so many members of both already had a stake in privateering syndicates (sodts d'armement), or because the business was already flourishing: Vauban feared indeed that it might languish unless something were done to speed the judgment of prizes and lessen the duties on prize goods levied by the general farms: he claimed in his Mmoire to know of entrepreneurs who had given it up for these reasons, at both its most vigorous bases, Saint-Malo and Dunkirk (although we now know that the number of corsairs commissioned at Saint-Malo in io95,andin 1696, was well abo ve previous levelsseventy-one against an average of fifty for 1692-94)." Far more significant was the background of debate about the merits of navies which had continued since Colbert's time. It is well known that Louvois, whether from personal or higher motives, had opposed the policy of a big navy, and after Seignelay's death in 1690 his arguments seem to have gained ground; a full year before the disaster of La Hogue, the naval party was having to defend its position.2 On the other hand, the anti-navalists, with whom Mme de Maintenon came to be identified, can hardly be said to have triumphed as a direct and immediate consequence of La Hogue. Their moment came with Chamillard's budget of 1695, which
See the lists in Anne Morel, La Guerre de course a St-Malo, 1681-1715 (Paris, Acadmie de Marine, n.d.), pp. 106 seq. 2 See the metnoire by Bonrepaus, dated 20 June 1691, in Archives] Nationales], Marine K, carton 1360. I owe this reference and the next to Dr. Lionel Rothkrug, of the University of Pittsburg, who generously placed at my disposal much of the documentation for his thesis on reform movements under Louis XIV.
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drastically cut back expenditure on the navy, on the ground that some of its ships would be better turned over to the course than left idle ' on the pretext of a glory that is purely imaginary ' ; and even then the elder Pontchartrain (who had charge of the navy until succeeded by his son Jerome in 1699 and who himself invested in privateering armaments) is described by Chamillard as reluctant ' to abandon the king's ships to adventurers ',l Contrary to what is often supposed, it was not the experience of La Hogue that persuaded a navally apathetic Louis XIV to lay his fleet, as it were, under cellophane. A year later, in fact, after the scattering of the 'Smyrna' convoy off Lagos in June 1693, the French Atlantic and Mediterranean squadrons united again, to form a grand fleet exceeding ninety of the linefar more than fought at Beachy Head, let alone La Hogueand in June 1694, off Catalonia, Tourville's combined forces were still more than half as large as this.2 What was lacking, down to 1695, was not a fleet, but any clear idea of how to use it aggressively, once the battle of Ireland had been lost; minor operations on the Catalan coast and the persecution of enemy commerce did not require these formidable concentrations of manpower and firepower. It was the two strategically unrewarding campaigns of 1693 and 1694 that clinched the argument of the anti-navalists. Even then, it would be absurd to describe their victory as definitive or to regard the strategic thought of the French government, always the resultant of a parallelogram of divergent forces and personalities, as a set of clear convictions. It is significant that ships of the line were under construction not only in 1694 but in 1702, 1704, 1706, and ijoj;3 and after all it was with fifty line-of-battle ships, not to mention the incidental usefulness of galleys, that the admiral of France, Toulouse, claimed the tactical victory of Malaga in
G. Esnault, M. Charnillard . . . correspondance et papiers indits, 2 vols. (Le Mans, 1884), i, 5-9. 2 C. de la Roncire, Histoire de la marinefranfaise, 6 vols. (Paris, 1899-1932), vi, 147, 150 n. 3 A.N., Marine G1^ fos. i-io, and Bs, no. 3. Cf. estimates of the French line-of-battle in 1700, 1703, 1706, and 1710 in J. H. Owen, War at Sea under Queen Anne, 1702-1708 (1938), pp. 278-80.
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July 1704. He did so in an effort to recover Gibraltar, the significance of whose recent capture was at once appreciated in France and Spain. During the remainder of the War of the Spanish Succession, however, except for the 'Alarm from Dunkirk' of 1708, French naval units were employed only in the humbler offices of trade protectionSpanish as well as Frenchand in a grand offensive against Allied trade, perhaps the most intensive ever waged by the French nation. Now, at any rate, Vauban's strategical theory was to be seriously tested. The miscellaneous character of privateering operations and the wide dispersion, by capture and otherwise, of the sources which record them make it very difficult to form any clear notion of their general shape and total effect. The large French literature on the subject is rich mainly in narrative, often rather breathless, hagiographical, and bewildering. Charles de la Roncire's synthesis of I932,1 while seriously documented and vigorously written, does justice only to the highlights of the campaigningto such episodes as Duguay's Spitzbergen campaign of 1703, the heroic death of Saint-Pol-Hcourt, the rewarding St. Helena cruise of the chevalier des Augiers in 1706, the capture of H.M.S. Nightingale by de Langeron in 1707, the memorable attacks on Anglo-Dutch convoys to Portugal and from the Baltic and Archangel in 1706-07, Cassard's victorious romp through the Dutch Caribbean at the very end of the war. The historians of the Malouins and Dunkerquois2' have gone further into the everyday routine substance of privateering, whose institutional framework in Brittany was admirably surveyed many years ago by H. Bourde de la Rogeriein a somewhat austere format.3 Much fundamental
Op. at., vi, 160-295, 406-546. Cf. Owen, op. at., ch. 4, for the activities of the Brest and Dunkirk squadrons in the Channel Soundings, 1704-05, and Le Nepvou de Carfort, Histoire de du Guay Troin, le Corsaire (Paris, 1922). 2 Morel, op. cit.; the sequel to Henri Malo's two volumes on Jean Bart and his period is La Grande Guerre des corsaires: Dunkerque, 1702-1715 (Paris, 1925). 3 Inventane sommaire des Archives Dpartementaks: Fnistre, vol. iii (Quimper, 1902), introduction.
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research remains to be done, however, on the French prize system as a whole, on the capital structure and 'rentability' of armaments a la course, on the amateurs themselves and the varying social milieu behind and below them. In this place no more is attempted than to rough out the broad contours of the phenomenon as it was experienced in 1702-13, as a basis for a few tentative conclusions as to the elementary magnitudes and fluctuations involved. Such a limited inquiry is made practicable by the preservation in the Archives Nationales of twenty-two folio volumes of abstracts of the judgments of the Conseil des Prises,1 the prize court of fifteen members constituted in 1695 to assist the newly installed admiral of France, Louis Alexandre comte de Toulouse (1678-1737), the king's son by Mme de Montespan who presided over it and in whose house it met every Wednesday. To this Conseil, more properly a Bureau in the strict language of the Almanack Royal, all prize depositions and other proceedings were transmitted from the sieges d'amiraut at the ports, and it gave judgment subject only to appeal to le Roi en son Conseilin practice, to the Conseil des Finances, which was attended both by the admiral himself and the secretary of state for the navy when it sat in prize causes. Doubtless we owe the excellent record-keeping of the Bureau des prises faites en mer to the good method of Henri du Trousset de Valincour, secretary-general both of the navy and of the admiralty jurisdiction. The judgments contained in the abstracts are preceded by a summary of the nature of the prize ship, its cargo and voyage, a rough indication of the place of capture, the name of the captor (ship and captain), the port into which the prize was taken or the amount of ransom if not worth bringing in, and the date on which proceedings were registered by the local amiraut (or consul or governor if taken into a European port outside France or to a French colony). By 1691, when the seven Breton amirauts were definitively created, there were
Gs 234-255: 'Dpouillement des jugements des prises', June 1702December 1713. For a sketch of the genesis and functioning of the Conseil see A. de Boislisle (ed.), Mmoires de Saint-Simon, vii, 413-41
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over fifty seats of admiralty somewhat unevenly distributed round the French coasts, many of them in tiny and decaying places with little or no prize business. Only in Brittany were there any important privateering bases or prize markets without an amiraut of their own, with the result that the prize litigation of Roscoff was handled by admiralty officers from Brest, and that of Port-Louis and Lorient (until 1782) by those of Vannesa common cause of delay in the liquidation of prize business which led the naval authorities in Lorient to claim a jurisdiction of their own, unsuccessfully, in 1709. Elsewhere,1 prizes were almost invariably proceeded against at the ports into which they were brought, and there too they were auctioned if condemned by the Conseil des Prises. There is much to suggest that the judgments do not record all the prizes taken into colonial ports, either because the formalities were not always observed in the colonies or because the written procdures were lost on their way to France; it is scarcely credible that no prizes at all should have been taken into Martinique in 1705 and 1706, whereas eighteen are recorded in 1703 and as many as seventy-five in 1711, and an even greater mystery surrounds the mostly blank returns from Saint-Domingue, whose ziwsi/m had certainly been very active in the previous war.2 On the other hand, it is unlikely that the returns from the principal non-French ports in Europe mainly Spanish, but also Malta and Leghornwere seriously deficient; whatever concealment went on in such comparaBourde de la Rogerie, op. at., p. x. For a complete list of the sieges d 'amiraut (to which Sables d'Olonne should be added), and for the boundaries between the Breton amirauts, see ibid., pp. xi-xiii. 2 According to an English prisoner-of-war out of Martinique, writing to the Commissioners of Sick and Wounded on 17 April 1705 (O.S.), that island then had 23 privateers and 1400 men wholly dependent on privateering; they had taken 240 prizes since the beginning of the war and 2000 prisoners, of whom 500 joined the French (P.R.O., S[tate] P[apers] 42/119, fo. io<5). Warre gave Burchett a figure of 250 prizes on 9 September 1704 (O.S.), according to 'the last Advices to France from Martinico' (P.R.O., Admiralty] 1/4089, fo. 615). The surviving dispatches from Martinique in 1705-6 (A.N., Colonies C8A 15 and 16) point to enemy naval pressure as a more effective deterrent; expeditions against St. Kitts and Nevis in 1706 absorbed 1400 and 1000 privateersmen respectively.
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tively out-of-the-way and lawless haunts as the Ionian Islands or the Greek Archipelago, French consular correspondence at this time leaves an impression of regularity and efficiency, while the corsairs generally had too much need of consular protection and technical services to seek to evade jurisdiction.1 While further work is required on the critical sifting of Valincour's abstracts,2 they offer a reasonably reliable basis for indicating the crude statistical outcome of the guerre de course outside American waters. Disregarding such oddities as the ransoms of Fort Gambia in 1702 and 1704, of Nevis by d'Iberville in 1706, of Rio de Janeiro by Duguay in 1711, of Surinam and Curacao by Cassard in 1712-13,3 and confining the calculation to waterborne prizesfrom English men-of-war to the herring-busses of the Maaswe arrive at a total of 7220. Eliminating 245 recaptures and 312 releases (mainly of neutrals), this total is made up of 2118 ransoms and 4545 other condemnations.4 The proportion of ransoms is surprisingly high, but most of them are accounted for by the depredations of Dunkirk and Calais privateers on fishermen and coasters: 726 ransoms to Dunkirk (mainly in Dutch florins) and 793 to Calais (mainly in sterling). Saint-Malo (190) and Brest (149) bring the total chiefly at English expenseto 1858, leaving only 262 to other bases (a fair number of these bills being expressed in Spanish
These observations are based primarily on a reading of the consular correspondence preserved in the archives of the Marseilles Chambre de Commerce, series K, and on the articles of agreement (projets et escrutes d'armement) found in the Ajrchives] D[epartementales], Bouches-duRhne, Amiraut IX B 4-5. My thanks are due to the custodians of these archives for their courteous assistance. 2 A more refined account requires, in particular, the pursuit of cases on appeal which circumstances have not permitted me yet to undertake. 3 The most lucrative hauls were those of Duguay (La Roncire, vii, 538) and Cassard (ibid., p. 546). D'Iberville demanded an indemnity of 42,000 or 1400 slaves as the price of quitting Nevis (R. Bourne, Queen Anne's Navy in the West Indies (New Haven, 1939), p. 207): for the extremely complex liquidation of this cruise and the malversations which attended it, see M. Giraud, Histoire de la Louisiane franfaise, i (Paris, 1953 )> IO4 sei' 4 This figure does not distinguish cases in which a ship but not the cargo (or part of the cargo) was condemned, or vice versa.
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and Portuguese coin). By definition, the sums in question were usually small; they were smaller for Calais than for Dunkirk, but the average even for Dunkirk was below 1500 florins and for British ransoms little more than ^100 in most years. It does not follow, of course, that the cumulative material and moral damage to the sufferers was comparably slight. Although the British and French governments in May 1708 arranged a truce to attacks on home fisheries, which was renewed in September 1710, the Dutch herring fishery endured this form of taxation to the bitter end, in addition to its total losses; there was some decline, though less than might have been expected, in the numbers of busses employed in it during most of the war years.1 In Newfoundland waters, both English and French codfisheries suffered likewise from wasting raids at higher levels of ransom. On the other hand, it is likely enough that some ransom bills were simply the price paid for smuggled goods exchanged at sea. In all, the ransoms paid at sea, if reduced to sterling, may be estimated provisionally at ^38o,ooo.z Measured by the crude numbers of prizes brought into port (less recaptures and releases), the Dunkirk admiralty easily led the field with 959, followed by Brest (506), Calais (461), SaintMalo (374), Toulon (208), Morlaix (183), Marseilles (136), Le Havre (in), Vannes (no), La Rochelle (90), Bayonne (84), Dieppe (74), Nantes (67), Cherbourg (60), La Ciotat (47), Antibes (40), Quimper (32), Boulogne (26), and Collioure
H. A. H. Kranenburg, De Zeevisscherij van Holland in den Tijd der Republiek (Amsterdam, 1946), pp. 219-20. Sailings to the Greenland whale fishery also fell off, but not to the same extent as in 1690-97: see Gerret van Sante (ed.), Alphabetische Naam-Lyst van alle de Groenlandsche en StraatDavische Commandeurs die zedert het jaar 1700 Groenland en zedert het jaar 1719 op de Straat-Davis, voor Holland en andere Provincin, hebben gevaaren (Haarlem, 1770), pp. xxvi-xxvii. 2 The variability of exchange rates makes any exact calculation misleading. I have used contemporary quotations for the Dutch florin at 2s. English; the standard piece of eight at 45.6d.; the silver ducat at 35. 6d.; the cruzado at 4f.; and the livre tournois at i8=ji. This last equation may silghtly undervalue the livre: according to information from Dr. John Sperling, the sterling averaged 17-2 Ihres from 1702 to 1707 and 18-3 livres from 1708 to 1714, if dinrences arising from price fluctuations and accounting procedures are ignored.
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(21). Other French ports account for a further seventy-six prizes, the performance of Bordeaux (n) providing striking
Calendar Year
NUMBERS OF PRIZES (excluding ransoms, recaptures, and releases) adjudged by Conseil des Prises, October iyo2-June 1713.
confirmation of the absence of a strong shipowning interest there in this period. In addition, thirty-four recorded French
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prizes were proceeded against at Ostend and Nieuport; twentysix at San Sebastin, Bilbao, Corunna, and Vigo; five at Lisbon (in 1703); 180 at Cadiz; nineteen in the Canaries; eighty-eight at Mlaga, Cartagena, Alicante, Almera, and Altea (in that order); sixty-five at Messina; sixteen at Malta; sixty-five at Leghorn; and eight at Smyrna, Syrian Tripoli, Tunis, and Algiers. The total for all Mediterranean (including French) ports is only 692, compared with a figure of 3618 for the eastern Atlantic (of which the Channel and North Sea ports from Brest to Ostend account for no less than 2852 or over three-quarters). Something may be learnt about the relative fertility of the European cruising-grounds if the figures are tabulated regionally, if somewhat arbitrarily, as follows:
Dunkirk, with Ostend and Nieuport Calais to Granville Saint-Malo to Nantes Sables d'Olonne to Bordeaux Bayonne to Vigo Lisbon, Cadiz, Canaries Western Mediterranean Eastern Mediterranean 993 785 1282 107 no 204 684 8
4173
A reference to the graph on page 215 will provide a rough comparison from year to year of the performance of the four leading groups above. The balance is made up of 370 prizes brought into the French colonies in America,1 viz. 260 to Martinique, four to Guadeloupe, twelve to Cayenne, eighteen to Acadia, sixty-three to Placentia, seven to Quebec, and four simply described as in ' Amerique' ; the only reference to SaintDomingue is a single ransom confirmed at Cap Francis. Even if this colonial total were doubled, however, it would not bear a significantly greater proportion to the whole than the Mediterranean quota. In fact, the captures reported by English and French colonial governors, when collated with the condemnaFour prizes were also sold at Pondicherrytwo English and two Dutch: Procs-verbaux des deliberations du Cornei! Souvern de la Compagnie des Indes (Pondichry, n.d.), i, 15,19-20, 70, 101-3, io6.
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tions registered in Valincour's depouillement, make a minimum of 700 French colonial prizes perfectly credible, and there were perhaps at least as many ransoms. No reliable estimate of the total sales value of prize ships and goods is yet practicable, but Faulconnier, the historian of Dunkirk, is so nearly accurate about the numbers of prizes condemned there that it is tempting to accept his figure of 30 m. livres-szy 1,666,000for their gross sales value.1 It is not absolutely clear whether he means gross or net product of sale, but other evidence strongly suggests that it is the former and throws serious doubt on Henri Male's figure of 82 m. gross.2 For an account also survives of the prize tenths remitted to Paris by the admiral's receiver at Saint-Malo throughout the war and these aggregate 1,316,071 livres.3 Now, as the tenth was levied after deductions for certain expenses,4 the Malouin sales must have amounted to more than 13,160,710 livres gross that is, to perhaps as much as half Faulconnier's figure for Dunkirk. That this is probably a realistic relationship as between Saint-Malo and Dunkirk, in terms of gross sales, is confirmed by a statement of the admiralty tenths for all ports (including Spanish and colonial) for the single calendar year 1706,5 when to a total of 1,356,595 livres Dunkirk contributed 293,634 and Saint-Malo 134,323 livresrather less than half the Dunkirk value. A figure of 82 m. gross for Dunkirk would require us to believe that its sales fetched over six times those of Saint-Malo over the war as a whole. This is most unlikely. It
Description historique de Dunkerque, 2 vols. (Bruges, 1730), ii, 166. Relying on H. Malo, La Grande Guerre des corsaires, p. 126 (where no explicit source is given for a gross value exceeding 82 m. livres}, Sir George Clark considers that the Dunkirk figure 'far exceeded six millions sterling' ('War Trade and Trade War, 1701-1713', Econ. Hist. Rev., ist ser., i (1927), 263). In converting into sterling here, Sir George Clark seems to have used the higher rate for the livre which prevailed in the Nine Years War. 3 A.N., GS 281. See the graph below, p. 228. 4 These were minor expenses as a rule; the dixieme was levied before deducting therm's de justice, the Invalides tax of 3 dniers on every livre of the gross product of sale, and the cost of subsisting prisoners. 5 A.N., G5 281. This is an account from 15 December 1705 to 31 December 1706.
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Calendar Year
SAINT-MALO. Prize tenths (in livres tournois, in thousands) remitted by Admiralty Receiver in respect of ransoms and sales, 12 November 1702end of 1713.
may be noted that, together with Ostend (38,921 livres}, Dunkirk accounts for about 25 per cent of the whole yield in 1706, and Saint-Malo for only io per cent; but the Breton ports as a whole, into which many Malouin prizes were taken, then aggregated rather more than Dunkirk with Ostend398,200
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against 331,748 livres.1 It is still more interesting that the Flemish and Breton groups together account for well over half the grand total of prize tenths in 1706. The next largest figures for that year are for Toulon (199,572 livres, compared with 162,694 for Brest), Cadiz (79,829), and Martinique (65,551). Calais, on the other hand, in spite of the great number of prizes for which its barques longues were responsible, paid only 43,313 livres in 1706. If the assumption were made that Dunkirk's proportion of the total value of prize sales throughout the war amounted to about a quarter, we might tentatively compute that grand total at four times Faulconnier's figure, at about 120 m. /ivres.This is almost certainly too low. If Saint-Malo's io per cent share of the 1706 values is at all representative of its share of the war total, we should obtain a value for this last rather more than io x io times the tenth which Saint-Malo paid from beginning to end of the warthat is, 10x10x1,316,071 = 131,607,100 livres. If, again, the year 1706 could be regarded as an average year for the yield of prizes as a wholeit was rather below average in terms of crude numbers,2we should obtain a value, for nearly
Such a comparison may give a more just impression of the rewards to Malouin capital, which had a considerable share in armaments at Morlaix, Brest, and Nantes. Moreover, Malouin corsairs not infrequently carried their prizes into other Breton ports (as well as into Cadiz). On the other hand, armateurs and government alike preferred prizes to be prosecuted and sold in the port of armament, near which also the majority of the crew had its home. The chief countervailing factors were the weather and the distance from home. Though captains were usually at liberty to cruise where they thought fit, they were also instructed to send prizes to a port where the principal armateurs had a correspondent, failing their own base, where the diredeur or procureur could keep an eye on the proceedings. The Marseilles escrittes d'armement are particularly instructive on this score. Every privateer had to return to base for the disarmament and pay-ofF: in most cases they brought their prizes with them or came in empty-handed. 2 The totals of prizes and ransoms condemned for each year of the war (excluding recaptures and releases) was as follows: 1702 (May-Dec.): 162 1706: 537 1710: 623 831 1703: 454 1707: 738 1711: 575 1704: 571 1708: 607 1712: 1705: 587 1709: 755 1713 (Jan.-April): 223
Total: 6663. Average for 1703-12: 627-8.
[Footnote continued'overleaf.]
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eleven years of privateering, somewhat exceeding n x i o x 1,356,595 = 149,225,450 livres. Clearly, no great credence can be lent to these calculations at present; but they are perhaps sufficiently consonant to suggest a gross sales value, including ransoms, at least of the order of 140 m. livres, equivalent to roughly .8 m. sterlinga figure by no means out of line with the estimated value of î m. in London's losses alone down to I7O8,1 but scarcely compatible with a figure of o m. for Dunkirk gains alone. The net product, available for distribution to the shareholder, would have been considerably less. It is probable that only some of the captains and principal amateursand the bankers behind themmade much by the course. Few shareholders (intresses] seem to have held large fractions in a privateer, or to have subscribed large sums to the cost of armament when naval ships were chartered. The articles of agreement committed the subscribers as a rule to a single campaign only, this limitation being subject to review in the light of results, for corsairs might well come home without having recovered the cost of their outfitting and of advances in wages to often unreliable crews. That the game went on in spite of many discouragements, however, is a sure indication that gains exceeded losses, even if it is also a sign of the decline of normal trade outletsthe profitable Malouih sailings to Newfoundland fell significantly from eighty in 1702 to nineteen in 1703 (and
These figures provide only a rough indication of the number of captures per annum. Condemnation normally occurred within three months of capture in European waters, but there might be an interval of anything up to a year for overseas cases and longer than three months in any event if a case went on appeal. Delays in the amiraute proceedings were greatest precisely in the most successful ports and occasioned bitter complaints. The Conseil des Prises acted with dispatch but was often held up by the excessive sophistication of the avocis of the parties, according to the critical 'Mmoire sur la course par M. Valincour' of 1711 (A.N., Marine G 144). 1 Historical] Manuscripts] Cfommission], House of Lords MSS., new ser., vii, 183. It is not to be assumed, of course, that the value of cargoes as prize was necessarily as high as if they had reached their intended market, though they might be higher on occasion.
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never exceeded thirty till 1713), for example,1and a symptom of that speculative rage which was to culminate in the Rue Quincampoix. There were certainly times when there were too many armateurs chasing too few seamen.2 These, rather than a shortage of working capital, were normally the chief limitation on the scale of French privateering, which would certainly not have attained the dimensions it did had the navy more continuously employed its registered seamen. One reason for the pre-eminence of Dunkirk, in any case a kind of maritime Alsatia with a large floating population, was doubtless that Flemish seamen were exempt from naval conscription;3 but in the later years of the war the machinery of the inscription maritime did much to facilitate the close partnership between the arsenal at Toulon and the Marseilles capital market (with Lyons in the background), while the armaments of Duguay at Brest were always manned by the commissaires des classes. Although the French Mediterranean course was largely conducted in the king's ships and galleys, 'accorded' to officers who were fertile in projects, the sources reveal beyond doubt that it was the mass of wholly private and usually small armaments
A.D., Ille-et-Vilaine, Amiraut 9 B 402-408. In the Nine Years War, the tonnage employed in the Saint-Malo codfishery fell to less than a quarter of its peace-time level (J. Delumeau, 'Le Commerce malouin a la fin du XVII6 sicle', Amales de Bretagne, Ixvi (1959), 284-5). The codfishers carried abnormally large crews: from this point of view, the decline in sailings to the Antilles could hardly have released similar resources at Nantes or La Rochelle. Moreover, the codfishing vessels were sometimes converted into privateers (Morel, op. at., p. 40). The diminution of Malouin privateering from 1706, conversely, may have owed something to increased involvement in South Sea trading: see House of Commons Journals, xv, 404-5. For the impact of the Nine Years War on Malouin commerce, see J. Delumeau, Le Mouvement du port de Saint-Malo a lan du XVIIe siede, 16811700 (Rennes, 1962). 2 In August 1702, for example, it was stated that many Malouin corsairs were held up for want of a full complement, and Pontchartrain's earlier proposal that manpower be concentrated on half a dozen of the strongest privateers seems not to have been followed (A.N., Marine G 144 and B3 120, fos. 475v-6). For a similar situation at Dunkirk and Calais in August 1711, cf. P.R.O., State Papers Dom. 34/16, fo. 54. 3 Malo, La Grande Guerre des corsaires, p. 141.
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232 Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760 which did most to distress the seagoing trade of the Allies in the Atlantic. It was their frigates and barques longues, of some twenty-six down to six guns or less,1 capable of close inshore sailing and nimble enough to 'wrong' a man-of-war upon a wind, which kept up a more or less unremitting pressure on enemy coasts and sea-lanes and captured most of the prizes, with or without the countenance of small naval squadrons. They could, and often did, increase their fire-power by sailing in company, under a formal agreement either to share their winnings for the duration of a cruiseeven in the event of separation for emergency repairs or for the safeconduct of a prizeor else for a few days. They could keep the sea for two months or longer. Some of them returned to it several times a year, and year after year, without being caught. In the whole war the English captured less than 300 privateers of all strengths.2 Losses, however, were not difficult to replace by capture or building: a new frigate could be constructed in three monthsSaint-Malo alone built twenty-nine frigates in 1703-04.3 These facilities, more than losses, explain the rapid turnover in privateering vessels. Losses were most serious if there were delays in the exchange of prisoners, especially of experienced captains. To have stopped the prisoner-of-war cartels altogether would have been the most certain means of destroying the routine privateers; but so totalitarian a measure seems only to have occurred to Governor Lowther of Barbados, and the most that was done was sometimes to dispatch captured French privateersmen from the Caribbean to Europe4
In the early years of the war, the average Dunkirk capre carried io guns and 60-70 mena few were armed only with hand weaponsbut after 1705 these averages rose to about 15 and 100 respectively, according to the information assembled in the index to Malo, op. cit. The Calais privateers seldom carried more than half a dozen guns. Few of the Bretons carried as many as 26 guns and 170-200 men, which may be taken as the minimum strength of a big privateer. 2 P.R.O., H.C.A. 32/47-86, 90, 92: prize papers. 3 Morel, op. at., p. 42. * C[akndar of] S[tate] P[apers], Col[onial Series, America and West Indies], 1711-12, no. 77: Lowther to Council of Trade and Plantations, Barbados, 20 August 1711 (O.S.); A.N.,Colonies C 8 Ais: MachaulttoPontchartrain, Martinique, 18 August 1703 and 15 December 1704.
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prisoners being expensive to feed, while West India merchantmen usually went short-handed for the voyage home. Once the'partisan' or guerrilla character of most privateering is understood, it is not surprising that the cruising-grounds were normally within a few days' reach of the bases. As the sailors sang to the Spanish ladies, 'From Ushant to Scilly is thirty-five leagues'. The Bretons had only to steer a rhumbline across the Chops of the Channel to catch the plane-chart shipmasters from America and the Mediterranean making for the Blaskets or the Sallies.1 A 'nor-'nor-easterly would carry the corsair even more easily to Cape Finisterre; indeed captains sometimes cruised off Cape St. Vincent and Cape Clear in a single campaign.2 Brest, as Vauban saw, enjoyed an exceptionally advantageous situation with reference to all these stations and that may be why its share of the Breton prizes considerably exceeded that of Saint-Malo, and why the Malouins sometimes armed a few of their privateers there, as they did occasionally at Port-Louis and Lorient. Calais had a similar freedom of choice, as between the Channel and the North Sea; in the North Sea it was the only important competitor of the Dunkirkers. The Dunkirk squadron indeed sometimes marauded as high as Bergen and the Orkneys, and as far south as the Gibraltar Straits; but the Thames or Maas could be reached from Dunkirk in a single tide and most of its capres did well enough in the North Sea itself. When English cruisers took better care of the Soundings, after 1708, privateering became more active near the Portuguese coast, although it was exceptional for an Atlantic privateer to enter the Straits. Geographical factors thus invited what state direction could never have accomplished with such instrumentsa convergence of numerous private interests against the trunk routes and junctions of Allied shipping in the eastern Atlantic, each main group having a limited radius of attack but composing in all a comprehensive
Admiralty Library, Misc. Papers on Naval Matters, p. 49: Halley to Pepys, 17 February 1696 (O.S.), 'touching the yet imperfect measure of knowledge in our ordinary navigation'. 2 A.D., Loire-Maritime, B 4572-4576: enregistrement des rapports des capitaines au long cours, 1705-13.
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strategy based on inner lines which were lengthened by Bourbon Spain. Here diplomacy underwrote geography, notably in negotiating the Spanish decrees of 13 April 1704 which absolved the French from payment of duties on prize goods and allowed them to examine foreign shipping in Spanish harbours. Nowhere, however, was French diplomatic pressure of more importance to the privateering war than in the western Mediterranean, where the chief cruising-grounds lay immediately within the Straits, in the Malta channel, and in the Sea of Tuscany (especially the Piombino channel, which separates Elba from the mainland). In 1706, the grand master was embarrassed at being asked to provide facilities for the sale of prizes and for the provisioning and cleaning of corsair frigates in Malta, but by 1711 this seems to have become a familiar practice.1 The English accused both the Knights and the Italian states of failure to enforce respect for their neutralityexhibiting, for instance, a pious horror of the arrest of the pope's alum2and believed that French influence with them grew as a result of privateering successes in 1711, when, for the first time, the Mediterranean accounted for over a fifth of French prizes. Consul Molesworth wrote from Tuscany in May that year that the Italians themselves were saying that 'notwithstanding our powerfull fleets in the Mediterranean, we sometimes receive worse usage from Neutral Powers than they dare give the French ...'. In July, Admiral Jennings was constrained to observe to the secretary of state that ' there is not one port in Italy, but countenances the Enemies ships, and setts lightly by any damages sustain'd on our parts', and the Admiralty ordered him not to confine himself 'to bare reprizals' if he
A.N., Marine B3 139, fos. 552-4; Royal Malta Library, MS. Arch. 1561, Perellos to Pontchartrain, 22 January 1711.1 owe this last reference to Mr. Roderic E. Cavaliere, who landly sent me a transcript. With some justification, the British came to regard Malta as a kind of French naval base: see Mr. Cavaliero's The Last of the Crusaders: the Knights of St. John and Malta in the Eighteenth Century (1960), p. 48. Cf. P.R.O., S.P. 99/58: Cole to Dartmouth, Venice, 8 August 1710. 2 P.R.O., S.P. 79/6: Henshaw to Dartmouth, Genoa, 24 May 1711.
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failed to obtain damages in such cases.1 On the other hand, it is difficult to miss the point of French seizures of so many food cargoescorn, cheese, rice, salted meat, and horse fodder consigned to Barcelona and Lisbon, mainly in Catalan and Neapolitan vessels furnished with Austrian passports, but sufficiently often in Genoese bottoms to draw repeated diplomatic protests from the Genoese Senate:2 in 1709 Genoese corn merchants had indeed contracted to supply the Allied armies in Catalonia,3 but many of these arrests were wrongful and it says much for the Conseil des Prises, and for the development of prize law, that so many Genoese carriers were released. In bulk, these seizures probably had some influence on the later stages of the war in Spain, especially as they coincided with the intensification of attacks on provision-ships from the British Isles and Holland. In American waters, the worst blows were to fall in 1711-13, from Duguay and Cassard, at Portuguese and Dutch expense. Measured by the number of prizes recorded in the prize judgments at Paris, routine privateering attained its maximum a little earlier, before the loss of its northern base at Acadian Port Royal in October 1710. This was the only 'nest of spoilers' against which action was taken before the demolition of Dunkirk: Sir Stephen Evans, governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, colourfully described it as the Dunkirk of North America.4 Like Dunkirk, it damaged coastal trade and fisheries. But even Boston shipping seems to have had more to endure from Martinique. Certainly the 'Martinicos' have left an uglier mark on English colonial dispatches and the French admiralty
Molesworth to Dartmouth, Florence, 19 May 1711, P.R.O., S.P. 98/23; Sir J. Jennings to same, Barcelona, 4 July 1711, S.P. 42/68; Lords of the Admiralty to same, 3 August 1711, S.P. 42/10, fo. 140. 2 P. Bonnassieux and E. Lelong, Inventane analytiaue des procs-verbaux du Conseil de Commerce, 1700-1791 (Paris, 1900), pp. 59-60, 5 and 26 June 1711. 3 B.M., Add. MS. 28153, fo. 34: George Carpenter to Sir J. Norris, Barcelona, 8 January 1710. * J. P. Baxter (ed.), Documentary History of the State of Maine, ix, 212. Cf. G. M. Waller, Samuel Vetch, Colonial Enterpriser (Chapel Hul, 1960), esp. p. 171.
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judgments bear witness to the number of New England and New York prizes which they took. This was no accident, for there were times when the French Antilles were desperately short of food.1 Their privateers seem chiefly to have cruised to windward of Barbados and the Leewards, which were more closely invested than was Jamaica (by the ' picaroons ' of Logane and Petit Goave), although the Spanish trade of Jamaica was certainly complicated by raids from Martinique in the vital zone between Rio de la Hacha and the Rio Chagre.2 The interest shown by Martinique corsairs in slaveships was illustrated as far afield as the Gambia, where they twice ransomed James Fort.3 Reinforced by refugees from St. Christopher and by some of their English prisoners,4 small enough to evade naval guardships in shoal water, some of them ranged up the North American coasts as high as Acadia.5 Between these poles of iniquity none of the mainland colonies could feel secure, least of all the Virginians whose estates lay along open rivers: the president of the Council of Virginia felt himself justified in fitting out a ten-gun coastguard even if it did no more than quiet the apprehensions of planters and induce them to prepare crops: *It is easy', he told the Board of Trade, 'for a Privateer
On 28 February 1705, the governor-general of the French West Indies, Machault, wrote to Pontchartrain that the dearth had worsened since no prizes had been taken for some time (A.N., Colonies C 8 A 15); the loss of manpower by capture would be a good reason for forbidding the course, but elle fournit les Isles de vivres' (ibid., 15 December 1704). 2 P.R.O., Adm. 1/4089 A, fo. 625: Handasyd to Hedges, Jamaica, 17 September 1704 (O.S.); Adm. 1/4090, fo. 438: Heathcote to Hedges, n December 1705 (O.S.); S.P.Dom. 34/7, fo. 51: Dummer to Hedges, io January 1706 (O.S.); Adm. 1/4091, fo. 221: Sunderland to Lords of Admiralty, 24 February 1707 (O.S.). Cf. H.M.C., House of Lords MSS., n.s., vii, no. 2402. 3 J. M. Gray, A History of Gambia (1940), pp. 142-3, 147-8. 4 Cal.S.P.CoL, 1702, no. 1137: Roberts to Nottingham, Barbados, io November 1702 (O.S.); P.R.O., S.P. 42/119, fo. 106. s J. B. Bartlett (ed.), Colonial Records of Rhode Island, iii, 560-1: Governor and Council to Board of Trade, Newport, 14 September 1706 (O.S.); E. B. O'Callaghan (ed.), Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York, v, 20: Cornbury to Board of Trade, 20 July 1707 (O.S.), Minutes of the Provincial Council of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, 1852), ii, 411-2: S. Finney and others to Cornbury, 3 July 1708 (O.S.).
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to Land at any of those Places in the night, and surprize People in their Beds.' He also deplored what he called 'the drawing off of people to defend die coast' and the need to remove negroes lest they run to the enemy each time the alarm was raised.1 When it is appreciated that a parliamentary indemnity of .100,000 did not suffice to compensate the inhabitants of Nevis and St. Christopher for what they had suffered from d'Iberville's raids,2 the fears of planters on the Chesapeake seem well enough founded: like Indian war parties, the privateers could damage nerves as well as purses. But for this very reason colonial correspondence can be misleading as to the scale of shipping losses in American waters. The French evidence leaves little doubt that even the Anglo-American trades suffered most heavily at the European approaches, when the final returns came home from the whole complex of Atlantic trading. The familiarity with which French privateers treated English coasts gave an edge to the storm in the City of London in the winter of 1707-08, beginning with the setting up of a select committee of the Lords to inquire into 'the State of the Nation in relation to the Fleet and Trade'.3 This was, or became, a real merchants' revolt, not merely an opposition party stunt, though the Junto hoped to get rid of George Churchill, the dominant figure on the admiralty board, and secured a debate in the Lords before the Address of Thanks.4 Prominent in the attack were the Leghorn merchants, angered as much by their ships 'being taken entring the Doors of our own home' as by the scale of their losses, which in January 1708 they estimated at ^250,000 in the previous two months^50,000 more, that is, than the Levant Company claimed to have lost in the whole of 1705. Others, notably the Jamaica and Virginia traders, soon echoed Edward Gould's reflection: 'The Book of Seldens
P.R.O., Adm. 1/3815: Popple to Burchett, 27 October 1707, 29 June 1709, and 12 August 1712 (O.S.). 2 R. Pares, A West India Fortune (1950), p. 49. 3 The Committee was agreed to on 12 November 1707 (O.S.): Journals of the House of Lords, xviii, 338. 4 R. R. Walcott, English Politics in the Early Eighteenth Century (1956), pp. 132-4.
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called Mare Clausum hath been verifyed of late in a contrary sence'.1 The last thing some Mediterranean merchants wanted was convoys, but 1707 was the year of Forbin's stroke at the Russia fleet, the rout of the autumn fleets to Virginia and Lisbonwith 1000 troop horses for the allegedly demoralized Portuguesethe detention of the out-going East Indiamen for seven months at Cork, and of unseasonable sailings to the West Indies. There were therefore demands for more efficient convoys and, above all, for more cruisers in the Channel Soundings and off the Straits of Gibraltar. Was the English admiralty rightly held to blame? What had occurred was in part the price of the Mediterranean offensive1707 was also the year of the Allied expedition to Toulon and in part the consequence of convoying an overseas commerce which had grown not only in size but in complexity. The admiralty had foreseen this at least as early as December 1702, when it protested against ministers' demands for the Virginia and St. Helena convoys: 'It is much to be doubted that if the service should require the Body of the Fleete abroad the next yeare, as it did the last, and that all these ships be allowed as Convoys and Cruizers to protect the severall Trades, the Channell and Coasts of this Kingdome will be greatly exposed to the Insults of the Enemy . . .'.2 In 1707 it could fairly claim that it was unable to spare ships to deal with the Martinique privateers 'in regard there was no small want of proper ships at home to guard the coast', even though it had added to the fourth- and fifth-rates at its disposal for trade defence.3 Nor can anyone go through the secretary's LetterBooks4 and fail to respect the tireless and ingenious manipulation of marginal resources there revealed: Josiah Burchett perP.R.O., Adm. 1/3863: depositions of Edward Gould, 2 November and 8 December 1707 (O.S.); House of Lords MSS., n.s., vii, i8i seq.: petition of Edward Gould and others, 29 January 1708 (O.S.). For the complaints of the colonial merchants, ibid., p. 226 seq. 2 P.R.O., S.P. 42/6, fo. 148 B: 'Statement of Convoys and Cruizers proposed for next year', 3 December 1702 (O.S.). 3 H.M.C., House of Lords MSS., n.s., vii, 315. 4 P.R.O., Adm. 2/403-442.
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haps had the kind of mind that used to refresh itself in Bradshaw. Yet the French evidence makes it clear at last that the merchants did not grossly exaggerate the size of British shipping losses. Their total of 3600 ships may have been guesswork, though perhaps not the figure of 1146 London shipsvalued with their cargoes at over .1 m.included in it.1 The Conseil des Prises had in fact condemned 1969 ships and ratified the ransom of 1020 others before 1707 was outa round total of 3000, to which must be added at least 250 captures in the West Indies recorded elsewhere. And at least three-quarters of these prizes were ships of British register, to say nothing of cargo carried on British account by the captured vessels of allies and neutrals, or of unrecorded captures. The proportion of British losses, though not so high, remained well above half that of the Allies as a whole during the remainder of hostilities, when a failing and desperate enemy took some 2600 prizes in addition to uoo ransoms: hardly more than 200 fell to him after the Anglo-French Cessation of Arms had taken effect in the autumn of 1712. This argues only a very limited success for the new emphasis on trade defence in British naval policy which followed the Cruisers and Convoys Act2 of March 1708. More sixth-rates were built and rather more French privateers were captured169, compared with 125 before 1708but many of them still, significantly, near the North Foreland, the Isle of Wight, and the Lizard.3 The Dunkirkers did not quite recover the brilliance of 1707 and it is notable that many of the Malouins were failing to take any prizes at all; but these were the best years for other ports, including Calais. We no longer hear of the French killing bullocks in Lundy Island and snatching sheep from County Kerry, and it looks as if the Ordnance Office was better able to assist local initiative in strengthening coastal fortifications;
H.M.C., House of Lords MSS., n.s., vii, 183. Cf. the figure of 1000 ships and 2 m. given by Warre to Burche, 9 September 1704 (O.S.): P.R.O., Adm. 1/4089, fo. 615. 2 6 Anne c. 65, summarised in Owen, op. at., pp. 284-5. 3 Charles Derrick, Memoirs of the Rise and Progress of the Royal Navy (1806), pp. 118-20; P.R.O., H.C.A. 32/47-86, 90, 92: prize papers.
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yet the Lord Advocate of Scotland complained on 12 March 1709 'how much Our Forth and all our Coast northward beyond Aberdeen is infested with small contemptible French Privateers that take up our ships in our very view and how little the Cruizers hitherto sent have assisted in this matter'.1 If London's coal stocks were never again reduced to one week's supply, as happened in iyo3,2 that was not because interference with Lowestoft and Yarmouth shipping was discontinued. The privateers no longer 'laid a boom across British seas', as they had done in 1707, and British cruisers more continuously policed the Soundings gateway; but there was more French activity near the Portuguese coast and within the Straits. Insurance at Venice, in September 1710, was quoted at 20 guineas per cent 'owing to French privateers'as high, that is, as the rate for Straits-bound shipping in November 1707, though six guineas below the rate for the homeward run in that exceptionally perilous month.3 Anglo-American trade, too, now suffered less in the English 'Mare Clausum', but homeward freights from Barbados did not fall below - per ton of sugar (with one exception) until 1711: in 1710 they were up to j8 or even 10the rate ruling in I7o8.4 These rates were two or three times pre-war and not, I think, entirely on account of higher war-time wages (which might, however, go far to explain why homeward freights from Jamaica were double those from Barbados). It would be dangerous to read too much into the general Balance of Trade figures, which in 1709-11 show a fall in British export values from the levels of 1707-8 and (more revealingly, perhaps) a drop in imports in 1711.s I cannot, however, follow Sir George Clark in denying
P.R.O., Adm. 1/4092, fo. 228: Stewart to Queensberry, Edinburgh, 12 March 1709 (O.S.). 2 T. S. Ashton and J. Sykes, The Coal Industry of the Eighteenth Century
(1929), p. 201.
1
3 P.R.O., S.P. 99/58: Cole to Dartmouth, Venice, 19 September 1710. Cf. H.M.C., House of Lords MSS., n.s., vii, 182. 4 This information was kindly communicated to me by Mr. K. G. Davies. 5 Davenant's table in Sir G. N. Clark, Guide to English Commercial Statistics (1938), p. 149. Import values throughout the war remained at least one-quarter, and usually over one-third, below the levels of 1700 and
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St. John's veracity when he claimed, in a letter to Drummond on 28 November 1710 (O.S.), that 'our trade sinks'.1 Certainly no judgment on his peace policy or the Tory conduct of naval affairs should overlook the pressure of the French privateering war in those last strange years. Further, when St. John wrote to Drummond that Dutch commerce 'flourishes to a great degree',2 we may also believe him. From 1705 the Dutch had been trading at French ports in hundredsthey had taken off quantities of French prize goods, for one thingand the ordinance revoking their passports had only just been published, on 19 November. This, according to Heinsius, was their most important trade.3 The Conseil du Ro stopped it as the best way to dispose them to a peace, but also because the measure was expected to give the course a boost; the armateurs had continually complained of the abuse of French passes by Dutch ships bound to non-Dutch destinations.4 In conjunction with the evidence of the prize jugements, this strongly suggests that during the greater part of this war Dutch commerce was not, after all, harder hit than British. The accepted view that it suffered more is only true, if at all, for the very last years. It is true, though not generally realised, that Dutch victims were more conspicuous at Dunkirk, trivial in value as were the numerous fishing doggers of Zierikzee and the Maas towns to be ransomed; but no other French bases, not even Calais, fattened primarily at Dutch expense. Almost certainly, the Dutch were far more deeply hurt by the loss of their French trade, following as it did, within less than a year, a renewal of naval hostilities in the Baltic. But in these new circumstances, clearly, they could the less afford an intensification of French privateering attacks.
1701. Cf. G. Chalmers, Estimate of the Comparative Strength of Great Britain (1794), p. 89. The Later Stuarts, 1660-1714 (1934), p. 225. 2 Quoted ibid. 3 The evidence for these statements is in my article, 'Le Commerce de la France de l'Ouest et la guerre maritime, 1702-1712', below, chapter 17, pp. 389-406. * A.N., F12 55, fos. 182-91: minutes of Conseil de Commerce, n and 18 July 1710.
12
PROJETS ET CONTRATS D'ARMEMENT EN COURSE MARSEILLAIS, 1705-1712 Une histoire definitive de la course demanderai!, entre autres choses, plus de connaissances que nous n'en possdons de ses structures financires ; d'autant plus que celles-ci varient sans doute selon les ports, les types de campagnes envisages, les regles du droit national et international, et mme suivant la coutume rgionale : de l des differences chaqu fois introduites dans les conditions de son fonctionnement. La question delicate de sa rentabilit ne peut encore tre aborde qu' partir des indications approximatives suggres par la multiplication des commissions en guerre ou les courbes des nombres bruts de prises [mais rarement de leur valeur] (1); aussi demeurons-nous a l'heure actuelle mal renseignes, du moins pour la plupart des ports francais (2), sur tout ce qui concerne les socits d'armement en course : leur ordre d'importance, la facon de s'y intresser et les sommes souscrites, le caractre de Jeurs associs et leurs rapports entre eux. Quel a pu tre, par exemple, le role exact d'un directeur ou d'un dpositaire dans une entreprise qui se distingue aussi nettement du commerce maritime normal ? Jusqu' quel point ont-ils cherch a imposer leur loi aux capitaines ? Arrive-t-il, au contraire, que
(1) On peut citer Anne MOREL, La guerre de course a Saint-Malo (1681-1715) , dans Mmoires de la soc. d'hist. et d'arch. de Bretagne, t. XXXVII, 1957, p. 5-103, et 't. XXXVIII, 1958, p. 29-169 (tableau des armements), et Ulane BONNEL, La France, les Etats-Unis et la guerre de course, 1797-1815, Paris, Nouv. ed. latines, 1961, p, 319 sqq. Quant aux valeurs des prises, j'ai fait une tentative d'estimation, surtout pour Saint-Malo, dans mon article The French Privateering War 1702-1713 , Historical Essays presented to David Ogg (d. H.E. Bell et R.L. Ollard), Londres, A. & C. Black, ci-dessus, 207 sqq., dont un graphique a t reproduit par Jean DELUMEAU, Le Mouvement du port de Saint-Malo, 1681-1720, Paris, Klincksieck, 1966, p. xvi. (2) Je n'ai pas consult les travaux de J. Ottenhof et de M. Launay sur la course nantaise pendant les guerres de la Ligue d'Augsbourg et de la Succession d'Espagne (D.E.S., Rennes, 1960-1962).
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des capitaines, ayant pris l'initiative d'un armement, aient su en garder la direction essentielle ? Malgr les ouvrages tiles du Dr L. Lemaire et d'Henri Malo concernant Dunkerque, malgr toute la littrature consacre a Duguay-Trouin, il nous manque des rponses satisfaisantes a tout ce lot de questions, meme pour une poque dnomme, il y a quarante ans dj, par La Roncire, l'apoge de la guerre de course . En attendant le dpouillement des archives des juridictions consulaires et sur tout des minutes notariales, qui seules peuttre offriront un jour une ide plus ou moins exacte de la structure des investissements corsaires, on peut utiliser la srie d'actes de vente et de socit enregistrs par l'amiraut de Saint-Malo de 1681 a 1791 (3). Un examen, mme superficie!, convainc cependant qu'il ne s'y trouve qu'une tres petite fraction des armements en course malouins du rgne de Louis XIV. Relativement plus nombreuses, et d'ailleurs beaucoup plus dtailles, sont les quatrevingts escrites ou escriptes , contrats sous seings prives pour le financement d'un armement en guerre, qui furent enregistres au greife de l'amiraut de Marseille entre le 18 fvrier 1705 et le 25 aot 1712 (4). Nous n'avons pu determiner pourquoi l'enregistrement de ces actes de socit commence en 1705 ; et nos recherches dans les archives des amirauts de Ponant ne nous ont pas revel une documentation comparable. Les deux premiers contrats de cette prcieuse srie sont dnomms respectivement convention prive et lettre de convention : il s'agit de conventions passes exclusivement entre capitaines et administrateurs (5) ; la premire se rfre a une escritte prive, destine a tre dresse en double exemplaire, ou chaqu intresse doit declarer le capital qu'il s'engage a apporter a la socit. Cette escrite des fonds elle-mme apparat dans
(3) Arch. dep. Ille-et-Vilaine, 9 B 165 a 186. (4) Arch. dep. Bouches-du-Rhne, IX B 4 et 5 (cit ci-aprs Am. Mile). Ces deux volumes font partie de la srie des enregistrements de l'amiraut de Marseille. On en trouvera une analyse dans l'Inventaire somtnaire des archives dpartementales antrieures a 1790 : Bouches-du-Rhne. Archives civiles, srie B, t. IV, 1932, p. 119-223 (par M. de MARIN et R. BUSQUEI). Le dpouillement que nous avons fait de ces registres remonte a 1958, et nous tenons a remercier ici M. Edouard Baratier de l'amabilit avec laquelle il nous a accueilli aux archives dpartementales des Bouches-du-Rhne. Depuis la redaction de ce travail, M. Charles CARRIRE a soutenu en Sorbonne, le 12 dcembre 1970, une these de doctoral d'Etat consacre aux Negotiants marseillais au XVHI' sicle, ouvrage dsormais fundamental pour la connaissance des milieux de l'armement a Marseille. Malheureusement, a l'heure o nous corrigeons ces lignes, cet ouvrage n'est pas encore depose a la bibliolhque de la Sorbonne. (5) Ibid., IX B 4, f 273 et 314-316 : Ia Sub t Ule (cap. Jos. Brontin) et la Fortune-de-a-Mer (cap. Jos. Maillet).
Projets et Contrats d'Armement en Course Marseilles
245
les enregistrements de l'amiraut de Marseille le 12 octobre 1705, avec l'accord entre Barthlmy Dedons, capitaine et ci-devant propritaire de la Notre-Dame de la Garde Saint-Franfois, et ses armateurs : elle mentionne soixante-seize souscriptions pour un total de 44 922 livres, allant des 5 000 livres payees comptant par le sieur Flix Gibert, dpositaire, jusqu'a de toutes petites sommes [100 livres et mme 50] (6). Voil dj une pratique trs diffrente des actes malouins, qui s'expriment en parts de vaisseaux ; mais il y en a d'autres. andis que les Malouins se contentent, en general, de donner pleins pouvoirs a un seul armateur sous reserve de la libert pour chacun de quitter la societ, aprs une ou plusieurs campagnes, les escrites marseillaises foisonnent de pactes et conditions : celles-ci rglent naturellement les droits et les obligations des directeurs, mais ne se limitent pas a cela. Ces conditions, au vrai assez variables dans leur formulation, leur longueur et leur contenu, forment une part essentielle de l' escrite , laquelle, en outre, s'attache ordinairement a une estimation plus ou moins dtaille des frais d'armement, que vont couvrir les souscripteurs. Cette estimation s'appelle le projet d'armement . En cartant les deux premires conventions de fvrier 1705, ainsi que trois enregistrements particuliers de 1711-1712 (7), nos escrites se rpartissent comme suit au fil des annes :
1705 . . . . 1706 . . . . 1707 . . . .
4 l O
1708 . . . . 3 1709 . . . . 8 1710 . . . . 22
1711 . . . . 27 1712 . . . . 10 TOTAL ... 75
Certes, il ne faut pas chercher dans ce tableau un miroir fidele de l'activit marseillaise en matire de course. Il suffit, en premier lieu, de se reporter aux dpches de l'intendant de la marine a Toulon pour apprcier toute l'importance des capitaux marseillais dans les armements toulonnais, dont plusieurs contrats se retrouvent parmi nos escrites , avec quelques autres passs a Martigues, a Cassis et a La Ciotat. A l'inverse, les armements marseiilais recueillaient des souscriptions un peu partout, parfois hors de la Provence. A se borner aux armements enregistrs a Marseille mme, il existe une contradiction flagrante entre le
(6) Ibid., IX B5, f 291 v"-295. (7) Pour deux cas (ibid., IX B 4, f 728, et IX B 5, f 117), il s'agit d'un changement de directeur (et de capitaine aussi pour le premier) ; le troisime (IX B 4, f 675 v") est une simple declaration de propriet. Notre liste comprend quatre rarmements, dont un scul ne dut pas recourir a un nouvcl appel de fonds (cf. infra, note 32).
246
tableau ci-dessus et les chiffres suivants des commissions en course galement enregistres par l'amiraut de Marseille (8) :
1705 . . . .
1706 . . . .
9
3
1708 . . . .
1709 . . . .
4
2
1711 . . . . 10
1712 ....
1
1707 . . . .
1710 . . . .
TOTAL . . . 35
Admettons l'insouciance avec laquelle, au crpuscule du grand rgne, ce registre a pu tre tenu, puisqu'il ne renferme au total que quarante commissions pour la guerre de Succession d'Espagne, centre deux cent dix pour les annes 1689-1697 (9); il demeure vident que les armateurs n'ont pris que progressivement l'habitude de faire enregistrer leurs actes de socit a l'amiraut. Pourtant, des 1708 on semble en droit de parier d'habitude : dans les jugements du Conseil des prises des annes 1708-1713, en effet, on ne rencontre que peu de corsaires ayant amene des prises a Marseille, qui n'avaient pas fait pralablement l'objet d'une escrite enregistre a l'amiraut ; et l'on peut apportar la preuve que la plupart des exceptions s'expliquent par l'appartenance a un autre port d'attach (10). Ce tmoignage n'a certes ren de concluant : bien que les enlvements par l'ennemi aient t moins frequents en Mediterranee que dans les mers du Nord (11),
(8) Ibid., IX B 4, passim. Nous laissons de cte une quinzaine de commissions en guerre et marchandises , qui ne donnent jamais lieu a des escrites enregistres. (9) Ibid., IX B 3. Cf. Paul MASSON, Histoire du commerce francais dans le Levant au XVII' sicle, Paris, 1896, p. 294-295, note. (10) A.N., G5 245 a 255 : enregistrement des jugements de prises. Il y a naturellement un dcalage de plusieurs mois au moins entre les dates des escrites et celles des jugements. Laissant toujours de cte quelques armements en guerre et marchandises (pour quoi, rappelons-le, nous ne disposons pas d' escrites enregistres), on relve cependant trois armements marseillais dont les escrites sont enregistres postrieurement au jugement : Esprit Gassin, la Fortune (jugement 1709, escrite 1710) ; Louis Grasson, Ie Faucon (mars 1711, escrite en avril) ; Francois Matalian, Ie Saint-Joseph (1711, escrite 1712). En 1709 des prises ont t confisques aux capitaines Tourre, la Notre-Dame-du-Mont-Carme!, Forgerol, la Sainte-Genevive, et Gaspard Martin, la Fortune-de-la-Mer, galement di tes de Marseille mais sans qu'on les trouve panni les escrites , non plus que 'Hirondelle (Sabatier) et le Terrible (Jure) en 1711, bien que l'armement de la premire, sous le commandement de Jure, ait fait l'objet d'une escrite vers la fin de 1709 ; Mathieu Tourre et C.H.V. Jure (cette fois cap. de la Renommee) ont connu des russites en 1708 sans laisser de trace dans les escrites . Il est vident en outre qu'il y eut des armements de La Ciotat (Brue, Jauffret) et de Cassis (Espitallier, Fougasse, Joseph Brmond, les premiers armements d'Honor Brmond, les derniers de Jean Pascon) qui n'y figurent pas. (11) Sans aller plus loin, voir la London Gazette, ou les prises de corsaires francais sont signales deux fois par semaine, surtout de Falmouth, grande base des commissie-vaarders de Flessingue et de Middelbourg. Les dossiers de prises a Londres (Public Record Office, H.C.A. 32/82 et 84) ne font tat que de trois captures de corsaires marseillais : le Sage, 38 canons
247
il est, en effet, plus d'un corsaire qui n'a jamais effectu une prise, ou n'en a jamais fait rapport devant une amiraut (12). Rien de plus banal galement, pour les corsaires marseillais, que l'utilisation des ports trangers pour la vente de leurs prises ; mais rien aussi de plus courant que l'insistance des escrites a exiger que les prises soient conduites autant que possible au port d'armement. Aussi bien un dnombrement provisoire (les rangons mises a part) des prises franchises amenes dans les ports mditerranens, que ce soit ou non par les Marseillais (13), traduit-il assez fidlement, ds l'anne 1709, le rythme d'enregistrement de nos contrats :
1705
Marseille . . La Ciotat Toulon Livourne Messine Malte . Malaga Carthagne Alicante Totaux .
5 1 23 4 1
1706
15 1 17 3
1
1707
5 1 28 1 12 6
1708
8 4 14 g
1709
13 4 18 7
6 8 1
1710
24 7 21 13 6 4 2 3
1711
40 19 27 21 7 11 11 7 4
147
1712
16 3 21 4 5 1 1 9 7 67
10
35
37
53
44
57
80
II convieni de s'arreter sur le cas de Toulon, dont les vaisseaux du roi, point tous prts aux particuliers, introduisent ici une
(1710) ; le Toulouse, 60 c. (1711) ; le Saini-Fratifois-Xavier, 6 e. (1712). Ce dernier fut pris a la hauteur de Lisbonne, bien que les Marseillais soient rarement entres dans l'Atlantique comme simples corsaires. Assurment les Zlandais, trs forts en Mediterranee, en ont enlev d'autres. (12) Au moins une quinzaine des armements marseillais qui figurent parrai les escrites , y compris les trois diriges par Cl. Clron et les deux command es par Fr. Pepinet. Le nombre exact n'est pas certain, puisqu'il est intervenu des changenients de capitaine : par exemple, il est probable que la Bien-Aime (Ant. Simiane), qui poursuivit des campagnes fructueuses, est le mme btiment que celui pour lequel fut enregistre une escrite mentionnant comme capitaine Louis de Barillon (Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 696 V697) dont on n'entend plus parier. (13) A.N., G5 239 sqq. Il faudrait ajouter au tableau deux prises amenes a Martigues (1711-1712) et une demi-douzaine en Barbarie (Alger et surtout Porto-Farina) ; trois, qui appartienncnt aux Marseillais sur les cinq prises amenes aux echelles du Levant (deux a Tripoli de Syri, en 1712, et trois a Smyrna, en 1713) ; quelques-unes aussi a Cadix, o toutefois la grande majorit revient aux Ponantais. N'appartiennent pas aux corsaires marseillais une vingtaine de prises amenes a Collioure, une quarantaine a Antibes, ainsi que neuf a Saint-Tropez et trois a Frjus. Au total, le nombre des prises marseillaises dfinitivement adjuges, entre 1705 et 1714, doit dpasser 200, en plus des rancons, relativement rares cependant au regard de ce qui se passait dans la mer du Nord.
248
certame distorsin ; mais en gros, a ce qu'il nous semble, il n'y a pas lieu de douter que la plupart des armements en course effectus a Marseille pendant la deuxime phase de la guerre de Succession d'Espagne n'apparaissent dans la srie de nos escrites , qui devaient, comme quelques-unes le disent expressment, avoir autant de force qu'un contrai pass devant notaire. Par armement marseillais il faut entendre un armement dont la direction sigeait a Marseille mais dont les capitaines provenaient souvent de Toulon ou d'autres ports proven?aux (comme les Brmond, grande familie corsaire de Cassis), sinon du Ponant (14). Il en va de mme pour les investissements, tout en accordant sur ce point a la place de Marseille la part du lion. Inversement, la part de cette place dans les importants armements de Toulon reste difficile a prciser. Le poids nous en est rappel par l'histoire de la liquidation du clbre armement de Cassard qui ravagea les Antilles en 1712-1713 (15). Des 1709 au plus tard, Cassard, capitaine de brlot du 24 juin 1709, puis capitaine de fregate du 20 janvier 1710, apparait tres li avec les armateurs et les chevins de Marseille (16); il s'tait d'ailleurs associa a plusieurs de leurs armements comme simple intresse (17), et ce fut une direction marseillaise qui assura son armement de l'automne 1710, dont Ie pro j et atteignit la somme extraordinaire de 250000 livres (18). Fait significatif, ce sont les mmes
(14) Tres nombreux pendant la guerre de la Ligue d'Augsbourg, les Malouins ne paraissent plus comme capitaines corsaires a Marseille ; mais, en 1706, on y rencontre Jacques Avril, Nantais comme Cassard, capitaine de flute du 29 sept. 1707 : Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Voyage, Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 368-9. (15) Am. Mile, IX B 5, f 256 : ordre du roi qui accorde sursance pour ses dettes a Jos. Maillet, un des plus forts intresses a cet armement, qui le determina a une visite en Hollande en 1714 (rancon de Curasao, etc.). Cf. Ch. de LA RONCIRE, Histoire de la marine francaise, t. VI, Paris, Plon, 1932, p. 540 sqq. (16) Ibid., p. 399 sqq ; A.N. Marine, B3 172, f 366 v, 376. Cf. G. RAMBERT, Histoire du commerce de Marseille, t. IV, Paris, Plon, 1954, p. 351. (17) II contribua pour moiti a celui de l'Hirondelle (Jure) en dec. 1709 et prit intrt dans la Sainte-Marguerite (3,000 L), la Bien-aime (1,000 1.), et l'armement de Grandpr (4,000 L) en 1710-11 : Am. Mile IX B 4, f>' 565, 609, 696 ; et IX B 5, f 32. (18) Ibid., IX B 4, f 652-3 : souscription de 115,000 livres (surtout fournie par les directeurs : Jean Dieud, Guitton, Gleise, Jos. Maillet, Roussel et Cle) ; Cassard lui-mme, inscrit pour 15,000 livres, s'oblige de fournir ou de faire fournir le reste , mais il est parti pour la cte de Catalogne, debiteur de plus de 10,000 ecus pour fournitures et se fiant au succes de son proces (instruit par le subdelegu) contre la Chambre d'abondance. Selon d'Aligre, chef d'escadre, les chicanes chimriques du commerce, pour viter de lui payer son convoi des bles de Turquie au printemps de 1710, dcourageaient les apports de fonds pour ce deuxime armement : A.N. Marine, B3 185, f' 159, 467, 496 ; ibid., 187, f' 342, 384 v.
249
directeurs qui, un an plus tard, dirigent l'armement de MM. de Grandpr et de Galliffet (l'un capitaine de vaisseau et commissaire general d'artillerie a Toulon, le second aide-major), avec un capital initial (150000 livres) exceptionnellement lev (19). Cette fois, malgr la predominance de Joseph Maillet, de Marseille, 1' escrite est date de Toulon, et c'est encore le cas de l'armement, infiniment plus modeste (11,233 livres), du Saint-Antoine-de-Padoue (capitaine Antoine Fourbin), dirige par Lazare Vielh, Marseillais galement, en 1711. Vielh explique qu'il pourrait avoir besoin de recourir a l'amiraut de Marseille, nonobstant les expeditions prises a l'amiraut de Toulon et attendu la residence en cette ville du suppliant (20). Il pense surtout a la liquidation des prises, lesquelles, d'aprs le contrai pass a Toulon, devront tre conduites a Marseille. Pareil motif inspire, de facon plus rvlatrice, I' escrite , apparemment toulonnaise, qui rgia l'armement de Grandpr : Toutes les prises qu'on pourra faire et qu'on destiner de faire venir aux ports de la coste de Provence seront envoyes a Marseille a l'adresse desdits directeurs, comme estant l'endroit le plus convenable pour la vente avantageuse des marchandises, quy seront sous les yeux des directeurs et quy sont d'ailleurs exemptes de divers droits qu'on est oblige de payer partout ailleurs. Et ce qu'on ajoute sous une autre rubrique rappelle la plus grande commodit du march marseillais : Les armateurs de Marseille et de tout autre port de Provence pourront fournir des lettres de change pour les prochains payements des Saints, ou des billets a ordre payables par tout le niois de dcembre prochain, dont ils supporteront la perte de la ngociation, et les directeurs les endosseront et en seront garants... (21) En vrit, .tant donne l'importance du march marseillais pour les armements de Toulon (22), on se serait attendu a 1'enre(19) Maillet y entre pour 32,000 livres, contre 13,500 versees dans l'armement Cassard ; les quatre autres directeurs ne souscrivent que de 4,000 a 6,000 livres, c'est--dire la moiti ou le quart de ce qu'ils avaient fait pour Cassard. On arme deux vaisseaux du ro : le Toulouse, 60 c., et le Trident, 56 c. (20) Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 734 V-735. (21) Ibid., IX B 5, f 30 v-32. Le Toulouse devait tre pris par une escadre britannique. (22) Nombreuses references au fil de la correspondance entre Toulon et le ministre : voir surtout les lettres de Vauvr des 17 janv. 1709 et 13 juillet 1711 : A.N. Marine, B3 174, f 19 ; et 200, f" 80-86.
250
gistrement a Marseille d'un nombre plus lev de contrats toulonnais (23). Il n'en est rien, et ce qui reste des archives de l'amirau de Toulon nous laisse malheureusement sur notre faim. Avant d'esquisser ce que peut apporter notre documentation, il faut bien marquer comment les affaires de course marseillaises pouvaient tre soutenues a leur tour par les ressources du port militaire de Toulon. Lorsqu'il s'agissait d'un pret de vaisseau, l'initiative revenait presque toujours a l'intendant ou a un officier de la marine royale ; il appartenait ensuite a l'intendant de faire connatre son avis a Versailles (24) et de ngocier avec les armateurs un contrai dont le texte tait soumis au ministre. Ces vaisseaux du roi n'apparaissent gure dans nos escritas . Font exception les armements de Cassard en 1710 et de Grandpr en 1711, six armements de galres du roi [deux ou trois ensembles] (25), et, en 1710, l'armement d'une galiote et de deux brigantins, dont le responsable envers le roi fut Charles Davy, baiili de la Pailleterie, chef d'escadre et inspecteur des galres, a qui revenait un cinquime des prises (26). Tout suggre done que ce sont essentiellement les vaisseaux du roi armes par les particuliers qui nous chappent quand nous voulons valuer d'aprs les "escrites enregistres l'intret port par les Marseillais a la course ; du moins, aprs que le roi ait effectivement renonce a son cinquime sur les prises faites dans ces conditions : l'ordonnance du 1er juillet 1709 constitue a cet gard une date capitale. L'intendant de Vauvr avait auparavant deplor l'indiffrence des armateurs : les armements de Toulon, crivait-il le 24 janvier 1709, ne se font que par les officiers du dpartement et quelques gens de la ville (27) ; il eut par la suite beaucoup a dire sur la collaboration entre Toulon et Marseille.
(23) La direction de l'armement de Grandpr se contente de designer un caissier pour avoir soin a Toulon de payer toutes les despances... sur ses billets . L'escrite de la Fortune-Galre, dirige par J. Laurens et P. Ballon, est aussi date de Toulon : Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 603. (24) Sur Joseph Maillet, par exemple, dont le commissaire ordonnateur Levasseur crit au ministre le 5 juin 1712 : Ce ngociant ne manque pas de bonne volont ; elle est accompagne de beaucoup d'intelligence, et d'un zle qui le rend capable des plus grandes entreprises, tant que son crdit Ie soutient (A.N. Marine, B3 208, P 290 V). (25) Am. Mile IX B 4, p 500 V-502 (Toussaint de Fortia, chev. de Pilles), 619 v-620 (chev. de Manse Mongres), 653-654 (marquis de Pontevez), 713 v716 (de Manse Mongres et de Pilles), 728 V-731 v (chev. de Laubpin). Tous ces officiers appartenaient au corps des galres. (26) Ibid., f 600 v-601 : la Sirenne (Jean Pallis). Le baiili touche le cinquime royal. (27) A. N. Marine, B3 174, f 31 (a Pontchartrain). Cf. LEBEAU, Nouveau Code des prises, Paris, an VII, t. I, p. 339-340, pour l'ordonnance du 1er juillet 1709.
Projets et Controls d'Armement en Course Marseillais
251
Du point de vue des armateurs, cette collaboration, maintenant plus sduisante, facilitait le recrutement des equipages, car le pret des vaisseaux du ro avait la faveur des services de l'administration des classes. De facn plus occulte, les officiers de la marine apportaient aux armements corsaires, dont l'quipage tait essentiellement recrut par les capitaines, une connaissance intime du Systeme des classes et assuraient a l'tat-major le concours d'un cercle d'amis (28). Certains d'entre eux disposaient aussi de fonds importants. M. de Grandpr, qui visita Marseille a la recherche d'argent pour son armement du Toulouse et du Trident, au printemps de 1711, sut y interesser Joseph Maillet pour la somme de 32 000 livres ; mais lui-mme et ses consorts soni compts pour 82 000 livres sans parier de 4 000 livres respectivement a l'actif de Cassard et de Galliffet. Le personnel de la marine royale avait ici souscrit les trois cinquimes du capital initial (29). Cet exemple, il est vrai, dpasse de loin les contributions des officiers des galres, ou celle d'un Francois de Pepinet, chef de brigade des gardes de la marine (30). L'exemple de Grandpr claire en fait la manire dont les armements en course a Toulon ont pu profiter des fortunes et des relations personnelles de certains officiers, tandis que la plupart, aprs tout, n'avaient a apporter que leur pe et quelquefois une part de leurs appointements (31). On les retrouve assez souvent, eux et leurs amis , intresses aux armements marseillais, mais pour des sommes modestes. N'oublions pas, d'autre part, que plus d'un capitaine toulonnais Antoine Fourbin, Joseph Braud, Antoine Alardon, Cyprien Daniel n'appartenaient pas, de toute evidence, a la marine royale.
(28) Lorsque le commissaire ordonnateur presse Cassard de chercher par toutes sortes de moyens d'engager les meilleurs officiers..., il a demand avec insistance de ne ren changer a ceux qu'il proposoit... ayant avec eux des engagements qui pourroient dranger son armement s'ils n'toient pas executes : Levasseur a Pontchartrain, le 19 octobre 1710 (A. N. Marine, B3 187, f 251). (29) Grandpr a d agir en croupier, a en croire l'esente du 16 octobre 1711, ou ses directeurs s'exonrent de toute responsabilit pour des personnes de Paris qui pourront y prendre interests . (30) L'investissement du chevalier de Laubpin dans son armement de l'Amazonne et \'Eclat ant e (49,600 livres) fut dix a vingt fois plus important que les interets des autres chevaliers dans les leurs : tait-il, lui aussi, croupier ? (31) Dans l'armement de la Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde-Sant-Franfois (Dedons, 1705), deux officiers s'acquittent par des billets sur le trsorier de la marine, trois autres par les trois mois08 d'appointements dont l'armement leur sera redevable (Am. Mile, IX B 5, f 292-295) : c'est ce dernier exemple que Ton suivra plus tard.
252
Ayant ainsi delimit la portee de nos escritas , tentons de dgager ce qu'elles nous apprennent de la structure financiero des armements en course. Nous jetterons ensuite un coup d'oeil sur les rapports entre les capitaines et les armateurs, entre les directeurs et les intresses. Soulignons qu' Marseille, a 1'encontre de l'usage malouin, on n'einploie gure le mot armateur pour designer un directeur d'armement ; on 1'appelle presque toujours directeur ou procureur , quelquefois armateur general , ou armateur procureur , ou procureur administrateur . Les armateurs sont simplement Messieurs les intresses . Pour soixante-treize armements sur un total de soixante-quinze, nous disposons de la liste des participations (32) ; le montant des placements atteint 2 844 603 livres, soit une moyenne d' peu prs 40 000 livres. Ce chiffre tient compte des armements de Cassard en 1710 (trois vaisseaux et une galiote : 115000 livres (33) et de Grandpr en 1711 (deux vaisseaux : 150000 livres), ainsi que de deux autres gros armements, galement en 1711 : celui des trois galres du roi commandes par Ie chevalier de Laubpin (109244 livres) et celui de la J our don-Galre, construction neuve de 10000 quintaux et de trente-six canons (101700 livres). Au bas de l'chelle on trouve, par exemple, la Fidelle, coraline emprunte au roi en 1710 (2 100 livres) : avec un seul canon, quatre pierriers, trente fusils, trente pistolets et trente sabres, elle rappeile gaillardement les chaloupes corsaires de Calais ou de Bayonne. On relve aussi deux petits armements de brigantins, a 1 256 et 2 060 livres ; deux galiotes, a 3 100 et 3 850 livres ; et un autre btiment a rames, nouvellement construit, avec deux canons et six pierriers, dnomm pinque, a 9 000 livres pour son premier armement et 4 000 pour son rarmement (34). Les armements de pinques (a trois ou quatre canons) demandaient un capital initial variant entre 8 350 et 14 859 livres, a moins qu'on y comprt
(32) En omettant VHirondelle (Jure) souscriptions de Cassard et de deux autres en parts, selon la pratique bretonne et le deuxime armement de la Riche-Galre (Matalian), finance par le profit des prises vendues a Livourne (Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 565). (33) Supra, note 18. (34) En general les projets de rarmement ont le mrne montant que celui d'armement ; la difference ici s'explique par le fait que le procureur Clron, devant les pertes de son premier armement, s'vertua a rchauffer l'enthousiasme de ses anciens intresses en restant lui-mme propritaire du Saint-Claude (Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 515 V-517). La modestie du projet de 1,256 livres s'explique de facon semblable, bien qu'ici le propritaire de la Conception rejette sur sa socit les dpenses de radoub au cas o il n'y aurait pas de prises ; dans le cas contraire, il aurait droit a un quart. La Fidelle n'exigeait pas une importante mise de fonds, puisqu'elle avait t emprunte a la marine royale.
Projets et Contrats d'Armement en Course Marseillais
253
(comme le faisaient parfois les armateurs) les barques de six a dix canons, dont les armements coutaient quelque 20 000 livres et mme jusqu' 25 000 livres. Au-dessous de ce niveau, en effet, se situent trente et un de nos armements, contre trente-trois dont les souscriptions dpassent 40 000 livres. On peut les classer grosso modo, a cte de ce que nous savons des estimations ou projets :
Souscriptions (en livres)
8000050001 25 001 10001 1250Totaux 150000 80000 50 000 25000 10000
Nombre d'armemenfs
9 14 18 21 11
Nombre de projets
4 8 12 14 3
73
41
On voit que le projet manque pour une bonne partie de ces armements. Il est interessant toutefois de constater que, sur un montant de 1 650 487 livres, correspondant a quarante projets (35), les souscriptions effectives s'lvent a 1 608 573 livres, soit un dficit de 41 914 livres. En general, un dficit n'est pas grave ; il y a souvent aussi un excdent. Pour dix armements, la marge de dficit ou d'excdent est minime. Pour six autres, l'excdent va de 16 % a 27 % de la somme projetee ; deux cas o Ie dpassement atteint 37 % et 44 % s'expliquent videmment par des dpenses imprvues. En revanche, huit dficits dpassent les 15 %, l'un atteignant 30 % et un autre 43 %. On peut se demander si, dans ces deux derniers cas, le navire a jamais lev Taere, singulirement la galiote la Triomphante, (3 840 livres souscrites pour un projet de 6,690 livres (36). Compte tenu d'une certame tendance a la sous-estimation, les dficits apparents devraient naturellement tre majors. D'autre part, un dficit n'tait pas en soi irremediable puisqu'on avait l'habitude de le combler par un emprunt, et de garantir celui-ci en mettant la prime de l'assurance (et, le cas chant, le cot de l'assurance de la prime) (37) au compte de la masse des armateurs, comme on
(35) En omettant le projet de Cassard (supra, note 18), pour viter une distorsin vidente. (36) Mais les souscriptions ont t recouvres par le capitarne, ce qui tmoigne en sens contraire, et la galiote fut destine a accompagner la barque Jacques-dit-la-Palestine, qui mit bien a la voile (Ibid., IX B 5, P 115, V-117). (37) Par exemple, Ie 24 juillet 1710, les directeurs de l'Immacule-Conception-dit-Duc-de-Berry (ibid., IX B 4, f 640-1), empruntent 10,000 livres et dbitent leur socit de 2,880 livres, les ayant fait assurer jusques a la prime . Sept mois plus tard, quand ils veulent emprunter pour faire les avan-
254
faisait ordinairement pour les dpenses effectues au cours de la campagne. Il arrivali quelquefois que Ton empruntt mrne quand un proj et avait t entirement couvert (38), ce qui renforce l'impression que Ie projet tait marqu par 'optimisme ; il ne comprenait pas toujours Ie titre dpenses imprvues , lequel, en tout cas, n'est jamais compi pour plus de 5 % du total. D'ailleurs, les directeurs et leurs proches avaient coutume d'augmenter leurs premiers interets par des souscriptions supplmentaires, parfois substantielles, qu'on appelait d'abondant . Plus rarement les armateurs s'accordaient pour augmenter tous leurs interets au prorata (39). Les erreurs de calcul ne doivent pas surprendre ; les incertitudes mmes dans revaluation des dpenses, deux mois ou plus avant l'appareillage, doivent tre tenues pour une explication sffisante de l'absence frequente d'un projet d'armement. Les armateurs de la barque Saint-Jean-Baptiste dclarent franchement : Comme nous ne sgaurons faire une fixation au juste du montani dudit armement, nous [nous] confions entirement a la probit des sieurs Jean Durand et Charles Belanger. (40) Pour ne parier que du navire, si l'on en savait le prix, ce qui n'tait pas toujours le cas (41), il fallait comptabiliser les reparations, le radoub et autres despances pour le mettre en estat , souvent une augmentation d'agrais , dans un cas mme un allongement de la coque. Ainsi les armateurs de la fregate la Silvie estiment en chiffres ronds (42) :
ces, les armateurs de la Marie-Anne limitent le change maritime a 20 % : ibid., f 697 ; il s'agit done ici d'un contrai a la grosse. Toute cette question reste a claircir. (38) Au bas de l'escrite de l'Hirondelle (Raphael : ibid., IX B 5, f 20), le directeur Aubanel ajoute ce post-scriptum : ... la prsente escrite est close a la somme de 56,800 livres et que, les despances ... ayant excd cette somme d'environ 9,000 livres, elles seront empruntes pour compte de la masse des armateurs et assures avec la prime pour leur compte . Rien dans Ie texte n'autorise cette dmarche : il s'agit peut-tre d'un usage ; a moins qu'Aubanel ait pu consulter ses intresses, une demi-douzaine de gros souscripteurs. Les armateurs de la Notre-Dame-du-Bon-Voyage (Avril) autorisent d'avance un tel emprunt (ibid., IX B 4, f 368), mais cette prevision reste assez rare en ce qui concerne la mise hors, au contraire du ravitaillement, etc. Cf. ibid., f 697, et IX B 5, f 24. (39) A titre d'exemple, la Sainte-Anne-Jsus-Marie : ibid., IX B 4, f 720-1. (40) Ibid., f" 725. (41) L'escrite de la Sainte-Marguerite (de Villebrune, 1710) autorise les directeurs a acheter une barque de teile portee qu'ils jugeront a propos pour le prix qu'ils aviseront, pour icelle armer en course : ibid., f 608. Les armateurs du Saint-Franfois-Xavier et Notre-Dame-t'Annonciade avaient donne pouvoir au chevalier du Faro Marqese, enseigne de vaisseau, de l'acheter pour 3,000 livres au plus : ibid., f 445 v". (42) Ibid., P 631.
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Dpenses extraordinaires en cables, voiles, mats de hune, etc 6 000 livres Dpenses ordinaires comme laverie, journes de matelots, radoub d'ustensiles et dpenses imprvues. 10 000 livres Parfois on avait recours a des experts nomms par les directeurs : pour le Jacques-dit-la-Palestine, pret a faire voile, le corps de barque fut estim par les capitaines Boyer et Roubaud, tandis que les sieurs Giraud et Pouvrires, maitres constructeurs, se chargeaient de ce qui concerne les agrais (43) ; mais ici tout tait dj en tat. A l'autre bout de l'opration, Pierre Maillet fait valuer provisoirement sa barque, la Galre-de-Malte, tonte espalme et quipe de munitions de guerre, a 10000 livres, quitte a dduire de son intrt dans l'armement ce qu'elle vaudra au moment de partir, selon estimation par deux amis communs (44). L'inventaire du navire comprenait ses armes et poudre dont la valeur n'est pourtant jamais constate : elle fait partie soit du prix du navire, soit, plus normalement, de ces autres despanses qu'on englobe ple-mle avec celles des agres, des ustensiles et du carnage. Tout cela corps, agrais, armes, apparaux, prest a faire voille reprsentait dj entre la moiti et les deux tiers du montani total ; quant au navire, il en constitue, a quelques exceptions pres, au moins Ie tiers. Il convieni de souligner ce poids du cot du navire dans les armements corsaires, puisque Ie btiment est mis aux enchres aprs son dsarmement et que Ie prix de vente en revient aux armateurs, quand ce n'est pas aux assureurs. Encore plus incertains peut-tre taient les deux autres elements d'un projet : solde de l'quipage et vivres. Englobes parfois sous la mme formule d'usage, teile que deux mois de solde et trois mois de vivres , les avances de salaires se payaient ordinairement pour deux mois, tandis qu'on pouvait exceptionnellement prvoir jusqu' quatre mois d' avitoillement . En mars 1710, les armateurs du Sans-Pare firent fonds d' autour de 9,000 livres pour, ensemble, deux mois d'avances et quatre mois de vivres ; en avril 1710, pour un equipage de deux cent vingt hommes, c'est prs de 36 livres par mois et par homme qu'on prvoyait pour les avances et les vivres de la barque Moqense, elle aussi commande par un Brmond, de Cassis (45). La formule autour de 9,000 livres s'explique assez quand on pense au march des grains. Jugeant equitable que les intresses connaissent la limite maximum de leur projet , les armateurs des deux
(43) Ibid., IX B 5, f 107. (44) Ibid., IX B 4, f 613 V-614. (45) Ibid., P 612 V-613, 602.
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galres commandes par le chevalier de Pilles, au printemps de 1709, l'estiment a 75,000 livres nonobstant la chert de toutes les denres ; les souscriptions atteignirent en fait 81,515 livres (46). En juillet 1710 comme en juin 1712, des directeurs diffrents ont calcul leurs achats de vivres sur Ie pied de huit sous par jour et par teste (47), ce qui n'est pas loign de l'estimation de 11,1 a 12,5 livres par mois pour cinq armements diffrents entre le 4 dcembre 1710 et le 20 avril 1711 (48) ; mais avant et aprs cette periode on relve 9,6 (16 octobre 1710) et 8,7 (22 aout 1711), ainsi que 9,0 le 15 fvrier 1712 [mais 16,7 le 6 mai] (49). Quant aux avances, tous les armateurs taient d'accord pour qu'elles se fissent au meilleur compte qui se pourra tant aux officiers [qu'au] reste de l'quipage (50). On aurait prfr les engager a la part c'est--dire au tiers biscaen et suivant l'usage de Saint-Malo (51) en dduisant les avances des parts eventuelles et en les prcisant selon le Reglement du 25 novembre 1693 ; celui-ci voulait que les parts ne soient rgles qu'au retour des vaisseaux, par le capitarne et les officiers-majors, a proportion du mrite et du travail de chacun... (52) Au debut, nos documents laissent aux directeurs le choix entre l'engagement a la part (conseill autant qu'il se pourra ) et les salaires au mois, ce qui suggre peut-tre le dfaut d'une experience, au moins rcente, de la course chez les Marseillais ; ce au grand dam encore de tout projet prcis. Cependant, puisqu'il fallait verser des avances a ceux qui s'engageaient a la part, la difference n'est peut-tre pas trs sensible ; en cas de prise, les bnfices du tiers biscaen seraient plutt percus aprs le dsarmement, une fois dduites les avances ; d'autre part, on doit teir compte du dixime sur les prises qu'il fallait a j outer en tout cas aux engagements au mois. Dans la pratique marseillaise, c'est ce dernier Systeme qui prvalait, et de beaucoup, ds 1710, mme pour l'engagement des officiers majors (53).
(46) Ibid., f 501-2. (47) Ibid., f" 631 (la Silvie) et IX B 5, f 115 v-116 (la Triomphante). (48) Ibid., IX B 4, f" 674, 686, 696 v, 707 v, 717. (49) Ibid., f 680, et IX B 5, f" 10 v, 64 v, 107. (50) Ibid., IX B 4, f 517. (51) Ibid., f o s 314,478. Sur Ie tiers biscaen, voir Ie mmoire du 9 juillet 1748 par Ie commis principal des classes a Bayonne, de la Courtaudire fils, aux Archives du port militaire de Toulon (2 Q 7) : On observe icy que l'quipage n'entre point dans les frais de l'armement... except les avances..., de facon qu'on ne dduit aux equipages que le tiers des frais qu'ont occasionn les prises... A Saint-Malo les engagements s'effectuaient normalement sur le pied de ce tiers. Cf. infra, note 57. (52) LEBEAU, op. cit., I, 181. (53) II est pourtant formellement exclu par l'esente en guerre du
257
Ainsi, aprs le prix du navire pret a mettre a la voile, les avances apparaissent comme la dpense la plus forte d'un armement en course. Mais comment calculer d'avance avec prcision les salaires de tous les officiers, matelots et soldats, renfort trs apprci des corsaires, alors que le recrutement d'un equipage, et surtout d'un equipage bien equilibr, ne s'effectuait pas sans difficults ni marchandages ? On n'ignore pas la concurrence entre les armateurs des grands ports corsaires en matire d'quipages (54). A Marseille, qui, comme base corsaire, n'tait comparable ni a Saint-Malo ni mme a Nantes, la situation du march des hommes tait lie aux besoins de la marine royale, mais surtout a ceux du commerce. Le commerce du Levant, en effet, beneficia en 1710-1712 d'une constante amelioration, paralllement a la montee en fleche des armements corsaires provengaux (55). Une fois de plus, on ne saurait tablir de rapport direct entre commerce et course dans le sens d'une simple substitution de l'une a l'autre ; il y a plus d'apparence que Ia qute des bles, dans les annes 1709-1710, s'est faite au detriment de la course, vu le nombre d'armateurs et de navires, et mme de capitaines corsaires, comme Cassard, qui s'y sont adonns pendant la disette (56). Quelle qu'ait t la part de la conjuncture, ce qui importait sans aucun doute aux armements corsaires provencaux, c'tait le manque relatif de matelots aguerrs qui vont a la part , si nombreux a SaintMalo et ailleurs en Ponant, selon l'intendant de Vauvr ; celui-ci ne pouvait pas armer ses escadres de Toulon sans renforts ponantais ; d'autre part, il semble tablir une liaison naturelle entre l'entranement des matelots et leur volont d'aller en course a la part (57). Jonville, commissaire de la marine a Marseille, renchrissait :
17 dcembre 1705 pour le Saint-Jean-1'Evangliste (Am. Mile, IX B 4 P" 294-8). Le dixime comme il se pratique dans les vaisseaux du Roy commence a tre cde au debut de 1708 (ibid., f 445 v, 484) ; on precise parfois qu'il doit etre calcul et distribu suivant l'ordonnance du 6 dcembre 1702, bien que celle-ci concerne les vaisseaux de l'Etat (LEBEAU, op. cit., I, 265-6), ainsi que le Reglement (identique) de 1693. (54) Le Reglement du 25 novembre 1693 parle dj des avances considerables que les matelots exigent des armateurs qui quipent... pour la course : LEBEAU, I, 178. (55) Voir MASSON, op. cit., appendice XV. (56) Ce n'est qu'au dbut de septembre 1710 que les armateurs du vaisseau le Diamant se sont 3 determines a ne pas armer a la course et au bled : A. N. Marine, B 187, f 141. (57) A Pontchartrain, le 11 octobre 1708 : ibid., 162, f 197. Les armateurs de la Marie-Anne (Le Moyne) veulent que son equipage aule a la part pour le mieux animer a faire son devoir : Am. Mile, IX B 4, f" 697.
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J'auray attention, Monseigneur, de garder mes meilleurs matelots pour l'armement de l'escadre des quatre galeres que le Roy a ordonn pour son seruice... Il me sera trs diffidile de fournir a ces armemens sans le secours du retour des Bastimens qui ont fait leur temps pour la cource et pour le commerce... (58). Jonville venait de satisfare aux impratifs de l'armement du capitarne de vaisseau Marqese de Roquemador, dirige par Jean-Baptiste Bruny, de Marseille, en levant des matelots par voie d'autorit (et non de gr a gr ) et en leur p rome ttant un cinquime en sus de la paye ordinaire des vaisseaux du roi, bonification normale quand on armait ceux-ci en course ; MM. Bruny en furent d'accord, pour euitter la peine de former leur equipage (59). Quelques mois plus tard, Jonville se plaint de l'puisement de son dpartement en matelots, car il avait arm neuf galeres du roi, avec soixante-dix matelots chacune, et fait plus de quinze autres armefments] particuliers , sans compter les btiments du commerce : Si les officiers de la marine, disait-il, ont prtendu qu'il y auoit des prefferences pour les armemens particuliers a leur prejudice, ils ont tort a mon esgard... (60). En fait, Vauvr venait d'interdire le recrutement pour les armements purement prives, afin de pourvoir aux besoins de six ou sept vaisseaux du roi accords aux particuliers (61). On remarque done sans surprise que les directeurs de Cassard, un an plus tt, n'avaient pas t fchs de le laisser, non seulement nommer ses officiers et regier leurs appointements, mais repartir les diximes de prises entre les equipages, sans que lesdits sieurs directeurs puissent tre inquietes (62). Malgr les dmarches d'un Maillet ou d'un Bruny auprs de l'intendant ou d'un commissaire de la marine, a propos des prts de vaisseaux ou de galeres, il reste que le capitaine corsaire devait assumer tout le dtail du recrutement et de la retribution des equipages. Nos escrites lui laissent la charge de ces ennuis, se bornant a lui fournir quelques indications trs simples et une estimation assez grossire du montant des avances. Les capitaines marseillais avaient affaire a de forts equipages, plus nombreux que ceux des corsaires malouins, surtout par
(58) A Pontchartrain, le 8 avril 1711 : A. N. Marine, B3 199, f 374 v (59) Jonville a Pontchartrain, le 11 fvrier 1711 : ibid., f 370. (60) Jonville a Pontchartrain, les 6 aot et 25 septembre 1711 ibid f' 397, 402. (61) Vauvr a Pontchartrain, Ie 8 dcembre 1711 : ibid., 200, f 437. (62) Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 652-3. Dans les escrites relativement intimes qu'il dresse avec Ie capitaine H. Brmond, Jos. Maillet est trs explicite sur ce point (ibid., f 738 et IX B 5, f 112).
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rapport a leur force relative en canons. Mis a part les vaisseaux et galres du ro, le btiment corsaire de Marseille embarquait, en moyenne, environ 150 hommes (officiers et soldats compris), tandis que l'quipage malouin moyen n'atteignait gure cent hommes au cours de ces mmes annes (63). Une pinque marseillaise de quatre canons, une barque de six, avaient besoin d'quipages de 70 a 120 hommes, chiffres qui, a Saint-Malo, correspondaient a des btiments trois fois plus forts en canons. Tel corsaire rnarseillais mettait davantage l'accent sur son armement en pierriers jusqu' vingt pour une barque a huit canons, tout comme si elle ne guettait que de petites prises caboteurs Italiens ou Catalans, par exemple , plutt que d'imiter cette espce de galre , de 16 a 40 canons, que les Anglais construisaient spcialement pour leur commerce en Mediterranee. Les corsaires marseillais d'une force comparable furent relativement rares : ils s'appelaient alternativement frgates et galres (ce qui semble les rapprocher de ces voiliers anglais a rames) et ils demandaient des equipages variant entre 140 (16 canons) et 280 hommes (40 canons), alors que les galres classiques portaient de 150 a 160 hommes environ (64). Cet ordre de grandeur est, bien entendu, largement dpass par les vaisseaux du deuxime (500 hommes) ou du troisime rang (400) commands par un Cassard, mais ils sont plus caractristiques de la course toulonnaise. Est-on mal fonde a croire que les Marseillais, quand ils pensaient course, la concevaient encore comme une guerre de galres ? La forte proportion de pierriers en est un indice encore plus frappant que les inventaires d'armes individuelles que renferment quelques-uns de nos projets : mousquets ou fusils, pistolets, sabres, batons ferrs, haches d'armes, espontons et grenades (65). A Marseille, on projetait habituellement une campagne de quatre ou de six mois ou de deux a trois mois pour les galres de type tradtionnel. En consequence, il y aurait toujours eu besoin au moins d'un deuxime avitaillement et souvent d'avances supplmentaires, sans parier des frais de relche ou d'avarie.
(63) Voir mon article, The Trade and Privateering of Saint-Malo during the War of the Spanish Succession , La Soclt Guernesiaise, Report and transactions, t. XVII (1964), p. 646, note 33 ; ci-dessous, p. 294, note 33. (64) Pour une definition anglaise contemporaine, voir Historical Manuscripts Commission, House of Lords MSS., new series, t, VII, p. 182. Cf. R. C. ANDERSON. Oared Fighting Ships, Londres, Percival Marshall, 1952, ch. 10. (65) Am. Mile, IX B 4, f B 483 v, 602, 613 v. Ce dernier specific 7 barils de poudre et 3 quintaux de plomb pour une barque de 120 hommes, armes de 60 mousquets, 40 pistolets, 60 sabres, etc. La Moqense, barque de mme force, demande 6 barils de poudre et 3 quintaux de plomb, mais 50 mousquets, 50 sabres et point de pistolets. La Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Rencontre (Alardon) avait aussi des pots--feu.
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Mais un projet d'armement ne regardait pas aussi loin : il ne concernait que la mise hors , dont les directeurs devaient normalement rendre bon et fidelle compte aux intresses avant Ie depart du corsaire (66). 11 fallait prvoir la redaction d'un autre compte aprs Ie dsarmement, voire aprs la liquidation des prises. En principe, les dpenses courantes d'une campagne se payaient sur les prises, avant que Ie capital social soit rembours. Mme une course fructueuse avail bien besoin de crdit, car un navire captur n'tait pas ncessairement adjug, tant btiment que cargaison, au preneur ; et il restait encore gnralement a le vendr. Il fallait done, avant son depart, fournir au capitaine corsaire des lettres de crdit (67), ou tout au moins l'autoriser a tirer des lettres de change sur ses armateurs : c'tait une fonction primordiale de la direction. Un directeur devait essentiellement avoir ses procureurs des correspondants, sinon des commissionnaires dans les principaux ports de relche. Occasionnellement, Ie texte de l' escrite les designe nommment ; souvent il y est dit que les directeurs les proposeront ; parfois il y a indication des ctes envisages Espagne, Italie, Sicile, Malte, Afri que, Levant ou de ports prcis (68). A eet gard, c'tait aux directeurs a donner de plus ampies instructions aux commandants, mais en leur laissant toute libert de croiser o il le jugeraient le plus profitable aux interets de l'armement. Malgr cette autonomie tactique reconnue au capitaine, y compris la libert de se joindre a d'autres corsaires s'il l'estime avantageux pour sa socit (69), les armateurs lui tmoignent une mfiance mal dguise. Il va de soi qu'ils craignent le pillage sauf pillage d'usage (70) d'autant plus que le capitaine
(66) Cf. Jean MEYER, L'armement nantais dans la deuxime moiti du XVIII" sicle, Paris, S.E.V.P.E.N., 1969, eh. IV. A notte poque, les armateurs marseillais parlent de leur mise . (67) Grandpr serait dot de surcroit de cinq ou six mille livres cn pistolles ou piastres, aupparavant partir, pour plus grande precaution (Am. Mile, IX B 5, f 31) ; et un directeur qui va s'embarquer sur la Strenne (Jean Pallis) aura de l'argent pour acheter le deuxime mois de vivres (ibid., IX B 4, f 601). (68) Deux armements s'adressent a Soussin et O, de Livourne, ainsi qu' la Veuve David et fils, de Gnes ; la Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Rencontre galement a MM. Garcin (Malte) et Billard (Collioure) : ibid., f s 484, 729. (69) A en juger par certains jugements de prises, les corsaires marseillais ont souvent collabor, a deux ou a trois. Ces socits , Ie plus souvent verbalement conclues, donnaient lieu, selon Ie Reglement du 27 janvier 1706, a de frquentes contestations (L.EBEAU, I, 320). (70) Au contraire du droit anglais, la legislation francaise est trs reticente en ce qui concerne le pillage legitime. L'ordonnance de la Marine de 1681 ne le sanctionne pas ouvertement. L'dit sur l'Amiraut de mars 1584 (reprodui-
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choisit ses officiers. Sensible a cette preoccupation, 1'Amiral ordonna, le 20 avril 1697, que ses of f icier. tabliraient un crivain sur tous les corsaires. A la lumire des jugements de prises, nous savons que les Marseillais euren t a souffrir de quelques dtournements, sans que les cas graves fussent frequents. Les officiers de la marine royale n'en taient pas innocents, mme s'ils n'ont jamais encouru de proces criminel, comme celui intent a CharlesHercule Jure, capitaine de la Terrible, pour excs de violences et malversations , peu aprs une condamnation a Tarnende pour n'avoir pas emmen des prisonniers au port d'armement conformment aux ordonnances (71). Plus curieux est le proces soutenu par les directeurs de la Galre-de-Malte contre son capitaine, Andre Saussillon, accuse d'avoir pill une barque majorquine avec la complicit de ses prisonniers et de l'avoir vendue ensuite a l'ile d'Elbe a vii prix et sans formalit de justice (72). Noble Barthlemy Dedons qui devait plus tard partager une amende pour pillage de 10,000 livres avec Francois-Joseph Marquisan, lui aussi capitaine de brlot, et Francois de Pepinet, enseigne de vaisseau perdit au profit de ses armateurs sa part d'une prise anglaise qu'il avait revendue aux Anglais a Alger (73) ; il avait dj mis son caissier dans l'embarras . a cause des avances considerables qu'il a fait de son chef ; et, selon le commissaire Jonville, son optimisme un peu malhonnte lui aurait valu mauvaise reputation auprs des Marseillais : II est icy depuis longtemps, ayant prtendu imposer en arrivant, disant qu'il luy venoit 200,000 livres de fonds de Paris ou de Lyon en lettres de change. Cela ayant manqu, il en attendoit
sant l'article 37 de l'dit de 1543), le limite aux bardes des prisonniers, except habillemens de grande valeur , et a l'argent jusqu' dix cus : J.-M. PARDESSUS, Collection de lois maritimes, Paris, Imprimerie Royale, t. IV (1837), p. 306. A Marseille, le 11 juin 1712, les armateurs de la galre Saint-Nicolas-le-Phnix ajoutent au pillage d'usage la poudre, les mesmes armes de guerre tant a feu que autres, except les canons et perriers (Am. Mile, IX B 5, f ' 113-5). (71) A. N., G5 251, f 356, 358 : jugements de la Notre-Dame-du-Rosaire et du Saint-Jacques, le 23 mars 1711. (72) Ibid., 250, f 460 : Saint-Esprit, le 9 dcembre 1710. (73) Ibid., 251, f 588 : Lusitania-de-Londres, le 21 mai 1711 ; et ibid., 255 : Saint-Francois-Xavier-et-Saint-Dominique, sept. 1713. Les armateurs s'tant decides a interjeter appel contre la mainleve de ces prises, les plus gros intresses a l'armement de Dedons l'autorisent, le 16 juillet 1715, a promettre a quelque personne de consideration jusques a la somme de 60,000 livres de donative en cas de russite , payable en lettres de change sur Paris par les mains du banquier Morand. Cette savoureuse apostille, qui se trouve au bas d'une esente de 1705 (Notre-Dame-derla-Garde-Saint-Francois : Am. Mile, IX B 5, f 295), est suivie d'une autre : Et nanmoins venant a perdre ledit proces nous ne serons de rien tennus.
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d'Italie considrablement et rien ne luy est venu, ce qui a rompu le march qu'il auoit fait avec les propritaires de deux vaisseaux qu'il auoit choisis, et qui a fait prendre party ailleurs aux matelots qu'il auoit leuez... Il est actuellement en procez auec les propritaires... (74) Tous les armements, de plus, couraient le risque de dpenses intiles chaqu fois que les corsaires amenaient un btiment soidisant neutre, et mme d'assez forts dommages lorsque le ConseiJ des prises ne sanctionnait pas les captures. Ainsi le chevalier d'Ollires, avec les capitaines Francois Matalian et Mugues Cruvellier, dut payer 4,500 livres de dommages et interets au sieur Piuma, de Genes, en 1711 (75). Pour flairer le faux neutre, il ne suffisait pas au capitaine corsaire de connatre les traites internationaux et les decisions royales : il lui fallait aussi connatre, par experience, toutes les ruses dont se couvrait le commerce ennemi, savoir interpreter les papiers de bord en function des pratiques du commerce legitime et des activits habituelles des ports et conduire l'interrogatoire d'un rude marin parlant une tout autre langue. Ces sortes d'expertises, en effet, faisaient partie de la virtuosit dunkerquoise, et il est assez surprenant que les escrites marseillaises n'y f assent gure allusion, sauf a propos de l'armement de Grandpr, a moins que cette mise en garde ne ft rserve aux instructions particulires confies par les directeurs aux capitaines. Le risque dont nos escrites se montrent le plus soucieuses est celui d'une vente des prises a vil prix. Bien entendu, le capitaine devait toujours, au retour, rendre compte au caissier de ses dpenses courantes et lui donner acquit pour tous les billets ou lettres de change qu'il avait tires : tout cela tait primordial et les directeurs y tenaient la main. Il arrivait qu'ils refusassent a l'avance d'entrer en discution avec un capitaine a propos de ses dpenses, sauf celles qui dcouleraient directement des prises ; ou bien on se mettait d'accord pour prendre les sentiments de telles personnes que nous jugerons capables pour decider des difficults qui pourraient estre agites, sans... venir a la facheuse extrmit de plaider... (76). Le sieur Claude Clron, procureur du Saint-Claude-le-Surprenant, a recu mandai de destituer son capi(74) Jonville a Pontchartrain, Ie 9 janvier 1709 : A. N. Marine, B3 174, f os 176 v-177; cf. ibid., 187, f 215, lettre de Levasseur et Charonier, Ie 6 octobre 1710. 5 (75) A. N., G 252 : jugement de la Notre-Dame-de-Carmes-et-SaintAntoine-de-Padoue, etc., le 2 septembre 1711. (76) Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 316 : la Fortune-de-la-Mer (Maillet, 1705).
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taine selon qu'il le jugera ncessaire , et il en use. Le caissier de l'Aventurier-Sans-Pareil envoie son parent, Honor Maurin, pour contrler les dpenses de campagne du capitarne Larchier. Les armateurs du Joseph se contentent de piacer un commissaire auprs du capitaine Jacob ; tandis que l'armement mis sous le haut patronage du baiili de la Pailleterie prvoit d'envoyer un des directeurs a la mer pour regier toutes les affaires conjointement avec le commandant Jean Pallis : Us signeront Tun et 1'autre toutes les dpenses a la mer... (77) D'autre part, Etienne Anselme, procureur administrateur du Saint-Frangois-Xavier en 1708, pouvait faire embarquer sur ladite barque un homme, s'il Ie trouve a propos, pour avoir soin de la mesme administration qu'il auroit luy mesme s'il estoit embarqu... (78) II s'agit l surtout de l'administration des prises, ce qui allait beaucoup plus loin que les attributions preventives de l'crivain reprsentant l'amiral. O mener les prises, sinon a Marseille, ce qui serait Ie mieux, mme pour un Cassard qui jouit de toute libert d'action a cet gard, en grand entrepreneur corsaire ? Le marquis de Pontevez devait s'accorder sur cela avec ses lieutenants. Les commandants Arnaud et Barthlemy devaient, en principe, attendre les instructions des principaux intresses avant de vendr a l'tranger (79). Les directeurs de MM. de Grandpr et de Galliffet s'obligeaient a repondr de la fidlit des deux hommes embarques a bord de chacun de leurs deux vaisseaux : un rester toujours auprs de M. de Grandpr pour avoir soin de teir compie de toutes les dpenses dudit armement pendant la campagne , tandis que les trois autres serviront comme commissaires de prises . Il tait prvu qu'un de ces commissaires travaillerait a la procdure de vente d'une prise dans un port tranger, a cte des personnes auxquelles seraient adresses les lettres de crdit fournies au commandant ; dans ce dernier cas, Grandpr devait le remplacer a bord, l'exprience ayant fait voir qu'il est tres ncessaire de prendre cette precaution . Moyen singulier toutefois de se mettre a l'abri de quelques abus de la part d'un commandant qui, comme Grandpr, avait su s'imposer, puisque les commissaires ne pouvaient rien faire sans sa connaissance, ordre et participation (80). Au fond, la meilleure facon de s'assurer de la bonne conduite
(77) (78) (79) (80) Ibid., Ibid., Ibid., Ibid., P* IX F IX 478, 601, 686 ; et IX B 5, f" 24-26. B 4, f 446. 300, 653, 720. B 5, f 31.
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des militaires tait de les faire participer directement aux profits de la socit, o d'ailleurs la plupart des capitaines avaient un intrt, ainsi que leurs officiers (81). Une minorit dix-sept sur soixante-neuf noms de capitaines prend intrt dans un ou plusieurs armements autres que les leurs, mais pour des sommes videmment moindres. D'autre part, le cas est rare a Marseille autre contraste avec Saint-Malo et Dunkerque o un capitaine corsaire devient directeur d'armement, quoique Joseph Maillet, le plus grand armateur marseillais, et fait ses preuves comme capitaine (82). On peut avoir une ide des interets directs de nos soixante-neuf capitaines dans leurs propres armements (et rarmements) en les classant comme suit :
Valeur des interets (en livres) 49,600-80,000 15,000-24,850 Nombre d'intrts souscrits par des capitaines 2 chevalier de Laubpin (Guerrire, etc., 1711); de Grandpr (Toulouse et Trident, 1711). 8 Oger Herman (Sage, 1709); Cassard (Parfait, Neptune, Srieux, Pendant, 1710) ; Fr. Augier (Fortune de la Mer, 1710); J.-B. Raphael (Hirondelle, 1711) ; Honor Brmond (SansPareil, 1710-1712, trois fois) ; Fr. Farrent (SaintNicolas-le-Phenix, 1712). 12 20 20
11
73
5,500-10,000 2,500- 5,000 1,000- 2,000

50 -
700
En outre, dix capitaines paraissent n'avoir en rien contribu a leurs propres armements, bien que deux d'entre eux, Paul Carbonnel et J.-B. Fabre, se soient intresses dans d'autres. Dans l'ensemble, cinq seulement Brmond, Cassard, Farrent, Herman et Ducairon firent des placements considerables ailleurs que dans leurs propres entreprises de course. Il reste que les interets des commandants sont gnralement assez importants (autour d'une moyenne de 5,175 livres), mme en cartant de ce
(81) Ainsi Ie capne Gaspard Gasignery verse pour mes officiers la somme de 10,000 livres dans l'armement de la Silvie^ qu'il commande ; il souscrit une somme identique, comme tous les autres associs, quand ils en autorisent Ie rarmement neuf mois plus tard (ibid., IX B 4, f os 632,740 v). (82) Parmi les directeurs marseillais, citons aussi les ci-devant capitaines Abeille et Aubanel ; Toussaint Catelin, encore capitaine en 1708, et Charles Lion, que l'on retrouve a la mer en 1708 et en 1712. Le 8 avril 1711, Ie capitaine du Faucon, Louis Grasson, bien aise de rester a terre pour se reposer de ses fatigues , devient directeur pour second avec M. Catelin (ibid., f 728).
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compie les deux plus gros souscripteurs nomms ci-dessus, ainsi que Brmond, dont les interets atteignent un total encore suprieur (81,640 livres). L'investissement global de tous ces officiers s'lve a 568,340 livres (83). Puisqu'ils naviguaient presque toujours a salaire , les officiers pouvaient compter plus srement sur leurs appointements que sur leurs parts de profits dans les armements, toujours distribues au prorata des placements. Suivant les tmoignages pars fournis par les escrites a ce sujet, il semble qu'on donnait 300 ou 400 livres par mois au capitarne, en plus de sa table et de ses valets, sauf peut-tre pour les petits armements (84). Un capitarne en second et un premier lieutenant pouvaient obtenir 150 ou 100 livres ; les enseignes et l'crivain, comme le Chirurgien et l'aumnier (s'il y en avait) [85], environ 50 livres chacun. L'tat-major avait droit en plus, comme le capitarne a lui seul, a un quart du dixime des prises ; on laissait done une moiti de ce dixime aux officiers mariniers et matelots, conformment a l'ordonnance royale du 6 dcembre 1702, que citent quelques escrites . Trois capitaines ont prfr nanmoins sacrifier leur quart leurs douze parts en change d'un droit de pavilion quivalent a 10 % du produit net de leurs prises ; les armateurs le prsentent comme une concession, une marque d'estime (86). Joseph Maillet, capitaine en 1705 de la Fortunede-la-Mer, troqua pour six pour cent du produit net non seulement toute prtention de salaire , mais aussi la part ordinaire qu'on donne aux capitaines de course a Saint-Malo rgle par le tarif (87). Sept autres capitaines, sans rien abandonner pourtant de leurs droits sur le dixime, ont regu une promesse de gratification d'un a deux pour cent du produit net ; mais noble B. Dedons regut seulement un demi pour cent, pour luy marquer de nos considerations , tandis que le sieur Surietty ne devait percevoir son deux pour cent par dessus ses avantages lgitimement deubs qu'au cas o les armateurs gaignent
(83) Pour un classement relatif, voir le tableau en appendice. (84) Le projet de 1'armement des trois galres du roi sous le commandement du chevalier de Laubpin comprend un relev dtaill des appointements, etc. (ibid., f 728, v : la Guerrire, la Fidelle, la Madame). (85) Jonville assurait au ministre qu'un aumnier ne pourrait pas servir avec dcence sur les petits corsaires (A. N. Marine, B3 188, f 226 : 1er janvier 1710) ; il lui fallait user de persuasion auprs du baiili de la Pailleterie afin d'en embarquer un seul pour trois galres (ibid., f 259). (86) Jos. Matalian, Jos. Braud, Jacques Merron : Am. Mile, IX B 4, f 08 295, 305, 519. (87) Ibid., f 316.
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plus de vingt pour cent (88). Il est a remarquer que les bnficiares de ces compliments taient tous de gros intresses, a l'exception de Dedons et de Surietty. Pas toujours, mais le plus souvent, la liste des intresses est recouvre par le capitaine, qui la remet personnellement au greffe de l'Amiraut. La raison nous en chappe : tait-ce encore une precaution contre les discutions ? Dans la convention prive du 19 fvrier 1705 entre le capitaine Joseph Maillet et son procureur, Honor Laugier, il tait present que Maillet signerait l'tat des souscriptions avant son depart a la mer, afin de faciliter un juste partage pendant son absence. Il est vrai qu'il s'agit ici d'une repartition d'un tiers des profits entre son equipage et lui ; mais il est clair qu'un pareil motif tait banal, puisqu'habituellement c'tait au capitaine qu'incombait rentiere responsabilit de teir ses gens en mains, et que d'ailleurs il pouvait fort bien ne pas revenir de sa campagne. Il est vrai, aussi, que certains commandants figurent comme initiateurs de leurs armements, o ils sont parfois notablement intresses, et que presque tous ont pu aider a collecter les fonds. Le procureur Clron permit mme a Emmanuel Pranin, capitaine de l pinque Saint-Claude-le-Surprenant, de signer les billets de participation a son premier armement, a condition qu'il les vist, mais c'est un cas presque isole (89). Qu'il soit ou non appel caissier, on dsignait toujours un directeur a qui les intresses devaient verser leurs dniers, en pieces sonnantes, en billets a ordre ou en lettres de change, mais jamais en billets de monnaie, qui taient universellement interdits (90). Une douzaine de fois, on s'engage a s'acquitter en espces d'or ou d'argent, sans aucune sorte de billets ou sans faute , parce que l'achat du navire reste encore a faire, ou bien parce qu'il est destin a partir aprs huit ou quinze jours, ou dans un mois au plus tard : il faut profiter de la belle saison , et de la guerre aussi, car les derniers armements se conclurent dans la premire moiti de l'anne 1712, lorsque les pourparlers franco-anglais taient dj entams en vue d'une suspension d'armes. A ce moment-l les billets a ordre et les lettres pour trois furent rarement admis. Au contraire, le contrat d'armement de la Silvie,
(88) Ibid., f 08 605, 648, 650, 692, 708 ; et IX B 5, f 19, 65, 108. (89) Ibid., IX B 4, f 479. Le capitaine Pranin fut plus tard remplac par Paul Carbonnel, qui n'eut pas la mme latitude. (90) Les contributions en nature sont rares. Charles Lion, qui avait souscrit pour tout un brigantin, la Conception, le 14 juin 1709, se contente de deux canons (evales a 125 livres), pour la Fortune-Galre le 21 janvier 1710 (ibid., f' 603). A l'armement du chevalier de Pilles (ibid., f 502), Alexandre du Four donne 800 livres en fournitures et 400 livres comptant.
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en juillet 1710, precise que les souscriptions le contingeant ne seront payables que lorsque la presante escrite sera signe et remplie pour la susdite somme... ou environ (91). Probablement tait-ce l une pratique habituelle des directeurs prudents. En tout cas, on s'oblige a les payer a leur premire requisition , et il leur faut endosser les paiements en papier et s'en porter garants ; de l la rgie que les directeurs seuls pouvaient mettre les billets de participation , reconnaissances qui constituaient le seul titre des intresses (92). Plusieurs fois, il est indiqu qu'une mise fournie immdiatement en dniers comptants bnficiera d'un escompte de 2 % ou mme d'un benfice de 3 % ; mais il fallait plutt prvoir la perte de la ngociation des lettres et des billets, qui parfois tait prise en charge par la socit, mais le plus souvent mise au debit du souscripteur. Les billets a ordre, lorsqu'ils furent admis, taient a trois mois de terme, ce qui correspond plus ou moins, pour nombre d'armements, a l'intervalle de temps entre la date d'enregistrement d'une escrite et la date de l'encaissement de tous les dniers, c'est-dire du recouvrement sign par le capitaine ou le procureur ; mais cet intervalle se reduit souvent a quelques semaines, sinon a quelques jours. Cette varit de pactes et conditions montre qu'il existait toute une gamme de types d'armement, diffrents non seulement par leur importance mais aussi par les circonstances originelles. Il en est de mme de la structure des directions. Le nombre comme les functions des directeurs varient beaucoup. Sur 73 armernents (93), 21 ne comportent qu'un seul directeur, tandis que 29 sont dots de deux, 16 de trois, 3 de quatre et 4 de cinq. Cette dernire categorie inclut les armements Cassard et Grandpr, dont nous avons parl, ainsi que ceux de la Charmante et de la Galre-Invncible doni la mise hors revint respectivement a 22,000 et 43,000 livres. Or, on relve sept armements dots d'un
(91) Ibid., f 631. (92) Tres peu de signatures rayes, mais les enregistrements, bien entendu, sont des copies. Le billet avait toute la force d'un acte de participation, sans que les uns puissent avoir plus d'hypothques que les au tres (ibid., IX B 5, f 292). Les procureurs de la Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde-dii-Jourdan-Galre (ibid., f 18), s'excusent d'etre obliges de reconnatre les actionnaires dmissionnaires ou cessionnaires . Il semble peu probable qu'il y ait eu un march des billets de participation, a en juger par les quelques listes de participants dresses lors d'un rarmement : ce sont les mmes que leurs devanciers (comparer : ibid., IX B 4, ' 632 et 740 v ; et IX B 4, f 675, avec IX B 5, f 25). (93) Dans deux cas les noms des directeurs ne sont pas indiques, bien qu'il s'agisse, tres probablement, respectivement de Claude Gros et de la Veuve David (ibid., IX B 4, f" 368, 585).
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seul directeur pour lesquels le montant des souscriptions dpasse nettement 43,000 livres, atteignant 57,000 livres environ pour I'Hirondelle (J.-B. Raphael, 1711), dirige par Antoine Aubanel, et pour le Marquis-de-Forville (Louis Grasson), dirige par Felix David. Les trois armements du Sans-Pareil (H. Brmond), par Joseph Maillet, content au moins 50,000 livres chacun. Mais ni Maillet, qui partage aussi la direction des plus grands armements, ni Aubanel ni David, qui travaillent ailleurs ensemble, n'voquent cette image de vieux solitaire que laisse le sieur Clron, qui n'admet auprs de lui qu'un adjoint (94). On ne doit videmment pas oublier tout un rseau de rapports personnels qui expliquent, par exemple, l'association troite de Maillet avec les marins de Cassis (95). Encore faudrait-il remarquer que quelques directeurs la veuve David et fils, Despuech et Ollivier, Roussel frres, Borelly et Le Bois, Tinel et Forestier, Laurens et Ballon, et Pne pre et fils taient dj associs sous une raison commerciale, done avec des liens ou mme des filiales dans les ports d'outre-mer (96). La distance est grande des armateurs de ce type a une foule de petits directeurs dont les noms n'apparaissent qu'une seule fois a travers nos escrites . Sur un total de quatre-vingt-seize directeurs, petits ou grands entrepreneurs, il en est soixante-cinq qui ne figurent comme tels qu'une seule fois, et dix-sept autres deux fois (97). Le record, selon les escrites , n'est que de sept armements, dont deux sont des rarmements du mme corsaire : il s'agit du brillant SansPareil de Maillet. Il est suivi par la Veuve David et fils, Antoine Aubanel, Antoine Amalric, Etienne Anselme, Jean de Dieud, Pne pre et fils et Roussel frres (quatre armements chacun) ; ensuite par Pierre Besson, Toussaint Catelin, Claude Clron, Laurens et Ballon, Flix David, et Joseph Crozet (trois chacun). A ce niveau, il est vrai, certains sont aussi intresses dans les armements toulonnais ; Maillet et le chevalier de Dieud se trouvent parmi
(94) II s'agit, il est vrai, du chevalier Dieud, sans l'avis et participation duquel le sieur Clron ne pourra rien entreprendre (ibid., f 478). Le chevalier n'a rien a faire dans le deuxime ni le troisime armement de Clron, toujours malheureux. (95) II emploie Francois Brmond et Jean Pascon ainsi que (3 fois) Honor Brmond (ibid., i" 602, 717, 612 V, 738, et IX B 5, f" 35, 112). (96) Par exemple, la Veuve David et fils a Genes, Despuech [Despeche] et Ollivier a Messine. (97) Y compris les quatre rarmements qui font l'objet d'une escrite , bien que la Silvie (ibid., IX B 4, f 740 V), ne doive pas tre le seul bailment rearm avec le profit de ses prises. Puisqu'il est souvent difficile de distinguer s'ils agissent individuellement ou en societ, les frres Roussel, Borrelly et Le Bois, Laurens et Ballon sont compts ici tous deux pour un seul directeur, comme Pne pre et fils et Tinel et Forestier.
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les cinq directeurs des armements Cassard et Grandpr, avec Michel Gleize, Nicolas Guitton et Jean-Baptiste Roussel. Il est interessant, par consquent, de grouper nos directeurs selon le nombre total des armements auxquels ils se sont intresses, toujours selon les escrites , comme simples socitaires aussi bien que comme administrateurs. Voici en tte Joseph Maillet (26 armements) et les frres Roussel (25 entre les deux), suivis par Flix David (16, sans y comprendre la Veuve David et fils), Amalric (15), Catelin et Dieud (14 chacun), Pierre Fazende et Jean Tourcaty, directeurs chacun d'un seul armement mais intresses a treize. Anselme, directeur de quatre armements, se trouve maintenant au mme rang (12 chacun) que les sieurs Esprit Amoureux et Despuech-Ollivier, qui ne dirigent que deux fois. Suivent trois autres directeurs d'un seul armement Pierre Gautier, Jacques Reynaud, J.-B. Saint-Michel qui s'Interessent a onze corsaires en tout, comme aussi Francois Martin, deux fois directeur ; puis Laurens et Ballon (3 + 7), Borelly et Le Bois (2 + 8), Augustin Lazare Vielh (2 + 6), Jean Durand (1 + 7), Pne pre et fils (4 + 3), et Alexandre de l'Eglise, Toulonnais (2 + 5). Moins en vue, maintenant, nous trouvons les armateurs Aubanel (4 + 2), Besson (3 + 1), Gleize (2 + 2) et Guitton (2 + 4). Six autres seulement parmi nos directeurs s'intressent a un total de cinq ou six armements ; tout le reste n'arrive qu' quatre au plus. Il y a vingt-quatre directeurs disons un quart du total qui ne risquent leurs capitaux que dans leurs propres entreprises : entre autres, Clron, Pierre Maillet, et Gaspard Maurin, fort engage dans le commerce des bles. Des que Fon additionne ces interets (voir le tableau en appendice), les gros souscripteurs semblent, en somme, ceux qui ont Ie plus souvent arm ; mais il n'y a pas de correlation exacte. Si Maillet arrive encore en tte et de loin (avec un total de 139,184 livres), il est suivi, cette fois, par F. David (94,700), puis par Aubanel (65,600), qui n'est, quant a lui, intresse que dans six armements, ce qui reprsente un investissement moyen exceptionnellement elev. Ensuite, l'ordre d'importance ne rserve gure de surprises : Anselme (65,600 livres), Dieud (49,250), Roussel frres (47,200), Catelin (41,000), Saint-Michel (32,500), Guitton (28,600), Gleize (26,500), et Tourcaty (25,900). A ce niveau on ne trouve pas de simples socitaires, mais seulement quatre capitaines : Honor Brmond (81,640 livres), de Grandpr (80,000), de Laubpin (49,600), et Francois Farrent (31,450, dont 24,850 pour le Saint-Nicolas-le-Phnix, qu'il commanda) ; Cassard ne
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parat que pour 23,000 livres, total qu'il faut majorer (98) pourtant de sa moiti d'intrt dans l'Hirondelle (Jure), barque dont la mise hors s'tait leve au moins a 16 000 livres et dont l'autre moiti fut partage entre Ie directeur Rigaud et un intresse nantais. Il est assez surprenant de constater que soixante administrateurs n'atteignent pas Ie niveau de 10 000 livres pour le total de leurs investissements ; 34 d'entre eux n'arrivent mme pas a 5 000 livres. Il n'est que trop vident qu'on est loin de ce monde malouin de specialistes de la course, dont plusieurs se retrouvent d'une anne sur l'autre, et encore plus loin de Dunkerque, o une poigne de dpositaires ralisaient jusqu' neuf armements par an. Notre tableau marseillais serait trompeur s'il y manquait des indications sur les simples socitaires (99). Farmi eux, quarantesix, sans avoir jamais dirige d'armements, se sont intresses dans quatre au moins. En premire ligne, parat Pierre Bompard, de Cassis, avec 28 armements. Il est suivi par J. Peirier, J. Villet et J. Arnaud (13 chacun) ; Fr. Marnier et Louis Rivire (12 chacun) ; G. Salomon et Cie (11); J.-M. Carrire, Ange Eydoux et le chevalier Roze (9) ; A. Bonnafous, M. Boyer, J. Vicard, et Soussin, consul francais a Livourne (8) [100], A. Aubert et L. Arnieux (7) ; neuf autres ont souscrit six fois chacun ; mais, au total, cinquantesept seulement s'intressent a quatre armements ou plus. Farmi les grands noms marseillais de l'poque, on relve ceux de J.-B. Magy (6 armements), Francois Rimbaud (4), Joseph Reymond (4), Pierre Remuzat (3), Louis Guilhermy et J.-B. Bruny (2). Une souscription de 500 livres a l'armement de Laubpin est signe Tournefort. Dans trois armements sont intresses, pour une somme totale de 10,560 livres, Soullier, Flottand et Soulier de Nmes. Emmanuel et Clc de Paris, souscrivent aux armements de Francois Matalian et Francois de Pepinet, en 1710-1712 ; le consul de France a Malaga, galement pour 1,000 livres, a la Jour don-Galre en 1711. Les intresses du personnel de la marine royale ne viennent pas tous de Toulon : il y en a occasionnellement de Rochefort, et le commissaire Jonville effectue par trois fois une mise modeste (150 a 250 livres). Du Trousset de Valincour, secrtaire de l'amiral, figure pour 500 livres dans l'armement des
(98) Voir aussi supra, note 18. (99) II est possible que quelques-uns nous chappent parce que les noms de baptme sont parfois omis ; d'ailleurs les scribes de l'amiraut ne sont pas toujours fciles a dchiffrer : aussi bien le lecteur voudra-t-il excuser les incertitudes orthographiques de certains noms propres. (100) Et de surcrot cinq fois pour un ami ou des amis, sans autre indication.
Projets et Contrats d'rmement en Course Marseillais
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deux galres du roi commandes par le chevalier de Pilles. On trouve parfois un abb, un notaire, un ingnieur, un directeur des tabacs, un Chirurgien, ainsi que Coulomb, mdecin du roi (1,000 livres) ; parfois un boulanger, un tonnelier, un contremaitre. C'est tout l'quipage de la barque Saint-Trophime qui souscrit 216 livres pour aider a raettre la Charmante a la mer (101). Assez souvent on souscrit pour des parents et des amis, dont la plupart sont designes nommment. La grande majorit de ces simples intresses fait qui en dit long sur la course ne misent qu'une fois : au moins quatre cent cinquante noms environ, sur un total de six cent trente-sept. Cette timidit est naturellement plus marquee chez les petits souscripteurs, mais leur disposition est partage par quatrevingt-douze socitaires qui ont pris Ie risque d'un investissement plus important dans un seul armement (de 1,000 livres a 9,060 1. 14 s. 6 d.). C'est prcisment a ce niveau, en totalisant les versements de chacun (voir l'appendice), que le nombre des simples intresses commence a dpasser celui des directeurs ; leur supriorit ne devient pourtant vidente qu'au niveau des investissements de 2,000 a 5,000 livres, ou l'on trouve aussi presque Ie tiers des capitaines. Il reste nanmoins que 60 % des socitaires se sont limites a un investissement total infrieur a 1,000 livres ; 56 % s'obligent pour des sommes de 150 a 950 livres, et gnralement une fois pour toutes. Pour la majorit d'entre eux, comme on l'a toujours cru, la course ne reprsente qu'un jeu phmre, une loterie parmi d'autres. On peut supposer que la navet ou l'amiti ont entram quelques-uns. Nos chiffres ne peuvent, en effet, teir compte de tous les amis (au pluriel) qui souscrivent ; heureusement pour la statistique, il s'agit gnralement d'un seul ami. En tenant compte des amis d'Italie et de mes officiers (102), on pourrait arriver a un total d'environ sept cents simples socitaires. En se limitant aux intresses nommment designes, on aboutit, les directeurs et capitaines inclus, a un total de sept cent quatre-vingt-quatorze. Nous laissons cependant de cte un directeur et huit capitaines qui semblent n'avoir contribue ni a leur propre armement ni a un autre. Indpendamment des pleins pouvoirs qui la caractrisent, le poids de la direction d'un armement se mesure a l'importance relative des interets en jeu. Sauf pour les tout petits armements,
(101) Souscription collective plus impressionnante : le capitaine corsaire Gaspard Martin verse 3,000 livres dans l'armement du Duc-de*Berry (Jos. Matalian, 1705), tant pour moi que pour les intresses du vaisseau le SaintPierre, suivant 1'ordre qu'ils m'en ont donne par escrit (ibid., IX B 4, f 306). (102) G. Gasignery, la Silvie (ibid., f 632).
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les listes de participants, qui peuvent monter a une quarantaine et parfois a soixante-dix (103) le nombre moyen est de 25 , commencent par une forte participation des directeurs, suivie, de facon significative, par les placements importants du capitaine et parfois de quelques autres, puis descendent rapidement vers les actions de 1,000 livres et au-dessous. On pourrait diffrencier les armements en fonction de cette structure. Il en est qui sont constitus presque entirement de multiples actions de mille livres, tandis que d'autres le sont d'actions de centaines de livres. A quelques execeptions prs, le comportement des vrais aficionados de la course ne tmoigne gure de constance sur ce point. Comme Pierre Bompard, chef de file des simples associs, certains oscillent entre ces deux niveaux de souscription. Parmi les cinquante-sept qui arment quatre fois ou plus, Faction dominante est de 200 a 800 livres : il s'en trouve cent soixante-seize, contre cent soixante et un de 1,000 a 2,000 livres et seulement vingt et un de 3,000 a 5,000 livres. Il ressort de ces indications que les administrateurs, parfois en compagnie des capitaines, taient bien places pour s'imposer a la masse des socitaires, une fois les versements encaisss. Un certain type d' escrite se distingue des autres par sa brivet. L, le promoteur se contente de faire campagne pour reunir les dniers et de se prvaloir d'un pouvoir absolu ; il ne promet mme pas une comptabilit avant le depart ; s'il entre dans les dtails, c'est pour se mettre a l'abri, tant de possibles reclamations de l'quipage que d'accusations de negligence, et pour garantir sa remuneration, ses propres provisions . Cellesci sont presque de rigueur. Sous sa forme la plus modeste, la commission n'est que de 2 % du produit de prises ; l'usage parat y ajouter 2 % sur le total de l'armement ; a la limite, les directeurs s'attribuent de surcroit 2 % sur le prix de revente du navire, ou sur les dpenses qu'ils feront, ou sur le dsarmement, ce qui accroit lgrement la marge, assez large d'ailleurs, entre le produit brut et le produit net d'une prise et c'est peut-tre ce que veulent dire quelques directeurs en prenant 2 % sur le tout . Au fil des annes, certains obtiennent, explicitement d'ailleurs, la latitude d'offrir des donatives et gratifications qu'on est souvent oblige de faire pour l'avantage dudit armement, et sans qu'ils soient obliges de justifier d'o cela procde . Puisqu'on admet que telles gratifications ne peuvent estre passes en
(103) La plus longue (soixante-quatorze signatures, dont six illisibles) s'applique au projet d'un armement en course d'un vaisseau appel la Calire-Anne (ibid., IX B 5, f os 10 V-12),
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compte , les armateurs cherchent plusieurs fois a les limiter a un mximum de 300 ou 500 livres (104). Us pensent en definitive a faciliter la confiscation des prises autant que l'expdition du corsaire. La question de la confiscation, qui pouvait tre conteste non seulement par les propritaires victimes, mais aussi par d'autres preneurs ou par l'amiral lui-mme, rejoint la question, si delicate, de la vente des prises. D'une part, les directeurs jugent parfois souhaitable de se faire reconnaitre a l'avance leur droit d'indemnit pour tous les frais de la poursuite, de la confiscation jusques au jugement dfinitif (105) ; d'autre part, ils se mettent a couvert de la necessit d'acqurir eux-mmes une prise qui risquerait autrement d'etre vendue a vil prix. Citons sur ce sujet, passablement obscur, les armateurs de la Sainte-Marguerite : Permettons aux sieurs directeurs et caissiers qu'au cas que, les effets provenant des prises estant expos aux enchres, le prix ne sera port a la juste valeur, audit cas sera permis de le faire reteir par voye indirecte par lesdits sieurs directeurs au profit de nousdits armateurs et a nostre risque, sans pouvoir leur ren imputer ni les rendre garant d'aucune solvabilit des debiteurs qu'ils feront a la vente desdits effets. (106) Voici, dvoil, le motif profond des entraves imposes aux capitaines en ce qui concerne les ventes a l'tranger. Mme en dsignant leurs procureurs a Livourne, et ailleurs, les administrateurs de la Notre-Dame-de-Bonne-Rencontre veulent que le capitarne Alardon leur donne avis par toute sorte de voye... en leur envoyant coppie des procdures . quand il y laisse une prise. Les administrateurs de la pinque Sainte-Anne-Jsus-Marie, tout en enjoignant que les prises soient conduites au port le plus proche de France , demandent aussi a en recevoir avis, dans l'intention de les faire assurer (107). Tout cela traduit un certain optimisme, comme ce vceu des associs du Saint-Louis : Au cas que, pendant Ie temps de ladite course, il fut fait des prises dont Ie produit fut sufisant pour donner une mise et plus aux intresses, la repartition en sera faite le plustot qu'il sera possible au sol la livre. (108)
(104) Ibid., IX B 4, f 08 650, 686. (105) Ibid., f" 725, 735. (106) Ibid., f' 608. (107) Ibid., f 08 484, 720. Cf. B.-M. EMERIGON, Traite des assurances, Marseille, 1783, t. I, p. 232-235. (108) Ibid., f 693. D'un ton tout autre, les armateurs du Saint-Nicolas-lePhnix (ibid., IX B 5, P 113) rclament : Toutes les fois qu'il y aura de l'ar-
274
Plus couramment, il fallait prvoir une deuxime requisition au prorata des mises pour prolongar une campagne : soit que des prises aient t faites, soit mme parfois dans le cas contraire (109). Sinon on pouvait se tourner vers un emprunt sur la place, comme on faisait pour les avitaillements et quelquefois pour l'achvement d'un armement, a la charge, bien entendu, d'en assurer le montani. Sur ce point, les armateurs du Jacques-dit-laPalestine nous confient leur pense secrete : Us [les directeurs] se prvaudront sur les prises pour lors faites et, n'y en ayant point, iceux fairont assurer telles despances et s'en rembourseront sur les prises qui seront ou pourront estre faites dans la suite, et a leur deffaut sur la valeur de la barque au retour d'icelle et en cas de sinistre sur lesdites assurances (110). Les associs savent tres bien qu'en cas de catastrophe les assureurs ont a supporter les dpenses et qu'eux-mmes n'auront perdu que leurs apports a la mise hors. D'autre part, en l'absence de tout sinistre, il y a de fortes sommes a dduire du prix de revente du navire, telles que dpenses de ravitaillement, etc. Le cas ou la revente n'y suffirait pas (quand mme le navire serait rentr en bon tat, fait tres exceptionnel) est prvu par quelques escrites ; celles-ci mettent tout le passif au compte des socitaires, individuellement, au sol la livre de leurs premiers apports ; mais elles sont rarement aussi claires que dans le cas des armateurs de la Sainte-Marguerite, qui s'obligent tous de chacun de nos biens (111). C'est pourquoi les armateurs stipulent de temps en temps que leur socit deliberer (112), sans laisser aux seuls directeurs la decision d'une prolongation de la course ; pour le moins, on limite d'avance a un ou deux mois la facult des directeurs de decider une prolongation (113). Les actionnaires ne sont done pas des commanditaires. Contrairement a ce fameux usage qui fait si souvent le profit des directeurs, les associs de la pinque Sainte-Anne-Jsus-Marie se rservent le droit de nommer un nouveau capitaine s'il arrive malheur a Joseph Barthlemy. Plus souvent ils auront a choisir deux, trois ou quatre d'entre eux pour viser les comptes du
gent dans la caisse du provenu des prises ils [les directeurs] pourront en donner les deux tiers a ceux des intresses qui fairont demande... et conserveront le tiers restant pour les vnements qui pourront arriver... (109) Ibid., IX B 4, f 614 ; IX B 5, f" 111-115. (110) Ibid., f 108. (111) Ibid., f 609. (112) Ibid., f 484, 720, 725. (113) A titre d'exemple, ibid., IX B 5, f 65.
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caissier avant le depart du corsaire, et surtout avant la liquidation de la socit (114). Le procureur Clron, qui regoit pour son deuxime armement le pouvoir d'agir en arbitre a tout ce que besoin sera , sans plus se soucier des avis d'un adjoint, est toutefois d'accord que ses comptes soient clos et arrts par deux de nous intresses . Deux ans plus tard, apres de nouvelles experiences malheureuses de Clron, il est stipule qu'en cas de dispute une reunion se tiendra dans la maison de l'un des intresses ; en revanche, il n'y a plus trace de la stipulation, d'ailleurs unique, de la premire escrite de Clron, qui le rendait comptable a la premire requisition de ses armateurs. A vrai dire, il n'y avait pas l de signe encourageant : a son deuxime armement du Saint-Claude, Clron avait dj du prendre a son compie le cot du navire, sans que la plupart de ses anciens intresses aient t attirs vers un projet ainsi rduit a moins de la moiti du premier. Quand il tente sa chance une troisime fois, c'est encore a petite chelle et le procureur-caissier y souscrit un bon quart du capitai : Clron, pour deux milles livres. Dieu le conduise (115). Dans l'ensemble, toutefois, les escrittes demeurent peu loquaces au sujet des droits des intresses. On attendrait plus de precisions a ce sujet a mesure que les directeurs inspirent moins de confiance au public. C'est la situation du pauvre Clron et peut-tre de quelques petites affaires de l'anne 1712, ou l'on tombe d'accord pour que toute la comptabilit soit enregistre devant l'amiraut, ou que tous les papiers soient conserves par Ie caissier, ou encore que les enchres des prises se fassent devant notaire (116). Jamais auparavant on n'avait cru utile d'aller aussi loin, du moins ouvertement ; ainsi les associs du Saint-Nicolasle-Phnix, animes d'une mfiance toute nouvelle, font admettre Ie principe d'une distribution des deux tiers de leurs profits avant que les comptes ne soient dfinitivement arrts (117). On aurait done tir quelques lecons ? Mais nous sommes dj dans la periode des pourparlers franco-britanniques et la course commence
(114) A titre d'exemple, ibid., IX B 4, f 608. (115) Ibid., f o s 478, 516, 624. Le projet du deuxime armement du SaintClaude annonce qu'il se fait pour tcher d'indemniser les anciens intresses qui avoient entr dans le premier et second armement fait en cette ville et ensuite a celle de Livourne ; puisque la premire escrite du Saint-Claude parie d'un btiment a rames alors sur le chantier, il parait bien qu'il a t deux fois rearm dans une periode de six mois, en 1709, avant cette deuxime escrite . (116) Ibid., IX B 5, P 70, 108, 116. (117) Supra, note 108. Un seul precedent, le Saint-Louis (ibid., IX B 4, f 692), mais d'un ton beaucoup moins exigeant et spcifique.
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a perdre son attrait pour les bailleurs de fonds. D'ailleurs, le procureur Clron ne fut pas le premier qui dut admettre Ie controle de ses comptes par les intresses. Une condition de ce genre, sans tre normale, n'est pas exceptionnelle, non plus que la prescription de soumettre toutes difficults et contestations parmy nous a la pluralit des voix des armateurs assembles. On trouve des conditions semblables pour d'importants directeurs comme Etienne Anselme. En somme, elles paraissent constituer plutot un signe de l'importance relative des intresses que de la reputation plus ou moins fragile d'un administrateur. Rien de semblablc quand Anselme prend sur lui la moiti de la premire mise dans la J our don-Galre ; dans la deuxime mise il a encore souscrit le quart, mais il s'est adjoint d'autres intresses plus considerables et il leur offre la possibilit d'un recours a la pluralit des voix : alors, en cas de partage d'opinion sur lesdites difficults..., elles seront... dcides par deux amis communs arbitres qui seront nomms et convenus amiablement entre nous (118). Les principaux armateurs de l'entreprise de Grandpr prvoient un pareil arbitrage, disant qu'il arrive bien souvent des incidents qu'on ne scauroit prvoir qui suscitent bien souvent des contestations entre les armateurs (119). Voil enfin, la condamnation implicite de l'objet primordial de toutes ces escrites , qui tait de prevenir les disputes de toute espce, dans un genre d'affaires qui n'en offrait que trop souvent l'occasion. Les contrats ne se ressemblent gure pourtant, si ce n'est quant a la manire d'y souscrire et de mettre au pas les equipages corsaires. On s'tonne que la prudence meridionale n'ait pas plus souvent insr dans ces textes des clauses de protection centre les abus possibles de ceux qui avaient le soin et l'administration de tout . Mais coutons celui qui en fut incontestablement la plus grande figure. Vers la fin de la guerre, Joseph Maillet s'puise a solliciter auprs des ngociants des souscriptions, de 500 livres chacune, en vue d'un armement dfensif contre trois corsaires zlandais qui croisaient sur leurs ctes. Aprs une deuxime assemble, Maillet crit a Charonier, inspecteur general de la marine a Toulon : Je ne vous retrace pas, Monsieur, les verbiages inutilles des conuoqus... II ne s'en prive pourtant pas. Fort de son crdit auprs de Pontchartrain, il avait avanc qu' infailliblement le ministre ferait rembourser les souscripteurs par la Chambre de Commerce : mais ma proposition s'aprochoit trop des sentimens romains pour attirer des sufrages . Dsil(118) Ibid., f 616 et IX B 5, f 20.
(119) Ibid., i" 32.
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lusionn, il souligne : Gente assay, huomini pacchi. (120) Malgr les circonstances un peu exceptionnelles, on comprend mieux, a la lumire de ces propos, l'autoritarisme de la plupart des directions d'entreprises corsaires, et les raisons pourquoi I' escrite tend surtout a le consacrer. Enregistre devant l'amiraut, elle peut bien tre regarde comme la charte du procureur devenu directeur (121).
(120) A. N. Marine B3 208, f 01 519-521 v (le 11 dec. 1712: copie). Le ngoce avait insist pour que la Chambre de Commerce supportai la dpense d'un renfort d'quipages pour le Parfait et le Fleuron, qu'on et affects a cette course ; Arnoul, intendant du commerce de Marseille, avait rejet cette proposition. (121) Je dois en terminant rendre hommage a l'aide que m'a prte ma femme, singulirement pour la transcription des listes d'intresss aux armements, si malaisment dchiffrables. Que soient aussi bien vivement remercis M. Michel Mollai et M. Marc Perrichet, doni le concours nous a t prcieux pour la mise au point du texte de eet article.
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APPENDICE
ORDRE DE GRANDEUR DES INVESTISSEMENTS TOTAUX (SELON LES ESCRITES ) (1)

Placements (en livres)
A. B. C. D. E. F. G. H. I. J. K. L.
90000- 140000 49600 - 81640 25900- 49250 15 500 - 25 000 10000- 15000 5150- 9950 2000- 5100 1 000 - 1 875 450 950 130 400 28 110 Rien TOTAUX
Directeurs
Capitaines (2)
3 2 2 7 7 21 13 4 1 1 8
Autres intresses nommment designes

4 8 35 88 117 16 189 30 637
2 2 8 5 19 24 28 4 3
1
96
69
(1) Le tableau est fonde sur l'analyse des listes de participation de 74 armements, en en excluant le rarmement de la Riche-Galere (cap. Fr. Matalian ; dir. Amalric et Crozet), finance par le produit de ses prises, mais en y comprenant les quarts d'intrt dans l'Hirondelle (cap. Jure ; dir. Rigaud), dont l'armement aurait cot au moins 16000 livres : sur ce pied, Cassard y entre pour 8000 livres. La contribution de Charles Lion a l'armement de la Conception fut le btiment lui-mme (un brigantin), avec armes et agrs, et a t value ici a 1 000 livres, d'aprs le projet du brigantin Sainte-Anne (850 livres). L'intrt dfinitif de Cassard dans son propre armement de 1710 reste inconnu : il y est inserii pour 15000 livres, mais tous les intresses ensemble ne souscrivent que 115 000 livres dans un projet qui monte a environ 250 000 livres, et 1' escrite porte que M. Cassard sera oblige de fournir ou de faire fournir le reste (Am. Mile IX B 4, f 652). Dans le tableau ci-dessus, o il figure dans la categorie C (pour 31000 livres souscrites au total), il faudrait probablement le situer plus haut ; en tout cas, ses investissements dans la course dpassent de loin la portee de nos escrites , comme d'ailleurs ceux de plusieurs autres capitaines et directeurs. Nos chiffres ne rendent pas compte non plus des prlvements de capitaux au prorata, lorsque les prolongations de course ne sont pas finances par les prises et les emprunts : tout nous conduit aussi a croire qu'il y a eu des rarmements (entendez a 1'echelle des premiers projets ) qui n'ont pas laiss de trace dans notre documentation, laquelle n'en renferme que quatre. (2) Catelin et Lion, comme Jos. Maillet, sont compts parmi les directeurs.
13
THE TRADE AND PRIVATEERING OF SAINT-MALO DURING THE WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION The fierce struggle which convulsed western Europe for over twenty years at the turn of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries has acquired such firm contours in the writings of Macaulay and Trevelyan and Churchill that some people may well feel there is now little more to be said about it. For many of us, too, even the issues for which William III and Marlborough did battle may have faded into unreality, whether stated in terms of religious or political freedom, or Great Power rivalry for control of Italy and Spain and the Netherlands, or of the balance of power, or of Anglo-French commercial and colonial competition. Anyone disposed to this indifference might be reminded of what Sir Winston Churchill's resistance to Hitler owed to the study of his great ancestor's perseverance against the armies of Louis XIV; but in any case there is a great deal that we still do not know about the modus operandi of the Nine Years War of 1688-97 and the War of the Spanish Succession that broke out in 1701 and was not finally closed till 1714. For example, during the Spanish War particularly, the Channel Islands waged a peculiar guerrilla campaign of their own, harassing the enemy's coastal shipping from Normandy to Spain and taking hundreds of prizes.1 Yet on the Channel Island privateers the standard histories are silent. Even the serious study of French privateering if one means to include some idea of how it was organised and financed, and some estimate of its results has barely been begun. Yet this was the classical age of the French corsairs, of Jean Bart, Rene Duguay Trouin and other captains only less famous than these heroes of Dunkirk and Saint-Malo. Like the U-boats of the twentieth century, they did critical damage to the Allied war effort, especially to the nerves of English commerce, at a time when full-dress naval encounters were rare. Louis XIV's penurious government, in fact, deliberately forsook the high cost of an organised fleet after 1694, and again after 1704, in favour of a policy of commerce destruction chiefly paid for by private enterprise, to which it sometimes brought large rewards. In this grande guerre de course, Saint-Malo occupied second place after Dunkirk, although the whole range of its maritime undertakings extended much further than Dunkirk's right across the oceans, indeed, to Chile and Peru, to China and Arabia, to say nothing of Guinea and the Caribbean and the all-important cod-fisheries of Newfoundland. In all these trades except Africa and the West Indies, Saint-Malo, the ' cit corsaire ' with a population then estimated at less than 20,000,2 was pre-eminent among French ports, even to the extent of pioneering some of them, precisely in the short term of years with which we are concerned. The wealth and business audacity of some Malouin merchants at this juncture were such that in 1712 a group of them finally took over from Paris the monopoly of the French East India Company. ' Messieurs de Saint Malo ' were a force even at Versailles; the most thrustful among them, Noel Danycan, sieur de Lpine, was related by marriage to the Pontchartrain family, which had charge of the navy and
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colonies. At the same time they were capable of snapping their fingers at government if it so suited their interests, as they did when Versailles from time to time prohibited sailings to the theoretically closed areas of Spanish America. If it were at all conceivable to speak of a republican spirit in the France of Louis XIV, one would surely look for it among these proud and tough realists, who bring to mind the self-absorbed, aggressive outlook that created some of the Dutch towns. Yet this brilliant career, which attained its climax when the French economy as a whole was contracting through monetary disorganisation and bad harvests, was achieved by Malouin enterprise and seamanship in face of serious natural disadvantages. The port lacked a commercial hinterland: compare Nantes or Le Havre, for example, with the Loire and the Seine to connect them with the region of the capital. The approach to the ' Vieux Rocher ' by sea is notoriously dangerous, and its port facilities so necessary on a coast with the highest tidal range in France were such as to shock seventeenth-century engineers. Nor had the place any special State-conferred privileges such as were enjoyed by Dunkirk (a free port from 1700) or Marseilles (a free port from 1703, besides its monopoly of the French Levant trade); the only mark of royal esteem to distinguish Saint-Malo was the right of its seamen to man the flagship of the fleet. All this would perhaps command your interest even if the city's skyline the cathedral and those massive chimneys that crowd the steeply pitched roofs within the granite corset of the ramparts were not so familiar to you, almost a part of your own world. Some of the grandest houses there, with their sculptured oak doors and family escutcheons, were in fact the product of private fortunes made in the later years of Louis XIV, if completed slightly later, as was the enlargement of the ramparts3: fit dwellings for a bourgeoisie that gave itself seigneurial names, like Magon de la Chipaudire or De La Lande Magon the position of the particule is variable and sometimes confusing, though the properties from which these derive seem usually to have been situated on the mainland, around Saint-Servan and Dian, away from the noise of the cabarets and the stink of drying fish. I wish I were in a position to devote my lecture to the links between this ' foyer des armateurs les plus entreprenants de la France '4 and the Channel Islands. In peace-time, as the researches of Professor Jean Delumeau and his pupils at Rennes have recently shown,5 the Islands had quite a brisk traffic with it. In 1698, for example, the Saint-Malo admiralty registered 112 departures for Jersey and 74 for Guernsey, while the corresponding arrivals numbered 97 and 65 respectively; measured in tonnage, the departures add up to very nearly the same for each island (about 600 ionneaux), while the arrivals from Guernsey at Saint-Malo totalled double those from Jersey, thus implying that the Guernseymen used bigger boats. However, if we aggregate the tonnage figures for all ten peace-time years between 1681 and 1700 inclusive (i.e. 1681-7 and 1698-1700) a more reliable indication than one year alone Jersey has a slight but perceptible preponderance, as follows: Departures horn Sf.-MaJo 2,589 fx. 1,944 ix. 4,533 Arrivals ai St.-Malo 3,222 ix. 2,796 fx. 6,018 Total 5,811 fx. 4,740 ix. 10,551
Jersey Guernsey
The Trade and Privateering of Sain t-Malo
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Almost invariably, each island exported more to Saint-Malo direct than it imported; for the ten years in question, the total excess of exports over imports, measured in tonnage, was about 25 per cent. If arrivals and departures for both islands are added together (plus 638 and 622 tonneau* in 1688 to and from the ' lies anglo-normandes ' without further specification), and if we then compare the result (11,811 tonneaux) with the comparable figures of Saint-Malo's trade with England and Ireland, we reach a much more interesting conclusion. We find that the aggregate trade of these islands with Saint-Malo was equal to no less than 42.7 per cent, of the tonnage passing between Saint-Malo and all the English ports to which it traded, and to 55.7 per cent, of the city's Irish trade.4 Bearing in mind that the English ports included London and Bristol, and that there was an important Irish Jacobite colony in Saint-Malo, the share of the Channel Islands (almost a sixth) in what was Saint-Malo's second largest foreign traffic, in time of peace, is surely rather impressive, without having to reckon with the unknown ramifications of smuggling. The virtual cessation of this legitimate trade during the war years may or may not have stimulated smuggling. It must certainly have provided an incentive to privateering in the Islands, for whose economy the abrupt amputation of their French trade in war-time must otherwise have brought crisis. How would your ancestors have managed without the numerous quantities of corn and salt, wines and brandies, timber and naval stores, hardware and earthenware, building materials and assorted dry goods, which your busy corsairs brought into St. Peter Port and St. Helier, along with ransom bills for such captures as the captains did not consider worth the effort of sending home? But some more peaceful extraction of French property also occurred. Whether or not the payment of ransoms had run into technical difficulties, the sieur Dobre, who chiefly handled the Guernsey ransoms, is found seeking a French pass in 1711 to trade at Saint-Malo or in Normandy, where the port of Carteret was said at the time to be making continual clandestine exchanges with the Channel Islands under cover of returning the hostages for ransoms. Five years earlier, Guernsey merchants were trying to send lead, tin and wool to Saint-Malo, in return for Breton linens, and were informed that they needed French permits, which they probably obtained; in 1712 a Jersey boat and her cargo of wool were arrested at Cherbourg, perhaps for lack of such a document.7 A certain amount of petty commerce seerns to have accompanied the exchange of prisoners. In 1704, Captain Jacques Lemprire of Jersey, who then commanded the flag of truce that several times a year carried French prisoners from the Islands to Granville and Saint-Malo, was allowed to buy an English prize in Saint-Malo and sought permission to stow it with French goods, as his successor certainly did in 1706. Lemprire, incidentally, might almost be regarded as an honorary Malouin. He had lived on the Vieux Rocher and sold at least one vessel there before the English declaration of war in May 1702, at which time his hostess, the Dame des Bassablons Vincent, lent her name to a false bill of lading covering a cargo of Bordeaux wines, just in case war broke out before it reached Guernsey. Six years later we have the naval commssairs' ordonnaeur of Saint-Malo describing Lemprire as ' un homme fin et habile qui, ayant de tout temps fait commerce icy, y a beaucoup de nos bons ngocians pour amis et qui fait a Jerz toute sorte de plaisrs a nos prisonniers '.8 No doubt the peace-time trading connection bred many intimate contacts of this kind between Malouins and Channel Islanders, even if few attained the popularity of Jacques Lemprire, captain and merchant.
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Some of the privateersmen on either side evidently knew each other well, to judge by an odd reference in a letter of August 1708, to the French naval minister: after complaining (not for the first time) of interference with French fishermen by an Island corsair, contrary to an agreement with the English government to leave them unmolested, the ordonnafeur of SaintMalo surprisingly adds that the Island corsairs in his neighbourhood ' sont bien plus gracieux, et ils boivent tous les jours avec les nostres, quand ils les rencontrent a la mer . . .'9 I do not quite know what to make of these carousals, unless ' both sides were trying to soften each other into giving away useful information. This may also have been one reason for the good relations which apparently existed between the Island corsairs and some of the French fishermen, or help explain why the fishermen of both sides were apt to stray near each other's coasts, at least in 1710-11, although here smuggling seems a likelier motive. I know of at least one English tobacco runner that operated under a fishing licence, and it was apparently the Channel Island fisherman who used Chausey as a rendezvous for smuggling tobacco into Normandy.10 The Sept lies were often used in a similar way. Andre de Ste Croix, the most prominent of Jersey privateering captains at this time, also had a contact in the lie d'Er, at the mouth of the channel into Trguier; tobacco was hidden under stones in the island and subsequently removed by the one and only farmer in the place, a me/ayer named Andreu (who got nine years' banishment for his pains), or by neighbours from the mainland parish of Plougouscan, who came over ostensibly to shoot sea-fowl on their holidays. This case came before the intendant of Brittany in 1709.11. I have little doubt that a patient sifting of the legal records would throw up others, in the Vendee and Saintonge as well as in Brittany and (especially perhaps) Normandy. But there can be no doubt at all that the main business of the Island privateers was capturing and sinking, not smuggling. It was as privateers that the ' Gerziats ', as they were known in Saint-Malo rather unfairly, seeing that Guernsey was the more active privateering island, were habitually referred to as canaille, sometimes as ' cette canaille maudite '. French self-esteem was injured by the damage and dislocation inflicted, occasionally within sight of observers ashore, by ' tous ces larroneaux qui nous font plus de dommage que les plus grands corsaires', though some indeed were caught and their crews compelled to semi-starvation in the chateau of Dian and elsewhere. The sieur Lempereur, the naval commissary whom I have just quoted, reporting the presence of 8 to 10 'Gerziats' in the Sept lies in 1706 and failing to obtain adequate coastguards, let himself go in writing to his minister : ' et franchement c'est une honte pour la 12 nation qu'on souffre impunment ces canailles exercer leurs pirateries . . . Though Lempereur may not have known it, in August 1705 a council of war at Brest had reviewed the possibility of attacking the Channel Islands themselves, but abandoned the idea as impracticable, not only because of rocks and tides and strong garrisons, but also because the French navy recognised that ' ces isles sont habtes par un grand peuple aguerr '.". It is as well to understand in this connection how much Saint-Malo depended on the supply of food and materials from the little ports of the Cotentin and northern Brittany: for cereals and cider, fruit and vegetables, honey and wax, ham and lard, butter and cheese, lime and tiles, hemp and flax and their derivatives, including ropes and canvas and the famous toiles that were the basis of the city's fundamental export trade to Spain and Spanish America. Many other requirements from further afield salt, wines,
The Trade and Privateering of Saint-Malo
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coal, sulphur, alum, iron and other metals also reached the place in the small coastwise baieaux on which the Channel Islanders preyed. Evidently it was more economical to face the risks of capture and the still more common delays when convoys of coasters ran to harbour for shelter from the privateers than the bad Breton roads. While the War of the Spanish Succession caused a drastic decline in Malouin trade as a whole in 1708 it was fifty per cent, below the aggregate tonnage of a normal year of peace and usually less than that14, the tonnage employed in the petit cabotage (that is, in the zone between Caen and the mouth of the Vilaine) dipped only slightly below the peace-time levels of 1698-9 and even exceeded that of 1700: in 1708 the figure for this is estimated at 12,500 formeaux, against less than 9,000 in 1700. As the pefi'fs cajbofeurs were small vessels, of less than thirty tons, such a difference implies that a great many more of them were making for Saint-Malo in 1708 than in 1700; and in 1710 there were apparently a great many more than in 1698 or 1699.15 In view of the generally distressed state of France and the mounting interference of Guernseymen and Zeelanders with her coastwise navigation, this fact is rather surprising. Did the state of war the demands of the Malouin privateers in particular stimulate the flow of imports? Unfortunately for this hypothesis, the level of such arrivals during the first five years of the Nine Years War (1689-93) was exceptionally low; although a sudden increase in them by half in 1694, which was more than maintained in 1695-7, may have had something to do with increased privateering activity, these levels were exceeded in 1708 and 1710-11, when the Malouin privateering effort was long past its peak. For what this indication is worth, however, it probably points to a persistent and even rising demand for the building of ships and houses, and for feeding an inflated war-time population in other words, to a degree of war-time prosperity not enjoyed by the country at large. Before reaching such a conclusion, however, we should look more widely at the balance of loss and gain that developed at Saint-Malo during the War of the Spanish Succession. And first we should consider one huge injury inflicted by war on the fundamental pattern of Malouin enterprise. This was the -severe curtailment of its historic share in the Newfoundland cod-fisheries. Every spring, in time of peace, four or even five score sizeable ierreneuviers sailed from Cap Frhel for Newfoundland and the Banks, including about a score of fishing vessels from Granville: the Granvillais concentrated on the Banks fishery, while the Malouin fleets split into groups that fished the south-eastern bays round Plaisance (Placentia) the so-called Chapeau Rouge and a section that went off to the Petit Nord, the northern peninsula of Newfoundland where were caught the smaller cod whose drying properties caused them to be in strong demand in Provence and Italy.15 Dried cod, in huge quantities, was Saint-Malo's classical export. Along with Breton linens, it was this humble commodity, a staple food in the Catholic countries of southern Europe especially, that furnished the Malouins with purchasing power in Spain and Italy and the other ports of France herself, notably Marseilles, which between 1681 and 1690 imported over twice as much of the Malouin catch as did Le Havre (with the Paris market behind it); Bordeaux and Nantes were of minor importance by comparison.17 These commercial links, which of course imply close personal contacts, greatly extended the horizons of Malouin business men; Marseilles was the key to Barbary and the Levant, Cadiz to the mines of Mexico and Peru, Le Havre (with Rouen) to the market of Paris. In the business houses of Cadiz many Malouins would
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have acquired knowledge of Spanish markets overseas, of how to deal with Spanish officials and how to get round the restrictive Spanish navigation laws. This does not explain why they took the lead in the great French breakthrough to the South Sea from 1701, but it was an indispensable condition of that initiative. Very few of the terre-neuviers returned direct to Saint-Malo, After delivering their catches in the Mediterranean they turned themselves into ordinary eargo tramps, trading between other ports before coming home perhaps with alum from the Papal States, soap and olive oil and cotton from Marseilles, salt and wines from Cadiz, iron from Bilbao, wines and tars from Bordeaux, or salt from La Rochelle usually eighteen months or more after setting sail for the fogs of Newfoundland; and even if the ierre-neuva did not pass ihrough the Straits of Gibraltar, she might be away for the best part of a year. As the fishing season was short, most of the absent months were spent carrying cargo never destined for the home port at all as (for instance) the corn of Sicily or Sardinia, which might be delivered at Alicante or Cartagena, or barrels of soda from Marseilles to Le Havre.18 Clearly, such a triangular trade was exposed to many risks in war-time. So were the drying-stages and other equipment of the Newfoundland bases themselves; codfishers figure prominently among English and Dutch prizes (and still more often ransoms, which at least meant a punitive tax), and an English raid in September 1710 wiped out many installations besides causing other losses. But war risks were not the only or even the main reason why sailings for the codfishery fell on so abruptly with the outbreak of war 88 in 1702, but only 22 the following year-and why they never regained peace-time levels.19 During the Nine Years War, sailings for the fishery had tumbled from 113 in 1688 and 47 in 1689 to a mere six in 1690, twelve in 1691, five in 1692 and six inl693. This far more drastic collapse is highly suggestive. For in those years, precisely, France was still sending a battle fleet to sea; as soon as that was laid aside, or broken into squadron warfare, we find Newfoundland sailings creeping up again to 17 in 1694, to 39 in 1696.20 A similar contrast is observable between the earlier and later years of the Spanish Succession War, though it is less striking then, doubtless because this time Brest never sent to sea more than privateering'squadrons. These squadrons, however, which were inseparable from the name of Rene Duguay Trouin, greatest of all Malouin captains, were composed largely of naval ships, with a call on naval manpower.21 And it was this naval call-up, of all the effects of war, that in my opinion contributed most to distort the normal pattern of Saint-Malo's trade so far as it was based on the codfishery. For the fishery demanded large numbers of men : the average crew of a Malouin ierre neu vier in 1702 was 44; in 1703 it was 74.22 It is true that not all these men were needed once the fishing was completed; it was a function of the sack ships (sacgues) to take out extra supplies of salt and return with unwanted fishermen. But the majority who stayed aboard the fishing vessels would not be home till many months later, perhaps not until the autumn or winter of the year after sailing from Saint-Malo. Some hundreds of the best seamen were thus temporarily lost to the navy even if they were not taken prisoner by the enemy. Moreover, Malouin seamen were more highly valued by the naval authorities at Brest than any others that fell within that great arsenal's field of recruitment. The intendant there declared that his best seamen, and almost the only good ones, came from the department of Saint-Malo (the city and its adjacent23 villages): an element of Malouin seamen was essential to a good crew. It is unlikely that such
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superiority can be attributed wholly, if at all, to any special efficiency on the part of the commissaires des classes in this department, as compared with those of the neighbouring Saint-Brieuc, Granville, Cherbourg and Le Havre (which often earned unfavourable comments from the naval intendant); experience in the codfishery and on privateers must have counted for more, though the Havrais also had both; above all, I believe, the high reputation of Malouin seamen must be taken as both cause and consequence of the city's long record of war at sea, which stretches back at least to the Hundred Years War, and of two centuries of trans-Atlantic voyaging . In his letters to Pontchartrain, the Secretary of State for the Navy, the commissary Lempereur more than once complained of disproportionately large levies on his department for the manning of armaments at Brest and occasionally for Toulon and Dunkirk also. Sailings for the Petit Nord of Newfoundland that Malouin preserve were particularly frowned on by the minister because of the extension of voyage-time beyond the Straits of Gibraltar which they involved.24 In the spring of 1708, when sailings for Newfoundland suddenly increased, there was an acute shortage of seamen in Brittany; and at Brest the intendant for the first time had recourse to Rochefort to make up his complements, even though he had fewer vaisseaux du ro in service than usual. In the previous year, the intendant Robert attributed his deficiencies to the continual arming of Newfoundlanders and corsairs at Saint-Malo.25 Nevertheless, the navy seems nearly always to have secured from Saint-Malo the full contingents for which it asked, even when the department had to be scoured for supplementary levees. This four de force was often directly achieved at the expense of the privateers by stopping their departures, curtailing their cruises, and above all (if we are to believe Lempereur) by forcing their captains to content themselves with a high proportion of men not registered for naval service.26 The navy always hoped that the corsairs would train novices, but the corsair captains (though they always took a few mousses) seldom came up to its absurd ratio of two novices for every prime seaman. Nor do the lists of crews (rofes d'guipages) preserved in the Brest naval archives27 confirm Lempereur's claim that the privateers were largely manned by Provengaux, Italians and other ' gens ramasss ' who formed a substantial floating population in war-time Saint-Malo, especially with the famine of 1709, when considerable numbers of distressed people came to the place for food and work.28 Out of 3,036 names of officers, seamen and soldiers whose place of origin my wife and I have analysed for the year 1711, there were only 81 Provengaux (57 from Marseilles) and only 30 Italians; even if we add 7 Maltese, 2 Greeks, 5 Portuguese and 23 Spaniards, the total increment from southern Europe is no more than 149 barely five per cent. Scandinavians, Netherlander, Irish, West Indians (including 8 negroes), one Canadian and two Swiss bring the total of ' trangers ' to 229 still far short of ten per cent. Even after we have added, moreover, a significant number of recruits from other French ports (including no less than 68 from Dunkirk, 31 from the Saintonge, 26 from Bordeaux) and a small but persistent sprinkling from many inland places at some distance, such as Toulouse, Rheims and Tours Paris herself contributing 31, it is safe to assert that in 1711 the vast majority of the officers and men still came from Brittany and Normandy, always with a strong nucleus (31 per cent, in 1711) from Saint-Malo and Saint-Servan; the officers (majors and mariniers) were probably most of them Malouins, the captains very often relatives of the principal armafeurs, if not also armaieurs themselves. In 1702, of course, the local element in these crews was proportion-
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ately higher over 43 per cent. since losses by capture, and to a minor extent by death, had hardly begun to be felt. As the war went on, even though engagements at sea were seldom long or severe, the privateers carried a number of partial cripples, for ' avec une jambe ou mesme un bras d moins, les officiers mariniers ne laissent pas d'estre en tat de servir, et c'est d'ailleurs l'usage icy que les armateurs qu'ils ont servy continuent a les employer quoiqu'ils ne soent propres a rien ',29 A legless pilot or an armless quartermaster was worth having if they knew the Scilly Island shoals or how to command the respect of the rather mutinous privateering crews. Discipline indeed was always so bad that many armaieurs included a dozen or several dozen soldiers, or at least ' soldatesques ' trained to musketry fire, rather than rely on the seamen alone : but this is a further reminder that Brest creamed off many of the best sailors. The privateering captains and armaieurs had necessarily to compete against each other for manpower, especially for the indispensable officiers mariniers masters, boatswains, master Bailsmen, gunners, carpenters, caulkers and the rest who quite frequently outnumbered the ordinary seamen on board privateers. It took many weeks or even months to get a large privateering crew together. Only three months after the renewal of war in 1702 between France and England and it was English trade, in the Channel Soundings, that the Malouins chiefly went for we hear of privateers waiting four or five months to complete their complements; they could not do so till others had returned; some were said to have been selfish in taking more officiers mariniers than they needed.30 In a labour market as tight as this, seamen could pitch their terms high, stipulating advances of wages well above naval rates in addition to their shares in any prize proceeds; many of them, having pocketed their avances, failed to turn up when the drums beat for sailing or else, frequently, deserted later; and if no prizes were taken, two or three months' wages paid in advance represented a sizeable item of dead loss to the armament.31 In 1704 it was stated that the armafeurs were limited by lack of men to using small vessels.32 And perhaps this is why the number of soldiers and volunteers rose in 1705 above the number of ordinary seamen to as much as a quarter of all the officers and crews that manned the privateers in that year, which saw the peak of Saint-Malo's privateering effort in this war. In that year also, to serve 54 privateers, the r/es d'quipage list as many as 1,636 officiers mariniers, compared with only 1,187 ordinary mafefofs almost as if some seamen had had to be bribed by the higher rating. The total number of officers and men, seamen and soldiers, in 1705, however, was over 5,000; only in one other year of the war (1704) did it exceed 4,000, and in five out of the nine complete years of war the figure was nearer 3,000 or well below.33 We must remember that the average Malouin corsair, at least until 1709, was several times bigger than the average Channel Islander, and more heavily gunned in proportion; and yet the crews were seldom much above double the strength of the Island ones.34 These rather dry statistics will already have suggested to you that Malouin privateering in the Spanish Succession War rose to an early climax and then declined rather suddenly. Measured alike by the numbers of men and the tonnage of shipping involved, the curve rises very steeply to 1705 and then falls away abruptly, though it recovers some of its upward thrust in 1708. A different indicator, the yearly value of the prize diximes remitted to Paris by the Admiral's receiver, yields a curve of similar shape (although you get a rather different one if you count, laboriously, the crude
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numbers of prizes and ransoms).35 This is puzzling at first sight. On the face of it, you would have expected the high dividend of 1705 to have stimulated investors' interest in 1706, instead of which only half as many corsairs were armed then, and only half the tonnage and men employed, as in 1705; only two new armaieurs appear in 1706 and one of them, Frangois Lair, who had lost both his arms in fighting a Zeelander, sent his privateer, the Adelaide, to Newfoundland. What is the explanation? I don't think it was in any way a shortage of suitable frigates and corvettes. It is true that the privateering interest liked new ones, but the Malouin chaniiers turned out 25 in 1704 and 15 in 1705, mainly for the course; also, the armaments acquired vessels elsewhere and made sensible use of many captured vessels with the necessary sailing qualities, including Channel Island privateers such as the Guillaume, which was sailed by the celebrated Jacques Cassard.36 Loss of manpower by capture is much more likely to have restricted privateering. The person most concerned in Saint-Malo with the slow and pedantic procedure for the exchange of prisoners, the commis des classes Pelsaire, stated on 4 May 1705 that the English then held no less than 2,000 men of his department, and on 17 May that he could only complete the levies for Brest if some of the corsairs returned: in August he had orders only to let the corsairs go to sea on condition they were home by the following 37 January, although such conditions were flouted with impunity as a rule. Lempereur, who was evidently on good terms with the privateering armafeurs C ordinairement le plus honntes gens de la ville ') and who protected them beyond what his orders permitted,38 in fact pleaded for an extension of this time limit :. and the reason he gave for this indulgence affords the best answer to our question, for he begins now to refer to the ' pertes continuelles ' suffered by the privateers, and then in March 1706 he begs Pontchartrain for a further prolongation of their cruises as the majority ' n'ont ren fait jusqu'icy . . .' Thus the promoters of the Csar Augusfe desired such an extension in the hope of recovering ' la despense terrible que eet armament infructueux leur a caus '; and when the Girard returned late, in August 1706, Lempereur excused his failure to impose a fine on the ground that the armaeur, Dupr Poitevin, had already lost five frigates that year ' et il ne faut point effaroucher les corsaires qui sont tous ruines'.39 So it was not, then, so much a scarcity of manpower in itself that produced the decline of privateering at Saint-Malo. More generally it was the heavy losses resulting from enemy captures: and this crisis appeared during the summer of 1705 not for the first time in the following year. We must conclude that the Admiral's record receipts in 1705 largely reflect the privateering successes of 1704 and perhaps also of the winter campaign of 1704-5. Thereafter, there was a wild flurry of armaments in a desperate effort to recover outlay, assisted by a swollen number of ' soldatesques ', who averaged 26 for each corsair sailing in the second half of 1705, compared with 21 during the first half and only 17 two years earlier, thus strongly confirming that the shortage of seamen was a particular limitation of increasing severity. It is tempting to connect this turn in the tide, furthermore, with the multiplication of armaments for the South Sea trade. On 18 May 1705, three Malouin ships dropped anchor in the Golfe du Morbihan with cargoes officially worth over 7 million livres from Peru.40 Dahlgren, the Swedish scholar who many years ago wrote a substantial study of France and the
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Pacific in this period, names eight Malouin vessels sailing for Chile and Peru in the later months of 1705, as compared with three in 1701, five in 17"03, and only two in 1704 (when the privateering war was at its height); four of the 1705 departures, moreover, occurred in November-December, when only three privateers set out.41 Since these sailings for the South Sea in 1705 carried off nearly 800 men for the best part of two years though the government allowed only nine months aller ef retour, on those occasions when official permission was given it is hard to believe that they did not set an additional serious limit on the fitting out of privateers for work in European waters. At least five more South Sea sailings were to follow in 1706, eight in 1707; by the New Year of 1708, the Malouins had despatched no less than 26 vessels in seven years to the Pacific coast of South America. It was said in the British parliament that this activity had removed the bigger Malouin privateers from the English Channel.42 In 1707, also, there was a striking spurt of interest in the Caribbean, occasionally via Guinea for slaves no less than twelve declarations in 1707 for Vera Cruz or Caracas, or sometimes simply and mysteriously for ' Amerique ' (or the ' Hes d'Amrique '), and half a dozen for the French Antilles, but nothing like so many for either destination 43 (not always as distinct in practice as in name) during the rest of the war. There was a lull even in Pacific sailings in 1708 and 1709, precisely when the number of ordinary privateering commissions picked up again, although at this juncture the ei f corsaire began to send ships to the Red Sea and India two to Moka in 1708, three to Pondicherry in 1709.44 All these ships, like those for the South Sea, were commissioned a lucky capture might be worth long hours of trying to do business with Spanish Creoles but none of them, I think, were purely or mainly privateers, even if it suited some to declare that they were merely taking out a cargo of foiJes just in case they had no luck with prizes. Similarly, if a substantial South Sea (also East India) entrepreneur like Athanese Jolif declares that his very large 500-ton ship, the Nofre Dame de f Assumption, armed with 50 guns, is going out ' faire la course a la dcouverte aux lies de rAmrique ', he was placing the royal officers under a double deception : for the ' lies ' read ' South Sea ', and for ' course ' a voyage to Chile and Peru, in which the odd English prize was merely incidental and certainly did not account for a return cargo worth 12 million livres, most of it in silver bar or piastres.45 Such a huge sum was doubtless exceptional, but the rewards of the South Sea trade of these years must certainly have run very high indeed. The Malouins were thought at the time to have taken off about two-thirds of the Peruvian 46 silver production between 1701 and 1720. This is probably an exaggeration, and we know that there were some disastrous expeditions. On the other hand, some of the Malouin vessels returned via Canton with silk and tea into the bargain: two of them, the Reine d'Espagne and the Grand Dauphin, were the first French circumnavigators, in 1710-13. Other ports notably Marseilles, Saint-Malo's old partner began to take a hand in voyages to the Pacific coasts of Chile and Peru. The sieur Lempereur was tempted to participate ' pour me soutenir dans le service ' and probably did so.47 So, in 1711, did Duguay Trouin, and it is interesting to have his opinion of it, expressed in a memoir of 1715 on the trade and navigation of Saint-Malo.48 What had opened so promisingly in 1695, under the leadership of the Malouin naval captain, Gouin de Beauchesne (ten years afterwards seneschal and premier j'uge de poL'oe de l'Amirauf de SaintMalo), had by 1715 run into heavy losses:
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. . . tout le monde s'y est porte avecq tant de fureur qu'il reste encore quarante vaisseaux a la Mer du Sud et plus de trente millions de marchandses, dont la plus grande parile doibt y pourrr et ce malheur porteroit un dernier coup a la destruction du commerce. Duguay recommended a total suspension of this trade until the Spanish overseas markets should recover. (Such a warning was just as apposite in later years, when Englishmen habitually tended to exaggerate Latin American powers of consumption.) It had in fact been prohibited by a government orc/onnance of January 1712, but in that year eleven more ships left SaintMalo for the Pacific and nine in 1713, speeded perhaps by fear of what the Utrecht peace negotiations might do to the Spanish-American trade, though we find three more Malouins going out as late as49 1720 (as well as three to China that may have taken the westward route). Duguay advised concentration on the East Indies and was bitterly resentful of the arrangement by which Messieurs de Saint-Malo were pledged to pay the bankrupt East India Company of Paris ten per cent, of their profits, and to guarantee a trade worth 2 million livr&s per annum on which such profits couid be earned. I have not left myself the time to dwell as I should have liked on the skill and daring that conceived and financed these varied enterprises. Several dozen of the Malouin business leaders of this period organised armaments for all the trades I have mentioned, including privateering. Possibly so speculative an enterprise as the course should hardly be called a trade: but the leading characteristic of these armafeurs was risk-taking and I am willing to hazard that they acquired this mentality in the privateering business, poised as that was between sensational rewards and total losses. Many of them, indeed, had been privateering captains in the first place. According to my card index, which contains the names of 138 armaieurs of privateers between 1702 and 1712 inclusive, no less than a third of them had served as captains in the Spanish or the previous war, including such prominent business names as those of Jean Martin de la Chapelle, Francois Lefer du Pin, and Jean Nouail du Fougeray; a still more outstanding shipowner, Frangois Lefer de Beauvais, was a corsair captain for five years from 1691 until he was fought to a standstill by two English men-of-war, after an engagement lasting twenty hours.50 Among these 138 names, at least 24 also armed for the South Sea and 19 for the West Indies, while no less than 51 had a major interest in the codfishery. In fact, it is rare to come across prominent entrepreneurs who did not succumb to the privateering lure at one time or another. Even those who did not undertake all the business of raising subscriptions and finding a crew for a privateering armament can be shown to have bought shares on occasion, like that successful codfishing widow, Francoise Patard, Dame du Bourg Onffroy, and her relative Guillaume, who held shares in at least six corsairs without ever arming one during the Spanish Succession War, though Guillaume had been responsible for five such armaments between 1691 and 1697. Unhappily, for 1702-12, we have the subscription lists of only 34 Malouin corsairs, and even they do not tell us the whole cost of the armaments; but these contracts range from a partnership of two, in the case of the 50-ton fuse corvette, to the continental type of joint stock known as the soa'f en commandiie, comprising as a rule eight to twenty individuals in addition to the armaieur or commandJfaire.51 It was not uncommon for an armaieur, who would hold the largest share in the armament he inspired say, or i or + -f also to buy lesser shares in others as a sleeping partner (nfress).
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Thus Frongois Browne, who organised four armaments during the Nine Years War and nine in the next, had interests in at least four others from 1702 to 1710; a more powerful figure, Guillaume Rouzier, whose ships went to Africa and the Caribbean as well as to the Pacific, and who was responsible for no less than fourteen corsairs from 1704 to 1709, had interests in others, sometimes as an insurer. A different kind of man must have been Nicolas L'Hostellier des Naudires, who appears only once as a privateering arma/eur after 1693, but who had shares in at least six privateers during the Spanish Succession War, quite apart from the money he put into the costly expeditions of Duguay Trouin.52 These last I have not discussed here, since they were mounted at Brest with the co-operation of the navy; but it is relevant to point out that they relied heavily on the finance which Duguay's able brother, the sieur de la Barbinais Trouin, negotiated in the Malouin capital market. In his famous Mmoires Duguay has little to say about this important aspect of his exploits (which certainly needs further enquiry), but he does acknowledge a special debt to his intimate friends Beauvais Lefer and de la Saudre Lefer, ' gens fort estimes et fort accrdits ', whose purse and whose credit had supported ' de tous les temps ' the great captain's expeditions,35 besides others which they armed themselves not to mention those of Lefer du Pin and the heroic Captain Deschesnays Lefer, son of the sieur de la Saudre.54 No family was more prominent in the great days of Saint-Malo. Although members of the Poitevin family had a still longer record in the command and organisation of corsairs Joachim from 1689 to 1712, Guillaume and Henri from 1694 to 1711the Lefer interests extended from Peru to Arabia. It was the Leier who, with Martin de la Chapelle, armed the first ships to pioneer the flourishing new Moka coffee trade, the Curieux and the Diligent, and I think it was typical of Malouin mentality that when they did so it was chiefly rich prizes that they expected. Yet by 1715 Beauvais Lefer was contemplating an extension of trade in the East Indies ' dans toute son tendue ',55 Can we doubt that he had a hand in Duguay's mmoire that I quoted just now, with its final blast against monopoly companies? In September 1715, in fact, the Malouins took possession of Mauritius from the Dutch and so, with the new Ile de France added to the little settlement on Bourbon Island, consolidated the French king's position in the Indian Ocean; in 1716 there was even talk of seizing the Cape of Good Hope itself.56 That the corsair mentality was central to Malouin initiatives overseas is clearer, at least to me, than the degree to which these distant enterprises were nourished by the capital accruing from prize sales. A fortiori, judging simply by the number of names connected with both, one would guess that some financial nexus existed. Can it be an accident that Danycan de Lpine, the founder in 1698 of the French South Sea Company, had armed no less than thirteen corsairs between 1690 and 1697? Is it irrelevant to his later grandiose undertakings that these corsairs captured some seventy recorded prizes at least? His close associate, the Italian-born Natale Stefanini, had armed five times and won seventeen prizes in three years. As a captain, though not yet as an armafeur, Beauvais Lefer must have done well out of the dozen prizes that he took, for captains held large shares in their privateers. The fact is that the record of Malouin prizes during the Nine Years War stands a great deal higher than it did during the elevenyears War of the Spanish Succession 20 per cent, higher in terms of the crude numbers of prizes and ransoms listed by Mademoiselle Anne Morel.57 Even more striking is the evidence, both of the commissions registered and of
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the prizes declared, that the Malouin privateering impetus was maintained right down to the end of the Nine Years War when they armed every ship they possessed, according to the intendant of Brittany58 whereas we have seen that it tailed off substantially after the first three years (May 1702May 1705) of the Spanish Succession War. The picture then is quite different: a far more visible rush to take out commissions at the outset, but a sudden deflation after several years, instead of the rising tide of interest and success that characterised the previous war. It is also noticeable that several of the biggest armaieurs of the 1690's, of whom Danycan is one, were no longer active in the priavteering business during the early 1700's. No doubt this was because they had other fish to fry: for example, Danycan's frequent journeys to Paris would have made it difficult for him now to provide the constant attention required by a privateering armament, even if he had not seen far more to be gained in the South Sea. Events proved him right, for the entire gross product of Malouin privateering from 1702 to 1713 that is, more than 14 million livres, from which we must deduct about a fifth for the admiralty dixime and other charges did not amount to double the declared value alone of the cargoes brought home from the Pacific, by three ships only, in May 1705. Dahlgren's admittedly conservative estimate of 125 million livres for the import value of the whole open South Sea trade, exclusive of imports from China, throws the profits of mere privateering well into the shade.59 I think we can safely take it that the South Sea trade, despite some heavy losses, was able to nourish itself by 1705. But that is not to say that in its beginnings it was not fertilised by the impressive rewards of Channel privateering down to that time, particularly during the Nine Years War. It is exceedingly unlikely that the wealth which made Danycan a national figure by 1698 owed as much to the codfishery, which had been thoroughly depressed from 1690 to 1697. That all these activities competed for men, ships and capital and for the time and interest of many leading armaieurs is perhaps more obvious than the manner in which they reinforced one another. I hope that what I have said about the crews, and the changing composition of the crews, will at least have suggested some degree of competition, although the change that came over Saint-Malo's European privateering after 1705 must also be put down to a run of losses in that very year. By 1706, nearly three-fifths of those who got up privateering armaments between 1702 and 1705 had left the business for good. Of those who are known to have armed then or later for the Pacific, only Rouzier and Lefer du Pin continued to organise Channel cruises on any significant scale after 1705, whereas fourteen of the twentyfour had done so in 1702-3 alone. As the Spanish war dragged on, of course, new names appear 51 in all from 1706 to 1712, which is about 37 per cent, of the war total. Over half of these men (28, to be exact) armed only once, however, and another nine only twice. Equally revealing, many of their armaments were on a much smaller scale, at least from 1709, when nearly half the vessels were of 70 tonneaux or less (fourteen of 25 or less); in 1711, a full half of the thirty-six corsairs commissioned were of 28 fonneaux and below, often mere bateaux of 8 to 12 fonneaux, armed with a couple of guns and stone-throwers (pierriers) and bearing no more than two dozen stalwarts, who were presumably expected to achieve something with their small arms and cutlasses. In 1709, and again in 1710, moreover, as many as half the privateers set forth were captured in 1711, a third.60. It surely says much for Malouin
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tenacity, and doubtless for old habit and the lure of enemy trade, that unadulterated privateering (unqualified, that is, by trading ventures) continued at all in these circumstances. No doubt the city's natural strategic situation explains some of this perseverance: as a base for striking at the coast of southern England, and especially at the zones on south-west Ireland and the Lizard through which England's colonial, Mediterranean and Portuguese trades habitually passed, its only rival was Brest, which the Malouins often frequented. But I am inclined also to conjecture that the deepening economic and social distress of France, particularly during the terrible famine of 1709, may have helped to revive the privateering spirit, in the way that various shortages certainly played a part in stimulating the flibuste of Martinique during these war years. We know that many Malouin families suffered by the long arrears in the payment of wages for naval service01; and we know how much the aggregate trade of the port had shrunk during the war in effect, the trade connected with the codfishery and other European trade. My evidence 62 also suggests a slump in shipbuilding in 1708 and 1710, though not in 1709 To say the least, it seems unlikely that everyone shared in the silver fleece of the South Sea argonauts. One has the impression, indeed, that fortunes rose and fell rather fast in this crowded and quarrelsome city, but that there was always a broad group of entrepreneurs with rather modest means well below the level of (s^y) the Trouin brolhers, not to mention Danycan de Lpine, cuyer and chevalier, with his court connections. But here, as at so many other points, one enters the realm of conjecture. All I have been able to do is to remind you of some of the intense activity that was taking place, at the high noon of Sain'.-Malo's career in war and trade, so close to your own homes: and possibly to define afresh, here and there, the edge of some of the problems that are now being scientifically investigated by Monsieur Delumeau and his pupils. May I close by expressing the strong wish that to the history of these islands humanly so rich and of course unique, and yet with a past still comparatively unknown in England there be devoted as much patient analytical research as ' Messieurs de Saint-Malo ' are now receiving?
REFERENCES
1 See my article, ' The Channel Island Privateers in the War of the Spanish Succession ', Soc. Guern., Trans., XV, iv (1950), 444-78 ; see below, pp. 339-87. 2. Etieime Dupont, Le Vieux Sain-MaJo (s.l., 1928), p. 78. 3. bcf,, pp. 52 ei sqq. 4. E. W. Dahlgren, es Relations cominerciales e maritales erilre Ja France et es coles de 'Ocean Pacifique, I : Le Commerce de Ja Afer au Sud jusqu' Ja Paix d'Utrecht (Paris, 1909), p. 114. 5. Le Mouvement du Pori de Saint-Malo a Ja Un du XVIle sicle, 681-1700 (Rennes Institut des Recherches Historiques, s.d. [1962], pp. 1146. I must express my warm thanks to Monsieur Delumeau and his pupils for allowing me to see the four iheses de Dj'pJme d'Etudes Suprieures [D.E.S.] referred to below. 6. ibid., pp. 104-10, 112-3. 7. Archives] Nationales, Paris], Marine B3/195, ft 77v, 116, 200; B3/35, f. 115v; A.N., F12/51, ff. 368-90; P. Bonnassieux and E. Lelong, nventaire anaJyiique des Proces Verbau* du ConseiJ de Commerce, 1700-91 (Paris, 1900), p. 53, 22 June 1712.
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8. A. N. Marine, B3/123, ft. 513, 524, 559-60, 569v; B3/135, . 143; B3/181, . 92. Jeanne Labb. L'Activii" du pori de Sain-Maio au dbu de ia guerre de succession d'Espagne, 17021703 (D.E.S., Univ. of Rennes, 1963), pp. 150, 155; A. N. Marine, B3/157, f. 167. 9. ibid., {. 258, Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 15 Aug. 1708. 10. ibid., B3/181, f. 90v, and 195, ft 163, 222, 237, 378; cf. J. S. Bromley, ioc. cit., p. 471, n. 74. 11. Archives] Dtpartsmentales d'] I[lle]-et-V[ilaine], C 2624, 2625 (procedure criminele, 1709) and 2626 Ougemen! of Ferrand, 4 July 1710). 12. A. N. Marine, B3/135, ff. 103, 294, Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 31 March and 7 Nov. 1706. 13. Charles de la Rancire, Histore de Ia marine iranqaise, VI (Paris, 1932), 420-1. 14. See the summary table in Jean Delacroix, L'Activit du pori de Saint-Malo en 1710-11 (D.E.S,, Univ. of Rennes, 1962), p. 12. Aggregate tonnage, inwards and outwards, in 1708 (44,629 tx.) was above the levels of the other years after 1702 so far analysed by M. Delumeau's team: cf. Roger Leprohon, La Vie maritime a Saint-Malo en 1708 (D.E.S., Univ. of Rennes, 1961-2), p. 27. The years 1681-1700 are surveyed by Jean Delumeau in 'Le Commerce malouin a la fin du XVIIe sicle ,' Annales de Bretagne, LXVI (1959), 263-86. 15. Leprohon, pp. 29-30; Delacroix, p. 16. 16. A. N. Marine, B3/135, f. 296v, Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 14 Nov. 1706. 17. J. Delumeau, 'Les Terres-neuviers malouins a la fin du XVIIe sicle', Anna/es (Economies Socfs CiviJisaions), XVI (1961), 665-85. 18. Ibid., 672-9; Labb, 56 ei sqq.; Leprohon, 71 ei sqq. 19. Labb, oc. ci. My own investigations in A.D. I.-et-V., 9B 402 407 suggest no figure higher than 28 (in 1707) until 1713 ( = 35), but M. Leprohon, p. 68, gives a figure of 49 departures for 1708. 20. J. Delumeau, Le Mouvement du pori de Sain-Maio, p. 117. 21. Although Duguay had fitted out privateers at Brest during the Nine Years War, he and his colleagues do not appear to have been lent any of the king's ships before the expeditions of 1702-3 against the Dutch whale fishery off Spitzbergen: see Le Nepvou de Carfort, Hisioire de Du Guay Tiouin (Paris, 1922), pp. 163 and 206 ei sqq. The correspondence with the Court of the naval intendant Robert at Brest (preserved in the archives of the Arsenal there, hereafter cited as B.A.A.), like that of Lempereur, leaves a clear impression that the manning of these squadrons placed continuous demands on the seamen of the naval arrondissemenf of Saint-Servan, which included Saint-Malo. 22. Labb, ioc. ci. 23. B.A.A., IE 452, ff. 252-3, and ibid. 460, f. 141, Robert to Pontchartarin, 17 March 1704 and 30 Jan. 1708. 24. A. N. Marine, B3/123, ff. 474, 483 and jbid. 128, ff. 45, 103v, Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 22 March and 6 April 1704, 27 Jan. and 31 March 1705. In the autumn of 1706 some of the Petit Nord fishermen insisted on entering the Mediterranean, contrary to their undertaking (B3/135, ff. 271v, 292, 323, 328v), and in March 1707 the maire and 31 other armaieurs petitioned to be allowed to do so (B3/145, ff. 346-7). In 1709 some got round the formal prohibition by sailing ostensibly for Placentia (B3/169, ff. 47, 54, 101, 110). Even the losses and devastation caused by English attacks in 1710 did not discourage them (B3/181, ff. 323, 335v, 344). The Malouins repeatedly complained that the government allowed greater freedom to Granville and other neighbours. 25. B.A.A., IE 458, ff. 1014-5, and 459, ft. 586 ef sqq., Robert to Pontchartrain, 6 June 1707 and 14 May 1708; cf. A. N. Marine, B3/157, f. 172. 26. This claim was first made to Pontchartrain by Pelsaire, commis des ciasses (and acting ordonnaieur),. on 25 Oct. 1704 (ibid., B3/123, f. 615). When the minister demanded an explanation of the number of foreigners employed by the privateers, he was told that they were mostly Dutch, ' qui s'engagent par necessit a cause de la rude saison d'hyver qui ne leur permet pas de passer outre ', but also Genoese, Irish, Flemings ' et autres gens du haut pays . . .' (B3/128, f. 350). On 26 Sept. 1706 Lempereur went so far as to tell Pontchartrain that the scarcity of seamen was compatible with privateering as these armaments were only made up ' pour la pluspart . . . avec des Basques, Italiens et autres trangers dont cette ville est remplie, et qui n'ayant point de demeure fixe ne sont pas compris dans les classes' (B3/135, f. 253). The 'Italians' were sometimes Provencaux (B3/195, f. 358). 27. B.A.A., St. Servan C6/33-140.
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28. A. N. Marine, B3/169, f. 277, Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 8 Sept. 1709. 29. Ibid., B3/195, f. 83, Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 18 March 1711. 30. A. N. Marine, G. 144, ' Memoire pour faciliter et diligenter a Saint Malo les armemants en course ', by Saint-Sulpice (Lempereur's predecessor), 9 Aug. 1702. 31. Ibid. Cf. A. N. Marine, B3/120, f. 505, Saint-Sulpice to Pontchartrain, 3 June 1702. It is interesting that, whereas the minister insisted on using scarce manpower for large privateers, the ordonnaieur thought it better to man more small ones, ' parce qu'avec un petit nombre de matelots classes et le reste de volontaires et estrangers on les met a la mer, et que quand ils sont bons voiliers l'on fait quelquefois avec eux plus de tort aux ennemys qu'avec de gros navires, qui ne peuvent a leur exemple aprocher de terre ny entrer dans les bayes et rivieres ' (ibid., f. 486v, 13 May). 32. Ibid., B3/123, f. 483v, Saint-Sulpice to Pontchartrain, 6 April. On 9 Jan. 1704 Saint-Sulpice estimated the numbers of his mafelofs as follows: on corsairs, 658; on merchantmen, 540; present, 400: total, 1638 (ibid., f. 418v). On 22 March 1704 he claimed that he had 650 paid men at Brest (800 by 6 April), besides 200 at Port Louis; soon afterwards Brest reduced its demand from 1,000 to 900 (ibid., ff. 473v, 483, 491v). 33. B.A.A., St. Servan C6/33-140. For this year, as for 1702-3, the roles appear to be complete; for other years they need to be completed (and always checked) by reference to the details in A.D. I.-et-V., 9B 435 (register of corsair commissions), but this fails us after 1709, so that for 1710-12 it is necessary to have recourse to the register of 'congs et commissions des navires ' in ibid. 408, where it is not always easy to distinguish the professional corsair from other armed vessels. By combining these sources it is possible to compile a provisional table of strengths, year by year, as follows :
1702 1703 1704 1705 1706 1707 1708 1709 1710 1711 1712
No. of privateers... Total tonneoux ...
21 3,185
32
5,275 165.2 3,813 119.1
50
5,780 115.6 4,553
91.1
54
7,190 133.5 5,179
95.9
24
3,691 153.9 2,737 114.0
24
3,048 127.0 2,301
95.9
28
4,715 168.4 3,619 129.3
28
3,713 100.4 3,099
83.8
34
2,719
80.0
36
3,293
91.5
12
385
32.5
352
43,624 123.9 33,577

95.4
Av. tonneoux 151.7 Total officers and crew 2,071 Average officers and crew ... 98.6
2,637
77.6
3,070
85.3
498
41.5
34. The C.I. averages, based on figures in the Letter of Marque Declarations (London, Public Record Office, H.C.A. 26/13-21), are 44 tons and 43 men for 1702-12 inclusive. 35. See the graphs in my contribution, 'The French Privateering War, 1702-13', to H. E. Bell and R. L. Ollard (edd.), Historical Essays 1600-1750 presented to David Ogg (London, 1963), pp. 215 and 219 ; above, pp. 225 and 229. 36. Monique Michel, Tiafic portuaire maJouin, 1705-1706 (D.E.S., Univ. of Rennes, 1962), p. 81; cf. A. N. Marine B3/123, f. 483v, Saint-Sulpice to Pontchartrain, 6 April 1704 ('environ vingt sur les chantiers dont quelques uns de 30 a 40 canons '). For the Guiuaume, see ibid., B3/128, f. 379 (Pelsaire, 4 May 1705). I have traced 13 C.I. prizes taken into SaintMalo from 1702 to April 1709 (A.D. I.-et-V., 9B 584 and 585), but many more were captured bv the French. 37. A. N. Marine, B3/128, ff. 379, 381v, 401. On 22 March 1704 Saint-Sulpice had told Pontchartrain that the French obtained fewer prisoners and that the course was essential for getting any at all (ibid., B3/123, f. 474). 38. To Pontchartrain, 29 May 1707 (ibid., B3/145, f. 150v). 39. Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 28 Oct. 1705, 3 and 7 March, 11 April, 1 Aug. 1706 (ibid., f. 318 and B3/135, fi. 85v, 88v, 115, 217). The letter of 28 Oct. 1705, however, mentions that there were then nearly 50 privateers at sea. 40. Dahlgren, op. cif., 305-6. Estimates of realised profits ranged from 3 m. to 12 m. hVres. Dahlgren asserts, p. 293, that ' presque tous les marchands de Saint-Malo taient intresses '. 4L E. W. Dahlgren, 'Voyages francais a destination de la Mer du Sud avant Bougainville, 1695-1749', NouveJJes Archives des Missions Scienfi/iques, XIV (Paris, 1907), 423-568. 42. Ibid.; Journals of the House o Commons, XV, 404-5. 43. A.D. I.-et-V., 9B 404. Cf. B.A.A., St. Servan C4/178, ff. 4 et sqq. ('Estat des Bastiments expediez au bureau des classes de St. Malo, et Detachements pour Navires armez dans d'autres ports ').
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44. Paui Kaeppelin, La Compagnie ces indes Orientates ei Francois Martin: elude sur j'hisloire du commerce e! des ablissemens francais dans l'Inde sous Louis XIV, 1664-1719 (Paris. 1908), pp. 568 et sqq. and appendix, pp. 658-60. 45. B.A.A., St. Servan C4/178, f. 6; Dahldren, op. cii., pp. 528-47, and oc. cif., pp. 478-9. The real armateur was de la Lande Magon. 46. /bid., pp. 8-9. 47. To Pontchartrain, 9 Nov. 1710, A. N. Marine, B3/181, f. 345. 48. Doblaren, Joe. cit., pp. 496-8 (Concorde of Brest and Norre-Dame de 'Incarnation). Duguay's ' Mmoire sur la navigation et le commerce de Saint Malo ' is to be found in A. N. Marine, B3/233, ff. 438-41. 49. Dahlgren, toe. df,, pp. 498 et sqq.; B.A.A., St. Servan C4/178. 50. La Rancire, VI, 203-4. For the Nine Years War I have relied on the lists in Anne Morel, La Guerre de course a Sainf-MaJo, 1681-1715 (Paris, Acadmie de Marine, s.d.; also available in Mem. de ia Soc. d'Hist. et d'Aich. de Bretagne, xxxvii-viii), pp. 106-73, although these are subject to correction in detail. 51. A.D. I.-et-V., 9B 167 (Actes de vente et de sccit). 52. Ibid.; Le Nepvou de Carfort, pp. 342-3. 53. Vie de Monsieur du Guay-Trouin sciite de sa main (ed. H. Malo, Paris, Col!, des chefsd'osuvre mconnus, 1922), p. 194. 54. Lempereur to Pontchartrain, 12 lune 1707, A. N. Marine, B3/145, f. 171v. 55. Kaeppelin, p. 568; B.A.A., IE 460, i. 173 (Robert te Ponichartrain. 6 Feb. 1708); A. N. Marine, B3/233, ff. 436-7, 442-56. 56. La Rondere, VI, 583. 57. Loc. cii. The number of prizes brought into Saint-Malo from 1702 to 1713 was over 350, in addition to 190 ransoms and to prizes taken into other French ports by Malouin corsairs: A.N.. G5/234-255 (Depouillement des jugements des prises). 58. Dahlgren, op. cii., p. 114. 59. If contraband imports were known, this figure might be doubled: Dahlgren, Joe. cii., pp. 9-10. For the value of the prizes see my contribution to Bell and Ollard, p. 217. 60. B.A.A., St. Servan C4/178, ff. 9-15. 61. Frequent references in Lempereur's letters to Pontchartrain beginning on 9 Dec. 1705 (A. N. Marine, B3/128, f. 340); on 18 Sept. 1710 (ibid., B3/I81, f. 292) he goes so far as to say that most of the seamen and officiers mariniers (who received no avances and depended on prizes actually taken) were reduced to mendicity. Nevertheless, the impression made by this correspondence is nothing like so sombre as that created by the letters o the intendant at Brest, where most of the population depended on naval employment and on wages up to several years in arrear. Cf. Lemperpur to Pontchartrain, 8 Sept. 1709 (Jbid. B3/169, f. 277): ' Ce n'est pas qu'il n'y ait icy un'nombre infiny de matelots et depuis quelqque temps il y en vient de tous costes parcequ'iis meurent de faim et qu'il n'y a point ailleurs de navigation. . . .' 62. B.A.A., St. Servan C4/178, ff. 7-12.
Rene Duguay Trouin (1673-1736). By Y.M. Rudel (Presses de la Cit)
14
DUGUAY TROUIN: THE FINANCIAL BACKGROUND
OF
the well-known protagonists of the classic period of French cruising war (guerre de course], the Nine Years War (168897) and the War of the Spanish Succession (170213), none stands forth in clearer, more unblemished outline than the Malouin, Rene Trouin, sieur du Guay. Variously described by posterity as the virtuoso and animator of the cruising war, 'le roi des corsaires', endowed with exceptional audacity and energy, his best biographer suggested that in more favourable times for the French navy he would have been fit for the highest commands, the equal of Duquesne or Tourville; Commander Owen, in a just English appreciation of the French cruising squadrons, hinted that he possessed the Nelson touch, although by the scale of his operations, and in particular by his brilliant handling of an amphibious attack on Rio de Janeiro in 1711, he might rather remind us of Sir Roger Keyes, whose optimism in face of long odds and faith in a guiding star exactly match Duguay's temperament. His own memoirs, largely a record of bloody actions not always won, testify to a power of rapid decision 'j ordonnai sans balancer' and more than once to the element of intuition in them, as the memoirs also do to a compassion for drowning men and prisoners of war, whose deprivations he personally experienced at Plymouth in 1694. They display not least a keen sensitiveness to points of honour, whether it was a matter of drawing his sword on an insubordinate gunner or urging the naval minister to recognize the conduct of deserving officers. Elsewhere he claimed that his conduct had always been more disinterested than that of Jean Bart, the baron de Pointis and Count Forbin. In all this he repeats the note of his search for 'la gioire', which has in it
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something of the English officer's conception of the Service but with overtones of devotion to the person of the Roi Soleil, to whom he was first presented in the winter of 1695-6 and whose manner made a lasting impression on him. 'La gioire' further implied personal distinction, social esteem, the hope of reward: from capitarne de fregate lgere in 1697 Duguay was promoted capitarne de vaisseau in 1705, and in June 1709 he was ennobled. The citation refers to 20 enemy warships and over 300 merchant vessels taken since his admission to the navy on 1 April 16971. It is significant that this very same patent also conferred noblesse on Luc Trouin, sieur de la Barbinais, Duguay's eldest brother (16661737). They had jointly petitioned for this recognition of their services, with the support of Francois-Roger Robert, the experienced, sensible and humane intendant of Brest from the end of 1703, indispensable ally of the Trouin brothers, nearly all of whose warships were equipped ('armed' as the French say) there from 1695 onwards. Although the crew-list (role d'equipage) of the Franfois of Brest bears his name as 3rd captain in July 1695, Luc was not so much a seaman as a merchant, born of a trading tradition which often included an apprenticeship to the sea; most Malouin shipowners at this time had begun their careers like that, and some were accused of recklessness in placing sons and relatives ('fils de familie') in command even of privateers at a tender age. Duguay himself was only 18, better grounded in Latin than in navigation, when he captained his first privateer, the 14-gun Danycan, a typical Malouin medium corsair, in 1693. La Barbinais, from start to finish his business manager, had been consul at Malaga, like his father and grandfather before him, but returned home on the Spanish declaration of war in 1689. In 1690 he had thoughts of cruising himself off Cadiz, the emporium of the Latin American trade in which St. Malo (thanks to Breton linens and sailcloth) had a vital stake; if France and Spain were at war, loss of direct access to Cadiz could to some extent be made good by Portuguese intermediaries, and it was to trade at Faro, 'chemin faisant', that La Barbinais also intended to cruise, although in the event he was to make his journey overland. All this he relates to J.-B. de Lagny, the powerful Director General of Commerce. That he was already establishing links with the court from 1690 will appear later in connection with a certain Levasseur, then an officer of the Chamber of Accounts. By 1692 he was acting as armateur at Brest on behalf of the marquis de Cavoye, an ally of Seignelay, the naval minister who had himself invested heavily in the cruising war before his death the previous year.2 Since the marketing of prize goods was itself a skill, and since a lengthy list of them could be sold in France only under promise of export, Malouin knowledge of foreign markets claims a place in any explanation of Malouin privateering prowess; the Spanish market, in particular, was a source of hard coin, indispensable for getting a privateer to sea. La Barbinais, moreover, would have acquired some intimacy with ships and all that it takes to get
Duguay-Trouin: The Financial Background
299
them to sea. The correspondence between court and arsenal at Brest emphasises repeatedly his activities as a fund-raiser for his brother's armaments, activities which called for immense exertions as the scale of these armaments increased from three or four ships in 17034 to seven in 1707 and eight in 1708 - and as the rewards of campaigns fell far short of their cost. Luc Trouin's evidently remarkable powers of persuasion, his credit with the merchant magnates of his native city and their numerous interlocking family connections, were under heavy strain by the beginning of 1708; and it may well have been this situation, coupled with the recent sensational capture of the three-decked Cumberland and two English Fourth Rates (and the bitter quarrel with the comte de Forbin arising out of it), which precipitated the petition for noblesse, in the not unreasonable hope that such a mark of royal favour would swing the balance with disillusioned investors. Certainly, Robert thought that this was the moment for the king to encourage the efforts of La Barbinais, but for. whose 'excellent administration' Duguay 'could have done nothing'. 5 These are strong words. Yet historians have left La Barbinais almost totally in the shade. In part, it must be said, this neglect is due to the wider failure to explore the logistical and financial foundations of this heroic period of the course. Inadequate documentation of costs and remuneration indeed rule out any hope that we shall ever be able to strike a balance between profit and loss for the majority of enterprises, still less for the cruising war as a whole. We may count the number of prizes, but it is seldom that we can get at their sales value, though contemporary chroniclers and dockyard officials were fond of guessing at the worth of spectacular cargoes before bulk had been broken. Jrme Phlypeaux de Pontchartrain, who succeeded his father Louis as naval minister in 1699 and held office till 1715, did require the ports to send up regular accounts of prize 'liquidations' in some detail but constantly berated them for failures to keep up with this complex paperwork, and in any case few such accounts now survive; even if we had more, there would remain the problem of crediting the net proceeds to particular armaments, since circumstances often prevented captains from bringing or sending prizes into their port of armament (as both government and owners preferred), to say nothing of then working out the dividend payable to the owners (armateurs) after deduction of the crews' third or (in the navy's case) tenth share, commission due to the 'directeur' or ship's husband, and other charges; and even then there might well follow prolonged litigation by another claimant, joint captures being not uncommon, or by the owners of a neutral vessel or neutral cargo cases complicated by the fact that the Admiral's Cornell des Prises, the central prize court, so often released some portions of a cargo while condemning the rest. At best, therefore, the calculation of prize income is a laborious and hazardous quest. To assess profit and loss, as a rule we need to make the risky assumption that captors of known
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cost and strength (in men as well as guns, for the cost of victuals was a major item), furnish a guide to the outlay on the majority of corsairs, whose cost is unknown: when this is known, it is nearly always a figure for the initial setting-forth (mise-hors) only, which takes no account of further disbursements on campaign, for repairs and replacements, or of a second and maybe, though rarely, a third sortie. Fortunately, these difficulties need not debar a closer approach than has yet been attempted to the structure of armaments ; that is, to the terms and conditions upon which investors (consorts, associs, intresses) agreed to come together, to the powers conferred on directors (at Dunkirk and Calais the depositai, in the Midi the procureur, administrateur, and finally directeur) and often on captains as well, or to the identities of a fair proportion of the participants, enabling us to distinguish the large from the small fry, the persistent from the casual investor, for whom a corsair was no more than a racing tip. For the Spanish Succession War we dispose of a continuous series of contracts (including rearmaments) at Calais for 1703-7 and 1710-12, a large number at Marseilles for 1705-12, and nearly a third of the total at St. Malo for 1702-8 and 1710-12 (with another 38 for 1693-7); a few also survive for Nantes and La Ciotat, although none are available for Dunkirk, where promoters preferred to shield these notarial 'actes de proprit' (or 'de socit') from inquisitive eyes rather than register them with the vice-admiralty of the port (amtraute).4 Some striking contrasts in the character of these records are worth mention, notably between Mediterranean and Atlantic practice, the former (where they were called 'escrites') being far more specific, extending to the terms of engagement of a crew, and always preceded by a 'project', which is to say an estimate of the whole cost of an armament for the first campaign (two to six months). There, in the 'Levant', interests or portions did not take the form of fractions as in the Atlantic 'Ponant', but of voluntary subscriptions greatly varying in amount and sometimes quite trivial. This could encourage a large number of subscribers: the privately armed 'pinques', 'barques', galleys and galliots of Marseilles were financed by an average of 25 individuals, double the Malouin average of 12.5 (10.6 for both wars combined).5 The calculation may slightly understate the size of a Malouin 'socit' as it was easier to split fractions than divide cash subscriptions, but in the standard case such sales were evidently infrequent and there were occasional 'dfaillants' who did not pay up. Differences in the size of a consortium, however, had more to do with the wealth of a local community than with the method of raising capital. These contracts show, first that the great majority of subscribers were domiciled in the port of armament or virtually adjacent (at St. Servan, Dian, Granville in the case of St. Malo) ; and second, that there was no necessary correlation between the number of subscribers and the cost of an enterprise. In 1707,
301
for instance, thirty signed the agreement for the Brave, a 10-gun corvette of St. Malo, whereas ten sufficed to arm the newly-built Marquis de Thtanges, 26 guns and a much larger crew. The contemporary corvette, often styled a 'barque longue', 8 to 6 guns, at Dunkirk and Calais, normally needed no more than a dozen investors at Calais, and yet 4-gun privateers there, carrying 40 to 50 men, might be backed by as many as eighteen; one in seven of the Calaisien privateers had only two or three owners, though it is true that these were mostly shallops or even pilot craft, sometimes combining a cruise with smuggling. Here is an example of a popular privateering constituency, figuring chiefly small merchants, shipmasters, tax-receivers, tavern-keepers, and a variety of artisans shipwrights, carpenters, nailmakers, coopers, woolcombers, tailors, a locksmith, a silversmith, a brewer not without a fair sprinkling of widows: at the same time, a homogeneous community extending from townhall to quayside. The list for 1703-12 (omitting 18 undocumented months in 17078) comprises 274 individuals, including only 31 not domiciled in Calais ; no less than 51 maintained an interest from at latest 1703-4 to 1711-12, while 94 invested in at least ten different armaments, 13 of these (all 'marchands') in over thirty: Guillaume Gresy fils, son of a mercer, and Antoine Dericqson, 'marchand anglais' later to become mayor, invested in 58 and 52 respectively. Such men could afford several enterprises more or less simultaneously and so hedge their risks. This was one clue to success in a highly speculative business, but there is no doubt of the prosperity of Calais privateering as a whole, aimed essentially at the inshore navigation of Britain's east and especially south coasts, content with small prizes with a great many ransoms : modest returns for a comparatively limited outlay. In the last years of the war, when France was economically exhausted, the course calaisienne (virtually forgotten in the history books) boomed. In 1710 commissions to harry the enemy numbered 72, as against 36 in 1704 and in 1706; and in 1711 12 there were 40 per cent more investors than in 17045, while the average number of investors per armament had risen from 7.4 to 10.4.6 Calais, heavily dependent on its English trade, looks like one of those ports of which it may be said that privateering was stimulated because peacetime income was cut off. The same can hardly be said of St. Malo, at any rate not in so stark a form. The naval commissary there could claim in 1707 that it was the one place in the world which could send twenty corsairs to sea while still maintaining a vigorous commerce. In any case, seeking substitutes for the loss of peacetime traffic was never enough to create a successful privateering port, as the poor showing of, say, Bordeaux is enough to remind us. Both tradition and location, on the other hand, would have beckoned St. Malo and above all Dunkirk to attack enemy shipping even had their wartime trade remained at pre-war level: subject to the severe limit (overlooked by historians) imposed by the available seagoing manpower,
302
there was room for expansion. We do know, however, that the volume of Malouin trade was roughly halved during the Nine Years War and, what is more, badly hurt in its most remunerative sector. It was the country's premier base for the great French codfishery, which had been growing in the 1680s: in 1702, when the Malouin cod fleet numbered 88 sail (of 140 tons average), a Guernsey observer told London that 'If they should receive any considerable damage it would affect their town as much as a bombardment'7. Many if not all their family fortunes, including that of the house of Trouin, began with Newfoundland and the Banks. With linen, cod was the staple export, most of the returning terre-muviers delivering the catch direct to ports in the Peninsula and western Mediterranean, where exchanges with Marseilles in particular, another growth-point in the French economy, meant contact with a major banking network stretching from Switzerland through Lyons to Genoa and Seville-Cadiz. It is not surprising to find a score of Malouin corsairs (including several of some renown) registering their commissions at the Amiraut of Marseilles, only half of them previously registered at St. Malo itself: the rest were clearly armed at Marseilles (more continuously active as a privateering centre in this war than in the next) and probably with the participation of Malouin capital, though proof of this exists in only a single case; conversely, the brothers Rampai of Marseilles invested in two frigates armed at St. Malo in 1695-6. One of the leading promoters of the South Sea trade was to be the Malouin Guillaume on de Carman, who moved to Marseilles in 1688 and returned home in 1707, after taking a ship to the Pacific from Marseilles: in those enterprises, it seems, there was often a real collaboration between the two ports. The leadership, however, belonged to St. Malo8. At the end of 1705 the loss of corsairs to the English navy and the Zeeland privateers was averaging a dozen a year. The number commissioned (54) in 1705 was nearly as high (60) as in 1704, but in 1706 it fell to 28 and never again rose above 40, with a clear tendency after 1708 towards smaller vessels (12 to 2 guns) and much reduced crews. And they were much less remunerative: after 1705 the Admiral's prize tenths fell dramatically and never achieved more than a very modest recovery. To this decline the wearand-tear on manpower certainly contributed: losses in 170711 averaged 26 p.a. But neither can it be divorced from the powerful counter-attraction of the new, interloping South Sea trade, which diverted the expectations of the merchant community. On 18 May 1705 three Malouiri ships dropped anchor in the Morbihan with cargoes officially worth 7,000,000 livres tournois (c. 500,000), mainly in silver bar and coin, from Peru. The 'cit corsaire' had pioneered this trade and was responsible for 26 of the 49 armed vessels known to have sailed round the Horn in 170107. Eventually the market, always liable to the obstruction of on-the-spot and changing Spanish authorities, came to be saturated and over-trading
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involved considerable losses to some French enterprises well before the war ended; but on the whole it yielded windfall profits to the Malouins9. Moreover, in 1707, they displayed a fresh spurt of interest in the Gulf of Mexico and the Spanish Main, with a consequential attempt to break into the Guinea slave trade. Yet the ambition, the vision, of the city's merchant magnates more properly 'negotiants' than mere 'marchands' was far from confined to opportunities on the coasts of the decrepit Spanish empire, now formally an ally but one deeply distrustful of French intrusiveness. Two Malouin traders set course in 1708 for Moka, three in 1709 for Pondicherry; in 171013 three South Sea vessels came home via Canton. For these voyages it was necessary to reach agreement with the East India Company, bankrupt but still a monopoly: between 1707 and 1712 it leased the use of its factories and privileges to groups of financiers in Paris, Marseilles and St. Malo, five out of eight of these 'treaties' involving Malouin finance. It equipped, or shared in equipping, 26 out of 34 sailings for the Indies between 1708 and 1719. In April 1712, the Company yielded its whole monopoly to the Malouins, who now held 85 per cent of the capital and eleven out of twelve directorships10. This rapid accumulation of wealth in full wartime, quite out of line with the experience of other ports and indeed with the French growth cycle of the eighteenth century, crowned a century of persistent opportunism. It was well said of Malouin business men that they were people cut out to extract the quintessence of everything that passed through their hands. The comment was distrustful, yet not unduly cynical: Duguay's contemporaries leave an impression, not of patrician culture, but of a harsh collective self-assurance, the pride of a small republic. Their monument is the granite city we see today, after a series of 'agrandissements' beginning in 1708, when the population within the walls was around 19,000. Yet this conveys no more than a hint of the fortunes of the greater merchant dynasties and their hangers-on, many of whom acquired country properties ('Malouinires'), privileged offices and titles of nobility. The estates of the East India directors have been valued at half a million to a million 1 .t. or more, the most modest at 200/400,000; but such figures need roughly to be doubled when account is taken of enormous dowries, purchase of offices for a son, and so on. Thus the elder Charles Loquet de Grandville (1646171 3), said to have been worth over a million when he died, left a son whose fortune was rated only thirteen years later at nearly as much in furniture and other luxurious mobiliers alone, after spending 720,000 l.t. on marrying two daughters into the old noblesse. Both were lawyers, often at Rennes on legal or state business; yet their name is 'the symbol of maritime success', Loquet pre clearly having links with the shipowners of Nantes as well as of St. Malo, and interested as early as 1704 in the slave trade, which the Nantais were then leading11. More to our purpose, he was associated with the Maison Trouin in arming Duguay's first
3 04
royal frigate, the 28-gun Hercule, at Brest in 1693, a date however when Marguerite Trouin nee Boscher (16641705) was still in charge of the family business, using her sons as agents; she followed their affairs with a close eye and, like Loquet pre, was said to have been much given to litigation. The Hercule captured two English West Indiamen which fetched 330,660 l.t. at auction in the Bourse at Nantes. Both vessels and their cargoes of indigo, dyewood, cotton, pimento, cacao, ginger and sarsaparilla were bought up by Loquet, while La Barbinais spent 157,156 l.t. on their sugar, ivory and miscellaneous iron, the two local bidders hardly more than a thousand between them 12 . Because it was a prime function or the principal armateur (or depositale) to dispose of prize goods, he had an excellent opportunity of buying them himself and then re-selling at a profit: as a disillusioned Gosport prize agent later admitted, 'second sales only are prety things'. It may not be too much to claim that this was indeed the main attraction of privateering armaments to their chief promoters about 218 of them at St. Malo, covering a wide social spectrum and dark suspicions naturally fell on them for lining their own pockets at the expense of the passive co-armateurs13. Loquet de Grandville and Trouin de la Barbinais were again the principals in Duguay's next armament, of November 1694, undertaken in the Francois, 48 guns, in consortship with the Fortune, 56, also financed by them and commanded by Jean-Baptiste Levesque de Beaubriand, 'grand homme de mer' belonging to a family of shipowners which had recently moved to St. Malo from Gran ville. Returning from a sterile cruise, too late in the year, in search of Dutch and Hamburger whalers a condition imposed by the naval minister in return for extending the lease of these two warships they captured three English East Indiamen off the Blaskets. This was early in October 1695, only weeks after the marquis de Nesmond had taken two more. As the Indiamen were homeward bound, these prizes were the most considerable of the war; it was six weeks before the BeaubriandDuguay cargoes were finally warehoused, at Port Louis (Lorient), while a futile search went on for some allegedly pillaged diamonds. The naval administration, without awaiting auction, put out feelers to financiers and merchants, including the London company itself (which sent two directors, one of them Thomas Pitt, to Paris), in the case of Nesmond's prizes. The minister also urged Nicolas Baudran, the Malouin banker in Paris who for years acted as Luc Trouin's principal agent there and had in fact a stake in the Francois-Fortune combination, to encourage his Dutch correspondents to attend the sales of all five prizes, thus incidentally hinting at one of the markets to which the Trouin brothers looked for the disposal of their booty : a step in any case required by the ban on the sale of painted Indian calicoes ('indiennes') and other cargo items within the kingdom 14 . In the end, matters were simplified by an agreement between the Compagnie des Indes
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Orientales and Samuel Bernard, the famous Protestant banker whose international credit sustained that of the French government itself until 1709, enabling it to pay its armies in foreign theatres, import grain during successive crises of near-famine, and much else. Bernard, backed by the resources of other leading financiers such as Thomas Le Cendre of Rouen, bought the Nesmond cargoes of the Seymour and Princess Anne for 3,150,000 l.t. (c. 225,000), In order to resell at a profit, however, he needed to enjoy the marketing privileges and exemptions of the Compagnie, whose quid pro quo was a one-third interest in the Indiamen and their cargoes. The Compagnie also insisted that Bernard's resales, which attracted hundreds of buyers, should take place at Nantes (its staple port) in accordance with standard procedure for the auction of East India goods. Arrangements for the Malouin prizes were somewhat different. On this occasion Bernard, by now a deputy of the Compagnie, acted with it in agreeing with leading armateurs of the Francois and Fortune, on 6 September 1696, to admit them to the privileges in return for half the profit, not on a resale, but on the margin by which the first and only sale exceeded its estimated yield ('prix d'estimation'), which was 2,100,300 l.t. In the event, nearly two years after capture, this turned out to be as much as 2,493,440 l.t., half of which was paid to the Malouins in September 1697. Bernard made half a million out of it, evidently derived from what was due to the Compagnie since he had acquired shares in it from nine of the directors ; even so, this was well below his fantastic profit on Nesmond's prizes, amounting to 2,400,000 l.t.' 5 . These transactions serve to widen the little we know about the individual Malouins whom the Trouin brothers could count upon, at least for a time: a matter of some importance seeing that Malouin entrepreneurs were notorious individualists and indeed given to strong mutual antipathies. Captain Beaubriand took an active part in the negotiations, signing the agreement with the Compagnie, which Duguay did not. The others who did so, besides Loquet and La Barbinais, were Nicolas Graldin 'le jeune' (16581712) and Nicolas l'Hostellier des Naudires (1643-1718), originally of Granville, the first enjoying the high status of 'cuyer', the second simply that of 'noble homme' a mark of respect rather than nobility; the Graldin family, which had emigrated to Brittany during the Commonwealth persecution, claimed Irish nobility. By 1688 it was also established at Nantes and Dunkirk, where Jacques Graldin was the leading promoter of Jacobite privateers 16 . Nicolas himself was involved in trade to Cadiz, the Canaries and Spanish America, at least after 1697 : it may have been the frustration of these outlets that led him to promote privateering armaments in 1691-3, but after that he was content to remain a mere investor, although a zealous one. He does not, however, appear to have been a regular supporter of the Trouin enterprises, his attachment in 1694-7 being apparently to their Beaubriand component. The opposite is true of L'Hostellier 'le pre', who is to be found
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again among the fourteen faithful signatories of the contract to rearm Duguay's squadron of 5 July 1709: in effect, the consortium of 1708 from which La Barbinais had great difficulty in extracting a renewal of confidence after their heavy loss in the campaign of that year, when Duguay had staked all on ambushing the return fleet from Brazil and missed it by a few days as a result (he claimed) of heeding the advice of a council of war, the only occasion on which he subordinated his 'inner voice' to his officers' vote. The consortium had already needed 'reanimating' by Duguay himself, feeling that he and they had preferred the king's service to their own17. One further point concerning the successful consortship of Beaubriand and Duguay requires notice. La Barbinais held an interest in both armaments, but in the Francois it was as much as six-sixteenths. So large a fraction was rare indeed, even for a promoter, and is barely credible. It is true that at St. Malo, as at Marseilles but not Dunkirk, privateering shares could be insured, but premiums were very high, rising from 24 to as much as 36 per cent in the course of 1703 for a campaign of three or four months18. Risks could be spread in another way. La Barbinais sold off slices of his sixsixteenths, subsequently to the contract of association, to more modest investors, 'sous-intresss' or (more commonly) 'croupiers'. This was the practice throughout the Ponant, if less so in the Levant, with expensive armaments; for major expediations, like that of de Pointis to Cartagena in 1697, the croupiers could be very numerous indeed. They had no standing in a consortium and no claims at law, beyond their bargain with one of the contracting associates. Even such lists as survive for these, therefore, do not necessarily include all the ultimate subscribers ; each interesse might have his own private clientle, instead of depending entirely on his personal or family resources. Though tiresome for historical analysis, since we seldom get a glimpse of the identities of the croupiers, it must be presumed that their participation substantially broadened the basis of the privateering interest, extending it to relatively humble strata of the community, sometimes having little connection otherwise with ships. At St. Malo business transactions large and small were facilitated, possibly informalized, by the very compactness of the 'nid des corsaires', with its narrow streets and tall houses, cramped inside walls 'which are about an English mile in compass' : an argument seriously put forward by the city authority in 1698 as an objection to constructing a new town at St. Servan, still a squatter's camping-ground, cut off at low tide. It must be admitted, however, that the croupier network, being anonymous in the eyes of the courts, lent itself to abuses, notably in bribing port officials by the offer of a free interest; in the next war the intendant of Dunkirk was himself to be accused of such an interest, while in 1708 de Valincour, secretary to the Admiral of France and his prize court ever since 1688, maintained that such a practice was widespread, its beneficiaries sharing in profits but not of course in losses19.
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It is probable that La Barbinais gave or sold a croupe to his Paris banker, Baudran, but there was another influential Parisian who held a sixteenth share in the Franfois and a sixty-fourth in the Fortune and who must have been a full associate in this joint armament. He was Gabriel-Henry Levasseur, destined to become a brother-in-law of Beaubriand Levesque in 1695. The Maison Trouin had had dealings with him since 1690, and it is likely that he played some part in obtaining the lease of Duguay's first two naval ships, the flute Profon in 1692 and later the Francois. By the end of the war he had for several years been secretary to the naval minister, Louis de Pontchartrain, who had himself many personal connections with Brittany thanks to twenty years' residence at Rennes as First President of the Parlement there. In an undated pleading ('factum') which must belong to 16957, 'Trouin-Barbinais' states that Levasseur, who was claiming to share in a resale, had profited greatly by his investment in the Francois without contributing much, 'mettant en consideration les facilitez qu'il pouvoit procurer dans le poste ou il estoit pour obtenir du Roi des Vaisseaux pour lacourse'20. This is the last we hear of him. Pontchartrain himself in 1699 handed the navy over to his son Jerome, long since groomed for the office, which included the colonies and some branches of foreign trade, especially the Mediterranean. There were other services which could be rendered by a friend at court, quite apart from the tribe of 'solliciteurs' employed by all parties (not least by foreign diplomats) wishing to bring pressure on the Conseil aes Prises, as Valincour complained. Success is competing for the lease of a naval vessel, usually for a period of months, depended on a process of bargaining in which ministry and armateurs might well find themselves at cross-purposes21. The final determination of such a contract, the 'Articles et Conditions', nearly always concluded by a captain on behalf of his armateurs, might require many months after the submission of a project, so that armateurs were inclined to accuse Versailles of knavish pedantry and perhaps call the whole thing off, especially as their undertakings were highly sensitive to intelligence from abroad - to the slightest rumour of peace parleys in particular. Many schemes ('projects') were still-born because of their intrinsic extravagance or because they proposed operations in seas which did not square with the policy of the moment. The navy would often have liked to determine in advance the objectives of a cruise or at least the cruising zone. On the whole, it was obliged to give way here to financial pressure, knowing too that the armateurs in turn had to allow a free hand to their own captains, within broad limits; but it was sometimes successful in this, several of Duguay's campaigns, notably to the northern whalery in 1695 and 1702, being thus dictated to him. Or the minister might well prefer to lease to armateurs willing to combine their forces, as Duguay and Beaubriand did in 16945, whereas Malouin individualism tended to obstruct this wise precaution,
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which bred so many disputes about joint captures not that the Dunkirkers, with their old Spanish tradition of mounting small squadrons, were so deterred. A more delicate matter on which Versailles tended to lose ground was its early insistence on the employment of naval officers, whose numbers fell from 1,138 in 1696 to 952 in 1702 but rose thereafter to 1,053 in 1704 and 1,041 in 1710: of these, however, the proportion of officers 'ia mer' or in the colonies declined from 808 in 1696 to 245 in 1710 (with a temporary rise to 674 in 1704). Many were reduced to near-destitution, unable to pay their lodging bills, and it is hardly surprising that many proposals to hire a royal warship came frm this source, especially as the course offered some hope of a brilliant action which might catch the minister's eye and thus earn promotion. Such projects were nearly always, in the war of 1702-13 at least and with a few exceptions at Toulon (where cruising technique, partly derived from experience at Malta, was displayed throughout the period by such notable warriors as Captains de Roquefeuil and de Grenonville), put up by young officers below the rank of lieutenant; more senior men sometimes feared to lose status by private war and many must have been ill suited for coursing. Although Duguay understood - none better the critical importance of reliable subordinates and at first had leaned as far as possible on his own relatives, he picked most of his officers from the navy, a choice made much easier once he had himself been commissioned to it, and a circumstance which must have contributed to the favours subsequently bestowed on the Maison Trouin. The majority of corsair captains and armateurs none the less insisted on perfect freedom to appoint their officers as they judged best, and many privateersmen too disliked the airs and graces of the naval officer, not to mention habits of discipline learnt in a different school. Still more disagreement might turn, more especially after the campaign, on precisely which items of outlay were attributable to the king's fifth share in prizes and ransoms. The 'cinquime', introduced in 1694 as a substitute for Pontchartrain's unworkable requirement that the armateur replace all stores and arms 'consumed' on campaign, was intended to acknowledge the fact that the king lent his ships fully ready for the sea. As the Succession War brought government penury, however, the dockyards were less and less able to fulfil their side of the contract and the armateur had to provide what was lacking in their magazines, as well as to advance the wages of labour engaged in refitting : all debited indeed to the cinquime, at the cost of friction over some complex accounts but if there were no prizes, or not enough, the armateur must wait years for even partial reimbursement. By 1709 the situation had become so bad that the armateur was expected to take the warship as he found her, purchase what stores the yards might still have available, and remain out of pocket also for completing her. The cinquime was abolished on 1 July. One important consequence was to stop
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the building of warships in the arsenals by means of private loans for the cost of labour and timber, ultimately payable out of the fifth, and thus deal a further blow to the dockyard labour force which the intendants were anxious to maintain. Since a model contract with the marquis de Nesmond in 1695, the yards had built many such vessels, usually described as frigates but some which would have been classified as Fifth or even Fourth Rates on the English establishment, on the understanding that they would belong to the navy but should be leased for the first three years: a good bargain for both sides, and one which enabled the corsair captain to exercise some influence on the specifications laid down by the arsenal's shipwrights in their consel de construction. It is a mistake to assume that the curtailment of the naval budget in 16945 released large numbers of fast cruisers; the navy of 1689 had not boasted more than fifty vessels of the 4th and 5th 'rangs' (only ten of them noted as 'trs fin de voile'), twenty-six light frigates (eight 'fines voilires'), and ten corvettes or barques longues (much in demand in the North Sea); and they were usually pierced for more guns than the corsair judged suitable. Brest perhaps benefited most from these build-and-hire contracts, including at least six placed by the Maison Trouin in 1704- 1 LL , It should be emphasised that the risks of loss and damage at sea to any royal ship on charter party fell on the crown, so that its financial contribution to private war was far from negligible. Nevertheless, after Blenheim and still more from 1707 onwards, it was living financially from hand to mouth. The year 1709 was disastrous. Bernard, the treasury's chief prop hitherto, was rescued from bankruptcy only by desperate juggling. Above all, one of the worst harvests on record spelt not only near-famine (aisette) but as always the violent contraction of credit and a stampede into liquidity. The crisis cannot have helped La Barbinais in his long-drawn-out struggle to persuade his brother's armateurs of 1708 to renew their support in 1709, after the huge disappointment of his would-be ambush off the Azores. Yet they signed up again on 5 July, only days after the king's 'renunciation' of his fifth. This would seem to imply that the new ordinance crystallized a difficult decision for them. On the contrary, we have it on the authority of Intendant Robert that La Barbinais, unlike the majority of armateurs, strongly objected to the renunciation as soon as rumours of it had reached Brest in June. He argued that his colleagues had already experienced great difficulty in funding the armament on the old basis, not least owing to the swollen cost of victuals always payable by the armateurs, although they might enjoy the advantage of buying through the navy's own victuallers and that the newly addedburden of refitting without ultimate reimbursement would mean cancelling the enterprise altogether. He estimated the additional cost would come to 120,000 l.t. at best. It was not a simple matter of drawing on the resources of rich men, even though they had already demonstrated their willingness to prefer the king's interest to their own; for these resources in turn largely con-
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sistcd in paper entitlements and lately even the best bills of exchange had been protested, including 36,000 in navy bills and 100,000 It. assigned by the tobacco-farm in Brittany. The upshot was that when Duguay did set sau (not till 2 3 September) the articles and conditions contained two special concessions: the royal fifth was to be preserved 'pour cette fois seulement', and crews were to be paid naval rates only that is, without the 2 5 per cent 'augmentation' normally required of the lessees of naval ships23. This last favour, it is true, had already been conferred on the 1708 armament, and was not the first, the king having already remitted his fifth on any prize warships of 50 guns or over taken in the campaign of 1705. A slightly more extended 'grace' was accorded to the prizes taken in the heroic action of 21 October 1707 against a large convoy to Portugal, the expensive 'Cumberland action', that little Jutland which caused a reverberating quarrel with the acrimonious Count Forbin, commanding the royal Dunkirk squadron: when partitioned between the two squadrons, not to mention several privateers in attendance to pick up the merchantmen, the yield of this glorious affair to Duguay's backers was probably no more than 100,000 l,t., in short a heavy loss24. In 1708, too, Duguay with Robert's support had wrung out of the court the unprecedented privilege of being allowed to apply the navy's code of discipline to privately employed crews: he had earlier been warned by Robert for exercising a severity unsuitable to private armaments, the matelots once at least deserting in droves. Such 'compensation' ('ddommagement') confirms Robert's reports that La Barbinais was already, early in 1708, in trouble with his investors and might have to search for replacements. In the end it seems he did not have to do so, at the price (as again in 1709) of a much larger commitment by the Maison Trouin itself. Duguay himself occasionally supported his brother's efforts by his presence in his native city; but his time was mostly divided between Paris, where he took to spending the winter, and Brest, which often awaited his return with impatience. Moreover, from the summer of 1706 onwards, he was frequently unwell, returning from the sea in November 1709 'fort malade'2 . It was a considerable achievement to persuade the reluctant armateurs of 1708 to renew their socite' in July 1709. Without exception they were Malouins by domicile, the main associ being Jacques de Gallet de Coulange, for fifteen years a receiver of the Tobacco Farm who had recently been seeking to use his court connections to obtain one of the coveted places of Farmer-General, an ambition that implied considerable wealth; he was not a shipowner but had been a timber and stores contractor to the yards of the Ponant, and it was in his name in 1704 that a never-to-be-repeated attempt to finance the Dunkirk squadron by private subscription had been made. The amiraut of St. Malo accused him of going out hunting when they wanted him in their warehouses, but the Tobacco-Farmers thought him honest. As
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with other receivers of the king's revenue, his position allowed him to handle large sums of money in the intervals between receipt and remittance : he was initially to be the largest investor in the Rio de Janeiro enterprise of 1711, and is one of the three 'amis intimes. . . gens fort estimes et accrdits' to whom Duguay expresses a special obligation in his memoirs26. The others were the wealthy Francois Lefer de Beauvais, cuyer (1672-1748), and his brother Pierre Lefer de la Saudre (1673-1745), sometime corsair captains and between 1702 and 1706 active privateering promoters, but thereafter turning aside to South Sea and East India voyages; both were to become directors of the Rio expedition, but neither signed the 1709 contract. Pierre Lefer married into the highly influential Magon family and in fact shared his Rio 'direction' with Jean Magon de la Lande il648-1737), cuyer, whose banker father had been receiver of the Admiral's tenths from 1691 till his death in 1709 and who had himself married an on. Guillaume on de Carman, already noticed, signed the 1709 contract, as did Pierre-Francois du Fougeray (16741729), a brother-in-law of Francois Lefer. Nor were these the only family ties within the consortium. Coulange himself brought in another Gallet, probably his son Vincent-Robert, 'who held various financial offices', while 'Boscher' was almost certainly Jacques Boscher, a cousin of the Trouin whose courage had won Duguay's admiration as his consort in command of the Sans Pareti in 1697; as a ne'gociant he was highly rated for poll-tax in 1710. Francois-Auguste Gouin de Langrolay (16591727), cuyer and a brother of the wealthy and celebrated Jacques Gouin de Beauchesne who had pioneered the South Sea route in 1698-1701, was the husband of Francoise Boscher and was to take a direction in the Rio enterprise; it was he who reclaimed much of the Pararne marshland from the sea27. Nicolas L'Hostellier des Naudires, an associate of theirs in the 1694 armament, also appears, with two relatives, his son Nicolas and (probably) Pierre; and so does a Beaubriand, almost certainly Francois, a brother of Captain Jean-Baptiste, who had died 'extremely rich' but in miserable circumstances at Goree in 1706, after his ship, the largest to sail for the South Sea to date, had been wrecked north of Cape Verde 28 . Of the remaining members of the consortium two were sea-captains: Jean-Baptiste Beccard des Aulnais, probably a relative of Denis Beccard (16751712), a notable shipwright and armateur, had taken the Comte de Breteuil, 30 guns, to the South Sea in 1703; Nicolas Tanquerel de la Basse Rue commanded the Joseph privateer, 24 guns, in 1707-9, and on the 1710 rle de capitation (poll-tax) he is assessed at only 24 l.t., well below Beccard at 1 50. But of Louis Fleuriot des Saudrais (120 l.t.) and Vincent de Bassablons (75 l.t. but his wife at 1 5 0), we know only that they appear among the medium wealthy on the role of 1710, where both are described as 'Monsieur' as indeed are all the other associates except Tanquerel and La Barbinais himself, who is rated at only 60 l.t. In 1708, at Brest, he had paid 110 l.t.: a striking
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indication of what his commitment to his brother had cost him in only two years29. It has been necessary to detail the consortium of 1709 not only because its members displayed faith in Duguay against a background of adversity, and because their mobilization illustrates the influence La Barbinais could exert as a broker, but also because we know so little of Duguay's financial supporters in the earlier years of the war; their articles of association should have been registered by the amiraut of Brest, but these were destroyed in World War II. They would have included some of those who have been mentioned, but there were others, notably the Lefer family, who had dropped out by 1709, if not 1708: Duguay went so far as to tell Pontchartrain that he had been abandoned by 'la meilleure partie de mes intresses', and that the consortium of 1709 had had to borrow 80,000 l.t. 3u . Most of the capital certainly came from St. Malo, but with contributions from Brest and Nantes, possibly Marseilles, Le Havre, Rouen and Paris also. All these places are represented, though modestly, in the surviving actes de s ocete of strictly Malouin privateers. Brest was doubtless the most prominent, for a well-inclined intendant like Robert could bring pressure on his subordinates even if he did not himself invest, as he probably did; we know that Desclouzeaux, his predecessor in the Nine Years War, had an interest in the armament of the Sans Pareti and Lonore in 1696. The navy's civilian officers were not prohibited from putting money into hired warships (as distinct from ordinary privateers) after 1694, although the admiralty officers were which explains why a member of the Brest amiraut used the cover-name of a Demoiselle de Lescouet for his investment in one of the Trouin armaments. The dockyard officer Bordenave, who owned two ships of his own and traded extensively as agent of Malouin merchants, was responsible for the arsenal's magasin general; in 1704 he was forbidden to trade but allowed to retain his interests in privateers on condition of not acting as principal armatcur; in fact, he promoted several armaments between 1702 and 1705, had had an interest in Duguay's of 1696, and in 1692 in that very same Favorite for which La Barbinais had acted on behalf of the marquis de Cavoye, as mentioned earlier3 '. The autumn sortie or 1709 was aimed at the capture of five English East Indiamen, homeward bound, and the plans for it are further evidence of the efficiency of the French spy network in this period; intelligence reaching Paris was quickly transmitted to the ports, and vice versa. Duguay hoped for prizes worth 12 to 1 5 million l.t. gross and so contribute something to the restoration of Brest and its starving population. But once again the blow missed its target, even more narrowly than the failure to take the Brazilian fleet two years earlier. To add wormwood to this disappointment, a large convoy from Barbados, scattering 'par pelotons' into Irish and English harbours, escaped Duguay's vigil off south-west Ireland. He saw no prospect of
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rearming, unless the minister would support a small cruise in the Indian Ocean which might be underwritten by some modest trading, a project infringing the Company monopoly however and brusquely turned down: it may seem strange that the several Malouin magnates who had already subcontracted with the Company apparently did nothing to bring him into their arrangements, and the possibility of local clannishness is not to be excluded, but three of the five were none the less to take a leading role in the Brazilian adventure. As things were, Duguay did not go to sea at all in 1710. In September La Barbinais was proposing to arm the Amaônm, 36 guns, and possibly to send the Gloucester, the 60-gun man-of-war heroically captured on the last campaign and sentenced to him, on a trading voyage to Cadiz. Nothing came of either projects 32 . Another, of altogether different dimensions, was already in the wind. Partly perhaps as a reflection of the increasing efficiency of English cruisers and convoys, but more on account of the recent dramatic appearance of Brazilian gold in Europe, there are signs of growing French interest in attacks on Portuguese shipping and colonies well before 1711. In 1704 the intendant Robert sent news of the sailing of the Brazil fleet from Bahia to Duguay and Saint-Pol, both at sea, and in 1706 Duguay chased another convoy, of 200 sail under six escorts, into the Tagus 'une des plus belles occasions de ma vie'. What is more, in the same year, the chevalier Desaugiers had instructions to attack Rio de Janeiro if his ambush of Dutch Indiamcn off the Cape of Good Hope should fail. In 1708 Pontchartrain himself suggested an attack on Angola and Brazil to Nicolas Parent, who next year was to ransom the island of So Thom. A far more maturely considered but eventually bungled assault on Rio was the Rochefort expedition of 1710 under Jean-Francois Duclerc, capitarne de vaisseau^*. It was the indignation aroused by news of Duclerc's surrender (and subsequent assassination, and of cruel treatment of the French prisoners-of-war, so Duguay tells us in his memoirs) that inspired him with the idea of a revenge. Nor was he blind to the glory of successfully bringing off what he saw as a most difficult undertaking, or to 'un butin immense', provided the lessons of Duclerc's humiliation were studied: his force, five warships and a thousand 'soldats de dbarquement', had been too weak and he had forfeited the advantage of surprise essential if only to preclude the evacuation of precious goods from the warehouses for lack of a precisely predetermined plan. Thus warned, moreover, the city's defences would since have been strengthened. Duguay adds that the catastrophe became known at court while he was there, as 1710 drew to a close. The first report appears to come from a survivor who wrote from Martinique on 23 November. A 'projet d'armement' was drawn up at St. Malo on 30 December, signed by the Trouin and Lefer brothers, Gallet de Coulange, Gouin de Langrolay, and La Lande Magon, all of whom we have met before; Duguay's memoirs
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record that Coulange and the Lefer were the first 'friends' whom he consulted. The other signatories were Noel Danycan de 1'Espine, wealthiest of all the magnates, pioneer and biggest investor in the South Sea, and now 'chevalier'; Thomas Ppin de Belle-Isle, 'ecuyer, a privateering captain and armateur who had taken part with Nesmond and Duguay in the routing of the Anglo-Dutch convoy from Bilbao in 1697; and a Paris banker, Jean Nicolas, who had worked with Bernard while a refugee (from Languedoc) at Geneva. The proposals, calculated on the hire often men-of-war (counting two frigates), reached Versailles well before 20 January, when Duguay had several times vainly sought an audience with Pontchartrain and had to explain that his freedom to negotiate was strictly confined by the articles of agreement, which insisted on the presence of at least one other 'directeur' eventually Coulange to settle unforeseen articles and conditions, as well as on the consent of three in all for every vessel chosen and any outlay beyond 700,000 It. Quite evidently, there were limits to the confidence Duguay's suporters were now willing to place in him. Coulange was later to say that he was in the habit of believing that he had rendered account to men when his conscience was clear before God. This probably reflects the attitude of Danycan, a newcomer to their ranks, with a reputation for none too scrupulous gamesmanship, skill in manipulating the regional authorities, wealth and connections enough to hold some leverage at Versailles itself34. He assumed two directions, as did the Trouin brothers, but Coulange took three, while La Saudre Lefer and La Lande Magon shared one between them. Each director was to find 50,000 l.t., a fourteenth of the estimated working capital - that is, for the 'setting forth' or mise-hors, which was the only expenditure then calculated in advance of a voyage, the rest being left to prizes or to an ex post facto call on a consortium 'au prorata' of each individual's share. This originally left two vacancies. One of them was to have been bought by a group of Nantais shipowners, but they had withdrawn by 23 March, on discovering that the estimated outlay had been raised from 700,000 to 810,000 l.t. ; the contract of association had obliged the parties to pay for any deficit only after disarmament. The ultimate net outlay, as audited by the dockyard (excluding three private armaments) was to come to c. 940,000 l.t. Meanwhile the call for supplementary funds before sailing may explain why Coulange transferred one of his dinctiom to the Trouins, who thus came to hold three. Gouin de Langrolay threatened to withdraw for a reason that may be variously interpreted: he was to go out with the squadron as 'controleur', 'inspecteur' or 'intendant' of the owners' interests, no doubt with an eye to pillage and to the disposal of any prizes overseas, but objected to having a naval commissary placed over him: he resigned the intendancy and remained a director. Fortunately an exalted personage had purchased the two vacant directorships. It was Louis-Alexandre de Bourbon, comte de Toulouse,
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Monseigneur F Amirai de France, whose fabulous entertainment of the king (his natural father) at Rambouillet, his stables and stag hounds, must certainly have owed much to the wealth derived from his prize tenths - he stone-wall ed every attempt to modify them though never himself apparently a zealous investor in privateering. What is more, early in May, weeks after Duguay had decided he must have 2,500 soldiers 500 above the number stipulated on 10 February in his contract with the navy Toulouse came to the rescue with an advance of 75,000 l.t. He had warned Pontchartrain that the marines would refuse to embark unless paid three months' wages (less cost of clothing) in cash before sailing, but they appealed in vain to the treasury. Intendant Robert thought that this problem could ruin all 35 . The Admiral's eleventh-hour bonus, which saved the expedition, did not buy an additional direction ; Duguay undertook to try to insure it. Nor had he need to solicit croupiers. That the others did so appears from scattered references. Duguay's own memoirs refer to 'un assez grand nombre de particuliers'. Then, when all was over, we find his armateurs complaining to the minister that he was hiding considerable sums from them in gratifications to his officers or their bereaved families and the signatories include three important names which were not those of directors : namely, Chappedelaine de L'Aumosne, prominent in South Sea, Caribbean, East India affairs; Gaillard de La Motte, cuyer, mayor, Malouin deputy to the new Conseil de Commerce in 17002; and La Perche de la Tranchaudire, a promoter of privateers 16891705 and father-in-law of Danycan's brother Joseph. Again, to enable private captains to command the 60-gun Fidele (fitted at Rochefort under the eye of Miniac de la Moinerie, an outstanding Malouin corsair) and five frigates, it was necessary to give them temporary rank in the navy: yet there was an ulterior reason for conferring temporary brevets on Lefer des Chesnais, Daniel de Pradel, and Rogn de Kertanguy, who were to command the Amarrine, 36, Concorde, 20, and Astree, 22. They had contributed large sums to the enterprise. Lefer's contribution, however, may well not have been in cash, for Duguay told the minister that he must press for the hire of the Amaionm frigate if he could not have the Victoire or otherwise lose Lefer's financial support. Certainly, the captain armateurs of the Fidele, Achille and Argonaute paid for their fitting instead of contributing cash: respectively, La Moinerie Miniac and two naval officers, the chevaliers de Beauve and Dubois de la Motte. Unlike the case of the Amaionne, however, the cost of arming these three vessels did not fall on the directors, with the result that at least 1 50,000 l.t. has to be added to the total outlay. On the other hand, the Mars, 56, was armed at Dunkirk by Danycan, through his correspondent Edward Gough, a Jacobite, and was to be commanded by his brother Joseph, a naval officer. Here, for once, we do possess the names of the croupiers - eight in all, though one of them signs for his
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'compagnie'. Without exception they were active privateering promoters themselves - depositami. To some extent, then, the directors made themselves responsible for individual components of the squadron, which finally consisted of seven battleline 'vaisseaux' (7456 guns), eight 'frgates' (4422), one of them a hospital ship and another 'quipe en galiote', and two bomb-galliots ('traversiers') 56 . Total initial outlay, excluding unknown expenses incurred by the dockyards but including 120,000 l.t. advanced by the armateurs and ultimately recoverable from the king's fifth (if any), as well as our notional 150,000 l.t. for the three independent armaments, may be conservatively estimated at 1,200,00 l.t., about half of which went on victuals, for 5,486 officers and men (not forgetting a small orchestra of oboes and violins) over eight months. At the eleventh hour the directors had had to raise 50,000 l.t. to replace wines and spirits from Bordeaux intercepted by Channel Island privateers: 'aux grands maux il faut de prompts remedes', as Duguay, afflicted with a feverish cold, remarked of the 'infinite de contretemps that beset his preparations. By retarding them, heavy rain in May had also increased expenditure57. Within a month of returning to Brest on 8 February 1712 Duguay dispatched his 'Relation de la prise du Rio de Janeiro' to the royal printer in Paris, claiming to have inflicted damage on the Portuguese to the tune of 20 million l.t., although the 'profit des Armateurs' wojuld come to only 7 or 8 millions38. The carefully laid plan of attack had met with unexpected obstacles. Five hundred French lives had been lost. None of the topographical memoranda and maps studied before sailing corresponded with what he actually found. Warned by Duclerc's intrusion, the defenders had strengthened their forts and retrenchments, and disposed of 1 3,000 regular troops besides militia. Worse still, the aggressors had lost the advantage of surprise, an advice boat from Lisbon (thanks to Leake) having given a fortnight's notice of their coming to Brazil. Whereas the attack had been timed to catch the annual convoy before it left harbour worth 15 to 20 million l.t. in Duguay's expectation there had been time to evacuate much valuable cargo from ships and warehouses. In consequence, the governor could offer a ransom of only 610,100 cruzados (c. 1.5 million l.t.) in gold dust, bar and coin, together with some gunpowder, sugar, and two hundred head of cattle to refresh the French troops. Of merchandise made prize, the greater quantity would fetch poor prices in France, so that Duguay sent them off to the South Sea, in two ships, counting on sales worth 3 million l.t. A little more was added by selling damaged goods, including such ships as had not been burnt, back to the inhabitants ; and by bringing home guns and church bells, though not sacred vessels the king having restored those taken at Cartagena in 1697.
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Duguay's expectation of a 'profit' of 7 or 8 million was premature and exaggerated: only a few weeks later the intendant reduced it by a million and may well have implied gross proceeds rather than profit. The Relation was dashed off, for prestige purposes, before it was known that the Magnanime, 74, and Fidele, 60, had been lost at sea, while the Aigle, 40, had perished at anchor in Cayenne, escort to the Queen of Angels, an illconditioned prize laden with sugar for which the warships could find no room. This last cargo was saved, the king's nominal fifth amounting to 8,641 Lt., which would imply a net profit to the armateurs of perhaps 35,000. Yet more than 600,000 in precious metals alone was lost with the Magnanime, besides merchandise. Duguay tells us that it was his old and tender esteem for her commander, the chevalier de Courserac, that induced him to confide so much gold and silver to his care; it would in any case have been a wise precaution to distribute the risks of carriage, although most of the valuables were sequestered in his 74-gun flagship, the Lji39. A sale of sugars in April fetched good prices, but the armateurs felt that the gold and silver would have sold more advantageously on the free market than at the prices offered by the mints of Paris and Rennes, to which they were compelled to turn the metal over; despite the favourable conversion rate at Paris for the gold, they were to carry the cost of coinage and recoinage themselves. Duguay himself angered his fellow armateurs by withholding 240 marks of gold dust for gratifications to officers and widows he wanted passionately to reward proven merit, none the less as all officers had served at half-pay and refusing to divulge names. He was obliged to surrender most of this, so that the gold, in all forms, dispatched on mule-back to Paris in mid-March was just over 2,558 marks. Since we do not have a precise breakdown of these forms, either in gold or silver, it is impossible to estimate their yield in litres lournois; for instance, there was a difference of six l.t. at Brest between 'new' and 'old' Portuguese coin. We can regard the metallic portion of the ransom (c. 1.5 million in l.t.) paid by Governor Castro Moris as a fair guide, however, provided we deduct what went down with the Magnanime. That would leave not more than 900,000 l.t., probably less. We can add 120,000 marks of copper yielded by 27 captured guns, mostly defective and described by the armateurs as more glorious to the State than useful to them, 37 iron guns and several other odd items inventoried on the ships that returned to France. But the booty was overwhelmingly in the shape of precious metal and 1,484 chests of sugar40. It is hard to believe that all this could have brought in more than enough to reimburse the cost of armament (to which must be added that of disarmament, mainly the wages that had not been advanced before departure), distribute their prize tenths to the crews, and pay out 31,712 l.t. to widows and the maimed. In fact, the armateurs told Pontchartrain that not all the Rio
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booty would meet their costs and used this as a reason for trying to pass on to the king the completion of the soldiers' wages; they refer to the 'succez malheureax de cette expedition dont les seuls interesses en souffrent', insisting on the huge extent of pillage and blaming it on Duguay, who thought he had kept it within reasonable bounds. The outcome would have been worse had not the Admiral as good as surrendered his tenth: an unprecedented gesture unlikely to have been made if the profit had been at all considerable, even though he was a director - for this did not rule out his later levy on the product of the South Sea venture. The royal fifth may be ignored too, since it was outweighed by liabilities to the armateurs for labour and materials advanced by them in the outfitting of his ships: they claimed in September 1712 that his debt exceeded his claim by 1 30,114 l.t. 41 . Any real profit, then, would depend on the returns from the South Sea. The first advices, from Concepcin, were not promising: Marchand de Chalmont, the supercargo, wrote that his ships carried too many woollens, instead of the linens which were Ie fondament des ventes dans ce pays' ; as prize goods the cargoes had not been as well assorted as those from home. From Arica seven months later he could report sales, in the favourite French smuggling corners at Ilo, worth 81,041j piastres (c. 284,000 l.t.) in silver coin and specie; and yet 'les marchandises se donnent maintenant pour ainsi dire'. The root of the trouble was competition between the French themselves. Frzier, whose celebrated Voyage refers to 171214, considered that the Peruvian market would absorb only three cargoes a year, with a total sales value of two million piastres, and Chile much less (400,000) a single ship 'would have made more profit than three or four'. Marchand said there were rumours of fifteen, including three intending to proceed to China which had undercut his prices. Duguay himself, in a survey of Malouin navigation dated 1715, makes the astonishing statement that there were still forty French vessels on the Pacific coast and over thirty million l.t. in unsold merchandise, most of which would rot away42. And yet, in the end, his own returns were high enough to yield the armateurs a clear profit of 92 per cent. They would have been higher but for the writing-off of bad debts amounting to more than 100,000 piastres (c, 350,000 l.t.): a loss rather unfairly (since the French notoriously experienced difficulty in obtaining payment from the Creole merchants) blamed on Marchand and his captains one of them, Daniel de Pradel, a substantial croupier.To the profit the sale of their ships, the 300-ton Concorde (armed at Brest 'en flute' as a victualler, 'vivandier') and the Notre Dame de l'Incarnation, 550 tons, contributed a little, once the decision to send the Concorde on to China had been called off. E. W. Dahlgren tells us that they fetched 350,000 piastres, but this sum must have been mainly for cargo: the viceroy of Peru paid only 10,000 for the Nuestra Senbora, a Rio prize 43 .
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We now possess several yardsticks for measuring the financial outcome of '1'expedition Riojaneiro'. First, Duguay tells us in fairly precise terms, that the 'profit' would have been 'nearly' 100 per cent higher but for the bad debts in South America and the loss of the Magnanime, Fidele and Aigle. The debts and the value of the precious metal borne by the Magnanime add up to 'over' one million l.t., leaving aside other cargo on the lost ships, which is likely to have been a narrow range of miscellaneous goods and chiefly sugar: textiles, hats, paper, candles, cotton thread, French swords, bombs and bullets had been dispatched to the Pacific. If we allowed 150,000 l.t. for general cargo lost at sea, that should be more than ample. When allowance is made for deductions from the gross proceeds of sale ('gros provenu') such as vice-admiralty fees ('vacations') and the crews' tenth the ships themselves, of course, were a loss to the navy alone - we arrive at an approximate total profit of rather less than a million l.t. Second, we have seen that the private outlay on the enterprise was more or less recovered by the sales of cargo brought safely home by the main body of the squadron, leaving the remittances from the South Sea as clear profit, less the usual deductions and (this time) less 5 per cent freight payable to the ships that brought the metal home, the cost or maintaining two vessels in the Pacific for the best part of eighteen months, and also the Admiral's tenth. We know of two such remittances: 64,4167 piastres (c. 225,457 l.t.) sent home in 1713 in the Vierge de Grace and Hermione, then 387,162 piastres (c. 1,355,067 l.t.) on board the Prince Heureaux des Asturies (formerly HMS Gloucester) a total of 1,610,524 l.t. gross. The Prince did not drop anchor at St. Malo till 24 July 1714, so this sum should represent (apart from uncollected debts) all the sales in Chile and Peru44. This is confirmed by our third yardstick: an account to the Admiral, dated 10 May 1719, of monies paid by La Barbinais to Lalande Magon/?/i, the Admiral's receiver at St. Malo: the dixime amounted to 127,253 l.t. before deducting 3,181 for the receiver's fees ('taxations'). We should not be far wrong in estimating the figure on which the tenth was assessed at some 1,300,000 l.t., since (as other surviving accounts show) it was very nearly the first charge on the gross proceeds of a prize sale. As Toulouse had apparently surrendered it on the proceeds of the booty brought directly home from Rio de Janeiro, moreover, we may take it that approximately 1,170,000 l.t. remained now for dividends to the investors. Lalande s account concludes with two payments made in August 1714, within a month of the return of the Prince, for the Admiral's interest as a director, to a total of 79,5 32 l.t. net, which is already a profit (on two directorships, each worth 50,000 l.t. and already amortized) of virtually 80 per cent: distribution of the remittances of 1713 would have yielded much less, but have brought the total profit up to Duguay's 92 per cent. If these dividends seem too low, we should remember that three armaments outside
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those of the main consortium had claims on the prize money; the director handling the disposal of prize was entitled, also, to the usual two per cent commission on its net value (as well as on the mise-hors). At all events, there can be no doubt at all that Duguay's South Sea initiative, disagreeably criticized by some of his colleagues, accounts for all, or nearly all, the profit there was45. But for the write-off of bad debts, the gross Pacific yield was closer to two millions than to the three millions of 'profit' which he had hoped from it, and the entire booty a long way from the seven to eight millions of which he had boasted in his Relation. This was evidently written primarily to boost the morale of his countrymen and to draw the court's attention to the difficulties which had been surmounted, not only by himself but by some of his officers. The achievement was thought likely, too, to impress neutrals like the Ottoman Turk and copies were rapidly dispatched to some of the consuls, who might have further ones printed off and displayed in public places46. The episode could scarcely affect the peace negotiations now opening at Utrecht, and strategically it could have no more consequence than the Cartagena raid of 1697. Not enough is known of Duguay's post-war career to trace the vicissitudes of his fortune. In 1717 he was rated for poll-tax at 300 Lt., which denoted someone of real prosperity and high standing even by Malouin standards, and was well above his brother's rating, which in 1710 had sunk as low as 60 Lt., that of a medium business man or of a moderately successful corsair. Duguay had his naval half-pay, an annual pension of 1,000 Lt., and 'quelque peu d'hritage' in land or rents; he was on good terms with the Regency government and in 1723 became an administrator of the new East India Company, having confided his manuscript memoirs to Cardinal Dubois, who died that year. Nevertheless he was notoriously spendthrift. He never married. When he died in 1736 he left La Barbinais, then aged 70, and two sisters without resources 'une familie dnue de biens'. It is good to know that the navy, then and again in 1775, allowed the pension to remain at least with the females of the family. La Barbinais, who had sought one of 800 l.t. for himself, was fobbed off with the cross of the Order of St. Louis47. So much for the 'anoblissement' of 1709.
References
l C. de Rondere, Historie de la marine fran$aise, VI (Paris, 1932), 177; M. J. Poulain, La course au XVII siede: Duguay Trouin et Saint-Malo la cit corsane a'aprs des documents indits (Paris, 1882) pp. 22-3; Le Nepvou de Carfort, Histoire de du Guay Trouin (Paris, 1922), pp. iv, 363-7; J. H. Owen, War at Sea under Queen Anne 1702-1708 (Cambridge, 1938), p. 64. Capt. Le Nepvou was the only historian to display some sense of the economics of Duguay's campaigns, but unfortunately died when he had reached the year 1709. Abbreviations below:
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ANM, Archives Nationales, Paris, Marine; AD, Arch. Departementales; BAM, Brest, Arch, de la Marine; BN, Bibliothque Nationale, Paris. For some of my research I am much indebted to an Emeritus Fellowship awarded by the Leverhulme Trust and to assistance from the British Academy. 2 BN, Ms fr., nouvelles acquisitions 10570, pp. 51-6, 66 (d), and Clairambault 888, ff. 4539. The titles attached to their family names by man v Malouins denote no more than a property, often a small house and garden, in the vicinity: thus 'Duguay' ('du Guest', 'du Gu') and 'La Barbinays' in the parish of Param: Carfort, pp. 12-15. 4 AD Pas-de-Calais, l 3B 36-39; AD Bouches-du-Rhone, IXB 4 and 5 ; AD Ille-et-Vilaine, 9B 1678 and 4 E 17 (fonds Pitot and Le Roy); Dunkirk, Chambre de Commerce, minutes des deliberations, 36 Dec. 1703. 5 Bromley, 'Proiets et contrats d'armement en course marseillais, 17051712', Rev. d'hist. conetsoc.,L(l972), 74--109 above, 243-78. 6 Calais, Arch. Municipales, Rule de capitation for 1699; Vincennes, Arch, de la Guerre, AL/ 2642, no. 73.1 am indebted to M. Alain Cabantous for this last reference. 7 ANM, B3/145, f . 2 5 5 ; J. Delumeau et ai, Le mouvement du port de Saint Malo 1681-1720: hilan statistice (Paris, 1966), pp. 2, 273; PRO, SP 47/2/24. 8 AD Bouches-du-Rhne, IXB 3; AN, G i l / 2 1 1 , nos. 216-8; C. Carrire, Negotiants marseillais au XVIir siede (2 v. Marseille, 1973), I, 84-5. 9 Bromley, 'The French privateering war 1702-13' in H. E. Bell and R. L. Ollard (ed.), Historical Essays 1600-17)0 presented to David Ogg (1963), above, p. 228 (graph reproduced in Delumeau, p. xvi); of losses, I communicated a table to a colloque at Boulogne in 1984 on 'Les Hommes et la Mer', whose proceedings are to be published by the Centre d'Histoire de la Region du Nord, Univ. of Lille III. For the South Sea, see E. W. Dahlgren, Les relations commentates et maritimes entre la France et les cotes de I'Ocan Pacifique, I (all published, Paris, 1909), 3056, and his list in Nouvelles archives des missions identifiques, XIV (1907), 423-568. 10 Delumeau, pp. 278, 281 ; P. Kaeppelin, La Compagnie des Indes et Francois Martin (Paris, 1908), pp.568, 577, 595-5, 658-60; A. Lespagnol, 'Ngociants et commerce indien au debut du XVIIF sicle: l'pisode des "Compagnies malouines" 17071719', ^4. de Bretagne, 86 (1979), 427-57. 11 Ib. pp. 437-8, 453; J. Meyer, La noblesse bretonne au XVUI' sicle (2v. Paris, 1966), I, 216-7,225. 12 Carfort, pp. 92-8; ANM, B 3/89, ff. 125-6; B. de la Rogerie, 'La guerre de course sur les cotes de Cornouaille de 1690 a 1697', Me'm. de la soc. d'hist. et d'arch, de Bretagne, XVII (1936), 176-7. 13 Most Malouin promoters are named in A. Morel, 'La guerre de course a St. Malo 1681-1715', ib. XXXVIII, 29-169, but I have corrected and amplified in the course of more leisurely research; their occupations and careers have to be reconstructed as chance offers since only a single poll-tax register (role de capitation) survives for this period, i.e. for 1710. It has oddly strayed to AD Loire-Atiantique, B3 597. Bromley, 'Prize Office and Prize Agency at Portsmouth 1689-1748', below, p. 483. 14 Carfort, pp.135-41; BAM, EL 468, pp. 369, 403, 467, 557, 577; 469, pp. 55, 84, 218, 411; ANM, B2/104, f. 5 5 5, and 109, ft. 668-9; L. Rothkrug, Opposition to Louis XIV (Princeton, 1965), p. 405. 1 5 Ib. pp. 39 3-403 ; J. Saint-Germain, Samuel Bernard, le banquier des rois (Paris, 1960), pp. 21-31; ANM, B2/114, ff. 60, 91-2, 124, 208-9; AN, Colonies C2/7, ff. 45-52; BN, Thoisy 89, ff. 183-90; AN, Minutier Central, tude xcix, 344 and 346. For this last reference and extracts from Marine B 2 I am deeply obliged to Prof. Lionel Rothkrug. Cf. BAM, 469, passim. 16 For cuyer etc., see Meyer, II, 1044-5, 1121, and Carfort, p^, 12; for the Graldin ('Girardin'), Bromley, 'The Jacobite Privateers in the Nine Years War', in A. Whiteman et al. (ed.), Statesmen, Scholars and Merchants (Oxford, 1973), pp. 2 3-7 ; above, pp. 145-9. 17 Carfort, p. 343 ; Vie de Monster du Guay Trouin crite de sa main (hereafter Vie), ed. H. Malo (Paris, 1922), pp. 61-2, 176-7; BAM, IE 488, pp. 120-1, 868-9, and 489, pp. 430, 501-3,551-2,774.
3BAM, IE 488, pp. 204-7.
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18 AD Ille-et-Vilaine, IF 1897/73 (fonds Magon). 19 BN, Clairambault 882, ff. 7-8, and 884, ff. 256, sqq.; British Library (Ref. Division), Add. Ms 29477, f. 18; ANM, D l / 2 2 ; B3/177, ff. 177-81; B4/29, ff. 252 sqq.; Arch, du Ministre des Affaires trangres Mem. et Doc., France 2021, f. 113. 20 BN, Clairambault 882, ff. 7-8 ; Thoisy 91, ff. 680-1. 21 I have discussed this in a paper, 'The loan of French naval vessels to privateering enterprises 1688 1 7 1 2 , communicated to a conference on 'Les marines de guerre europennes XVII C XVIIF sicles', held at the Sorbonne in September 1984 under the auspices of Prof. Jean Meyer. It is anticipated that the proceedings will be published shortly. References for most statements in this and the next two paragraphs will be found there. An E.T. of Nesmond's model build-and-hire contract (1695) is printed by G. Symcox, The Crisis of French Sea Pouter (The Hague, 1974), pp. 245-8. See above, pp. 187-212. 22 The French navy had of course no Sixth Rates. The 4th rang on the 1689 war establishment (ANM, G9, pp. 1-20) carried 48 to 40 guns, with three marginal exceptions (50, 38, 34), and the 5th rang 40 to 28 (where they overlap seven light frigates); in peacetime these strengths were reduced. Some of the men-of-war hired by the Maison Trouin were 3rds (6050) and even 2nds (7464); of those built for it, the Auguste and Jason were both 3rds. 23 BAM, lE491,pp.91-9 136-8, 177-8, 194, 220-6, 431. The royal fifth basis, though rejected in 1710, was nevertheless conceded in 1711, in the special circumstances of the Brazilian venture. 24 Carfort, pp. 282-322. Cf. Vie, pp. 160-72, and Mem du conte de Forbiti (2v. Amsterdam, 1748), II, 262-8.
25 BAM, IE 481, pp. 260, 329-32, 378, 473-6; 482, pp. 528-9, 644; 484, pp. 19-20; 487,735-7, 1090-1; 488, pp. 121,204-7,260,290, 315-8, 588, 632, 747, 868-9; 490; pp. 397-8, 463-4; 491, pp. B8, 177,789.
26 Carfort, pp. 342-3; ANM, B3/142, f. 637, and F2/28, f. 359; A.M. de Boisisle (ed.), Corresp. gen. des contrleurs-gntraux avec les intendant! de province, III (Paris, 1897), pp. 32, 483, 690;]. M. Price, France and the Chesapeake (2v. Ann Arbor, 1973), I, 227-8; Vie, pp. 194-5. 27 For these marital links, Paris-Jallobert, Anciens registres paroissiales de Bretagne: Saint-Malo (3 v. Rennes, 1900-2). 28 Dahlgren, pp. 368-70. 29 AD Loire-Atl. C 3597 and 3413. 31 Carfort, p. 163; BAM, IE 467, pp. 252, 25 5, 298-9; 468, pp. 143-4; 469, pp. 4, 233, 470, pp. 429, 437; 481, pp. 105, 164, 236; 482, pp. 218-9, 320-1; BN Clairambault 888, ff. 435-9, and Ms fr. nouv. acq. 10576, ff. 134, 146; ANM, F2/36, ff. 487-8, 498; 37, ft. 39,129-30. 32 Carfort, pp. 34856. He points out that in the Vie events of 1709 are transposed to 1710, perhaps by the publisher. 33 BAM, IE 480, p. 455; Vie, pp. 142-51; ANM, B4/31, ff. 129-31 ; F2/30, f. 593 V ; C. R. Boxer, The Golden Age of Braifl (Berkeley - Loss Angeles, 1 962), pp. 87-92. The text of the capitulation, which circumstances forced Duguay to accept prematurely, is given by Clive Parry (ed.), The Consolidated Treaty Series, vol. 27 (New York, 1969), pp. 197-201, with Duguay's receipt. 34 Vie, pp. 193-4; Relation de L'expdition de Rio-Janeiro (Paris, 1712), pp. 1-8; ANM, B4/35, ff. 204-14, 220-61; 36, ff, 139-40; Poulain, p. 208. 35 ANM B 4 / 3 5 , f f . 2 3 8 , 2 4 5 , 251-5, 283-4, 289-91; BAM, I E 493, pp. 300-3,306. 36 ANM, B4/36, ff. 111-2; 35, ff. 192, 211-4, 241; B3/192, f. 115. 37 BAM, IE 493, pp. 213-4, 489, 555-61, 808-11, 902-3, 1015, 1027-9, 1053, 1149. 38 This was only 7 pp. and 'coste du Brsil' should be added to the title; this cannot have been the version mentioned on 7 March 1712 by Robert (BAM, IE 494, ff. 249-50, 307-10), which Duguay had had printed at Brest, without showing the Ms. to the intendant. Another Paris edn. appeared in 1712 che\ Pierrecot, under a slightly different title. Relation de fexpe'dition de Rio-Janeiro. E. Sue printed a version in Hist, de la Marine, V. (1857), 505-15, but the later chronology of it is so loose as to arouse suspicion. Cf. Boxer, pp. 93105.
30 ANM, B4/34, f. 82
323
39 Vii, pp. 232-3; BAM, I E 494, pp. 414, 847 fi.; 495, pp. 318-23; Sue, V, 161 reprints a 'general extract' of the prize drawn up on the Lys, 18 Jan. 1712.
40 BAM, IE 495, pp. 38-9, 79, 231, 266-7, 289-92, 323, 465; ANM, B4/36, ff. 43, 80-2,94-8, 111-2, 115-6, 119, 124-40. 41 Ib. ff. 94, 111-18, 124-6.
42 AN, G5/211, dossier 11 ; BN, Clairambault 884, ff. 219-20; Frzier, A voyage to the South Sea ... (London, 1717), p. 201; ANM, B3/233, ff. 438-41. Cf. Bromley, 'French traders in the South Sea : the journal of Lieutenant Pitouays, 1706-1709, Revista da Universidade de Coimbra, XXVII (1979), 147-60; Pitouays comments on 'L'avarice des armateurs' in overloading cargo at the expense of victuals ; below, 325-8. 43 Vie, p. 2 3 3 ; Dahlgren, Voyages, p. 498. The silver (Mexican) peso or piastre had long been valued at c. 4 l.t. in France, but at this time was being quoted at 3.6 or a little less; perhaps recklessly, I have used a multiplier of 3y. 44 Vie, p. 233; AN, G5/211, dossier II; Dahlgren, Rel, Comm., p. 668; idem. Voyages, nos. 76-7, 86. 45 AN. G5/28te. 46 ANM, B7/89 (ii), ff. 27-8; AN, Aff. Etr. (consular) B1/147, f. 308 verso. 47 AD Ille-et-Vilaine, C2074, C3049; Loise-Atl. C3 597; ANM, C7/93.
15
FRENCH TRADERS IN THE SOUTH SEA: THE JOURNAL OF LIEUTANANT PITOUAYS, 1706-9
Occasionally, if not often, a limited historical theme has been so thoroughly investigated as to deter further enquiries for long afterwards. Such has been the effect of E.W. Dahlgren's massive work on the French trading voyages to Chile and Peru early in the eighteenth century, the most blatant if least violent challenge to the Spanish imperial monopoly, at the time of its greatest weakness. The first volume of Les Relations comtnerciales et maritimes entre la France et les cotes de r Ocan Pacifique was published by Champion in Paris as long ago as 1909: Le Commerce de la Mer du Sud jusqu la paix d'Utrecht. A second volume, which was to have taken this dramatic episode down to its effective conclusion in 1724 and to have treated more particularly of the trans-Pacific China trade that grew out of it, was never completed, probably because of the author's duties as director of the Royal Library in Stockholm, where the notes he made for it are still to be found. Earlier, in an article provisionally listing all these voyages (1), he had shown that only 116 out of his total of 175 vessels sailing from French ports to the South Sea had left by the end of 1713; there were twenty more departures in 1714 alone, as many as 27 from 1715 to 1724 inclusive, making a total of 163 by the end of 1724. Yet no one has taken up the story where Dahlgren left off, and very little has been added until recently to the story he told. As late as 1959, it was still open to Mademoiselle Anne Morel, drawing the attention of a colloquium to the enormous proportion of Peruvian silver carried off by the ships of Saint-Malo at this time when the galeones from Cadiz were rarely seen at Cartagena, to assert : 'J'ai cru ncessaire de remettre en lumire une activit dont il me semble qu'on mconnait l'importance...'(2) Saint-Malo was far and away the most active port in the French bid to outflank the consulado of Seville in the shipment of textiles and hardware directly to the viceroyalty of Peru, if not also to that of New Spain, and we
(1) 'Voyages francais a destination de la Mer du Sud avant Bougainville, 1695-1749', Nouvelles Archives des Missions Scientifiques, XIV (Paris, 1907), 423-568. (2) 'Les Armateurs malouins et Ie commerce interlope', in M. Mollai et al. (ed.), Les Sources de l'histoire maritime en Europe: actes du quatrime cottoque international d'histoire maritime (Paris, 1962), pp, 311-15.
3 26
now possess the statistics of all its commerce in this period of its greatest prosperity (3) ; but these can provide no more than a footnote to Dahlgren's work, and there is more to be learnt from the archives at Rennes concerning business aspects largely ignored by him, including the operations of the Malouin Noel Danycan de Lpine, the chief initiator of these voyages and the central figure in Dahlgren's book. On the business side there has been more news lately from Marseille, which had close links with Saint-Malo as a traditional market for codfish. Of the seven ships it dispatched to Peru between 1703 and 1713, five were armed by Jean-Baptiste Bruny and his Malouin associate Guillaume on. Gaston Rambert has studied one of their voyages in some detail, that of the corsair Jean Doublet, thanks in part to Bruny's private papers (4). Professor Charles Carrire, further, has examined the structure of investment in several of these armaments: no less than eighty-five investors in the case of the Saint Jean-Baptiste (Captain Doublet) in 1707, including several prominent Parisians like the financier Antoine Crozat, but also risk-takers from Geneva, Genoa, Livorno, Hamburg, and Cadiz itself (5). Numerous also were the artisans and shopkeepers of Marseille willing to participate by borrowing at usurious rates, 'a la grosse aventure', besides the seamen and passengers who did so (6). A ship's officer without some financial stake in these armaments must have been a rarity. Eighty-three officers in the seven armaments mounted at Marseille borrowed a total of 325,035 livres to enjoy one (7). Much larger sums must have been committed at Saint-Malo. This participation makes it surprising that, as a rule, the officers have so little to say in their sea-journals about the trading they did the manner of its conduct, its successes and frustrations in the ports of Chile and Peru. Almost all those I have seen are confined to the bare details of navigation, weather, encounters at sea and receptions ashore. They differ only in form from the summary reports or declarations which French captains were required to make on return home at the local amiraut. Dahlgren used these reports as well as a number of journals surviving in French collections, mainly those preserved by the Service Hydrographique de la Marine and now in the Archives Nationales (8). No doubt this is why his study, so rich on the inception
(3) Jean Delumeau et collaborateurs, Le Mouvement du port de Saint-Malo 1681-1720 : hilan statistique (Rennes, Institut de Recherches Historiques, 1966), pp. 286-8. (4) 'Marseille et le commerce interlope en Mer du Sud (1700-1723)', Provence Historque, XVII (Aix-en-Provence, 1967), 32-60. (5) Negotiants marseillais au XVIII' sicle (2 vols., Marseille, n.d. [1977]), I, 83-91. (6) C. Carrire, M. Courduri, F. Rbuffat, 'Marseille et fa Mer du Sud (1703-1716): l'histoire de la pacatale', Provence Historque, XXV (1975), 51-67. (7) Ibid. 59. (8) See G. Bourgin and E. Taillemite, Inventaire des archives de la marine (service hydrographique), sous-srie 4JJ: journaux de bord (Paris, 1963). Dahlgren acknowledged in the preface to his book that his interest had been aroused by the journal of the Saint
French Traders in the South Sea
327
and results of the voyages, and even more so on the intricate Franco-Spanish diplomacy surrounding them and the consequent prevarications of the French administration, overlooks the mechanics of the trading itself. Only five of his twenty-two chapters directly follow the ships into the South Sea, and then what he notices is their contribution to the history of exploration, their mixed reception by the Spanish authorities, and eventually the presence of too many of them for their own profit. He goes so far as to declare (pp.364-5): 'Les voyages offrent en general peu d'intrt, et toute leur importance est dans le resultai conomique et les circonstances qui accueillirent leur retour.' Of course, when these journaux de bord were transformed into books for the benefit of a reading public increasingly avid for the literature of travel, we may expect rather more. Thus Froger's Relation du voyage de M. de Gennes au dtroit de Magellan (1700), concerning the abortive pioneering expedition of 1695-1697, provides vignettes of the physical appearance of African and Brazilian ports of call, together with the manners of their inhabitants and a good deal on strange plants and fish. Greatly superior in this genre is Frezier's famous Relation of 1716, translated into English in 1717. He was an engineer, sent out in 1712-1714 to perfect the astronomical observations and topographical data accumulated on preceding voyages, notably by Fr. Louis Feuille in 1707-1712(9), which in turn were corrections of the English and Dutch charts used by the French, as for instance the true latitude of Cape Horn. Although he apologised for offering so little to divert his readers, Fr/zier claimed to give the world 'a most exact account of the commerce, forces, government and manners' to be found in Chile and Peru, second only to the overriding urgency of more accurate charting of channels and anchorages, ignorance of which had proved costly in life and shipping gear. Yet his commercial information too is slight enough: a few pages on mining, on corn exports from Valparaiso, on the trade of Chile in general though the country is rich, 'the inhabitants are nevertheless very poor in cash, because, instead of working at the mines, they are satisfy'd with the trade they drive of hides, tallow, dry'd flesh, hemp and corn' (10). This is nai've enough. One cries out for more on the lines of his observation on leaving Coquimbo: 'The little likelihood there was that the Sieur Duchne should sell his goods at the price he demanded, and the resolution he had taken to wait till the Peace was proclaim'd, designing to stay the last on the
Antoine in the Royal Library at Stockholm, but that it was pretty well silent on the South American stages of a voyage to Canton. (9) Journal des observations physiques... sur les cotes orientales de l'Amrique Meridionale et dans les Indes Occidentales 1707-1712 (Paris, 1714). Feuille embarked with Doublet on the Saint Jean-Baptiste, but the published account, Voyage de Marseille a Lima (Paris, 1920), by a Sieur Durret, is touristic. (10) A Voyage to the South-Sea... (London, 1717), p. 115. Ct'. p. 117, where he calculates the corn exported in 30 ships (an average of 6,000 hanegas each, at prices ranging from 18 to 20 reales) during an 8-month stay at Valparaiso.
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coast, flattering himself that no more ships would come from France, prevail'd with me...'(11). Blind illusion! According to the well-informed Duguay Trouin, who had himself dispatched in this direction much of the booty seized at Rio de Janeiro in 1711, the French still had forty ships in the South Sea in 1715 'et plus de trente millions de marchandises dont la plus grande partie doibt y pourrir...' (12). But this over-trading was nothing new. Dahlgren himself comments on it, in connection with the transactions of the shady Abbe Noel Jouin as early as 1706(13). In Premier's estimation, the Peruvian market would only absorb three cargoes a year, for a selling value of two million piastres, and Chile much less (400,000 piastres), so that in other words 'one French ship would have made more profit than three or four' (14). A far cry, indeed, from the easy sales achieved by Captain Beauchesne de Gouin, leader of the first successful expedition, in 1700: 'il me venait toutes les nuits des marchands, tant de la ville de Pisco que d'autres petites villes circonvoisines, qui demendoient de la marchandise pour des sommes considerables et en achetoient qui estoient plus qye demy pourie, disant qu'ils ne vouloient pas s'en retourner sans emprter quelque chose, ... se mocquant de nous d'estre venu au Perou avec de la villainie et de la geuzerie....' (15). Between the return of Beauchesne and the end of 1705, there were eighteen departures from Saint-Malo for the South Sea, two from Brest (but armed by Danycan), two from Toulon, and one each from Marseille and Cadiz. Twelve of these took place in 1705. In 1706 there were to be another ten, including the first from Nantes and La Rochelle, the 30-gun Saint Franfois (Descazaux de La Foliette) and the 24-gun Patriarche des Indes (Rene Dasquistade) (16), both frigates armed by Joachim Descazaux du Hallay, younger brother of La Foliette and like Darquistade a member of the Basque colony at Nantes, in fact a dominant figure who had been the city's first deputy to the new Conseil de Commerce of 1700 and ennobled when he left it in 1702. When he died in 1732 he left his fortune and business connections to Darquistade, later mayor of Nantes and a nobleman. The closeness of their association is illustrated by their common effort to break into the East India Company of Saint-Malo in 1714(17). When Descazaux next armed a vessel for the South Sea, at Bayonne in 1710, it was
(11) Ibid. 137. (12) [Paris,] Afrchives] Nationales,] M[arine] IP 233, fos. 438-41, 'Mmoire sur Ja navigation et le commerce de Saint-Malo' (1715). (13) Relations commerciales et maritimes, p. 373. (14) Op. at. (English translation), p. 201. (15) Journal of Beauchesne, Phelippeaux, ANM, 4JJ, 47; cf. Dahlgren, op. at. 140. This is the journal quoted in 1712 by the English privateering captain, Woodes Rogers, in A Cruising Voyage round the World, new ed. by G. E. Manwaring (London, 1928), pp. 86-8. (16) Numbered 39 and 40 in Dahlgren's list, loc. cit.; cf. Relations commerciales, 365. (17) Jean Meyer, La Noblesse bretonne au XVltt* sicle (2 t., Paris, 1906), I, 344'
329
commanded by Joachim Darquistade, a brother of Rene. According to Dahlgren, this ship, the Hermione, brought back over a million piastres, compared with a return of 724,549 piastres on the armament of 1706(18), which was directed by Rene. These figures, as Dahlgren was the first to admit, need treating with caution, if only because of the proportion of specie in coin, bar, plate or dust withheld from the mints on return to France, about 20 per cent in the case of the Hermione (19). Since her voyage took place when the market was seriously overcrowded, her returns in silver, remarkable at any time, must be considered altogether exceptional. It is difficult not to believe that her success owed much to the experience gained by Captain Rene Darquistade in 1706-1709. Of this we possess a first-hand account by the First Lieutenant of the Patriarche, the Sieur Pitouays, of whom nothing else is so far known, though he too may well have come from the Basque country. The 'Journal Pour Servir av Sr. Pitouays', now in the British Library (Manuscripts Department) (20), which acquired it at the Apponyi sale at Sotheby's in 1892, is a thing of beauty, written in a small neat hand on folio sheets of excellent paper, with twelve 'plans et vees' inserted into the text or (in three cases) folding into it. These display coastal profiles and anchorages, drawn to scale and with the utmost delicacy, sometimes with ships identified in a numbered key, occasionally with a decorative cartouche that was not always completed. It could have been intended for publication, although the author is meticulous in his daily record of the ship's position, winds, rhumbs, leagues sailed, and compass variation; all these are tidily tabled at the end of each month, with separate columns for latitudes estimated and latitudes observed; so long as the Patriarche was at sea, not a day is missing. It does not follow that the journal was written up daily: at Valdivia, on 6 February 1707, Pitouays already notes that the bay is more difficult to enter, because commanded by land batteries, than that of Concepcin, which he did not reach till three days later. The comparison may of course be due to some later revision, but there is no other indication of this, even though the entire appearance of the manuscript is that of a fair copy, which in fact is headed by an 'Avertissement' stating the whole length of the voyage thirty-three months, eight days.
(18) Loc. cit., n.s 39, 40, 76. (19) For the Phlypeaux and Saint Charles, armed in 1707, the returns stated by Dahlgren (ibid. n.os 49 and 51) totalled 1,189,726 piastres; but Danycan's own account in the Ajrchtves] D[epartementales d'J Ille-et-Vilaine (2 Ed 8) shows a total of only 784,159 piastres, yielding 2,832,617 Ihres in cash and promissory notes. The net sum distributed to the investors in 1715 was 1,518,490 livres. (20) Additional MS. 34,246. Fos. 1 'and 61 are reproduced by kind permission of the British Library Board. Another journal of the outward voyage, 'pour servir a Moy Brossy', who transferred to the Saint Antoine at Pisco and went on to Canton, returning (via Cape Horn) in August 1711, survives in A. N. M., 4JJ, 129; but it is much shorter and rather bleak.
Title page of the Journal of Lieutenant Pitouays
33 j
Lieutenant Pitouays did not return home on the Pairiarche, however. She was sold at Pisco on 14 March 1708, 'pour des raisons indispensables' (fos. 89V-90) that we can only guess: 14,000 piastres was a good price for a 24-gun frigate that had seen hard wear, including a very profitable voyage 'en peu de temps' (fo. 3) to Vera Cruz in 1705 (21). The lieutenant shipped on board her consort, the Franfois, when she left Pisco on 18 April 1708; Darquistade, as supercargo, must have done the same he certainly came home in her, along with his officers. So from that date until they anchored in Port Louis on 27 March 1709 the journal is that of the Franfois; or more properly that of the fleet of nine ships which set sail from Concepcin on 4 November, a total of 338 guns and 1,780 men, under the escort of the royal warship Aymable, commanded by Michel Chabert, chef d'escadre, who had been sent out in August 1707 with the commission of almirante real at a juncture when Madrid, briefly occupied by Portuguese forces in the previous summer, feared a Creole revolt (22). In view of Dahlgren's very full discussion of this expedition and its financial outcome, it is of considerable interest that Pitouays, who is unusually informative on the coastal trade and would have talked with the crivains of the various ships (if not also seen their accounts), twice (fos. 102, 104), states that the fleet carried home cargo to the value of ten million piastres. Allowing for the fact that the most richly laden vessel, the Verge de Grace of Saint-Malo, eventually returned alone by Corua, this estimate is consistent with court rumours and a later estimate by the controller-general Desmaretz of cargo worth at least thirty million livres (23). Dahlgren himself was inclined to accept some such figure, although the declared figures were little over half as much, even including the Vierge de Grace and 309,179 piastres remitted by Lima to Spain (24). Pitouays' many references to market conditions in the South Sea were mostly pessimistic, less because of the attitude of local Spanish officers than because of intense competition between the French themselves. At Concepcin already, in February 1707, the Pairiarche found two Malouin ships which after a year on the coast had kept back linens for sale in Chile on their return passage, only to find that the 5-aune piece had fallen from 7 to 2'/a piastres. The competition was increased by three strong frigates armed by the Compagnie des Indes Orientales (25), which nevertheless at Valparaiso were disposing of cargo almost at French prices, so saturated was the market
(21) Meyer, I, 341. (22) For the circumstances see Dahlgren, Relations, pp. 350-7 and 401-14. Chabert's other ship, the Oriflamme, had to turn back off the Horn owing to a bad outbreak of scurvy. (23) Ibid. 419, 479. Frequent alterations in the mint price of silver rule out a precise equation, but the Spanish piastre may roughly be reckoned at four livres. (24) Ibid. 474-8. (25) Ostensibly to proceed to the East Indies afterwards, though only one of them did so: ibid. 378-95.
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there. Their presence induced Darquistade to get ahead of them, after he had agreed with Jean Nouail des Antons, captain of the Vierge de Grace, also fresh on the scene, 'de vendr de concert par tout ou on iroit' (fo. 66). At Coquimbo, the inhabitants would at best only do barter, plate included however. At Arica goods were plentiful and silver short, an earlier arrival, the Saint Joseph having 'pour ainsi dire regl les prix' (fo. 72), besides the fact that the corregidor now took 8 per cent on sales instead of the usual 5 per cent ; nevertheless the Patriarche might have sold half her cargo there but for the untimely arrival of her consort, whose merchandise was better assorted. In general, as noticed by Beauchesne de Gouin half a dozen years earlier, the Arica merchants preferred to do business at Ilo, about 150km. to the north-west and 'moins ecler que a Rica' (26). Lieutenant Pitouays took a ship's boat to prospect good smuggling corners and current prices at Ilo (Ilio, Hilo). It was a parish with only a dozen houses, but the traders came from miles around, as far distant as Arequipa, finding it easier here than elsewhere to evade ambushes laid by the alcaldes on the roads. Since the French visitors often had trouble in obtaining fresh provisions in the South Sea, another strong advantage of Ilo was the excellent quality of the wine (favourably compared with that of Concepcin) and other refreshments from the Tambo valley. But parties had to be sent far inland to collect debts. Pitouays himself took a mule along the bad road to Arequipa, but had his own small supply of goods (pacotilles worth 1,500 piastres), with another lot entrusted to him by Captain Darquistade, confiscated on the way; he was also unsuccessful in collecting a debt of 25,000 piastres from a missionary. He rejoined his ship at Quilca in February 1708: she had spent over five months at Arica, selling goods worth 250,000 piastres, of which 60,000 came from two merchants who visited the Patriarche by night, disguised as sailors. At Pisco, where she was sold, a great deal of tough bargaining went on. Under the presidency of Don Jos de Rosa, the Pisco merchants formed a ring. Average French profits were down to 60 per cent as the East Indiamen had got there before them: 'ainsi on peut dire que le commerce est entierement perdu' (fo. 89). Never had French goods sold so poorly, some even below cost price: but after a year on the coast, they were in haste to start home. The Saint Antoine, another frigate armed at Nantes, sold cargo (says Pitouays, fo. 90) 'a toutes mains' for half its real value, being bound for China. Three Malouin ships, including two of Danycan's, the Phelypeaux and Saint Charles (27), were forced to sell cargo allegedly worth 1,600,000 livres for a mere 880,000 piastres, after the Pisco dealers had broken off negotiations and resort was made to arbitration ; the alternative
(26) Journal of Phelippeaux, A.N.M., 4JJ, 47. (27) Cf. supra, n. 19. In his journal of 1702, Captain de Launay criticised his directors for ordering their two ships to keep company all the time: A. D. Ille-et-Vilaine 2 Ed II, fo. 53.
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was a prolonged promenade of the Chilean coast, for no business was to be done further north, least of all at Callao, where the attitude of the new viceroy, Castel dos ROS, disappointed Frenchmen who had hoped that his embassy in Paris would bring them rewards (28). In any case, according to Jean de Boislor, captain of an Indiaman, La Toisn d'Or, not much was to be hoped from the proud and opulent Lima merchants: 'ils ne sc.avent ce que eest que de vendr moins que de deux eens pour cent.de benefices' (29). All in all, Pisco, though a dozen miles from the sea, remained the best place for French trade after Ilo. It was also possible to clean ships there: it was here that the Franfois got her first careen in twenty-eight months. On the obstructiveness or venality, or both, of Spanish governors, oidores, jueces visitadores, corregidores and alcaldes majares, Pitouays' evidence is mixed. No words were too harsh for Don Juan Alonso de Valdez, 'fort sec et dassez mauvaise fisionomie' (fo. 32V), governor of Buenos Aires, the original destination of the Patriarche, which went on to the South Sea only because he refused all business. The French Asiento Company (unlike its predecessors) indeed had an office at Buenos Aires, but it was allowed only two vessels a year (30) and Valdez must have known only too well that slaves could cover much miscellaneous trading; the French factor, Hays, was known to be a man of 'grandes et vastes idees' (31), doubtless an allusion to the clandestine silver route from Potos. It is interesting that Darquistade entertained the idea of sending his salesmen to Potos itself when he reached Chile; he was deterred by the preference of Creole merchants for coastal sites where 'ils ne sont inquiet de personne' (fo. 70V). When he called on Hays he found officers from the ill-fated Falmouth, which had been forced back from Magellan's Strait and taken refuge in La Plata with a starving crew : the suspicious Valdez allowed them to die (32). Seeing through Darquistade's pretence that the Patriarche was armed to wage war on the Portuguese, and carried cargo merely to barter it for refreshments, Valdez would supply these only for cash and ordered all but the pursers to stay in their ships; Marsolle, crivain of the Patriarche was allowed to stay behind, with
(28) Journal du marquis de Dangeau, t. XII (Paris, 1857), 388. A letter to Danycan from the Phlypeaux in Pisco, dated 25 Jan. 1708 (A. D. Hle-et-Vilaine, 2 Ed 11), suggests that the viceroy's attitude was influenced by his councillors and by the timing of shipping for Panama. Pitouays (fo. 78) records a message from the Indiamen that good trade was to be done in Guatemala. The enterprising Abbe Jouin, an old flibuslier, took the Confiance of Saint-Malo up there in 1707, but this essay ended in violence: Dahlgren, Relations, pp. 371-8. (29) Journal in A.N.M., 4JJ, 47, 'Caillau de Lima', 1 Aug. 1707. (30) G. Scelle, La Traite negrire aux Indes de Castille (2 t., Paris, 19C5), II, 337. Pitouays calls Valdez a creature of Legans, then in prison at Bordeaux for leading the conspiracy of the grandees against Philip V in 1705. (31) Ibid. 284, n. 3. (32) Pitouays' account of this tragedy tallies with that of Captain Joseph Danycan in the Fonds Danycan at Rennes (A. D. Ille-et-Vilaine, 2 Ed 8); cf. Dahlgren, Relations, pp. 365-7.
Valparaiso and the Bay of Valparaiso from the Journal of Lieutenant Pitouays
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two sick men, when she sailed on 23 October (only a week after arrival) and eventually rejoined the Franfois overland at Valparaiso. Pitouays, whose journal is enlivened by critical reflections, regretted that they did not sell goods even at low prices to buy provisions. Counting on Buenos Aires, they had only eight months' supply on leaving France, and some of this 'cages a poules, bestiaux' had been jettisoned to escape the British navy in the bay of Biscay. Refitting in the bay of Maldonado consumed another six weeks' supply, so they were down to a ration of eight ounces of bread a day when they finally put the Plate behind them: 60 quintals for 108 men. At this point the Franfois carried only 43 quintals for 116 men and was forced to await the return of a corvette from Buenos Aires, reaching Concepcin a month after her sister. Fortunately, provisions were plentiful and cheap there. All French traders made it their first port of call in the South Sea, rather than the heavily defended Valdivia, where Beauchesne had had a hostile reception in 1700, after six months of struggling against the wind in Magellan's Strait (33). Pitouays advised against the Strait, the usual passage hitherto, unless a ship carried ample provisions. The Falmouth had met disaster, with her men too weak to work the sails, 'faute d'avoir embarqu les vivres ncessaires pour y mettre plus grand nombre de ballots' (fo. 33), in other words '6 ou 7 mois de vivres pour y mettre une cargaison de quatre eens mil escus', all because of 'l'avarice des armateurs' (fo. 37V). Thanks to the purchase of an English prize at Tenerife on the way out, which they renamed'Loyseau', 200 tons and 26 guns, the Patriarche and her sister had been able to disembarrass themselves of part of their cargo, though the Oiseau was to capsize in the Plate. Much cargo was still stowed between decks, however, and some of it was spoilt by the sea. This was considered an objection to going round by Cape Horn, but a shortage of victuals proved the stronger argument. According to Dahlgren (34), the first French traders to use this passage had been the three Indiamen mentioned above, a few weeks earlier. The highest latitude recorded by our lieutenant was 58 32', on 13 January 1707, a degree or two further north than some of the Cape Homers noted by Gaston Rambert (35). With a bay where 'on peut mouiller ou on veut sans crainte destre insult' (fo. 57V), and dealers willing to sell a sheep for half a piastre and an arroba of wine for four, Concepcin occupied a privileged position in all these voyages. It was the obvious rendezvous outward and homeward bound, a place to effect minor repairs and above all to recruit the health of the seamen. For this reason it was a good place to pick up news, whether market intelligence from further north or the news from Europe, for which the Creoles
(33) (34) (35) (36) Ibid. 380. Ibid. 133-40. Loc. cit. 41-2. Op. cit. 51.
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as well as Frenchmen, a year or two absent from home, displayed a keen appetite that played a part in trade negotiations themselves, at least in wartime, when the war at sea or across Iberia had so clear a bearing on the application of the laws of the Indies and the prospect of a return to normal shipping movements. When the Patriarche dropped anchor at Concepcin on 9 February 1707 two months after leaving the Plate she found six other French ships, which had been there for at least a month. This in itself was ruinous for trade, but in any case Concepcin, described by Frzier as 'a good village', was too far from the main centres of mining and population; in 1702, the Prsident de Grndan, one of Danycan's pioneering ships, had found little cash available because the garrison's pay had yet to arrive (37). Moreover, even refreshments could double in price within a year, as the Toisn d'Or discovered in December 1707, when the 'extraordinary' successor of the pliable Don Diego de Sonigas ('trs honneste homme', fo. 64) allowed provisions to be sold only through the hands of the alcaldes not that this prevented the French from taking in victuals by night at the old prices (38). Perhaps this is why Pitouays, after he had returned to Concepcin in August 1708, was to find that the 'ohyder' had clapped some officers of the Saint Joseph in irons and refused them ship provisions, a matter which was only corrected by the arrival of Chabert, flying his Spanish colours as General of the South Sea; he seized a Spanish vessel and threatened a descent in force, while the Spanish cavalry were marshalled for miles around. This episode is the only case of violence recorded by our lieutenant, and it provoked a reference to the 'rodomontades' of 'cette race maudite de ce pays icy' (fo. 100V). Since so much depended on personalities, fresh appointments were clearly a matter of vital interest to French captains and supercargoes, whose journals usually have more to say about local hospitality (dinners, salutes) than about buying and selling. Fre'zier thought it worth while to inform his readers that the president of Chile appointed a new maestro de campo at Concepcin every three years (39) ; and we know what high though misplaced hopes the French entertained of Gastel dos Rios, whose arrival at Lima was reported at Concepcin on 1 March 1707 nine months later Danycan's Phlypeaux was ordered out of Callao with nothing taken aboard there but fresh water (40). The proximity of the relatively independent presidencia at Santiago, on the other hand, was no obstacle to business at Valparaiso at this time. If armed horsemen at first opposed a landing from the Patriarche at Coquimbo, this was because the place had twice been sacked by the ladrones (1685, 1694) and the inhabitants were easily alarmed: Dampier, after all, had visited these seas in 1704 and Woodes Rogers was to return with
(37) (38) (39) (40) A. D. Ille-et-Vilaine, 2 Ed 11, Ime de bord of Capt. de Launay, fo. 52V. A.N.M., 4JJ, 47, journal of Toisn d'Or; cf. Dahlgren, Relations, 384, 388. Op. cit. 54. A.D. Ille-et-Vilaine, 2 Ed 11, Dupr Aberours(?) to Danycan, Pisco, 25 Jan. 1708.
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him in 1709. As soon as these fears were put at rest, Darquistade and his officers feasted with the local notables, including the richest Peruvian, whom Pitouays does not name. At Arica the corregidor, Juan de Moura, was equally friendly (at 8 per cent on sales), but news of the coming of the jueces pesquisidores caused the merchants to scatter, goods sold (but not always yet paid for) being carried into the mountains or sent back to the ship. The 'judges' turned out to be only the corregidor of Arequipa, who brought a letter from the new viceroy offering no more than refreshments at Callao (41). So long as he remained at Arica, however, Don Gabriel Carlos 'a bien fait trembler les gens... ayant fait mettre aux fers tous ceux qui estoient accuse d'avoir achet a bord de nos vaisseaux...' (fo. 79V). Although he is described as bribable, the Patriarche had to threaten a landing party before he would provision them. He also followed them to Ilo 'pour nous faire enrager', being joined there by three other officers who disbanded the wine-sellers and forbade all refreshments. De Launay, captain of the Grndan, had been similarly interrupted, amid a crowd of eager buyers, at Ilo in November 1702; he had to ferry cargo in boats to landing-places seven or eight leagues distant, where the difficult corregidor had no jurisdiction (42). We cannot be sure how much business was carried on at Pisco itself either. In 1707 at least, it was the best market along with Ilo, but Jean de Boislor, whose journal of the Toisn d'Or is a more informative source than most (43), tells us that he disposed of his residual cargo two leagues away, at Paraca, despite presents to the gubernador and corregidor. Pitouays' account of his journeys by chaloupe throws some light on these manoeuvres, but at this point he was away for two months on a debtcollecting expedition to Arequipa. What he does tell us, however, is warning enough not to take the connivance of Spanish officials for granted. Even in the easiest circumstances, the methods of trade could be circuitous, if not clandestine. Officials wished to preserve an appearance of legality even when they connived at the law's evasion. Nor were all of them willing to break the law, even for a bribe. It seems legitimate, even on this slight evidence, to wonder whether too much has been made of their venality. From a reading of this and other livres de bord, it is certainly clear that their powers of punishment and confiscation were enough to create panic among Creole merchants, whose enforced subterfuges must have added to their costs, as smuggling always does. Of them, of their resources and methods, of their business policies and decisions, in these most difficult years, it is to be hoped that the Latin American historians will one day be in a position to tell us more. The incomparable archives of the Indies should ultimately explain much that cannot be gleaned from the sea-journals of the foreign traders. At a conjuncture
(41) Pitouays refers only to judges, but says (fo. 77V) that they had come to 'perquisition' the merchants. (42) A. D. Ille-et-Vilaine, 2 Ed 11, livre de bord, fo. 61. (43) A.N.M., 4JJ, 47.
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when it might be five years or more before the Creole merchants saw a return on investments consigned to Cadiz (44), they had clearly the strongest incentive to welcome the French captains. But these were the first to introduce contraband to the coasts of Chile and Peru, by comparison with the long experience accumulated in the Caribbean. How was it organised? By what routes and agencies? Based on what sources and kinds of information? Some of the visitors carried Spanish passengers, who might be interpreters or at best commercial men: the Saint Antoine even sold most of her cargo to two passengers who joined her at Buenos Aires (45), which suggests some informal correspondence with Lima, where it was to be delivered and paid for. There is also the not unimportant matter of the stimulus to coastal agriculture afforded by so many French crews in need of revictualling. In these ways and in others a scrutiny of the journals provokes questions that for too long historians have failed to formulate and to which, of their nature, the journals alone cannot provide a satisfying answer.
16
THE CHANNEL ISLAND PRIVATEERS IN THE WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION

" The history of British privateering has still to be written". This opinion, expressed by Dr. G. N. Clark twenty years ago, has not yet lost all force. Dr. Clark has himself done much for privateering history in the wars of William and Anne, while more recently we have had a most valuable study of the prize system in the eighteenth century from Professor Richard Pares, building on the foundations laid by R. G. Marsden over thirty years ago.' Much has been done by these writers to illuminate, in particular, policy about privateering and the doctrines and diplomacy of neutral rights. In addition we have a few studies of local privateering for certain periods, though far fewer than the French. Information is still, however, lacking on the number, ownership, and strength of British privateers, the areas in which they operated, the value of their prizes and those of the Navy ; and until much more is known about these and other aspects of the subject a definitive appreciation of the place of privateering in the British conduct of war, or even of any single war, is hardly practicable. Even if the silence of the standard histories of naval war on the subject of British privateering turns out to be justified and the ultimate unimportance of privateers in British strategy demonstrated, we should still wish to know what importance they may have had as a stimulus to economic activityin the rise of Liverpool, for example,or as an outlet for the employment of capital and labour. Thus the contribution of privateering successes to capital growth in Elizabethan England is now recognized, at least as a hypothesis, but has yet to be adequately tested, let alone assessed in a manner which would satisfy the economic historianif indeed material for such an assessment survives. Equally, we could wish for better knowled.ge of the extent of the lossss suffered by Spanish and Portuguese trade at that time at the hands of French, Dutch and English privateers and pirates. One difficulty in all this is, of course, that the records, like privateering itself, are widely scattered. For the Anglo-French wars from 1689 at least, however, partly because governments were with mixed success bringing privateering under better control and because, to the extent that official action succeeds, regulations breed records, there is abundance of material in the Public Record Office alone for a more detailed description of British privateering than has yet been attempted. What is attempted in this paper is no more than an essay in the kind of descriptive account, for one group of privateers and one war only, which it is possible to construct from the information available in the High Court of Admiralty papers preserved there notably the volumes of Letter of Marque Declarations and the bundles of Prize Papers,supplemented by the Privy Council Register and Papers, the State Papers and the Admiralty records. I have made use also of an important series of the Marine documents in the Archives Kationales2 and of the rich collection in the Guernsey Greife. Use of these sources makes it possible to supplement the interesting account recently given by Mr. Le Pelley to the Soct.3 Nevertheless it requires some hardihood on the part of anyone without intimate knowledge of the Channel Islands to venture a contribution to their history and I am aware that the full implications for that history of what I have found escape me. My approach has been that of an English historian of English privateering : I came to the history of the
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Channel Islands only because the records make it clear beyond a doubt that the Island commanders in Queen Anne's war were not only more numerous than those of any other English or colonial base but also, if the number rather than the value of prizes be a criterion, more successful than all the rest put together. Such a criterion is of course misleading but I hope also to suggest that the value of Guernsey prizes alone was a significant fraction of the whole. There is adequate evidence, moreover, to show that the activities of the Channel Islanders created sufficient distress and alarm in the trading ports of France, great as well as small, to earn them a better recognition than they have yet received at the hands of any but local historians. Except for the cruise of the Vainqueur, Captain Chaillon, in Newfoundland waters in 1710 and a little activity late in the war off Bilbao and Cape Ortiguer,4 the whole privateering effort of the Channel Islands was concentrated off the French coast, often close inshore. Though one or two of the Island privateers sometimes cruised also in the Channel between the Casquets and the Isle of Wightthat is, somewhat further down Channel than the Cinque Ports privateers, which lived largely off the neutral trade with French ports as it passed through the Channel narrows, and though the Islanders were occasionally to be met off the coasts of Dorset, Devon and Cornwall, most of their cruising was done west of the Cotentin. Whereas the Guernsey privateers alone brought some 480 prizes into Guernsey and another dozen into Jersey, they sent only 65 into English ports5 and many of these were in fact captured off Brittany or in the Bay of Biscay, being sent into England sometimes to find a better market for their prize goods,6 sometimes on account of the winds. Not more than a dozen prizes were, in fact, taken off the English coast and some of these were probably fortuitous. Only the movements of the Industry, Captain Rousse, who seized four neutral ships " half seas over " and carried them into Dover in July 1704,' suggest what might be termed a cruising plan in this zone. West of the Cotentin the Islanders had the field almost to themselves so far as privateers were concerned. During the first two years of the war one Bristol privateer and several Londoners took a few prizes off Brittany8 and the Flushing privateers sometimes cruised in the Bay of Biscay (though not in winter), while an Ostender embarrassed the Lieutenant-Governor by bringing four French prizes into Guernsey after the Cessation of Arms in 1712.9 The most serious competitor was, significantly, the Channel Soundings squadron of the British Navy which, after the Cruisers and Convoys Act of 1708, was sometimes relieved by the Main Fleet itself (much reduced in size). Their main purpose was to suppress enemy privateers but they detached ships from time to time to distress enemy trade also. The cruising frigates, however, took most of their prizes well to the west of Ushant or Belle-Heusually anything from 20 to 60 leagues distant10and the Islanders worked much nearer shore than that. Only during the first two years of the war did the Navy take any number of prizes near the French coast and most of them were the result of Rear-Admiral Dilkes's resounding success against a convoy of 48 sail in Canale Bay on 26 and 27 July 1703." Only very seldom did a naval ship and an Island privateer join in a chase. It is doubtful whether Dilkes would have risked his ships so near the Minquier Rocks or " have come within 4 Foot Water more than the Ships drew " before manning his boats, if he had not been able to call on the Lieutenant-Governor of Jersey for the services of two privateering captains " who well understood that Coast."12 Now it was precisely this intimate knowledge of the ragged, reef-fringed coast of Brittany, of its bays and estuaries and tides, of its constellated island outliers and the channels which thread them, all the way from the Baie du Mont-St.-Michel to the Pointe de Penmarc'h and the Glnans, that, to begin with, constituted the special skill and opportunity of the privateers of Guernsey and Jersey. The Islands were themselves, of course, well placed to serve as springboards for tip-and-run raids on the shipping which passed between Brittany and Normandy through the Canal
The Channel Island Privateers

13
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de la Droute and the still narrower as well as dangerous Raz Blanchard. But this little zone was merely the nursery school of the privateers, which took most of their prizes west of the Baie de St. Brieuc and along the Biscay coast. They cruised and often anchored in the waters of Brhat, the Sept lies, Batz, the Bays of Audieme and Quiberon, the Glnans, Groix, Belle-Ile, Ile d'Yeu, and Ile de R. The Sept lies, the Glnans and Quiberon Bay served as retreats or forward bases of attack.14 At one time the French feared an attack on Groix, which was thinly populated and weakly defended.15 Both passages to La Rochelle were entered : a considerable number of vessels were seized at anchor in St. Martin's roads, in the Pertuis Breton, and some privateers also cruised in the Pertuis d'Antioche south of R. The Pertuis de Maumusson, the narrower and dangerous approach to Marennes and the salt flats of the Brouage, was entered more than once.16 As the war went on, first in 1707 and with increasing boldness afterwards, the Islanders insulted the Morbihan, the Loire and, most particularly, the Gironde. At least eight Guernsey and two Jersey captains took or ransomed prizes at the mouth of the Gironde or "in Bordeaux River " between 1708 and 1712, after Chaillon had set the example in 1707the same Chaillon who cruised on the Newfoundland Banks three years later,and at least three captains showed their sails profitably in the Loire during the same years.17 " Ces mauvais corsaires infectent toute cette coste cy," wrote Lusanc,ay, Commissaire de Marine at Nantes, in April 1708, reporting the presence of the Island privateers in the river and a project to fortify the island of La Pillier, where they were accustomed to drop anchor. Four years earlier at Lorient he had complained of their ravages : they took or scuppered every vessel they met.18 Bitter complaints of this kind were reiterated by the authorities of many ports early and late in the war. In August 1704 vessels could not proceed the short distance to Lorient from Nantes or Le Croisic without encountering privateers.19 The Marchal de Chteaurenault, commanding in Brittany, told Pontchartrain in December 1704 that the Island " capres " were masters of the Breton coast and that everything suffered, including the royal revenue : " presentement cette coste n'est pas praticable aux bastimens marchands qui veulent y venir, non seulement de ees costes l, mais jusques a Dunkerque."20 In Aprii 1705 it was reported that merchandize could not be sent from Cherbourg and other ports in Lower Normandy to the Caen fair and three months later it was being suggested that, with the troops there, six Dunkirk galleys and Cotlogon's squadron, it would be possible to destroy the Channel Islands " cette pine de pied qui ruine toute notre commerce de la Manche." In July 1706, the cider trade between Avranches and St. Malo, on which a portion of the population of Lower Normandy depended, was daily interrupted.12 At Nantes and at Port Louis, where long-haul shipping was said to risk capture in the roads in 1704, small vessels could not move from port to port in 1708 without convoy.22 Noirmoutier, in May 1710, was said, though garrisoned, to be surrounded by corsairs" ces petits bastiments l qui ravagent et prennent toutes les barques qui paroissent," wrote the Marchal de Chamilly to Pontchartrain, " ce qui me fait trembler pour toutes nos barques qui portent de grains dans toutes les isles de Rh, d'Olron, Brouiage et isle d'Aix, pour la fourniture du pain de munition aux troupes qui y sont en garnison, car s'ils nous en prennent quelqu'une l'entrepreneur de la munition ne voudra plus s'exposer a y en envoyer, qui seroit le plus grand malheur qui pourroit nous arriver."23 From Bordeaux, where several bankruptcies were caused by losses to privateers in the river as early as 1707, five Guernseymen were reported in the river in June 1710 ; " ils entrent et sortent aussi famih'rement qu'ils pourroient faire dans la Tamise, ils trouvent des vivres de gr ou de force sur la cte de Saintonge, autant qu'il leur en faut, il ne sort aucun batiment franôis de la Gironde, ni il n'y en autre aucun qui ne court risque d'etre pris ou ranconn. Jugez si cette situation est agrable pour le commerce et si elle est propre a augmenter le produit du bureau de Bordeaux."24 These instances could be multiplied and they deserve emphasis, partly because they represent a not unimportant aspect of the French experience of the war, especially when added to the widespread distress after 1708, and partly because it was against
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the depredations of the Channel Islanders, gradually extended as far south as Arcachon,25 that much of the bitterness of the coastal population of France was directed. Some thousands of Frenchmen suffered in their persons or in their purses, as the mere number of Guernsey and Jersey prizes makes clear. Nor were they only sailors and business men, for consumers suffered much. Cargoes of salt destined for Newfoundland fish went into St. Peter Port instead. Cargoes of timber, iron, lead and naval stores failed to reach the shipyards and repair shops of Dunkirk, St. Malo, Port Iôuis, Vannes, Quimper, St. Gilles, Nantes, L,a Rochelle. Wines, brandies, and cider for Dunkirk, Calais, St. Malo, Brest, and Morlaix were intercepted. Though privateering activity in Biscay intensified after the vendange,26 Bordeaux exporters lost not only wines and brandies but hoops and staves imported for the hogsheads. A small number of West Indies vessels, the most highly valued of all prizesladen with sugar, cocoa, molasses, cotton, and indigo for Nantes, Iâ Rochelle, and Bordeauxwere taken by Guernsey men.27 To an extent not easily ascertainable all this must have told on the French war effort. Thus lyUttrell wrote on 6 April, 1703 : " The Guernsey and Jersey privateers have of late pick't up abundance of French prizes, laden with wine, brandy, and other necessaries going from Brittany to Dunkirk and Ostend, design'd for their army in the Netherlands".28 A number of ladings consigned to Bruges, especially of wines and brandies, certainly lost their intended market, whatever that may have been.29 The provisioning of the Dunkirk and other French privateers must similarly have suffered.30 But in the last resort it is likely that the impact of loss was felt most by the owners and crews of the small vessels which carried the petit commerce of France, and by the merchants who freighted them with such modest necessities as salt at Marennes or Seudres, millstones at Honfleur or rye at Port Iôuis, Granville oysters or Canale cider, with oxhorns and horsetails for Rouen, glass and plaster and seacoals for Iâ Rochelle, with flax, bale goods, flourmeal, soap, chestnuts, earthenware and ironmongery. The significance of all this is only to be understood, of course, when it is appreciated how much the inter-provincial trade of France had to be carried by water, for cabotage helped to make good the deficiencies of road communication.31 And the great centres of this port-to-port trafficNantes, I,a Rochelle, Bordeauxwere also those which stood to lose most by losses in overseas trade, insignificant as this was compared with the dimensions to which it grew during the eighteenth century. According to a report made to the French Minister of Marine in 1731, the Islanders claimed to have taken or sunk during the war no less than 3,500 French ships.32 This was almost certainly a wild exaggeration. It would imply something like 2,500 sinkings and that is hard to believe, even though the figure could include small boats and though sinkings were on the increase by 1709.33 The number of prizes condemned to Channel Island privateers during the war was certainly not in excess of one thousand. Up to 29 September 1711, there is available a complete list of all prizes,34 recaptures and ransoms included, which gives the following results for the Guernsey and Jersey privateers : Prizes Period Guernsey Jersey
1 June 1702 i July, 1703 2 July 170329 Sept., 1704 30 Sept. 170429 Sept. 1705 30 Sept. 170529 Sept. 1706 30 Sept. 170629 Sept. 1707 30 Sept. 170729 Sept. 1708 30 Sept. 170829 Sept. 1709 30 Sept. 170929 Sept. 1710 30'Sept. 171029 Sept. 1711 Total to 29 Sept. 1711.
49 55 72 68 43 83 80 78 80 608
i 4 19 23 19 34 15 15 2i 151
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If the 13 prizes taken by Guernsey and Jersey privateers in consortship are added, we get a grand total of 772 for the greater part of the war. An analysis of the Prize Papers themselves gives a total, for the whole war, recaptures and ransoms included, of about 746 vessels taken by Guernsey privateers, but not quite all of these were condemned.35 Discreditable as this may be to the alleged arithmetic of the Islanders, it is a sufficiently formidable record. The Island privateers took more than twice as many prizes up to 29 September 1711 as all the other English privateers together36 and, incidentally, far exceeded their own record in the previous war.37 Unfortunately it is not possible to state the total value of the prizes. Appraisements of prize vessels and cargoes for the purpose of calculating the Admiralty tenth have not all survived and in any case ceased altogether when Parliament abolished the tenth as from 26 March 1708.i8 Moreover, sale values of prizes, which were required by Proclamation of i June 1702 to be sold by inch of candle, differed considerably from the valuations of the appraisement commissioners, being as a rule well in excess of the valuations.3' Nevertheless, on the basis of the figures of the appraised values, ransoms, and the salvage payable for the recapture of British ships taken by the enemy, it is possible to attempt a rough estimate of the value of the prizes taken before the Prize Act of 1708 came into force. I have so far undertaken this laborious calculation only for Guernsey prizes, of which 200 appraisements, exclusive of salvage awards, yield a total of 41,467 sterling. I estimate that there were 70 other appraisements which have not survived but which might justify the addition of 7,000 to the total on the basis of an average, conservatively estimated, of 100 eachor over 14,000 if a strict average is assumed. If we add the known salvage figures for recaptures to the end of 1707 and for ransoms to 25 March I7O8,40 we get an estimated value for Guernsey prize vessels and cargoes for the whole period from 4 May, 1702 to 25 March, 1708 as follows : sterling 200 surviving appraisements 41,467 70 missing appraisements estimated at 7,000 Salvage awards on 29 recaptures 8,352 1,260 34 ransoms Total .. 58,079 As the number of prizes per annum increased during the remaining 4! years of active war and as ransoms alone in that period totalled 12,794 sterling,41 it seems safe to conclude that the Guernsey privateers alone brought in or ransomed prizes to a value in excess of 100,000 for the war as a whole. In view of the excess of sale values over the appraised values and the character of some of the prizes brought in after March, 1708, it is indeed fairly certain that the full market value of Guernsey prizes in this war reached a total considerably in excess of that figure. Though it includes the value of prize vessels we might be entitled to argue from it that Guernsey privateers alone were responsible for at least one-twentieth the value of prize goods from all sources given by Whitworth, for it does not appear from the appraisements that the aggregate value of the prize vessels was more than equal to that of the cargoes and, on the other hand, it is unlikely that Whitworth's figure allows anything for ransoms.42 However that may be, it is certain that the proceeds of Guernsey and Jersey privateering were mainly derived at the expense of the French, whose losses from this source may provisionally be placed somewhere between 100,000 and 150,000. Rightly to assess the effect of these losses on French economic life would need a study of the French coasting navigation before 1715 which, so far as I am aware, has not been made. It is clear enough from the' reports of Intendants, Commandants, Commissaires de Marine and others, however, that the toll of prizes does not tell the whole tale. Account must be taken of delays in delivery as well as of failure to deliver, of standstills in port departures, time lost in waiting for convoys, and the reflection
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of risks in high rates of marine insurance.44 Dislocation of trade may have counted for more, taking the war as a whole, than deprivation of a consignment or a market. Against this must be set the services of neutral shipping and of the Dutch, who were permitted in 1704 to take off French cargoes in return for certain permitted imports, the hst of which varied with changes in the military situation.45 Though Iôuis XIV ordered in 1710 that no further passports should be granted to Dutch ships, the Conseil du Roi considered that this action might have more dangerous consequences to France than to her enemies.46 The Channel Islanders very seldom disturbed neutral or Dutch ships, the condemnation of which was at best speculative. Moreover, as their activities spread further south, they increasingly resorted to the practice of ransoming the ships and cargoes which they took and the effect of this was to tax rather than destroy enemy trade ; so far at least as the master of the captured vessel was free not to agree upon a ransom and could call his own price, the amount of the ransom would be below the market value of his ship and goods at their port of destination. There are cases on record of French masters themselves requesting ransom. It is possible that some of them were willing to give bills to the full market value of their ships and cargoes as the price of personal freedom, but on the whole this is unlikely to have happened ; the master knew his cargo better than his captors did and was in a strong position to bargain to the extent that his captors had motives of their own for preferring to ransom.47 The Guernseymen especially became much addicted to ransoming. Out of the 141 vessels ransomed by British ships of war and privateers between 29 September 1707 and 29 September 1711, no less than 109 were Guernsey ransoms.48 In the whole course of the war the Guernseymen ransomed 172 vessels (i.e. almost a quarter of their captures) and received bills of ransom to a total value of about 14,054.49 We know a good deal about the ostensible motives of the captors because they had to answer for a ransom before the High Court of Admiralty, which disliked the practice.50 The most usual reason given by Channel Island captains to the Prize Commissioners who examined them on their return home was that the wind was blowing very high " and contrary to come for this island." Sometimes a northerly, NNW or WNW wind is expressly mentioned, or a westerly wind and a lee shore, with the great distance from home in some cases. Often the examinee made no bones about admitting that the capture was of small value, if not also an old or leaky ship (or perhaps with a broken mast), although, presumably lest this appeared a lame defence, the blowing of a contrary wind was nearly always thrown in for good measure. It is hard to believe that the value of a capture was not often the ruling consideration even in cases where it was not admitted. It was by no means always given as a defence in cases of ransom for trivial sums but it is significant that, if the amount of ransom is any guide, very few valuable cargoes were ransomed, wind or no wind, and of these most were taken far to the south or after an attempt had been made to bring them into the Channel Islands. It was possible by January 1711 for Captain William Ahier to consider a ship and lading which he was prepared to ransom for 1,550 livres tournois (about no sterling) as of " no great consequence," though he relied also on the conventional circumstance of a contrary wind.51 Nearly all ransoms were below this figure and we might take it as the marginal line at which it would be worth sending a capture home for condemnation were it not for the number of other circumstances, real or alleged, which determined this decision.52 Even if the other circumstances so far mentioned are ignored, the value of a capture depended to a considerable extent on the captor's ability to provide a prize crew. This was a common motive of ransom among privateering captains generally. For the Channel Islanders, in spite of their large crews, the argument had special weight because of the great number of their prizes, and I do not doubt that many captains reasoned much along the lines of Ahier's defence for the ransom of the Wife of Sable d'Ollonne : " the Master thereof proposing to Ransom, he the deponent considering the number of men they had on board, and that he could not send her for this Island, without coming allong with her, which should a been a great hindrance to him in the proceeding of his Campaine. . . ,"53 Convincing as this reasoning sounds, however, I
345
think it is possible that Ahier was also, if not conclusively, influenced by the circumstance that the Wife of Sable d'OUonne was laden with Newfoundland green cod : he could probably extract more from the expectation that this would fetch a good price in Nantes, whither it was destined, than he arid his owners could have got for it in Guernsey or England, where it would not have been easy to market green cod for home consumption or for re-export.54 As it was, Ahier procured a ransom bill for 6,600 livres (say 470). A number of returning Newfoundlanders were ransomed for similar high figures. The marketing factor had probably a good deal to do with the increase in the practice of ransom : it was very rare before the middle of 1707 and there were only 34 cases of it up to April 1708. Nor can the problem have been confined to fish. The Channel Island demand for other prize goods must have been well saturated long before the war was outwith com55 and salt, for example. But there remained the English and possibly foreign markets. My information extends only to cargoes sent direct to English ports in captured vessels. It is probably significant that the bulk of these cargoes consisted of salt, wines, and brandiesmore occasionally of sugar, honey, butter, prunes, hides, hemp, cork, rosin, and turpentine. This was doubtless no more than a matter of convenience in so far as the goods were taken near Havre or north of the Casquis ; but in fact the greater part was taken in Rochelle Roads, Audierne Bay, "the river of Vannes," off Batz, and so oneven, in the case of one salt cargo, in " Garonne road". Prizemasters indeed sometimes testified that they had been ordered to an English port. Captain Poundwell, for instance, ordered a prize crew to take the St. Anne o] Brittany, with a wine cargo, to the first convenient port in England.56 The popularity of Plymouth, Dartmouth, Falmouth and Penzance is noticeable in this connection, for these were the very ports into or near which the Islanders notoriously smuggled tobacco, wines, and brandies a little later in the century, though Southampton of course had long acted as their staple port in England.57 Customs duties and other levies, however, could not have been evaded, except by the corruption of officials, on goods in captured vessels sent direct to England, owing to the checks provided by the procedure for the custody of prizes pending sentence in the Admiralty Court. Nevertheless the marketing of prize goods was necessarily affected by the duties payable on them. The absolute prohibition laid by Parliament on the import of all French goods from 24 August 1689, had been a severe discouragement to privateeringalmost a veto on it, in effect, though the preamble to the Act of 1692, which renewed the prohibition, makes it clear that in practice not all Customs officers had obeyed their statutory duty of seeing that every kind of cargo taken on board a French vessel was " stav'd spilt burnt or destroyed". Hardly less discouraging were the heavy duties on French goods which replaced the prohibition from 28 February 1696 ; the Act which repealed these duties on bona fide prize goods shortly afterwards admits as much. The prohibition of 1689 extended to imports into the Channel Islands and it is to this legislation58 that I think we must attribute the comparative lack of interest in privateering there during the first six years of William's war, as the following figures of commissions granted in each year (ending 28 August) of that war strikingly illustrate :59 1689-90 1690-91 1691-92 1692-93
2
3 6 3 1693-94 5 1694-95 4 1695-96 27 1696-97 (i April) 5
Total
55
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By the Proclamation of i June 1702, French goods taken as prize were again exempted from the additional duties of logo,60 but a special duty of 15 per ton on prize wines and brandies was imposed by Parliament for three years from 8 March 1704. This duty lapsed on 8 March 1706, but was replaced by a still heavier duty of 25 per ton from 15 March, 1707.6I By contrast, the duties on prize goods produced in foreign colonies were lowered to the level of the duties on English colonial produce by proclamation on 17 May 1703 : the single exception made in this case was fish of foreign taking.62 But fish, wines, and brandies were precisely the cargoesapart from the occasional capture of a French West Indiamanon which the Channel Island privateers chiefly relied for their profits. I do not think it is any accident, therefore, that they sent very few prize vessels with wines and Brandies to an English port after February 1707, at any rate directly, or that Newfoundland cargoes came to be ransomed for high sums (though fish oil was not subjected to discriminatory duties). This is not to say that wines and brandies may not have been smuggled into England after that date and before it. Godolphin certainly suspected the wines63on board four English vessels which cleared for Rotterdam from Guernsey in I703What really exercised the Treasury at this time was a suspected trade between the Islands and France. Although the Act of 1704 referred to the need for strengthening the trade with Portugal and of raising revenue for the conduct of the war as the occasion of the special duties on prize wines, the Treasury papers make it clear that Godolphin had his eye as early as February 1703 on the possibility that the landing of large quantities of salt and other prize goods from the Channel Islands at English ports might be used to colour a collusive trade with France. Nothing came of his proposal that prize vessels taken and condemned in the Islands " should be brought to England with their cargoes entire as being a better markett for the sale of them and would be a meanes to prevent such collusive Importations from these Islands as were apprehended to have been practised during the last war "6<t ; but on 8 December, 1703, the Admiralty Judge was ordered to notify the Customs Commissioners when any process commenced in the High Court for the adjudication of prizes brought into Jersey and Guernsey.65 These fears were not laid aside when the duties on prize wines were enacted in 1704 and 1707. Following complaints of fraud by the Customs Commissioners, the Privy Council on 20 May 1708 authorized the Treasury to instruct the Customs officers in Guernsey to keep account of all prize cargoes brought in there and forbade the export of any prize cargo until a copy of the sentence of condemnation had been delivered to the Register of Certificates in the Island" the better to prevent French goods being Exported from the said Island to Great Britain under the Colour of Prize goods." No foreign goods or merchandize might be shipped, and no goods of any origin landed in the Island, unless they had first been entered with the Register and Comptroller, to threaten or obstruct whom was to be a penal offence as in England. The Lord High Treasurer was ordered on the same day to direct the Customs Commissioners to issue more or less identical instructions to their officers in Jersey. The Jersey Order omitted two passages in the Guernsey Order, however, seemingly because it had been made a penal offence already, by Order in Council of 20 February 1689, to hinder or abuse the Register of Certificates in that island in the discharge of his duties, while those duties themselves had been laid down by the Order of 17 December 1679 which first substituted a Customs employee for the Bailiff and three Jurats as the certificating authority in Jersey. A more significant omission is the power of the Register to administer oaths to the masters of ships in Jersey, where the States appear to have succeeded in reserving this power to the magistrates at the Revolution. In Jersey at least, except as regards the certification of prize goods and one or two details of clearings procedure in general, the Order of 1708 added little to the Register's powers, which had been augmented already in 1685, 1689, and 1693 as regards visit and search and the protection of his person. Though the evidence for Guernsey is less accessible, it is unlikely that the powers of the Register there had been much less considerable, in theory : an Order of li April, 1700, had prescribed for both Islands the form of
347
oath to be taken on landing a cargo and the manner of discharging the bond to be given by masters for foreign goods exported to England. It is really the implied necessity for a restatement of the provisions of earlier Orders, with new penalties and a new prize clause attached, that gives the Order of 20 May 1708 its significance. The Treasury was asserting its authority in 1708, as it had many times done before, in the reigns of James II and of William and Mary,but this time with an extension of its control over prize goods. That control was further extended by an Order in Council of 26 June 1708, which required the locking up of prize goods in Customs warehouses until they were appraised and sold ; but this was merely in accordance with the procedure to be followed everywhere in accordance with the Cruisers and Convoys Act of that year.66 It is difficult to say how well founded was the Treasury's suspicion, shared though it was by business circles in London.67 The Treasury papers suggest an obsession with fraud based a fortiori on the historical closeness of trading links between the Islands and France and on the obstructions and abuse offered to the Customs officers in the Islands.68 The vigorous action of the States of Jersey in refusing to register the Orders of 1708 may well have confirmed the suspicion. The privateering interest in Jersey certainly made the most of the omission to name the Islands in the Prize Act of 1708 when resisting its warehouse provisions and the petition of the Jersey States to the Privy Council, authorized by an Acte of 29 September 1708, complained that the new measures would ruin the Island's small trade and lead to a great emigration, adding somewhat innocently that alternatively " they must be forced constantly to gratify the Officers whome the said Commissioners shall employ there with sums of money".6' Perhaps it was significant that the petition also prophesied the discontinuance of privateering unless the Orders were withdrawn. After deputies from both islands had been heard in person by the Council, important concessions were made in August and December, 1709, promising a minimum of supervision of the trade with France after the war and a minimum Customs establishment ; but as regards the movement of prize goods the only point yielded was the provision in the Prize Act requiring the deposit of such goods in official warehouses.70 In thus contesting the introduction of somewhat more precise Customs procedures the Islands may have cherished not least the chance of evading the duties on prize goods sent to England. I have no proof that they succeeded in this, but the provocation to run prize wines at least was a strong one, and it would seem strange also that the Islands appear to have made no specific protest against the wine and brandy duties themselves if they had no means of evading them. On the other hand their resistance to the Customs does not necessarily argue a correspondence with France and the habit of passing off merchandize gained thereby as prize. The encroachments of the Customs had been resisted, at least in Jersey, at a time when the French trade went on unimpeded. Moreover the bona fide privateers had a strong vested interest against such trade in war time, for it carried the obvious risk of disclosing their own movements to the enemy.71 If it is not unlikely that there was some such correspondence and that some of it took the form of collusive captures at seathe surrender of the Islands' neutrality was, after all, recent enough for not all its implications to prove acceptable,the evidence is nevertheless slight and conflicting. When the French authorities suggested measures to prevent the carriage of grain from Normandy to the Channel Islands in 1709, the intendant at Caen stated that he had no proof that this was being carried on. In the same month, however, a minister of Alderney gave evidence of correspondence with the enemy among his parishioners. An Acte of the States early in 1710 forbade the " corsaires trangers " to take in bread and meat at Jersey, but only because there was then an acute meat shortage in the island and high prices had caused grievances among the garrison. The Bailiff of Jersey represented to the Privy Council in 1711 that Joshua Pipn and four more of the Jurats refused, among other offences, to permit witnesses to be sworn for the Crown touching prohibited goods imported into Jersey from France.72 The intendant at Poitiers asserted in 1710 that the seamen of Les Sables d'Olonne
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assisted the corsairs, but it was claimed that they did so under duress. Similar charges were made against the inhabitants of Royan and Lorient, where there were two convictions ; but the aid so given was said to be in the form of food and intelligence.73 It is hardly a suspicious circumstance in itself that the privateers often worked close inshore since their concentration on coastal trade obliged them to do so, though indeed we may wonder whether losses to the enemy sufficiently account for the fact that half the Jersey privateers certainly took no orthodox prizes. One of the most prominent of Jersey's owners, moreover, had a business correspondent (a namesake if not a relative) in St. Malo. The prisoner of war transports may have offered a few opportunities for trading deals. Some contact with French shipowners, merchants, or brokers was also implicit in the honouring of ransom bills and the return of hostages for ransom.74 Nevertheless the evidence of the Prize Papers themselves, and still more that of the Marine documents, amounts to a massive denial that collusive capture was a common occurrence. If it occurred on any considerable scale it was very well concealed. Proof 7S of it involved forfeiture of bail and privateer as well as prize from 20 March 1705. Something needs to be said at this point about the nature of the privateering interest in the Islands. Were the privateers wholly financed by the Islanders themselves ? The Letter of Marque Declarations, which at this period give the names of probably most of the owners, rarely mention any who are not described as of Guernsey or Jersey. They tell us that Jonathan Randall of Weymouth, John Pye of Falmouth, Daniel Hilgrove of Southampton and Daniel Coleman of London had an interest in one privateer each, jointly with Channel Island owners.76 Randall joined with Sir Charles Carteret and Lewis Mordaunt in setting forth the Maggott shallop of Jersey one of the only two privateers in which the higher Crown authorities in either Island had a share in this war. But the only privateer in which English capital seems to have been important was the Bucephalus, Captain Lee, whose owners were Claude Jemmineau (a prominent Venice merchant), Samuel Johnson, John Sale, William Dobre and John Lambert, all " of London," and Moses Corbet of Jersey.77 The importance of this description lies in the inclusion of William Dobre as a London merchant. In the many other Declarations where his name appears he is described as " of Guernsey " and this leads me to doubt how accurate that description may be in other cases, especially as John Dobre, who in 1703 was acting as agent for several Guernsey privateers in London, is also so described. But neither description would be incorrect in the case of Channel Islanders who had business in both places.78 Further, only two owners of Island privateers, John Lee and Thomas Robinson, can be regarded as possibly identical with the owners of English privateers. It is true that many English names do appear among the owners of Guernsey privateers, especially from 1708 onwards, but there were many bearers of English, Welsh, and Jewish names living in the Islands at that time. What external evidence there is goes to support the reliability of the Letter of Marque Declarations as a guide to owners (and, with a few exceptions, to the ships' officers also). If their authority is accepted, we must conclude that the role of English capital in Channel Island privateering of this period was slight. With the exceptions mentioned above, all the owners whose names are given in the Declarations are said to be of Guernsey or Jersey, and frequently they are described as merchants. It is common to find six or more owners in the case of a Guernsey privateer, and seldom as few as three before 1708. In that year an important change came over the character of Guernsey ownership. In 1708 and afterwards a privateer was more often in the hands of only two or three owners : it very often happened also that those owners invested in only a single privateer, whereas up to that time not only were large syndicates the normal thing but most of their members had an interestusually some fraction of 32in a number of privateers. Up to the end of 1707 the names of only 79 owners appear in 85 Guernsey Declarations ; for the 99 commissions granted from 1708 to 1712, on the other hand, there were no
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less than 176 owners, of whom the names of 144 appear for the first time. These figures by themselves would seem to argue an increase in the size of privateering syndicates were it not for the second striking fact that as many as 118 of these 144 new ownersalmost 82%had an interest in one privateer only, whereas half the earlier owners, including most of the captains, had shares in two or more privateers 24 of them (i.e. just over 30%) in six or more privateers. Moreover, some of the earlier owners who continued to invest after 1707there were 32 of them in all now invested in fewer privateers. It looks, therefore, as if owners generally preferred, from 1708 onwards, to concentrate their resources in a smaller number of privateers. Nor is this simply an inference from the figures quoted. If we look at the records of the seven Guernsey owners who had an interest in 16 or more privateers, we find that John De Saumarez and Lawrence Martin invested in 14 and 18 different privateers respectively before 1708 but in 8 and 5 only from 1708 to 1712 ; Thomas Le Marchant in 16 before 1708 and in 9 from 1708 to 1711 ; Michael Falla in n before 1708 and in 5 from 1708 to 1710 ; Elisha Dobre, William Dobre and Peter Stephen in 19, 19 and 15 respectively before 1708 and 6, 6 and 2 in 1708-9." And yet there was no diminution in the number of commissions granted. Nevertheless it would be rash to read too much into these contrasts, for the periods in question are not strictly comparable in length and several of the smaller owners did not follow this tendency ; nor is it possible to state the size of the various holdings. The extraordinary multiplication of new names in the lists of Guernsey owners during the second and shorter part of the war calls for some explanation. The established success of the privateers might count for a good deal but it can hardly be a coincidence that this change in the character of Guernsey ownership began in 1708the year when, as from 26 March, Parliament abolished the Lord High Admiral's tenth share in the appraised value of prizes and gave the sole property and interest in them, saving only the Customs and other duties payable, to the captors.80 That year saw a sharp rise in the number of commissions30 in all, as against io for 1707 and an average of 14 over the years 1702-1707.8I But neither the Prize Act of 1708 nor the established success of Guernsey privateering explain in any obvious way why it so seldom happened that the new owners invested in more than one privateer. It cannot have been an unlucky choice of privateer or captain, normally, that discouraged them from a second venture. They, or the armators on their behalf,82 employed many of the most powerfully armed ships and successful captains. Indeed most of the bigger privateers were commissioned in the later years of the war. It is this fact, possibly, together with the suggested tendency towards the concentration of ownership, which explains why some at least of the later owners ventured in no more than one privateer. Elisha Williams and Thomas De Saumarez were in a position in 1710 and again in 1711 to own between them one of the most powerful of all Guernsey privateers, but the Guernsey Frigate was their only venture.83 On the other hand, in point of the number of prizes, 1708 and the years to follow were noticeably better than the earlier years for Guernsey, as may be calculated from the lists of prizes submitted by the Admiralty Court Register to the Customs Commissioners,84 and perhaps this growth in the number of Guernsey prizes, though it tells us nothing about their value, supplies a second clue to the solution of our problem. Was Guernsey privateering coming to appear as less of a gamble ? If so, may not an amateur type of investor have been encouraged ? And would the interest of the amateur newcomer normally have survived more than a cruise or two ? The profits of a single cruise, if it showed any profits at all, can seldom have been high and only the investor like William Dobre who could afford shares in a number of privateers probably made much by them. I think it is possible therefore that the new investor was usually as willing to sell out as he had been to try his luck, particularly as he had often to wait some months after the end of a voyage before he could hope to see a return on his money. The process of getting a prize condemned might take anything up to a year and frequently up to six months, though about two-thirds of the prizes were condemned within three months.85 Besides this delay it was common for litigation to take place in the Royal Court between the owners of different privateers.86 Conclusively to establish the nature of this new class of
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investors would require an extensive knowledge of Guernsey history to which I make no claim, but there is no doubt of the influx of many new names into the business, nor of its accompaniment by a decline in the interest of the earlier investing class as a whole. Far fewer Guernsey captains, in particular, invested after 1708. There was no such marked change in the character of privateering ownership in Jersey at any time during the war, perhaps because Jersey privateers were fewer, smaller, and less successful. There were only 46 owners in all and fully a third of them were captains of privateers as well. The names of Captains Edward Browne, James Lempriere, John Browne, and Edward Dumaresq appear more often in the Letter of Marque Declarations, in that order, than those of any other Jersey owners except Francis Drake, whose name occurs 21 times. The majority of owners, early and late in the war, were connected with only one or two privateers. Half a dozen Jersey owners held occasional shares in what were predominantly Guernsey privateers.87 Between n June 1702 and 16 August 1712 the High Court of Admiralty granted 1578 commissions or letters of marque. Many of these, perhaps the majority, were issued to the commanders of armed merchantmen and were not strictly privateering commissions at all. All the more striking therefore is the grant of no less than 251 commissions to Channel Island captains.88 This total is made up of 175 commissions to captains of Guernsey-owned privateers ; 65 to captains of Jerseyowned privateers ; and two to captains of the only privateers in this war to be set forth by Guernsey and Jersey owners combined.8' The preponderance of Guernsey, emphatic at all stages of the war, appears year by year as follows : Total of Commissions granted, Guernsey Jersey Guernsey and Jersey
1702
1703 1704 1705 1706 1707

1708
1710
14
19 10 17
2 I
1709 1711
1712
12 19 26 19 20 21 8
6 8 6 18 6 7 6 i
65
i i
2
175
The warning needs at once to be given, however, that these figures are not an accurate indication of the numbers either of privateers or of captains. A commission was granted to a captain to set forth a specific ship with specific owners. Consequently it was necessary for a captain to take out a new commission, not indeed for each voyage, but for each ship he commanded. Any important change in the ownership of a ship, moreover, might necessitate a new commission, since bonds had to be given by or on behalf of the owners for the good behaviour of the captain, who might or might not be an owner and was seldom more than a part-owner. To some extent therefore the number of commissions granted reflects changes in ownership and the number of new ships (captured, built, bought, or merely adapted to privateering) which were put into service. Thus, Guernsey's 175' commissions were granted to not more than 88 captains, 43 of whom commanded more than one privateer ; while there were not more than 38 Jersey captains.00 Changes in ownership occurred more frequently in Guernsev
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It is less easy to compute the number of privateers with exactness, owing to the use of the same name by different ships and the difficulty of distinguishing ships with any certainty by reference either to their tonnage or to changes in their owners' names (which may argue no more than a sale, as can often be shown). There are 92 different names for Guernsey privateers alone in the Declarations.91 But the actual number of ships involved is certainly higher than this. We can be fairly sure, for instance, that the Conqueror whose tonnage is given as 100 on 19 August 1709 is the same ship as the Conqueror of 90 tons (with 12 instead of 14 guns but with the same number of crew) for which a commission was granted on 18 April 1710, and the same as the Vainqueur of 100 tons, 12 guns and the same number of crew commissioned in October 1707, William Chaillon going captain on each occasion, though the list of owners differs with each commission ; but the Vainqueur of 30 tons and 6 guns which William Tramalier was commissioned to command in January 1711 must have been a different ship altogether. One feels little confidence in identifying the Chasse of 200 tons and 20 guns, commissioned in May 1711, either with the Chasse of 80 tons and 16 guns commissioned three months later with a different captain and different owners (though the size of crew is exactly the same), or even with the Chasse of 150 tons and 20 guns which was commissioned in July 1712.92 Similar difficulties are raised by other privateers having the names of famous men or desirable qualities.93 Where variation occurs on all three items of strength, and especially where it is combined with a long interval between different Declarations, it is probably reasonable to assume that different ships are meant. On the other hand it is impossible to be sure that a ship was never renamed, as certainly happened in at least one case.94 Was the Sailor's Prosperity simply a refinement on the Prosperity, as the tonnage and other figures as well as the interval between the two commissions suggest ? And was the Prosperity, in turn, the same as the Prosperous, as again the figures suggest ? Something like translator's licence may have occurred when the Declarations were made. Taking all the known circumstances into account, the best I can do with, these tedious and treacherous calculations is to place the number of Guernsey privateers, conservatively perhaps, at 115 and the Jerseymen at 51 : a total of 166. Three or four privateers seem to have exchanged islands at different times, apart from the two which were financed by both. These figures are a considerable increase on those for the earlier war, when there were not inore than 46 privateersthat is to say, 38 of Guernsey and 8 of Jersey,and unless there were many rechristenings95 it does not appear that more than a dozen of the latter (at most) saw service in the following war. What is of more significance, however, is that twelve Guernsey and three Jersey captains served as such in both wars. A few others who commanded privateers in the War of the Spanish Succession had served as lieutenants, masters, gunners, or boatswains on board privateers in the previous war.96 Almost all the outstandingly successful captains in the early years of the second war had seen service in the first, and doubtless it was the existence of a large nucleus of seasoned privateersmen which made possible the striking rapidity with which Guernsey, though not Jersey, took to privateering in 1702. The stated tonnage of the Queen Anne privateers varies between 6 and 200, but there were only 9 Guernsey privateers of 100 tons or over, and only 27 of over 50 but less than 100 tons. On the other hand, 50 Guernsey privateers were of 20 tons or less, many of them 15 tons or less. Jersey privateers were small on the whole. The bigger privateers as a rule mounted between 12 and 20 guns (excluding patereros) but the 2oo-ton Marquis d'Or carried 24 and so did the Guernsey Frigate on the first occasion when she was commissioned.97 Two, three, or four guns was the normal armament for a privateer of 30 tons or less, with another four guns for every additional 30 tons. But there was no fixed proportion. The 3O-ton Hopewell Galley, Fidelity, and Flying Horse all carried 6 guns and so did the 20-ton Industry, while the 30-ton Diligence carried as many as 12 guns and the 35-ton Union i6.98 On the whole, Channel Island privateers were heavily gunned for their size. As will be seen, however, the Island privateering at this time did not depend on the use of. guns for the greater part of its successes. It was rare for more than twenty rounds of
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great shot to be carried and some of this would be needed for bringing a chase to bear up." There were several Jersey privateers which carried no guns whatever. More reliance seems to have been placed on small arms and cutlasses, with both of which most members of the crew were as a rule provided.100 Channel Island privateers carried crews which were very large in proportion to their size and large in comparison with most English privateers. Crews of 30 to 60 were the rule but higher figures were not uncommon. The biggest privateers carried as many as 130 or 140, the Guernsey Frigate on one occasion as many as 160 a figure very seldom equalled by any English privateer of this period. It was exceptional for even the smallest privateers to carry fewer than 25 seamen : even the 6-ton Swallow had a crew of 20 (the lowest figure for any Guernsey privateer in the war). It is permissible to see the typical Guernsey privateer of this period as a sloop or galley of between 30 and 50 tons burthen, mounting 4 to 8 guns and carrying a crew of 30 to 60 men. The provisioning of many privateers with crews of this size constitutes a problem at first sight. Nominally, according to the Declarations, provisioning was usually for a period of two or three months, sometimes for 6 weeks only but more often for 6 months. The Pembroke Galley was commissioned for 9 months in July 1702 and the Vainqueur for 8 months in October 1707 and again in December 1708, but these are exceptional cases. But it was not, of course, necessary to provision a whole crew for so long as this, since a number of them were detached to man prizes and prizes were frequently left to make their own way to Guernsey before a campaign was concluded. Such was the number of the prizes, indeed, that it is difficult to resist the conclusion that here is to be found the main explanation of the relatively large size of the Channel Island crews. A series of captures early in the cruise must have tended to bring it to a conclusion unless subsequent prizes were ransomed. The supply of provisions was sometimes supplemented en course however. Having on account of contrary winds to spend a week-end under the Ile Verte and "wanting provisions," Captain Henry Knap took the crew of the Greyhound Sloop and -his prisoners ashore to get fish at low water.101 Captain Ste. Croix of Jersey once took two chests of medicine and some barrels of pickled pilchards off a ransomed prize.102 Captain Bushell, another Jersey man, allowed a suspicious Irish merchantman to go free the first time he met her on the master making him a present of five barrels of butter and " a hamper of Canary". The Prosperity of Waterford, on a single voyage in 1711, was apparently robbed of ten barrels of beef and some butter by one Guernsey man and had some more butter taken, though paid for, by another.103 On at least one occasion captured wine was drunk during the campaign104 and it is hard to believe that this did not happen oftener, or that captured provisions were not frequently consumed. It was the opinion of Clairambault, Commissaire de Marine at orient, that the Island corsairs could not carry provisions enough for three weeks sail without taking prizes. Further, both he and Chamilly, Commandant in Aunis and Saintonge, believed that they had friends at Royan and elsewhere who supplied them with food and intelligence.105 In the aggregate the demand for crews must have strained the Islands' resources in native seamen. The fourteen Guernsey privateers commissioned between n June and 20 July 1702within an interval, that is to say, short enough to allow the presumption that they were all at sea simultaneouslymustered crews totalling 505. The unusually long gap of five months between the issue of the last of these commissions and the next, issued in January 1703, perhaps argues some exhaustion of the supply of available seamen.106 A firmer conclusion on this score would be facilitated if information were forthcoming on the number of Guernseymen normally employed during peace in merchantmen, or as fishermen, and the extent to which their activities were carried on during the war.107 If the instructions to privateers of i June 1702 were observed, one third of the crews ought to have been landmen. In the Declarations of 1692, when the numbers of each are stated, the landmen occasionally outnumber the seamen more than two to one. Time alone would obviously diminish the force of this distinction in the course of a long war and it is
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hard to imagine any Channel Islander whose ignorance of sea ways could have been absolute, but it is likely that the privateering crews always contained a number of new or at least inexperienced seamen. In this connection it would be helpful to have information about fluctuations in industrial and agricultural employment in the Islands. If available, it might throw light on Jersey's relative lack of interest in privateering. Indeed the general point needs to be made that the story of any group of privateers should be examined, if possible, in the light of the economic situation and interests of the port or island which produced it. It has long been known that use was made of non-native seamen. Jonathan Duncan mentions an Order of the Royal Court of Guernsey directing the prvot and his deputy and the constables of parishes to seize all sailors who were not actually inhabitants of the island and empowering them to break open the doors of all houses suspected of harbouring such sailors. Duncan did not cite the source of this information but must have been referring to the Order of 7 March 1706, preserved in the Greife.108 In fact he somewhat understates the extent of the powers so conferred to enforce co-operation, for the officers concerned were authorised to arrest anyone who resisted them in their search. The Court had already in the strongest terms forbidden all privateering captains and masters of Guernsey vessels to embark, lodge or conceal seamen who were not " tablis et habitus en ces Isles," following the communication of Her Majesty's pleasure to the Governors that they should be sent to England. The further step taken on 7 March recognised the complete absence of response to the Lieutenant-Governor's Proclamation calling on all such seamen to give themselves up to the officer of the guard.109 Both Orders seem to imply the futility, on the whole, of the measures taken earlier by the Lieutenant-Governors to arrest deserters from the Fleet,110 and it is at least doubtful whether the collaboration of the Royal Court, even if it was sincere, was much more effective.111 On 5 June 1707, the Court took note of a Proclamation enjoining the assistance of the Bailiff, Jurats and others in preventing the molestation of Admiralty agents in the performance of their duties,112 and on 21 February 1709 registered an order by the Commander-in-Chief forbidding the hire of any English prisoners returning from France.113 If one is to argue from the silence of the records, the subsequent conduct of Guernseymen in these matters was exemplary but such a view would be naive in the light of what is known about the Islanders' resistance to the encroachments of the British Customs, the ramifications of the privateering interest,114 and the rough practices of some of the captains. Even if the word of a Governor that the Guernseymen of this period were " a contentious wrangling people " is not wholly to be trusted, there is other evidence to support the wisdom of Hatton's hope that Secretary Nottingham would admonish a newly appointed Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Edmund Andros, to behave so temperately " that the ill party in the island, who are his bitter enemies, may have no cause to complain".115 The attractions of privateering for the ordinary seaman in the Channel Islands ought not, however, to be taken for granted. By October 1703 at any rate, a sufficient number of privateers had been lost to the enemy for seamen to be backward in serving with them in the absence of an efficient system for exchanging prisoners, according to Governor Hatton, who then informed Nottingham that he had received " great complaints of what our privateers of Guernsey suffer by delay in exchanging prisoners," which he attributed to the lack of resident agents of the Commissioners for the Exchange of Prisoners.116 Several months earlier Nottingham had already informed the Commissioners that the French prisoners of war in Jersey and Guernsey were to be exchanged, man for man and quality for quality, for Channel Island prisoners in France ; but as late as 20 November Hatton was forwarding an address from the Bailiff and Jurats of Guernsey complaining that the French would not return Guernsey prisoners unless they could recover their own men in Guernsey.117 There was probably some exaggeration in this, for the Commissioners' records show that Captain Henry Chubb, later to be one of the most successful privateering commanders, had escorted a party of 210 French prisoners from Guernsey to St. Malo in July."8 The address was in fact provoked by the withdrawal of two companies of the military, leaving only two for the garrison, at a time when there was a large number
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of French prisoners in the island said to be " in despair at learning they cannot be exchanged". " By want of a garrison," say the Jurats, " we are exposed to visible danger. The French prisoners are just outside our town, which has no defence, and we in fear that they will break prison. They are desperate, and may risk anything if not set free. We have the enemy, so to speak, at our doors, and the bravest of our men are away on privateers cruising against the enemy and may at any time bring in more prisoners, which will expose us to further danger and accidents in the harbour which is crowded with vessels, and generally in the island." It is requested that the garrison be reinforced and the prisoners exchanged or sent to England.w But even if the allegation of French discrimination against Guernsey prisoners was unfounded, being merely the story brought back by escaped prisoners, belief in its truth must have hindered the recruitment of privateering crews. In any case the difficulties seem soon afterwards to have been smoothed out, apparently through the ingenuity of Peter Martin.120 Though the Commissioners informed the French authorities that they had as yet no power to treat of a general exchange of all prisoners on both sides such as they had possessed in the last war, they added that Captain Chubb had orders to fetch French prisoners from Guernsey to St. Malo as soon as the French list was received from thence.121 In February 1704 the Commissioners were instructed not only to exchange French prisoners in the Channel Islands for English prisoners at St. Malo but to give preference to the Channel Islanders among these latter. ' 2Z This stipulation might suggest that the government in London set a certain value on the Island privateering, or at least that Sir Charles Hedges did so,123 since the Commissioners' agents were directed as a general rule to give priority to old, sick, or wounded prisoners, second place to those taken on board the ships of the navy, and third to those who had been longest in prison.I2* But the Commissioners, whose difficult task has received too little attention from historians, could do no more than negotiate with the French authorities in accordance with the written agreement between them : they could ask for the return of specificprisoners but in the last resort the enemy made up the lists of those who were to be released. Information is lacking alike on the number of Channel Islanders who were taken prisoner and on those who obtained release.'25 Here and there among the Prize Papers one learns that a Captain or privateer had been taken by the enemy. John Gruchy, William Hawkins, Thomas Le Mesurier, Abraham Durant, John Pipn, John and William Brock, and Peter Le Roux were all captured at least once. John Brock was again in command of a privateer within less than a year after he had been taken. Gruchy's absence from the sea appears, on the other hand, to have lasted almost four years, though he was not necessarily a prisoner for so long. One would like to assume that the privateers which took no prizes were all captured before they could do sothere were 19 such cases for Guernsey and 19 for Jersey,but this would be altogether too hazardous a guess.126 Whether or not the fear of capture impeded the manning of crews at any time,127 there is reason to doubt whether the legendary lure of privateering altogether applied to Channel Island seamen in the mass. That lure was based on shares in prizes and there is good evidence to show that the crews of Channel Island privateers in this period were not by any means invariably entitled to shares in prizes. Use was sometimes made of this fact in the examination of witnesses, especially where the claim to a prize was disputed by two or more privateers, presumably because a seaman's evidence was then regarded as disinterested. Thus the surgeon and three sailors of the Revenge Sloop, Captain Peter Thoumes, deposed that they had " no pretensions to prizes" but received monthly pay and plunderage only."128 The carpenter and a sailor of the Marlborough Galley, Captain Daniel Naftel, testified that they were hired by the month at 4 livres and had no share in prizes.129 The Interrogatories used in another case suggested that, if hired by the month, a sailor in the Vainqueur, Captain Durant, had no shares in prizes or any other recompense. On the other hand, John Dorey, a gunsmith on the Vainqueur, said that he received half the monthly pay and half a share, which he had sold to " a particular man of the
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island," and Peter Aniodin, a sailor on the same privateer, that he received five shares.'30 There seems, therefore, to have been some variation in practice between ordinary sailors on the same privateer. Nor must it be supposed that the pitiful wage paid to the carpenter and the sailor of the Marlborough Galley was necessarily typical. The claims for arrears of wages which appear in the Amiraute records of the Royal Court suggest, rather, a range between 14 and 24 livres a month for ordinary seamen.131 Officers did a little better than that, but not much. The surgeon on one of Captain Robinson's privateers contracted for 35 livres a month.132 The prizemaster on the Sailor's Prosperity, Captain Roche, received six shares in prizes besides a monthly wage of 25 livres and had previously, on other privateers, received four shares and a wage of 22 livres. The prizemaster on the Guernsey Frigate, Captain Robinson, which disputed the claims of the Sailor's Prosperity to two prizes, received eight shares and a monthly wage of 36 livres. Both he and the gunner of the Guernsey Frigate admitted, however, that they had sold their shares to Elisha Dobre and Peter Carey, owner and armator of their ship.133 In cases where the owners did agree to allow shares, the temptation to part with them for cash down must have been strong, for the majority of prizes were of little value and privateering crews were large ; owners had doubtless the same strong motive for increasing their own number of shares. The evidence of members of the company of the Guernsey Frigate is particularly impressive on this score since Robinson was one of the most successful captains. Nor is it likely that owners and armatore were alone in the market for the purchase of sailors' shares ; at least I have found no trace among the lists of owners in the Letter of Marque Declarations of the names of Peter Parker, who had acquired shares from sailors of the Prince Euaene Galley, Captain Chubb, or of John Le Ray, who had bought 22 shares from several sailors of the Union Sloop, Captain William Hawkins, or of Jean Grut who had bought 8 shares from Peter Olivier.134 Doubtless shares were sometimes resold by those who dealt in this business.135 The growth of a class of ticket-holders " who traded on the seamen's need for ready money at a heavy price " was certainly known in England.136 Even when officers and seamen retained their shares, it was sometimes necessary to obtain a sentence of the Royal Court for payment of the provenu. Thus the captain and crew of the James and Turner Galley sued their armator, John Turner,, for their part and portion of a ransom and prizes on 9 December 1710.137 Having regard to the number of privateers, seamen, and shares involved, however, these suits, like claims for arrears of wages and payments of compensation for death or injury, were surprisingly rare. It is reasonable to suppose that they furnish a very fair indication of the extent of grievances of this kind, since access to the Court by humble people for quite trivial sums cannot have been either difficult or expensive. Nor did the Court give them an unsympathetic hearing. It seems not to have been prejudiced in favour of the owners and armatore.138 On some matters it entertained witnesses to prove " la Coutume usite en tel cas entre les Capres." Thus it was apparently good privateering custom to continue a sick sailor's wages if he had to be put ashore13' and to pay compensation for wounds received on board a privateer at the rate of 5 livres a week. For death on active service 5 or 6 livres a week were payable to a widow, though the alternative of a payment of 16 pistoles (160 livres) outright might be Written into the contract of service. 14 An interesting example of another kind was the successful claim of the wife of Thomas Le Mesurier for payment of 17 shares of prizes and ransoms made by his privateer while he was a prisoner in France.141 On the whole, therefore, the evidence warrants the conclusion that the seamen of the Guernsey privateers at any rate were fairly well protected by the custom of the sea and the system of justice in their island.142 If they were not always entitled to shares in prizes the reason in some cases was that they had parted with them for ready money. Their wages were poor in relation to the risks they underwent and even to the low standard of life then prevailing in the Islands; but the mere fact of this low standard at homeassociated possibly with unemployment, and fami-
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liarity very often with the common hazards of the sea, doubtless induced in them a willingness to gamble on the hope of shares even in small prizes, or of a little pillage and drink, and some, though not a complete, indifference to danger. I am not prepared to generalise about the love of adventure, which can be no more than another name for the threat of starvation. What were the risks ? The prizes certainly included a small number of French and Flemish privateers143usually, in effect, armed merchantmen, some of them as heavily gunned as privateersbut Tupper's assumption that the Channel Island prizes " were, doubtless, chiefly small French coasters " is fully borne out by the Prize Papers in the Public Record Office.144 The great majority of captures were made without resistance or after only a perfunctory resistance ; it was unusual for an engagement to last as much as half an hour (or a couple of broadsides) and longer engagements than that were rare, though the pursuit itself might have taken hours. Among the more notable engagements one remarks the two-hour duel near Port Louis on 17 March 1711 between the Guernsey Frigate, 24 guns, and L'Aimable Marie de St. Malo, 20 guns, which " suffered very much in the boarding." The Diane de Calais, 6 guns, resisted the Three Eagles of Jersey, 6 guns, Captain William Bushell, for three hours. The Good Fortune of Ostend, 6 guns, gave a very good account of herself in a running fight with the William Galley, Captain William Brock, 14 guns, off the Lizard. Perhaps the most hardly fought action in which a Channel Island privateer was engaged in this war was fought between the Duke of Bavaria, 14 guns, and the Hopewell Galley, Captain Hubert, 2 guns, which lasted for two hours of " great fire," at the end of which the Duke was able to sheer off but broke her topmast.145 Frequently a few musket shots sufficed to bring a chase to strike and it not infrequently happened that the crews of prizes taken close inshore or in estuaries deserted before the capture was made. Captured vessels were often manned by half a dozen men, or less, and a boya good many French boys became prisoners in Guernsey. Jersey, though not Jersey privateers, obtained several prizes which had been driven there by stress of weather.146 Whenever possible, the Channel Island privateers preferred to use guile. They understood the importance in attack of surprise, the tactical possibilities of hard weather, of night and a morning mist in summer, the concealment afforded by the islands which lie off the coasts of Brittany, Poitou, Aunis, and Saintonge and which they knew, or came to know, as intimately as the French themselves. Brhat, the Sept lies, the Ile Verte in Morlaix bay and Batz, besides the Sept lies and the Glnans, were all favourite lairs, supplying sometimes cover for an ambush, sometimes shelter in bad weather. Chteaurenault stated in 1704 that the Jersey and Guernsey corsairs had constructed a jetty between two of the Sept lies : " ils y ont un beau mole ou ils sont en suret de tout temps et d'o voyant les bastimens passer, ils courent a eux sans rien craindre, leur retraite leurs estant sure."'47 Peter Le Cocq, captain of the Hanover Sloop, described his capture of the Trmpense de St. Malo, a Newfoundlander homeward bound with fish and train oil, on November 4 1702 as follows : at ten o'clock in the morning, spying a sail 4 leagues WNW, the deponent " made all the sayle he could for to gett under the Seaven Islands for to put himself out of her sight, that the vessel in sight might come nearer to him, and soone after saw another saile makeing the same course as the first, and the first saile being come nearer the Seaven Islands the said deponent sailed immediately after her, and being up to her fired five muskets for to make her strick which she did."148 When Captain Joseph Brock, then commanding the Runner Galley of London, gave up a chase off the Sept lies, four small Guernsey privateers came out of the islands and fought an hour with her.14' Captains Vallet, HenryKnap, and Thomas Le Mesurier cut the Vigilant and other vessels out of the tail of a convoy by hiding on the other side of the Ile Verte while the convoy went by.150 A modified version of this device was demonstrated by Captain Poundwell on 16 January 1704, when with 2 guns and 22 men in the Daniel Sloop he met a strongly
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escorted French Heet of 200 sail standing along shore towards St. Malo but forced by southerly winds to put into Batz : Poundwell being near the shore " gott amongst them undiscovered by the Convoys and in the dark boarded and took four small vessels loaden with wine and salt and left the said fleet at the Isle of Bass designed for St. Malo etc. eastward."15' No doubt the speech of Channel Island captains assisted their disguise if they were within hail ; Gruchy also took advantage of the Dutch traffic with France to fly a Dutch ensign.152 Some of the crew of the Prince Eugene Galley, Captain William Hawkins, displayed their cunning in very different circumstances when, having been taken by the Chasseur de St. Malo, they hid themselves aboard the prize and made themselves masters of her as soon as it was safe to revolt.'53 The privateers often attacked in twos and threes, especially when it was a case of cutting prizes out of a convoy or in harbour. Sometimes there was an agreement at the outset of a cruise to keep company together. William Thompson, captain of the Severn Galley of Bristol, explained just such a pact with Captain William Brock of the Guernsey Galley in 1703 as if it were customary : " for what prizes they should happen to take during that Consortship they should be each concerned in ; and further the Agreement was, that in coming up with any ship or ships, the ship that first came up with such ships should make the best of her way in pursuit to come up with the headmost and to take what more he could and leave the prize or prizes he came up with to the other Privateer in pursuit to board such ship or ships as they should meet with."154 The cumulative impression created by the Prize Papers, however, is that agreements of this kind were much less common than agreements to join forces for a short period, perhaps 24 hours, for an attack on a given objective.155 This second type of agreement often followed an accidental encounter with a fellow privateeran accident, however, which occurred frequently because most of the cruising grounds were well known and some of the French islands served well enough as a rendezvous. The deposition of Captain John Pr of the Fisher Sloop in the Gabriel de Arquis may be quoted as fairly typical. Passing Port Corbin on 3 October 1702, he " took notice that there was eight vessels at an anchor . . . . Afterwards in the Evening he came to an Anchor amongst the Islands called the Molaines, soe neare the tnaine Land that some men (whome the sd depon' suposed were the masters of the sd vessels) called to him and asked him from whence was the shallop, to whom the Dep' answered from Diep. But he being alone he went amongst the Islets to seek for another Privateer for to goe along with him." Here, three leagues away, among the Mirouaines, he found Captains Robinson and Guilmotte and offered to lead the way. All agreed to share man for man, the deponent refusing to quarrel since " it was not then a time fitt for to have any difference together'" : if they were " willing to make any execution itt was time to doe itt without any delay because of the tide that did begin to spend". Sailing ahead, Captain Pr entered the port at io o'clock at night to find that his intended victims had disappeared further up the river, where lightning revealed their masts, and waited for his consorts to come up before the pounce.156 The successful execution of these joint designs, whether there was an agreement or not, called for some forbearance from the partners to them since tactics often required the continued pursuit of a chase by one privateer while his fellow put another in the bag. Captain William Brock, for instance, complained of the unfair conduct of Captains Robinson and Poundwell in claiming entirely for themselves several prizes out of a fleet which he had been the first to attack. Having obliged the Chasseur de Calais to come to the wind so as to enable Robinson to board her, Brock continued the chase in such manner as to force out a sloop which again Robinson took. When the unlucky Brock obliged two more sloops to alter course and put out his boat to occupy one of them, Poundwell's men got there first and fired a musket at Brock's boat. Brock asserted that but for him none of these ships would have been taken.157 Perhaps Brock himself, in company with Captains Slowly and Abraham Le Mesurier, behaved with equal lack of charity when he and Slowly had taken the Faulcon of St. Malo and refused to allow members of Le Mesurier's crew on board her, though Le Mesurier claimed to have been only one gunshot distant at the
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158
time of the capture. A share in a prize might be grounded on the mere fact of participation in a chase. When Robinson disputed L,e Mesurier's claim to a share in the salvage of the Adventure of Maryland on the grounds that lye Mesurier was a mile and a half away when she was recaptured and Robinson " did not know what regulations there was about Privateer's pretending Chassing parts," L,e Mesurier replied that the sight of the Bucephalus and two other Guernsey privateers had in fact spared Robinson the attentions of a French privateer near the scene of action.159 Robinson himself had a grievance against Captain Roche when, having hauled up to fire his chase guns, he enabled Roche to shoot ahead and clap his men aboard a prize/60 but he contested a claim by Roche's owners to the Union and St. Peter of Nantes which Robinson had taken while Roche was putting a prize crew on board the Si. Martin of Nantes. The difficulty in this last case was that Roche, who was criticised for being too long in manning the St. Martin and indeed for over-manning her, was not even in sight when the other two prizes were taken : a verbal agreement had apparently been made between the two captains in Roche's cabin before the action took place, but Roche had disappeared and the question of whether the agreement was for 24 hours or whether other conditions were stipulated, on which the dispute turned, could only be determined by hearsayunless Robinson's word alone were taken.161 Clearly, the temptation to put at least a token crew on board a prize must have been very strong when shares in a joint capture might be disputed and when witnesses gave conflicting evidence about the exact circumstances of capture or the nature of the purely verbal agreements between captains which were the usual arrangement.162 Possession in such circumstances might well be nine points of .the law. Equally it put a strain on the loyalty of the privateers to one another and probably limited their ability to co-operate, especially as members of crews, whose interests might also be involved, had their own views about these agreements on occasion. It was suggested, for example, in one of the Interrogatories put to members of Robinson's crew ex parte John Roche and equipage, that Robinson had been accused by one of his own officers of selling them and that he had broken his speaking trumpet over the officer's head.163 The successes of the privateers owed very much to the difficulties experienced by the French authorities in organizing effective counter-measures. They were not, of course, idle in this matter. Brigantines were stationed at various points along the coast and armed corvettes were appointed to cruise for privateers in the bays and near some of the islands ; from time to time small expeditions were fitted out from Brest and elsewhere to deal with some local menace ; whenever possible, coastal batteries were put in order164 (though the fear of a major descent on the coast was also a factor in this). The coastal militia, of which Vauban had a low opinion, had been to some extent re-organized in 1701 but it was not properly brought up to date until after 1716 and had to arm itself at its own expense. In any case its responsibilities did not extend beyond the defence of the bays and estuaries.165 For mobile defence/ it was necessary to rely on volunteers and it was by no means easy always to recruit 'themor the militiamen for that matter. The supply dried up at harvest time, for instance. In Brittany crews had to be found among the fishermen, who would only serve under officers whom they knew and trusted and who took to their fishing as soon as they were back in port. At Concameau their wives wished to prevent them leaving their fishingthe brigantines at Lorient were immobilised from the end of August till the end of November, 1704, while the Concameau fishing fleet was away in the bay of Douarnenez. Officers were needed, it was thought, who could man the brigantines from the parishes at a moment's notice when privateers were known to be in the neighbourhood ; the grant of droits de pillage might assist them.166 The Commissaire de Marine at Nantes found it necessary in 1705 to recommend incentives to get the coastguard vessels to sea and make captures even when manned.'67 The Commissaire at Lorient pointed in 1704 to the desirability of having soldiers on board the brigantines to keep discipline at sea as well as guard the ships in port ; also they knew how to shoot and the fishermen did not.168 Moreover, coastguard ships and, worse still, the corvettes responsible for hunting privateers had sometimes to be called away for convoy duties.'6" Over all hung the
The Channel Ishnd Privateers
359
chronic " disette d'argent". The inadequacy of official protection was revealed by the pressure on merchants to undertake the expense of fitting out vessels to give chase and again, in 1708, by the authority given to admiralty officers in the ports, after a delay which discouraged self-help, to issue free commissions to the inhabitants of the coast who would fit out such vessels (as, according to Clairambault, they had sought permission to do when the privateers came inshore in bad weather or to ambush barques and small vessels).170 There are indications that the blank commissions sent to the admiralty officers for this purpose were not very freely issued, however.171 In any case, in May 1710, the merchants of La Rochelle were complaining that, owing to their losses at sea and to war taxation, they could not afford to arm a cruiser. The Nantes merchants would only do so in 1711 if the Crown would meet them on their own terms, and the Bordelais only after much fuss.172 The privateers were, of course, a difficult nuisance to stamp out because of their numbers, their mobility and the shallowness of draught which enabled them to use channels which more powerful ships could not enter. Chteaurenault thought that it was necessary to establish a small fort in the Sept lies to secure the navigation between Trguier and St. Malo. When an expedition to those islands was despatched in April 1705 it found nothing to do, for the birds had flown.173 More effective seem to have been the steps taken at L/orint to clear the waters round Belle lie and the Glnans in the summer of 1706 : a felucca was to search out the corsairs among the rocks while two brigantines, escorted by corvettes, were stationed so as to catch them when they took to the open sea. Brigantines had the advantage over a frigate of being able to sail when there was little or no wind but were too big to keep at sea for long and not always strong enough to give chase ; they were replaced at Belle He, significantly, by a captured Jersey privateer.174 But such counter-measures were always liable to be interrupted by the persistent demand for convoys or the need to change crews or refit. The privateers were able to take advantage of even the temporary absence of the corvettes stationed at the Glnans. It was noted that they never stayed long in the same place. Chased out of the Glnans, they could find refuge " du coste de Bordeaux"."s The galleys at any rate could make good sail with the wind and could use their oars against it. When all this is said, the records leave no doubt of the boldness of the Island privateers. They did not rely for prizes on chance encounters at sea. Enough has been said already to indicate their use of cutting-out tactics in rivers, harbours, and roadsteads. A large number of prizes were taken at anchor. A common technique also was to force a chase aground and haul her off on the tide.176 If many of the vessels so taken were mere barques or deserted by their crews before capture, it is also true that there was often danger from a lee shore or from the forts at the mouths of estuaries and elsewhere whose fire was sometimes reported heavy. Good nerves as well as skill were sometimes needed to cut the hawsers of a vessel in harbour and bring her off under fire, perhaps with her rigging removed or a torn mainsheet or holes cut in her bottom by the French crew.177 The Adventure of Liverpool was recaptured in St. Martin's roads by five men of the Sailor's Adventure, Captain Carter, who, having no small boat of their own, had swum aboard, stopped two holes and got her off nine hours later under fire from the forts.178 There were many not dissimilar episodes, some costing dead and wounded.17' The testimony of the prize depositions on these matters is circumstantial and matter-of-fact in tone. There is no suggestion of an attempt at the picturesque. The details sworn by one witness are usually corroborated by a second. They are presented in the form of short replies to questions formulated by the experienced civilians of Doctors' Commons, not the yarns of the mariner at the cottage door. If the experience of Anne's war is any guide, the historian of the Chausey Islands hardly displayed an undue bias when he wrote of " le role redoutable que les Channel's Islands . . . couvertes par le pavilion anglais, taient appeles a jouer dans les guerres navales".180 A contemporary French observer wrote that they were capable of doing more harm to French shipping than bigger ships.'81 While it is doubtful whether it will ever be possible to measure their interference with the movements of French trade, and hence to fix their place in the larger strategic picture of the war,
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it may yet be claimed for them, and for the Guemseymen especially, that they sustained with much daring and more skill, during the whole length of the War of the Spanish Succession, an offensive on a considerable scale and over a steadily wider area which caused serious alarm to the French. Their activity was felt as far afield as Bilboa and Dunkirk. But because they did not despise small prizes, understood the lie of the French coast and its islands, and used craft well adapted to operations close inshore, they were able, above all, to inflict wounds on French port-toport trade. This made their contribution to the Grand Alliance, and to the misery of France in the declining years of Louis XIV, something quite specific, unique in the history of contemporary English privateering and comparable only with the grande guerre of the French corsairs themselves.

NOTES
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1_G. N. Clark, The Dutch Alliance and the War Against French Trade, 1688-1697 (Manchester, 1923) and "War Trade and Trade War, 1701-1713" in The Economic History Review, vol. i, no. 2, pp. 262-280; R. Pares, War and Trade in the West Indies (Oxford, 1936) and, especially, Colonial Blockade and Neutral Rights, 1739-1763 (Oxford, 1938); R. G. Marsden, Law and Custom of the Sea (London, Navy Records Society, 2 vol., 1915-16). 2Cited as "A. N. Marine." I have used other abbreviations as follows: Adm.: Admiralty Records, Public Record Office; Amiraut: Amiraut series in the Guernsey Greife; C.S.P.Dom.: Calendar of State Papers, Domestic; H.C.A.: High Court of Admiralty Records, Public Record Office; H.M.C.: Historical Manuscripts Commission; Jugements: Jugements, Ordonnances et Ordres du Conseil, Guernsey Greffe; P.C.: Privy Council Register and Papers, Public Record Office; S.P.: State Papers, ibid; T.: Treasury Papers, ibid. I must express my obligation to the late Major Carey Curtis for his courtesy and help at the Greffe. 3J. Le Pelley, " Channel Island Seamen in the Wars of William and Anne," in La Sociale Guernesiaise, Report and Transactions for the Year 1946, xiv., pt. 1 (1948), pp. 35-47a revision of an earlier article by Mr. Le Pelley in The Mariners Mirror, vol. 30, no. 1. I am much obliged to Miss Vera Carey for drawing ray attention to the revision of this article and for other help. 4Chaillon took the Four Brothers of Tremblade and Si. Francois d'Assise, the latter mounting 8 guns and both laden with salt, on the Banks (depositions at St. John's, 17th Aug. and 6th Oct., 1710, H.C.A. 32/59, 60). Bristol privateers were notably successful in these waters. The Vainqueur was one of Guernsey's three biggest privateers. The Chasse, Captain Ahier, took La Marie de Bordeaux when she was 7 leagues out from Bilboa with fruit on 27th Feb., 1712; the BiiTchett Galley, Captain Robinson, took the Alexander Ann, St. Joseph de Mistre, St. Francois de Peneri and Olive de Kehruq on 5th June, 1710, when they were homeward bound in ballast after delivering salt from La Rochelle to Pontevedra and Vigo. All five prizes were ransomed. H.C.A. 32/90(1) and 92(1). 5Including 13 Jersey prizes sent to England, the figures for the different ports are as follows: Dover 4, Portsmouth 1, Southampton 14, Poole 4, Weymouth 13, Dartmouth 10, Plymouth 12, Fowey 2, Falmouth 7, Penzance 4, Scilly Isles 5, St. Ivs 1, Bideford 1 ; total 78. The Jersey prizes were all brought into the ports of Devon and Cornwall. H.C.A. 32/50-3, 55, 59, 60-4, 67, 69-74, 77-9, 81, 85. 6V. infra, p. 450. 7The neutrals were the Hope, Christiansen, Wrestling Jacob, Ivers, Juffrow Cornelia, Blomme all three Danishand the Ju/frow Agnetha, Martensen, of Reval. They were all homeward bound with Bordeaux cargoes (H.C.A. 32/62, 65, 86 [pt. 1]). The fact that no part of their cargo was condemned may explain why Rousse did not repeat this practice (H.C.A. 30/597). On the whole the Island privateers interested themselves very little in neutral trade, the bringing up of which often involved an appeal to the Privy Council and delays in judgement even when a cargo, or part of a cargo, was condemned. For appeals by neutral owners in cases involving the Islanders see Maria of Riga, Fischer, Postilion of Copenhagen, Moller, and Rosenburgfi of Stockholm, Bommelaer (H.C.A. 42/15, 18). 8The Bristol privateer was the Severn Galley, Captain Thompson. The two Londoners, the Conqueror and the Runner Frigate, were owned by John Prevost, who may have been a Channel Islander but who is described as a London merchant in the Letter of Marque Declarations (H.C.A. 26/17, 19). The Runner was successively commanded in 1702-4 by Captains Robert Slowly, Joseph Brock, and John Maret. Brock went captain of the Eagle of Guernsey when it was commissioned on 11 April, 1704 (H.C.A. 26/19); the evidence for his having commanded the Runner is in the Prize Papers (St. Anthony de Dunkirk, Brussin, H.C.A. 32/48) and the fact that he does not appear as such in the Letter of Marque Declarations shows that these are not an exhaustive privateering Who's Who. Slowly commanded several Guernsey privateers in William's warthe Hopewell 1692, Deceiver 1695, and Good Fellowship 1696 (H.C.A. 26/2, 3), but the owners, John Prevost and John Dupuy, of the privateers commanded by him under Anne were resident in London; by 1706, in command of the Falcon, he was taking prizes in the Mediterranean (Nostra Seora de Bon Voiagio, Scudras, H.C.A. 32/73). I cannot discover that Captain John Rounsivall (" Rounsifull ") ever commanded a Guernsey privateer; the Dolphin, which is included in Mr. Le Pelley's list doc. cit., p. 47) was London-owned according to the Declaration by the Earl of Argyll on 5th Dec., 1692 (H.C.A. 26/2, f.75), and neither of the privateers of which he
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was captain under Anne, the Whitehall Galley and the Conqueror of London, was a Channel Islander, though he cruised between Poole and Guernsey in 1703 (Francis and Joseph of St. Malo, Hayes, H.C.A. 32/58; ibid. 26/18, 19; The Post Man, 25-27 March and 2-5 April, 1703). On the other hand, the Revenge Galley of London, Captain John Roland, and the Pembroke Galley of London, Captain John Gruchy, were owned and commanded by Guernseymen in 1702 (H.C.A. 26/17). The Good Luck, Captain Crilly, of Rye, also cruised off northern Brittany in 1703 and her owners claimed a reward for her services in bringing intelligence to Rear-Admiral Dilkcs at Spithead of a large French convoy in Canale bay (P.C. l/2,f.9; P.C. 2/83, ff.278-9). 9A. N. Marine B3/124/.553; H.C.A. 32/48, Si. Anthony de Rebelln, de Vino. Cf. The Post Man, 3-5 Sept., 1702: " Falmouth, Aug. 31. This morning sailed 3 Dutch Privateers to cruise on the French coasts". Lucas Le Rus (Rusey), captain of the Prince George of Guernsey, complained of violence shown by Flushing privateersmen to members of his crew (in Success of Boston, Newell, H.C.A. 32/81). The Lieutenant-Governor feared that Guernseymen would get the blame for taking the four French prizes brought in by an Ostend privateer after the Cessation of Arms (Spicer to Dartmouth, 20th Dec., 1712, S.P. 47/3, f. unnumbered). Ostend privateers were cruising off Normandy in 1713 (H. Malo, La Grande Guerre des Corsaires, Paris, 1925, p.169). 10H.C.A. 32/46-86: especially the depositions made at Plymouth, on which the Soundings squadron was based and into which most of its prizes were sent. Cf. J. H. Owen, War at Sea under Queen Anne 1702-1708 (Cambridge, 1938), passim. 11G. L. Clowes, The Royal Navy (London, 1897-1903), ii, p.504. The best account of the episode is in The Monthly Register, I., No. 7 (July, 1703), p.42. Channel Island privateers reported the position and course of large French convoys on later occasions and important information was sent express to the Secretary of State by the Lieutenant-Governor or by the Commanding Officer in his absence (Mordaunt to Hedges, 9th Feb., 1704, and 20th Jan., 1705, S.P. 47/2, ff. 76, 219; Brereton to Tucker, 2nd Aug., 1705, Adm. 1/4090, ff.323-4). Captain Lemprire was sent to get intelligence at St. Malo when bringing back prisoners (Mordaunt to Hedges, 7th Aug., 1705, S.P. 47/2, ff.254-5). Information might also be sent to the Admiralty by the naval captains who spoke with the privateers (e.g., Captain Roberts, Southsea Castle, to Burchett, 17 May, 1711, S.P. 42/9, f.343). It was part of the standing Instructions for Privateers that they should keep " a Correspondence by all Conveniences and upon all Occasions from time to time" with the Admiralty: the Instructions of 1st June, 1702, not printed by Marsden, are in H.C.A. 26/20, f.5. This was a not unimportant function of the Channel Island privateers, who were well fitted by their habit of working close inshore to observe enemy movements for themselves, besides what they learnt of enemy preparations from their prisoners. 12The Monthly Register, 1703, loc. cit.; C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, p.71. 13G. Dupont, Histoire du Cotentin et de Ses lies (Caen, 1885), iv, pp.443 ff., summarises the interesting memorandum drawn up in 1731 for the Comte de Maurepas by M. de Caux, " ingnieur en chef des cotes de Normandie," on the strategic importance of the Channel Islands. DC Caux was impressed by the lessons of the War of the Spanish Succession. He referred to the look-out stationed on Herrn in time of war in these terms: "Les corsaires, qui attendent l, n'ont qu' filer leurs cables, sans lever leurs ancres, et a se lancer a la poursuite de l'ennemi aussitot qu'il est sgnale." The Guernseymen established themselves also in the Chausey Isles (A. N. Marine, B3/141, f.8; cf. Comte de Gibon, Les Hes Chausey et leur Histoire, Paris, 2nd edition, 1935, p.165). 14Chteaurenault to Pontchartrain, Rennes, 5th Dec., 1704, A. N. Marine, B3/126, f.321 ; Clairambault to same, Lorient, 29tb March, 1706, ibid. B3/137, f.217; Beauregard to same, Lorient, May, 1707, ibid. B3/147, f.12. 15Ibid. B3/122, f.336. 16Ibid. B3/141, f.8; examples in H.C.A. 32/90(1) and 92(1). 17Examples in H.C.A. 32/60: Francois de Brest, taken in the Loire, and Francois Gabriel, in the Garonne. 18A. N. Marine B3/158, ff.260-1; B3/124, f.329. Cf. the reports of Ferville, marine commandant at Port Louis, 1708, ibid. B3/158, ff.411, 416, 422-4, 437. A. Monentheuil, Essai sur la Course (Paris, 1898), pp. 69-70, states that in 1703 no fewer than 23 out of 121 vessels sailing from Nantes were captured. 19Ricous, marine commandant at Lorient, August, 1704, ibid. B3/124, f.33. Lorient was much decayed at this time (L. Chaumeil, "Abrg d'histoire de Lorient de la Fondation (1666) a nos jours (1939)" in Annales de Bretagne, xlvi, pp.66-87). 20A. N. Marine B3/126, .321; B3/132, f.285. 21Ibid. B3/128, ff.8, 9, 284; B3/148, f.130. A project for the seizure or, failing that, the pillage of the Channel Islands was forwarded to the French Admiralty in April, 1704, with the
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warning that the fortress of Guernsey was " bien artill " (St. Sulpice, Commissaire de Marine at St. Malo, to Pontchartrain, ibid. B3/123, f.499); in Sept., 1705, Pontchartrain ordered such a plan to be discussed with Chteaurenault (minute on dispatch from Beaujeu, ibid- B3/128, ff.10, 11). 22Ricous to Pontchartrain, 18th June, 1704, ibid. B3/124, 1.21; Lusancay to same, Nantes, April, 1708, ibid. B3/158, f.260. 23Ibid. B3/190, f.181. 24Chamillart, Contrleur-Gnral, to Ponlchartrain, 20th March, 1707, ibid. B3/152, f.64;. memorandum by Daumay, Bordeaux, 7th June, 1710, ibid. B3/189, f.150. Cf. examples in H.C.A. 32/74 and 90(1). 25Several examples for 1711-12 in H.C.A. 32/90(1) and 92(1). 26Clairambault to Pontchartrain, 7th Oct., 1707, A. N. Marine, B3/148, f.230. 27For example, the Don de Dien of Bordeaux, St. Germain of Nantes, Si. James of Nantes, and Fort de Curasao were all taken between 1709 and 1712 (H.C.A. 32/56, 61(2), 67, 82). Sugar and other tropical produce was sometimes taken on its way from Bordeaux, etc., to other ports e.g., Si. John de l'Iste de Dieu and Si. John de Pont Lobe in H.C.A. 32/67. 28Narcissus Luttrell, A Brief Historical Relation of State Affairs (Oxford, 1857), v, pp.284-5. 29The Duke of Banaria, L'Envieuse de Dieppe, Golden Lion of Bruges and St. lohn de Bruges were all taken outward bound from Nantes (H.C.A. 32/56, 57, 61(1), 66). 30Bordeaux cargoes alone for Brest, St. Malo and Dunkirk, 1703-8, included the Angelica de Redan, Emraude of Dieppe, L'Emraude of Royan, Glorious de Dieppe and James de f Isle Dien (H.C.A. 32/48, 57, 61(1), 65). 31Good roads in Brittany were few, badly maintained and poorly fed by a rseau vicinal; transport by land was slow, expensive, and liable to be interrupted by peasant rioters. Export trade, especially in grain, was of the first importance to the provinceto the great landowners whose income was mainly derived from it and to the merchants and seamen of many small ports (J. Letaconnoux, " Les Subsistances et le Commerce des Grains au XVIIIe Sicle " in Annales de Bretagne, xx, no. , pp.126-135). Nantes had a considerable trade with other French ports, especially Bordeaux (A. Gupin, Histoire de Nantes, Nantes, 2nd edition, 1839, pp.332-3). A good proportion of the more valuable Channel Islands prizes were taken in their passage between these two ports. 32G. Dupont, op. cit., iv, pp.444-5. Dupont adds the detail that all this took place in the Raz Blanchard and Canal de la Droute, but this does not appear to be warranted by the report which he summarises (ibid, p.405). 33Pembroke to Hedges, 4th Feb., 1709 (Marsden, op. cit., ii, pp.209-210). Gratuitous sinking was deprecated by the Admiralty (ibid.) and the privateers had some reason for reticence about it, so that the Prize Papers would be unlikely to throw much light on its extent. They record only a small number of sinkingse.g., the events described by Captain John Pr (Dupr?) in Gabriel de Args, H.C.A. 32/60. 34List of all prizes condemned in the High Court of Admiralty from 4th May, 1702, to 1st July, 1703, and subsequent lists made for the Commissioners of the Customs, H.C.A. 30/774. 35Prize Papers, H.C.A. 32/46-86, 90, 92; Sentences, H.C.A. 34/22-30; Sentences on Appeal, H.C.A. 48/6. 36The number of prizes taken by British (other than Channel Island and colonial) privateers and condemned up to this date was about 340 (lists for Customs Commissioners, H.C.A. 30/774). 37187 prizes were carried into Guernsey, 46 into Jersey, in William's war, mainly by Channel Island privateers in 1695-7 (Report of the Commissioners appointed to state the Public Accounts, H.C.A. 30/774). 38* Anne, c. 13. 39Accounts of the sale at auction were often attached to the statements of appraisement commissioners: a comparison of the two in the case of Guernsey prizes shows that sales usually realised a sum between 20% and 100% above the appraised valuation. Cf. Godolphin's Report to Privy Council, 19th June, 1708, P.C. 1/2/8. It is a nice point whether the appraisement commissioners knowingly undervalued so as to reduce the Admiralty's share. Captain Naftel sold the St. James of Ile de Dars and her cargo for 2,000: they had been appraised at 801 3s. Od. (H.C.A. 32/47). 40There is a separate list of recaptures for the period 4th May, 17021st Dec., 1707, in H.C.A. 30/774. The amount of salvage varied between one-eighth and a moiety of the appraised value of the recaptured cargo, the sum being assessed by the Admiralty Judge in the light of circumstances, including the length of time in enemy hands. Cf. 4 W. & M., c. 25, s. xx. The appraisements are in H.C.A. 32/49-53, 55-9, 61-86, 92(1). I have converted the appraisements made in Guernsey at the rate of 14 livres tournois = 1 sterling, which was the rate used by the Receiver-General of the Rights and Perquisites of the Admiralty, though the Appraisement Commissioners in Guernsey converted at 14 livres, 4 sols (Public Record Office, A.O. 3/3 [3]).
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Corsairs and Navies, J660-1760
41V. njra note 49. 42Sir C. Whitworth, State oj the Trade of Great Britain (London, 1776). The total official estimated value of prize goods for the whole war was 1,082,800 16s. Id. Whitworth's figures should include prize goods seni to England from the Channel Islands as such, but not, very likely, prize goods landed in the Islands, even if exported subsequently to England. He treats the Islands as foreign countries. [I now (1985) estimate their gross income as exceeding 300,000.] 43I must leave to others the task of assessing the influence of the proceeds on the economy of the island and on the fortunes of individuals. Some deduction must of course be made in respect of the expenses of condemnation and appraisement and a considerably larger deduction for duties payable on prize goods. About 5,000 must also have gone to the Admiralty on prizes taken before 26th March, 1708. It is surely notable in this connection that William Dobre, one of the most considerable owners of privateers, started a banking business in 1712 (E. F. Carey, in Soc. Guern., Report and Trans., x. pt.3 [1928], p.316). 44Nantes exporters were paying '10% insurance on freights to the West Indies in 1709 (Lusansay to Pontchartrain, 19th Oct., 1709, A. N. Marine B3/171, f.394). French shipping was also expensive because of the outlay on armament and the high wages demanded by crews; nor could the light frigates used for trade carry a large cargo (Memorandum of Chambre de Commerce, Dunkirk, 30th May, 1705, ibid. B3/132, ff.417-8). 45G. N. Clark, "War Trade and Trade War, 1701-1713," The Economic History Revieiv, i, no. 2, p.274. Many French importers preferred to use neutral or Dutch shipping because they could buy more cheaply; much of the port-to-port trade, greatly to the distress of French shipbuilders and others, came into the hands of the Dutch, who obtained passes to load at Bordeaux, La Rochelle, R and Nantes with the connivance of French merchants (A. N. Marine B3/175, ff.129, 146-8). Other Ponant merchants fitted out French ships with foreign crews and neutral flags (ibid. B3/180, f.258). 46Desmaretz to Pontchartrain, Versailles, 28th July, 1710, ibid. B3/189, f.165. 47R. Pares, Colonial Blockade and Neutral Rights, p.20, states that there would be no point in the arrangement unless the ransom was always less than the value of the prize; but this might not be true in cases where the captured master yielded to a ransom under threat of having his vessel destroyed, as did the master of the Samaritain de I'lsle Dieu to Captain Bushell, Three Eagles of Jersey (H.C.A. 32/67). Captains would naturally be reticent about this but the hostage sometimes told. The Prize Commissioners in Guernsey informed the Admiralty Register on 10th April, 1712, that captains were unwilling to make their depositions before their ransoms were paid (H.C.A. 32/92 [1]). They sometimes destroyed worthless vessels without taking a ransom but it is difficult to say how often. Pnntchartrain complained not only of the destruction of French ships by Guernsey privateers but of the burning of one of them by Captain Robinson after she had just been ransomed by a British privateer (Dartmouth to Lords of Admiralty, 16th Aug., 1710, Adm. 1/4094, f.109; same to same, 14th Nov., 1710, Adm. 1/4094, f.217; Burchett to Dartmouth's secretary, 8th Dec., 1710, Adm. 2/437, f.334). But Robinson may have been especially prone to this sort of thing (deposition of Capt. Pr in Gabriel de Args, H.C.A. 32/60). Cf. Ricous to Pontchartrain, 4th Aug., 1704, A. N. Marine, B3/124, f.33. 48Lists of prizes in H.C.A. 30/774. 49H.C.A. 32/46-86, 90(1), 90(2). Expressed in the currencies of ransom the sums were as follows : Livres tournois 231,778 French crowns 4,531 Dollars or pieces of eight 422 In converting into sterling, I have taken the mean of the rates of exchange between London and Paris attested on 20th Nov., 1712, by Daniel Arthur, a London merchant banker, in Si. Martin de Sable d'Olonne, Dinot, H.C.A. 32/72 (2). He quoted 39.5 to 40.5 pence for a French crown of 60 sous (or 1 sterling for 17/15/6 to 18/4/6 livres tournois). But this was the end of the war and the sterling value of earlier ransoms may have been lower. Even in 1712 the owners of the Bristol privateer which took the St. Martin demanded a rate of 12 livres. The rate between the Channel Islands and London employed by the Receiver-General of the Rights and Perquisites of Admiralty up to 1708 was 14 livres; the Guernsey appraisement officers converted at 14 livres, 4 sols. I have used the Receiver's rate for dollars at roughly 4i to 1 sterling (Public Record Office, A.O. 3/3 [3]). A standard piece of eight was worth 4s. 6d. in English silver coin in 1703. 50For this and a discussion of ransom practice generally see Pares op. rit., pp. 19-26. Most of the evidence for this paragraph is well exemplified in H.C.A. 32/90(1) and 92(1). 51Deposition In Providence, Curin. H.C.A. 32/92(1).
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52Admiralty Court fees were a consideration also. An attempt was made by James Bonamy, on behalf of the owners of the Ambuscade, to get the Mary James d'Audierne condemned for half fees as she was not worth 24 (H.C.A. 32/72L2J). Fees were usually about 35 for the process of condemnation. 53_Deposition in Guernsey, 20th Aug., 1711, H.C.A. 32/90 (pt. 1). 54It was suggested in the Marguerite de Nantes, Belmer, ransomed by a Bristol privateer, that the sale of the ship and her cargo of Bank fish would not, in view of the fish duties, yield more than the ransom of 250a good deal less than Ahier got. Cf. La Marie Anglique, Le Francois, and Joseph Mary of Sable d'Olonne, Richard, ransomed respectively for 5400 and 6600 livrea, H.C.A. 32/90(1) and 92(1). 55Captain Vostier explained the ransom of Le Tintamare of Penerf by the distance of Arcachon from Guernsey and by the fact that corn was "of no sale in this Island" (H.C.A. 32/90 fl]). Some salt cargoes were not even appraised in Guernsey after the early years of the war. 56H.C.A. 32/50(1). 57E. E. Hoon, The Organization of the English Customs System, 1696-1786 (New York, 1938), pp.169-170; T. S. Willan, The English Coasting Trade, 1600-1750 (Manchester, 1938), pp. 90-151. There is evidence of official concern with the fraudulent re-export of tobacco at least as early as 1687: see Jersey Prison Board Papers (printed for the Privy Council, 1891copy in the Bodleian Library), Suppl. App. no. 183A. 581 W. & M., C.34; 2 W. & M., c.14; 7 & 8 Wm. III., c.20; 8 & 9 Wm. III., c.24. 59H.C.A. 26/1-3. 60The Declaration for the Encouragement of Her Majesty's Ships of War and Privateers. P.C. 2/79, ff.139-143; Marsden, op. cit., II., pp.186-190, omits the passage on French wines. 612 & 3 Anne, c.18; 6 Anne, c.73. Cf. E. Hughes, Studies in Administration and Finance, 1558-1825 (Manchester, 1934), pp.235-247, for the history of the salt duties and the related subject of fishing bounties under Anne: the importation of foreign salt in ships of less than 20 tons hurden was prohibited by 1 Anne, c.15. 62Declaration for the Encouragement of Ships of War and Privateers, P.C. 2/79, f.388. Cf. the Presentment from the Customs Commissioners 12th March, 1703, read at the Council 1st May and approved except what related to fish of foreign taking, " in regard the same may be exported againe to Foreign Marketts, or sold Cheaper in England then Fish caught by Her Majesty's Subjects, and cured with salt that shall have payd Her Majesty's Dutys " (ibid, ff.373-4). 63Minutes of Treasury Board, 13th February, 1703, T.l/86, f.222. The wine aroused suspicion because it was mostly in small cask but also because Godolphin regarded the export of wine to Rotterdam from Guernsey as a very unprofitable trade even if practicable. During the first three years of war, according to Whitworth (op. cit., pp. 1-20), the aggregate value of Guernsey's trade with England fell away sharply from the level of 1701-2 (Christmas to Christmas). Hatton informed Nottingham on 5th April 1703 that the islanders could carry no trade for want of convoys (C.S.P. Dom. 1702-3. p.675). Whitworth's figures, for what they may be worth, show that English imports from Guernsey fell in 1702-3 to rather less than five-sixths of their 1701-2 value (12,705 appr.) and that exports to Guernsey, again by value, were more than halved. Except for 1704-5 and 1712-3, English imports were maintained at or in excess of the value (10,199 appr.) of 1698-9 throughout the war, being trebled in 1705-6, whereas 1699-1701 had been years of low imports. English exports to Guernsey, on the other hand, remained low from 1700 to 1706 and did not regain their 1698-1700 level till 1711-12. Whitworth's figures of English exports to Jersey show a marked slump in value throughout the war from the high level of 1698-1700, which was not regained till 1711-12; but the pre-war value of imports from Jersey was, except in 1710-11, well maintained and in several years far surpassed. It is likely enough that the figures of Channel Island exports to England include a substantial prize element, but prize goods are entered separately in Whitworth's tables. The tables of course take no account of smuggled goods or of ships bought and sold. For an evaluation of the statistics of the Inspector-General of Exports and Imports, used by Whitworth, see G. N. Clark, Guide to English Commercial Statistics 1696-1782 (London, 1938), pp. 33-42: for Whitworth in particular, ibid., pp. 30-1. 64P.C. 2/79, f.388. For the alleged correspondence with France, especially of Jersey, in William's war, see C.S.P. Dom. 1689-90, p.352; ibid. 1690-1, p.479; ibid. 1691-2, p.48; ibid. 693, pp.244, 446; ibid. 1695, pp.172, 232. The Lieutenant-Governor of Jersey, several Jurats, the King's Customer and others were said to be implicated. 65Calendar of Treasury Books, 1703, pp.73, 475. An account of prizes brought into Guernsey and Jersey was sent once or twice a month by the Admiralty Court Register to the Customs between 8th Feb., 1704, and 14th Feb., 1705 (H.C.A. 30/774). These accounts list 94 prizes but give less information than the general lists of prizes supplied to the Customs (ibid.): the Principal Commissioners for Prizes told the Treasury Board on 30th Nov., 1703, that up till then they had received no account of prizes at Jersey or Guernsey, ihough they had two Agents there (Cat. Treasury Rooks, 1703, p.92).
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666 Anne, c.16. The draft Orders of 1708 are copied in P.C. 2/82, S.88-92, 109-110. The Register of Certificates in Guernsey at this time was Samuel Blinston; John Thompson is described as " a check and Coraptroll " upon him. Jersey apparently had no Comptroller and the office was abolished in Guernsey by Order in Council of 25th Dec., 1709. For a general description of the duties of a Register of Certificate Cockets see Hoon, op. at., pp.l37f. Their essential function in the Islands was to prevent abuse of the Customs exemptions and drawbacks allowed in the trade of the Islands with Great Britain. For the growth of the Register's powers in Jersey see the Memorandum of W. H. V. Vernon and H. Sutton, pp.Slff., and the Orders in Council there cited, in the Jersey Prison Board Case (supra, note 57). The attitude of the Jersey States to the encroachments of this official can be followed in the Actes des Etats de l'Ile de Jersey for the years 1676 to 1730 (Soc. Jersiaise, 16e, 17e, 19e publications, 1901, 1902, and 1905): see especially the Actes of 19th March, 1680, 12th Feb., 1694, and 29th Sept., 1708. On the general question of the validity of Orders in Council issued without previous consultation with the States see J. Le Patourel, " The Political Development of the Channel Islands," in Soc. Guern., Report and Trans, for 1946, p.33. I am much indebted to Professor Le Patourel for advice on several points in the preparation of this paper. 67The suspicion was shared by some London merchants who declined to be impressed by the figures of Guernsey prizes without information about collusion (H.M.C. H. of L. MSS., N.S., vii, p.l90). 68Commissioners of Customs to Godolphin, 14th June, 1708, P.C.1/2/8. 69P.C.1/2/8. The petition was received by the Council on 30th Dec., 1708, and referred on 13th Jan., 1709, to the Lords of the Committee, who heard the Jersey Deputies in person and ordered the Lord High Treasurer to examine their grievances on 21st April (P.C. 2/82, ff.240, 307). Cf. Actes des Etats, 1701-30, pp.35-6. 70Report on proposals for ease of trade in Jersey, 16th June, 1709, Add.MSS. 38,463, f.87. Revised Instructions for Jersey, 22nd Aug., 1709, P.C. 2/82, ff.414-6; for Guernsey, 25th Dec., P.C. 2/82, ft.497-9. These repealed the Orders of 1708 but repeated many of the earlier provisions. For a petition that the Order in Council of 25th Dec., 1709 be not continued after the end of the war see Jugements 5, ff.149-150. R. Durand, Guernsey : Past and Present (2nd edition, Guernsey, 1933), p.73, is misleading on the Customs establishment. 71See the protest by Captains Stephens and Knap of Guernsey against trade with France, 12th July, 1693, in C.S.P. Dom., 1693, p.244: "They inform the enemy of our force and probably give them notice when there is any privateer in Alderney, for the French seldom go by until we have left that place ". I have not found any similar protests in Anne's war but it was a good argument. 72Magny to Chamillan, Caen, July, 1709, A. N. Marine B3/175, f.374; S.P. 47/2, f.330; Cartaret to the Lords of the Committee, received 18th July, 1711, P.C. 1/2/10; Actes des Etats, 28th Feb., 1710. 73Roujault to Chamillart, Poitiers, 13lh June, 1710, A. N. Marine B3/190, ff.501-3; subdelegu at Les Sables to Roujault, ibid., ff.502-3; Chamilly to Pontchartraih, La Rochelle, 1710, ibid., ff.l95, 206; Clairambault to Pontchartrain, Lorient, 1711, B3/198, ff.38, 105, 282. 74Francis Drake of Jersey had an interest in at least 21 privateers. He was able to furnish Captain Joshua Barnes of the Endeavour with a letter of credit to Julien Drake at St. Malo, instructing him to pay ransom if the Endeavour was captured, and with another letter to M. Pigault at Calais desiring him to draw on Julien Drake for the same purpose if necessary. Both Drake and Pigault, however, were concerned with the machinery for ransoming hostages. The Endeavour was taken in mid-Channel by a French privateer and ransomed for 25, which Barnes obtained at Dartmouth from Thomas Plumleigh and carried to the French privateer in a boat. The French authorities stated that the Endeavour, though disguised as a fishing boat, was a tobacco runner; Francis Drake complained to Julien and to Pigault that the French privateer had violated the fishing licence and that Barnes had only redeemed the vessel because he was frightened. When accused in Jersey of trading with France under colour of the licence, Barnes denied it on oath (Adm. 1/4094, fi.142-9; S.P. 47/3). The Endeavour does not appear to have been a privateer. Lieutenant-Governor Collier, however, had a Jersey "privateersman" imprisoned in 1705 for bringing in a St. Malo boat, with silk and linen on board worth 900-1000 livres, and for agreeing with the master for freight of them at 20 crowns, which he was unwilling to declare: the privateersman's name was Aaron de Ste Croy, but unless he was identical with Captain Andre de Ste Croix (who took many prizes) he had no commission (S.P. 47/2, f.290). Collier, unlike Harris in William's reign, seems to have set his face against illicit trade. 753 & 4 Anne, c.12. 76H.C.A. 26/13-21. For this reign, as a comparison with the Letter of Marque Bonds shows, the owners were not usually identical with those who gave recognizances for the good behaviour of the captain. On the other hand, I have assumed in this discussion that the lists of
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owners given in the Letter of Marque Declarations are more or less complete. As a rule their names correspond with the names of owners to be found elsewhere, notably in the Greife documents. But there are exceptions. The name of Pierre Henry, for instance, does not once occur in the Declarations: but it is clear from the transcript of his account book in the Priaulx Library that he held shares in several privateers'between 1702 and 1706. They were small shares1/8, 1/9, 3/32in small privateers and perhaps because of this it was not thought necessary to mention him in a Declaration. Or he may have acquired shares after the Declarations had been made. In either event the possibility is opened up of others such as he whose names do not appear. The Declarations themselves are evidence of a good deal of buying and selling of privateering shares, and there was probably much more of this dealing than is there recorded. Nevertheless, a comparison of the evidence does not lead me to the view that the case of Pierre Henry was a common one, and I am satisfied that the Declarations furnish an adequate account o the major shareholders, though not of the sizes of their shares. At a later date the Declarations give only the names of sureties who might be, until 1759, but were not necessarily, owners as well (Pares, op. at., 7n). Henry was far from being the largest owner at this time as stated in E. F. Carey, The Channel Islands (London, 1904), p.206. I must express my obligation to the late Mr. Ralph Durand for introducing me to the transcript at the Priaulx Library. 77Letter of Marque Declarations for the Maggott shallop. Captain (?) Hawkins, 12th May, 1704, H.C.A. 26/19; Union Galley, Captain Peraud, 13th Dec., 1711, H.C.A. 26/16; Anne, Captain Tramalier, 26th Sept., 1710, H.C.A. 26/15; John Galley, Captain John Pipn, 4th Sept., 1710, ibid; Clement, Captain Lempriere, 12th Feb., 1703, H.C.A. 26/18/18;. Bucephalus, Captain Lee, 21st March, 1707, H.C.A. 26/21. 78Endeavour Sloop, Bailey, H.C.A. 32/46. James Bonamy is described in 1712 as the London correspondent of James Perchard, a Guernsey owner, in Mary Jam.es d'Audierne, H.C.A. 32/72(2). Peter Martin, a prominent owner, was in London in November, 1703, C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, pp.140, 209. William Dobre opened an account with the Bank of England in 1712 (E. F. Carey in Soc. Guern. Report and Trans., x, pt. 3 (1928), p.316). There was a small colony of poor Channel Islanders, chiefly the families of seamen, in Wapping at this time (Archbishop of York's report on the state of the French Church at Wapping, 15th March, 1706, P.C. 1/2/6). 79Apart from those mentioned in the text, the Guernsey owners with the largest number of investments were: Captain John Tupper and Michael Falla, 15 shares each; Nicholas Le Pelley, 13; Peter Perchard and Nicholas Thoumes, 10; Peter Tupper, 9; James Perchard, John Allez, Captain Abraham Le Mesurier and William Le Marchant, 8; James Carey, Nicholas Carey, John Bowden and Leonard Le Mesurier, 7; Daniel Le Febure, Matthew De Saumarez and Captain William Brock, 6. Captains John Gruchy, Henry Knap, Thomas Le Mesurier and Daniel Naftel had interests in three or four privateers. The following were owners when Jurats at this time: William and Eleazar Le Marchant, Peter Carey, Peter Martin, Peter Priaulx, James Carey. Socially, many captains were indistinguishable from owners in the Channel Islands; Elisha Dobre, one of the biggest owners under Anne, had been commissioned captain of the Reserve on 14th Sept., 1695 (H.C.A. 26/2). 806 Anne, c. 13. 81V. infra, p. 350. 82An armator, or armateur, was strictly the ship's " husband," responsible for her armament and equipment in men and stores. It was with him that the seaman contracted to serve and it was against him that wage arrears and other claims were made in the Royal Court; armators arc frequently named as litigants in the Amiraut series of the Court's records. They also managed the prize business of a privateer with the help of correspondents in England, They were nearly always owners as well in Guernsey. Prominent among them were John Tupper and Elisha Dobre, with whom Pierre Henry had dealings (Priaulx Library, Tupper transcript, passim). Other armator-owners in Anne's war included Thomas Le Marchant, John and Matthew De Saumarez, William and John Dobre, Philip and Samuel Bonamy, James Perchard, Peter Carey, Peter Cannivet, Nicholas Le Pelley and Joshua Gosling. Privateering captains sometimes acted as armatorse.g., John Hubert, John Turner, Daniel Naftel. 83Letter of Marque Declarations for the Guernsey Frigate, 27th July, 1710, and 3rd Nov., 1711, in H.C.A. 26/15-16. It is worth noting that the Guernsey Frigate on the first of these occasions carried over 150 men and so required bail in 3,000; the reduction of her crew to 140 on the occasion of the second Declaration was probably designed to lower the bail to 1,500 84V. supra, p.447. 85Hatton told Nottingham on 23rd Nov., 1702, that the Guernsey privateers wanted a Prize Court in the Island to avoid the length of time taken in getting prizes condemned in England (S.P. 47/2, f.40). On the other hand, a sample count of 78 Guernsey prize cases in the High Court in 1709-11 shows that 51 were condemned within three months of capture, of which 28 within one month; only 10 prizes were condemned more than six months after capture (H.C.A. 30/774). But even a few weejcs' delay may have mattered to the investor who needed a quick return on his money. 86There are many cases of disputes between groups of owners about shares in the Amiraut series at the Greife. The High Court of Admiralty papers also contain a good many:
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for instance, St. James of Ile de Dars, Letierq, H.C.A. 32/47, 67, and Union de Nantes, Andre, ele., H.C.A. 32/85(2). 87James Lemprire, Charles Pipn, Edward Browne, John Villeneuve, John Maugier and perhaps Peter Scale and Richard Le Gras. 88Letter of Marque Declarations 1702-12, H.C.A. 26/13-21. One commission was granted, for reasons not clear to me, after the Proclamation for the Suspension of Arms on 10th Aug., O.S., 1712, which was of course prolonged after its expiry at the end of four months. Vessels and goods taken in the Channel and " les Mers du Nord jusq'au Cap St. Vincent " within 6 weeks of the Treaty for the Suspension were, however, to be considered good prize. The Treaty was dated 19th Aug., N.S. The Privy Council did not order peace to be published in Jersey and Guernsey till 4th May, O.S., 1713 (Dumont, Corps Universel Diplomatique, viii, part i, pp.308-9; P.C. 2/84. ff.2-3, 53, 87, 101, 119). It was complained at Dunkirk in September, 1713, that Jersey and Guernsey privateers had recently been taking out commissions at Flushing and Ostend (Malo, La Grande Guerre des Corsaires, p.225). 89These were the Prince Eugene Gaily, Captain Richard Pipn, set forth by John and Matthew De Saumarez, of Guernsey, and Edward Browne, of Jersey, and the Union Galley, Captain Samuel Peraud, whose owners were John Villeneuve and Nicholas Allez of Guernsey, Captains Edward Browne and Samuel Peraud of Jersey, and John Pye of Falmouth. Their commissions were dated 17th March, 1709, and 13th Dec., 1711 (H.C.A. 26/13, 16). 90Eight captains commanded both Guernsey and Jersey privateers. They were Edward Dumaresq, Richard Pipn, John Ograud, Abraham Durant, Robert Fitzhugh, William Bushell, Samuel Peraud and Peter Maugierall apparently Jerseymen. This figure takes no account of the number of Jerseymen who commanded Guernsey privateers only. Most of the Jersey privateers were small and most of the Guernsey ships to which the Jerseymen moved were of 60 tons or over. I have discovered no evidence that Guernsey owners were more accommodating. On the other hand, the Jersey captains who were thus attracted had usually a good record of prizes on Jersey privateers. See the lists of prizes condemned in this war in H.C.A. 30/774. 91H.C.A. 26/13-21. 92The repetition of the tonnage figure of August, 1710 in May, 1711, and tonnage repetitions elsewhere might dispose one to respect the tonnage figures in the Declarations rather severely for identification purposes. In that case we might be entitled to assume the existence of three Chasse privateers. Unfortunately, the 80-ton and the 200-ton Chasse both carried crews to the unique number of 130, while the 150-ton Chasse carried 140 men and the same number of guns as the 200-ton privateer. I should therefore say that it is virtually certain that the same ship is involved on each occasion and that the tonnage figures are the least trustworthy. 93Compare the metamorphosis of the Marlborough Galley in H.C.A. 26/20, 13, 15: 6 Oct. 1704 Captain P. Tupper 90 tons 10 guns 56 men 21 Oct. 1704 S. Le Feburd 60 10 60 Nov. 1707 D. Naftel 60 8 60 Aug. 1710 P. Maugier 60 6 12 The re-appearances of the Churchill Galley, Revenge, Hope and Hopewell, Restoration and Union in the Declarations offer the same problem. While agreeing with Mr. Le Pelley (loc. cit., p.47) that the terms " galley " and " sloop " seem to have been used somewhat loosely, I have the impression that galley tonnages were usually the higher. Cf. H.M.C. H. of L. MSS., N.S., vii, !>.182: " a galley is built to sail, and to row with oars, and measures twice her burthen or loading, and is broad and sharp, and carries twice the breadth in sail of common sailing ships . . . and is at double the charge in number of seamen . . . of force from 16 to 40 guns . . . ." 94The Larke (1703) became the English Heart in 1705 (Priaulx Library, transcript of Pierre Henry's account book, f.41). I am unable to identify Le Pigeon listed by Tupper (see Lc Pelley, loc. cit., p.47), though a Fisher and Swallow were commissioned in 1702. Ollivier Mancel, who captained the Pigeon in 1703, according to Tupper, does not appear in the Letter of Marque Declarations till 1709. Perhaps there was some irregularity. The Pigeon was sold in London by Sir William Dobre late in 1703 (transcript of Henry's account book, f.30). 95Of privateers commissioned early in the war only the names of the Hanover, Nottingham, and Pembroke have the ring of a topical compliment (H.C.A. 26/17). 96H.C.A. 26/1-3. The names of the captains, mostly as they signed themselves, and the years in which they were first commissioned were as follows: GUERNSEYJohn Roland, 1690; John Stephens, 1691;. John Knap, 1692; Peter Cock, 1693; John Gruchy, 1695; Dennis Rousse, 1695; Thomas Le Mesurier, 1695; Peter Thoumes, 1696; Abraham Le Mesurier, 1696; Peter Tupper, 1696; John Luce, 1696; and John Oliver, 1696. JERSEYJames Lemprire, 1692; Jean Maugier, 1692; Daniel Jauverin, 1696; and Edward Browne, 1696. Of the Queen Anne captains, Peter Bonamy, John Turner, John Mattis and John Vallis (Guernsey), John Orange and Thomas Pipn (Jersey) had served as Lieutenants and/or masters of privateers under King William; Richard Robinson, John Dupr, Peter Du Froc(k), Thomas Naftel (Guernsey) and Andrew de Sainte Croix (Jersey) as gunners; Daniel Poundwell (or Pownell) and John Hubert (Guernsey), as boatswains. Seamen who had already commanded privateers not infrequently served in subordinate offices afterwards. 97There were three privateers of 200 tons, viz., the Chasse, the Guernsey Frigate and the Marquis d'Or (H.C.A. 26/15, 16).
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98Jersey's Jolly Shallop, Captain Philip Shoosmith, was of 4 Ions and was armed with palcreros only (H.C.A. 26/19). Cf. the Two Brothers, Captain Browne, of 4 tons, whose commission was seen by F. B. Tupper, The History of Guernsey and Its Bailiwick (Guernsey, 1876), pp.385-6. 99An exception was the Conqueror, which carried 50 rounds of great shot and 20 barrels of gunpowder when commissions were taken out by William Chaillon on 19th Aug., 1709, and 18th April. 1710 (H.C.A. 26/14). 100Usually muskets; sometimes a few pairs o pistols as well. 101H.C.A. 32/74, deposition of Knap in Norn, ignot., a bark of Isle Dieu, January, 1705. At this point of his cruise Knap had already taken so many prizes that his crew was reduced to ten. The prisoners took the opportunity to escape by hiding among the rocks. 102H.C.A. 32/74, deposition of de Ste-Croix in Notre Dame du Mont Vierge. It was also sometimes necessary for the captor to provision his prize before she was brought into port, e.g., in Marie Franose, H.C.A. 32/72(2). 103H.C.A. 32/85(2), deposition of R. Knowles in Vigilance of Belfast, Knowles, 28th Aug., 1712; H.C.A. 32/46, attestation of Sullivan in Prosperity oj Waterjord, Moriarty. 104H.C.A. 32/74, deposition of John Vallet, captain of the Flying Horse, in Norn, ignot., 18th June, 1705. 105A. N. Marine, B3/198, ff.38, 105, 282; ibid. B3/190, ftl95, 206. 106On 5th April, 1703, Hatton told Nottingham that there were nearly twenty Guernsey privateers (S.P. 47/2, f.51). C.S.P. Dom., 1702-3, p.675, wrongly paraphrases " over twenty local privateers," In fact, exactly twenty commissions had been granted by this date, but Daniel Poundwell was twice commissioned and one or two others may have been captured. No Guernsey prisoners had yet been returned, however, so that, omitting the crew of Poundwell's first ship, the Letter of Marque Declarations point to a total demand for 644 men. But the figures in the Declarations are not necessarily very exact and do not, of course, tell us how far one privateer may have borrowed men from another. Unless the privateers were all at sea at the same time some borrowing is likely to have taken place. 107In the nature of the case, the English Prize Papers throw much light on French trade but only when they deal with a recapture do they tell us anything about our own. In the Sarah de Jersey, Esnouf, we learn or instance that Philip Pipn, gentleman of Jersey and lord of the fee of Noirmoutier, with Captain No Le Cras and others, freighted corn from Portsmouth to Lisbon in 1707, the return cargo consisting of wine, oranges and lemons (H.C.A. 32/82). 108 The History of Guernsey (London, 1841), pp.131-2; Jugemenls, 5, f.118. The Royal Court apparently used the New Style of reckoning dates, which from 1700 was eleven days ahead of the Old Style officially used in England until 2nd Sept.. 1752. I have throughout adhered to the dates used in the documents. 109Ibid. 110Collier to Nottingham, 31st July, 1703, C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, p.71. The Lieut.-Governor of Jersey acknowledged the receipt of instructions to seize deserters dated 27th April, 1703. Similar instructions were doubtless sent to Guernsey: see J. Le Pelley, loc. cit., p.45. Mr. Le Pelley also cites a report by Captain Atkins alleging the presence of 300 English seamen, including deserters, in Guernsey in 1696. IllThat the efficacy of justice on the Island was subject to injury from quite small circumstances at this time is suggested by the Petition of the Lord Lieutenant, Bailiffs and Jurats of the Royal Court for money to build a new Court House and prison on 8th March, 1703. They staled that as there was then no prison in the island debts could not be recovered nor the sentences of the Court executed, C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, p.351). 112Jugements 5, f.126. See also the Privy Council Register for 26th May and 5th June, 1707, in P.C. 2/81/372, 376. Duncan, op. cit., p.132, states that Peter Dobre, Agent to the Lord High Admiral, presented an Order in Council to the Royal Court for registration to the same effect on 15th July, 1707, but I have not found the evidence for this. 113Jugements, 5, f.144. 114Half the Guernsey Jurats invested in privateers, William Le Marchant, James Carey and Nicholas Thoumes (before he became a Jurat) especially heavily. John Renouf had done so in 1696, the year in which he was made a Jurat. Neither the Lieut.-Governor nor any member of the Andros family did so. In a case before the Royal Court concerning the disposal of two prizes in 1709, so many of the Magistrates were recused as to leave only the Lieutenant-Bailiff and one of the Jurats (Order in Council, 19th May, 1709, registered in Jugements 5, f.151). 115C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, pp.229, 506. 116C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, p.161. 117C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, pp.68, 208-9. 118S.P. 42/118, f.333. 119C.S.P. Don. 703-4, p.208. The petitioners slated that they had about 300 French prisoners, "lodged in a house on the sea shore and opposite Havre". On 5th April, 1703, Hatton had estimated that there were 400 French prisoners in Guernsey (ibid. 1702-3, p.675). According to tables prepared by the Commissioners of Sick and Wounded for the Secretary of State, there were 238 prisoners in Guernsey on 19th October; 277 on 4th November; 314 on 30th January 1704; 273 on 6th January, 1705 (S.P. 42/118, ff.338, 348; S.P. 42/119, f.32). I can find no tables for 1706-9, but in the table for 29th June, 1710 shows only 1 prisoner in Guernsey. On 17th August,
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1710 there were 101 and on 7th April, 1711, 168 (S.P. 42/121, ff.259, 286, and one folio unnumbered). From 1707 the practice of ransoming prizes at sea increased. In 1703, apparently, French prisoners escaped often (Jugements 5, f.97). 120C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, pp.209, 220. 121Commissioners of Sick and Wounded to St. Sulpice, Commissaire de Marine at St. Malo, A. N. Marine, B3/123, f.458. 122C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, p.527. 123Hedges had been Judge of the High Court of Admiralty since 1689 and did not relinquish that office when appointed Secretary of State; but I see no reason to suspect him of thinking of his fees on this occasion. 124Commissioners of Sick and Wounded to Hedges, 4th March, 1704, S.P. 42/119, f.77. 125The French authorities seem to have desired to get rid of their prisoners with the minimum of delay but both sides insisted on parity of exchange (C.S.P. Dom. 1702-3, passim). Early in 1704 they were authorised to pledge their King's honour that all English prisoners should be sent back, ransom being paid for any overplus at the rate of one month's pay for each man (ibid. 1703-4, p.510). 126One cannot, for example, be sure that owners never took out Letters of Marque for trading or even fishing vessels. The number of such cases might constitute presumptive evidence of trade with the enemy, especially in the case of Jersey, only half of whose captains took any prizes at all. 127There were many complaints of the sufferings of prisoners during the War of the Spanish Succession. For the condition of French prisoners in Plymouth, for instance, see A. N. Marine B3/123, fl.504-5, 555, 566-7. English prisoners returning from Dian and St. Malo early in 1704 complained of exactions and hardships (C.S.P. Dom. 1703-4, p.576). But there is evidence that conditions at St. Malo and Dian were relatively good, at any rate between 1702-08 (E. Dupont, Les Prisonniers de Guerre Anglais en France au XVIHe Sicle, Paris, 1915). The French documents strongly suggest that the situation of prisoners at Dunkirk was especially bad, but it is unlikely that there were any Channel Island prisoners there (A. N. Marine B3/122, f.464, and B3/128, f.586). Much suffering was occasioned on both sides by the dishonesty, or insolvency, of the victualling contractors; and the English Commissioners at any rate ordered delivery of rations in cash from the beginning of August, 1704 (A. N. Marine B3/123, f.590). Inevitably prisoners in France felt the successive bread famines also. 128In Charles Galley de Rochelle, Chauvet, examination in Guernsey 17th January, 1710, of Edes, Barnes, Castell and St. Croix, H.C.A. 32/55. " Plunderage " almost certainly means pillage. The pillage of goods and merchandise found upon or above the gun deck of a prize taken in fight and not otherwise, except her tackle and furniture, was allowed to captors " without further or other account" by Proclamation of 1st June, 1702 (P.C. 2/79, ff.139-143). It had been legalised by statute (Marsden, Law and Custom, II., x.). 129In Lyon Blanc, Baudry, examination in Weymouth, 29,th November, 1705, H.C.A. 32/69. The officers and crews of English privateers were sometimes hired by the month, without benefit of prize; for example, the Rainbow of London, Captain Young, in the Seine, H.C.A. 32/82. Cf. an entry in Henry's account book with reference to the " net proventi (appartenant aux bourgois) de la prise L'Hirondelle de Glaseo " (Tupper Transcript, f.42). 130In Hopewell de Cork, Webb, examinations in Guernsey 15th February, 1712 and 5th April, 1714, H.C.A. 32/63. 131Amiraut 4, ff.21, 31 and 5, f.13. At the rate of exchange of 14 livres tournois to the pound sterling employed for the conversion of prize appraisements by the officials responsible for the collection of the Lord High Admiral's tenths, these wages would amount to between 20 and 27 shillings a month. Compare the wages of 6-10 shillings a week earned by skilled craftsmen and others in Jersey towards the end of the 17th century cited by A. C. Saunders, Jersey in the \lth Century (Jersey, 1931), based on the Dumaresq MS. Tupper, op. cit., p.389, quotes penalties of 10 to 30 livres for minor offences in Guernsey promulgated between 1683 and 1695. 132Amiraut 4, f.31. It was exceptional to carry a surgeon or doctor (H.C.A. 26/13-21). 133In Union of Nantes. Andre, etc., examinations in Guernsey 6th and llth March, 1713. of Pietersen, De Portrou and Hughes, H.C.A. 32/82 (2). 134Amiraut 5, ff.10, 16. Parker claimed payment of the product from the Sieur Jean Alez, armator of the privateer, .but was told by the Court to address himself to Captain Chubb's testators. The Court on 28th February, 1711, ordered Captain Rogers, one of the testators, to pay Parker, James Perchard, armator of the Union, was ordered to pay Le Ray on 27th February, 1711. 135This may be the suggestion of an entry in Pierre Henry's account book: Peter Tupper owes him L58 19s. 7d. tournois " pour un huitime de 5 des chares de matelots a gages pour les bourgeois " (Tupper Transcript, f.42). 136R. Pares, "The Manning of the Navy in the West Indies, 1702-63," in Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 4th series, vol. xx, p.40. 137Amiraut 5, f.6. On the evidence of the litigation seaman seems ordinarily to have been entitled to three shares, if the owners agreed to pay shares to the crew, and a lieutenant to about twenty shares (Amiraut 5, ff.8, 16, 26, 28). 138The Court gave sentence on 17th January, 1713, against Samuel Dobre, armator of the Btirrhett Gaily, Captain Courier, " concerning the wages he had stopped his seamen on account
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of mutiny," and Dobre appealed to the Privy Council (P.C. 2/84, 1.303). George de la Gard likewise appealed against sentence given in the Court in favour of some seamen belonging to the Revenge Gaily, Captain Dumaresq, on a wages suit and was successful (P.C. 2/83, fi.174, 185). 139Amiraut 4, f.21. 140Amiraut 4, ff.31, 52; ibid. 5, ff.8-10; Jugeraents 5, f.119. Some of the families of the men who were lost on the Sailor's Prosperity, Captain Roche, which was presumed to have perished at sea in February, 1710, were said to be living in great distress (Union de Nantes, Andre, etc. H.C.A. 32/85E2]). 141Amiraut 5, ff.26, 28. 142The seamen were not always the injured parties. Several of them were prosecuted between 31st January and 20th February, 1710, for having broken their contracts. One of ihem, John Parker, who had seen long service as a lieutenant or master, failed to embark on three cruises (Amiraut 5, ff.ll, 13, 15). More serious were the cases of Dennis Rousse, captain of the Prosperous, and Henry Knap, captain of the Greyhound, both of whom had to be admonished by the Court to keep their engagements with their owners. The obligation placed on Rousse by the Court on 22nd May, 1703, was to return en course within fifteen days of his return to the island, provided the owners equipped him within that time; he had apparently left the island and was to return within fifteen days or be answerable for all damages (Amiraut 4, f.5; Jugements 5, ff.97-8). The lieutenant and ten of the crew of the Mordaunt Sloop, Captain Rawling (Roland?), refused to sail on one occasion on the ground of ill treatment by the captain (Amiraut 3: 28th and 3rd January, 1705). Two seamen of the Chasse, Captain Henry Brock, were convicted of selling prize merchandise (Amiraut 5, ff.22, 30, 34). 143The French privateers proper captured by Guernseymen included the Faulcon of St. Malo (16 guns), Victoire de St. Maio (18 guns), Envense de St. Malo (4 guns), Elizabeth de Calais (6 guns), Notre Dame de Bon Secours (6 guns), Jeune Veuve (6 guns), Anne Victoire of Cherbourg (no guns) and La Lgere de Rochelle (14 guns). The Good Fortune of Ostend (6 guns) was a privateer commissioned by the Duke of Bavaria. Some of these, f ell prize to two privateers sailing in consort and some had had their crews weakened by the subtraction of prize crews (H.C.A. 32/58, 85 (2), 57, 46, 74, 64 (2), 50 (2), 69, 61 (2). The George (24 guns), taken by Captain Richard Pipn in the mouth of the Gironde, was a bigger catch but the Jerseymen took only three or four enemy privateers (H.C.A. 32/79, 48, 55, 94). The Entreprenant of St. Malo (30 guns) fell to Pipn in company with two Guernsey privateers after brief resistance (H.C.A. 32/57). The captured merchantmen included L'Aimable Marie de St. Malo (20 guns), the Saints Marie de Dunkirk (12 guns), and the Duke of Bavaria (14 guns) which carried the commission of the Marquis of Bedmar, Captain General of the Spanish Netherlands; the Bachelor's Endeavour (16 guns), which fell to Captain Peraud of Jersey, was a recapture and had only a small French crew on board (H.C.A. 32/50 (2), 71, .56, 51). A number of other prizes carried 2, 3 or 4 guns and small arms. France during this war used privateers and even naval ships for trading voyages and the term " armed merchantman " may carry a suggestie falsi at times. Some of them are included in the Account of all Ships of War and Privateers taken from the enemy to 15th Nov.. 1707, which was laid before Parliament on 20th Nov. and lists 24 privateers in the capture of which Channel Islanders had a hand (H.C.A. 30/774). 144Tupper, op. cit., pp.385-6; examinations and appraisements in H.C.A. 32/47-86, 90, 92. Deponents were asked for information about the ship's position and other circumstances of a capture. 145H.C.A. 32/50(2), 55, 61(), 56. Cf. the following extract from Captain Gruchy's journal for 23rd Jan., 1703, when he came up with 13 Ostend and French sail and captured three of them : " The Enemy put themselves in a posture of defence, and drew up in a line of Battle. 1 put my spizzle yard alongships, prepared my grapplings, and my men with Pistolls, cutlasses, pollaxes and Granados, appear'd ready to board some of them, upon which the said fleet dispersed and I pursued, and after a sharp dispute with the Commadore sayling through the body of their fleet, I boarded one of their ships of 4 guns and 6 Patereros and well fitted with small arms and liad a Letter of Mart, the Captain of which told me their Commadore was Capt. Peter Du Baert (nephew to the famous Jean Du Baert of Dunkirk) with a ship of six guns mounted, 6 Patereros, and 50 men and good small arms " (Sie. Barbe Ostend, H.C.A. 32/51). Gruchy in the Pembroke Galley, lost his topmast and had his sails and rigging much shattered. Some of the lost engagements may, of course, have been more severe: the Conqueror of Guernsey, Captain Durant, had four men killed and others wounded when she was captured by a Nantes privateer in 1712 (S. de la Nicolliere-Teijeiro, La Course et les Corsaires du Port de Nantes, Paris, 1896, p.72). 146Depositions in Anne, Albey, Anne and George, Vaughan, Si. Anne de Guildo, Jerriguit, and Notre Dame de Vierge, H.C.A. 32/48, 50, 74. The prize crew on the Hopewell, Stafford, mistook Mont Orgueil for a Breton castle (H.C.A. 32/62). Cf. H.C.A. 42/20 in the Si. Nicholas, Dutot, an appeal against the seizure by H.M.S. Orford of a French trader which had just left Guernsey before the island had received advice of the declaration of war. French shipping in the harbours of Jersey and Guernsey when the war broke out was. however, released: 7 vessels in Jersey,-6 in Guernsey (C.S.P. Dom. 1702-3, p.101; S.P. 42/2, fi.26, 31, 42). 147Chteaurenault to Pontchartrain, Rennes, 5th Dec., 1704, A. N. Marine B3/126, f.321 ; Beauregard, capitaine de port at Lorient, May, 1707, A. N. Marine B3/147, f.12. 148Deposition of f.e Cooq in Guernsey, 12th Nov.. 1702, H.C.A. 32/83.
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149In St. Anthony de Dunkirk, depositions in Guernsey 13th Jan., 1704, H.C.A. 32/49. The captors were Powndwell, Robinson, Abraham and William Le Mesurier. 150Depositions in Guernsey 1705, H.C.A. 32/85(1). 151Andros to Hedges, 19th Jan., 1704, S.P. 47/2, f,217. 152The master of the Swedish Fortune, Wiebes, was so deceived by Captain Roland, whom he desired to lend him a pilot to get into St. Malo (H.C.A. 32/58); cf. deposition of Le Clerc in the Swallow, Le Clerc, Weymouth, 12th Nov., 1705, H.C.A. 32/81. See Comer Williams, The Liverpool Privateers (London, 1897), p.130, for a Guernsey privateer which pretended to be a French privateerwith the Liverpool privateer as her prize in companynear the Gironde in 1757. 153H.C.A. 32/79(1), deposition of the Lieutenant of the Chasseur, who added that " Hawkins' men beat him and his company most sadly after they had demanded quarter," one of them dying of his wounds and the Lieutenant himself being unable to move " for his hurts ". 154Deposition in Belle Alliance, Roux, H.C.A. 42/20. 155It was stated in the Galley de Caudas, depositions in Guernsey, 5th March, 1705, H.C.A. 32/61(2), that "it is the Gustme here amongst the Privateeres when they make an agreement amongst the Captains to make itt by word of Mouth and not in writeing ". The Prosperous and Marlborough had not even been able to " change words " before their joint attack on the St. James of He de Dars in a fog (allegation ex parte Capt. D. Naftel, llth Sept., 1712, H.C.A. 32/67). Captain Oliver Mansell in the Terror stated that he had left Guernsey with the William Galley and Mary Sloop but had not promised to keep company as far as St. Malo (deposition in Guernsey 13th Feb., 1704, St. Peter de l'l sie au Moine, H.C.A. 42/20). 156Deposition in Guernsey, 19th Oct., 1702, H.C.A. 32/60. 157Interrogatories administered ex parte the William Galley, Capt. Brock, to J. Termison, a prisoner, and Termison's deposition, Guernsey, 5th March, 1706, H.C.A. 32/55. 158Deposition of Le Mesurier, Guernsey, January, 1703, H.C.A. 32/58. The notes made in this case by Sir John Cooke, the Advocate General, are in the Bodleian Library, MSS. Rawl. 383, ff.607-8. 159Depositions of Robinson, Le Mesurier and Guilmotte in Guernsey. 8th Oct., 1702, H.C.A. 32/48. 160H.C.A. 32/72(2). 161union de Nantes, etc., H.C.A. 32/85(2). 162Information on these disputes comes mainly from the records of the High Court of Admiralty, which as a rule determined them. But the Roy_al Court seems to have taken cognizance of the detailed apportionment of shares in a joint capture. Thus, when a difference arose between the armators of two privateers on the subject of sharing the prize Jeune Franqaise of Calais " sur le pied d'homme pour homme," the Court ordered sale of the cargo by both armators jointly (Amiraut 4, f.12). Five captains were ordered to produce lists of their crews in connection with the capture of the Chasseur de Calais and three other prizes (Amiraut 4, f.24). On the other hand, it was apparently open to a captor to take to the Royal Court the larger question of his claim to any share at all in a prize if it was based on a contract or agreement made in the island. John Bowden, armator of the Prosperous Galley, Captain Hubert, brought such an action in the Royal Court in 1707 concerning differences with the armators of the Marlborough, Captain Naftel, about the claim of the Prosperous to have shared in the capture of the St. James of Ile de Dars. He lost his case and appealed to the Court of Jugements, where it was still depending in June 1710. On the 26th of that month Captain Hubert obtained a commission from the Admiralty Court to take evidence in the island on the matter, apparently without the knowledge of Bowden, who, however, agreed that the Commission should proceed. The armators of the Marlborough contended that Bowden and Hubert were out of power to prosecute before another Court while the case was before the Court of Jugements. The Royal Court, after summoning the Commissioners to appear before it, quashed their proceedings on 28th November Following an order of the Admiralty Court on 13th May, 1712, a copy of these proceedings was sent to Hedges, the Admiralty Judge, who issued two more Commissions for the hearing of witnesses in the island. These Commissions were executed in November 1712. The case is aa interesting example of the conflict between English and Channel Island jurisdictions and represented a victory for the Admiralty Court. H.C.A. 32/47; ibid. 32/67; Amiraut 5, f.3. ]63Interrogatories to George Hughes, H.C.A. 32/85(2). 164The batteries of La Rochelle could not be used when privateers appeared in the roads in May 1706 (A.N. Marine, B3/141, f.8). 165C. Durand, Les Milices Gardes-Cotes de Bretagne de 1716 a 1792 (Rennes, 1927), pp. 11-15. The royal rglements of the 13th June 1708 and 2nd May 1712 aimed at the improvement of training and the creation of special detachments better armed than the capitaineries. ]66A.N. Marine B3/124, ff.32, 35, 41, 43-45. Ricous, Marine Commandant at Lorient, intelligently argued that the replacement by a Royal nominee of a popular commander, one who had married in the district, was a mistake for recruiting reasons. 167Ibid. B3/136, f.106. 168Ibid. B3/124, f.359. 169Thus Clairambault to Pontchartrain, Lorient, 6th June and 23rd July, 1707 (ibid. B3/148, ff.8, 118). Jean Vie. a prominent Nantes corsair, was so employed in 170<1 (La NicolliereTeijero, op. at. p.90).
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170A.N. Marine, B3/128, f.305; B3/148, fi.8-9, 230, 283; B3/159, fi.213, 295; B3/189, f.149. Towards the expenses of arming these vessels merchants were empowered to raise a droit de tonnage (A. Monentheuil, Essai sur la Course, Paris, 1898). Jean Vie was ordered by the French Admiralty to rid the Breton coast of the Island corsairs in 1710 and is said to have carried out this task efficiently in 1710-11 (La Nicollire-Teijeiro, op. cit. pp.95-98). 171Lusancay to Pontchartrain, Nantes, 1st June, 1711, A. N. Marine B3/202, f.10, wrote: " II et est fort a souhaiter que les villes de St. Malo et de Nantes eussent e asss de libert pour pourvoir a leur mode et a leurs depens faire armer des bailments qui eussent protege leur commerce " But in 1705 the St. Malo merchants were unwilling to incur the expense, ibid. B3/128, f.305. 172Chamilly to Pontchartrain, May 1710, ibid. B3/190, f.194; B3/202, f.ll. Not until the autumn of 1711, after more than a year's correspondence with the Minister of Marine, did the Chamber of Commerce at Bordeaux succeed in financing the armament of a frigate, the Nymphe, whose rather mediocre achievements can be followed in the Registre des deliberations de la Chambre de Commerce de Guienne, 1705-14-, Archives de la Gironde, C.4251. As late as 3rd Feb., 1713 the Chamber requested the Intendant to constrain by " garnison effective" those merchants who had failed to subscribe to the % loan for this purpose (ibid., f.431). Six months earlier the Chamber rejected on grounds of expense the suggestion of the Intendant that they arm a captured Guernseyman for the defence of their river (ibid., f.387). 173Chteaurenault to Pontchartrain, 5th Dec. 1704, etc., A.N. Marine, B3/126, f.321; B3/132, ff.285, 331, 345. 174Clairambault to Pontchartrain, 13th April, 1706, etc., ibid. B3/137, ff.206, 217, 251, 361, 426; cf. ibid. B3/128, f.464. At the request of Vie, who had taken her, the John Galley of Jersey, Captain John Pipn, was put into service to assist him against the Island privateers in July 1711 (La Nicollire-Teijeiro, op. cit. pp.95-96). 175Clairambault to Pontchartrain, 5th Dec., 1704 and 23rd July, 1707, A.N. Marine, B3/124, f.37; B3/148, f.137. Cf. Beauregard, capitaine de port at Lorient, May 1707, ibid. B3/147, f.19. 176The French Government complained very strongly of breaches by Channel Island privateers of the Fishery Treaty of May 1708 (renewed Sept. 1710), by which those engaged in catching flat and fresh fish " from the Orcades round the coast of Great Britain and Ireland, the Islands of Guernsey and Jersey included, and from the Height of Ostend to Bayonne," and vessels carrying such fish to market, were not to be molested on either side. There were infractions of the Treaty on both sides but the offenders certainly included some Guernsey privateers, as the British authorities admitted. The privateers used enemy fishing boats sometimes to get close inshore (Dartmouth to Lords of Admiralty, 2nd April, 1711 and enclosure from Pontchartrain, 4th March, 1711, Adm. 1/4095, f.24). The text of the treaty is in the London Gazette for 12th May, 1708 and 7lh Sept., 1710 (renewal). See also correspondence of the Commissioners of Sick and Wounded with Dartmouth in S.P. 42/121-2, passim, and the correspondence between Burchett and Hedges in Adm. 2/436-440. I hope to discuss this controversey elsewhere. The point must be made here that some Channel Islanders could behave without scruple and sometimes brutally. One of them is said to have deposited a captured crew on a deserted island (A.N. Marine B3/123, ff.56, 76). It is good to have a prisoner's evidence that Gruchy at least treated his prisoners " with all imaginable Civility " (Sie. Barbe d'Ostende, H.C.A. 32/51). Nor should it be forgotten that most of the captains were under 30, some of them very young. 177Nom. ignot., a dogger, etc. H.C.A. 32/74; Marcella, ibid. 32/78: St. Peter de l'Ile au Moine, ibid. 42/20. Other instances could be given. 178Deposition of Captain David Carter, Guernsey, 12th June, 1712, H.C.A. 32/50(2). 179E.g. the deposition of Captain Edward Vostier in Si. Peter of ie d'Ar, Guernsey, 18th Feb., 1712, H.C.A. 32/90(1). Vostier assumed command of the Marquis d'Or when her captain, Daniel Naftel, was killed in an engagement " near Wood Tower, in the Lower End of Bordeaux River ". 180Gibon, op. cit., p.163. 181Ricous to Pontchartrain, 4th Aug., 1704. A.N. Marine B3/124, f.33.
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PART II. A NEW VOCATION: PRIVATEERING IN THE WARS OF 1702-13*
The well-informed historian of the Cotentin peninsula contrasts the misery of these years in Normandy with the prosperity of the lies AngloNormandes: 'Leur marine employee a la course et a la contrebande s'accrut petit a petit pendant les douze annes que dura la guerre.' Jonathan Duncan, the historian of Guernsey, is equally credible in writing that, 'for the first time in its annals, the island was enabled to export commodities of high value. English merchants came over to purchase the French goods captured by the privateers, and particularly brandies, which met with a ready sale. When peace was restored, new ideas of trade gradually developed themselves among the inhabitants, who had now acquired some capital.' The force of this statement lies in the last word and we should bear in mind Philip Falle's warning, that privateering was 'gainful to some particular Persons', rather than diffusing prosperity through the community in the way that a 'peaceable open trade' can do.1 Even at its apogee in this period, the caprerie employed a smaller labour force than the knitting industry, though its replacement rate was higher, and it employed a number of immigrants. It boomed and ran out, leaving a trail of wasted bodies, fatherless families and personal rancours, if at the same time a new pride and confidence wrested from harsh experience. Who benefited? The contemporary examples of Dunkirk and St. Malo would lead us to expect that it was a minority of captains - at Dunkirk promoted to the bourgeoisie, at St. Malo as often as not already members of the ruling families and a minority of investors, chiefly to be found among the promoters of armaments, the armateurs in the narrower sense of ships' husbands, those who raised the cash from other subscribers and managed the finances of the resulting socit, overseeing the equipment, manning and victualling of a privateer with the help or instrumentality of its captain, negotiating with other ports into which it might put in, and above all handling prize sales. In Zeeland he was known as the boekhouder. At Dunkirk and sometimes elsewhere, the husband was so much characterised by his role as banker, wholesaler and accountant that he was called the 'dpositaire' of the armament, with power to call on his passive partners - the 'associs', 'intresses' or 'co-proprietaires' - for additional subscriptions according to the fractions each had purchased in the armament. In the Mediterranean ports, where investors subscribed
This is a full version of Section V of Chapter V of A People of the Sea: The Maritime History of the Channel Islands, ed. A.G. Jamieson (Methuen, 1986). The text printed here is from Professor Bromley's own typescript which is now deposited in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, since several passages in this chapter had to be omitted for reasons of space from A People of the Sea.
1
Dupont, op. cit. p. 405; Duncan, op. at, p. 232; Falle, ubi cit. supra.
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fixed sums, large or small, instead of buying fractions, and were commonly far more numerous, there was sometimes an elected 'caissier' to manage the funds as well as a 'directeur' or two for the overall supervision of an armament, usually merchant-shipowners with some credit in Marseilles and correspondents abroad, or else naval officers with influence at home, quite often a combination of the two. Whichever of these two types of structure was adopted, it was the depositaries and the directeurs who operated as the driving-wheels of 'la course' in their different worlds. Depending on the scale of the investment required, they might be substantial shipowners, wholesale merchants and (at Dunkirk) brewers, or modest shipmasters, shipbrokers, shipchandlers, notaries, innkeepers and master-craftsmen in the shipping trades; naval officers, a few of them captains but the majority ofjunior rank, though of noble families, lay all across this spectrum. Many of these promoters were bankrupted for their pains. Others were the real profiteers of the game, not so much because they held the largest interest in their armament, which was by no means always the case, as because they controlled the sale of prize goods, often buying these themselves and reselling at a profit. It was said, perhaps too sardonically, at Dunkirk in 1710, that 'si 1'on voit briller quelqu'un, l'on ne doute pas qu'il est ou qu'il a est dpositaire'. At Marseilles, St. Malo and Calais - for which ports extensive lists of privateering shareholders are extant-we find that it was exactly these men who most often speculated in the course. They invested in each other's armaments. We can therefore demarcate a specific privateering interest in each place, not extending necessarily to the whole shipping fraternity, still less confined to it.2 The English letter-of-marque declarations, which list, though incompletely, the 'owners, employers and setters forth' of an armament, do not indicate which of them was ' Armator or Husband' - to adopt the terminology found in other documents. Confusion is introduced, however, when captains describe themselves as 'armateurs', as Robinson, Gruchy and Holland did in the 'Accort' of 1712 already discussed. In the business of preparing a privateer for sea, in particular, no sharp line can be drawn between captain and husband. At all times, even ashore, corsair captains remained the natural and convenient intermediary between owners and crews; but they might assume other responsibilities, such as buying a suitable vessel on behalf of the ship's husband. What the captain was in no position to look after was the financial and legal business of his 'socit' or 'consortie' - both these terms being current in the Islands at this time for the owners' partnership. The accounts of Mathieu de Sausmarez make this fully clear; his captains may spend on their necessities at home or in England, but it is he who foots the bill - and who corresponds with an agent in London for
2 Marseilles, Arch. Dp. ix B4 and 5; Rennes, Arch. Dep. 9B 167 and 168; ibid. 4 E17 (tude Vercoutre); Arras, Arch. Dp. 13B 36-39.
376 Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760 seeing a case through Doctors' Commons and possibly as far as the Privy Council in its capacity as Lords of Appeal in Prize Causes.3 To avoid the ambiguity of 'armateur', it seems best to call him the husband or director. In France he was sometimes, at least in form, elected by his coproprietors as well as accountable to them; and at Calais there is some evidence that he might be replaced by one of the latter. This may have occurred in the Islands too, but evidence is lacking. In general, he was the initiator of an armament, bound to retain for himself any fractions - a quarter or some multiple thereof- not purchased by others. Because of their accountability to partners and crews, not least because of disputes with each other about joint captures, there are numerous references to husbands in the Guernsey vice-admiralty records, very often arising out of claims for unpaid shares, unpaid wages and other debts. These references confirm what has been said about the chief French promoters: they are also the most frequent investors in privateers. So too with Mathieu de Sausmarez. His acounts show that he held fractions in at least thirty armaments during the Succession War: and, as the ledger we have opens in 1708, it is unlikely that all the earlier armaments of interest to him have left their traces there. And yet his name does not appear more than six times in the letter-of-marque declarations for the Succession War; it is not always there even when his accounts reveal him as the husband. Either the declarant did not feel able to name all the setters-forth or the Admiralty Court registrar was content with a roll-call of selected names: more likely still, the named owners, back in the Islands, were disposing of fractions of their fractions even at the date when a commission was issued. As far as this evidence goes, Jean de Sausmarez appears 26 times as a part-owner, frequently in armaments which (as his ledger bears out) also interested Mathieu; but he was probably interested in many more. With Elize Dobre, who had armed and commanded the 6-ton Reserve of Guernsey in 1695, Jean de Sausmarez in fact tops the list of Guernsey investors from 1702 to 1712. Both were prominent husbands. Who were the others in the War of the Spanish Succession?
De Sausmarez and Daniel Naftel Sr. armed the Revenge (D. Naftel Jr.) 'conjointement': Account Book, p. 104. De Sausmarez corresponded for six years with Martin de Gruchy in London about the Anne of Aberdeen (Adamson), taken off Sables d'Olonne by Capt. Chabosseau just before the Cessation of Arms and condemned for carrying a fraudulent passport. When her owners appealed, he thought of going to London in person and asked both Jean Durell, his brother-in-law (deputy bailiff of Jersey), and 'ma soeur de Cartaret' to procure him a letter of recommendation to 'quelque personne de distinction' with a view to easing matters through the appeals committee of the Privy Council, usually consisting of only three or four Lords (Letter Book ii, to Durell, 11 April 1713). He won his case, after enquiries in France to establish the nonvalidity of the passport in 1714, and further examination of his proofs in Guernsey in 1715, but not until 1716 (ibid., to De Gruchy, 7 Sept. 1714, 2 July 1715); even so, his Scottish adversaries came back to the attack next year (ibid. 16 Nov. 1717, 30Jan. 1718). Case papers in HCA 32/74 and 42/10.
3
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From the example of Mathieu de Sausmarez, it would be imprudent to accept anything less than six appearances in the declarations as a pointer to the identity of a husband. To be on the safe side we may take four appearances as the minimum. This must omit a small number of husbands, but include very few who were not. 4 We arrive at a total of 36 names, all but two of them -Jean Mauger ('Major') and Nicolas Allez active from 1702-3, and all but three - Thomas Le Mesurier, William Brock and Henry Knap - reappearing until at least as late as 1707-8; eleven names recur from the early war years until 1711-12, nine as far as 1709-10.5 Since these last include Mathieu de Sausmarez, there is no reason to suppose that they withdrew from privateering before the end of the war. For its later years, however, the declarations list fewer settersforth. (This could be because there was developing a higher concentration of ownership by then, but one cannot feel sure that it was not simply the result of greater laxity in the court registry.) These individuals must be regarded as the inner circle of Guernsey's war entrepreneurs, the more so as no less than seventeen of them were investing in privateers in the previous war. Michel Falla, Daniel Lefebure, Thomas and William Le Marchant began to take an interest as early as 1691-2, and continued to do so right down to 1711, without peers in their persistence, the core of the inner circle; most of the others became active in 1695-6, when private war was seen to produce a dividend in the Islands. Certain families stand out at this early stage besides the Le Marchants. The Careys are particularly prominent among the 'founders', though Pierre (a gunner in 1691) and Nathaniel become less visible as owners in the Succession War. More than one generation of Le Mesuriers appears in the Nine Years War, including six captains (four of privateers); Abraham, Elie, Leonard, Pierre, Philippe and Thomas. Jean and Pierre Tupper, zealous husbands in the next war, already appear as captains, occasionally as owners also. So do Elize Dobre, Nicolas Thoumes,
4 Thus it seems that either Elisha Williams or Thomas de Sausmarez, the only two owners of the powerful Guernsey Frigate of 1710-11 to appear in the declarations, was her husband. 5 They are (with numbers of armaments, not vessels, in brackets): Jean de Sausmarez (26), Elize Dobre (26), Laurens Martin (24), William Dobre (21), Thomas Le Marchant (18), Pierre Estienne (17), Michel Falla (16), Jean Tupper (15), Nicolas Le Pelley (13), William Le Marchant (12), Nicolas Thoumes (10), Peter Perchard (10), Abraham Le Mesurier (9), Pierre Tupper (9), Jean Allez (8), James Perchard (8), William Brock (7), Jacques Carey (7), Nicolas Carey (7), John Baudain (7), Daniel Lefebure (7), Leonard Le Mesurier (7), Thomas Le Mesurier (7), Guillaume Le Mesurier (6), Jean Dobre (6), Pierre Dobre (6), Mathieu de Sausmarez (6), Pierre Lefebure (5), Daniel Naftel senior (5), Jacques Bonamy (5), Jean Mauger (5), Henry Knap (4), Jean Gruchy (4), Nicolas dc Jersey (4), Nicolas Allez (4). The very occasional investment in a Jersey privateer has been included here. The declarations (HCA 26/13-21) must not be regarded as more than a crude indication of the order of precedence.
378
Daniel Naftel senior, Pierre and Jean Estienne, second only to Jean Tupper in the number of prizes he took though never much of an owner; Jean Mauger, a Jersey commander, gravitated to Guernsey in 1696. A few other families which later invested in the caprerie, notably the Bonamys, were also well represented at sea during the Nine Years War. 6 Very noticeable in the early years, moreover, is the strong nautical presence among the declared owners. There is nothing surprising in the fact of two captains, Andre Bonamy and Thomas Le Mesurier, financing the 20-ton Andrew with her single gun in 1694, but more so to find a predominance of captains and retired captains among the owners of the Nonsuch Galley (Morell) in 1696. A little later, all seven owners of the Good Fellowship (Slowly), all five of the Four Brothers (P. Tupper), and all four of the Resolution (J. Estienne), except possibly Nicolas Le Pelley in each case, could call themselves captains. All four owners of the 2-gun St. Martin's Sloop (N. Thoumes) were captains.7 It is tempting to ask whether the initial impetus to Island privateering came from precisely this milieu. Certainly it has a popular flavour about it sometimes found at Dunkirk, more obviously in the West Indies, rarely at St. Malo. This is confirmed by the fact that all the Island armaments in the Nine Years War whose structure we know, admittedly only a handful, conferred two-thirds of the prize money - not the one-third customary in France and enshrined in 'the Privateer Act' of 1693 - on captain and crew. It was for this reason that Captain John Knap and the ship's company of the Deance undertook later, in 1703, to furnish 'a nos propres fraix tout ce qui sera necessaire pour notre subvention de vivres et de boires tout le temps que nous serons en course sans que le dit armateur y soit aucunement oblige au moyen de quoy nous aurons les deux tiers des prises . . . ' The implication is that the crew were relieving the owners of a third of the cost of fitting-out, which is roughly the proportion often to be found in the costings of a French armament when added to the cost of two months' advance pay.8 The Deance contract does not refer to pay at all; reward, like reimbursement, would depend on prizes. Perhaps this made it especially desirable for the crew to find an 'armateur' who could be trusted to look after their interests. They chose Nicolas Thoumes, an experienced captain and husband, who in return
HCA 26/1-3. the most prominent owners at this time not to reappear in the following war were Jean Raulx (8), Jean Poulet (8), Nathaniel Carey and Robert Renouf (7). Elias Le Mesurier (8) reappears only in 1702, Pierre Carey (11) possibly in 1710, when however there are two namesakes to choose between, one a jurat. 7 Ibid. 2 (4 April 1694, 7 Feb. 1696) and 3 (9 and 11 June 1696, 12 March 1697). 8 Amiraut 3 (26 June 1695, 15 Dec. 1696); Bodleian, Rawl. A 270, f. 40; Priaulx, Deance charter party, cit. supra. The best evidence for French costings comes from the 'projets d'armement' drawn up at Marseilles: Arch. Dp. II B 4, ff. 563v-4, 585, 602, 612v-3, 627-8, 640-1, 647v-9, 674-5, 680-3, 686, 739; 5, ff. 10M1, 20, 69V-70, 103, 107, 115v-6. A cheap vessel would tend to increase this proportion, but much less so than the oarsmen required for a galley.
6
379
would receive, not a commission, but a share. Yet the 35-ton Defiance was no mere rowboat. Mounting eight guns with up to forty men, she belonged to the middle class of Guernsey privateers. The method of her financing should have been easier for lighter armaments. Pierre Tupper armed the 10-ton Chevel Marin in 1705 on the basis of one-third only to the 'bourgeois', himself and her captain, Elie Guillemotte, being the only declared setter-forth, though his accounts show that Jean Falla and 'Mr Cabot de Hampstone' bought an eighth of her first cost, for less than 19 sterling. Reckoning her owners' share at 151, this would imply that her crew contributed as much for the victuals. But she carried only twentyfive men, eighteen of whom received wages, and was provisioned for a mere six weeks.10 It is safe to assume that the Defiance, nominally victualled for six months - according to the letter-of-marque declaration - cost a good deal more. Can we, then, believe that the agreement in her case was representative of the more expensive armaments? There are too many references to wage claims in the vice-admiralty court to allow any such assumption. Moreover, the De Sausmarez accounts clearly point to a two-thirds share of prize proceeds for the owners. It is hardly conceivable that privateering would have attracted as much mercantile investment as it did if it was to earn only a third of the proceeds, even had the seagoing community been in a position, time after time, to put up the cost of victuals and go without wages. Of the 'inner circle' of 1702-12, nevertheless, no less than ten had commanded privateers in the previous war, and six major investors served for a time at least during the Succession War itself: Elize Dobre and Guillaume Le Mesurier in 1702-3; William Brock till he was captured by the French in 1705; Pierre Tupper, though wounded in 1704, until 1706; Henry Knap, who started as a common seaman, till 1711; Jean Gruchy to the end of hostilities. Of these, it is true, Dobre, Tupper and Gruchy had already made their names as captains in 16956; but Leonard Le Mesurier and Naftel senior had then also been described as such in the letter-of-marque declarations, though not of privateers, while Nicolas Allez there appears as 'mariner'. At least sixteen experienced seamen is an impressive proportion of our total of thirty-six leading investors. With Elize Dobre well in the lead, half a dozen of them indeed figure high on the list. Again, certain families stand out: to the Le Mesuriers and Tuppers among the seagoing fraternity, we must now add the names of Dobre and Allez; it is tempting to add the Brocks too, for three of them commanded privateers besides William -John, Joseph and Henry, all of whom were investors in two or three armaments, without necessarily sailing as their commanders. The much narrower circle of Jersey investors was dominated by men
9 10
HCA 26/19 (25 Oct. 1703). Priaulx, Tupper MS, p. 42; HCA 26/20 (13 April 1705).
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who commanded, or had commanded, privateers. The most assiduous investor was Captain Edward Le Brun (Browne), captain of the 12-gun Durrell Galley in 1696 and of the 4-ton Two Brothers in 1702: his name appears 32 times in the letter-of-marque declarations from 1692 to 1711; in the Succession War he had a hand in more than one armament in every three - and in the last four years of hostilities, two in every three. He was often associated with Captain Jacques Lemprire, who appears 23 times between 1692 and 1711, and with his relative, Captain John Le Brun (19 declarations). The only civilian to approach this score was Francis Drake, who (like Lemprire) had close ties with Le Brun and with St. Malo.11 They are followed by Captains Thomas Pipn (11) Edouard Dumaresq (8) and John Coombes (7); though the last, domiciled in London, never commanded a privateer, William Coombes did. Captains Richard Pipn (5) and Jean Augraud (4) complete the list of seafarers with four or more declared investments, unless the St. Helier merchant James Shoosmith (4) should be added: he had two relatives, Philip (3) and Philip's son John, among the most active privateering captains. Apart from Drake, who may have been a shipmaster in his youth, the only non-nautical investors of any prominence in Jersey were Jean Villeneuve (9) and Georges de la Garde (4), a merchant, although we know from the De Sausmarez letters that Philippe Patriarche, who began to invest in 1695, was still interested in privateering as late as 1711. De Sausmarez corresponded also with Edward Le Brun and Lemprire (who rendered his capers reciprocal services) and indeed twice invested in Le Brim's armaments. On the second occasion he wrote to Le Brun that he was delighted to be associated 'with 'un sy honest homme comme vous et a l'egart du Coursere de Capitarne Couturier je fere de bon coeur un tiers'. 1 " His brother-in-law, the jurat Jean Durell, who invested in several armaments in 1692-5, does not appear to have done so afterwards; he was deputy bailiff in 1701 and later Queen's advocate. Edward Le Brun, archetype of the successful privateer-husband, made the transition from 'captain' to 'esquire'. In Guernsey, Captain Nicolas Thoumes was a jurat by 1711. Several Jersey commanders - notably Jean, Richard and Thomas Pipn, but also Edouard Dumaresq - were already connected with magisterial families. Most privateering captains who turned to husbanding, and made a success of it, joined the merchant class. Between them and the magistracy no great gulf was fixed, as we are reminded by the example of Mathieu de Sausmarez, who married a
" p. OOn. 00 above. HCA 26/14 (17 March and 1 Sept. 1709); Letter Book i, 14 Aug. 1710. Other, but very occasional, Guernsey investors in Jersey privateers were Laurens Martin, Thomas Le Marchant and Jean Gruchy. M. de Sausmarez also invested an eighth in the two trading voyages of the Expedition (Jean Mauger) of Jersey to North America, returning via Lisbon, in 1709-11, the second voyage (to Philadelphia) evidently no great success: Sausmarez Papers, letters from Pierre Scale, Jr.
12
381
Dumaresq of Jersey. Nevertheless, neither set of magistrates has left a strong trace among the owners of privateers in this period. In Jersey, the only jurats to subscribe to this speculative business, and that with no recorded assiduity, were, besides Durell and Patriarche, Elie Dumaresq and Jean and Philippe Pipn; the Cartarets show a low profile at this time, Sir Charles Cartaret (bailiff) investing apparently only on a single occasion, as did Colonel Thomas Collier, lieutenant-governor 16951715.13 Guernsey's lite figured rather more prominently, thanks to the many investments of Pierre Carey in the Nine Years War, of Jacques and Nicolas Carey and especially of William Le Marchant in the Succession War. Thomas Le Marchant, a notable of Alderney, with at least eight interests in the first war and eighteen in the second, who invested from 1692 until at least 1708, latterly at the rate of three or four privateers every year, throws most other Guernsey investors into the shade. Other jurats known to have bought an occasional interest were Eleazar Le Marchant and Pierre Priaulx, three other members of whose family invested at least once in 1708-10. Thomas Dobre, greffier of the Royal Court, bought a sixteenth in both armaments of the Revenge (Thomas Naftel), one of Mathieu de Sausmarez' ventures in 1709; Pierre Dobre, five times a declared owner, was a member of the standing commission appointed by the Admiralty in 1710 to take evidence about prizes. Robert Lee, the Prize Office representative in 1702, was more surprisingly a part owner of the Industry next year. When all this is said, business men of one sort or another put up most of the capital for Guernsey's war-making. Daniel Lefebure could be described as both merchant and gentleman, and the same no doubt was true of both the De Sausmarez, whatever could yet be claimed for such other outstanding investors as Jean Allez, Michel Falla, Laurens Martin and Nicolas Le Pelley. Both Jean Baudain and James Perchard, like some of the Dunkirk husbands, were brewers; perhaps Pierre Carey was so too, if identical with Carey 'de la Brasserie'.14 Perchard, several of whose family were more mildly committed than he to the caprerie, had two relatives in London: Peter, also a brewer, of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, and Elias, 'merchant' of Virginia St, Stepney, in 1702 but by 1706 'woolendraper' of St. Katharine's-by-the-Tower; they were declared 'setters-forth' on ten and four occasions respectively. Jacques Bonamy, who risked his money five times, was a London correspondent of James
HCA 26/19 (12 May 1704) and 21 (4 Sept. 1706). In June 1708 Collier ordered Captains Ste Croix and Gruchy to cruise for the protection of the island and the States levied a small rate on the parishes towards their expenses: Actes des Etats . . . 1701-1730, p. 32. 14 Information drawn from De Sausmarez' ledger; he also had an account with Pierre Carey 'du Pillori'. D. Lefebure was in trouble in 1703 for harbouring 'several black square boxes' landed by Capt. T. Hardy, fresh from the grand fleet at Vigo (HCA 32/76, goods on HMS Pembroke).
13
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Perchara and Mathieu de Sausmarez. A more substantial investor than any of these - he is fourth on our list - was William Dobree, merchant of Abchurch Lane, by 1706 of Love Lane.15 With this record, it would be highly surprising, at least on French analogies, if Peter Perchard and William Dobre among the Londoners did not themselves husband privateering armaments, buying and equipping vessels for dispatch to the Islands, where they had close relatives to look after their interests; messages could reach them in less than a fortnight. 16 They would have been especially well placed, moreover, to see controversial prize cases through the High Court of Admiralty, where the proctors might depend heavily on the ability of their clients to obtain evidence - sometimes a very troublesome matter, as we know from the example of Mathieu de Sausmarez and the Anne of Aberdeen. It is hard to explain the ownership structure of the Bucephalus Galley, commissioned on 21 March 1707 under Abraham Le MesurierJr. of Guernsey, unless she was husbanded by William Dobre: apart from Moses Corbet of Jersey - his only appearance as a privateering investor the other setters-forth are all described as 'of London'; Claude Jemmineau (a prominent Venice merchant), Samuel Johnson, John Scale and John Lambert. With 10 guns, this was a stronger warship than the 4gun Bucephalus previously commanded by Le Mesurier and owned entirely by Guernseymen - including, however, lize and Pierre Dobre.18 In the later years of the war there was a pronounced infusion of English (and Welsh) names among the declared owners of Guernsey privateers: about seventy in all, allowing for the anglicization of Island names.19 For the most part, though identified in only a very few cases, they appear to be Londoners. Exceptions are Daniel and Thomas Hilgrove of Southampton, Thomas Plumleigh of Dartmouth, John Pye of Falmouth, Richard Pye and John Pellew, probably also of Falmouth - all the names of Island correspondents on the South Coast. Others may
15 HCA 25/14 (Danieli Sloop and Mermaid); 19 (Merchant Galley and Martin Galley); 32/ 72 (2) (Mary James of Audierne). P. Perchard's business address was Brew House Yard 'near Hungerford Market'. The only prominent Jersey promoter with a London address, however, was Capt. John Coombes, established by 1708 in Throgmorton St. (ibid. 25/ 20, Chichester Galley). 16 The documents in HCA 25 show that a bond could be introduced in the High Court within ten days of being given in the Islands. 17 Above, n. His 'solliciteur' was Martin de Gruchy. 18 HCA 26/21: 'Sale' was Jean Seale, 'marchand de Londres' (d. 1714), a brother of Pierre Seale of Jersey, who bought lottery tickets for M. de Sausmarez in 1714: Account Book, p. 162. Earlier commissions of 13 June 1702 and 30 June 1704 in HCA 26/17 and 19. 19 Down to the end of 1707 the names of 79 Guernsey owners are recorded in 85 declarations; for 1708-12, no less than 176 occur in 99 declarations, of which 144 for the first time.
The Channel Island Privateeers
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have been officers of the privateers themselves, like Thomas Button, lieutenant of the Two Brothers (Le Brun) or Peter Harris, lieutenant of the Industry (Rousse), who subscribed to three armaments, in his case early in the war. A few are to be found among the letter-of-marque bondsmen, like William Cope, joiner of Cripplegate, Thomas Garrick of the Royal Exchange, Peter Beauvoir of Westminster, gentleman; David Garrick stood security for one of Le Brun's privateers in 1702, but was never a declared owner after 1696. Many of these securities were London liverymen of unimpeachable English origin - joiners, glaziers, haberdashers, tailors, vintners - and it says much for the trustworthiness of a Dobre, a Perchard or a Bonamy that they could persuade nonIslanders to pledge themselves for as much as 1,500, which was far more than the outlay on any but the biggest Island armament. It is likely enough that they had business of one kind or another with the Islands: the majority lived in the waterside area of Stepney, Wapping and Ratcliffe, often connected with shipping as sailmakers, blacksmiths, painters, coopers and victuallers: some may well have assisted in the equipment of an Island privateer in the Thames. This being so, it seems reasonable to assume that the Island expatriates in London could readily have secured investors too among its citizens, especially when the caprerie had proved its success. By 1710-11, all of the large frigates now beginning to be employed were largely if not wholly owned by mainlanders. 20 While the London factor remains difficult to evaluate, it was no more than marginal. Few of the mainland investors, even in the South Coast ports, ventured their money more than once, on the evidence of the High Court declarations; this is true, for example, of Samuel Lefebure, a London merchant who transacted much agency business for the privateers. More generally, it has to be admitted, on the same evidence, that the great majority of all investors seem to have risked their money only once or twice. But this is particularly true of those who joined the game after 1707:144 in a Succession War total of 223 declared investors in Guernseymen. For them, the whole adventure was no more than yet another lottery in an age of gambling. The specialists, essentially the husbands, numbered less than fifty - a dozen for Jersey, three times as many for Guernsey - and by no means all of them persevered year in and year out. Such perseverance, however, must be interpreted as the clearest indication of success. These more zealous entrepreneurs invested, it would appear almost
J. Bonamy and P. Perchard were two of the four declared owners of the 20-gun Chasse when commissioned on 10 Aug. 1710; in June 1711 the owners were Edward Salmon, Godfrey Minshull and Dennis Godier; in July 1712, Jean Allez, Sampson Well and Peter Allam. The 24-gun Guernsey Frigate remained in the hands of Elisha Williams (together with Thomas de Sausmarez) 1710-12. The 24-gun Marquis d'Or (d'O) was owned on 1 Sept. 1711 and 20 March 1712 by Thomas Mauger, Guillaume Carey and James Langston. For these see HCA 26/15-16.
21
384
indiscriminately, in armaments of all shapes and sizes except the larger frigates, as if to suggest that the way to succeed was to back several at sea simultaneously while limiting their fractions in any single privateer. Such outlays were well within their resources after the first period of experiment. A few figures are known, both for small and medium armaments, sufficiently consonant to give some idea of average costs: differences of course could arise from the qualities and condition of the vessel, the length of campaign envisaged, the prevailing cost of victuals and wages. An eighth share of the 1-gun Cheval Marin cost just over 264 livres in 1705, bringing the total (to the nearest livre) to 2,114 livres (151). This was what Pierre Tupper called 'the first cost', meaning her initial armament: later expenses, incurred while cruising, brought the total to 4,581 livres (327): the buyer of one-eighth paid about 40 sterling. But the crew enjoyed two-thirds of her prizes and presumably contributed the victuals. The same seems to have been true of Tupper's 10-gun Guernsey Galley of 1702-4, for her first armament cost her owners only 2,238 livres (160): rearmament in 1703 came to 3,211 livres (230), and in 1704 to 1,948 livres (139). In this case the purchaser of one-eighth would have had to find less than 70 over two years, less than he should have received sooner or later in prize money. He did, however, contribute to the crew's thirst - in cider, wine and spirits. What he does not appear to have done, given the low cost of the first armament in comparison with the second, is to have contributed to a valuation of the vessel, unless this w'as included at each rearmament: it seems inconceivable that Tupper could have contributed it gratis. A comparable privateer, the 12-gun Pembroke Galley, was sold to Pierre Henry of Guernsey in 1702 for 91-60.21 We are on firmer ground with the costings of Mathieu de Sausmarez, all of whose armaments allotted two-thirds of the prize money to the owners. They footed the entire bill therefore. The first armament of the 12-gun Revenge in 1708 cost them 9,150 livres (654), the second 12,726 livres (909): the holder of an eighth would have paid in rather less than 200, nearly thrice the call on an equivalent shareholder in the Guernsey Galley although she was twice rearmed. Yet the second armament of the Revenge cost considerably more than the first, and so it looks as if the
Priaulx, Tupper MS, pp. 31-4, 41, 43. There is a puzzling sequel to the sale of the Pembroke Galley by Jean Gruchy, her commander and'residual owner'. On 24 Aug. 1706, at the request of Laurens Martin, part-owner, the Amiraut ordered her to be put to auction, against the wishes of another part-owner, Gruchy's wife; the mystery thickens on 5 Oct., when the court ordered her to consent to the armament of'the said' privateer 'conformement a la pluralit des intresses d'iceluy': Amiraut 4, pp. 7, 10. The Pembroke does not appear in the letter-of-marque declarations after July 1702. This episode does establish, however, that vessels were the assets of a partnership, not simply of the husband.
21
The Channel Island Privateers 385 partnership had to fund extensive repairs to the ship. The great disparity between this case and that of the Guernsey Galley must mainly be due to the burdens of victuals and wages. The Revenge was only a little stronger in guns, but she carried a larger crew - 80 instead of 60 - and it contributed nothing to the outlay. It is the Guernsey Galley which appears to have been a bargain, for the 'first advance' for the 14-gun Conqurant, with the same size of crew as the Revenge, came to 800 sterling. This was in 1709, when competition for labour had much intensified since the early war years. In that same year Baudain's 12-gun Prosperous Galley, with a crew of 70, cost 9,298 livres (665), and in 1710 the Revenge of the Flying Sloop, bought for 3,500 livres, cost 7,618 (544) to set forth: she carried 50 men.22 With a crew of only 25 or 30, however, De Sausmarez' own Mordaunt Sloop, 4 guns, cost him 6,205 livres (443) before her first sailing in 1706 and 8,467 (605) in 1709: the difference could have resulted from a higher bill for repairs, but is more likely due to the longer campaign envisaged on the second occasion three months instead of two.23 Both outlays were large, however, in relation to the Hope of 1705, 6 guns and 50 men, costing 4,988 livres (356), or indeed to De Sausmarez' own Prosperous Sloop of 1709, 2 guns and 25 men, costing 4,341 livres (310) and provisioned for three months. It looks as if the Mordaunt, which enjoyed a relatively long career, was a more expensive vessel than the others, although the Neptune Galley of Jersey in 1707, of similar strength, ran her close at a mise of 7,834 livres (559).24 Out of keeping with all these fairly congruent magnitudes is the huge sum of 23,000 livres (1,643) spent by De Sausmarez in 1710 on arming the Cadogan Galley, even if she mounted 16 guns with a crew of 100. But, though described as a 'capre' she evidently carried some cargo, for he paid 2,140 livres to Jean Falla for his share in merchandise brought from Holland for her, in consort with the Fallas, Daniel Naftel and Thomas Le Marchant: far too much for canvas or ship's furniture. This seems to be a rare case, for the Islands, of the armed merchantman. 25 De Sausmarez' ledger contains only one liquidation of a prize account. It is for the first cruise of the Mordaunt under Captain Holland in 1706 and was signed by the husband's eight partners on 15 December 1708 remarkably quick work by comparison with Tupper's armaments of 1702-4, for which the account was not finally closed until 1713. Even so, a supplementary credit was added on 25 January, thanks to successful litigation over two joint captures. In all there was a credit of livres 21,649 / 9/8, after allowing the husband his commission of 3 per cent on the prize
Account Book, pp. 14, 106, 123, 137, 156; Amiraut 5, 12 March 1711. Account Book, pp. 1, 67, 74, 90; HCA 26/21 (5 Oct. 1706) and 14 (23 Aug. 1709). 24 Amiraut 3, 22 Feb. 1705; Account Book, pp. 45, 67, 116; HCA 26/20 (1 Nov. 1705), 14 (1 Sept. 1709), 13 (19 Feb. 1709). 25 Ibid. pp. 8, 23, 114; HCA 26/15 (13 July 1710).
23 22
386
proceeds: against this, a debit of livres 6,205/9/2 for his outlay on the privateer: a net profit of livres 15.444/-/6 (1,103). The taker of oneeighth would have parted with about 55 and reaped 143. In this case, all nine investors except Charles Andros were privateer-husbands, including Lemprire of Jersey. (It may be noted that the letter-of-marque declaration lists only three names.)26 It is possible, from the same source, to list the distributions made to the partners in nine other armaments in which De Sausmarez held an interest, but only to set a notional input, based on the sample costs already given, against them:27
PRIVATEER CREW CAPTAIN CAMPAIGN DISTRIBUTION COSTfl.t.)
Hunter Marlborough Marlborough Mordaunt Mordaunt Churchill Revenge Chasse Pr. Eugene
25 60 60 30 30 50 80 130 70
Bisson Naftel P. Mauger Bouriau Mancel Holland Dumaresq H. Brock Vostier
1709 1707 1710 1708 1709 1708 1709 1710 1710
13,920 13,520 18,394 6,281 2,346 10,923 48,640 8,793 9,815
5,000 9,000 9,000 7,000 8,467 ? 8,000 ? 10,000 ?20,000 ?10,000
? ? ? ?
Of the above, Mancel's Mordaunt and both the Marlborough privateers were captured by the French, thus depriving their owners of their last asset. There was clearly a loss in the first of these cases, but a profit on the other two before capture. Of the rest, except for Bisson's Hunter and especially Dumaresq's Revenge, one made only a very modest gain, while three showed a loss. De Saumarez' two earlier armaments of the Revenge (Naftel) in 1708, which cost the proprietors the pretty sum of 21,876 livres (1,554), brought a net profit of 10,625 livres28 While this sample can by no means claim to be representative of Island experience, it reflects well enough the mixed character of the results to investors. Many, having burnt their fingers, soon withdrew. A very few persisted, content often enough with marginal gains but rewarded by the occasional windfall. If they were husbands, they also stood to earn a
Account Book, pp. 1-2, 54. The commission was divided when there were two husbands acting 'conjointly', as when De Sausmarez and Daniel Naftel Sr. armed the Revenge under D. Naftel Jr. in 1708: ibid. p. 123. Naftel was illiterate. French husbands usually charged 2 per cent. 27 Ibid. pp. 41, 174, 153, 51, 73, 52, 25, 126, 131. The ledger consists of a series of accounts current with individuals; some items refer to another, apparently lost, called 'mon Livre alfabatique'. This might explain the absence of a return on some of his investments, although here and there he marks his share of particular prizes. Very few of the privateers in which he invested seem to have been captured. 2 * Ibid. p. 153.
26
The Channel Man d Priva teers
387
respectable commission. Further than that, their very qualification as husbands gave them the knowledge and judgment for buying and selling prize ships and goods, as the accounts of Mathieu de Sausmarez repeatedly exemplify - he was as much wine merchant as shipowner. If the prize of war extended from humble earthenware and oxhorns, iron, glass, lime and millstones, to sugar, indigo and logwood, it was wine and 'brandy wine', in large quantities, that lined the Island cellars. Some of the booty came direct to England's south-western ports, far more of it was re-exported, giving rise to Treasury suspicions of a collusive trade with the enemy. Either way, there was a marketing problem, of entirely fresh dimensions, to exercise the wits of merchant-shipowners. Should they choose, moreover, to run the gauntlet of Britain's fiscal barricades, they now disposed of seamen whose cunning and recklessness would stick at nothing.
Louis Alexandre de Bourbon, Comte de Toulouse. After Rigaud (Giraudon)
17
LE COMMERCE DE LA FRANCE DE L'OUEST ET LA GUERRE MARITIME, 1702-1712*

Je voudrais lucider ces mots de Philippe Sagnac : Le commerce frangais dcrot a partir de la guerre de la Ligue d'Augsbourg, mais l'histoire en est interessante, parce qu'on y voit l'activit des particuliere et des socits lutter centre les circonstances, maintenir les traditions commerciales et les relations avec les marches extrieurs, et sauvegarder Pavenir de notre commerce1. Ph. Sagnac a dit vrai. Mais il y a une contradiction apparente entre cette affirmation et les suivantes : La marine marchande dprit. Nos bailments de commerce ne sont plus gure proteges par les vaisseaux du roi. S'ils se risquent en pleine mer, ils tombent entre les mains des corsaires... Notre commerce souffre plus que celui des trangers. Le commerce du Levant devient tres penible; la navigation aux lies languit; et Bordeaux est impuissant a couler les denres de la Guyenne... Pas de constructions...2 Je me propose de donner dans ces pages quelques indications qui serviront peut-tre a rsoudre cette contradiction, qui n'est pas d'ailleurs particuliere a Sagnac, et de montrer que ces secondes propositions sont inexactes ou, du moins, exagres3. L'absence presque complete de renseignements quantitatifs sur l'economie europenne de cette poque reste, en vrit, un obstacle considerable a la comprehension des guerres et d'une politique dans lesquelles les facteurs conomiques jouaient un rle preponderant. Quelle tait l'action rciproque des guerres et des economies? Comment, par exemple, fonctionnaient les mcanismes des paiements internationaux au cours d'une guerre pendant laquelle les Provinces-Unies taient belligrantes et l'Espagne champ de bataille? Jusqu' quel point les affaires continuaient-elles comme a Pordinaire? Dans quelle mesure les ressources, bloquees dans une direction, taient-elles dtournes vers une autre? De quelle f agon, en particulier, le commerce tait-il affect par la pression de la puissance maritime ennemie?
* Communication aux Journes franco-britanniques d'histoire, Bordeaux, 17 septembre 1952. 1. Dans E. Lavisse, Histoire de France, t. Vili, 1 partie, Paris, 1908, p. 249. 2. Ibid. p. 203. Voir Ph. Sagnac et A. de Saint-Lger, Louis XIV, 2- ed., Paris, 1944, pp. 611-619. 3. L'armistice franco-anglais fut proclam le 21 aot 1712 et fut renouvel avant son terme. Les hostilits franco-hollandaises continurent jusqu'au printemps de 1713, mais l'hiver n'tait pas propice a la course hollandaise a proprement parier, zlandaise (A. D. Gironde C 4251, p. 414). J'ai encore a dpouiller les archives de la Zelande.
390
Jusqu' ce que des problmes de ce genre aient t examines en dtail, les historiens seront tents d'tendre des generalisations fondees sur la situation financire de l'tat, ou la crise partielle de certaines industries, a l'tat du commerce francais en general a la fin du regne de Louis XIV. Naturellement, la depreciation des billets de monnaie et l'impuissance de l'tat a faire face a ses obligations troublrent profondment le commerce en 1709 et 1710; mais il est arbitraire de trailer ces faits, ainsi que la disette de 1709, la guerre de la Baltique, la fiscalit, le Colbertisme exager, l'inscurit des mera, comme les divers aspects d'une mme catastrophe conomique. Ces facteurs n'agirent pas avec la mme intensit, ni ncessairement dans Ie mme sens, pendant une guerre qui dura plus de onze ans. En fait, a ne l'estimer qu'au point de vue des departs de la navigation au long-cours, le commerce extrieur de la Prance de l'Ouest subit des fluctuations assez fortes pendant cette periode. D'aprs l'analyse que j'ai pu faire des passeports et des congs de sorties enregistrs par les Amirauts4, 1'volution du commerce de Bordeaux, Nantes et Saint-Malo est, en gros, la suivante : 1 une chute brutale a la suite de la declaration de la guerre en mai 1702, sans amelioration notable en 1703 c'est peut-tre ce choc qui conduisit Malvezin5 a caractriser inexactement toute l'histoire du commerce bordelais a cette poque comme funeste ; 2 une amelioration croissante, qui atteint son maximum en 1706-1708, Bordeaux approchant mme en 1707 le niveau exceptionnellement lev de 1700, Nantes surpassant en 1708 celui de 1701; 3 une rechute en 1709, durant, sans toujours s'aggraver partout, jusqu' 4 une reprise plus ou moins rapide des departs de navires en 1712. Ce schema approximatif s'applique aussi a la plupart des ports secondaires de la France de l'Ouest, a en juger par les expeditions des tonnages vers la Baltique un des principaux marches pour leurs exportations8.
4. A. D. Gir. 6 B 79 a 86, 6 B 299 a 304; Loire-Inf. B 4723, B 4703, B 4677, B 4724 et 4725, B 4679 et 4680; Ille-et-Vilaine 9 B 402 a 407. On regrettera le manque d'un registre pour Nantes entre le 20 mars 1703 et le 3 avril 1704, et pour Saint-Malo entre juillet 1705 et dcembre 1706. Les registres des congs font entirement dfaut aux archives d'Amiraut de La Rochelle et de Bayonne. M. Gouron, L'Amiraut de Guienne, Paris, 1938, p. 456, rsum les chiffres bordelais, en distinguant les voyages frangala, trangers et coloniaux, mais je ne puis pas accepter ses chiffres pour ces derniers. 5. T. Malvezin, Histoire du commerce de Bordeaux, t. Ili, Bordeaux, 1892, pp. 13-14, a salsi l'importance du Systeme des passeports hollandis mais en a beaucoup sous-estim l'tendue. 6. N. E. Bang, et K, Korst (ed.), Tabeller over skibsfarf og varetransport gennem Oresund, 1661-1783, og gennem Storebaelt, nitl-illfi, t. I, Copenhague, 1939, pp. 30 et suiv., 373 et suiv. J'y remarque que Saint-Martin de R et la Seudre y viennent immdiatement aprs Bordeaux. La Rochelle y est surpass par Bourgneuf, et Nantes par Le Croisic et Le Pouliguen runis. Ceci s'explique par l'importance du traflc des seis, bien qu'l soit digne de remarque que
La France de VOuest et la Guerre Maritime
391
Distinguons les vicissitudes des ports aussi bien que les phases de la guerre. Dans ce que j'oserai appeler les bonnes annes, c'est Bordeaux qui tient la tete, avec environ deux fois plus de departs au long cours que Nantes, et cinq fois plus que Saint-Malo, aux meilleurs moments de la guerre. Cependant, le commerce bordelais dpendait aussi troitement des relations commerciales de la France avec le Nord de l'Europe que des vendanges; Nantes tait le port colonial le plus actif ; Saint-Malo atteignit l'apoge de sa carrire maritime grace aux initiatives hardies de ses armateurs dans le domaine du commerce de la Mer du Sud et de la traite des Indes Orientales, grace aussi a ses corsaires. On ne s'attendra pas done a ce que les trafica de ces trois ports, avec chacun de leurs marches, correspondent d'anne en anne a l'allure gnrale de revolution du commerce de l'Ouest. Les exportations directes de Bordeaux vers la Baltique, par exemple, taient bien plus considerables en 1704-1705 qu'en 1706-1708 plus considerables qu'en 1700 mme7. En 1710, les armements nantais et malouins a destination des peches de Terre-Neuve regagnrent ie niveau de 1708, comme ce fut le cas avec les armements a la dcouverte 8 : un plus grand tonnage de port d'attach malouin fut expdi en 1710 qu'en aucune des autres annes documentes de la guerre. Les trafics antillais de Nantes reprirent en 1710 la vigueur perdue en 1709. La Rochelle, d'aprs les declarations de passeports9, fut beaucoup plus frquente par les Hollandais en 1709-1710 qu'en 1705-1708, a cause probablement de la hausse des prix des vins bordelais10, ce qui aurait favoris les retours en eaux-de-vie, en seis, en denres coloniales; assurment, ce ne fut pas par hasard qu'en 1709 presque toutes les barques bordelaises sortirent a destination de La Rochelle, charges d'huiles et de charbons et parfois sur lest. Je ne saurais douter que la crise de 1709 les gelees, la disette, la crise des credits fut plus sevre et plus prolonge a Bordeaux que dans les autres ports de l'Ouest. Ce n'est qu' Bordeaux que la courbe du commerce colonial reflte fidlement celle du commerce europen : le tmoignage des congs et des passeports se voit ici confirmer par la suspension, des le 3 octobre 1709 et jusqu'au
Saint-Martin tait aussi un entrepot de vins, de pruneaux, de raisins sees et de papier, et rexportait des mlasses et du gingembre vers le Nord, a en juger par les procdures de prises conserves au P[ublic] R[ecord] Offlce] (Londres), H[igh] CCourt] [of] A[dmiralty] 32, liasses 46 a 86. 7. Bang., op. cit., pp. 373 et suiv. 8. E. W. Dahlgren, Voyages frangala a destination de la mer du Sud avant Bougainville, 1695-1749, dans Nouvelles archives des missions scientifiques, t. xiv, Paris, 1907, pp. 423 et suiv. 9. A. D. Char.-Marit. B 5698 a 5708. 10. A. D. Gir. C 4301, f. 4 : Fnellon a la Chambre de Commerce; Malvezin, op. cit., p. 20; N. W. Posthumus, Nederlandsche Prijsgeschiedenis, t. I, Leiden, 1943, p. 226.
392
11 fvrier 1712, de l'employ retenu a Royan pour aviser la Chambre de Commerce de ce qui se passali en bas du fleuve, d'autant qu' prsent il n'entre en Rivire que peu de Vaisseaux et n'en sort ausai que trs peu 11. Douze ans auparavant, l'intendant Bazin de Besons avait commenta Fattachement excessif des Bordelais au commerce des vins, leur preference pour un commerce de commission, leur apathie en face des desastres12. La Chambre de Commerce suscita des retards lamentables avant d'armer une fregate, en 1711 enfin, pour barrer la Gironde aux corsaires ennemis qui l'importunaient depuis quatre ans13. Elle hesita d'en avertir le gouvernement en 1708 dans la crainte que la Cour ne nous oblige d'armer des corvettes ou d'entretenir des gardes-ctes pour notre conservation... :i* : mais le ton de sa correspondance pendant les premires annes de sa carrire donne l'impression qu'elle attendait trop du secours des puissances . Il semble alors avoir manqu a Bordeaux l'me agressive du capitalismo nantais et malouin. Le commerce au long-cours s'alimentait largement au moyen des centaines de batimento de petit tonnage. Ce qui a contribu en grande partie a faire des ports frangais occidentaux un veritable ensemble commerciai, c|tait Tapprovisionnement des vaisseaux et la fourniture de cargaisons pour l'exportation aux Indes occidentales franchises et espagnoles. Il est a remarquer que le cabotage et la navigation a destination des lies franchises se remirent du choc initial de la guerre plus vite que la navigation au long-cours en general, ainsi qu'ils le firent, sauf a Bordeaux, aprs la debacle de 1709. Il est difficile pourtant d'apprcier dans leur ensemble les mouvements de tous les deux, tant le cabotage tait sujet aux influences d'ordre local. insi les departs de Nantes vers Noirmoutiers montent en fleche en 1706 et en 1710, pendant que les departs vers Rochefort sont en pleine diminution. Les expeditions bordelaises a destination de la Bretagne diminuent en 1705 et 1706, a 1'encontre de l'ensemble de l'activit du port qui va croissant : les expeditions de Vannes a destination de Bordeaux galement15. Et c'est justement en 1709, a cause de la disette, que le port d'Hennebont, plus actif ds 1708 qu'il n'avait t avant-guerre, exportait les plus grands tonnages de seigle16.
11. A. D. Gir. C 4251, pp. 169, 354-5. 12. Mmolre ooncernant la generalit de Bordeaux et ses dpendances (copie dans la collection Fagel, Trinity College, Dublin). 13. A. D. Gir. C 4251, pp. 207-213, 242-3, 270-1 : deliberations de la Chambre, 5 juin 1710, 12 juillet 1710, 10 fvrier 1711; C 4431 : Arrts du Conseil du 27 juillet et du 18 aot 1711, qui autorisrent la Chambre de lever des droits extraordinaires sur les vaisseaux et d'imposer un emprunt forc sur ses membres. 14. A. D. Gir. C 4260, f. 92 : Ch. de Comm. a Fnellon, 12 mai 1708. 15. A. D. Morbihan 9 B 65. 16. Ibid., 0 B 66 a 71.
La France de l'Ouest et la Guerre Maritime
393
On ne doit pas oublier qu' cette poque la plus grande partie de la marine marchande de la France appartenait, de beaucoup, aux ports de la cte occidentale. La distribution des tonnages entre ces ports tait pourtant trs inegale. Dans le recensement officiel de 170417 Nantes et Les Sables-d'Olonne en quelque sorte satellite nantais comptent autant de vaisseaux que tous les autres ports reuns. Avec Brest et Vannes, Nantes contrlait, en outre, les deux-tiers des barques et les trois-quarts des chaloupes. La maitrise bretonnante du cabotage est done encore plus frappante que la supriorit de Nantes comme grand port d'armateurs. La part de Bordeaux n'y est que trs modeste : 29 vaisseaux et 176 barques centre 151 et 347 nantais. Ceci donne a rflchir, car en 1702 les Bordelais avaient demand une centaine de passeports pour le trafic des lies, ce qui semblait indiquer des navires d'un assez grand tonnage : y avait-il des transfers de vaisseaux aux autres ports dont je n'ai pu prendre connaissance? des transfers a La Rochelle, par exemple, d'o les Bordelais voulaient expedier 69 armements pour les lies en 170218? Quoi qu'il en soit, un si grand nombre n'en fut pas captur sitt. En fait, Bordeaux semble avoir perdu moins de btiments que ses rivaux dans le trafic des Antilles, qu'elle avait plutt tendance a leur abandonner. C'tait les Bretons qui, comme armateurs, couraient le plus les risques de la guerre maritime, laquelle pesait rudement et directement sur ]es caboteurs, inconstamment proteges par les gardes-ctes et enfermes souvent dans les ports. Avant d'examiner les vicissitudes du pavilion frangais sur les mers il faut voir dans quelle mesure il tait ncessaire d'en faire usage. En grande partie, c'est l'histoire des relations commerciales de la France avec les neutres et avec l'ennemi qui explique revolution gnrale du commerce et celle du commerce bordelais en particulier. Presque tout le commerce important avec l'Europe du Nord se faisait par des navires trangers, a l'exception notable du trafic avec les Pays-Bas espagnols, qui cesse aprs Ramillies et la chute d'Ostende. Assurment ceci ne consti tue pas un tmoignage sffisant de la pression de la puissance maritime ennemie dans le Pas-de-Calais et la Mer du Nord, car le volume du tonnage frangais utilise sur ces routes maritimes en temps de paix tait encore minime; mais cette pression apparait nettement dans le cours trs lev des frets a Bordeaux en 1703-1705 pour la Fiandre, et aussi dans les cours rela17. Voir le tableau dans E. Gabory, La manne et le commerce Ae Nantes, 1661-1-15 (Rennes, 1901), p. 161; cf. Anales de Bretagne, t. XVII (1901-1902), p. 397. On y sgnale un total de 648 vaisseaux, centre 533 en 1698 et 763 en 1701 : P.-J. Charlia, Troia sicles d'economie maritime frangaise (Paris, 1931), pp. 43-i. 18. A. D. Gir. 6 B 79. Sur le trafic antillais, voir l'appendice ci-aprs, p. 66.
394
tivement eleves pour le Nord de l'Europe19, car ces annes-l sont prcisment les seules ou les neutres scandinaves furent arrts en grand nombre par les Anglais : environ 80 btiments danois et norvgiens et autant de sudois. Il est vrai que quelques-uns seulement de ces navires furent jugs de bonne prise20; mais les navires ainsi arrts, sans compter les arrts zlandais21, constituaient une part trs importante de ce commerce neutre avec la Prance occidentale et les retards entrames par les procdures le gnaient gravement. Ein 1705, les Danois rclamrent 200.000 kroner de dommages; les marchands de Stockholm avaient dj demand a Charles XII des represailles22. Ceux-ci, trs faenes, affirmrent que les Anglais saisissaient presque tous leurs navires qui faisaient Ie voyage au retour de la France. La portee diplomatique de cette vive irritation apparat dans la large tolerance accorde a partir de l'automne de 1705 au trafic neutre avec la France. Lorsqu'il fut virtuellement arrt en 1710, il le fut par les hostilits navales entre le Danemark et la Sude. L'quilibre politique dlicat des pays baltiques jusqu'alors favorisait ie commerce frangala. Non seulement les ministres de la reine Anne ne purent pas obtenir une revision du traite anglo-sudois de 1661, qui protgeait le transport des matriaux de construction navale sudois, mais, aprs 1705, le transport du goudron et des mats norvgiens contrebande indiscutable ne fut gure entrav23. C'est pourquoi, d'aprs les recherches que j'ai pu faire, l'effort maritime franeais ne fut pas gne par le manque de matriaux de navigation de 1705 a 1710. Contrairement a ce que l'on dit souvent, la guerre n'arrta pas les constructions navales frangaises. Par exemple, SaintMalo btit vingt-neuf vaisseaux dans les seules annes 1703-1704 et les chantiers de Lorient produisirent huit grands navires de 480 a 1.000 tonneaux en 1704-1709. Pendant la guerre, l'Amiraut de Bayonne fit enregistrer la construction de presque quatre-vingts navires, flibots, frgates et galiotes de 40 a 300 tonneaux, soit un
19. Ibid. C 1681. 20. [P.R.O ] H.C.A. 32/47 a 86, 90, 92; ibid. 30/597. 21. Sur les plaintes contre les Zlandais, Lamberty, Mmoires pour servir a l'histoire dw XVIII' sicle, t. II, pp. 265-6, 302-3; V, p. 185; XII, pp. 30-43. 22. Hist. 1188. Comm., Portland Papers, t. IX, p. 188 : Vernon a Harley, Copenhague, 14 avril 1705; [P.R.O] S. P. 95/16 : Jackson a Harley, Stockholm, 27 aot 1704, avec la petition de 49 bourgeois de Stockholm ci-incluse, laquelle fut renouvele l'anne suivante (ibid., Jackson a Harley, 22 juill. 1705). Les agents francais ne tardrent pas a exploiter la colere du College de Commerce danois : S. P. 76/25, f. 118 et 75/26, f. 143. 23. Voir G. N. Clark, Neutral Commerce in the War of the Spanish Succession dans The British Year Book of International Law (Oxford, 1928), pp. 6983. Sur le commerce franco-norvgien, P.-J. Charliat (d.), Mmoires indita de thor SfoMen a la cour de France, 1699 dans Bergens-Historiske Forenlng, n 33 (1927), pp. 287-360.
395
montani de 6.809 tonneaux en 1704-1709. Les annateurs nantais firent construir des vaisseaux corsaires a Redon et a La Roche Bernard24. Il est vrai toutefois de dir que la France dut davantage a ses ennemis qu'aux neutres. On suppose encore que les Hollandais commergaient avec la France sous pavilion neutre, mais pendant la plus grande partie de la guerre ils n'en eurent pas besoin. Le l" juin 1704, l'accord anglo-hollandais interdisant le commerce avec la France expira, n'ayant dure qu'un an, et l'Angleterre ne parvint pas a rallier la rpublique a son renouvellement. Assurment, les corsaires anglais et zlandais traitrent la navigation hollandaise comme ils continuaient a traiter celle des Scandinaves, mais de tels procds soulevrent a Rotterdam et a Amsterdam le mme mcontentement qu' Copenhague et a Stockholm, et le gouvernement anglais, cdant aux instances de Marlborough, y mit fin pour sauver l'alliance. En aot 1705, une vingtaine de navires hollandais furent relachs sans tre jugs25. Afin de justifier l'abandon de l'accord de 1703, Heinsius dit a Stanhope que le commerce frangais tait pour la Hollande ce que le commerce espagnol tait pour l'Angleterre26. Cependant, il dut teir compte de la politique commerciale de Louis XIV, laquelle cherchait a opposer les Hollandais aux neutres, en prodiguant des privileges a ceux-ci, et restait hostile aux importations hollandaises jusqu' l'automne de 1704. L'arrt du 11 octobre 1704 n'admit de Hollande que les fromages, les rabes, le borax, le bois de buis et le goudron; la liste fut largie en 1705 par les arrts du 24 mars et du 19 mai, qui permirent l'importation des bois de barii et de matriaux de teinture27. Cela mentre les besoins des manufactures franchises que les neutres n'avaient pu satisfaire; mais c'tait encor plus le besoin urgent d'couler les denres de la Guyenne qui en fut le motif reel28. On avait eu l'intention de n'accorder des passeports qu'avec reserve : tout au contraire, ils se multiplirent suivant les besoins29. En 1705,
24 A. Morel, La guerre de course a Saint-Malo, 1681-1715 (these ms., 1938); H.-F. Buffet, I/orient sous Louis XIV (Rennes, 1927), p. 38; Archives de la Chambre de Commerce de Bayonne, registres d*Amiraut I a X; A. D. LoireInf. B 4478-4479 (contrts de propriet). 25. G. Van den Haute, Les relations anglo-hollandaises au debut du XVIII' icle (Louvain, 1932), pp. 255 et suiv.; G. N. Clark, War Trade and Trade War, 1701-1713, dans The Economic History Review,, t. I, n 2, 1928, pp. 262-280. 26. [P.R.O.] S. P. 84/228, f. 50; Stanhope a Harley, La Haye, 10 mars 1706. 27. Tous ces arrts, ainsi que ceux qui ne concernrent que les Scandinave, furent consolides par l'arret du 18 aot 1705, ce qui est cit par Lamberty, III, pp. 750-3, et par Malvezin, II, p. 18. En 1706 les Hollandais apportaient les pices, l'huile de baleine et les fanons, mais cette permission fut rvoque le 27 octobre. 28. Arch. Nat. F", t. 55, f 0 8 174-5 : proces-verbal du Conseil du Commerce. 30 mai 1710. 29. Ibid., f. 185 v (11 juill. 1710).
396
Versailles dlivra 315 passeports aux seuls Hollandais pour charger a Bordeaux chiffre qui monta a 517 en 1706, 500 en 1707, 404 en 170830. Mme les Sudois n'atteignirent gure le cinquime de ces chiffres, qui nous fournissent l'explication principale de l'expansion du commerce frangais des 170531, bien que la contraction de 1709 ne s'explique pas d'une fagon aussi simple. Lorsque le Conseil du Roi, le 19 novembre 1710, supprima les passeports pour les Hollandais, il le fit contrairement a l'avis du Conseil du Commerce32 : d'ailleurs, plus d'une centaine de passeports furent accords l'anne suivante. Il faut reconnatre que le rgime des passeports ne manquait pas d'inconvnients. La gne des formalits en fut intensifie par le fait que les passeports n'taient valables que pendant un temps determin. Plus ennuyeux pour les Hollandais fut le reglement qui les obligea de charger les cargaisons de retour au port francais du dchargement, ce qui entrainait quelquefois des dlais pour la navigation et pouvait dtourner le commerce d'importation d'un port a un autre, comme ce fut le cas probablement en 1709; mais le commerce de la France occidentale, contrairement a celui de la France du Nord, tait surtout un commerce d'exportation, qui s'alimentait par les lettres de change33, quoique les importations de Hollande soient devenues plus ampies selon que les manufactures franchises prouvaient de plus en plus de dficits de matires premires34. On affirma aussi que les passeports furent cause de la hausse des frets en 1705; d'une manire plus convaincante, les Deputes de Commerce y remarqurent qu' Bordeaux les frets taient tombes de 80 a 10 florins par tonneau et les assurances de 40 % a 5 % depuis que les Anglais avaient cesse de troubler la navigation hollandaise. Naturellement, il fallait payer une commission
30. A. D. Gir. 6 B 81 a 83. Sur les Hollandais, voir l'appendice ci-dessous, 31. Le tableau suivant des departs de Bordeaux a destination du Nord en 1703, 1704, et 1705,recueilli des livres de congs (A. D. Gir. 6 B 300-301), donne quelqu'ide de l'mportance relative des Hollandais : Ports sudois (Stade et Riga y compris) : 33, 96, 88. Ports danois et norvgiens : 26, 71, 49. Ports de Slesvig et de Holstein : 9, 23, 19. Ports hollandais : O, 8, 305. Signaler que le chiffre des congs hollandais correspond a peu prs au chiffre des passeports en 1706. On s'est demand si l'interdiction de 1703-1704 tait vraiment applque : j'en suis sur qu'elle l'tait dans l'ensemble, trs rigoureusement, quant a la navigation hollandaise, comme le refus de renouvellement parat l'indiquer. 32. Arch. Nat. F, t. 55, f 0 8 182-188; texte de l'Ordonnance dans Lebeau, Nouveau Code des Prises, t. I, p. 354. 33. Assez souvent les Hollandais arrivaient sur lest : voir, e.g., Fnellon a la Ch. de Comm. de Bordeaux, 28 janv. 1709 (A. D. Gir. C 4301, f. 4). 34 Arch. Nat. F12, t. 55, f. 174V. Aux importations permises aux Hollandais en 1705 on ajouta plus tard, notablement, le fil a denteile, la graine de lin, les bois de construction et de marqueterie, l'argent vif, Ie bray, Ie morphil, la potasse, la vdasse, et mme des espces de laines. Cf. A. D, Gir. 6 B 1984 : passeports de YEsprance de Rotterdam, etc.
397
pour les passeports blancs, que Ton distribuait en Hollande a rencontre du Conseil du Commerce, autant que pour les passeports qui permettaient 1'introduction des importations dfendues35. La revocation formelle de ces privileges aux Hollandai n'avait pas pour seul objet de les disposer a faire la paix. L'ordonnance du 19 novembre 1710 fit beaucoup de cas des abus du Systeme. Partis des ports frangais, les patrons hollandais pouvaient renseigner les corsaires ennemis sur la navigation franchise. Munis de passeports frangais, ils trafiquaient avec d'autres pays trangers a l'abri de la course frangaise, qui se voyait ainsi dpourvue de prises legitimes. De mme, au moins a Bordeaux, les trangers abusaient des passeports pour trafiquer aux Antilles frangaises trafic a l'gard duquel les autorits manifestrent des moments de complaisance en 1708-1709, mais qui provoqua de vifs ressentiments chez les ngociants frangais, dont les interets se trouvaient opposes a ceux des Antillais. On dit que les ennemis taient en tat d'entreprendre ce voyage a 70 % meilleur march36. Les ports frangais ne firent pas pareille cause commune centre la concurrence des trangers dans le cabotage frangais, laquelle se passait surtout entre les ports occidentaux et ceux de la France du Nord, done aux dpens des Boulonnais, des Dieppois, des Dunkerquois, dont les protestations n'attendrissent pas le coeur aux ngociants de l'Oue&t37. C'est un point sur lequel Pontchartrain s'est toujours mentre trs sevre; pourtant il avait a lutter non seulement contre les officiers vaux et les armateurs insubordonns, mais aussi
35. A. D. Gir. C 4380, f. 1 : le sentiment des Deputes au Conseil du Commerce sur un mmoire donne au sujet des passeports que le Roy accorde aux bollandola, 19 avril 1706. L'auteur du mmoire insista qu'il y avait des gens qui faisaient une spcialit d'obtenir les passeports moyennant de grosses commissions. Cf. ibid., C 4251, p. 119 : mmoire du sieur Melier sur la saisie des denres hollandoises dfendues pour lesquelles il avait obtenu de la Cour un passeport particulier moyennant 5 % de leur valeur probable ; ce passeport ne spcifla ni date ni navire. Sur les formalits, A. D. Gir. 4251, pp. 17-18. 36. Pontchartrain eut a oceur la disette aux lies : lettres du 7 nov. 1708 aux Directeurs de la Ch. de Comm. de Bordeaux (A. D. Gir. C 4300, f 8 94-5). La Chambre se plaignit le 3 juill. 1708 que Ton chargeait mme des corsaires flessingues pour les Hes sous la protection des passeports et du pavilion frangais : ibid. C 4267, f o s 142-5. Cf. l'opposition du Conseil du Commerce aux propos de Pontchartrain et de Daguesseau, 8 juillet 1709 : Arch. ff. Etrangeres, France 1986, f o s 67-8. Sur la consternation des Nantais, Arch. Nat. Marine BV171, f. 394 : de Lusangay a Pontchartrain, 19 oct. 1709. 37. Arch. Nat. Marine B3/132, f. 417 : Barentin a Pontchartrain, Dunkerque, 30 mai 1705; ibid., 171, f 0 8 129-131, 141-8, Desmarets a Pontchartrain, 4 juillet 1709, etc. Les Dieppois avaient fait construir pendant la guerre cent btiments pour le cabotage de la France de l'Ouest, selon le mmoire adress a Desmarets : ibid., f. 148. Les archives de l'amiraut de Guyenne les montrent, comme les Boulonnais, tres actifs dans le cabotage BordeauxBrest. Cf. [P.R.O.] H.C.A. 32/64 : le St James de Drontheim apporta du sel de Paimboauf a Dunkerque et y regut les ordres du consul danois d'aller a La Rochelle; il y a des exemples semblables dans la mme srie.
398
centre les exigences conomiques38 : les trangers qui apportaient les matriaux de constructions navales a Dunkerque, a Dieppe, a Morlaix ne pouvaient pas toujours en disposer ni trouver des cargaisons de retour39. H y a de nombreux documents prouvant la part de la proprit franchise dans les cargaisons effectues sous pavilion neutre et ennemi, car les ngociants avaient l'habitude d'en enregistrer leur proprit chez les greffes d'Amiraut40. Parce que le rseau de leurs correspondants couvrait presque tous les porta de l'Europe ennemie ainsi que neutre, il n'tait pas difficile d'en emprunter les noms, d'autant moins que ces derniers taient assez souvent de la mme familie que les trangers, naturalises ou non naturalises, qui se constituaient de vritables colonies dans les ports francais : Juifs portugais11, Irlandais et Anglais catholiques rfugis, Hollandais, Sudois, Flamands, Hambourgeois42. Ce fut ainsi que presque tous les navires hollandais relchs par les Anglais en aot 1705 avaient t affrts pour le compte de Frangais : les ngociants bordelais, reputes timides,
38. Voir M. Giraud, Orise de conscience et d'autorit a la fin du rgne de Louis XIV dans Annles, 7 anne, n 2, avril-juin 1952, pp. 172-190. On ne doit pas ncessairement reprochar aux officiers d'Amiraut les negligences et les lenteurs attribues au personnel administratif de la Marine : le cas de Lempereur, souvent cit par M. Giraud, me parait exceptionnel d'ailleurs. Selon M. Gouron, op. cit., p. 456, les officiers des Amirauts avaient intrt de se comporter en honntes gens. Ce n'est qu'a La Rochelle que j'ai trouv les traces d'une mauvase organisation, que Pontchartrain combla de reproches : est-ce que ce fut un des avantages commerciaux de La Rochelle a cette poque? Mais c'est peut-tre le seul port a conserver le tmoignage centre lui-mme. 39. [P. R. O.] H. C. A. 32 en fournit nombre d'illustrations : e.g. ibid. 85, Victory, de Copenhague, Eckhoff (Morlaix-Brest-Nantes 1704); Uhlostadt, de Stockholm, Paulsen (Morlaix-Bordeaux 1705). Les caboteurs trangers s'intressaient surtout au traflc des seis. 40. Documentation particulirement abondante dans les archives de la Chambre de Commerce de Bayonne, reg. d'Amiraut I a IX. Cf. A. D. Char.-Marit. B 5700 : attestations de Jacob Juppin et d'autres, 1705; A. D. Loire-Int, B 4575, f. 34. 41 A Bayonne les Silva, les de Castro, les Souza, les d'Acosta, les Henriques. 42. Sur Bordeaux, A. D. Gir. 4473, f. 9 et suiv. : liste des noms des marchands trangers des pays du Nord qui demeurent a Bordeaux (remise a Pontchartrain, 15 avril 1711), dont 15 Hollandais, 12 Flamands, 10 Hambourgeois, 8 Irlandais, 6 Suedols, 3 Anglais, l Danois, l Ecossais, etc. Le commerce hansatique avec la France fut soumis a l'interdiction imperlale le l" juin 1703 et ne reprit vigueur que ds 1706, grace aux passeports frangala qui ne lui avaient pas t ncessaires pendant la premire anne de la guerre. Les chiffres suivants des arrives de navires (A. D. Gir. 6 B 125 : Lettres de Mer, 6 nov. 1711 a 12 nov. 1712) signalent 'importance relative des ports nordiques pour le commerce bordelais vers la fin de la guerre et j'y attache en parentheses les chiffres du 28 juin 1703 au 24 dec. 1704 (ibid. 124) : Holstein 47 (11), Hambourg 38 (0), Danzig 31 (5), Lbeck 20 (0), Bremen 17 (1), Slesvig 8 (8), Knigsberg 6 (0), Norvge 6 (43), Danemark l (50), Sude 5 (99), Riga O (8).
La France de l'Quest et la Guerre Maritime
399
partageaient nanmoins avec les Hollandais une perte d'un million de livres due a la hausse des frets et des primes d'assurances causee par ces arrts43. Les ngociants frangais avaient recours galement a des subterfuges pour dissimuler leurs marchandises, et parfois leurs navires, dans d'autres trafics, mme dans Ie cabotage. Entre La Rochelle et Bayonne d'une part, les ports portugais d'autre part, des cargaisons franQaises passaient pour italiennes ou portugaises, parfois dans des navires prtendus gnois ou maltais44, quoique Ie commerce franco-portugais soit fort gne de temps en temps par les interdictions prononces par Ie gouvernement frangais dans Ie cours d'une politique de represailles. On masquait ainsi un peu de trafic avec la Mediterranee, non sans l'intervention des corsaires biscayens, qui ne respectaient pas toujours les passeports francais accords aux ennemis45; mais il semble y avoir eu trs peu de commerce direct par mer entre la France de l'Ouest et la Mediterranee, sauf celui des morutiers malouins, bien armes, qui faisaient franchir a leur morue salee les zones dangereuses de Gibraltar et des Baleares avec des pertes minimes. L'argent espagnol atteignait Marseille par terre via Bayonne ou Bordeaux46. Le commerce franco-espagnol n'tait pas trs actif, a en juger par le nombre des departs enregistrs : 3 a 7 armements malouins par anne a destination de Cadix ceux-ci d'un grand tonnage et 12 a 32 departs par anne de Nantes a destination de Bilbao. Les exportations bordelaises se faisaient pour la plupart au moyen de petits caboteurs bretons, a destination galement de Bilbao, sans exceder d'ordinaire les tonnages de provenance nantaise47. Sur les trafics espagnols de La Rochelle et de Bayonne les renseignements
43. [P. R. O.] S. P. 104/72 : Hedges a Stanhope, 21 aot 1705; A. D. Gir. C 4380, f. 1. De mme, comme le tmoignent nombre de contemporains bien renseignes, les Hollandais taient intresses aux cargaisons charges sur les navires neutres pendant la periode de l'interdiction : ce fut le motif principal des arrts faits alors par les Anglais. Toutefois, d'aprs les procdures de prises a Londres, on saurait croire que les passeports neutres aient masqu autant de marchandises allemandes a ce temps-l, lorsque les ports sudois d'Allemagne, comme Ie Holstein et les villes hansatiques (mais non Ie Slesvig), subirent l*embarras de faire partie du Saint-Empire belligrant : situation lgale et gographique qui se prta bien aux jeux des hommes d'affaires et de loi. 44. A. D. Char-Marit. B 5703 : attestations de Juppin, 24 et 30 mars 1708. Bayonne, reg. d'Am. I, f o s 79-82; II, f> 21-7, 35-7, 53, 82, 93; III, f o s 13-14. Sur les ventes flctives des navires, ibid. II, f. 16 et III, f. 49. 45. Arch. Nat. Marine B3/132, f B 215-7, 358, 360; A. D. Gir. C 4251, f 19-23 Ces saisies taient autorises par le roi d'Espagne, du 3 oct. 1704 jusqu'en juillet 1705. 46. P. Masson, Histoire du commerce frangala dans le Levant au XVII* sicle, Paris, 1897, p. 333. 47. C'tait un moyen de faire passer les vins bordelais en Angleterre, dont le commerce avec l'Espagne des Bourbons se rtablit en 1705 : A. D. Gir. C 4260, f. 25.
400
Gorsairs and Navies, 1660-1760
quantitatifs nous manquent absolument. Cependant, les archives de la Chambre de Commerce de Bayonne font preuve des liens intimes et constants qui subsistaient entre les ports basques frangais d'une part et les ports de l'Bspagne septentrional d'autre part. De ces ports-ci, mme de Pontevedra et de Vigo, les Basques frangais transportaient des cargaisons jusqu' Cadix. us empruntaient aux Espagnols une bonne partie des capitaux et des equipages dont ils avaient besoin pour armer leurs morutiers, en faisant mme de Pasajes leur port d'armement48. Le gouvernement frangais se montra encore complaisant a leur gard en exemptant du rgime des congs les pinasses qui faisr'.ent le voyage de Saint-Jean-de-Luz en Guipzcoa et Biscaye48. Afin d'encourager son commerce avec l'Espagne, Bayonne, dj port privilegi, regut la permission d'importer de Hollande les pices, le cacao et la cir jaune50. Or, les Bayonnais agissaient souvent pour le compte des Nantais. Les relations commerciales franco-espagnoles taient done plus troitement lies que n'indiquent les chiffres des sorties de navires, d'autant plus qu'il arrivait souvent que ds navires a destination et au retour des Antilles et de Terre-Neuve touchent dans des ports espagnols et y vendent parfois leur cargaison. Outre cela, les corsaires francais y menaient bon nombre de leurs prises anglaises, hollandaises, portugaises dont une partie significative fut achete par les armateurs bayonnais. Mais enfin, qui s'attaquait au pavilion frangais et avec quel rsultat? La menace la plus constante provenait, non de la marine britannique, mais des puissants corsaires zlandais les flessingues et aussi des nombreux petits corsaires des lies Anglo-Normandes. Jusqu' la prise de Minorque une partie excessive de la flotte britannique fut engage en Mediterranee51 et a partir de 1708 sa puissance offensive fut diminue a cause des unites plus nombreuses exiges par la defense des cotes britanniques. Comprenons-nous combien les corsaires frangais pouvaient imposer leur loi a l'Amiraut britannique? Pendant des mois ils gardaient l'initiative dans les mers lointaines et dans la Manche. Les historiens frangais connaissent-ils les orages parlementaires que les pertes navales soulevrent en Angleterre a la
48. Arch. ff. Etr. France 1985, f o s 22, 104-5 : seances du Conseil du Commerce, 5 mai 1706 et 11 fv. 1707. 49. Ch. de Comm., Bayonne, reg. d'Am. V, f. 84 : extrait des registres du Conseil d'Etat, 11 avr. 1707. D'ailleurs, Ie 31 aot 1706, les pinasses basques furent libres de naviguer en Espagne, en dpit de la fermeture gnrale des ports, d'autant que Ie transport des laines par la Navarre est interrompu ; lettre de Pontchartrain, ibid. V, f. 85. 50 Ibid. VI, f s 83-4 : attestation de Pierre Saint-Gener, 23 mai 1707; nombre de permissions semblables des le commencement de 1707 jusqu' l't de 1708 sont enregistres, ibid. V a VII. 51. J. H. Owen, War at sea under Queen Anne(, nos-1708 (Londres, 1938), pp. 98, 236.
401
fin de 170732? La tche principale de l'escadre anglaise de la Manche tait de proteger le commerce tache qu'elle pouvait a peine remplir avec une douzaine d'units et de frequents sjours au port. Elle pouvait rarement detacher des croiseurs pour attaquer le commerce frangais et elle effectuait ses prises surtout pendant les convois ou la surveillance intermittente qu'elle exercait sur Brest. C'tait le croisement des routes maritimes franchises et anglaises au large d'Ouessant qui lui permettait de prlever sa dime sur les terre-neuvas et sur le commerce des Hes, bien qu'elle dut croiser Ie plus souvent a l'ouest des iles Seilly. Au large du cap Saint-Vincent aussi les f regates anglaises taint souvent a redouter. D'autre part, pendant toute la guerre, les corsaires anglo-normands s'acharnrent sur les ctes franchises a l'Ouest du Cotentin. A l'encontre de la marine anglaise et des corsaires zlandais, ils taint assez petits et assez mobiles pour manceuvrer tout pres des ctes. L'opinion traditionnelle, selon laquelle ils s'attaquaient principalement aux pcheurs bretons sans defense, est fausse. Us n'auraient pas pu faire des prises de plus de 100.000 livrea sterling sans causer des pertes considerables au cabotage frangais, y compris d'assez grandes quantits d'approvisionnements et de matriaux de construction navale. Ds frquentaient surtout les ctes de la Bretagne, dont les iles dpendantes leur servaient tant de guet-apens que d'asile; mais ils n'hsitaient pas a s'aventurer jusqu'aux rades de Saint-Martin et du Brouage; ils bloquaient de temps en temps l'embouchure de la Gironde elle-mme; en 1711-1712, ils tendaient leur champ d'action jusqu'aux cotes de l'Espagne septentrionale. Tout ceci est tabli par les procdures de prises anglaises et d'une f agon mouvante par les plaintes des ports au Secrtaire d'Etat de la Marine. Je me contente ici d'invoquer sur ce sujet Ie tmoignage du grand armateur nantais, Rene Monthaudouin, en 1711 : Le grand nombre des Corsaires de Gerzay et de Grenezay qui croisent journellement aux costes de la France avaient depuis Ie commencement de la guerre, et particulirement depuis les trois annes dernires, transi la navigation d'une manire si dsavantageuse pour le bien de l'Estat et du Commerce qu'aucun btiment ne peut entrer ny sortir des ports du Royaume sans tre expos a tre prise. Ceci n'est pas une plainte, peut-tre exagre, adresse au ministre, mais la justification de l'armement d'un corsaire pour combattre un corsaire53. Je ne voudrais pas exa52. Cobbett's parliamentary history, t. VI, p. 597 et suiv.; Historical Manuscripts Commission, Bouse of Lords IfSS.^ New Series, t. VI, no. 2401; Journals of the House of Lords, t. XVIII, pp, 338, 366-392, 405-422, 467-470; Journals of the House of Commons, t. XV, pp. 407-418; Statutes at large, 6 Anne c. 65. 53. A. D. Loire-Inf. B 4574, f. 133 : declaration de propriet dans L'Illustre, capt Jean Vie, 7 juill. 1707.
402
gerer l'importance d'une recherche personnelle54. II y avait 3.310 barques et chaloupes dans les ports de l'Ouest, d'aprs le recensement de 1704, et leurs ennemis en prirent moina de l.OOO. Mais il me parafi vrai de dire que ces corsaires coupaient souvent les communications maritimes entre la France du Nord et la France de l'Ouest. D'est en 1707-1709 que les Zlandais" le Prophete Elie et ses confrres firent le plus grand nombre de prises dans le golfe de Gascogne, presque toutes aux dpens du commerce des Hes et de Terre-Neuve, au moins d'aprs les archives de l'Amiraut de Nantes, qui enregistra 40 prises et 28 rangons zlandaises pendant ces troia annes55. C'est a cause de leur force 40 vaisseaux armes de 24 a 54 canons que Pontchartrain proposa aux ports de la France de l'Ouest le maintien par eux de six bonnes fregate garde-cotes de 40 a 54 canons, ainsi que d'une douzaine de frgates de 22 a 24 canons et vingt corvettes pour garder les parages o les corsaires de Gerzei, Grenezei, et Ostende ont coutume de venir, et pour conveyer les flottes : propositions avortes cependant56. Les voiliers a destination de l'Amrique, victimes frequents des Zlandais, couraient aus&i le risque de rencontrer les corsaires et les escadres anglaises d'outre-mer, dont l'efficience tait pourtant diminue, aux Antilles, par la desertion des matelots et les querelles contumelies avec les autorits civiles67. La navigation franchise souffrait probablement davantage dans ces parages des raids corsaires de la Jamaque et de Curagao. Il est difficile d'obtenir des renseignements prcis sur l'tendue de leurs succes, mais il semble que leur activit tait sporadique et dirige surtout d'abord contre les Espagnols5*. La navigation anglaise avait probablement plus a craindre des Martiniquais, au moins avant le Prize Act de 1708, ce qui encouragea la course britannique. Bien entendu, on ne saurait dresser le bilan des pertes du commerce frangais en tenant compie des seules statistiques des prises. H faut teir compte davantage peut-tre des retards et autres inconvenient
54. The Channel Island privateers in the war of the Spanish Succession dans Transactions de la Socit Guernesiaise, t. xiv (1949), ci-dessus, pp. 339-73. 56. A. D. Loire-Inf. B 4572 a 4575 : enreg. des rapports des capitaines au long-cours, 1705-1713. 56. Arch. Aff. Etr. France 1985, f' 127-9 : seance du Conseil du Comm., l" jan. 1707. Cf. E. Gabory, op. cit., p. 113, selon lequel ce fut l'opposition nantaise qui fit chouer le projet. Pontchartrain suggra une repartition d& la contribution des ports dans les proportions suivantes : Saint-Malo 8, Nantes 7, Bordeaux 4, La Rochelle 4, Sables d'Olonne 2, Morlaix 2. 57. Voir Ruth Bourne, Queen Anne's navy in the West Indies (New HavenLondres, 1939), passim. 58. A. D. Loire-Inf. B 4572 a 4575 : rapp. des cap. au long-cours; [P. R. O.I C. O. 137/6, n 24 (vii); ibid. 8, n os 24 (ii) et 33 (i); C. O. 28/12, n" 53 (ix); ibid. 14, n" 2 (vi) : listes incompltes des prises juges a la Jamaque et a la Barbade. Jusqu'au 19 fv. 1705 on avait conduit 20 prises en Jamaque, 14 en Barbade, 4 en Antigua (T. 1/93, f 01 192-8).
4Q3
imputes aux convois; de la fermeture frequente des ports; de la hausse des gages et des primes d'assurance a Nantes elles s'levaient en 1709 a 40 % pour les frets a destination des lies59; des desertions et des exigences des matelots, aggraves par la necessit de relches plus frquentes a Port Louis, Brest, Vigo, la Corogne et d'autres ports espagnols; et enfin fait trop peu connu des tres frequents dommages causes par l'eau de mer aux cargaisons de sucres et de tabacs lorsqu'il fallait faire force de voiles afin d'chapper a l'ennemi60. Voil une cause d'accroissement sensible, quoique non mesurable, des pertes totales. Quant aux pertes totales du trafic colonial, j'ai pu constater que les archives de la Haute Cour de l'Amiraut nous renseignent sur 88 prises franchises dans le commerce antillais, dont les deux-tiers au cours du voyage de retour, et sur plus de 150 terre-neuvas. A celles-ci il faut ajouter des voiliers jugs dans les vice-amirauts des colonies anglaises et les prises zlandaises. On peut obtenir une evaluation de la proportion relative de ces dernires en dpouillant les rapports de mer nantais, qui mentionnent, pour les voyages des lies de 1705 a 1713, environ 120 pertes, dont la moiti due aux Zlandais61. Quelquesuns de ces infortun voiliers avaient t armes ailleurs qu' Nantes, et d'autre part nous ne sommes pas obliges de croire que tous les armements nantais partaient de Nantes; mais, avec ces rserves, je pense qu'un bon quart des armements nantais pour les Antilles n'est pas revenu en France, et que Nantes a t plus directement atteinte que ses rivaux, absolument et relativement. Les Bordelais ne demandaient pas autant de passeports pour les Hes; les Rochelais ne subissaient pas autant de pertes62. Que faut-il en conclure? Que ce commerce essentiel diminua beaucoup pendant la guerre, comme ce fut certainement le cas pour la pche a la morue, qui baissa de plus de moiti63? n existe sans doute des raisons gnrales de le supposer. La production antillaise de sucre ne pouvait tre intgralement transpor59. Arch. Nat. Marine EVITI, f. 394 : Lusangay a Pontchartrain, 19 oct. 1709. 60. Documentation ahondante dans les rapports des capitaines au longcours : A. D. Loire-Inf., loc. cit. 61. Ibid. 62. Navires prig par les Anglais dans le commerce antillais et jugs en Angleterre : Nantes 40, Bordeaux 11, La Rochelle 10, Saint-Malo 6, Marseille 4, Le Havre 4, Dieppe 2, Martinique 2, pas identifies 9 (H. C. A. 32/46-86 et 92). 63. Arch. Aff. Btr. France 1986, f. 45 : sance du Conseil du Comm, 5 jan, 1709. Selon ceci, la pche a la morue employait 250 vaisseaux en temps de paix, mais 120 seulement pendant la guerre. D'aprs les congs, le montani des departs de Nantes et de Saint-Malo en 1707 (meilleure anne de la guerre) n'est que 55 : cf. plus de 100 armements malouins pour le Petit-Nord et Ie Chapeau Rouge en 1702 et moins de 20 en 1709 et 1711.
404
tee, faute de tonnage*4. De mme, le tableau des prix dress par Henri Hauser65 nous mentre, entre 1705 et 1709, une hausse de 6 % a 29 % sur le sucre brut a Nantes par rapport a 1700, avec un net recul en 171166. On sait d'ailleurs combien les Antillais furent a court de vivres et qu'ils ne survcurent que grace a des denres provenant de l'Amrique du Nord : l'essor de la course martiniquaise a bien l'air d'avoir t determin par les ncessits de la chasse au plat67. La disette aux lies reflate non seulement la perte des navires de ravitaillement partis de France, mais aussi les diffcults du traflc franco-irlandais en approvisionnements08. Tout cela semble constituer un tableau assez sombre. Il n'est nullement exager pour Bordeaux, dont le commerce antillais atteignit rarement, d'aprs les passeports, la moiti du volume de 1700, sana parier de celui de 1714 : je ne trouve, d'ailleurs, que peu de traces d'une collaboration bordelaise avec les ngociants des autres porta sucriers. Mais le mouvement de la navigation de Nantes et de La Rochelle aux lies prsente un aspect tout diffrent. A partir de 1704 au plus tard, les expeditions de Nantes dpassrent le niveau de 1700; pendant deux annes de guerre elles atteignirent le doubl du volume de 1701. Les renseignements concernant La Rochelle sont moins complets, mais, en 1705 et en 1708 du moins, le volume de ses armements antillais dpassa non seulement le meilleur chiffre (56) connu pour le dix-septime sicle, mais aussi la meilleure moyenne (40) du dix64. A. D. Gir. C 4300, t" 94-5 : Pontchartrain a la Ch. de Comm. de Bordeaux, 7 nov. 1708. 65. Recherches et documents swr l'histoire des prix en France de 1500 a 1800 (Paris, 1936), pp. 495 et suiv. 66. Mais ceci pourrait s'expliquer par revolution du traflc hollandais et, en tout cas, la srie de ces prix n'excde qu'en trois ans le niveau (assez lev) de 1700-1701. Les cours du sucre terre et du sucre blanc ne l'excdent qu'en deux ans, et pour cela lgrement. A signaler aussi que le cours de l'indigo baissa 'fort au-dessous du niveau d'avant-guerre. Le cours des sucres & Amsterdam baissa fort aussi pendant la guerre : Posthumus, op. cit.j pp. 495 et suiv. Ce recul pourrait expliquer le surchargement des sucres aux lies, o il y avait eju de la dtresse d'ailleurs en 1701, lorsque les sucres s'taient vendus trs chers, d'aprs les Deputes de Commerce (mm. presentes au Rgent, Bibl. Nat. ms. f r. 8038, f" 317T, 318, 439). Selon G. Scelle, Histoire politique de la traite negriere aux Indes de Castille, i. n (Paris, 1906), p. 263, la main-d'ceuvre y tait chre, mais pas trs rare, pendant la dure de l'Assiento transis. 67. Historical MSB. Com'roisstow, House: of Lords MSS., New Ser., t. VII, pp. 263-4. C'est pourquoi le gouvernement frangala voulait accorder des passeports aux trangers : Aff. Etr. France 19 6, f" 67-8; A. D. Gir. C 4300, f. 94. 68. On doit pourtant remarquer que ce traflc, comme celui avec l'Ecosse, ne disparurent nullement pendant la guerre. A ne regarder que les quatre annes, 1707-1710, les passeports francais accords pour le voyage de l'Irlande montent aux chiffres suivants : Bordeaux 174, La Rochelle 164, Nantes 164. A Bordeaux, un total de 387 passeports irlandais et 109 cossais pour 1702-1712.
495
huitim89. Cette conclusion tant fondee sur les chiffres des passeports et non sur ceux des congs, je ne crois pas qu'elle puisse s'expliquer par le fait que les convois anuliate se rassemblaient d'ordinaire dans les rades charentaises. Faut-il plutt 1'expliquer par la mise en valeur de Saint-Domingue et par les nouvelles occasions offertes au troc aux Indes espagnoles70 ? Quoiqu'il en soit, le volume des armements nantais et rochelais ne varie pas d'une anne a l'autre en raison inverse de Pintensit des attaques ennemies. Je crois mme que, malgr de graves pertes maritimes, nous pouvons dir que le commerce antillais de Nantes et de La Rochelle s'acerut, dans l'ensemble, pendant la guerre. Les navires perdus furent remplaces, grace en partie a l'achat de prises les Nantais en achetrent environ cinquante pour ce seul commerce71 et peut-tre aussi au transfert de navires provenant d'autres commerces repris par les Hollandais ou les neutres. De plus, quelques passeports accords aux Irlandais et l'usage fait des vasseaux hollandais par les trangers non naturalises de Bordeaux a part, la navigation trangre ne semble gure avoir enfreint le pacte colonial72. Paul Masson a crit au sujet de cette guerre : Les capitaux se cachaient, ils ne manquaient pas73. A Nantes et a La Rochelle, au contraire, comme a Saint-Malo, ils ne tardrent pas a se hasarder en pleine guerre. Peut-tre augmentrent-ils, car, pendant ces annes si douloureuses pour le royaume en general, les amateurs malouins ne furent pas les seuls a se lancer dans de nouvelles expeditions hasardeuses et profitables. C'est a cette poque que les Monthaudouin et les Joubert jetrent les bases de la traite nantaise74. A vrai dire, si Ton examine les contrats de proprit enregistrs dans les ports, on est frappe par la varit des placements d'un Groux de Nantes, d'un Lefer de Saint-Malo, d'un Hayes de La Rochelle75. Il ne faut pas oublier non plus que l'ensemble des armements exigeait la participation de nombreux intresses. Sauf a Bordeaux, nous avons le sentiment dans ces annes difficiles de vivre dj sous la Rgence.
69. M. Delafosse, La Rochelle et les lies au XVII' sicle dans La Revue d'Histoire des Colonies, t. XXXVI, 1949, p. 241; Henri Robert, Les fra/ics coloniaux du port de La Rochelle au XVIII' sicle (Poitiers, 1949), p. 5. 70. Assez difficile toutefois, d'aprs lea rapports de mer nantais. Cf. G. Scelle, op. cit., t. II, pp. 215 et suiv. 71. A. D. Loire-Inf. B 4478 a 4480. 72.'A D. Gir. C 4301, f. 31 : Pontchartrain a Lombard, 16 nov. 1709; ibid. C 4251, f. 109 : mm. de Ribaii, Billate, Saige, etc., 28 juin 1708. 73. Op. cit., p. 349. 74. Scelle, op. cit., t. II, pp. 252-4. Les Nantais armrent au moins 3 vaisseaux pour la Guinee ou le Senegal en 1706-1707, 3 en 1708, 4 en 1709, 6 en 1710, 3 en 1711, 6 en 1712 : A. D. Loire-Inf. B 4727 (billets de rangon). Cf. Gaston-Martin, Nantes aw XVIII' sicle : l're des ngriers (Paris, 1931), p. 177. 75. Ibid. B 4478-9; A. D. Ille-etVil. 9 B 168; A. D. Char.-Marit. B 5698 a 5708.
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APPENDICE.
Nombre de passeports accords aux Hollandais [H] et de passeports pour le voyage aux Hes d'Amrique [I]i : Alinees Ports basques
H
1702 1703 1704 1705 1706 1707 1708 1709 1710 1711 1712
Bordeaux
H I 99* 15 20 21 22 32 35 27 25 26 35
La Rochelle1
H I Lacune 38 35 68 25 5 90 2 106 57 183 284 23 260 38 8 34 Lacune
Nantes8
I H 10 9 Lacune 43 62 40 84 48 141 40 142 63 61 40 57 43 37 13 1 53
Saint-Halo
H 1 I
72 49 61 36 13 19
2 4 5 3 5 3
14 315 517 500 404 227 173 87
1 8 1 Ss 3 Lacune 6 15 9 20 17 3* 3 17 3 3 2
1. Pour les chlffres malouins et nantais, j'ai d faire usage des enregistrements des congs de departs. Evidemmeiit, les passeports s'appliquaient parfois aux voyages de l'anne suivante, de sorte que les chiffres n'en sont pas strictement comparables avec ceux des congs, 2. Chiffres recueillis dans les Hasses, done peut-tre incompleta. 3. Du 4 avril au 3 avril de l'anne suivante. De plus, les enregistrements nantais ne distinguent pas nettement les voyages a destination des Hes, des voyages pour l'Amrique; mais on faisait ordinairement ce dernier voyage via, les Hes. 4. Dont 69 partirent de La Rochelle, un de Saint-Jean-de-Luz : A. D. Gir. 6 B 79. 5. Janvier-juin seulement. 6. Dont un depart de Bordeaux en 1708, deux en 1709 : A. D. Gir. 6 B 302, f. 159; 303, f" 2, 28.
18
SOME ZEELAND PRIVATEERING INSTRUCTIONS: JACOB SAUTIJN TO CAPTAIN SALOMON REYNDERS, 1707 OR the privateering of Middelburg and Flushingthe Commissievaart, as it was known in the Netherlandsthe later wars of Louis XIV were as much a heroic age as they were for the more widely recognized grande guerre de course of Dunkirk and Saint-Malo. That its remarkable record, unlike that of the French, has so far failed to find the place it deserves in the general history of the wars is no doubt mainly due to its neglect by Dutch historians, and this in turn perhaps to the controversial name which the Commissievaart earned for itself, rightly or wrongly, in the province of Hollandthe interests of whose merchants in enemy trade it sometimes damaged and always opposedas well as with King William and the States General. Even now it is best remembered for the diplomatic friction caused by its many seizures of neutral and allied shipping.1 The fact that most of these were concentrated within relatively short periods, early and late in the Nine Years War and during the first years of its successor, served of itself to create and publicize something like a crisis in the relations between Middelburg and the Hague, and to influence the public abroad unfavourably. Most foreignerscertainly Swedes, Danes, and Hanseaticswould probably have agreed with the English ambassador Stanhope when he wrote of the Zeelanders that they 'make
I. See G. N. Clark, The Dutch Alliance and the War against French Trade, 1688 1697 (Manchester, 1923), ch. v, and idem, 'Neutral Commerce in the War of the Spanish Succession and the Treaty of Utrecht', The British Year Book of International Law (1928), pp. 69-83. Many contemporary documents bearing on these- disputes were printed in Lamberty's Mmoires, esp. ii. 265-324 and xii. 30-45, 154-76, 197-215. I have discussed Zealand's point of view, and some consequences of its procedures, in 'Les Corsaires zlandais et la navigation scandinave pendant la Guerre de Succession d'Espagne', apud M. Mollai (ed.), Le Navire et l'Economie Maritime du Nord de l'Europe (Paris, 1960),; below, pp. 435-47.
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no difference between friends, Neutrals and Ennemies, but take all they meet, and immediately declare good prise all they take'.2 Although this aphorism is itself lacking in discrimination, Stanhope might have added that the Zeeland corsairs had a nasty habit of depositing their prisoners on lonely shores without food or money. King William had another reason for his reserved attitude towards the Zeelanders: they competed with the navy for manpower, and he several times called them in and had the States General cancel their commissions.3 His death, of course, removed a great co-ordinating force behind Dutch naval policy, so that in the Spanish Succession War the Zeeland admiralty college both reduced the scale of its contribution to the Republican navy and restricted what ships it contributed to a defensive role in the North Sea.4 Since its coasts, and even its inland waters (the binnenstroomen)^ were under constant threat from the privateers of Dunkirk and Ostend or Nieuport, so self-regarding an outlook was natural enough, especially on the part of a poor province which prospered only in war-time, thanks to the Commissievaart. But few contemporaries in Amsterdam and the Hague, any more than in London and Vienna, were likely to view the policies of the admiralty at Middelburg in this charitable light. A totally different impression, strong and well defined, will be gained by anyone who reads the correspondence of the French port authorities at this time, especially the despatches of French consuls in many parts of the Mediterranean. For them, 'les Flessinguois' were a pest more intense if shorter-lived than Barbary had been. Although the Zeelanders do not seem to have penetrated the Mediterranean, as privateers, until the end of 1692, nor to have appeared there en masse until 1695 at earliest, it is noticeable that the Dutch declaration of war in 1702 brought them back at once.5 Their movements were watched and reported in detail to the French secretary of state for the navy, as
2. Stanhope to Hedges, The Hague, 7 August 1703, P.R.O., S.P. 84 (Foreign, Holland), vol. 224, fo. 619. 3. Placate of 6 November 1691, 25 November 1692, 13 November 1693, 28 March and 19 October 1695, in C. Cau (ed.), GfrootJ Pflacaet-JBfoeck], iv. 215-16. Cf. Clark, Dutch Alliance, p. 51, for William Ill's intervention with the Zeeland admiralty on 2 March 1694. 4. J. C. de Jonge, Geschiedenis van het Nederlandsche Zeeweên (3rd edn., Zwolle, 1869), iii. 569-73, 61112. 5. First references to Mediterranean captures in Resolution der Admiraliteitscollegie van Zeeland, 18 February and 14 March 1693, in A.R.A., St[aten] Gen[eraal] Admfiraliteit] 2515. For 1702, cf. Archives] Nationales, Paris], Aff. Etr. B1 706 (corresp. consulaire, Livourne), sieur de Gibercourt to Pontchartrain, 6, 16, and 23 June 1702.
Some Zeeland Privateering Instructions, J 707
409
well as to the Chamber of Commerce at Marseilles, which was said to have lost between three and four hundred vessels, mainly to such privateers as the Vliegende Faam and the Grote Rooseboom, in the first four years of the Spanish Succession War.6 The French consul in Leghorn, which was far the best prize market and also the chief refitting base for the corsairs of both sides in the Mediterranean, complained in October 1704 that the situation was then far worse than in the previous war; soon afterwards he reported the presence of over a score of Dutch privateers 'dans ces mers'.7 This phrase included the Levant, where the Ottoman Porte was next year to impose restrictions on the taking of prizes, notably into Chios and Mitylene, between which islands there was a profitable cruising zone, or in the waters between Samos and Negroponte. The Marseilles Chamber frequently ordered standstills on its shipping in the Levant, sometimes for as long as four months, as well as on departures from Marseilles itself. French counterprivateering did not develop until 1705 and was not very successful until after 1709, and even then, if only to recover their costs, the captains preferred more remunerative prey than enemy corsairs. As late as September 1711 the 'Flessinguois' were still active in the Greek Archipelago ; in May 1712 eight of them were seen at Leghorn, and in December 'Messieurs du Commerce' of Marseilles found it impossible to agree on a method of dealing with three Dutch corsairs working off the coast of Provence itself.8 Elsewhere, in the Bay of Biscay, from 1705 to 1712 alone, the Zeelanders seized or ransomed over sixty vessels in the French West India trade and over forty codfishers.9 They were frequently reported, cruising in twos and threes, off Ushant; in February 1704, half a dozen of them were busy off north Brittany recapturing prizes bound for Saint-Malo; and some thirty were alleged to be cruising between Ushant and Cape Finisterre in November ijoj.10
6. Vauvr, intendant e la marine, Toulon, to Pontchartrain, 29 August 1706, A.N., Marine B3 139, fo. 361. 7. Gibercourt to Pontchartrain, 17 October and 28 November 1704, A.N., Aff. Etr. B1 706. 8. Vauvr to Pontchartrain, 27 September 1711 and i May 1712 (A.N., Marine B3 200, fo. 275, and 208, fo. 242); Maillet to Charonne, 11 December 1712 (ibid., 208, fos. 519-21"). 9. Nantes, Arch. Dp[artementales, Loire-Atlantique], Amiraut B 4572-5 (rapports des capitaines au long cours, 1705-13). 10. Robert, intendant de la marine, Brest, to Pontchartrain, 29 February 1704 and 14 November 1711 : Brest, archives de 'arsenal, i E 452, pp. 178-9, and 458, pp. 812-13. I wish to thank Mademoiselle G. Beauchesne and Commandant Le Chuiton for enabling me to consult these archives.
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They were sometimes very strongover forty guns, in one case fifty-two, though a strength of twenty to thirty was commonerand far too heavily manned to have been recruited entirely, or even mainly, in Zeeland alone. Their pugnacity and endurance in combat suggests an affinity with their neighbours of Dunkirk and there were probably many Flemish seamen among them, just as French prisoners or deserters served them in the Mediterranean, if less numerous there than the Italian element. It was the opinion of Robert, the experienced and fairminded naval intendant at Brest, that 'de tous les vaisseaux ennemis qui sont a la mer il n'y en a point qui ayent de meilleurs equipages et qui se battent mieux que les Flessinguois'.11 In this sustained if piecemeal accompaniment to the campaigns of William and Marlborough, no family maintained a more active role over so many years than the Middelburg merchants whom Sir George Clark once described as 'the great house of Sautijn'.12 The brothers Jacob and Jan Sautijn, born respectively in 1648 and 1650, were unusual among Zeeland privateering directors in frequently working as partners, though Jacob was also often associated with his son Abraham, and Jan with his son Daniel, during the Spanish Succession War. As
u. Robert to Pontchartrain, z August 1706, ibid., i E 456, p. 659. Cf. ibid., 460, p. 186 (same to same, 6 February 1708) for the statement that the Zeeland crews were more Italian than Dutch, although below strength. There are no satisfactory figures of the privateers at sea at any one time. The lists published by Lamberty, Mem., xii. 21315 for December 1703 give a total of 22 Middelburg and 26 Flushing privateers, with a total armament of 1,024 guns and 7,537 men; but unpublished lists for April 1704 and i February 1705 in the Rijksarchief at Middelburg (Collfectie] Verheye [-Van Gitters], bundles 30 and 31) show that, of a combined total of 45 privateers, only 12 were out cruising, the remainder being laid up, taken by the enemy, or turned over to trade. The often-cited lists in the appendix to De Jonge, iv. 759-60 are misleading if read as indications of a net aggregate strength because they take no account of such withdrawals. From 16 June 1702 to 19 May 1705 the Zeeland admiralty registered 147 commissions, and there were 35 more from 3 June 1711 to 27 March 1713 (Middelburg, Rijksarchief in Zeeland, archief van de directe en indirecte belastingen, 58 and 59); the gap in these records is partly filled by the printed Resaluden of the States General, which record 93 Zeeland commissions from 6 December 1707 to the end of May 1711. Thus it seems safe to assume (allowing for the remaining gap in the evidence between 19 May 1705 and 6 December 1707) that over 300 commissin van retorsie were issued to Zeeland armaments alone in the Spanish Succession War, besides a small number for Amsterdam, the East India Company, etc. The number of captains would not have been so high as this, as some were commissioned more than once; but the number of campaigns must have been considerably in excess of three hundred, though not seldom planned for a duration of eighteen months. For the Nine Years War, see Clark, Dutch Alliance, pp. 54-5. I am much indebted to Mr. M. P. de Bruin, formerly of the Rijksarchief in Zeeland (hereafter cited R.A.Z.), and to Dr. A. J. Veenendaal for their helpfulness in this connection. 12. Op. cit., p. 53. De Jonge makes special mention of the Sautijn brothers in his eulogy of the privateering war, op. cit., in. 531-2 and iv. 3950.
Some Zeeland Privateering Instructions, 1707
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managers and shareholders, Jacob and Jan between them were concerned in fifteen armaments during the Nine Years War, with an aggregate of 320 guns; the Sautijn coat of arms was present at La Hougue (and in 1702 at Vigo), and their warships took a share in protecting Walcheren from the Dunkirkers. During this and the succeeding war, alone or in partnership, Jacob is said to have been responsible for thirty-six privateers, totalling 1,206 guns and 8,520 men, involving some five hundred campaigns (kruistochten), and accounting for the capture, ransom, or sinking of eighty ships. In August 1706, he was sufficiently well placed to take as his second wife a daughter of Jacob Elias, a member of the Amsterdam town council and a director of the East India Company.13 Jacob Sautijn probably enjoyed considerable influence over the Zeeland admiralty college; his signature headed more than one petition of the Zeeland privateering interest in its frequent disputes with the States General; his warships ranged as far as Greenland and Cyprus. One might well regard him as the soul of the Commissievaart in its last great period. His personal petitions certainly bear the impress of both a strong temper and an orderly mind. The director of a Zeeland privateering armament was known as the bookholder (boekhouder}, but he had much to do besides mobilizing subscriptions and keeping an account (the cassa) of income and outlay. In everything that concerned the outfittingsometimes the building of a new frigate, always the selection of officers and the recruitment of a crew, their equipment and provisioninghis was the controlling hand. It was also his function to prosecute prizes and to serve as proxy for the shareholders, the rederij, in taking any other legal action to protect their interests and in complying with the requirements of the law. And it was the bookholder who planned the strategy of a campaign, drew up the captain's instructions, and corresponded with him through agents in the foreign ports most frequented by the privateersboth for refitting and for the custody or disposal of their prizes. We have it on
13. 'Namen en Montuere van de seer Bezeylde Commissievaarders door Jacob en Jan Sautijn cum Suis, kooplieden binnen Middelburg als Boeckhouders en Reeders . . . 1689 tot 1697' (R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye, 31). Other details are from A. J. van der Aa [et al.], Biog. Woordenboek der NederL, xvii (Haarlem, 1874), pp. 1469, where it is claimed that Jacob Sautijn's privateering gains aggregated the sum of 31,110,000 guilders. So high a figure requires substantiation, but De Jonge, iv. 47 n., asserts that prize goods sold in Middelburg in 1707 alone fetched 630,000 guilders, without counting numerous prizes sold in Leghorn, Lisbon, etc., or the very valuable premiums for captured warships, so that the claim is not to be dismissed a fortiori. The alternative spelling 'Sautain', given by Van der Aa, suggests that the family was of French or Walloon origin.
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the authority of a Flushing bookholder of the time that a captain's instructions were not drafted without much trouble.14 A certain rarity attaches to the set of instructions printed below, from the hand of Jacob Sautijn himself in the summer of 1707, when the privateering war was at its height. The operational history of the Commissievaart has to be reconstructed for the most part indirectly, either from the correspondence of enemy consuls and maritime personnel, or from the numerous but cryptic references arising in the course of legal business before the council (raad} of the admiralty college in Middelburg, whose minutes are our principal surviving source.15 More direct evidence is scarce indeed. One would give much to catch sight of a captain's journal, or of a journal kept by the schrijver (clerk) whom every privateer was required to carry, following aplacaat of the States General published on 28 July i7O5,16 and who was responsible under oath taken before the admiralty councils for the safekeeping of all papers found on board a prize, sealing its cargo, and generally making sure that there was no plunder or improper sale. Much also could be learnt from the confidential instructions drafted for the captains by the bookholders. Again according to uieplacaat of 28 July 1705, which embodied a systematic code of conduct intended to discipline the privateersparticularly with regard to the treatment of friendly shipping,bookholders were required to exhibit their instructions to the admiralty colleges, which in turn were to make sure that they conformed with the meaning and intention of the placaatP But the instructions too, unhappily, are no longer to be found in the Dutch archives, perhaps because they were destroyed at the time in order to preserve them from spies. At sea, no doubt, a captain's inclination would be to burn or jettison his instructions if he thought he was going to have to surrender; at least they do not turn up as a rule among the prize papers that survive in French archives. Why Jacob Sautijn's
14. Geleijn Hurgronje to Capt. Daniel Propheet, i July 1712 ('. . . UEd: instruktie die ik met soo veel moeijte opgestelt hebbe . . .'), in A. P. Snouck-Hurgronje, Genealogie der familie Snouck-Hurgronje (Venlo, 1924), letter xvi, pp. 44-5. For the years 170213 about eighty bookholders, from some sixty families, appear in the records : some thirty families were persistently prominent, including one at Veere. 15. The same act-books were used for naval business. Prize sentences were also recorded in a separate register, but the volumes for 170510 and part of 1711 were destroyed in the bombing of Middelburg. 16. Placaat noopende de Commissievaarders (G.P.S., v. 30610) articles ix, x, xxv. In practice, the bookholders nominated the schrijver and the admiralty council minuted his nomination. 17. Ibid., art. iv-viii.
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instructions of July 1707 have come down to us will be made clear in the proper place. They are addressed principally to Salomon Reynders, who had been in Sautijn's service since January 1703, as captain of the Zeven Provincin, a medium-size warship pierced for 32 guns and bearing a complement of 150 to 180 men. She may have been identical with the privateer of the same name which had worn the Sautijn coat of arms at La Hougue, or with that which took part in the attack on Chteaurenault's silver-fleet and captured the Indiscret fireship in 1702, under a different command. Under Reynders, the Zeven Provincin took, or participated in taking, at least nine French privateers and as many merchantmen, including several recaptures.18 Two Danish merchantmen, the Good Hope of Apenrade and the White Elephant^ both seized in 1703, became the object of diplomatic intervention and prolonged litigation.19 They were among the cases that produced a firstclass row between the province of Zeeland and the States General, involving the tender questions of state rights and the independence of prize judicature, and culminating in the new privateering regulations of 28 July 1705 and in a further placaat of the same date regularizing the permissible traffic with France and Spain.20 Sautijn had had previous experience of 'political' suspensions (surchances) and releases, and he resented them strongly;21 but it will be seen that the instructie addressed to Reynders in 1707 advised him firmly to respect the Republic's treaties as well as the passports issued by the States General for the import of brandy and other commodities from enemy territory. For the cruise here contemplated Sautijn had also available a bigger frigate, the Propheet Elias, 38 guns, of which Reynders was to proceed
18. A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2435 and 252531. 19. The Goed Hoop (Frelle Christensen) was a Slesvig vessel, laden for Bordeaux on Hamburg and Lbeck account, allegedly with a French interest; the Zeeland admiralty allowed sale of the cargo in defiance of the States General, who on i August 1703 ordered the captors to be prosecuted; on 22 July 1704 the Hansa resident asked for the execution of no less than five Resolutions of the States General ordering release, but the admiralty sentenced the cargo and the owners asked leave to appeal on 14 September 1707 (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2524-5, 2530-1). The Witten Olifant (Dirck Nantes), bound Bordeaux to Archangel with cargo on Danish account for the tsar, was the subject of protests by the Danish and Russian ambassadors on n and 20 August 1703 but was still sub judice on n March 1705 (Hid., 2524, 5656); she carried wines 'of the highest merit'. 20. Placaat op het stuck van Waaren van Contrabande na 's Vyands Landen (G.P.B., V. 352-5). 21. Besides the cases mentioned above, there were the three 'pretence neutrals' the Roos, Carolas, and St Annataken in the Nine Years War and the subject of a petition from Sautijn to the States of Zeeland in R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 30.
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captain, leaving the Zeven Provincin to Captain Pieter Booms. Booms had been in his service during the Nine Years War22 and had the advantage of knowing the Mediterranean, where it was intended that the two privateers in consort should spend most of their 16-month campaign; but he was to take his orders from Reynders. Little information has come to light about his earlier career, and none about that of the Propheet Elias: quite likely she was newly built, possibly at Amsterdam, and named after Vrouwtje Elias, Sautijn's new wife, also from Amsterdam. In detail, the instructions here printed are chiefly concerned with the directions and times of cruising, the conduct of prizes, and what to do in an emergency. On the whole, they can be left to speak for themselves, provided certain features of the legal framework are kept in mind. These are immediately derived, in the main, from the three placateti published by the States General on 28 July 1705 which Sautijn itemizes. Two of them, concerning trade with the enemy and the regulation of the Commissievaart, have already been mentioned. Regarding the first of these, it is necessary only to say that it prescribed certain limitations on trading with the enemy that had been resumed with the lapse of the one-year Interdict, which the Republic had imposed as from i June 1703 under strong English pressure but refused to renew a year later;23 trade with France and Spain in Dutch bottoms was afterwards quite open so long as the necessary passports were obtained for each voyage from the respective governments, although it was not until 1705 that they were issued in any significant number by the court of Versailles and not until 28 July of that year that the form of the Dutch passport was regulated. The same placaat provided that passes should only be granted for voyages direct to a single enemy port and home again; and it excluded voyages to the French West Indies altogether and the carriage of contrabandchiefly arms, ammunition, naval stores, and horses24to enemy ports anywhere. On 22 August the States further resolved that Dutch ships thus
22. As captain of De Paeuw, an exceptionally small 'kaper' of 6 guns, 50 men (included in the list cit. supra, note 13). 23. There is a useful discussion of the 17034 Interdict in G. van den Haute, Les Relations anglo-hollandaises au debut du XVIII' sicle (Louvain, 1932.), pp. 255 ff. 24. As defined by States General Resolution of 13 May 1705, the contraband list included everything that 'tot den oorlog dient, en specialijk alle materialen dienende tot het bouwen en equiperen van schepen'. The export of horses had been forbidden by Resolution of the States General on 12 December 1704, but was allowed on 21 August 1706.
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furnished with their passports might not be arrested by the English. Such trade in Dutch bottomsa large one till 1710was chiefly with the western ports of France and the return cargoes were chiefly salt, wines, and brandies.25 From March 1707, however, the Zeeland admiralty minutes very frequently register passes for Spanish ships to bring in wool and iron from San Sebastian or Bilbao,26 presumably because Dutch industry could not dispense with the special qualities of these Spanish raw materials nor rely on Dutch or neutral shipping to bring in enough. This restricted but nevertheless large-scale return to the historic Dutch practice of trading with the enemy virtually ended the arrest of Scandinavian and Hanseatic ships by Zeelanders on the lookout for 'pretence neutrals' carrying belligerent cargoes: indeed, the acute diplomatic embarrassments caused by those arrests may well have been a secondary motive in the Republic's refusal to renew the Interdict, which had given the merchants of Holland only too much reason to colour their cargoes, and more rarely their ships, under cover of neutral ownership. These same embarrassments, associated with acts of defiance on the part of the Zeeland States and admiralty college, lay behind the secondplacaat of 28 July 1705, which, besides speeding up the course of prize procedure and improving the machinery for revising the judgements of the admiralty colleges (sitting as prize courts) on appeal, reserved the grant of privateering commissions to the States General themselves27 and provided certain new safeguards (for what they might be worth) against improper arrests, the abuse of plunder, the concealment of a captured ship's papers, and so on. Article xvi refers in general to the treaties of navigation with allies and neutrals, adding that none of their vessels may be molested when engaged in traffic permitted to Dutch nationals; Ottoman subjects, but they alone, were
25. J. S. Bromley, 'Le Commerce de la France de l'Ouest et la guerre maritime, 170212', rmales du Midi, Ixv (1953), 4960. 26. A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2530, fos. 140, 143% 150, I77T. Apparently Zeeland's deputies at The Hague had issued a strong manifesto against the Spanish passports and four Spanish ships had recently been arrested by the privateers: the admiralty was ordered on 26 February 1707 to register such passports as the States General might allow (ibid., fo. 79). 27. Since October 1703 the States of Zeeland had replied to the Resolution of the States General of 8 September 1703, which revoked all privateering commissions, by assuming the power of issue to themselves, sometimes by amending commissions previously issued by the States General: e.g., the Faem, 17 October 1703 (ibid., 2524); Asia, etc., 19 March 1704 (ibid., 2525); Grote Rooseboom, 20 December 1704 (ibid., 2596).
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protected even when their property was found in enemy bottoms.28 Article iii raised from 25,000 to 30,000 guilders the amount of cautionmoney which a privateering syndicate was obliged to put down before a commission could be issued, and articles ix-x required the appointment of a clerk or schrijver, paid by the state, to every privateer. The exhibition of its confidential instructie was the subject of articles iv to viii. A spare copy was to be delivered to the admiralty college by the bookholder, in the presence of captain and officerseight days before sailing, as the Zeeland college later decided,and the bookholder must take oath on paper that he had given no other orders 'underhand'. Everything concerning the 'project' of the voyage was to be included, and anything contrary to the orders or the placaten of the States General was to be amended by the college. Only one example of such an amendment by the Zeeland admiralty has come to light.29 If Sautijn's instructions were at all representative, there can have been little or no pretext for amendment: a good deal in them is concerned simply with the requirements of the law, which, as one made wise by costly and sometimes fruitless litigation, he exhorts his captains to observe. The first instruction ( (I) below) is endorsed : 'Instructie voor Salomon Reynders soo. die aan d'admiralityt van Zeeland is over gegeven.' Whether the later instruction ( (II) below) was similarly exhibited remains uncertain, but there seems no obvious reason why it should have been kept any more secret, unless it was the extension of the cruise to Iceland. The above Placaat noopende de Commissievaarders was reinforced by a new public Instructie voor Capiteyn en Officieren promulgated by the States General on the same day. This is to be distinguished from the private instructions drafted by the bookholders themselves. Dealing largely with matters of discipline, visitation and search (including the schrijver s duties), and the conduct of prizes, it is of the type of standing Instructions which all the European sea-powers issued, revised and renewed from time to time. It was really the privateersman's articles
28. G.P.B., v. 307, Placaat noopende de Commissievaarders, 28 July 1705, art. xiv. Art. xii of this placaat prohibited the capture of any enemy ships within the 'District van Samos, Icaria, Dlos, Andr en Negroponte', besides the taking of prizes into forbidden places like Chios: cf. below, note [45]. 29. On 21 April 1706 the bookholder of the Onbekenden was ordered to amplify his instructie as it omitted reference to a Resolution of the States General of 15 February concerning Prussian and Hanseatic passports (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2528, fo. 231'). Since these were not expressly mentioned in Sautijn's instruction of July 1707, the college seems soon to have relaxed its vigilance.
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of war and is what Sautijn means when he refers to the 'Artykelbrief ' (literally 'Article-letter'), though this term refers more generally to the naval code of disciplineand indeed he must have had that also in mind since article xliv of the public Instructie of 28 July expressly applies the Articulbrief ten oorlogh (last promulgated on 8 April lyoi)30 for the corporal punishment, by a privateering captain and his councilof-war (Scheeps-Kryghsraad], of anyone found guilty of plundering a friendly vessel. The penalties for serious offences on board privateers were extremely severe, ranging from forfeiture of wages and prize-money to that macabre form of capital punishment which consisted in being thrown into the sea bound to the body of a murdered victim. Mutiny also carried a death-sentence. Violent assault on another member of the ship's company was punishable by keel-hauling, ducking from the yard-arm, or even being fastened to the mast by a knife driven through the hand.31 Anyone who took the name of God in vain was to be lashed to the mast; absence from morning or evening prayers might mean a week on bread and water as well as a fine. But quarrelling (especially over plunder), desertion, and even mutiny were the plague of privateers from all countries, as Sautijn well knew.32 His instructions of 1707 are obviously pervaded by an anxiety to prevent them. Although the official Instructie suited the privateering owners well enough, obviously there were features of both the above placaten which they strongly disliked. It seems to have taken at least a year to bring the Zeeland States to agree to them. When they did so, their price was the third placaat of 28 July 1705, which was described as 'an equivalent and balance against the aforesaid open commerce,
30. Articulbrief en Instructie raakende den oorlogh ter %ee (G.P.B., v. 27580), article liv. The Instructie voor Capiteyn en Officieren, &c. met Commissie van retorsie uytvaarende is wrongly headed 28 July 1702 in ibid, v. 324; it is the fourth Placaat of 28 July 1705 in all but title, but I have followed Sautijn in referring to it simply as the Instructie or 'Artykelbrief'. 31. For similar imaginative retribution elsewhere see C. R. Boxer, 'The Dutch East-Indiamen: their Sailors, their Navigators, and Life on Board, 1602-1795', The Mariner's Mirror, xlix (1963), 98-9; the V.O.C., of course, had its own Artikel-brief. 12. On 14 May 1695, the admiralty accepted his request to imprison Captain Hendricksen and other officers of the Walcheren privateer, pending evidence of embezzlement from Italy, and on lo-i i September a naval party was ordered to suppress disorders on board, with the aid of the militia if the States of Zeeland agreed (A.R.A., St. Gen. Ac!m. 2518). On the problem of discipline abroad a privateer see Woodes Rogers, A Cruising Voyage round the World (\7\~L),passim.
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and to support their massive and very costly armaments'.33 It increased the 'premiums' payable for the capture or destruction of enemy warships and privateers. Such premien, although there was a precedent for them in 1625, had been introduced very late in the Nine Years War, on 31 May 1697, and revived on 6 June iyo2.34 They go far to explain the vigour of the Commissievaart from the outset of the Spanish Succession War and its readiness for combatthe last thing sought by the majority of French corsairs. Payable out of a special fund created by doubling the tonnage and customs duties (Last- en Veilgeld) on ships and cargoes entering or leaving Dutch harbours,35 these awards were calculatedquite differently from the basis promulgated in 1625 at the rate of 75 guilders for each man on board the enemy warship during battle, plus 75 guilders for each pound of gunshot of which it was capable at a single firing, provided the action took place between the Shetlands and the Straits of Dover: outside the North Sea, the rate was 50 guilders. Within the North Sea, but only for privateers furnished with the commission of the States General themselvesas not all the Zeeland privateers were at the timethe rate was doubled by an Ampliane' of 20 June 1704; but captures outside the North Sea, in the otherwise more remunerative cruising-grounds of Biscay and the Mediterranean, were not rewarded with a double rate before the placaat of 28 July 1705. For the first time, however, it was now stipulated that no premie could be claimed in these cases unless the first fortnight of the cruise had been spent in the North Seaa clear reminder that the primary purpose of the incentive was the protection of Dutch coasts and shipping from the Dunkirkers, although it also served as a sanction to discourage the grant of commissions by a provincial admiralty. In addition, all Uieseplacaten made generous provision, at federal expense,
33. Placaat tot leveyligingh van de Commercie en Navigatie (G.P.B., v. 31011); 'Nodigh en Zedigh Bericht van de Geinterresseerde in de Commissievaart deser Landen', by Jacob Sautijn and others, 26 April 1708, para. xii (Coll. Verheye 28). In fact, a placaat for doubling the premie on a North Sea capture was ready by 16 July 1704, but the Zeeland States had not concurred in it and decided not to publish it, presumably because it did not go far enough to meet the claims of the bookholders, who had requested more than one liberal construction since 1702 (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2438).
34. G.P.B., i. 975-6; iv. 217-19; v. 300-303.

35. It was intended that half the yield of these duties, thus increased, should be devoted to the payment of premiums (G.P.B., v. 303-4); but it proved nothing like enough. In his 'Necessary and Modest Advice' of 26 April 1708 (cz't. supra, note 33) Sautijn asserted that arrears then amounted to six tons of gold (ten tons on 4 September 1707), and there were many later complaints of this tenor. He advocated equal treatment between the North Sea and the English Channel.
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for Dutch privateersmen wounded or maimed in action, that of 28 July going further in allowing up to seven stivers a day Kostgeld for the subsistence of prisoners; the bookholders frequently put in claims for such expenses, as they did for a schrijver's wages, however trivial the sum in question. Lastly, the Placaat for the Protection of Commerce and Navigation of 28 Julythe correct title of what Sautijn always calls the 'piaceteti for the doubling of the premiemade a considerable concession to Middelburg and Flushing in the matter of salvage awards for Dutch vessels recaptured. Previously, the captor had been entitled to receive half the value of such ships and their cargoes if they had been in enemy hands more than four days, and a fifth or a third if less. Henceforward they were to enjoy half the value 'indistinctelijk'however short the period of enemy possession. The force which all these possibilities and requirements had for Jacob Sautijn should now be clear from a reading of his instructions of 22 and 24 July 1707respectively documents (I) and (II) belowto which in each case a small last-minute postscript is added, the second one undated but probably added about the same day, 2 August, as the first. It seems clear from the internal evidence that (I) was composed before Sautijn had decided to send out Reynders and Booms in consort, and that (II) was Boom's copy of a supplementary instruction that could only go into effect if they succeeded n meeting, as in the event they did, before Reynders was out of the North Sea. The orthography of the originals, firm and graceful if not altogether easy to decipher, is fully consonant with Sautijn's signature, usually accompanied by the ample swirling flourishes of a modern banknote, as are the capitals which open each paragraph. The afterthoughts written into the margins,36 here and there, further attest that he wrote out all the instructions himself. In translating them, as literally as possible, an effort has been made to avoid terms outside the English maritime usage of his time, but much here was peculiar to the Dutch and it has to be admitted that Sautijn's syntax occasionally defies an exact rendering.
36. These marginalia are enclosed within round brackets after the articles to which they most closely refer. I am most grateful to Professor E. H. Kossmann and Dr. J. Kossmann-Putto for checking the translation and for other invaluable help. No attempt has been made to reproduce all Sautijn's capitals or to follow his punctuation invariably.
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(I)
Instruction for Captain Salomon Reynders, commanding the Frigate named de Propheet Elias, with Commission of their high mightinesses the States General of the United Netherlands for distressing the enemy [tot afbreuk van den vijand]
Art. i
You shall keep good Unity among the officers and seamen on your ship and practise good seamanship and soldiership and hold Christian worship and prayers as is proper.37 A: 2 You shall govern yourself after the three Placcaten of their high mightinesses dated the 28th July 1705 and the Artyckd Brieff of their high mightinesses. All delivered into your hands: containing 1 Placaat of their high mightinesses concerning the Commerce and Navigation of the inhabitants of this state on enemy territory &c. as well as contraband wares and goods excluded by passport. 2 Placaat on the subject of the Commissievaart wherein you shall very clearly see the orders of their high mightinesses and govern yourself thereafter: & y Placaat for the doubling of the premie for the privateers of these provinces which may capture or ruin enemy warships and privateers, and retake and free from the enemy vessels of the subjects of this state &c. (In the firstplacaat you will see what ships you are allowed to take &c.)
A: 3 I also deliver for your information &c. the Instruction and Artyckelbrief and the Treaties of their high mightinesses with the kings of Sweden, Denmark and other Neutral powers.38 A: 4 Whereas the ship and crew [v0/c] under your command is [sic] at present in condition to put out to sea, so shall you with favourable wind and weather sail with proper foresight and good care, and cruise 14 to 16 days in the North Sea, and from the beginning to the end of your cruise keep a good and proper journal. A: 5 Also you shall send me extract from your journal how long you have cruised in the North Sea, and whatever befalls you there, undersigned by you and your clerk &c. 37. Cf. the 'Instructie voor Capiteijn Pieter Leuter voerende de poon genaamt de Hijsende Sonne'a small Zierikzee privateera fragment from which surviving in A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 5658 calls for prayers morning and evening. 38. The main treaties of navigation and commerce with Sweden were those of 1675 and 1679 (texts in J. Dumont, Corps universe! diplomatique, VII. i. 316 ff., 437 ff.) and with Denmark, those of 1691 and 1701 (ibid., VII. ii. 292 ff. and Vili. i. 32 ff.). They include provisions dealing with contraband, the right of search, trade between enemy ports, passports and evidence of nationality; Danish neutrality was complicated by the fact that Holstein subjects were formally committed by an Imperial declaration of war, like the Hanseatic towns. Sautijn may also have included a copy of the Capitulation of the Porte signed with the Dutch in 1681, for which see G.P.B., v. 388-95.

A: 6
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Cruising in the North Sea you are allowed, if necessary, to join company with other Zeeland privateers for the period of 14 days, and in joining company procure a proper written contract with year month and day properly signed by both parties.
A: 7 All prizes that you capture in the North Sea you shall send here into Zeeland, or convoy as far as the coast but on no account to Amsterdam or Rotterdam, yet if through necessity the same should put into Amsterdam in such event you shall address the same to Mr. David Welmerdam merchant there, and if they should put into the Maas in such event you shall address the same to Mr. Josias Lambrecht merchant there &c.39 A: 8
When you convoy your prizes hither, you shall remain cruising in our coastal waters [in de pynk êe]to as long, and keep as close inshore \onder de Wal\, as you can, so that your prize crews can come on board again, and send me extract from your journal regularly, both from the North Sea and from England, undersigned by you and your clerk, because otherwise I should recover no premie for captured privateers &c.
A: 9
When your cruise to the north is done, you shall afterwards cruise in the Bay \de Boght} from Ushant as far as Cape Ortegal and Finisterre, according to wind and weather and where you think to be able to make most prizes &c.
39. Dutch law required privateers to deliver prizes to the jurisdiction of the admiralty college to which their owners had given bond for good behaviour. The Zeeland college claimed jurisdiction even when a Holland privateer had taken part in a capture with one of its own (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2533, fo. 106, 22 August 1708); on 4 June 1708 the bookholders were ordered to tranship to Zeeland, for sale, any prize goods taken to Holland (ibid., 2532, fos. ^2^-4), despite the better prices sometimes obtainable at Amsterdam (ibid., 2531, fos. 304,16 and 19 November 1707). Josias Lambrecht may have been connected with the Flushing merchants, Nicolas and Gerrard Lambrechtsen, whose vessel Mercurius was laden with brandies at Bordeaux in 1707 on Rotterdam account and subsequently attacked by a Flushing kaper flying French colours (ibid., 2530, fos. I9V-2OT); they were responsible themselves for privateering armaments in 1703 and 1711. David Welmerdam I have not identified. 40. This now obsolete term is also to be found in M. Smallegange, Nieuwe Chronyk van Zeeland, i (Middelburg, 1696), 193. It relates to that part of the North Sea which lies immediately west of Walcheren. I owe this reference to Mr. W. Voorbeijtel Cannenburg, who writes: 'It was the fishing ground of U\e pynkschepen (small flat-bottomed fishermen which were hauled on the beach when returning from sea), and pynkegat is the name of several of the numerous, rather shallow passages between the banks by which the "pinkies" could reach the beach or roadstead and which were not deep enough for bigger, deep-drawing ships.'
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A: io
The prizes which you capture in the Channel or in the Bay [of Biscay] you shall send off or bring up into one of the English harbours and then send me knowledge of it at once by post, as also to Mr. Henry Buijstyn merchant in London &c.41
A: u
For the prizes brought up you shall take very good care, and make your officers do the same, so that the lading of the prize goods is not lessened plundered or ferried ashore [aan Land gecadrait], and to these ends have everything well sealed, and make the clerk properly carry out his instruction given by the Admiralty council and endorse all bills of lading papers 6k documents found in the prizes. You shall take good care for all papers so that none be lost or embezzled &c.
A: 12
If you happen to retake any English ships and there was no chance of sending them up with convoy or good company, or of convoying them with your frigate, then you are allowed to bring them into one of the English harbours42 and send knowledge of it to Mr. Henry Bustyn [sic] merchant in London &c.
A: 13
If in the Bay you should take French ships laden with dryfish, then you can ransom them, but you shall not ransom them higher than five and twenty thousand guilders in Dutch currency, possibly less but not more.43 If they are of greater worth, you shall bring them if possible into Lisbon and sell the same there at the highest price possible &c.
A: 14
If and when you should take or retake Portuguese ships, you shall send or bring them into England and send me knowledge at once of the taking and bringing up in time to allow insurance &c. thereon.44
41. A Mr. Buston, of Rosemary Lane, occurs in The Little London Directory of 1677 (repr. J. C. Hotten, 1863), but I have found no later reference to a London merchant bearing this or any similar name. 42. That is, by simply putting a prize crew aboard and running the gauntlet of the French corsairs. 43. He would have been lucky to get half as much. The ransoms of returning terreneuvas recorded at Nantes (Arch, dep., Amiraut B 4572-5) seldom go as high as 8,000 guildersthe sum for which the Zeven Provincin had ransomed the Prudence in 1706 (ibid., B 4572,7 June 1706). When a Flushinger demanded 20,000 guilders for the Libert of Pornic, her master replied that he had his owner's orders not to give as much (ibid., 30 July 1707). 44. Presumably for the very dangerous voyage from some West Country harbour to Zeeland, for which the bookholders sometimes (as on 22 September 1708) expected a nava! convoy (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2533, fo. 170). It may be implied that a Portuguese vessel might be caught trading with the enemy, if not recaptured from him.

A: 15
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If to the north you retake Dutch Scottish or English ships, or others, all must be brought or sent into Zeeland and you must send knowledge how long they have been in the power of the enemies.
A: 16
Ships laden with iron [and] wool, coming from enemy harbours to these provinces and being provided with passports from their high mightinesses, you shall allow on their voyage &c.
A: 17 Ships laden with brandy coming from France to these provinces with passports you shall allow on their voyage, even although brandy were excluded by passport. Further you shall govern yourself by the placaat of their high mightinesses dated 28 July 1705. A: 18
You shall cruise no longer to the North and in the Bay than till the end of the month of October, and after you shall have cleaned [your ships] in England or Lisbon you shall sail into the Mediterranean Sea, there to remain cruising against all enemy ships and bring them to Leghorn, or Genoa, Venice or other safe harbours.45 Yet ships and subjects of the Grand Turk [Jen grooten heer} you shall not bring up nor damage,46 but cruise in such places where you think it to be best for capturing rich enemy ships, and cruise alone or in company as you think to be of most service to advance your masters' interests.
A: 19
When the season is over for taking rich ships in the Mediterranean Sea, and if the trade and navigation of the French be forbidden,47 you should best cruise before Cadiz or again come into the Bay to stay out cruising for the period of 16 months, 45. Naples, Messina, Malta, and Zante were also much frequented by the commissievaarders. Following a conversation between the grand vizier and Jacob Colijer, ambassador to the Porte, Dutch privateers were forbidden to take prizes into any Ottoman ports from August 1705 (ilid., 2527, fo. 150% Consul Calckberner to Zeeland admiralty, Leghorn, 21 August 1705). The Placaat noopende de Commissievaarders of July 1705, art. xii, refers to 'de Haavens van Scio, Metelin, ende ander verboodene Plaatsen' (G.P.B., v. 307). 46. The Porte had forbidden Ottoman subjects to travel in French vessels (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2438, fo. 152,16 September 1705), but there were several cases of Turkish merchants so taken, notably Hassan and Suleiman, Smyrna merchants (trading out of Alexandria with 48 negro slaves, coffee, rice, and linen), who in 1705 chartered a French vessel at Susa and were carried off to Leghorn in her after being seized by De Faem, Capt. Peyrard (iiiJ., 2527, fos. 129, 168, 197, 227). 47. Primarily a reference to the important Levant trade of Marseilles (the only French port permitted to undertake it), although there was also much French traffic with Italy and Barbary.
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if possible, and achieve just as rich a cruise as other Zeeland privateers [Capers] have done,48 for who knows how long this war shall yet continue.
A: 20
When you come to England, or should send, or bring up, prizes into any harbours there, you shall address the same to the underwritten merchants and correspondents
&c.
Plymouth Falmouth Wight Ireland, Cork .. To Mr. Johan Neel49 Mr. Steven Reade50 Mr. Chareles Merchandt51 Mr. Jean der Kinderen52
You or your prizes coming to Lisbon, address yourself and the prizes to Messrs. Loot and Van der Wel.53 Coming to Leghorn, or sending up prizes thither, address yourself to the [den heere\ Consul & Commissary Slickkers &c.54 48. In January 1712 the Flushing bookholder Geleijn Hurgronje was to give Daniel Propheet, captain of the Hercules privateer, strong though not mandatory advice to cruise 'before the Rivers [presumably the Loire and Gironde approaches] and Ushant', which 'I still think ... is the best cruise' (Snouck-Hurgronje, op. at., p. 40). (The danger of peace was then, of course, much more imminent.) It was not unknown for Zeeland privateers to enter the Gironde, to make captures or even, under cover of a French pass obtained by a foreigner living in Bordeaux, seek a cargo for the West Indies: see Bordeaux, Arch. dep. Gironde, C 4260, pp. 8 and 92 (Chambre de Commerce to Chamillart, 6 October 1705, and to Fnellon, depute de commerce, 12 May 1708), and C 4267, pp. 1425 (Ch. de Comm., mmoire of 3 July 1708). 49. On 5 May 1711 Vryberg, the Dutch envoy in London, informed the Middelburg admiralty that he had arranged, on their authority, to remit five bills of exchange to Bartholomew Havant, son-in-law of Niel [sic] at Plymouth, for repairs to the Nassau man-of-war (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2537). 50. On 2i January 1712 Geleijn Hurgronje wrote to Steven Read [sic], asking him to draw on him for any expenses incurred by Gapt. Propheet (Snouck-Hurgronje, p. 41). As English newspapers of the time confirm, Falmouth was easily the most popular of English ports with the commissievaarders : for its windward position, cf. p. 50. above. With a packet-boat arriving there from Lisbon every week it was also a good place to gather intelligence of enemy movements. 51. Unidentified. 52. Probably a relative of Pieter and Abraham der Kinderen, Middelburg merchants and bookholders, whose privateers included the Kork Marchand (Jan Knutt), commissioned in May 1703 (R.A.Z., archief. . . belastingen 58). 53. Paulus Loot of Amsterdam had been one of the two Dutch prize agents in Lisbon (with Anthonie Cramer) since the beginning of the war, although the consul, Abraham Heijsterman, claimed this business as late as 1708; Zeeland maintained that the consulate and prize money were of 'diverse nature', and there had been a precedent for separating the two at Leghorn (A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 5654, 15 December 1703, and 5659, 14 May 1708). Van der Wel remains unidentified. 54. Thomas Slicher, with the warm backing of the Zeelanders, was appointed consul at Leghorn by the States General on 20 May 1706, after the death of Giacomo Calckberner, who himself had not taken over the prize agency until the death of Daniel Duvelaar early in the war, though consul at Leghorn since 1680: K. Heeringa (ed.), Bronnen tot de Geschiedenis van den Levantsen Handel, ii (The Hague, 1917), pp. 1089, 121-2; A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2528, fos. 233'5.

I deliver to you for your voyage 4 tin boxes i Box, in which 18 copies of your Commission.
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i Box in which
6 Forms of questionnaires [vraagkstucken] if you take enemy traders 6 Forms of questionnaires for when you take enemy privateers 6 Forms for when you take smugglers [lorrendraijers].
i Box wherein the Placcateti of their high mightinesses, as also your Instruction and Commission. i Box in which (In the same Box...) 12 French letters of ransom \Rantsoenbrieven\ 12 German \Du^tse\ letters of ransom.
[I] also deliver to you a printed [word illegible : ? Bancktie, ? booklet] in which you will see what treaties their high mightinesses have made with the kings of Sweden & Denmark & other potentates, together with the Artyckelrief [sic] for your regulation. Wishing you herewith many blessings and success on the voyage, and pray Heaven that you may enjoy many captures. Remaining your very good Friend Jacob Sautijn
1707
22
Further Consideration and Instruction for Captain Salomon Reynders A : If you had captured privateers at sea and were beset in convoying them by a superior strength of enemy capers or warships, you shall try to get your [prize] crew out of the enemy privateer if it cannot escape and then sink or destroy the same, as otherwise the premie will not be received. B: If you take enemy merchantmen and were beset by superior enemy strength, you shall deal with them as above; if any such merchantman has a Commission, in order that not all be lost, but as it is possible to come by the premie thereof, do then everything with good management for the best advantage of the shareholders \Reederie\ Sec. & [word illegible:? msent,? common] certificate. Your Good Friend Jacob Sautijn
1707
8
2
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(II)
Later Instruction between the Captains Salomon Reynders and Pieter Booms Today 24 July 1707
Am
Since Captain Pieter Booms is ready to go to sea, he shall wait cruising in the North Sea for Captain Salomon Reynder [sic] either alone or in company with the Onbekenden^ or Staten van Zeeland, on condition that all the prizes which they capture must come here into Zeeland &c.67
A: 2
Captain Pieter Booms shall within 6 to 8 days come in here off shore [voor de Wa\ to see whether Capt: Salomon Reynders commanding the Propheet Elias comes to sea and then he shall cruise n close company [in Compagnie vastelyck] to the North &c.
A: 3 In mid-August you must be together about Shetland [Hitland] so as to be at Iceland by the end of the month of August, in order to watch the French whale catchers there which to all appearance will be full of fish and still busy with truck so that you could very easily take the same there Sic.58 A: 4 All those with Commissions you must man and convoy hither, but if there be any which have no Commissions these could you ransom, because there would sometimes be so many ships, more than you would be able to man &c.
55. Built and equipped at Amsterdam, bookholder Pieter de la Rue, captain Dominicus d'Amste (ibid. 2528, fo. 2i2T, io April 1706). 56. Bookholder Daniel Sautijn (whose father Jan was one of the sureties), captain Philips van Hierschot (ibid. 2530, 13 April 1707); later taken to Cadiz by the French {ibid. 2536, 15 February 1710). 57. Booms was at least nominally captain of the Zeven Provincin by 18 April 1707, when the admiralty minuted a schrijver, which it again did on n June; but it was not until 13 July that it received formal notification that Booms was to succeed Capt. Jan de Wijke (ibid. 2530). Much later, 30 June 1710, the schrijver of the Propheet Elias claimed his wages from 7 June 1707 (ibid. 2536), which seems to show that Reynders got out to sea before Booms, who might or might not find him : hence article 2 of this instruction. 58. According to Savary des Bruslons, Diet. univ. de commerce (Amsterdam, 1726), pp. 219-22, the Spitzbergen whale fishery was still the most important: Bayonne, the centre of French interest in it, had sent out eighteen to twenty whalers in 168990. The Bayonne amiraut recorded two sailings only in May 1702 for the 'Baleine aux glaces', and thereafter none at all until May 1711 (Bayonne, archives de la Chambre de Commerce, Amiraut I, fos. 42, 57; IX, 50). But Sautijn, who had earlier sent privateer's to the Greenland fishery, is likely to have been well informed about French practices, so that this instruction at least suggests a question.

A: 5
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When you with your prizes from Iceland and those which you have taken in the North Sea come offshore, so shall you convoy your prizes into the Veergat if possible, yet remain outside with your Frigates so that the prize crews return on board by pink [metpyncken].59
A: 6
When you have your people back on board, you shall both sail in company for Falmouth to clean there.
A: 7 If it happens that you come down from the North without having taken whalers or prizes, you shall, without touching in this country, sail for Falmouth in company there to clean and revictual &c. A: 8
When you have cleaned in England, you shall again in company with Captain Booms sail into the Strait [Straatwaart in] and there cruise together as long as is practicable ere you clean and revictual, and keep yourself as long unrecognized as is possible. (NB If the town of Toulon and Marseilles go over to the allies,60 whereby the Commissievaart in the Strait would be less advantageous, we shall let you know by letter and give further order.)
A: 9
Being arrived at Leghorn with or without prizes, you shall clean and revictual to resume your cruise again in company together, cruising on the most favourable stations for taking rich prizes &c.
A: io
If it happens that it comes to your certain knowledge that the French ships no longer navigate and that their navigation was forbidden, you would best go cruising off Cadiz and come into the Bay, there to cruise out your time, because one knows not how long the war will last.81 59. For the use of pynkschepen see above, note 40. The Veergat is the tidal channel between the islands of Walcheren and Noord Beveland, leading to the little port of Veere (often used by the Sautijn privateers). 60. The Austro-Savoyard army had reached Nice on to July, over five weeks later than the Anglo-Dutch fleet, and on the 26th camped above Toulon, which had been reconnoitred by sea on the 9th: J. H. Owen, War at Sea under Queen Anne (Cambridge, 1938), pp. 168-82. The siege was raised on 21 August. 61. Peace negotiations, though more or less continuous from July 1706, were not in progress during the summer of 1707; Mesnager's talks with Van der Bussen in Rotterdam opened in the following January.
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A: ii
And as Captain Salomon Reynders [sic] has the greater ship and has served me longer than Captain Pieter Booms, so shall Captain Reynders have the command this whole cruise and they shall help one another as brothers and good friends to the best advantage of the masters, and together keep good order over the officers, so that no mutiny arises and in this loyally help one another and above all do everything with sober and understanding judgement.
A: 12
In the Strait shall Captain Booms inform Captain Reynders how and in what places en route [sic] to make the most conquests, for they should inform one another as well as possible. Herewith I wish both the Captains with their officers and people a well preserved voyage and many conquests & remain Your Good Friend Jacob Sautijn
1707
24
Further Considerations and Instruction for Captain Salomon Reynders and Pieter Booms: A : If you had captured privateers at sea and were beset in convoying them by a superior strength of enemy capers or warships, you shall try to get your [prize] crew out of them if it cannot escape and then sink or destroy the same, as otherwise the premie will not be received. The same shall you do if you take enemy merchantmen which have Commissions, yet hold on to them as long as is possible. (NB In case of attack you must loyally assist one another unless the enemies were so strong that you had both to take flight and look for a good refuge, and if at sea you lose touch, you must comply with your first Instruction.) B: In order to cruise now against all enemy ships that come about the North you shall as soon after you join forces with Captain Pieter Booms sail for Shetland and cruise between Shetland and Buchan Ness [Bornisse]62 till mid-August according to wind and weather. C : Yet if it happens that you came to capture good prizes of value there you should convoy them hither and not go to Iceland to watch the whalers. Jacob Sautijn
62. The Dunkirkers often cruised here, against the Dutch herring-fleets or to intercept Dutch shipping returning north about Scotland, of which Buchan Ness is the most easterly point. The Shetlands marked the northerly limit of the North Sea as defined by the placaten governing the award of a premie. This article is more specific than articles 46 of document (I), which it revises; and the implication is diat it was added not later than 2 August, when the privateers must have sailed if they were to comply with the fortnight's cruising rule.
Som e Zeeland Priva teering Ins truc tions, 1707
429
In the absence of any surviving ships' journals, it is impossible to follow the movements of the Zeeland privateers at all closely; and unlike the French, their captains made no report to the authorities on their return home. But from other evidence we know that Jacob Sautijn's two frigates joined forces and completed their stint in the North Sea, where it was later stated that they cruised for 'more than thirty days', whether or not they got as high as Iceland.63 No French whalers appear in the minutes of the Zeeland admiralty, which record only the award, as salvage, of half the value of the Juffrouw Amelia, apparently a Dutch vessel recaptured by the Propheet Elias, probably before 2 August.64 If Sautijn's 'later instruction' was fulfilled, the two frigates should have been refitting in Falmouth by November: it is certain only that they went to Cork.65 There is no evidence that they sent any prizes there, or into any English ports, on this cruise. Probably, after leaving Cork, they spent some time cruising off Ushant and to the south of Belle Isle, rather than making at once for the Straits. There was an unusually large number of Zeelanders in the Bay in November 1-707.66 So far as can be ascertained, however, the only success registered by the Propheet and her consort was the ransoming, in late November, in 46 degrees north and 6^ degrees westroughly the latitude of Rochefort and i^ degrees further west than Ushantof a codfisher making for Nantes from the Newfoundland Banks, the Providence d'Olonne (Jean Gabillare), which was ransomed for 650 pistoles perhaps the equivalent of about 550 sterling or 5,500 guilders, which was a fairly common order of ransom in these cases but nowhere near the maximum allowed in Sautijn's instructions.67 Most of the Zeeland ransoms recorded at Nantes were expressed in florins or livres, payable in Middelburg, Flushing, or Lisbon, so that one expressed in Spanish gold coin is itself worthy of note; unless (as is possible), the French
63. R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 31, admiralty sentence ofay December 1717, appended to a petition of iyz3 from Sautijn to the States General. This petition and the papers annexed to it have provided a main source for what follows. 64. A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2530, fo. 100, 22 August 1707. 65. A.N., G5 245, fo. 356. Cork was much frequented by Atlantic shipping as a source of provisions and English privateers sometimes visited it to augment their crews: cf. Woodes Rogers, A Cruising Voyage round the World (ed. G. E. Manwaring, 1928), pp. 2, 4. 66. Brest, archives de l'arsenal, I E 459, pp. 812-13, Robert to Pontchartrain, 14 November 1707. 67. Nantes, Arch, dep., Amiraut B 4572, 2 December 1707. As was customary with ransoms, Reynders received a personal gratuity12 pistolesin addition.
43 0
master carried the coin with him, the bill was presumably negotiable in Leghorn or Amsterdam, if not in Lisbon. It is unlikely that our two privateers put into Lisbon. If they did, it could only have been a brief call, for on 7 December at latest they were entering the Straits of Gibraltar. On that day, early in the morning, they met two Algerine corsairs, one of fifty, the other of forty guns, with eight hundred men between them. According to Sautijn's later account, which in the end was accepted not only by the Zeeland admiralty but by the States General, the ensuing engagement lasted all day. It is likely to have been hard and bitter, a confrontation between the toughest and the nimblest privateers of the age. Despite their inferiority in gunpower, the Middelburgers succeeded in driving the bigger of their two opponents under the shelter of the fortress of Tangierreoccupied since 1684 by the sultan of Moroccowhile its companion was so badly mauled that she was later stranded on the Barbary coast, between Larache (El Arish) and Salice (Sal). It was for this last casualty that Sautijn eventually, after three years' correspondence with the dey of Algiers in order to establish the fact of her definitive destruction, was to seek a premium of 58,000 guilders and finally, after another five years of pleading and pamphleteering, to obtain an award of 29,000 guilders from the Zeeland admiralty, although as late as 1723 he was still petitioning for the payment of this sum.68 By that time he was a soured and apparently broken man, contrasting his long services to the state with his family's condition (as he felt it) of near-beggary. He was thinking of his losses to the enemy, and in particular of those two 'extra wel bezeylde Fregatten', the Propheet Elias and the Zeven Provincin. Hardly had they emerged from their day-long action with the Algerines before they were unlucky enough, that same evening, off Cape Spartel, to encounter two French men-ofwar, Le Toulouse (de Grenonville) and Le Content (chevalier de Rochepierre), both third-rates with a combined strength of over 100 guns and a complement (at least on paper) of over 700 men. According to their commander, the capitarne de fregate Grenonville, the Toulouse and the Content were in an 'unimaginable condition', bent only on getting to Cadiz for repairs, when they decided to risk battle with the
68. R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 31: the petition is undated, but was read in the States General on 16 March 1723: ibid., archief Staten Zeeland 2580. The Dutch Treaty of Peace and Commerce with Algiers, negotiated in 1679, had broken down in 1691: efforts to restore it began in 1702, but the new treaty was not ratified till 25 June 1708, and this broke down in turn very soon.
431
two Zeelanders; but it is likely that the latter were in much worse case. Few episodes in the long privateering war can more eloquently attest the fighting quality of the Commissievaart than that Reynders and Booms, heavily outgunned as they were and exhausted as their crews must have been, fought for at least two hours, 'a la portee du pistolet' finally, before they surrendered, Reynders having had all his masts shot down. They were taken into Malaga some twelve months before their campaign was due to end.69 The survival of their instructions we owe to the fact that they seem to have been sent to Marseilles by the intendant at Aix, Lebret, in support of his efforts to induce a reluctant Chamber of Commerce to accord the captors a gratification. With backing from Pontchartrain, the secretary of state for marine, Lebret asked for 8,000 livresa sum which Vauvr, the naval intendant at Toulon, judged far too low if officers armed en course were to be incited to attack enemy corsairs in future.70 Grenonville himself did not understate his public spirit in describing his feat of arms to the Chamber:
Je vous mande cecy, Messieurs, afin de vous faire voir l'envie que nous avons de travailler pour vos interets plus que pour les nostres, qui ne veulent point que nous cherchions des corsaires dont la prise ruine nos armements.71
We should not disbelieve him. There was no real premie system in France and counter-privateering could only pay for itself by living off
69. R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 31. Cf. Marseilles, archives de la Chambre de Commerce, E. 75, Grenonville to the Chamber, 14 January 1708. According to the captors, the Propheet Elias carried 38 guns and 250 men, the Zeven Provincin 28 and zoo, at the time. At the battle of Malaga in 1704, Le Toulouse and Le Content were rated at 62 and 60 guns, 380 and 350 men respectively (C. de la Roncire, Hist, de la marine fr., vi. 361); for Le Content cf. Pierre Le Conte, French S flips, 1648-1300 (Soc. for Naut. Research, Lists of Men-of-War, i65o-ijoo,\\, Cambridge, 1935), p. 16, and A.N., Marine G9 ('Liste gen. des Vaisseaux du Roy au Premier Janvier 1689'). The precise strength of a warship fluctuated, of course, according to her assignment and other factors. Thus the Zeven Provincin carried only 26 guns (and six mortars) in December 1703, according to Lamberty, Mem., xii. 213-14. Sautijn by 1712 was referring to both his lost privateers as 4o-gun frigates. 70. Marseilles, arch, de la Ch. de Commerce, E. 75. Lebret's letter is dated 3 January 1708, but this seems to be a slip for 1709, since it was only on 27 December 1708 that Vauvr expressed his surprise at the low figure, after 15,000 livres had been suggested earlier (A.N., Marine B3 162, fos. 328 ff.). In writing to Lebret on 25 January 1708, Pontchartrain merely asked for a special gratification (i.e., an ex gratia payment), as was the custom of the Chamber in such cases. This letter, giving the 'Prophete Elie' 42 guns, seems to have been the source used by La Roncire, vi. 395, for his mention of the capture: the correct reference is now E. 70. I owe much to the unfailing helpfulness of M. Ferrol Rbuffat, Chef des Services Historiques of the Marseilles Chambre de Commerce. 71. Ibid., E. 75, 14 January 1708.
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enemy trade. The capture of the Propheet Elias and the Zeven Provincin would not have been seriously remunerative, though the Propheet reappears in 1711 as member of a convoy armed in SaintDomingue for a voyage to Bordeaux via Havana, and the Zeven Provincin was being refitted for service with a Toulon squadron within a month of her capture and three months before she was formally condemned by the Conseil des Prises at Versailles in April 1708very likely a tribute to her sailing qualities.72 What of the captured officers and men? Most of the officers at any rate were back in Zeeland by February,73 though some non-Dutch members of the crews, of whom there were doubtless a good many, may have chosen otherwise. None of the belligerents, least of all privateering armaments, wanted the cost of feeding prisoners on their hands for long, and it would not have been difficult to work a quick passage home to the Netherlands from Lisbon, or even from Malaga or Cadiz. Captain Reynders, in fact, was recommissioned for Jacob Sautijn on 28 September 1708. He may well have been captured and released again, for all that the Zeeland records have to say about him during the next four years. On 23 July 1712 he took service, in command of the Vliegende Mercurius, with Hermanus van de Putte, another Middelburg bookholder with a long-standing interest in Mediterranean campaigns; in company this time with the Griffioen (Captain Willemsen), Reynders was selling prizes in Falmouth in August 1712 and at Gibraltar (which now had a Dutch consul) early in 1713, when he got so far inside the Straits as to take two prizes to Sardinia and four enemy cornships into Leghornalmost the last of Zeeland's haul and something of an anti-climax to twenty years of hard fighting.74 When peace came, Reynders took to slaving, between Elmina and Dutch Guiana,75 in this resembling so many of the Nantes privateering
72. Nantes, Arch, dep., Amiraut B 4574, Perle of Bordeaux, 24 July 1711; A.N., Marine B3 ioi, fo. 175% Aligre to Pontchartrain, 8 January 1708; A.N., G5 245 ('Dpouillement des jugements de prises'), fos. 3567 and 434-5, 16 April and 7 May 1708. The Zeven Provincin was prosecuted at Toulon and her consort at Malaga. The ransom payable for the Providence d'Olonne was forfeited to the new captors. 73. Papers annexed to Sautijn's petition to States General, 1723 (R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 31). 74. Resaluden van de Staten Gen., 28 September 1708; R.A.Z., archief . . . belastingen 59; A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2538. 7j. .R.A., Westindische Compagnie 770 (Zeeland Chamber Instructie-Bouk), fo. 2o8v (Bosbeek frigate, 25 March 1715, bound for Elmina, coasts of Guinea, and Rio Esquibo [sic]).
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captains, except that some of them had combined both activities during the war. A shadow of a different kind crosses the name of Pieter Booms. He too was recommissioned, on 6 December 1709, for Jeremas van de Meer of Middelburg, probably as captain of the Jalousie: at least it is as such that he is found claiming arrears of salary two years later. Evidently he had quarrelled with his new bookholder, who complained that Booms, having given him and the advocate fiscal of the admiralty college two journals at variance with one another, then refused to provide any further account 'van sijne administratie in de Middelandse Zee'. Yet in 1717 this coyness did not prevent the admiralty road from accepting his attestation, in support of Sautijn's search for a premie, that he had cruised more than thirty days in the North Sea in 1707. Besides taking the trusted Reynders into his service once more, Sautijn took out a commission in 1709 for Captain Jan Corneliszoon, while his son Abraham did the same for Captain Willem Hendrickszoon. In his later despairing attempt to get recognition for the destruction of the Algerine 'pirate', he was to claim that the 'deplorable injury [deplorabel Schade]' of December 1707 had not prevented him from arming more privateers, and that they too had done great damage to enemy warships before themselves being taken.77 But his great days as a bookholder were over by 1710, when he was still standing out against paying the wages of the schrijver of the Propheet Elias, otherwise appearing in the Zeeland admiralty minutes only as a claimant for small sums of compensation for the sick and wounded of the Propheet and the Zeven Provincin.'1^ Not even the Zeeland admiralty would concede the full amount he claimed in 1712 for the stranded Algerine, and at first the deputies of Holland would go no further than 6,000 guilders. Between 1712 and 1723 he sued and lobbied, first for a more generous sum, then for the remittance of 29,000 guilders which successive resolutions of the States General had accorded him. In the end, when the matter was closed by the States of Zeeland on 7 April 1724, he seems to have obtained no more than 14,000 guilders.79 It is
76. Res. St. Gen., 6 December 1709; A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2537, i i July and 5 October 1711; R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 31, 'Extract uyt der Sententien van den Raad ter Admiraliteyt in Zeeland', 27 December 1717. 77. Res. St. Gen., 15 and 28 September 1708, 22 August 1709; R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 31. 78. A.R.A., St. Gen. Adm. 2536, 30 June, 9 July, 17 November 1710; ibid., 2537, 2 March 1711. 79. R.A.Z., Coll. Verheye 31 ; archief Staten Zeeland 3250, pp. 928-9.1 am indebted to Mr. P. Scherft, Director of the Rijksarchief in Zeeland, for help on this point.
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probable that he really needed the money badly, 'after so long service and much cost of solicitation, etc.'; his name, though not that of his son Abraham, is conspicuously absent from the roll-call of successful bookholders who subscribed to the Middelburg Commercie Compagnie formed in 1720 for trading to the South Sea, the Spanish Main, and the West Indies.80 The pamphlets which old Jacob Sautijn circulated in these last years to advance his cause are sad and full of self-pity. But they pulsate with a kind of angry pride also. Nor are they merely the outpourings of a great entrepreneur, long acquainted with triumph and disaster. In his own way, and at his own risk, he had devoted capital, skill, and perseverance 'tot afbreuk van den vijand'. In his feelings towards the Amsterdam and Rotterdam interests which traded with the enemy, he reminds us not a little of Jonathan Swift's portrayal of the moneyed interest, lining its pockets at the expense of landed patriots and poor soldiers alike. Without this passionate bellicosity it is doubtful whether the 'Flessinguois' would have earned their redoubtable reputation in France, and it is only fair to remember it, whatever elements of selfdeceit and self-interest it doubtless contained, when one tries to assess the business mentality behind the Zeeland Commissievaart,
80. R.A.Z., Commercie Compagnie Middelburg 1582. Cf. Adriaan Wisse, De Commercie-Compagnie te Middelburg van haar oprichting tot den jaar ij54 (Leiden doctoral thesis, Utrecht, 1933).
19
LES CORSAIRES ZELANDAIS ET LA NAVIGATION SCANDINAVE PENDANT LA GUERRE DE SUCCESSION D'ESPAGNE
L n'y a pas a mon sens d'histoire maritime sans histoire des guerres, ni d'histoire de l'economie baltique sans l'histoire encore mal connue de la neutralit. Jusqu'ici, la neutralit a t surtout tudie du point de vue juridique, et je ne connais qu'un seul ouvrage qui ait cherch a la situer dans le cadre concret de la vie maritime. Tout en analysant trs finement les questions d'ordre juridique et diplomatique, assez dlicates en elles-mmes, qu'a souleves l'intervention britannique dans Ie commerce neutre du xviiie sicle, mon matre et ami, le trs regrett Richard Pares, qui vient de disparaitre, nous a donne le bel exemple de les expliquer dans leur rapport indissoluble avec les moeurs corsaires et avec les ralits, galement humbles, et parfois sordides, des tribunaux de prises. Je me permets done de vous signaler, en commengant, les mrites et Tutilit de son livre trop nglig, Colonial Blockade and Neutral Rights, 1739-1763 (Oxford, 1938). Je voudrais dans cette communication attirer 1'attention de nos collgues sur quelques aspects pratiques de la detention d'un navire, qu'il soit en definitive restitu ou non, et sur quelques-unes de ses implications d'ordre humain.
Il faut signaler d'abord que, dans la seconde moiti du xviie sicle, les ngociateurs des grands traites ne se proposaient pas seulement, dans les clauses concernant les droits des neutres, d'clairer ou de systmatiser les conditions qui pouvaient justifier une confiscation, en donnant surtout une definition de la contrebande de guerre. Us furent galement soucieux de diminuer les risques d'une interruption du voyage, en se mettant d'accord sur
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le texte exact des certificis de mer, des passeports, des zeebrieven, qui devaient garantir Pinnocence des cargaisons sur la foi des serments prts devant les magistrals des ports de depart ou autres notabilits publiques1. Ce document officici, qui ne semble pas antrieur au traite hollando-espagnol de 1648 et qu'il faut bien entendu distinguer des passeports qu'ont dlivrs de tout temps les gouvernements belligrants, devait tre videmment mieux respect que les connaissements et autres documents de caractre priv. Les resultis furent en fait bien dcevants, allant mme a l'inverse de ees belles intentions. Les corsaires y trouvaient en effet un pretexte de plus pour censurer les papiers des navires ; ils y gagnaient par consquent une immunit juridique qu'ils surent exploiter. Car, il esl important de le remarquer, une seule imperfection dans le texte du passeport lgalisait la sasie, et une juste cause de saisie exemptait le preneur de tous frais de justice et des avaries, que le navire et sa cargaison soient au bout du compie relachs ou non. Done, ce beau Systeme de sauf-conduits aboutissait finalemenl a multiplier les risques de saisie, toul en surexcilant l'animosite des gouvernements neutres dont l'honneur tait engag. L'preuve des dernires guerres de Louis XIV, teile que les navires scandinaves, au premier rang, l'ont subie, en tmoigne suffisamment. Je laisse de cote les tentatives de Guillaume III pour supprimer tout a fait le commerce baltique de la France : on sail qu'il a voulu exercer le simple droit de canon, sans succes d'ailleurs2. Aprs cel effort quasi totalitaire, les puissances maritimes n'ont pas us d'une pareille rigueur, sauf pour interdire le passage des grains baltiques, pendant les seules annes de disette, et celui des goudrons de Sude, que les traites sudois ne regardaient pas comme contrebande de guerre. Dans Tun et l'autre cas, le belligrant s'est content d'exiger la vente des cargaisons en pays neutre ou alli, sans en payer toutefois les frais de justice 3. Mais la plupart du temps, les soupcons ne se fondaient que sur l'tat des passeports, tout particulirement avant 1705. Rappeions que, des le mois de juin 1703, les puissances de la Grande Alliance
1. Voir Philip C. JESSUP et Francis DEAR, Neutrality: its history, economics, and law, 1.1, New York, Columbia University Press, 1935, ch.vi. 2. Voir G. N. CLARK, The Dutch alliance and the war against French trade, Manchester University Press, 1923, ch.v. 3. Ibid., pp. 116-8; G. N. CLARK, Neutral commerce in the war of the Spanish succession, 1928 British Year Book of International Law, pp. 69-83. Pour les goudrons, voir les procdures cites par W. T. PRATT, Law of Contraband of War, Londres, 1856, pp. 196, 201 sq.
Les Corsaires Zelandais et la Navigation Scandinave
43 7
s'taient mises d'accord pour interdire leur propre commerce avec l'ennemi, comme auparavant; on voyait justement alors se multiplier les saisies des navires neutres, ceux-ci n'en taient que plus tents de falsifier leurs papiers et excitaient la jalousie des sujets des puissances allies pendant l'anne ou fut maintenue l'interdiction. A en croire les lgistes de la High Court of Admiralty, les passeports scandinaves furent tres rarement en bonne forme durant cette periode i. Quoi de plus naturel? Le corsaire, souvent peu lettre, devait d'abord distinguer le droit du Sudois de commercer de port en port, de l'obligation, impose au Danois par les traites, de faire un voyage direct. Il faUait toujours que les certificis spcifient rigoureusement, outre les ports de depart et de destination, les qualits et les quantits des marchandises transprteos ainsi que les noms et les nationalits des propritaires. Mais les ngociants sudois eux-mmes ont t contraints d'admettre que leurs certificis ne correspondaient pas exactement aux cargaisons de retour; au moment de les demander a Stockholm ou a Gothenbourg, ils ignoraient quelle qualit de vins, par exemple, leurs correspondants sauraient obtenir en France2. On pouvait discuter la forme de l'expdition d'un certificat aussi bien que son contenu : pour les Sudois par exemple fallait-il Ie certificat du College de Commerce, ou bien sufisait-il de prter serment devant Ie magistral d'une ville? Le passeport du roi de Sude tail connu sous quatre formes difrentes, landis que les formes prsenles par la seule convention avec le Danemark en 1691 offraient un choix embarrassant de formules applicables a des circonstances variables, sans parier d'un Irail anlrieur, de 1670, qui lail encor en vigueur3. Champ libre, done, a l'apprcialion des corsaires, mais aussi a la negligence des greffiers des pelils ports scandinaves, assez loigns pour la plupart des centres d'administralion royale. A Bergen sorle de seconde capilale danoise pourlanl , un commissaire fran9ais ngociail des achals de mis non seulement avec des marchands propritaires de Drammen et Christiania, mais aussi avec un fonctionnaire de Trondjhem; et de Bergen sortaient des goudrons pour Dunkerque 4. A suivre la correspon1. P(ublic) R(ecord) O(ffice) (Londres), S.P. 104/2, Hedges a Vernon, Whitehall, 29 juin 1703 ; S. P. 104/153, Hedges a Robinson, Whitehall, 24 dec. 1703 ; S.P. 104/154, Bramston a Hedges, Londres (Doctors Commons), I er aot 1704. 2. S. P. 95/16, Jackson a Hedges, Stockhohn, 27 aot 1704. 3. S. P. 75/25, f. 135, Vernon a Hedges, Copenhague, fv. 1704. 4. Ibid., Vernon a Hedges, Copenhague, 31 mars et 5 mai 1703.
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dance anglaise, on croirait que la collusion entre exportateurs et magistrals tait en effet chose notoire en Norvge (et en Slesvig); cela ne devait gure adoucir l'amertume des ngociants de Copenhague, qui voyaient leurs navires constituer une bonne moiti des arraisonnements anglais en 1703 J et se sont plaints, a juste titre peut-tre, que les innocents payaient pour les coupables. Il est vrai qu'en general, en Angleterre comme aux Provinces Unies, la plupart des cargaisons ainsi saisies, et surtout les navires, taient relachs. Les Scandinaves ont moins blm les saisies que rinjustice de leur en faire payer les frais. Si nous lisons la correspondance diplomatique a ce sujet, nous voyons que la grande plainte des Anglais eux-mmes, ds 1710, contre l'intervention des corsaires sudois, est essentiellement qu'ils risquaient ainsi de perdre leur voyage allusion probable aux difficults de la navigation d'hiver en Baltique. Peu de protestations analogues du cote scandinave o Ton insistait plutot sur les frais de detention et de procdure. Je citerai un des documents 2 les plus loquents a ce propos : une sorte de cahier de dolances de quarante neuf bourgeois de Stockholm qui, en aot 1704, demandent a leur roi d'tablir un bureau spcial pour enregistrer leurs revendications pcuniaires contre les belligrants. Us font preuve, naturellement, de la plus vive sensibilit a propos des moeurs des corsaires, qui pillent les cables de leurs btiments et les hardes de leurs marins. Mais ils fnt beaucoup plus de cas des interrogatoires vexatoires que leur inflige la Cour d'Amiraut anglaise, surtout a cause des commissions expdies en pays neutre cautionnement dment garanti, ce qui ne fut pas toujours facile a fournir 3 pour apporter la preuve de la proprit dans les cargaisons en litige, faute de passeports en bonne forme. Avec quelque peu d'exagration sans doute, ils affirment que leurs pertes en cas de restitution sont aussi graves qu'en cas de bonne prise. Outre les extorsions des avocis, il leur faut supporter le poids intolerable des gages et de la subsistance de l'quipage dtenu et celui des avaries, fort aggraves par de mauvais mouillages ou par des caves humides, o l'entrepl lait a la charge des plaignants, sans compier les honoraires des douaniers, des pilles, des lonneliers, de tout un monde enfin de petils fonctionnaires qui dressent les mandis,
1. Ibid., Vernon a Hedges, Copenhague, 27 octobre 1703. 2. S. P. 95/16, remis par Jackson a Hedges, Stockholm, 27 aot 1704. 3. S. P. 75/25, Vernon a Hedges, Copenhague, 4 dcembre 1703.
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les attestations, les nventaires, les evaluations. Pour comble de malheur, il leur reste a payer les frais de la poursuite. En fin de compte, a les entendre, les cargaisons ne valent pas le fret et, partout en Sude, les marchands de vin ferment boutique : la Cour Royale est elle-mme victime de cette injuste austrit. Mmes plaintes a Copenhague, o le College de Commerce reclama en 1705 la somme de 200 000 cus de ddommagement]. Que les Danois aient voulu en finir avec les restrictions que leur imposaient les traites est tout a fait comprehensible, alors que Ie commerce hollandais tait encore en pleine activit dans les ports francais : on voyait par exemple 500 navires hollandais dans Ie seul port de Bordeaux en 1707 2. Un ministre danois tait libre alors de juger la situation commerciale d'un pays neutre moins avantageuse que celle d'un belligrant 3. Les Danois devaient cependant admettre que les Anglais avaient relach plusieurs btiments dont la confiscation n'aurait pas t injustifie 4. Le Juge d'Amiraut, Sir Charles Hedges, alors Secrtaire d'Etat, crit lui-mme : Whenever it is in my power, I hadmuch rather acquit than condemn, s Cependant, l'examen strict des certificis de mer s'imposait, selon lui, par crainte des reclamations des armateurs corsaires. On doit comprendre que la Cour d'Amiraut tenait sance publique et qu'alors privateers are apt to make complaints and the Parliament willing to receive them , sans compter le risque qu'ils aient recours a la juridiction concurrente de Westminster Hall 6 . La Cour d'Appel
1. Historical Manuscripts Commission, Portland Papers, t. ix, London, 1923, p. 188, Vernon a Harley, Copenhague, 3/14 avril 1705. 2. J. S. BROMLEY, Le Commerce de la France de t'Ouest et a guerre maritime (1702-12), Ann. du Midi, t. 65 (1953); ci-dessus, p. 406 (appendice de chiffres). 3. S. P. 75/26, Waldersee a Boyle, Londres, 18 mai 1708; S. P. 100/1, Waldersee a Boyle, Londres, 22 juin 1709. 4. S. P. 75/25, Vernon a Hedges, Copenhague, 26 juin 1703. 5. S. P. 104/4, Hedges a Harley, Londres, (Doctors Commons), 18 septembre 1707. 6. S. P. 104/2, Hedges a Vernon, Bath, 20 aout 1703, et Londres, 20 septembre 1703, Un peu plus tard (Ibid., 16 novembre 1703), en rpondant a un mmoire de Rosencrantz, envoy danois a Londres, Hedges explique ainsi tres nettement la doctrine suivie par la Cour d'Amiraut : Quoiqu'on doive convenir, et qu'on ne sauroit faire paroitre le contraire, soit dans le cours de la dernire guerre, ou de celle-ci, qu'aucuns Navires Danois pu leurs Charges ont est confisques faute de Forme dans les Passeports ou Papiers seulement, nanmoins on ne peut pas disconvenir que, faute de bons Passeports et Documens, il est permis de visiter, examiner, et poursuivre en Justice un tel Navire et sa Charge, et en ce cas rOnus probandi la Proprit du Vaisseau, et de la Charge, et Ie Dessein du Voyage doit tomber sur les Prtendans, et s'ils manquent a soutenir leurs Prtentions par des Preuves telles qui sont requises par Ie Droit des Gens, on peut confisquer Ie Vaisseau avec sa Charge.
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des Prises elle-mme, tout en tant une commission du Privy Council, manquait galement de libert de manoeuvre lorsqu'elle examinait un proces inter partes , ft-il question de vins pour le compte d'un ambassadeur russe *. Bien avant l'anne 1708 date a laquelle Ie Parlement statua sur les droits de tous les capteurs de prises, tant vaisseaux de la Reine que particuliers lgistes et hommes politiques en Angleterre tenaient pour un principe que la prerogative ne devait jamais tre exerce en faveur des victimes d'un vaisseau de guerre particulier. C'est ce que les trangers eurent toujours du mal a comprendre. Les Etats-Gnraux des Provinces Unies, au contraire, ont fait preuve de beaucoup plus de souplesse devant les protestations des diplomates trangers contre les pirateries des corsaires zlandais, universellement reputes comme aussi rudes que combattifs. Les Danois se disaient encore plus maltraits en Zelande qu'en Angleterre. De toutes parts, de l'Empereur et de l'Angleterre aussi bien que des Couronnes du Nord, les plaintes affluaient a La Haye, renforces de temps en temps par des menaces de represailles, menaces qui furent d'ailleurs mises a execution contre un retourschip de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales qui se trouvait a Bergen en 1703. On peut s'expliquer ainsi l'attitude des deputes hollandais dnoncant dans les mmes termes que les trangers la mauvaise conduite des Zlandais, dont ils avaient d'ailleurs eux-mmes directement a souffrir 2. L'influence hollandaise se traduit dans les nombreuses sursances qu'ont imposes les Etats Gnraux aux proces en cours devant le College d'Amiraut de la Zelande, sigeant a Middelbourg, qui fut frquemment oblige d'envoyer les procdures de prises a La Haye 3. La decision finale revenait en effet aux Etats Gnraux auxquels, aprs la disparition du Stathouder-Roi (qui lui-mme, avait t vivement irrit contre les Zlandais), il
1. P.R.O., High Court of Admiralty [appels] 42/14, Juffrouw Wendela de Stockholm; S. P. 104/71, Hedges a Stanhope, Whitehall, 30 octobre 1703. 2. LAMBERTY, Mmoires pour servir a rhistoire du 18e sicle, La Haye, 172434, t. ii, 303. 3. Les Resolutin des Etats Gnraux qui portent sur les affaires maritimes en Zelande sont enregistres intgralement dans les gros livres de Resolutin der Admiraliteitscollegie van Zeeland, a l'Algemeen Rijksarchief, sous les nmeros St(aten) Gen(eraal) Adm(iraliteit) 2512 a 2538 pour les annes 1689-1713. Il y a des lacunes pour les annes 1702 et 1712, combles, pour 1702, par les MinuutResolutiin, St. Gen. Adm. 2435. Dans ces sries s'inscrivent sommairement tous les actes du College d'Amiraut. La correspondance de celui-ci avec les Deputes des Etats Gnraux pour les Affaires Maritimes se trouve dans les liasses St. Gen. Adm. 5639 a 5663, accompagne de temps en temps des berichten (informations) de la part des opbrengers (preneurs).
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fallait avoir recours pour obtenir une commission de capitaine corsaire. Le 8 septembre 1703, Leurs Hautes Puissances n'hsitrent pas a refuser pour un temps l'octroi de nouvelles commissions 1, ce qui poussa les Etats de Zelande, ds le 16 octobre, a substituer au besoin les noms de nouveaux capitaines dans des commissions encore en vigueur 2. Mais cet expedient ne pouvait sauvegarder 1'avenir des armements corsaires; pour les sauver, Middelbourg devait, des 1704, s'incliner de plus en plus devant les exigences de Leurs Hautes Puissances qui lui ordonnrent schement de relcher quatre navires sans qu'il en cote ren aux demandeurs danois3. Ce fut la condition mise a la restitution du Suiken Molen, retourschip des Indes, victime des represailles danoises : victoire, done, pour la politique de represailles, mais aussi pour la politique en soi, C'est de fort mauvaise grace que l'Amiraut zlandaise cda a de telles pressions. On doit pourtant, en bonne justice, reconnatre qu'elle prit la defense, non seulement des privileges provinciaux, qui comprenaient la juridiction des prises, mais aussi, comme nous 1'avons sgnale, d'un principe galement eher aux Anglais : car se montrer scandalise par ce qu'on appelait en Zelande les sursances politiques , n'tait-ce pas s'en teir au grand principe de la separation des pouvoirs? N'tait-ce pas se reposer sur la conscience des juges qui doivent trancher inter partes selon les regles du droit ree. u 4? C'est peut-etre a ce grave conflit, venu, en pleine guerre, menacer l'unit de la Confederation Nerlandaise, qu'il faut attribuer le mauvais renom des capteurs zlandais a cette poque. Les historians en sont impressionns, a travers les Mmoires du Sieur de Lamberty s, lequel, toutefois, voyait les vnements selon l'optique de La Haye. Il nous incombe de garder un sens plus strict des perspectives. Aux yeux des ngociants scandinaves, la conduite des Anglais tait tout aussi scandaleuse, ou presque, et les arraisonnements
1. LAMBERTY, xii, 197-201; St. Gen. Adm. 2524, 17 septembre 1703. 2. Par exemple, la commission du corsaire Faam, armateur Abraham Couck. en faveur du capitaine Hamers (Ibid., 17 octobre 1703). Cf. LAMBERTY, xii, 174-5. 3. St. Gen. Adm. 2525, 26 juillet 1704; 2526, 19 novembre 1704 (Justitia de Drammen, Paulsen; Hoop de Flensburg, Boysen; Juffrouw Margarita de Bergen, Prins; Juffrouw Maria de Bergen, Mijter). 4. bid. 5654, Amiraut zlandaise aux Etats Gen., 17 octobre 1703; 2525, 17 mars 1704; 5656, Amiraut-tats Gen., 21 janvier 1705. Cf. LAMBERTY, xii, 174-6. Le Raad d'Amiraut protesta contre l'informaliteit d'une mesure des Etats Gnraux en 1695, mais alors on n'est pas venu aux mains (St. Gen. Adm., 2518, 9 juillet 1695). 5. LAMBERTY, i, 265-6, 302-3; iii, 432; v, 185; xii, 30-1, 34-7, 43-5, 154-7. 163, 200-1.
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anglais taient en vrit beaucoup plus nombreux. On compte par exemple 80 saisies de btiments danois, et autant de btiments sudois, en 1703 et 1704 l, tandis que les saisies effectues par les Zlandais pendant la mme periode n'ont pas excede une vingtaine de navires danois et une douzaine de sudois, dont quelques-uns avaient t repris sur l'ennemi et d'autres arrts sur des soupcons qui n'taient pas sans quelque fondement reel 2. Nous devons aussi nuancer notre jugement sur les habitudes de la Cour des Prises zlandaise, dont on se plaignait plus encore que de l'attitude des corsaires de Flessingue et de Middelbourg. Il est exact que les membres du Raad (Conseil) de l'Amiraut ont eux-mmes avou qu'ils se trompaient parfois au milieu de la multitude de leurs affaires diverses 3. Rappelons-nous qu' leurs bons soins tait aussi confie l'administration journalire du contingent provincial de l'arme navale nerlandaise. Mais on les accusait surtout de montrer une complaisance excessive envers les corsaires : accusation assez facile a porter centre un College d'Amiraut qui se faisait un devoir d'etre 1'interprte des interets gnraux du Kaapvaart traditionnel, qu'on commengait a appeler plus dignement Ie Commissievaart, et ou les petites communauts de Walcheren investissaient une si grosse partie de leurs ressources assez modestes. Dans cette plbe maritime, par ailleurs, les tumultes taient toujours a craindre. Nanmoins, il faut l'admettre, il y eut bien des occasions ou Ie Raad a su rsister fermement aux demandes des boekhouders c'est-a-dire des directeurs des armements corsaires, comme les clebres frres Sautijn, Abraham Catteau, Nicolas Lambrechtsen et bien d'autres, hommes d'affaires durs et dbrouillards, parfois aussi anciens capitaines corsaires, qui savaient a la perfection profiter du formalisms juridique de YAdmiraliteitscollegie. On remarque aussi combien de fois les plaignants eux-mmes se sont fis aux bons soins de quelques membres de ce groupe redoutable. A corsaire, corsaire et demi! Pourtant, le trait le plus curieux de ces procds fut la disposition des juges a rapproch er les parties en litige et a les encourager a conclure un accord (par devant notaire ou non), que Ie tribunal precautions dOment prises contre toute collusion n'avait qu' ratifier. Ces accorden ou quasi-contracten devinrent la rgie. On les appelait extra-judicieel rantsoeneeren, parce qu'il tait de leur essence d'assurer au capteur une rancon, quelquefois consid1. 2. (chiffres 3. P.R.O., High Court of Admiralty 32/47 a 86, 90, 92. Prises et reprises de navires neutres ou amis amenes en Zelande, 1703-1706 provisoires) : 1703 : 42; 1704 : 18; 1705 : 8; 1706 : 3; Total 71. St. Gen. Adm. 2525, 17 et 26 mars 1704.
443
rabie, en change de la restitution d'un btiment et de sa cargaison. On s'accordait quelquefois sur place, tandis que l'offensive diplomatique continuait de plus belle, de sorte qu'un accord priv pouvait faire obstacle a une sursance de procdure *. L'envoy imperial en fait un grief, probablement significatif, lorsqu'il dit, le 5 juillet 1703, au sujet des btiments hansatiques, que les Zlandais contraignent par leurs rudes procdures les intresses a les racheter, ran?onnant sans obir aux ordres de l'Etat, qui leur enjoignent de surseoir toutes les procdures et d'informer Vos Seigneureries de l'estat des affaires, pour en disposer comme Elles jugeront juste et equitable 2 . Pour nombre de rclamants sans doute, le motif n'tait autre que de couper court aux frais d'une detention qui risquait autrement de durer plusieurs annes 3, et qui ne favorisait pas non plus les interets d'un armement corsaire, ordinairement de courte dure lui-mme et doni les reeders (intresses) ne voulaient pas trop retarder la liquidation des comptes. Toutes les parties en litige, de plus, craignaient que les cargaisons ne se deterioren!. Il faut encore noter combien de fois on blame les ventes prcipites auxquelles l'Amiraut zlandaise se prtait, tout en conservant le produit des ventes aux ayant droits ( ad opus jus habentium ). Les dchargements de cargaisons, bien entendu, auraient t souvent ncessits par les chaleurs d't, qui ne soni bonnes ni pour les vins ni pour les goudrons : raison supplementaire de rsister aux sursances . On invoque aussi, non sans vraisemblance, l'avis des tonneliers d'Etat ou des dgustateurs asserments; on allegue que de vieux btiments ont des voies d'eau ou que les futailles sont mal faites ou mal arrimes 4. Cependant, les ventes ne s'expliquent pas toujours ainsi. Dans le cas d'une reprise de btiment, assez commune d'ailleurs, la vente se justifiait, aux yeux des Zlandais, par la necessit de determiner plus srement la valeur de la cargaison dont dpendait Ie prix de sauve1. Ibid. 5654, Amiraut-tats Gen., 18 avril 1703, Wijndruiff, Ciaessen. 2. Ibid. 2524, 14 juillet 1703. 3. Citons les cas les plus graves : De Goede Hoop d'Apenrade, Frelle Christiansen (pris en avril 1703, mis en appel en septembre 1707), et Ie Liefde de Lbeck, Heinrich Schroeder (repris sur les Francais en fvrier 1704, vendu Ie 30 novembre 1707). Je compie cinq autres navires (deux danois, un sudois, un hambourgeois, un du Slesvig) dont les procdures ont traine pendant deux ans. Beaucoup d'autres, en revanche, n'ont subi qu'une detention de quelques mois. 4. St. Gen. Adm. 2518, 13 aot 1695, Hans en Jacob de Stockholm, Remington; 2526, 2 juillet 1704, Fortuna de Stockholm, Steenoort; 5655, 17 aot 1704, Justitia de Drammen, Paulsen; 5656, 11 mars 1705, Witten Olifant, Dirck Nantes-
444
tage l : plutt qu'aux connaissements il valait mieux se fier au marche local que Ton supposait avide, en general, des denres franchises ou baltiques. Lorsqu'on avait la chance de pouvoir faire coincider les ventes avec celles de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales, et de bnfieier ainsi d'un plus large concours d'acheteurs, on trouve le Raad empress a faire lever une sursance . D'autre part, les officiers de l'Amiraut n'ont pas contredit l'ambassadeur anglais qui avait affirm que la Maria de Drammen et sa cargaison avaient t vendues a un prix de rien 2 . Plus gnralement, en tout cas, l'Amiraut me semble avoir favoris des ventes prmatures parce que cela lui garantissait le paiement plus prompt des droits de prise (rantsoenpenningen) et du droit de tonnage (lastgeld). De ce dernier, toujours du en cas de juste cause de saisie, dpendaient ses propres salaires. Les cargaisons vendues en Zelande devaient payer en plus les droits d'importation quand bien mme le produit en allait aux rclamants, ou qu'il s'agissait de la vente des pacotilles du patron et de l'quipage detenus3. Qu'advenait-il enfin de ceux-ci pendant leurs loisirs forces? Il leur tait dfendu de toucher a leurs provisions de bouche, ou mme a leurs propres bardes, sans permission formelle de l'Amiraut c'est--dire sans l'agrment des capteurs. Un placet pour vendr les pacotilles n'tait pas non plus accord sans caution pralable 4. Le patron ou le maitre ne furent que rarement autoriss a loger a bord s. Point d'asile non plus dans les prisons : cela cotait beaucoup trop eher aux boekhouders. (On sait qu'ils n'ont pas voulu assurer la subsistance des prisonniers ennemis, dont bon nombre, par consquent, taient ordinairement d abarques et brutalement abandonns avant d'arriver au port.) J'ai relev pourtant deux mandats assez suggestifs a eet gard car ils enjoignent aux patrons de payer, avant de mettre a la voile, les dpenses du gelier de Flessingue 6. Peut-tre quelques marins neutres avaient-ils
1. Ibid. 2527, 26 septembre 1705, St Jacob; 2528, 21 janvier 1706, De Winthout. 2. bid. 2526, 12 novembre 1704, Gouden Eendragt; 2528, 28 avril et I e r mai 1706, Maria de Drammen. 3. bid. 2524, 16 juin 1703, Vergulde Duiff de Brme, Wischuisen. 4. Ibid., 9 juillet 1703, Fortuna, Haste Laurensen; 2525, 7 juin 1704, Juffrouw Anna de Stockholm, P. Jaspersen; 2526, 20 aot 1704, Fortuna de Stockholm, Jasper Steenoort, et 3 septembre 1704, Juffrouw Margaretha de Bergen, H. Cramer. 5. Ibid., 18 avril 1703, Engel Gabriel, Jan Poppe, et 11 juin 1703, Vergulde Duiff. 6. Ibid., 18 juillet 1703, Engel Gabriel, Poppe, et Juffrouw Anna de Stade, Claes Meyer.
Les Corsaires Zelandais et h Navigation Scandinave
445
ia libert de preare du service a bord des vaisseaux co^saires ou rnme a bord des vaisseaux de guerre, qui ont toujours embarqu nombre d'Allemands ou de Scandinaves doni le recrutement en Zelande inquietai! le College d'Amiraut, surtout parce que le Commissievaan offrait des recompenses plus sduisantes. En revanche, les Etats Gnraux interdisaient aux matres trangers d'engager des sujets nerlandais, sous peine de 300 florins pour chacun : ils ne devaient sortir qu'avec l'quipage d'arrive. C'est peut-tre Ie risque vident d'une dispersion de l'quipage qui explique la raret, dans les Actes de l'Amiraut, des ordres pour le paiement des gages aux marins detenus, comme il fut ordonn a Joachim Boij, matre du Carolus Landgrave von Hesse Casse!, a qui son equipage avait vainement demand la demi-solde. Meine ordre a Paul Moller, matre du Hoop de Bergen, qui avait refuse de les payer a moins qu'on ne lui rende son navire et son chargement. Un autre patron, Dirck Nantes, a d les payer sur sa part du produit de la vente de son navire, le Witten Olifant. En revanche, ce furent les preneurs de la Sta Anna van Langesout qui se virent reprocher d'avoir nglig de payer les gages de l'quipage. Pour les marins du Kroon d'Hambourg, ce fut soit a leur matre, Ditloff Jansen, soit a leur capteur, de payer *. En tous cas, le Raad d'Amiraut a fait preuve d'un sentiment de justice (ou de simple prudence) lorsque les marins sont venus se plaindre a ce sujet. Il se peut que la demi-solde ait t habituellement payee dans ces circonstances, mais je n'en suis pas sur. Il reste qu'on a cherch parfois a vendr ses pacotilles sur place et que, selon Ie matre du Notre Dame del Coro, c'tait seulement pour subsister 2. Puisqu'en general les gages des equipages marchands taient troitement lies au fret, Ie paiement de celui-ci tait videmment d'une importance capitale, mme lorsqu'il fallait vendr la cargaison ou une partie de la cargaison. Le matre demandait en outre son primage ou chapeau (kaplaken). Il est a remarquer que Ie premier au moins semble avoir t inscrit dans quelques-uns des accords prives, que la cargaison soit confisque ou non 3 . En cas de partage du produit de la vente de la cargaison, le fret entrait, avant partage, dans le passif de ce produit; on en discutait quant aux waaklonen, c'est--dire pour les gages des sentinelles
1. Ibid., 30 juillet, 8 septembre, 3 octobre et 25 aot 1703; 2528, 10 mai 1706. 2. Ibid. 2518, 4 juillet 1695. 3. Ibid. 2524, 12 fvrier 1703. Juffrouw Sophia, Andries Andriessen, et 14 juillet, Juffrouw Anna de Stade, Meyer; 2525, 25 juin 1704, Margaretha, Eriksen; 2438, 16 fvrier 1703, St Laurens.
446
Cursairs and Navies, 1660-1760
a bord l qui n'taient a la charge du preneur qu'en cas de relche intgrale. Un tel succes pourtant n'exemptait pas ncessairement Ie reclamant de payer les frais de detention et de justice, encore moins le remboursement de toutes ses propres dpenses. Il y avait des contestations assez vives a ce sujet, de sorte qu'un matre n'obtenait pas toujours son conge sans donner caution sur ce chapitre 2. Parfois, il lui fallait une intervention des Etats Gnraux pour l'viter; mme ensuite, on pouvait rencontrer une resistance de dernire heure de la part du boekhouder3. Quelquefois, celui-ci faillit ne pas se voir indemnis de toutes ses dpenses 4, mais le cas fut, je crois, des plus rares. Ordinairement, a ce qu'il me semble, les accords prives mettaient le boekhouder a 1'abr de tout risque d'avoir a payer ses propres frais de justice, a plus forte raison des avaries 5. Ordonne-t-on toutefois au boekhouder Daniel Minet de payer Ie radoub du Hoop de Flensburg? 11 rpond qu'il n'a jamais demand le navire. Et que penser de Nicolas Lambrechtsen, boekhouder, qui avait ob ten u le dchargement de la Juffrouw Maria en invoquant une voie d'eau, mais qui jugea preferable de nier le fait lorsqu'il fut charg de faire le radoub ncessaire 6? Si, par malheur, tait rendu un jugement dfavorable au boekhouder celui-ci tait capable d'une extreme mauvaise volont, mettant obstacle a la restitution materielle d'un btiment (ou de son materiel d'armement), ou bien se refusant a solder un compte 7. S'il y avait eu vente de la cargaison, il pouvait arriver aussi qu'on se trouvat aux prises avec le Venduemeester, qui engardaitleproduit, mais qui demandait le paiement des droits et pouvait se reveler insolvable 8. Enfin, on n'chappait pas toujours a un stedelyk arrest, par lequel l'autorit locale contrecarrait un jugement de l'Amiraut 9 : il y aurait a faire toute une histoire de l'influence
1. Ibid. 2438, 21 fvrier 1705, Liefde de Lbeck; 2526, 29 dcembre 1704, Justitia de Drammen, etc. 2. Ibid. 2526, 25 octobre 1704, Juffrouw Maria, Ruiter. 3. Ibid., 18 aot et 1er septembre 1704, Patriarche Jacob d'Apenrade, Broedereen. 4. Ibid., 2528, 1er mai 1706, Sta Anna van Langesout, Jens Ciaessen. 5. Ibid. 2524, 9 juillet, Twee Gebroeders, H. Janssen, et 23 novembre 1704, Fijf Gebroeders, Claes Hodendijk; 2527, I er juillet 1705, Catarina Laurina, Aman Craijer. 6. Ibid. 2526, 23 aot 1704. 7. Ibid. 2517, 6 mai 1694, Anna Catarina et trois autres navires; 2528, 24 avril 1706, De Winthout. 8. Ibid. 2518, 21 mars 1695, Hoop de Frederikstad; 2524, 21 fvrier, Juffrouw Sophia, Andriessen, et 16 juillet 1704, Fortuna d'Hambourg, Taugman; 2526, 26 novembre 1704, Fortuna de Stockholm, Steenoort. 9. Ibid. 2517, 6 mars 1694, Gustavus; 2519, 24 mars, Si Joris, et 28 mars 1696, Juffrouw Catarina; 2525, 8 mai 1704, Hans en Jacob ds Stockholm.
447
qu'ont su exercer quelques armateurs sur la politique municipale de Middelbourg. vitons toutefois la vieille erreur de les confondre tout a fait avec le College d'Amiraut. Ainsi, a travers une documentation encore incomplete, on peut distinguer quelques pratiques dont une connaissance, mme superficielle, a quelque valeur provisoire ne ferait-elle qu'illustrer, une fois de plus, quelle sagacit, voire quelles qualits morales, taient souhaitables chez un maitre de navire d'autrefois. L'ouvrage de Pares, nous le montrera plus tard, dans les colonies anglaises, aux prises avec des circonstances analogues, ou mme pires i. Sans doute, au cours d'une detention prolonge, le matre pouvait-il obtenir de nouvelles instructions de ses armateurs, mais ceux-ci, en fin de compie, devaient se fier beaucoup a son avis, a ses capacites, et surtout a son honntet. C'tait a lui, en grande partie, de sauver ce qui pouvait Ttre en cas de saisie, de conserver son equipage et de mener a bien le voyage interrompu. Faute de competence, il pouvait tout compromettre : par exemple, en prtant son nom a des affrteurs d'un pays belligrant, en facilitanl la dissimulation de la contrebande ou en opposant des rponses equivoques aux interrogatoires. Pendant la detention, on lui confisquait tous ses documents. En cas de saisie, il lui venait parfois la tentation de sacrifier les interets des armateurs aux siens, ou ceux des affrteurs a ceux des armateurs, au nombre desquels il figurait ordinairement lui-mme. Nous ne saurions rejeter I'hypothese qu'il ait eu l un motif supplementaire de composer avec ses capteurs zlandais; ce fut certainement le cas ailleurs 2. Tous les tribunaux de prises enfin, ont tenu le plus grand compte de leurs impressions au sujet du caractre du matre, aussi bien qu' des dtails comme son lieu de naissance, son domicile, ses voyages antrieurs, voire mme sa femme et ses enfants. C'est ainsi que nous possdons, dans ces sources prcieuses et encore insuffisamment utilises que sont les dossiers de prises, une base qui nous permettrait peut-tre de reconstituer peu a peu des biographies types de marins. Esprons qu'un effort systmatique de recherches nous permettra de mieux pntrer ces milieux baltiques dont nous commencons a connatre la complexit.
1. Colonial Blockade and Neutral Rights, 1M-1763, pp. 108-147. 2. Ibid., p. 133.
Shipping in the Channel. From a work by Peter Monamy (c. 1686-1747), a marine painter from Jersey, noted for the precision of his ship-knowledge. This painting was in the possession of the author.
20
THE PROFITS OF NAVAL COMMAND: CAPTAIN JOSEPH TAYLOR AND HIS PRIZES
In April 1708, Robert Jackson, Captain of H.M.S. Sorlings, was heard talking loudly in a Barcelona coffee-house of a prize which he had brought into the port. A guard had been sent aboard by General George Carpenter, the senior English officer in Barcelona, and Jackson's crew had been refused admittance. 'No King nor Generali', said he, 'had to do with his prize, for it was his, and he did not go to sea for nothing.' For this insult the captain was briefly imprisoned. He refused to hand over the captured ship's papers until he was given liberty, on parole, to fetch them from the Sorlings unaccompanied. He then took four days to deliver the papers, not to Carpenter but to Count Uhlfeldt, the Austrian military governor.1 During the preceding years the Prize Commissioners in London, responsible to the Treasury for taking custody of all ships and cargoes brought in as prize by the navy under their condemnation or release by the High Court of Admiralty, frequently had occasion to complain of the conduct of naval captains. The captains' earliest failing was resistance to form-filling: characteristic of the greater effort, from the outset of the War of the Spanish Succession, to make prize administration less vulnerable to criticism in Parliament was a 'scheme' requiring captors to send the Prize Office an exact description of any ship taken, where it came from, when and by whom it was arrested, and so on. Even when this innovation had come to be accepted, muster-lists of the ships' companies at the time of capture might be lacking, thus postponing the distribution of prize money, to the distress of seamen, their wives or widows, for whom a small bonus of this kind was important enough to raise clamours and petitions.2 The wives of seamen on the Lyme in 1703 went so far as to accuse her captain of prevailing on their husbands to
[London,] B[ritishl L[ibrary (Reference Division)], Add. MSS.5443, fos. 303-305, 21st April 1708. " [London,] P[ublic] R[ecord] [Office], Admiralty] 1/3662, Principal Commissioners for Prizes (Prize Office) to Admiralty, 26th February 1703 and 1st January 1707; Adm. II 405, p. 356. Secretary of Admiralty to Rear-Adm. Gray don et al., 1st December 1702; Treasury] 1/109, fo. 29, Prize Office to Treasury, 1st October 1708, and Lord Treasurer's memorial to Queen in Council, 19th May 1709.
1
450
empower him to receive all prize money for his own use - an abuse apparently notorious during the previous ('Nine Years') war and one which explains why naval crews came to appoint an agent of their own to watch their interests in the prize court. Whether their men were defrauded of their shares or not, some captains continued to dispose of their captures overseas behind the backs of the official prize officers, paying 'our Agents only what they call Her Majesty's share' or refusing to render any account at all. These and other types of'embezzlement' are intelligible enough in the comparatively lawless conditions of the West Indies or the Guinea coast, but they occurred also in the Mediterranean and at Lisbon; even at Dover it was not unknown for captains to treat the Prize Office men with a high hand. 4 By the Queen's proclamation of 1st June 1702, for the first time, such irregularities rendered a naval officer liable to court-martial and loss of employment, and this was no idle threat.5 The same proclamation, in effect reasserting the Crown's prerogative over prize money, granted naval captors half the 'neat proceed' in prizes - that is, after payment of import duties and other charges - unless they were enemy privateers or warships subsequently taken into the British navy, as many were. In that event, the whole value of such a privateer, as appraised by experts nominated by the prize court, was to go to the captors (less the Admiralty tenth), while 'gunnage and tunnage' - that is, 10 for every gun and ten shillings6 for every ton would be payable on a French or Spanish naval vessel. In any event, 'gun money' would always be payable on any 'ship of war or any private man of war' taken in fight or destroyed. All this went some way to meet the pressures that had developed during King William Ill's reign for a more generous treatment of captors than Parliament had provided for in the 'Privateers Act' of 1693;7 but still naval captors were
PRO, Adm. 2/409, p. 314, Adm. Sec. to Treasury and to Captain Lechmere, 13th December 1703; P[rivy] C[ouncil] 1/14/A3. Cf. Vernon to Shrewsbury, 1st October 1698 in G.P.R. James (ed.), Letters Illustrative of the Reign of William III (3 vols., London, 1841), III, 187; Historical Manuscripts Commission, Portland MSS, VIII (London, 1907), 61, 'Questions as to Abuses in the Navy', 1699; Journals of the House of Commons, XI, 154, and XII, 405, 469, 592. 4 PRO, Tl/87, fos. 452-5, Prize Office to Lowndes, 13th November 1703; Adm. I/ 3662, Prize Office to Admiralty, 17th August 1703, 5th March and llth Septesmber 1706, 10th October 1707; Adm. 1/4283, Lowndes to Burchett, 3rd May, 3rd July, 19th October 1705, 31st May 1707; Adm. 2/407, pp. 145-6, Burchett to admirals and commanders 10th April 1703. 5 E.g., cases of Captain Grosse (ibid. 403, pp. 111-12), Morrice (404 p. 120), and Balchin (420, p. 526). The proclamation is reprinted in R. G. Marsden (ed.), Documents relating to Law and Custom of the Sea (2 vols., London, Navy Records Society, 1915-16), II, 186-90. 6 The proclamation erroneously printed 'pounds': PRO, PC 2/79, fos. 189-90. 7 4 Will. & Mar. c. 25. This awarded only a third to naval captors, but as much as fourfifths of the cargo and the whole of the prize ship if the captor were a privateer.
3
The Profits of Naval Command
45 \
less favourably treated than the privateers, who now received ninetenths of any lawful prize, besides being freed from the attentions of the Prize Commissioners, widely believed in the navy to allow theft and damage to ships and cargo in their custody before selling them for less than they were worth.8 These were among the reasons offered by Mr. Thomas Reynolds, later a director of the South Sea Company, 'why 'tis absolutely necessary for such Captains, Officers and Ships Company as may have the good fortune of taking Prizes to impower one person to act for them at London . . . with direction to him for appointing such a person at the respective Out Ports . . .'.9 Reynolds, considered impartial and able by the Prize Commissioners themselves, was acting for most flag officers and naval commanders by the end of 1703.1 Besides undertaking 'to have a person of Integrity as well as Judgment' to be at all appraisements and sales in London and the outports, and to keep an eye on Prize Office warehouses, he would do his best to hasten proceedings in the admiralty court and particularly before the Lords Commissioners on Appeals. He was perhaps the first in a long line of Prize Agents whose methods were to give rise to a parliamentary enquiry in 1803 and deserve further study. 11 Their numbers and responsibilities substantially increased as a result of legislation early in 1708, which conferred on the captors, whether men of war or privateers, 'the sole Interest and Property' in lawfully condemned prizes, subject only to Customs duties on the cargoes, some of which were high. This did not of course relieve captors of complying with the procedures laid down by the admiralty court (as well as the Customs) for the proper custody of prizes and prisoners, but it placed the navy on equal terms with the privateers (and not even they had any longer to pay the Admiralty tenth), as regards both their property in prizes and their freedom to sell as suited them best. In future captors or their agents would also appoint their own experts to inventory and value ships and cargoes before sale, although the Act significantly required equal numbers of agents to act for commanders, for officers and for crews at appraisements and sales, with provision for public notification of the days appointed by agents for paying shares (up to three years from that date, after which unclaimed money would be paid to the new seamen's hospital at Greenwich). Beginning with its officers 'in any Part of America', the Prize Office would gradually be
8 Captain George St. Lo, England's Safety: or, a Bridle io the French King (London, 1693), reprinted in Somers Tracts, II (London, 1814), 50-73: see ibid, 71. 9 [Greenwich], National] Maritime] Mfuseum], AGC XXI/36/MS 0593. 10 PRO, Tl/88, fo. 130, Prize Office to Lowndes, 21st December 1703. 11 Fourth Report of the Commissioners of Naval Enquiry, July 1803. Parliamentary Papers 1802-3 (109), IV, 249.
452 Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760 12 wound up. All this goes to show that Captain Jackson's outburst in Barcelona was not so wide of the truth as first appears. But he did not claim one further boon deriving from Parliament's interference with prize awards; it also awarded 5 for every man alive on an enemy warship at the beginning of an engagement and this 'head money' would be worth more than the old 'gun money', both loosely called 'bounty money'.13 'What', said the Mad Man in Daniel Defoe's Review, 'nothing makes them fight but the Money . . . they'll be as mad with it in Wapping as at Jamaica.'14 Nevertheless, no change was made in the proportion of prizes payable to naval crews: it remained at two-eighths until 1808. From 1702 a captain was entitled to three-eighths, unless he was under the orders of a flag officer, in which case the admiral (or admirals) took an eighth.15 Such was the foundation of the prize fortunes, modest or sensational, described by one excellent authority as 'the chief attraction of the naval service', at least for commissioned officers, sometimes accused of sacrificing prior duties to the pursuit of rich merchantmen.16 Admiral Boscawen's country seat, at Hatchlands Park near Guildford, is only the most celebrated of those which were built (as is written on his tomb) 'at the expense of the enemies of his country'. The beauty of the Dart estuary owes much to the wooded estate acquired by Captain Philemon Pownall, who rebuilt the house at Sharpham about 1770 with his prize money.17 In the parish church of Denbury, near the head of the river Teign (also in Devon), is a tablet sacred to the memory of Joseph
There were two related Acts, 6 Ann. c. 64 and c. 65, the first for encouraging the trade to America, the second 'for the better securing the Trade of this Kingdom by Cruisers and Convoys', which took effect on 26th March 1708. The Prize Office was abolished in America by the first of these Acts, at home by order of the Privy Council on 15th November 1708, though the Treasury was to appoint a skeleton staff to deal with arrears (BL, Harleian MSS. 2263, fo. 303). 13 Often in arrears now that the Treasury no longer had a fund fed by the Crown's share in prizes; PRO Tl/109, fo. 9 and 124, fo. 62, Prize Office to Treasury, 9th September 1708 and 29th September 1710. U Facsimile Text Society edn. (New York, 1938), V, 254 (21st August 1708). 15 Marsden, op.cit, II, 1878; proclamation of 20th May 1708 in London Gazette, 4440. Lord Mulgrave's revised scale of 15th June 1808, which raised the share of ship's crew to a half, proved so unpopular with officers that it was revoked in 1816. Admiral Warren in 1745 claimed a share in prizes taken by captains sailing under his orders even if they were hundreds of miles away: see The Royal Navy and North America: The Warren Papers, 1736-1752 (ed. Julian Gwyn for Navy Ree. Soc., 1973) pp. 67-8, 250n. Warren's prize fortune exceeded 127,000. (ibid. xliv). Cf. J. Gwyn, The Enterprising Admiral: The Personal Fortune of Admiral Sir Peter Warren (Montreal and London, 1974). 16 Daniel A. Baugh, British Naval Administration in the Age of Walpole (Princeton, N.J., 1965), pp. 112-3. A few sensational examples are given by Peter Kemp, Prize Money: A Survey of the History and Distribution of the Naval Prize Fund (Aldershot, 1946), pp. 20-5. 17 W. G. Hoskins, Devon (London, 1954), p. 322.
1
453
Taylor, armigerus ('esquire'), who died on 17 December 1733 at the age of 73: Hostile sanguine infecit aequor Et naves misere lacralas dimisit
Et raro in portum rediit Bellicis non decoratus trophaeis ... Denbury is flanked to south and north by the villages of Torbryan and the Ogwells (East and West). Here and at Highweek (now absorbed by the town of Newton Abbot), at the time of his second marriage in 1726, Captain Taylor owned farms and buildings, with perhaps five tenants; he lived himself in the park at West Ogwell.18 He must have acquired these estates some time after January 1716 (when he was still writing to his prize agent from Pendomer, near Yeovil),19 to some extent perhaps as a result of his marriage in 1726. Or had he made a fortune in prizes? Taylor's origins, at Lyme on the Dorset coast, seem to have been fairly humble. As a youth in 1685, while chatting on the shore with a Customs Officer, he was seized by a boatload of the Duke of Monmouth's men and lucky to have escaped with his life, for he refused to join the rebellion. The first trace of his naval service occurs on 21st December 1690, as a midshipman: a complimentary certificate from his captain describes him as 'mariner'. On 7th July 1692 he was master on a fireship 'while she burnt'. Two years later at the advanced age of 34, he was commissioned Lieutenant, serving until 1697 on the Gloucester, a newly built '4th rate' of 60 guns, and then on the Dragon, 46. This was the class of cruiser that Taylor was to command for most of the next war, first the Triton (from 24th February 1704) and then the Litchfield (6th October 1708 to 8th February 1714), each of 48 guns. Unlike the three higher rates, these frigates were not laid up during winter and so their officers received full pay all year round a matter of
18 Information supplied by my friend Mr. Harold Trump, who kindly examined family deeds in the County Record Office at Exeter besides the Denbury tablet, below which in low relief is a dramatic representation of a warship engaged with several French galleys. Cf. Hoskins, Devon, pp. 442, 446, 499-500. The family's right to bear arms is traced to Taylor's command of the flagship at Plymouth at the time of Queen Anne's death, a dangerous moment for the Hanoverian succession: The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales (ed. Sir B. Burke, London, 1884), p. 999. The family later acquired the Beaconfield estate near Plymouth. 19 NMM, AGC XXI/36/MS. 0604: Taylor to Master, 17th January 1716. 20 The biographical details which follow are gathered from ibid. MSS 0527-0531 and 1115; cf. list of captains 1688-1716 in NMM, SER 136.
454 Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760 grievance among senior captains, who until 1705 received no half pay while unemployed in wartime.21 In the nature of their function, moreover, cruisers stood a much better chance of winning prizes than ships of the line. Taylor was posted lieutenant on two line-of-battle ships, Suffolk and Prince George, in 1701-2, being present at the attack on the Spanish silver fleet in Vigo bay in October 1702, which yielded over 80,000 to the captors in prize money (apart from an unknown but probably large quantity of plunder) and as much again to the Treasury.22 Except for Commodore Charles Wager's seizure of the cargoes of several of tYiegalleones at Cartagena in May 1708,23 Vigo was the most lucrative naval episode of the Succession War. But the number of participants in Sir George Rooke's fleet was large and a single lieutenant's share cannot have amounted to more than a few hundred pounds, unless he had 'embezzled' more. To stop the flow of petitions, the Privy Council, a year later, ordered a distribution 'without making any Distinction of Payment in respect to the severall Rates of Ships, and that in such distribution the assisting Ships be esteemed as Principalls'.24 It is interesting that even a year's delay caused Lord Treasurer Godolphin some anxiety, 'apprehending that quick payment will tend to encourage the seamen and avoid the hazard of keeping so large a sum in cash and notes'.25 Captain Taylor's surviving accounts with his prize agents do not begin until 1704/5 and reveal that he then received 38.11s.5d. (38.57p) 'as his own and Richard Prestridge's share of the remaining part' of the Vigo booty.26 In that year he also drew 200 as part of Her Majesty's bounty, 'for his good service in fighting of four French galleys', in addition to a gold medal for cutting his way single-handed through 'a great squadron of French ships' off Lisbon to carry the news of their approach to Admiral Rooke, who rewarded him by sending him home with the news of the fall of Gibraltar. His prize and bounty
R. D. Merriman (ed), Queen Anne's Navy (Navy Ree. Soc. 1961), p. 315; cf. PRO PC 1/2/6. Officers' 'wages' were all lowered in 1700 from the level to which they had risen in 1694: thus the captain of a 4th rate from 15 to 10 shillings a day, a lieutenant on a 2nd rate from 24 to 16 shillings a day (Baugh, op. at. 110). 22 PRO, Adm. 1/4283, Lowndes to Burche, 7th September 1703. For a reassessment of Spanish losses see H. Kamen, 'The Destruction of the Spanish Silver Fleet at Vigo in 1702', Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, C (1966) 165-73. 23 For the circumstances, see Ruth Bourne, Queen Anne's Navy in the West Indies (New Haven, Yale Hist. Pub. XXXIII, 1939), pp. 169-72. 24 PRO, PC 2/79, fos. 447-9 ( l l t h November 1703). The Prize Commissioners wanted these rules to be generalized for the future (to Lowndes, 13th November 1703, T1/87/452). 25 PRO, Adm. 1/4283, Lowndes-Burchett, 7th September 1703. 26 NMM, AGC XXI 36/MS. 0596. The account ostensibly begins 1704, but this must refer to the legal year ending 25th March 1705, for it at once refers to two prizes taken in 1705, which year is omitted otherwise.
21
455
money - earned as captain of the Charles Gaily, from 18th February 1703 until he shipped aboard the Triton on 24th December 1704 amounted to a total of 817.3s.4d. down to 3rd October 1706, when his account with Reynolds ended. This looks impressive when set beside a 'wage' of 137 a year as captain of the Charles Gaily, a 5th rate of 32 guns, and 182.10s. on the Triton, but on four of his prizes Taylor had to meet the claims of 4, 5, or 7 fellow captains, to a total of 272.11s.51/2d. They all shared two-eighths, showing that the prizes had been taken by a squadron and that a further eighth had gone to its commander. Nor is this all. From his other twelve prizes in this account Taylor's receipts represent fractions of two-eighths in all cases except that of the Virgin's Grace, an armed merchantman for which he received 205.8s., and even on this an eighth had already gone to the flag officer. On five prizes the accounts refer to an agreement (with date) between the captains, which would have provided for equal shares in captures technically made by only one of them, thus preventing disputes in the prize court.27 Otherwise much might depend on getting some of one's men included in a prize crew or, increasingly, on a flag officer's certificate of ships 'taking and assisting therein'. 8 That Taylor was disinclined to overlook the smallest claim is apparent from two letters written long after the war to Harcourt Master, who became his prize agent on 25th October 1706 and whose accounts with Taylor survive in one form and another from that date until 15th November 1715, together with a few miscellaneous papers.29 On 19th November 1715, after congratulating Sir Harcourt (a London alderman who had become a Knight Bachelor in the previous year) on obtaining a Commissionership for the Leather Duty from Sir Robert Walpole, Taylor raises a series of questions and corrects errors in his accounts: 'I hope you will emiatly [immediately] rectifie the Dividents of those prizes . . . You see by Capt. Canning [sc. his example] how hardly men part with money when they have it.' Canning, he explains, was overpaid 6.5s. on the Lafnes (La Fine, a Dieppe privateer), not on
27
Or attempting to do so: thus H.M.S. Southsea Castle and the Mary Gaily 'agreed to share and divide equally betwixt them . . . all such prizes as ... they or either of them should take either in company or apart during their Cruize', but this did not prevent the Mary, a privateer, from disputing the man-of-war's claim to share the Pearl prize in 1710 (PRO, H[igh] C[ourt of] Admiralty] 32/47). For examples of disputes between men-of-war, cf. ibid. 32/49 (Ameriquain), 78 (Parfait) and 84 (Toulouse). 28 Ibid. 48 (Bonadventura and Si. Andrew d'Ostend); cf. ibid. 50 (1) 55 and 60 (2) for certificates of Sir Stafford Fairborne (May 1708), Lords of Admiralty for Sir George Byng (19th January 1706) and Lord Dursley (21st May 1709), all referring to Taylor. Such certificates were needed if the flag officer was to be sure of his eighth: Tl/85/655 (Solicitor General's opinion, 31st May 1703). 29 NMM, AGC XXI/36/ MSS. 0604-5 (letters of 19th November 1715 and 12th January 1716) and 0597-0602 (accounts).
456
the Fortunate Princess (a Calais privateer). Further, Captain Littleton is not entitled to a share in the Beringhen, taken after he had left the squadron; and the Royale, also a privateer of Saint-Malo, belongs only to Taylor himself while his dead sons's gun money on her is still payable, as is his own on the privateers taken by Captain Hopson at the same time as the Hocquart of Dunkirk, of which Taylor has yet in any case to receive his share of the net proceeds. To anyone not versed in the accountancy scruples of the Navy Board the four 'Principal Commissioners' and their assistants who administered the dockyards from an office in the City of London, on behalf of the Admiralty in Whitehall - it may seem surprising that all these prizes were taken ten years earlier, in 1705, except for La Fine and the Fortunate Princess (1703).30 The Board could in any case do no more than make out interest-bearing bills for payment 'in course' - creditors taking their turns to cash them - in the case of captured privateers bought for the navy. The same was true of the quite separate Board of Ordnance, which often had to buy prize guns it did not want, and the Victualling Board, which had to debit itself for prize provisions frequently consumed, if not embezzled, by naval captors.31 Both these bodies had a name for delayed payments. Taylor's accounts naturally bear traces of this unpunctuality, sums being paid in at different times and often late for the same prize. But his grumblings to his prize agent were directed more towards unfinished business in the admiralty court32 and fine adjustments in the division of the spoils by that agent himself. It is evident that a successful Prize Agent needed exceptional patience. When Thomas Reynolds was appointed a Victualling Commissioner in June 1706,33 he must have decided he could no longer find the time to look after the claims and counter-claims of his clients in the admiralty court and outside. That Harcourt Master succeeded him as far and away the navy's most prominent agent, acting for crews as well as officers, is probably a tribute to his probity and a capacity for taking infinite pains. He must also have been on good terms with the
311 As verified from the bundles of prize papers in PRO, HCA 32. A letter from the Prize Office to Burchett, 10th December 1706 (Adm. 1/3662) lists the appraised values of six privateers in which Taylor had an interest (Royale 572, Desmarest 470, Beringhen 378, Entreprenant 613, Catherine of Havre de Grace 643, Hocquart 503 (figures to nearest ). All these were bought for the navy and renamed. 31 Ibid., Prize Office to George Clarke, 28th May 1705; Adm. 2/414, p. 475 (Burchett to Officers of Ordnance, 9th June 1705) and 406, pp. 519-20 (Burchett to Warre, 17th March 1703); Tl/92, fo. 122, Prize Office to Treasury, 1st November 1704. 32 E.g., the case of the Thetis, taken 1705, still dragged on owing to charges of embezzlement on the part of one of her captors: ibid. Tl/98, fo. 394. 33 Merriman, op. cit., 359.
457
proctors and advocates of Doctors' Commons, the college of civilian lawyers which housed the High Court of Admiralty and officiated in it (besides conducting much ecclesiastical business). Above all, in the open situation arising out of the new legislation after March 1708, he would have needed sound commercial judgment and reliable agents of his own in some of the ports, especially Portsmouth and Plymouth, whither most prizes were brought in, appraised and sold - unless cargoes were likely to command a significantly better price in London.34 Advertisement of sales 'by Direction of the Agents of the Captors' began in The London Gazette (no. 4449) on 1st July 1708: the goods lay in Her Majesty's Warehouse at Plymouth, but allotments 'will be timely printed, dispers'd and affix'd upon the Royal Exchange, London'; the same with respect to two ships, their tackle and furniture, lying in the port of Plymouth on 8th July (no. 4451). Prize Agents might also invite enquiries at their own houses, as did Master at Great Tower Hill, although the auctions themselves usually took place in coffee-houses, especially Edward Lloyd's in Lombard Street, already known for the underwriting of marine insurance. On one occasion interested parties were invited to call on Master or on Mr. Walter Benthall, a broker of Lombard St., who was probably acting for the ship's company of the captor, H.M.S Gosport; another time, they were to enquire of Master in London or of Mr. Thomas Ridge (brewer and naval contractor) in Portsmouth, which may have been simply a matter of convenience.35 Although the Cruisers and Convoys Act of 1708 had envisaged three agents for any one captor, it looks as if in practice there were never more than two, who would have to come to some agreement about the times and places of sales, the apportioning of prize cargo into lots, and finally the distribution of shares. Provided all formalities were observed by a captain, there should have been no difficulty about this at home in England. It is noticeable that any single agent advertised in the Gazette for making distributions at his house, so far as these were not made on board the captor ships themselves, which
' 4 The Prize Office view was that goods fetched at least 25 per cent more in London (Tl/85, fo. 420) and that London merchants considered the risks of a coastal voyage 'worth their while' (Tl/82, fo. 141, to Treasury, 27th October 1702). Cf. Reynolds to Receiver General for Prizes, 1st October 1702 (Tl/821, fo. 372): 'Those Gentlemen who have requested me to look after their affaires relating to Prizes desire that sales may be made in London, being very sensible that 'tis the Numbers of Buyers that makes the Market.' In his 1693 pamphlet, ubi dt. supra, St. Lo urged that goods be appraised in small quantities, thus enabling small merchants to buy; like public sale by inch of candle this would much augment selling prices. 35 Gazette nos. 4559 and 4569, 22nd July and 17th August 1709. For some reason, presumably because they found other outlets more efficacious, the prize agents stopped advertising sales in the Gazette after April 1710, although they continued to use it in order to notify captors where and when their money could be collected.
458
was the general rule.36 Such an agent was more likely to meet difficulties with the agents of other captors, especially as most naval prizes were joint captures and some ships failed to send up muster-lists or even, according to Master, to appoint an agent.37 The fact that he himself acted for so many ships must have eased this situation, which indeed could explain in part why he accumulated so much prize business. Officers and crew, or a captain and his whole company, were likelier to clash when sales took place abroad, even in Ireland. In the colonies, a captain was quite likely to keep matters in his own hands.39 Captain (later Admiral) Edward Vernon himself sold an assortment of prize goods at Jamaica, Santa Marta and 'the Baru' (Barranquilla?) for 6,565 at the end of 1710.40 Master's account with Taylor, far more detailed than that with Reynolds, shows how a Prize Agent could act as a private banker. Besides recording shares in prize and bounty money, including modest sums due to the captain's son Thomas (lost in the Enterprise in 1709) and Exchequer notes (Bank of England paper) paid in by the captain to Master's clerk at Plymouth, the receipts contain interest on, and occasionally the realisation of, investments. Thus a Navy Board bill, dated 30th August (for 'cordage') and bought at a discount of 5 per cent in November 1707 for 305.19s.6d., was redeemed three years later at par (321.19s.3d.) plus interest 44.19s.8d. Perhaps acting on a general instruction from his client, however, Master more usually purchased the bills (promises to pay) of the Victualling Board: for example,
36 Of 92 such advertisements between 29th July 1708 and 2nd November 1710, Master was responsible for 32 and the Prize Office (for captures before 26th March 1708) for 12; Samuel Eyre, merchant, was the next most prominent name in London, Tempest Holmes and William Young in Plymouth, Thomas Warner in Deal, etc. Eight agents were listed by the registrar of the prize court in November 1711: PRO, HCA 32/ 92 (1). Cf. Master's affidavit, 25th July 1713, in the case of the Stadt of Stockholm (on appeal, HCA 42/19): acting for the mate and crew of the Royal Ann Gaily, he had a joint account in the Bank of England with a Mr. Jones, agent for her captain, the duke of Leeds. 37 PRO, Adm. 43/1 (head money vouchers), case of Superbe prize. 38 HCA 32/57 (Esperance de la Paix): Messrs. Keefc and Taylor, merchants of Kinsale acting for Captain Aldred and a majority of the officers, sold the prize cargo for 1,585.10s. but then refused to pay the crew, whose agent was a sergeant of marines, according to his own attestation on 6th October 1712; he may well have misunderstood the reasons, as so many complainants did. 39 Ibid. 77 (Si Paul): Lt. Lisle accused Capt. Moore of selling prize sugars in Maryland at 30 to 40 shillings a hundredweight, but of refusing shares above the rate of 25 shillings. 40 BL, Add. MSS. 40, 805. The transactions are entered in his own hand on blank pages in the captured journal of the Hirondelle of Saint-Malo, whose cargo this probably was, consisting of linens, silks, woollens, lace, spices, wax, hardware, hats, stockings, etc. It looks as if Vernon purchased the share of his ship's company for 1,250, being five-eighths of the goods sold 'at outcry'.
459
Benjamin Dunning's victualling bill for salt, dated October 1708 and bought in August 1709 at 12 per cent discount, the seller to be allowed interest at 6 per cent between these dates. Nicholas Clegg's victualling bill for 610, dated October 1709, was bought almost at once at 16 per cent discount. This illustrates the widening of discount margins as the war lengthened and public debt mounted. A naval captain, evidently, was in a stronger position to wait for his money than many of the navy's contractors; and the fact that suppliers of naval victuals were often quite small men, meant that vitualling bills could be picked up in the market at particularly large discount rates, especially as the Victualling Board (whose office was close to Master's on Town Hill) tended to lag behind all others in meeting its debts.41 Master's commission on buying or selling these investments was Va per cent, compared with 5 per cent on prize money. But he made no charge for performing other small services, such as paying the school bills of Taylor's younger son or 'Your lady's bill drawn payable to Mary Phillips'. By 17th December 1711 the captain's accumulated receipts and 'outgoings' - his turnover, as it were - balanced at 7,492.9s. (as compared with 5,417.8s.7d. on 14th October 1709). A week later Master sent him a list of twenty victualling bills subscribed on his behalf to 'the South Seas and Fishery Corporation'. This was the notorious South Sea Company chartered by Parliament in June to take over the navy's (and related) floating debt. Master, like Reynolds, was one of its thirty-one directors.42 It offered a superficially attractive opportunity of redeeming bills at par; on 23rd May 1712, indeed, Master is to be found applying to the Navy Board for the speedy issue of bills to some of his clients on the ground that 'the present commission for taking subscriptions into the South Sea Company expires at midsummer'.43 Busily engaged at sea to Lisbon and Salice, later to Pasajes with the person and equipage of Lord Lexington, on his way to negotiate the Spanish peace terms, including privileges vital to the South Sea Company 44 - Taylor would have heard that the Company's stock was in the doldrums, the discount on public debts having been transferred to it. Most of his savings were sunk in it: 6,461 in victualling bills, another 750 in bounty on seven French privateers. It is likely enough that he had consented to these
41 See John Ehrman, The Navy in the War of William III 1689-1697 (Cambridge 1953), ch. v. On the use of prize agents as investment brokers, cf. Gwyn, Nai'y in North America, especially pp. 66, 167, 213. 42 P.G.M. Dickson, The Financial Revolution in England: A Study in the Development of Public Credit 1688-1756 (London. 1967), pp. 116-8,' 126. 41 PRO, Adm. 43/1. 44 See David Francis, The First Peninsular War 1702-1713 (London, 1975), pp. 38796.
460
transactions, for the journal of H.M.S. Litcheld*5 shows that she was at Sheerness from 27th November 1711 till 31st January 1712, so that he could for once have been in direct contact with his agent. However that may be, there is a note in his hand on 30th August 1713 stating that the bounty money was 'transfer'd to Mr. Gould for me'.46 He had by then reduced his holding of South Sea stock to 2,268. If he held on to it until the speculation reached its height in 1720, and then sold, he might have realized up to 20,000. By withdrawing over two-thirds of his holding in 1713, he must have incurred a loss of some hundreds of pounds, probably as much as the average value of a French privateer appraised in England - say 560.47 Taylor's accounts (1705-1715) point to an interest in 46 prizes, besides a privateer that can be traced to the Charles Gaily under his command, earlier, and another to the Litcheld, later.48 Including these, he had a share in 24 privateers - of Dunkirk, Calais, Dieppe, Le Havre, Morlaix and especially Saint-Malo - with an average of 20 guns. Of the remainder at least eight were armed merchantmen, besides the Thtis, a naval vessel carrying cargo. All these could have attracted bounty money, although before 26th March 1708 only if taken in fight or into the royal service, in which event the captor also got 90 per cent of the appraised value instead of half the net price at auction; head money from 26th March 1708, however, was worth over twice as much as the earlier 'gunnage and tunnage' together,49 while the whole value of any prize now reverted to the captor. In 1711 Taylor earned 749.15s.8d. in head money on seven privateers; in 1705 he was lucky to receive 35.12s.6d. in gun money on La Fine, even allowing for an overpayment of 6.5s. to Captain Canning.50 But only ten of his privateers and four of the armed merchantmen were captured during the more favourable years from March 1708, and none by Taylor alone. His most
In rny possession, purchased from Francis Edwards Ltd. of Marylebone, London, in 1976; it begins 6th October 1708, when Taylor took command, and ends at Plymouth (his usual base) 9th April 1713. (Now in National Maritime Museum.) 46 NMM, AGC XXI/36/MS. 0611; Nathaniel Gould was a prominent contractor for naval stores, a director of the Bank of England, and an investor in South Sea stock, prominent in the discussions which produced the fatal restructuring of the Company's capital by Act of Parliament in 1720 (Dickson, op. at. 99, 103). 47 The average for seven privateers (five of which interested Taylor), guns included, about which the Prize Office wrote to the Admiralty, 10th December 1706 (PRO, Adm. 1/3662). For the market behaviour of South Sea stock cf. Dickson, op. at. 70, 109. 48 Bonheur of Dunkirk (HCA 32/51) and the Flying Passenger, taken off Beachy Head on 20th February 1711 with H.M.S. Sortings (ibid 60). 49 A privateer of 20 guns would be of approximately 200 tons (total bounty therefore 300) and carry 130 men (bounty 650). 50 Shared between four captains and the widow of another, gun money on the Beringhen, 22, and Entreprenant, 20, together amounted only to 22.6s.3V2d.
45
461
lucrative catches occurred on two successive days in October 1710 when cruising with two other warships some sixty leagues south-west of Ushant: the Richard of La Rochelle and the Deux Frres of Bordeaux, with sugar, indigo and cacao from Martinique and Saint-Domingue, of which the net proceeds came respectively to 6.911 and 3,103. Previously he had taken part in the capture of four homeward-bound West Indiamen, but that was in 1705 and then his share in the captains' two-eighths of the captors' moiety amounted to no more than 188 in all. In 1710, if there were only two consorts, he could obtain more than that from a laden codfisher alone or, for that matter, from an outwardbound West Indiaman. This would explain a letter to him from John Methuen, whom he had known in Lisbon and who was now a Lord Commissioner of Admiralty. It is dated 2nd February 1710, a couple of months after the captain's return from Newfoundland, where he had rebuilt the fort at St. John's: '. . . nobody has a more reali esteeme and friendship for you . . . Have used my endeavours to have you appointed for My Lord Dursley's Squadron . . . your ship being in my opinion very proper for that Station'.52 Vice-Admiral James, Viscount Dursley, commanded for some years a substantial force, based on Plymouth, to cruise in the Channel Soundings and off the south-west coast of Ireland, primarily to safeguard the departure and return of England's large convoy to 'foreign parts' through waters infested by Malouin privateers, often supported by Duguay-Trouin's squadron from Brest. Its duties took it across the sea-lanes to Nantes, La Rochelle and Bordeaux. In seeking to rejoin it, Captain Taylor confirmed his interest in prize money. Unfortunately, his accounts with Reynolds and Master, informative (and rare) as they are, do not provide a satisfactory basis for a precise calculation of his total gains from prizes and the royal bounty. Apart from what he got before the accounts begin, and the complications of offsetting payments to other captains, it seems that he once or twice disposed of prizes and paid out shares in them without the concurrence of his Prize Agent, whose accounts in any case have not survived for the period llth March 1712 to 26th March 1713; as we have seen, moreover, there were a number of unsettled claims as late as January 1716, when the box of Taylor's papers in the National Maritime Museum gives out. Allowing for these omissions, and for deductions to his own ship's company and fellow captains, it would not seem that
51 HCA 32/80 and 84; details of these and several other sales arc among the miscellaneous papers which Taylor preserved with his accounts 'rendered' and 'current', but neither of these records his personal share, as they do for the Esperance, a codfisher returning from Newfoundland and sold for 1,816, of which Taylor's share was a third (to be shared presumably with his officers and crew). 52 NMM, AGC XXI/36/MS. 0581.
462 Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760 he earned as much as 6,000 in all from prize and bounty during the eleven years of the Spanish Succession War. Nor can his duties have brought any large increment from other sources. On the other hand, he was so constantly engaged at sea that he need have spent little on himself; it is true that his sons's education was partly debited to his prize account, but almost none of his wife's expenses - we know nothing of her resources. Everything considered, especially his investments, it looks as if his prize fortune may be more than adequately represented by his holding of 7,211 in South Sea Company stock at the end of 1711 - a far cry from the fabulous fortunes of an Anson or a Boscawen in later times, or of Commodore Wager in his own, but still a considerable sum, the equivalent of over 150,000 today. With some fifty prizes to his credit, Captain Taylor may well have been fairly typical of the frigate captains of his age, though doubtless not all were as careful as he in minding every penny - or for that matter as unfailingly conscientious in their routine duties as contemporary testimonials (and the journal of H.M.S. Litcheld) suggest he was. Given that so many captures were the work of a squadron, only its commander, usually a flag officer, could expect to do markedly better in European seas. In view of our modern cult of the anti-hero, too, it is worth emphasising what a high proportion of Taylor's prizes were ships of war. It is true that the trouble with enemy privateers was not in fighting, but in bringing them to action: for one caught, a hundred would be chased, frequently at the expense of topmasts and bowsprit. But Joseph Taylor, who narrowly missed an engagement with Duguay-Trouin,53 would hardly have understood that 'life was to be risked for money, not glory'.54 There was simply Her Majesty's increasingly professional sea-service, with hardly a break in the succession of wartime duties, and 'our men' - for in his journal he writes always of 'we'. The pity is that prizes sowed so much discord between Her Majesty's commanders themselves.
53 With Dursley on 24th April 1709 (journal) or 4th May New Style (Le Nepvou de Carfort, Histoire de Duguay Trouin, le corsane (Paris, 1922), p. 335). 54 Baugh, op. t. 113.
21
PRIZE OFFICE AND PRIZE AGENCY AT PORTSMOUTH, 1689-1748

As a commentary on the turbulence of Portsmouth politics surrounding Admiral Hawke's election as Member of Parliament in 1747 and the creation of sixty-three new burgesses in 1750, the satirical tale of 'The Geese in Disgrace', published in 1751, may still invite interpretation. Hardly so the engraving of 'The Gothamites in Council', which appeared shortly afterwards to illustrate these 'Honest Men of Ph'.1 The artist makes short work of the 'Malice, Envy, Covetousness &c. &c.', disguised as 'Independancy', among the cackling egalitarians. For in the middle ground of the picture are sailors carrying chests marked 'Lima' along the foreshore, hard by a corner-house apparently thronged with figures and bearing a prominent legend: AGENT FOR PRIZES. 'Lima' had been inscribed on the shillings issued by the Mint in 1745 with the silver captured by Commodore Anson in the South Sea 298 chests of it, 'brought to town from Portsmouth in thirty-two wagons, guarded by the crew, and lodged in the Tower, in order to be coined into the current money of this kingdom. . .'2 Such sights, to say the least, boosted wartime morale and Portsmouth was more than once the scene of excited patriotism. Captain the Hon. Augustus Hervey, on going in May 1747 'to spur them up in fitting the ship [H.M.S. Princessa], and to see all these prizes that were brought in', remarked that they 'drew conquests of people down, and great fun was had here'. 3 Though worth less than half Anson's Acapulco ship, this haul fetched 755,896 net and was worth 62,991 to Anson alone, being his two-thirds share in the flagofficer's eighth. 4 Under the rules prevailing since the royal proclamation of June 1702, the participating captains were entitled to another twoeighths, the other commissioned officers and masters to an eighth, and likewise the warrant officers with the masters' mates; midshipmen and the 'pettys' shared a further eighth. The residual two-eighths went to the ship's company. Leaving aside the claims of flag-officers, which could be sustained without their necessarily
464
being present in action,5 the division of prize money and of 'head' money a bounty of 5 for every man on board the enemy at the commencement of an action thus fell into five classes. Assuming net proceeds of 300,000, that is, after paying all administrative and legal charges, the ordinary seaman's share would amount to two years' wages, at the standard wage of nineteen shillings per lunar month. Petitions for unpaid shares, often from wives or widows, show that seamen (and marines) were interested in much smaller sums than this. Indeed, the succession of Prize Acts after 1739 were styled Acts for the Encouragement of Seamen; and their provisions, growing in bulk and complexity with every war, particularly with regard to the timing and public notification of the various stages of trial, sale and distribution, reveal the anxiety of Parliament and Admiralty for prompt and accurate payments of prize and bounty money. It is hard for us now to realize how much they counted in contemporary eyes as a lubricant of naval initiative, indeed as an emollient of notorious hardships. This was especially true since 26 March 1708, from which date the whole property in a prize unless it was a perquisite of admiralty or a recapture, in which case special rates applied went to the captors. Privately armed warships had enjoyed this benefit, except for the admiralty tenth, under the 'Privateers Act' of 1693. The Lord High Admiral having surrendered his tenth to the Crown in 1707 and the Crown forfeiting all claims by the Act for the Encouragement of Trade to America (6 Ann. c. 64), naval and private warships were henceforward on an equal footing.6 At first intended for the duration of the War of Spanish Succession, but re-enacted in every subsequent war, this historic concession by the State to private property was to have profound effects on the freedom of government to interfere in prize causes, notably in placating angry neutral powers.7 More immediately the bell tolled for the Commissioners of Prizes, the Prize Office, hitherto responsible (from 1689 to the Treasury and of course to the Admiralty court, but not the Admiralty itself) for all the elaborate safeguards needed to protect a prize from damage or theft, the inventory of her furniture and lading, the collection of her papers and setting in train of the examinations 'in preparatio' of witnesses among both captors and prisoners, the measurement and warehousing of assorted cargo, appraisal of its value and that of the ship ('by Five understanding Persons'),8 restoration of part or whole to the original owners in a minority of cases but more usually sale 'by the Candle', payment of duties, and last (but not least in complexity) the distribution of the net proceeds to the
Prize Office and Prize Agency at Portsmouth, 1689-1748
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captors according to their 'qualities' For these exigencies, and the minute account-keeping that accompanied them, the half-dozen Principal Commissioners in London with Secretary and Comptroller, but a Treasurer or Receiver-General separately commissioned to act as watchdog upon the Board deputed two Sub-Commissioners respectively at Dover, Portsmouth and Plymouth, one each at Bristol and at Hull, all salaried at 300 a year. Each of these ports 'of chief resort' comprised the adjacent 'district' thus Plymouth 'from the Island of Scilly inclusive to Lyme exclusive', while the particularly hardpressed officers at Dover were allowed clerks at Deal and Ramsgate-Margate. Where there were two SubCommissioners, they were allowed both a storekeeper and a clerk accountant, Bristol and Hull having to make do with a clerk storekeeper. These minute establishments, which implied many hired services, could scarcely be expected to supervise the entire coast. Because of their convenience in relation to the enemy's trade-routes, numerous prizes were brought into Weymouth, Dartmouth, Falmouth, Kinsale and Milford; because of their privateering successes, Jersey and especially Guernsey welcomed still larger, numbers. At all these places, as well as at some others (including Southampton and Rye on the south coast, Harwich and Great Yarmouth on the east), the Commissioners found it necessary to appoint an Agent, who was paid charges and a 'quantum meruit', reduced to two per cent of net proceeds in 1702.' Commissions of five per cent were paid to the Agents, usually also consuls, at major ports of reception abroad like Lisbon and Genoa, and in some of the colonies. lu In addition, the Commissioners might appoint an Agent, on one occasion one of themselves, " to acompany the grand fleet, at an allowance of five per cent. The Principal Commissioners and the Sub-Commissioners were men of some standing, frequently Members of Parliament and useful placemen before the election of 1707: along with other specified office-holders they were excluded by the place clause in 4 and 5 Ann.c.20 (1705). Previously one Commissioner, James Vernon, had retained his post, evidently as a more or less silent partner, even on becoming a Secretary of State. No less than six out of the ten gentlemen deputed as Sub-Commissioners at Portsmouth between 30 June 1689 and 29 November 1707 held parliamentary seats: Colonel Oliver St John (Stockbridge, Hampshire, from 1679 until his death in 1689); Sir Charles Raleigh (Downton, Wiltshire, 1695-1700); Edward Knatchbull, who soon moved to Dover on being elected at Rochester in 1702;
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Dr Charles Goreing (Steyning, Sussex, 1701-07); Sir George Parker, bt., 'a very honest gentleman, well esteemed in Sussex', for which county he was elected in 1705 and 1710;'2 and Paul Burrard, who resigned at his own request in 1707 in order to remain Member for New Lymington (1707-14 and again from 1722). Clearly, all these commissionerships belonged to the Crown's fund of patronage; in proposing Parker for Dover, Godolphin's chief secretary had not failed to point out that 'your favour to him will be well taken by his brother [in law, Edward] Bagott and other gentlemen of the House'.13 For this reason alone they were unlikely to escape criticism. The whole establishment was also thought to be too expensive. In the protracted disputes of 1695-6 between Lords and Commons concerning a better deal for the takers of prizes, and again in 1702, the Commons proposed that the duties be taken over by the Customs Commissioners; not surprisingly, the latter insisted that they could never find the time. 14 Yet when John Paschall was proposed for a vacancy at headquarters in 1694, Godolphin told the king there were already too many Prize Commissioners.15 And doubtless Captain Willshaw expressed a persistent resentment among his brethren when he told Pepys, apparently with reference to the Dutch Wars, that officers and seamen made little by prizes 'while several of the prize-officers on shore, who never ventured anything for them, made shift to get their coaches and 6 horses'.16 In a famous pamphlet Captain George St Lo, a Principal Commissioner for the first six months of 1693 and afterwards a dockyard commissioner, offered two explanations for the friction between captains and prize officers: 'first the undue appraisements; secondly, the great embezzlements which they meet with from prize-officers, which often put the captains upon plundering the ships before they deliver them in."7 St Lo, a humane but sometimes eccentric reformer, gives no evidence for either of these accusations. If he made a good point in suggesting that prize goods be appraised in small quantities, so as to increase competition between buyers of limited means, it is hard to see what he meant by proposing 'free and public' sale by inch of candle as this was already the practice; and it was naive to suppose that the presence of captains' representatives at appraisals would prevent fraud to the king. Captains in particular were notorious for disregarding the rules. Charles Sergison, Clerk of the Acts of the Navy Board (1690-1719), who had much to say about officers' indiscipline, used their detention of prize money in their own hands for years on end as a prime illustration
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of what he meant 'ill usage of the seamen'. '8 Prizes disposed of overseas, and never fully accounted for, help to make nonsense of a declared value of 480,000 gross for the whole of the Nine Years War, including debts outstanding to the Prize Com missioners in 1701.'9 Egged on by aggrieved sea-officers and informers, the House of Commons persecuted John Parkhurst and John Paschall, the two Commissioners appointed in 1699 'to recover and manage' the arrears; they were sent to the Tower in February 1701 and Paschall ultimately absconded. With the old clerks dismissed and the chief accountant a dying man, they were required to make sense under pressure of a mass of defective accounts stretching back for ten years, during which the Treasury's own auditor, William Aldworth, had been less than helpful: 'his Love to his Friend and his Bottle rarely left him cool enough for such work.'2" The affair dragged on until 1705, by which time a new set of Commissioners were grappling with the shortcomings of captors, though no longer with King William's disturbing habit of making special grants out of a fund that at times showed no surplus at all. 21 One of these grants was to Viscount Sidney and John Glover, for the 'discovery' of interlopers seized by one or other of the chartered companies, and it was maintained that two of the Principal Commissioners, Sir Roger Langley and Sir John Jennings, had shares in these. 22 The impropriety is by no means clear; neither Langley nor Jennings resigned. Still less has any evidence come to light that would implicate the Principal or SubCommissioners in the 'many prodigious Imbezlements' of which they were accused in An Answer to Mr Paschal's Letter to his Friend in the Country (1702). Though the author was clearly well informed, his only colourable charges are of laxity in prosecuting five naval captains against whom he had laid informations. A reading of the Commissioners' correspondence with the Admiralty in the early years of the next war certainly sugges.ts that they had learnt vigilance by then, although complaints of illicit disposal, notably in the plantations, and of faulty documentation, especially the failure of captains to use the 'Scheme' or official return devised by the Commissioners in 1703, occurred frequently; the Receiver General for Prizes also had difficulty in making out his distribution lists for want of the relevant muster books. 23 Cases of defiance were reported from the Downs, 24 though none were so plausible as one from Portsmouth in 1697, 'the captain asserting a quarantine order' in refusing to admit the prize officers to search for hidden goods on board the Southampton.2* In all this the Admiralty, with its increasing
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authority, supported the Prize Office, for instance ordering a court-martial at Spithead to hear allegations of embezzlement against Captain Morrice in 1702. The captains were directed 'to take care to show all Civillity to the Prize Officers'.26 In this climate of recrimination and tale-bearing officers in the out-ports and abroad were fully included. For example, they were accused of collusive sales, although, curiously enough, St Lo wished them (and the Customs Officers) to be free to buy he thought they would help to push up prices. Even the most indirect personal benefit was forbidden by the Instructions for the Sub-Commissioners. On the other hand, they were 'always to have some Person secretly employ'd by you, that may bid a competent Price; wherein you are to observe such a Proportion, as that the Combinations of Merchants may not carry away Her Majesty's goods at too low a Price, nor that the Merchants may be discouraged to deal with you, as not finding their reasonable Account' (para. ix). It cannot have been easy in a small community to create a market and remain chaste. As successive issues of The London Gazette monotonously show, unsold lots were offered again and again at Lloyd's Coffee House or Salters Hall at declining set-up prices; or goods sold had to be offered again because they had not been paid for within the month always stipulated in the contracts. How much worse for those out-ports which had no vigorous commerce of their own or which, like Portsmouth, depended overwhelmingly on government contracts. At Brest, still more isolated, the Intendant himself took a personal interest in attracting buyers from real business centres like Nantes, and wrote copiously to his minister about it. 27 The British instructions enjoined notification of sales 'in writing, some convenient time beforehand, in the most Publiek Place in your Port, and places adjacent'; but this form of advertising, even when supported by the Gazette, must have left a good deal to the exercise of informal influence. Moreover, even creditworthy buyers were free to pay in tallies, which left further scope for private arrangements. Was it merely the 'quantum meruit' which made the British envoy to Florence ask for the prize agency at Leghorn?28 Or a salary of 300 which caused the ageing Sir Robert Holmes, governor of the Isle of Wight, to offer his services as a Sub-Commissioner?29 In out-ports where there was a mere Agent, he was perforce often a merchant and therefore that much more subject to temptation. The temptation lay in buying goods cheap and reselling at a profit. Nevertheless there is more evidence of faulty management than of corrupt dealing. It says much for the prize establishment, allegedly 'a byword for
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inefficiency and corruption',30 that only one serious case of collusive selling was thrown up between 1689 and 1708. Martin Westcomb, consul and prize agent at Cadiz, was ordered home in 1699 'to adjust his accounts'. According to the Prize Commissioners in London, he had awarded himself a SubCommissioner's salary, 'notwithstanding his deputation is but for a quantum meruit', and so obstructed the joint agent they had sent out that the latter resigned his commission. Westcomb 'sells on shipboard (a Place most fit for such Accounts as he hath sent us); whereby Collusion and Combination is highly suspected; and wherein, our Accountant-General observes, he hath sold at a strange Under-value.' In particular, he was alleged to have sold, clandestinely and on the cheap, a ship and cargo that afterwards fetched a handsome price to a broker 'with whom he and other adherents of his are concerned'.31 Although a Sub-Commissioner at Plymouth, Edmund Buckeridge, got into trouble in 1693, for retailing French wines, nothing worse than 'mismanagement' was ever charged against the Portsmouth prize office. This was in 1705, when Goreing and Parker were Sub-Commissioners. They were said to be too often absent from their duties and to have been slow in remitting the produce of sales to the Receiver-General.32 Since both were Members of Parliament, needed by the government whips during the winter, it is likely that they left too much to the care of their clerk accountant, Roger Clutterbuck, who 'doth not attend'. 33 He was replaced on 3 May 1705, at Goreing's request, by John Mellish, who in turn was removed on 16 July 1706 by Burrard and Sands, soon after their own appointment.34 Since they were answerable for the errors of accountants and other miscarriages in their offices, Goreing and Parker were turned out; as late as 1712, four years after Goreing's death, Parker was still reconciling his accounts with the Treasury.35 On the other hand, they were probably justified in craving a special allowance, in February 1703, for their ten weeks' search of the warships, transports and tenders at Spithead when Rooke's fleet returned from the looting of Port St Mary (near Cadiz) and attacking the treasure fleet at Vigo.36 Much of this booty was secreted and run ashore. One mariner told the Prize Commissioners that he had assisted in smuggling plate, satin, muslins, and four bags of dollars 'as I suppose', on his captain's orders: they were handed out of the gunroom port and lodged at the Bear and Ragged Staff in Portsmouth." This was the only occasion during the wars of William and Anne when Portsmouth could have witnessed a scene at all approaching those described at the beginning of this
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chapter, and Sir George Parker was entitled to sympathy when he wrote: 'There came into Spithead last Night three Men of War and nine Transport Ships which I designe to go on board, but how I shall do when the whole Fleet comes in I know not, for we have not such a thing as a Boat or Boate-man that belongs to our Office. . .''* Nor was there warehouse space at Portsmouth for all the plundered goods. At Parker's instance, the Customs agreed to secure the wines and brandies at Cowes. Cowes (or Yarmouth) had in fact been suggested earlier as more suitable for a prize office than Portsmouth, on the ground that the Isle of Wight was better endowed with a Customs service, including tidesmen and boats, besides its freedom 'from all Petty Duties payable in Corporations which comes to a greate deale of money'.4" The turning-out of Parker and Goreing suggests that the Commissioners in London now had more control over the out-ports than their predecessors had exercised, despite the fact that their Secretary, while taking fees of which they disapproved, 'had not application equal to the employment, and they themselves were by turns obliged weekly to draw and dictate papers and letters'; he was insufficiently dependent upon them and refused to hand over his books to an additional clerk they had established.41 Perhaps it had been some such obstruction that caused Edward Batten, a Sub-Commissioner at Portsmouth during most of the Nine Years War, to seek Treasury intercession, and that of the Speaker of the House of Commons, in obtaining access to the books at headquarters in order to state his own accounts in 1698.42 Batten (or Battine) had been sufficiently trusted to be sent down to Plymouth for six months in 1693-4 to sort out the legacy of Sub-Commissioner Buckeridge.4' Batten was a burgess of Portsmouth who had been Clerk of the Survey in the dockyard as long ago as 1679, and in 1686 a Commissioner of the Fortifications, besides service in the militia.44 And it was probably he who had made the original suggestion that the whole prize business should come under the direction of the Treasury.45 Perhaps he was also responsible for the commissioning of another Portsmouth 'gentleman', Christopher Godsalve, 'to be Receiver for Money ariseing by Prizes in the Port of Portsmouth' on 22 October 1689.46 Apart from the Receiver-General in London, this was the only appointment made during this period under that title, but it does not seem to have lasted: purser of the Edgar in 1687, Godsalve was purser of the Hampton Court in September 1690.47 From the Tower of London in 1701, Messrs Parkhurst and Paschall, scapegoats for the Commission of which they were
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probably the real working members, were to regret that the Instructions to the Sub-Commissioners had been insufficiently respected, despite frequent exhortation;48 but on present evidence it looks as if the business at Portsmouth was relatively well conducted in the Nine Years War, and that the credit should go to Edward Batten, who at least did not have to divide his time with duties at Westminster. Nevertheless, except for a rare upheaval like that created by Admiral Rooke's return from Vigo in 1702, it has to be admitted that the Portsmouth prize officers were less strained than those of Plymouth or the Downs. For Portsmouth the definitive Admiralty computation for the Nine Years War lists only 99 prize ships and quantities of prize goods (i.e. not brought home in a captured ship), against 177 for Plymouth and 178 for the Downs (Dover to Margate).49 Comparable figures for the next war, laboriously calculated from the prize papers, suggest that Plymouth with 304 was approximately three times as busy as Portsmouth with only 94; again the Downs exceeded Portsmouth in crude numbers if not in values.50 For prize warships only, the official count from 4 May 1702 to 15 November 1707 shows a less striking though still marked divergence: Plymouth received forty-one (including thirty-eight enemy privateers), Portsmouth eighteen (of which eleven privateers), Dover and the Downs fifteen (eleven privateers).51 To some extent Dover owed its prominence to the privateering activity of the Cinque Ports, whereas neither Portsmouth nor Plymouth were as lively in that way as many lesser places, not to mention London, Bristol, above all the Channel Islands. The Letter of Marque Declarations for 1689-97 record only one wholly Portsmouth-owned privateer, and that provisioned for only a month,52 although the celebrated Thomas Ridge participated with London merchants in half a dozen armaments that were predominantly trading or fishing voyages.53 In the following war, especially 1708-12, there is evidence of a stronger Portsmouth interest, perhaps stimulated by the Mediterranean successes of Captain William Thomson in the Ambuscade. The consul at Algiers described her in 1712 as 'belonging to Mr Ridge of Portsmouth',54 whose connection with the Mediterranean was by then of long standing; the other Portsmouth owners were Thomas Missing and Thomas Blakeley (with a Londoner, John Boyt), and they combined again to arm the Diligence (also a galley and likely therefore to have been destined for the Straits) under William Bamber in 1710.5S Ridge, Missing and Blakeley, all three substantial entrepreneurs, dominated what there was of Portsmouth privateering in the War of
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Spanish Succession. But the Ambuscade sold her prizes abroad and few others were condemned to Portsmouth privateers in the prize court. 56 In practice, too, the naval prizes were less frequently sold in the out-ports after 1702. The reasons were simple but compelling. In asking the Treasury for a general permission to bring prizes round to London when they had 'any considerable amount of goods', the Prize Commissioners were mindful of the 'difficulties met with in getting our accounts and despatches from the Out Ports', which hindered quick payment to the captors, never slow to complain; they also hoped for a considerable abatement of their establishment charges, and even for the 'sinking' of some officers.57 Administrative economy, but also better security, had been advanced already as reasons for bringing the plunder expected from Port St Mary's, and then from Vigo, up 'the River'. 58 More interestingly, on 22 October 1702, the Commissioners had asked the Admiralty to instruct Commodore Leake to bring some Newfoundland prizes to London, 'it being found by experience to be by much the best market': now, in April 1703, they told the Treasury that prizes sold for a quarter or sometimes a third less at the outports.59 In reply to two of the petitions from captors that came before the Commissioners of Public Accounts in 1699, Parkhurst had admitted that wines lying at Plymouth sold at 10 per ton below the London market 'at least', duty paid.60 In 1698 the Treasury had agreed that three prizes be brought up from Plymouth because they would fetch 'much more' in London.61 On 30 April 1703, Godolphin empowered the Prize Commissioners to bring to London all prizes containing goods of considerable value. 62 The qualification is significant, however, as such prizes not only required convoy but usually made an unwelcome call on naval manpower, not to mention victuals and stores, including anchors and cables, which captains and dockyard commissioners were inclined to grudge.63 Some naval officers in any case objected to the 'very great number of seafaring men. . . employed by the Prize Office in all the ports of England (into many of which no prizes ever come). . .'64 Prize goods, and especially ships, were still advertised in the London Gazette as exposed for sale at the Portsmouth town hall or prize office, although samples might sometimes be available for viewing or tasting in the Commissioners' warehouses at Buttolph Wharf (Billingsgate) or at Salters Hall. Such advertisements were insignificant, however, by comparison with the great body of sales in London; and even there the set-up prices were frequently lowered before goods, often in damaged condition,
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were sold or failing payment, re-sold.65 Unless the Admiralty court ordered it, one other condition had to be satisfied before prizes could be sent away from the port of arrival: the consent of the captors.66 Captains were said to be against this course, doubtless because they might hope to keep a closer eye on their trophies if they were left where they were. Some seem to have been surprised if wines fetched less than a sixth of their Bordeaux prices when sold at Plymouth, just as captors were slow to face the facts of waste and leakage casks were more easily counted (or drunk) than measured (or their flying hoops noticed).67 As legal and other delays often caused cargoes to perish, many were sold before condemnation, especially if a case was appealed and it was necessary to obtain evidence from abroad. It was partly to speed up court procedure that (about 1702) Thomas Reynolds, a victualling agent turned prize agent, offered his 'Reasons why 'tis absolutely necessary that such Captains Officers and Ships Company as may have the good fortune of takeing Prizes impower one person to act for them at London . . . with direction to him for appointing such a person at the respective Out Ports'.68 He insisted that it was essential 'to have a Person of Integrity and Judgement to be at all appraisements and sales', captors during the last war being often great sufferers 'in having their Prizes sold for much less than worth', and again 'everyone thinking it no Crime to take from Prizes what they could gett'. They needed someone to assist at all unladings, with a key to the warehouse, as well as a watchdog in the High Court of Admiralty to answer objections and keep down demurrers, to make sure the perishables were sold and the Prize Office made up correct accounts, and to maintain personal touch with the captors. Although undated, these 'Reasons' were probably penned about the time when Reynolds was urging the Prize Office to concentrate its sales in London, 'those Gentlemen who have requested me to look after their affaires . . . being very Sensible that 'tis the Numbers of Buyers that makes the Marke'."*
II
It is clear that Reynolds was acting as a captors' agent well before the disappearance of the Prize Office towards the end of 1708, its outstanding business being placed in the hands of two Commissioners. By then, now that captors had sole property, there was a great deal more for their agent to do. At a meeting he called at
4 74
Doctors' Commons to settle the future method of prosecution on behalf of naval captors, Sir Charles Hedges, the Admiralty judge, refers to them as General Agents. This distinguished them from the former Prize Office Agents, but we shall have to call them Prize Agents since this is how they are known to history (although no historian has hitherto studied them). 70 Although not exactly a new profession, for captors had sometimes appointed representatives to look after their interests in the past, their numbers must have greatly multiplied from 1708. Reynolds's 'Reasons' suggest that they might have been increasing before then, but also that captors needed persuading, for of course these agents too expected a 'quantum meruit' no less than six per cent of the net proceed according to the account current kept by Captain Joseph Taylor with Harcourt Masters late in the war. 71 Taylor began to deal with Masters when Reynolds joined the Victualling Board in 1706 and gave up agency. Their relationship extended beyond prize and head money to the captain's investments and school bills: in short, an example of any serving officer's reliance on a man of business in London, a mixture of banker and solicitor. Among Taylor's papers is a standard power of attorney for receiving from the Navy Office, 'or whom else it may concerne, all and singular such Sallery, Wages, Tickets, Bounty-money, Prize-money, Short-allowancemoney, Smart-money, Pensions', due for service in the navy or merchantmen, and also from all other persons whatsoever rents, freights, merchandises, debts and other claims.72 Such delegation was not of course confined to war time. Edward Jasper, a manager of the Sun Insurance Office, with experience both of the Navy Board and the investment market, looked after Captain Peter Warren's affairs from 1735 to 1742, until replaced by Samuel and William Baker, the second of whom was to become a director of the East India Company.73 Jasper, and probably Masters too, made a practice of discounting seamen's tickets by collecting them from naval officers, perhaps also from the numerous publicans and slopsellers of the ports. There was also a trade in the flood of paper issued by the Navy and Victualling Boards to pay for their contracts; not all recipients could stand out of cash until 'payment in course'. Masters bought a large number of such bills for Captain Taylor, most of which were later transformed into shares of the South Sea Company, of which both Masters and Reynolds were directors.74 It is clear that many naval officers employed influential financiers, and one would expect prize agency in their case to spring naturally out of a more general naval agency. Often, moreover, a captain would be
41'5
empowered to act in prize matters for his officers and ship's company. Both these categories might prefer, it is true, separately or together, to appoint prize agents of their own, thus incidentally complicating the task of distributing shares, especially when more than one ship could lay claim to a prize the usual situation. Captain Taylor's papers illustrate the acrimony which rival claims could engender between captains alone, often for trivial sums. But seamen, their wives or widows, not seldom complained against their commanders to a sympathetic Admiralty, which in 1702 had desired to commission an officer of its own, Francis Paynter, 'to receive and pay out all prize money', and so to prevent the injuries done to sailors in the previous war. After notice of this appointment had appeared in the Gazette, however, it was crushed by the Treasury.75 With the demise of the Prize Office, the seamen were left to such protection as the Admiralty and its High Court could provide. What might happen if a crew were foolish enough to name one of themselves as receiving agent was vividly attested in 1712 by Joseph Harding, a sergeant of marines whose best efforts had proved no match for Messrs Keefe and Taylor, merchants of Kinsale, empowered by their captain and a majority of his officers.76 Sergeant Harding would not have been expected to do more than receive the shares (two-eighths) due to the crew of the Rochester. He was thus not a general prize agent. But a large and not the least exacting part of prize agency (though Reynolds had no occasion to mention it in his 'Reasons') consisted in 'distributions'. By the time the money became available a ship's company might well have dispersed; at all events, through death and other causes, it would no longer correspond exactly with the list of those entitled to shares. Hence both the Prize Office and its successors fell back on the system of 'recalls' used for naval wages individual payments made at stipulated office hours, usually in London< to those men, or more likely their 'powers' (representatives), who had not taken part in the first general distribution. As their notices in the Gazette tell us, agents usually made this on shipboard, leaving only the recall to be met at their own houses at any time during the three years allowed by statute, after which unclaimed money was to be remitted to the hospital at Greenwich. 77 The defect inherent in this method is sufficiently indicated by the reliance of that 'noble Charity' on this branch of income and its considerable place in legislation. In 1712 Masters accounted for 794 unclaimed shares of seamen and marines in twenty-two prizes, an average unclaimed of about
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twenty per cent.7" The multitude in this category could usually expect only shillings or even pence. The tedium of recalls was exacerbated further by the very general character of seamen's letters of attorney, a single power for sometimes several hundred men, and the possibility of forgery. When the Commissioners for Naval Inquiry urgently made prize agency the subject of their Fourth Report in 1803, they fastened on the method, or lack of method, used to test these powers, often 'persons of the lowest and worst condition'.79 Experienced prize agents themselves were sometimes deceived, especially as they came to rely on subagents at the ports for this work and such 'Recall Agents' might have many distributions on their hands at any one time. At a half or one per cent commission they were not highly remunerated.80 It is significant that the Naval Agency and Distribution Act of 1864, which transferred distributions to the Admiralty itself, halved the commission payable to the prize agent (now called ship's agent) to two and a half per cent on 'the net amount actually distributable'. 81 In 1803 it had usually been five per cent, usually of the gross proceeds, although after deduction of import duties and brokerage. By that date it would appear that Prize Agents had incurred something of the odium formerly attached to the old Prize Office. A thoughtful officer could refer to 'the hue-and-cry' against them, which he attributed to 'the injudicious and inefficient selection' of agents, among whom he singled out admirals' secretaries/2 But these were only the outstanding example of the sleeping partners with whom the 'positive active agents', in the competition for prize business, had got into the habit of accepting: the same with captains for whom the efficient agent was regarded as a substitute. They might share as much as half the latter's commission, besides receiving from him as all above the rank of petty officer came to expect substantial advances of prize money before it was legally encashable.83 As a result, some agents relied less on their 'avowed Emolument' than on profits accruing from the investment of the proceeds of sales while appealed cases dragged their weary length along. In that event there might well be an interval of several years between sale (after condemnation in the first instance) and final sentence. The Commissioners of Naval Inquiry considered that 'this considerable exclusive Profit' set the agent's 'Interest at Variance with his Duty', and was especially reprehensible if he was also a merchant, since then he must be tempted to speculate with the funds in his hands, with the risk of bankruptcy.84 With a touch of Evangelical probity, Captain Griffiths even disapproved of
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advances to officers in their running accounts with agents: 'Never take a halfpenny until it is alike payable to your crew; favour sacrifices a portion of your independence. As you would not make or select for your Banker, a man engaged in speculation, why appoint such your prize agent?'85 The Naval Inquiry Commissioners also disliked Accounts Current, but on the ground that officers, especially abroad, might be credited with sums to which they were eventually not entitled, to the detriment of Greenwich Hospital. All this, however, they regarded as falling under the description of abuses and irregularities, rather than fraud. As some safeguard, especially against delayed distributions, they recommended that 'a Prize Office should be established in London, under the Management of Three Commissioners, who should have Agents or Correspondents at Plymouth, Portsmouth, and Sheerness. . ,'86 It would not perform all the work of the old Prize Commissioners (whom the Report, a hurried one, never mentions), but it would remove the unavowed emoluments from prize agency and undertake distributions in appealed cases.
Ill
Apart from the 1803 Report, very little is known about 'the Business of Agency'. A list of prizes condemned between 23 March 1708 and 21 January 1712 yields forty names in connection with 162 prizes, most of which involved more than one captor.1*7 The scene is dominated by Harcourt Masters, with 139 agencies, one of them shared with Thomas Ridge, described as Esquire;88 followed by Tempest Holmes of Plymouth (46) and Samuel Eyre of London (28). The others were a long way behind, many of them figuring only once. John Mellish, the Portsmouth SubCommissioners' disgraced accountant, described as 'Gentleman', appeals twice, undertaking a belated distribution on behalf of the Prize Office.89 Half the agents at least were or might be called merchants, including a mercer and a 'salesman'; there was also a wine cooper. The remainder were esquires or gentlemen, including Matthew Cork of the Middle Temple (9). London accounts for eighteen names, Plymouth for six; there are three respectively attributable to Dover and Deal, to Kinsale and Cork, to Portsmouth and Gosport; the rest are described as of Falmouth, Bristol, Guernsey (all 'merchants') and 'Netherney' (an esquire of Devon). Masters and Ridge excepted, however, little is at present known about this first generation of Prize
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Agents.90 We need a specimen of their business papers. In the William Salt Library at Stafford, where he held several properties, the accidents of time have spared the papers of an agent who ran accounts with a small number of officers and engaged in prize transactions during the seventeen-forties.91 Richard Drakeford had been to sea as early as 1709 and was soon serving as a captain's clerk. By 1731 he was a purser and continued so until 1744, first on the Tiger, then the Lennox, though he was not at sea after 1744; in 1744 he used what influence he had at the Admiralty, unsuccessfully, to obtain the purser's warrant for the Devonshire. He was then addressed as 'merchant in Cole Harbour, Gosport'. By 1749 he was purser of the Princess Amelia, but did no duty: as the dockyard commissioner wrote to the Navy Board in May, 'he hath for some time past been confined with the gout, stone and gravel, and therefore desired that his leave of absence be continued:. . . there are other officers at this port who. . . cannot stir because the purser is absent.'92 Drakeford was still writing from Gosport in 1751, still occupied with the enlargement of 'the chapel' there for which a faculty had been obtained in 1746; but a codicil to his will in June 1752 shows that he had by then returned to Stafford, where his nephew was town clerk. From this namesake he was in a position to purchase two closes in the parish of Castle Church and there, at Forebridge Hall, he died in 1757. His accounts and letter-books are those of a methodical person, keenly attentive to the details of business, despite his 'old companion the Gout', which came to cripple his handwriting. They are by no means exclusively concerned with prize and bounty money. A ledger he kept from 1737 to 1753 shows him rendering miscellaneous services to a number of individuals, down to purchases of bacon and cheese, laundering and the recovery of officers' wages. Edward Jasper, who had managed Warren's affairs, described Drakeford as 'a very substantial Gentleman at Gosport, and of good Abilities'.1" They had known each other at least since 1734. At that time Jasper used his 'good husbandry' to pass Drakeford's bills through the Victualling Office, and was soon urging the purser 'not to let slip any opportunity that may be advantageous. . . and let me particularly recommend it to you to buy all the Ticketts you can meet with (having a due regard to those you apprehend may be Apprentices) as they are the very best Returns you can make'. 94 In 1743 he sent Drakeford a lottery ticket: 'I am of your mind and love independence.'95 They were brought together in prize matters by the affairs of the Princessa, a Spanish vessel taken in April 1739 by the Kent, Oxford and Lennox, Jasper
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being agent for the first, Thomas Fisher for the second, and Drakeford (with Roger Adams) for the third, of which he was purser. The same trio was concerned in another prize captured during the war of reprisals with Spain, the Nuestra Seora del Camino, with naval stores from Bilbao, worth much less than the Princessa and the occasion of a protracted dispute with the Customs; she was not sold, 'in a perishing condition', until 6 December 1744 at Mrs Gayton's on the Point, a Portsmouth inn or coffee house.96 The Princessa's cargo sold for 12,610 at Portsmouth Town Hall on 25 September 1741, but here too there was a hitch, for Admiral Sir John Balchen put in a contested claim, eventually (ten years after capture) settled on his widow's behalf for 1,281.97 Drakeford also assisted Jasper in distributing 'the long winded St Joseph and St Jago's money'. This ship too was at once placed under a Customs guard, partly because there was no Prize Act until the following year, but also because she was reported to conceal 'great treasure': five large boxes were sent to London under cavalry escort, and the ship would have been brought round had she been more seaworthy.98 Sale took place in 1740, but the money could not be distributed owing to a rival claim, rejected four years afterwards: 'I can now tell you', wrote Jasper on 29 September 1744, 'with great joy of heart that yesterday morning all my Troops passed the Rhine. . . There are many Officers Widows and people at Gosport and Portsmouth which. . . M r Cousens may pick up.' Patrick Cousins was Drakeford's clerk, especially employed for distributions, locating those entitled to shares or their receivers. What Jasper meant was that he should 'look out and get as many of the powers for you as he could of people that live in your parts', the major distribution taking place in London.99 Thus Drakeford on this occasion would be merely a receiving agent, sharing the commission with Jasper, who for this service charged five per cent on each share. It is a good example of how one agent could serve another for individual or local purposes, such as obtaining letters of attorney (or administration) and sometimes, for legal purposes that might turn on weight of numbers, additional signatures to an existing power. Paying out prize money they called 'solving' it. With the onset of war with France in March 1744 Jasper and Drakeford felt sure enough of one another to become partners instead of correspondents. The 'Business of Agency', to quote the Articles of Agreement,100 was 'likely to extend'. But many, perhaps most, of the prizes would be brought into Plymouth, so it was desirable to find a third partner there. Jasper chose John Trevanion, Clerk of Survey in the dockyard, 'a very ready Man'
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who must have been well known to him personally but who possessed the further attraction of being recommended by Thomas Corbett, Secretary of the Admiralty: 'we shall by this means get Mr Corbett's Interest heartily. . ."01 John Trevanion had also recommended himself, hoping for a share of prizes 'by the assistance of my Friends and the little acquaintance I have in the navy'. 102 The 'Copartners' agreed 'to share and share alike' for the duration and to employ no deputies at the partnership's risk except for prizes taken into other ports of their respective districts, and then only under absolute necessity a concession to Trevanion, who anticipated oversight of all Devon and Cornwall. Each was to make up his books by 1 September every year and open them for the others' inspection. When disputes came between captors the usual cause of delayed distributions the proceeds of sale would be deposited with Sir Joseph Hankey and Company, billbrokers in London, with whom Drakeford ran an account. 'I don't doubt', Jasper wrote to Trevanion, 'but by exerting ourselves that we shall come in for a tolerable share.' Drakeford flattered himself that the number of their acquaintance in the navy should enable them 'to establish a House of as much reputation and Business as most concerned provided the Warr goes on'. 103 His correspondence reflects a veritable scramble for agency. Jasper preened himself on his contacts in high places, beginning with Sir Charles Hardy, a Lord of Admiralty and 'my brother Director in the Sun', to which insurance company Jasper had introduced him. There was also 'my dear friend Admiral Mathews', while Admiral Davers 'assured me of his Friendship with regard to Head money'; towards Christmas 1744, Admiral Vernon is taking 'pot luck with me'. All captains were to be cultivated: thus Captain Pittman, 'a keen Cruizer, I hope we shall hear from him often. Capt Beavor has got the Fox, and assur'd me this Morning upon his word of honor, that he will employ us only. I hope today to get a General Letter from Mr. Vernon, which may be of good service, for. . . he has many friends in the Fleet."04 Trevanion, agreeing that 'the giveing dispatch to business and makeing quick distributions is the only way to get credit', sounded a less optimistic note while the Articles were still being drafted: 'the whole world are now turned Agents and some will I fear underbid the Markett.' He had wished to include one of the Plymouth merchants in the partnership, ostensibly to assist in selling, but still more perhaps because Mr Morshead 'makes agreements with the captains in a way that no Agent can approve of. I have no other way to account for his getting at people I was
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almost assur'd of.' Even as the Agreement was being signed, Jasper admitted that 'all mankind allmost are a pushing for Agency, at the outports especially, nay even Merchants there'.' us Yet it was Drakeford who vetoed a merchant partner: 'they will always endeavour to buy where the Markett is open, to serve themselves, and I don't believe they can have any great prevalency to hurt us in gaining Agency.""6 What Drakeford overlooked was that the partnership might turn merchant itself. Not many agencies came its way, and these chiefly through Trevanion, agent to Captain Warwick Calmady of the Lively and to Captain Robert Young of the Kinsale this last shared with William Bell, a Commissioner of Sick and Wounded. Calmady bought up his company's shares, but the officers and men of the Kinsale had appointed Trevanion. Later, Calmady sold his shares to Hasden Young (of Damwell Court, Devon), a brother of Robert who was witness to an agreement signed at Portsmouth on 28 August 1744 for the sale of the Zephyr, taken by the Lively, between Jasper and a London merchant, Peter Simonds. The memorandum provided that the prize was to sail to Rotterdam or Zierikzee with her cargo of sugar, coffee and cocoa and be insured for 3,500, the buyer meeting the balance of his payment after delivery at the port of discharge, but being allowed 2,000 in the event of loss at sea. Jasper sent Trevanion a receipt for 1,000 on account from Hasden Young, who apparently wanted the money urgently to insure some of his brother's prizes at Newfoundland and said this was 'far short of the sums I want by my brother's orders'.107 Having taken five West India prizes, Captain Young had written to say that he 'had gotten himself chose sole Agent' on behalf of the Kinsale, and that Hasden Young was to take possession of one of them, the St Pierre of Nantes, 'whenever she arrives'. IOS The prizemaster, Lieutenant Foley, had in fact already sailed her into Portsmouth and Jasper was recommending that she be brought round to London, where the cargo would fetch 3,000 more than at Portsmouth, according to 'the prodigious number of buyers' attending the sale of the St Catherine, a similar prize (also to the Kinsale) which he was handling: this West India produce was all being exported to Holland and Hamburg, and the St Pierre should be insured for 10,000. '9 Already alarmed by the news that at Portsmouth 'three Gentlemen' claimed a promise from Young to be his agents there, Jasper came down to Gosport in person: 'had the triumvirate got hold of Mr Foley and his Father-in-Law Captn St Lo it might have been a means of flinging us out of the saddle.' He besought Corbett at the
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Admiralty to write to Young and told Drakeford to 'let Foley have what money he thinks proper. . . and if you can get an Assignment on their prize money this will be pinning down the thing'." 0 Drakeford, having put his man Cousins on board, was to hasten the examinations, in the safe hands of Sam Chandler. 1 " Young's claims to be his brother's only true representative, empowered to stop all proceedings, thus fell like a spark on dry timber. 'I am for no compromise at all,' Jasper wrote; 'go on with Courage, land the goods as fast as possible and we will sell away . . .'"2 On this occasion at least, Customs Collector Brooke, whom Jasper distrusted, made no difficulties and the sale took place in the town hall at Gosport on 18 September: sugar, coffee, cocoa, indigo and cotton, the sellers to pay duty and the buyers to be entitled to drawback. The net proceeds amounted to 6,250 - 'a great mortification to the Captors whose expectations ran so high . . .'"3 Hasden Young had removed his prohibition of the sale, but there was more trouble to come. First, the merchant Simonds was disappointed of a ship from Holland 'to fetch our sugars'. Writing from London on 17 November 1744, he feared that Hamburg would soon be cut off by ice, and that prices of 'prize sugars and other commodities of the French Islands' would fall there and in Holland as soon as the expected French convoy of 120 sail reached home during the winter; it was not the right season for buying sugars and he would only buy more, whatever 'unexperienced inconsiderate and greedy men' might do, if they were moderately priced: 'Nothing can induce us to buy at Portsmouth but cheapness.' Freight and insurance charges from Portsmouth moreover, were relatively high, which was why he had chartered a ship from Holland: and 'God knows when there will be a convoy from Portsmouth to the Nore'. Simonds wrote thus to Drakeford in the light of 'the inconveniences and long delays which we experience on what we have bought of the St Pierre's sale', but with immediate reference to four similar prizes in the hands of Pusey Brooke, not as Collector but as Agent. Before auction Brooke was inviting offers from London, but providing no samples and asking unreasonably high prices. Simonds would make an offer only if Brooke would promise him the preference on one of the prizes, otherwise 'we should only hold the candle for somebody else'. This was evidently an attempt to set up the prices, for Simonds would expect no preference in the event of a higher bid. Drakeford was to act for him, but there was more to it than that. With reference to the Spanish iron bars shortly to be sold from the Nuestra Seora del Camino, Simonds added that iron was not
Prize Office and Prize Agency at Portsmou th, 1689-1748
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their trade, 'but if they went cheap and you think you can sell 'em again by small parcells with a reasonable profit, we will be glad to be concerned with you for one half or one third'." 4 But Drakeford, while merely a correspondent for Brooke's prizes, was himself Jasper's partner in selling the 'Iron Prize', so long held up. 115 It looks as if he, and not Jasper, had been the first to suggest that they buttress, or rather exploit, their agency business by obtaining control of certain lots for resale: 'If you could gain a knowledge of the Marketts in Holland we might do great good to our selves in the approaching sales. . . Had I known as much of the nature of London combinations before ours as I think I now do, you and I might have been some hundreds the better for it, but as thats too late we must try for the future to keep this to our selves, second sales only are prety things. You may make Mr. Symonds an offer of being purchaser of this iron and weel share with him, and if sugars He go into any part you shall think proper. . .' Jasper revelled in clever manoeuvres; 'under the Rose' was a favourite expression with him. He would get in touch with Simonds 'without whom as I have said often we won't transact any thing of purchasing, for since Agency is in the decline and a deep Consumption, we must exert our selves in another shape, and surely our Nobbs were not given us for nothing. Let the Triumvirate go on. . . two Dishes of meat and a sincere welcome at the Corner House to my friend is all I ask.' He had already written to say he was 'glad Tom Smith and you have had a confabulation about the Flora and hope in future every thing will be agreeable to us, but if not mind the old saying Quietness is best: If your neighbours unload the ship, and sell her by private contract endeavour to get the quickest intelligence you can, that we may steer accordingly. Their Cooper, Lotter, and Broker. . . make hopefull work." 16 For some reason he was certainly harassed by other affairs Jasper's letters to Drakeford now became less frequent; he had been writing hitherto every few days. The connection with Simonds was maintained by William Vaughan, the London broker who managed the partnership's sales in Portsmouth. It is from him that we learn that, late in November 1744, Simonds was showing an interest in three prizes, including the iron cargo 'if not too dear'. Vaughan was persuaded he would give 'as much as any Gentleman except the bid without judgment, and that if he buys you will be concern'd in part for him'." 7 The partnership as such was not involved in these rather obscure transactions. It is unlikely that Trevanion knew anything
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of them. Down in Plymouth he was worried about the captors' dissatisfaction with the product of the St Pierre: 'I expect a very nice scrutiny into our accounts and charges. . . Some of your charges exceed what are made at this port.' In particular, Plymouth knew no such thing as Vaughan's 'Broakeridge', one per cent on top of the agency commission; and Trevanion felt scruples about charging interest on money deposited with the Customs, which should be allowed to Drakeford 'out of our agency, for supposing no duties had been payable we then should have had agency for 8,000 whereas we have now Agency for 16,000'. And when could he hope to hear that Simonds's ship had been discharged and the balance paid over? 'I wish all our accounts were well adjusted.' He was concerned about Jasper's health. 118 On 19 January 1745 Jasper told Drakeford he had finished the 'gross payments' for the St Joseph 'and heartily tired I am'." 9 Then came the news that he had applied some of the St Pierre money to his own use, and was insolvent. Trevanion, who was immediately liable at law to the captors and already uneasy, tried to maintain that Drakeford was responsible for Jasper's debt to them, but the Attorney General held that the two solvent partners must bear the loss equally between themselves.120 Jasper's solicitor, John Boult, deemed it prudent to pay Captain Young his share at once 'his whole share, contrary to your opinion' to avoid an action against Trevanion, who might have been accused in equity of keeping the captain's share by violence and at least charged interest on it. 121 It does not seem that the other captors were fully paid until 1750. Drakeford and Trevanion put up some of the money, to keep themselves in credit, but agreed to 'receive' no more till the securities assigned by Jasper to Boult, in trust for the captors, had been collected. Jasper had every reason to make this assignment, or other creditors would be upon him. In January 1745 he was described as 'unfit for business'.122 On 27 March 1746 he told Drakeford that he had handed over his agency to Messrs Bell and Harrison, hoping his friends would give them all the commissions they could. ' 21 They shared a house on 'the corner of Savage Gardens, Tower Hill'. Late in November 1747 it was burnt out: 'they had but just Time to save the most material of their papers."24 Drakeford remained in the agency business, if only on a minor scale. Among his papers are inventories, advertisements, and distribution lists for the Angelica (with coffee) and the Indomptable, a French privateer auctioned for a net 149-10s. at the India Arms in Gosport on 15 November 1745.125 William
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Vaughan, now Drakeford's correspondent in London (working closely with Bell and Harrison, who were better acquainted with admiralty court procedure), came down to 'lot, show, and sell' the little Angelica, allowing ample time for 'the Merchants... to write abroad for Orders'; his brother Benjamin visited Plymouth in the same capacity. 126 From there Drakeford no longer heard from Trevanion, who seems not to have forgiven the predicament in which the partnership had placed him. Another Plymouth agent, Timothy Brett, sought Drakeford's assistance in dealing with a prize transport ship, the Penelope, against the opposition of James Henshaw, a well-known prize (and victualling) agent, who asserted 'an absolute promise' from the captors, later denied by them. 127 Besides this disputed agency, there was trouble over an incorrect inventory of the Penelope, and then delay in distributing the proceeds of the Francois, another French privateer, sold for 850: Brett was provoked by a claim put in by a cutter in sight at the time of capture a commonplace of the prize courts and one which led to 'inconceivable trouble in getting Head Money' because the joint captor's claim to that must also be adjusted. 128 This was not settled for the Francois till six months after sale, in which interval the prize could have been resold ten times, according to Brett's brother Charles.129 When resold at a quick profit captors might well grumble. There is more than one reference to the ingratitude and insincerity of captors in Drakeford's correspondence, although it is unclear exactly what Vaughan meant by their 'unhandsome usage' of James Bucknall, the Portsmouth dealer in used stores and an agent of London merchants, who was to form part of the crash creation of new burgesses in 1750.13 Against such a background old familiar complaints against the defunct Prize Office notably of under-selling, of delayed distributions, of corruption acquire a new perspective. Nor can it have been administratively more cumbrous than the jostling between private agents. When Captain Fox's squadron, under Admiral Warren's orders, seized forty-eight sail of La Motte's homeward-bound convoy from Saint-Domingue in June 1747, the captors numbered nine men-of-war; but as many as thirty-three agents met at Garraway's coffee-house on 29 July to decide how they should concert action. It was agreed to let each agent sell those prizes that struck to the ship he was responsible or partly responsible for. Drakeford had a power from the Chester (Captain Legge) but no prize had struck to her and Thomas Harrison, his London correspondent, was not admitted to the meeting. He and Bell relied on one of Henshaw's clerks for
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information of what took place: 'Great Mr Harris was not present, which perhaps facilitated the Compromise' that the Chester and the Pluto, represented by Henshaw, should nevertheless receive their due proportions of the gross proceeds. This hearsay Bell and Harrison reduced to writing at Doctors' Commons by way of affidavit. To secure themselves further they engaged 'an able proctor'. They were determined, wrote Harrison, 'to be armed in the best manner we can against these designing men; designing we may very justly call them, for after they had promised us the Agency for these two ships, they had the modesty to ask Capt. Legge to revoke his Letter of Attorney . . . Vnsall'. 131
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APPENDIX SUB-COMMISSIONERS OF PRIZES AT PORTSMOUTH 1689-1708 30 June 1689 20 Sept. 1689 5 May 1692 9 Feb. 1694 Sir Charles Raleigh, Col. Oliver St John Edward Batten vice St John, deed. William Cowse vice Batten (to Plymouth) Batten vice Cowse (to Plymouth)
23 June 1702 Edward Knatchbull, Charles Goreing 22 Sept. 1702 Sir George Parker, bt., vice Knatchbull (to Dover) 20 May 1706 Paul Burrard, John Sands 29 Nov. 1707 Richard Norris vice Burrard (resigned)
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NOTES Reproduced as end-papers to Book of Original Entries 1731-51, ed. N.W. Surry and J.H. Thomas (Portsmouth Record Series, 1976), who also print the poem and associated texts as Appendix II, pp.79-89. I am much obliged to Dr Thomas for a number of references concerning Portsmouth. 2 Daily Post, 5 July 1744, quoted in Documents relating to Anson's Voyage round the World 1740-1744, ed. G. Williams (Navy Records Society, 1967), p.236. 3 Augustus Hervey's Journal, ed. D. Erskine (1953), p.48. 4 J. Gwyn, The Enterprising Admiral : The Personal Fortune of Admiral Sir Peter Warren (Montreal and London, 1974), p.20. This is the only study available of a prize fortune, but cf. my article, 'The Profits of Naval Command: Captain Joseph Taylor and'his Prizes', Beitrge zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte Klett Cotta, Band 5 (Festschrift fr Hermann Kellenbenz, Nuremburg, 1978), pp.53(M4; above, pp. 449-62. 5 Thus Anson, though in London, took the largest slice of the product of a convoy to Saint-Domingue devastated by the Western Squadron, which he nominally commanded, in June 1747: Gwyn, Enterprising Admiral, p.20. Cf. Naval Administration 1715-1750, ed. D.A. Baugh (Navy Ree. Soc. 1977), pp.41, 73-4. If no flag or flags were entitled to claim, the captains' share increased to three-eighths. 6 The Act is numbered c. 36 in the Statutes at Large; I take the capitulation from the Statutes of the Realm, VIII, p.804. It was this statute which also introduced Head Money, in place of the time-honoured bonuses known as Gunnage and Tunnage, which were worth less. 7 Best discussed by R. Pares, Colonial Blockade and Neutral Rights 1739-1763 (Oxford, 1939), pp.6, 16, 46, 65-8. At first it was doubtful whether the sovereign's advocate and proctor was any longer entitled to prosecute naval prizes: P(ublic) R(ecord) O(ffice), H(igh) C(ourt of) A(dmiralty) 32/67, attestation of Sir George Smith, 27 May 1715, in the cases of the Florissant and Fortune de Marseille. 8 Instructions by the Principal Commissioners for the Sub-Commissioners, 29 June 1702, p.6: copy (e.g.) in P.R.O. T(reasury) 64/195. These were printed. They differ only in a few small details from the MS Instructions of 23 July 1689 to the Sub-Commissioners at Plymouth (Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Carte 197, ff. 89-93), which were content with 'three or four understanding Persons'. 9 P.R.O. Tl/82/56 and 217. 10 When the Agent at St John's, Newfoundland, complained that his five per cent had netted him only 75 in two years and desired liberty to trade, he was awarded a salary of 100 plus three per cent commission but forbidden to trade: P.R.O. Tl/95/207 and 240. " On 19 May 1703 the Treasury asked the Admiralty to inform Shovell that he must entertain William Goslin, with his clerk and two secretaries, 'on board some proper ship': P.R.O. Ad(miralty) 1/4283. But Goslin fell ill (Tl/86/349). 12 W. Lowndes to Godolphin, 22 Sept. 1702, pointing out that Parker belonged to the duke of Somerset's interest: Cfalendar of) T(reasury) B(ooks), XVII/i p.358. 13 Ibid. 14 House of Lords MSS, new series, II, pp. 152-3; P.R.O. Tl/79/68. 15 Qalendar of) S(tate) P(apers) D(omestic), 1694-95, p.287.
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29 30 31 32 33 54 35 36 37 38 39 40
41
Samuel Pepys's Naval Minutes, ed. J.R. Tanner (Navy Ree. Soc. 1926), pp.64-5. England's Safety: or, a Bridle to the French King (1693), reprinted in Somers Tracts (1814), II, p.71. The Sergison Papers, ed. R.D. Merriman (Navy Ree. Soc. 1950), pp.8-9. B(ritish) L(ibrary), Harleian 7481; Bodleian, Rawlinson C 148, ff. l^. G.N. Clark's well-known The Dutch Alliance and the War against French Trade 1688-1697 (Manchester, 1922), p.61, relied on these accounts. D. Ogg, England in the Reigns of James II and William III (3 vols, Oxford, 1955), III, pp.298-9, is nearer the truth. Many discrepancies were clarified in Mr. Paschall's Letter to a Friend in the Country. . . (1701), pp. 10-11. Ibid. p.9. This painful story may be followed in C(ommons) J(oumals), XIII, pp.362-5, 418, 483-7; XIV, pp.388, 403, 490-1. James Vernon's extreme anxiety is recorded in his letters to the duke of Shrewsbury: Letters Illustrative of the Reign of William III, ed. G.P.R. James (3 vols, 1841), III, passim. The Commissioners of Public Accounts found Seaborn Buckeridge, Accountant to the Prize Office, guilty of defacements and interlinings in the accounts of the St John of Stockholm: C.J. XXII, pp. 588-9. For an earlier defence of the Prize Office, see C.S.P.D. 1694-95, pp. 370-1. Calendar of) T(reasury) P(apers) 1556-1696, pp.449, 503, 550-1; C.T.B. X, pp.551-2, 940-1. Ibid. XII, pp.9-10; C.T.P. 1697-1702, p.S3. A copy of the Scheme, which required details of each prize and the circumstances of its capture, is in Ad. 1/3662, Prize Office to Burche, 26 Feb. 1703; for its neglect see (e.g.) Ad. 2/405/1-2; and for the muster books, Ad. 1/3662, Commissioners to Fawler, 1 July 1707. P.R.O. Ad. 2/207/145-46. Abroad, commanders sometimes refused to hand over the prize's papers to H.M/s Agent: Prize Office to Godolphin, 5 Mar. 1706, in Ad. 1/4283. P.R.O. Ad. 1/3662, Prize Office to Admiralty, 20 Nov. 1697. P.R.O. Ad. 2/404/120 and 191. Many examples in the Archives de la Marine at Brest, I E 435-^143. P.R.O. S(tate) P(apers) 98/21, Dr Henry Newton to Sir Charles Hedges, 30 Dec. 1704 NS. He was told it was beneath his station, although his predecessor, Sir Lambert Blackwell, had also been consul, victualling and prize agent: ibid. 104/91, 23 Mar. 1705. C.S.P.D. 1689-90, p.75. Pares, Colonial Blockade, p.66. C.J. XII, pp.400-1. P.R.O. Tl/93/100, Prize Office to Treasury, 26 Jan. 1705. C.T.B. XX/ii, p.246. Nevertheless, Clutterbuck appeared in 1702 as one of the magistrates who examined captors and prisoners 'in preparatio'. Ibid, pt iii, p.709. Ibid. XXVI/ii, p. 147. Ibid. XVIII, p.298. P.R.O. Ad. 1/3662, Prize Office to Treasury, 17 Dec. 1702. Ibid. Prize Office to Admiralty, 6 Nov. 1702. C.T.B. XVII/i, pp.379, 382. All Souls College, Oxford, Wynne MSS, vol. 55, f. 85. Unless it dates from the third Dutch war, this document must have been written after the death of Queen Mary possibly in 1695-6, when there was talk of handing over Prize Office business to the Customs. P.R.O. Tl/90/314-18. Burnaby nevertheless stayed on until the Commission was revoked on 25 Nov. 1708 (H.C.A. 24/13).
490
42 43
C.T.P. 1697-1702, p. 140. C.S.P.D. 1689-90, p.266, for his succession to Col. St John, deceased; C.T.B. X, pp.276 and 485, for his spell at Plymouth, his place having been briefly occupied at Portsmouth by William Cowse, 'late Agent for Prizes in the Straits'. 44 Information kindly supplied by Dr J.H. Thomas from sacrament certificates in P(ortsmouth) C(ity) R(ecords) O(ffice) 52/2, 3, 5, 6. 45 C.T.B. IX, p.41, Board Minute, 12 July 1689. 46 Bodleian, Rawl. A 290, f. 41. 47 P.C.R.O. 52/5, 6. 48 C.J. XIII, p.486. 49 P.R.O. H.C.A. 30/774. 50 Ibid. 32/46-86. But the produce of sales down to 7 Nov. 1704, as communicated to the House of Commons (C.J. XIV, p.411), was for Plymouth 11,177, Portsmouth 3,137, Dover, etc. 1,006 (rounded to the nearest pound). 51 P.R.O. H.C.A. 30/774. The totals (home and abroad) were 24 men of war and 175 privateers. The stronger privateers were usually bought by the navy for service as frigates. All but thirty-one of the privateers were captured by the navy. Some prizes were mere boats. 52 Ibid. 26/2, f. 86: Resolution Sloop (John Bryant), 36 tons, 6 guns, 30 men, 'ten whereof are seamen and the rest landsmen': the owners were John Bryant, anchorsmith; John Mounsher, ropemaker; Edward Harman, merchant; and Richard Markes. For Mounsher see R.R. Walcott, English Politics in the Early Eighteenth Century (Oxford, 1956), p. 187. 53 Ibid. 26/2, ff. 67, 85, 167 (Greenland Company), 177; 26/3, ff. 43 (to the Straits and back), 87 (Newfoundland, Straits and back). For Sir Thomas Ridge, see Surry and Thomas, Original Entries, pp.xxiv-v, and P. Mathias, The Brewery Industry in England, 1700-1800 (Cambridge, 1959), pp. 198-9. 54 P.R.O. H.C.A. 26/13, f. 34 (7 Jan. 1708); recommissioned under John Wall on 28 Sept. 1711 (H.C.A. 26/16), after Thomson had died of a rat's bite; S.P. 71/4, f. 165. Cf. N. Taubman, Memoirs of the British Fleets and Squadrons in the Mediterranean, Anno 1708 and 1709. . . (1710), pp.58-9. 55 P.R.O. H.C.A. 26/14, f. 125. In April 1711 they commissioned the Ambuscade under Capt. Bamber (H.C.A. 26/15), but she was a much larger vessel (30 guns, 140 men) than her namesake. For the elder Thomas Missing, 'merchant prince of Titchfield and a Portsmouth Alderman', see Surry and Thomas, Original Entries, p.xxv; he became M.P. for Southampton 1722-7, but in 1701 had described himself as a baker (information from Dr Thomas, P.C.R.O. 53/36). Blakeley was mayor of Portsmouth in 1719. 56 The Norton Galley (Wall) took a prize into Leghorn (and ransomed two others) in 1706; nine prizes are recorded to the Ambuscade (into Alicante, Naples, Barcelona) in 1708-10, with two more into Lisbon in 1711. I am most grateful to Mr. W.B. Meyer of Huntingdon for much of my information about Portsmouth privateers. For the war of 1739-48, he has found only one, the Adventure (Thomas Israel), which took seven prizes in 1744-45. 57 P.R.O. Tl/85/420. 58 P.R.O. Ad. 1/3662, Prize Office to Admiralty, 10 and 28 Nov. 1702. 59 Ibid.; C.T.P. 1702-1707, p. 144. 60 C.J. XII, pp.448, 528-9. 61 C.T.P. 1697-1702, p. 143. " C.T.B. XVIII, p.254. 63 P.R.O. Ad. 2/405/228, 470; Ad. 2/408/294, 435; Ad. 2/409/17, 56. Cf. many references in Ad. 1/3662, Prize Office to Admiralty (unpaginated).

64 65
491
66 67 68 69
71 72
74 75 76 17
78 7
"
80 81 82 83 84
85
86 87 88
** '" "'
House of Lords MSS, new ser. VII, p.524. Buyers would meet half the sale price within twenty-four hours, but often fail to pay the other half at the end of the stipulated month. This Was an important cause of delay in making up the captors' accounts. The Commissioners prosecuted at least one buyer (P.R.O. Ad. 1/3662, 2 Mar. 1704) and on another occasion threatened to publish the names of the transgressors (Gazette no. 4218, 15 Apr. 1705). P.R.O. Ad. 1/3662, 9 July 1704. C.J. XII, pp.425, 448-9, 464, 483, 528-9. (Greenwich) N(ational) M(aritime) M(useum), AGC XXI/36/MS 0593. P.R.O. Tl/81/372, forwarded to Treasury 1 Oct. 1702. P.R.O. H.C.A. 32/67 (Florissant, attest. Smith). N.M.M. AGC XXI/36/MSS 0607-0611. He had earlier charged five per cent (ibid. MS 0597). Cf. Calendar of) Tfreasury) B(ooksand) P(apers), V, p.21. N.M.M. AGC XXI/36/MS 1118. Gwyn, Enterprising Admiral, pp.124, 162, 178-9. This pioneer study concentrates on Warren's investments. There are rather more references to prize agency in Prof. Gwyn's selection from the Warren Papers, 1736-1752, for the Navy Ree. Soc.: The Royal Navy and North America (1973). Cf. P.G.M. Dickson, The Sun Insurance Office 1710-1960 (Oxford, 1960), pp.241, 274. Bromley, 'Profits of Naval Command', pp.536-7. Gazette no. 3822 (29 June 1702); C.S.P.D. 1702-3, p.500; P.R.O. Ad. 1/4283, Lowndes to Burchett, 20 Nov. 1702; C.T.P. 1702-1707, p.60. P.R.O. H.C.A. 32/57 (Esperance de la Paix). Already 10 Ann. c. 27 required agents to send the hospital an account of the produce of a prize and of the payments made within three months of a first distribution, Cf. the more elaborate provisions of 45 Geo. Ill, c. 72. B.L. Additional MSS 38,466, ff. 3-49. H(ouse of) C(ommons, Sessional Papers) 1802-1803 (160) iv, pp.258-62. See especially the evidence of James Poulain, a specialized recall agent, ibid. pp.293-302. Ibid, p.294. 27 & 28 Viet. c. 24, s. 19. Captain A.J. Griffiths, Some Observations on Some Points of Seamanship: with Practical Hints on Naval Oeconomy (Cheltenham, 1824), pp.35-6. Gwyn, British Navy, pp,397-8; H.C. 1802-3(160) iv, pp.253-5. Ibid., pp.257-8, 262-3. Under 45 Geo. Ill, c. 72 the net proceeds were to be lodged, at the prayer of either party, in the High Court of Admiralty, whose Registrar was given discretion to invest them in public securities if both parties agreed. Observations, p.38. Griffiths also advised against excessive intimacy between officers and agents. Where the agent was a consul, there might be a conflict of duties: D.A. Baugh, British Naval Administration in the Age of Walpole (Princeton, N.J., 1965), pp.397-8. H.C. 1802-3 (160) iv, pp.267-71. Parliament did not adopt this proposal. P.R.O. H.C.A. 30/774. For the Mars ('Martial') of Calais; Gazette no. 4569, 17 Aug. 1709. Gazette no. 4737, but cf. no. 4735 (same prize). Richard New, of Gosport, is mentioned once. William Stocker, citizen and combmaker of London, left his bails in the lurch: P.R.O. H.C.A. 32/50 (1) and 74 (Amity of St Valry). I am deeply obliged to Mr F.B. Stitt, the. Librarian, for calling my attention to the Drake ford MSS, of which he has compiled a provisional list, and to the owners, Messrs Hand, Morgan, and Owen, solicitors.
492
92 93 94
"
96
97
98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105
' U6
107 108
"" "
'" "2
113
"*
115 116
"'
118 119 120
Baugh, Naval Administration (N.R.S.), P-88. To Capt Chadwick, 27 Apr. 1744, Drakeford (MSS) 21. 11 May 1736, ibid. 22. 22 Oct. 1743, ibid. 21. Ibid. 10; C.T.B.P. V, pp,514-81. She was sold under an Admiralty Court commission addressed to Jasper, Fisher, and Drakeford, and Pusey Brooke, Collector of Customs (for whom see Surry and Thomas, Original Entries, pp.1 and 97), half the proceeds being awarded to 'suffering merchants' i.e. those who had claims against the guarda costas; before 4 June 1740 captors in this war had sole property only in prizes taken in European seas from Spain (13 Geo. Il, e. 4). Drakeford 11, F. Boult (Jasper's solicitor) to Drakeford, 7 Feb. and 19 Dec. 1749; Boult considered that James Henshaw, the Balchens' agent, 'has used you and Mr Fisher very ill'. C.T.P.B. IV, pp.64-5, 68-9, 247. Drakeford 21, draft letter of 3 Oct. by Drakeford and Jasper's reply of 6 Oct. 1744. Ibid. 7, 5 May 1744. Ibid. 21, Jasper to Drakeford, 28 Mar. 1744. Ibid., to Jasper (copy), 25 mar. 1744. Ibid., 29 Mar. 1744, and draft to Trevanion, 17-19 April. Ibid., Jasper to Drakeford, 26 Apr., 6-10 June, 18 Aug., 15 Dec. 1744. Ibid., to Jasper, 3 Apr. 1744. Ibid., draft to Jasper, 1 Apr. 1744. Ibid. 22, Young to Trevanion, 11 Sept. 1744 (copy). The Portsmouth contract of 25 August is in ibid. 21, Trevanion's powers ibid. 11. Ibid. 21, Trevanion to Jasper, 14 Aug. 1744 (copy). Ibid., Jasper to Drakeford, 20 July. Ibid., same to same, 7 and 9 July: to Corbett, 12 July (copy). Trevanion agreed to advance four or five guineas to each of Foley's men, unless they had already sold out to him, which was 'ten to one'; he was anxious that they should sign his power if they had not already done so, in order that it should contain a majority (ibid. 22, to Drakeford, 13 July). A Crown attorney, for whom see Surry and Thomas, Original Entries, passim. Drakeford 21, 18-20 Aug. 1744. Drakeford 22, from Trevanion, 6 Jan. 1745. The advertisement for sale in in ibid. 11: buyers were to pay down a quarter of their bids in cash, the rest within a month; two and a half per cent discount would be allowed on purchases carried away within two months; they were to be taken with all their faults and defects; the brokers would be free to resell uncleared lots, if necessary by private contract; and buyers were to pay the broker sixpence per lot 'to bind the bargain'. The brokers were William and Benjamin Vaughan. Any disputes were to be arbitrated by Peter Simonds, John Dorrien and James Bucknall. Ibid. 22, Simonds to Drakeford, 6 Oct., 17 and 26 Nov. 1744; and W. Vaughan to same, 29 Nov. The advertisement is in ibid 10, for 6 Dec. A hundred catalogues were sent by William Vaughan to Portsmouth, ibid. 22, Vaughan to Drakeford, 29 Nov. Ibid. 21, to Jasper (draft), 3 Oct.; to Drakeford, 11 and 23 Oct. Ibid. 22, to Drakeford, 29 Nov. Ibid., to Drakeford, 6 and 21 Jan. 1745. Ibid. 21. Ibid. 11.

121 122 123
493
124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131
Ibid. 22, Boult to Drakeford, 23 Apr. 1745. Ibid. 11, Boult's correspondence with Drakeford, 1745-50. Ibid. 22. This file contains some desultory letters from Jasper through 1746 until 25 Aug. 1747 (apologizing for writing only when 'I have some affairs of my own'). It was Bell and Harrison who distributed the enormous prize money due to Anson's Centurion: ibid. 27, Vaughan to Drakeford, 18 June 1747. Ibid., same to same, 29 Nov. 1747. Ibid. 12. This file contains several powers from officers and men of the captor, H.M.S. Lizard. Ibid. 22, Vaughan to Drakeford, 1 Nov. 1746, 13 Aug. 1747. Ibid., letters from Henshaw, 17 Jan. and Brett, 15 Feb. 1746. For Henshaw, see Baugh, Naval Administration in the Age of Walpole, p.400. Ibid., Brett, 18-23 Nov. 1746. Ibid., to Drakeford, 2 May 1747. Ibid. 27, Vaughan to Drakeford, 7 May 1747; Surry and Thomas, Original Entries, pp.61, 97. Drakeford 22, from Vaughan, 30 July, and Harrison, 1 Aug. 1747. The distribution between captor ships and a list of all the prizes is to be found ibid. 12, the total net proceed of 294,462/17/7 being almost the same as that stated by H.W. Richmond, The Navy in The War of 1739-48 (3 vols, Cambridge, 1920), III, p.98n. (but cf. Gwyn, Enterprising Admiral, p.xliii), as is the seaman's share, 25/19/0. Though a lieutenant got nearly 1,050 and a warrant officer 459, Brett told Drakeford on 18 April that some officers of the Chester were displeased with their 'small shares'. The difference between gross and net proceeds, ranging from 5,000 to nearly 10,000, in the awards to each captor ship, may explain this.
22
THE SECOND HUNDRED YEARS WAR But why so prolonged a confrontation? If naval jealousies are the yardstick, we had better not throw it away in 1815. Resentment of the British Mediterranean squadron played a part in the seizure of Algiers (1830), the Syrian crisis (1839-41) and the Spanish marriage (1846);1 in 1844 (Tahiti), 1849 (Rome), and 1859-60 (Savoy) fear of a rapidly assembled 'steam bridge' from Cherbourg to Portsmouth provoked measures of passive defence in Palmerston's England; years before Fashoda (1898) the influential 'Jeune Ecole' revived Vauban's arguments for the guerre de course; and only in 1904 did French naval programmes lose first place in Admiralty counter-planning. The nineteenth century was par excellence one of naval scares, not necessarily boosted by diplomatic crisis as in the period of intermittent war, when it had been Britain's turn to rattle the sabre, impressment serving as a successful diplomatic weapon in 1770 (the Falklands), 1787 (Holland) and 1790 (Nootka Sound). The climate of a naval race developed only with a professional and a national press to watch bewildering advances in weapons, speed and armour. It has yet to be shown that even government, in eighteenth-century London, kept a close eye on French dockyards except in wartime (e.g. Harley's spies) and the revanchist interval between 1763 and 1778 (the Wolters agency at Rotterdam and the Turin consulate):2 when up-to-date information on the readiness of ships already built was the overriding requirement. By then, too, the Family Compact having twice shown its teeth (1744-8, 1762-3), it was part of the same exercise to count the Spanish fleet, negligible in 1702-13 but nearly as powerful as the French in 1779 - a potential addition of 3828 guns to a French line of 4258, against Britain's 5780, in Europe and the West Indies.3 But these reports make nothing of technological innovations, unlike those which repeatedly called the colossal bluff of the Pax Britannica. French influence on English design was transmitted by captured vessels, her strongly gunned frigates and two-decker 74-gun battleships. Was this also how the Jacobins adopted the carronade, which wrought such havoc at the Saintes in 1782, along with the flint-lock and other devices introduced by Charles Douglas for more rapid and accurate firing? By that date British superiority in firing discipline justified the risks of departing from line-of-battle tactics, which had produced so many sterile engagements, particularly before Hawke's modification of Russell's rigid
1. The marriage of Isabel of Spain with her cousin Don Francois, approved by Guizot but not by Palmerston. 2. See N. Tracy, Mariner's Mirror, 61 (1975), 73-83. 3. Dull, op. cit., pp. 361-4.
496
Fighting Instructions of 1691. Hawke's personal style - after all, the real clue to Quiberon Bay - stamped itself on a preference for close-range horizontal broadsides and ultimately on the confidence of the Royal Navy. The comparable genius of Suffren, following the doctrine of Morogues, shared this inclination: but after 1815 French instructions still had to condemn wasteful and uncertain long-range dismasting fire, 'one of our gravest errors of our last war'. 4 This seems to reflect that fleet-preservative complex, derived from inferior numbers, which postponed decisions at sea; a frustrated enemy saw French ballistics and emphasis on speed alike as tokens of defensiveness. The higher velocity of heavy shot was of most interest to the tactics of evasion. From this discovery evolved the wider beam, the larger proportions and crews of French ships after 1720, when a vessel of 100 guns firing 1896 Ib. was to be less powerful than another of 80 firing 1992 Ib.: in 1745, a British 70 was barely equal in weight of shot to a French 52. By this measure the weakened Marine of 1761 was as strong as the much larger fleet of 1688 (see Fig. 1). The AngloFrench calibre ratio in 1793 has been calculated at 7:6 by N. Hampson,5 who shows that by June 1794 only the treason of Toulon had prevented a near equality in capital ships, thanks to the dirigisme of the Terror. The Republic could also boast nearly three times as many frigates, of which Britain was always desperately short, to say nothing of the swarm of lesser armed craft, public or private, to which British commerce presented so ample a target. Any comparison of effective strength, best measured in gunpower, must also reckon with manpower, a ship in commission (effectif) often needing months to become 'fully fitted for the sea'. British commanders, who did most of their own pressing, had to make good the failure of Parliament to devise either a Frenchstyle conscription (advocated by Admiralty in 1706 and 1740) or a volunteer reserve, preferred by shipowners and clarified in numerous pamphlets from Thomas Robe's Ways and Means (1726) to John Green's 'fellowship' plan of 1780. Naval militia bills (1744, 1758) got no further. Like the ill-starred voluntary register of 1696, these efforts noticeably occurred only during emergency, whereas absolutism was capable of reforming the classes maritimes at any time. No one has yet proved that Walpole was wrong to envy the relative orderliness, punctuality and information made possible by the Inscription,6 which also facilitated a sensible distribution of skills between ships. No English historian can read the naval intendants without marvelling at an administration that could move masses of seamen overland, under little or no guard, without a high rate of desertion. Further, it took care of a seaman's family and better care of his own health, if only by letting him go home at intervals, contrary to the 'turnover' practice of the Royal Navy, which in any case required more prolonged spells at sea for blockade and trade defence. Despite resistance to the classes in notorious spots like Martigues, and a marginal loss oifiiyards in the Antilles and Levant, we never hear of desertions on the English scale (over 42,000 in 1775-83 and again 1793-1802; 133,708 for 1755-63 if losses from
4. P. Padfield, Guns at Sea (London, 1973). 5. La Marine de Van II (Paris, 1959), p. 22. 6. As it is called today, 'Affaires Maritimes'.
Calibre of cannon (French pound weight)
Total number of cannon (cast-iron - steel)
Figure 1. The French fleet in 1688 and in 1761 according to weight of broadside. Source : Archives nationales. Marine Gg ( 1688) B5/3 ( 1761 ).
498
disease are included). British seapower was sustained by a stiffening of foreigners and marines (respectively 15 and 20 percent in 1810/12). Nor was France alone in recruiting rivermen (particularly after the intendant Arnoul's tour in 1693), even if she relied more on inshore fishermen-little handier on a warship than landsmen or 'idlers', whom every ship nevertheless could use. (On this point, one prefers the opinion of Grub Street, so close to Thames-side, to the Venetian relazioni; and Petty's Political Arithmetick enumerates only 40,000 seamen in 1676.) High wages lured landsmen into wartime colliers and merchantmen, while the deep-sea cod fishery habitually drew youth from the plough - often to drift into American service, as did hundreds of naval deserters, as many as 20,000 for 1793-1812 according to Admiralty estimate in 1869. In the colonies impressment, prohibited afloat in 1708 and 1756, depended on the goodwill of governors and innkeepers; it did no more than cancel losses, if as much. There and at home its strong-arm methods, though increasingly refined by co-operation with crimps, caused more rioting than in France, where the Inscription was as efficient as its bureaucracy (by virtue of the ability or willingness ofcommissaire andsyndic to withstand local interests, salt-farmers or revolutionary clubs besides shipowners) where there was availability of cash. The English never questioned the superior theoretical training and gentlemanly accomplishments of French officers. An academy was founded at Portsmouth in 1729 to imitate them. When Barham closed it in 1806 as 'a nursery of vice' he spoke for the growing influence of evangelical piety on naval discipline, but the academy never attracted much support from the landed and professional families who supplied nearly nine-tenths of the midshipmen. Besides an earlier apprenticeship to the sea, English officers saw more of it in peace and war. The defeat of Conflans in November 1759 was only the outstanding episode in a blockade that kept Hawke off Brest for eight months, till January 1760. To safeguard an enormous coastal navigation, which touched all interests, Parliament itself imposed an establishment of forty-three year-round cruisers in 1693 and 1708. Between these dates the Jamaica squadron came to afford the British West Indies better local protection that the French enjoyed (with no such station even when the British had two, after 1743), while the Admiralty developed a machinery of consultaion with shipowners for the highly complex management of convoys. These often numbered hundreds of vessels and sailed as frequently as once a fortnight to the Baltic by the summer of 1808; in time it became possible to organise more than a single convoy a year to extra-European destinations, and it was their trade which was the pacemaker of tonnage growth in the eighteenth century. Coupled with the technique of unremitting blockade in Biscay and intermittently in the Gulf of Lions, this organisation largely explains the conquest of Canada and Bengal (although in India the financial structure of the French Company, too dependent on the state, must take the blame for long-term weaknesses). Even so, in 1792, Britain had nearly as many ships trading to the Mediterranean as to countries beyond Europe - excluding that ubiquitous 'country' trade which gave her economic supremacy in the Far East - and well over three times as many engaged in the traffic with northern
The Second Hundred Years War
499
Europe, above all in timber and naval stores. All these required naval escorts. Despite the Hanseatic wine, coffee and sugar entrepots (and a strikingly successful performance in the Levant) high-cost French shipping, on the contrary, made but slight impression on the northern seas; most of the European trade of Bordeaux and Nantes (as P. Butel and J. Meyer have shown) was carried in foreign bottoms. Hence a double reliance on neutral carriers in wartime, less perhaps for supplies than to maintain exports vital to the subsistence of peasants, artisans, and the treasury itself, as is suggested by the minutes of the Conseil de Commerce during the anti-Dutch embargo of 1711-12 and by Napoleon's licensing system a century later. The only convoys vital to France, away from her coasts (poorly protected, certainly, against Zeelanders and Channel Islanders in the earlier wars), traversed Mediterranean and Atlantic. They were irregular, but British commanders bought country and parliamentary seats from the pickings, at the cost of enormous wear and tear to themselves, crews and ships. The use of forward bases in the Straits, where the navy might sometimes impinge on Continental war and politics as directly as in the Baltic, added a formidable strain. Nor could the Admiralty hope to escape assault in the endless improvisations to which all these calls on its limited resources subjected it, though its ingenuity extorts admiration now. It was axiomatic that 'less than 30 ships of the line completed and manned will not keep 20 constantly at sea even in the summer'.7 The journal of a 54-gun maid-of-all-work, H.M.S. Litchfield, 1708-13 shows that she was in harbour for 583 days in a single commission of 1572.8 For lack of a strategy that did not involve the movement of troops, French ships spent more time in port and could be maintained in better repair, until money ran out: E. Desbrire's Projets et tentatives de dbarquement aux lies britanniques9 fills four volumes. When the tasks of the two fleets are compared, therefore, even a 3:1 superiority is abbreviated: with the Family Compact and the programmes of Choiseul and Castres, it was annihilated. Moreover, since war at sea contributed the biggest item to an alarming National Debt, which divided the nation into stockholders and taxpayers, Parliament repeatedly reduced its armed forces far below realistic safety margins after each peace, not least in 1750-4 (see Fig. 2), with the result that supremacy was only gradually reconstituted as the wars went on; even the Seven Years' War began badly, after the initial successes of 1755 (in Biscay, not the fogs of Newfoundland). These considerations severely qualify the 'redoutable automatisme' of Jean Meyer's argument. In 1753, only months before Washington marched to the forks of the Ohio, Lord Elibank wrote that it was the interest of both landowners and merchants 'to submit to any insult rather than engage in war'.10 The navy obtained ten per cent of the national budget thirty years later: in 1792, expecting fifteen years of peace, Pitt reduced it. The North American origin of war in 1754 should warn us off any ex post
1. 8. 9. 10. Quoted by H. W. Richmond, Statesmen and Seapower (Oxford, 1946), p. 123. In my possession. Paris, 1900-2. P. G. M. Dickson, The Financial Revolution in England (London, 1967), p. 249.

Million
Figure 2.
Naval Expenses of Great Britain from 1745 to 1780 Source: Ruddock F. Mackay, Admiral Hawke. Oxford, 1965, p.305-306
facto supposition that one conflict necessarily engendered the next. Each had its own contrasting antecedents, which can scarcely be understood in broad outline. When, contrary to the warnings of Turgot, France intervened in the American Revolution, it was to recover 'the public consideration that the misfortunes of the last war and perhaps other causes have greatly weakened' (Vergennes11) but the rebellion of two million colonials was an entirely new
11. Quoted by Dull, op. cit., p. 304.
The Second Hundred Years War
501
noise in the world; there is no such direct connection with 1756-63 as linked Jenkins' Ear in 1739 with the Asiento clauses of Utrecht. And Vergennes's almost Bismarckian grasp of the European equilibrium, a model for Talleyrand, is worlds away from the Propaganda Decrees of the National Convention. Personal failings on both sides contributed to the rupture of January 1793 and it is right to insist on the threat to Holland, rather than to the Scheldt in itself, which had been closed at Dutch behest but under international sanction. Of course British opinion was shocked by the September Massacres before the diplomatic crisis, though Burke's ideological onslaught was unsympathetic to the cabinet. What tipped the scales for that pragmatic body was the open-ended annexationism, more explosive than 'natural frontiers', implicit in the Convention's invitation to liberty-loving foreign peoples. To suggest that Pitt, economist and reformer, wanted war is simply a facile extrapolation from his later desire to indemnify Britain for its cost - ultimately a public debt whose annual interest was as high as the whole indemnity imposed on the restored Bourbon and to replace old markets closed by the deluge; he sought peace in 1797. When he rolled up the map of Europe, he was sustained by a moral idea, the Law of Nations. Yet until 1814 Britain did not back Bourbon legitimacy as such. So much the worse for an essentially ideological interpretation of these wars. A conception of law, 'the liberties of all Europe', had guided that Pitt-like protagonist of the smaller European states, William III, whose career makes no sense in opposition to mere 'vellits d'hgmonie continentale'. Lacking the hypocrisies of popular sovereignty, so convenient to Napoleon, but never doubting the metaphysical roots of French primacy, the grand roi preferred to divide and rule by diplomacy. None the less, as Bismarck said of Napoleon III, he was a 'mauvais coucheur'. The war whose main issue was the English succession originated in the Reunions, the Revocation, the Moselle forts, Cologne; William 'came over' in 1688 more to add England to his coalition than to save her church. He was assisted by recent alarms (from 1673) about England's deficit in her balance of trade with Colbertian France - fear of an industrial competitor mirrored in reverse by the cahiers of 1789 - but far more by the unquiet domestic record of James II. Hence the later rhetoric which infused a mythology of absolutism among a public tinged (if not more) by French literature and science: lettres de cachet, censorship, inspectors, popery and wooden shoes. It was recognition of James III that swung English opinion behind the Grand Alliance in 1701. That in turn was precipitated by the Austrian movement into Lombardy and the French into the Spanish Netherlands after the death of Carlos I, not by English or Dutch refusal to acknowledge Philip V, much as his breach of the 1699 Partition Treaty confirmed that Louis XIV was not to be trusted. This original remote cause of the Spanish Succession War, the only one which France did not enter with enthusiasm, bequeathed a lasting impression of bad faith. An incidental challenge to the Protestant Succession, however, was all it had in common with the genesis of the preceding war. Scarecely five years apart, the two were yet less of a sequence then the wars of 1793-1815, divided by an act of God at Madrid, not by a quasi-truce at Amiens and Elba. As in 1775 and 1789, an inscrutable
502
Providence took a hand in 1700. After 1713, Britain's commitment to continental affairs was sealed by the electorate of Hanover, the Baltic imbroglio, and Elizabeth Farnese's views on the future of Italy: a Franco-British alliance then proved its worth until Chauvelin, architect of the Family Compact, persuaded Fleury to drop it, so secretly that Walpole, knowing in any case that navies alone could never force a peace, allowed the cardinal to recover the diplomatic leadership of Europe. But for the folly of Belleisle in 174112 she might have kept it: instead, the fluid continental situation of 1742-4 enabled Carteret to reconstruct another anti-Bourbon coalition. Even so, his colleagues got rid of him and an open clash with France might have been avoided if her soldiers had not insisted on going for the Dutch barrier in Belgium. Is not the title of our chapter loaded with a mischievous determinism? It is certainly true, moreover, in 1744 as under Louis XIV (and again in 1793), that the French had only themselves to blame for having to fight on land as well as sea, whatever responsibility attaches to Newcastle for the opening moves in the Diplomatic Revolution of 1756, long since planned by Kaunitz. The duke perfectly understood that 'France will outdo us at sea when they have nothing to fear on land'; but he must insure Hanover and hoped to do so without a continental war - it was the unpredictable ruler in Berlin who saw to that. Here is another reminder of the fragility of the Utrecht 'balance', itself so much more comprehensive than a method of asphyxiating French finances. There were independent power struggles, plenty of other troubled waters. None of these wars was a purely Anglo-French duel, least of all American Independence. But the diverse interests of allies tended to prolong them, by hindering strategic concentration or delaying a settlement. Hence a persistent strand of 'patriotic' isolationism in England, whose strategic counterpart was to fight exclusively on or across the oceans. Since the causes of war were never identical - and navies never a major explanatory factor - the key question is the quality of peace. Capabilities and intentions were seldom in step. Yet even during their summers of friendship, after 1715 and 1783 (and 1815), there were Englishmen and Frenchmen convinced that their countries were 'natural enemies', against whom contingency plans must always be got ready. In this respect, free from the businessas-usual parsimony of a House of Commons and accountable only to the King, French diplomacy was the more active, continuing for instance to subsidise German courts (which Britain did only during emergencies) and advise Indian armies (Mysore, Hyderabad, the Marathas, 1785-8), to say nothing of the researches of military engineers in Britain. There was also the tempting Jacobite card to play - and till 1783 a symbolic irritant in a dismantled Dunkirk. Neither country spoke with a single voice, least of all Louis XV's diplomatic corps. British diplomats, too, like most of the aristocratic amateurs who occupied the Paris embassy (a post of cabinet rank), were generally less competent than French; patronage damaged policy at critical moments. And the machinery of negotiation left much to subordinates: the colonial disputes outstanding in 1743 were, after all, to have been adjusted by commissaries. Yet
12. The French intervention in the Austrian succession.
503
simplicities of public opinion doubtless counted for more, though less in France (before 1792) than in Britain, where a strident imperialism, personified by the elder Pitt, limited government manoeuvre in the middle decades. Traces of this appetite are visible before 1688, on Hudson's Bay and the New York frontier; the Indian alliances of Frontenac and the brothers Iberville fed it, still more the guardacostas of the Caribbean, above all the vicious maxim that commerce is war. So long as a static view of the attainable quantum of world trade prevailed (and was analysed as the sum of bilateral trades), the colonial boom was dangerous, particularly for two industrial powers thrusting for markets: America took 37 percent of English domestic exports in 1772-3 and 57 per cent in 1797-8, compared with only 10 per cent in 1700-1,'3 and in this the mainland was more important than the Antilles, which George III valued above Gibraltar but which were relatively more vital to the French economy, though Canada too was showing a profit after 1748. To the risks of combustion here we must add a tariff war beginning at latest in 1667; from 1692 Parliament virtually prohibited French 'luxuries' until 1786, when pressure from Vergennes collaborated with the smuggler's phenomenal profiteering to produce a commercial treaty denied by Parliament to Bolingbroke and Torcy in 1713. They were defeated less by vested interests than by bad statistics and a slogan masquerading as a doctrine: 'France's gain must be England's loss'.14 The industrious French can now be seen as heirs to an earlier xenophobia excited by the very different competition of the Dutch. As it also remained an assumption that wealth was the sinews of war, it was only a step to the Chathamite strategy of destroying France, and better still the whole House of Bourbon, in the West Indies and West Africa. Wiser statesmanship, aided by the unwillingness of some powerful planters to share their market with conquered sugar islands (as distinct from a strategically useful Tobago), made the peace of 1763 more generous than it might have been, in the unusual absence of ddommagements, and the Antilles bloomed in Bordeaux as never before. The trouble was, and perhaps still is, that the glory of French arms cannot admit defeat.
13. P. Deane and W. A. Cole, British Economic Growth, J688-1959 (2nd edn, Cambridge, 1969), p. 34. 14. See D. C. Coleman and A. H. John (eds), Trade, Government and Economy in Pre-Industrial England (London, 1976), pp. 187-211.
INDEX The Index has been compiled and arranged according to the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, Second Edition 1986, and has been divided into three parts:General Index Index of Persons Index of Ships' Names In the case of the second_ Index, due to pressure of space only the principal persons have been indexed. It has therefore been -necessary to omit references to many masters and small 'armateurs', but such persons can easily be traced through the chapter headings and references to the principal privateering ports. Ships' names are listed as they are cited in the text with the result that sometimes the same ship may be shown, for example, under both its French and Flemish names. Where several ships have borne the same or similar names, they have been differentiated by the number of guns (shown in brackets), by their tonnage or by the use of a definite article. 'Saint', 'Sainte' etc are shown by the prefix 'St.'. and 'Notre Dame' by 'N.D.'. It has not been found possible to devise a satisfactory method of listing ships by such categories as "warships", "privateers", "merchantmen" etc. and any attempt to list by nationality would have been unreliable.
GENERAL INDEX Acts of Parliament, Punysshement of Pyrotes and Robbers of the Sea [1536], 156 Privateer Act [1693], 378, 450, 464 Bounty Act [1689], 63 Trial of Treasons [1696], 156, 162 Encouragement of Trade to America [1707) , 464 Cruisers and Convoys [1708], 239, 340, 347, 457 Prize Act [1708], 343, 349, 402 Encouragement of Seamen [1739], 464 Naval Agency and Distribution, [1864], 476 Admiralty, Contracts, Marseilles, 244 High Court of, 48 High Court, prize records, 213 Irish, records, 139 Tenth (English) 343 Abolition of, 324, 349 Tenths (various), 74, 77, 188, 227 Toulon, 250 Zeeland College of, 440 Advances, based on French Navy rates of pay, 194 'A la part', 3 'A la solde', 3 Algiers, British Peace with 1682, 29 Commerce with, 41 French Treaty with 1694, 29 Navy, 1694 list, 37 Privateers, 430 'Ambosat' or 'electo', 6 Archives, De la Marine, 172 Municipal de Dunkerque, 177 Archives (cont) Nationales, 339 Rennes, 326 Zeeland Admiralty, 79 Arica, 332 Armateurs, 3, 11 Collaboration between Toulon and Marseilles, 250 Flemish, 193 Grievances of, 179 "husbands", 374-387 Augsburg, War of the League of, 77, 107, 135, 389 Baltic Trade, 46-7 Barbary Regencies, Ottoman, 29-42 Barfleur, Battle of see La Hougue Barques longues, 78, 83-4, 200, 229, 232, 301 Bass Rock, Jacobite garrison, 147 Bayonne, trade with, 400 Beachy Head, 89 Bergen, wine and brandy trade, 504 Berre, Etang de, 126 Biscay trade, 48 Blockades against Jean Bart, 79 "Blue water" strategy, 26 Board of Ordnance, 456 'Boekhouder', 411 Bordeaux, trade development, 390-1 Bottomry bonds, 52 Boucaniers, 1, 4-5 Brest, 184 Naval archives, crew lists at, 285 Brethren of the oast, 15 Breton linen, export to Cadiz, 144 Bureau des prises faites en mer, records of, 221 Cabin plunder, 3 Calais, 4
506
GENERAL INDEX Desertion, 129-135, 195, 496, 498 Dijkvelt-Callires peace talks, 156 'Dixieme', 256, 286, 299, 302, 319 Droits de pillage', 358 Dunkirk, Jacobite privateer base, 149 Privateers, 47, 71, 73-101, 168 Prizes, 74-76, 91-100 Rapports des capitaines, 78 Shipping, 169 Dutch East India Company, 113, 411 Duty on prize goods imported into England, 346 Ecrivain', Duties of, 191 on French privateers, 261 'Engage' , 7 'Escrites', Mediterranean, 300 European trade, effects of war, 17021712, 389-406 Famine in France, 1708-9, 292 Filibusters, see Flibustiers and
1
Calais privateers, 168, 301 Campeche, 15 Canale Bay, 340, Capitaines-armateurs, 188 and see under main privateer ports Caribbean freebooters, 1-20 Cartagena (Colombia), 1, 14, 454 Carteret, port of, 281 Chaloupes, 78, 83-4 Chamber of Commerce Squadron, 192 Channel Soundings Squadron, 340 'Chasse-parties', 12 Chatham Chest, 12 Christiansand, 81 Cider trade, 341 'Cinquime' (royal fifth), 188-9, 198-200, 203-4, 250, 308, 310, 316-7. Abolition of (1709), 201 Circumnavigation, first French, 288 Classes maritimes, 194 Coastguard vessels suppied to West French privateers, 402 Cod, Dried, St Malo's trade in, 283 Fisheries, 302, 409 Code de la Marine, 133 Coffee trade, Red Sea, 22 'Commissievaart', Middleburg and Flushing, 407-434 Commissioners of Oyer and Terminer, 158 Commissioners and Sub-Commissioners of Navy Board, 465 Commissions, blank, 152 Compagnie des Indes Orientales, see French East India Company Compagnies Franches, 133 Concepcin, 335 Confiscation, 273 Conseil, de Construction, 200 des Finances, 221 des Prises, 47, 48, 55, 66, 73, 88, 105, 198, 221-2, 230, 235, 239, 246, 262, 293, 299, 307, 432 du Rol, 241,344 Consortship, 206, 'Conventions prives', 244 Convoy protection, British, 61-2 Coquimbo, trade, 332 Corn, Harvest, economic influence, 44-51 Ships, interception of, 45 Corsairs, 1660-1760, 1-20 Algerine, 37, 41 Breton, 141 French in North Sea, 66 Geographical origins, 131 Martinique, 27 and see Privateers Council of the Indies, 21 Coulange, Compagnie Simon, 109-111 Creole merchants, 338 'Croquants', 8 Custom of the Coast, 15 Dead letters, 179 1 Dpositaires', 70 Depreciation of money, 390
Freebooters
Flags of convenience, 54 Flekker, 81 Flemish seamen, 194 Flibustiers (and see Freebooters), 1, 4-5, 9, 184 Flushing, 215, 407 Food cargoes, French seizure of, 235 Foremastmen, 123 Fort James, ransome of, 236 'Frais de justice', 77 Freebooters (and see Freebooters), Caribbean, 5, 8-9 French Asiento Company, 333 French East India Company, 22, 279, 289, 303-4, 320, 440, 444 Loan of French warships to, 187, 203 French Guinea Company, 21 French East India Company, loan of French warships to, 187, 203 French South Sea Company, 290 French warships loans to privateers, 1688-1713, 187-212 Frezier's 'Relation' of 1716, 327 Froger's 'Relation du voyage de M, de Gennes au dtroit de Magellan', 327 'Calici subditi', 164 Gardes de la marine recruited into privateers, 190 Gens de raer, documentation, 121-137 Gibraltar, Straits of, 38-9 Gold, Brazilian in Europe, 313 Good Hope, Cape of, 113 Grain, and see corn, Ships threatened by Breton privateers, 341 Grand Alliance, 1701, and Wars of, 47, 436-7, 501 Granville Terreneuviers, 283 Greek Archipelago, Zeeland privateers in, 203 Greenwich Hospital, 475, 477 Guernsey, Fitting out costs, 384-7 G r e f f i e r ' s records, 339 Privateering families, 377-8
GENERAL INDEX Guernsey, (cont) Ransoms, 281 Guinea Company, loan of French warships to, 187 Hamburg trade, 53 Hanseatic, convoys, 113 League, 48, 53 Honduras, 15 Huguenot prisoners at Camaret, 164 Ilo, 332 Instructions, to Zeeland privateers, 407-434 'Inscription maritime' 85, 216, 496 Invalides, 177 Irish, Admiralty Records, loss of, 139 at St Malo, 145 Immigrant corsairs, 143 Migration in 17th century, 139 Provision trade, 144 Refugees in Brittany, 172 Jacobites, 86 Jamaica, 7 Jamaica Squadron, 498 Justice, 13 Kola expedition, 111-2 La Ciotat, 176 La Hougue, 411 Battle of, 122 La Plata, 333 La Rochelle, wine and spirit trade with Dutch, 391 La Tremblade, 177 Leghorn merchants, 237 Le Havre privateers, 168 Logane, 236 Letters of credit, 260 Letters of Marque, 174-5, 214 Channel Island declarations, 348 English declarations in PRO, 339, 375, 471 Jersey declarations, 350 Lettres de change, 261, 396 Lettres de conventions, 244 Liberation, Dutch War of, 215, 220 Lima merchants, 333 Limerick, surrender of 1691, 142 Lorendrayery, 58 Malaga, victory o, 219-20 Manning, 122-4, 167-186 Competition between privateers and armateurs, 286 Problems for privateers, 122-4 Marooning, 13 Marseilles, Admiralty contracts, 244 Chamber of Commerce, 409 Commissaire du bureau des matelots, 125 Galleys, 88 Privateers, 91, 302 Martigues, 127 Martinique, 27, 238 'Matelotage' , 15.
507
Mediterranean passes, 38 Mercenaries, 5 Corsair, 170 Marennes, Dpartement of, 177 Mauritius, capture of, 290 Middleburg, 88, 215, 407, 440-1, 447 Middleburg Commercie Compagnie, 434 Moka coffee trade, 290 Mutiny, 181 Nantes, 171, 305 Development of trade, 390-1 Slave trade, 214 Naval warfare, 1745-1815, 496-503 Navy Board, 456 Nesmond's Traite of 13 June 1695, 200 Neutrality in Baltic, 435 Nevis, ransom of, 205 Newfoundland cod fisheries, 283 Nine Years War, 1688-97, 7, 44, 46-7 61-9, 73-4, 77, 81, 85, 139-65, 279 283-4, 290-1, 297, 302, 407, 418, 467, 471 North Sea in wartime, 1688-1713, 4372 'N pieds', 9 'Officiers bleus' as corsairs, 192 Old Providence Company, 6 Olron, Laws of, 12 Ostend privateers, 80 Ottoman Empire, Barbary Regencies, 29-42 North Africa, 30-32 Panama, ransom of, 5 Passports, 436 Dutch, 414 Scandinavian, 437 Swedish, 437 West France, 396-7, 406 Pay, Advances, 180 Privateers, by salary or by 'tiers biscayen', 178 Standard, 'Solde ordinaire', 196 Payment in lieu of replacement, 188 Peru Silver trade, 22 Loss of two thirds total silver trade to Malouins 1701-1720, 280 Pensacola question, 22 Pensions for sick or disabled seamen, 12 Petit Goare, 2 Picaroons, 168 of Logane and Petit Goare, 236 Pillage, 3 ff, 27, 170, 178, 183-6, 260-1, 318, 358 Piombino Channel, 234 Piracy in West Indies, 2-3 Pisco, 332 Pitouays, Lieutenant le Sieur de, 'Journal', 1706-9, 325-338 Placaeten, February 1696, 164 28 July 1696, 79 28 July 1705, 78, 412, 415-6, 418-9 Placentia, 27, 226, 283 Plunder, recognised, 184 Poldava, Peter the Great's Victory, 45
508
GENERAL INDEX Quimper, 224, 342 Ransom, 223, 344 Receiver General for Prizes, 467 Recruiting, Age limit, 136 Seamen from Inscription maritime, 218 Soldiers from Compagnies tranches de la Marine, 216 Red Sea coffee trade, 22 Rennes, Archives at, 326 Rio, expeditions to, 133, 311, 313, 316, 319 Rochefort, 134, 176, 313 Commissaire du bureau des raatelots 'grand registre', 125 Hiring of warships for privateering, 189 Royal African Company (French), loan of warships to, 187 Royal fifth (cinquime) after deduction of Admiralty tenth, 188 Ryswick, Peace of, 26 St Domingue, 1, 5, 8, 11 St George's Channel, 141 Saint Malo, 4, 169, 176-7, 180, 184, 279-295, 301-2, 325 Actes of Socit de. 90 Admiralty, 280 East India Company of, 328, 331 Frigates built at, 232 Privateers, 172-3, 279-295 Prize tenths, 228 Trade and privateering, 279-295, 390 St Martin's Roads, 341 Saint Servan, 173 Saint Tropez, 127 Salomon, G et Ci, 11 Scandinavian shipping, 435-447 Seven Years War, 499 Shallops, armament of, 168 Shares, 12 Silver trade, Peruvian, 22, 463 Slave trade, 21, 38, 204, 214, 236, 288, 303, 333, 432 Smuggling, Channel Islands, 282, 345 Smyrna convoy of 1693, 60, 64, 219 'Solde ordinaire', 196 South America, 113-4 South Sea Company, 451, 459, 474 South Sea Trade, 287, 291, 302, 325338 South Sea venture, 318 Spanish Succession, War of (1702-13), 21-8, 45, 73, 81. 132-3, 169-70, 174, 178, 180, 189, 204, 246, 248, 279-295, 298, 339-73, 408-9, 435447, 449, 454, 464, 472 Spitzbergen, campaign of 1703, 220 Spy network, French, 312 Subscribers, 300 Tangier, 430 Tenths, admiral's, 74, 77 'Tiers biscayen', 178 Toulon, 308 Admiralty of, 250 Allied expedition to, 238 Consortship, 206
Politlque Resolutin, 57 Port Louis, 304 Port Royal (Acadia), 25, 235 Port St Mary (nr. Cadiz), 469 Portsmouth, Prize Office and Agency at, 16891748, 463-493 Precious metals booty, 317 Press gangs, British, 134 Prisoners, Exchange of, 33-4 French, taken by British, 128-9 Privateering, Counter-privateering against the Zeelanders in Mediterranean, 202 Financial rewards, 108, 297-323 Loan of French warships for, 187212 and see Corsairs Privateers, 1-20 Algerine, 430 Antilles, 27 Armament of, 351 Breton, 168-170 British, 69, 339 Estimated building costs, 254 Calais, 168, 301 Channel Islands, 339-73 Dover and Cinque Ports, 69 Dunkirk, 47, 71, 73-101, 168 Flemish, 169-170 Flushing, 407 Guernsey, 282, 374-87 Jacobite, 139-65 Jersey, 350 Jamaica, 27 Le Havre, 168 Levant, 409 Manning under Louis XIV, 16881713, 167-86 Problems. 122-4 Marseilles, 91, 302 Martinique, 238 Middleburg, 407 New England, 25 Newfoundland Banks, 27 Ostend, 80 Prisoners from held by English, 128-9 St Malo, 172-3, 279-95 Zeeland, 65-6, 203, 407-34, 435-47 Prize, Agency, Portsmouth, 463-93 Agents, 451, 456
Commission, London, 449 Courts, 214

Fraud in Courts, 59 Goods, marketing of, 288 Money, 449-62 Papers, High Court of Admiralty, 213 Pri zes, Channel Island privateers, 342 Dunkirk, value of, 91-101 Fortin's Muscovy, 198 Number, Conseil des Prises, 225 Profits, Atlantic, 204 St Malo, 75 Sale to meet running expenses, 260 Prohibition, English, on importing French goods from 24 August 1689, 345 Punishment, 13, 417
GENERAL INDEX Toulon, (cont) privateersr armament, 247-8 Treason Bills of 1693-5, 157 Tortuga Island, 2, 6 Valparaiso, 334 Venice, Insurance at, 1710, 240 Navy, 129 V i c t u a l l i n g Board, 4 5 6 , Vigo Bay, attack on Spanish Silver Fleet, 454, 469 Walcheren, 411 West Indies shipping, Guernseymen attack on, 342
509
Zeeland,
Admiralty archives, 79 Admiralty College, 440 Privateers, 65-6, 203, 407-434, 435-7 Prize Court, 442 Ransoms, extra-judicial, 442 Zieriksee fisheries, ransom of 68
INDEX OF PERSONS Bonnafous, A, 270 Abestee, Peter, 59 Bonrepaus, Francois d'Usson, Marquis Aguessau, Henri d', 183 de, 49, 51, 106, 155 Ahier, William, 344 Alardon, Antoine, 251 Booms, Pieter, 419, 431, 433 Boscawen, Edward, first Viscount Aldworth, William, 467 Falmouth (Admiral), 452 Anselme, Etienne Boscher, Jacques, 311 Anson, George Baron (Admiral), 463 Bougier, Charles, 89 Antons, Jean Nouail des, 332 Arnaud, J, 263, 270 Boyer, A, 270 Brasiliano, Roche, 7 Arnieux, L, 270 Brmond, family of Cassis, 248 Arnoul, Pierre, 122-4, 498 Asher, Eugene, 126 Bremond, Honors, 265, 269 Brent, Robert, 152 Aubanel, Capitaine, 269 Bridenbaugh, Carl and Roberta, 8 Aubert, A, 270 Brock, William, 356 Augiers, Chevalier des, 220 Aumont, Due d', 189 Browne, Edward, 350 Aumosne, Chapdelaine de 1', 194, 315 Browne, Francois, 146, 290 Aylward, John, 144 Browne, John, 350 Bruny, Jean-Baptiste, 258, 326 Baeteman, Nicolaes, 71, 80, 183, 192 Buckeridge, Edmund, 469 Baker, Thomas, 33, 40 Burchett, Josiah, 60, 238 Barbinais-Trouin, Luc de la, 133, Butler, Nathaniel, 5, 10 298-9, 304, 306-7, 309-10, 311, 313, 319-320 Carlos, Gabriel, 337 Bart, Andre, 107 Carman, Guillaume Eon de, 302, 311, Bart, Francois, 192 326 Bart, Gaspard, 86, 115 Carrire, G-H, 270 Bart, Jean, 47, 60, 79, 82-4, 105Carteret, John Earl Granville, 502 108, 113, 170-1, 185, 215, 217, Cassard, Jacques, 215, 220, 235, 248 279, 297 250-2, 257-9, 267, 269, 289 Bart, Jean-Baptiste, 87 Cassard, Rene 27, 193-5, 202 Barthlemy, Commandant, 263 Catelin, Sieur du, 126 Batten, Edward, 470 Ceberet, Intendant, 82, 107 Baudran, Nicolas, 304, 307 Chabert, Michel, 331 Beaubriand, Jean-Baptiste Levesque Chalmont, Marchand de, 318 de, 201, 304-5, 307 Chamillard, Michel de, 218-9 Beauchesne, Gouin de, 288, 335 Chamilly, Commandant, 352, Beaujeu, Chevalier de, 190 Chamilly, Marchal de, 341 Beaupr, Choiseul, 11 Chapelle, Jean Martin de la, 289 Beauvais, Francois Lefer, Sieur de, Chapelle, Martin de la, 290 192, 289 Charlevoix, Frangois-Xavier, Pre, Beccard des Aulnis, Jean-Baptiste, 1, 5, 9, 11-2, 14 311 Chateaurenault, Frang_ois-Louis Bedford, Gerard, 159 Rousselet, Marquis de, 142, 181, Beeston, Sir William, 2 195, 341, 356, 359 Belauger, Charles, 254 Chaulnes, Amiral, 153 Belledalle, Jean Porquet de, 109 Choiseul, Etienne-Franôis, Due de, Braud, Joseph, 251 13 Bernard, Samuel, 305, 309 Churchill, George, Admiral, 237 Besons, Bazin des, 392 Clairambault, Commissaire, 352 Betagh, William, 3 Clarges, Sir Thomas, 159 Blnac, Louis, 203 Clark, Sir George, 77, 240 Boislor, Jean de, 337 Clark, G N, 339 Boinpard, Pierre de Cassis, 270 Clron, Claude, Sieur, 262, 266
510
INDEX OF PERSONS Dunbar, Robert, 139, 147, 149 Duncan, Jonathan, 353, 377 Durand, Jean, 254 Dursley, James Viscount, ViceAdmiral, 461 Du Tillet, Commissaire, 127 Du Trousset de Valincour, 91 Ellis, Sir William, 151 Esquemeling, John, 5, 11-2, 14 Evans, Sir Stephen, 235 Eydoux, Ange, 270 Falkland, Lord, 160 Falla, Michael, 349, 377 Faulconnier, Pierre, 73, 227 Feuille, Louis, Father, 327 Fisher, Sir Godfrey, 32 Fitzgerald, Antoine, 147 Fitzgerald, Patrick, 146 Fitz-James, Henry Duke of Berwick, 143 Fiandre, Intendant de, 108 Forbin, Antoine, Chevalier de, 79-81, 91, 170, 185-6, 193, 215, 218, 249, 251 Forbin-Gardanne, Claude Corate de, 60, 111, 114, 297, 299, 310 Fougeray, Jean Nouail du, 289 Fougeray, Pierre-Francois, 311 Fox, Captain, 485 Gallet, Vincent-Robert, 311 Galliflet, Captain, 249, 263 Gastines, M de, 180, 186 Graldin, Jacques, 305 Graldin, Nicolas ('le jeune1), 148, 315 Geraldine (or Graldin), Antoine, 141, 145 Geraldine, Sir James, 141, 144 Geraldine (or Graldin), Nicolas, 148 Geraldine (or Graldin), Raymond, 141, 145 Geraldine (or Graldin), Nicolas (the younger), 145 Geraldine (or Graldin), Richard, 146, 148-9 Gilbert, Flix, Sieur, 245 Godolphin, Sidney first Earl, 346, 454, 466, 472 Golding, John, 157-8, 162 Goold, John, 158 Gough, Edward, 115 Gouin de Beauchesne, Jacques, 311, 328, 332 Gouin de Langrolay, Francois-Auguste, 311 Gould, Edward, 237 Graaf, Laurens de, 7 Graraont, Due de, 189 Grandpr, Etienne Nicolas de, 192-3, 244-252, 262-3, 267, 269, 276 Grandville, Charles Loquet de, 303-4 Graton, Jacques, 194, 206 Grenonville, Captain de, 308, 430-1 Gresy, Guillaurae, 301 Grignan, Corate de, 127 Hallay, Joachim Descazaux du, 328 Harold, Walter, 146
Clron, Procureur, 275-6 Cochart, Jacques, 191, 194, 199, 206 Cotlogen, Alain Emmanuel, Marquis de, 109 Colbert, Jean-Baptiste, 121 Cole, Robert, 33 Collins, Darby, 158 Constable, John, 151 Coornaert, Emile, 73 Corbett, Thomas, 480-2 Coulanges, Jacques de Gallet de, 310, 313-4 Courtney, Stephen, 3 Courserac, Chevalier de, 317 Creagh, David, 155, 161 Cromwell, Oliver, 6 Crozat, Antoine, 326 Cruice, Walter, 146 Cruvelier, Hugues, 262 Dahlgren, E W, 287, 318, 325 Dampier, William, 3, 5, 7-9, 13-5, 336 Dandennes, Jacques, 191 Danemberg, Ferdinando, 149 Daniel, Cyprien, 251 Danycan, Noel, Sieur de Lpine, 22, 87, 129, 174, 189, 279, 290-1, 314-5, 326, 328, 332 Darqustade, Joachim, 329, 332 Darquistade, Rene, 329 Daudruy, Pierre, 104 David, Flix, 269 Davy, Charles, Baiili de la Pailleterie, 250. Debien, Gabriel, 8 Dedons, Barthlmy, 245, 261 Defoe, daniel, 2-5, 12-14 De Jange, Jhr, 60 De Launay, Captain, 337 Delezet, Anne-Henry, 89, 109 Delumeau, Jean, 73, 280 Demadrys, Intendant, 170 Dericqson, Antoine, 301 Desaugiers, Chevalier, 113 Desclouzeaux, Hubert Champy, Chevalier de, 312. Desclouzeaux, Intendant, 176, 197-8 Des Grassires, Inspecteur-Gnral, 176 Dieud, Chevalier de, 203, 268 Dilkes, Sir Thomas, Rear-Admiral 340 Dobre, Elisha, 349 Dobre, Elize, 376, 379 Dobree, William, 349, 382 Doublet, Jean, 105, 148, 215 Drake, Francis, 350 Drakeford, Richard, 478-485 Du Bacage, Captain, 185 Ducasse, J-B, l, 2, 13-14 Duclerc, Jacques-Francois, 196, 202 Duclerc, Jean-Francois, 313 Dudley, Governor, 25 Duguay-Trouin, Rene, 28, 113, 174, 181, 185, 192, 194-5, 200, 201, 202, 206, 215, 235, 244, 279, 284, 288, 290, 297-323, 328, 461-2 Duguay, Intendant, 81, 86, 90, 105, 107, 109, 111-2, 114-5, 180, 183, 190, 192-3, 196-7, 205, 231 DumarHsq, Edward, 350 Du Molard, Sieur, 127
INDEX OF PERSONS Harries (or Harris), Matthew, 86
511
Hauser, Henri, 404 Hawke, Edward first Baron, Admiral,

463, 495 Hedges, Sir Charles, 439, 474 Heinsius, Anthonie, 241, Henry VIII, King of England, 156 Herefort, Roger, 115, 149, Hervey, Augustus, 463 Hestroye, Pottier de la, 181, 186 Hogga (Khoja) Alderhaman, 37 Holsten-Gottorp, Duke of 54 Holt, Sir John, 164
Iberville, Pierre Leraoyne d', 1, 22,

174, 195, 205 Iberville, d', brothers, 215, 237 Innocent XI, Pope, 30
Jackson, Robert, 449 Jackson, William, 8 Jacob, Capitaine, 263 James II, King of England, 139-40, 145, 153, 155-6 James III (Stuart: Old Pretender), 145, 149 Jasper, Edward, 478-84 Jeffrey, Robert, 105 Jennings, Sir John, Admiral, 234 Jennings, Sir William, 144 Jessen, Theodor Balthasar von, 51 Johnson, Charles, 13 Jones, Thomas, 158, 162 Jonville, Commissaire, 257-8, 280 Jouin, Abbe Noel, 328 Jourdan, Jean, 22, 146 Jure, Charles Hercule, 261 Kearney, Richard, 161 Kennedy, George, 146 Knap, Henry, 377 Knap, John, 378 Labat, Pre, 5, 12, 168 Lambert, Patrice, 146 La Moinerie Miniac, Chevalier de, 192, 315 La Motte, Dubois de, 201, 315 La Motte, Guillara de, 315 La Motte, Captain, 485 Langeolay, Goiun de, 313 Langeron, Captain de, 220 Languedoc, Montbars de, 7 Larchier, Captain, 263 La Roncire, Charles Germain Marie Bourel de, 244 Laubepin, Chevalier de, 252, 269 Lagier, Honor, 266 La Vasseur, Gabriel Henry, 189 Leake, Sir Andrew, Commodore, 27 Le Blanc, Intendant, 87, 105 Lebret, Intendant, 431 Le Brun (or Browne), Edward, 380 Lefebure, Daniel, 377, 381 Lefebure, Samuel, 383 Lefer, Francois de Beauvais, 181, 192, 201,"290, 311, 313 Lefer, Pierre de la Saudre, 290, 311, 313-4 Lefer, Deschesnays, 290 Le Cendre, Thomas, 305 Lemai re, L, 244
Le Harchant, Thomas, 349, 377, 381 Le Marchant, William, 377 Le Mei, Louia, 183 Lemesurier, Thomas, 377-9 Le Moyne, de Bienville, 24 Lempereur, Sieur de, 82, 111, 128 131, 135, 175, 177, 287 Lemprire, Jacques, 281, 285, 288, 380 Lemprire, James, 350 Lente, Christian von, 49 Le Pelley, John, 339 Le Pers, Pere, 1 Lery, Daniel de, 126 Levasseur, Gabriel-Henry, 298, 307 Levesque, Beaubriand, 148, 192 Littleton, Doctor, 160 Louis XIV, King of France, 3, 22, 140, 153, 167, 215, 298, 344, 395, 436. L'Ollonais (of Sables), 7, 10 Lowther, Governor, 232 Lucker, Edward, 146 Louvois, Michel Ie Tellier, Marquis de, 218 Lusanây, Commissaire, 341 Lussan, Ravenau de, 7, 14 Luttrell, Narcissus, 342 Luzerne, Corate de, 205 Macarthy, Charles, 161 Magdaniel, Captain, 182 Magny, Sieur du, 126 Magon de la Lande, Jean, 311, 313-4, 319 Magy, J-B, 270 Maillet, Joseph, 249, 251, 255, 264266, 268-9, 276 Maintenon, Francoise d'Aubign, Marquise de, 218 Maisonneuve, Pierre, 183 M31o, Henri, 77, 86, 90, 183, 227, 244 Malvezin, T, 390 Marlborough, John Churchill Duke of, 215 Marnier, Fr, 270 Marsden, R G, 339 Martin, Lawrence, 349 Masson, Paul, 405 Masters, Sir Harcourt, 455, 477 Mary Beatrice, Queen, 140 Matalieu, Francois, 262 Maurin, HonorS, 263 Mazarin, Giulio Cardinal, 9 Meynne, Cornells, 107 Middleton, Charles Earl of, 154, 156 Mjihlen, Jrgen thor, 51 Moisnet, Jean, 87, 110 Molesworth, John Viscount, 234 Montespan, Francoise-Athnais, Marquise de, 221 Monthaudouin, Rene, 401 Moore, Governor, 24 Morel, Anne, 325 Morgan, Henry, 5-7, 11-12 Morgan, Joseph, 31 Murphy, John, 161-2 Mustapha Dey, 36 Mustapha Khoja, 37 Nagle, Peter, 140
512
INDEX OF PERSONS Robert, Francois-Roger (cont), 132, 135, 181, 85, 194, 196-8, 205, 260, 285, 298-9, 309-310, 313, 313, 315, 410, 468 Roche, Nicholas, 141 Rocquemadore, Marquze de, 195, 262 Rogerie, H Bourde de la, 220 Rogers, Woodes, 3, 4, 12-3, 336 Roncire, Charles de la, 90, 220 Roquefeuil, Captain de, 308 Roquemador, Marquise de, 258 Rookby, Justice, 158 Rooke, Sir George, Admiral, 32, 49, 454 Rosa, Jos de, 332 Roussel freres, 269 Rouzier, Guillaume, 290-291 Roze, Chevalier, 270 Rycx, Jan, 80, 87 Sabrn, Bagnols Chevalier de, 200 Sagnac, Philippe, 389 St Lo, George, 142-4, 466, 468 Saint Mar, Colbert de, 195, 199 Saint Pol de Hicourt, Marc-Antoine Chevalier de, 60, 89, 109-10, 181, 194-6, 220, 313 Sarsfield, Patrick Earl of Lucan, 157 Saumarez, John de, 349 Saumarez, Thomas de, 349 Saupin, Jean, 200 Saus, Cornil, 80, 189, 192-3, 206 Sausmarez, Jean, 376 Sausmarez, Mathieu de, 375, 377 Saussillon, Andre, 261 Sautijn, Jacob, 407, 410-2, 419-28, 432, 434 Sautijn, Jan, 410-11 Sawkins, R, 7, 10, 14 Schrijver, Captain, 182 Seignelay, Jean Baptiste Antoine Colbert, Marquis de, 121, 187, 218 Sergison, Charles, 466-7 Shaaban Dey, 30 Sharp, Bartholomew, 10, 14 Shelvocke, G, 3, 4 Simoens, Jan, 71, 182 Sonigas, Diego de, 336 Spycket, Jean, 189 Stanhope, James first Earl, 395, 407 Stephen, Peter, 349 Stratford, Thomas, 144, 150, 153 Subercase, Auger de, 27 Suffren de Saint Tropez, Pierre Andre de, 496 Tanquerel de la Basse Rue, Nicolas, 311 Taverne, Nicolas, 80, 86, 91, 105, 107, 115, 194 Taylor, Joseph, 449-462 Tertre, Pre du, 14 Thibeaudeau, Claude, 106 Thoumes, Nicolas, 378 Tindall, Mathew, 160 Toulouse, Louis-Alexandre de Bourbon, Corate de, 150, 189, 202, 219, 221, 315 Tourville, Anne-Hilarion de Cotentin, Corate de, 133-4, 219 Tranchaudire, La Perche de la, 315 Treby, Sir George, 158
Nash, Samuel, 40
Maudires, Nicolas l'Hostellier des,

290, 305, 311 Nesmond, Andre Marquis de, 191, 304, 309 Neville, John, 33 Newton, Doctor, 161 Nicholson, Colonel, 25-6 Nicolas, Jean, 205 Norey, Chevalier de, 200, 203 Oldfield, John, 159 Oldys, William, 160, 165 Ollires, Chevalier d', 262 Orgement, Louvigny d', 178 Oxenstierna, Bengt, 50 Pallis, Commandant, 263 Pares, Richard, 339, 435 Parker, Sir George, 470 Parkhurst, John, 467 Paschall, John, 467 Patoulet, Intendant, 106, 148, 171 Peirier, J, 270 Ppinet, Francois de, 251 Peter I (The Great), 45 Petty, Sir William, 64 Pilles, Chevalier de, 256, 271 Piorget, Rene, 126 Pin, Francois Lefer du, 289-291 Pinfold, Sir Thomas, 160 Pitouays, Lieutenant, 325-338 Pitt, Thomas, 304 Pitt, William, 501 Piuma, Sieur de Genes, 262 Pleits, Jacques, 148 Plets, Jacques-Winoc, 87, 89, 104119, 148, 194 Pointis, B de Saint Jean, Baron de, 195, 199, 297 Poitevin, Dupr, 287 Poitevin family, 290 Pomereu, Intendant, 179 Pontchartrain, Jerome Phlypeaux (the younger), 105, 106, 108, 111, 128, 193, 198, 200-2, 204, 206, 276, 285, 287,299, 307, 313-5, 317, 318, 397, 402, 431 Pontchartrain, Louis Phlypeaux (the elder), 81, 90, 105, 121, 150, 152-3, 155-6, 176, 189, 197, 219, 307, 308 Pontevez, Marquis de, 263 Ponthon, King's Proctor, 89 Porter, John, 144 Pownall, Philemon, 452 Pradel, Daniel de, 318 Pranin, Emmanuel, 266 Quidley, Patrick, 158 Remy, Nicolas, 106 Reynders, Salomon, 407, 413, 419, 431-3 Reynolds, Thomas, 451, 473 Riencourt, Consul, 130 Ringrose, Basil, 7 Rios, Gastel dos, 333 336 Riviere, Louis, 270 Robert, Francois-Roger, 126, 128,
INDEX OF PERSONS Trouin, Marguerite, nee Boscher, 304 Trouin de la Barbinais, Luc, 189, 202, 209 Trouin, Duguay, see Duguay-Trouin Trouin brothers, 189, 205 Tully, Thomas, 143 Tyrconnel, Richard Talbot Duke of, 140 Valincourt, Jean Baptiste du Trosset de, 185, 270, 307 Valincourt, Henri du Trousset de, 221 Vauban, Sebastien le Prestre de, 73, 80, 83, 86, 91, 112, 139, 171, 187, 194, 216, 218, 220, 358 Vaughan, Captain, 158, 161-2 Vauvr, Jean-Louis Girardin de, 125126, 129, 134, 189-90, 197-8, 204205, 250, 257-8, 431 Vergier, Controleur, 77-8, 108, 170, 186 Vernon, Edward, Admiral, 458 Vernon, James, 4 Vertesale, Pigault de, 110 Vetch, Samuel, 25 Vicard, J, 270 Villet, J, 270 Voi lie, Jacques, 89 Wager, Charles, Commodore, 454 Walker, Sir Horenden, 26
513
Walpole, Sir Robert, 121, 139 Walsh, Robert (?), 162

Warren, Sir Peter, Vice-Admiral, 485 Watling, Ravenau, 7 Westcomb, Martin, 469 Whitworth, Sir Charles, 343 William III, King of England (William of Orange), 4, 43-4, 82, 139, 140, 159, 215, 450, 501 Williams, Elisha, 349 Wulf, Hathieu de, 182
INDEX OF SHIPS' NAMES Abraham, 213, Achille, 200, 206, 315 Adelaide, 211 Adventure of Maryland, 358-9 Aigle, 317, 319 Aimable Marie de St Malo, 356, 371 Alexander Ann, 361 Amazone (42), 202, 251 Amazone (36), 313, 315 Ambuscade, 365, 471-2, 490 Ameriquain, 455 L'Amiti, 57, 105, 117 Amity, 491 Andrew, 378 Ange Gardien, 136, 175 Angelica, 484-5 Angelica de Redon, 363 Anna Catarina, 446 Anna Katharina, 55 Anne, 367 Anne of Aberdeen, 376, 382 Anne Victoire, 371 Aquiln, 206 Argonauta, 315 Armes d'Hussum, 55 Armes de Stettin, 56 Arms of Frederickshall, 48 Adia, 415 Astree, 315 Auguste, 80, 133, 193, 322 L'Aventurier Fortune, 106 Aventurier Sans Pareil, 263 Aymable, 331 Bachelor's Endeavour, 371 Badine, 140 Belle Alliance, 372 Beringhen, 456, 460 Bien-Aimee, 247, 248 Bien Arrive, 54 Blackwall, 80 Bonadventura, 455 Bonheur, 460 Bosbeek, 432 Brave, 301 Bretonne, 207 Bucephalus, 348, 358, 367, 382 Bucephalus Galley, 382 Burchett Galley, 361, 370 Cadogan Galley, 385 Carolus, 413 Carolus Landgrave von Hesse Cassel, 445 Caterina Laurina, 446 Catherine of Havre de Grace, 456 Cavalier de Riga, 54 Centurion, 493 Cerf Volant, 2 Charles de Stromstatt, 59 Charles Gaily de Rochelle, 370, 452, 460 Charmante, 267 Chasse, 351, 361, 368 Chasse (20), 383, 386 Chasse (80 tons), 368 Chasse (150 tons), 368 Chasse (200 tons), 368 Chasseur, 186 Chasseur de Calais, 357, 372 Chasseur de St Malo, 357 Chef d'Oeuvre, 172, 176 Chne Royal, 155 Chester, 485-6, 493 Cheval Marin Dor, 57 Chevel Marin, 379, 384 Chichester Galley, 382 Churchill Galley, 368, 386 Clement, 367 Coetquen, 146 Comte de Breteuil, 311 Corate de Vrede, 56 Comtesse de Samsoe, 57 Conception, 252, 266, 278 Concorde, 315 Concorde (en flute), 318 Concordia, 58 Confiance, 333 Conqueror, 351, 361, 369, 371 Conqueror of London, 362
514
INDEX OF SHIPS' NAMES Fijf Gebroeders, 446 Fine, 455, 456, 460 Fisher, 368 Fleuron, 203, 277 Flora, 483 Florissant, 488 Flying Horse, 351, 369 Flying Passenger, 460 Fort de Curacoa, 363 Fortuna, 444 Fortuna (Hamburg), 446 Fortuna (Stockholm), 443, 444, 446 Fortunate Princess, 456 Fortune, 154, 246 Fortune (4) (Dunkirk), 163 Fortune (Stockholm), 56, 372, Fortune de Marseille, 488 Fortune, 175 Le Fortune, 148, 150, 304, 305, 306 Le Fortune (Geraldine Privateer), 155 Fortune de la Mer, 246, 262, 264, 265 Fortune de Toningue, 55 Fortune Dore (Danzig), 56 Fortune-Galre, 250, 266 Four Brothers, 378 Four Brothers of Tremblade, 361 Fox, 480 Francis and Joseph of St Malo, 362 Francois, 485 Francois (40), 189, 298, 305-7, 331 Francois de Brest, 362 Gabriel de Arquis, 363, 364 Galathe, 190, 200 Galre de Malte, 255, 261 Galere de Tonningue, 55 Galere Invincible, 267 Galley de Candas, 372 Gentile, 199 George, 371 Gilded Unicorne, 48 Girard, 287 Glorious de Dieppe, 363 Gloucester, 319, 453 Goed Hoop, 413 De Goede Hoop, 443 Golden Lion, 363 Golden Orange Tree, 37 Good Fellowship, 361, 378 Good Fortune of Ostend, 356 Good Hope, 413 Good Luck, 362 Gosport, 457 Gouden Eendragt, 444 Grafton, 193, 194 Grand Dauphin, 288 Grand Prieur, 158 Greyhound Sloop, 352, 371 Griffioen, 432 Grote Rooseboom, 409, 415 Guernsey Frigate, 349, 351, 355-6, 367-8, 377, 383 Guernsey Galley, 357, 384-5 Guerriere, 264-5 Guillaume, 287 Gustavus, 446 Half Moon, 37 Hampton Court, 470 Hanover, 368 Hanover Sloop, 356 Hans en Jacob, 443, 446
Content, 430, 431 Copperberg, 57 Cumberland, 201, 299, 310 Curieux, 290 Daniel! Sloop, 356, 382 Danycan, 298 Dauphin, 56 Dauphin Blanc, 56 Dauphine, 185, 206 Deceiver, 361 Defiance, 378-9 Demi Lune, 56 Demoiselle Anne, 56 De Paeuw, 414 Desmarest, 456 Deux FrSres, 461 Devonshire, 478 De Winthout, 444, 446 Diamant, 203 Diligence, 351, 471 Diligent, 290 Don de Dieu, 362 Don du Saint Esprit, 175 Dragon, 453 Due de Berry, 271 Duke of Bavaria, 356, 363, 371 Durrell Galley, 380 Eagle, 361 Eclatant, 211 Eclatante, 251 Edgar, 470 Elephant Dor, 108 Elizabeth, 158 Elizabeth de Calais, 371 Emraude (of Dieppe), 363 L'Emeraude (of Royan), 363 Embuscade, 200 Endeavour, 366, 367 Engel Gabriel, 444 England's Frigott, 148 English Heart, 368 Entreprenant, 371, 456, 460 Enterprise, 458 L'Envieuse, 363 Envieuse de St Malo, 371 Esperance, 67, 396, 461 L'Esprance (GlUckstadt), 55 Esperance de la Paix, 458 L'Esperance de Nantes, 146 Espion, 147 Etoile du Jour, 56 Expedition, 380 Faam, 441 Faem, 415,423 Falmouth, 333, 335, 362 Fantaisie, 80 Faucon, 246, 264 Faucon Jaune, 56 Faulcon, 357, 371 Favorite, 189, 312 Pendant (50) , 211 Pendant (58), 200, 264, Ferme, 189, 206 Fidele, 182 Fidele (48), 206 Fidele (60), 315, 317, 319 La Fidele, 147 Fidelle, 252, 265 Fidelity, 351
INDEX OF SHIPS' NAMES Happy Return, 158 Henry and Mary, 58 Hercule, 207, 304 Hercules, 424 Hermione, 319, 329 Hirondelle, 246, 248, 252, 254, 264, 268, 270, 278, 458 Hocquart, 456 Hoop, 441, 445, 446 Hope, 58, 361, 368, 385 Hopewell, 361, 371, Hopewell de Cork, 370 Hopewell Galley, 351, 36, 368 Hunter, 386 Illustre, 401 Immacule Conception dit Due de Berry, 253 Indien, 211 Indiscret, 413 Indomptable, 484 Industry, 340, 351, 381, 383 Jacques, 158 Jacques dt la Palestine, 53, 274 Jalousie, 433 James and Turner Galley, 355 James de l'Isle Dieu, 363 St James of the Ile de Dars, 363 Jason, 203, 332 Lively, 481 Liverpool, 372 Lizard, 493 Louis, 155 Loyal Clancarty, 154, 161, 164 Loyseau, 335 Lusitania de Londres, 261 Lyme, 449 Lyon Blanc, 370 Madame, 265 Maggott, 348, 367
515
Magnanime, 317, 319 Marcella, 373

Margaretha, 445 Marguerite, 176
La Marguerite, 55
Maria, 444 Maria of Riga, 361 La Marie Angelique, 365 Marie-Anne, 257
La Marie de Bordeaux, 361

Marie de Consbach Marie Franchise, 175, 369 Marie Pontchartrain, 186 Marin, 140, 149 Marlborough (2 ships), 386 Marlborough Galley, 354-5, 368, 372 Marquis de Forviile, 268 Marquis de Thianges, 301 Marquis d'Or, 351, 368, 373, 383 Mars, 315 Martin Galley, 382 Mary Gaily, 455 Mary (Teignmouth) 158 Mary James d'Audierne, 365. 367, 382 Mary Sloop, 372 Merchant Galley, 382
Jeune Estienne et Andre, 67

Jeune Francaise, 372 Jeune Veuv 371
Les Jeux UO) (and see Les Yeux),

144, 148. John Galley, 367, 373 Jolly Shallop, 369 Joseph, 311 Jourdan Galere, 252, 270, 276 Juffrow Agnetha, 361 Juffrouw Amelia, 429 Juffrow Anna (Stade) 56, 444-5 Juffrow Anna (Stockholm), 444 Juffrow Catarina, 446 Juffrow Catharina, 57 Juffrow Cornelia, 361 Juffrow Margarita, 58, 441, 444 Juffrow Maria, 441, 446 Juffrow Regina, 57 Juffrow Sophia, 445, 446 Jung Frow Hellena, 52 Justitia, 441, 443 Kent, 478 Kinsale, 481 Koperberg, 57 Kork Marchand, 424 Kroon, 445 Landgrave von Hesse Cassel, 58 Larke, 368 Legere de Rochelle, 371 Lennox, 478 Lonore, 312 Leopard Dore Levrette, 155 Le Lvrier, 146 Liberte, 422 Libert de Stade, 57 Licorne, 111 Liefde, 443, 446 Litchfield, 453, 460, 499
Mercure, 203
Mercurius, 421 Mermaid, 382 Mignon, 111 Milfort, 211 Moqueuse, 255 Mordaunt (2 ships), 386 Mordaunt Sloop, 371, 385 Nyade, 204 Neptune, 56, 264 Neptune Galley, 385 Nightingale, 220 Nonsuch Galley, 378 Nostra Seora de Bon Voiagio, 361 Norton galley, 490 N.D. de Carmes et St. Antoine de Padoue, 262 N.D. de Bonne Rencontre, 273 N.D. de la Garde dt Jourdan Galere, 267 N.D. de La Garde St. Francois, 245, 251, 261 N.D. de l'Assomption, 288 N. D. de Bon Secours, 371 N.D. del Corso, 445 N.D. de l'Incarnation, 318 N. D. des Bonnes Nouvelles, 155 N.D. de Vierge, 371 N.D. du Bon Voyage, 248, 254 N.D. du Mont Carmel, 246 N.D. du Mont Vierge, 369 N.D. du Rosaire, 261 N.D. l'Annonciade, 254
516
INDEX OF SHIPS' NAMES
Nottingham, 368 Riche-Galre, 252, 278 Nuestra Senhora, 318 Rochester, 475 Nuestra Seora del Camino, 479, 483 Roos, 413 Rosenburgh of Stockholm, 361 Royal Ann Gaily, 458 Oiseau, 335 Olive de Kehruq, 361 Roue de Fortune, 148 Royale, 456 Onbekenden, 416 Oxford, 478 Roy de Danemarck, 57 Ruby, 201 Runner Frigate, 361 Parfait, 264, 277, 455 Runner Galley, 356 Patience, 57 RusSe, 289 Patientia, 57 Patriarch Abraham Sage, 246, 264 Patriarchs des Indes, 328-338 Sailor's Adventure, 359 Pelegrina, 34, 40 Sailor's Prosperity, 351, 355, 371 Pelican Dore, 56 St. Aaron, 158 Pellican, 57 St. Anna, 413 Pembroke, 368, 381 St. Anna van Langesout, 445-6 Pembroke Galley, 352, 371, 384 St. Andre de Stockholm, 154 Penelope, 485 St. Anne, 278 Perle, 432 St. Anne de Guildo, 371 Phlypeaux, 332, 336 St. Anne of Brittany, 345 Pierre-Marie, 136 St. Anne-Jesus-Marie, 254, 273-4 Le Pigeon, 368 St. Anthony de Dunkirk, 361, 372 Pigeon Blanc, 154 St. Anthony de Rebelln, 362 Pigeon Bleu, 57 St. Antoine, 332, 338 Plateron d'Argouge, 135 St. Antoine de Padoue, 249 Pluto, 486 St. Barbe d'Ostend, 371, 373 Postilion of Copenhagen, 361 St. Catherine, 481 President de Grndan, 336 St. Charles, 332 Prince de Galles, 143, 146, 154, St. Claude, 252, 275 163 Prince Eugene Galley, 355, 357, 368, St. Claude le Surprenant, 262, 266 St. Esprit, 261 386 St. Francois, 328 Prince Frederick, 58 St. Francois d'Assise, 361 Prince George, 454 St. Francois de Peneri, 361 Prince Heureaux des Asturias, 319 St. Franc_ois-Xavier, 247, 254, 263 Prince of Wales, 144 St. Franc,ois-Xavier et St. Dominique, Princessa, 463, 478, 479 261 Princess Ane, 305 St. Germain, 363 Princesse, 163 St. Jacob, 444 La Princesse, 148 St. Jacques, 261 Princesse Amelia, 478 St. Jago, 479 Princess Hedwig Sophia, 57 St. James, 363 Profond, 307 St. James de Drontheim, 397 Propheet Daniel, 58 St. James of Ile de Dars, 368, 371 Propheet Elias, 413-4, 426, 429-33 St. Jean Baptiste, 254, 326 Prophete Elie, 402 St. Jean 1'Evangeliste, 257 St. John, 57 Prosperity, 351 St. John de l'Isle de Dieu, 363 Prosperity of Waterford, 352, 369 St. John de Pont Labe, 363 Prosperous, 351, 371, 372 St. John of Stockholm, 489 Prosperous Galley, 372, 385 St. Joris, 446 Prosperous Sloop, 385 St. Joseph, 143, 158, 246, 336, 479, Providence, 158, 364 484 Providence d'Olonne, 429, 432 St. Joseph de Mistre, 361 Prudence, 422 St. Laurens, 445 Prudent, 189 St. Louis, 275 St. Marguerite, 248, 254, 273, 274 Queen of Angels, 317 St. Marie, 107 St. Marie de Dunkerque, 154, 159, 371 Railleuse, 149, 206 St. Martin, 355 Reine d'Espagne, 288 St. Martin's Sloop, 378 Renommee, 246 St. Martin de Sable d'Olonne, 364 Reserve of Guernsey, 376 St. Nicolas, 57, 371 Resolution Sloop, 490 St. Nicolas (privateer), 154 Restoration, 368 St. Nicolas le Phnix, 261, 264, 269 Revenge, 376, 381, 384, 386 273, 275 Revenge Galley, 362, 371 St. Paul, 458 Revenge of the Flying Sloop, 385 St. Peter, 57, 353 Revenge Sloop, 354, 368 St. Peter de l'Isle au Moine, 372-3 Reyne Marie, 146
INDEX OF SHIPS' NAMES St. Pierre, 271 St. Pierre (of Lbeck), 55 St. Pierre (of Nantes), 481, 484 St. Pierre of Stockholm), 56 St. Roze, 11 St. Tromphine, 271 Samaritain de l'Isle Dieu, 364 Sans-Pareil, 255, 264, 268, 311-2 Sarah de Jersey, 369 Toulouse, 455 Toulouse (60), 247, 249, 251, 264 Le Toulouse (62), 430, 431 Trident, 200, 249, 251, 264 Triomphante, 253, 256 Triton, 453, 455 La Trompeuse, 149 Trompeuse de St Malo, 356 Twee Gebroeders, 446 Two Brothers, 369, 380, 383 Uhlostadt, 58, 398 Union, 351, 358, 368 Union de Nantes, 368, 370 Union Galley, 367 Vainqueur, 340, 351-2, 354, 361 Vergulde Duift, 444 Victoire, 315 Viotoire de St Malo, 371 Victory, 398
517
Sarsfield, 146
Le Sauvage, 149 Seine, 370 Serieux, 264 Serpente (26), 206
La Serpente (24) , 148

Severn Galley, 357, 361 Seymour, 305 Silvie, 254, 264, 268 Sirenne, 250 Soleil, 145, 154, 158, 164 Soleil Dore, 87 Sorcire, 141 La Sorcire (24), 148, 206 Sorlings, 449 Sorlingues (28), 199 Southampton, 467 Southsea Castle, 362, 455 Stadt of Stockholm, 458 Success of Boston, 362 Suffolk, 454
Vierge de GrSce, 319, 331-2

Vigilance of Belfast, 369 Vigilant, 356
Vijf Gebroeders, 58 Virgin's Grace, 455

Vliegende Faam, 409 Vliegende Mercurius, 432
Vreede, 57
Walcheren, 417
Suiken Holen, 441

Superbe, 192, 194, 458 Swallow, 352, 368, 372 Sylvie, 266 Tempite, 206 Terrible, 246, 261 Terror, 372 The Good Fortune of Ostend, 371 Thetis, 456 Thetis, 460 Three Eagles, 356, 364 Tiger, 478 Tigre (32), 189, 199, 211 Tintamare, 365 Toisn d'Or, 333, 336
White Bear, 57 White Elephant, 413 Whitehall Galley, 362

Wife of Sable d'Ollonne, 344 Windruiff, 443 William Galley, 356, 372 Witten Olifant, 413, 443, 445
Wrestling Jacob, 361

Les Yeux (and see Les Jeux), 206
Zephyr, 481
Zeven Provincin, 413-4, 422, 426, 430-3

J.S. Bromley - Corsairs and Navies, 1600-1760

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CORSAIRS AND NAVIES

Sebastian le Prestre de Vauban. By Rigaud (Girandoti)

CORSAIRS AND NAVIES

Printed and bound by Billing and Sons Ltd., Worcester

325 339 389 407 435 449 463 495 505

Index compiled by Cecilia Dolley

PERMISSIONS Giraudon (Frontispiece, 9); Presses de la Cit (6).

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JOHN SELWYN BROMLEY

JOHN BROMLEY, HISTORIAN

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

John Bromley, Historian

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

John Bromley, Historian

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

John Bromley, Historian

PUBLICATIONS OF J.S. BROMLEY

Publications of J.S. Bromley to the Anglo-Dutch Historical Conference 1962, (Groningen).

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Studies, ed. J. Webb, N. Yates and S. Peacock (Portsmouth), pp. 169-99.

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Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Outlaws at Sea, 1660-1720

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

96. BL. Add. MSS 39, 946, Ib. 10V-

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1 760

The Caribbean and Atlantic Seaboard

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1712

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1 712

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1712

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1712

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1712

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

A Letter-Book of Robert Cole, 1694-1712

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

The North Sea in Wartime, 1688-1713

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

The North Sea in Wartime, 1688-1713

Corsairs and Navies, 1660-1760

The North Sea in Wartime, 1688-1713