Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

fhips as were ready, leaving directions, how and where the 1708. reft fhould join him. On the 25th they came to an anchor off the ifle of Pines. In March, the commodore received advice at two feveral times from captain Pudner, who was ftationed near Porto-Bello, that the galleons, with the king's money, could not fail before the ift of May; upon which it was refolved to return to Jamaica, but it was given out, that they were only gone to cruize. On the 6th of April, the commodore anchored at Port-Royal keys, and having taken in provisions, he failed again on the 14th, and, about eight or ten days after, gave chace to feveral fhips off Bocca, Chica, fome of which escaped into Carthagena, and others he loft fight of in hazy weather. On the 23d of May, the Anne floop joined the commodore from the Bastimentes, and brought a letter from captain Pudner, with advice, that the galleons, being thirteen fail, were at fea, coming from Carthagena. The commodore had then with him the Expedition, Kingston, Portland, and Vulture fire-fhip, and cruized till the 27th, in expectation of the galleons; but, not meeting with them, he began to fear they had intelligence of his being on the coast, and were gone for the Havanna. On the 28th of May, about noon, the galleons, in all feventeen fail, were discovered from his top-maft-head; and, at the fame time, they discovered him, but, despifing fo small a force, refolved to proceed. He chafed them till evening, when they, finding they could not weather the Baru, a fmall island, which lay in their paffage to Carthagena, refolved to difpute the matter there, and ftretching therefore to the northward with an easy fail, they drew as well as they could into a line of battle. The admiral, who wore a white pennant at the main-top-maft-head, in the center, the vice-admiral, with the fame pennant at the fore-top-mast-head, in the rear, and the rear-admiral, who bore the pennant on the mizzentop-maft-head, in the van, about half a mile from each other, there being other fhips between them. Of the feventeen two were floops, and one a brigantine, which stood in for the land; two others of them were French fhips, which, running away, had no fhare in the action; the reft were Spaniards. The commodore inftantly made his difpofition; he refolved to attack the admiral himself; gave orders to captain Simon Bridges, who commanded the Kingston, to engage the vice-admiral, and fent his boat to the Portland, commanded by captain Edward Windsor, with orders to attack the rear-admiral; and, as there was no immediate occafion for the fire-fhip, the plied to the windward.

The

1708.

up

The fun was juft fetting, when commodore Wager came with the admiral, and then beginning to engage, in about an hour and half's time (it being dark) fhe blew up, not without great danger to the Expedition, from the splinters and planks, which fell on board her, on fire, and the great heat of the blaft. Hereupon the commodore put abroad his fignal lights for keeping company, and endeavoured to continue fight of fome of the enemies fhips; but finding, after this accident, they began to feparate, and discovering but one, which was the rear-admiral, he made fail after her, and coming up about ten o'clock, when he could not judge which way her head lay, it being very dark, he happened to fire his broad-fide into her ftern, which did fo much damage, that it seemed to disable her from making fail; and being then to leeward, he, tacking on the Spaniard, got to windward of him, and the Kingston and Portland (which had by reason of the night, or the blowing up of the admiral, loft fight of the other fhips) following his lights foon after, came up with him, and affifting in taking the rear-admiral, who called for quarter about two in the morning. On board of this fhip he fent his boat to bring to him the chief officers; and, before the rifing of the fun, he saw one large fhip on his weather-bow, and three fail upon the weather quarter, three or four leagues off, lying then with their heads to the North, the wind being at North-eaft, an easy gale. Then he put out the fignal for the Kingston and Portland to chace to windward, not being able himself to make fail, being much difabled; and, as he had a great part of his men in the prize, fo were there no lefs than three hundred prisoners on board his own fhip.

On Sunday the 30th, the wind being from the north-east, to the north north-west, and but little of it, the Kingston and Portland had left off chase; but the commodore made the fignal for continuing it, which they did, and ran him out of fight, the fire-fhip still continuing with him; and he having lain by fome time, not only to put the prize in a condition of failing, but to refit his own rigging, made fail eastward on the gift, when the Kington and Portland joined him, and gave him an account, that the fhip they chafed was the viceadmiral, to which, as they said, they came fo near, as to fire their broadfides into her, but were fo far advanced towards the Salmadinas, a fhoal off Carthagena, that they were forced to tack, and leave her. This gave the commodore great uneafinefs, and determined him to call the captains of these fhips to account; but, in the mean time he

fet

sent them orders to take or deftroy a galleon of forty guns, 1708. which he understood by a Swedish fhip, that had been trad-N ing at Baru, had taken fhelter in that island. She was juft coming out of port, as the Kingston and Portland appeared; upon which her crew ran her a fhore, fet her on fire, and blew her up, fo that nothing could be got out of her, as the captains affirmed, and, as it appeared to the commodore afterwards, was true. On the 2d of June, the commodore finding his provisions and water fhort, the wind contrary, and nothing more to be done in thofe parts, resolved to fet the Spanish prifoners a fhore, according to their requeft, on the island of Baru, and then proceed for Jamaica; which he performed accordingly; and the Spanish rear-admiral retained, as long as he lived, a grateful sense of the commodore'scivility.

On the 8th of July, the Expedition, Kingston, and Vulture fireship, brought the prize fafe into Port-Royal harbour (b): here the commodore found the new act of parliament for the diftribution of prizes; and though he had before per

(b) The prifoners gave an account, that the admiral was a fhip of fixty-four brafs guns, with fix hundred men, called the St. Jofeph, and had on board, as fome faid, five millions of pieces of eight; but, according to others, seven millions in gold and filver; that the vice-admiral mounted fixty-four brafs guns, and had between four and five hundred men, with four, or, as fome faid, fix millions of pieces of eight: and that the rear-admiral was mounted with four and twenty guns, having eleven more in the hold, and between three and four hundred men: but that, upon fome difference between the admiral and him at PortoBello, orders were given, that no money fhould be shipped on board her; fo that thirteen chefts of pieces of eight, and fourteen pigs or fows of filver, which were privately brought on board in the night, and belonged to

fome of the paffengers, was all
the treafure, which was on board,
except what other might have
about them, or were in trunks,
of which they could give no ac-
count. This is the account,
which the prifoners gave. Se-
veral relations published foon af-
ter that time make the riches of
the admiral and vice-admiral to
have been far greater, the for-
mer at least thirty, and the lat-
ter twenty millions of pieces of
eight. They all however agree,
that the rear-admiral had no re-
giftred money on board. The
other Spanish fhips had little or
no money on board, but were
chiefly laden with cocao, as the
rear-admiral was, and but one of
them was of any confiderable
force, being of feven hundred
tuns burden, and having forty
brafs guns, and an hundred and
forty men. But the two French
fhips had about an hundred thou-
fand pieces of eight on board.

1708. mitted the failors to plunder as they thought fit, when the prize was taken, yet now he appointed agents, in obedience to that act of parliament, and ordered captain Long to deliver up near thirty thousand pounds worth of filver and effects, that he had taken between decks, in order to fatisfy the failors of the uprightness of his intentions. He likewife took care to dispatch intelligence to England, that ships might be fitted out to cruize for the galleons, that had escaped; and, on the 23d of July, he held a court-martial on the two captains Bridges and Windfor, who were both dismissed for not having done their duty in the late engagement (c).

The Moroc

Another fquadron of the British fleet, under the command. of Sir George Byng, carried over the arch-dutchefs Mary Anne, married to the king of Portugal, which was performed with great magnificence: fhe had a quick and easy paffage, arriving at Lisbon on the 27th of October. This did in the fame measure make amends to that crown for our failing them in not fending over the fupplies, that had been ftipulated. And it was a particular happiness, that the Spaniards were fo weak, as not to be able to take advantage of the naked and unguarded state, in which the Portuguese were at that time.

After this large account of foreign affairs, it is time to return to the transactions at home.

In the month of July, an ambaffador from the emperor of ambaffa- Fez and Morocco arrived in Great-Britain with a present of dor confined. fix lions for the queen; but upon his coming to Hammer

smith near London, he was put under an eafy confinement by way of reprizal for the restraint put upon captain Delaval, the queen's envoy in that country, before he reached that court; which happened upon a false report, that some ill usage had been offered to Hamet Ben Hamet Cardenas, the late Morocco ambaffador here. But, upon better information, the captain was released, as was alfo the Morocco ambaffador. However the British envoy did not think fit to

(c) Captain Bridges of the Kington was difmiffed, becaufe he left off chafe when within fhot of the Spanish vice admiral, doubting the pilot's knowledge, and being near the fhoal of Salmadinas, though the pilot offered to carry the hip within fhoal. Captain Windfor of the Portland was alfo difmiffed, for not bear

ing fo near the enemy, as to keep fight of fome of them, when they were engaged on the 28th in the night; for leaving off chace the next day, and for fhortning fail on the 30th, before he came up fo far with the Spanish vice-admiral near Salmadinas, as he might have done.

go

go in perfon to the court of Morocco, and only fent thither, 1708. with her majesty's letter and prefent, Mr. Corbiere, his fecretary, who was received with great demonftration of respect.

dor arrested

About this time an indignity offered in London to count The Mufcode Matucof, the Mufcovite ambaffador, was highly refented, vite ambaffanot only by himself, but likewife by all concerned in the preservation of the rights and privileges of public minifters. Thomas Morton, a laceman in King-street, Covent-Garden, and fome other tradefmen, to whom the ambaffador owed feveral fums of money, amounting in the whole to about three hundred pounds, finding he had taken his audience of leave, and being apprehenfive, that he would leave the kingdom without paying his debts, though a merchant in the city, trading to Mufcovy, had fet a day for fatisfying moft of them, held several consultations together, and at last refolved to arreft him; which was done accordingly, on the 21ft of July, in the open ftreet, with feveral aggravating circumftances. For the ambaffador, not knowing at fift the reason of his being feized, and imaging he was fet upon by villains, struggled in his own defence, and was ill-ufed and overpowered by the bailiffs, who carried him to a fpunging-house at the sign of the Black Raven, where he was detained till the earl of Feverfham and a merchant of the city had bailed him. The ambaffador, incenfed at this infult, in violation of the law of nations, applied himself for redress to the government; and the next day wrote a letter to Mr. fe-' cretary Boyle, wherein he urged, "That the queen, who "was fo jealous of the refpect due to the ambaffadors of "crowned heads, and had fo gloriously vindicated the ho"nour of the earl of Manchester, her ambaffador at Venice, " and caused a rigorous punishment to be inflicted on the "officers of the cuftom-house, fome of whom were fet in "the pillory, and others condemned to the gallies, only for 66 infulting the gentlemen of his retinue, could not but most justly revenge the affront lately put upon him by a cor"poral punishment. That count Zobor, who was deliver

ed up to the difcretion of the king of Sweden for picking "a quarrel with his envoy, likewife afforded an inftance of "the fatisfaction he required, as being defirous of nothing "with greater earnest, than to avoid all the ill confequences

of this affair. For, in cafe the criminals were connived "at, under any colour whatfoever, he should be obliged to take other meafures, and retire without recredentials,' leaving the whole matter to the management of his Czarish majefty,

66

« AnteriorContinuar »