The ArchivesEventsRoberts Sacks Trepassey (1720)
Roberts Sacks Trepassey (1720)
Bartholomew Roberts's raid on the Newfoundland migratory-fishery harbour of Trepassey in late June or early July 1720, on a day usually given as about 21 June, and the cruise on the Grand Banks that followed it.
Also writtenThe Trepassey raid; Bartholomew Roberts at Trepassi, Newfoundland, June 1720; Roberts on the Newfoundland Banks, 1720
In late June 1720, on a day usually given as the twenty-first, one small sloop worked into the harbour of Trepassey, on the southern Avalon Peninsula of Newfoundland, and the crews of the vessels at anchor there left their ships and went ashore. The sloop was Bartholomew Roberts's. Nobody fired on him. The best-known account gives a harbour of burning shipping and a ruined shore fishery; the colonial papers give victualling, repairs and recruiting.1
The fishery that made the harbour worth entering
Trepassey, spelled "Trepassi" in the printed narrative of 1724, was an English migratory-fishery station rather than a garrison town. Each summer the south-coast harbours filled with sack ships, bye-boat vessels and fishing shallops, lightly defended, carrying provisions, cordage, sails and skilled seamen, riding at anchor under small crews. For a pirate the attraction was less treasure than refit, victuals and hands; the recurring complaint of the fishery was that pirates carried off fishermen as readily as goods. Piracy had been a recurring anxiety here since the Peace of Utrecht in 1713, and officials in Newfoundland and the neighbouring stations reported on it repeatedly.
The sloop that came in
Roberts had been a pirate for a year. Born in Pembrokeshire about 1682, he was elected to command his company after Howell Davis was killed at Principe in 1719, cruised off Brazil and the West Indies through the following winter and spring, took a rich Portuguese ship on the Brazil coast, and worked northward up the American seaboard. He came to Newfoundland in a sloop of about ten guns with a company of roughly forty-five men. The 1724 chapter never names her; later writers call her the Fortune, probably a back-formation from the French prize he took shortly afterwards.2
What the 1724 print says
The fullest narrative is the chapter on Roberts in A General History of the Pyrates, printed in 1724 under the name Captain Charles Johnson. It is a commercial book that embellishes. Johnson has the sloop stand in under sail and the harbour give way without a shot: "There were two and twenty vessels in the harbour, which the men all quitted upon the sight of the pirate, and fled ashore." The pirates then made "destruction and havoc", "burning and sinking all the shipping, except a Bristol galley, and destroying the fisheries, and stages of the poor planters, without remorse or compunction." Intimidation and wanton damage, in that telling, rather than plunder.3
What the colonial papers say
Olaf Uwe Janzen's study of piracy in the Newfoundland fishery after the War of the Spanish Succession reads the Colonial Office correspondence for Newfoundland, series CO 194, against the printed story and arrives somewhere else. Janzen dates the visit to late June or early July 1720 and finds Roberts using Trepassey as a service centre: provisions, repairs, men taken on. The one surviving eyewitness statement, a deposition by a man named Moses Renos, denies that there was very much destruction, and Janzen concludes that Roberts "does not appear to have caused very much destruction, burning only one vessel and generally leaving the rest alone."4
The large numbers come from men writing at a distance. Lieutenant Governor Gledhill at Placentia told the Board of Trade that the pirates "have Burnt and destroyed 26 Ships", a figure that bears out Johnson's scale in general terms without matching his count, and Janzen treats Governor Alexander Spotswood of Virginia as another case of the habit. Captain Percy's naval report on the season is said to mention neither Roberts nor pirates at Trepassey. Against all of it sit the local fishing returns, not markedly worse for 1720 than for 1722. A harbour-wide fire is hard to reconcile with a normal catch.5
The week lies somewhere between a spectacular sack and a brief opportunistic call, closer to the modest end of that range.
The Bristol galley and the Banks
One vessel came out of the harbour with him. "Roberts mann'd the Bristol galley he took in the harbour, and mounted 16 guns on board her," the 1724 text records, where Moses Renos's sworn deposition, calendared in the Colonial papers, gives eighteen guns. On the Banks, the same account continues, "he met with nine or ten sail of French ships, all which he destroyed except one of 26 guns, which they seiz'd, and carried off for their own use. This ship they christ'ned the Fortune, and leaving the Bristol galley to the Frenchmen, they sailed away in company with the sloop, on another cruise." The galley was a flagship briefly, traded up for a heavier French prize and handed back.6
Roberts left Newfoundland better armed and better manned than he reached it. From the Banks he worked south and east, taking prizes through the rest of 1720 and 1721 in the Caribbean and off West Africa, and was killed in action against HMS Swallow off Cape Lopez in February 1722. The effect on the Trepassey fishery looks slight against the reports of it, and the alarm served officials who wanted convoys and naval protection.
What grew in the telling
The ship names grew in the telling. Popular accounts rename the Bristol galley the Royal Fortune and call the French 26-gun prize the "Good Fortune". Neither name is in the 1724 chapter, which leaves the galley unrenamed and christens the French ship simply the Fortune. Roberts commanded more than one vessel called Fortune or Royal Fortune in the two years that followed, and the confusion has probably run backwards into 1720 from there.7
Trepassey still keeps Black Bart as local heritage.
What the sources cannot yet give is the harbour's own paper. The date of about 21 June 1720 is not in the 1724 chapter, which names no day, and is only the day later writers usually give, while Janzen puts the visit in late June or early July; the CO 194 Newfoundland correspondence and the Admiralty logs for the season would settle it, and so would the count. Twenty-two vessels in the printed narrative, twenty-six burned in Gledhill's report, effectively one in the eyewitness deposition, and nothing yet read reconciles them. The name of the sloop he brought in is not established, and the 1724 General History, the only connected account, is used throughout as a source that embellishes.
What the evidence does not settle
Date of the raid
- The raid's exact date is unfixed, near late JuneUnverified
Number of vessels destroyed
Name of Roberts's sloop
- The sloop's name is unknown; secondary works wrongly call her FortuneUnverified
Each line is one question with its own grade, taken from the register where a claim carries it. Nothing here is graded as a whole.
Sources for this record
Every statement above that rests on a checked claim carries a small number; the numbers lead here. Each entry gives what is claimed, how far the record supports it, and where it comes from.
- Bartholomew Roberts took a single small sloop into the harbour of Trepassey, on the southern Avalon Peninsula of Newfoundland, in late June 1720, on a day usually given as about 21 June though Janzen's archival study puts the visit in late June or early July, and the crews of the vessels lying at anchor there abandoned their ships and fled ashore rather than fight. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Period narrative: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates (1724), chapter on Captain Bartholomew Roberts, printed under the name Captain Charles Johnson; and Olaf Uwe Janzen, The Problem of Piracy in the Newfoundland Fishery in the Aftermath of the War of the Spanish Succession
- Roberts, born in Pembrokeshire about 1682 and elected to the command of his company after Howell Davis was killed at Principe in 1719, reached the Newfoundland fishing grounds in a sloop of about ten guns with a crew of roughly forty-five men; the primary narrative of the raid does not name that vessel, and the identification with a sloop called the Fortune rests on secondary works and is probably confused with the French prize taken afterwards. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Scholarly archival study with period narrative: Olaf Uwe Janzen, The Problem of Piracy in the Newfoundland Fishery in the Aftermath of the War of the Spanish Succession, drawing on Colonial Office series CO 194; A General History of the Pyrates (1724), chapter on Captain Bartholomew Roberts
- The 1724 General History of the Pyrates reports two and twenty vessels in Trepassey harbour, all burned or sunk except one Bristol galley, together with the destruction of the fisheries and the stages of the poor planters, a scale that Lieutenant Governor Gledhill's letter of 3 July 1720 to Secretary Craggs, reporting near 150 boats and 26 ships destroyed at Trepassey and St Mary's that summer, bears out in general terms, the exact count remaining Johnson's. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates (1724), chapter on Captain Bartholomew Roberts, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson
- Olaf Uwe Janzen's archival study, reading the Colonial Office correspondence for Newfoundland in series CO 194 together with the deposition of Moses Renos, the only surviving eyewitness statement, dates the visit to late June or early July 1720, finds Roberts using Trepassey chiefly as a service centre for provisions, refitting and recruitment, and concludes that he burned only one vessel and generally left the rest alone. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Scholarly archival study: Olaf Uwe Janzen, The Problem of Piracy in the Newfoundland Fishery in the Aftermath of the War of the Spanish Succession, citing CO 194 and the Moses Renos deposition
- Lieutenant Governor Gledhill of Placentia reported to the Board of Trade that the pirates had burnt and destroyed 26 ships, a figure nothing else corroborates and one of a pattern of exaggerated destruction claims made by officials at a distance, while Captain Percy's naval report on the season is said to mention neither Roberts nor pirates at Trepassey and the local fishing returns for 1720 are not markedly worse than those for 1722. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. State paper reported in a scholarly archival study: Olaf Uwe Janzen, The Problem of Piracy in the Newfoundland Fishery in the Aftermath of the War of the Spanish Succession, citing Gledhill's report in Colonial Office series CO 194 (CO 194/6, folio around 367) and the Newfoundland fishing returns
- Roberts manned the Bristol galley he took in the harbour and mounted guns aboard her, 16 on the General History's account and 18 in the sworn deposition of Moses Renos calendared in the Colonial papers, then met nine or ten sail of French ships on the Banks of Newfoundland, destroyed all but one of 26 guns which his company seized and christened the Fortune, and left the Bristol galley to the Frenchmen before sailing away in company with his sloop. Disputed The sources disagree, and we say how. Period narrative: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates (1724), chapter on Captain Bartholomew Roberts, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson, for sixteen guns; the deposition of Moses Renos, calendared in the Colonial Office papers (CO 194), for eighteen
- The 1724 General History does not rename the Bristol galley and christens the French 26-gun prize simply the Fortune, so the popular accounts that call the galley the Royal Fortune and the French prize the Good Fortune have no warrant in the primary text. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Period narrative: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates (1724), chapter on Captain Bartholomew Roberts, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson; the errors exemplified by the Golden Age of Piracy web article on Bartholomew Roberts