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Condent

Pirate captain of the Flying Dragon in the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean about 1718 to 1721, pardoned at Bourbon and never tried.

BornNot establishedDiedNot establishedAlso writtenCaptain Condent (chapter heading, The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II, 1728); Congdon (Dow and Edmonds, The Pirates of the New England Coast, 1923, p. 349)

One chapter of one book carries this man: the life of Captain Condent in the second volume of the History of the Pyrates, printed in 1728 and conventionally credited to Captain Charles Johnson. He has no Christian name, and the cruise carries not one calendar year. A captain of that name worked the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean about 1718 to 1721, and he was never tried.1,2,3,4,5

The name

The surname is unstable across Condent, Congdon and related forms. George Francis Dow and John Henry Edmonds, writing in 1923 of the pirate resort on the island of St Mary, set "Congdon" among the captains who came there with Burgess, Taylor and England, and gave him no forename.6,7

"Billy One-Hand" is modern, a gloss on a wound that broke the arm and did not take it off. No by-name of his own survives from the period. Of his origin there is one sentence, Johnson's: "Captain Condent was a Plymouth Man born, but we are as yet ignorant of the Motives, and Time of his first turning Pyrate". Plymouth is as far as that goes.8,9

Out of Providence

He left Providence at Woodes Rogers' arrival, in a sloop belonging to Mr Simpson of New York, "of which Sloop he was then Quarter-Master". The first blood is his own. An Indian crewman, beaten and meaning to blow the sloop up, got down among the arms in the hold; Condent went after him with a pistol and a cutlass, took his shot in the arm, which broke it, and shot him dead. What followed was the crew's: they hacked the body about, and the gunner tore out the heart and ate it. Soon after, the sloop took the merchant ship Duke of York, the company split over her, and the sloop's half elected him captain.10,11,12

The Atlantic cruise

At the Isle of May the company took the whole salt fleet, about twenty sail, and there he set up an Administration of Justice, whipping and pickling masters whose men complained of them. At St Jago they took a Dutch ship, once a privateer, with one broadside that killed her captain and several men. He renamed her the Flying Dragon. The Fiery Dragon, and the wreck at St Mary that is sometimes given that name, belong to later writing.13,14,15

Off Brazil he plundered several Portuguese ships and let them go, and fought a Portuguese man of war of seventy guns for about three glasses before breaking off, over-matched. The cruelty in the chapter belongs to that coast, and its victims are Portuguese and Catholic rather than the Arab or Muslim captives of modern retellings. In revenge for pirates lost and imprisoned there, prisoners had their ears and noses cut off, and a captured priest was made to say Mass at the mainmast and then ridden about the decks.16,17

He was civil to some men and savage to others, and the two never reconcile. The Wright Galley, Captain John Spelt, hired by the South Sea Company, was detained, and her master, a townsman of his, used civilly and discharged with a present out of a Portuguese ship taken for her bale goods. Near the Cape he took an Ostend East Indiaman, a London merchant named Nash aboard as supercargo, and a Dutch East Indiaman after her, before standing for Madagascar.18,19,20

The Cassandra

At Johanna the chapter has him only assist, "in Company of two other Pyrates", in taking the East Indiaman Cassandra from Captain Macragh. Against that stands the commander's own account, "A LETTER from Captain Mackra, dated at Bombay, Nov. 16, 1720". His ship was set upon at Juanna on the seventeenth of August, "about Eight o'Clock in the Morning, when we discovered two Pyrate Ships standing into the Bay". Two, not three. Only "the chief Captain, Edward England, and some others I knew", he writes, kept the pirates from cutting him to pieces, and afterwards the crews went into the Cassandra "under the Command of Taylor". Condent is nowhere in that letter, and his part in the capture looks like a conflation.21,22,23,24,25

The richest prize is Portuguese as well, and not the Arab ship in the Red Sea that later writing makes of it: at the Isle of Mascarenas, a ship of seventy guns with the Viceroy of Goa aboard, all ransom refused. On the Zanguebar coast he took a Dutch fortification, plundered and razed it, and carried off the men who volunteered.26,27

The pardon at Bourbon

The career ends by agreement rather than by rope. At St Mary the company broke up, and Condent petitioned the Governor of Bourbon for a pardon, granted on condition the ships were destroyed. The Flying Dragon was sunk. "Condent married the Governor's Sister-in-Law, and stay'd some Time", and afterwards, on report only, he "is since come to France, settled at St. Maloes, and drives a considerable Trade as a Merchant".28,29,30

What is missing here is the paper. The life rests on one chapter of a book of 1728, read in a modern transcription of an East Carolina University copy never collated against a clean first edition, and its authorship is disputed, that transcription cataloguing the work as Defoe's. The French colonial record of the Bourbon surrender, in Le Mercure of May 1722 and in Grandidier's collection, is the one real document behind any of it, and it is unread here. Nothing read here gives a day, a place or a manner for his death.31

What the evidence does not settle

Forename

  • Whether Condent had any attested forenameConfirmed

The Cassandra

  • Whether Condent took part in the Cassandra actionPossible

His end

  • The date, place and manner of Condent's death

Birthplace

  • A Plymouth birth rests on the 1728 chapter alone

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.

  1. The whole connected life of the pirate captain Condent rests on a single period narrative, the chapter on him in the second volume of the History of the Pyrates (1728), a work conventionally attributed to Captain Charles Johnson, and no second independent period account of him was read for this record. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  2. That chapter calls him only Captain Condent and supplies no forename anywhere in it. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  3. A pirate captain known as Condent or Congdon operated in the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean about 1718 to 1721. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and modern accounts: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew; Christopher Condent; Edward Congdon; Pirate Edward Congdon retires (October 2017), reporting the Bourbon surrender from French colonial material
  4. Condent was never tried and no court adjudicated his personal guilt for any act attributed to him, his career ending instead in a pardon from the Governor of Bourbon. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and secondary account: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew; Pirate Edward Congdon retires (October 2017), reporting the Bourbon surrender from French colonial material
  5. The chapter gives not a single calendar year for the cruise and states that the time and motive of his first turning pirate are unknown to its author, so nearly every event in it is placed only by its position in the narrative. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  6. George Francis Dow and John Henry Edmonds, writing in 1923 of the pirate resort on the island of St Mary off Madagascar, name Congdon, without a forename, among the successful leaders who came there, alongside Burgess, Clayton, Taylor and England. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Modern scholarship: George Francis Dow and John Henry Edmonds, The Pirates of the New England Coast 1630-1730 (1923), chapter Pirate Haunts and Cruising Grounds, p. 349
  7. The settled identity of this pirate stands no higher than likely, the surname being unstable across Condent, Congdon and related forms, the forename genuinely contested and the nickname modern. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and modern accounts: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew; Christopher Condent; Edward Congdon; Pirate Edward Congdon retires (October 2017)
  8. The nickname Billy One-Hand is modern and appears to be a later gloss on the wound in the 1728 chapter, where the arm is broken by the Indian's shot and not amputated, no period by-name for him having been located. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  9. The chapter's only word on his origin is the sentence "Captain Condent was a Plymouth Man born, but we are as yet ignorant of the Motives, and Time of his first turning Pyrate". Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  10. The chapter has him "retire from Providence (on Governor Roger's Arrival at that Island) in a Sloop belonging to Mr. Simpson, of New York, a Jew Merchant, of which Sloop he was then Quarter-Master", making his first recorded rank quartermaster and his departure coincide with Woodes Rogers' arrival. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  11. An Indian crewman aboard the Simpson sloop, having been beaten, seized the arms in the hold meaning to blow the vessel up, and Condent went down after him with pistol and cutlass, had his arm broken by the Indian's shot and shot the man dead, after which the crew hacked the body and the gunner tore out and ate the heart. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  12. After the taking of the merchant ship Duke of York a dispute split the company, and the sloop's half elected Condent captain. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  13. At the Isle of May his company seized the whole salt fleet of about twenty sail. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  14. There he set up what the chapter calls an Administration of Justice, whipping and pickling the commanders complained of by their men, a redresser-of-ill-usage motif the same author uses elsewhere and which no other source confirms. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  15. At St Jago he took a Dutch ship, formerly a privateer, with a single broadside that killed her captain and several of her men, and renamed her the Flying Dragon, which is the form the chapter uses throughout and not the Fiery Dragon of later writing, whose identification with a wreck at St Mary is unsupported by anything read for this record. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  16. On the coast of Brazil he plundered several Portuguese ships and released them, and engaged a Portuguese man of war of seventy guns for about three glasses before breaking off, over-matched, and escaping. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  17. In revenge for pirates lost and imprisoned on that coast his prisoners had their ears and noses cut off, and a captured priest was made to say Mass at the mainmast and then ridden about the decks, the victims in the chapter being Portuguese and Catholic and not the Arab or Muslim prisoners of later retellings. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  18. His conduct in the chapter is markedly uneven, civil and even generous to some, such as his townsman Spelt, and savage to others, such as the Portuguese and their priest, and he should be flattened into neither a monster nor a gentleman. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  19. The Wright Galley, Captain John Spelt, hired by the South-Sea Company, was detained, and Spelt, a townsman of his, was treated civilly and discharged at last with a present out of a Portuguese ship taken for her bale goods and stores. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  20. Near the Cape he took an Ostend East-India Man, with the London merchant Mr Nash aboard as supercargo, and then a Dutch East-India Man, before making for Madagascar. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  21. Johnson has Condent only assist, "in Company of two other Pyrates", in the taking of the East-India Man Cassandra, Captain Macragh, at Johanna about 1720. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  22. The Cassandra's commander, in his own letter dated at Bombay on 16 November 1720 and printed in the first volume of the same work, records that he was attacked at Juanna on the 17th of August, about eight in the morning, when "we discovered two Pyrate Ships standing into the Bay". Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: A General History of the Pyrates, Vol. I, the chapter Of Captain England, A LETTER from Captain Mackra, dated at Bombay, Nov. 16, 1720
  23. In the same letter the commander names the pirates' leader as Edward England, writing that but for "the chief Captain, Edward England, and some others I knew" the pirates would have cut him and all who would not join them to pieces. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: A General History of the Pyrates, Vol. I, the chapter Of Captain England, A LETTER from Captain Mackra, dated at Bombay, Nov. 16, 1720
  24. The same volume records that after the action the men went into the Cassandra "under the Command of Taylor". Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: A General History of the Pyrates, Vol. I, the chapter Of Captain England
  25. Condent's presence at the taking of the Cassandra from Captain Macrae in 1720 rests on the 1728 chapter alone and is probably a conflation. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  26. The richest prize of the cruise in the chapter is a Portuguese ship of seventy guns carrying the Vice-Roy of Goa, taken at the Isle of Mascarenas with all ransom refused, and not the Arab ship or Red Sea haul of later writing. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  27. On the coast of Zanguebar he took, plundered and razed a Dutch fortification, carrying off the men who entered with him voluntarily. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  28. The company disbanded at St Mary's and Condent surrendered under a pardon from the Governor of Bourbon on condition that the ships were destroyed, the Flying Dragon being sunk. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and secondary account: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew; Pirate Edward Congdon retires (October 2017), reporting the Bourbon surrender from French colonial material
  29. After the pardon, the chapter says, "Condent married the Governor's Sister-in-Law, and stay'd some Time". Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  30. The chapter reports, marking it as hearsay, that he "is since come to France, settled at St. Maloes, and drives a considerable Trade as a Merchant". Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew
  31. The life was read in a modern proofread transcription of the East Carolina University copy of the 1728 second volume, uncollated against a clean first edition and conventionally attributed to Captain Charles Johnson though catalogued in that transcription as Defoe's, while the one genuine document behind any of it, the French colonial record of the Bourbon surrender in Le Mercure of May 1722 and in Grandidier's collection, was not read for this record. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative and secondary account: The History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (1728), the chapter Of Captain Condent, and his Crew; Pirate Edward Congdon retires (October 2017), reporting the Bourbon surrender from French colonial material (Le Mercure, May 1722; Grandidier's Collection)