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Tortuga

The island off Hispaniola whose single southern anchorage made it a French buccaneer haven. Its harbour had two channels and would take ships of seventy guns, and everything taken at sea was carried in and sold whole to the ships waiting in the port. Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin landed there in 1666 and was sold as a servant when the West India Company wound up its plantation. Jamaica's governors and council spent the same decade drawing its men away, refusing to attack it and dealing with Ogeron as its governor.

Also writtenFrench Tortugas (Dampier's name for the isle of Tortugas by Hispaniola); Tortudos (the spelling in the Jamaica letters of 1666 and 1689); Basse-Terre (the southern harbour and its settlement); Cayona (the port town of the settled south, in Exquemelin)

In English it was the island of Tortugas by Hispaniola, formerly called French Tortugas. The north coast takes the open Atlantic and was uninhabited. The south faces the narrow channel toward Hispaniola and holds the only workable anchorage, at Basse-Terre.5,1

One door

Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin lived there. The harbour had two entries or channels and would take ships of seventy guns. The settled south fell into four quarters, the Low-Lands, the Middle Plantation, Ringot and the Mountain, with the port town of Cayona in the first. The book he wrote of it differs from edition to edition and language to language, and in 1685 Henry Morgan sued its London publisher for libel.2,1

The Company's servants

The French settled the island twice and drove out the Spaniards, who had held it first.6

Exquemelin sailed from Havre de Grace on 2 May 1666 in the St John, in French service, and came to Tortuga. What went ashore was cargo: they unladed the goods belonging to the West India Company, and the ship sailed on.7

Then the Company's business failed. Its factors found they could not recover either money or returns from the people of the island. It recalled them with orders to sell everything it owned there: goods, property, and its servants, some for twenty pieces of eight and others for thirty.8,9

Exquemelin, a servant who had come out of France in the Company's service, went with the rest of the stock. He was sold to a master he calls a tyrant, who fed him so little he expected to die of it and priced his freedom at three hundred pieces of eight.10,11

What the hunters became

Before the haven there were hunters. At the beginning, the planters and hunters of Tortuga heard what a few men had taken at sea, left their ordinary work and got what boats they could to turn pirate. The rest of the arrangement made the anchorage worth having: what they took was carried back and sold, whole, to the ships waiting in the port.12,13

Lolonois escaped the Spaniards and came safe to Tortuga, which Exquemelin calls "the common place of Refuge".14

Jamaica's view

Under-Secretary Williamson, taking down the West Indies island by island from Major Scott's mouth, gave Tortuga a line: "lost by us in 1654 ; sold to the French by one Watts, Governor there."15

Sir Thomas Modyford wrote to Lord Arlington on 5 June 1666 that he must go on encouraging the privateers, and so reduce the numbers of the French at Tortudos. On 8 June he told the Duke of Albemarle that two ships of the Curacao fleet had gone to Tortuga, four more with two French rovers to retake Providence. On 21 August he quoted a letter from David Marteene, "the best man of Tortuga", who had two ships and a hundred and sixty men and would bring both in.16,17,18

Men went the other way too. When the commissions against the Spaniards were called in, Captains David Martin and Murran and a number of the English privateers resolved never to return unless there were war, and preyed on the Spaniards from Tortuga instead. That David Martin may be Modyford's David Marteene.19

The Council of Jamaica met at St. Jago de la Vega on 19 December 1666 and valued the island. It resolved that attacking the French at Tortuga and Hispaniola would be unwise: nothing was to be got by it, and in the minute's words "the French are leaving Tortuga as unhealthy ; it is not worth keeping". The men in it were another matter. The same minute told the commanders of the men-of-war to take aboard all buccaneers of the Protestant religion and any others who would swear fidelity to the King, and to disable the rest of their boats.20,21

The same sitting allotted the blame. The General was to "put the whole fault and miscarriage on Ogeron", an agent, the councillors said, of the Royal Company of France who meant to stop them trading with any but their own ships.22

The English dealt with Ogeron as governor there. The Hope was taken near Hispaniola on 8 November 1667 by the French man-of-war Fortune, and on 6 December the Governor of Jamaica sent her master to Tortuga to demand ship, goods and damages of M. Ogeron and Captain Champaine. They got the ship back, and a few of the servants and goods. Monsieur Bertram Ogeron, Governor of the island of Tortuga, was wrecked in his own ship and taken by the Spaniards.23,24

With the peace to keep after Panama, Sir Thomas Lynch wrote to Arlington on 29 November 1671 that he had pressed the Governor of Tortuga to send down Thurstone and Diego, "two of our men-of-war". The men were English; the governor he had to ask for them was French.25

The name goes out of use

By 1684 the French governor Jamaica dealt with sat elsewhere. Lynch reported a new one at Petit Guavos, Monsieur Cussy, and asked him to forbid his people at Isle des Vaches to receive or shelter pirates and to return a sloop of Captain Kempthorn's taken by surprise at Tortugas.26

In 1689 Molesworth warned Shrewsbury on 17 April that Jamaica lay close to Tortudos, Petit Guavos and the Isle of Ash, "where French privateers abound and can reach it in two days". The Lords of Trade reported on 26 April that the north of Hispaniola, the Islands of Ash, Petit Guavos and Tortugas were French and harboured many privateers. The merchants trading to Jamaica petitioned in July, putting the passage from Petit Guavos or Tortugas at twenty-four hours and those harbours "but thirty leagues away".27,28,29

For the haven of the years this archive covers see Nassau; for an anchorage with no town behind it, Ile a Vache.

Three gaps are worth naming. Nothing here gives the fort above the anchorage a plan, a date or a builder; the engineers' drawings sit in the fortification papers of the French overseas archives, with eighteenth-century plans of Basse-Terre in Paris. The harbour has no depths. Exquemelin's seventy guns says what the road could hold, and only a sounding would turn that into a figure. After 1689 the island drops out of this record. No pirate visit or expedition against it is documented here between about 1700 and 1725. The French colonial correspondence for Saint-Domingue would help establish whether that silence belongs to the surviving record or to the island's history.

What the evidence does not settle

Seventeenth century chronology

  • Dates for Spanish and English rule differ between sources

Governor Le Vasseur's first name

  • Le Vasseur's first name is given as Francois or JeanUnverified

Appointment of Bertrand d'Ogeron

  • Whether Louis XIV or the Company appointed d'Ogeron is unclear

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 island's whole strategic value rests on a single asymmetry: the north coast faces the open Atlantic swell and was uninhabited in the seventeenth century, while the south coast faces the narrow channel toward Hispaniola and carries the island's only workable anchorage, at Basse-Terre. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and archaeological project literature: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, De Americaensche Zee-Roovers (Amsterdam, 1678), published in English as Bucaniers of America (1684), English text in Early English Books Online, EEBO A39081, for the north coast described as totally uninhabited, incommodious and unhealthy, its shore rocky and inaccessible (Probable); Archeologie de la Piraterie research programme (Jean Soulat, Alexandre Coulaud, Yann von Arnim), Ile de la Tortue project page, consulted 2026, for the statement that Basse-Terre was the island's sole accessible anchorage and that the fort was placed above it (Probable)
  2. The narrative record of buccaneer Tortuga rests substantially on one book, Exquemelin's De Americaensche Zee-Roovers of 1678, written by a participant who reached the island in 1666 as an indentured servant of the French West India Company, which records the four districts of the settled south and the port town of Cayona and describes the southern harbour as having two entries or channels and as able to take ships of seventy guns, the only period figure on capacity located; the same book's reliability was contested in law when Henry Morgan brought a libel action against a London publisher of its English text in 1685. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and modern scholarship: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, De Americaensche Zee-Roovers (Amsterdam, 1678), English text in Early English Books Online, EEBO A39081, for the districts of the Low-Lands, the Middle Plantation, Ringot and the Mountain, for Cayona and its chiefest and richest planters, and for the two entries and the statement that the harbour was able to take ships of seventy guns (Probable); Joseph Gibbs, "A certain false, malicious, scandalous and famous libel: Sir Henry Morgan's legal action against a London publisher of Alexandre Exquemelin, 1685," International Journal of Maritime History (2018), for the libel action (Probable). No sounded depth from the buccaneer era has been recovered, so no depth in feet or fathoms is stated for the seventeenth-century roadstead and the seventy-gun figure is carried as a statement of capacity only
  3. A governor named Le Vasseur fortified the hillside above the anchorage about 1640, building around a natural rock about eleven metres across and seven to nine metres high with a quadrangular enclosure and two southern bastions. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Archaeological project literature: Archeologie de la Piraterie, Ile de la Tortue project page, consulted 2026, for the structure of Fort de la Roche and its date (Probable)
  4. A Spanish force from Santo Domingo landed artillery in 1654 on the high ground above the fort and shot down into it, which demonstrated that the site could not be held against guns on the ridge, and the replacement work built by the engineer Blondel between 1666 and 1668 below the ruined rock was accordingly a harbour-defence battery, a circular tower over a lower courtyard with a sea-facing curtain pierced by embrasures. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Archaeological project literature: Archeologie de la Piraterie, Ile de la Tortue project page, consulted 2026, for the 1654 emplacement of artillery on the height, for the defect of the site and for the design and dates of Fort Blondel (Probable)
  5. Dampier's narrative names the island of Tortugas by Hispaniola and says that it was formerly called French Tortugas. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: William Dampier, A New Voyage Round the World (1697), the chapter on Salt Tortuga and its salt ponds, printed p. 55 to p. 56 (library file dampier_new_voyage_1697.txt, lines 6788-6790)
  6. The chapter of Exquemelin's narrative describing Tortuga is headed with the statement that the French settled there at two several times and cast out the Spaniards, the first masters of the island. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part I, chapter II, the chapter heading (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 785-790)
  7. Exquemelin set sail from Havre de Grace on 2 May 1666 in a ship called the St John, in French service, arrived at the island of Tortuga, and records that there they unladed the goods belonging to the Company of the West-Indies before the ship was sent on with some of her passengers. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), chapter I, the outward voyage and the arrival (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 535 and 770-774)
  8. Exquemelin records that the factors of the Company on Tortuga found they could not recover either moneys or returns from the people of the island. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part I, chapter II, the Company's dealings with the planters (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 1275-1278)
  9. Exquemelin records that the Company recalled its factors from Tortuga with orders to sell everything it owned in the plantation, the servants belonging to the Company being sold some for twenty and others for thirty pieces of eight, along with all its other merchandise and property. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part I, chapter II, the Company's withdrawal (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 1283-1287)
  10. Exquemelin writes that on that occasion he was himself sold, being a servant under the Company in whose service he had come out of France, and that he fell into the hands of the man he calls the most cruel tyrant. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part I, chapter II, the author's sale (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 1291-1293)
  11. Exquemelin writes that his master on Tortuga used him with all the hard usages imaginable, including hunger by which he thought he would perish, and would let him buy his freedom only at three hundred pieces of eight. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part I, chapter II, the author in servitude (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 1296-1299)
  12. Exquemelin's narrative says that the planters and hunters of Tortuga, on hearing of a rich prize taken at sea, resolved to follow that example, many of them leaving their ordinary employments and using what means they could to get boats or small vessels in which to exercise piracy. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part I, the origin of the pirates of Tortuga (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 3258-3262)
  13. Exquemelin's narrative says that what the first Tortuga rovers took was carried to the isle of Tortuga and the whole purchase sold there to the ships that waited in the port for their return or that happened to be lying in it. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part I, the origin of the pirates of Tortuga (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 3275-3277)
  14. Exquemelin's narrative has the captain he calls Lolonois escape from the Spaniards and come safe to Tortuga, which the text calls the common place of Refuge. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part II, the chapters on Lolonois (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 4246-4248)
  15. A memorandum by Under-Secretary Williamson on the West Indies, calendared under 1667 and indorsed as taken from Major Scott's mouth, lists Tortuga among the French islands with the note that it was lost by us in 1654 and sold to the French by one Watts, governor there. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1661, memorandum by Under-Secretary Williamson relating to the West Indies, indorsed 'From Major Scott's mouth', p. 534 (library file csp_v5_pp520-534.txt)
  16. Governor Sir Thomas Modyford wrote to Lord Arlington from Jamaica on 5 June 1666 that he would be forced to continue the encouragement begun to the privateers, and thereby lessen the numbers of the French at Tortudos. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1209, Gov. Sir Thos. Modyford to Sec. Lord Arlington, Jamaica, 5 June 1666, pp. 384-385 (library file csp_v5_pp384-392.txt)
  17. Governor Sir Thomas Modyford reported to the Duke of Albemarle on 8 June 1666 that two ships of the fleet that had been bound for Curacao were gone to Tortuga, and that the other four, joining with two French rovers, were gone to attempt the retaking of the island of Providence. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1213, Governor Sir Thos. Modyford to the Duke of Albemarle, Jamaica, 8 June 1666, p. 387 (library file csp_v5_pp384-392.txt)
  18. Governor Sir Thomas Modyford told the Duke of Albemarle on 21 August 1666 that his brother would show him a letter from David Marteene, the best man of Tortuga, who had two ships with a hundred and sixty men and would bring both in. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1263, Governor Sir Thos. Modyford to the Duke of Albemarle, Jamaica, 21 August 1666, pp. 405-406 (library file csp_v5_pp402-411.txt)
  19. A paper of 1666 arguing that the private men-of-war were advantageous to Jamaica states that Captains David Martin and Murran and divers of the English privateers, on the news that the commissions against the Spaniards were called in, resolved never to return to Jamaica unless there were a war, but daily preyed upon the Spaniards from Tortuga. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1265, Reasons why the private men-of-war are advantageous to the Island of Jamaica, 1666, pp. 407-408 (library file csp_v5_pp402-411.txt)
  20. The Council of Jamaica resolved at St. Jago de la Vega on 19 December 1666 that it was imprudent to attempt the French at Tortuga and Hispaniola, there being nothing to be got by it, the French leaving Tortuga as unhealthy, and the island not worth keeping. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1357, Minutes of the Council of Jamaica, St. Jago de la Vega, 19 December 1666, pp. 433-434 (library file csp_v5_pp428-437.txt)
  21. The same minute of the Council of Jamaica of 19 December 1666 instructed the commanders of the men-of-war to receive into their ships all buccaneers of the Protestant religion and others who would take the oath of fidelity to the King, and to be industrious to disable the rest of all barques, boats and vessels whatsoever. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1357, Minutes of the Council of Jamaica, St. Jago de la Vega, 19 December 1666, pp. 433-434 (library file csp_v5_pp428-437.txt)
  22. The same minute of the Council of Jamaica of 19 December 1666 directed that the General second his declaration in favour of the buccaneers and put the whole fault and miscarriage on Ogeron, whom the councillors describe as an agent of the Royal Company of France intending to keep them from trade with any but their ships. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1357, Minutes of the Council of Jamaica, St. Jago de la Vega, 19 December 1666, pp. 433-434 (library file csp_v5_pp428-437.txt)
  23. A brief account of the loss of the ship Hope, taken near Hispaniola on 8 November 1667 by the French man-of-war Fortune, records that on 6 December the Governor of Jamaica sent her master and some of her company to Tortuga to demand of the Governor, M. Ogeron, and of Captain Champaine the restoration of ship, goods and damages, and that the ship and a few of the servants and goods were delivered up. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 5, 1661-1668, item 1907, Brief account of the loss of the ship Hope in 1667, calendared under 1668, p. 641 (library file csp_v5_pp629-642.txt)
  24. The heading of the ninth chapter of Exquemelin's third part names Monsieur Bertram Ogeron as Governor of the isle of Tortuga and describes his shipwreck and his falling, with his companions, into the hands of the Spaniards. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative: Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, The History of the Bucaniers of America, in four parts (1695 English printing), Part III, chapter IX, the chapter heading (library file exquemelin_history_1695.txt, lines 13973-13976)
  25. Sir Thomas Lynch wrote from Jamaica to Lord Arlington on 29 November 1671 that he had pressed the Governor of Tortuga to send down Thurstone and Diego, whom he calls two of our men-of-war. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 7, 1669-1674, item 663, Sir Thos. Lynch to Sec. Lord Arlington, Jamaica, 29 November 1671, p. 276 (library file csp_v7_pp271-282.txt)
  26. Sir Thomas Lynch reported from Jamaica on 20 June 1684 that a new Governor, Monsieur Cussy, had arrived at Petit Guavos, and that he had asked him to forbid his subjects at Isle des Vaches to receive or succour pirates and to return a sloop of Captain Kempthorn's that they had surprised at Tortugas. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 11, 1681-1685, item 1759, Sir Thomas Lynch to the Lord President of the Council, Jamaica, 20 June 1684, pp. 656-658 (library file csp_v11_pp645-664.txt)
  27. Colonel Hender Molesworth wrote to the Earl of Shrewsbury on 17 April 1689 that Jamaica was close to Tortudos, Petit Guavos and the Isle of Ash, where French privateers abounded and could reach it in two days. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 13, 1689-1692, item 74, Colonel Hender Molesworth to the Earl of Shrewsbury, 17 April 1689, pp. 22-23 (library file csp_v13_pp20-33.txt)
  28. The report of the Lords of Trade and Plantations of 26 April 1689, entered on the Order of the King in Council of 2 May 1689, states that the northern part of Hispaniola, the Islands of Ash, Petit Guavos and Tortugas are inhabited by the French and harbour many privateers. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 13, 1689-1692, item 102, Order of the King in Council, Hampton Court, 2 May 1689, reciting the report of the Lords of Trade and Plantations of 26 April 1689, p. 34 (library file csp_v13_pp34-39.txt)
  29. A memorial of the merchants trading to Jamaica, received on 26 July 1689, states that the French could sail to Jamaica in twenty-four hours from Petit Guavos or Tortugas, which were but thirty leagues away. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 13, 1689-1692, item 298, Memorial of the merchants trading to Jamaica, received from Col. Beckford 26 July 1689, p. 108 (library file csp_v13_pp100-113.txt)