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Amity

Thomas Tew's sloop, about seventy tons and belonging mostly to Bermuda; she made one Red Sea prize in 1693, fell astern of Henry Every's squadron in 1695, and outlived her captain under other men.

LaunchedDecember 1692ToNot establishedAlso writtenAmity Sloop (John Dann's examination); ship Amity (Adam Baldridge's deposition); Sloop Amity (Adam Baldridge's deposition); Captain Tew's Sloop from Barbadoes (Adam Baldridge's deposition)

In his examination John Dann called her "the Amity Sloop, Thomas Tew Comander". Adam Baldridge, in his deposition, once wrote "the ship Amity, Captain Thomas Tew Commander", and elsewhere "the Sloop Amity". The ship is a slip. Every figure he gives is a sloop's, and Dann calls her nothing else.1

What she was

Baldridge, who supplied her company while she lay careened at St Mary's, put her burden at about seventy tons and her force at "8 Guns, 60 men". Dann, describing the squadron she later fell in with, allowed the vessels "about 6 Guns each" and said "two of them had 50 men on board". The two counts do not meet.2,3

She "belonged most of her to Bermudas", Baldridge wrote, and Tew held a part-owner's share in her. Before Bermuda she had come out of Barbados, "Captain Tew's Sloop from Barbadoes" in Baldridge's separate note; that she was Captain Richard Gilbert's there comes from modern work and not from the depositions.4,5

The first voyage

In December 1692 Isaac Richier, Governor of Bermuda, gave Tew a privateering commission. He was to sail in company with George Dew, "Captain George Drew" in Johnson's printing, and take the French factory at Goree on the Gambia, which Johnson spells "Goorie". A storm separated the two sloops.6

She turned instead for the Cape of Good Hope and the Red Sea, her company agreeing to it, as the story is told, with the cry "A gold Chain, or a wooden Leg, we'll stand by you".7

She took one ship. Baldridge called her "a Ship in the Red Seas that did belong to the Moors", subjects of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb, and the plunder made "the whole share run 1200 l. a man". No account of the time gives that vessel a name. Popular accounts supply one, the Fateh Muhammed, and they are wrong: that ship belongs to Henry Every's action of 1695.8

She careened at St Mary's on Madagascar and her people traded with Baldridge, who set down that she "set saile from St. Maries December the 23d 1693, bound for America". She was at Newport in Rhode Island the following year; the April usually given for the arrival is a later addition.9

Fitted out at New York

Benjamin Fletcher, Governor of New York, befriended Tew and granted him a privateering commission. Defending the grant afterwards, Fletcher described him as "not only a man of courage and activity ... a very pleasant man". That defence was written after Bellomont had alleged that Fletcher knew of Tew's piratical habits.10

Fletcher wrote to the Council of Trade and Plantations on 22 June 1697. Tew, he said, "brought in no ship to this port". He came "as a stranger", told the governor that "he had a sloop well manned", and "gave bond to fight the French at the mouth of Canada river, whereupon I gave him a commission and instructions accordingly".11

Dann said flatly that the Amity was "fitted out at New Yorke". Both can stand: a commission and a refit need not fall in the same month. By about June 1695 she was at Liparan, in the strait of Bab-el-Mandeb, in company with Henry Every's loose squadron, the captains having agreed that Every should command.12

Astern of the action

The pursuit of the Mughal fleet was the point of the confederacy, and the Amity missed it. In Dann's one clause, the sloop "fell asterne and never came up to them". The Fancy, the Pearl and the Portsmouth Adventure took the Fateh Muhammed and the Ganj-i-Sawai without her, on or about 7 September 1695, a date that comes from later accounts.13,14

Tew was killed on this voyage, "by a great Shott from a Moors ship". Which ship it was, and on what day, is not known. The Amity was astern of the captures, so whatever killed him was a separate encounter, and the tradition that he fell at the taking of the Fateh Muhammed will not stand with that.15

After Tew, and the other Amity

Johnson ends her there. After Tew's death, he says, the men "suffered themselves to be taken, without making Resistance". Baldridge had the sloop in front of him again on 11 December 1695, coming into St Mary's under John Yarland and still at the trade.16

Under Yarland she took the Charming Mary at Mauratan on Madagascar, made one Bobbington captain, refitted at St Augustine and stood away into the Indies. Baldridge heard afterwards that she was "trapaned and taken by the Moors", and that is the last anyone says of her.17,18

A second vessel of the name muddies even that. On 17 January 1696/7 Baldridge logged in a brigantine he describes as "that was Captain Tew's Sloop from Barbadoes and fitted into a Brigantine by the Owners of the Charming Mary at Barbados", and she was afterwards broken up by the Resolution. His wording points two ways, because in the same deposition Tew's sloop is still a sloop under Bobbington and bound for the Indies. Whether the brigantine was the Amity rebuilt or a Barbados namesake is unsettled.19

Nothing survives that a shipwright would recognise. No survey, no builder's record, no muster roll, no picture: her tonnage, guns and crew are one trader's figures, taken while she lay on her side. Her first commission has been described but never read here. Her end is a sentence Baldridge had at second hand. Whether the brigantine of 1697 was ever her, nobody wrote down.

What the evidence does not settle

Burden, guns and crew

  • The trader's figures against John Dann's lower count

Commission and provenance

  • The December 1692 Bermuda commission and the Barbados ownership

Final identity

  • Whether the 1696/7 brigantine Amity was Tew's rebuilt hull or a namesakePossible
  • She was last certainly recorded at St Mary's on 11 December 1695

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. John Dann's examination names "the Amity Sloop, Thomas Tew Comander" and Adam Baldridge's deposition, which once writes "the ship Amity, Captain Thomas Tew Commander", elsewhere calls her "the Sloop Amity"; she is a sloop throughout the primary record. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination and deposition: Examination of John Dann (Jameson doc 63), C.O. 323:2 no. 25 IV; Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  2. Adam Baldridge gives the Amity's burden as about seventy tons. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  3. Baldridge gives the Amity "8 Guns, 60 men" under Tew, while John Dann's examination of Every's squadron allows the vessels "about 6 Guns each" and says "two of them had 50 men on board"; the two counts are not reconciled. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination and deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II; Examination of John Dann (Jameson doc 63), C.O. 323:2 no. 25 IV
  4. Baldridge records that the Amity "belonged most of her to Bermudas", and Tew held a part-owner's share in her. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  5. The Amity had come out of Barbados, where she had been Captain Richard Gilbert's, a provenance resting on modern scholarship together with Baldridge's separate note of "Captain Tew's Sloop from Barbadoes". Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Modern scholarship and sworn deposition: 'A Man of Courage and Activity': Thomas Tew, Anglo-American Piracy; Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  6. In December 1692 Isaac Richier, Governor of Bermuda, gave Tew a privateering commission to sail in company with George Dew, whom Johnson calls "Captain George Drew", and attack the French factory at Goree on the Gambia, which Johnson spells "Goorie", and a storm separated the two sloops. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and modern scholarship: A General History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (Of Captain Tew); 'A Man of Courage and Activity': Thomas Tew, Anglo-American Piracy
  7. Rather than proceed to the Gambia the Amity turned for the Cape of Good Hope and the Red Sea, her company assenting, on Johnson's telling alone, with the cry "A gold Chain, or a wooden Leg, we'll stand by you". Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: A General History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (Of Captain Tew)
  8. On the 1693 voyage the Amity took one vessel, described by Baldridge as "a Ship in the Red Seas that did belong to the Moors", the plunder making "the whole share run 1200 l. a man"; the primary record gives the prize no name, and the Fateh Muhammed named for it by later accounts belongs to Henry Every's action of 1695. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  9. The Amity careened at St Mary's on Madagascar, where her people traded with Baldridge, and he records that she "set saile from St. Maries December the 23d 1693, bound for America", reaching Newport in Rhode Island in 1694, the April usually given for that arrival coming from later accounts. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  10. Governor Benjamin Fletcher of New York befriended Tew and granted him a privateering commission, and in his own later defence described him as "not only a man of courage and activity ... a very pleasant man", a document written after the Earl of Bellomont had alleged that Fletcher knew of Tew's piratical habits. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Calendared colonial documents: Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period: Illustrative Documents, printing N.Y. Col. Doc. IV. 447
  11. Fletcher reported to the Council of Trade and Plantations on 22 June 1697 that Tew "brought in no ship to this port", came "as a stranger", told him "he had a sloop well manned", and "gave bond to fight the French at the mouth of Canada river, whereupon I gave him a commission and instructions accordingly", naming no vessel. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state paper: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, vol. 15 (1696-1697), no. 1,098, Governor Fletcher to the Council of Trade and Plantations, New York, 22 June 1697, p. 518
  12. Dann's examination has the Amity "fitted out at New Yorke" in late 1694 or early 1695 for a second Red Sea voyage, and by about June 1695 she was at Liparan in the strait of Bab-el-Mandeb with Henry Every's loose squadron, the captains having agreed that Every should command. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination: Examination of John Dann (Jameson doc 63), C.O. 323:2 no. 25 IV
  13. In the pursuit of the Mughal fleet the Amity, on Dann's evidence, "fell asterne and never came up to them". Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination: Examination of John Dann (Jameson doc 63), C.O. 323:2 no. 25 IV
  14. Only the Fancy, the Pearl and the Portsmouth Adventure were present at the captures of the Fateh Muhammed and the Ganj-i-Sawai, dated to about 7 September 1695 by later accounts rather than by Dann. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Sworn examination: Examination of John Dann (Jameson doc 63), C.O. 323:2 no. 25 IV
  15. Thomas Tew was killed on the 1695 voyage "by a great Shott from a Moors ship", and since the Amity had fallen astern the primary record does not place him at the taking of either the Fateh Muhammed or the Ganj-i-Sawai. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination and deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II; Examination of John Dann (Jameson doc 63), C.O. 323:2 no. 25 IV
  16. Johnson's account, that after Tew's death his men "suffered themselves to be taken, without making Resistance", is contradicted by Baldridge, who records the Amity coming into St Mary's on 11 December 1695 under John Yarland and continuing to pirate. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn deposition and period narrative: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II; A General History of the Pyrates, Vol. II (Of Captain Tew)
  17. Under John Yarland the Amity took the Charming Mary at Mauratan on Madagascar, made one Bobbington captain, refitted at St Augustine and went into the Indies. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  18. Baldridge heard afterwards that the Amity was "trapaned and taken by the Moors", which is the last report of her and is his hearsay. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II
  19. A brigantine also called Amity, described by Baldridge as "that was Captain Tew's Sloop from Barbadoes and fitted into a Brigantine by the Owners of the Charming Mary at Barbados", arrived at St Mary's on 17 January 1696/7 and was later broken up by the Resolution, and whether she was Tew's sloop rebuilt or a distinct Barbados namesake is unresolved. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Adam Baldridge (Jameson doc 68), C.O. 5:1042 no. 30 II