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Whydah Gally

The ship of about 300 tons that Samuel Bellamy took from Capt. Lawrence Prince in late February 1717 and made his flagship, mounting eighteen guns as a merchantman and twenty-eight under Bellamy, lost with all but two of her people off Wellfleet on 26 April 1717 and found again in 1984.

LaunchedNot establishedTo26 April 1717 (O.S.), Cape CodAlso writtenWhido (the 1718 Boston trial print, and Cyprian Southack); Wedaw (the sworn deposition of two of the Fisher's men); Whydah Gally (the name and the year 1716 carried on the bell recovered from the wreck in 1985)

The ship taken from Capt. Lawrence Prince and commanded by Samuel Bellamy is spelled Whido in the 1718 Boston trial print and by Cyprian Southack, and Wedaw in the sworn deposition of two of the Fisher's men; these are one vessel.2

Three hundred tons, eighteen guns

She was a ship of about 300 tons: so John Brown swore at his examination, and so Southack judged her, who had walked the beach she came ashore on. On the day Bellamy caught her she had eighteen guns mounted and fifty men aboard, a merchantman's provision for a homeward run.3,4

She was taken homeward, out of Jamaica for London with sugar, indigo, Jesuits bark and some silver and gold aboard. That is the return leg of a slaving voyage, and it is why she is called a slave ship. How many people she carried out on the outward leg is not known.5

Taken from Prince

Her master was Capt. Lawrence Prince, and she changed hands after a chase of about three days. It was late February 1717, which contemporaries wrote 1716/17; some later accounts move it into March. Prince did not walk away empty. Bellamy gave him the Sultana, loaded with goods, and above twenty pounds in silver and gold. The Sultana was herself a prize, taken from Capt. John Richards and made into a man of war, and the Whydah took her place as the flagship. The place is unsettled. The popular accounts put the chase in the Windward Passage; Lieutenant Governor Bennett wrote on 30 July 1717 that Prince was taken as he turned homeward through the Bahama Islands.6,7,8,1

Twenty-eight guns

Bellamy put ten more guns in her. By the time she was working the New England coast the two men off the Fisher swore to a ship of twenty-eight guns, and that is very likely her armament for the whole of the northward voyage. Brown put the company at about 130 men, and up towards the Capes of Virginia they took three ships and a snow. A leaky Scotch ship was sunk. A snow of about 100 tons, taken from Montgomery, was kept and manned to twenty-eight men. A consort sloop kept with her under Paull Williams, the Paulsgrave Williams of the later accounts.9,10,11

The last day

On 26 April 1717, off Cape Cod, she took the sloop Fisher, Robert Ingols master, and the pink Mary Anne of Dublin, and put seven men aboard the pink to work her. That prize crew was the last she put out.12

About midnight the same day she drove ashore in a gale on the outer arm of the Cape, in the Wellfleet area. All aboard her but two were drowned, more than a hundred of them. The round number of a hundred and forty-two or a hundred and forty-five that circulates with her has nothing behind it. The night itself is told in the record of the wreck, and the reckoning at Boston afterwards in the Bellamy Collection.13,14

Southack buried the drowned and wrote the count onto his own chart, a hundred and two men. He found the ship beaten to pieces over four miles of beach and at least two hundred wreckers there before him, and he reckoned he might yet save goods to the value of about two hundred pounds.15,16

The bell

Barry Clifford located the site off Wellfleet in 1984, and in 1985 his divers brought up the ship's bell, with her name and the year 1716 on it.

The contemporary papers establish silver and gold in the Whydah's homeward cargo and Southack's search for money along the beach, but do not give a total weight for the treasure.17

What the record does not give for this ship is her own paperwork. No builder's certificate, nothing from the yard or the counting house: neither the year she was launched nor the man who paid for her is established from any document read for this page. Nothing read here counts the people she carried out of West Africa on her first voyage. The place of her taking is unsettled and the day of it is no better than the end of February. Her dead are counted three ways: more than a hundred, the hundred and two Southack buried in his own hand, and a traditional hundred and forty-odd that no source read for this page supports.

What the evidence does not settle

Building

  • The 1715 London launch and paying merchant come from a modern account
  • The bell's 1716 date is a year off the launch estimateConfirmed

Capture

  • Windward Passage or the Bahama Islands are given as the capture siteVery likely

Number of dead

  • Cotton Mather reported more than a hundred pirates drownedConfirmed
  • Southack buried the hundred and two drowned he recoveredConfirmed

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. Samuel Bellamy took the ship afterwards known as the Whydah from a Captain Prince and lost her on the Massachusetts shore in April 1717. Lieutenant Governor Benjamin Bennett of Bermuda, writing to the Council of Trade and Plantations on 30 July 1717, reports "The ship that Bellamy had called the Widdaw, which he took from one Capt. Prince belonging to Bristol as he was turning through the Bohama Islands from Jamaica bound home", and that on 27 April a pirate ship of 26 guns commanded by Bellamy took a vessel bound from Madeira to New England near Cape Cod, after which both crews got drunk and "ran their own vessell on shoar att a place called Nossetts Bay to the Southward of the Cape, on board her were 120 men, two whereof were only saved". Peter Heywood at Jamaica had already reported the same news on 3 July 1717 as "Bellamy with his ship and Company's perishing on ye shoals off of Cape Codd". The despatch places the capture in the Bahama Islands rather than the Windward Passage, dates the loss to 27 rather than 26 April, and makes Prince a Bristol man; the commissioning of the ship in London by Humphry Morice in 1715, her burthen of three hundred tuns, and Morice's offices at the Bank of England are not touched by it. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. State papers and official correspondence: Lieutenant Governor Benjamin Bennett to the Council of Trade and Plantations, Bermuda, 30 July 1717, calendared as no. 677 in Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, volume 29, 1716 to 1717 (July 1717, 17 to 31; pp. 344 to 364), C.O. 37, 10. No. 5, read at British History Online; and Peter Heywood, commander in chief of Jamaica, to the same, 3 July 1717, calendared as no. 629 in the same volume (pp. 336 to 344), C.O. 137, 12. No. 97. Bennett prefaces his account "From Boston in New England I am advised", so his report is an official relay of New England news rather than direct testimony.
  2. The ship taken from Capt. Lawrence Prince and commanded by Samuel Bellamy is spelled Whido in the 1718 Boston trial print and by Cyprian Southack, and Wedaw in the sworn deposition of two of the Fisher's men; these are one vessel. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Printed trial record and sworn depositions: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), N01688; Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 107), vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a; Deposition of Ralph Merry and Samuel Roberts (Jameson doc 111), no. 11945, paper 3
  3. Three independent contemporary papers give the Whydah as a vessel of about 300 tons burthen: the printed Boston trial, the examination of John Brown, and Cyprian Southack, who inspected the wreck. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Printed trial record and sworn examinations: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), N01688; Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment); Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 107), vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a
  4. At her capture from Capt. Lawrence Prince the Whydah mounted eighteen guns and carried fifty men, the trial print describing a ship of 300 tons with that fit, which is her armament as a merchantman before Bellamy rearmed her. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Printed trial record: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), N01688; Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment)
  5. When taken the Whydah was bound from Jamaica to London laden with sugar, indigo, Jesuits bark and some silver and gold, a homeward leg consistent with a completed slaving voyage, though no paper read for this record states that she had carried enslaved people. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Printed trial record and sworn examinations: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), N01688; Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment)
  6. The Whydah's master before her capture was Capt. Lawrence Prince, who was given Bellamy's Sultana loaded with goods and above twenty pounds in silver and gold in exchange for her. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Printed trial record and sworn examinations: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), N01688; Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment)
  7. Bellamy took the Whydah from Prince after a chase of about three days, the primaries dating it to the end of February 1717, written 1716/17 by contemporaries, while some later accounts give March; the day is left open. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Printed trial record and sworn examinations: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), N01688; Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment)
  8. The Whydah replaced the Sultana, a man of war made from a ship taken from Capt. John Richards, as Bellamy's flagship. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination and trial papers: Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment); Trial of Thomas Davis (Jameson doc 113), fragment 99; Memorial of Thomas Davis (Jameson doc 114), fragment 26283, paper 2
  9. Under Bellamy the Whydah carried twenty-eight guns, the sworn deposition of two of the Fisher's men describing a ship of twenty-eight guns and spelling her Wedaw. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn deposition: Deposition of Ralph Merry and Samuel Roberts (Jameson doc 111), no. 11945, paper 3
  10. After the capture the Whydah's company, about 130 men, cruised north towards the Capes of Virginia and took three ships and a snow, sinking a leaky Scotch ship and keeping a snow of about 100 tons taken from Montgomery, which was manned to twenty-eight men. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination: Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment)
  11. The consort sloop sailing with the Whydah was captained by a man the examination writes as Paull Williams, identified in later accounts as Paulsgrave Williams. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Sworn examination: Examination of John Brown (Jameson doc 108), no. 11945, paper 5 (a fragment)
  12. On 26 April 1717 off Cape Cod the Whydah took the sloop Fisher, Robert Ingols master, and the pink Mary Anne of Dublin, putting a seven-man prize crew aboard the pink. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Sworn depositions: Deposition of Thomas FitzGerald and Alexander Mackonochie (Jameson doc 109), no. 11945, paper 9; Deposition of Ralph Merry and Samuel Roberts (Jameson doc 111), no. 11945, paper 3
  13. The Whydah drove ashore on the outer arm of Cape Cod in the Wellfleet area at about midnight on 26 April 1717, Old Style, in a gale. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Official correspondence and printed documents: Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 110), vol. 51, pp. 289, 289a; Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period: Illustrative Documents (The Pirates of the Whidah), EBook 24882
  14. All aboard the Whydah but two were drowned and the sourced figures give more than a hundred dead; the often-repeated total of about 142 to 145 lost is a traditional estimate carried by no source read for this record. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Official correspondence and printed documents: Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 107), vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a; Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 110), vol. 51, pp. 289, 289a; Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period: Illustrative Documents (The Pirates of the Whidah), EBook 24882
  15. Cyprian Southack buried the drowned and wrote the count onto his salvage chart, a hundred and two men drowned and buried, the running counts in his letters being lower interim tallies. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Official correspondence and period map annotation: Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 107), vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a
  16. Southack found the wreck beaten to pieces over four miles and already stripped by at least two hundred wreckers, and expected to recover goods only to the value of about two hundred pounds. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Official correspondence: Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 107), vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a
  17. The contemporary papers establish silver and gold in the Whydah's homeward cargo and Southack's search for money along the beach, but do not give a total weight for the treasure. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Printed trial record and official correspondence: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), N01688; Cyprian Southack to Governor Samuel Shute (Jameson doc 107), vol. 51, pp. 287, 287a
  18. The printing of Charles Johnson's General History read for this record carries no Samuel Bellamy narrative, referring only to the West African port of Whydah Road and listing a Charles Bellamy in passing, so no fact about this ship rests on Johnson. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Period narrative: A General History of the Pyrates, EBook 40580