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Religion and Providence at Sea

Worship, providence and blasphemy afloat between about 1690 and 1725, inside an assumption that God governed the sea. It covers the King's ships' statutory worship, the Bible oath that made a pirate company, the gallows sermon that called piracy sin, and a plundered pilgrim ship received as religious injury.

Also writtenProvidence at sea; Pirates and religion; Worship, blasphemy and the gallows sermon

There was no irreligious space at sea in this period. Merchantman, slaver, fourth rate and stolen sloop sailed under one assumption: that God intervened continuously in the world and that a voyage's events could be read as messages. Historians call the habit providentialism; Alexandra Walsham finds it in every sector of English society.

The state's first article, and the church's sea liturgy

The Act of 1661 for the government of His Majesty's navies opens with worship, requiring officers at sea to cause "the publique Worshipp of Almighty God according to the Liturgy of the Church of England" to be solemnly performed in their ships; its second article punished rash oaths, cursings, execrations, drunkenness and uncleanness. The Book of Common Prayer of 1662 supplied the text, in a section headed "Forms of Prayer to be used at Sea" with distinct forms for storms, battle, deliverance and burial. The duty bound the Royal Navy alone: no merchant master had to hold a service, so a pirate ship without worship departed from no general norm.1

Reading a voyage for its verdicts

John Atkins, surgeon in HMS Swallow, wrote in his 1735 voyage of the sea as an element "whom none ought to trust; but they who have a Faith in Providence", and read a new volcanic island as a warning against "the Consequences of angry Omnipotence" while offering a subterranean fire hypothesis of his own. Johnson's General History of 1724 reads a company dying for want of water the same way, brought into soundings "(by the working of Divine Providence, no doubt,)".2

The oath that made a company

The 1724 book says of George Lowther's men in 1721 that their articles were "drawn up, signed and sworn to upon the Bible", of Bartholomew Roberts's company that new comers were "initiated by an Oath taken on a Bible, reserv'd for that Purpose only", and of John Phillips's men in 1723 that they "all swore to 'em upon a Hatchet for want of a Bible". The Bible is an instrument here, an object sworn on, and when none was to hand a hatchet served. The compiler could not tell how an oath bound men who had defied the laws of God and man, and fell back on mutual interest.3

Confessional lines are thinner than the popular picture allows. Johnson carries one anti-Catholic utterance, David Sympson's preference for any captain who was not a Papist, and on the exclusion of Irishmen from Roberts's company the same book contradicts itself, giving a grievance against Walter Kennedy as the ground in one place and rejecting that ground in another.

Two passages often over-read

The first is Article XI of the set the 1724 book attributes to Roberts's company: "The Musicians to have Rest on the Sabbath Day, but the other six Days and Nights, none without special Favour." That is a labour provision giving one trade aboard a day off, and no source yet found describes a pirate company holding a service or keeping a Sunday. The second is the clergyman taken in the Onslow, bound for the chaplaincy of Cape Corso Castle, whose captors alleged "merrily, that their Ship wanted a Chaplain" and then would not force him. One offer, declined, is not a custom. The same book carries the opposite too, devil talk and prayer books used for songs, each of which it stages before an audience.4

The gallows theology

A pirate's hanging was a liturgical event with a printed afterlife. The Ordinary of Newgate published the confessions and dying words of the executed from 1676 to 1772; the sheet that matters here is Paul Lorrain's account of Captain William Kidd and the pirates hanged at Execution Dock on 23 May 1701. The Boston form was fuller: Cotton Mather's Faithful Warnings of 1704 called the condemned "a tragical spectacle, in a number of miserables", and his Converted Sinner of 1724 was preached "at the desire of certain pirates". These sermons and sheets are prosecution theology addressed to a congregation.5

The 1724 book's account of the Cape Coast Castle executions of 1722 shows the machinery improvised: with no chaplain, a ship's surgeon offered himself "in the room of an Ordinary". The first six condemned would not perform: they exclaimed against the severity of the court, and some, asked their country and age, answered that they "should give no Account but to God". Others behaved with seeming devotion: Peter Scudamore sang the first part of the thirty-first Psalm at the gallows by himself, while Thomas Sutton asked that a praying prisoner be removed "as a common Disturber".6

The injury in the Indian Ocean

Henry Every's taking of Mughal shipping in September 1695 struck a vessel carrying pilgrims home from Mecca, and at Surat and at court the injury was received as religious as well as commercial. Tyler Kynn's 2021 study reads it from a Mughal captain's letter, and finds the empire blaming the English and the East India Company. The reading was legible in London: the 1724 book gives the pilgrims' obligation "once in their Lives to visit that Place" while calling their offerings gifts for a shrine of Mahomet.7

No golden age pirate left a prayer, a diary or a letter about God. Every statement here about pirate belief has passed through a judge, a chaplain or a bookseller, and most through Johnson's crime book of 1724, evidence of what that book says rather than of what pirates did. No source yet found records worship aboard a pirate vessel, and whether the refusals at Cape Coast were typical cannot be settled from a corpus that wanted both penitent and reprobate. No Persian or Arabic source has yet been read.

What the evidence does not settle

Sabbath observance

  • Sabbath clause in Roberts's articles lacks independent confirmationUnverified

Execution ritual refusals

  • Whether execution refusals at Cape Coast and Boston were typical is unsettledUnverified

Religious framing of Every's plunder

  • Whether the ship taken in 1695 carried Mecca pilgrims is not establishedUnverified

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 first article of the Act of 1661 for the establishing of articles and orders for the regulating and better government of His Majesty's navies required commanders, captains and other officers at sea to cause "the publique Worshipp of Almighty God according to the Liturgy of the Church of England established by Law to be solemnly orderly and reverently performed in theire respective Ships", and its second article made unlawful and rash oaths, cursings, execrations, drunkenness and uncleanness punishable as a court martial should think fit; the Book of Common Prayer of 1662 supplied the text in a section headed "Forms of Prayer to be used at Sea", with distinct forms for storms, for before a fight at sea, for thanksgiving after a storm, for deliverance from an enemy and for the burial of the dead at sea, the duty binding King's ships and not merchant hulls. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Statute in a standard scholarly edition and period liturgical text: Charles II, 1661: An Act for the Establishing Articles and Orders for the regulateing and better Government of His Majesties Navies Ships of Warr and Forces by Sea, Statutes of the Realm, volume 5, pages 311 to 314, British History Online; Forms of Prayer to be used at Sea, in The Book of Common Prayer, 1662
  2. The providential reading of events at sea is recorded in both the naval and the criminal literature of the period: John Atkins, surgeon in HMS Swallow, writes in his 1735 voyage of the sea as an element "whom none ought to trust; but they who have a Faith in Providence" and reads a newly risen volcanic island as intended "to strike Mankind with a Dread of Providence, and warn a sinful World against the Consequences of angry Omnipotence" while advancing a subterranean fire hypothesis in the same paragraph, and the General History of 1724 records of a company dying for want of water that "This was their Case, when (by the working of Divine Providence, no doubt,) they were brought into Soundings". Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Period narrative and period printed book of contested reliability: John Atkins, A Voyage to Guinea, Brasil and the West Indies; in His Majesty's Ships, the Swallow and Weymouth, London, 1735; A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson, London, 1724
  3. The General History of 1724 reports the sworn oath as the constitutive act of a pirate company, stating of George Lowther's men in 1721 that their articles were "drawn up, signed and sworn to upon the Bible", of Bartholomew Roberts's company that new comers were "initiated by an Oath taken on a Bible, reserv'd for that Purpose only", and of John Phillips's men in 1723 that they "all swore to 'em upon a Hatchet for want of a Bible"; the same compiler states that he cannot tell how Roberts could think an oath obligatory where defiance had been given to the laws of God and man, and offers the members' mutual interest as the explanation instead. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Period printed book of contested reliability: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson, London, 1724, the Roberts, Lowther and Phillips chapters
  4. The two passages most often cited as evidence of pirate piety both come from the General History of 1724 and neither establishes a practice: Article XI of the set attributed to Roberts's company reads "The Musicians to have Rest on the Sabbath Day, but the other six Days and Nights, none without special Favour", which is a labour provision for one trade aboard and says nothing of worship, and the clergyman taken in the Onslow on his way to the chaplaincy of Cape Corso Castle was offered a share by men alleging "merrily, that their Ship wanted a Chaplain" and promising he should do nothing "but make Punch, and say Prayers", was not forced, and declined; no source yet found describes a pirate company holding a service, keeping a Sunday or ceasing work for worship. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Period printed book of contested reliability: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson, London, 1724, the Roberts chapters
  5. The execution of a pirate carried a printed theology: the Ordinary of Newgate, chaplain of the prison, held the right to publish the behaviour, confessions and dying words of the executed, the accounts running from 1676 to 1772 with over four hundred editions surviving, and Paul Lorrain, Ordinary from 1700 to 1719, signed the account of Captain William Kidd and other pirates executed at Execution Dock on Friday 23 May 1701; at Boston the equivalent was the execution sermon, Cotton Mather's Faithful Warnings of 1704 presenting the condemned as "a tragical spectacle, in a number of miserables", his Converted Sinner of 1724 preached "In the hearing and at the desire of certain pirates, a little before their execution", and these pamphlets and sheets are prosecution theology addressed to a congregation rather than reports of what pirates believed. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Scholarly project background page, repository catalogue records and period printed sermons: Ordinary of Newgate's Accounts, The Old Bailey Proceedings Online, Digital Humanities Institute, University of Sheffield; Huntington Library catalogue record 14152 for Paul Lorrain's account of Captain William Kidd, 1701; Cotton Mather, Faithful Warnings to Prevent Fearful Judgments, Boston, 1704; Cotton Mather, The Converted Sinner, Boston, 1724
  6. The General History of 1724 records that at the Cape Coast Castle executions of 1722 no chaplain officiated and a ship's surgeon "was so charitable at this Time, to offer himself in the room of an Ordinary"; that the first six condemned refused the penitential script, exclaimed against the severity of the court, said they were poor rogues hanged while others no less guilty escaped, and answered that they "suffered the Law, and should give no Account but to God"; that other prisoners, described as destitute of ministers, behaved with seeming devotion, Peter Scudamore desiring at the gallows that they would have patience with him to sing the first part of the thirty-first Psalm, which he did by himself throughout; and that Thomas Sutton, in irons, mocked a praying fellow prisoner and asked that he be removed or his prayer book taken away "as a common Disturber". Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Period printed book of contested reliability: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson, London, 1724, the Cape Coast trial appendix
  7. Henry Every's plunder of Mughal shipping in September 1695 took a vessel carrying travellers returning from the pilgrimage to Mecca, and the injury was received at Surat and at the imperial court as religious as well as commercial, Tyler Kynn's 2021 study reading the episode from a previously unexplored Mughal captain's letter and showing the empire attributing blame to English interests and to the East India Company; the religious character was legible in London too, the General History of 1724 explaining to English readers that the pilgrims thought "themselves obliged once in their Lives to visit that Place" while misdescribing their offerings as gifts for a shrine of Mahomet. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Peer reviewed journal article, at abstract and record level, with a period printed book of contested reliability: Tyler Joseph Kynn, Pirates and Pilgrims: The Plunder of the Ganj-i Sawai, the Hajj, and a Mughal Captain's Perspective, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, volume 64, pages 93 to 122, 2021; A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates, attributed to Captain Charles Johnson, London, 1724, the Every chapter