In 1695, Every set sail for the volcanic island of Perim to wait for an Indian fleet that would be passing soon.[g] The fleet was easily the richest prize in Asia—perhaps in the entire world—and any pirates who managed to capture it would have been the perpetrators of the world’s most profitable pirate raid.[1] In August 1695, Fancy reached the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, where Every joined forces with five other pirate captains: Tew on the sloop-of-war Amity, with a crew of about sixty men; Joseph Faro on Portsmouth Adventure, with sixty men; Richard Want on Dolphin, also with sixty men; William Mayes on Pearl, with thirty or forty men; and Thomas Wake on Susanna, with seventy men.[2] All of these captains were carrying privateering commissions that implicated almost the entire Eastern Seaboard of North America. Every was elected admiral of the new six-ship pirate flotilla despite the fact that Tew had arguably more experience, and now found himself in command of over 440 men while they lay in wait for the Indian fleet.[2] A convoy of twenty-five Grand Mughal ships, including the enormous 1,600-ton Ganj-i-sawai with eighty cannons, and its escort, the 600-ton Fateh Muhammed, were spotted passing the straits en route to Surat. Although the convoy had managed to elude the pirate fleet during the night, the pirates gave chase.
Dolphin proved to be far too slow, lagging behind the rest of the pirate ships, so it was burned and the crew joined Every aboard Fancy. Amity and Susanna also proved to be poor ships: Amity fell behind and never again rejoined the pirate flotilla (Tew having been killed in a battle with a Mughal ship), while the straggling Susanna eventually rejoined the group. The pirates caught up with Fateh Muhammed four or five days later.[3] Perhaps intimidated by Fancy‘s forty-six guns or weakened by an earlier battle with Tew, Fateh Muhammed‘s crew put up little resistance; Every’s pirates then sacked the ship, which had belonged to one Abdul Ghaffar, reportedly Surat’s wealthiest merchant.[h][4] While Fateh Muhammed‘s treasure of some £50,000 to £60,000 was enough to buy Fancy fifty times over,[5] once the treasure was shared out among the pirate fleet, Every’s crew received only small shares.[6]
Every now sailed in pursuit of the second Mughal ship, Ganj-i-Sawai[7] (meaning “Exceeding Treasure,” and often Anglicized as Gunsway),[8] overtaking it a few days after the attack on Fateh Muhammed.[5][9] With Amity and Dolphin left behind, only Fancy, Pearl, and Portsmouth Adventure were present for the actual battle.[10]
Ganj-i-sawai, captained by one Muhammad Ibrahim, was a fearsome opponent, mounting eighty guns and a musket-armed guard of four hundred, as well as six hundred other passengers. But the opening volley evened the odds, as Every’s lucky broadside shot his enemy’s mainmast by the board.[11] With Ganj-i-sawai unable to escape, Fancy drew alongside. For a moment, a volley of Indian musket fire prevented the pirates from clambering aboard, but one of Ganj-i-sawai‘s powerful cannons exploded, instantly killing many and demoralizing the Indian crew, who ran below deck or fought to put out the spreading fires.[12] Every’s men took advantage of the confusion, quickly scaling Ganj-i-sawai‘s steep sides. The crew of Pearl, initially fearful of attacking Ganj-i-sawai, now took heart and joined Every’s crew on Indian ship’s deck. A ferocious hand-to-hand battle then ensued, lasting two to three hours.[13]
Muhammad Hashim Khafi Khan, a contemporary Indian historian who was in Surat at the time, wrote that, as Every’s men boarded the ship, Ganj-i-sawai‘s captain ran below decks where he armed the slave girls and sent them up to fight the pirates.[14][15] Khafi Khan’s account of the battle, appearing in his multivolume work The History of India, as Told by Its Own Historians, places blame squarely on Captain Ibrahim for the failure, writing: “The Christians are not bold in the use of the sword, and there were so many weapons on board the royal vessel that if the captain had made any resistance, they must have been defeated.”[14] In any case, after several hours of stubborn but leaderless resistance, the ship surrendered. In his defense, Captain Ibrahim would later report that “many of the enemy were sent to hell.”[16] Indeed, Every’s outnumbered crew may have suffered anywhere from several to over a hundred casualties, although these figures are uncertain.[17][16]
According to Khafi Khan, the victorious pirates subjected their captives to an orgy of horror that lasted several days, raping and killing their terrified prisoners deck by deck. The pirates reportedly utilized torture to extract information from their prisoners, who had hidden the treasure in the ship’s holds. Some of the Muslim women apparently committed suicide to avoid violation, while those women who did not kill themselves or die from the pirates’ brutality were taken aboard Fancy.[18]
Although stories of brutality by the pirates have been dismissed by sympathizers as sensationalism, they are corroborated by the depositions Every’s men provided following their capture. John Sparkes testified in his “Last Dying Words and Confession” that the “inhuman treatment and merciless tortures inflicted on the poor Indians and their women still affected his soul,” and that, while apparently unremorseful for his acts of piracy, which were of “lesser concern,” he was nevertheless repentant for the “horrid barbarities he had committed, though only on the bodies of the heathen.”[19] Philip Middleton testified that several of the Indian men were murdered, while they also “put several to the torture” and Every’s men “lay with the women aboard, and there were several that, from their jewels and habits, seemed to be of better quality than the rest.”[19] Furthermore, on 12 October 1695, Sir John Gayer, then-governor of Bombay and president of the EIC, sent a letter to the Lords of Trade, writing:
It is certain the Pyrates, which these People affirm were all English, did do very barbarously by the People of the Ganj-i-sawai and Abdul Gofor’s Ship, to make them confess where their Money was, and there happened to be a great Umbraws Wife (as Wee hear) related to the King, returning from her Pilgrimage to Mecha, in her old age. She they abused very much, and forced severall other Women, which Caused one person of Quality, his Wife and Nurse, to kill themselves to prevent the Husbands seing them (and their being) ravished.[20]
Later accounts would tell of how Every himself had found “something more pleasing than jewels” aboard, usually reported to be Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb‘s daughter or granddaughter. (According to contemporary EIC sources, Ganj-i-sawai was carrying a “relative” of the Emperor, though there is no evidence to suggest that it was his daughter and her retinue.[21]) However, this is at odds with the deposition of Philip Middleton, who testified that “all of the Charles‘s men, except Every, boarded [Fateh Muhammed and Ganj-i-sawai] by Turns.”[16] At any rate, the survivors were left aboard their emptied ships, which the pirates set free to continue on their voyage back to India. The loot from Ganj-i-sawai, the greatest ship in the Muslim fleet, totaled somewhere between £200,000 and £600,000, including 500,000 gold and silver pieces. All told, it may have been the richest ship ever taken by pirates.
Sourced from: Wikipedia
REFERENCES
- Rogoziński 2000, p. 84
- ^ Jump up to:a b Baer 2005, p. 99
- ^ Jump up to:a b Fox 2008, pp. 73–79
- ^ Rogoziński 2000, p. 248
- ^ Woodard 2007, p. 21
- ^ Burgess 2009a, p. 136
- Ganj-i-sawai
- ^ Travers 2007, p. 41
- ^ Woodard 2007, p. 20
- ^ Jump up to:a b Rogoziński 2000, p. 85
- ^ Burgess 2009a, pp. 136–137
- ^ Jump up to:a b Baer 2005, p. 101
- ^ Earle 2006, p. 117
- ^ Jump up to:a b Elliot 1877, p. 350
- ^ Rogoziński 2000, p. 86
- ^ Jump up to:a b c Baer 2005, p. 102
- ^ Fox 2008, pp. 60, 79
- ^ Elliot 1877, pp. 350–351
- ^ Jump up to:a b c Grey 1933, p. 151
- ^ Jameson 1923, doc. No. 60
- ^ Fox 2008, pp. 80–81
