Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
of Peru and Mexico which culminated in Dampier's failure to cap-
ture the Manila galleon. At this point, several of his men defected and
made their way westward in a prize ship. Dampier and his depleted
crew were obliged to abandon the
St George
and make their way
across the Pacific in a captured Spanish barque. In Amboyna they
were imprisoned as pirates by the Dutch and it was only in Decem-
ber 1707 that Dampier reached England to discover that Stradling
and others had already savaged his reputation. The most interesting
point about this, otherwise sordid, expedition is that Stradling fell
out with his sailing master, Alexander Selkirk, and abandoned him
on Juan Fernandez in September 1704.
Dampier did not have to spend long ashore. In August 1708
he sailed as pilot and sailing master in the
Duke,
a privateer under
the command of Woodes Rogers, a tough but good-humoured sea-
man and an excellent captain. The
Duke
and her consort, appropri-
ately named the
Duchess,
were pretty foul vessels and manned by the
usual riff-raff supplied to privateers and it is to Rogers's credit that
he maintained discipline throughout the voyage. A mutiny in mid-
Atlantic was swiftly suppressed and the captain had the ringlead-
er flogged by a fellow conspirator, to break 'any unlawful friendship
amongst them'. He could be ruthless when necessary but he also saw
that the men's wages were paid promptly and he took his officers in-
to his confidence. Dampier's advice he found particularly valuable,
since Rogers, himself, had never been into the South Sea. Rounding
the Horn in January 1709, the ships ran into severe storms and were
driven far to the south. By Rogers's reckoning they reached 61°53′,
which was probably the highest latitude any mariners had reached
in the southern hemisphere. The men suffered terribly during those
weeks through being incessantly soaked to the skin and frozen by
biting winds. Rogers, on Dampier's advice, decided to put in at Juan
Fernandez. Approaching the principal anchorage, he was surprised
to see smoke rising from a signal fire on the beach. A boat was sent
