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diff --git a/13442-0.txt b/13442-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ec52895 --- /dev/null +++ b/13442-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2445 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13442 *** + +[Illustration: SAINT ETHELBURGA'S CHURCH, INTERIOR] + + + + +HENRY HUDSON + +A BRIEF STATEMENT OF +HIS AIMS AND HIS ACHIEVEMENTS + +BY + +THOMAS A. JANVIER + + +TO WHICH IS ADDED +A NEWLY-DISCOVERED PARTIAL RECORD +NOW FIRST PUBLISHED + +OF + +THE TRIAL OF THE MUTINEERS +BY WHOM HE AND OTHERS +WERE ABANDONED TO THEIR DEATH + + + +1909 + + + +TO +C.A.J. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +PART I +A Brief Life of Henry Hudson + +PART II +Newly-discovered Documents + + + + +PREFACE + + +It is with great pleasure that I include in this volume +contemporary Hudson documents which have remained neglected for +three centuries, and here are published for the first time. As I +explain more fully elsewhere, their discovery is due to the +painstaking research of Mr. R.G. Marsden, M.A. My humble share in +the matter has been to recognize the importance of Mr. Marsden's +discovery; and to direct the particular search in the Record +Office, in London, that has resulted in their present reproduction. +I regret that they are inconclusive. We still are ignorant of what +punishment was inflicted upon the mutineers of the "Discovery"; or +even if they were punished at all. + +The primary importance of these documents, however, is not that +they establish the fact--until now not established--that the +mutineers were brought to trial; it is that they embody the sworn +testimony, hitherto unproduced, of six members of Hudson's crew +concerning the mutiny. Asher, the most authoritative of Hudson's +modern historians, wrote: "Prickett is the only eye-witness that +has left us an account of these events, and we can therefore not +correct his statements whether they be true or false." We now have +the accounts of five additional eye-witnesses (Prickett himself is +one of the six whose testimony has been recovered), and all of +them, so far as they go, substantially are in accord with +Prickett's account. Such agreement is not proof of truth. The newly +adduced witnesses and the earlier single witness equally were +interested in making out a case in their own favor that would save +them from being hanged. But this new evidence does entitle +Prickett's "Larger Discourse" to a more respectful consideration +than that dubious document heretofore has received. Save in matters +affected by this fresh material, the following narrative is a +condensation of what has been recorded by Hudson's authoritative +biographers, of whom the more important are: Samuel Purchas, Hessel +Gerritz, Emanuel Van Meteren, G.M. Asher, Henry C. Murphy, John +Romeyn Brodhead, and John Meredith Read. + +T.A.J. +New York, _July_ 16, 1909. + + + + +THE ILLUSTRATIONS + + +No portrait of Hudson is known to be in existence. What has passed +with the uncritical for his portrait--a dapper-looking man wearing +a ruffed collar--frequently has been, and continues to be, +reproduced. Who that man was is unknown. That he was not Hudson is +certain. + +Lacking Hudson's portrait, I have used for a frontispiece a +photograph, especially taken for this purpose, of the interior of +the Church of Saint Ethelburga: the sole remaining material link, +of which we have sure knowledge, between Hudson and ourselves. The +drawing on the cover represents what is very near to being another +material link--the replica, lately built in Holland, of the "Half +Moon," the ship in which Hudson made his most famous voyage. + +The other illustrations have been selected with a strict regard to +the meaning of that word. In order to throw light on the text, I +have preferred--to the ventures of fancy--reproductions of +title-pages of works on navigation that Hudson probably used; +pictures of the few and crude instruments of navigation that he +certainly used; and pictures of ships virtually identical with +those in which he sailed. + +The copy of Wright's famous work on navigation that Hudson may have +had, and probably did have, with him was of an earlier date than +that (1610) of which the title-page here is reproduced. This +reproduction is of interest in that it shows at a glance all of the +nautical instruments that Hudson had at his command; and of a still +greater interest in that the map which is a part of it exhibits +what at that time, by exploration or by conjecture, was the known +world. To the making of that map Hudson himself contributed: on it, +with a previously unknown assurance, his River clearly is marked. +The inadequate indication of his Bay probably is taken from +Weymouth's chart--the chart that Hudson had with him on his voyage. +A curious feature of this map is its marking--in defiance of known +facts--of two straits, to the north and to the south of a large +island, where should be the Isthmus of Panama. + +The one seemingly fanciful picture, that of the mermaids, is not +fanciful--a point that I have enlarged upon elsewhere--by the +standard of Hudson's times. Hudson himself believed in the +existence of mermaids: as is proved by his matter-of-fact entry in +his log that a mermaid had been seen by two of his crew. + + + + +A BRIEF LIFE OF HENRY HUDSON + + + + +HENRY HUDSON + +I + + +If ever a compelling Fate set its grip upon a man and drove him to +an accomplishment beside his purpose and outside his thought, it +was when Henry Hudson--having headed his ship upon an ordered +course northeastward--directly traversed his orders by fetching +that compass to the southwestward which ended by bringing him into +what now is Hudson's River, and which led on quickly to the +founding of what now is New York. + +Indeed, the late Thomas Aquinas, and the later Calvin, could have +made out from the few known facts in the life of this navigator so +pretty a case in favor of Predestination that the blessed St. +Augustine and the worthy Arminius--supposing the four come together +for a friendly dish of theological talk--would have had their work +cut out for them to formulate a countercase in favor of Free Will. +It is a curious truth that every important move in Hudson's life of +which we have record seems to have been a forced move: sometimes +with a look of chance about it--as when the directors of the Dutch +East India Company called him back and hastily renewed with him +their suspended agreement that he should search for a passage to +Cathay on a northeast course past Nova Zembla, and so sent him off +on the voyage that brought the "Half Moon" into Hudson's River; +sometimes with the fatalism very much in evidence--as when his own +government seized him out of the Dutch service, and so put him in +the way to go sailing to his death on that voyage through Hudson's +Strait that ended, for him, in his mutineering crew casting him +adrift to starve with cold and hunger in Hudson's Bay. And, being +dead, the same inconsequent Fate that harried him while alive has +preserved his name, and very nobly, by anchoring it fast to that +River and Strait and Bay forever: and this notwithstanding the fact +that all three of them were discovered by other navigators before +his time. + +Hudson sought, as from the time of Columbus downward other +navigators had sought before him, a short cut to the Indies; but +his search was made, because of what those others had accomplished, +within narrowed lines. In the century and more that had passed +between the great Admiral's death and the beginning of Hudson's +explorations one important geographical fact had been established: +that there was no water-way across America between, roughly, +the latitudes of 40° South and 40° North. Of necessity, +therefore--since to round America south of 40° South would make a +longer voyage than by the known route around the Cape of Good +Hope--exploration that might produce practical results had to be +made north of 40° North, either westward from the Atlantic or +eastward from the North Sea. + +Even within those lessened limits much had been determined before +Hudson's time. To the eastward, both Dutch and English searchers +had gone far along the coast of Russia; passing between that coast +and Nova Zembla and entering the Kara Sea. To the westward, in the +year 1524, Verazzano had sailed along the American coast from 34° +to 50° North; and in the course of that voyage had entered what now +is New York Bay. In the year 1598, Sebastian Cabot had coasted +America from 38° North to the mouth of what now is Hudson's Strait. +Frobisher had entered that Strait in the year 1577; Weymouth had +sailed into it nearly one hundred leagues in the year 1602; and +Portuguese navigators, in the years 1558 and 1569, probably had +passed through it and had entered what now is Hudson's Bay. + +[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE OF TITLE-PAGE OF A SEA HANDBOOK OF +HUDSON'S TIME] + +As the result of all this exploration, Hudson had at his command a +mass of information--positive as well as negative--that at once +narrowed his search and directed it; and there is very good reason +for believing that he actually carried with him charts of a crude +sort on which, more or less clearly, were indicated the Strait and +the Bay and the River which popularly are regarded as of his +discovery and to which have been given his name. But I hold that +his just fame is not lessened by the fact that his discoveries, +nominally, were rediscoveries. Within the proper meaning of the +word they truly were his dis-coveries: in that he did un-cover them +so effectually that they became known clearly, and thereafter +remained known clearly, to the world. + + + + +II + + +Because of his full accomplishment of what others essayed and only +partially accomplished, Hudson's name is the best known--excepting +only that of Columbus--of all the names of explorers by land and +sea. From Purchas's time downward it has headed the list of Arctic +discoverers; in every history of America it has a leading place; on +every map of North America it thrice is written large; here in New +York, which owes its founding to his exploring voyage, it is +uttered--as we refer to the river, the county, the city, the +street, the railroad, bearing it--a thousand times a day. + +And yet, in despite of this familiarity with his name, our certain +knowledge of Hudson's life is limited to a period (April 19, +1607-June 22,1611) of little more than four years. Of that period, +during which he did the work that has made him famous, we have a +partial record--much of it under his own hand--that certainly is +authentic in its general outlines until it reaches the culminating +tragedy. At the very last, where we most want the clear truth, we +have only the one-sided account presented by his murderers: and +murderers, being at odds with moral conventions generally, are not, +as a rule, models of veracity. And so it has fallen out that what +we know about the end of Hudson's life, save that it ended foully, +is as uncertain as the facts of the earlier and larger part of his +life are obscure. + +An American investigator, the late Gen. John Meredith Read, has +gone farthest in unearthing facts which enlighten this obscurity; +but with no better result than to establish certain strong +probabilities as to Hudson's ancestry and antecedents. By General +Read's showing, the Henry Hudson mentioned by Hakluyt as one of the +charter members (February 6, 1554-5) of the Muscovy Company, +possibly was our navigator's grandfather. He was a freeman of +London, a member of the Skinners Company, and sometime an alderman. +He died in December, 1555, according to Stow, "of the late hote +burning feuers, whereof died many olde persons, so that in London +died seven Aldermen in the space of tenne monthes." They gave that +departed worthy a very noble funeral! Henry Machyn, who had charge +of it, describes it in his delightful "Diary" in these terms: "The +xx day of December was bered at Sant Donstones in the Est master +Hare Herdson, altherman of London and Skynner, and on of the +masters of the gray frere in London with men and xxiiij women in +mantyl fresse [frieze?] gownes, a herse [catafalque] of wax and +hong with blake; and there was my lord mare and the swordberer in +blake, and dyvers oder althermen in blake, and the resedew of the +althermen, atys berying; and all the masters, boyth althermen and +odur, with ther gren staffes in ther hands, and all the chylders of +the gray frersse, and iiij in blake gownes bayring iiij gret +stayffes-torchys bornying, and then xxiiij men with torchys +bornying; and the morrow iij masses songe; and after to ys plasse +to dener; and ther was ij goodly whyt branches, and mony prestes +and clarkes syngying." Stow adds that the dead alderman's widow, +Barbara, caused to be set up in St. Dunstan's to his memory--and +also to that of her second husband, Sir Richard Champion, and +prospectively to her own--a monument in keeping with their worldly +condition and with the somewhat mixed facts of their triangular +case. This was a "very faire Alabaster Tombe, richly and curiously +gilded, and two ancient figures of Aldermen in scarlet kneeling, +the one at the one end of the tombe in a goodly arch, the other at +the other end in like manner, and a comely figure of a lady between +them, who was wife to them both." + +The names have been preserved in legal records of three of the +sons--Thomas, John and Edward--of this eminent Londoner: who +flourished so greatly in life; who was given so handsome a send-off +into eternity; and who, presumably, retains in that final state an +undivided one-half interest in the lady whose comely figure was +sculptured upon his tomb. General Read found record of a Henry +Hudson, mentioned by Stow as a citizen of London in the year 1558, +who may also have been a son of the alderman; of a Captain Thomas +Hudson, of Limehouse, who had a leading part in an expedition set +forth "into the parts of Persia and Media" by the Muscovy Company +in the years 1577-81; of a Thomas Hudson, of Mortlake, who was a +friend of Dr. John Dee, and to whom references frequently are made +in the famous "Diary" such as the following: "March 6 [1583]. I, +and Mr. Adrian Gilbert and John Davis did mete with Mr. Alderman +Barnes, Mr. Townson, and Mr. Young, and Mr. Hudson abowt the N.W. +voyage." Concerning a Christopher Hudson--who was in the service of +the Muscovy Company as its agent and factor at Moscow from about +the year 1553 until about the year 1576--the only certainty is that +he was not a son of the Alderman. There is a record of the year +1560 that "Christopher Hudson hath written to come home ... +considering the death of his father and mother"; and, as the +Alderman died in the year 1555, and as his remarried widow was +alive in the year 1560, this is conclusive. Being come back to +England, this Christopher rose to be a person of importance in the +Company; as appears from the fact that he was one of a committee +(circa 1583) appointed to confer with "Captain Chris. Carlile ... +upon his intended discoveries and attempt into the hithermost parts +of America." + +[Illustration: APPARATUS FOR CORRECTING ERRORS OF THE COMPASS. +FROM "CERTAINE ERRORS IN NAVIGATION." LONDON, 1610] + +General Read thus summarized the result of his investigations: "We +have learned that London was the residence of Henry Hudson the +elder, of Henry Hudson his son, and of Christopher Hudson, and that +Captain Thomas Hudson lived at Limehouse, now a part of the +Metropolis; while Thomas Hudson, the friend of Dr. John Dee, +resided at Mortlake, then only six or seven miles from the City +... By reference to a statement made by Abakuk Prickett, in his +'Larger Discourse,' it will be found that Henry Hudson the +discoverer also was a citizen of London and had a house there." +From all of which, together with various minor corroborative facts, +he draws these conclusions: That Henry Hudson the discoverer was +the descendant, probably the grandson, of the Henry Hudson who died +while holding the office of Alderman of the City of London in the +year 1555; that he "received his early training, and imbibed the +ideas which controlled the purposes of his after life, under the +fostering care of the great Corporation [the Muscovy Company] which +his relatives had helped to found and afterwards to maintain"; that +he entered the service of that Company as an apprentice, in +accordance with the then custom, and in due course was advanced to +command rank. + +That is the net result of General Read's most laboriously +painstaking investigations. The facts for which he searched so +diligently, and so longed to find, he did not find. In a foot-note +he added: "The place and date of Hudson's birth will doubtless be +accurately ascertained in the course of the examinations now being +made in England under my directions. The result of these researches +I hope to be able to present to the public at no distant day." That +note was written nearly fifty years ago, and its writer died long +since with his hope unrealized. + +But while General Read failed to accomplish his main purpose, he +did, as I have said, more than any other investigator has done to +throw light on Hudson's ancestry, and on his connection with the +Muscovy Company in whose service he sailed. Our navigator may or +may not have been a grandson of the alderman who cut so fine a +figure in the City three centuries and a half ago; but beyond a +reasonable doubt he was of the family--so eminently distinguished +in the annals of discovery--to which that alderman, one of the +founders of the Muscovy Company, and Christopher Hudson, one of its +later governors, and Captain Thomas Hudson, who sailed in its +service, all belonged. And, being akin to such folk, the natural +disposition to adventure was so strong within him that it led him +on to accomplishments which have made him the most illustrious +bearer of his name. + + + + +III + + +"Anno, 1607, Aprill the nineteenth, at Saint Ethelburge, in Bishops +Gate street, did communicate with the rest of the parishioners, +these persons, seamen, purposing to goe to sea foure days after, +for to discover a passage by the North Pole to Japan and China. +First, Henry Hudson, master. Secondly, William Colines, his mate. +Thirdly, James Young. Fourthly, John Colman. Fiftly, John Cooke. +Sixtly, James Beubery. Seventhly, James Skrutton. Eightly, John +Pleyce. Ninthly, Thomas Barter. Tenthly, Richard Day. Eleventhly, +James Knight. Twelfthly, John Hudson, a boy." + +With those words Purchas prefaced his account of what is +known--because we have no record of earlier voyages--as Hudson's +first voyage; and with those words our certain knowledge of +Hudson's life begins. + +St. Ethelburga's, a restful pause in the bustle of Bishopsgate +Street, still stands--the worse, to be sure, for the clutter of +little shops that has been built in front of it, and for +incongruous interior renovation--and I am very grateful to Purchas +for having preserved the scrap of information that links Hudson's +living body with that church which still is alive: into which may +pass by the very doorway that he passed through those who venerate +his memory; and there may stand within the very walls and beneath +the very roof that sheltered him when he and his ship's company +partook of the Sacrament together three hundred years ago. Purchas, +no doubt, could have told all that we so gladly would know of +Hudson's early history. But he did not tell it--and we must rest +content, I think well content, with that poetic beginning at the +chancel rail of St. Ethelburga's of the strong life that less than +four years later came to its epic ending. + +The voyage made in the year 1607, for which Hudson and his crew +prepared by making their peace with God in St. Ethelburga's, had +nothing to do with America; nor did his voyage of the year +following have anything to do with this continent. Both of those +adventures were set forth by the Muscovy Company in search of a +northeast passage to the Indies; and, while they failed in their +main purpose, they added important facts concerning the coasts of +Spitzbergen and of Nova Zembla to the existing stock of +geographical knowledge, and yielded practical results in that they +extended England's Russian trade. + +The most notable scientific accomplishment of the first voyage was +the high northing made. By observation (July 23, 1607) Hudson was +in 80° 23'. By reckoning, two days later, he was in 81°. His +reckoning, because of his ignorance of the currents, always has +been considered doubtful. His observed position recently has been +questioned by Sir Martin Conway, who has arrived at the conclusion: +"It is demonstrably probable that for 80° 23' we should read 79° +23'."[1] But even with this reduction accepted, the fact remains +that until the year 1773, when Captain Phipps reached 80° 48', +Hudson held the record for "farthest north." + + [Footnote 1: "Hudson's Voyage to Spitzbergen in 1607," by Sir + Martin Conway. _The Geographical Journal_, February, 1900.] + +To the second voyage belongs the often-quoted incident of the +mermaid. The log of that voyage that has come down to us was kept +by Hudson himself; and this is what he wrote in it (June 15, 1608) +with his own hand: "All day and night cleere sunshine. The wind at +east. The latitude at noone 75 degrees 7 minutes. We held westward +by our account 13 leagues. In the afternoon, the sea was asswaged, +and the wind being at east we set sayle, and stood south and by +east, and south southeast as we could. This morning one of our +companie looking over boord saw a mermaid, and calling up some of +the companie to see her, one more came up and by that time shee was +come close to the ships side, looking earnestly on the men. A +little after a sea came and overturned her. From the navill upward +her backe and breasts were like a womans, as they say that saw her, +but her body as big as one of us. Her skin very white, and long +haire hanging downe behinde of colour blacke. In her going downe +they saw her tayle, which was like the tayle of a porposse, and +speckled like a macrell. Their names that saw her were Thomas +Hilles and Robert Rayner." + +[Illustration: FROM DE BREY. EDITION 1619] + +I am sorry to say that the too-conscientious Doctor Asher, in +editing this log, felt called upon to add, in a foot-note: +"Probably a seal"; and to quote, in support of his prosaic +suggestion, various unnecessary facts about seals observed a few +centuries later in the same waters by Doctor Kane. For my own part, +I much prefer to believe in the mermaid--and, by so believing, to +create in my own heart somewhat of the feeling which was in the +hearts of those old seafarers in a time when sea-prodigies and +sea-mysteries were to be counted with as among the perils of every +ocean voyage. + +This belief of mine is not a mere whimsical fancy. Unless we take +as real what the shipmen of Hudson's time took as real, we not +only miss the strong romance which was so large a part of their +life, but we go wide of understanding the brave spirit in which +their exploring work was done. Adventuring into tempests in their +cockle-shell ships they took as a matter of course--and were brave +in that way without any thought of their bravery. As a part of the +day's work, also, they took their wretched quarters aboard ship and +their wretched, and usually insufficient, food. Their highest +courage was reserved for facing the fearsome dangers which existed +only in their imaginations--but which were as real to them as were +the dangers of wreck and of starvation and of battlings with wild +beasts, brute or human, in strange new-found lands. It followed of +necessity that men leading lives so full of physical hardship, and +so beset by wondering dread, were moody and discontented--and so +easily went on from sullen anger into open mutiny. And equally did +it follow that the shipmasters who held those surly brutes to the +collar--driving them to their work with blows, and now and then +killing one of them by way of encouraging the others to +obedience--were as absolutely fearless and as absolutely strong of +will as men could be. All of these conditions we must recognize, +and must try to realize, if we would understand the work that was +cut out for Hudson, and for every master navigator, in that cruel +and harsh and yet ardently romantic time. + + + + +IV + + +It is Hudson's third voyage--the one that brought him into our own +river, and that led on directly to the founding of our own +city--that has the deepest interest to us of New York. He made it +in the service of the Dutch East India Company: but how he came to +enter that service is one of the unsolved problems in his career. + +In itself, there was nothing out of the common in those days in an +English shipmaster going captain in a Dutch vessel. But Hudson--by +General Read's showing--was so strongly backed by family influence +in the Muscovy Company that it is not easy to understand why he +took service with a corporation that in a way was the Muscovy +Company's trade rival. Lacking any explanation of the matter, I am +inclined to link it with the action of the English Government--when +he returned from his voyage and made harbor at Dartmouth--in +detaining him in England and in ordering him to serve only under +the English flag; and to infer that his going to Holland was the +result of a falling out with the directors of the Muscovy Company; +and that at their request, when the chances of the sea brought him +within English jurisdiction, he was detained in his own +country--and so was put in the way to take up with the adventure +that led him straight onward to his death. In all of which may be +seen the working-out of that fatalism which to my mind is so +apparent in Hudson's doings, and which is most apparent in his +third voyage: that evidently had its origin in a series of curious +mischances, and that ended in his doing precisely what those who +sent him on it were resolved that he should not do. + +All that we know certainly about his taking service with the Dutch +Company is told in a letter from President Jeannin--the French +envoy who was engaged in the years 1608-9, with representatives of +other nations, in trying to patch up a truce or a peace between the +Netherlands and Spain--to his master, Henry IV. Along with his open +instructions, Jeannin seems to have had private instructions--in +keeping with the customs and principles of the time--to do what he +could do in the way of stealing from Holland for the benefit of +France a share of the East India trade. In regard to this amiable +phase of his mission, under date of January 21, 1609, he wrote: + +"Some time ago I made, by your Majesty's orders, overtures to an +Amsterdam merchant named Isaac Le Maire, a wealthy man of a +considerable experience in the East India trade. He offered to make +himself useful to your Majesty in matters of this kind.... A few +days ago he sent to me his brother, to inform me that an English +pilot who has twice sailed in search of a northern passage has been +called to Amsterdam by the East India Company to tell them what he +had found, and whether he hoped to discover that passage. They had +been well satisfied with his answer, and had thought they might +succeed in the scheme. They had, however, been unwilling to +undertake at once the said expedition; and they had only +remunerated the Englishman for his trouble, and had dismissed him +with the promise of employing him next year, 1610. The Englishman, +having thus obtained his leave, Le Maire, who knows him well, has +since conferred with him and has learnt his opinions on these +subjects; with regard to which the Englishman had also intercourse +with Plancius, a great geographer and clever mathematician. +Plancius maintains, according to the reasons of his science, and +from the information given him, ... that there must be in the +northern parts a passage corresponding to the one found near the +south pole by Magellan.... The Englishman also reports that, having +been to the north as far as 80 degrees, he has found that the more +northwards he went, the less cold it became." + +[Illustration: "HOW THE EARTH IS ROUND" +FAC-SIMILE OF PAGE "THE ARTE OF NAVIGATION" LONDON. EDITION 1596] + +Hudson's name is not mentioned by Jeannin, but as no other +navigator had been so far north as 80°, there can be no doubt as to +who "the Englishman" was. The letter goes on to urge that the +French king should undertake the "glorious enterprise" of searching +for a northerly passage to the Indies, and that he should undertake +it openly: as "the East India Company will not have even a right +to complain, because the charter granted to them by the States +General authorizes them to sail only around the Cape of Good Hope, +and not by the north." But Jeannin adds that Le Maire "does not +dare to speak about it to any one, because the East India Company +fears above everything to be forestalled in this design." + +Precisely that fear on the part of the East India Company did +undercut the French envoy's plans. In a postscript to his letter he +adds: "This letter having been terminated, and I being ready to +send it to your Majesty, Le Maire has again written to me.... Some +members of the East India Company, who had been informed that the +Englishman had secretly treated with him, had become afraid that I +might wish to employ him for the discovery of the passage. For this +reason they have again treated with him about his undertaking such +an expedition in the course of the present year. The directors of +the Amsterdam Chamber have written to the other chambers of the +same Company to request their approval; and should the others +refuse, the Amsterdam Chamber will undertake the expedition at +their own risk." + +In point of fact, the other chambers did refuse (although, before +Hudson actually sailed, they seem to have ratified the agreement +made with him); and the Amsterdam Chamber, single-handed, did set +forth the voyage. + +In view of the fact that the French project in a way was realized, +a curiously subtle interest attaches to Jeannin's showing of how +narrow were the chances by which Hudson missed being taken into the +French service, and was taken into that of the Dutch. A French +ship, under the command of a captain whose name has not been +preserved, did sail for the North--almost precisely a month later +than Hudson's sailing--on May 5, 1609. Beyond the bare fact that +such a voyage was made, nothing is known about it: whence the +inference is a reasonable one that it produced no new discoveries. +But suppose that Hudson had commanded; and, so commanding, had not +sailed that unknown captain's useless course but had brought his +French ship into what now are our bay and our river; and that the +French, not the Dutch, had founded the city here that now is--but +by those hair-wide chances might not have been--New York? + + + + +V + + +Mr. Henry C. Murphy--to whose searchings in the archives of Holland +we owe so much--found at The Hague a manuscript history of the East +India Company, written by P. van Dam in the seventeenth century, in +which a copy of Hudson's contract with the Company is preserved. +The contract reads as follows: + +"On this eighth of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand +six hundred and nine, the Directors of the East India Company of +the Chamber of Amsterdam of the ten years reckoning of the one +part, and Master Henry Hudson, Englishman, assisted by Jodocus +Hondius[1], of the other part, have agreed in manner following, to +wit: That the said Directors shall in the first place equip a small +vessel or yacht of about thirty lasts [60 tons] burden, well +provided with men, provisions and other necessaries, with which the +above named Hudson shall, about the first of April, sail in order +to search for a passage by the north, around the north side of Nova +Zembla, and shall continue thus along that parallel until he shall +be able to sail southward to the latitude of sixty degrees. He +shall obtain as much knowledge of the lands as can be done without +any considerable loss of time, and if it is possible return +immediately in order to make a faithful report and relation of his +voyage to the Directors, and to deliver over his journals, +log-books, and charts, together with an account of everything +whatsoever which shall happen to him during the voyage without +keeping anything back. + +"For which said voyage the Directors shall pay the said Hudson, as +well for his outfit for the said voyage as for the support of his +wife and children, the sum of eight hundred guilders [say $336]. +And in case (which God prevent) he does not come back or arrive +hereabouts within a year, the Directors shall farther pay to his +wife two hundred guilders in cash; and thereupon they shall not be +farther liable to him or his heirs, unless he shall either +afterward or within the year arrive and have found the passage good +and suitable for the Company to use; in which case the Directors +will reward the before named Hudson for his dangers, trouble, and +knowledge, in their discretion. + +"And in case the Directors think proper to prosecute and continue +the same voyage, it is stipulated and agreed with the before named +Hudson that he shall make his residence in this country with his +wife and children, and shall enter into the employment of no other +than the Company, and this at the discretion of the Directors, who +also promise to make him satisfied and content for such farther +service in all justice and equity. All without fraud or evil +intent. In witness of the truth, two contracts are made hereof ... +and are subscribed by both parties and also by Jodocus Hondius as +interpreter and witness." + +[Footnote 1: Hondius, an eminent map-engraver of the time, was a +Fleming, who, being driven from Flanders by the Spanish cruelties, +made his home in Amsterdam, where he died in the year 1611.] + +[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE OF TITLE-PAGE OF A SEA HANDBOOK OF +HUDSON'S TIME] + +Of Hudson's sailing orders no copy has been found; but an abstract +of them has been preserved by Van Dam in these words: "This +Company, in the year 1609, fitted out a yacht of about thirty lasts +burden and engaged a Mr. Henry Hudson, an Englishman, and a +skilful pilot, as master thereof: with orders to search for the +aforesaid passage by the north and north-east above Nova Zembla +toward the lands or straits of Amian, and then to sail at least as +far as the sixtieth degree of north latitude, when if the time +permitted he was to return from the straits of Amian again to this +country. But he was farther ordered by his instructions to think of +discovering no other route or passages except the route around the +north and north-east above Nova Zembla; with this additional +proviso that, if it could not be accomplished at that time, another +route would be the subject of consideration for another voyage." + +It is evident from the foregoing that never did a shipmaster get +away to sea with more explicit orders than those which were given +to Hudson as to how his voyage was, and as to how it was not, to be +made. On his obedience to those orders, which essentially were a +part of his contract, depended the obligation of the directors to +pay him for his services; and farther depended--a consideration +that reasonably might be expected to touch him still more +closely--their obligation to bestow a solatium upon his wife and +children in the event of his death. And yet, with those facts +clearly before him, he did precisely what he had contracted, and +what in most express terms he was ordered, not to do. + + + + +VI + + +Hudson sailed from the Texel in the "Half Moon" (possibly +accompanied by a small vessel, the "Good Hope," that did not pursue +the voyage) on March 27-April 6, 1609; and for more than a +month--until he had doubled the North Cape and was well on toward +Nova Zembla--went duly on his way. Then came the mutiny that made +him change, or that gave him an excuse for changing, his ordered +course. + +The log that has been preserved of this voyage was kept by Robert +Juet; who was Hudson's mate on his second voyage, and who was mate +again on Hudson's fourth voyage--until his mutinous conduct caused +him to be deposed. What rating he had on board the "Half Moon" is +not known; nor do we know whether he had, or had not, a share in +the mutiny that changed the ship's course from east to west. With a +suspicious frankness, he wrote in his log: "Because it is a journey +usually knowne I omit to put downe what passed till we came to the +height of the North Cape of Finmarke, which we did performe by the +fift of May (stilo novo), being Tuesday." To this he adds the +observed position on May 5th, 71° 46' North, and the course, "east, +and by south and east," and continues: "After much trouble, with +fogges sometimes, and more dangerous ice. The nineteenth, being +Tuesday, was close stormie weather, with much wind and snow, and +very cold. The wind variable between the north north-west and +north-east. We made our way west and by north till noone." + +[Illustration: DUTCH SHIPS OF HUDSON'S TIME. +FROM DE VEER. DRIE SEYLAGIEN, AMSTERDAM, 1605] + +His abrupt transition from the fifth to the nineteenth of May +covers the time in which the mutiny occurred. Practically, his log +begins almost on the day that the ship's course was changed. In the +smooth concluding paragraph of this same log, to be cited later, he +passes over unmentioned the mutiny that occurred on the homeward +voyage. Judging him by the facts recorded in the accounts of the +voyage into Hudson's Bay, it is a fair assumption that in both of +these earlier mutinies Juet had a hand. + +I wish that we could find the bond that held Hudson and Juet +together. That Juet could write, and that he understood the science +of navigation--although those were rare accomplishments among +seamen in his time--fail sufficiently to account for Hudson's +persistent employment of him. For my own part, I revert to my +theory of fatalism. It is my fancy that this "ancient man"--as he +is styled by one of his companions--was Hudson's evil genius; and I +class him with the most finely conceived character in Marryat's +most finely conceived romance: the pilot Schriften, in "The Phantom +Ship." Just as Schriften clung to the younger Van der Decken to +thwart him, so Juet seems to have clung to Hudson to thwart him; +and to take--in the last round between them--a leading part in +compassing Hudson's death. + +One authority, and a very good authority, for the facts which Juet +suppressed concerning the third voyage is the historian Van +Meteren: who obtained them, there is good reason for believing, +directly from Hudson himself. In his "Historie der Niederlanden" +(1614) Van Meteren wrote: "This Henry Hudson left the Texel the +6th of April, 1609, and having doubled the Cape of Norway the 5th +of May, directed his course along the northern coasts toward Nova +Zembla. But he there found the sea as full of ice as he had found +it in the preceding year, so that he lost the hope of effecting +anything during the season. This circumstance, and the cold which +some of his men who had been in the East Indies could not bear, +caused quarrels among the crew, they being partly English, partly +Dutch; upon which the captain, Henry Hudson, laid before them two +propositions. The first of these was, to go to the coast of America +to the latitude of forty degrees. This idea had been suggested to +him by some letters and maps which his friend Captain Smith had +sent him from Virginia, and by which he informed him that there was +a sea leading into the western ocean to the north of the southern +English colony [Virginia]. Had this information been true +(experience goes as yet to the contrary), it would have been of +great advantage, as indicating a short way to India. The other +proposition was to direct their search to Davis's Straits. This +meeting with general approval, they sailed on the 14th of May, and +arrived, with a good wind, at the Faroe Islands, where they stopped +but twenty-four hours to supply themselves with fresh water. After +leaving these islands they sailed on till, on the 18th of July, +they reached the coast of Nova Francia under 44 degrees.... They +left that place on the 26th of July, and kept out at sea till the +3d of August, when they were again near the coast in 42 degrees of +latitude. Thence they sailed on till, on the 12th of August, they +reached the shore under 37° 45'. Thence they sailed along the shore +until we [sic] reached 40° 45', where they found a good entrance, +between two headlands, and thus entered on the 12th of September +into as fine a river as can be found, with good anchoring ground on +both sides." + +That river, "as fine as can be found," was our own Hudson. + +Van Meteren's account of the voyage, although not published until +the year 1614, was written very soon after Hudson's return--the +slip that he makes in using "we" points to the probability that he +copied directly from Hudson's log--and in it we have all that we +ever are likely to know about the causes which led to the change in +the "Half Moon's" course. For my own part, I believe that Hudson +did precisely what he had wanted to do from the start. The +prohibitory clause in his instructions, forbidding him to go upon +other than the course laid down for him, pointedly suggests that he +had expressed the desire--natural enough, since he twice had +searched vainly for a passage by Nova Zembla--to search westward +instead of eastward for a water-way to the Indies. As Van Meteren +states, authoritatively, he was encouraged to search in that +direction by the information given him by Captain John Smith +concerning a passage north of Virginia across the American +continent--a notion that Smith probably derived in the first +instance from Michael Lok's planisphere, which shows the continent +reduced to a mere strip in about the latitude of the river that +Hudson found; and that he very well might have conceived to be +confirmed by stories about a great sea not far westward (the great +lakes) which he heard from the Indians. + +But the starting point of this geographical error is immaterial. +The important fact is that Hudson entertained it: and so was led to +offer for first choice to his mutinous crew that they should "go +to the coast of America in the latitude of forty degrees." His +readiness with that proposition, when the chance to make it came, +confirms my belief that his own desire was to sail westward, and +that he made the most of his opportunity. And the essential point, +after all, is not whether the mutiny forced him to change, or +merely gave him an excuse for changing, his ordered course: it is +that he was equal to the emergency when the mutiny came, and so +controlled it that--instead of going back, defeated of his purpose, +to Holland--he deliberately took the risk of personal loss that +attended breaking his contract and traversing his orders, and +continued on new lines his exploring voyage. It is indicative of +Hudson's character that he met that cast of fate against him most +resolutely; and most resolutely played up to it with a strong hand. + + + + +VII + + +As the direct result of breaking his orders, Hudson was the +discoverer of our river--to which, therefore, his name properly has +been given--and also was the first navigator by whom our harbor +effectively was found. I use advisedly these precisely +differentiating terms. On the distinctions which they make rests +Hudson's claim to take practical precedence of Verrazano and of +Gomez, who sailed in past Sandy Hook nearly a hundred years ahead +of him; and of those shadowy nameless shipmen who in the +intervening time, until his coming, may have made our harbor one of +their stations--for refitting and watering--on their voyages from +and to Portugal and Spain. + +The exploring work of John and of Sebastian Cabot, who sailed along +our coast, but who missed our harbor, does not come within my +range: save to note that Sebastian Cabot pretty certainly was one +of the several navigators, including Frobisher and Davis, who +entered Hudson's Strait before Hudson's time. + +Verrazano was an Italian, sailing in the French service. Gomez was +a Portuguese, sailing in the Spanish service. Both sought a +westerly way to the Indies, and both sought it in the same +year--1524. Verrazano has left a report of his voyage, written +immediately upon his return to France; and with it a vaguely drawn +chart of the coasts which he explored. (It is my duty to add that +certain zealous historians have denounced his report as a forgery, +and his chart as a "fake"--a matter so much too large for +discussion here that I content myself with expressing the opinion +that these charges have not been sustained.) Gomez has left no +report of his voyage, but a partial account of it may be pieced +together from the maritime chronicles of his time. He also charted, +with an approximate accuracy, the lands which he coasted; and while +his chart has not been preserved in its original shape, there is +good reason for believing that we have it embodied in the +planisphere drawn by Juan Ribero, geographer to Charles V., in the +year 1529. On that planisphere the seaboard of the present states +of Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode Island is called "the +land of Estevan Gomez." + +Lacking the full report that Gomez presumably made of his voyage, +and lacking the original of his chart, it is impossible to decide +whether he did or did not pass through the Narrows and enter the +Upper Bay. Doctor Asher holds that he did make that passage; and +adds: "It is certain that the later Spanish seamen who followed in +his track in after years were familiar with the [Hudson] river, and +called it the Rio de Gamas." In support of this strong assertion he +cites the still-extant "Rutters," or "Routiers," of the period--the +ocean guide-books showing the distances from place to place, +marking convenient stations for watering and refitting, and +describing the entrances to rivers and to harbors--"from which we +learn," he declares, "that the Rio de Gamas, the name then +regularly applied to the Hudson on the charts of the time, was one +of these stages between New Foundland and the colonies of Central +America."[1] + + [Footnote 1: Asher mentions, in this connection, that + "Nantucket Island also figures in some of these rutters under + the name of the island of Juan Luis, or Juan Fernandez, and is + recommended as a most convenient stage for those who, coming + from Europe, wish to proceed to the West Indies by way of the + Bermudas."] + +In regard to Verrazano--admitting his report to be genuine--the +fact that he did pass through the Narrows into the Upper Bay is not +open to dispute. He therefore must have seen--as, a little later, +Gomez may have seen--the true mouth of Hudson's river eighty-five +years before Hudson, by actual exploration of it, made himself its +discoverer. But Verrazano, by his own showing, came but a little +way into the Upper Bay--which he called a lake--and he made no +exploration of a practical sort of the harbor that he had found. + +It is but simple justice to Verrazano and to Gomez to put on record +here, along with the story of Hudson's effective discovery, the +story of their ineffective finding. Fate was against them as +distinctly as it was with Hudson. They came under adverse +conditions, and they came too soon. Back of the explorer in the +French service there was not an alert power eager for colonial +expansion. Back of the explorer in the Spanish service there was a +power so busied with colonial expansion on a huge scale--in that +very year, 1524, Cortes was completing his conquest of Mexico, and +Pizarro was beginning his conquest of Peru--that a farther +enlargement of the colonization contract was impossible. + +[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE OF TITLE-PAGE OF THE MOST FAMOUS SEA +HANDBOOK OF HUDSON'S TIME] + +Therefore we may fall back upon the assured fact--in which I see +again the touch of fatalism--that not until Hudson came at the +right moment, and at the right moment gave an accurate account of +his explorations to a power that was ready immediately to colonize +the land that he had found, were our port and our river, +notwithstanding their earlier technical discovery, truly discovered +to the world. As for the river, it assuredly is Hudson's very own. + + + + +VIII + + +From Juet's log I make the following extracts, telling of the "Half +Moon's" approach to Sandy Hook and of her passage into the Lower +Bay: + +"The first of September, faire weather, the wind variable betweene +east and sooth; we steered away north north west. At noone we found +our height [a little north of Cape May] to bee 39 degrees 3 +minutes.... The second, in the morning close weather, the winde at +south in the morning. From twelve untill two of the clocke we +steered north north west, and had sounding one and twentie fathoms; +and in running one glasse we had but sixteene fathoms, then +seventeene, and so shoalder and shoalder untill it came to twelve +fathoms. We saw a great fire but could not see the land. Then we +came to ten fathoms, whereupon we brought our tacks aboord, and +stood to the eastward east south east, foure glasses. Then the +sunne arose, and we steered away north againe, and saw the land +[the low region about Sandy Hook] from the west by north to the +north west by north, all like broken islands, and our soundings +were eleven and ten fathoms. Then we looft in for the shoare, and +faire by the shoare we had seven fathoms. The course along the land +we found to be north east by north. From the land which we had +first sight of, untill we came to a great lake of water [the Lower +Bay] as we could judge it to be, being drowned land, which made it +to rise like islands, which was in length ten leagues. The mouth +of that land hath many shoalds, and the sea breaketh on them as it +is cast out of the mouth of it. And from that lake or bay the land +lyeth north by east, and we had a great streame out of the bay; and +from thence our sounding was ten fathoms two leagues from the land. +At five of the clocke we anchored, being little winde, and rode in +eight fathoms water.... This night I found the land to hall the +compasse 8 degrees. For to the northward off us we saw high hils +[Staten Island and the Highlands]. For the day before we found not +above two degrees of variation. This is a very good land to fall +with, and a pleasant land to see. + +"The third, the morning mystie, untill ten of the clocke. Then it +cleered, and the wind came to the south south east, so wee weighed +and stood to the northward. The land is very pleasant and high, and +bold to fall withal. At three of the clocke in the after noone, we +came to three great rivers [the Raritan, the Arthur Kill and the +Narrows]. So we stood along to the northermost [the Narrows], +thinking to have gone into it, but we found it to have a very +shoald barre before it, for we had but ten foot water. Then we cast +about to the southward, and found two fathoms, three fathoms, and +three and a quarter, till we came to the souther side of them; then +we had five and sixe fathoms, and anchored. So wee sent in our +boate to sound, and they found no lesse water than foure, five, +sixe, and seven fathoms, and returned in an houre and a halfe. So +we weighed and went in, and rode in five fathoms, oze ground, and +saw many salmons, and mullets, and rayes, very great. The height is +40 degrees 30 minutes." + +That is the authoritative account of Hudson's great finding. I +have quoted it in full partly because of the thrilling interest +that it has for us; but more to show that the record of his +explorations--the "Half Moon's" log being written throughout with +the same definiteness and accuracy--gave what neither Gomez nor +Verrazano gave: clear directions for finding with certainty the +haven that he, and those earlier navigators, had found by chance. +On that fact, and on the other fact that his directions promptly +were utilized, rests his claim to be the practical discoverer of +the harbor of New York. + +For more than a week the "Half Moon" lay in the Lower Bay and in +the Narrows. Then, on the eleventh of September, she passed fairly +beyond Staten Island and came out into the Upper Bay: and Hudson +saw the great river--which on that day became his river--stretching +broadly to the north. I can imagine that when he found that +wide waterway, leading from the ocean into the heart of the +continent--and found it precisely where his friend Captain John +Smith had told him he would find it, "under 40 degrees"--his hopes +were very high. The first part of the story being confirmed, it was +a fair inference that the second part would be confirmed; that +presently, sailing through the "strait" that he had entered, he +would come out, as Magellan had come out from the other strait, +upon the Pacific--with clear water before him to the coasts of +Cathay. + +That glad hope must have filled his heart during the ensuing +fortnight; and even then it must have died out slowly through +another week--while the "Half Moon" worked her way northward as far +as where Albany now stands. Twice in the course of his voyage +inland--on September 14th, when his run was from Yonkers to +Peekskill--he reasonably may have believed that he was on the very +edge of his great discovery. As the river widened hugely into the +Tappan Sea, and again widened hugely into Haverstraw Bay, it well +may have seemed to him that he was come to the ocean outlet--and +that in a few hours more he would have the waters of the Pacific +beneath his keel. Then, as he passed through the Southern Gate of +the Highlands, and thence onward, his hope must have waned--until +on September 22d it vanished utterly away. Under that date Juet +wrote in his log: "This night, at ten of the clocke, our boat +returned in a showre of raine from sounding the river; and found it +to bee at an end for shipping to goe in." + +That was the end of the adventure inland. Juet wrote on the 23d: +"At twelve of the clocke we weighed, and went downe two leagues"; +and thereafter his log records their movements and their +doings--sometimes meeting with "loving people" with whom they had +friendly dealings; sometimes meeting and having fights with people +who were anything but loving--as the "Half Moon" dawdled slowly +down the stream. By the 2d of October they were come abreast of +about where Fort Lee now stands. There they had their last brush +with the savages, killing ten or twelve of them without loss on +their own side. + +After telling about the fight, Juet adds: "Within a while after wee +got downe two leagues beyond that place and anchored in a bay +[north of Hoboken], cleere from all danger of them on the other +side of the river, where we saw a very good piece of ground [for +anchorage]. And hard by it there was a cliffe [Wiehawken] that +looked of the colour of a white greene, as though it were either +copper or silver myne. And I thinke it to be one of them, by the +trees that grow upon it. For they be all burned, and the other +places are greene as grasse. It is on that side of the river that +is called Manna-hata. There we saw no people to trouble us, and +rode quietly all night, but had much wind and raine." + +In that entry the name Manna-hata was written for the first time, +and was applied, not to our island but to the opposite Jersey +shore. The explanation of Juet's record seems to be that the +Indians known as the Mannahattes dwelt--or that Juet thought that +they dwelt--on both sides of the river. That they did dwell on, and +that they did give their name to, our island of Manhattan are facts +absolutely established by the records of the ensuing three or four +years. + +During October 3d the "Half Moon" was storm-bound. On the 4th, Juet +records "Faire weather, and the wind at north north west, wee +weighed and came out of the river into which we had runne so +farre." Thence, through the Upper Bay and the Narrows, and across +the Lower Bay--with a boat out ahead to sound--they went onward +into the Sandy Hook channel. "And by twelve of the clocke we were +cleere of all the inlet. Then we took in our boat, and set our +mayne sayle and sprit sayle and our top sayles, and steered away +east south east, and south east by east, off into the mayne sea." + +Juet's log continues and concludes--passing over unmentioned the +mutiny that occurred before the ship's course definitely was set +eastward--in these words: "We continued our course toward England, +without seeing any land by the way, all the rest of this moneth of +October. And on the seventh day of November (stilo novo), being +Saturday, by the grace of God we safely arrived in the range of +Dartmouth, in Devonshire, in the yeere 1609."[1] + + [Footnote 1: From Mr. Brodhead's "History of the State of New + York" I reproduce the following note, that tells of the little + "Half Moon's" dismal ending: "The subsequent career of the + 'Half Moon' may, perhaps, interest the curious. The small 'ship + book,' before referred to, which I found, in 1841, in the + Company's archives at Amsterdam, besides recording the return + of the yacht on the 15th of July, 1610, states that on the 2d + of May, 1611, she sailed, in company with other vessels, to the + East Indies, under the command of Laurens Reael; and that on + the 6th of March, 1615, she was 'wrecked and lost' on the + island of Mauritius."] + +From the standpoint of the East India Company, Hudson's quest upon +our coast and into our river--the most fruitful of all his +adventurings, since the planting of our city was the outcome of +it--was a failure. Hessel Gerritz (1613) wrote: "All that he did +in the west in 1609 was to exchange his merchandise for furs in +New France." And Hudson himself, no doubt, rated his great +accomplishment--on which so large a part of his fame rests +enduringly--as a mere waste of energy and of time. I hope that he +knows about, and takes a comforting pride in--over there in the +Shades--the great city which owes its founding to that seemingly +bootless voyage! + + + + +IX + + +What happened to Hudson when he reached Dartmouth has been +recorded; and, broadly, why it happened. Hessel Gerritz wrote that +"he ... returned safely to England, where he was accused of having +undertaken a voyage to the detriment of his own country." Van +Meteren wrote: "A long time elapsed, through contrary winds, before +the Company could be informed of the arrival of the ship [the "Half +Moon"] in England. Then they ordered the ship and crew to return +[to Holland] as soon as possible. But when they were going to do +so, Henry Hudson and the other Englishmen of the ship were +commanded by government there not to leave England but to serve +their own country." Obviously, international trade jealousies were +at the root of the matter. Conceivably, as I have stated, the +Muscovy Company, a much interested party, was the prime mover in +the seizure of Hudson out of the Dutch service. But we only know +certainly that he was seized out of that service: with the result +that he and Fate came to grips again; and that Fate's hold on him +did not loosen until Death cast it off. + +Hudson's fourth, and last, voyage was not made for the Muscovy +Company; but those chiefly concerned in promoting it were members +of that Company, and two of them were members of the first +importance in the direction of its affairs. The adventure was set +forth, mainly, by Sir Dudley Digges, Sir Thomas Smith, and Master +John Wolstenholme--who severally are commemorated in the Arctic by +Smith's Sound, Cape Digges, and Cape Wolstenholme--and the +expedition got away from London in "the barke 'Discovery'" on April +17, 1610. + +Purchas wrote a nearly contemporary history of this voyage that +included three strictly contemporary documents: two of them +certainly written aboard the "Discovery"; and the third either +written aboard the ship on the voyage home, as is possible, or not +long after the ship had arrived in England. + +The first of these documents is "An Abstract of the Journal of +Master Henry Hudson." This is Hudson's own log, but badly +mutilated. It begins on the day of sailing, April 17th, and ends on +the ensuing August 3d. There are many gaps in it, and the block of +more than ten months is gone. The missing portions, presumably, +were destroyed by the mutineers. + +The second document is styled by Purchas: "A Note Found in the +Deske of Thomas Wydowse, Student in the Mathematickes, hee being +one of them who was put into the Shallop." Concerning this poor +"student in the mathematickes" Prickett testified before the court: +"Thomas Widowes was thrust out of the ship into the shallop, but +whether he willed them take his keys and share his goods, to save +his life, this examinate knoweth not." Practically, this is an +assurance that he did make such an offer; and his despairing +resistance to being outcast is implied also in the pathetic note +following his name in the Trinity House list of the abandoned ones: +"put away in great distress." There is nothing to show how he +happened to be aboard the "Discovery," nor who he was. Possibly he +may have been a son of the "Richard Widowes, goldsmith," who is +named in the second charter (1609) of the Virginia Company. His +"Note"--cited in full later on--exhibits clearly the evil +conditions that obtained aboard the "Discovery"; and especially +makes clear that Juet's mutinous disposition began to be manifested +at a very early stage of the voyage. + +The third document is the most important, in that it gives--or +professes to give--a complete history of the whole voyage. Purchas +styles it: "A Larger Discourse of the Same Voyage, and the Successe +Thereof, written by Abacucks Prickett, a servant of Sir Dudley +Digges, whom the Mutineers had Saved in hope to procure his Master +to worke their Pardon." Purchas wrote that "this report of Prickett +may happely bee suspected by some as not so friendly to Hudson." +Being essentially a bit of special pleading, intended to save his +own neck and the necks of his companions, it has rested always +under the suspicion that Purchas cast upon it. Nor is it relieved +from suspicion by the fact that it is in accord with his sworn +testimony, and with the sworn testimony of his fellows, before the +High Court of Admiralty when he and they were on trial for their +lives as mutineers. The imperfect record of this trial merely shows +that Prickett and all of the other witnesses--with the partial +exception of Byleth--told substantially the same story; and--as +they all equally were in danger of hanging--that story most +naturally was in their own favor and in much the same words. From +the Trinity House record it appears that Prickett was "a land man +put in by the Adventurers"; and in the court records he is +described, most incongruously, as a "haberdasher"--facts which +place him, as his own very remarkable narrative places him, on a +level much above that of the ordinary seamen of Hudson's time. + +Dr. Asher's comment upon Prickett's "Discourse," is a just +determination of its value: "Though the paper he has left us is in +form a narrative, the author's real intention was much more to +defend the mutineers than to describe the voyage. As an apologetic +essay, the 'Larger Discourse' is extremely clever. It manages to +cast some, not too much, shadow upon Hudson himself. The main fault +of the mutiny is thrown upon some men who had ceased to live when +the ship reached home. Those who were then still alive are +presented as guiltless, some as highly deserving. Prickett's +account of the mutiny and of its cause has often been suspected. +Even Purchas himself and Fox speak of it with distrust. But +Prickett is the only eye-witness that has left us an account of +these events; and we can therefore not correct his statements, +whether they be true or false." + +My fortunate finding of contemporary documents, unknown to Hudson's +most authoritative historian, has produced other "eye-witnesses" +who have "left us an account of these events"; but, obviously, +their accounts--so harmoniously in agreement--do not affect the +soundness of Dr. Asher's conclusions. The net result of it all +being, as I have written, that our whole knowledge of Hudson's +murder is only so much of the truth as his murderers were agreed +upon to tell. + + + + +X + + +In the ruling of that, his last, adventure all of Hudson's malign +stars seem to have been in the ascendant. His evil genius, Juet, +again sailed with him as mate; and out of sheer good-will, +apparently, he took along with him in the "Discovery" another +villainous personage, one Henry Greene--who showed his gratitude +for benefits conferred by joining eagerly with Juet in the mutiny +that resulted in the murder of their common benefactor. + +Hudson, therefore, started on that dismal voyage with two +firebrands in his ship's company--and ship's companies of those +days, without help from firebrands, were like enough to explode +into mutiny of their own accord. I must repeat that the sailor-men +of Hudson's time--and until long after Hudson's time--were little +better than dangerous brutes; and the savage ferocity that was in +them was kept in check only by meeting it with a more savage +ferocity on the part of their superiors. + +At the very outset of the voyage trouble began. Hudson wrote on +April 22, when he was in the mouth of the Thames, off the Isle of +Sheppey: "I caused Master Coleburne to bee put into a pinke bound +for London, with my letter to the Adventurars imparting the reason +why I put him out of the ship." He does not add what that reason +was;[1] nor is there any reference in what remains of his log to +farther difficulties with his crew. The newly discovered testimony +of the mutineers, cited later, refers only to the final mutiny. +Prickett, therefore--in part borne out by the "Note" of poor +Widowes--is our authority for the several mutinous outbreaks +which occurred during the voyage; and Prickett wrote with a +vagueness--using such phrases as "this day" and "this time," +without adding a date--that helped him to muddle his narrative in +the parts which we want to have, but which he did not want to have, +most clear. + + [Footnote 1: Captain Lake Fox has the following: "In the road + of Lee, in the river Thames, he [Hudson] caused Master + Coalbrand to be set in a pinke to be carried back againe to + London. This Coalbrand was in every way held to be a better man + than himselfe, being put in by the adventurers as his + assistant, who envying the same (he having the command in his + own hands) devised this course, to send himselfe the same way, + though in a farre worse place, as hereafter followeth." + Prickett tells only: "Thwart of Sheppey, our Master sent Master + Colbert back to the owners with his letter."] + +Prickett's first record of trouble refers to some period in July, +at which time the "Discovery" was within the mouth of Hudson's +Strait and was beset with ice. It reads: "Some of our men this day +fell sicke, I will not say it was for feare, although I saw small +signe of other griefe." His next entry seems to date a fortnight or +so later, when the ship was farther within the strait and +temporarily ice-bound: "Here our Master was in despaire, and (as he +told me after) he thought he should never have got out of this ice, +but there have perished. Therefore he brought forth his card +[chart] and showed all the company that hee was entered above an +hundred leagues farther than ever any English was: and left it to +their choice whether they should proceed any farther--yea or nay. +Whereupon some were of one minde and some of another, some wishing +themselves at home, and some not caring where so they were out of +the ice. But there were some who then spake words which were +remembered a great while after." This record shows that Hudson had +with him a chart of the strait--presumably based on Weymouth's +earlier (1602) exploration of it--with the discovery of which he +popularly is credited; and, as Weymouth sailed into the strait a +hundred leagues, his assertion that he had "entered a hundred +leagues farther than ever any English was" obviously is an error. +But the more important matter made clear by Prickett (admitting +that Prickett told the truth) is that a dangerously ugly feeling +was abroad among the crew nearly a year before that feeling +culminated in the final tragedy. + +Prickett concludes this episode by showing that Hudson's eager +desire to press on prevailed: "After many words to no purpose, to +worke we must on all hands, to get ourselves out and to cleere our +ship." + +And so the "Discovery" went onward--sometimes working her way +through the ice, sometimes sailing freely in clear water--until +Hudson triumphantly brought her, as Purchas puts it, into "a +spacious sea, wherein he sayled above a hundred leagues South, +confidently proud that he had won the passage"! It was his resolve +to push on until he could be sure that he truly "had won the +passage" that won him to his death. + +When they had entered that spacious sea--rounding the cape which +then received its name of Cape Wolstenholme--they came to where +sorrel and scurvy-grass grew plentifully, and where there was +"great store of fowle." Prickett records that the crew urged Hudson +"to stay a daye or two in this place, telling him what refreshment +might there bee had. But by no means would he stay, who was not +pleased with the motion." This refers to August 3d, the day on +which Hudson's log ends. Prickett adds, significantly: "So we left +the fowle, and lost our way downe to the South West." + +By September, the "Discovery" was come into James Bay, at the +southern extremity of Hudson's Bay; and then it was that the +serious trouble began. By Prickett's showing, there seems to have +been a clash of opinions in regard to the ship's course; and of so +violent a sort that strong measures were required to maintain +discipline. The outcome was that "our Master took occasion to +revive old matters, and to displace Robert Juet from being his +mate, and the boatswaine from his place, for the words spoken in +the first great bay of ice." + +For what happened at that time we have a better authority than +Prickett. The "Note" of Thomas Widowes covers this episode; and, in +covering it, throws light upon the mutinous conditions which +prevailed increasingly as the voyage went on. As the only +contemporary document giving Hudson's side of the matter it is of +first importance--we may be very sure that it would not have come +down to us had it been discovered by the mutineers--and I cite it +here in full as Purchas prints it: + +"The tenth day of September, 1610, after dinner, our Master called +all the Companie together, to heare and beare witnesse of the abuse +of some of the Companie (it having beene the request of Robert +Juet), that the Master should redresse some abuses and slanders, as +hee called them, against this Juet: which thing after the Master +had examined and heard with equitie what hee could say for +himselfe, there were proued so many and great abuses, and mutinous +matters against the Master, and [the] action by Juet, that there +was danger to have suffered them longer: and it was fit time to +punish and cut off farther occasions of the like mutinies. + +"It was proved to his face, first with Bennet Mathew, our Trumpet, +upon our first sight of Island [Iceland], and he confest, that he +supposed that in the action would be man slaughter, and proue +bloodie to some. + +"Secondly, at our coming from Island, in hearing of the Companie, +hee did threaten to turne the head of the Ship home from the +action, which at that time was by our Master wisely pacified, +hoping of amendment. + +"Thirdly, it was deposed by Philip Staffe, our Carpenter, and +Ladlie Arnold [Arnold Ludlow] to his face upon the holy Bible, that +hee perswaded them to keepe Muskets charged, and Swords readie in +their Cabbins, for they should be charged with shot ere the Voyage +was over. + +"Fourthly, wee being pestered in the Ice, hee had used words +tending to mutinie, discouragement, and slander of the action, +which easily took effect in those that were timorous; and had not +the Master in time preuented, it might easily have overthrowne the +Voyage: and now lately being imbayed in a deepe Bay, which the +Master had desire to see, for some reasons to himselfe knowne, his +word tended altogether to put the Companie into a fray [fear] of +extremitie, by wintering in cold: Jesting at our Master's hope to +see Bantam by Candlemas. + +"For these and diuers other base slanders against the Master, hee +was deposed, and Robert Bylot [Bileth, or Byleth], who had showed +himself honestly respecting the good of the action, was placed in +his stead the Masters Mate. + +"Also Francis Clement the Boatson, at this time was put from his +Office, and William Wilson, a man thought more fit, preferred to +his place. This man had basely carried himselfe to our Master and +the action. + +"Also Adrian Mooter was appointed Boatsons mate: and a promise by +the Master, that from this day Juats wages should remain to Bylot, +and the Boatsons overplus of wages should bee equally diuided +betweene Wilson and one John King, to the owners good liking, one +of the Quarter Masters, who had very well carryed themselves to the +furtherance of the businesse. + +"Also the Master promised, if the Offenders yet behaued themselves +henceforth honestly, hee would be a means for their good, and that +hee would forget injuries, with other admonitions." + +Hudson's fame is the brighter for this testament of the poor +"Student in the Mathematickes" whose loyalty to his commander cost +him his life. At times, Hudson seems to have temporized with his +mutinous crews. In this grave crisis he did not temporize. For +cause, he disrated his chief officers: and so asserted in that +desolate place, as fearlessly as he would have asserted it in an +English harbor, that aboard his ship his will was law. + +But his strong action only scotched the mutiny. Prickett's +narrative of the doings of the ensuing seven weeks deals with what +he implies was purposeless sailing up and down James Bay. He casts +reflections upon Hudson's seamanship in such phrases as "our Master +would have the anchor up, against the mind of all who knew what +belongeth thereto"; and in all that he writes there is a +perceptible note of resentment of the Master's doings that reflects +the mutinous feeling on board. Especially does this feeling show in +his account of their settling into winter quarters: "Having spent +three moneths in a labyrinth without end, being now the last of +October, we went downe to the East, to the bottome of the Bay; but +returned without speeding of that we went for. The next day we went +to the South and South West, and found a place, whereunto we +brought our ship and haled her aground. And this was the first of +November. By the tenth thereof we were frozen in." + +And then the Arctic night closed down upon them: and with it the +certainty that they were prisoners in that desolate freezing +darkness until the sun should come again and set them free. + + + + +XI + + +Nerves go to pieces in the Arctic. Captain Back, who commanded the +"Terror" on her first northern voyage (1836), has told how there +comes, as the icy night drags on, "a weariness of heart, a blank +feeling, which gets the better of the whole man"; and Colonel +Brainard, of the Greely expedition, wrote: "Take any set of men, +however carefully selected, and let them be thrown as intimately +together as are the members of an exploring expedition--hearing the +same voices, seeing the same faces, day after day--and they will +soon become weary of one another's society and impatient of one +another's faults." + +The Greely expedition--composed of twenty-five men, of whom +only seven were found alive by the rescue party--in many ways +parallels, and pointedly illustrates, the Hudson expedition. +There was dissension in Greely's command almost from the start. +Surgeon Pavy's angry protests compelled the sending back in +the "Proteus"--paralleling the sending back of Coleburne +in the pink--of one member of the company; and Lieutenant +Kislingbury--paralleling Juet's insubordination--objected so +strongly to Greely's regulations that he gave in his resignation +and tried, unsuccessfully, to overtake the "Proteus" and go home +in her. Being returned to Fort Conger, he was not restored to his +rank, and remained--as Juet remained after being superseded--a +malcontent. + +One of the commentators on the expedition thus has summarized the +conditions of that dreadful winter of 1883-84: "It was now +October, and the situation of the explorers was becoming desperate, +but the bickerings seem to have increased with their peril. As the +weary days of starvation and death wore on, nearly every member of +the party developed a grievance. Israel was reprimanded by Greely +for falsely accusing Brainard of unfairness in the distribution of +articles. Bender annoyed the whole camp by his complaints regarding +his bed-clothes; Pavy and Henry accused Fredericks, the cook, of +not giving them their fair share of food; and Pavy and Kislingbury +had a quarrel that barely stopped short of blows. Then Jewell was +accused of selecting the heaviest dishes of those issued.... Bender +and Schneider had a fist fight in their sleeping bag; and on one +occasion Bender was so violent that a general mutiny was imminent, +and Greely says in his written record: + +'If I could have got Long's gun I would have killed him.' Bender +brutally treated Ellison, who was very weak; and Schneider abused +Whistler as he was dying--the second occurrence of the kind.... The +thefts of food by Henry, and his execution, formed a culmination to +the dissensions, though it did not entirely stop them. Never was +there a more terrible example of the demoralizing effects of the +conditions of Arctic life and privations upon men who in other +circumstances were able to dwell at peace with their fellows." + +[Illustration: BARENTZ'S SHIP IN THE ICE. +FROM DE VEER. DRIE SEYLAGIEN, AMSTERDAM, 1605] + +Out of those conditions came like results aboard Hudson's ship: +discontent developing into insubordination; hatred of the +commander; hatred of each other; petty squabblings leading on to +tragedies--as minor ills were magnified into catastrophes and +little injuries into deadly wrongs. Strictly in keeping with the +mean traditions of the Arctic is the fact that the point of +departure of the final mutiny was a wrangle that arose over the +ownership of "a gray cloth gowne." + +Prickett records: "About the middle of this moneth of November dyed +John Williams our Gunner. God pardon the Masters uncharitable +dealing with this man. Now for that I am come to speake of him, out +of whose ashes (as it were) that unhappie deed grew which brought a +scandall upon all that are returned home, and upon the action +itself, the multitude (like the dog) running after the stone, but +not at the caster; therefore, not to wronge the living nor slander +the dead, I will (by the leave of God) deliver the truth as neere +as I can." + +Prickett's deliverance of the truth leaves much to be desired. +Without giving any information in regard to Hudson's "uncharitable +dealing" with the gunner, he takes a fresh departure in these +words: "You shall understand that our Master kept (in his house at +London) a young man named Henrie Greene, borne in Kent, of +worshipfull parents, but by his leud life and conversation hee had +lost the good will of all his frinds, and had spent all that hee +had. This man our Master would have to sea with him because hee +could write well.... This Henrie Greene was not set down in the +owners booke, nor any wages for him.... At Island the Surgeon and +hee fell out in Dutch, and hee beat him ashoare in English, which +set all the Companie in a rage soe that wee had much adoe to get +the Surgeon aboord. [This curiously parallels the fight between +Surgeon Pavy and Lieutenant Kislingbury] ... Robert Juet, (the +Masters Mate) would needs burne his finger in the embers, and tolde +the Carpenter a long tale (when hee was drunke) that our Master had +brought in Greene to cracke his credit that should displease him: +which wordes came to the Masters eares, who when hee understood it, +would have gone back to Island, when hee was fortie leagues from +thence, to have sent home his Mate Robert Juet in a fisherman. But, +being otherwise perswaded, all was well.... Now when our Gunner was +dead, and (as the order is in such cases) if the Company stand in +neede of any thing that belonged to the man deceased, then it is +brought to the mayne mast, and there sold to them that will give +moste for the same. This Gunner had a gray cloth gowne, which +Greene prayed the Master to friend him so much as to let him have +it, paying for it as another would give. The Master saith hee +should, and thereupon hee answered some, that sought to have it, +that Greene should have it, and none else, and soe it rested. + +"Now out of season and time the Master calleth the Carpenter to +goe in hand with an house on shoare, which at the beginning our +Master would not heare, when it might have been done. The Carpenter +told him, that the snow and froste were such, as hee neither could +nor would goe in hand with such worke. Which when our Master heard, +hee ferreted him out of his cabbin to strike him, calling him by +many foule names, and threatening to hang him. The Carpenter told +him that hee knew what belonged to his place better than himselfe, +and that he was no house carpenter. So this passed, and the house +was (after) made with much labour, but to no end. The next day +after the Master and the Carpenter fell out, the Carpenter took his +peece and Henrie Greene with him, for it was an order that none +should goe out alone, but one with a peece and another with a pike. +This did move the Master soe much the more against Henrie Greene, +that Robert Billot his Mate [who had been promoted to Juet's place] +must have the gowne, and had it delivered unto him; which when +Henrie Greene saw he challenged the Masters promise [to him]. But +the Master did so raile on Greene, with so many words of disgrace, +telling him that all his friends would not trust him with twenty +shillings, and therefore why should hee. As for wages hee had none, +nor none should have if hee did not please him well. Yet the Master +had promised him to make his wages as good as any mans in the ship; +and to have him one of the Princes guard when we came home. But you +shall see how the devil out of this soe wrought with Greene that he +did the Master what mischiefe hee could in seeking to discredit +him, and to thrust him and many other honest men out of the ship in +the end. To speake of all our trouble in this time of Winter (which +was so colde, as it lamed the most of our Companie and my selfe +doe yet feele it) would bee too tedious." + +That is all that Prickett tells about their wintering; but what he +leaves untold, as "too tedious," easily may be filled in. Beginning +with that brabble over the "gray cloth gowne," there must have gone +on in Hudson's party the same bickerings and wranglings that went +on in Greely's party, and the same development of small animosities +into burning hatreds. And it all, with Hudson's people, must have +been rougher and fiercer and deadlier than it was with Greely's +people: because Hudson's crew was of a time when sea-men, for +cause, were called sea-wolves; while Greely's crew was the better +(yet exhibited scant evidence of it) by an additional two centuries +and a half of civilization, and was made up (though with little to +show for it) of picked men. + + + + +XII + + +The end came in the spring-time. Through the winter the party had +"such store of fowle," and later had for a while so good a supply +of fish, that starvation was staved off. When the ice broke up, +about the middle of June, Hudson sailed from his winter quarters +and went out a little way into Hudson's Bay. There they were caught +and held in the floating ice--with their stores almost exhausted, +and with no more fowl nor fish to be had. Then the nip of hunger +came; and with it came openly the mutiny that secretly had been +fermenting through those months of cold and gloom. + +Prickett writes: "Being thus in the ice on Saturday, the one and +twentieth of June, at night, Wilson the boat swayne, and Henry +Greene, came to mee lying (in my cabbin) lame, and told mee that +they and the rest of their associates would shift the company and +turne the Master and all the sicke men into the shallop, and let +them shift for themselves. For there was not fourteen daies +victuall left for all the company, at that poore allowance they +were at, and that there they lay, the Master not caring to goe one +way or other: and that they had not eaten any thing these three +dayes, and therefore were resolute, either to mend or end, and what +they had begun they would goe through with it, or dye." + +According to his own account, Prickett made answer to this precious +pair of scoundrels that he "marvelled to heare so much from them, +considering that they were married men, and had wives and +children, and that for their sakes they should not commit so foule +a thing in the sight of God and man as that would bee"; to which +Greene replied that "he knew the worst, which was, to be hanged +when hee came home, and therefore of the two he would rather be +hanged at home than starved abroad." With that deliverance "Henry +Greene went his way, and presently came Juet, who, because he was +an ancient man, I hoped to have found some reason in him. But hee +was worse than Henry Greene, for he sware plainly that he would +justifie this deed when he came home." + +More of the conspirators came to Prickett to urge him to join them +in their intended crime. We have his weak word for it that he +refused, and that he tried to stay them; to which he weakly adds: +"I hoped that some one or other would give some notice, either to +the Carpenter [or to] John King or the Master." That he did not try +to give "some notice" himself is the blackest count against him. +The just inference may be drawn from his narrative, as a whole, +that he was a liar; and from this particular section of it the +farther inference may be drawn that he was a coward. + +In the dawn of the Sunday morning the outbreak came. Prickett tells +that it began by clapping the hatch over John King (one of the +faithful men), who had gone down into the hold for water; and +continues: "In the meane time Henrie Greene and another went to the +carpenter [Philip Staffe] and held him with a talke till the Master +came out of his cabbin (which hee soone did); then came John Thomas +and Bennet before him, while Wilson bound his arms behind him. He +asked them what they meant. They told him he should know when he +was in the shallop. Now Juet, while this was a-doing, came to John +King into the hold, who was provided for him, for he had got a +sword of his own, and kept him at a bay, and might have killed him, +but others came to helpe him, and so he came up to the Master. The +Master called to the Carpenter, and told him that he was bound, but +I heard no answer he made. Now Arnold Lodlo and Michael Bute rayled +at them, and told them their knaverie would show itselfe. Then was +the shallop haled up to the ship side, and the poore sicke and lame +men were called upon to get them out of their cabbins into the +shallop. + +"The Master called to me, who came out of my cabbin as well as I +could, to the hatch way to speake with him: where, on my knees, I +besought them, for the love of God, to remember themselves, and to +doe as they would be done unto. They bade me keepe myselfe well, +and get me into my cabbin; not suffering the Master to speake with +me. But when I came into my cabbin againe, hee called to me at the +horne which gave light into my cabbin, and told me that Juet would +overthrow us all; nay (said I) it is that villaine Henrie Greene, +and I spake it not softly. Now was the Carpenter at libertie, who +asked them if they would bee hanged when they came home: and, as +for himselfe, hee said, hee would not stay in the ship unless they +would force him. They bade him goe then, for they would not stay +him.... + +"Now were all the poore men in the shallop, whose names are as +followeth: Henrie Hudson, John Hudson, Arnold Lodlo, Sidrack Faner, +Philip Staffe, Thomas Woodhouse or Wydhouse, Adam Moore, Henrie +[sic] King, Michael Bute. The Carpenter got of them a peece, and +powder, and shot, and some pikes, an iron pot, with some meale, +and other things. They stood out of the ice, the shallop being +fast to the sterne of the shippe, and so (when they were nigh out, +for I cannot say they were cleane out) they cut her head fast from +the sterne of our ship, then out with their top sayles, and toward +the east they stood in a cleere sea. + +"In the end they took in their top sayles, righted their helme, and +lay under their fore sayle till they had ransacked and searched all +places in the ship. In the hold they found one of the vessels of +meale whole, and the other halfe spent, for wee had but two; wee +found also two firkins of batter, some twentie seven pieces of +porke, halfe a bushell of pease; but in the Masters cabbin we found +two hundred of bisket cakes, a pecke of meale, of beere to the +quantitie of a butt, one with another. Now it was said that the +shallop was come within sight, they let fall the main sayle, and +out with their top sayles, and fly as from an enemy. Then I prayed +them yet to remember themselves; but William Wilson (more than the +rest) would heare of no such matter. Comming nigh the east shore +they cast about, and stood to the west and came to an iland and +anchored.... Heere we lay that night, and the best part of the next +day, in all which time we saw not the shallop, or ever after." + +That is the story of Hudson's murder as we get it from his +murderers; and even from Prickett's biased narrative so complete a +case is made out against the mutineers that there is comfort in +knowing that some of them, and the worst of them, came quickly to +their just reward. + + + + +XIII + + +A month later, July 28, a halt was made in the mouth of Hudson's +Strait to search for "fowle" for food on the homeward voyage. There +"savages" were encountered, seemingly of so friendly a nature that +on the day following the first meeting with them a boat's crew--of +which Prickett was one--went ashore unarmed. Then came a sudden +attack. Prickett himself was set upon in the boat--of which, "being +lame," he had been left keeper--by a savage whom he managed to +kill. What happened to the others he thus tells: + +"Whiles I was thus assaulted in the boat, our men were set upon on +the shoare. John Thomas and William Wilson had their bowels cut, +and Michael Perse and Henry Greene, being mortally wounded, came +tumbling into the boat together. When Andrew Moter saw this medley, +hee came running downe the rockes and leaped into the sea, and so +swamme to the boat, hanging on the sterne thereof, till Michael +Perse took him in, who manfully made good the head of the boat +against the savages, that pressed sore upon us. Now Michael Perse +had got an hatchet, wherewith I saw him strike one of them, that he +lay sprawling in the sea. Henry Greene crieth _Coragio_, and layeth +about him with his truncheon. I cryed to them to cleere the boat, +and Andrew Moter cryed to bee taken in. The savages betooke them to +their bowes and arrowes, which they sent amongst us, wherewith +Henry Greene was slaine out-right, and Michael Perse received many +wounds, and so did the rest. Michael Perse cleereth [unfastened] +the boate, and puts it from the shoare, and helpeth Andrew Moter +in; but in turning of the boat I received a cruell wound in my +backe with an arrow. Michael Perse and Andrew Moter rowed the boate +away, which, when the savages saw, they ranne to their boats, and I +feared they would have launched them to have followed us, but they +did not, and our ship was in the middle of the channel and could +not see us. + +"Now, when they had rowed a good way from the shoare, Michael Perse +fainted, and could row no more. Then was Andrew Moter driven to +stand in the boat head, and waft to the ship, which at first saw us +not, and when they did they could not tell what to make of us, but +in the end they stood for us, and so tooke us up. Henry Greene was +throwne out of the boat into the sea, and the rest were had +aboard, the savage [with whom Prickett had fought] being yet alive, +yet without sense. But they died all there that day, William Wilson +swearing and cursing in most fearefull manner. Michael Perse lived +two dayes after, and then died. Thus you have heard the tragicall +end of Henry Greene and his mates, whom they called captaine, these +four being the only lustie men in all the ship." + +[Illustration: AN ASTROLABIE, 1596. +FROM "THE ARTE OF NAVIGATION." LONDON. EDITION 1596] + +I am glad that Prickett got "a cruell wound in the backe." Were it +not that by the killing of him we should have lost his narrative, I +should wish that that weak villain had been killed along with the +stronger ones. They were strong. It was a brave fight that they +made; and Henry Greene's last recorded word, "Coragio!" was worthy +of the lips of a better man. But he and the others eminently +deserved the death that the savages gave them, and it is good to +know that Hudson's murder so soon was avenged. Juet's equally +exemplary punishment, equally deserved, came a little later. On the +homeward voyage the whole company got to the very edge, and Juet +passed beyond the edge, of starvation. When the ship was only sixty +or seventy leagues from Ireland, where she made her landfall, +Prickett tells that he "dyed for meere want." + +What befell the survivors of the "Discovery's" crew, on the ship's +return to England, has remained until now unknown; and even now the +account of them is inconclusive. In the Latin edition of the year +1613 of his "Detectio Freti" Hessel Gerritz wrote: "They exposed +Hudson and the other officers in a boat on the open sea, and +returned into their country. There they have been thrown into +prison for their crime, and will be kept in prison until their +captain shall be safely brought home. For that purpose some ships +have been sent out last year by the late Prince of Wales and by the +Directors of the Moscovia Company, about the return of which +nothing as yet has been heard." + +For three hundred years that statement of fact has ended Hudson's +story. The fragmentary documents which I have been so fortunate as +to obtain from the Record Office carry it a little, only a little, +farther. Unhappily they stop short--giving no assurance that the +mutineers got to the gallows that they deserved. All that they +prove is that the few survivors were brought to trial: charged with +having put the master of their ship, and others, "into a shallop, +without food, drink, fire, clothing, or any necessaries, and then +maliciously abandoning them: so that they came thereby to their +death, and miserably perished." + +There, unfinished, the record ends. What penalty, or that any +penalty, was exacted of those who survived to be tried for Hudson's +murder remains unknown. Their ignoble fate is hidden in a sordid +darkness: fitly in contrast with his noble fate--that lies retired +within a glorious mystery. + + + + +XIV + + +Hudson has no cause to quarrel with the rating that has been fixed +for him in the eternal balances. All that he lost (or seemed to +lose) in life has been more than made good to him in the flowing of +the years since he fought out with Fate his last losing round. + +In his River and Strait and Bay he has such monuments set up before +the whole world as have been awarded to only one other navigator. +And they are his justly. Before his time, those great waterways, +and that great inland sea, were mere hazy geographical concepts. +After his time they were clearly defined geographical facts. He +did--and those who had seen them before him did not--make them +effectively known. Here, in this city of New York--which owes to +him its being--he has a monument of a different and of a nobler +sort. Here, assuredly, down through the coming ages his memory will +be honored actively, his name will be in men's mouths ceaselessly, +so long as the city shall endure. + +And I hold that Hudson's fame, as a most brave explorer and as a +great discoverer, is not dimmed by the fact that up to a certain +point he followed in other men's footsteps; nor do I think that his +glory is lessened by his seeming predestination to go on fixed +lines to a fixed end. On the contrary, I think that his fame is +brightened by his willingness to follow, that he might--as he +did--surpass his predecessors; and that his glory is increased by +the resolute firmness with which he played up to his destiny. +Holding fast to his great purpose to find a passage to the East by +the North, he compelled every one of Fate's deals against +him--until that last deal--to turn in his favor; and even in that +last deal he won a death so heroically woful that exalted pity for +him, almost as much as admiration for his great achievements, has +kept his fame through the centuries very splendidly alive. + + + + +NEWLY-DISCOVERED DOCUMENTS + + + + +CONCERNING THE DOCUMENTS + + +In an article entitled "English Ships in the Time of James I.," by +R.G. Marsden, M.A., in Volume XIX of the Transactions of the Royal +Historical Society, I came upon this entry: "'Discovery' (or +'Hopewell,' or 'Good Hope') Hudson's ship on his last voyage; +Baffin also sailed in her." A list of references to manuscript +records followed; and one of the entries, relating to the High +Court of Admiralty, read: "Exam. 42. 25 Jan. 1611. trial of some of +the crew for the murder of Hudson." + + Note--The varying spelling, most obvious in proper names, + follows that of the documents. + +As I have stated elsewhere, none of the historians who has dealt +with matters relating to Hudson has told what became of his +murderers when they returned to England. Hessel Gerritz alone has +given the information (1613, two years after the event) that they +"were to be" put on trial. Whether they were, or were not, put on +trial has remained unknown. Any one who has engaged in the +fascinating pursuit of elusive historical truth will understand, +therefore, my warm delight, and my warm gratitude to Mr. Marsden, +when this clew to hitherto unpublished facts concerning Hudson was +placed in my hands. + +Following it has not led me so far as, in my first enthusiasm, I +hoped that it would lead me. The search that I have caused to be +made in the Record Office, in London, has not brought to light even +all of the documents referred to by Mr. Marsden. The record of the +trial is incomplete; and, most regrettably, the most essential of +all the documents is lacking: the judgment of the Court. So far as +the mutineers are concerned, all that these documents prove is that +they actually were brought to trial: what penalty was put upon +them, or if any penalty was put upon them, still remains unknown. + +But in another way these documents do possess a high value, and are +of an exceptional interest, in that they exhibit the sworn +testimony of six eye-witnesses to the fact as to the circumstances +of Hudson's out-casting. Five of these witnesses now are produced +(in print) for the first time. The sixth, Abacuck Prickett, was the +author of the "Larger Discourse" that hitherto has been the sole +source of information concerning the final mutiny on board the +"Discovery." That Prickett's sworn testimony and unsworn narrative +substantially are in agreement, as they are, is not surprising; +nor does such agreement appreciably affect the truth of either of +them. Sworn or unsworn, Prickett was not a person from whom pure +truth could be expected when, as in this case, he was trying to +tell a story that would save him from being hanged. Neither is the +corroboration of Prickett's story by the five newly produced +witnesses--they equally being in danger of hanging--in itself +convincing. But certain of the details (e.g., the door between +Hudson's cabin and the hold) brought out in this new testimony, +together with the way in which it all hangs together, does raise +the probability that the crew of the "Discovery" had more than a +colorable grievance against Hudson, and does imply that Prickett's +obviously biased narrative may be less far from the truth than +heretofore it has been held to be. + +The summing up of the Trinity House examination gives the crux of +the matter: "They all charge the Master with wasting [i.e., +filching] the victuals by a scuttle made out of his cabin into the +hold, and it appears that he fed his favorites, as the surgeon, +etc., and kept others at ordinary allowance. All say that, to save +some from starving, they were content to put away [abandon] so +many." It was from this presentment that the Elder Brethren drew +the just conclusion--as we know from Prickett's characteristic +denial under oath that he "ever knew or heard" such expression of +their opinion--that "they deserved to be hanged for the same." + +In the testimony of Edward Wilson, the surgeon--one of the +"favorites"--the point is made, credited to Staffe, that "the +reason why the Master should soe favour to give meate to some of +the companie and not the rest" was because "it was necessary that +some of them should be kepte upp"--in other words, that some +members of the crew, without regard to the needs of the remainder, +should receive food enough to give them strength to work the ship. +This is an agreement, substantially, with the charge preferred +against Hudson in the "Larger Discourse"; upon which Dr. Asher made +the exculpating comment: "But even if this charge be a true one, +Hudson's motives were certainly honorable; with such men as he had +under his orders it was dangerous to deal openly. Their crime had +no other cause than the fear that he would continue his search and +expose them to new privations: and it seems that in providing for +this emergency, he had even increased his dangers." Dr. Asher's +excuse, I should add, refers more to concealment of food than to +unfair apportionment. + +I have no desire to play the part of devil's advocate; but--in the +guise of that personage under his more respectable title of +Promotor Fidei--it is my duty to point out that if Hudson +deliberately did "keep up" himself and a favored few by putting the +remainder on starvation rations--no matter what may have been his +motives--he exceeded his ship-master's right over his crew of life +and death. His doing so, if he did do so, did not justify mutiny. +Mutiny is a sea-crime that no provocation justifies. But if the +point at issue was who should die of hunger that the others should +have food enough to keep them alive, then the mutineers could +claim--and this is what virtually they did claim in making their +defence--that they did by the Master in a swift and bold way +precisely what in a slow and underhand way he was doing by them. + +In the more agreeable rôle of Postulator, I may add that this +charge against Hudson--while not disproved--is not sustained. The +one witness, Robert Byleth, of whom reputable record survives--the +only witness, indeed, of whom we have any record whatever beyond +that of the case in hand--did not even refer to it. In his +Admiralty Court examination--he is not included in the record of +those examined at the Trinity House--he said no more than that the +"discontent" of the crew was "by occasion of the want of +victualls." Neither in his statement in chief nor in his +cross-examination did he charge Hudson with wrong-doing of any +kind. Byleth himself does not seem to have been looked upon as a +criminal: as is implied by his being sent with Captain Button +(1612) on the exploring expedition toward the northwest that was +directed to search for Hudson; by his sailing two voyages +(1615-1616) with Baffin; and, still more strongly, by the fact +that he was employed on each of these occasions by the very +persons--members of the Muscovy Company and others--who most would +have desired to punish him had they believed that punishment was +his just desert. That he did not testify against Hudson must count, +therefore, as a strong point in Hudson's favor; so strong--his +credibility and theirs being considered comparatively--that it goes +far toward offsetting the testimony of the haberdasher and the +barber-surgeon and the common sailors by whom Hudson was accused. + +But it is useless to try to draw substantial conclusions from these +fragmentary records. The most that can be deduced from them--and +even that, because of Byleth's silence, hesitantly--is that in a +general way they do tend to confirm Prickett's narrative. They +would be more to my liking if this were not the case. + +A curious feature of the trial of the mutineers is its long +delay--more than five years. The Trinity House authorities acted +promptly. Almost immediately upon the return to London of the eight +survivors of the "Discovery" five of them (Prickett, Wilson, +Clemens, Motter and Mathews--no mention is made in the record of +Byleth, Bond, and the boy Syms) were brought before the Masters +(October 24, 1611) for examination. In a single day their +examination was concluded: with the resulting verdict of the +Masters upon their actions that they "deserved to be hanged for the +same." Three months later, 25 January, 1611 (O.S.), the matter was +before the Instance and Prize Records division of the High Court of +Admiralty; of which hearing the only recorded result is the +examination of the barber-surgeon, Edward Wilson. Then, +apparently, the mutineers were left to their own devices for five +full years. + +So far as the records show, no action was taken until the trial +began in Oyer and Terminer. The date of that beginning cannot be +fixed precisely--there being no date attached to the True Bill +found against Bileth, Prickett, Wilson, Motter, Bond, and Sims. +(For some unknown reason Mathews and Clemens were not included in +the indictment; although Clemens, certainly, was within the +jurisdiction of the Court.) The date may be fixed very closely, +however, by the fact that the two most important witnesses, +Prickett and Byleth, were examined on 7 February, 1616 (O.S.). +Three months later, 13 May, 1617 (O.S.), Clemens was examined. And +that is all! There, in the very middle of the trial--leaving in the +air the examinations of the other witnesses and the judgments of +the Court--the records end. + +Had document No. 2 of the Oyer and Terminer series been found, some +explanation of the five years' delay of the trial might have been +forthcoming; and the exact date of its beginning probably would +have been fixed. As the records stand, they leave us--so far as the +trial is concerned--with a series of increasingly disappointing +negatives: We do not know why two of the crew--one of them +certainly within reach of the Court--were not included in the +indictment; nor why the trial was postponed for so long a time; nor +certainly when it ended; nor, worst of all, what was its result. + +I should be glad to believe that the mutineers--even including +Byleth, who was the best of them--came to the hanging that the +Elder Brethren of the Trinity, in their off-hand just judgment, +declared that they deserved. If they did, there is no known record +of their hanging. A curiously suggestive interest, however, +attaches to the fact that at just about the time when the trial +ended one of them, and the only conspicuous one of them, seems +permanently to have disappeared. That most careful investigator the +late Mr. Alexander Brown was unable to find any sure trace of +Byleth after his second voyage with Baffin, which was made in +March-August, 1616. Seven months later, as the subjoined records +prove, he was on trial for his life. It seems to me to be at least +a possibility that the result of that trial may have led directly +to his permanent disappearance. If it did, and if Prickett and the +others in a like way disappeared with him, then was justice done on +Hudson's murderers. + + + +THE DOCUMENTS + + +Trinity House MS. Transactions. 1609-1625. + +(24 _October_ 1611) + + + The 9 men turned out of the ship: + Henry Hudson, master. + John Hudson, his son. + Arnold Ladley. + John King, quarter master. + Michael Butt, married. + Thomas Woodhoase, a mathematician, put away in great distress. + Adame Moore. + Philip Staff, carpenter. + Syracke Fanner, married. + + John Williams, died on 9 October. + --Ivet [Juet], died coming home. + + Slain: + Henry Greene. + William Wilson. + John Thomas. + Michell Peerce. + + Men that came home: + Robart Billet, master. + Abecocke Prickett, a land man put in by the Adventurers. + Edward Wilson, surgeon. + Francis Clemens, boteson. + Adrian Motter. + Bennet Mathues, a land man. + Nicholas Syms, boy. + Silvanus Bond, couper. + + +After Hudson was put out, the company elected Billet as master. + +Abacuck Pricket, sworn, says the ship began to return about 12th +June, and about the 22d or 23d, they put away the master. Greene +and Wilson were employed to fish for the company, and being at sea +combined to steal away the shallope, but at last resolved to take +away the ship, and put the master and other important men into the +shallope. + +He clears the now master of any foreknowledge of this complot, but +they relied on Ivett's judgment and skill. + +Edward Wilson, surgeon, knew nothing of the putting of the master +out of the ship, till he saw him pinioned down before his cabin +door. + +Francis Clemens, Adrian Motter and Bennet Mathues say the master +was put out of the ship by the consent of all that were in health, +in regard that their victualls were much wasted by him; some of +those that were put away were directly against the master, and yet +for safety of the rest put away with him, and all by those men that +were slain principally. + +They all charge the master with wasting the victuals by a scuttle +made out of his cabin into the hold, and it appears that he fed his +favourites, as the surgeon, etc., and kept others at only ordinary +allowance. All say that, to save some from starving, they were +content to put away so many, and that to most of them it was +utterly unknown who should go, or who tarry, but as affection or +rage did guide them in that fury that were authors and executors of +that plot. + + + + +Instance & Prize Records. (High Court of Admiralty). Examinations, +&c. Series I. Vol. 42. 1611-12 to 1614. + + +Die Sabbto XXV'to _January_ 1611. + +EDWARD WILLSON, of Portesmouth Surgion aged xxij yeares sworne and +examined before the Right Wor'll M'r [Master] Doctor Trevor Judge +of His Matyes High Court of the Admiltye concerninge his late +beinge at sea in the Discovery of London whereof Henry Hudson was +M'r for the Northwest discovery sayth as followeth. + +Being demaunded whether he was one of the companie of the Discovery +wherof Henry Hudson was M'r for the Northwest passage saythe by +vertue of his oathe that he was Surgion of the said Shipp the said +voyadge. + +Beinge asked further whether there was not a mutynie in the said +Shipp the said voyadge by some of the companie of the said Shipp +against the M'r, and of the manner and occasion thereof and by +whome saythe that their victualls were soe scante that they had but +two quartes of meale allowed to serve xxij men for a day, and that +the M'r had bread and cheese and aquavite in his cabon and called +some of the companie whome he favoured to eate and drinke with him +in his cabon whereuppon those that had nothinge did grudge and +mutynye both against the M'r and those that he gave bread and +drinke unto, the begynning whereof was thus viz't. One William +Willson then Boateswayne of the said shipp but since slayne by the +salvages went up to Phillipp Staffe the M'rs Mate and asked him the +reason why the M'r should soe favour to give meate to some of the +companie, and not the rest whoe aunswered that it was necessary +that some of them should be kepte upp Whereuppon Willson went downe +agayne and told one Henry Greene what the said Phillipp Staffe had +said to the said Willson Whereuppon they with others consented +together and agreed to pynion him the said M'r and one John Kinge +whoe was Quarter M'r and put them into a shallopp and Phillipp +Staffe mighte have stayed still in the shipp but he would +voluntarilie goe into the said shallopp for love of the M'r uppon +condition that they would give him his clothes (which he had) there +was allso six more besides the other three putt into the said +shallopp whoe thinkeinge that they were onely put into the shallopp +to keepe the said Hudson the M'r and Kinge till the victuals were +a sharinge went out willinglie but afterwards findinge that the +companie in the shipp would not suffer them to come agayne into the +shipp they desyred that they mighte have their cloathes and soe pte +of them was delivered them, and the rest of their apparell was +soulde at the mayne mast to them that would give most for them and +an inventory of every mans pticuler goodes was made and their money +was paid by Mr Allin Cary to their friendes heere in England and +deducted out of their wages that soe boughte them when they came +into England. + +Beinge asked whoe were the pties that consented to this mutynie +saythe he knoweth not otherwise then before he hath deposed savinge +he saythe by vertue of his oathe that this exãet never knewe +thereof till the M'r was brought downe pynioned and sett downe +before this eãxtes cabon and then this examinate looked out and +asked him what he ayled and he said that he was pynioned and then +this exãte would have come out of his cabon to have gotten some +victualls amongest them and they that had bounde the M'r said to +this exãte that yf he were well he should keepe himselfe soe and +further saythe that neither did Silvanus Bond Nicholas Simmes and +Frances Clements consente to this practize against the M'r of this +exãtes knowledge. + +Beinge demaunded whether he knoweth that the Hollanders have an +intent to goe forthe uppon a discovery to the said Northwest +passadge and whether they have anie card [chart] delivered them +concerninge the said discovery saythe that this exãte for his parte +never gave them anie card or knowledge of the said discovery but he +hath heard saye that they intend such a voyadge and more he cannot +saye savinge that some gentlemen and merchants of London that are +interessed in this discovery have shewed divers cardes abroad w'ch +happelie might come to some of their knowledge. + +Beinge asked further whither there bee a passadge throughe there he +saythe that by all likeliehood there is by reason of the tyde of +flood came out of the westerne ptes and the tyde of ebbe out of the +easterne which may bee easely discovered yf such may bee imployed +as have beene acquainted with the voyadge and knoweth the manner of +the ice but in cominge backe agayne they keepinge the northerne +most land aboard found little or noe ice in the passadge. + +Beinge asked what became of the said Hudson the M'r and the rest +of the companie that were put into the shallopp saythe that they +put out sayle and followed after them that were in the shipp the +space of halfe an houre and when they sawe the shipp put one [on] +more sayle and that they could not followe them then they putt in +for the shoare and soe they lost sighte of them and never heard of +them since And more he cannot depose. + +Rich: Trevor. Edw: Willsonn. + + +I certify that the foregoing is a true and authentic copy. + +J.F. Handcock, +Assistant-Keeper of the Public Records +London, 9th _June_, 1909. + + * * * * * + +Admiralty Court. Oyer and Terminer. 6. + +No. 2 cannot be found. The bundle commences at present with No. 8. + +No. 77. True Bill found for the trial of Robert Bileth alias +Blythe, late of the precinct of St. Katherine next the Tower of +London, co. Middlesex, mariner, Abacucke Prickett, late of the city +of London, haberdasher, Edward Wilson of the same, barber-surgeon, +Adrian Matter, late of Ratcliffe, Middlesex, mariner; Silvanus +Bonde, of London, cooper, and Nicholas Sims, late of Wapping, +sailor, to be indicted for having, on 22 June 9 James I, in a +certain ship called The Discovery of the port of London, then being +on the high sea near Hudson's Straits in the parts of America, +pinioned the arms of Henry Hudson, late of the said precinct of St. +Katherine, mariner, then master of the said ship The Discovery, and +putting him thus bound, together with John Hudson, his son, Arnold +Ladley, John Kinge, Michael Butt, Thomas Woodhouse, Philip Staffe, +Adam Moore and Sidrach Fanner, mariners of the said ship, into a +shallop, without food, drink, fire, clothing or any necessaries, +and then maliciously abandoning them, so that they came thereby to +their death and miserably perished. [Latin. Not dated.] + + * * * * * + +Admiralty. Oyer and Terminer. 41. + +[_Abstract_] + +Friday 7 _February_, 1616 [O.S.] + +Abacucke Prickett, of London, haberdasher, examined, says that +Henry Hudson, John Hudson, Thomas Widowes, Philip Staffe, John +Kinge, Michael Burte, Sidrach Fanner, Adrian Moore and John Ladley, +mariners of the Discovery in the voyage for finding out the N.W. +passage, about 6 years past, were put out of the ship by force into +the Shallop in the strait called Hudson's Strait in America, by +Henry Grene, John Thomas, John Wilson, Michael Pearce, and others, +by reason they were sick and victuals wanted, "under account" +[i.e., if rations from the existing scant store were served out +equally] they should starve for want of food if all the company +should return home in the ship. Philip Staffe went out of the ship +of his own accord, for the love he bare to the said Hudson, who was +thrust out of the ship. Grene, with 11 or 12 more of the company, +sailed away with the Discovery, leaving Hudson and the rest in the +shallop in the month of June in the ice. What became of them he +knows not. He was lame in his legs at the time, and unable to +stand. He greatly lamented the deed, and had no hand in it. Hudson +and Staffe were the best friends he had in the ship. + +About five weeks after the said ship came to Sir Dudley Digges +Island. Here Grene, Wilson, Thomas, Pearse and Adrian Mouter would +needs go ashore to trade with the savages, and were betrayed and +set upon by the savages, and all of them sore wounded, yet +recovered the boat before they died. Grene, coming into the boat, +died presently. Wilson, Thomas and Pearse were taken into the ship, +and died a few hours afterwards, two of them having had their +bowels cut out. The blood upon the clothes brought home was the +blood of these persons so wounded and slain by the savages, and no +other. + +There was falling out between Grene and Hudson the master, and +between Wilson the surgeon and Hudson, and between Staffe and +Hudson, but no mutiny was in question, until of a sudden the said +Grene and his consorts forced the said Hudson and the rest into the +shallop, and left them in the ice. + +The chests of Hudson and the rest were opened, and their clothes, +and such things as they had, inventoried and sold by Grene and the +others, and some of the clothes were worn. + +Thomas Widowes was thrust out of the ship into the shallop, but +whether he willed them take his keys and share his goods, to save +his life, this examinate knoweth not. + +At the putting out of the men, the ship's carpenter [Staffe] asked +the company if they would be [wished to be] hanged, when they came +to England. + +He does not know whether the carpenter is dead or alive, for he +never saw him since he was put out into the shallop. + +No shot was made at Hudson or any of them nor any hurt done them, +that he knows. + +He did not see Hudson bound, but heard that Wilson pinioned his +arms, when he was put into the shallop. But, when he was in the +shallop, this examinate saw him in a motley gown at liberty, and +they spoke together, Hudson saying: It is that villain Ivott +[Juet], that hath undone us; and he answered: No, it is Grene that +hath done all this villainy. + +It is true that Grene, Wilson and Thomas had consultation together +to turn pirates, and so he thinks they would have done, had they +not been slain. + +There was no watchword given, but Grene, Wilson, Thomas and Bennett +watched the master, when he came out of his cabin, and forced him +over board into the shallop, and then they put out the rest, being +sick men. + +He told Sir Thomas Smith the truth, as to how Hudson and the rest +were turned out of the ship. + +He told the masters of the Trinity-house the truth of the business, +but never knew or heard that the masters said they deserved to be +hanged for the same. + +They were not victualled with rabbits or partridges before Hudson +and the rest were turned into the shallop, nor after. + +There was no mutiny otherwise than as aforesaid, they were turned +out only for want of victuals, as far as he knows. + +He does not know the handwriting of Thomas Widowes. He, for his +part, made no means to hinder any proceedings that might have been +taken against them. + +(Signed) ABACOOKE PERIKET. + + + +[_On the same day_.] + + +Robert Bilett, of St. Katherine's, mariner, examined, saith that, +upon a discontent amongst the company of the ship the Discovery in +the finding out of the N.W. passage, by occasion of the want of +victualls, Henry Grene, being the principal, together with John +Thomas, William Wilson, Robert Ivett [Juet] and Michael Pearse, +determined to shift the company, and thereupon Henry Hudson, the +master, was by force put into the shallop, and 8 or 9 more were +commanded to go into the shallop to the master, which they did, +this examinate thinking this course was taken only to search the +master's cabin and the ship for victualls, which the said Grene and +others thought the master concealed from the company to serve his +own turn. But, when they were in the shallop, Grene and the rest +would not suffer them to come any more on board the ship, so Hudson +and the rest in the shallop went away to the southward, and the +ship came to the eastward, and the one never saw the other since. +What is otherwise become of them be knoweth not. + +He says that the men went ashore (as above) to get victuals; and +from their wounds the cabins, beds and clothes were made bloody. + +There was discontent amongst the company, but no mutiny to his +knowledge, until the said Grene and his associates turned the +master and the rest into the shallop. + +He heard of no mutiny "till overnight that Hudson and the rest were +[to be] put into the shallop the next day," and this examinate and +M'r. Prickett persuaded the crew to the contrary, and Grene +answered the master was resolved to overtrowe all, and therefore he +and his friends would shift for themselves. + +Such clothes as were left behind in the ship by Hudson and his +associates were sold, and worn by some of the company that wanted +clothes. + +The ship's carpenter never used such speeches, to his knowledge. +[This seems to refer to Staffe's question, "Would they be hanged +when they came to England?"] + +Philip Staffe, the carpenter, went into the shallop of his own +accord, without any compulsion; whether he be dead or alive, or +what has become of him, he knoweth not. + +No man, either drunk or sober, can report that Hudson and his +associates were shot at after they were in the shallop, for there +was no such thing done. + +He was under the deck, when Henry Hudson was put out of the ship, +so that he saw it not, nor knoweth whether he were bound or not, +but saith he heard he was pinioned. + +Henry Grene, and two or three others, made a motion to turn +pirates, and he believes they would have done, if they had lived. + +He denieth that he took any ringe out of Hudson's pocket, neither +ever saw it except on his finger, nor knoweth what became of it. + +Such beds and clothes as were left in the ship, and not taken by +Hudson and the rest into the shallop, were brought into England, +because they left them behind in the ship. + +There was no watchword given, but Grene and the others commanded +the said Hudson and the rest into the shallop, and upon that +command they went. + +He told Sir Thomas Smith the manner how Hudson and the rest went +from them, but what Sir Thomas said to their wives he knoweth not. + +There was no mutiny, but some discontent, amongst the company; they +were not victualled with any abundance of rabbits and partridges +all the voyage. He doth not know the handwriting of Widowes, nor +hath he seen what he put down in writing. + +(Signed) ROBERT BYLETH. + + * * * * * + +Admiralty. Oyer and Terminer. 41. + +13 _May_, 1617. + + +Frances Clemence, of Wapping, mariner, aged 40, says that Henry +Hudson, the master, and 8 persons more were put out of the +Discovery into the shallop about 20 leagues from the place where +they wintered, about 22d of June shall be 6 years in June next, as +he heard from the rest of the company, for this examinate had his +nails frozen off, and was very sick at the time. + +Henry Grene, William Wilson, John Thomas and Michael Pearse were +slain on shore by the savages at Sir Dudley Digges Island, and +Robert Ivett [Juet] died at sea after they were slain. + +Philip Staffe, the ship's carpenter, was one of them who were put +into the shallop with the master and the rest; whether he is dead +or not, he knows not. + +The master displaced some of the crew, and put others in their +room, but there was no mutiny that he knew of. + +Henry Hudson was pinioned, when he was put into the shallop. (With +other answers as in the previous examinations.) + + +THE END + + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Henry Hudson, by Thomas A. Janvier + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13442 *** |