The Fall Of These Masts Might Bring Down Others, And We Should
Then Lie Perfect Butts For The Enemy To Batter At, And His Heavy Guns
Might Easily Sink Us.
If we should attempt to carry her by boarding, we
must necessarily run the risk of losing many of
Our men, with little
prospect of success, as they had above treble our number to oppose us,
not having now in all our three ships above 120 men fit for boarding,
and these weak, as we had been long short of provisions. If, therefore,
we attempted to board and were beaten off, leaving any of our men
behind, the enemy would learn our strength, or weakness rather, and
might go to the harbour and retake our prize, in spite of every thing we
could do to hinder. Our ammunition also was now very short, and we had
only, enough to engage for a few glasses longer. All these circumstances
being duly considered, together with the difficulty of procuring masts,
and the time and provisions we must spend before we could get them
fitted we resolved to desist from any farther attempt upon the enemy,
since our battering her signified little, and we had not sufficient
strength to carry her by boarding. We determined therefore to keep her
company till night, and then to lose her, after which to make the best
of our way to the harbour where we had left our prize, to secure her.
We had engaged this ship first and last about seven glasses, during
which we in the Duke had eleven men wounded, three of whom were scorched
with gun-powder. I was again unfortunately wounded by a splinter in my
left foot, just before the arms chest was blown up on the quarter-deck;
and so severely that I had to lie on my back in great pain, being unable
to stand. Part of my heel-bone was struck out, and all the foot just
under the ankle cut above half through, my wound bleeding very much
before it could be stopped and dressed, by which I was much weakened. In
the Duchess above twenty men were killed and wounded, one of the slain
and three of the wounded belonging to my ship, which had been lent when
I was left in the harbour. The Marquis had none killed or wounded, but
two of her men were scorched by gun-powder. The enemy was the
Vigoniae, a brave and lofty new ship, admiral of Manilla, and this her
first voyage. She was calculated to carry 60 guns, and had above 40
mounted, with as many pattereroes, all brass, and, as we were informed,
had a complement of 450 men, of whom 150 were Europeans, besides
passengers. We were told also that several of her crew had formerly been
pirates, who had all their wealth on board, and were resolved to defend
it to the last extremity. The gunner was said to be a very expert man,
and had provided extraordinarily for defence, which enabled them to make
a desperate resistance; and they had filled all her sides between the
guns with bales of soft goods, to secure the men.
During the whole action she kept the Spanish flag flying at her
mast-head. We could observe that we had shattered her sails and rigging
very much, and had slain two men in her tops, besides bringing down her
mizen-yard; but this was all the visible damage we had done them, though
we certainly placed 500 round shot in her hull, which were six-pounders.
These large ships are built at Manilla of excellent timber, which does
not splinter, and their sides are much thicker and stronger than those
of the ships built in Europe. Thus ended our attempt on the biggest
Manilla ship, which I have heard related in so many ways at home, that I
have thought it necessary to give a very particular account of the
action, as I find it set down in my journal. Generally speaking, the
ships from Manilla are much richer than the prize we had taken; for she
had waited a long time for the Chinese junks to bring silks, which not
arriving, she came away with her cargo made out by means of abundance of
coarse goods. Several of the prisoners assured me that a Manilla ship
was commonly worth ten millions of dollars; so that, if it had not been
for the accidental non-arrival of the junks from China that season, we
had gotten an extraordinarily rich prize. After my return to Europe, I
met a sailor in Holland who had been in the large ship when we engaged
her, and who communicated to me a reason why we could not have taken her
at all events. Her gunner kept constantly in the powder-room, and
declared that he had taken the sacrament to blow up the ship if we had
boarded her, which accordingly made the men exceedingly resolute in her
defence. I the more readily gave credit to what this man told me, as he
gave a regular and circumstantial account of the engagement, conformable
to what I have given from my journal.
It is hardly to be doubted that we might have set this great ship on
fire, by converting one of our ships into a fireship for that purpose:
But this was objected to by all our officers, because we had goods of
value on board all our ships. The enemy on this occasion was the better
provided for us, having heard at Manilla, through our British
settlements in India, that two small ships had been fitted out at
Bristol for an expedition into the South Sea, and of which Captain
Dampier was pilot. On this account it was that they had so many
Europeans on board the great ship, most of whom had all their wealth
along with them, for which they would fight to the utmost; and it having
been agreed to pay no freight on the gun-decks, they had filled up all
the spaces between the guns with bales of goods, to secure the men.
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