"Privateering" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... separated the combatants, and saved the honor of each; for both had suffered alike, and victory had belonged to neither. The peace of 1784 terminated this short, but, to Holland, fatal war; the two latter years of which had been, in the petty warfare of privateering, most disastrous to the commerce of the republic. Negapatam, on the coast of Coromandel, and the free navigation of the Indian seas, were ceded to England, who occupied the other various ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... know, is a fishing-haven on the south coast of Cornwall, famous during the Napoleonic Wars for its privateering, and for its smuggling scarcely less notorious down to the middle of the last century. The doctor's parents, though of small estate, had earned by these and more legitimate arts enough money to set them dreaming of eminence for their ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... Privateering, the resourceful auxiliary to a weak navy, is also piracy, though not recognized so by the law of nations. The private ship which, under the authority of letters of marque and reprisal issued by the government, made war upon a hostile power, was always an indispensable adjunct ...
— Pirates and Piracy • Oscar Herrmann
... delivered when he first took real command of the Revenge after sailing out of the river at Bridgetown, and it was listened to with respectful and earnest interest. In brief manner he explained to all on board that he had thrown to the winds all idea of merchandising or privateering; that his pardon and his ship's clearance were of no value to him except he should happen to get into some uncomfortable predicament with the law; that he had no idea of sailing towards St. Thomas, but intended to proceed up the coast to burn ...
— Kate Bonnet - The Romance of a Pirate's Daughter • Frank R. Stockton
... stealing &c. v.; theft, thievery, latrociny|, direption[obs3]; abstraction, appropriation; plagiary, plagiarism; autoplagiarism[obs3]; latrocinium[obs3]. spoliation, plunder, pillage; sack, sackage[obs3]; rapine, brigandage, foray, razzia[obs3], rape, depredation, raid; blackmail. piracy, privateering, buccaneering; license to plunder, letters of marque, letters of mark and reprisal. filibustering, filibusterism[obs3]; burglary; housebreaking; badger game*. robbery, highway robbery, hold-up* [U.S.], mugging. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... for bravery and seamanship being now established, he soon found a sufficient number of persons willing to adventure a part of their fortunes in a privateering voyage which he proposed. He accordingly sailed from Plymouth on the 24th May, 1572, in the Pasco, a ship only of seventy tons, having for his consort the Swan of 250 tons, commanded by his brother John Drake, with seventy-three men and boys, and provisions for ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... nations occur, the English saw themselves deprived of the valuable commerce they carried on in their ports, to be transferred, most probably, to the United Provinces; in addition to which consideration, their navigation had already sustained excessive injury from the privateering of the Zealanders, who had captured, it is said, no less than twenty-seven hundred English merchant-ships. These, and various other causes, had provoked the Parliament to use expressions of the highest indignation at the measures of the court, and to a peremptory refusal of further supplies ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... her, and she loves me, sir. I've left the privateering. I've enough to set me up and buy a tidy sloop—Jack Lee's; you know the boat, Captain; clinker built, not four years old, eighty tons burthen, steers like a child. I've put my mother's ring on Arethusa's finger; and if you'll give us your ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson
... at the time, in financial difficulties, he no doubt welcomed the outbreak of the war. Service in the cause of the colonies could not be remunerative, and Jones knew it. A privateering command would have paid better than a regular commission, but Jones constantly refused such an appointment; and yet he has been called buccaneer and pirate by many who have written about him, including as recent writers as Rudyard Kipling, ...
— Paul Jones • Hutchins Hapgood
... Selkirk (1676 to 1721) was an adventurous sailor who joined Dampier's privateering expedition to the South Seas in 1703. He quarrelled with his captain, Stradling, and requested to be landed on the uninhabited island of Juan Fernandez. He immediately repented of his request, and begged to be taken off; but his prayers were disregarded, ...
— Anson's Voyage Round the World - The Text Reduced • Richard Walter
... character of weight and consequence, the case appears to me directly the reverse. It is an attaint upon character; a sort of privateering on family property. It may have weight among dependent tenants, but it gives none on a scale of national, and much less of universal character. Speaking for myself, my parents were not able to give me a shilling, beyond what they gave me in education; and to do this they distressed ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... during their intermittent visits took upon themselves the functions of governors, and effectually prevented the diffusion of anarchy. The Governors of the French colony made their presence felt more than the English settlers could tolerate; they interfered with them unduly, engaged in privateering expeditions and land forays against them, destroyed their property, and burned down their houses. Indeed, more than one French Governor conceived the notion, with the sanction of the King of France, of putting an end entirely to English colonization ...
— The Story of Newfoundland • Frederick Edwin Smith, Earl of Birkenhead
... debased. In certain onslaughts made upon them by officers of the law, some of the smugglers became murderers. The business became unprofitable for a time until the enterprising Lafittes—thinkers—bethought them of a corrective—"privateering". ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... granted by the allies of England, such as the king of France and the Dutch. About the middle of the 17th century separate sittings of the court for instance and prize business began, perhaps because of the conflicting claims to droits of Charles II. and the duke of York as lord high admiral; and privateering under royal commission took the place of the former irregular "spoiling.'' The account which Lord Mansfield gave of the records of the Admiralty Court, that there were no prize act books earlier than 1641, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... only to war at sea: the Declaration of Paris, of 1856, supposed apparently to need no ratification (to which the United States is now the only important Power which has not become a party), as to privateering, combination of enemy and neutral property and blockades; The Hague Conventions of 1907, No. vi. as to enemy merchant vessels at outbreak, No. vii. as to conversion of merchantmen into warships, No. viii. as to mines, No. ix. as to naval ...
— Letters To "The Times" Upon War And Neutrality (1881-1920) • Thomas Erskine Holland
... however, amongst civilized nations a mode of piracy still tolerated, or which was tolerated in the last war, but is now ripe for extinction. It is that war of private men upon private men, which goes on under the name of privateering. Great changes have taken place in our modes of thinking within the last twenty-five years; and the greatest change of all lies in the thoughtful spirit which we now bring to the investigation of all ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... dim, half-threatening blue; as indeed it has always ruled its destinies in great measure, bringing first the persecuted hither and then inviting so many successive generations forth to warlike expedition, or Revolutionary privateering or distant commercial enterprise. With the sea, too, Hawthorne's name again is connected, as we shall presently notice. Then, quitting the brimming blue, our eyes return over the "flat, unvaried surface covered chiefly with wooden houses, few or none of which pretend to architectural beauty," ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... from this cause came about the famous land expeditions, such as the sack of Maracaibo by Lolonnois the Cruel, and the historic capture of Panama by Morgan. Large cities were taken and held to ransom. Organized raids were made, accompanied by murder and rapine. The gallantry of privateering was degenerating into the bloody ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... things. The junk was taken to the flagship. Its crew were Burnei Moros. Their property was returned to them, and what appeared, in our reckoning, its equivalent in articles of barter was given to them, because their capture was not induced by greed. My chief intent is not to go privateering, but to make treaties and to procure friends, of which I am in great need. The Burneans were much pleased and satisfied with this liberality displayed toward them, thus showing how ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803, Volume II, 1521-1569 • Emma Helen Blair
... now made freshly odious by an appearance of discrimination and partiality. The Federalists did improve their opportunity in the way of general legislation: much needed laws were passed to stop privateering, to protect the ports, and to increase the naval armament; and Adams was placed in a much better position to maintain neutrality than Washington had been. Fear of another outbreak of yellow fever accelerated the work of Congress, ...
— Washington and His Colleagues • Henry Jones Ford
... of Frobisher, Sir Francis Drake, also entertained the idea of making the northwest passage. While engaged in privateering or piratical expeditions against the Spanish, Drake landed on the Isthmus of Panama, saw the Pacific for the first time, and determined to enter it by the Straits of Magellan. In 1577 he made his way through the straits, plundered ...
— History of the United States, Vol. I (of VI) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... England and the Netherlands had existed for ages, and was still extending itself, to the great advantage of both countries. A dispute, however, between the merchants of Holland and England, towards the year 1215, caused a privateering warfare, and a ten years' suspension of intercourse. A reconciliation afterwards led to the establishment of the English wool staple, at Dort. A subsequent quarrel deprived Holland of this great advantage. King Edward refused ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... Beauregard, was taken after a short cruise. A third, the Petrel, mistook the frigate St. Lawrence for a merchantman and attempted to take her, but was sunk by a broadside. After a year the blockade stopped privateering. ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... for the hazardous venture of privateering offered great returns. George Cabot of Boston was the son of an opulent shipowner. During the Revolution, George, with his brother swept the coast with twenty privateers carrying from sixteen to twenty guns each. For four ...
— History of the Great American Fortunes, Vol. I - Conditions in Settlement and Colonial Times • Myers Gustavus
... had seen the efficiency of cruising and privateering, even against Great Britain, and in our then infantile condition, during the war of the Revolution; and besides was a man of sense, and amenable to judgment and reason. He listened to the two experienced and valiant officers; ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... His Majesty's ships. [Footnote: Admiralty Records 1. 1480—Capt. Lord Alexander Banff, 21 Oct. 1744.] Any ship forced to winter at Rhode Island, again, always counted upon losing enough men to "disable her from putting to sea" when the spring came. Here, too, the privateering spirit was to blame, Rhode Island being notorious for its enterprise in that form of piracy. Another impenitent sinner in her inroads upon the companies of king's ships was Boston, where "a sett of people made it their Business" to entice them away. ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... that such a number of ships could not be manned, but if it is considered that there are now employed in privateering a greater number of men, than are sufficient to man this proposed fleet, it is easy to obviate this difficulty by offering such inducements, as will infallibly lead both officers and men to prefer the public to any private service whatever. The United States have ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various
... week was one such as the village had never beheld. A visitor to the island might have thought that war had been declared and that a privateering expedition was ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams
... fact. The revolutionary war left the whole country as well depraved in morals as exhausted in resources. This was particularly the case with such towns as Salem, which had been largely exposed to the irresistibly corrupting influence of privateering. ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 3: New-England Sunday - Gleanings Chiefly From Old Newspapers Of Boston And Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... It would have been hopeless for England to have attempted seriously to challenge that authority where it existed in view of the relative strength at that time of the two kingdoms; and in general the English seamen confined themselves to hampering and annoying the Spanish commerce by acts of privateering which the Spaniards naturally designated as piracy. But to the bold and inventive mind of the great Raleigh there occurred another conception. Spain, though she claimed the whole American continent, had not in fact made herself mistress of all its habitable parts. North of ...
— A History of the United States • Cecil Chesterton
... man and a source of great danger to our cause," said the Governor. "He is vain and loves display and is living far beyond his means. To maintain his extravagance he has resorted to privateering and speculation, and none of it has been successful. He is deeply involved in debt. It is charged that he has used his military authority for private gain. He was tried by a court-martial but escaped with only a reprimand ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... exploited, whether in narrative histories or in volumes of documentary materials. Accordingly the Society's Committee on Publication readily acceded to the suggestion that a volume should be made up of documents illustrating the history of privateering and piracy as these stand related to the life of America during the colonial period—for it is agreed that few aspects of our maritime history in that period have greater importance and interest than these two. ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various
... much misery for want of victuals and apparel, and "without taking any purchase of any value." The Constance returned to the Irish coast, "extreme poorly." The vessel entered Cork harbour, and then Pett, thoroughly disgusted with privateering life, took leave of both ship and voyage. With much difficulty, he made his way across the country to Waterford, from whence he took ship for London. He arrived there three days before Christmas, 1594, in a beggarly condition, and made his way to his brother ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... on the subject, directed the restraints and prohibitions of that intercourse to be discontinued on terms which were made known by proclamation. Since the renewal of this intercourse our citizens trading to those ports, with their property, have been duly respected, and privateering ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 4) of Volume 1: John Adams • Edited by James D. Richardson
... book opens with the famous accusation of Histiaeus by Artaphernes: "Thou hast stitched this boot and Aristagoras hath put it on." Histiaeus in fear fled to his own city Miletus; being disowned there, he for a time maintained a life of privateering, but was eventually captured and crucified by Artaphernes. The Ionian revolt had been narrowed down to Miletus and one or two less important towns. The Greeks assembled a fleet, but a spirit of insubordination manifesting itself ...
— Authors of Greece • T. W. Lumb |
