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Updated: May 21, 2025
Joe Hawkridge and Jack Cockrell, more fit for duty than the others, put their backs into it right heartily while the sailors droned to the cadence of the pump a sentimental ditty which ran on for any number of verses and began in this wise: "As, lately I traveled toward Gravesend, I heard a fair Damosel a Sea-man commend: And as in a Tilt-boat we passed along, In praise of brave Sea-men she sung this new Song, Come Tradesman or Marchant, whoever he be, There's none but a Sea-man shall marry with me!"
Presently the night breeze drew off the land, bringing with it the scent of green things growing. Joe Hawkridge stared at the fire on the beach and then turned to look at the spark of light on the ship. The raft had drifted considerably to the southward. Anxiously Joe said to his shipmate: "The flood o' the tide must be setting us down the coast, in some crazy current or other.
Captain Wellsby got rid of the rest of his men on this trip, excepting the gunner and carpenter, and these lingered with him as a kind of body-guard pending the ticklish business of releasing the imprisoned pirates and forsaking them to their own devices. The jolly-boat was laden to the gunwales and Jack Cockrell held back, saying to Joe Hawkridge: "Why trouble the captain to set us ashore?
"He searched us out where we lay trussed like fowls, all bound with ropes. We blundered fair into the camp last night, and old Trimble Rogers here, his legs knotted with cramps, couldn't make a run for it. They saved us for Blackbeard's pleasure but he had other fish to fry." "What then?" demanded Jack. "'Twas Joe Hawkridge that ran to cut our bonds when the fight began.
He was about to give the order when Joe Hawkridge, gunner's mate, called to Jack Cockrell standing his watch at the helm: "Remember the snow I told ye of? Yonder is the same rig and tonnage, alike it as peas in a pod." Jack spoke to the shipmaster who summoned Joe to the quarter-deck.
It was a chance to rehearse the tale as they had concocted it, and it seemed to hang together well enough to satisfy these simple rogues. In his turn, Joe Hawkridge demanded to know the gossip of the Revenge. The storm had sobered Blackbeard, it seemed, and he had displayed the skill of a masterly seaman in bringing them safely through.
Vesey declared it as his belief that you would be discovered not far from his burned home, so as soon as they left I mounted my best horse and started to give you warning." "I appreciate your kindness, Hawkridge; how did you know the right direction?" "I knew the course to Vesey's ranch, and was speeding that way when I caught sight of you and Sterry on the top of this hill.
His body would be prepared for Christian burial because of the esteem in which he was already held by many of the townspeople. To Jack Cockrell and Joe Hawkridge it was sad news indeed but tender-hearted Bill Saxby mourned like one who had lost a parent. He closed the shop for a day and hung black ribbons on the knob.
But, strangely enough, these people forgot the Whitney home, upon which it may be said the horsemen stumbled the next moment. Down the ridge rode the dozen or more, Hawkridge, Sterry and Capt. Asbury at the head, with the others almost upon their heels. In the brisk morning air the frightened Jennie Whitney hastened to the door and gazed wonderingly upon the party.
I appealed to Inman to let up on him, but he won't; some of the boys are so mad they will shoot him on sight." "And Capt. Asbury?" Vesey's face became hard. "He ought to be hanged because of the way he acted last night." "But what is proposed to do with him and Sterry?" "Give them a fair trial." Hawkridge shook his head with a meaning smile.
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