. . . they
put out to sea when they were equipped for the voyage,
and sailed for three days, until the land was hidden by
the water. Then the fair wind died out, and north winds
arose, and fogs, and they knew not whither they were
drifting and thus it lasted for [a long period of time].
Then they saw the sun again, and were able to determine
the quarters of the heavens; they hoisted sail, and
sailed . . . through before they saw land. They
discussed among themselves what land it could be and
[one of them] said that he did not believe that it could
be Greenland. (Wigal, 22)
This passage from Leif Eriksson’s
Saga of Erik the Red demonstrated the
primitiveness of early navigation. Few ships ventured out of
sight of land. Their navigators relied on landmarks, tides,
nature, and other simple indicators to safely reach their
destinations. This method remained a stalwart of navigation
until inventors found a way to calculate longitude in the
eighteenth century. Until then they practiced “running down
the latitude” as Amerigo
Vespucci wrote in 1597, “We sailed with the northwest
wind, thus running along the coast with the land ever in
sight . . .” (Wigal, 56) and William
Dampier, a buccaneer, recorded a century later.
We steered
away NW by N intending to run into the latitude of the
Isles Galapagos and steer off west, because we did not
know the certain distance, and therefore could not shape
a direct course to them. When we came within 40 minutes
of the Equator we steered west. (Preston, 107)
“Running down the latitude” meant a ship sailed north or
south within sight of land until it reached a latitude
that was the same as where the ship wished to end up. Then
she sailed east or west, while the navigator regularly
checked their course while the helmsman steered according to
the sea artist’s instructions.1 To steer a
vessel before the twelfth century an oar was hung over the
side and the helmsman turned this steering oar to increase
or decrease the drag. The Vikings
maneuvered their longships this way. From the 1100s onward,
the hinged rudder replaced the steering oar. Rather than
being located on the side of the vessel, the rudder was
located on the stern beneath the water line. Once tillers,
whipstaffs, and steering wheels were added, shipwrights
could design newer and larger vessels.
The ship on the left has
a steering board, while the one on the right has a
rudder.
Whipstaffs were first used during the 1400s. They were
located at a higher height than the ship’s tiller, to which
they were attached, but not too far from it. (The tiller was
connected to the rudder.) With the whipstaff situated inside
a cabin or below the main deck, a window provided the
helmsman with a view of the sails, rather than what lay
ahead on the ocean. Lookouts relayed needed information,
while the navigator stood on the deck above the steerage
cabin and gave instructions through a speaking tube. The
center pole in the left picture replicates the Mayflower’s whipstaff. The
compartment in front of it was the “bittacle,” which housed
the compass. The picture in the center shows an
upclose view of the Elizabeth
II's whipstaff (one of Sir Walter Raleigh's ships
that brough colonists to Roanoke Island). The right picture
shows an exterior view of the cabin where the helm was
located below the quarterdeck and after of the capstan.
Close view of the
Elizabeth II's
tiller, which was attached to the whipstaff, which was
on the deck above the tiller, and a long view of the
tiller.
The first evidence of a steering wheel on a ship dates
to 1705, although its invention came in the previous
century. The difference between this and the whipstaff was
the helmsman now stood on the quarterdeck where he could see
both sails and ocean, but not necessarily what lay ahead of
the ship. The wheel provided him with greater accuracy and
more maneuverability in doing his job, but unlike his
predecessors he was on an open deck. If it rained, he got
wet. If a wave washed over the stern, he might get swept
overboard. If the sun beat down on a hot day, his skin
burned.
Landmarks were essential to seamen. William Dampier2
wrote in A New Voyage Round the World:
On the back
of the town, a pretty way up in the country, there is a
very high mountain, towering up like a sugar-loaf,
called Monte Christo. It is a very good sea-mark, for
there is none like it on all the coast. The body of this
mountain bears due South from Manta. About a mile and
half from the shore, right against the village, there is
a rock, which is very dangerous, because it never
appears above water; neither doth the sea break on it,
because here is seldom any great sea; yet it is now so
well known, that all ships bound to this place do easily
avoid it. A mile within this rock there is good
anchoring, in 6, 8, or 10 fathom water, good hard sand,
and clear ground: and a mile from the road on the west
side, there is a shoal running out a mile into the sea.
(123-4)
Another example of a landmark was the Cayman Islands,
which was how mariners used the islands. Only later did they
stop there to restock supplies or repair their ships.
Aside from an acquaintance with landmarks, a navigator
had to know the weather patterns. The monsoons, for example,
influenced the direction and times when ships traveled to
and from the East Indies. The Spanish treasure fleet
schedules were theoretically timed to minimize the dangers
from hurricanes from midsummer into fall. Majority vote, not
the captain or the sailing master, determined what course
the pirates sailed. John Lambert held this latter position
aboard Sam Bellamy’s Whydah. Alexander
Selkirk served as navigator aboard the privateer Cinque Ports before his marooning on Juan
Fernandez Island. Four and a half years later, Woodes
Rogers rescued him in February 1709 and among the
belongings he brought aboard this privateer were “his
Mathematical Instruments,” tools used in the art of
navigation.
Rogers’ navigator on the Duchess was
none other than William Dampier, chosen because of his
knowledge and experience, “the only living Englishman to
have been thrice and twice around the world.” (Preston, 310)
These three privateers would be among those who captured a
Manila galleon, whose hold contained “jewels, silver plate,
musk, cinnamon, cloves . . . silks, damasks, and Chinese
porcelain,” which would eventually bring £150,000 at
auction. (Preston, 320)
When Bartholomew
Roberts captured the Samuel, he
discovered Henry Glasby of Scotland whose sea artistry
skills surpassed Roberts’ current navigator, Nicholas
Thomas. Glasby wasn’t interested in going on the account.
He tried to
hide but the pirates found him, beat him and threw him
aboard their vessel. He refused to sign the articles but
was “cut and abused very much”. In the end he complied
and this most reluctant of pirates would play a central
role in Roberts’ story from this time on. (Sanders,
115)
Following the death of Roberts and the capture of his
men, Glasby, who had been aboard the Royal
Master for more than a year and a half, was tried in
the Great Hall of Cape
Coast Castle on 2 April 1722. One witness, Captain
Traherne of the King Solomon, swore:
The pirates
“did as they would . . . never observing him” . . . he
was a prisoner, that he had striven to rein in the
excesses of the pirates, and that, when he could, he had
returned stolen goods to their owners. He was “civil
beyond any of them”, said John Wingfield. (Sanders,
232)
Other witnesses – including acquitted pirates –
supported this testimony. The court acquitted Glasby, but
considered “his evidence would be of great use . . . for
trying the remaining pirates”. (Sanders, 232)
While ships today often take the most direct
(or shortest) route, that option wasn’t available to ships
that relied on sail to reach their destinations. The wind
determined when and where they could go. One area seamen
preferred to avoid, although it wasn’t always possible, was
the “doldrums.” This was a region, anywhere between fifteen
and 150 miles wide, above and below the equator. There was
little wind and the air was often oppressively hot and
muggy, although a hurricane, squall, or thunderstorm could
occur with little warning. French sailors called this area le pot au noir (the black hole).
A
vessel caught in this region was often becalmed,
unable to move, which put the crew and passengers at
risk. When food and water became scarce, those
aboard pooled rations and went on short allowance,
meaning they had access to small portions of these
resources at specified times. John Cox and his
fellow buccaneers found themselves in such a
situation in 1680. Water became so precious it sold
for “30 pieces of Eight per Pint.” (Little, 116) The
infrequent allocations were never enough to sate
one’s appetite. This led some to steal from the
precious stores. One pirate did so while crossing
the Pacific in 1686. Upon discovery, he
suffered “three Blows from each Man in the ship,
with a Two-Inch and a half Rope3
on his bare Back." (Little, 117)
If the wind didn’t reappear and their supplies ran out,
the pirates could die. This was why ships in the Age of Sail
sailed along specific regions of the oceans. Above and below
the doldrums were constant winds, which became known as
“trade winds” (or “trades”) because ships relied on these to
transport trade goods from one country to another.
Established trade routes served as prime hunting grounds for
pirates. Nowhere was this truer than the Windward Passage,
located between Hispaniola and Cuba – the last stop for
treasure fleets bound for Spain. Off the coast of Hispaniola
lay Tortuga, which the buccaneers used as their haven in the
seventeenth century. This location made ships traversing the
Windward Passage rich pickings for the pirates.
Closer to the poles, the winds blow from the west and
are known as “westerlies.” In between the trade winds and
the westerlies are the “variables,” where unreliable winds
blow. These latitudes are sometimes called the “horse
latitudes” because of how the lack of wind and stifling heat
affected horses being transported to the Americas.
Knowledge of the winds, however, was only one example of
a navigator’s tools. Sea maps, called “charts,” provided
details for a ship’s safe passage through a body of water.
They contained coastal outlines and landmarks, as well as
information on depth soundings, tides, and currents. But
early maps often distorted or misplaced continents because
much of the world remained unexplored. Known regions, such
as those that Spain claimed, were mapped, but these maps
were jealously guarded from other countries. One of the most
prized treasures pirates and early privateers sought when
capturing Spanish ships were sea charts. Those of the
western coast of South America were unknown to Englishmen
until Bartholomew Sharp captured the Santa
Rosario in July 1681.
In this prize
I took a Spanish manuscript . . .. It describes all the
ports, roads, harbours, bays, sands, rocks and rising of
the land and instructions how to work the ship into any
port or harbour. They were going to throw it overboard
but by good luck I saved it – and the Spaniards cried
out when I got the book. (Rutherford-Moore, 18)
The confiscation of these
charts proved invaluable, for when Captain Sharp gave
them to the king, the pirates were pardoned. Once translated
and copied, the navy and merchant marine used these sea
charts to sail in Spanish waters. Blackbeard also
found them valuable, for he appropriated Henry Bostock’s
“cargo of cattle and hogs, his arms, books and instrument”
on 5 December 1717. (Konstam, 165) The books most likely
included a waggoner, while the instrument was probably a
backstaff, a navigator’s tool used to calculate latitude.
The first sea charts appeared in the thirteenth century.
About 300 years passed before anyone gathered them together
in a single book called a “waggoner.” The name stemmed from
Lucas Janszoon Waghenaer, who published Speighel
der Zeevaerdt in 1584. Four years later, an English
translation appeared entitled The Mariner’s
Mirror. It became so popular English seamen referred
to it as a “waggoner” and the word came to mean any sea
atlas.
Aside from these sea charts, navigators employed various
instruments to determine a ship’s location and speed. The
magnetic compass
indicated direction and was essential for steering a steady
course. Early versions were merely magnetized needles that
pointed north while suspended from a string. Later the
needle was mounted on a pivot, and by the 1500s, a round
card was fixed to the needle. To prevent inaccurate
readings, however, the navigator and helmsman had to remove
their knives around the steering compass,
located in the binnacle.
Left to Right: Compass,
Elizabeth II's
Traverse Board and Sandglass, Traverse
Board
To determine how fast a ship sailed, a log
line (knotted at regular intervals) was heaved overboard
from the bow. At the same time a thirty-second sandglass – also called a
sand clock – was turned over. Once the sand ran out, the
line was hauled back in and the knots were counted. This
information was put into a calculation to determine the
speed of the vessel, which was then recorded in the log book
or on a traverse
board, a wooden board into which pegs were inserted.
The right-most picture above portrays one similar to that
aboard the Mayflower, which was located
behind the helmsman. A ship’s day began at noon and was
divided into four-hour periods called watches. During each
watch, a seaman placed pegs in the appropriate holes on the
traverse
board to record the ship’s direction and speed.
When a vessel came near land, the crew took soundings to
determine how deep or shallow the water was.4
The leads-man (sometimes more than one) secured himself to
the bow of the vessel and heaved the line, attached to a
lead weight, forward. Sometimes he called out the knots as
they passed through his hands; other times, he counted them
as he hauled in the line. This information was shouted to
the captain near the helm. To determine what type of seabed
was beneath them, the leads-man first applied wax or tallow
to the weight. Sand or mud indicated a soft bottom, but a
clean one indicated hidden dangers such as rocks or reefs.
Navigators also used books of tables and sailing
directions. The earliest known navigation manual was printed
in Lisbon around 1509 and called Regimento do
Estrolabio. Tomes primarily of the eighteenth century
included The English Pilot, A Pilot for the
West Indies, American Coast Pilot, and The
British Mariner’s Guide. One title became known as the
“seaman’s bible.” First published as The New
Practical Navigator, it was written by John Hamilton
Moore, but Nathaniel
Bowditch, who had basically home-schooled himself
before putting to sea as a ship’s clerk and later master,
discovered errors in Moore’s calculations. For example, the
table listed 1800 as a leap year and listed March first with
a declination of seven degrees eleven minutes. In actuality
the declination was seven degrees thirty-three minutes,
which translated into an error of about twenty-three miles.
In 1802 the American publisher asked Bowditch to correct the
errors and eventually reprinted the book as The
New American Practical Navigator. The next edition
included corrected charts, instructions on how to navigate,
survey direction, collect wind data, and calculate high
tides, and information about currents, the ship’s log,
marine insurance, bills of exchange, and the
responsibilities of the owners, masters, factors, and
agents. From then on the book’s author was known as
Nathaniel Bowditch. It has been in print for over two
centuries.
Telescopes, dividers, parallel rulers, and Gunter’s
scales were also essential tools. The first, usually called
a spyglass or “bring ‘em near,” was usually made of brass
and kept in a mahogany
case to protect it from the elements. Recovered from the
wreckage of the Whydah were several
examples of brass dividers. These were used to measure
distance and to plot a course on a sea chart and resembled
the compass used in geometry. Archeologists discovered “five
pairs of brass navigation dividers in extremely fine
condition” from the wreckage of the Speaker,
John Bowen’s pirate ship that sank in 1702 off the coast of
Mauritius. (X Marks the Spot, 90) Gunter’s
scales, also known as “Sliding Gunters,” were a predecessor
of the slide rule.
Mariner's telescope and
dividers
To calculate latitude a variety of instruments were
used, depending on the time period. The earliest of these
was the astrolabe,
which Arabs invented for use on land. This brass ring had
degrees marked on it. Two cross pieces intersected each
other and formed four small triangles. Attached to the
intersection were a knob and two pointed lengths of brass
that could be moved to determine the angle of the sun at a
certain time of day, or the polestar at night. The astrolabe
was in use as early as the second century BCE, but none
before the sixth century have survived. Muslim seamen used
it in the ninth century, not to determine the ship’s
location, but to know where Mecca was so they could pray.
European seamen began using it in the eleventh century, and
it remained in common use during the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries, after which its use and importance slowly
declined. The problem with the astrolabe was it wasn’t
accurate; the navigator needed a steady hand and the wind
could influence its readings. An error of one degree equated
to sixty miles. Often a navigator’s reading was off by four
or five degrees, which meant the ship was far off her
desired course.
Astrolabe
(front, back, in use)
A cross-staff
was similar to a yardstick with a sliding bar (about
two-thirds as long) set at right angles across it. One end
of the staff and both ends of the bar contained sights that
allowed the user to hold the end of the staff to his eye
while adjusting the bar in a vertical position until he saw
the horizon through the sight at the lower end of the bar
and a star (usually the sun, but he could use the North
Star) through the upper end of the bar. As long as he took
the sighting in relatively peaceful seas, the navigator
could compute their latitude with a fair degree of accuracy.
Cross-staffs
on Elizabeth II
These two instruments, however, required the user to
stare directly into the sun, which eventually could blind a
person. John Davis invented the back
staff (also called a quadrant) in 1595 to replace the
cross-staff. The back staff looked like a long “Y” with an
arced bar having degrees marked on it. A smaller “Y” branch
was attached near the base and on the opposite side of the
long “Y.” It, too, had an arced bar with angles marked on
it. Both arcs possessed vanes. The navigator peered through
the sighting vane (on long “Y”), while positioning the
shadow vane. At the base of the backstaff was a square with
a slit in its center. This was the horizon vane. The
navigator faced away from the sun and aligned the backsight
(sighting vane) so he could see the horizon vane. Then he
moved the peg of the shadow vane until a shadow fell on
directly on the slit in the horizon vane. These two angles
told him the angle of the sun and the latitude of the ship.
After 1759 the sextant
slowly replaced the back staff and cross-staff. John Hadley
invented its predecessor, the octant, in 1731. Both used
mirrors to measure latitude and were more accurate than
their predecessors because
users could view the horizon and sun at the same time. The
sextant resembled an upside down “V” with a graduated arc –
known as an index bar – that stretched across the two ends
of the “V”. At the point was a movable gear attached via a
strip of metal to the index bar. The navigator peered
through the lens reflecting the sun, while moving the gear
until the mirrors lined up the sun with the horizon. The
angle on the index bar allowed him to calculate the sun’s
angle and the ship’s latitude.
While there were instruments to determine the ship’s
latitude, calculating her longitude remained a major
problem. The principal means navigators used to make
this determination was dead
reckoning, which calculated a ship’s position based on
the last fixed or observed position. The sea artist took
into consideration the distances entered in the ship’s log,
as well as the courses steered and the winds and weather
encountered since the voyage began. At best he made a good
guess as to where the vessel was, but more times than not
his guess was wrong. That error could and did place ships
way off course or in serious jeopardy. The Mayflower
was supposed to anchor in the Chesapeake Bay, but ended up
off the coast of Massachusetts.
To accurately determine longitude, a sea clock was
needed, but on a ship the elements affected these
instruments. The first such clock wasn’t invented until the
1700s, and not until 1762 and 1764 was one of John
Harrison’s
inventions proven to accurately work on voyages to the
Caribbean. Even so, chronometers (a sea clock lacking a
pendulum) were too expensive for most ships and/or seamen to
have. The British Royal Navy didn’t issue them to the
majority of their vessels until 1825. Greenwich Mean Time,
upon which time was standardized, didn’t become effective
until 1833.
Notes:
1. The navigator, also
known as a sailing master and one of the sea artists found
aboard a vessel, was an educated man who knew trigonometry
and could determine the best route to get the ship to her
destination. The helmsman, on the other hand, was one of
the crew – each seaman took his turn at the whipstaff or
wheel. He used a compass and the sun, moon, and stars to
follow the course the navigator determined.
2. While Dampier never referred to
himself as a pirate, or his participation in raids
against the Spanish as piracy, his buccaneering
“adventures” took him to places little explored by
Europeans. He made meticulous notes not only of
the flora, fauna, and people, but also “the
movements of the tides, currents, and winds around
the islands.” (Preston, 1) On his three voyages
around the world, he took precise measurement of
distances and “pinpointed the location of islands,
while giving practical tips on the best approaches
through reefs, tidal races, and shoals.” (Preston,
6) The Royal Navy would still rely on this
information three centuries later.
3. The measurement refers to the rope’s
circumference, rather than its length.
4. One measurement frequently given with a
ship is her draft/draught. This is how much water she
requires to stay afloat. If her draft is seven feet, she
needs more than seven feet to remain movable in the water.
If the water is six feet deep, she’s either wrecked or
aground.
For those who
would like to learn more about navigation, I recommend the
following:
Atkinson, James. Epitome of the Art of Navigation. J. Mount,
1778.
Beal, Clifford. Quelch’s Gold:
Piracy, Greed, and Betrayal in Colonial New England.
Praeger, 2007.
Clifford, Barry, and Kenneth J. Kinkor. Real Pirates: The Untold Story of the Whydah from Slave Ship to Pirate Ship. National
Geographic, 2007.
Cordingly, David. Under the Black Flag:
The Romance and the Reality of Life Among the Pirates.
Random House, 1995.
Dampier, William. A New Voyage
Round the World. 1500 Books, 2007.
Ifland, Peter. Taking the Stars:
Celestial Navigation from Argonauts to Astronauts.
Krieger, 1999.
Konstam, Angus. Blackbeard:
America’s Most Notorious Pirate. John Wiley &
Sons, 2006.
Little, Benerson. The Buccaneer’s
Realm: Pirate Life on the Spanish Main, 1674-1688.
Potomac Books, 2007.
Nickerson, W. Sears. Land Ho!: A
Seaman’s Story of the Mayflower, Her Construction, Her
Navigation and Her First Landfall. Michigan State
University, 1997.
Pirates: Terror on the High Seas
– from the Caribbean to the South China Sea. Turner,
1996.
Platt, Richard. Eyewitness Pirate. DK
Publishing, 2007.
Preston, Diana and Michael. A Pirate of
Exquisite Mind: Explorer, Naturalist, and Buccaneer; The
Life of William Dampier. Walker & Company, 2004.
Rogers, Woodes. A Cruising Voyage
Round the World: The Adventures of an English Privateer.
Narrative Press, 2004.
Rutherford-Moore, Richard. The Pirate
Round: Early Eighteenth Century Maritime Navigation
during the Golden Age of Piracy. Heritage Books,
2007.
Sanders, Richard. If a Pirate I
Must Be . . .: The True Story of “Black Bart,” King of
the Caribbean Pirates. Skyhorse, 2007.
Smith, Robert H. The Maritime Heritage of
the Cayman Islands. University of Florida Press,
2000.
Thirslund, Soren. Viking
Navigation. Viking Ship Museum, 2007.
Waters, David Watkin. The Art of
Navigation in England in Elizabethan and Early Stuart
Times. Yale, 1958.
Wigal, Donald. Historic Maritime Maps.
Parkstone Press, 2007.
X Marks the Spot: The Archaeology of
Piracy edited by Russell K. Skowronek and Charles R.
Ewen. University Press of Florida, 2006.
Online resources:
Pirates
and Privateers
