‘BULLY’ HAYES; THE PIRATE OF M THE PACIFIC.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1095, 24 February 1893, Page 10

‘BULLY’ HAYES; THE PIRATE OF M THE PACIFIC.

A CHAPTER OF SOUTH SEA HISTORY. 1 Bully ’ Hayes ! 0, halcyon days of ‘7O and ‘74, when the Pacific was not, as now, patrolled by mon-of- war from lonely Pylstaart, in the Friendlies, to the lowlying far-away Marshalls and the coral lagoons ol the North-west; when tli9 Queensland schooners ran full nigger cargoes to Bundaberg, Maryborough and Port Mackay; when the Government Agents, drunk nino days out of ten (as they probably will ba now), did as much recruiting as the recruiters themselves, and drew (even as they may draw to-day) thumping bonuses from the planters sub rosa. In those days the Hawaiian niggercatching fleet of Spreckels cruised right away south to palm-clad Arorai, in the Line Islands, and ran the Queensland ships close in the business. They came down from Honolulu in ballast-trim, save for the liquor and fire-arms, and went back full of a sweating mass of blackhaired, copper-coloured Line Islanders, driven below at dark, to take their chance of being smothered if it came on to blow. Better for them had it so happened, as befel the Tahiti a few months ago, when 400 souls sank on their way to slavery in San Josd de Guatemala. Merry times, indeed, had we then in the trade ‘absolutely above reproach ’ when Queensland rivalled the Hawaiian Islands in the exciting business of nigger-catching, and when Captain William Henry Hayes, of Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.A., vulgarly called ‘ Bully ’ Hayes, came twice a year to Samoa with full cargoes of oil, copra, and niggers, all obtained on the captain’s peculiar time-payment system. A few weeks ago I met an old shipmaster coming out of Sydney Exchance. We fell to talking of bygone days when we were both in * the trade,’ he a pastmaster in the art of black-birding, and I but a callow recruit, or rather recruiter, having plenty of enthusiasm and a consciehce sufficiently elastic for the pecularities of the business ‘absolutely above reproach.’ Presently the old fellow—who, by the way, was a Scotchman and accustomed to speak of the trade as a ‘ verra ineequeetous business,’ said, with a sigh, as he put down his ‘gless’—*Weel, weel, it’s nao use talkin,’ there was wheeps o’ money in it, aud noo that Saum Greefiths has gone on the ither tack (the man hiana’ the guts of a shairk) I’m thinkin’ we’ll have another chanoe o’ grabbln’ niggers wool again, and it’s no so unlikely that “ , o’ the Hopeful ’ 1 (referring to a well-known Australian politician at one time Samuel W. Griffiths’ b6te noir) ‘ willna’ hae the pluck to show his colours, too, and send oot anither Hopeful. D’ye mind, noo, that there was nae sae lucky a mon at it a’ than that deevil’s pup of a Bully Hayes, as ye know weel.’ One hardly ever hears the name of the redoubtable Bully mentioned nowadays; yet it is not so many years ago since his name was a power all over the wide Pacific from Manilla to Yalpasaiso. In those days did a German trading vessel in the islands sight a white-painted brig with yacht-like lines and carrying Cunningham’s patent top sails the Teutonic skipper cracked on all his ship could stagger under and thanked Gott whan he saw the stranger hull down ; for Bully, with his fidus Achates, the almost equally

notorious Captain Ben Peeso, had a penchant for boarding Dutchmen and asking for a look at their chronometers, and in his absent-minded way was taking these latter away with him. And in Sydney, too, many of the pompous pauncheous, grey-head9d, I-am-a-Broken-Hill-shareholder-sir city men will remember the gray, dashing, black whiskored Yankee captain when, in the ‘sixties,’ came to Melbourne in a flash clipper ship and paid also a long visit to Port Jackson, where he spent his money royally, flirting (alas; if he had but stopped at that) with every accessible woman of high or low degree —provided she was fair to look upon —and pliying the devil generally in every known and unknown manner; and who then sailed gaily away to China, neglecting to attend to many little financial matters in connection with the refitting of his ship, and leaving the affections of a number of disconsolate beauties in a very bad state of repair. I knew Bully Hayes well, for I sailed with and was wrecked with him in his famous brig, and, after the conversation just alluded to, the memory of those wild days come 3 strongly upon me. lam not going to risk damnation of soul by spinning a fancifully embroidered tale about things that did not happen, and wrong the memoryof the defunct pirate (whose bones Heat the bottom of the North-west Pacific, unless, indeed, as i 3 most likely, they were long ago digested by the blue sharks), by even alluding to the murders, most foul and unnatural, credited to him by his enemies. Many of these tales are purely missionaries’ babble and slander—the nidus formed in Micronesia, and spread by villainous newspaper reports all over the United States. I will relate what I did see and what did occur. A man’s truo character is always revealed by sudden misfortune. I was with Hayes when, perhaps, the heaviest stroke of ill-luck he ever experienced befell him. In March of ‘74, the lilywhite brig Leonora gagged herself to death on the jagged coral of Strong’s Island, in the Caroline Group, and Bully seemed for the nonce a broken man. But I did not so well know then that beneath that gay, laughing, devil-may- care exterior there lay a whole world of dauntless courago and iron resolution ; that six months after the brig was destroyed he would, by unwearying toil and the wonderful fascination he evercised over his fierce and ruffianly crew, find himself a wealthier man than when be trod his brig’s deck with a full cargo of oil beneath his feet and ten thousand dollars in his cabin.

Let me first of all, though, speak of the Leonora, once the Waterlily, and alias the Luna, the Leonie, and the Racinga. As the Waterlily she was first known, and under that name did her maiden voyage in the opium trade and beat the record. At this time Hayes made his appearance at one of the Treaty Ports in a ship named the Old Dominion. On the way out from New York his crew had mutinied, headed by the steward, a Greek. In the fight that ensued Hayes killed one man outright by a blow of his fist, and threw another with such violence that he died in a fow hours. An inquiry was held, and Hayes came out of it well. The Old Dominion was sold, and Hayes entered the Imperial Chinese service as commander of a gunboat. Another gunboat was commanded by one Ben Peese. The two became friends, and in conjunction with some mandarins of high rank, levied a system of blackmail upon the Chinese coasting junks that brought them (not the junks) in money very rapidly, and Hayes’ daring attack on and capture of a nest of (other) pirates procured for him a good standing with the Chinese authorities. Peese soon got into trouble, however, and when a number of merchants, who had been despoiled, had succeeded in proving that his gunboat was a worse terror to them than the pirates whom he worried, he disappeared for a time. The Waterlily, instead of sailing for Calcutta, was chartered at a big figure by some rich merchants to take a cargo to Rangoon. Shortly after her departure, Hayes resigned and went to Macao. Here he was joined by his colleague, in command of the Waterlily. How Peeso had got possession of her was not known. Hayes told people that his friend had bought her, but those intimate with Peese knew a great deal better. Anyhow, the merchants who chartered her said that Peese had pirated her, landed them somewhere in the straits, taken all their dollars, sold the cargo to the Dutch military authorities, and cleared out.

And then with a new ship, a new crew (many of whom were Hayes’ and Peese’s former Chinese naval pirates), the partners sailed for the Bonin Islands, where Peese was well knowu and had lived before. Two days ere making the Bonins a ship was sighted ashore on a reef. It was a gunboat from Macao with an official on board bound to the Bonin Islands to investigate the murder of a Portuguese captain and mate. A boat was lowered from the Waterlily, and Peese, who spoke Spanish well, learned from the captain that the gunboat, which was then hard and fast, had run ashore in the night and bumped a big hole in herself just amidships. Peese agreed for a thousand dollars to stand by them and save all he could, including her four guns. The guns were rafted to the Waterlilp in the boats belonging to the gunboat. At dusk Hayes went aboard and took the

brig’s Chinese carpenter with him. On examination he said the ship could bo got off again if she could be canted over and a sail put over the hole. This the gunboat captain agreed to try, and signalled for his boats to return from the Waterlily. After working all night the thing was done, and the captain and officers were profuse in their expressions of admiration of Hayes’s skill. As the tide fell the carpenters got to work, and the gunboat was made water-tight. Under Hayes’s direction at flood tide, she was then kedged over the reef into the lagoon, and anchored in smooth water. Peese and Hayes then arrauged to sail in the brig (at next tide), lay her alongside and put the guns and stores aboard again, agreeing to take the captain’s order for TOOdols. and 300dols. in cash. But next morning the brig was nowhere to be seen, and although the captain had his ship, ho was minus his big guns, small arms, stores to the value of 2000 or 3000 dollars, and his passenger, the Corregidor. In attempting to get under weigh he again ran ashore, and remained hard and fast for a week. Meanwhile, Hayes and Peese had gone off on a southerly course to the Pelew Group (the Corregidor was put on board a German barque met on the way), where the cannons were sold to the chiefs, and the two captains gave a great feast, and got rid of nearly all their crow, taking Pelew men and seven Japanese in their places. Here Hayes- and Peese fell out —over a woman, of course. Peese had bought a very beautiful girl from one of the chiefs for 250J015., which ho told Hayes privately, he did not inten Ito pay. Hayes, for reasons of his own, insisted on his either paying the sum agreed on or giving her up. Peese, declaring he would do as he liked, drew his pistol and ordered the girl into tho boat. Hayes tore the weapon from him, and seizing the girl with ono hand, pointed the pistol at Peeae and told him to go on board. Peese was no coward, but he knew his man, and sulkily retired. With all Hayes’ wickedness he was not entirely heartless. He asked the girl to tell him if she was afraid of Peese. She said ‘No!’ and then Bully quietly told her to follow his fellow captain aboard. But Peese never forgave him, and from that day the pair were full of mutual distrust.

After cruising about the Western Carolines for two or three months, and in some mysterious way filling up the brig with a cargo of cocoanut oil, and getting half a ton of hawk-bill turtle shell worth 6dols a pound, the two worthies appeared in Apia Harbour, Samoa. Here they sold the cargo and obtained a commission from the firm of Johann Cm jar Godeffroy and Sons, of Hamburg—a firm that in Polynesia rivalled, in a small way, John Company—to procure for them 200 or 300 Line Island labourers at lOOdols per head. In those days the most respected storekeeper in Apia was a retired mariner—a Captain Turnbull—a stout old man, slow of speech, and profoundly, but not obtrusively, religious. People used to wonder how it was that ‘Misi Pulu,’ the shrewdest business-man in the group, would supply Hayes with a thousand or two thousand dollars’ worth of trade, and merely take his I O U, while refusing to give credit to any other soul. Spoken to on the matter, the gruff old man replied, ‘That’s my business, but I’ll tell you why I trust a man like Hayes and won’t trust anyone here. I know the man, and I’ve told him what none of you would dare to tell him, that I looked upon his course of life with horror. He laughed at me and said with a dreadful oath that if ever he could do me a “good turn” he would. That pleased me, and when ho c mie to me a week afterwards and said that he wanted new canvas and running-gear, but the Dutchmen wouldn’t sell him any on credit, I said I would—and did, and he paid me, and I’ll give him a few thousand dollars credit any day.’ Bully and Peese sailed for the Ellice and Gilbert groups, and soon news reached Sydney that they had been playing havoc with the traders there. With the traders of Captain Eury, and those of Captain Daly, of the brig Lady Alicia, they were very rough, appropriating all their oil and other native produce and giving them sarcastically - written «■ receipts. Hayes stated that this was in retaliation for Daly having visited his stations in soma of the Kingsmills, and having been too friendly with some of the local fair. When the brig returned to Samoa Hayes alone was in command; the voluble, bearded Peese had, he said, sold him his interest in the ship and gone to China again. People talked and said that Hayes had killed him, but as the strength of the big captains’s right arm was well known in Samoa nobody talked too loud. It was on this occasion that Hayes ‘ had ’ the German firm for some thousands of dollars. It seems that in returning through the Kingsmill and Gilbert groups he found a number of the German firm’s traders in terror of their lives, tho natives having warned them to ciear out or be killed. Hayes consented to givo them all passages to Samoa—for a consideration of course, and they agreed on behalf of their firm to pay him eaeh 50dols passagemoney, a reasonable enough sum. Most of them had large quantities of oil and copra—this also was shipped. After the last island had been visited Hayes called them together in the cabin and addressed them: ‘Now, boys, I’ve promised to give you all passages to Samoa, and I will —if you do what I want. Now, you’ve all got money belonging to the German firm. Well, each of you must give me 50dols, and if you take my advice you’ll stick to the remainder. One thing you

all know as well as I do, and that is, that 1 the Dutchmen will take your souls out of thoir cases if you owe them anything. As for the oil and copra I'll see to that. That’s all I’ve got to say, and if any of you won’t agree to this let him come on deck and try and convince me. The traders grinned and consented to take the offer of a passage and the privilege of annexing the firm’s dollars, and each paid his bOdols. When Hayes got to Samoa, Weber, the German manager, interviewed Bully, who detailed the clangers the traders had escaped, and genially said ; ‘ I hardly like to make you pay for your traders’ passages, but as I have such a heavy cargo for you, you won’t object to pay mo a trifle—say 50dols each. They’ve all got money for you as well as oil and copra.’ Weber paid, Hayes giving an acknowledgment. Then Weber sent his cargo-boats to unload the brig. He wa rather surprised when Hayes sent him note :

Brig Leonora, Apia. Dear Sir. You have forgotton that you havo not yet made any arrangements with me about the freight of your oil and copra, . Freight on 200,0001bs copra, at leant per lb, 2000dols; for the oil a lump sum of 500dols ; in all 2500d015. Unless the freight is paid at once, and delivery taken forthwith, l will proceed to New Zealand, and sell to recoup myself, — W. I. Hayes. The Germans nearly went mad, but knowing what Hayes was and fearing to lose everything they paid and took delivery, and Hayes, as ho paid over., told Weber that he would always have a good opinion of him in future for his prompt manner in settling up. Weber gasped, but said nothing. Just about this time the U.S.S. Narrangan3ett stoamed into Apia harbour. It had baen rumoured around .Polynesia for some time previously that certain charges had been made against Bully by American citizens. What the exact nature of these charges were has never been known. Anyhow, the captain of the corvette heard that Hayes was at anchor in Apia, and came down full speed from Pago Pago in Tufuila. Captain Ed. Hamilton (who died only last year) was then pilot, and brought theNarrangansett in. The moment the anchor was down, an armed boat’s crew dashed aboard the Leonora and took possession. The officer in command had a surprise in store for him, when, entering the brig’s cabin, he

saw seated at tho table, not the truculent, piratical ruffian he expected to see, but a quiet, Btout man of herculean proportions, who bowed politely and said, ‘ Welcome on board the Leonora, sir. Have you come to seize my ship and myself l Well, now, don’t apologise, but sit down awhile until ray steward brings you a glass of wine, and then I’ll go and see what all this is about,’ This officer afterwards told Hamiltob that he was so struck with Bully’s cool effrontery and his equally gonial smile that he did sit down and take a drink, and then Hayes accompanied him to the corvette. As the boat ran alongside, the officers and bluejackets not on duty thronged to the sido to see tho famous pirate, who walked calmly to the quarter-deck, and, singling out the captain (Meade, I think, was his name) said : ‘ How do you do, sir. lam happy to see my country’s flag again in these seas ; but wind the hell do you mean , sir, by putting an armed crew on my deck? By God, sir, if you don’t give me good reasons I’ll make you repent it.’ The corvette captain stood quite unmoved, although there was a suppressed titter heard amongst his officers.

‘I pardon you your offensive language, Captain Hayes, as I daresay you feel excited. If you will come below I will show you good authority for my action. I have orders to arrest you and investigate serious charges against you. I trust, however that you will be able to clear yourself.’ The quiet, gentlemanly manner of the naval officer acted like a charm upon Hayes. The fierce glitter in his bright blue eyes died out, ancl bowing to tho corvette captain he turned to the group of officers, and in a bluff sincere manner said : ‘ Gentlemen, I apologise to your captain and to you for my insulting manner. I see that I have acted in an unbecoming way ; but I am a hasty man, yet quick to make amends when I am in the wrong.’

The officers returned his salute, and then Bully went below and listened with an unmoved face to the warrant for his arrest. He was allowed to write a letter to his wife, and given tho liberty of the ship whilst the captain of the Narrangansett was preparing for tho trial. A notication was sent to the three Consuls of his seizure, and asking them to verify the charges made to them by various persons against Hayes. None but the German Consul responded, and his witnesses (traders whose stations had been cleaned out by Hayes) utterly broke down. One look at those steady, steel-blue oyea was enough for them. They knew what was in 3tore for them if any of them crossed Bully’s pith again, and slunk away to their German protectors. After two hours’ investigation, the captain broke up the court, and formally told those present that he would announce his decision in writing. As the German Consul, followed by two German merchant skippers, rose from the table, Hayes asked the captain if he could say a few words. Leave was granted.

‘I merely wish to tell those gentlemen leaving that I hate liars—especially Dutch liars.’

‘ You forget your position, sir,’ said the captain, turning away to hide a smile.

Two hours afterwards the Narrangansetts’s captain wrote a brief note to the Consuls, stating that he wonld not—from the unreliable and contradictory evidence —be justified in taking Hayes to the United States, and added some severe remarks about the skulking and terified manner of the witnesses.

Then Hayes was told he was a free man and straightway the prisoner became the guest, and Bully made a neat little speech. ‘ Gentlemen, I thank you for your kindness ami courtesy to me. You have done me a good service. If I went to the States now and told how I had been seized by a tyrannical American officer, it would make me a rich man. I could run for President. I could get in, too. I could paint you all as a crew of piratical ruffians disgracing the uniform of the greatest country in tha world, and the papers would back me up. They would make mo president of a big bank and would send all of you to serve your country in Alaska—to keep you from getting lynched by an indignant nation. Bub lam just going to be good and generous and remain in obscurity ; and to morrow night I shall fee proud and happy if you will honour me by coming to my house and see the pirate in his lair.’

In the the afternoon Bully ‘dressed ship ’ and gavo his crew liberty. They went into Matafele, the German quarter of Apia, and painted the town vermilion ; the Narrangansett sailors joined in, and, only for some officers being present, the Gorman residents would have had a bad night of it. Hayes’ crew were all drunk, so were the Narrangansett men, and a lot of flash Samoans lent a hand in the proceedings.—Sydney Bulletin.