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New York Morning Herald, August 24, 1839
A Suspicious Sail--a pirate.
A vessel was discovered off our coast on Wednesday under very mysterious circumstances.
The pilot boat Laffayette, about ten o'clock on the morning of that day, while off
the Woodlands, about twenty-five miles from this city, fell in with a Baltimore built
schooner, painted black with a green bottom, and with the appearance of having been
at sea about three months. She had two long topmasts, and on her stern were two gilt
stars. The pilot boat Blossom was in company with her.
On approaching the vessel a number of negroes, twenty five or thirty, were seen on
deck. Some were almost or quite naked; some were wrapped in blankets, and one had
on a white coat. The Blossom had previously attached a tow line to the schooner,
but slipped it on perceiving an intention on the part of the blacks to haul up the
boat to their vessel. The strange crew on board were armed with muskets and cutlasses.
One of them had a belt of dollars round his waist; another called the captain, had
a gold watch. They could speak no English, but appeared to talk in the negro language.
The schooner of which they were in possession, appeared to the commander of the pilot
boat Lafayette and to the others who examined her, to be a slave ship. It was supposed
that the prisoners had risen upon the captain and his assistants and captured her.
Long grass was growing upon her bottom, and her sails were much torn, as if she had
been driving about at the mercy of the gale, with her sails set and no one at the
helm.
When the blossom first fell in with the vessel it supplied her with a bag of bread
and a keg of water. One of the Blossom's men was on board for some time and reports
that the blacks were all furnished with knives. Two of them got into the yawl of
the pilot boat and there was great difficulty in making them get out again. The schooner
had no small boat. On leaving her she stood to the eastward, and at sunset Wednesday
evening, she was seen still standing in the same direction.
The United States steam frigate, Fulton, Captain Perry, schooner Wave, Lieut. Com.
Howard, and revenue cutter, Jackson, Capt. Bieker, were dispatched yesterday in pursuit
of his supposed pirate, Slaver or Flying Dutchman. The probability is, that the suspicious
vessel is no more nor less than the Spanish slaver which was recently run away with
from Havana. The poor half-starved black wretches who are in her will undoubtedly
be thankful when they are captured, for they know nothing of navigation, and have
no food, according to the report of the pilots. It may be, however, that she is some
slaver which has been captured by the slaves, and they are now drifting about bound
for no particular port.
