53 Facts About Woodes Rogers

Woodes Rogers was an English sea captain, privateer, slave trader and, from 1718, the first Royal Governor of the Bahamas.

Woodes Rogers is known as the captain of the vessel that rescued marooned Alexander Selkirk, whose plight is generally believed to have inspired Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe.

Woodes Rogers's father held shares in many ships, but he died when Rogers was in his mid-twenties, leaving Rogers in control of the family shipping business.

In 1707, Woodes Rogers was approached by Captain William Dampier, who sought support for a privateering voyage against the Spanish, with whom the British were at war.

Woodes Rogers led the expedition, which consisted of two well-armed ships, Duke and Duchess, and was the captain of Duke.

On his return, he was successfully sued by his crew on the grounds that they had not received their fair share of the expedition profits, and Woodes Rogers was forced into bankruptcy.

Woodes Rogers wrote of his maritime experiences in the book A Cruising Voyage Round the World, which sold well, in part due to public fascination at Selkirk's rescue.

Woodes Rogers was twice appointed Governor of the Bahamas, where he succeeded in warding off threats from the Spanish, and in ridding the colony of pirates.

Woodes Rogers was the eldest son and heir of Woods Rogers, a successful merchant captain.

Woodes Rogers spent part of his childhood in Poole, England, where he likely attended the local school; his father, who owned shares in many ships, was often away nine months of the year with the Newfoundland fishing fleet.

Sometime between 1690 and 1696, Captain Woodes Rogers moved his family to Bristol.

At 18, Woodes Rogers was somewhat old to be starting a seven-year apprenticeship.

Little suggests that it is likely that Woodes Rogers gained his maritime experience with Yeamans' ship on the Newfoundland fleet.

Woodes Rogers became a freeman of Bristol because of his marriage into the prominent Whetstone family.

In 1706, Captain Rogers died at sea, leaving his ships and business to his son Woodes.

At least four vessels in which Woodes Rogers had an ownership interest were granted the letters.

One, Whetstone Galley, named for Woodes Rogers' father-in-law, received the letters before being sent to Africa to begin a voyage in the slave trade.

Woodes Rogers suffered other losses against the French, although he does not record their extent in his book.

Woodes Rogers turned to privateering as a means of recouping these losses.

In late 1707, Woodes Rogers was approached by William Dampier, a navigator and friend of Woodes Rogers' father, who proposed a privateering expedition against the Spanish.

Some crew mutinied after Woodes Rogers refused to let them plunder a neutral Swedish vessel.

Woodes Rogers stocked his ships with limes to fend off scurvy, a practice not universally accepted at that time.

The next morning Woodes Rogers sent a party ashore and discovered that the fire was from Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk, who had been stranded there four years previously.

When Woodes Rogers attempted to negotiate with the governor, the townsfolk secreted their valuables.

Woodes Rogers was able to get a modest ransom for the town, but some crew members were so dissatisfied that they dug up the recently dead hoping to find items of value.

Woodes Rogers's ship beset by storms, Hatley shot an albatross in the hope of better winds, an episode memorialised by Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Woodes Rogers sustained a wound to the face in the battle.

The ships then went to the Dutch port of Batavia in what is Indonesia, where Woodes Rogers underwent surgery to remove a musket ball from the roof of his mouth, and the expedition disposed of the less seaworthy of the two Spanish prizes.

Woodes Rogers was the first Englishman, in circumnavigating the globe, to have his original ships and most of his crew survive.

Woodes Rogers' book was much more successful, with many readers fascinated by the account of Selkirk's rescue, which Cooke had slighted.

Much of Woodes Rogers' introduction is devoted to advocacy for the South Seas trade.

Woodes Rogers describes the area of the River Plate in detail because it lay "within the limits of the South Sea Company", whose schemes had not yet burst into financial scandal.

Woodes Rogers' book was carried by such South Pacific navigators as Admiral George Anson and privateering captains John Clipperton and George Shelvocke.

Sir William Whetstone had died, and Woodes Rogers, having failed to recoup his business losses through privateering, was forced to sell his Bristol home to support his family.

Woodes Rogers was successfully sued by a group of over 200 of his crew, who stated that they had not received their fair share of the expedition profits.

Woodes Rogers decided the way out of his financial difficulty was to lead another expedition, this time against pirates.

In 1713, Woodes Rogers led what was ostensibly an expedition to purchase slaves in Madagascar and take them to the Dutch East Indies, this time with the permission of the British East India Company.

Woodes Rogers collected information regarding pirates and their vessels near the island.

Accordingly, Woodes Rogers turned his sights from Madagascar to the West Indies.

Woodes Rogers's connections included several of the advisers to the new king, George I, who had succeeded Queen Anne in 1714, and Rogers was able to forge an agreement for a company to manage the Bahamas, which were infested with pirates, in exchange for a share of the colony's profits.

Until Woodes Rogers obtained his commission, the islands had been nominally governed by absentee Lords Proprietor, who did little except appoint a new, powerless governor when the position fell vacant.

Woodes Rogers did not leave immediately for his new bailiwick, but spent several months preparing the expedition, which included seven ships, 100 soldiers, 130 colonists, and supplies ranging from food for the expedition members and ships' crews to religious pamphlets to give to the pirates, whom Rogers believed would respond to spiritual teachings.

Woodes Rogers organised a government, granted the King's Pardon to those former pirates on the island who had not yet accepted it, and started to rebuild the island's fortifications, which had fallen into decrepitude under pirate domination.

Less than a month into his residence on New Providence, Woodes Rogers was faced with a double threat: Vane wrote, threatening to join with Edward Teach to retake the island, and Woodes Rogers learned that the Spanish planned to drive the British out of the Bahamas.

Some pardoned pirates on New Providence took boats to join Vane, and Woodes Rogers decided to send two ex-pirate captains, Benjamin Hornigold and John Cockram, with a crew to gather intelligence, and, if possible, to bring Vane to battle.

Woodes Rogers returned with ten prisoners, including captain John Auger, and three corpses.

Nine were convicted, and Woodes Rogers had eight hanged three days later, reprieving the ninth on hearing he was of good family.

Woodes Rogers redoubled his efforts to repair the island's fortifications, buying vital supplies on credit in the hope of later being reimbursed by the expedition's investors.

Woodes Rogers's health suffered, and he spent six weeks in Charleston, South Carolina, hoping to recuperate.

Woodes Rogers arrived three months later to find that a new governor had been appointed, and his company had been liquidated.

In 1722 or 1723, Woodes Rogers was approached by a man writing a history of piracy, and supplied him with information.

Still seeking to bolster the island's defences, Woodes Rogers sought imposition of a local tax.

The assembly, which had been instituted in Woodes Rogers' absence, objected, and Woodes Rogers responded by dissolving it.