William Dampier

This article is about the explorer. For the scientist, see William Cecil Dampier.

William Dampier
William Dampier: buccaneer, navigator and explorer
Born	baptised 5 September 1651 East Coker, Somerset, England
Died	early 1715 (aged 63) unknown
Nationality	British
Occupation	Explorer
Known for	Exploring and mapping Australia, Circumnavigation

William Dampier (baptised 5 September 1651 – early 1715) was the first man of English descent to explore sections of New Holland (Australia) and also the first person to circumnavigate the world three times. Dampier has been described as the first natural historian of Australia and the greatest explorer-adventurer between Sir Walter Raleigh and James Cook.

After impressing the Admiralty with his book A New Voyage Round the World, Dampier was given command of a 26-gun ship and made valuable discoveries in Western New Holland, but was court-martialled for cruelty.

On a later voyage, he was able to rescue Alexander Selkirk, who was Daniel Defoe's inspiration for Robinson Crusoe. Others influenced by Dampier include James Cook, Lord Nelson and Charles Darwin.

Early life

William Dampier was born in East Coker, Somerset in 1651. He was baptised on 5 September, but his precise date of birth is not recorded. He was educated at King's School, Bruton. Dampier sailed on two merchant voyages to Newfoundland and Java before joining the Royal Navy in 1673, taking part in the two battles of Schooneveld in June of that year. His service was cut short by a catastrophic illness, and he returned to England for several months of recuperation. For the next several years he tried his hand at various careers, including plantation managing in Jamaica and logging in Mexico, before he joined another sailing expedition.

First circumnavigation

Map from "A New Voyage Round the World", published in 1697 by William Dampier, the English sea captain, naturalist, and occasional buccaneer. The Miskito coast is marked with a star. Dampier and his associate, the surgeon and buccaneer Lionel Wafer describe the Miskito peoples in the period 1690–1700. These tribal groups, often mixed with runaway slaves, formed a distinct culture in the coastal region, sometimes forming alliances with pirates against Spanish authorities in the 16th–18th centuries.

In 1679 Dampier crewed with buccaneer Captain Bartholomew Sharp on the Spanish Main of Central America, twice visiting the Bay of Campeche or "Campeachy" as it was then known (see map opposite) on the north coast of Mexico. This led to his first circumnavigation during which he accompanied a raid across the Isthmus of Darién in Panama and captured Spanish ships on the Pacific coast of that isthmus. The pirates then raided Spanish settlements in Peru before returning to the Caribbean.

Dampier made his way to Virginia, where in 1683 he was engaged by the privateer John Cooke. Cooke entered the Pacific via Cape Horn and spent a year raiding Spanish possessions in Peru, the Galápagos Islands, and Mexico. This expedition collected buccaneers and ships as it went along, at one time having a fleet of ten vessels. Cooke died in Mexico, and a new leader, Edward Davis, was elected captain by the crew.

A map of the East Indies from Dampier's A New Voyage Round the World, published in 1697

Dampier transferred to Captain Charles Swan's ship, the privateer Cygnet, and on 31 March 1686 they set out across the Pacific to raid the East Indies, calling at Guam and Mindanao. Leaving Swan and 36 others behind on Mindanao, the rest of the privateers sailed to Manila, Poulo Condor, China, the Spice Islands, and New Holland (Australia). Contrary to Dampier's later claim that he had not actively participated in actual piratical attacks during this voyage, he was in fact selected in 1687 to command one of the Spanish ships captured by the Cygnet's crew off Manila.

On 5 January 1688 Cygnet was beached on the northwest coast of Australia, near King Sound. While the ship was being careened Dampier made notes on the fauna and flora and the indigenous peoples he found there. Later that year, by agreement, he and two shipmates were marooned on one of the Nicobar Islands. They obtained a small canoe which they modified after first capsizing and then, after surviving a great storm at sea, called at "Acheen" (Aceh) in Sumatra.

After further adventures, Dampier returned to England in 1691 via the Cape of Good Hope, penniless but in possession of his journals. He also had as a source of income the famous painted (tattoed) Prince Jeoly and his mother, whom he had purchased as slaves and subsequently exhibited in London, thereby also coming to be better known while his book was being printed.

The Roebuck expedition

See also: HMS Roebuck (1690)

Map of the area charted in HMS Roebuck in 1699

The publication of these diaries as New Voyage Round the World in 1697 was a popular sensation creating interest at the British Admiralty and in 1699 Dampier was given the command of the Roebuck with a commission from the Admiralty (and by inference King William III who had reigned jointly with Queen Mary II before her death in 1694). His mission was to explore the east coast of New Holland, the name given by the Dutch to what is now Australia, and Dampier's intention was to travel there via Cape Horn.

The expedition set out on 14 January 1699, far too late in the season to round the Horn and it approached New Holland via the Cape of Good Hope. Following the Dutch routes to the Indies, on 26 July 1699, Dampier reached Dirk Hartog Island at the mouth of what he called Shark Bay in Western Australia. He landed and began producing the first known detailed record of Australian flora and fauna. The images are believed to be by his clerk James Brand. Dampier then followed the coast northeast, reaching the Dampier Archipelago and then Lagrange Bay, just south of what is now called Roebuck Bay all the while recording and collecting specimens, including many shells. From there he bore away north for Timor. Then he sailed east and on 3 December 1699 rounded New Guinea, which he passed to the north. Sailing east, he traced the southeastern coasts of New Hanover, New Ireland and New Britain, charting the Dampier Strait between these islands (now the Bismarck Archipelago) and New Guinea. En route he paused to collect specimens with one stop resulting in a collection of many giant clams.

His ship was rotten and its carpenter apparently inept, so Dampier was forced to abandon his plan to examine the east coast of New Holland while less than a hundred miles from it. In danger of sinking he attempted to make the return voyage to England but Roebuck foundered at Ascension Island on 21 February 1701. While anchored offshore the ship had started to take water, and though sent below to effect repair, the carpenter only made it worse. As a result the ship was run ashore. His crew was marooned there for five weeks before being picked up on 3 April by an East Indiaman and returned home in August 1701.

Although many papers were lost with the Roebuck, Dampier was able to save many new charts of coastlines, and his record of trade winds and currents in the seas around Australia and New Guinea. He also saved a few of his specimens. In 2001 Roebuck was located in Clarence Bay, Ascension Island, by a team from the Western Australian Museum. Because of his widespread effect and partly because so little exists that can now be linked to one of the world's greatest mariners and authors, it has been argued that the remains of his ship and the objects still remaining on the site at Ascension Island—while remaining the property of Britain and managed by Ascension Island—are perhaps best viewed as the shared maritime heritage of those parts of the world first visited or described by Dampier.

Dampier published an account of the 1699–1701 expedition, A Voyage to New Holland.

Court martial

On his return from the Roebuck expedition, Dampier was court-martialled for cruelty. On the outward voyage Dampier had his lieutenant, George Fisher, removed from the ship and jailed in Brazil. Fisher returned to England and complained about his treatment to the Admiralty. Dampier wrote an angry vindication of his conduct, but he was found guilty, docked his pay for the voyage, and dismissed from the Royal Navy.

According to records held at the National Archives the Royal Navy Court Martial held on 8 June 1702, involved the following three charges:

1. William Dampier, Captain, HMS Roebuck.

   Crime: Death of John Norwood, boatswain.

   Verdict: Acquitted.

2. William Dampier, Captain, HMS Roebuck.

   Crime: Hard and cruel usage of the lieutenant.

   Verdict: Guilty.

   Sentence: Forfeit all pay due and deemed unfit to command any of HM's ships.

3. George Fisher, Lieutenant, HMS Roebuck

   Crime: Dispute between the captain and the lieutenant.

   Verdict: Acquitted.

Second circumnavigation

The War of the Spanish Succession had broken out in 1701, and English privateers were being readied to act against French and Spanish interests. Dampier was appointed commander of the 26-gun ship St George, with a crew of 120 men. They were joined by the 16-gun Cinque Ports galley with 63 men, and sailed on 11 September 1703 from Kinsale, Ireland. The two ships made a storm-tossed passage round Cape Horn, arriving at the Juan Fernández Islands off the coast of Chile in February 1704. While watering and victualling there, they sighted a heavily armed French merchantman, which they engaged in a seven-hour battle but were beaten off.

Dampier succeeded in capturing a number of small Spanish ships along the coast of Peru, but released them after removing only a fraction of their cargoes because he believed they "would be a hindrance to his greater designs." The greater design he had in mind was a raid on Santa María, a town on the Gulf of Panama rumoured to hold stockpiles of gold from nearby mines. When the force of seamen he led against the town met with unexpectedly strong resistance, however, he withdrew.

In May 1704 the Cinque Ports abandoned the St George and, after putting Alexander Selkirk ashore alone on an island for complaining about its seaworthiness, sank one month later off the coast of what is today Colombia. Some of its crew survived being shipwrecked, but were made prisoners of the Spanish.

It was now left to the St George to make an attempt on the Manila galleon, the original purpose of the expedition. The ship was sighted on 6 December 1704, probably the Nuestra Señora del Rosario. It was caught unprepared and had not run out its guns. But while Dampier and his officers argued over the best way to mount an attack, the galleon got its guns loaded and the battle was joined. The St George soon found itself out-sized by the galleon's 18- and 24-pounders, and, suffering serious damage, Dampier was forced to break off the attack.

The failure to capture the Manila galleon completed the break-up of the expedition. Dampier, with about thirty men, was left in the St George, the rest going on board a captured bark and crossing the Pacific to Amboyna in the Dutch settlements. The undermanned St George had to be abandoned on the coast of Peru. Dampier and his remaining men embarked in a Spanish prize across the Pacific, where they were thrown into prison as pirates by the Dutch but later released. Dampier eventually made his way back to England at the end of 1707.

Third circumnavigation and death

In 1708 Dampier was engaged to serve on the privateer Duke, not as captain but as sailing master. Commanded by Woodes Rogers, this voyage was more successful: Selkirk was rescued on 2 February 1709, and the expedition amassed £17,000 (equivalent to £19.6 million today) in profits. Dampier is believed to have died before he could receive his share. The date, location and circumstances of his death, and his final resting place, are all unknown. His will was proven on 23 March 1715, and it is generally assumed he died earlier that month, but this is not known with any certainty.

Legacy

Dampier influenced several figures better known than him:

• His observations and analysis of natural history helped Charles Darwin's and Alexander von Humboldt's development of their theories.
• He made innovations in navigation technology that were studied by James Cook and Horatio Nelson.
• Daniel Defoe, author of Robinson Crusoe, was inspired by accounts of real-life castaway Alexander Selkirk, a crew-member on Dampier's voyages.
• His reports on breadfruit led to William Bligh's ill-fated voyage in HMS Bounty.
• He is cited over 80 times in the Oxford English Dictionary notably on words such as 'barbecue', 'avocado', 'chopsticks' and 'sub-species'. That is not to say he coined the words, but his use of them in his writings is the first known example in English.
• His travel journals depicting Panama influenced the undertaking of the ill-fated Darien Scheme, leading to the Act of Union of 1707.
• His notes on the fauna and flora of northwestern Australia were studied by naturalist and scientist Joseph Banks, who made further studies during the first voyage with Captain James Cook. This helped lead to the naming of and colonisation of Botany Bay and the founding of modern Australia.
• Jonathan Swift explicitly mentions Dampier in his Gulliver's Travels as a mariner comparable to Lemuel Gulliver.
• He is believed to have influenced the writing of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner".

Honours

The following geographical places/features are named after William Dampier:

• Dampier Archipelago, Western Australia;
• Dampier County, a cadastral division of New South Wales;
• Dampier Land District, a cadastral division of Western Australia;
• Dampier Peninsula, Western Australia;
• Dampier Ridge, part of the submerged continent of Zealandia
• Dampier Seamount, off Saint Helena;
• Dampier Strait (Indonesia);
• Dampier Strait (Papua New Guinea) and;
• the town of Dampier, Western Australia.

Between 1913 and 1922, an electorate of the Australian House of Representatives, the Division of Dampier in Western Australia, was also named after Dampier.

HMS Dampier, a British frigate/survey ship, saw service with the Royal Navy between 1948 and 1968.

In 1966 and 1985, William Dampier was honoured by Australia Post with postage stamps depicting his portrait.

Books

• A New Voyage Round the World, (1697)
• Voyages and Descriptions, (1699)
• A Supplement of the Voyage Round the World
• The Campeachy Voyages
• A Discourse of Winds
• A Voyage to New Holland, (Part 1 1703, Part 2 1709)

Further reading

• Diana and Michael Preston, A Pirate of Exquisite Mind
• Anton Gill, The Devil's Mariner: A Life of William Dampier, Pirate And Explorer, 1651–1715 (1997)
• Riccardo Capoferro, Frontiere del racconto. Letteratura di viaggio e romanzo in Inghilterra, 1690–1750, Meltemi, 2007.
• Woodes Rogers, Cruising Voyage Round the World, 1712.
• Clennell Wilkinson, William Dampier, John Lane at the Bodley Head, 1929.
• Fabio Lopez Lazaro. The Misfortunes of Alonso Ramirez: The True Adventures of a Spanish American with 17th Century Pirates. University of Texas Press, 2011.
• McCarthy, M., 2004, HM Ship Roebuck (1690–1701): Global Maritime Heritage? The International Journal of Nautical Archaeology, 33. (2): 330–337.
• Mitchell, Adrian, Dampier's Monkey: The South Seas Voyages of William Dampier, Wakefield Press, 2010. ISBN 978-1-86254-759-9
• Gerald Norris (editor), Buccaneer Explorer William Dampier's Voyages, ISBN 1-84383-141-4

External links

• "The Pirate Who Collected Plants" at the Ocean Portal of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
• "Ascension Island: Wreck of the Roebuck", the 2001 expedition to find Dampier's ship sponsored by the Western Australian Maritime Museum
• "A Singular Man: William Dampier—Adventurer, Author, Survivor" by Edward E. Leslie (1988) in Desperate Journeys, Abandoned Souls: True Stories of Castaways and Other Survivors (pp. 47–60)
• Works by William Dampier at Project Gutenberg
  • A Voyage to New Holland
  • A Continuation of a Voyage to New Holland
• Works by William Dampier: facsimile scans at Early Canadiana Online, originals held by the National Library of Canada.
  • A new voyage round the world
  • Voyages and descriptions
  • A voyage to New Holland
  • A continuation of a voyage to New-Holland
• Dampier Bibliography from the Human and Cartographic History of the Galápagos Islands
  • A New Voyage Round the World (HTML version)
• J. Bach, 'Dampier, William (1651–1715)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 1, Melbourne University Press, 1966, pp 277–278.
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Dampier, William". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.