G A S P A R I L L A
* * * *
FLORIDA STATE LIBRARY
STORIES OF FLORIDA
Prepared for use in Public Schools
FEDERAL WORKS AGENCY
John M. Carmody, Administrator
WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION
F. C.Harrington, Commissioner
Florence Kerr, Assistant Commissioner
Roy Schroder, State Administrator
Sponsored by
FLORIDA STATE DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION
Compiled by workers of the Writers’ Program of the Work Projects
Administration in the State of Florida
1940
FLORIDA STATE LIBRARY
GASPARILLA
Gasparilla, the Spanish corsair, played a significant part for some forty years in the fortunes of ships whose paths lay through the Spanish Main. He is said to have preyed on vessels in the Atlantic but, with a permanent base on an island located just off the southwest coast of The Florida mainland. The Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico were the principal scenes of his activities. The pirate leader also signed himself Richard Coeur de Leon on occasion.
Jose Gaspar, who was to become Gasparilla and scourge the coast of Florida, was born in 1756, at Barcelona, Spain. His parents were prominent people, loyal to their King. After his early schooling, at 18 years of age, he entered the naval academy. There he became known as a bold leader of his classmates, a young man fond of dress, charming and polished in manner. Gaspar graduated at 22. Upon receiving his papers, he began service as a lieutenant in the Royal Navy of Spain.
At this time, Charles III, called the greatest of the Bourbons, had been on the throne for 19 years. During those years Spain had added greatly to her prestige through many naval victories. She had acquired Minorca, and was warring with England over control of Gibraltar. The country also had made an alliance with the American colonies who at the time were trying to free themselves of British rule.
The first five years of Gaspar’s naval activity were years of prominence and prosperity for Spain. But in 1782, lulled into a false sense of security, Spain was dealt a severe defeat by the British. After a long bitterly fought naval battle, several Spanish ships were forced to put far out to sea to escape either capture or destruction. Among these was the Florida Blanca, the ship upon which Jose Gaspar was serving as lieutenant.
The next year, in a treaty with England, Spain was allowed to keep Minorca, and she also acquired the Floridas. Meanwhile the ships at sea were forced into idleness while awaiting orders. The risk-loving Jose Gaspar and a group of restless young officers, chafing under inactivity, began thinking of the newly-acquired Floridas and the excitement and riches said to await the adventurous there. After many talks among themselves, they formed a committee, with the boldest of the lot, Gaspar, at its head, to appeal to the captain to desert the navy and sail for the New World.
The loyal captain became righteously angry. He declared the act treason, and ordered the young officers severely punished. The punishment rankled deeply, and, led by Gaspar, talk turned to mutiny. Secret councils were held and before many weeks most of the crew had joined with the bold young officers.
In the mutiny which followed, the captain and his few loyal men were murdered. The Florida Blanca then set sail for the Floridas. She carried eight guns, and was well stocked with food and ammunition. With Gaspar were about forty men, all decided on a piratical career. These included a number of well-educated and trained naval graduates, as well as rough and ready enlisted men.
The first land sighted was the Florida east coast. Skirting the shore, the ship followed the long line of the keys stretching from Biscayne Bay to Key West. Then rounding the westernmost Marquosas, the ship proceeded northward past Cape Sablo, Ponce de Leon Bay, Ten Thousand Islands, Cape Romano, and Caxambas to the entrance of Charlotte Harbor.
Protecting this harbor were four small islands, Cayo Costa, Captive, Sanibel, and Gasparilla. Probably because of the similarity of the name of the last island, which appeared as early as 1774 on a map by Bernard Romans, to that of his own, Gaspar changed his name to the more romantic, Gasparilla, and also renamed the Florida Blanca, the Gasparilla. Others of the expedition likewise changed their names, desiring to hide their identity completely.
After a reconnoitering cruise of the region, Gasparilla Island was chosen as headquarters. In a short ceremony dedicating the islands to piracy, Gasparilla gave each man the choice of staying with him, or a being put ashore on the mainland, and allowed to go his way. Every man swore allegiance to Gasparilla as their leader. His friend, Roderigo Lopez, was made first lieutenant.
The crew immediately set to work building shelters. The plan was to build a group of houses of palmetto logs, than add to these as need developed. At first the pirates spent their time looking for the treasures of the corsairs who they believed had preceded them. It is not known, however, if any were found. The region was almost a wilderness. No white man lived near, and it was only occasionally that Indians approached, looking for game.
About three months after settling on the island, the crew set out in search of a first victim. After several days cruising off the north coast of Cuba they sighted a merchantman, engaged in trade between Spain and the West Indies. The trader, taken completely by surprise and with inadequate armament, offered little resistance. Gasparilla gave the crew the choice of joining him as pirates, or death. About a dozen joined the pirates. The captain and the others were shot and thrown overboard. Considerable money and stores of food were found. Within the hold of the ship, Gasparilla spied two frightened girls. These, according to an account in Gasparilla’s own diary, were taken captives but treated courteously. He planned, he said, to offer all women prisoners as wives to his men. He also insisted upon a ceremony and faithfulness to the marriage by both men and women.
Captures of other ships followed, and the camp grew. Gasparilla Island soon had 12 crude but comfortable structures built of palmetto logs, thatched with palms, and strengthened with timbers hewn from the sturdier trees of the mainland. These were built in a semicircle, about two hundred feet apart and facing the Gulf. The houses were chiefly furnished from the captured ships, but rough chairs, tables and beds were also made from available timber.
A wharf was built and here the small boats from the pirate ships stood by, ready for immediate use. On Captiva Island, a building was constructed for men prisoners. Women captives were kept on Gasparilla Island. The men prisoners were forced to labor about the camp, probably in “gangs” with a pirate as boss. Captiva Island was also selected as a burial ground for both pirates and prisoners.
Upon Cayoplean, a little island close to Turtle Bay, was a burial mound of the Indians, on which Gasparilla constructed an observation tower, where a sentinel was stationed to scan the Gulf in the hopes of spying a merchant ship.
As time passed, Gasparilla’s character became more cruel and ferocious. He retained his polished manner, however, and was always a great lover of fanciful clothes. He was something of a Bluebeard, fanatical in his demand for beautiful women. But he was so fickle that when an additional capture was made and a new face appealed to him, one of the older captives paid with her life to make room for the newest favorite.
In 1795 Gasparilla and his men, numbering between sixty-five and seventy, attacked and captured a Spanish bark, making its first voyage with cargo and passengers between Cadiz and Havana. The ship was well-manned and armed, but the pirates made a surprise attack and before the valiant captain could rally his men, the ship was disabled and captured.
The crew was given the usual choice of piracy or death, and both vessels were sailed back to Gasparilla Island. The new vessel was made the master ship, since it was more modern in build and equipment than the other Gasparilla I, and the latter was held in reserve. The captured vessel was renamed the Gasparilla II.
Not long after this, Gasparilla’s first lieutenant, Roderigo, came to him saying he was deeply homesick, and asked to be allowed to take the Gasparilla I, a crow of men, and return home. After much thought Gasparilla gave his consent. Roderigo planned to sail the bark into an English port and from there make his way home. He hoped in this manner to escape detention and arrest as a deserter. He would say he had been saved from the wreck of the Florida Blanca and had been wondering for years in an effort to reach home.
When Roderigo sailed away, it was the last Gasparilla saw of him for more than eight years. Then one day, when the pirates had climbed aboard a captured ship, and the captain and men had been lined up for inspection to be given their choice of a life of piracy or a grave in the sea, Gasparilla saw his old lieutenant standing next in line to the captain. The two friends were overjoyed at seeing each other once more and Roderigo again swore allegiance to his old comrade.
Back in his native town, Roderigo said he explained that the Florida Blanco had never reached the English port, but was wrecked and lost in mid-ocean. Half-drowned, he was picked up in a life-boat and landed at Liverpool. From there he made his way to Spain. The entire populace believed the story and he was given a hero’s welcome. He told them Jose Gaspar had gone down with his ship.
During this recital Roderigo finally confessed to Gasparilla that he had taken with him, Gasparilla’s diary. He had left the manuscript with his wife, Sanibel, but he assured his leader, it would be safe there. Gasparilla had missed his book and had searched for it long and fruitlessly. He was angry with Roderigo, but much too glad to have him back to punish him.
Both Roderigo and Gasparilla were wrong in their assumption that Sanibel would guard her trust. Not long after Roderigo left his native country, his wife began talking of the diary in her care. The city authorities heard of it, and seized the diary, getting from its finely written pages, knowledge of Gasparilla and his career of piracy. The diary ran from 1784, the year following his arrival in Florida, to 1795, when it was stolen by Roderigo. It disclosed that in these eleven years, Gaspar and his men had captured and sunk 36 ships. The notes also revealed that more than forty ships escaped.
Reference was made to a battle with a Britisher, in which there was such a terrific fight that the buccaneers barely got away. In this battle 14 of Gasparilla’s men were killed and 20 wounded. Gasparilla, himself was so severely injured that he was confined to his bed for two months. According to the diary the stolen goods amounted to about 480,000 pesos in gold coinage of several nations, with jewelry, furniture, clothing, equipment, food, rum, and other goods.
Nowhere in the notes did Gasparilla refer to where he had hidden these riches. One entry gives the pirate rendezvous with a community of eight officers—43 able bodied men, 23 wives, 12 manservants, 8 maidservants, 15 probationary prisoners, which included 7 men, 6 women, and 2 small boys.
A romantic story of Gasparilla was related in the diary. It concerned the adventure of Ann Jeffrey, an English girl. Ann had sailed to Louisiana to visit a sister. On the return voyage, the clipper was raided by Gasparilla and the girl was taken captive. According to Gasparilla, he gave her every courtesy while a prisoner on the island and after several months fell deeply in love with her. One day he told her of his love and asked her to marry him. Fearfully, Ann told him that this was impossible because she loved someone else. When Gasparilla pressed her, she confessed that it was Batista, one of Gasparilla’s youngest and bravest pirates, and that, with his consent, they hoped to be married. Gasparilla was astounded that one of his men would dare to desire a woman of his own choice. All that night the buccaneer walked the floor in chagrin and anger, and many believed that the morrow would bring the death of Batista.
The next day Gasparilla ordered an expedition, and insisted that Ann join them. Far out at sea the crew spied a British merchantman. Gasparilla ordered that the ship be taken but that there was to be no killing if it would be avoided. Soon he and a group of his men boarded the vessel. Speaking to the captain, Gasparilla stated he did not stop the ship to rob, nor to take captives, but merely to ask the captain to take on two passengers, a man and a maid. He added that he wished them married as soon as he, Gasparilla, was out of sight of the ship. The captain agreed.
Another story of Gasparilla, garnered from the diary, told of his capture of a full-rigged and well-armed boat. He demanded that the passengers, if any, be brought before him. The only passenger was a handsome, tall man in the uniform of the Spanish Navy, the trusted emissary of his government on a special mission to Mexico. The man proved to be Arturo, friend of Jose Gaspar in their academy days. Gasparilla, hungering for news from home, was delighted. He took Arturo prisoner but quartered him his own house, giving him every courtesy. Arturo frankly told Gasparilla, that although he was still fond of him, he would make every effort to escape, and if he succeeded, would endeavor to have Gasparilla hanged. Despite this, the two men continued good friends, deeply enjoying each other’s company.
One night, Arturo, unable to sleep, saw a mutinous pirate slip into Gasparilla’s quarters, a long knife between his teeth. With a leap, the brave Spanish officer attacked the man as he was about to plunge the knife into Gasparilla’s breast. In the struggle, Arturo received the knife in his own heart before Gasparilla could come to his aid. The diary told of a terrible revenge on the murderer. Gasparilla, deeply mourning his friend, gave him the best funeral possible.
In 1819 the United States, made war upon all piracy along the Gulf of Mexico. Pursuit of this outlawry was so concentrated that many pirate bands dissolved. A few of Gasparilla’s group struck out for themselves, but Gasparilla and the others continued their depredations for two more years.
In September 1821, Gasparilla, captaining a sloop of war, with 14 mounted guns, attacked the ship Orleans, of Philadelphia. She was a large heavily armed vessel bound from New York to the West Indies. The crew of the Orleans, overawed by the ferociousness of the attack made little resistance, and goods to the value of $40,000 were taken. When Gasparilla offered the men the choice of piracy or death, the crew, mostly Spaniard, Portuguese, and Negroes, joined him.
After robbing the ship, Gasparilla wrote a note in French to a United States officer, a passenger aboard:
At sea and in Good Luck.
Sir:
Between buccaneers, no ceremony; I take your dry-goods, and in return, I send you pimento; therefore we are now even. I entertain no resentment.
Bid good day to the officer of the United States and tell him that I appreciate the energy with which he has spoken of me and my companions-in-arms. Nothing can intimidate us; we run the same fortune, and our maxim is that “the goods of this world belong to the strong and valiant.”
The occupation of the Floridas is a pledge that the course I follow is comformable to the policy pursued by the United States.
(Signed) Richard Cocur de Leon.
The next year, however, Gasparilla felt the war against them was too strong to continue. He and his followers decided that they also would live in safety as honest men for the balance of their lives. But in the spring of 1822, when the band started gathering together to divide their riches which were hidden in six different places, Gasparilla sighted what appeared a merchantman just off the coast of Boca Grande. Hurriedly the men held conference. Should they let it pass? The temptation was too great and greedily Gasparilla and his men decided to add one more victim before they gave up their career of piracy.
Closely following the shoreline of the Gulf, the Gasparilla II slipped into Charlotte Harbor, passed through the body of war now known as Little Gasparilla Pass. There was excitement among the crew which was divided into two groups. One group of 35 was under a leader, often reported as being Jean Lafitte, the famed New Orleans pirate. Another group of 35 was led by Gasparilla himself. Ten men had been left to guard the island.
At about four o’clock that afternoon, the buccaneers dashed through Boca Grande pass and sped toward the English ship. They were almost upon it, when the ship lowered the English flag and raised instead the Stars and Strips of the United States. Great guns appeared on the desk and begun firing upon the pirates. Quickly Gasparilla realized he had been tricked. His men were outnumbered and comparatively weak in arms. A shot shattered the bow of his ship. Escape was impossible. A fatalist, Gasparilla wrapped a piece of anchor around his waist and jumped into the sea.
His boat crew, with the exception of the cabin boy, were hanged. The cabin boy, because of his extreme youth, was carried to New Orleans where he was sentenced to 10 years in prison. The 10 men left in charge of the island escaped into the woods, making their way to the mainland before the pursing crew from the United States ship could overtake them.
One escapade of Gasparilla was learned long after his death. Two men taking the census of 1900 stopped off at Panther Key, and spent the night at the cottage of John Gomez, who claimed to be the
brother-in-law of Gasparilla. He was an old man with but little strength left. Nevertheless, all through the night, he held his visitors spellbound with tales of piracy. He told of the capture of ships, the murder of resisting officers, men and women, and last of all he told the story of the little Spanish princess.
In the year 1801, the old man related, a young princess of Spain sailed for Mexico. While she was there she received great acclaim and homage. To show her appreciation, she asked that all of the fairest of Mexico’s maidens be allowed to go back with her, that they might be educated in the social graces of old Spain. A treasure of gold bound in chests of copper accompanied them. About forty miles off the coast of Boca Grande, Gasparilla and his blood-thirsty crew overtook their ship. After a hand-to-hand fight, the crew of the merchantman were killed, the gold commandeered, and the princess with the all Mexican girls taken captive.
Gasparilla kept the princess, the Mexican girls were divided among his men. But it was necessary to Gasparilla’s ego that the woman he chose should also desire him. The princess spurned the attentions of the pirate chief and he, angered, swore that if she did not return his affections of her own free will she would be beheaded.
Gomez, that same night, drew a map, giving the burial place of the Spanish girl, and the two men, investigating the story, found the grave where Gomez indicated, and in it the skeleton of a beheaded woman.
