CHAPTER FOUR

26 June 1721 – Hampton, Virginia

Joseph drove the wagon from the stable to the boarding house as soon as they had finished an early breakfast. Anne waited on the front step with the trunks and valise. In a small canvas bag, she had packed some food and cider for the road. Joseph estimated it would take them a day to get to the plantation.

She wore a loose, shortened gown over her shift and petticoat without stays or corset. Might as well be comfortable, she told herself. Women clothes be damned if I don’t have to.

After the porters helped Joseph lift the trunks onto the wagon, which had already been loaded with some chairs and boxes of household goods, Anne handed him the valise. He stored it behind their seat bench where they could get to it easily. He held out a hand which Anne ignored as she climbed up onto the wagon box on her own. The porter began to smirk but a sharp look from Joseph stopped him. “Good luck to you,” he called out as they drove away.

The terrain was fairly flat even where there was only a trail and not a wagon track to follow. Anne sat silent, looking out at the rivers and streams. Seems to be a lot of water hereabouts, she mused. They drove past many fields of tobacco leaves. Here and there they passed a bit of forest.

“Most of the land’s been cleared for farming,” Joseph told her.

Occasionally they saw a path or road veer off beside a field. With her spyglass, bought in York Town, Anne could sometimes see a house in the distance. Most were one story with deep porches. The two-story houses had second floor porches which were always covered by roof and furnished with chairs.

“People here rich?” she asked.

“No, not really. Some small farms and some bigger ones. The biggest plantations are farther north near Williamsburg.”

“How far is that?” Anne asked, looking at Joseph.

“Another twenty-five or so miles beyond our place.” Joseph glanced at her cautiously, encouraged by her curiosity.

“And how far to that?” she asked, wrinkling her brow.

“About twenty miles from here.” He turned back to the track ahead which had suffered from the early summer rains. The wagon jogged back and forth through the ruts.

“What’s there?” she asked.

“Where?” he replied.

“Our place.” She pronounced “our” as a two syllable word.

“A house. Two stories. Big porch. Parlor and kitchen downstairs. Two bedrooms upstairs. Not much furniture though. Table in the kitchen.” He tossed his head back towards the wagon. “We’re bringing chairs. And a rocker. Got a good deal from a family heading further south.”

Something about the way he said it made Anne look at him sharply. “Good deal, eh?”

“Yes,” he answered, looking sideways at her with a grin twitching around his mouth.

“Took advantage, did you?” The timbre of her voice did not indicate disapproval.

“A good deal,” he insisted, refusing to rise to the bait.

“Father said crops are planted.” She was again looking out at a long, narrow field growing tobacco.

“Yes. We have almost 500 acres. And slaves to work them. Two house slaves, five yard slaves and sixteen for the fields. Came with the property.”

Anne drew in a breath sharply. Joseph looked at her. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I won’t have slaves,” she said coldly. Her auburn hair almost crackled with the force of her feelings and her freckles flared red.

“Oh.” Joseph didn’t know what to say. You can’t run a plantation without slaves, he thought but he waited for Anne to speak.

“I won’t have slaves,” she repeated. Joseph didn’t respond.

After some consideration of how best to proceed, Joseph took a deep breath and asked, “What about servants?”

Anne thought about it. I won’t have slaves. My father has slaves, including my mother in all but name. I’ve seen the slave trade. I’ve worked with escaped slaves. It’s brutal and vile and I won’t have it.

Before she could respond, Joseph turned the horses to the side of the path. “I think it’s time we talked about what we need and what we want,” he said. He climbed off the seat and led the horses to some grass near a chestnut tree. Anne stared at him in surprise, then hopped off the wagon and joined him under the tree.

She looked him straight in the eye and, with a smile, said, “I was a pirate. I sailed with former slaves and saw the slave trade close up and at Father’s plantation. I won’t have slaves and changing what we call them won’t make a difference.”

Joseph looked back at her. “I know you were a pirate. That is why I wasn’t surprised when you lifted the brooch in York Town.” He swept a hand towards the ground under the tree to indicate that they should sit.

Anne sat cross-legged facing him. “My father wanted me to marry a plantation owner. A man who dealt in human beings as property. I refused. Then I met James Bonny, a sailor, and married him. Father didn’t approve and so we ran away. I think part of him was relieved, though. I was difficult.” How stupid I was. But all sixteen-year-olds are, aren’t they?

“Women aren’t usually allowed on pirate vessels, so I pretended to be a man. Men’s clothing is far more comfortable than women’s anyway. I was used to it since my ma dressed me as a boy from a child. Kept people from realizing who I really was – the bastard daughter of a married lawyer.” Her voice trailed off. Joseph sat silent, listening.

“But I was a fast learner and by the time they realized I was a woman, they all liked me and knew I could pull my own weight. When the British offered amnesty, the bastard coward my husband turned informer. I left him, met Jack Rackham in a bar in Nassau. We sailed his ship Revenge for a while until she went aground. Then we took the William and kept on. That’s when we met Mary.”

“Mary Reade?” Joseph asked.

“Yes. She’d been an actual soldier, can you imagine? Her ma dressed her as a boy to fool her dead husband’s mother. Their boy had died and Mary’s father was long gone. It worked, too. Until the granny died. Mary was so much a boy by then that she joined the army. Went to France and fought. Fell in love with an officer.” Anne chuckled. “That caused some dissent in the ranks, I can tell you.”

Joseph nodded.

“Well, when they found out it was worse than two men loving, which is what they’d thought, but actually a woman in their ranks, they threw her out. She made her way back to London then crewed a merchantman headed for Nassau. We met up with her there. She was a looker, too. Jack fell hard.”

Joseph glanced over at his new wife. He didn’t see any kind of jealousy or anger on Anne’s face. I might have felt different, he thought.

“After Revenge wrecked, we took the William. She was a good, fast ten-tonner. A sloop. Had a decent crew or so we thought.” Anne paused, remembering.

“In the end, they failed us. So did Jack. Barnet came after us – British Captain sent by Governor Lawes who was the bastard who sentenced me.” She glanced over at Joseph for the first time. He put a hand on her knee and squeezed it. She looked away again. “Jack was drunk. They were all drunk except me, Mary and one sailor. Sleeping it off. Mary and I saw the ship coming and raised the alarm but the damned men were too far gone to help. We did what we could but they got us.”

She stopped, the memories overwhelming her, a single tear running down her cheek. “Couldn’t hold them off. Barnet took us all. Jack was hanged, disemboweled I’m told. Put in a cage, gibbeted on Deadman’s Cay. Body’s still there. The rest were hanged and left swinging around the harbor as a warning.” Anne’s voice had taken on a hard tone.

“Mary and I pled bellies,” she looked over at Joseph. “I never asked Mary but I suspect that Jack was father to both. She died of a fever in prison before her babe ever appeared. Mine lived. A boy. I got to hold him for a little while then they took him away.” She sniffed and Joseph saw tears rolling down her cheeks and splattering on her shift.

She may be a pirate, but she’s got a woman’s heart.

“Yes,” Joseph responded with a smile. “But you weren’t … hanged.”

“You knew all this and yet, you took me on?” She didn’t look up, her mind still in the prison.

“Indeed, that’s why I took you on, as you say.”

Anne looked up in surprise. “Why?” she asked.

“Your father made me an offer. Take his beautiful, headstrong, dangerous, nay, murderous, auburn-haired daughter off his hands in exchange for money, a plantation and a new life.” Joseph said. “Seemed like a good bargain.”

Anne stared at him. She thought for a moment, then, tilting her head sideways, looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Why would that have been a good bargain, Joseph Burleigh?”

Joseph’s blue eyes twinkled. “I wondered when you’d stop thinking about yourself and ask about the man who married you for money.”

She stared at him. “And why was it then? A bargain?” she asked.

“I had some … difficulties of my own to deal with. In short, I needed to get out of Carolina and I needed money to start over. You were the perfect solution to my problems.”

“Solution?” Anne almost screamed. “What are you, Joseph Burleigh, that I am your solution?”

“‘Was,’ Anne, not ‘am.’ I was a forger, quite a good one, a highwayman, and a swindler.” He said. “Captain Stoutley was recommended by a friend who is a smuggler and a pirate, in fact.”

Anne’s mouth dropped open. “And my father made a bargain with you?”

“Yes. He knew something of my profession. In fact, that’s how we met. One day I waited in some trees not far from your father’s plantation to intercept him. I had heard in the town that he was in the process of buying some land from a neighbor. A Mr. Gunn. Do you remember him?”

Anne shook her head. “I left young. I think I might know the name but that’s all.”

Joseph nodded. “Gunn was a Scotsman who had tried to grow tea. But the crop failed so he decided to move north to Boston and try his hand at something else. He needed money to move so he approached your father whose land adjoined his. They struck a bargain.” He laughed. “Like too many Scots, our Mr. Gunn couldn’t hold his liquor – or his tongue.”

“So I lay in wait. And sure enough, along came your father, on horseback to buy the Gunn property. I waylaid him and demanded the coin I thought he carried. But he refused, stating that he wasn’t carrying coin anyway but credit notes. ‘I would not be so careless as to carry actual coin,’ he told me.

“We faced each other for a few moments while I considered whether credit notes would be useful. I had determined by then that I wished to give up my life of crime. Being a highwayman is tiring, dirty, wearying work. And it was getting around that I was forging and swindling. All probably much less exciting than the open seas and piracy,” he added.

“It has its moments, piracy,” she admitted.

“Then your father winked at me. ‘Perhaps we can help each other,’ he said. ‘I have a daughter in need of a new existence.’ Needless to say, I was taken aback, but he was so genial that I thought I might as well listen to what he had to say. So we rode to a nearby bridge, dismounted, let the horses eat and drink while we talked. When we were done, I had agreed to take his wild pirate daughter off his hands and he had agreed to stake me to land and a new start.” Joseph finished and looked at Anne.

She started to laugh and then couldn’t stop. My father found a land pirate to take his sea pirate daughter off his hands. When she finally regained control, she wiped the tears from her eyes with her kerchief. “Did you have no qualms?” she asked.

Then Joseph laughed. “Of course, I did, my dear. But I had been living a hard, treacherous life among hard men — and women — and I thought I could handle you. Besides,” he added, “once he showed me your miniature, I was in for life. And so, here we are,” he concluded.

“We are a pair, then. A pirate and a forger. Perfect for each other.”

“Perfect, indeed,” Joseph answered her. “Maybe. We need to talk about our new life and what we want it to look like.”

“Agreed. I want the farm to prosper, then children to start,” Anne was staring off into the distance.

“As many as you’re willing to bear,” Joseph responded.

“And I won’t be housekeeper.” Joseph started to protest but Anne put up a hand. “I’ve no calling to it and no skill. If we have people in the house who can run it, they will.”

“As the wife, it’s your ultimate responsibility, Anne. Didn’t you help run the pirate ship?”

“Sometimes. But I won’t do it. I’ll do other things but not that. No keys round my belly. Ever.” She looked at his disturbed face.

“Well, we can see how that goes,” he said.

Anne leaned back against the tree and said, “I have a proposal.” Joseph sat up straight and nodded for her to go on. “We can have servants – house and field – but they have to be paid and taught to read and other skills. They get decent houses and good food.” She paused. Her expression darkened. “And families will never be separated or sold. Ever.”

“Aren’t you afraid they’ll take it into their heads that they don’t need us?” Joseph was aware of the plantation owners’ fears that given leeway, slaves would rebel, run off, murder them or at least refuse to work. He also understood owners’ firm belief that plantations could not be profitable without slave labor.

“No. Give them a decent life and they’ll stay. Why wouldn’t they?” Anne turned and grabbed Joseph’s arm and leaned into him, looking him straight in the eye. “This is not negotiable,” she said.

Joseph looked into the distance, thinking through what she’d said. “You were raised on a plantation. Your father owns slaves. What turned you against it?”

Anne pulled a blade of grass and started chewing on it. “The children,” she replied.

Joseph looked at her quizzically. “What children?”

“All of them. My father sired several then sold them off. Plus in the West Indies, I saw slaves beaten, raped, killed. Sold. Mothers hysterical. Fathers held back by chains.” She gulped and took a long, deep breath.

“My mother was a servant,” Anne continued. “She had no rights and even when we came to Carolina, my father saw her as a servant. But she was lucky, she got to pretend she was more. Lady of the house. But she had no more choice about her life – or mine – than the slave mothers did.”

Joseph reached out and touched her arm.

“I fought back. And then I ran. Far away as I could from him, from the slaves, from the children who couldn’t run.” She looked down again. “I never really escaped them, though. Men escaped from slavery – whether black Africans or red Indians – help crew most pirate ships. And the islands are also worked by slaves. Which is the other reason I am against it. I know those people. They were friends and colleagues.”

“All right. We’ll have servants, not slaves,” he said. “But this arrangement cannot get out. It would draw attention to us. The neighbors would view us with suspicion, at a minimum. It’s not safe.”

Anne nodded. “Then we will tell the servants that if they wish to enjoy the benefits of life on our plantation, they must agree never to discuss how they live.” She put a hand on Joseph’s cheek. “Thank you,” she said. Then she stood up. “Let us to our new life. And God help us both.”

“And the servants,” Joseph added.

Later, when the sun shone high overhead, they stopped by a stream to rest and water the horses and to eat their picnic dinner under a cluster of cypress trees. The needles that carpeted the ground made for comfortable seating.

“There are the two house sl…” Joseph caught himself. “Servants. One’s a cook and one cleans and sews. All you have to do is tell them what to cook and clean or whatever needs doing.”

“Don’t they know?” she asked.

“Generally, yes. But they’ll look to you for leadership.”

“Well they aren’t going to get it. But I’m sure they can manage. If there’s a conflict, I’ll hear it. Otherwise, I’m happy to let them go at it. And if there’s anything you want to eat or drink, tell whoever the housekeeper is.” Anne downed a gulp of cider.

“My dear wife, if it helps, please remember that I don’t know anything about running a plantation either,” Joseph said, shooting a sideways glance at Anne. “But I have confidence.”

“Possibly misplaced,” Anne muttered. Joseph looked at her and stifled a laugh.

“Absolutely misplaced, Wife, but there nonetheless. I suggest you grab some for yourself.” Joseph kissed her on the cheek, stood up and gathered the horses and wagon.

It was late afternoon when they came to a big stand of willow oak trees planted in an “L” shape on their right side. A lane lined with more of the tall trees led off from the right side of the wagon towards the northeast.

“The house is down there,” Joseph said pointing at the wagon track. “Welcome home.”

“Can’t see anything but plants and trees,” Anne said, leaning out of the wagon.

“House is a mile away. That’s our tobacco there, on both sides.” Anne heard the pride in Joseph’s voice, which she could yet not share.

“Then let’s get there. I’m hungry and jolted enough for one day, in fact for a lot of days,” she grumbled. Joseph cracked the reins and turned the horses into the roadway.