Thomas Penniston (
fl.
''Floruit'' (; abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for "they flourished") denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indicatin ...
1704-1706) was a
privateer who operated out of
New England. He was known for sailing alongside
Adrian Claver
Adrian Claver (fl. 1704–1705, last name occasionally Clavar) was a Dutch privateer based out of New England. He sailed alongside other prominent privateers such as John Halsey, Regnier Tongrelow, and Thomas Penniston.
History
Claver captaine ...
and
Regnier Tongrelow.
History
The first records of Penniston’s privateering are from July 1704 when French privateer
Captain Davy captured ships off the
Capes of Delaware. Adrian Claver in his ship ''Castel del Rey'' was sent to catch Davy but failed; upon his return, Claver set out again after Davy, this time with Penniston alongside in the
sloop
A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular sa ...
''Setty''. They returned in August, still unsuccessful, and Davy moved on to menace ships off
Tarpaulin Cove
Tarpaulin Cove is a bay in Dukes County, Massachusetts. It is located on Naushon Island east of Kettle Cove and northeast of Robinson's Hole
Robinson's Hole is the strait in Massachusetts' Elizabeth Islands separating Naushon Island from Pas ...
. Claver and Penniston sailed together again in early 1705, this time against the Spanish, cruising off
Venezuela before returning in August with a Spanish
prize ship taken near
Havana.
Penniston was in port the following month to sell off a captured prize ship of his own full of wine and brandy. While ashore, his sailors met up with the crew of fellow privateer
Captain Gincks
Captain Gincks (floruit, fl. 1705–1706) was a privateer based in New York City, New York. He is best known for sailing alongside Adrian Claver, and for a violent incident involving his sailors while ashore.
History
Gincks's 130-man brigantine ...
’ ship ''Dragon'' and began a drunken riot. They beat several men, harassed the local sheriff, and killed a Lieutenant who happened into the fracas. Soldiers from the local
Royal Navy ship arrived to quell the riot and arrest the perpetrators; the Lieutenant’s killer was tried and hung.
Claver’s ''Castel del Rey'' was now under the command of
Otto Van Tuyl
Van Tuyl is the surname of the Dutch family from which many North American Van Tuyls, Van Tuyles, Van Tyls and Van Tyles are descended. The family name derives from the ancient village of Tuil (Tuijl), in the central Netherlands. The family's earli ...
. Penniston’s ''Setty'' and Regnier Tongrelow’s ''New York Galley'' along with Van Tuyl and their
tender (captained by
Nat Burches) left for the
West Indies in December 1705, though Van Tuyl was killed when his ship was wrecked leaving New York harbor.
The others used
Barbados and
Bermuda as bases to raid the
Caribbean
The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...
. Penniston sent back a series of captured prize ships before he and Tongrelow combined to take several vessels from a French convoy near
Petit-Goave.
Tongrelow searched for a large Spanish vessel which Burches had forced ashore, and shortly afterward Penniston engaged a group of French vessels. He was known for fearlessly attacking groups of targets,
and engaged an 18-gun vessel and a 24-gun vessel simultaneously.
After the ''Setty'' was badly mauled, with several sailors killed and Penniston having lost an arm, they were forced to retreat.
Penniston tried to make it to port in
Jamaica but the heavily damaged ''Setty'' sank en route and was lost with all hands.
It was over 10 years later in 1717 that his heirs were finally granted “the quantity of fifty ounces of
Plate aforesaid, for Sloop hire and Service done by Capt. Penniston in an Expedition against some ffrench Privateers.”
See also
*
War of Spanish Succession – the European conflict which spilled into the Americas as “Queen Anne’s War,” occasioning a rise in privateering commissions.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Penniston, Thomas
Year of birth missing
1706 deaths
British privateers