Reconciling the Impossible: the Historical Facts and the Misfortunes of Alonso Ramirez

Title page of Infortunios de A. Ramirez (1690)
Copyright © Hispanic Society of America

I hope that those who usually follow my work in French will forgive me, but the subject of this blog post, as well as the study it introduces, really requires the use of the lingua franca of our time...

Long considered a pure fiction, the Infortunios de Alonso Ramírez, a small work published in Mexico in 1690, chronicles the misfortunes of a Spaniard who was held captive by a gang of English pirates traveling in the Asiatic seas for about two years. Over the past twenty years, this work has been the subject of several studies, which tend to demonstrate that it is a partially true story. Accordingly, some scholars posited that its author was a prisoner aboard the Cygnet, a ship on which the famous William Dampier served, as well as in the same capacity aboard a second pirate ship called The Good Hope. However, Ramírez's account is replete with so many half-truths and lies that it is difficult, if not almost impossible, to arrive at any certainty, and this reduces its historical importance. But reading the scholars who have examined the Infortunios so far, one could believe the opposite and consider it a valuable testimony for the study of 17th-century piracy. In fact, this erroneous perception comes directly from their failure to paint a relatively complete and fair picture of the adventures of the historical pirates they assimilated to those of Ramírez's account, an essential point in order to draw reasonable hypotheses about his Infortunios. This text will attempt to fill that gap. The exercise will be done not only using the unavoidable narratives of Dampier and documents from the Archivo General de Indias relating to the Philippines, but above all using other ones coming mainly from the archives of the defunct Dutch East India Company, which were not very accessible or little used until now. In doing so, new (and better) foundations will be laid for the future study of the historicity of Ramírez's "Misfortunes", which will be, in any case, particularly difficult. It will also be an opportunity, in the light of the same sources, to reassess the voyage of the Cygnet in Asia, as well as the less known one of Captain John Eaton's company, to which some of the pirates of the Good Hope had belonged.

You can access this study here:

• Roving in Troubled Waters: The Fairy Tale of Alonso Ramirez as an Alternative Narrative to Dampier's New Voyage?

Be aware that this is my own translation of the original text that I first wrote in French. One of my acquaintances was kind enough to review it, pointing out the most important mistakes. The result is certainly not perfect, and further editing would have been required. I therefore pray the reader to be indulgent. However, any suggestions for enhancing or correcting this paper will be greatly appreciated. And as always, any comments or questions regarding the contents are welcome. Good reading and... discoveries!

Nouvelles perspectives pour l'étude d'Exquemelin

C'était, à la fin d'un autre siècle, à une époque où je lisais beaucoup, une époque où le mot « internet » ne faisait pas encore partie de la langue commune. Ma bourse ne me permettait que rarement d'acheter des livres neufs. Je fréquentais donc les bouquinistes de la ville de Québec, un samedi, un dimanche, ici et là. C'est à l'une de ces occasions que je mis la main sur un ouvrage dont le titre attira aussitôt mon attention, Histoire des Frères de la côte. J'en feuilletai quelques pages, y lisant en diagonale les aventures de pirates français et anglais des Antilles. Ce fut mon premier contact avec « Alexandre Olivier Exmelin », car telle était la forme sous laquelle figurait le nom de l'auteur dans cette édition de poche, « moderne » et largement tronquée, de son fameux Histoire des avanturiers flibustiers qui se sont signalez dans les Indes. J'ai encore le livre dans ma bibliothèque [image de couverture ci-contre]. Je ne l'ai pas lu depuis fort longtemps, lui préférant maintenant les éditions originales et complètes du XVIIe siècle que l'on peut trouver facilement sur... internet. C'est devenu un souvenir, une sorte de curiosité.

C'est pourtant grâce à cet ouvrage, à son auteur, Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin, de son nom exact, que je dois ma passion pour les flibustiers et leur histoire. Certes, il a été détrôné par William Dampier comme mon chroniqueur favori... question de goût, sans doute. Pourtant tout comme l'oeuvre de Dampier, celle d'Exquemelin, malgré certains défauts, demeure un témoignage incontournable pour qui étudie l'histoire des flibustiers, bien qu'elle soit, elle aussi, plus que cela, puisqu'elle contient des renseignements intéressant les sciences naturelles, la géographie et l'ethnographie de l'Amérique du XVIIe siècle. Mais le Français m'a toujours paru trop insaisissable. Il disait peu de choses de lui-même, et au fil de mes travaux, je m'aperçus que plusieurs éléments biographiques concernant l'auteur se trouvant, entre autres, dans la préface de ma version moderne tronquée de son oeuvre ne collaient tout simplement pas : je sais maintenant que ces éléments biographiques sont quasiment tous faux.

En effet, depuis plus de trois siècles, bien des absurdités et des faussetés ont été écrites à la fois sur l'auteur et sur son oeuvre. Il y a quelques années, feu Jacques Gasser et moi, un peu en parallèle, avions commencé à lever le voile sur l'auteur. Nous avions même l'intention d'écrire ensemble un texte sur ces découvertes. Mais comme je ne peux me satisfaire de peu en matière de flibustiers, je me suis mis à analyser les diverses versions et traductions originales de l'oeuvre d'Exquemelin, car là aussi il y avait des indices sur la vie de l'homme, ou du moins des éléments permettant de mieux le comprendre. Or, en octobre 2020, le décès de Jacques a mis un terme à ce projet. Il faut dire qu'il jugeait ma version préliminaire du texte beaucoup trop long!

L'an passé, j'ai finalement proposé mon étude à la revue HISTOIRE(S) de l'Amérique latine (HISAL), qui avait déjà publié mon article sur Étienne Massertie. La voici donc, cette étude sur Exquemelin dans le volume 16 de HISAL. Je l'ai faite à la lumière de renseignements inédits, qui montre notamment qu'il était polyglotte et catholique, qu'il fut engagé dans la traite négrière et que, dans les dernières années de sa vie, il résidait à Saint-Malo. En parallèle, j'ai ré-analysé les premières éditions de son oeuvre. Le texte qui en résulte ne prétend pas donner une biographie complète de l'homme, pas plus qu'il ne constitue une étude exhaustive de ses écrits. Son objectif, plus modeste, est de proposer un nouveau canevas pour tous ceux qui étudieront Exquemelin à l'avenir:

• Nouvelles perspectives pour l'étude d'Exquemelin

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Exquemelin, a reassessment

It was, at the end of another century, a time when I read a lot, a time when the word "internet" was not yet part of the common language. My purse rarely allowed me to buy new books. So I used to visit second-hand book sellers in Quebec City, on a Saturday, a Sunday, here and there. It was on one of these occasions that I got the hand on a book whose title immediately caught my attention, Histoire des Frères de la côte. I leafed through a few pages, reading snippets of the amazing adventures of French and English pirates in the West Indies in the 17th Century. This was my first contact with "Alexandre Olivier Exmelin", for such was the form of the author's name in this "modern" and largely truncated pocket edition of his famous Histoire des avanturiers flibustiers qui se sont signalez dans les Indes, the French incarnation of his work. I still have the book in one of my bookcases. I haven't read it for a very long time, preferring the original and complete editions of the 17th Century, that can be easily found on... the internet. So, it has become a reminder, a kind of curiosity.

However, thanks to this book, to its author, Alexandre Olivier Exquemelin (that is his right name), I owe my passion for the buccaneers and their history. Admittedly, he was dethroned by William Dampier as my favorite chronicler... question of taste, no doubt. However, just like Dampier's work, that of Exquemelin, despite certain (and many) faults, remains an essential testimony for whoever studies the history of the buccaneers, although it is more than that, since it contains information interesting in the natural sciences, geography, and ethnography of seventeenth-century America. But the Frenchman has always seemed too elusive to me. He said very little about himself, and in the course of my own studies, I realized that much of the biographical sketch about the author (that I could read in the preface of my truncated modern version of his work) simply did not fit the facts... in the same way as the Wikipedia entries about him. I now know that this biographical sketch is almost all false.

Indeed, for more than three centuries, many absurdities and falsehoods have been written about both the author and his work. A few years ago, the late Jacques Gasser and I, somewhat in parallel, began to lift the veil on the author. We even intended to write together a text on these discoveries. But as I cannot be satisfied with little in terms of buccaneers, I began to analyze the various versions and original translations of the work of Exquemelin, because there too there were clues to the life of the man, or at least some elements for its better understanding. However, in October 2020, the death of Jacques put an end to this project. It must be said that he considered my preliminary version of our intended common text much too long!

Last year, I finally submitted my study to the journal HISTORY(S) of Latin America (HISAL), which had already published my article on Étienne Massertie. So here is my study on Exquemelin in HISAL, vol. 16. Using unpublished information, I shed a new light on the man, showing in particular that he was polyglot and Catholic, that he was later engaged in the slave trade and that, in the last years of his life, he resided in Saint-Malo. In parallel, I re-analyzed the first editions of his work. The resulting text does not claim to give a complete biography of the man, nor does it constitute an exhaustive study of his writings. Its more modest goal is to provide a new framework for all those who will study Exquemelin in the future. Good reading.... in French (!):

• Nouvelles perspectives pour l'étude d'Exquemelin