taken from the Greek substantive Peirates, Praedo Marinus, and therefore a Pirate in a Legal Sense is called a Robber on the High Seas.” But this ostensibly clear definition is, as scholars have argued, rhetorically loaded: “What precisely constitutes piracy, of course, has always been predicated on the observer’s economic and political perspective.”5 State-sanctioned privateers were often viewed as pirates by their victims, for instance. And, as in the Tyral incident, what constitutes “robbery” as opposed to an act of war between sovereign nations is often both legally and morally unclear. As such, the term shifts in use and meaning, often to fit the needs of its users. British leaders in northeastern North America simply paralleled the language of piracy already widespread in the Caribbean and conducted their own campaign of linguistic propaganda to criminalize Indigenous seaborne acts. In 1720, Governor Richard Phillips of Nova Scotia reported that eleven Indians “robbed and plundered [a vessel] in a Barbarous manner,” while seven years later, Massachusetts Governor Dummer received word that the “Indians of Cape Sables...committed divers barbarous acts of hostility on an English vessell.” By emphasizing the “barbarous” qualities of these attacks, British descriptions deploy racialized stereotypes about Indigenous Americans, while undermining the legal, political, and moral reasoning that drives the Wabanaki in the first place. This also relies on a tautology—the attacks are “piracy” because they are uncivilized and barbarous; they are barbarous because they are committed by Wabanaki, who receive the label in part because they attack British ships and disrupt British expansion. Absent here are the motives and goals of the so-called pirates themselves, of course, as Wabanaki efforts to prevent the loss of their traditional lands and maritime practices are pre-determined as illegitimate. By placing Indigenous maritime attacks under an umbrella of uncivilized and unlawful behavior, Britain implicitly—but intentionally—portrayed Dummer’s War in a way that “the looming statelessness of Indian piracy appeared so threatening to the civilized world that Britain hoped it might unite even the bitterest of European rivals.”6 SEA HISTORY 178, SPRING 2022
Individual acts of war were portrayed as less legitimate, and thus more threatening to ostensibly civilized nations. Put differently, if the Wabanaki could outduel Britain on the water, they could easily overpower other burgeoning colonies as well. The term also skewed the narrative surrounding these Indigenous acts, as its usage suggested random or unorganized attacks, rather than operations requiring naval expertise. By calling the Wabanaki “pirates,” English authorities from New England to London engaged in a “war of words,” as historian Matthew Bahar described it, and employed “a tried and tested language of piracy that reduced Wabanki to socially and politically primitive criminals.”7 If the Royal Navy was defeated in a battle with a piratical criminal, it implied that the loss was due to something unfair or underhanded, not because British sailors were out-gunned and out-maneuvered. Wabanaki naval success is thus re-framed as both ill-won and illegitimate. The way the English framed “piracy” during the early eighteenth century to bolster their own crusade has altered contemporary understandings of Indigenous maritime skills and knowledge, as many historical narratives continue to overlook traditional and contemporary Indigenous relationships with the sea as a result. One Step at a Time Because historical scholarship on the Atlantic has traditionally elevated stories of economic exchange and seaborne empires, much of it remains grounded in European and colonial points of view, even when discussing settler-Indigenous relationships in maritime environments. The danger of this, Cohen writes, is that although “the Atlantic lens has been extremely successful at bringing into sharp focus certain processes and social groups, its emphasis on European empire, migration and capitalism has also blurred the presence of Amerindians in the story.”8 Relying too heavily on European understandings of the sea and of maritime history risks fostering an incomplete or inaccurate understanding of past events, and of their continuing relevance to the present. As contemporary debates about land settlements, fishing rights, and shoreline access
suggest, these relations are ongoing and still as fraught with contention and political power dynamics as they have been for the past 400 years. What would it mean to seek out and take seriously the perspectives and histories of Indigenous mariners past and present? How might those perspectives alter understandings of historical patterns and trends? Unpacking English narratives of Dummer’s War during the 1720s is just one step in this larger effort to seek out, listen to, and carefully consider Indigenous perspectives and knowledge within AngloWabanaki relations. Ongoing projects of maritime scholarship must, in the service of both accuracy and breadth, amplify those voices that have not always been at the forefront of the conversation. Doing so offers a wider range of stories from the past and a fuller understanding of human relationships with the Atlantic Ocean. Put simply, there is much more to maritime history than the stories of Europeans who settled North America; understanding the full complexity of that history means seeking out and listening to Indigenous perspectives on the sea, both historical and contemporary. Kiara Royer is an undergraduate at Williams College majoring in history and political science. She is an executive editor for the Williams Record, the college’s weekly newspaper, and has worked as an intern and researcher for the Searchable Sea Literature online database, work which formed the basis of this article. Ned Schaumberg, PhD, is an assistant professor at Williams-Mystic: The Coastal and Ocean Studies Program of Williams College and the Mystic Seaport Museum. His research focuses on the ways various cultures “read” their watery environments and attempt to describe them in language. In particular, he considers how texts from Indigenous cultures written in English reflect complex relationships and cultural values related to rivers, coastlines, and oceans. 5 Bahar, “People of the Dawn,” 423. 6 Bahar, “The Golden Age of Piracy,” 179. 7 Bahar, “The Golden Age of Piracy,” 162. 8 Cohen, 394.
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