d a few
days afterwards took a brigantine belonging to Rhode Island, and then
proceeded to Barbadoes, off of which island they fell in with a Bristol
ship of ten guns, in her voyage out, from whom they took abundance of
clothes, some money, twenty-five bales of goods, five barrels of
powder, a cable, hawser, ten casks of oatmeal, six casks of beef, and
several other goods, besides five of their men; and after they had
detained her three days let her go, who, being bound for the aforesaid
island, she acquainted the governor with what had happened as soon as
she arrived.

Whereupon a Bristol galley that lay in the harbor was ordered to be
fitted out with all imaginable expedition, of 20 guns and 80 men, there
being then no man-of-war upon that station, and also a sloop with 10
guns and 40 men. The galley was commanded by one Captain Rogers, of
Bristol, and the sloop by Captain Graves, of that island, and Captain
Rogers, by a commission from the governor, was appointed commodore.

The second day after Rogers sailed out of the harbor he was discovered
by Roberts, who, knowing nothing of their design, gave them chase. The
Barbadoes ships kept an easy sail till the pirates came up with them,
and then Roberts gave them a gun, expecting they would have immediately
struck to his piratical flag; but instead thereof, he was forced to
receive the fire of a broadside, with three huzzas at the same time, so
that an engagement ensued; but Roberts, being hardly put to it, was
obliged to crowd all the sail the sloop would bear to get off. The
galley, sailing pretty well, kept company for a long while, keeping a
constant fire, which galled the pirate; however, at length, by throwing
over their guns and other heavy goods, and thereby lightening the
vessel, they, with much ado, got clear; but Roberts could never endure a
Barbadoes man afterwards, and when any ships belonging to that island
fell in his way, he was more particularly severe to them than others.

Captain Roberts sailed in the sloop to the island of Dominico, where he
watered and got provisions of the inhabitants, to whom he gave goods in
exchange. At this place he met with thirteen Englishmen, who had been
set ashore by a French Guard de la Coste, belonging to Martinico, taken
out of two New England ships that had been seized as prizes by the said
French sloop. The men willingly entered with the pirates, and it proved
a seasonable recruiting.

They stayed not long here, th