The Project Gutenberg EBook of Henry Hudson, by Thomas A. Janvier

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Title: Henry Hudson
A Brief Statement Of His Aims And His Achievements

Author: Thomas A. Janvier

Release Date: September 12, 2004 [EBook #13442]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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[Illustration: SAINT ETHELBURGA'S CHURCH, INTERIOR]

HENRY HUDSON

A BRIEF STATEMENT OF
HIS AIMS AND HIS ACHIEVEMENTS

BY

THOMAS A. JANVIER

TO WHICH IS ADDED
A NEWLY-DISCOVERED PARTIAL RECORD
NOW FIRST PUBLISHED

OF

THE TRIAL OF THE MUTINEERS
BY WHOM HE AND OTHERS
WERE ABANDONED TO THEIR DEATH

1909

TO
C.A.J.

CONTENTS

PART I
A Brief Life of Henry Hudson

PART II
Newly-discovered Documents

PREFACE

It is with great pleasure that I include in this volume
contemporary Hudson documents which have remained neglected for
three centuries, and here are published for the first time. As I
explain more fully elsewhere, their discovery is due to the
painstaking research of Mr. R.G. Marsden, M.A. My humble share in
the matter has been to recognize the importance of Mr. Marsden's
discovery; and to direct the particular search in the Record
Office, in London, that has resulted in their present reproduction.
I regret that they are inconclusive. We still are ignorant of what
punishment was inflicted upon the mutineers of the "Discovery"; or
even if they were punished at all.

The primary importance of these documents, however, is not that
they establish the fact--until now not established--that the
mutineers were brought to trial; it is that they embody the sworn
testimony, hitherto unproduced, of six members of Hudson's crew
concerning the mutiny. Asher, the most authoritative of Hudson's
modern historians, wrote: "Prickett is the only eye-witness that
has left us an account of these events, and we can therefore not
correct his statements whether they be true or false." We now have
the accounts of five additional eye-witnesses (Prickett himself is
one of the six whose testimony has been recovered), and all of
them