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In the Connecticut River off the "upper end of Pine Meadow," near
Northfield, Mass., is Clarke's Island which was granted by the town to
William Clarke in 1686, and confirmed to his heirs in 1723, It then
contained ten and three-fourth acres, and was a secluded spot, well
covered with trees. Later, what with cutting off the woods and the
work of the freshets, a large part of the island was washed away. It
was here, tradition has it, that some of Kidd's treasure was hidden by
"Whisking" Clarke.

The local story is that Kidd and his men ascended the river, though how
they got over the series of falls is not explained, and made a landing
at Clarke's Island. Here, having placed the chest in a hole, they
sacrificed by lot one of their number and laid his body on top of the
treasure in order that his ghost might forever defend it from
fortune-seekers. One Abner Field, after consulting a conjurer who
showed him precisely where the chest was buried resolved to risk a
tussle with the pirate's ghost, and with two friends waited in fear and
trembling for the auspicious time when the moon should be directly
overhead at midnight.

They were to work in silence, and to pray that no cock should crow
within earshot and break the spell. At length, one of them raised his
crow-bar for a mighty stroke, down it went, and clinked against metal.
"You've hit it," cried another, and alas, instantly the chest sank out
of reach, and the ghost appeared, and very angry it was. A moment
later, the devil himself popped from under the bank, ripped across the
island like a tornado and plunged into the river with a prodigious,
hissing splash. The treasure hunters flew for home, and told their
tale, but village rumor whispered it about that one Oliver Smith and a
confederate had impersonated the ghost and the energetic Evil One.

On October 20, 1699, Bellomont wrote in a letter to England:

"I have prevailed with Governor Winthrop of Connecticut to seize and
send Thomas Clarke of N. York prisoner hither. He has been on board
Kidd's sloop at the east end of Long Island and carried off to the
value of about 5000 pounds in goods and treasure (that we know of and
perhaps a great deal more) into Connecticut Colony; and thinking
himself safe from under our power, writ my Lt. Governor of New York a
very saucy letter and bade us defiance. I have ordered him to be
safely kept