Sir Thomas Lynch to the Lord President of Council [extrait]

Jamaica, May 6, 1683 [16 mai 1683].

(...) The Guernsey has been out of port near three months. The pirate was gone before she reached the coast of St. Domingo, so the Captain plied eastward, got flesh, as I conclude, at Porto Rico, and thence made for the Virgins or the coast of the Main in search of La Trompeuse. At present we know of no pirate from the east of Porto Rico to the Gulf. The vessels we have sent out, the galley we built and the reputation of the King's frigates has so frightened them that one of our canoes can pass anywhere, and the French privateers treat our vessels with more respect than ever.

I was informed yesterday that Mons. Poncay, the French Governor of Hispaniola, is dead. I formery sent to Mr. Blathwayt the infamous story of Vanhorn. He and the great privateer Laurens are now together, and Vanhorn is careening. He has tried to draw the privateers together, but it is said that Laurens, having two good ships and four hundred men, will not join him, and that his own people and the other French abhor his drunken insolent humour. However, the Spaniards are also alarmed that they are sending two men-of-war from Carthagena to Honduras, so that it is probable that these rogues will not unite nor do the mischief feared. (..) The rumour of Sharpe's return to the South Seas has made the Viceroy of Peru arm divers considerable ships, so that, if he come, he will not escape without more miracles. (...)

I learn from Windward Islands that the French pirate with two or three more had been at St. Thomas and haunted the Virgin Islands, and designed to come eastward to the latitude of Barbados and take the negro ships. (...)

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source: P.R.O. Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series: America and West Indies, 1681-1685: no. 1065.