A pirate execution in old Florida? Well, almost. This is one of the strangest historic tales from Florida’s oldest city, St. Augustine.
Pirates still roam the streets of St. Augustine
You see, in the early days of the Sunshine State, when the Spanish owned the place, pirates haunted nearby waters. They attacked many times, stealing everything they could, burning the town and its wooden fort, and killing Spanish citizens.
On top of that, Spain’s continuing conflicts with the British didn’t help this situation at all. Attack by warships from the Bahamas could happen at anytime.
It got so bad that the colonial government began building a stone fort in 1672, within which all 1,000 inhabitants could take refuge in times of danger from either pirates or the British.
Unfortunately, it took twenty-three years to build that fort. In the meantime, government officials, soldiers and regular folks kept a wary eye on Matanzas Bay and beyond to the Atlantic Ocean for dangers of any kind.
So it was in 1684, before the fort’s completion, that a British fleet started out from the Bahamas intent on attacking St. Augustine. Unfortunately for them, however, a vicious storm sank many of their ships just short of their goal.
Realizing he could no long carry our his mission, the fleet commander, Thomas Jingle, aborted the planned atack. And before returing to the Bahamas with his remaining ships, he took them just north of the city near the St. Johns River in order to restore his supplies of food and water.
A pirate ship recreation
What Jingle didn’t realize was how carefully the Spanish kept a watch on that area. Sentinels saw the ships and when a boat from one of them arrived on shore, all the men on board were captured and herded back to St. Augustine. In charge of that boat and it’s small crew of six was a ship’s steward named Andrew Ranson.
The stage was now set for a pirate execution that didn’t go as planned.
Upon their arrival in St. Augustine, the Spanish governor, Juan Marques Cabrera, had the prisoners tortured. He hoped to gain vital details about Captain Jingle’s further plans.
For his trouble, Cabrera got no such information, but in order to save themselves, Ranson’s crew turned on him by saying their leader was actually a pirate. Exasperated, the governor gave the crew ten years of hard labor and ordered Andrew Ranson to be executed by garrote-a slow strangulation from behind. Ranson protested his innocence but to no avail.
Example of the lethal noose
With his back against a pole on the day set for his death, Ranson clutched a rosary. Soon, the executioner threaded a rope through the pole, put the loop around Ranson’s neck and slowly turned a handle six times. A pirate execution in those days was a pretty gruesome thing.
After those six turns of the handle, Ranson twitched for a short while and then stopped moving. Thinking to make sure his task of pirate execution was complete, the executioner gave the rope one more good twist. Incredibly, the rope broke.
And as soon as that happened, Father Perez de la Mota rushed to the body only to find Ranson still breathing. Against all odds, the pirate execution had failed.
Believing a miracle had happened, the priest and his associates rushed the prisoner to a religious sanctuary. The good Father and his associates had actually believed in Ranson’s innocence from the beginning. Because of that, they felt sure their prayers had been answered by God.
The stone fort: The Castillo de San Marcos
Dazed but happy to be alive, Ranson awoke to a huge controversy. Governor Cabrera had demanded that his prisoner be returned for another, and final, execution. Father de la Mota’s response was a refusal. He simply said thatthe broken rope was the will of God for Ranson to live.
This argument went on for three years until Spain transferred Cabrera out of Florida. Seeking a compromise acceptable to all, the new governor, Don Diego Losada, offered to give Ranson amnesty if he would live at the construction site of the new stone fort and use his excellent building skills to hurry its completion.
Ranson agreed and eventually helped to finish what eventually whould be known as the Castillo de San Marcos in 1795. And in 1702, he was granted full freedom for helping to defend St. Augustine against a British invasion. And so ended the story of a nearly completed pirate execution that, in the end, just might have helped save the city of St. Augustine from destruction.
More Information on Pirates
Pirates in Florida, Real and Imagined
Secret London: Execution Dock was used for more than 400 years in London to execute pirates
St. Augustine: The Town Built to Fight Pirates
Other Articles About Strange Events in St. Augustine
Haunted Lighthouse in St. Augustine, FL
HAUNTED ST. AUGUSTINE, FL – CASTILLO DE SAN MARCOS
School Rules in Colonial St. Augustine, FL
ST. AUGUSTINE, FL: PYRAMIDS IN A NATIONAL CEMETERY
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