Wilson says:
"In these troublous and not over-squeamish times, when
commerce was other than the peaceful pursuit it has since
become, a promising venture in privateering was often
preferred to slower if safer sources of profit by the
strong-stomached merchants and mariners of New York.... News
that piracy under the guise of privateering was winked at by
the New York authorities spread quickly among the captains
serving under the black flag."
Now there never was a lustier freebooter of the high seas than Capt.
Thomas Randall, known familiarly as "Cap'n Tom," commander of the
privateering ship _Fox_, and numerous other vessels. This boat, a
brigantine, was well named, for she was quick and sly and yet could
fight on occasion. Many a rich haul he made in her in 1748, and many a
hairbreadth escape shaved the impudent bow of her on those jolly,
nefarious voyages of hers. One of her biggest captures was the French
ship _L'Amazone_. In 1757 he took out the _De Lancey_, a brigantine,
with fourteen guns, and made some more sensational captures.
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