Castaways 9

By the end of October, the men were sick of dried peas, rock-hard sea biscuits, and salt meat. The occasional shark, dolphin, or weary bird was their only source of fresh food. They slept in wet clothes and mildewed bedding, perfect incubators for typhus, dysentery and cholera. By the time they reached the Brazilian coast, their remaining meat and grain was infested with roaches and rat droppings, the vitamin C deficiency had kicked in, and forty-eight crewmen, including Alex’s Captain Pickering, had died of scurvy. His replacement, a 21 year-old upper class lieutenant named Thomas Stradling, was so detested by the crew that continuous squabbling, and the constant threat of mutiny, became the onboard culture. The two ships had been separated rounding the Horn. Stradling holed up the Cinque Ports in Cumberland Bay, and Dampier caught up to him just in time to put down his crew’s rebellion. Both ships continued up the Pacific coast as far as Mexico, capturing several Spanish ships en route. But by March of 1704, the two captains were in conflict, and Stradling had attacked Dampier as ‘a drunk who marooned his officers, stole treasure, hid behind blankets and beds when it came time to fight, took bribes, boasted of impossible prizes and when there was plunder to hand, let it go.’ In May, they decided to deliberately separate, and Stradling headed back south to Juan Fernández, to reprovision. The Cinque Ports was leaking so badly that the crew was pumping out water around the clock. Selkirk told Stradling that it was so riddled with worms that the masts and flooring were in danger of collapse. He began to argue with Stradling that the ship’s unseaworthiness was a deathtrap, to no avail. In October, loaded with turnips and goats and crayfish, Stradling ordered him to prepare the ship to leave. Selkirk refused, indicating that he would rather be left on Más a Tierra. It was the most important decision of his life. Stradling granted his wish.

‘He was put ashore from a leaky vessel, with the captain of which he had
 had an irreconcilable difference; and he chose rather to take his fate in
 this place, than in a crazy vessel, under a disagreeable commander. His
 portion were a sea-chest, his wearing clothes and bedding, a firelock, a
 pound of gunpowder, a large quantity of bullets, a flint and steel, a few
 pounds of tobacco, a hatchet, a knife, a kettle, a Bible, and other books
 of devotion, together with pieces that concerned navigation, and his
 mathematical instruments.’
                                               Richard Steele, The Englishman 1711