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Nathaniel Butler




First serving in the service of the , when he employed a shipwrecked Dutch boat-builder. He would also be the first to introduce the Potato to North America when, in 1621, he had a cargo of potatoes shipped to Governor Francis Wyatt of Jamestown {Link without Title} .

After a brief stay in Jamestown the following year, during which he published a report entitled ''"Unmasked Face of Our Colony in Virginia as it was in the winter of the Year 1622"'' later presented to the , at the age of 61. He later found employ with the Providence Island Company during 1639 and 1640.

While on a privateering expedition in mid-1639 along the Spanish Main , he successfully captured a Spanish frigate at the harbor of Trujillo , and was later paid 16,000 pesos in ransom. However, the frigate alone was considered a poor prize by the standards of the time and, suffering from inexperienced officers unfamiliar with the region (including future privateer James Riskinner ), the expedition followed a very erratic course throughout the Caribbean and failed to capture anything else of value by the time of their return to Providence in September 1639.


FURTHER READING

  • Kupperman, Karen Ordahl. ''Providence Island, 1630-1641: The Other Puritan Colony''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 978-0-521-55835-8

  • Rogozinski, Jan ''Pirates!: Brigands, Buccaneers, and Privateers in Fact, Fiction, and Legend''. New York: Da Capo Press, 1996. ISBN 978-0-306-80722-0



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