AMERICA.

Colonist, Volume IV, Issue 424, 15 November 1861, Page 3

AMERICA.

A. DARING EXPLOIT OP THE WAR—RESCtTE CF A CAPTURED SHIP FROM THE PRIVATEERS, AND KILLING THE PRIZE CREW. The schooner S. J- Waring, of Brookhaven, from New York for Montevideo, 4th July, with an assorted cargo, returned to New York on Sunday, (in the third day out, 7th July, she was brought to by the privateer J«ff. Davis, which sent a boat full of men alongside, and ordered the captain of the schooner to haul down the United States flag, and declared her a prise. They took from her a quantity of provisions, and then put on board a prize crew of five men, taking away Captain Francis Smith, the two mates, and two seamen, and leaving the steward, two seamen, and Brice Mackinnonj, a passenger, on board. The prize crew were Montague Amiel, a Charleston pilot, in command, one named Stephens as mate, Malcolm Sidney as second mate, and three men. They made a southerly course, and on the 16th July, when fifty miles to the southward of Charleston, the prize captain and the second mate being asleep in their berths, the first mate dozing on deck, and the others asleep, Tillman, the steward (colored), carried out his preconcerted plan of killing the captain and two mates with a hatchet, and throwing the bodies overboard. The job was all done in five minutes, Tillman taking command and steering the schooner northward. One of the remaining men was tied up till the next morning, when he was released upon a promise to help work the vessel. Not one on board under•tood navigation, but having once got hold of the land, Tillman brought the schooner up to pilot ground, when Charles E. Warner of the pilot boat Jane, took charge of her. One of the schooner's men Donald M'Leod, refused to assist in her recapture, the whole'duty falling on the steward and a sailor. The names of the schooner's men are William Tilman, steward: William Stedding, seaman, who assisted; Donald M'Leod, seaman, who refused. STORY OF THE HERO A COLORED MAN. The following is a portion ot the story of William Tillman, the steward :— He was born of free colored parents in Milfbrd, Delaware, and is 27 years of age, His parents moved to Providence, R. 1., when he was 14 years old, and he has since called that place his home. He has followed the sea for ten years, and has been in the employ of Jonas Smith and Co., No. 227 Front-street, by whom the schooner was owned, for the last three years. He is of a medium height, rather strongly built, crisp hair, of nearly unmixed negro blood, and bears in his countenance an expression of honesty, strong common sense, with some touches of humor. Tue schooner S. J. Waring had started on a voyage to Buenos Ayres, in Montevideo, with an assorted cargo, which, with the vessel, was valued at 100,000 dollars, There were on board—the captain and mate; W. Tillman, steward ; Wm. Stedding, seaman, born in Germany, twenty-three-yeais of age, has been sailing four years out of New York; Donald M'Leod, saaman, of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, thirty years of age has been sailing out of New York for seven or eight years; and Brice Mackinnon, a passenger. On the 7th of July they fell in with the Jeff Davis, and a prize crew of five were put on board, who were unarmed, To use the language of Tillman:— They ran ten days, and didn't find Charleston; we were, however, only fifty miles south of Charleston and 100 to the eastward. On the voyage they treated me the best kind of way, and talked the best kind of talk. One day the first lieutenant of the pirates was sitting in the cabin, crosslegged, smoking; and he said to me, 1 When you go down to Savannah, I want you to go to my house, ani I will take care of you.' I thought, continued the negro, 1 Yes, you will take care of me when you get me there.' I raised my hat, and said, ♦Yes, sir, thank jou.' But atterwarda I said to Billy (the German), • I am not going to Chaileston a live man; they may take me there dead.' He had been told by the prize master that he would get rewarded in Charleston for performing his duty so well in bringing the schooner in j he had also heard conversation not intended for his ears, in regard to the price he would probably bring; and he heard the prize master say to one of his men : • You talk to that steward and keep him in good heart.' •By G—d,' said the prize master, * he will never see the North again.' Tillman conferred with two of the seamen about taking possession of the schooner ] but they declined adopting any plan, saying that none of them knew how to navigate her back, should they succeed in getting control. Tillman thought the matter over for three days and then made an appeal to the German, and said, • If you are a man to stick to your word, we can take this vessel easy.' Then we made a plan that I should go to my berth, and when most of them were asleep he was to give me some sign, or awake me. We tried this for two nights, but no good chance offered. But last Tuesday night we caught them asleep, and we went to work. THRILLING NARRATIVE BY A PASSENGER M'Kinnon, the passenger, gives the following striking account of how the ■• work' was done:—lt could not have been more than ten minutes later when I was awakened from a light aleep by a peculiar sound in the captain's room, which I knew instinctively could only have been produced by an axe cleaving Amiel's skull. No sooner did the ♦ thush ' strike upon my ear than I leaped out of bed, and leaning against the door casing in the partition, saw the steward.dart through the twilight—for he had extinguished the light—noiseless as a cat across the cabin towards the second mate's j room. I also saw, at the same glance, i Cnptajn Amiel rise from bis birth and attempt ft follow l ( jm; bty tjw >1qoc(

blinded him, and he fell to the- flooirs with a horrid gurgling sound in his throat. All this was but the work of a second. The cleaving of the skull, liks the flash from a gun preceding the report, was followed by a weak, faint cry, like that of a sick child, and the gurgling in the throat. I knew then that his wound was mortal. Stooping sideways, the steward entered the second mate's cabin and once more swung his axe, but not so effectively. The mate started up with a ' G—d d—n you, don't strike me again,' and clutched at the steward's breast, but eluding the wounded man he ran on deck, to where the man lay near the wheelhouse, and keeping his axe behind him demanded ♦ what all this noise was about V The man who had been aroused by the outcries of the captain and mate, had raised himself on his elbow, and stared at the steward in a half stupid, half fascinated way, not seeing the [istol which Stedding, the man at the helm, had pointed at him for use in casa of necessity. As he turned his ha toward the steward, the latter drove his weapon home into the base of his skull. Stedding and the steward then tumbled him overboard. He rose on the wave, with a hoarse cry, when about two lengths astern, the water having raised him ; but ha must soon have gone down to his long account. ... Then the steward came down to the cabin, where I stood, while Stedding stood, pistol in hand, to guard the deck. The captain cried faintly, twice, to me by name, •Help me—help me!' but he was past help. Another swishing blow of the axe, and he did not repeat the cry. Then the steward returned to the second mate's cabin, where, seated on a pile of starch boxes, his legs drawn up, and his head between his knees, was the half stupified man. Again and again the axe fell, and again the cry, 'Don't do that,' fell on my ear, each time fainter than the last. Stedding and the steward now came down, and the steward and he took the corpse of the captain by the feet, and dragging it up the companionway, tossed it overboard. Stedding and the steward once more came down, and each taking the second mate by the shoulder, led him out from the place where he had crouched on the starch boxes. He seemed to walk, with their assistance, as they went up the companionway, but his head lay a pulpy mass upon his shoulder, and a moment after a loud splash alongside told the fate of another of the privateers. The steward told him that he would not kill him but iron him, and his fate must depend on his good behaviour; he wanted to spill as little blood as possible. He willingly held out his wrists for the irons. They then went to the forecastle and called the other piivateer, Dorsey. Upon learning the condition of affairs he begged for his life, which they promised to spare if he would assist in working the ship and be true and faithful, to all of which he agreed. The steward now took command. None of us knew anything of navigation. The South Carolinian was released from irons the next morning, and proved a very useful and willing fellow in working the ship. On Friday the 19th, we made the land. Sunday morning, at four o'clock, we got a pilot off Sandy Hook, and soon after hired a tug for 60 dollars to tow us up to New York, where we arrived about four p.m.