Life Aboard A British Privateer In The Time Of Queen Anne : Being The Journal Of Captain Woodes Rogers, Master Mariner. THE INTRODUCTION. Most people know their Robinson Crusoe, and have heard of the author Defoe. But how many of us have heard even the name of Woodes Rogers, Master Mariner or have read his quaint Journal of a cruising voyage round the world in the ships cc Duke and cc Dutchess of Bristol, printed in 17I2 for A. Bell and B. Lintot at the Crosse Keys and Bible between the two Temple Gates Fleet Street. Yet it was this Woodes Rogers who not only discovered the original Crusoe, Alexander Selkirk, but after making a note of him when found aboard a island of Juan Fernandez, at once proceeded to make very practical use of him by giving him command of the cc Increase, one of many small prizes taken in the South Seas from the Spaniards by the Duke and Dutchess. That Rogers was more than a master mariner, of much resource and pluck, is shown in his Journal, and the wonderful way in which he handled the very mixed group of men which formed the small floating commonwealth under him. It was more than thirty years later that Lord Anson sailed a similar voyage round the world with the advantage of the experience of Rogers and others...
