The Military System of the Marathas, with a Brief Account of Their Maritime Activities c17: Chapter XIII: Piracy or Sovereignty of the Sea
The Military System of the Marathas, with a Brief Account of Their Maritime Activities c17
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Contents
- c17.28 — 4 parts
Chapter XIII: Piracy or Sovereignty of the Sea
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The downfall of the Maratha naval power was due to its inefficiency, but prejudice has handed down the names of the Maratha captains as pirates. Naval practice both in Asia and Europe has undergone revolutionary changes since the days of Kanhoji Angria and Anand Rao Dhulap, and the freedom of the sea in times of peace, if not in times of war, is today accepted as an axiom of international relations. Their interference, therefore, with free navigation and appropriation of alien vessels wrecked on the coast at once condemn the Maratha admirals as guilty of piracy in the eyes of a generation that does not know how universal these practices were two hundred years ago on the Malabar coast, if not elsewhere. And it is generally ignored that the Marathas were not the only nation guilty of such practices. They were simply following the precedents of their European neighbours.
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The first European nation to reach Indian waters in modern times were the Portuguese. Their powerful navy gave them an overwhelming advantage over the Indian princes and they were resolved to make the fullest use of it. They claimed the sovereignty of the sea and compelled all powers, friendly or otherwise, to respect their claim. None were allowed to navigate the Arabian Sea or the Indian Ocean without their express permission, and such permission had to be purchased by every trading vessel. Even Indian sovereigns were not exempted from this acknowledgement of Portuguese naval supremacy. In 1534 Bahadur Shah of Gujarat concluded a treaty with Nuno da Cunha, and one of the clauses clearly laid down that all ships sailing from Bahadur Shah's ports would have to come to Bassein to take *cartaz* from the officers of the King of Portugal, irrespective of their destination, exception being made only in favour of vessels bound for Mecca.¹ In 1547 Joao de Castro conceded to King Nizamshah free *cartazes* for five ships only, on condition that they should not give passage to any Turk.² In 1548 similar favours were granted to the Sultan of Bijapur by a treaty,³ but in a subsequent treaty concluded with that prince in 1574 it was stipulated that if any vessel sailing without Portuguese *cartazes* was seized in a port of Adilshah by his subjects, half of the prize should belong to the Portuguese and the other half to King Adilshah even if the captured boat happened to be the property of one of his subjects.¹ But it was not the Muhammadan princes alone who were subjected to these humiliating terms. In 1631 Virappa Naik, King of Canara, and the Zamorin of Calicut undertook not to allow any vessel to enter or leave their ports unless it had been furnished with a Portuguese cartaz.² Only small rowing vessels were allowed free ingress and egress.
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¹ Biker, *Tratados da India*, Vol. I, p. 66.
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² Ibid, pp. 120-2.
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³ Ibid, pp. 122-7.
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¹ Biker, Tratados da India, Vol. I, pp. 160-7.
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² Ibid, pp. 270-5 and 281-93.
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When other European nations came to India by the maritime route, the Portuguese attempted to shut them out of the Indian trade by exercising the sovereignty of the sea, which they claimed and which their Indian neighbours had to respect. In 1608 the ships of William Hawkins with their crew and cargo were seized and taken away by the Portuguese Captain Mor, and when Hawkins expostulated with a Portuguese officer, he was quietly told that ‘these seas belonged unto the King of Portugal, and none ought to come here without his license’. The angry captain swore, fulminated and challenged his adversary, but to no effect.³ Three years later, Sir Henry Middleton met with similar opposition from a Portuguese admiral. He writes: ‘The nine and twentieth, there came a small Portugall frigat from the Admirall of the Armada (as they terme them) wherein was one Portugall and his boy who brought me answer of my letter sent the day before from the Capitaine Major, wherein hee used some complements certifying me that he was glad to heare I belonged to a King a friend, and that he and his would be readie to doe mee service in anything he might, provided I brought a letter or order from the King of Spaine or the Vice-Roy, for my trading in these parts, which if I could shew him, he would willingly obey; if otherwise, he must guard the port he had in charge, where the King his Master had his factorie’.⁴
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³ Purchas, His Pilgrimes, Vol. III, pp. 4-5.
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⁴ Ibid, Vol. II, pp. 172-3.
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The Portuguese power in the east gradually declined, but they did not give up this claim. Towards the close of the seventeenth century, the Italian traveller, Gemelli Careri, still found them exercising this right. He writes: ‘So that being become formidable to all the Princes of Asia, they had made all the Country about Tributary; and being Sovereigns of the vast Ocean by means of their mighty fleets, no ship of any Nation whatsoever could sail those Seas without their Leave and Pass; seizing the Ships and Goods, and Imprisoning the Men for presuming to Sail without their Protection. This authority the Portuguese, tho weak, still exercise over all Ships of Moors and Gentils; for the *Europeans* are got above it.’¹
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¹ Churchill *Voyages*, Vol. IV, p. 220. ² Ibid. ³ Toma que hao’ de guardar as Capitaens de mar e guerra ou quaesqera outros das embarcacoens de Estado no tomar das prezas (Bibliotheca publica of Evora. Cod. CXV/1-5) fol. 3. ⁴ Regimento com que sahy commandando a Armada da costa do Norte em 11 de dezembro 1736 (Bibliotheca publica of Evora; Cod. CXV;1-35, fol. 3). ⁵ Bibliotheca Publica of Evora Cod. CXV/1-35 fol. 34.
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In the next century also the Portuguese ‘still exercised this authority over all ships of Moors and Gentils’.² Among the instructions issued by the Viceroy, Conde de Sandomil, on 12 September 1735, occurs the following: ‘Whenever the captain takes or sees a ship he will immediately send for its *cartaz* and if it does not possess one or possesses only an old *cartaz* or if it is discovered that the ship has made a voyage to a forbidden port or carries forbidden cargo, he shall formally cause it to be taken and have the date and the latitude where the capture took place and whether there was any fighting or not, recorded through his scribe’.³ In 1736 Antonio de Britto Freire was expressly ordered to give chase to all ships he might meet on his way, if he could do so without any prejudice to his voyage or to the safety of the *cafilla* he was convoying.⁴ The same instructions were repeated on 13 September 1737, and 5 September 1738, when the same officer was entrusted with the responsibility of convoying Portuguese merchant fleets.⁵
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It is needless to say that if such orders were issued to Portuguese naval officers in the middle of the eighteenth century when the Portuguese naval power was undoubtedly on the wane, they had sent out their fleet in earlier times with the sole purpose of taking prizes. The Dutch Governor-General and the Council of India wrote to the Directors of the Dutch East India Company in 1668:
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‘The Portuguese vessels are now mostly engaged in piracy, they principally attack ships belonging to Canara several of which had been brought to the port of Goa’.¹ In the previous year the Portuguese Government had actually suggested to the Dutch that they should join their naval forces and make prize of Moorish ships in Indian waters, as such an enterprise would be immensely profitable.² In 1682 Captain Smith of the *Returne*, while sailing from Bombay, obtained among others the following instruction: ‘Whereas the Portuguese have beene lately very insolent and were so bold as to fire at the *Eagle*; if you should meete with any of them offer noe affront or violence to them; but if they fire at you and assault you defend yourselfe the best you can’.³
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¹ Dutch Records, India Office transcripts, English translation, Vol. 29, p. 13, No. DCCXL. ² Ibid, Letter No. DCCXXXVII, dated 20 March, 1667. ³ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 4, fols. 122-23. ⁴ Dutch Records, India Office Transcripts, English translation, Vol. 27, No. DCCXII. Adersia is probably a corruption of Aliraja or Ariraja, the naval chief of Cannanore.
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But the Portuguese were not the only nation who made use of their maritime power against weaker states and denied to them the right of free navigation. On 11 February 1664, the Dutch East India Company concluded a treaty with ‘Adersia, Ruler and Chief of the Moors, in the countries under the King Kalatry’, by which they not only secured a monopoly of the spice trade of the country but also restricted the right of free navigation of Adersia’s people as the following significant Articles show:
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‘18. The Company shall have the right to submit all the coming and departing vessels to inspection.
19. No vessel shall be allowed to leave any port under the government of Adersia without a pass from the Director of the Company at Cannanore.
20. The passes will only be delivered on the recommendation of Adersia to prevent any pirates from obtaining them.’⁴
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How the Dutch enforced their rights against other nations in the seventeenth century we do not precisely know, but it appears from an entry in the Bombay Public Consultations that in the second decade of the next century they had also started the profitable business of capturing and confiscating alien ships. They had seized some English vessels apparently without any just reason, and the Bombay Council sent a strong protest to the Council of Cochin against their action.¹
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¹ Bombay Public Consultations, Range CCCXLI, No. 4 p. 13. Consultation 23 January 1717-18.
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The English East India Company’s officers also issued passports and insisted on the trading vessels of the country buying them. Khafi Khan thought that the English behaved much worse than the Portuguese on the sea,² and the account left by Sir Thomas Herbert, who visited the East in the earlier part of the seventeenth century (his book was published in 1634), substantially corroborates the Muslim historian.³ But in the second half of the century their practice seems to have much improved. In 1672 Peter Johnson, Captain of the frigate *Revenge*, brought a Calicut merchant ship as a prize to Surat, as it had no English pass,⁴ and in 1675 the English factors of Broach warned the *Nakhodas* of some Malabar vessels that unless they provided themselves with English passes, their ships would be regarded as good prize if any English ship met them on the sea.⁵ But in the same year the Carwar factors had to remonstrate with their superiors at Surat for the leniency shown to those delinquents who refrained from procuring their pass. ‘The owners of ships at Batticola and at other ports hard by make their braggs that the taking of their vessells chances soe seldome and when Your Honour doth take them without a passe Your Honour doth only hinder them in their voyage by carrying them to Bombay and afterwards lett them goe. But Your Honour doth use them soe civilly there that they thinke their time very ill spent to desire a passe of us, and wee know that if Your Honour etc.’s vessells should but look out with a vigilent eye they would find a great many Batticola and other vessells that belongs to the adjacent places without any passe, how beneficiall this would be to the keeping up our Honourable Masters credit here in these parts, which hath bin much impaired now a late dayes as to this perticular wee leave the negotiation to Your Honour etc.'s serious consideration.'¹
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² Elliot and Dowson, *History of India*, Vol. VII, pp. 344-5.
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³ *Relation of some Yeares Travaile, Begunne Anno 1626 into Afrique and the greater Asia especially the territories of the Persia Monarch and some parts of the Orientall Indies*, pp. 184-5.
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⁴ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 3, fol. 22, Consultation Surat, 19 July 1672.
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⁵ Ibid, Vol. 107, fol. 120, (Broach to Surat, 20 August 1675).
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¹ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 88, fol. 216, (Carwar to Surat, 3 February 1674-75).
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This remonstrance shows that English opinion in India was not in those days adverse to the seizure of unlicensed ships but held it as a lawful exercise of sovereignty of the sea. Three years later, on 27 February 1668-69, Captain William Norgrave was given the following instructions: 'Wee have appointed you upon the *Hunter* to transport Mr. George Bowcher to Callicut; to whom wee have given instructions to direct you to examine all vessells for English passes, you shall meet with in your going downe; and such as shall be found to have none, belonging to any port of the Mallabarr coast, to be secured and brought up to Bombay especially such as may belong to Allee Rajah or the Moores of Burgora, Cotta, Durmapatam or Billiapatam, or the natives of Porcat, taking great care in your acts of seizure, you govern yourselfe and men with that moderation, discretion and conduct as to discharge yourselfe with courage and reputation and with that uprightness and faithfulness as to forbeare yourselfe and prevent your men from purloyning or embezzling any of their goods etc., a full return of all things being intended backe to the owners when wee shall receive satisfaction for the severall wrongs done us from those places.'² In this case the English authorities did not intend anything but what they considered just retaliation. The instructions of Sir John Gayer were generally lenient but did not repudiate the principle on which the Portuguese and the Dutch were acting.
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On 28 May 1695, he told Captain Leonard Edgecombe: 'If in your passage out or home you meet with any country ships demand to see their passes and if they have none threaten them hard what you will do to them if you meet them without again but let them by no means be abused by you or any of your ships company but if you find any English on board them that have not our orders for being there take them (away)'.¹ But Governor Boone upheld the prevailing practice when he detained the *Shibar Khanderao* belonging to a subject of Kanhoji Angria. In defence of his action he wrote to Angria: 'Concerning the Shybar Canderow belonging to Trimbuckjee Meggee, you write that his goods and those of the Surat merchants are stopt; as Trimbuckjee is an inhabitant of this place and has his warehouses here, and allways takes my pass for said Shybar, and this year without said pass pretended to go to sea, how could it be permitted? In the same manner all the merchants of Surat take my pass to carry on their trade, and if their goods were laded in this Shybar, why was not I acquainted therewith? The vessells and their cargos that sail without a pass, both the Portuguese and you make prizes of, as you well know;
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and when this vessell was taken without my pass, it was on the same penalty, but I am not yet determined to do so'.² Thus it is clear that the practice of controlling the navigation of the Arabian Sea by the maritime powers of Western India had been by common consent recognised as a lawful act, and although the greed and cupidity of naval officers had frequently led to misuse of the custom, there is no doubt that it originally arose from a much-felt need. The coast was in those days infested by numerous pirates. They could and did frequent the ports in the guise of inoffensive traders and assumed their true character on the high seas when a suitable opportunity occurred.³ Such practice could to a certain extent be stopped by the issue of passes to genuine merchants, and the price demanded for these safeguards does not seem to have been very high. From the Portuguese *cartazes* granted to Maratha merchants it appears that the Goa Government demanded 20 Xerafins for each hundred *Khandis*⁴ of the cargo carried by the vessel. The price of an English pass varied according to the distance of the destination;
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'the fee for a pass from Broach to Surat was 4, from Goa 2 and from Cambay 3 or 4 Rupees per 500 Candy’.¹ It was demanded in return for the service rendered by the government concerned to traders in general by policing the sea, and the payment was made without much demur, as Henry Grose tells us: ‘Towards defraying the charges of this marine, the company required of all the vessels trading in those seas, those of the other European nations excepted, to take the passes of the Bombay Government, for which they paid a small consideration, at which I never heard the least murmuring, the merchants being duly sensible not only of the benefit their trade received from the English protection, but that this contribution was far short of the cost of it’.² How much Angria or the Peshwa’s officers usually demanded for their passes we do not know,³ but there is no reason to suppose that the price was excessive for no complaint of that nature has come down to us. From the meagre references made by Portuguese and English writers to the naval practices of the times it appears that the Maratha fleet generally gave convoy to merchantmen sailing from their ports. Evidently, the purchasers of the Angria’s pass also received a good return for their money.
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² Ibid, Vol. 4, Pt. II, fol. 21.
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¹ Factory Records, Bombay, Vol. 10a, Instruction dated 28 May 1695.
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² Bombay Public Consultations, Range CCCXLI, No. 4, pp. 58-59.
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³ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 106, fol. 74, (Bombay, 26 March 1672).
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⁴ *Khandi* = 20 maunds. This rate of duty is given in some *cartazes* published by Biker and quoted in Sen, *A Preliminary Report on the Historical Records* at Goa, pp. 49-51.
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¹ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 107, fol. 120.
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² Grose, Voyage to the East Indies, pp. 68-9.
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³ I have not been able to trace more than one pass issued by Angria. It appears that Sambhaji Angria used to charge one Rupee per Khandi for his pass. Bombay Public Consultations, CCCXLI No. 8, 1736, p. 348, Consultation 1 October 1736.
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The Maratha captains did not in general act differently from their brethren in the Portuguese, English and Dutch navies. They seized trading ships only when these had failed to purchase their passes, and in those days such an omission, as the Carwar letter already quoted shows, could be very well construed as a deliberate defiance. The merchantmen were generally well-armed, the few passengers that they took also provided themselves with muskets and blunderbusses and not infrequently put up a fight before the ship surrendered to a man-of-war. The capture of such armed ships could hardly be regarded as an act of cowardice as the torpedoing of an unarmed trading vessel by a submarine today. In any case the merchant ship was fully aware of the risk she was running, and the contest was not very unequal.
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Both the Marathas and the Portuguese stoutly denied the charge of piracy, and their protest was couched in almost identical words. In 1700 the Portuguese detained a vessel belonging to the Sidi of Janjira or one of his subjects. When the Sidi remonstrated with the Government of Goa, they replied that the ship had been captured on legitimate grounds, viz., failure to buy their *cartaz*. The ship was eventually restored to its owner in consideration of the friendship then subsisting between the Portuguese and the Mughal. The letter concluded with a significant sentence that reminded the Sidi that ‘the Portuguese were the sovereigns of the sea and not pirates’. ¹ The Angria retorted to his English accusers that he was not a pirate but the Admiral of the Maratha empire. To the expostulations of the Bombay Government, Henry Grose informs us, the Angria ‘made no further a satisfactory answer, than that disclaiming the title of Pirate, he assumes that of Admiral to the Mar-rajah, to whom he insisted that the sovereignty of the seas belonged, and that he was determined to maintain it, against all such as should refuse to acknowledge, or not take his passes’. ² It should be remembered that neither the *Success* nor the *Robert* nor the *Otter* had Kanhoji’s pass, and he argued that, as their owners were not English subjects, they were not protected by the treaty of 1713. In 1791 the Portuguese Secretary of State wrote to Bahiro Pant Mechendale: ‘The vessels of the *Sarkar* (i.e. Poona Government) took in the port of Angediva, a merchantman belonging to that place laden with cargo and at Chapora they robbed the canoes of the fishermen without leaving even their small sails, besides other incidents to which I do not refer, for it seems that some of these and other hostilities which I do not mention here, might have been committed by the Bhonsla, Melondim, and the Angria of Kolaba who use the banner of the Mos: Felicitious (i.e. Peshwa)’. In answer to this complaint, Gangadhar Pant, Subhedar of Gheria, wrote to the Governor of Goa: ‘The said vessel was in the sea and it got no *cartaz*, nor had it a passport, nor the banner of Your Excellency.’ ³ It was, therefore, justly captured. It is remarkable how similar are the arguments put forward by Governor Boone in his letter to Kanhoji Angria, by the Government of Goa in their correspondence with the Sidi of Janjira, by Kanhoji Angria in his letter to Captain Cornwall, and by Gangadhar Pant in his reply to the Portuguese Governor in defence of similar actions at different times. The Maratha Government, however, did not always uphold the actions of their servants. In 1763 Madhav Rao I promised to make an enquiry about the circumstances under which some Portuguese ships had been captured by his fleet and to restore them if they had been seized without sufficient reason.¹
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¹ Livros dos Reis Visinhos, (Goa) Vol. IV, fol. 28.
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² Grose, *Voyage to the East Indies*, pp. 150-1.
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³ Biker, *Tratados da India*, Vol. IX, pp. 185-187.
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¹ Officios dos Governadores (Archivo Ultramarino of Lisbon) Maco 2, No. 15, 20 January, 1764.
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On 7 June 1781, Naraen Sinay, the Portuguese envoy, complained to Anand Rao Dhulap that five Maratha Gallivats of his fleet had robbed some Parangues belonging to Portuguese subjects and the total loss sustained by them on that occasion amounted to Rs. 11,780,000, and in two months' time a Shibar captured on that occasion was restored to its rightful owners with some money compensation for other losses.² Sometimes the Portuguese Government actually solicited the protection of the Maratha navy for their ships in Maratha waters and such protection was not usually refused.
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² Livros dos Reis Visinhos, Vol. II.
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It is true that such interference with free navigation, though admittedly based on a common custom, doubtless caused great hardships to merchants of all nationalities. Shivaji himself had at different times to solicit passports for his own ships from the Portuguese and the English.³ In 1670 he had tried to secure his ships from Portuguese interference by a treaty. The Portuguese, however, positively refused to allow any vessel but small rowing craft and grain-boats to ply without their cartaz. In 1782 Raghuji Angria of Kolaba suggested that Portuguese merchantmen of Goa, Daman and Diu should take his cartaz, while vessels belonging to his subjects should similarly purchase Portuguese passports. But the Governor of Goa answered: 'I am unable to accept this Article and it is impracticable, for the Crown of Portugal has the sovereignty and the dominion of the sea of Asia by first occupation and conquest, by possession and immemorial custom, and we cannot compel the subjects of the Majestic State to take the *cartazes* of any other potentate’, but as the Portuguese Government were no longer able to maintain the supremacy they once enjoyed in Indian waters, he added: ‘I desire to preserve amity with the Magnificent friend on terms that will not be very onerous to either party. I shall not do anything to your merchants even if they do not possess my *cartaz*. In the same manner the fleet and the ships of the Magnificent ally should not interfere with the merchants of the Majestic State even if they do not possess the *cartaz* of the Magnificent ally.’¹ Three years earlier, the Portuguese had renounced by treaty their right of enforcing *cartazes* on the Peshwa’s ships. Thus, by peaceful negotiation the antiquated and clumsy custom of interfering with free navigation by the maritime states of the Malabar coast was being gradually abolished.
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³ Pissurlencar, Portugueses & Maratas, p. 26; Foster, The English Factories in India, p. 275.
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¹ Livros dos Reis Visinhos, Vol. II; Sen, *A Preliminary Report of the Historical Records at Goa*, p. 54.
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The English had by similar means procured freedom of navigation for their own vessels and those belonging to their servants and subjects. In 1713 Kanhoji Angria had undertaken not to molest English ships, but a controversy regarding the status of foreign vessels laden with English goods had led to a breach between the two powers. The subject was, therefore, more clearly dealt with in 1739, when a treaty was concluded between Baji Rao I and the Government of Bombay. Article 1 of that treaty runs as follows: ‘The English shall only issue passes to the Company’s vessels, the merchants or servants, dependents, belonging to the island of Bombay, or other places where the English have settlement, and the English shall not interfere with Baji Rav’s fleet, nor give convoy to foreign vessels; save that if two or three vessels should accidentally fall in company with the English, in such case Baji Rav’s fleet shall not molest them.’ And Article 2 provided that neither ‘the English, nor their subjects or dependents, shall not freight or put their effects on board any vessels not provided with passes from Baji Rav, but if any unavoidable necessity obliges them to the contrary of this, in case of such effects being seized by Baji Rav’s fleet they shall be restored to the owners, they proving their property therein.' But all restrictions were finally removed by the treaty of Salbye, Article 11 of which laid down that 'The Hon'ble East India Company and the Peshwa mutually agree that the vessels of each shall afford no disturbance to the vessels of the other and the vessels of each shall be allowed access to the ports of the other, where they shall meet with no molestation and the fullest protection shall be reciprocally afforded'.
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It is, however, curious that though the Angria had always been styled a pirate by his European opponents, such an epithet was never publicly applied to the Peshwa's admirals, though their naval practices were not at all different. The reason is not far to seek. The peculiar constitution of the feudal empire of the Marathas with 'its states within the state' led to a misconception of the political status of the Angria family particularly when they were on unfriendly terms with the Peshwa. The inconsistencies resulting from the inalienable hereditary rights claimed and exercised by each feudal family caused great confusion, and foreigners not familiar with such practices in their own country were naturally bewildered when they found that Angria did not respect the Peshwa's passports and the Peshwa's officers similarly took no notice of any safeguard granted by Angria. This led them to believe that Angria was nothing but a rebel against his sovereign, and the depredations which he committed on the sea were, therefore, regarded by them as acts of piracy. It is worth noticing that long after the fall of Gheria Raghuji Angria still claimed the right of seizing foreign boats furnished with the Peshwa's passport.¹
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¹ *Itihas Sangraha, Peshave Daftarantil Sanadapatrantil Mahiti*, pp. 154-5.
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But however crude and fanciful the practices of the Marathas may seem, we have seen that they had the sanction of a well recognised custom behind them and had formed the subject matter of solemn treaties; their legitimacy cannot, therefore, be questioned. At least one English writer, Captain Alexander Hamilton, seems to have frankly acknowledged this, when writing about the sovereignty of the sea claimed by the Chief of Burgara. He observes: 'Our own King was invested with the like sovereignty not only on his own coasts, but on those of France, Holland and Denmark, and could have no greater right than he had, only he was in a better condition to oblige the transgressors of his laws to obedience than he was .’¹ In the first half of the eighteenth century might still constituted the best right in international affairs all the world over.
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¹ Hamilton, *A New Account of the East Indies*, Vol. I, p. 300.
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Another Maratha naval practice that led to so much negotiation and controversy, was that relating to wrecks. By the immemorial custom of the coast a wreck was appropriated by the prince to whose shore it was driven, for he argued that it had been sent by God to his doors. Henry Oxinden was the first English envoy to negotiate about the English ships wrecked on Shivaji’s coast, but that prince was at first reluctant to make any concession on this point. Oxinden wrote to his official superiors at Bombay that his request for the restoration of English wrecks was opposed by Shivaji’s officers. ‘They say that should they grant us our wrecks the French, Dutch and other merchants would demand the same which they cannot graunt being positively against the lawes and constitutions of their country now and formerly the Nisamshay Kingdome by which they are still governed.’² Ultimately Shivaji was prevailed upon to make this concession, but it appears that during the stormy days following his death the Marathas had again reverted to their original custom, for wrecks formed the subject of an Article of the treaty of 1739. Article 9 of that treaty laid down that ‘Any vessel belonging to the English or Bajirav that shall be driven by stress of weather, or other accidents, for shelter on the coast of either jurisdiction, all possible assistance shall be given for the refittal; but if stranded or wrecked on either shore, half of the cargo and vessel shall belong to the Government, and the other half be reserved to the owner’.³
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² Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 88, fols. 145-7, Oxinden’s letter from Rairi, 30 May 1974.
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³ Forrest, *Selections from State Papers, Maratha Series*, Appendix A, p. 703.
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But clear and simple as this arrangement may seem, it did not lead to an immediate termination of troubles. Where financial interests are involved, a point may be easily stretched and the slightest injury to a ship may convert it in the eyes of interested parties into a wreck. So a wreck had to be defined officially, and this was done by Article 2 of the treaty, concluded between the Bombay Government and Peshwa Madhav Rao I on 14 September 1761. This provided that ‘all assistance be afforded in future to any vessel or vessels in distress, having English colours or passes, without subjecting the owners or proprietors thereof to any impediments under the pretence of their being wrecks from the splitting of a sail, the breaking of their masts or yards and such trifling misfortunes; whereas no vessels are to be deemed wrecks but such as are driven ashore, and there break to pieces by stress of weather when the Maharatta officer and the people of the vessels are to join in saving all that is possible, which must be lodged in secure warehouses, and then one-half of what is so saved shall belong to Madarao and the other half to the owners’.¹
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¹ Aitchison, *Treaties, Engagements and Sanads* (1909 edition), Vol. VI, p. 18.
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The Bombay Government secured still better terms for the owners when Raghoba solicited their help against his countrymen of the ministerial party and the Maratha Government gave up all claims to wrecks by Article 14 of the treaty of Purandar. They undertook to restore everything to the owners after all reasonable expenses had been defrayed by them.
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The appropriation of a wreck no doubt caused great hardship to the poor owners, but the custom was shared by the English and the Portuguese with the Marathas and probably originated from prudential considerations to prevent fraud by unscrupulous shipowners. In 1678 a ship was wrecked very near the harbour of Bombay and part of the cargo was saved. The Bombay authorities took compassion on the poor merchants and solicited the permission of their superiors at Surat to restore to them what little of their property had been saved. The reply of the Surat Council not only explains the prevalent custom but places before us its justification. The Surat authorities permitted the suggested restoration after deducting the expenses incurred by the Company in saving the property from the wreck. But they observed that restoration of such property was ‘contrary to the custome of most nations in such cases and which not withstanding may appear severe and somewhat inhumane to add to those (that were too miserable before) a greater weight of unhappiness, yet this law was founded upon very high and prudent reasons, to prevent the severall abuses ill men employed upon shipping might otherwise undertake to act through some sinister ends of benefit acrewing to themselves by the willfull casting away of the ship.¹
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¹ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 89, fol. 134.
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All customs, military, naval or administrative, are based on past experiences. In course of time they become antiquated and are then rejected. But in the period of transition, before their anachronism is detected and before they are finally abolished, they cause hardship and inconvenience. But it will not be just to condemn as inhuman or heartless those who may administer such antiquated laws and pursue such out-of-date customs in a period of transition. The average man hardly perceives the absurdity of the institutions he inherits from his fathers. Such was also the case with the Maratha naval leaders. Judged by the standard of modern times, their actions will undoubtedly appear high-handed, but they were simply observing in their daily official routine the same practices as their European contemporaries in Western India. The freedom of the seas was an idea yet unknown. Both on land and on sea might still constituted the best, if not the only, right. We should not forget that this was the age of ‘Letters of Marque’, and a King’s Commission or letter patent formed the sole difference between piracy and privateering. Piracy was condemned, but privateering was held honourable. One was expected to respect the rights of one’s compatriots, but common usage allowed little consideration for the rights of the foreigner on the high seas, and the more remote a naval captain was from his home, the less was he inclined to be hampered by inconvenient conventions. In Indian waters the Portuguese had set up a precedent which was probably based on customs prevailing on the coast. The precedent was followed by other nations, European and Indian. They challenged the Portuguese claim to the sovereignty of the sea, but the principle of the sovereignty itself remained unchallenged. This led to the numerous controversies and inconsistencies that mark the naval history of the period. But for these inconsistencies the Marathas alone were not responsible.¹ Had their naval power survived, they might have continued or abolished the antiquated claims they had once enforced. But as it is, they can hardly be condemned as pirates. Like the Portuguese naval commanders, Shivaji, Kanhoji Angria and Anand Rao Dhulap could also claim to be sovereigns of the sea, but, saddled with a hereditary system of naval command and incapable of advancing with time, they failed to compete with their English rivals, and their naval efforts seem as ineffectual and ephemeral today as the short-lived reign of terror established on the high seas by pirate chiefs of the west.
c17.62
¹ ‘From the 15th century Denmark levied “Sound dues” on foreign vessels passing through the strait, the Hanse traders and certain others being exempt. In the 17th century quarrels arose on this matter between Denmark and the Neherlands and Sweden, while in modern times the powers found the dues irksome, and in 1843 and 1853 protests were made by the representatives of the United States of America, but Denmark based her right on immemorial custom, and adhered to it.’ It was only from 1 April 1857, that Denmark consented to waive this claim on receipt of a united compensation of 30,476,325 rix-dollars or about £4,000,000. *Encyclopaedia Britannica* (13th edition), Vol. 25, p. 460.