Captured ship: St John the Evangelist or St Jean Evangeliste of Marseilles, Raymond...

HCA 30/1066

1656-1665

Captured ship: St John the Evangelist or St Jean Evangeliste of Marseilles, Raymond Constant master, Guillaume Roux otherwise William Roux purser.

History: a French ship, bound from Marseilles to Hamburg via Alicante, also calling at Malaga and Cadiz, where the Jews Jacob Brandon (or Brandão), Joseph da Costa and Moises Abandina were taken on board as passengers for Amsterdam, having arrived there from Salé otherwise Sallee, on the Barbary Coast [near Rabat, in Morocco]. Apart from a silver bar possibly taken on board at Cadiz, the ship’'s cargo comprised cotton wool, galls, Marseilles waters, almonds, capers, soap, rice and prunellas, olives, verdigris, sal ammoniac, jujubes, aniseed and marble stones. Almost lost in bad weather at Portland roads on 13 October 1665, the ship was taken leaving the roads by HMS Elizabeth, Robert Robinson commanding, and brought into Plymouth.

Documents: 9 bundles of ship's papers, private archives and mail in transit, as follows:-

• Bundle 1: 1/1-1/40: Bundle of papers of the St Jean Evangeliste and her voyage to Hamburg in 1665, in the hand of Guillaume Roux, and several bills of lading with holes showing that they were once filed on a thong (French). Marked A 1-38.
• Bundle 2: 2/1-2/20: Bundle of papers of the St Jean Evangeliste and her voyage to Hamburg in 1665, in the hand of Guillaume Roux, and a few more bills of lading also with holes showing that they were once filed on a thong, but not the same thong as those in Bundle 1 (French). Marked B 1-18 (no. 7 is not present).
• Bundle 3: 3/1-3/58: Bundle of papers [a masters' archive] of the St Jean Evangeliste and her voyage to Hamburg in 1665, in the hand of Guillaume Roux, including a muster list; also to previous voyages, under François Grimaud to Alexandria in 1663; a voyage from Constantinople [undated], and an unknown voyage under Captain Montagnard. Papers also include poems, annotated playing cards (an ace of diamonds and a 3 of hearts), recipes for medicinal remedies, etc., most in the hand of Guillaume Roux, presumably once contained in an internal wrapper marked ‘Songs, love letters, receipts (recipes?) and other inconsiderable papers’; papers relating to a voyage in 1654 of the St Fernand, under Louis de Paul of Marseilles, with cargo from Alexandria, going from Malta to Leghorn, but forced by bad weather to put in at Sardinia and make for Marseilles instead of Leghorn (copy, written by Roux); an original letter from Françoise Loury, Marseilles, 6 August [...] to her husband Etienne Loury on the galley La Croix de Malte, and relating to the ship Le Saint Sacrement, Philip Vidal, captain, on a voyage to Alexandria, 19 November 1659 (French); (now numbered 1-58). These three bundles probably relate to material once contained in the following three wrappers, or the wrappers which may relate to Bundle 4: a) papers relating to Guillaume Roux, shown to him at his examination at Plymouth on 16 October 1665. b) papers relating to Guillaume Roux, shown to him at his examination at Plymouth on 20 October 1665, with endorsement showing that bills of lading and other papers in the parcel were put on a file, as were ‘the blue book and papers therein’. c) bills of lading shown to Raymond Constant and the bills of lading and other papers shown to Guillaume Roux at their examination at Plymouth on 20 October 1665, with an endorsement showing that the parcel’s contents included letters, receipts, lists of the men, and ‘inconsiderable’ papers, but nothing concerning the lading (presumably some of the papers described in the above internal wrapper).
• Bundle 4: 4/1-4/12: papers of Guillaume Roux, including draft and/or copy letters written by him 13 and 15 August – 11 September 1665 and undated, to various addressees, including Mme Anne Forniere; an original letter from Joseph Fournier, Toulon, 25 June 1665, to his mother Anne Fournier, and original letters to Guillaume Roux, from Arles, 7 May 1663, and Cairo, 1 and 5 August 1664 (French); (now numbered 1-12). These papers might once have been contained in Bundle 3 above, or in either of the following two wrappers: a) letters and papers shown to Guillaume Roux at his examination at Plymouth on 20 October 1665. b) papers shown to Guillaume Roux at his examination at Plymouth on 25 October 1665.
• Bundle 5: 5/1-5/104: papers, the personal archive of Jacob Brandon, c.1656-1665, including papers relating to ships Elizabeth or Isabela; Lindeboom, Jan Pransen Flaeming, master, and Santa Maria (in Arabic, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish). Brandon was travelling to Amsterdam to present his accounts.
• Bundle 6: 6/1-6/99: mail in transit from Salé, with many letters dated 9 September 1665, mostly to Amsterdam, presumably carried by Jacob Brandon for distributing there (Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish). These bundles may correspond to papers in the following wrapper, except that the papers said to be in Hebrew are not present: a) letters and papers shown to Guillaume Roux, Jacob Brandon, Joseph da Costa and Moises Abandina at their examinations at Plymouth on 25 and 26 October 1665 (internal wrapper states letters written to Jacob Brandon at Salé and other papers, some in Hebrew), most relating to a Dutch ship, the St Mary).
• Bundle 7: 7/1-7/5: letters (some fragments) to Joseph da Costa mostly from Jacob Brandon, Asilah and Tetuan, June 1665 and undated (Portuguese); (now numbered 1-5). These letters presumably relate to papers in the following wrapper: a) papers shown to Joseph da Costa at his examination at Plymouth on 25 October 1665.
• Bundle 8: 8/1-13: manifest, unknown ship, Salé, 9 September 1665, and a file of papers of Jacob Brandon, 1659 and undated, including a manifest for the ship São João or San Juan, Pedro Volckerse, captain, sailing from Salé; also mail in transit from Marseilles, 12-31 July 1665 to La Rochelle, Cadiz, ?Calais, etc., presumably carried by Guillaume Roux for distribution (Dutch, French, Portuguese); (all now numbered 1-13). These papers may once have been contained in the following wrapper: c) letters and papers shown to Jacob Brandon and Guillaume Roux at their examinations at Plymouth on 29 November and 5 December 1665.
• Bundle 9: 9/1-9/3: presumably relating to the St Jean Evangeliste or Jacob Brandon, but as yet unplaced: 9/1: fragment of document (Italian), n.d., perhaps used at the back of a file with two thong holes. 9/2: fragment of document (Spanish), n.d. 9/3: a manifest (Dutch) for an unknown ship, n.d.

Papers brought together from HCA 30/223, HCA 30/224, HCA 30/226, HCA 30/640, HCA 30/648, HCA 32/1822 and HCA 32/1845 in 2017

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