6. Philip Ashton: The Fisherman who escaped Pirates to become a Castaway.
In June 1722, Massachusetts’s fisherman Philip Ashton set out as part of the crew of the schooner, Milton into the seas of Nova Scotia. It would be sixteen months before he returned home. For while they were at sea, the Milton and its crew was set upon and captured by a band of pirates under the command of Edward Low. When Philip and his crewmates refused to join them, the pirates locked them in the hold and kept them as captives.
For nine months, Philip unwillingly accompanied the pirates while they plundered the seas of the Atlantic and along the coast of South America. Finally, an opportunity for escape presented itself. In March 1723, the pirates stopped for water on Roatan, a small island off the coast of Honduras. Philip volunteered to help-and once ashore, made a break for freedom into the jungle. The pirates eventually gave up looking for him and left the island without him, leaving Philip marooned and alone.
Philip had no tools or food and lacked the knowledge of how to trap and kill animals with his bare hands. So he made do. He managed to make a crude shelter and ate fruit and raw turtle eggs to survive. This meager diet, however, was woefully inadequate. Then in November 1723, another man arrived on the island. He was a British man who had escaped the Spanish. Philip’s new companion disappeared after a few days- but he left behind a knife and other vital supplies. Philip could now kill and cook tortoises. The chance encounter saved Philip’s life.
Finally, after a further seven months in which fever and the extreme heat nearly finished him off, a British ship rescued Philip in June 1724. On his return home, he wrote a popular book about the adventures, which were published in Boston in 1725. However, many people doubted the truth of Philip’s story- because it sounded uncannily like that of the recently released Robinson Crusoe.