Folktale Friday: Captain Kidd

Allen & Ginter (American, Richmond, Virginia) Captain Kidd, Burying Treasure, from the Pirates of the Spanish Main series (N19) for Allen & Ginter Cigarettes, ca. 1888 American, Commercial color lithograph; Sheet: 1 1/2 x 2 3/4 in. (3.8 x 7 cm) The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Jefferson R. Burdick Collection, Gift of Jefferson R. Burdick (Burdick 201, N19.9) http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/search-the-collections/408721

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From The Hundredth Town by Harriette Merrifield Forbes, 1889, pp. 12

Tradition affirms that Captain Kidd concealed a large portion of his ill-gotten booty somewhere along the inhospitable shores of the Hobomak, and so vigilantly has it been guarded by the infernal powers, that not a soul has caught a glimpse of it since. Not that no attempt has been made to recover it from such infamous stockholders, and give it a more honorable investment. Many a deep-sunk pit would you find along the desolate shores of the pond, dug, about the charmed hour of midnight, by two ignorant day-laborers, while a third stood guard, holding a drawn sword and gun charged with a silver bullet, and a fourth marched close to the limit of the magic circle, reading most reverently from a big family Bible which he carried perpendicularly before him; thus, by weapons carnal and weapons spiritual, bidding defiance to the Spirit of Darkness. But, with all their midnight financiering, the gold pieces were never observed to twinkle particularly bright through the interstices of their silk purses.

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From “A Look at Westborough’s Historic Past,” The Community Advocate, June 27, 1997.

According to Jacqueline Tidman (former historical librarian): “another area – this one off Flanders Road – has been said to be where one of Kidd’s confederates, ‘Pirate Joe,’ buried some of his ill-gotten booty.”

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