In less than a quarter of an hour after the first hot shot was fired, smoke poured out of the admiral’s main-deck ports; and, two minutes later, it was succeeded by flames.

From that moment the result of the conflict was no longer doubtful.  The pirates, among whom great confusion prevailed, even previously to this disaster, now lost all subordination, and it was soon seen that each man worked for himself, striving to save as much as he could of his ill-gotten plunder.  The governor understood the state of the enemy, and, though prudence could scarcely justify his course, he determined to press him to the utmost.  The Anne and Martha were both brought back through the pass, and the twelve-pounder was taken on board the former, there being room to fight it between her masts.  As soon as this was done, the two craft bore down on the brigs, which were, by this time, a league to leeward of the burning ship, their commanders having carried them there to avoid the effects of the expected explosion.  The admiral and his crew saved themselves in the boats, abandoning nearly all their property, and losing a good many men.  Indeed, when the last boat left the ship, there were several of her people below, so far overcome by liquor, as to be totally helpless.  These men were abandoned too, as were all the wounded, including Waally, who had lost an arm by the fire of the battery.

Neither did the governor like the idea of passing very near the ship, which had now been burning fully an hour.  In going to leeward, he gave her a berth, and it was well he did, for she blew up while the Anne and Martha, as it was, were considerably within a quarter of a mile of her.  The colonists ever afterwards considered an incident connected with this explosion, as a sort of Providential manifestation of the favour of Heaven.  The Martha was nearest to the ship, at the instant of her final disaster, and very many fragments were thrown around her; a few even on her decks.  Among the last was a human body, which was cast a great distance in the air, and fell, like a heavy clod, across the gunwale of the sloop.  This proved to be the body of Waally, one of the arms having been cut away by a shot, three hours before!  Thus perished a constant and most wily enemy of the colony, and who had, more than once, brought it to the verge of destruction, by his cupidity and artifices.

From this moment, the pirates thought little of anything but of effecting their retreat, and of getting out into open water again.  The governor saw this, and pressed them hard.  The twelve-pounder opened on the nearest brig, as soon as her shot would tell; and even the Martha’s swivel was heard, like the bark of a cur that joins in the clamour when a strange dog is set upon by the pack of a village.  The colonists on shore flew into the settlements, to let it be known that the enemy was retreating, when every dwelling poured out its inmates in pursuit.  Even the females now appeared in arms; there being no such incentive to patriotism, on occasions of the kind, as the cry that the battle has been won.  Those whom it might have been hard to get within the sound of a gun, a few hours before, now became valiant, and pressed into the van, which bore a very different aspect, before a retreating foe, from that which it presented on their advance.