Peter Easton, on one expedition, had plundered thirty ships in St. John's and held Richard Whitbourne prisoner, releasing him on the condition that Whitbourne go to England and obtain a pardon for Easton.

Born near Teignmouth in Devon, England, Whitbourne had been apprenticed to a merchant adventurer of Southampton, and had sailed extensively around Europe and twice to Newfoundland.

After serving in a ship of his own against the Great Armada under Lord Admiral Thomas Howard, 1st Earl of Suffolk, he has spent the past quarter-century in cod fishing off Newfoundland.

By the time the pardon is granted, however, Easton will have moved on to the Barbary Coast to harass the Spanish.