Low Twelve

A SOLDIER OF FORTUNE

Captain George B. Boynton was born in the city of New York in 1842, at 73 Fifth Avenue, just below Fourteenth Street. He received an excellent education, but when the war for the Union broke out, he was seized with patriotic fervor and enlisted in a cavalry regiment belonging to his native State. He fought bravely throughout the war. At the battle of Pittsburg Landing his right cheek was cut open from ear to mouth by a saber cut. He refused to stay in the hospital, but did valiant service with his regiment until the final surrender at Appomattox, when he was honorably discharged with the hundreds of thousands of other Union soldiers.

The taste of war which young Boynton thus gained has never left him. When he returned to his home he meant to do the same as most of his comrades did - settle down to a peaceful life for the rest of his days. But a revolution began in Cuba in 1868, under Carlos Manuel de Cespedes, and Boynton threw all his enthusiasm and energies into it. He became famous as a blockade runner. Despite the alertness of our Government, he got together many valuable cargoes of rifles, ammunition and supplies of war, and was equally successful in dodging the Spanish officials.

It will be remembered that though Cespedes captured the town of Bayamo and the insurgents were victors in a goodly number of battles with the Spanish soldiers, the final result was not favorable to the Cubans. Captain Boynton saw that he would have to wait a long time for the money due him on account of the war supplies he had furnished. While he was meditating over the best course to follow, if indeed any course remained open to him, the Franco-Prussian War broke out. Believing there might be something for him in this new and more formidable conflict, he went to France to look into things. During that struggle he brought several cargoes of war supplies into French ports, and on one occasion came very near losing his life. The Austrian Government was engaged in equipping its army with a new rifle. It had sold 3500 of the old rifles to a London firm, and they were to be delivered on the firm's order at the Vienna arsenal. Captain Boynton opened negotiations with the firm, bought the rifles and sent a ship to Trieste. When the rifles were safely stowed in the vessel, the Austrian authorities, not satisfied with the arrangement, ordered the ship to be detained. When the order was communicated to Captain Boynton, he replied that the officials might go hang, and directed the captain to steam away. Fire was opened upon the defiant vessel and she was struck several times. The wonder is that she was not sunk, but she succeeded in safely reaching the open sea. The daring captain deserved a better fate than to learn upon arriving in the harbor of Bordeaux, in March, 1871, that the Prussians and French had signed a treaty of peace at Versailles only three days before. All the money paid for the guns and for chartering the vessel was a dead loss, which fell upon Captain Boynton.

Having the rifles on his hands, he decided that, instead of trying to deliver them in Cuba, he would dispose of them to Don Carlos, who was stirring up things in Spain, with the object of placing himself upon the throne. The Pretender eagerly seized the chance thus offered, and before entering Spain, in April, 1872, pledged himself to pay a generous sum for the rifles. The delivery was made, and Captain Boynton furnished several cargoes to the Carlists during the uprising, which continued to a greater or less extent for three years. No man could have been more intrepid than he. He bought several vessels in England and chartered others to be used in running the blockade. He had more than one narrow escape from the Spanish men-of-war, and came near being arrested and imprisoned in England. It will be admitted that the captain rendered the most valuable kind of aid to Don Carlos, and the pay which he received for his services was nothing. The infamous pretender, when he saw certain failure before him, not only refused to pay a dollar of his indebtedness to the American, but did his best to get rid of his creditor by having him assassinated. The captain was so indignant that he began figuring how he could suitably punish the swarthy miscreant.

Before a decision was reached, the war flames flashed up in the Balkans. He hastened thither, and fought with his usual bravery on the side of the Servians and Montenegrans against the Turks. Then the Russians mixed in, and Boynton, who had a large supply of war supplies on the vessel which he had chartered to carry him to the scene of hostilities, sold most of them to the Russians, who were so pleased that they allowed him to witness as their guest the battle of Plevna. Then the captain returned to New York, but with eyes and ears open for new fields for his activities.

It looked for a time as if he would have to abandon the profession for which he had formed so strong a liking. The Ten Years War" in Cuba came to an end in 1878, and Spain for the time was triumphant. The Cubans unaided were unable to win: their independence. They had to wait twenty years for Uncle Sam to expel Spain from the fertile island, and to present liberty to the natives, with the doubt very strong on our part whether the Cubans were worth even a portion of American blood that was shed in their behalf.

Captain Boynton was getting on in years, and after his tempestuous experiences, he had about made up his mind to settle down to the quiet business of life, when a quarrel broke out between Chile on the one hand and Peru and Bolivia on the other, because of the claims made by the latter two to the guano and nitrate beds on the borders of the three countries. The murmur of distant war was music in the captain's ears, and its beguilings were not to be resisted. He left New York by the first boat for Valparaiso, and most of his life since then has been spent in South America, where the chronic situation is that of revolution. For the quarter a century following he was rarely absent from that seething continent, and in the history of the almost numberless wars his name will be found writ large.

Captain Boynton, however, engaged in a "side issue" which must not be forgotten. It will be remembered that Arabi Pasha headed an uprising in Egypt against foreign domination. He was defeated and made prisoner. Not deeming it prudent to let him remain in Egypt, where he was
likely to make further trouble, England removed him to Ceylon. The deposed leader had many powerful friends in Alexandria, and with them Captain Boynton made an agreement to take the exile back to that city. If he succeeded, he was to be paid $150,000. The veteran soldier of fortune made secret and skilful arrangements, for surely his experience ought to have qualified him for the dangerous part he had set out to play. In due time he arrived in Colombo, where the first news that greeted him was that the English had released Arabi Pasha. Thus the grand scheme of the captain went up in smoke and he never received a penny for his part in the venture. Ill luck seemed to follow him persistently.

It would require a larger volume than this to tell all the stirring adventures of Captain Boynton in South America. He took a leading part in the uprising against Balmaceda, in Chile, in 1891, and eluded by a hair's breadth the clutches of President Baez in Santo Domingo, and President Hippolyte in Hayti. He made a flying visit to China, where, as was inevitable, he plunged into the fighting which was then going on in different parts of the Flowery Kingdom. If he was unsuccessful in the way of making money, he was marvelously lucky in saving his head.

In the latter part of September, 1893, the captain of the British warship Sirius, while lying in the harbor of Rio Janeiro, saw a tug flying the British flag, heading for the cruiser Aquidaban, the flagship of the fleet under Admiral Mello. This officer had joined his brother admiral, Da Gama, in heading a revolution against the government of President Peixoto of Brazil. The uprising was speedily put down.

The captain of the Sirius was at Rio to protect British citizens and property. That which he saw led him to believe the tug with its English flag meant to attack the rebel warship. He stopped it and demanded an explanation. Captain Boynton was in command and he was taken on board the Sirius. He declared that he was an American, whereupon he was turned over to Captain Picking, of the cruiser Charleston, who telegraphed to Washington for instructions as to what he should do with his prisoner. Boynton vigorously denied that he had intended to attack the Aquidaban, but was going out to Admiral Mello to try to sell him his cargo of war munitions. But Captain Boynton had a torpedo on board and had flown the British flag, which was a violation of the law of nations. Captain Picking was perplexed, and telegraphed to Secretary of the Navy Herbert for further instructions. It looked for a time as if international complications would follow as a result of Captain Boynton's activity. After some delay, the Washington authorities ordered him brought back to the United States, where it was hinted he might be tried on the charge of piracy. He was kept for four days at the Brooklyn navy yard, when the Federal authorities decided to let him go upon his promise that he would keep away from Brazil until the troubles there were over.

In reading of the experiences of this remarkable soldier of fortune - only a small portion of which have been referred to one must wonder how it is he often came so near and yet escaped death by so narrow a margin. A partial explanation lies in the fact that Captain Boynton has been a Free Mason for a good many years. Many incidents in his remarkable career bearing upon this membership cannot be told, for reasons which all brethren will understand. One occurrence, however, will be given and must suffice. At the time he was especially active in Santo Domingo, he was caught "red handed" - that is, trying to deliver munitions of war to the revolutionists. He was tried by drum-head court-martial and sentenced to be shot the next morning at sunrise. Captain Boynton made himself known as a Mason to one of the prominent officials, who was also a Mason. That night he succeeded in "escaping," rejoined his ship, and when the sun rose was sailing merrily away over the Spanish main.