Surgeon.

Surgeon-General in Morgan's fleet which carried the buccaneers to the Spanish Main. He wrote an account of the disastrous explosion on board the Oxford during a banquet given to Morgan and the buccaneer commanders on January 2nd, 1669, off Co...

Surgeon.

Surgeon-General in Morgan's fleet which carried the buccaneers to the Spanish Main. He wrote an account of the disastrous explosion on board the Oxford during a banquet given to Morgan and the buccaneer commanders on January 2nd, 1669, off Cow Island to the south of Hispaniola, at which the details were being discussed for an attack on Cartagena.

Browne writes: "I was eating my dinner with the rest when the mainmasts blew out and fell upon Captains Aylett and Bigford and others and knocked them on the head. I saved myself by getting astride the mizzenmast." Only Morgan and those who sat on his side of the dinner-table were saved.

Browne, who certainly was not biased towards Morgan in his accounts of his exploits, is one of the few narrators who gives the buccaneer Admiral credit for moderation towards his prisoners, particularly women.