Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Jenkins, Robert
JENKINS, ROBERT (fl. 1731–1738), master-mariner, was in 1731 master of the brig Rebecca, from Jamaica to London, when, on 9 April, off Havana, he was boarded by a Spanish guarda-costa commanded by Captain Fandino, who had a widespread reputation for cruelty. On this occasion he plundered the Rebecca, took from her all that was of any value, cut off one of Jenkins's ears, and so left her, ‘with the intent,’ it was believed, ‘that she should perish in her passage’ (Rear-admiral Stewart to the governor of Havana, 12 Sept. 1731). The Rebecca, however, arrived in the Thames on 11 June, and Jenkins, whose case excited some little attention, was shortly afterwards permitted to state it before the king. The admiral in the West Indies specifically mentioned it among other outrages for which he demanded satisfaction from the governor of Havana; but it was then dropped, till revived again in the political agitation of 1738, when Jenkins was examined before a committee of the House of Commons. His story lost nothing in the telling; he produced something which he asserted was the ear that had been cut or torn off, and being asked ‘what were his feelings when he found himself in the hands of such barbarians,’ he replied, ‘I committed my soul to God, and my cause to my country.’ The report roused the utmost public indignation. ‘We have no need of allies to enable us to command justice,’ said Pulteney on 15 May; ‘the story of Jenkins will raise volunteers.’ It certainly was an important factor in bringing on the war with Spain in the following year. The popular exaggeration and political excitement not unnaturally produced a reaction, and it afterwards came to be questioned whether the story was not a fable, or whether Jenkins, if he had lost an ear, had not lost it in the pillory. The evidence, however, is distinct that as early as June 1731 it was publicly stated that Jenkins's ear was cut off by the captain of a Spanish guarda-costa (Gent. Mag. i. 265), and that the commander-in-chief in the West Indies referred to the outrage in a formal letter of 12 Sept. 1731, although no attempt to make political capital out of it was made till 1738. Nothing more is known of Jenkins. His barbarous captor, Fandino, was himself captured, after a desperate resistance, by Captain Thomas Frankland (1717?–1784) [q. v.] on 4 June 1742, and sent a prisoner to England. Mirabeau effectively quoted Jenkins's case when arguing before the French assembly (20–2 May 1790) against the policy of entrusting a popular assembly with the power of declaring peace or war (Discours de … Mirabeau, p. 48).
[Lord Mahon's Hist. of England (cab. ed.), ii. 268; Engl. Hist. Rev. iv. 741. England's Triumph, or Spanish Cowardice … by Capt. Charles [sic] Jenkins, who has too sensibly felt the effects of Spanish tyranny, 1739, is a catchpenny chapbook, in which no reference is made to Jenkins's case, except in a worthless frontispiece.]