Captain Peter McQuay (also M'Quay, McQuie, M'Quie) sailed a ship called the "Thomas", registered in Liverpool, England. He was originally from Minnigaff, in the County of Galloway, Scotland, married Elizabeth Robinson in Liverpool in 1787 and they had a son there called Peter baptised in March 1793. Four years later, The Marine List printed a brief sentence of news "The Thomas, M’Quie, from Africa to the West Indies, is cut off on the Middle Passage." (Lloyd's List, No. 2975, Friday 15 December 1797.)
There are many related reports, from personal diaries to modern academic texts. One writer quotes the actual words of Captain Peter giving a detailed description of a battle between his ship and a French Republic corvette early in 1797, saying, "M’Quie noted sorrowfully, 'What must my feelings be when I inform you that my surgeon, Mr James Beatty, was shot through the head and died instantaneously at my feet on the quarter deck.'" Another document comments on more personal attributes saying that the ship belonged to Mr Thomas Clarke and was "commanded by a very brave, respectable, and intelligent man, Captain Peter M’Quie".
The day that the Captain died was 2 September 1797. The ship was only a few days away from its destination and the crew were busy having breakfast. The armourer who was in charge of the weapons had left the secure chest unlocked. Some watchful women slaves noticed and smuggled the arms down to the captive men slaves below decks who freed themselves, launched a surprise attack, overpowered the crew during the ensuing fight, killed the Captain and took control of the ship.
There was a range of outcomes for the crew. Firstly, many were killed that morning in the conflict, butchered afterwards, or forced overboard. Twelve men escaped in the ship's stern boat. Nine sailors evaded death because the Africans wanted their sailing expertise to turn the ship around and take them all home. Four of those subsequently escaped in the ship's longboat, leaving just five crew on board the "Thomas". After a strange turn of events the Africans also took possession of an American ship, got drunk and confused from consuming its cargo of rum, then were abandoned by the remaining crew of the "Thomas" who sailed away to safety on the American ship.
So what about the two small boats that had escaped from the "Thomas": The four men in the longboat reached land, although they were barely alive after six days without food or water. In contrast, the stern boat was at sea for five-and-a-half weeks and only two of the twelve men survived. One description alluded to "the most dreadful hardships" whilst another blamed "exposure and lack of provisions". However, a letter to the Times newspaper quotes a naval chronicle for the year 1807 and says that the men were involved in a gruesome process of drawing lots, slaughter and cannibalism for survival. ("Points from Letters" Times, 26 January 1938, page 8. The Times Digital Archive, http://tinyurl.galegroup.com/tinyurl/8t5fZ4.)
That sounds very dramatic, tragic and shocking although the concept was familiar from poem and film plots. What was actually a greater surprise to me was a report that Captain Peter "who had been more than once attacked in the course of former voyages, had, as he thought for the better protection of the ship, during the voyage trained his male slaves to the use of arms, so that if the Thomas should be attacked they might help him at least repel boarders." ("The Slave Trade - Middle Passage" Chapter 14 in Lang, J., "The Land of the Golden Trade [West Africa]" 1910.) He had seen an opportunity but misjudged the threats, or mismanaged the risks, and paid with his life.