VIEWPOINTS : Abandoning Ship Can Be the Best Option : Modern Workers May Have Something to Learn From History: Sometimes, Quitters Are Winners

Pity poor J. Biggs. As an officer on the ill-fated 1806 Miranda expedition to liberate Venezuela from Spanish domination, he started with high hopes on a grand adventure. Alas. These hopes soon soured, and he found himself saddled with a megalomaniac and misguided boss on a poorly advised enterprise. What’s a loyal employee to do?

From my cursory studies of early Latin America, I had always thought Francisco Miranda was the classic tragic figure. Stubbornly intent on accomplishing his noble mission, he fell short for no other reason, I believed, than the uncooperative hand of fate. But a chance discovery of an 1809 volume in an Adirondack rare book store introduced me to J. Biggs, a second lieutenant on the mission, and forced me to reevaluate that unkind hand.

A reading of “The history of Don Francisco de Miranda’s attempt to effect a revolution in South America, in a series of letters. By a gentleman who was an officer under that general,” a comprehensive if ungainly title for a book, reveals that Miranda was simply a lousy manager who was intent on forcing his project onto the unwilling. Above all, he was plagued by his inability to maintain order among his own staff. His admirable persistence proved a poor substitute for skill and careful planning, leaving J. Biggs in an unenviable situation.

Biggs began full of optimism on his secretive adventure. On his first day out, he wrote to his correspondent that he faced unknown dangers (he wasn’t entirely sure where they were headed or who was financing them), “but we presume our conductor knows what he is doing and will lead us to great exploits.” This presumption was shortly challenged. He wrote two weeks later: “I wish I had not to inform you of (a) disagreeable occurrence; one, which I am sorry to say, does little credit to our chief, and may materially injure, if not ruin our enterprise.”

It seems that Miranda initially had two colonels serving under him on his expedition, one of whom, Colonel Lewis, also served as the captain of their ship, the Leander. There was some friction between the two senior officers, and when Colonel Armstrong was found abusing Lewis’ servant, a row broke out. Miranda came to Armstrong’s defense with little attempt at reconciliation but only increased the bad blood between his officers and polarized the rest of the crew.

Although the mission depended in large part on Lewis’ expertise, Miranda made no attempt to smooth their disagreements. Biggs wrote in April that Miranda had “taken it into his head that he is a sailor as well as a general and a philosopher, and he seems to think that a ship may be forced to make headway in a calm, or beat windward with the greatest facility, against strong currents and light winds; and because the Leander ridicules his new hypothesis in not doing either of these impossibilities, he has become impatient, ill tempered and abusive, scolding from morning till night at the poor navigators for what he calls their inattention, neglect and disaffection.”

Disaster struck when the Spanish captured two smaller ships that had joined the Leander at Port au Prince, with great loss of weapons, officers and enlisted men. True to style, Miranda avoided the matter afterward, Biggs noted, and did not “enable us to understand why his schemes had been thus blasted in the bud.”

After wandering the Caribbean for three long months in search of replacement supplies, the men finally landed on “The Main” at La Vela de Coro, Venezuela. This was to be the moment of glory. Miranda was firmly convinced that his mere appearance would cause the people of Venezuela to rise up en masse and support his march on to Caracas. One of the more pathetic incidents in history of heroism followed. Instead of greeting him as the liberator, the coastal residents fled, leaving Miranda to occupy an abandoned town. As Biggs wrote: “They had no thought of accepting our proffer of liberty, and we could not oblige them to take it.” Miranda’s marketing people had clearly failed him. An advancing Spanish army shortly forced them to evacuate from the coast.

The army retreated to Aruba, where illness raged, insolence flared and courts-martial were staged “for want of something else to do.” What were J. Biggs’ options in such dire circumstances? Not many. He vented his frustration through increasing sarcasm in his letters, but this didn’t effect much change.

Mutiny was discussed, then abandoned, because “we prefer more suffering, rather than increase the contempt and ridicule of our enemies and the world, by cutting one another’s throats.” There was always the hope of the next packet, which would bring money and support from the English.

Finally, at Port of Spain in Trinidad, men began abandoning ship in dribs and drabs, leaving Miranda without an army. Miranda attempted to stop the outflow through various means, but was unsuccessful and finally undone by his poor financial management.

Our Biggs also left ship, noting that he sincerely hoped “never to put my foot on her decks again.” He made his way back to the United States, without receiving payment for his one year under the mast.

What lesson can be drawn from the misadventure? It’s a simple one, but antithetical to the instructions found on locker room walls and in most corporate how-to libraries: Sometimes, quitters are winners.

There comes a point where it is obvious that one’s leader cannot be swayed from lurching toward disaster, be it a plan to establish a republic or to force on the market a pet product or idea. And in some instances there is no higher authority to appeal to, no member of the board with a sympathetic ear.

When dangerously dwindling resources still refuse to shake the leader’s undeserved high esteem of himself, the cause may be beyond salvage.

While failure is to be expected and, as others have noted, is often a welcome tonic to an organization, it may be prudent to occasionally inquire, in Biggs’ words, “whether (one’s) failure should not be ascribed more to his own mistakes and perversity than to his want of force.”

As a final note, Miranda finally did return to Venezuela in 1810, but he did so under the long shadow cast by the Liberator, Simon de Bolivar. Bolivar appointed Miranda dictator in 1811, but even this glory was short-lived. Resented for surrendering the revolutionary army to Spanish forces the following year, Miranda was handed over to the royalists. He died in a Spanish jail in 1816.