Background
He was born c. 1580 in Devonshire, England, United Kingdom. The details of his early life are obscure.
He was born c. 1580 in Devonshire, England, United Kingdom. The details of his early life are obscure.
There is no information about his education.
At the age of twenty-three he was considered "sufficient Mariner for Captaine" of an expedition to northern Virginia. This voyage was planned by Richard Hakluyt and "sundry of the chiefest Merchants of Bristoll, " who profited by Gosnold's experience and before proceeding secured a trading patent from Sir Walter Raleigh. Pring sailed from Milford Haven on April 10, 1603, in command of the Speedwell and the Discoverer, vessels of fifty and twenty-six tons, laden with trucking goods. He made land at Penobscot Bay, coasted westward into Cape Cod Bay, and landed at Plymouth Harbor, to which he gave the name of Whitson Bay. Here he built a barricado, planted test seeds, collected sassafras and cedar.
On October 2 he landed again at Bristol and reported a successful voyage. In 1604 Martin Prinx sailed as master of the Olive Branch on Charles Leigh's unfortunate expedition to colonize Guiana. Leigh accused him of inciting the crew to mutiny, but another member of the expedition reported only that Prinx became discontented and returned by a Dutch ship. If this was Martin Pring, as seems probable, the occurrence did not prejudice his reputation, for in 1606 he was appointed by Sir John Popham to serve as master under Captain Hanham on an expedition sent to join Challons on the coast of Virginia. Failing to find Challons, who had fallen into the hands of the Spanish, they explored the coast, of which Pring made a chart and a report.
In 1621 Pring made a contribution of ten marks to a fund to be used for "some good worke to be begun in Virginia, " in return for which he was made a freeman of the Virginia Company and given two hundred acres of Virginia land. In 1610 Pring was employed to survey Bristol Channel. In 1613 he appears as master in the service of the East India Company, where in 1619 he attained the rank of commander of naval forces.
In 1621 Pring returned to England where he narrowly escaped a Privy-Council trial in consequence of his private trading and his pro-Dutch policy. Under this cloud he quitted the service of the Company in 1623.
Pring died in 1626.
Martin Pring served with distinction in East India Company as a commander of naval forces and launched a policy of friendship with the Dutch in order to secure a joint monopoly against the Spanish and Portuguese. He was responsible for the seizure of two semi-piratical ships belonging to Lord Rich, who appealed the matter to the Privy Council, that was one of the chief causes of the quarrel which resulted in the capture of the Virginia Company by the Rich-Sandys faction. Pring became notably successful, when he took command of the 300-ton privateer Charlesin, as it brought him a Spanish man-of-war of about 30 guns. Besides, he was first, who landed at Plymouth Harbor, to which he gave the name of Whitson Bay.
In 1623 he was elected a member of the Merchant Venturers Society of Bristol.
He had wife Elizabeth and six children.
