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- July 2007
Edward Teach (c. 1680 – November 22, 1718), better known as Blackbeard, was a notorious English pirate in the Caribbean Sea during the early 18th century, a period of time referred to as the Golden Age of Piracy. His best known vessel was the Queen Anne's Revenge, which is believed to have run aground near Beaufort Inlet, North Carolina in 1718. Popular history claims that he had as many as fourteen wives, most of them common-law, but documentation is lacking. His last wife was Mary Ormond (or Ormand) of Bath, North Carolina, to whom he was married for only a short while. A painting of him hangs in Van Der Veer House (ce. 1790), in Bath.
Blackbeard often fought, or simply showed himself wearing a big feathered tricorn, and having multiple swords, knives, and pistols at his disposal. It was reported in the General History of the Pirates that he had hemp and lighted matches woven into his enormous black beard during battle. Accounts of people who saw him fighting say that they thought he "looked like the devil" with his fearsome face and the smoke cloud around his head. This image, which he cultivated, has made him the premier image of the seafaring pirate. (more...)
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- August 2007
Aruj or Oruc Reis (Turkish: Oruç Reis) (c. 1474 – 1518) was a Turkish privateer and Ottoman Bey (Governor) of Algiers and Beylerbey (Chief Governor) of the West Mediterranean. He was born on the island of Midilli (Lesbos) in today's Greece and was killed in a battle with the Spaniards in Algeria. He became known as Baba Aruj or Baba Oruç (Father Aruj) when he transported large numbers of Mudejar refugees from Spain to North Africa; in the Christian countries of the Mediterranean he was known as Barbarossa, which meant Redbeard in Italian. He was the older brother of the famous Turkish privateer and Ottoman admiral Hayreddin Barbarossa.
Oruç was one of four brothers who were born in the 1470s on the island of Lesbos (Λέσβος) to their Muslim Turkish father, Yakup Ağa, and his Christian Greek wife, Katerina. All four brothers became seamen, engaged in marine affairs and international sea trade. Oruç was the first brother to be involved in seamanship, soon joined by the youngest brother Ilyas. Hızır initially helped their father in the pottery business, but later obtained a ship of his own and also began a career at sea. Ishak, the eldest, remained on Mytilene and was involved with the financial affairs of the family business. The other three brothers initially worked as sailors, but then turned privateers in the Mediterranean, counteracting the privateering of the Knights of St. John of the Island of Rhodes. (more...)
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- September 2007
Sir Francis Drake, Vice Admiral, (c. 1540 – January 27, 1596) was an English privateer, navigator, slave trader, politician and civil engineer of the Elizabethan era. Drake was knighted by the queen in 1581. He was second-in-command of the English fleet against the Spanish Armada in 1588. He died of dysentery after unsuccessfully attacking San Juan, Puerto Rico in 1596.
His exploits were semi-legendary and made him a hero to the English but to the Spaniards he was equated with the devil. He was known as "El Dragón" (an obvious play on his family name) for his actions. King Philip II offered a reward of 20,000 ducats (about $10 million by 2007 standards) for his life. Many a city in the 16th century was ransomed for less. (more...)
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- October 2007
Captain Edward 'Ned' Low (also Lowe or Loe) was a notorious pirate during the latter days of the Golden Age of Piracy, in the early 18th century. A thief and a scoundrel from a young age, he was born into poverty in Westminster, London in around 1690, and moved to Boston, Massachusetts as a young man. Following the death of his wife during childbirth in late 1719, he became a pirate two years later, operating off the coasts of New England, the Azores, and in the Caribbean.
He captained a number of ships, usually maintaining a small fleet of three or four. Low and his pirate crews captured at least a hundred ships during his short career of piracy, burning most of them. Although he was only active for three years, Low is notorious as one of the most vicious pirates of the age, violently torturing his victims. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, in his work The Green Flag, described Low as "savage and desperate", and a man of "amazing and grotesque brutality". His demise, in around 1724, has been the subject of speculation, with many differing theories. (more...)
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- November 2007
Anne Bonny (c. Born on 1700-1705 Died? on April 25, 1720 ?) was an Irish pirate who plied her trade in the Caribbean.
While in the Bahamas, Anne Bonny began mingling with pirates at the local drinking establishments, and met the pirate John "Calico Jack" Rackham, with whom she shortly thereafter had an affair. Rackham offered to buy her from her husband in a divorce-by-purchase, but James Bonny refused. He complained to the governor, who brought her before the court, naked, and sentenced her to be flogged and to return to her legal husband. Anne Bonny and Rackham instead eloped.
She disguised herself as a man in order to join Rackham's crew aboard the Revenge. (Pirate articles often barred women from the ship.) The couple stole a sloop at anchor in the harbor and set off to sea, putting together a crew and taking several prizes. She took part in combat alongside the males, and the accounts describing her exploits present her as competent, effective in combat, and someone who gained the respect of her fellow pirates. (more...)
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- December 2007
René Trouin, Sieur du Gué, usually called Réné Duguay-Trouin, (Saint Malo, 10 June 1673 -- 1736) was a famous French corsair of Saint-Malo. He had a brilliant privateering and naval career and eventually became "Lieutenant-General of the Naval Armies of the King" (i.e. admiral) (French:Lieutenant-Général des armées navales du roi), and a Commander in the Order of Saint-Louis.
At sixteen he joined the navy aboard the Trinité, under Captain Legoux, on the 16 December 1690. The Trinité subsequently captured the François Samuel and Seven Stars of Scotland. Duguay-Trouin displayed such bravery that he was handed command of the Danycan, soon after he turned 18.
On the 6 June 1692, the King handed him command of a forty-gun ship, the Hermine. He captured five ships at the entrance of the Channel.
Louis XIV handed him a sword of honour in 1694, and made him a nobleman in 1709, with the motto Dedit haec insignia virtus ("Bravery gave him nobility"). At the time, he had captured 16 warships and over 300 merchantmen from the English and Dutch. (more...)
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- January 2008
Sir Admiral Henry Morgan (Hari Morgan in Welsh), (ca. 1635 – August 25, 1688) was a Welsh privateer, who made a name in the Caribbean as a leader of buccaneers. He was among Wales's most notorious and successful privateers.
In 1667, he was commissioned by Modyford to capture some Spanish prisoners in Cuba in order to discover details of the threatened attack on Jamaica. Collecting ten ships with five hundred men, Morgan landed on the island and captured and sacked Puerto Principe, then went on to take the fortified and well-garrisoned town of Portobelo, Panama. It is said that Morgan's men used captured Jesuits as human shields in taking the third, most difficult fortress.
The governor of Panama, astonished at this daring adventure, attempted in vain to drive out the invaders, and finally Morgan consented to evacuate the place on the payment of a large ransom. These exploits had considerably exceeded the terms of Morgan's commission and had been accompanied by frightful cruelties and excesses, but the governor of Jamaica endeavoured to cover the whole under the necessity of allowing the English a free hand to attack the Spanish whenever possible. In London the Admiralty publicly claimed ignorance about this, whilst Morgan and his crew returned to their base at Port Royal, Jamaica, to celebrate.
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- February 2008
Gráinne Ní Mháille (c. 1530 – c. 1603), also known as Granuaile or Gráinne Mhaol, known in English as Gráinne O'Malley or Grace O'Malley, is an important figure in Irish legend but was in fact a larger-than-life figure from 16th century Irish history. O'Malley is sometimes known as "The Sea Queen Of Connaught". (Left in picture)
Many folk stories and legends about O'Malley have survived since her actual days of pirating and trading. There are also traditional songs and poems about her.
A widespread legend concerns an incident at Howth, which apparently occurred in 1576. During a trip from Dublin, O'Malley attempted to pay a courtesy visit to Howth Castle, home of the 8th Baron Howth. However, she was informed that the family was at dinner and the castle gates were closed against her. In retaliation, she abducted the Earl's son and heir, the 10th Baron. He was eventually released when a promise was given to keep the gates open to unexpected visitors, and to set an extra place at every meal. Lord Howth gave O'Malley a ring as pledge on the agreement. The ring remains in the possession of a descendant of Gráinne O'Malley, and at Howth Castle today, this agreement is still honoured by the Gaisford St. Lawrence family, descendants of the Baron. (more...)
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- March 2008
Stede Bonnet (c. 1688 – December 10, 1718) was an early 18th-century Barbadian pirate, sometimes called "the gentleman pirate" because he was a moderately wealthy landowner before turning to a life of crime. Bonnet was born into a wealthy English family on the island of Barbados, and inherited the family estate after his father's death in 1694. Bonnet decided to turn to piracy in the summer of 1717. He bought a sailing vessel, named it Revenge, and traveled with his paid crew along the American eastern seaboard, capturing other vessels and burning other Barbadian ships.
After arriving in Nassau, Bonnet met the infamous pirate Blackbeard. Before separating in December 1717, Blackbeard and Bonnet plundered and captured merchant ships along the East Coast. After Bonnet failed to capture the Protestant Caesar, his crew abandoned him to join Blackbeard aboard the Queen Anne's Revenge. Bonnet stayed on Blackbeard's ship as a guest, and did not command a crew again until summer 1718, when he was pardoned by North Carolina governor Charles Eden and received clearance to go privateering against Spanish shipping. Bonnet was tempted to resume his piracy, but did not want to lose his pardon, so he adopted the alias "Captain Thomas" and changed his ship's name to Royal James. He had returned to piracy by July 1718.
In late August and September, Colonel William Rhett, with the authorization of South Carolina governor Robert Johnson, led a naval expedition against pirates on the river. Rhett and Bonnet's men fought each other for hours, but the outnumbered pirates ultimately surrendered. Bonnet wrote to Governor Johnson to ask for clemency, but Johnson endorsed the judge's decision, and Bonnet was hanged in Charleston on December 10, 1718. (more...)
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