hey who wants to hear about 18th century pirates remember them/!

Each favorite gets a pirate fact

1. There have been two authenticated pirate wrecks found - Bellamy’s ship off Cape Cod and Blackbeard’s in North Carolina

2. Sam Bellamy was like the richest pirate when he died. It’s going to take them decades to go through the wreckage

3. Pirates loved to wear fancy clothes, like upper society clothes. It wasn’t uncommon for them to take nice clothes from those they encountered

4. Pirates lived in a democracy

5. Pirates weren’t racist, but they also weren’t anti-racist (people love to say they were anti-racist, but pirates were also capitalists and sometimes they freed slaves, sometimes they sold them)

6. When they “acquired” new ships, pirates would remove the officer cabins. Everyone, captain included, slept on hammocks together

7. Pirates weren’t violent. They preferred not to use violence, and used the threat of violence over violence. Now some, like Charles Vane, did like to torture people!

8. Spencer Reid sadly was not a pirate

9. Pirates were a huge threat to transatlantic trade and hurt colonialism, which is why I love them

10. Pirates didn’t bury their treasure

11. They spent it, I’m sure you can guess on what

12. Not strictly related to pirates but the reason those at sea drank so much is because the alcohol wouldn’t go bad, but water would

13. The golden age of piracy comes directly from the wars in Europe that spilled over to the Atlantic and the privateers that the British and Spanish hired

14. Once the Queen Anne’s war ended, those privateers were suddenly out of work, so they turned to piracy

15. We tend to think or piracy as the Caribbean, but there were several different active ports of piracy through the 17 & 18th century. Madagascar was a big one in the 1600s when pirates/privateers also went after British trade with India

16. This was actually a big catalyst in the British foray into cracking down on piracy - it really threatened trade with India and the British couldn’t survive without all the wonderful things India produces

17. Colonies LOVED pirates

18. The British had a nice rule that colonists couldn’t buy anything from the Spanish but it took forever for these goods to get there and they were expensive so they preferred smuggled goods which for there faster and were cheap

19. i’m hangry

20. There is a difference between pirates and privateers. Privateers were “legal” but they often blurred the lines. Kind of like the revolving door b/w PR and JO, except with stolen goods and warfare

21. Pirates didn’t really have a lot of treasure. Most of their scores were small; it was rare they found a giant haul like Bellamy did

22. There were sea worms idk what they’re called that attached themselves to the bottom of the hull so ships had to be cleaned (Careened) regularly

23. Ever seen Black Sails? Robert Guthrie was a real person! He was an exiled Scottish nationalist who became Paulsgrave William’s stepfather. Williams’ was Bellamy’s crewmate and friend

24. Sam Bellamy’s bones were never found. There’s a fun local legend that he survived but there’s zero evidence to support that. Of all the survivors, all but one (who was forced to work on the ship) were hung during the trials

25. Colonial governors - especially those in the Caribbean - were BFFs with pirates in the late 1600s because they helped the economy thrive. So yes, they aided and abetted

26. Port Royale was pirate hub in the Caribbean until a giant storm destroyed it. Then pirate hub moved over to Nassau and New Providence Island

27. This was the age Sam Bellamy was when he died!