Pirates: The Pirate Hunts

As the Golden Age of Piracy drew to a close, the oceans turned into hunting grounds where pirates became prey. Dan tells the dramatic tale of the rise and fall of Bartholomew Roberts, or Black Bart, one of the most feared pirates of the age. From West Africa to South America, Roberts dominated the Atlantic. He captured over 400 ships before the British Navy, led by Captain Chaloner Ogle, finally caught up with him. His death in a blaze of cannon fire—and the mass hanging of his captured crew—marked the brutal end of piracy’s golden era. Dan is joined by Sophie Nibbs, the curator of the new Pirates exhibition at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, to explore this final chapter of our Pirates series. You can discover more and book tickets for the 'Pirates' exhibition at the National Maritime Museum Greenwich here https://www.rmg.co.uk/whats-on/national-maritime-museum/pirates. Written by Dan Snow, produced by Mariana Des Forges and edited by Dougal Patmore Join Dan and the team for a special LIVE recording of Dan Snow's History Hit on Friday 12th September 2025! To celebrate 10 years of the podcast, Dan is putting on a special show of signature storytelling, never-before-heard anecdotes from his often stranger-than-fiction career as well as answering the burning questions you've always wanted to ask! Get tickets here, before they sell out: https://www.kingsplace.co.uk/whats-on/words/dan-snows-history-hit/ You can now find Dan Snow's History Hit on YouTube! Watch episodes every Friday (including this one) here https://www.youtube.com/@DSHHPodcast. Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe. We'd love to hear your feedback - you can take part in our podcast survey here: https://insights.historyhit.com/history-hit-podcast-always-on. You can also email the podcast directly at [email protected] mailto:[email protected]. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Dan Snow?

  Hey friends, if you love this podcast and want to decide what history we cover, then you need to become a Dan Snow's History Hit subscriber. Pitch your topic and if I like it, we'll make it into a subscriber exclusive episode. So far, we've covered the English Reformation, the Hudson Bay Company, the Trail of Tears, all of which have been decided by dedicated subscribers. So take the reins of your favourite podcast by heading over to historyhit.com/subscribe or sign up in your podcast player.

• 0:32Speaker 01

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• 2:26Dan Snow?

  He was the most successful buccaneer of the Golden Age of Piracy. His audaciousness, flair, style, and flag have helped to shape impressions of his pirate world ever since. He was the dreaded pirate Roberts, Bartholomew Roberts. He was a Welshman from Haverford West, born John Roberts. He was an older gentleman by the standards of the day, working as a merchant sailor when fate swept him up and relaunched him on a new trajectory to command a pirate crew

• 3:06Dan Snow?

  to achieve notoriety, infamy, and a reputation as one of the most formidable captains of the so-called Golden Age. It all began in 1719. He was in his late 30s. He was serving as second mate on a slave ship off the West African coast. He oversaw the loading of the miserable souls. He ensured they were shackled, packed in the tween deck with not enough space to stand up. At the end of the middle passage, having made it to the Americas, he would offload his human cargo. He would throw the many corpses into the ocean. He would direct his men to wash down the human filth before loading the slave-grown

• 3:48Dan Snow?

  sugar for the voyage back home to Britain. Between weather, conditions, company, and the devilish work, it was a life that bred tough, cruel men. Death was always close at hand. It was particularly close on the occasion when his vessel was captured by pirates, led by Captain Howell Davis. Pirates had no use for prisoners unless they could command a ransom. The only other category of men who were spared was seasoned sailors who knew the ropes. You could tell a seaman at 100 paces: weathered faces, calloused hard hands, and a rolling gait when they walked. Roberts was a sailor. He was useful.

• 4:29Dan Snow?

  All crews in that age were chronically short of manpower, particularly in disease-ridden West Africa or the Caribbean. Roberts was abruptly told that he'd had a change of career. He had been recruited.

• 4:43Dan Snow?

  Roberts and several of his crewmates were forced to join Davis's crew of pirates and take up the buccaneering life. Though initially reluctant, apparently, Roberts realised that piracy offered more freedom, more remuneration, and perhaps more pleasure than the hard labour and low wages of honest seafaring. Roberts made an impression on the pirate ship from the start. Others admired his seamanship and leadership. So when Captain Davis was unexpectedly killed in an ambush not long after, the crew elected Roberts as their new captain. The rugged meritocracy, even democracy, of pirate life must have been bracingly different from the hidebound world from which he came. It was a vote that launched one of the most

• 5:27Dan Snow?

  extraordinary piratical careers of the age, one that informs much of what we think we know and love about pirates. But while Roberts's entry into piracy was dramatic, his end would be even more so. The British Royal Navy's mission to stop Bartholomew Roberts is one of the greatest stories of pirate hunts ever told. And in this final episode of our Pirate series, I'll be sharing that story with you. I'll also be joined by Sophie Nibbs, the curator of the excellent Pirates exhibition at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, where you can see the actual documents from the mass trial of his pirate crew. You're listening to Dan Snow's history hit. So, beat the quarters, number one, topsail spotted on the starboard

• 6:09Dan Snow?

  bow, everybody to your posts. This is the dramatic end to the golden age of piracy.

• 6:20Dan Snow?

  Sophie, take me back to the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico, the Spanish Main, at the peak of the golden age of piracy, so what was of late 17th, early 18th century. Was it just sort of a Wild West of shipping being attacked, cargo stolen by these pirates?

• 6:35Speaker 04

  Pretty much. You had a huge amount of maritime trade. You had these huge ships, which were laden with, obviously, gold, but also things like spices and silks and all of these kind of luxury goods that were being shipped around. And it became hugely appealing to a pirate to be able to seize one of these ships and to be able to take that treasure. And so you did have a huge amount of kind of lawless activity of pirates taking to the seas and wanting a bit of that for themselves.

• 7:01Dan Snow?

  Once at the helm, Captain Roberts proved himself to be both daring and ruthless. He changed his name to Bartholomew, and his first act was to revenge the death of his former captain. Seeking revenge, he attacked the Portuguese colony of Principe Island, raising the fort and the main settlement. The all-important first action went very well. His crew now believed they'd made the right choice. They believed in him, the capstone of successful leadership. From there, he embarked on a bloody Atlantic rampage. Between 1719 and 1722, Robert's crisscrossed the seas from West Africa to the Caribbean, to Brazil, and even Newfoundland. One early brazen exploit cemented his reputation.

• 7:45Dan Snow?

  Robert boldly infiltrated a Portuguese treasure fleet off the coast of Brazil. He captured other smaller peripheral ships, and then got the imprisoned captain to point out the richest vessel of the convoy. He slid alongside her and surprised her crew. He led his men up and over the ship's rail. There was no time for resistance. The treasure ship was his in seconds. For the convoy realized what was happening. He had escaped, with a haul of tens of thousands of gold coins and jewels even, intended for the King of Portugal himself. On another occasion, he descended upon the harbor of Trapace in Newfoundland and reportedly burned and plundered dozens of fishing vessels, sowing terror among seafarers. He just cut a swathe across the North Atlantic.

• 8:28Dan Snow?

  Flying the black flag he designed himself, he captured, torched, and sank ships. He would steal the finest, though, and repurpose them for his own needs. He was more potent than some imperial authorities. He bullied the French governor of Saint-Bart's, letting him and his men stay for weeks and have the run of the port. It must have made magaloof at the height of summer or spring break in Florida look tame. In the Caribbean Leward Islands, after learning that some of his pirate brethren had been hanged by colonial authorities, Robert's exacted revenge by burning a fleet of ships in Saint Kitts Harbor as a grim warning. He earned himself a reputation for audacity and ferocity. Trade in the West Indies almost ground to a halt.

• 9:11Dan Snow?

  The engine of European empires stuttered badly, thanks to this low-born sailor with heaven-sent skills and towering ambition. Roberts's success was really unmatched in the Golden Age of piracy. It's said that he seized over four hundred ships in his brief career. His activity earned him the moniker Black Bart. A man who cast a long shadow certainly across the Atlantic. Merchants and governors came to fear his name. He didn't hesitate to use violence or intimidation to cow his victims. In January seventeen twenty-two, Roberts captured a convoy of slave ships off West Africa and demanded a ransom for their return. One captain refused, and that prompted Roberts to burn the ship with eighty enslaved captives still chained up in the hold.

• 9:56Dan Snow?

  A horrifying demonstration of the lengths that he was prepared to go. But his appearance belied this savagery, this brutality. He was notorious across the Atlantic for his flamboyant and stylish attire. He was a dandy. He was often described as dressing up fancy. In the book, A General History of the Pirates, a sort of exaggerated biography of famous pirates from this time, Roberts is described as favouring a rich crimson damask waistcoat and breeches, a red feather in his hat, and a gold chain with a diamond cross around his neck. He also carried a sword and two pairs of pistols, often slung over his shoulders in a silk sling. Now, the book might be a bit fanciful in its descriptions, but it is striking that

• 10:37Dan Snow?

  the author, Captain Johnson, singles out Roberts as someone who wore fine fabrics and was keen on accessories. His appearance was striking enough for the French to nickname him Le Joli Rouge, meaning "The Pretty Red". He was strict and demanded discipline from his men. He'd drop a pirate code of conduct to ensure everyone did what they were supposed to do. They were always ready for action, and they kept out of conflict with one another. He allowed his men to drink plenty of rum, but he himself was teetotal. If you go back to the first episode of this series, Myths vs. Reality, there's a link in the show notes. You can find out more about the rules of being a pirate on Roberts's ship, including having to be in bed by eight PM, which sounds ideal to me.

• 11:20Dan Snow?

  Up early, nice bit of maritime theft and an early night. These rules fostered loyalty among a diverse crew drawn from all over the world. A team that grew to several hundred men operating across a small fleet. By 1721 Bartholomew Roberts was at the height of his infamy. He was the most feared pirate of the Atlantic world. His raids were disrupting commerce from Africa to the Americas. There was a general outcry from merchants pleading the imperial authorities to do something. The British Crown in particular stepped up. They decided to end Roberts's reign. They could not tolerate the scourge of Atlantic trade any longer. Tell me about the early 18th century and these pirate hunts. What were they?

• 12:03Speaker 04

  So the pirate hunts are encouraged suppression of piracy. So you had the British Parliament, if we're looking from a kind of British perspective, the British Parliament putting together acts of parliament for the suppression of piracy. And that is encouraging a focused hunting of pirates. Prior to this, you had particular pirates that might have been considered wanted or notable, and there might have been smaller incidents of pirates being captured. But you get this really focus as a response to the fact that it's interrupting trade and seen as a national threat or a security threat. With also hand in hand with offering pardons to those who wanted to surrender. So prior to this, as a pirate, if you're getting captured, you're largely going to be killed. Getting captured is not, or handing yourself over is not really an option. But you get this encouragement of, A, they're being hunted down, but B, if they don't want

• 12:48Speaker 04

  to be hunted down, they can actually surrender and be given a royal pardon.

• 12:52Dan Snow?

  So there's a new sheriff in town?

• 12:53Speaker 04

  There is, yes. Piracy became a massive threat to shipping. It was about money at the end of the day. And if ships were being seized, you're losing a huge amount of revenue. You're A, you're losing power, you're losing ships, you're losing the ability to go and explore and to take land. And there was colonial expansion happening from European powers on all sides. And pirates became a huge problem. And so while the British Navy was very much involved, there were other navies as well, really actively suppressing piracy as it just became a huge threat to any seafaring nation.

• 13:22Dan Snow?

  How does the navy get better in the 18th century, the long 18th century, at projecting force, sailing further, being more effective when they get there, and suppressing these pirates?

• 13:32Speaker 04

  I mean, there's a few factors involved in that, one of them being conflicts that took place and so the recruitment of naval crews and needing to expand the naval force. So Anglo-Dutch wars, for example, meant that they needed a huge force. And so you're actively recruiting and training very skilled sailors who are skilled in conflict as well and able to handle weapons and able to take on that fight. And also a focus on having a presence at sea as well. And this kind of competition, it's a real competition in terms of expanding colonial powers and wanting to be the most powerful one as well, as much as a sort of need to defend oneself, but also actually to go out there and to be the aggressor.

• 14:11Dan Snow?

  Now, forget Nelson and the Napoleonic wars. The axial age, the formative age for the Royal Navy was really the years around the turn of the beginning of the 18th century, about three generations earlier. The Nine Years' War of the 1690s with France and the War of Spanish Succession also against France of the early 1700s catapulted Britain's Royal Navy, I think really for the first time into a huge, highly effective force that would one day come to dominate the world's oceans. That was the crucible in which Britannia was forged. The wars against France spurred a rapid naval build-up. Dozens of new ships were built to keep pace with and then overtake French naval power. That was possible because the navy was funded through massive government borrowing, backed by taxation, voted on by

• 14:55Dan Snow?

  parliament. It was a reliable system. Creditors were happy to lend to the British government at lower rates of interest than to the unreliable despots on the continent who ruled without parliament and could just cancel debts at a whim. That influx of money funded things like dockyard expansion. Royal dockyards at places like Deptford and Woolwich and Palsmouth and Chatham, they were modernised and their output was increased and their repair capacity went up, for example. The quality of ships were increasing. Cannon were improved, they were standardised. It was a virtuous circle because better ships and weapons gave Britain an edge. The navy was therefore better at protecting British trade, which brought in more money in customs and excise duties when those trade goods arrived safely in British harbors.

• 15:38Dan Snow?

  And a better navy also allowed Britain to seize naval bases around the world, like Gibraltar and Nova Scotia and Menorca, which in turn hugely expanded the support base for British ships. You also find in this period that shipbuilding goes through a process of professionalisation. You get more geometry and mathematics rather than traditional rule of thumb methods. Shipwrights are trained more formally and there's better precision in ship performance. And since we're recording this podcast at Greenwich, we absolutely have to talk about improved navigation. If you want to travel fast and safe and prosperously in the age of sail, it really helps to know exactly where you are. And the best way of fixing your position whilst out of sight of land was to measure that position relative to the sun. How high in the sky was the sun at noon, for example?

• 16:22Dan Snow?

  And these decades saw lots of gradual improvements, things like backstaffs and quadrants, which allowed sailors to measure the altitude of the sun without, for example, burning their eyeballs out, looking straight at it. And alongside this, you get more accurate charts and manuals like those produced by the Navy Board. And this made long-distance voyaging safer and more efficient. The Royal Observatory in Greenwich was founded in 1675, not to stargaze for its own sake, but as a clear-eyed national investment, a serious institutional commitment to improving navigation using stars. That's why it was there. And that astronomy helped to refine latitude calculations. It fostered a culture of scientific inquiry.

• 17:03Dan Snow?

  More ships, better ships, able to stay at sea for longer, able to replenish and resupply at ports dotted all around the world. They helped to ensure that new strategies could be pursued against foreign enemies, but also pirates as well. Merchant ships were gathered in convoys, they were escorted through dangerous waters. Meanwhile, enemy harbors or pirate nests could be blockaded around the clock. So the navy's becoming hugely more effective, not only better at defeating Britain's imperial rivals, but just doing that key job of policing the oceans. The window of opportunity for pirates, that wild west of the high seas. That period was coming to an end.

• 17:40Speaker 04

  There's one very famous incident in particular, which is actually related to Bartholomew Roberts. He's operating around the Caribbean, he's operating in the Americas. Where he's finally caught up was actually off the coast of Africa in seventeen twenty-two. So we've got Channel Ogle, who is a naval captain, and he is encouraged to go and hunt down Bartholomew Roberts because he's considered a huge threat.

• 17:59Dan Snow?

  And that's interesting. So it's not like keeping out for this guy. It's like your job is to leave Portsmouth and go and get this dude.

• 18:04Speaker 04

  Yes. I mean, he was active in the area at the time, but that was the mission that he was given because of how dangerous this pirate was considered to be.

• 18:11Dan Snow?

  So was the Georgian state, was the Admiralty, they're just worried about the number of ships he's taking? Or was there a little, did they want to get him because he was quite a cool, Robin Hood-like, romantic character that they needed to just?

• 18:21Speaker 04

  I think there was probably a lot going on. It would have been financially rewarding to hunt him down. But it was also about the kudos, if you like, of being the one to get him. He's notorious, he's dangerous, he's also inspiring potentially other people to get involved in piracy, because these stories are travelling back. Well, precisely. The stories of him are travelling back. And so there's also this idea of using it as a cautionary tale as well. If you let this person continue to function in the area, then why would other people not choose to go and join him? So he's caught up within seventeen twenty-two by Channel Ogle, who's on a ship called the Swallow.

• 18:54Dan Snow?

  This is Dan Snow's History. There's more on this topic coming up.

• 19:00Dan Snow?

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• 19:42Dan Snow?

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• 20:25Dan Snow?

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• 20:54Speaker 02

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• 21:43Speaker 01

  Pessimism. It's never going to improve a disconnected healthcare system. Next. So what will? At Optum, we're working every day to connect primary, specialty, and pharmacy care, and help lower prescription costs. Will we fix it all overnight? No, but we'll wake up trying, again and again, until healthcare works as one for everyone. That's healthy optimism. Learn more at Optum.com.

• 22:20Dan Snow?

  For months, Ogle, an experienced naval commander, was stationed off the Guinea coast. In itself, just being there for that length of time, that was a feat that had been unimaginable 50 years earlier. Ships like his could now be sustained thousands of miles away from home for long periods of time. In the autumn of 1721, he'd heard word that a pirate had been spotted near the kingdom of Widder, roughly modern-day Benin. And it was true. Roberts was in the area, raiding ships loaded with goods and enslaved people. The swallow raced to intercept, but it was too slow. Roberts had learned of the navy's approach. He crowded on sail and gave them the slip. But it was a narrow escape. Roberts and his crew headed south to lay low at Cape Lopez in modern-day Gabon,

• 23:04Dan Snow?

  where in February 1722, he stocked to careen his ship, that is, beached it, let the tide go out, turn it on its side, and then scrape off, grind off all the seaweed and accretion that gathered on the keel. Then he'd resupply his ships before an intended journey across to Brazil. Ogle, though, was doggedly on his tail. HMS Swallow must have been tipped off because they approached Cape Lopez cautiously. And the reason for that caution was that Roberts actually outgunned the naval vessel. The pirate had two warships, including his flagship, the frigate Royal Fortune, so he could command more guns than Ogle. Ogle's crew had also been ravaged by tropical diseases. But Roberts's squadron wasn't in a fit state for battle either.

• 23:47Dan Snow?

  The pirates had spent the previous night in wild celebration. They'd recently taken a rich prize. They drank through its liquor stores on the beach on the night of the 9th of February. Perhaps they were in bed by 8 p.m. Perhaps the strict pirate code was not implemented on that particular occasion. The other problem that Roberts had was one of his other ships was on its side, being careened, being cleaned up and repaired. So he got the crew to abandon that one, gathered as many men as he could onboard his flagship. And he decided he would try and make a break for the open ocean. With his crew decidedly under the weather, with many of them still drunk or heavily hungover, he put to sea, dressing up first, of course, in his finest clothes festooned with jewellery. The engagement was short, ferocious and dramatic.

• 24:32Dan Snow?

  It took place, apparently, amidst a savage southern tropical storm. Roberts's plan was to sail straight at the naval vessel, pass it, receive one mighty broadside, but then get away and make it out to sea. As Roberts passed the naval vessel, it did indeed fire all its cannons, unleashed a mighty broadside, and that seems to have done some damage to Roberts's flagship, crippling it perhaps. Equally, the storm suddenly stopped and the ships were becalmed. The Royal Fortune was wallowing, and it seems the naval ship managed to turn around and its gunners loaded anti-personnel grape shots, so not big cannonballs, but lots of smaller balls that could spray out like a shotgun or even a sort of early machine gun, if you like, lots and lots of rounds.

• 25:18Dan Snow?

  This type of shot wasn't particularly useful against solid oak, but it was devastating against human flesh. It was a lethal volley. Cannon spat out iron spray, and the dandified form of Clapham Roberts was cut down instantly. One round of grape shot tore through his throat, killing him on the spot. His body hit his quarterdeck with a spray of blood. The legendary pirate captain was dead. It was said about him, he had a merry life and a short one. Roberts's crew was stunned, their captain had been felled, and they were determined to deny the enemy the trophy of his body. Honoring his wish that he'd not be taken dead or alive,

• 26:02Dan Snow?

  his men weighted his corpse and slipped it overboard into the sea. His human remains consigned to the deep. The waters of Cape Lopez became Black Bart's grave. His body was never recovered. The remaining pirates struck their colours. They surrendered, and Ogle's boarding parties secured the infamous ship. The battle was over.

• 26:28Speaker 04

  And then the rest of his crew is arrested, they are taken back to Britain and they are put on trial for piracy. We have an example of a trial record from this trial, which has been kindly lent to us by the National Archives. And you kind of see the names of the people who would have, because pirate crews aren't often recorded. But I mean, the event itself, it was hugely significant in the sense that it was in public consciousness. Actually, in the exhibition, we have a coconut cup, which was produced to sort of commemorate this event. And it has Ogle's crest on one side and it has the HMS Swallow on the other side. So this is quite a significant historical moment that is worthy of making a kind of commemorative object for.

• 27:03Dan Snow?

  So that's at the time, then?

• 27:05Speaker 04

  That's at the time, yeah. That is of the time. That is, shows you how important pirate hunting was and how celebrated it was if it was successful. It was kind of celebrated that this fearsome pirate had been hunted down. And Chaloner Ogle, actually, afterwards, he becomes something of a kind of national hero. So he's known for the fact that he's captured Bartholomew Roberts and is actually given a title as a thank you for this, which is, I think, the only example that we know of somebody actually receiving a title as a kind of reward for pirate hunting, which just goes to show how significant this was, how much of a threat Bartholomew Roberts, whether perceived or actual, you know, how much they wanted to get him.

• 27:37Dan Snow?

  In the aftermath, the Royal Navy sought to make a harsh example of Roberts's men. The captured pirates were thrown into irons, unlike the human cargo they were used to transport across the Atlantic. They were transported to the British base at Cape Coast Castle in Ghana to stand trial before an Admiralty Court. April 1722 saw that trial take place, the largest mass pirate trial in history. Many of the men had died of wounds or disease before even making it to trial. Some were acquitted or pardoned for their lesser roles. Fifty-two, though, were condemned and hanged for piracy. The grim sentence carried out by suspending them from gallows at Cape Coast Castle and other West African ports.

• 28:18Dan Snow?

  The executions were deliberately public and macabre. Lacking the sudden long drop, the trapdoor, instead, the pirates were slowly strangled by the noose, sometimes taking up to 45 minutes of convulsive dancing the hempen jig before they died. Their bodies were then often tarred and hung in chains as a warning to other would-be pirates along the coast. I imagine the brutal spectacle of fifty two separate bodies hanging sent a clear message throughout the maritime world. It was a message that the era of the pirate kings was over.

• 28:54Speaker 04

  Generally speaking, a pirate career is very short. You're not out there for decades. You're out there for, you know, two or three years at best.

• 29:01Dan Snow?

  If the enemy don't get you, the navy might, and then your own crew.

• 29:03Speaker 04

  Well, precisely. Yeah, I mean, you have many ways in which you might meet your end. But yeah, there are some pirates who do make it out alive.

• 29:09Dan Snow?

  But let's talk about some of these pirates that we've heard of, like Blackbeard. Blackbeard was taken off the coast of North Carolina?

• 29:16Speaker 04

  He was, yes. He was captured by Lieutenant Robert Maynard in seventeen eighteen. And he's another example of a very grisly end. He sort of received multiple gunshot wounds. And I think that's written at maybe twenty slashes. So it sort of suggests being shot out and also sort of close combat as well, just showing you the level of violence involved in these conflicts.

• 29:36Dan Snow?

  Yeah, so there's no enemy ship striking their colors and Nelson having dinner in his grand cabin with the enemy commander. They all seem to fight till the end.

• 29:43Speaker 04

  This is, yeah, sort of hand to hand combat, really, at this point of boarding a ship and actually, you know, taking the pirates by force, which is how Blackbeard dies.

• 29:51Dan Snow?

  Because there would be no quarter for pirates in this.

• 29:53Speaker 04

  No, I mean, well, if they were to surrender and be captured potentially, but the pirate captain would largely be be killed. The crew might be rounded up and held, but often it was also a case of they would be killed and sort of thrown overboard where they were found. But in the case of Blackbeard, not only is he killed in a really violent way, but they actually chop off his head. And it's actually displayed on the front of the ship that Maynard is sailing. And we do actually have in the exhibition, there's a logbook, or we've got a reproduction of the logbook, which details this and explains that his head is kind of displayed as a as a trophy, if you like, and also a warning to other pirates that this is probably the end that you'll meet. Although with the logbook, they do like to start with a report of the weather, despite whether they're describing.

• 30:33Dan Snow?

  Most important thing is.

• 30:34Speaker 04

  Most important thing.

• 30:35Dan Snow?

  Where the breeze is coming from.

• 30:36Speaker 04

  Even if you're describing the capture and death of one of the most famous pirates of all time, let's talk about the weather first.

• 30:41Dan Snow?

  Yeah.

• 30:41Speaker 04

  As seafarers, very important.

• 30:42Dan Snow?

  I agree. Gentle southwesterly, more important.

• 30:46Dan Snow?

  Speaking of pirates who were displayed in Grizzly, every time I go down the Thames, I'm always reminded that wasn't one of the famous pirates stuck down there in a...

• 30:52Speaker 04

  Yes, there's a particularly famous Captain Kidd.

• 30:55Dan Snow?

  Oh, yeah.

• 30:56Speaker 04

  So you've got Execution Dock, which was in Wapping, which is not that far from where we are now. And Captain Kidd is famously put to death there after being captured. And then later, his body is taken and displayed publicly along the Thames estuary as a warning. It was there for a number of years. The intention of this is obviously to say to people who were thinking about going off and joining a pirate crew, this might be the end that you meet. And so not only is he hung publicly as a warning, then his body is then used to dissuade others from doing the same thing.

• 31:28Dan Snow?

  But there are female pirates in the Western tradition as well, and they seem to get away with it a bit more.

• 31:34Speaker 04

  So we have Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who are very famous female pirates. Largely, it was very rare to be a female pirate at that time. And they are one of the very few examples that we have of women being on board pirate ships. There's some suggestion they might have disguised themselves as men in order to initially be accepted on board because there was deeply unfair held belief that it was unlucky to have women on board a ship. So it's thought they might have disguised themselves as men to initially be able to join pirate crews. But the records of them being very actively involved in battles and quite skilled sword fighters by all accounts as well. They again had quite short careers. They were both captured and arrested, but they aren't put to death because at the time both of them claimed to be pregnant. So their lives were spared for that reason. But Mary

• 32:18Speaker 04

  Read sadly dies in prison. But Anne Bonny, it's believed that she may have maybe gone to North Carolina, but it's believed that she was able to sort of retire, if you like, and live a relatively quiet life after her brief jaunt in piracy.

• 32:33Dan Snow?

  By the late 1730s, the Golden Age of Piracy was really finished. Imperial navies made aggressive efforts to secure police trade routes and protect their colonial holdings. They patrolled the Atlantic and Caribbean. They launched more and more dedicated anti-piracy campaigns. Colonial governors were empowered to offer pardons to pirates who surrendered early. Admiralty courts set up across the Atlantic world to ensure quick trials and public executions. The crackdown was brutal and effective. Mass hangings, improved naval firepower, and just fewer safe havens. They all left little room for piracy to flourish.

• 33:10Dan Snow?

  By 1740, organised piracy had all but disappeared across the Atlantic, marking the end of the Golden Age and the transformation of pirates from real-world threat to romanticised legends in popular lore. Do you think these pirate trials, the fact they've been reported on the press, did that do things to, well, either discredit pirates and piracy? Or did that make it more glamorous and build our obsession with these swashbucklers?

• 33:36Speaker 04

  I think in some ways it probably built a bit of the obsession. Captain Johnson's The General History of Pirates is actually in some ways reliant on newspaper reports and trials from the time. It sort of pieces together these different bits of pirate history and uses them as the basis for these slightly embellished, slightly more romantic, potentially, depictions of pirates. The trials, although you might think that would be dissuading people from celebrating pirates, actually it's sort of putting the information about pirates out there and keeping them in the public consciousness.

• 34:02Dan Snow?

  How does that transition to the Victorian romantic view of pirates that you get from Robert Louis Stevenson in Treasure Island?

• 34:09Speaker 04

  There seems to be an ability to romanticise something that is not currently taking place. And so the further that you get away from something, if it's a case of your family member going out to sea and being at risk from pirates, you're probably not going to look too kindly on them or celebrate them as figures of kind of fun and rebellion and escape. But give yourself even a couple of decades and, you know, once we're getting further and further on, those stories are further and further away. So you can romanticise Blackbeard if he's not a real threat to you. You know, he becomes intriguing and exciting and it's that ability that we always seem to have. Once you distance yourself from the reality of it, the space between the two you can fill with a bit of romance.

• 34:50Dan Snow?

  And so we're back where we started at the beginning of the series with the tales and the legends of the Victorians of Stephenson's Long John Silver and J M Barrie's Captain Hook. Romantic stories of pirates on great adventures, seeking their fortune in the face of an unjust, cruel system. Stories that we're still captivated by today. Those adventure stories, though, are rooted in difficult truths about savagery, slavery, theft and murder. But they're also stories about men and women trying to survive in a hard world. People who rejected the arbitrary rules of civilised conduct and tried to make their own way. As you say in the exhibition, piracy is not a historical phenomenon. I mean, there's still piracy today around the world.

• 35:32Speaker 04

  There absolutely is. Piracy is still a global issue and piracy, in the same way that it did historically, follows trade routes. So where we are relying on goods and people being moved through shipping, piracy continues. Piracy can still be lucrative. The means by which people do it, the weapons that they use, might be different, but in terms of it being for economic gain, it often being active in areas where there is exploitation or depletion of natural resources or political unrest, that is still the case. It's less now about taking goods from ships, largely because we have shipping containers and obviously trying to unload a shipping container onto a small ship would not be potentially something you want to get involved in. But in terms of holding large ships hostage, the way in

• 36:16Speaker 04

  which pirates tend to get their money is more about holding people ransom physically and now increasingly actually digitally. So in terms of hacking into a ship's navigational system or computer and holding it to ransom, so almost not even needing to be there. Not as common, but it's something that is becoming increasingly risky. But as long as we are relying on the sea for trade and for movement, piracy continues to exist.

• 36:40Dan Snow?

  Well, that brings us to the end of our Pirate series on Dan Snow's History. If you've enjoyed it, please leave us a review wherever you get your podcasts. They really do help. And if we've mentioned anything seriously you'd like to hear more about, please send me an email at [email protected]. Thank you so much to Cheryl Twig and Stella Scobie at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich in London. I hope these podcasts have inspired you. Check out the museum's new pirate exhibition to see actual objects, artefacts from these stories and many other incredible things as well. It's the best museum in London. You've got to go, folks. Thank you for listening. This series was written and produced by me, Marion de Forge, and Dougal Patmore. See you next time, folks.

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• 38:47Dan Snow?

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