by Craig Cabell
According to Lee there is a letter written by a Mrs Ada S. Bragg to Mrs E.P. White stating that Mrs White’s great-great-aunt was Mary Ormond who became Blackbeard’s last wife.28 If we take this letter at face value then it provides us with some connection to Blackbeard and reinforces the claims from historians that Mary Ormond was Blackbeard’s wife. However, we must look at this with some scepticism. In Johnson’s account the poor girl was badly treated on her wedding night by Blackbeard who forced her to have sex with some of his brutal shipmates:
While his sloop lay in Ocracoke Inlet, and he ashore at a plantation where his wife lived, with whom after he had lain all night, was the custom to invite five or six of his brutal companions to come ashore, and he would force her to prostitute herself to them all, one after another, before his face. 29
Now as we don’t have any records that reinforce Johnson’s statement we can look at it in the following two ways.
It may be that Johnson was adding the lurid detail to his narrative to spice it up or he had heard this from other pirates, from sitting in on trials of pirates, from shipmates of Blackbeard, or from hearsay. One source that Johnson used would have been Blackbeard’s first mate Israel Hands who was maimed by Blackbeard when the pirate shot him and survived his career of piracy. Around the same time as Johnson was writing his accounts of the various pirates in his book, Hands was back in London. Indeed, it is Konstam who states we ‘can be fairly certain that the writer met the pirate during this period and that the latter was the source of many accounts of Blackbeard’s career’.30 If this is right then it means that Hands was one of Johnson’s principal sources on Blackbeard. The account, where after Blackbeard had finished with his wife and then forced her to make herself available to his friends with her protests falling on deaf ears, could have some basis of truth to it, albeit tenuous.31
Alternatively, what if it was Blackbeard who concocted this story and he was the one who related it to the rest of his men? Johnson doesn’t name the other pirates who had their way with Mary. So if Blackbeard himself created the story in collusion with a few of his closest shipmates, men who were probably too scared to go against the pirate, they would certainly agree to have taken part in such actions, even if they didn’t. After all, it is highly unlikely that the whole ship’s company were there. The impression we get from Johnson is that there were only a few other ‘brutes’ who abused Blackbeard’s young wife. So with their collusion the whole story could have been a fabrication told to Israel Hands by Blackbeard and the other men. Hands could have told it to Johnson, but if it’s true then we can see the ruthless pirate at work. It may have been something he did on the spur of the moment or something he’d planned beforehand.
However, there is no official record of Blackbeard, Edward Teach, ever having been married and there is no official record of a wedding that took place where he was the groom. Then if he did take up with a woman, she would have been a mistress and not his wife. If she was his mistress then having her available for some of his men makes a little more sense.
As a contrast to this crude treatment of his own wife/mistress, others have suggested that he treated women with great respect. He had no power of resistance when confronted with an attractive woman and would find himself twisted around their fingers.32 This may account for the rumours and gossip that he had thirteen wives before he met and took up with Mary Ormond.
Much has been written about Blackbeard’s physical image by a variety of writers. Many people talk about his imposing height, the multitude of weapons he carried into battle with him, the lighted fuse wire under his hat and of course, the flowing black beard that gave him the name that became more famous than his own. ‘An evil reputation was a great aid in persuading prospective victims of surrender quickly with a minimum of resistance. With this in mind he deliberately attempted to emphasise the evil side of his character.’33
It is indeed possible that some of Blackbeard’s characteristics have been invented and re-invented by storytellers over the years. Again, it’s Johnson’s narrative that is the starting point for many of the descriptions that depict the pirate: ‘Captain Teach, assumed the cognomen of Blackbeard from that large quantity of hair which, like a frightful meteor, covered his whole face and frightened America more than any comet that has appeared there a long time.’34
There was one man who had actually met him and left us with a brief description of the pirate in his deposition.
Captain Henry Bostock, master of the sloop Margaret must have been shaking in his boots when he was run down by the large pirate ship. There was nowhere for him to run and his much smaller vessel simply rode the swell; the much larger ship only a few hundred yards from him had her gun ports open. Smoke drifted in the air from the guns on the mighty ship that signalled the gunners were ready to fire. On the top deck of the ship men jeered and taunted him and his small crew. Ordering his sloop’s tender to be lowered into the water, he clambered into it and was rowed across to the pirate vessel where he was roughly hauled aboard. On the deck of this pirate ship, Bostock came face to face with the most frightening man he’d ever seen – Blackbeard. However, later in his deposition he simply described him as a ‘tall spare man with a black beard which he wore very long’. It was Johnson who took the sparse description and expanded upon it to provide us with the image we have today of the famous pirate and since then, other writers and storytellers have expanded it further and embellished it even more:35
This beard was black which he suffered to grow of an extravagant length: as to breadth it came up to his eyes. He was accustomed to twist it with ribbons, in small tails, after the manner of our ramilies wigs, and turn them about his ears. In time of action, he wore a sling over his shoulders with three brace of pistols hanging in holsters like bandoliers, and stuck lighted matches under his hat, which, appearing on each side of his face his eyes naturally looking fierce and wild, made him altogether such a figure that imagination cannot form an idea of a fury, from hell, to look more frightening.36
These ‘lighted matches’ stuffed under Blackbeard’s hat would have been impressive and frightening to his shipmates and certainly to his victims. They were the same fuses that were used for lighting the fuses to fire the cannon. What we don’t know is if he had them in his hat all the time or just put them on for boarding captured ships.
However, there is one thing of note about this encounter between Bostock and Blackbeard. He and his crew were prisoners of the pirates for eight hours after they’d ransacked the Margaret and taken his cargo consisting mostly of cattle and pigs. Once he’d taken everything from the Margaret, Blackbeard let Bostock and his crew sail away in their own vessel, free and unhurt.
If Blackbeard was trying to cultivate an image of the most ruthless and brutal pirate who ever sailed, why did he let Bostock and his crew go? If, however, the image he was trying to create was the antithesis of the real Edward Teach then this makes sense. If the truth was that Teach was a benign and lenient man, then this act of leniency does make sense, but it may just be that he was feeling particularly magnanimous that day.
As we shall see later, Teach was prone to sudden violent actions but if he was projecting an image, then these violent outbursts had to be part of it. Few would even consider raising a hand against him and that was his genius. He played on his fearsome image to build this reputation. However, to maintain this kind of image, Blackbeard would have to work hard especially in front of his crew to prove to them he was more ruthless, unpredictable, ferocious and violent than any of them. Johnson reinforces this by relating an action that he believed helped his crew to think he was the devil:
For being one Day at Sea, and a little flushed with drink: – Come, says he, let us make a Hell of our own, and try how long we can bear it; accordingly he, with two or three others, went down into the Hold, and closing up all the Hatches, filled several Pots full of Brimstone, and other combustible Matter, and set it on Fire, and so continued till they were almost suffocated, when some
of the Men cry’d out for Air; at length he opened the Hatches, not a little pleased that he held out the longest.
Of course it may be that the above incident didn’t happen, but if something similar did and Johnson heard it from Israel Hands or other pirates, then we can see Blackbeard hard at work building his reputation. Being magnanimous and letting a ship go only adds to his unpredictability, certainly in the face of actions like this one.
Although Blackbeard was a violent man, there is no actual record of him killing anyone. However, killing and maiming are not too far apart from each other and we know that Blackbeard had no qualms about maiming people, even his own crew.
Chapter 3
Nemesis – Alexander Spotswood
Governor Spotswood was irritated. The hammering and sawing that had been going on in his mansion for months was still not finished. The house was half-built and the endeavour he was about to embark upon needed concentration. It was a bleak November Wednesday when the two Royal Navy captains arrived at his mansion at his request. They sat across from him now, sipping their port. Although the big oak door to his large drawing room was closed the incessant banging and sawing could still be heard coming from the bowels of the mansion.
Spotswood’s two guests were Captain Ellis Brand, commanding HMS Pearl and Captain George Gordon, commanding HMS Lyme. They were there because he had a plan and he needed them to carry it out. The problem he had was one of protocol. Even though he had a title of Admiral of Virginia, his authority over the Royal Navy in Virginian waters was extremely limited. He knew the two captains reported directly to the Admiralty in London and that his own chain of command back to the King was through their Lordships at the Council for Trade and Plantations. Even trickier was that this expedition was to be undertaken in the neighbouring colony of North Carolina where he had no jurisdiction whatsoever.
The two naval officers could easily say no to his plan and that would be that. After a few pleasantries, Spotswood poured the men another glass of port each and said, ‘Gentlemen. I have decided to expurgate that nest of vipers at Bath Town once and for all.’ He was, of course, referring to Blackbeard and his crew who were anchored at Ocracoke Island near Bath Town in North Carolina. The two naval officers listened as Spotswood outlined his decision to attack the pirates and both men agreed to the proposal.37
It was that meeting between the three men that ultimately sealed Blackbeard’s fate. To all intents and purposes, Spotswood was Blackbeard’s nemesis. For this reason a chapter devoted to Spotswood is crucial for us to understand the kind of man he was and his importance to Teach.
Even if Blackbeard had accepted the King’s Pardon, there is no telling if he would have turned back to piracy and so without Spotswood, Blackbeard would have been free to roam the American coast for many more years, plundering ships and towns at will until he was stopped or until he chose to give up piracy and live as a wealthy man. So to understand the Blackbeard story it is necessary to understand Spotswood, bearing in mind he overstepped his authority, funded and planned the expedition himself that would see the death of the pirate. From his letters and other sources we know much more about Spotswood than we do about Blackbeard – Edward Teach. Spotswood’s duration as Lieutenant-Governor of Virginia lasted twelve years, from 1710 to 1722. He ruled in the place of Governor George Hamilton who selected him while he was a lieutenant-colonel in the Army.
Taking up the post in 1710, Spotswood’s initial objectives were to increase the power of the governor’s office, end piracy, and improve relations with the American Indians through regulated trade. Not a man to mince words and a very moral man, he often and openly expressed his utter contempt of the members of his Council and those of the House of Burgesses who were at odds with his actions and polices.38 Indeed, his main objective was to impose the will of England on the colony of Virginia but by the end of his term in office, he had become a Virginian himself by investing heavily in the colony. For example, he built his own ironworks in Spotsylvania County which became the largest producer of iron throughout the colonies. Also Spotswood designed and built the Governor’s Palace, the powder magazine in Williamsburg and the Bruton Parish Church building. He was given the position of deputy postmaster-general for North America in 1730 and died in 1740 of a short illness while he was in Maryland raising troops for a military campaign by the British against the Spanish in South America.
He was born in Tangier, an English colony, in 1676 to Catherine and Robert Spotswood; the latter was a surgeon for the garrison. When Spotswood was only 4 years old his father died and his mother decided to stay in Tangier where she married the schoolteacher for the garrison, the Rev. George Mercer. There they stayed until the troops were ordered home in 1683. As a young boy growing up in Tangier he would have been exposed to military action; the regular skirmishes with the Moors just outside the walls of the colony. It was an exciting and exotic place to grow up. However, back in England life became more conventional. Warfare was a constant thing in his life. ‘His elder half-brother Roger Elliot (the product of Catherine’s first marriage) helped to secure Alexander an appointment as an ensign in the Earl of Bath’s Regiment in 1693.’39 Eventually he rose to the rank of lieutenant.
Some historians suggest that he was wounded, quite seriously, during the War of Spanish Succession (1701 – 14) at the Battle of Blenheim (1704), at which time he was the quartermaster-general for the English Army. However, our sources make no reference to his being wounded or to the legend that says Spotswood was hit by a 4lb cannonball which he managed to keep and show off to his guests whenever he had any.40
Also there is some consensus indicating that he was taken prisoner during the Battle of Oudenarde and was released through the negotiating skills of the Duke of Marlborough, John Churchill, but not every historian agrees with this. Disillusioned with his lack of progress in terms of promotion within the military he began looking elsewhere and on 18 February 1710 he was commissioned by Queen Anne to be the Lieutenant-Governor (Deputy to the Governor) of Virginia. Some scholars say he obtained this post through his friendship with George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney and Governor of Virginia (1704 – 37), or through the good offices of Marlborough himself.
Hamilton was Marlborough’s trusted deputy and a fellow Scotsman like Spotswood. While Hamilton had been given the title of Governor of Virginia he certainly wouldn’t be the man to run it. He gave that privilege to Spotswood and he would stay in England and receive half the revenues from the colony for doing nothing.
Spotswood arrived in Virginia in late 1710 and set about tackling the major issues of the colony: Indian relations, economic depression and security. He found the colony was poorly defended:
I cannot but be of the opinion that a small fort built upon Point Comfort would be of good use, the very name of it would strike an awe in the Enemy, it would afford a Retreat for Ships when pursued by Privateers in time of War or by Pirates as must be expected in time of Peace.41
Also of concern was the economy as he states in his letter to the Council of Trade: ‘The price of tobacco is fallen so low that it has brought many of the Owners in Debt at London, and lessened the Supplys of goods for their familys.’42
However, he soon found himself unable to effect real change because his responsibility to the colony exceeded his resources and his power. Committed to efficient and effective leadership, he faced a radical element in the colony and soon found that he had little support from the General Assembly. The twelve men of the Governor’s Council resented his arrival because they had ruled the colony for four years without a governor. Indeed, the power struggle in Virginia reflected the old battles between King and Parliament in Britain but this time fought out on a different stage. ‘Spotswood frequently tried to use prerogatives that were no longer available to King George I back in Britain, and his colonial assemblies knew that,’ writes Angus Konstam in his book on Blackbeard. In Britain Parliament held power over the King and the Council and the House of Burgesses believed the same s
hould be true of Virginia. Their view was that they represented the rights of the American people rather than serving the governor who, essentially, acted for the King.
In 1711 Spotswood shows his willingness to step outside of his own borders and interfere in other colonial states. In this case it was North Carolina, where an insurrection was taking place. In a letter to the Lords Proprietors of Carolina dated 28 July 1711, Spotswood blames the Quakers for the uprising, saying that they had poisoned ‘the minds of all those who had any remains of a peaceable disposition’.
The prime antagonist in this affair was one Colonel Thomas Cary who had been the former deputy governor of North Carolina but had ‘afterwards been removed by an order of the Lords Proprietors’. Cary, however, did not hang around but
being joined by certain Quakers entrusted by the proprietors in some part of the Administration, gathered together a Rabble of the looser sort of people and by force of arms turned out the President and most of the Council, and by his own Authority assumed the administration of the Government.43
Some historians claim that the Tuscarora Indians were involved in this insurrection but as Spotswood states, they were divided in their feelings:
There are now further discoverys made of the ill designs of Colonel Cary and his party, there being several Affidavits sent in hither to prove that Mr. Porter, one of Mr Cary’s pretended Council was with the Tuscaruro [sic] Indians endeavouring by promises of great Rewards to engage them to cut off all the Inhabitants of that part of Carolina that adhered to Mr Hyde. The Indians own the proposal as accepted by their young men, but that their old men who have the greatest Sway in their Councils being of their own Nature suspicious that there was some trick intended them, or else directed by a Superior providence, refused to be concerned in that barbarous design.44