Blackbeard

by Craig Cabell

  Most of the people making these claims were making little more than guesses. None of them had of course stepped aboard and made a count of the amount of weapons the refitted ship was carrying. They based their calculations solely on what they saw of the ship from a distance, or on second-hand information from the crews of ships Blackbeard would go on to plunder in his new vessel.

  Archaeologists excavating at the wreckage site of what is thought to be the remains of the ship have not found anything like this number. What guns have been discovered vary greatly in weight, size and origin. These include mostly French and British guns with one that appears to be from Sweden. This mix of nationalities would fit well with the concept of a pirate ship, where the crew would use whatever they plundered from other vessels, but at the time of writing the surveys had only revealed less than thirty cannon.95 For the purposes of this book we will stick to the accepted norm of up to forty cannon.96

  The main deck of La Concorde did not have the space for so much firepower, so Blackbeard had gun-ports cut into the side of the hull below the main deck, giving it greater firepower for blasting other vessels with broadsides. There were no turret cannon in those days so each side of the ship would hold the largest number of cannon; however, by this time most ships were also placing cannon in the bow and stern of their ships so they could have full coverage and keep up a steady rate of fire when either chasing another vessel or trying to get away from one.97 Most pirates modifying captured ships would have very quickly increased the firepower in order to intimidate their prey as much as possible without having to fight, while also ensuring they had enough firepower if they did have to fight. We can assume Blackbeard did the same.

  In order for Blackbeard to modify this new prize he headed for a sheltered anchorage at Bequia

  an island small enough to lack a British or a French garrison, and a long-established watering place for buccaneers, privateers and pirates. There Blackbeard and his men set to work, building a slave-holding pen, landing La Concorde’s human cargo and crew, then converting La Concorde for their own use.98

  Now we have Blackbeard busy at converting the slaver into a fast pirate ship but we are left with one problem. What happened to Benjamin Hornigold?

  During the capture of La Concorde, two sloops approached the larger vessel one on either side of her, moving fast and firing as they gained. If Hornigold was commanding the other sloop then where did he go after the capture of such a large prize? Captain Johnson says this about what happened to Hornigold:

  By Hornigold’s consent, Teach went aboard of her as captain and took a cruise in her. Hornigold returned with his sloop to Providence, where, at the arrival of Captain Rogers, the governor, he surrendered to mercy, pursuant to the King’s proclamation.

  Historian Robert E. Lee states that Teach asked Hornigold if he could claim La Concorde as his prize and be placed in command. Hornigold agreed to this request. He then states that both men shook hands and departed. However, Konstam suggests that Blackbeard and Hornigold had already parted company by this time and the other sloop would have been commanded by one of Blackbeard’s most trusted men. The other sloop was a prize that he and Hornigold took earlier in the year.

  What we do know is that Hornigold returned to the Bahamas where he approached the new governor, Woodes Rogers, and accepted the King’s Pardon. Indeed, Hornigold became invaluable to Rogers, who fitted him out as a pirate-hunter to hunt down and bring back for trial as many pirates as he could.

  As a pirate, Hornigold was at one point king of the pirates based out of Providence, so any men joining his crew would have had the highest standing in the pirate community. He had the biggest ship with the biggest guns, but the crews would have been disappointed with the haul under Hornigold because he would only plunder certain ships.

  He had always refused to acknowledge the treaty that ended the War of Spanish Succession that had taken away his source of income as a privateer operating in that conflict. Some historians believe that he still considered himself a privateer rather than a pirate, similar to the way in which Captain Kidd claimed right up to the end of his life just before his execution that he was a legally-sanctioned privateer and not a pirate.

  Hornigold allowed ships belonging to Britain to pass unhindered, while only attacking those ships that sailed under the flag of her enemies. Pirates, on the other hand, attacked any ship that seemed a good prize regardless of nationality. The crew serving Hornigold, considering themselves pirates and being greedy for whatever they could get – much like Captain Kidd’s crew – would have become more and more restless about the lack of activity. Hornigold’s crew held a council on board the ship and voted to attack any ship of any nationality as they were fed up with their captain’s fussiness about which ships he would or would not attack. This action deposed Hornigold as captain, essentially making him a bystander on his own ship which must have infuriated him as he watched his crew turn their guns on British ships.99 Perhaps it may have been this that persuaded him to accept the King’s Pardon and turn pirate-hunter. Did Blackbeard play a part in this mutiny? There is no evidence to suggest he did but if he was turning his guns on all ships including British his already growing reputation could have helped Hornigold’s crew make up their minds – a move of which Blackbeard would have approved.

  Back on Bequia we know that Blackbeard landed the crew and human cargo of La Concorde onto the island and even built a pen for the slaves and crew. Bequia is in the Grenadines and its name comes from the Arawak Indian language meaning ‘island of the clouds’. It is the second-largest island in the chain. In Blackbeard’s day the island was home to mostly Carib and Arawak Indian tribes, though pirates used the island as a base for repair and replenishment of their ships due to its safe anchorage. From the reports filed by Dosset and his lieutenant we know the crew of La Concorde and those slaves rejected by Blackbeard were left on the island with few supplies and limited weapons.

  Imagine Dosset, forced to stand with his crew and the slaves in the pen built by the pirates on the beach, watching his ship being torn apart and refitted by the pirates. With each passing day the ship would look less and less like the one he had commanded. The most notable changes would have been the extra firepower, with cannon barrels aimed in all directions. He had crossed the Atlantic with sixteen, and that number had been more than doubled. The other feature of which he would have been painfully aware was that it was now bustling with crew, some of which were formerly his own. Not only had he lost his ship but he had also lost a proportion of his crew to the pirates, including some of the slaves. One can only imagine his frustration and humiliation.

  Of the crew we know of that transferred to Blackbeard, four went willingly and a further ten went under some form of duress. However, as this information comes from the report filed by Dosset’s Lieutenant Ernaud sometime later, it is likely that there was some bias involved so we must assume that it is open to interpretation. The crew who were apparently forced to transfer included a pilot (or navigator), three surgeons, two carpenters, two sailors and the cook.100

  One of the crew who voluntarily defected to Blackbeard was the cabin boy, Louis Arot. According to the reports it was he who told the pirates where to find the gold dust that was on board La Concorde. Perhaps he wanted a change of scene, or perhaps he did not like the captain and the officers. We shall never know his motivation.

  Yet, while the alterations were taking place Blackbeard carried out a strange act for so ruthless a pirate. He gave the smaller of his two sloops to Dosset and the remainder of his crew so they could leave the island.

  There was absolutely no requirement, legal or otherwise, for him to hand over any vessel to those he had attacked. He could quite easily have left them stranded on the island to find some way of making their own way off. However, from his efforts to equip the larger vessel with more guns, ammunition and stores, Blackbeard would have had them stripped from the smaller sloop which he then handed over to the prisoners.101

&nb
sp; So while Blackbeard had given the French a lifeline with the smaller sloop it was completely unarmed, its guns being used to increase the firepower on La Concorde, Blackbeard’s new flagship. He very likely would have winched up any extra guns from the hold of the Revenge after stripping the smaller sloop of all its ordnance.102

  All Dosset had were his crew and a quantity of slaves and they were on an island some distance from their original destination. Dosset and his crew renamed their new vessel the Mauvaise Rencontre, which in French means Bad Encounter. Considering their newfound circumstances, the name seemed painfully appropriate. In a couple of trips, they transported the remaining contingent of slaves from Bequia to Martinique to at least fulfil that part of their voyage.103

  The French were not on Bequia for the same length of time as Blackbeard and his crew. Indeed, they were there for only a few days before sailing away in the unarmed sloop given to them by Blackbeard.

  We could look at this action by Blackbeard in two ways: one is that it was very generous of Blackbeard to give Dosset and his crew a ship; the other that it was extremely cruel to give them one that was unarmed and would be at the mercy of any pirate they encountered. Perhaps that’s what Blackbeard felt – let them take their chances on the high seas.

  Angus Konstam states it would have taken Blackbeard at least two weeks to transfer the slaves and crew to the island and then make the alterations to the ship. Once the alterations were completed and Blackbeard had his floating fortress, he renamed his new flagship with a name that could have harked back to his days as a privateer in the War of Spanish Succession.

  However, this new name could also have been because Blackbeard was, in his own way, doffing his hat to Queen Anne herself and to the era of piracy that she had reigned over as monarch. When she died she left no heirs and her successor was her second cousin George, who became George I and started the rule by the House of Hanover. Perhaps this was Blackbeard’s way of showing some loyalty to the House of Stuart and Queen Anne for whom he had fought, and naming his ship after her was him displaying his disapproval of the new monarch. It could have been Blackbeard simply recognising that an era was coming to a close and this was his way of paying homage to it.

  Whatever the reason for naming his ship as he did, the vessel that sailed into the anchorage on the island of Bequia as La Concorde sailed out, fully refitted as a pirate fortress, ready to take on any victim or naval vessel, as the Queen Anne’ s Revenge.

  Chapter 7

  Blackbeard’s Victims

  Nor had we much time left to us for thought. Suddenly, with

  a loud huzza, a little cloud of pirates leaped from the woods

  on the north side and ran straight on the stockade.

  At the same moment, the fire was once more opened from the

  doorway, and knocked the doctor’ s musket into bits.

  Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson

  Before we continue let’s look at Blackbeard’s actions so far. He took the

  Revenge from Major Stede Bonnet who he let walk freely about the ship in his morning coat as well as letting the major spend vast amounts of time in his library below decks. Bonnet had bought the ship outright and had his library brought aboard so it was there when Blackbeard took the ship from him. We know, too, that when Blackbeard transferred his command from the Revenge to the Queen Anne’ s Revenge he had transferred Bonnet as well. If what Lee says is true that they got along well together, then perhaps Blackbeard wanted Bonnet as a friend because he missed Hornigold? However, we also know that Bonnet was unhappy about the arrangement and certainly wouldn’t have been glad to transfer to the Queen Anne’ s Revenge. So what’s going on here?

  Then we have Blackbeard who, after capturing La Concorde and sending the crew and slaves ashore and starting his alterations on the ship, gave them one of the sloops under his command but which was stripped of guns. He gave Dosset the means to get off the island on which they were stranded, but in an unarmed ship in an area infested with pirates.

  What does this tell us about Blackbeard?

  If he was building his reputation as the most feared and ruthless pirate on the high seas, then these actions reinforce that. They show Blackbeard in complete control over Bonnet and in control over Dosset, his crew and the slaves. By giving them the ship he was being generous but by giving them one that was unarmed he was playing God – leaving them to their fate if they faced pirates on the way back to Martinique. Blackbeard was no fool; he knew that Dosset and his lieutenant would report the events to the authorities when they arrived. The rest of Dosset’s crew would tell the tales in the dosshouses, taverns and bars in Martinique and the story would spread.

  We can see the story of Blackbeard building through the reports filed by his victims.

  On 29 September 1717 Blackbeard attacked the Betty, a sloop registered in Virginia. Being a Virginia-based vessel this capture would likely have come to the attention of the Lieutenant-Governor of Virginia, Alexander Spotswood, who later instigated the search for and final destruction of Blackbeard.

  Blackbeard’s crew took the cargo of Madeira wine from the Betty. Madeira was known for its quality but it is unlikely that they cared much about the quality preferring quantity, and if we compare other pirate crews to this one then the wine didn’t last long. Once they had taken what they wanted they sank the vessel with her hold still bearing a quantity of cargo that the pirates didn’t require or couldn’t carry. Indeed, in the charges that Spotswood brought against Blackbeard’s quartermaster, William Howard, they explicitly state that it was William Howard who sank and destroyed the Betty and the cargo remaining aboard. The fate of the crew of the Betty is uncertain.104

  We know from the report filed in Philadelphia from which the reporter for the Boston News Letter published his stories of the activities of Blackbeard that the pirate was operating in the Delaware Bay area. The entire area was covered in salt marshes and mudflats fed by numerous rivers. Two capes form the entrance to the Bay – Cape May and Cape Henlopen – where it joins the Atlantic Ocean and it is around these capes and the bay itself that Blackbeard was to go on to claim several of his early victims.

  In previous chapters we’ve seen that Blackbeard took Captain Codd’s vessel and it was Codd who filed his report on 24 October 1717 that formed the basis of the reports on the pirate’s activities published in the November edition of the Boston News Letter. What is interesting about the Codd affair is that there is no mention of cargo being taken from his ship. Codd was carrying 150 indentured servants and presumably other cargo as well. Why would Blackbeard go to all the trouble of chasing the sloop, stopping her, boarding her and then come away with nothing? We believe, like some historians, that the reason why Blackbeard didn’t take any cargo and let the ship go was because once the pirates discovered the passengers were largely servants they felt a common bond with these underdogs; knowing the servants had little wealth, they identified with them and so allowed the ship under Captain Codd’s command to continue to sail into Philadelphia.105 However, people do carry their own personal possessions so we can only wonder as to whether the pirates relieved the passengers of some of these.106

  During this period, September/October 1717 we know from the report that Blackbeard took the Spofford which was headed for Ireland with a load of staves, the Sea Nymph which was filled with wheat and heading for Oporto, a sloop from Madeira commanded by Peter Peters, another sloop commanded by Griggs, another sloop from Madeira and another from Antigua. Most of the vessels they let go after plundering them of cargo and guns and stores but the Sea Nymph they kept, effectively doubling the number of vessels within Blackbeard’s fighting force.107

  There is no indication of what cargo was on the sloop commanded by Captain Peters but on the basis that it had sailed from Madeira and the chief export of that island at the time was wine, it is fairly safe to assume this would comprise part of the cargo.

  Another of Blackbeard’s victims was Captain Farmer whose sloop h
ad already been looted by pirates before Blackbeard got to him. Sailing from Jamaica, Captain Farmer had very little left to be plundered by the time he reached Delaware Bay, so Blackbeard stripped the vessel of its mast, anchors, cables and any extra money that the preceding plundering had left behind. With no cargo and missing all these items, Farmer was then permitted to complete his journey in what was basically little more than a stripped floating shell.108

  At much the same time another captain was sailing his sloop through the region. This was Captain Sipkins (in a New York-registered sloop) in command of a 12-gun vessel that was taken by the pirates, though he doesn’t name Blackbeard or Teach specifically. We can make the educated guess that it was Blackbeard who took the vessel as it happened in his hunting ground of Delaware Bay and we know that the pirate was adding to his little fleet. Being more useful for their needs they set about converting it to a pirate ship. What isn’t clear is what happened to the crew of this sloop or where Blackbeard got the crew to man his new prize, presumably from the former crew? Farmer managed to reach dry land and reported the incident.109

  By this reckoning, Blackbeard now controlled three vessels – the Revenge, the Sea Nymph and this latest acquisition.

  On 30 October 1717, Captain Goelet sailing from Curaçao to New York became the next known victim of Blackbeard: ‘This sloop was half loaded with cocoa which the Pirates threw overboard.’110 However, the pirates realised the new sloop could be useful and decided to keep it, giving Captain Goelet and his crew the much slower Sea Nymph. They made a swift escape while the pirates were still in a generous mood. After Goelet was released, another ship and a brigantine were taken but there is no indication of what happened to the vessels or their crews.111