On the 28th of that month, he attacked and defeated a large, well-armed French vessel called La Concorde. Instead, Blackbeard allowed the former captain to live on in the spacious cabin aboard his sloop the Revenge – a cabin that had been turned into a library before Bonnet set sail.įurther proof that Blackbeard came from an educated background?īlackbeard had been capturing vessels left and right, but in November of 1717 he began the battle that would cement his legend. It’s interesting that Thatch did not turn Bonnet out of his own ship, since the Gentleman Pirate was completely unskilled as a tactician and as a sailor. Bonnet had been incapacitated in an ill-advised attack on a Spanish ship, and was happy to offer control of his fortunes to Thatch. Blackbeard, along with several other associates of Hornigold, disagreed with this philosophy, and Hornigold was soon voted out of his position as Commodore of the pirate fleet.īlackbeard took off with his own flotilla, including a ship named the Revenge, captained by Stede Bonnet, called The Gentleman Pirate. Hornigold, a former privateer, had made it a habit, out of national loyalty, to never capture English ships. Europeans did not follow this style at all, but such grooming habits would be typical of someone trying to manage bushy African hair. Another is the fact that his hair and beard were always described as being braided. One is the fact that the pirate’s swarthy skin is often mentioned in his descriptions. ![]() We may never know for sure, but certain pieces of circumstantial evidence support this. Some believe that the man known as Edward Thatch was the illegitimate son of a wealthy family, a family further disgraced by the child’s mother, an African slave. One intriguing idea is that Blackbeard’s black beard hid a secret – African ancestry. One wonders, then, why Thatch, who had very obvious leadership abilities, did not gather a crew and capture his own ship (Hornigold, like many pirates, had started out with no more than a canoe). And while Hornigold had a reputation as a teacher, a man who nurtured young pirates in their careers “on the account” it’s interesting to note that Hornigold and Thatch were of an age. However Blackbeard began his career, the first reliable account of him comes in 1716, when the renowned pirate captain Benjamin Hornigold put Thatch in charge of a sloop he had captured.īlackbeard had been sailing with Hornigold for a while. Having nothing but guns, ships, and experience attacking the merchant shipping of foreign nations, it was easy for these men to “go on the account” and become pirates. Join Amazon Prime – Watch Thousands of Movies & TV Shows Anytime – Start Free Trial Now When this war ended, privateers, who had been robbing ships for years under the auspices of their respective governments, found themselves suddenly without work. Legend says Blackbeard began his sailing career during Queen Anne’s war, a conflict which was in many ways the first “world war” since it involved most European nations and their colonies. ![]() ![]() His ability to read and write suggests a wealthy or at least middle-class background, unusual in a pirate. Scholars believe he may have been born in the English port city of Bristol in about 1680. More modern scholarship says “Thatch” is closer to the truth, although even that may have been an assumed name.
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