Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio, and Grim
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky Listener Discretion, advised, genius or insanity.
Speaker 1: Those were Edward teaches two working theories as to why
Speaker 1: the quaint sixty ton sloop known as the Revenge was
Speaker 1: currently anchored in a small pirate harbor off the coast
Speaker 1: of the Bahamas. Mere days after the Revenge's arrival, the
Speaker 1: docks were already a buzz with rumors and speculation about
Speaker 1: the ship, primarily because of the state in which it
Speaker 1: had sailed into port, or more accurately washed into port.
Speaker 1: The vessels still bore the scars of its most recent misadventure.
Speaker 1: Red stains and splintered wood marred the Revenge's deck only
Speaker 1: hastily wiped away by what little remained of their crew.
Speaker 1: If Edward Teach was being honest, he was surprised the
Speaker 1: Revenge was still afloat at all. There was almost no
Speaker 1: scenario in which a glorified dinghy like the Revenge, really
Speaker 1: any pirate ship at all, should have survived a run
Speaker 1: in with a goliath like that of a Spanish warship
Speaker 1: at the time seventeen seventeen. A typical government sanctioned man
Speaker 1: of war could have easily held well over one hundred guns.
Speaker 1: The Revenge had ten, though after the devastating defeat against
Speaker 1: the Spanish warship, the Revenge's eccentric captain made sure to
Speaker 1: outfit their artillery with an additional two guns, you know,
Speaker 1: to make up for losing half the crew and nearly
Speaker 1: his own life. Which brought Edward Teach back to his
Speaker 1: original question and the reason he found himself knocking on
Speaker 1: the door to the Revenge's captain's quarters. Was it genius
Speaker 1: or insanity that had led this captain to steer his
Speaker 1: crew to almost certain death? The answer, of course, was
Speaker 1: the one theory Teach had not thought to consider in
Speaker 1: the first place, stupidity. It was past the captain's doors
Speaker 1: and into his private residence that Teach found himself standing
Speaker 1: face to face with the fanciful night shirts and vast
Speaker 1: collection of books adorning the cabin of one Steed Bonnet, or,
Speaker 1: as he would one day come to be known, the
Speaker 1: Gentleman Pirate. Today, the name Steed Bonnet is often relegated
Speaker 1: to a footnote amongst the larger legends associated with the
Speaker 1: quote Golden Age of piracy until a recent television series
Speaker 1: on HBO Max. He was almost entirely forgotten by all
Speaker 1: but the most passionate students of eighteenth century history. His
Speaker 1: import had really only ever been measured by the interactions
Speaker 1: he had with more infamous pirates. But to Edward Teach
Speaker 1: in that moment, Steve Bonnet was no such footnote. He
Speaker 1: was an idiot, sure, but more than that, he was
Speaker 1: a mystery, an opportunity. For so long, Teach had only
Speaker 1: been a part of other men's crews, just waiting for
Speaker 1: the day he could take on a ship and a
Speaker 1: crew of his own, And now suddenly here he stood
Speaker 1: next to the incompetent oaf who was unknowingly handing Teach
Speaker 1: his freedom and his future on a silver platter. Bonnet
Speaker 1: had a ship, but he needed a crew, and frankly,
Speaker 1: he needed a captain to lead them while he healed
Speaker 1: from his injuries. What happened once his wounds healed would
Speaker 1: be an issue for a later date, when he was
Speaker 1: sure he could handle. As he continued to stare at
Speaker 1: the spectacle of a man before him, and for the
Speaker 1: first time since stepping on board, Teach felt the lips
Speaker 1: he hid under his considerable beard pull into a genuine smile.
Speaker 1: He held out his hand to the captain and introduced himself,
Speaker 1: not by his given name, but by the name borne
Speaker 1: out of years of infamy on the high seas, a
Speaker 1: name that sent even the most fearsome of foes cowering
Speaker 1: in their boots. He introduced himself as Blackbeard. The two
Speaker 1: shook hands and made their deal. Blackbeard would take the
Speaker 1: revenge temporarily while steed Bonnet healed. But unbeknownst to them,
Speaker 1: with that handshake also came the promise of their end,
Speaker 1: for by the end of December the following year, both
Speaker 1: pirates would be dead. But as Blackbeard stared at steed Bonnet,
Speaker 1: clad in ruffles and what he was sure was a
Speaker 1: posture held only by those raised sucking on silver spoons,
Speaker 1: the infamous pirate captain couldn't help but imagine a different
Speaker 1: life for himself, one where he stood at the helm
Speaker 1: of a mighty ship and the horizon was suddenly within reach.
Speaker 1: I'm Danish Schwartz, and this is noble blood. Given that
Speaker 1: the name itself is gilded, it's hard not to romanticize
Speaker 1: the era we've come to recognize as the Golden Age
Speaker 1: of piracy. Little more than a skull and crossbones is
Speaker 1: needed before our subconscious starts humming shanties and conjuring pictures
Speaker 1: of open oceans and overflowing treasure chests. But the reality,
Speaker 1: as per usual, was not as carefree as a drunkenly
Speaker 1: stumbling Jack Sparrow might have you believe. The life of
Speaker 1: a pirate was not one chosen lightly. In fact, it
Speaker 1: was rarely chosen at all. Most crew members found themselves
Speaker 1: forced into this sort of life through dire financial straits.
Speaker 1: It was also common for black men to use piracy
Speaker 1: as a means to escape the Atlantic slave trade. That's
Speaker 1: not to say that life at sea was free from
Speaker 1: racial prejudice, but a life of poverty on a ship
Speaker 1: as a freeman was still preferable to life as a
Speaker 1: slave on the mainland. So while we often pair the
Speaker 1: title pirate with the likes of Orlando Bloom, in reality
Speaker 1: it was much less swashbuckling rogue saving swooning maidens, and
Speaker 1: more desperate fugitives doing whatever they could to stay alive
Speaker 1: and not behind bars or enslaved, which is perhaps why
Speaker 1: the story of Steed Bonnet, the man who actively chose
Speaker 1: to abandon his life of luxury to take up a
Speaker 1: life of piracy continues to confound and fascinate us to
Speaker 1: this day. But before anyone had ever heard of the
Speaker 1: gentleman pirate, Steed was just a boy born into your
Speaker 1: typical wealthy land owning family profiting off slave labor in
Speaker 1: early eighteenth century Barbados. Due to his parents' early deaths.
Speaker 1: By the age of six, Bonnet had inherited his family's estate,
Speaker 1: which boasted over four hundred acres of sugar crops, a
Speaker 1: mill dedicated to the production of cane sugar, and over
Speaker 1: ninety enslaved laborers, along with a litany of servants who
Speaker 1: catered to Steed's every need. Given little other choice, Bonnet
Speaker 1: was raised to follow the course his parent's life had
Speaker 1: set out for him. And even though there is no
Speaker 1: historical basis for it, I like to imagine a tiny
Speaker 1: six year old Seed Bonnet sitting at his father's desk
Speaker 1: in his newly inherited study, his stubby legs still too
Speaker 1: short to reach the floor, swinging idle beneath the table
Speaker 1: while he stares at Ledger after Leger, trying to make
Speaker 1: sense of his late father sugar enterprise, only to remember
Speaker 1: that he can't read more likely, the business affairs of
Speaker 1: the Bonnet estate were taken over by Steed's next of
Speaker 1: kin until he came of age, but that by no
Speaker 1: means changes the fact that Steed was born and raised
Speaker 1: to believe that the Barbadian sugar trade would be his future.
Speaker 1: At twenty one, he married a young woman whose family
Speaker 1: also came from the Barbadian social elite, but apart from
Speaker 1: that and the four children they had together, the couple
Speaker 1: would have little else in common. Then again, Bonnet held
Speaker 1: little in common with most of the members of the
Speaker 1: high society life he had been born into. He may
Speaker 1: have technically been made a major in the Barbadian militia
Speaker 1: due mostly to his status as a slaveholder and landowner,
Speaker 1: but his interests quickly became skewed towards the enemies of
Speaker 1: the militia that he was set to defend against. The
Speaker 1: Careers of pirates at this time were far from private,
Speaker 1: and Bonnet, the bookish scholar that he was, made sure
Speaker 1: to keep himself exceptionally up to date on any and
Speaker 1: all things pirate. He was a militia man, after all,
Speaker 1: and in some reports, even a justice of the peace.
Speaker 1: He had to be aware of the villains washing up
Speaker 1: on their shores, at least until he became one himself. Now,
Speaker 1: there are many conflicting theories as to why Bonnet began
Speaker 1: his pirate exploits. Some say the impetus for his escape
Speaker 1: from high society stemmed from his poor relationship with his wife,
Speaker 1: But I do think it's important to note that there
Speaker 1: is little information on the exact nature of Bonnet's relationship
Speaker 1: with his wife, and the reports we do have are questionable.
Speaker 1: Some sources call his wife quote nagging, while others, like
Speaker 1: Charles Johnson in his seventeen twenty four publication A General
Speaker 1: History of Pirates, merely cited quote some discomforts he found
Speaker 1: in a married state. Other scholars suggest Bonnet may have
Speaker 1: been suffering from some form of mental illness. However, this
Speaker 1: leads us into the murky waters of posthumous diagnoses, which
Speaker 1: remains largely unhelpful when contextualizing Bonnet's story on a larger scale.
Speaker 1: The truth is we will never know the real reason
Speaker 1: Bonnet chose to abandon the comforts of his affluent life.
Speaker 1: It's easy to point fingers at nagging wives or mental
Speaker 1: illness to come to conclusions, but ultimately those reasons are
Speaker 1: built off assumptions and biases that lack anything close to
Speaker 1: actual supported evidence. All this to say, Steed could have
Speaker 1: succumbed to the pressures associated with any and all of
Speaker 1: the aforementioned stressors in his life, but he could have
Speaker 1: just as likely been having the world's most extreme midlife crisis.
Speaker 1: And while Bonnet may have made up his mind to
Speaker 1: leave his old life behind, that by no means meant
Speaker 1: that he had any sort of idea what he was
Speaker 1: actually doing. All Bonnet really knew was that in order
Speaker 1: to become a pirate, he needed two things, a ship
Speaker 1: and a crew. The former was acquired simply enough. Bonnet's
Speaker 1: pockets were deep enough to encourage the builders to turn
Speaker 1: the blind eye to the eccentric aristocrat who demanded a
Speaker 1: library be built into the captain's quarters of his ship.
Speaker 1: Finding a crew was a harder sell. A pirate crew
Speaker 1: was typically bought in the same way a pirate ship
Speaker 1: would be on the high seas, through theft or mutiny.
Speaker 1: But since Bonnet had decided to forego traditional pirate code
Speaker 1: and build himself a ship of his own, getting a
Speaker 1: crew to work under him, a land lubber with exactly
Speaker 1: zero experience out on open ocean was a recipe for disaster.
Speaker 1: But far be it from Bonnet to let something out
Speaker 1: as inconsequential as inexperienced keep him from following through on
Speaker 1: a truly terrible idea. His solution a fair wage. Seeing
Speaker 1: as he was perpetually one small misstep away from having
Speaker 1: his crew replace him with a captain who was far
Speaker 1: more capable, Bonnet made the one move he suspected would
Speaker 1: keep them in his favor. On a normal pirate ship,
Speaker 1: crew members were paid a percentage of the plunder they received,
Speaker 1: but Bonnet, aware of his already unorthodox method of acquiring
Speaker 1: his ship, doubled down to match the needs of his crew.
Speaker 1: With a steady income, they would be less likely to
Speaker 1: replace him with someone better. And so, in spring seventeen seventeen,
Speaker 1: with his shiny new boat, begrudgingly acceptant crew, and an
Speaker 1: over abundance of unearned confidence, Steed Bonnet set sail from
Speaker 1: Barbados on the vessel he had named for probably no
Speaker 1: other reason other than that he thought it sounded cool.
Speaker 1: The revenge now, whether it was due to his cruise
Speaker 1: knowledge of the trade or the universe taking pity on him,
Speaker 1: Bonnet's initial venture into piracy went surprisingly well. The Revenge
Speaker 1: successfully overtook upwards of eight ships of varying sizes, stripping
Speaker 1: each of their valuables before they swiftly moved on to
Speaker 1: their next target. He only stopped if he wanted to
Speaker 1: set fire to a ship he plundered, a practice that
Speaker 1: he suspiciously only acted upon when the ship was native
Speaker 1: to Barbados. Some historians theorized that Bonnet may not have
Speaker 1: wanted news of his criminal activities reaching home, but soon
Speaker 1: enough no amount of arson could keep tales of the
Speaker 1: Revenge's exploits at bay. Despite his string of early successes,
Speaker 1: Bonnet's lucky streak officially came to an end in September
Speaker 1: seventeen seventeen, when he and his crew came face to
Speaker 1: face with a Spanish man of war. After a skirmish
Speaker 1: that left the Revenge with half its crew and more
Speaker 1: or less half a captain, the remaining men made the
Speaker 1: decision to head towards the known pirate harbor Nasa off
Speaker 1: the coast of the Bahamas. Cut to Edward Teach, the
Speaker 1: infamous Blackbeard, staring with a mixture of disdain and awe
Speaker 1: at the battered ship and equally battered captain. Perhaps the
Speaker 1: most peculiar pirate he'd ever met, Steed Bonnet. Steed was
Speaker 1: everything a pirate shouldn't have been, wealthy, educated, well mannered.
Speaker 1: There was no reason for him to have ended up
Speaker 1: in a pirate harbor, both him and his ship riddled
Speaker 1: with the scars of battle. But once Blackbeard was able
Speaker 1: to look past the lavish dressing gown and entirely impractical
Speaker 1: library at sea, Blackbeard saw Bonnet as the opportunity that
Speaker 1: he was. After Bonnet's debacle with the Spanish Navy, it
Speaker 1: was no secret that Bonnet's crew was unimpressed by their
Speaker 1: lackluster excuse of a captain, and now that the former
Speaker 1: aristocrat could barely leave his bed because of his injuries,
Speaker 1: it was becoming increasingly difficult to ignore the fact that
Speaker 1: the Revenge needed a real captain. If Steed didn't appoint one,
Speaker 1: his crew might take matters into their own hands and
Speaker 1: make that decision for him. Luckily for Bonnet, Blackbeard was
Speaker 1: more than happy to step into the role. After setting
Speaker 1: sail from Nassau with its new captain at the helm,
Speaker 1: the Revenge steadily made its way up the coast leaving
Speaker 1: a trail of destruction cast carelessly behind them. Any vessel
Speaker 1: unlucky enough to be caught in their path was subject
Speaker 1: to the typical looting and plundering of any pirate raid.
Speaker 1: Jewels were stolen, coins were pocketed, and casks of Madeira wine, rum,
Speaker 1: and ammunition were plucked like they sat on grocery store
Speaker 1: shelves instead of in the halls of merchant ships. But Blackbeard,
Speaker 1: always the overachiever, didn't stop there after he'd taken his fill.
Speaker 1: He would order his crew to dump any and all
Speaker 1: extra cargo that they weren't planning on taking with them,
Speaker 1: just because he could. And while tales of Blackbeard's villainous
Speaker 1: exploits echoed off the walls of almost every tavern up
Speaker 1: and down the Atlantic coast, whispers of a peculiar gentleman
Speaker 1: draped in finery aboard the revenge were swiftly making the
Speaker 1: round as well. In the months since his near brush
Speaker 1: with death with the Spanish Bonnet, had recovered from the
Speaker 1: majority of his injuries, only to find himself in the
Speaker 1: peculiar position of being a guest in his own home.
Speaker 1: Though guests may have been too generous a term, he
Speaker 1: may have owned the ship and paid the crew, but
Speaker 1: he even sleeping in the captain's quarters didn't change the
Speaker 1: fact that the Revenge was becoming more of a prison
Speaker 1: than his lesh estate in Barbados had ever been. At
Speaker 1: the time, seating his role as captain to Blackbeard had
Speaker 1: seemed like the only logical choice, But as Bonnet grew stronger,
Speaker 1: he also became acutely aware that his crew had little,
Speaker 1: if any remaining loyalty to him, not that this was
Speaker 1: at all surprising. During one instance, when Bonnet was momentarily
Speaker 1: given back control of the Revenge, the ill equipped gentleman
Speaker 1: pirate threatened an oncoming merchant vessel that he and his
Speaker 1: crew would quote do them mischief unless they came aboard
Speaker 1: and shared a meal with them, not exactly the type
Speaker 1: of behavior that instills fear and loyalty in pirate ranks.
Speaker 1: When the crew all but begged Blackbeard to stay on
Speaker 1: as captain, Bonnet felt the carefully crafted pirate fantasy he
Speaker 1: had built for himself slipping through his fingers. Trapped aboard
Speaker 1: a ship he'd bought to escape his former life, the
Speaker 1: disgruntled former aristocrat fell into a deep depression, confiding in
Speaker 1: one of his few remaining loyal crew members, his new found,
Speaker 1: though predictably familiar, desire to now leave behind his life
Speaker 1: of piracy for a quieter existence abroad, maybe Spain or Portugal,
Speaker 1: his real only prerequisite being the country's protection against being
Speaker 1: extradited for piracy crimes. Strangely enough, the answer to Bonnet's
Speaker 1: prayers would come from the British Crown itself, in the
Speaker 1: form of a decree called a Proclamation for Suppressing of Pirates, or,
Speaker 1: as it was better known, the Act of Grace. Across
Speaker 1: the Atlantic, the repercussions of the quote Golden Age of
Speaker 1: piracy were finally beginning to affect life life in England.
Speaker 1: King George the First was facing pressure from merchants and
Speaker 1: shareholders to enact some sort of measure to quell the
Speaker 1: exponentially growing crime rate on the high Seas. Their livelihoods
Speaker 1: were quite literally being dumped in the ocean. His solution,
Speaker 1: which on the surface appears slightly counterintuitive, was to offer
Speaker 1: a pardon to any and all pirates who surrendered themselves
Speaker 1: to the Crown before the fifth of January that year.
Speaker 1: It gave pirates like Bonnet the opportunity to turn themselves
Speaker 1: in with next to no consequences save their promise never
Speaker 1: to practice piracy against the Crown ever again. Now, if
Speaker 1: that offer sounds a little too good to be true,
Speaker 1: you wouldn't be the only one to think so. The
Speaker 1: language of the proclamation made it clear that the Crown
Speaker 1: only offered quote promise of a pardon, which, if pop
Speaker 1: culture rhetoric has taught us anything about pirates, it's that
Speaker 1: a promise to or or from one is about as
Speaker 1: binding as a scrap of masking tape, or, you know,
Speaker 1: a marriage contract with Steed Bonnet. Needless to say, there
Speaker 1: was a fair amount of skepticism in the pirate community
Speaker 1: towards the King's pardon, leading some historians to theorize that Blackbeard,
Speaker 1: with his general distrust of authority and recently acquired small
Speaker 1: fleet of pirate vessels, sent Bonnet to the town of
Speaker 1: Bath to acquire a pardon for himself as a test
Speaker 1: before he attempted to procure one of his own. For
Speaker 1: Bonnet's part, it didn't take much to convince him to
Speaker 1: seek the pardon for himself, especially since one could argue
Speaker 1: running away from his problems was historically Steed's favorite pastime.
Speaker 1: It probably took even less convincing for Bonnet to leave
Speaker 1: his ship and his crew in the care of Blackbeard.
Speaker 1: As he set sail on a small dinghy inland to
Speaker 1: settle his affairs. Maybe he even waved back to his
Speaker 1: crew as they grew into small dots on the horizon,
Speaker 1: as he felt the weight he'd been holding on to
Speaker 1: as a pseudo captain turned guest turned prisoner, lifting with
Speaker 1: every inch he floated closer to land. But Steed's old
Speaker 1: crew aboard The Revenge wouldn't have seen the small hand
Speaker 1: waving toward them in the distance. No, just a Steed
Speaker 1: Bonnet stepped on land toward what he was sure would
Speaker 1: be a brighter future. His old hired crew was just
Speaker 1: realizing that Blackbeard and Blackbeard's own pre Revenge crew had
Speaker 1: just turned their weapons against them. Now, if there was
Speaker 1: an official rule book on how to be a pirate,
Speaker 1: I imagine the first rule would be printed in all
Speaker 1: caps across the front page, bolded, highlighted, and double underlined,
Speaker 1: never trust a pirate. Unfortunately, for Bonnet, such a book
Speaker 1: was not held in his fully stocked library aboard The Revenge,
Speaker 1: and Blackbeard wasted no time taking advantage of bonnet ignorance
Speaker 1: to strip the Revenge of any and all things of
Speaker 1: value to their horror. This unfortunately included Bonnet's original crew, who,
Speaker 1: thanks to the very captain they had so very recently
Speaker 1: switched their allegiance to, were left marooned on an island
Speaker 1: near Topsail Inlet, off the coast of North Carolina. Because,
Speaker 1: of course, Blackbeard was the type of petty not only
Speaker 1: to strip the Revenge clean of everything save a few
Speaker 1: barrels of food, but to take his crew just to
Speaker 1: maroon them on an island so that Bonnet couldn't have them.
Speaker 1: When Blackbeard initially took command of the Revenge, he had
Speaker 1: managed to assemble one hundred and fifty men after the
Speaker 1: Spanish navy had all but decimated Bonnet's already modest crew
Speaker 1: of seventy five. But as rumor of the Revenge's exploits spread,
Speaker 1: soon even the men they were robbing were begging to
Speaker 1: join their company. In one instance, upon crossing paths with
Speaker 1: the Revenge, a merchant ship willingly surrendered and pledged their
Speaker 1: loyalty to Blackbeard rather than suffer the consequences of their
Speaker 1: most likely imminent demise. As time went on, what had
Speaker 1: started as a mere one hundred and fifty aboard one
Speaker 1: lone damaged ship, mounted to upwards of four hundred men,
Speaker 1: spread across several vessels. And while this may have sounded
Speaker 1: like a good thing, Bonnets and by extent, the Revenge's
Speaker 1: dead weight was becoming more apparent by the day, especially
Speaker 1: since any raid Blackbeard undertook had to be split amongst
Speaker 1: all of his crew, and plunder shared four hundred ways
Speaker 1: didn't come with the same sense of satisfaction or the
Speaker 1: amount of money it would with a smaller group, And
Speaker 1: since Blackbeard was essentially cleaning house after Steed, it was
Speaker 1: clear that Steed's men had to go. Meanwhile, in Bath,
Speaker 1: Bonnet had successfully expunged his record of all criminal pirate activity,
Speaker 1: and he was more than ready to set sail aboard
Speaker 1: his ship onto the next chapter of his life. Unfortunately
Speaker 1: for him, this was also the point in which he
Speaker 1: finally noticed the metaphorical knife that had been sticking out
Speaker 1: of his back ever since he'd landed on the mainland
Speaker 1: when he stepped aboard the Revenge after just three days away. Remember,
Speaker 1: he was always planning on coming back to his ship.
Speaker 1: He just wanted to clear his pirate record. He was
Speaker 1: planning on taking the ship that he owned too, wherever
Speaker 1: he would live next. But he now realized he owned
Speaker 1: a ghost ship. It was little more than a hollowed
Speaker 1: out husk of driftwood, run aground and completely abandoned in
Speaker 1: his absence. There's a metaphor in there somewhere, but even Bonnet,
Speaker 1: a man so fond of literature that he built a
Speaker 1: library at sea, was in no mood to appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Once upon a time he had named his ship the Revenge,
Speaker 1: but taking stock of his empty sloop and completely missing crew,
Speaker 1: quickly changed it from name to a purpose. And when
Speaker 1: he eventually found his few remaining men marooned and left
Speaker 1: to die on an uninhabited island, for once, the skeptical
Speaker 1: crew and their inept gentleman pirate were in agreement. Blackbeard
Speaker 1: was going to pay. Unfortunately, I have to spoil the
Speaker 1: ending to this particular part of the story and tell
Speaker 1: you Blackbeard did not pay, at least not by Bonnet's hands.
Speaker 1: As great the tale of the Revenge's Revenge would have been,
Speaker 1: apart from a handful of near misses, the two enemy
Speaker 1: captains would never cross paths again in their lifetime. Bonnett, however,
Speaker 1: didn't know this yet, and quickly made it his life's
Speaker 1: mission to make Blackbeard suffer for his treachery for turning
Speaker 1: the Revenge into a Blackbeard franchise and then completely abandoning it.
Speaker 1: The first amongst a series of hiccups in Steve Bonnet's
Speaker 1: plans proved to be the most problematic one. Technically, he
Speaker 1: was no longer a pirate, at least he wasn't supposed
Speaker 1: to be according to the terms of his pardon. The
Speaker 1: ink had barely dried on Bonnet's pardon before he was
Speaker 1: already about to break the only term of his agreement. Granted,
Speaker 1: he was given little other choice. Blackbeard had left the
Speaker 1: Revenge with nothing but a few casks of food, and
Speaker 1: after failing to secure a privateering commission from the governor
Speaker 1: following his pardon, Bonnet forged a head the only way
Speaker 1: he knew how. This time, Bonnet began conducting his pirate
Speaker 1: business under the name Captain Thomas and sailing a ship
Speaker 1: that looked remarkably similar to the Revenge, but was instead
Speaker 1: named the Royal James. And to ensure that bonnet activities
Speaker 1: were relatively above board, he made sure that all of
Speaker 1: his run ins with merchant vessels were classified as trades,
Speaker 1: even if he stole everything but the shirts off their
Speaker 1: backs in exchange for maybe a small parcel of rice or,
Speaker 1: in one case, an old anchor cable. Originally, the Royal
Speaker 1: James only quote traded out of necessity, but by July
Speaker 1: seventeen eighteen, the gentleman pirate and his crew had once
Speaker 1: again fully abandoned all charades of diplomacy in favor of
Speaker 1: embracing the pirate life. In the summer of seventeen eighteen,
Speaker 1: the Royal James was on an extended, glorified shopping spree,
Speaker 1: boarding merchant vessels and taking their fill before going off
Speaker 1: to find their next victims. During this time, Bonnet managed
Speaker 1: to add two more sloops and a handful of new
Speaker 1: crew members to his small but mighty fleet. Soon after
Speaker 1: acquiring the new ships, The Francis and the Fortune, Bonnet
Speaker 1: and his men sailed their way into the Cape Fear
Speaker 1: River Estuary off the coast of North Carolina, only to
Speaker 1: find that they had a much more practical problem on
Speaker 1: their hands. The Royal James had a leak as the
Speaker 1: ship began to take on more and more water, and
Speaker 1: the Atlantic hurricane season was closing in. Bonnet and his
Speaker 1: crew had no choice but to make landfall to fix
Speaker 1: their flagship vessel and wait out the bad weather. By
Speaker 1: late August, word of Bonnet's extended stay in the Cape
Speaker 1: Fear River had reached Charlestown, and the Governor of South
Speaker 1: Carolina was less than pleased. Even though Bonnet's location was
Speaker 1: technically in North Carolina, outside the governor's jurisdiction, Governor Johnson
Speaker 1: was not prepared to let someone with Seed Bonnet's lengthy
Speaker 1: criminal history and ties to arguably one of the most
Speaker 1: nefarious pirates of their time, lounge about on a beach nearby,
Speaker 1: and so on September twenty sixth, seventeen eighteen, Colonel William
Speaker 1: Rhett found himself sailing into the Cape Fear rivermouth with
Speaker 1: two government ships and one hundred and thirty militiamen on
Speaker 1: a commission from Governor Johnson too to carry out the
Speaker 1: capture and arrest of Steed Bonnet and the crew of
Speaker 1: the Royal James. Meanwhile, from further up the waterway, Steed
Speaker 1: Bonnet held his spyglass to his eye and squinted at
Speaker 1: the blurry shapes he saw bobbing in the distance. Now,
Speaker 1: he may not have been the most experienced pirate, but
Speaker 1: Bonnet was at least ninety percent sure that the masses
Speaker 1: he saw were ships merchant vessels if he was not mistaken,
Speaker 1: And it was under that assumption that Bonnet sent three
Speaker 1: canoes full of his crew to go off and capture
Speaker 1: the mysterious merchant ships in the river mouth. However, as
Speaker 1: his men drifted closer, the sight of the British Naval
Speaker 1: flag quickly enlightened Bonnet's crew as to the reality of
Speaker 1: their situation. The men hastily scrambled to turn around and
Speaker 1: sail back to warn their captain about the imminent attack.
Speaker 1: But when they returned, they realized that the Royal Navy
Speaker 1: ships behind them weren't moving at all. In fact, it
Speaker 1: seemed as though one of the vessels was stalled in
Speaker 1: the opening of the estuary. Aboard the British naval ship,
Speaker 1: the Henry, poor Colonel Rhett was having a rough day
Speaker 1: with Bonnet in his sights. The Henry sped towards its target,
Speaker 1: only to be abruptly jarred to a halt as its
Speaker 1: hull scraped the bottom of the Cape Fear River without
Speaker 1: any way to free itself from its sandy prison, the
Speaker 1: Henry transformed from dangerous adversary to only slightly intimidating art installation.
Speaker 1: As the tide continued to drop lower and lower, and
Speaker 1: so with the British Navy stuck in the entrance to
Speaker 1: the harbor and Bonnet and his men unable to flee
Speaker 1: due to ret blocking their only escape route, all parties
Speaker 1: were forced to angrily brood in their respective corners until
Speaker 1: the moon inevitably turned the tides in one of their favors.
Speaker 1: By the time the Henry finally managed to get itself
Speaker 1: back on the water, the sun had long since disappeared
Speaker 1: below the horizon, and even Bonnet was not so foolish
Speaker 1: as to attempt to navigate the rocky estuary in the dark. Together,
Speaker 1: He and the crew of the Royal James decided to
Speaker 1: wait until morning before taking any action, but as the
Speaker 1: moon rose, bonnet patience waned. Before long, even the crew
Speaker 1: had taken note of his erratic behavior. By the late
Speaker 1: hours of the night, the once timid aristocrat had all
Speaker 1: but vanished, eclipsed by the shadow of a man being
Speaker 1: forced to watch the last of his freedom wash away
Speaker 1: with the tide. The wounds of Blackbeard's betrayal still stung
Speaker 1: fresh in his memory, and as he and the crew
Speaker 1: of the Royal James waited for the sun to rise,
Speaker 1: Bonnet couldn't help but see treachery etched into the faces
Speaker 1: around him. With nothing else to do, Bonnet set about
Speaker 1: preparing his men for battle, assembling the forty or so
Speaker 1: men that he'd scattered amongst his three vessels, and bringing
Speaker 1: them together aboard the Royal James to defend their flagship
Speaker 1: and its captain. Predictably, some of the men were less
Speaker 1: than enthusiastic when asked to put their life on the line,
Speaker 1: to which Bonnet simply responded, quote, if anyone refused to fight,
Speaker 1: he would blow their brains out. It was also at
Speaker 1: this point that, with no one left to yell at,
Speaker 1: Bonnet returned to his captain's quarters to write a letter
Speaker 1: to the Governor of South Carolina, because, when in doubt,
Speaker 1: always asked to speak to the manager. In his letter,
Speaker 1: he condemned the governor for his actions against him and
Speaker 1: his crew, and he ended the message explaining that should
Speaker 1: wrehtt follow through on his attack come daybreak, he would
Speaker 1: not hesitate to quote burn and destroy all ships and
Speaker 1: vessels going in or coming out of South Carolina. But
Speaker 1: as the sun rose over the Atlantic, any words uttered
Speaker 1: by Bonnet, written or otherwise were swiftly forgotten. The Royal
Speaker 1: James was the first to make a move, launching full
Speaker 1: speed ahead towards the Henry, hoping Rhet would take the
Speaker 1: bait and chase them out of the harbor and into
Speaker 1: the open ocean, where they would make their escape. However,
Speaker 1: in order to complete this maneuver, the Royal James was
Speaker 1: forced to avoid the Henry in the relatively narrow river
Speaker 1: mouth by banging close to the shore, which predictably was
Speaker 1: when everything once again devolved into chaos. Rhett, realizing what
Speaker 1: Bonnet was attempting to do, used the advantage of having
Speaker 1: two vessels to try to flank the Royal James on
Speaker 1: either side, only for Rhet to feel the familiar dreaded
Speaker 1: scrape of sand below, dragging the Henry to a halt.
Speaker 1: To Colonel Rhet's horror, the other ship sent with him,
Speaker 1: the Sea Nymph, had run aground as well, meaning instead
Speaker 1: of corralling bond It on either side, they had given
Speaker 1: him a runway in which to sail off to freedom.
Speaker 1: Except of course they hadn't, because just as Bonnet gleefully
Speaker 1: came to the same conclusion and barreled forward to greet
Speaker 1: his victory upon the open ocean, the Royal James too
Speaker 1: came to a screeching halt as a hull found the
Speaker 1: warm embrace of the Cape Fear River floor, and suddenly,
Speaker 1: for the second time in twenty four hours, Ruett and
Speaker 1: Bonnet were stuck twiddling their thumbs and staring at each
Speaker 1: other while they waited for the tide to release them
Speaker 1: from their oddly specific purgatories. However, this time, the Royal
Speaker 1: James had managed to beach itself in such a way
Speaker 1: that they were within shooting distance of the Henry, which
Speaker 1: led the crews of both vessels to fire recklessly at
Speaker 1: each other as they waited out their stalemate. Bullets and
Speaker 1: taunt were exchanged in equal measure over the following six hours.
Speaker 1: Unti let last, fate chose the Henry to be the winner.
Speaker 1: When Rhett carefully maneuvered his ship so that the Royal
Speaker 1: James was effectively staring down the barrels of their cannons.
Speaker 1: Bonnet finally waved the white flag and surrendered himself to
Speaker 1: be taken into custody at Charlestown, but of course, Steed
Speaker 1: being Steed, he was not planning on staying there for long.
Speaker 1: For all the trouble it had taken to apprehend Steed
Speaker 1: Bonnet and bring him into custody, their welcome upon arriving
Speaker 1: in Charlestown was surprisingly underwhelming. For one, Charlestown had yet
Speaker 1: to build a suitable prison to hold the more than
Speaker 1: thirty pirates Governor Johnson now had in his custody. Improvising,
Speaker 1: the Governor had Bonnet's crew put in a spare one
Speaker 1: story building in town until they could organize their trials. However, Bonnet,
Speaker 1: whether it was due to his I've never slept in
Speaker 1: anything less than silk attitude or because they didn't want
Speaker 1: him plotting something nefarious with his men, was intentionally isolated
Speaker 1: and put into the care of South Carolina's Provost, Marshal
Speaker 1: Nathaniel Partridge, who imprisoned him in his own home, which
Speaker 1: meant that while Bonnet's thirty men were detained in some
Speaker 1: decrepit shack with barely a chamber pot split between them,
Speaker 1: Bonnet suffered silently in the private guest quarters of a
Speaker 1: prominent South Carolina government official imagine. But Steed didn't have
Speaker 1: to suffer alone for long. Soon the prosecution had managed
Speaker 1: to turn two of bonnet Crewe into key witnesses in
Speaker 1: exchange for clemency. As such, they were then separated from
Speaker 1: the rest of the crew and consequently sent to Partridge's
Speaker 1: home to await trial. At least Bonnet's boatswing, Ignacious Pell,
Speaker 1: was the other man set to testify for the prosecution.
Speaker 1: A man named David Harriet arrived at Part's home but
Speaker 1: quickly began conspiring with Bonnet. Like I said earlier, Bonnet
Speaker 1: was never planning on staying imprisoned for long, and so
Speaker 1: three weeks after his initial arrest, Bonnet and Harriet slipped
Speaker 1: out past the heavily bribed guard surrounding the Partridge estate
Speaker 1: and escaped into the night. Some historians report that the
Speaker 1: two men dressed in women's clothing as disguises, which I'm
Speaker 1: inclined to believe is true, if only because Bonnet's previous
Speaker 1: lifestyle choices leaned towards the more theatrical. But regardless, Harriet
Speaker 1: and Bonnet managed to make it to the small canoe
Speaker 1: that they'd arranged for, and they sailed quietly out of
Speaker 1: Charlestown Harbor. Now, if Governor Johnson had thought he was
Speaker 1: angry at the idea of Steed Bonnet lounging beachside on
Speaker 1: the shores of Cape Fear River, that was nothing compared
Speaker 1: to what he felt upon getting word that Bonnet had
Speaker 1: escaped custody, and, after a week spent sending search party
Speaker 1: after search party out to no avail, the Governor's fuse
Speaker 1: was burning dangerously short. Desperate to begin Bonnet's trial, the
Speaker 1: Governor put out a reward for seven hundred pounds for
Speaker 1: Bonnet's capture, and once again Colonel Rhett was sent out
Speaker 1: to scavenge the land for any and all traces of
Speaker 1: the dread gentleman pirate. Ultimately, in typical Steed fashion, his
Speaker 1: demise came from his own hand, or rather his pen.
Speaker 1: While it's true that Bonnet had successfully escaped without a trace,
Speaker 1: that didn't mean he'd managed to get very far. The
Speaker 1: canoe that he and Harriet had disappeared into the night
Speaker 1: with had only taken them to the edge of the
Speaker 1: Charlestown Harbor to a place called Sullivan's Island. There, the
Speaker 1: man who supplied them the canoe was meant to have
Speaker 1: secured them a sloop to actually escape on. Only that
Speaker 1: ship never came, and after a week without word, Bonnet
Speaker 1: was tired of waiting and decided to take matters into
Speaker 1: his own hands. He confronted his adversary the only way
Speaker 1: he knew how, with a strongly worded letter. After dotting
Speaker 1: his eyes and crossing his teas with what I imagined
Speaker 1: to be slightly more aggression than was probably called for,
Speaker 1: Bonnet sent off his letter of complaint about the contract
Speaker 1: for his sloop, but it would never reach the ship Cellar. Instead,
Speaker 1: the note would fall into the hands of Colonel Rhett, and,
Speaker 1: following an altercation that left Harriet and two others dead,
Speaker 1: Bonnet ultimately handed himself in for the final time, with
Speaker 1: little other choice but to face the court that would
Speaker 1: ultimately decide his fate. Given his proclivity for reading, it
Speaker 1: stands to reason that in another life, Bonnet could have
Speaker 1: abandoned his family's sugar plantation for law school instead of piracy.
Speaker 1: But that wasn't this life, and Steed Bonnet in the
Speaker 1: courtroom was his own worst enemy. The one witness the
Speaker 1: prosecution still had the Royal James's boatswain ignacious Pell tried
Speaker 1: to protect Bonnet as best he could. When asked if
Speaker 1: Bonnet was their commander in chief, Pell answered, much to
Speaker 1: the annoyance of the prosecution, he went by that name,
Speaker 1: but the quartermaster had more power than he. The entirety
Speaker 1: of Bonnet's trial proceedings are available for free online, so
Speaker 1: I won't go into too much detail, but I will
Speaker 1: say it's both impressive and kind of funny that the
Speaker 1: judge's tone of increasing exasperation comes through so clearly, even
Speaker 1: three hundred years after the fact. At one point, an
Speaker 1: incident of the Royal James stealing upwards of twenty barrels
Speaker 1: of molasses was brought into evidence, leading the judge to
Speaker 1: ask the question on everyone's mind, what need had you
Speaker 1: of so much molasses, to which Bonnet replied cryptically, quote,
Speaker 1: I did not carry it away, and it was contrary
Speaker 1: to my inclination. I like to imagine the judge had
Speaker 1: been wearing glasses all day just so that at that
Speaker 1: moment he could have taken them off and pinched the
Speaker 1: bridge of his nose between his fingers, trying to hold
Speaker 1: it together. When he repeated back to him, you gave
Speaker 1: orders for it to be done, and yet it was
Speaker 1: contrary to your inclinations or other highlights, like Bonnet claiming
Speaker 1: innocence about a raid of another sloop due to him
Speaker 1: having been asleep at the time. But ultimately it was
Speaker 1: a futile effort. On November tenth, seventeen eighteen, the jury
Speaker 1: found Steed Bonnet guilty, and two days later the judge
Speaker 1: sentenced him to death. On December tenth, Steed Bonnet found
Speaker 1: himself putting one foot in front of the other as
Speaker 1: he stepped up the gallows at the White Point Garden
Speaker 1: in Charlestown. When he looked out the crowd assembled to
Speaker 1: witness his final moments, he had no choice but to
Speaker 1: finally face the consequences of the life he had chosen
Speaker 1: for himself. I consider that I speak to a person,
Speaker 1: the judge had said to him on the day of
Speaker 1: his sentencing, whose offenses have proceeded not so much from
Speaker 1: his not knowing as his slighting and neglecting his duty.
Speaker 1: There was no more running for Steed, no more starting over.
Speaker 1: No amount of money or charming naivete could save him. Now,
Speaker 1: as the noose tightened around his neck, Steed Bonnet, the
Speaker 1: gentleman pirate cast his eyes on the horizon, just as
Speaker 1: he had a year and a half earlier, sailing aboard
Speaker 1: the freshly christened Revenge, awaiting fate. That was the sad
Speaker 1: end to the unintentionally funny life of Steed Bonnet. But
Speaker 1: stick around after a brief sponsor break to hear what
Speaker 1: happened to black Beard after he and Bonnet parted ways.
Speaker 1: Given how much of a household name Blackbeard is compared
Speaker 1: to Steed Bonnet, it may surprise you to learn that
Speaker 1: his pirting career was roughly the same length as our
Speaker 1: gentleman pirates. After leaving the Revenge's crew to die on
Speaker 1: an island near Topsail Inlet, Blackbeard went to the one
Speaker 1: place Bonnet least expected, bath North Carolina. Yes, teach also
Speaker 1: went to get himself a pardon from the governor, only
Speaker 1: he went one step further, befriending the governor and gaining
Speaker 1: a privateering commission so that he could continue to pillage
Speaker 1: and plunder, but under the protection of the law. The
Speaker 1: governor of Virginia, though, was not a fan of Blackbeard,
Speaker 1: and after the well publicized antics he and Bonnet had pulled,
Speaker 1: he was itching to see Blackbeard brought to justice. The
Speaker 1: Governor of Virginia sent a man named Lieutenant Reynard off
Speaker 1: with two slopes to Okracoke Island, where they had received
Speaker 1: word that Blackbeard and his men were hiding out with
Speaker 1: many of Teach's men, including his second in command, Israel,
Speaker 1: hands on business inland. Blackbeard found himself at a disadvantage
Speaker 1: when the fight with Maynard began. After massive carnage sustained
Speaker 1: on both sides from cannon and gunfire, the fight was
Speaker 1: ultimately won by Maynard. His secret strategy had been sending
Speaker 1: the majority of his men below deck just before they
Speaker 1: were boarded by Blackbeard's men. The ensuing surprise attack cost
Speaker 1: Edward Teach his life, and on November twenty second, seventeen eighteen,
Speaker 1: Blackbeard was killed by five bullet wounds and around twenty
Speaker 1: cuts laid across his body. Maynard would then famously decapitate
Speaker 1: him and hang his head from the front of his ship,
Speaker 1: only for it later to be put on a stake
Speaker 1: at the entrance to Chesapeake Bay as a warning for
Speaker 1: other pirates who sailed by. It's somehow oddly fitting that
Speaker 1: a man whose life and death have been aggrandized to
Speaker 1: such mythological proportions should sit side by side in history
Speaker 1: with someone as ostensibly unremarkable as steed Bonnet. In the end,
Speaker 1: both men only engaged in piracy for around two years,
Speaker 1: a blink of an eye in the course of the
Speaker 1: three centuries that we've spent talking about them since, despite
Speaker 1: having polar opposite personalities on paper, there are legends that
Speaker 1: Blackbeard would light slow burning fuses and then carefully place
Speaker 1: them in his beard to make it look as though
Speaker 1: he existed in a halo of thick, black smoke. And
Speaker 1: if that doesn't scream Steed Bonnet theatrical tendencies, then I
Speaker 1: don't know what does. And maybe it's all just legend,
Speaker 1: But maybe there's a reason in their stories have been
Speaker 1: inextricably tied together over the centuries. Maybe those two men
Speaker 1: who sailed out for adventure or freedom or money were
Speaker 1: more similar than history gives them credit for. Noble Blood
Speaker 1: is a production of iHeart Radio and Grim and Mild
Speaker 1: from Aaron Manke. Noble Blood is hosted by me Dana Schwartz.
Speaker 1: Additional writing and researching done by Hannah Johnston, hannah's Wick,
Speaker 1: Mira Hayward, Courtney Sender, and Lori Goodman. The show is
Speaker 1: produced by rima Il Kali, with supervising producer Josh Thain
Speaker 1: and executive producers Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.