WEBVTT - Pirates 11: Still Waters 0:00:05.360 --> 0:00:08.200 The slightest trace of gold and red flickered in the trees, 0:00:08.440 --> 0:00:11.200 marking the end of summer and the impending close of 0:00:11.280 --> 0:00:14.720 another year. Richard Worley and eight other men loaded a 0:00:14.800 --> 0:00:19.040 handful of meager provisions of biscuits, water, and dried tongue 0:00:19.200 --> 0:00:22.800 onto the small open boat. They had six aging muskets 0:00:22.840 --> 0:00:25.840 and whatever ammunition they could find between them. What they 0:00:25.920 --> 0:00:28.360 lacked in food and weapons that day, though in late 0:00:28.400 --> 0:00:31.840 September of seventeen seventeen, the would be pirates made up 0:00:31.840 --> 0:00:35.680 for in spirit. Inspired by Blackbeard's raid on ships to 0:00:35.720 --> 0:00:38.440 the south a year earlier, the men set sail one 0:00:38.840 --> 0:00:42.240 fifty miles to the Delaware River. If the legendary pirate 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:44.960 found the hunting grounds they're good enough, well, then so 0:00:45.000 --> 0:00:48.839 would they. Lofty aspirations aside, they were well aware their 0:00:48.960 --> 0:00:52.000 meager ship never stood a chance at plundering ships on 0:00:52.040 --> 0:00:55.880 the high seas. Instead, they hugged the coastline, searching for 0:00:55.960 --> 0:00:59.480 more suitable prey. When they reached the Delaware River without 0:00:59.520 --> 0:01:04.240 a single raid, Warley suggested hunting upriver. Seventy five miles later, 0:01:04.440 --> 0:01:08.560 near Newcastle, they happened upon a shell light sail boat 0:01:08.760 --> 0:01:11.959 belonging to George Grant. After taking what they wanted, the 0:01:12.040 --> 0:01:15.200 pirates set Grant and his boat free. The men might 0:01:15.200 --> 0:01:18.600 have felt proud of their first act of piracy, although technically, 0:01:18.680 --> 0:01:21.120 since the theft occurred on a river instead of the 0:01:21.200 --> 0:01:25.480 high seas, most considered the raid more simple robbery. The 0:01:25.520 --> 0:01:28.640 crew headed down river to hunt again, capturing a sloop. 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:31.680 Warley kept the ship along with half the crew, and 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:35.000 gave the rest his small boat in exchange. He upgraded 0:01:35.040 --> 0:01:37.840 ships once more on the next raid. Now with a 0:01:37.880 --> 0:01:42.080 worthy vessel, the pirates headed out to see Meanwhile, Grant 0:01:42.200 --> 0:01:45.160 had raised the alarm. New York's governor sent out the 0:01:45.319 --> 0:01:48.279 h MS Phoenix to search for the crew's original small 0:01:48.320 --> 0:01:51.720 boat along the coastline, leaving Worley to slip out to 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:55.200 sea and head south. By late October, the crew of 0:01:55.280 --> 0:01:58.200 nine had grown to twenty five. They had a ship 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:01.440 with six guns aboard and ashened a black flag with 0:02:01.560 --> 0:02:04.960 a white death's head. With Worly as captain, the men 0:02:05.080 --> 0:02:07.680 signed an oath agreeing to stand by the crew and 0:02:07.720 --> 0:02:10.919 take no quarter. The pirates looked forward to a bright 0:02:11.000 --> 0:02:14.440 and successful run, but they had no idea. Two forces 0:02:14.480 --> 0:02:18.560 were working against them in nearby Charleston, South Carolina Governor 0:02:18.680 --> 0:02:22.520 Robert Johnson, heard that another pirate, captain Moody, had anchored 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:26.360 just south of Charleston Bar. The news worried him. Blackbeard 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:30.080 Vane and Steve Bonnet had disrupted the port's trade, and 0:02:30.200 --> 0:02:34.040 Johnson remained adamant it would never happen again. Knowing the 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:37.680 pirate had a formidable fleet and plenty of firepower, Johnson 0:02:37.680 --> 0:02:40.960 assembled an even larger and more powerful fleet, intent on 0:02:41.080 --> 0:02:45.400 capturing Moody. Unaware of the Governor's plans or Moody's whereabouts, 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:49.160 Warley and his crew set off to South Carolina's coast. 0:02:49.480 --> 0:02:52.440 Nearly out of fresh water and provisions, they waited for 0:02:52.520 --> 0:02:55.920 a passing ship. Moody caught wind of Johnson's plan and 0:02:56.040 --> 0:02:58.640 headed out to sea, leaving the governor's men to find 0:02:58.680 --> 0:03:02.160 only one pirate in the area. They mistook Worley for 0:03:02.240 --> 0:03:05.120 Moody and ventured close enough to entice the pirates to 0:03:05.120 --> 0:03:08.239 give chase. Worley took the baits and raised the flag. 0:03:08.560 --> 0:03:11.000 When he drew close enough to engage, the governor's men 0:03:11.080 --> 0:03:14.720 hoisted their flag and unleashed a barrage of fire into 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:18.320 Worly ship. Although the gunfire killed some of the pirates aboard, 0:03:18.480 --> 0:03:22.480 Worley survived and stood trial. He died by hanging at 0:03:22.480 --> 0:03:26.799 White Point Garden, where Blackbeards protege Steve Barnett had met 0:03:26.840 --> 0:03:30.400 his own end just a few months earlier. Warley had 0:03:30.480 --> 0:03:33.920 dreamed of the pirate life, and that's exactly what he got. 0:03:35.160 --> 0:03:48.680 I'm Aaron Manky and welcome two pirates, three booters, buccaneers, rovers, privateers, 0:03:48.840 --> 0:03:52.760 whatever you called them. Sometimes the lines between government sanctioned 0:03:52.840 --> 0:03:56.960 and unsanctioned piracy were a bit blurry. The acts and 0:03:57.000 --> 0:03:59.720 the names caused plenty of headaches for governments and the 0:03:59.800 --> 0:04:03.920 lead goal system, where sentencing depended on clear cut definitions 0:04:03.920 --> 0:04:09.880 of legal versus illegal piracy. In short, piracy was complicated. 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:13.320 Now letters of mark could be forged, a few privateers 0:04:13.440 --> 0:04:16.800 rated ships with revoked letters. Those on the receiving end 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:20.320 of sanctioned raids saw little to no difference between pirates 0:04:20.320 --> 0:04:24.880 and privateers. Savvy lawyers probably found no shortage of loopholes 0:04:24.920 --> 0:04:28.159 in the wording, forcing the prosecution to include a wide 0:04:28.240 --> 0:04:33.160 array of terms when charging anyone with piracy. Author Captain Johnson, 0:04:33.400 --> 0:04:37.080 who some scholars believed to be Daniel Dafoe pointed out 0:04:37.200 --> 0:04:40.080 numerous instances of what courts of law considered to be 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:43.880 a pirate, sparing you the verbose wording and pages of 0:04:43.920 --> 0:04:46.880 explanation that made my head hurt. Let's just say that 0:04:46.960 --> 0:04:51.120 attacking the Majesty's ships or rating a fellow countryman's vessel 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:55.520 are two basic examples of piracy. Also, anyone who aided 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:58.960 a pirate, purchased plunder goods from one, or concealed a 0:04:59.040 --> 0:05:03.200 pirate risk being tried as an accomplice, complicating matters. Further, 0:05:03.320 --> 0:05:07.520 colonies found the profitability and the protection gained from piracy 0:05:07.560 --> 0:05:11.599 made reigning in the act difficult. Small colonies made a 0:05:11.640 --> 0:05:15.600 good location for pirate operations. Small settlements also made them 0:05:15.680 --> 0:05:19.039 vulnerable to attack. History tells us that England and other 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:23.200 European countries were often at war, Reducing available military might 0:05:23.320 --> 0:05:26.679 and funding pirates on the side of the colonists often 0:05:26.720 --> 0:05:30.120 proved a safer choice. Now, if you'll pardon the pun, 0:05:30.279 --> 0:05:33.919 the Treaty of You treked in seventeen thirteen, uh turned 0:05:33.920 --> 0:05:36.679 the tide, so to speak. With an agreement in place, 0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:40.280 Britain had the resources to fight piracy. In seventeen eighteen, 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:43.400 the British Navy had a host of warships, sloops and 0:05:43.520 --> 0:05:46.320 a few thousand men in the Caribbean, and each of 0:05:46.360 --> 0:05:49.360 the ships housed a minimum of fifty guns, making even 0:05:49.400 --> 0:05:53.000 the smallest vessel as powerful as the most formidable pirate ship, 0:05:53.240 --> 0:05:57.159 Blackbeard's Queen Anne's Revenge. Still, curtailing the problem would take 0:05:57.160 --> 0:06:00.839 more than a single approach. Pirate ships far outnumbered the 0:06:00.839 --> 0:06:04.599 British Navy. Aside from sending extra naval ships to hunt pirates, 0:06:04.640 --> 0:06:08.560 Britain introduced a few legislations. Governments often pardons to those 0:06:08.560 --> 0:06:11.760 willing to give up piracy, as we've discussed before, and 0:06:11.760 --> 0:06:14.479 while not effective on its own, they hoped that pardons 0:06:14.560 --> 0:06:17.719 might weaken pirate cruise. We learned that the Flying Gang, 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:21.960 consisting of approximately three hundred pirates, gladly accepted the pardon 0:06:22.240 --> 0:06:26.040 well initially. While that sounds significant, the pardons only helped 0:06:26.120 --> 0:06:29.680 reduce attacks near the Bahamas, and of course, pirates risked 0:06:29.680 --> 0:06:34.000 execution and governors hired informants and offered rewards to private 0:06:34.040 --> 0:06:37.560 ships that captured pirate vessels. King George made a reward 0:06:37.600 --> 0:06:41.560 structure for the capture of pirates based on hierarchy. Commanders 0:06:41.600 --> 0:06:45.320 fetched two hundred pounds. Principal officers earned the pirate hunter 0:06:45.440 --> 0:06:48.880 forty pounds, while others brought in twenty to thirty, depending 0:06:48.920 --> 0:06:53.000 on their rank. In seventeen twenty one, authorities required crews 0:06:53.200 --> 0:06:56.839 armed aboard merchant ships to fight attacks from pirates. Failure 0:06:56.920 --> 0:07:00.080 to resist piracy resulted in the loss of wages and 0:07:00.200 --> 0:07:03.640 a six month jail sentence gone to where the days 0:07:03.640 --> 0:07:06.200 when pirates had to be returned to England for trial 0:07:06.279 --> 0:07:09.000 before the High Court, as stated in an Act of 0:07:09.080 --> 0:07:12.960 Parliament originally put in place in fifteen thirty six. Instead, 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:16.320 a new act allowed local vice admirals to put pirates 0:07:16.320 --> 0:07:20.080 on trial. The Act also granted executions as long as 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:24.360 they occurred on or nearby the sea. Trials rarely lasted 0:07:24.360 --> 0:07:26.760 more than a couple of days and almost always favored 0:07:26.760 --> 0:07:30.920 the court. Some pirates died awaiting execution, though, while others 0:07:30.920 --> 0:07:35.240 were sent to the gallows to hang immediately after sentencing. Typically, 0:07:35.240 --> 0:07:37.760 those bodies would remain on the gallows for three days 0:07:38.040 --> 0:07:42.160 the tides came and went washing over the corpses. In England, 0:07:42.280 --> 0:07:47.760 hanging several pirates simultaneously was not uncommon. Between seventeen sixteen 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:51.360 and seventeen twenty six, four hundred pirates met their fate 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:54.360 at the gallows. Forty one of Steve Bonnet's crew hanged 0:07:54.360 --> 0:07:58.400 in seventeen eighteen, and in seventeen twenty two, over fifty 0:07:58.480 --> 0:08:02.800 of Bartholomew Robert's crew are hanged in a group execution. Often, 0:08:02.800 --> 0:08:05.840 the bodies of the most notorious pirates were tarred and 0:08:05.920 --> 0:08:08.680 placed in a cage two rots in full public view. 0:08:09.120 --> 0:08:11.920 The tar kept the body intact longer from the elements 0:08:12.480 --> 0:08:15.360 and the seagulls, although I imagine it might also have 0:08:15.440 --> 0:08:20.080 been a solid anti piracy campaign. Captain Kidd's body remained 0:08:20.080 --> 0:08:24.000 on display for two years in England. In seventeen twenty one, 0:08:24.080 --> 0:08:26.920 Calico Jack's corpse was displayed in the cage for all 0:08:26.960 --> 0:08:30.280 to see upon entering the harbor. A year later, Charles 0:08:30.400 --> 0:08:35.280 Vane's body followed suit. Local authorities prominently displayed both pirates 0:08:35.320 --> 0:08:39.000 on what is appropriately called dead Man's k in Port Royal. 0:08:39.800 --> 0:08:42.440 But the Crown and the colonies had one more weapon 0:08:42.559 --> 0:08:53.560 against piracy, the pirates themselves. The War of Spanish Secession, 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:56.640 otherwise known as Queen Ann's War, lasted from seventeen o 0:08:56.760 --> 0:08:59.680 one until the Treaty of You tracked in seventeen thirteen. 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:03.800 British privateers roam the Caribbean during the war, making an 0:09:03.840 --> 0:09:07.280 immense wealth for themselves. With nearly an unlimited supply of 0:09:07.320 --> 0:09:10.080 ships to hunt, A good share of the crew spent 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:12.920 their fortunes as fast as they earned them. Too. Those 0:09:12.960 --> 0:09:15.800 who operated out of places like Port Royal found themselves 0:09:15.840 --> 0:09:20.400 abruptly unemployed with the treaty declared. For many, returning to 0:09:20.400 --> 0:09:23.160 the Royal Navy wasn't an option. Even if the low 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:26.959 pay and abuse didn't deter them. The available job opportunities 0:09:27.000 --> 0:09:30.160 had dried up. The long end drawn out war left 0:09:30.160 --> 0:09:35.360 the Royal Navy bankrupt. Merchant ships became the only alternative, well, 0:09:35.520 --> 0:09:38.480 the only legal one, that is. But life and work 0:09:38.559 --> 0:09:43.439 aboard these vessels offered very little grueling work, poor living conditions, 0:09:43.679 --> 0:09:47.720 and a pittance of pay did little to entice anyone. Still, 0:09:47.760 --> 0:09:51.000 for the hungry and unemployed, something was better than nothing. 0:09:51.320 --> 0:09:54.680 With an abundance of applicants, captains and shipowners cut the 0:09:54.800 --> 0:09:58.360 already low wages in half, encouraging the rest to seek 0:09:58.400 --> 0:10:02.720 employment elsewhere. Sailors chose another more lucrative option that offered 0:10:02.760 --> 0:10:07.400 better pay, better living conditions, and humane treatment. Piracy for 0:10:07.480 --> 0:10:10.720 those sailors, Continuing to raid French and Spanish vessels became 0:10:10.760 --> 0:10:15.200 the most reasonable and justifiable path. The Spanish continued to 0:10:15.240 --> 0:10:18.240 attack English ships, claiming that they were smugglers if they 0:10:18.240 --> 0:10:21.360 found a single Spanish coin on board, an easy task 0:10:21.520 --> 0:10:24.120 since that was the main currency of the Caribbean. The 0:10:24.120 --> 0:10:27.640 Spanish killed or jailed any English captain or crew members 0:10:27.640 --> 0:10:30.720 who dared to resist, and of course they would seize 0:10:30.720 --> 0:10:35.160 their ship and the cargo. For British privateers, piracy provided 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:38.080 them with a living. For the colonies, the pirates served 0:10:38.120 --> 0:10:42.640 as payback for Spanish harassment. Pirates posed little threat, especially 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:47.200 since most English pirates refrained from attacking British ships. Piracy 0:10:47.240 --> 0:10:50.520 became the perfect solution for a man named Benjamin hornegal 0:10:50.960 --> 0:10:53.040 Before the treaty, he had been one of England's most 0:10:53.080 --> 0:10:57.959 dedicated privateers. In seventeen, the crown no longer needed his services, 0:10:58.360 --> 0:11:02.000 and he found himself among the plethora of unemployed sailors. 0:11:02.520 --> 0:11:06.400 In early summer, Hornegald and other sailors drank and commiserated 0:11:06.440 --> 0:11:10.479 about their impending poverty and the constant harassment from the Spanish. 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:12.920 The more he thought about their predicament, the more he 0:11:12.960 --> 0:11:16.760 felt confident his idea could work. They would retaliate against 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:20.760 the Spanish and earn a healthy living. Later that summer, 0:11:20.800 --> 0:11:23.960 Hornegald managed to secure a crew and a ship. He'd 0:11:23.960 --> 0:11:27.280 also plotted a course for the perfect hunting location. The 0:11:27.320 --> 0:11:30.480 band of pirates left port and headed four fifty miles 0:11:30.520 --> 0:11:35.000 north to a spot between Cuba and Hispaniola. Earlier we 0:11:35.160 --> 0:11:38.319 learned that Hornegald found New Providence burned out and deserted, 0:11:38.520 --> 0:11:40.640 and that his crew set to work rebuilding the port. 0:11:41.040 --> 0:11:45.280 Nasa provided the perfect setup for small time piracy. At first, 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:48.800 the pirates hunted from periaguas, essentially large canoes that were 0:11:48.840 --> 0:11:51.800 big enough to carry approximately thirty men and some cargo. 0:11:52.200 --> 0:11:55.319 The canoes bank of oars made them fast to the halls, 0:11:55.360 --> 0:11:58.400 allowed them to sail across shoals and areas too dangerous 0:11:58.400 --> 0:12:02.560 for larger, deeper vessels. Hornegal divided the crew among the 0:12:02.640 --> 0:12:06.120 three boats he captained one, assigning John West and John 0:12:06.160 --> 0:12:09.320 Cockram to lead the other two. For six months, they 0:12:09.320 --> 0:12:12.840 prayed on small Spanish ships. Not once did they attack 0:12:12.920 --> 0:12:16.680 an English vessel. Hornegald insisted that this made them privateers, 0:12:17.040 --> 0:12:19.600 not pirates. Of course, we can call this a matter 0:12:19.640 --> 0:12:24.199 of self deception, deflection, or even an outright lie. England, France, 0:12:24.240 --> 0:12:27.679 and Spain were at peace, and Hornegald had no authority 0:12:27.800 --> 0:12:30.720 or letter of mark. The crew sold their plunder on 0:12:30.800 --> 0:12:34.520 Harbor Island, just sort of Nassau. Hornegald and Cockrhum worked 0:12:34.520 --> 0:12:37.960 closely with Richard Thompson, a wealthy landowner and merchant. There, 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:41.280 the three created one of the most profitable black market 0:12:41.360 --> 0:12:44.680 and smuggling businesses in the golden Age of piracy. The 0:12:44.720 --> 0:12:48.080 bond between the three grew close enough that Cockrum married 0:12:48.080 --> 0:12:50.800 one of Thompson's daughters. It didn't take long for the 0:12:50.840 --> 0:12:54.440 Spanish to notice Hornegold's raids, and rumors of an attack 0:12:54.520 --> 0:12:57.760 against the pirates began to spread West and a few 0:12:57.800 --> 0:13:01.360 others decided to quit piracy after that and left Nassau. 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:06.120 Cockrum and Hornegold remained. The attack never materialized, and the 0:13:06.120 --> 0:13:09.440 band of pirates returned to hunting Spanish ships, this time 0:13:09.520 --> 0:13:13.480 on a sloop borrowed from retired seaman Jonathan Darvill, and 0:13:13.559 --> 0:13:16.680 at this point scholars believe Edward Teach joined the crew. 0:13:17.040 --> 0:13:20.280 A larger ship meant larger bounties. When the crew returned 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:23.040 to port. They paid Darville four times the ship's worth. 0:13:23.840 --> 0:13:27.640 Raids in late seventeen fourteen brought the crew sizeable bounties, 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:30.960 making Hornigold one of the most respected pirates in the Caribbean. 0:13:31.400 --> 0:13:35.040 He had been penniless, but now he had reinvented himself 0:13:35.720 --> 0:13:44.840 and he was about to do it again. Unfortunately, those 0:13:44.920 --> 0:13:49.160 raids drew unwanted attention. Bahamas Governor Thomas Walker vowed to 0:13:49.240 --> 0:13:53.000 rid the island of pirates. Nearby, in Bermuda, Governor Henry 0:13:53.000 --> 0:13:56.680 Pouline offered to annex the Bahamas to eliminate the pirates. 0:13:56.720 --> 0:14:00.640 Den Despite opposition against them, Hornegold and Black Bear continued 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:03.800 to plunder. Neither the Dutch nor English worried much about 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:06.680 the pair, believing the pirates prayed solely on the French 0:14:06.720 --> 0:14:09.040 and the Spanish. But that changed in the fall of 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:12.680 seventeen fifteen when the crew raided the mary An English 0:14:12.760 --> 0:14:15.920 sloop with six cannons and large enough for one and 0:14:15.960 --> 0:14:19.160 forty men. When the crew sailed into New Providence instead 0:14:19.160 --> 0:14:22.400 of Harbor Island, Hornegald promised the pirates and others who 0:14:22.400 --> 0:14:25.760 worked in the trade his protection. Now calling themselves the 0:14:25.800 --> 0:14:30.640 Flying Gang, the pirates nearly outnumbered law abiding citizens. Before long, 0:14:30.840 --> 0:14:34.680 Hornegal had captured a Spanish sloop and christened it the Benjamin. 0:14:35.040 --> 0:14:38.120 In a surprise move, he promoted new pirates Sam Bellamy 0:14:38.200 --> 0:14:41.760 as the captain of another ship instead of Teach. Now, 0:14:41.800 --> 0:14:44.600 as we've learned earlier, Bellamy later formed a coup and 0:14:44.640 --> 0:14:47.800 went his own way. Hornegald continued to grow his fleet, 0:14:48.120 --> 0:14:50.960 and in seventeen sixteen he and the crew voted to 0:14:51.000 --> 0:14:54.240 give a thirty ton sloop to Blackbeard. Teach continued to 0:14:54.240 --> 0:14:58.080 sail with Hornegal on many more profitable raids through late 0:14:58.120 --> 0:15:01.760 seventeen seventeen. But all good things must come to an end. Right. 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:05.680 With increasing pressure from England, Hornegald accepted a pardon in 0:15:05.760 --> 0:15:09.960 early seventeen eighteen. Although no longer a pirate, Hornegal never 0:15:10.000 --> 0:15:12.480 gave up hunting. He had been at sea when the 0:15:12.520 --> 0:15:15.120 governor of Jamaica sent ships to find him and deliver 0:15:15.280 --> 0:15:18.720 the King's offer. Hornegold returned to NASA and joined former 0:15:18.760 --> 0:15:22.760 crewmate Walker in welcoming a man named Woods Rogers. Though 0:15:22.800 --> 0:15:27.120 many accepted a pardon, piracy itself remained a serious problem. Worse, 0:15:27.440 --> 0:15:31.720 England pulled naval support, leaving Rogers and the colony vulnerable 0:15:31.760 --> 0:15:34.880 to the Spanish and pirates like Charles Vane, who had 0:15:34.920 --> 0:15:38.800 threatened to attack. Rogers had only one choice left asked 0:15:38.800 --> 0:15:42.320 the former pirates for help. Hornegald and Cockrum stepped up, 0:15:42.520 --> 0:15:46.520 offering their services as pirate hunters. Rogers gave them a 0:15:46.560 --> 0:15:49.520 sloop and the two sailed out in search of Charles Vane. 0:15:50.000 --> 0:15:52.720 They found him one d twenty miles north of Nassau 0:15:53.000 --> 0:15:56.040 on Green Turtle k Vaine and his men had taken 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:59.360 four merchant ships and their crew to the island to plunder. 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:02.600 After anchoring off shore, Horn of Goold and Cockram assessed 0:16:02.640 --> 0:16:06.280 the situation. Vain and his men far outnumbered them. They 0:16:06.280 --> 0:16:09.160 could turn back or wait for Vain to split from 0:16:09.200 --> 0:16:12.400 his crew on a hunt. So they waited for three 0:16:12.440 --> 0:16:16.400 long weeks. Just as Vain headed out, Captain Nichols would 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:19.920 all aboard the Wolf arrived. The former pirates had also 0:16:20.040 --> 0:16:23.240 taken the King's pardon Wood all in. Vain talked while 0:16:23.280 --> 0:16:26.800 the crew's unloaded supplies and ammunition from the Wolf, Horn 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:30.040 of Goold and Cockroam. New Vein had spies and sympathizers 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:34.200 and NASA, but Wood All's allegiance might have surprised them, 0:16:34.240 --> 0:16:36.680 but Charles Vane did not seem pleased with the news 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:39.160 that would all brought. In a fit of anger, he 0:16:39.240 --> 0:16:42.240 marooned the merchant ship's crew and headed out to see 0:16:42.600 --> 0:16:45.480 after the pirates left. Horn of Goold and Cockram arrived 0:16:45.480 --> 0:16:49.400 to give the hostages supplies. Late that night, Hornegald set 0:16:49.400 --> 0:16:52.080 out alone to hunt down the pirates. Five days later, 0:16:52.120 --> 0:16:55.360 he and his crew captured the Wolf. Back in Nassa, 0:16:55.640 --> 0:16:58.960 Rogers grew nervous, fearing that Hornegold had returned to piracy. 0:16:59.480 --> 0:17:02.760 Three weeks later, Hornegal returned with the Wolf, including its 0:17:02.800 --> 0:17:06.600 captain and crew, which removed all doubt about his integrity. 0:17:06.720 --> 0:17:10.080 The hunter has continued their quest, capturing more pirates along 0:17:10.119 --> 0:17:13.320 the way. Rogers became so pleased that he wrote England 0:17:13.400 --> 0:17:18.240 to sing Hornegal's praises. Vain, however, continued to remain elusive. 0:17:18.680 --> 0:17:21.600 Woods Rogers barely had enough men to guard his prisoners, 0:17:21.960 --> 0:17:25.119 and his men fell victim to disease. All this stood 0:17:25.119 --> 0:17:28.720 between Nassau and Vain Or the Spanish was a dilapidated 0:17:28.720 --> 0:17:32.320 and poorly manned fort, a thirty gun sloop and three 0:17:32.480 --> 0:17:37.920 trusted pirate hunters Josiah Burgess, Cockrum and Hornegal. In December 0:17:37.960 --> 0:17:41.920 of seventeen eighteen, nine of ten recently captured pirates were 0:17:41.920 --> 0:17:45.119 found guilty of piracy after signing the pardon, while the 0:17:45.200 --> 0:17:48.119 court sentenced the nine to hang. The tenth prisoner had 0:17:48.160 --> 0:17:52.399 been forced into piracy and was acquitted. Over twelve thousand people, 0:17:52.760 --> 0:17:57.080 mostly pirates or former pirates, gathered at the shoreline gallows 0:17:57.200 --> 0:18:00.280 to watch as the condemned men walked by. Men who 0:18:00.280 --> 0:18:02.800 had signed the part and cheered while they're still pirate 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:06.919 counterparts gave the one armed guards a wary eye. A 0:18:06.960 --> 0:18:10.160 few of the condemned smiled back at the crowd, unrepentant 0:18:10.200 --> 0:18:13.000 and defiant. As they stood before the crowd with a 0:18:13.080 --> 0:18:17.080 noose around their necks. Rogers pardoned one of the men, then, 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:20.720 with the crowd looking up, he signaled to the executioner. 0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:25.239 Eight men dropped their corpses, swaying against a background of 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:29.840 clear blue water. The pirates life in Paradise had come 0:18:29.880 --> 0:18:41.560 to an end. Those eight hangings symbolized a change. Pirates 0:18:41.600 --> 0:18:45.399 no longer ruled NASA. Rogers had regained control despite the 0:18:45.480 --> 0:18:49.159 lack of sufficient support or funding from England. After that, 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:52.280 pirates became less of a problem. Over two thousand of 0:18:52.320 --> 0:18:55.880 them roamed the season seventeen one. Just three years later 0:18:56.040 --> 0:18:59.400 that number dropped by half, and by seventeen twenty six 0:18:59.560 --> 0:19:02.920 only two hundred pirates remained. The hangings on that December 0:19:03.000 --> 0:19:07.520 morning became infamous among historians. Some speculate that Roger's choice 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:10.840 and manner of execution had been the pivotal moment in 0:19:10.840 --> 0:19:13.359 the Golden Age. And yet we can't talk about the 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:17.679 end of the Golden Age of piracy without discussing Benjamin Hornegald. 0:19:17.720 --> 0:19:20.680 Without his help, Woods, Rogers could not have taken control 0:19:20.720 --> 0:19:25.520 of NASA. Was he a pirate, yes, despite his insistence otherwise. 0:19:26.000 --> 0:19:28.840 But as Rogers found out, Hornegald was a man of 0:19:28.880 --> 0:19:31.920 his word, and in his own way, matched his own 0:19:31.960 --> 0:19:35.520 devotion to king and country. There were different accounts as 0:19:35.520 --> 0:19:38.399 to what happened to Hornegal, whichever is accurate, we know 0:19:38.520 --> 0:19:41.720 that in the spring of seventeen nineteen, Benjamin Hornegal left 0:19:41.800 --> 0:19:45.679 NASA and sailed into the sunset, never to be seen again. 0:19:46.119 --> 0:19:48.480 Some say that he came to Rogers aid once more. 0:19:48.560 --> 0:19:51.680 In the War of the Quadruple Alliance against the Spanish. 0:19:51.960 --> 0:19:54.919 In this telling, the Spanish captured him and tossed him 0:19:54.960 --> 0:19:58.240 into a Cuban prison, where he later died. Another telling 0:19:58.320 --> 0:20:01.400 is that Rogers sent him on a trading voyage to Mexico. 0:20:01.720 --> 0:20:04.840 Hornigold's ship struck a reef, deserting him and a handful 0:20:04.880 --> 0:20:07.840 of survivors on an isolated island. The men went to 0:20:07.880 --> 0:20:10.520 work constructing a canoe, just as they had in the 0:20:10.560 --> 0:20:15.120 early days of New Providence. Everyone escaped except Hornegald, who 0:20:15.160 --> 0:20:18.600 died there on the island. And in yet another version, 0:20:18.840 --> 0:20:22.840 none of Hornigold's crew survived the shipwreck, drowning instead at sea. 0:20:23.240 --> 0:20:25.919 If this retelling is accurates, I can't help but wonder 0:20:25.960 --> 0:20:29.200 if his brethren believed that Hornegald ended up in Davy 0:20:29.280 --> 0:20:32.080 Jones Locker, that mythical place at the bottom of the 0:20:32.119 --> 0:20:36.120 sea where all drowned sailors go. However he met his end, 0:20:36.480 --> 0:20:39.800 he certainly left behind a legacy. Those who knew him 0:20:39.840 --> 0:20:43.160 said he was a devout patriot, a highly skilled captain, 0:20:43.400 --> 0:20:46.200 and showed more kindness to his prisoners than the men 0:20:46.280 --> 0:20:50.480 who served under him. Yes, he was a pirate, but 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:54.679 despite that, Benjamin Hornegald, the mentor of Blackbeard and the 0:20:54.760 --> 0:20:57.840 leader of the Nassau pirate community, and the Flying Gang 0:20:58.320 --> 0:21:01.200 did more to bring about the own fall of piracy 0:21:02.000 --> 0:21:12.040 than anyone else. Pirate execution seems like one of the 0:21:12.040 --> 0:21:14.800 plot points we can always count on in the Hollywood 0:21:14.840 --> 0:21:18.520 films about them, and as we've seen today, history backs 0:21:18.600 --> 0:21:22.280 that up. So thanks for um hanging around for this 0:21:22.520 --> 0:21:25.760 thrilling chapter in our exploration of that world. But of 0:21:25.800 --> 0:21:28.840 course we're not done just yet. My crewmates Alie Steed 0:21:28.960 --> 0:21:31.800 has one more tail from the gallows to share. Stick 0:21:31.800 --> 0:21:35.240 around after this brief sponsor break to hear all about it. 0:21:41.400 --> 0:21:44.480 In the spring of seventy six, William Fly found work 0:21:44.520 --> 0:21:46.600 as a boast in a board a ship called the Elizabeth. 0:21:47.200 --> 0:21:50.040 The captain, a man named Green, set course from Jamaica 0:21:50.080 --> 0:21:53.560 to Guinea in West Africa. Somewhere along the way, Fly 0:21:53.760 --> 0:21:56.200 got to thinking maybe he should be the captain and 0:21:56.240 --> 0:22:00.479 convinced several of his shipmates to join him in mutiny. First, 0:22:00.720 --> 0:22:03.240 they need to murder both the captain and the first mate. 0:22:03.720 --> 0:22:07.360 Afterward they'd turned from a sailor's life to one of piracy. 0:22:07.880 --> 0:22:12.159 On seventy six, Flying his conspirators carried out their planet 0:22:12.200 --> 0:22:15.879 around one am, Fly burst into the captain's cabin and 0:22:15.880 --> 0:22:18.920 told Green that he had two choices to die right 0:22:18.960 --> 0:22:22.399 there or join them on deck. Fly preferred the ladder 0:22:22.440 --> 0:22:24.280 to save him the trouble of cleaning blood off the 0:22:24.320 --> 0:22:26.520 floor and walls of the cabin that would soon be his. 0:22:27.280 --> 0:22:29.159 A few buckets of water and a scraper would do 0:22:29.200 --> 0:22:32.600 the job quicker. On deck, the captain promised not to 0:22:32.680 --> 0:22:35.000 impede any of their plans. They could lock him in 0:22:35.080 --> 0:22:39.520 chains if they wanted anything, just spare his life. Fly 0:22:39.640 --> 0:22:42.600 had Green hauled on deck while the captain continued to 0:22:42.680 --> 0:22:47.200 beg Fly sliced him with his cutlass. Still alive, Green 0:22:47.280 --> 0:22:49.919 clung to the main sheet, the line that connected to 0:22:49.960 --> 0:22:53.560 the boom to stop himself from being tossed overboard. Another 0:22:53.600 --> 0:22:57.600 conspirator grabbed an axe and cleaved off the captain's hand. Then, 0:22:57.680 --> 0:23:00.520 flying the other's tossed Green overboard and watch until the 0:23:00.560 --> 0:23:03.639 sea swallowed him. Then they repeated the process with the 0:23:03.680 --> 0:23:07.679 first mate. Fly renamed the ship the Fameous Revenge. His 0:23:07.760 --> 0:23:10.160 first act as captain was to have every man who 0:23:10.200 --> 0:23:13.960 sympathized with the previous captain and first mate put into chains, 0:23:14.640 --> 0:23:18.359 and then he threw a party. On June third, the 0:23:18.359 --> 0:23:21.360 newly minted pirates arrived off the coast of Cape Hatteras 0:23:21.359 --> 0:23:24.960 in North Carolina. The crew spotted a sloop, the John 0:23:24.960 --> 0:23:29.640 and Hannah, anchored nearby and pulled close. The captain Falker 0:23:29.840 --> 0:23:33.400 wrongly assumed that Fly needed help navigating around a tricky sandbar. 0:23:33.800 --> 0:23:35.760 He and a few of his crew rode a small 0:23:35.760 --> 0:23:38.280 boat out to the Fameous Revenge to offer their assistance. 0:23:39.000 --> 0:23:41.720 Fly greeted his guests and showed them into his cabin. 0:23:42.080 --> 0:23:44.520 Then he informed Falker that he'd cut right to the chase. 0:23:44.880 --> 0:23:47.719 He and his crew were gentlemen of fortune, a fancy 0:23:47.720 --> 0:23:50.480 way of saying pirates, and he informed the good captain 0:23:50.520 --> 0:23:53.640 that he intended to relieve him of his ship. However, 0:23:53.760 --> 0:23:56.400 high winds prevented the pirates from bringing the larger ship 0:23:56.480 --> 0:23:59.760 alongside the Fameus Revenge, which sent Fly into a fit 0:23:59.800 --> 0:24:03.679 of rage. He stripped and brutally whipped Captain Fulker and 0:24:03.680 --> 0:24:07.800 took him and a handful of his crew prisoners. Then, sheerly, 0:24:07.800 --> 0:24:11.960 out of spite, he sank the John and Hannah. Later, 0:24:12.040 --> 0:24:15.080 the crew captured two additional ships, neither of which contained 0:24:15.080 --> 0:24:17.960 anything of value. But Fly put Falker and some of 0:24:17.960 --> 0:24:20.200 the other prisoners aboard one of the ships and let 0:24:20.200 --> 0:24:23.520 it go, although he kept a sailor named Atkinson. Fly 0:24:23.720 --> 0:24:26.040 ordered the sailor to pilot the ship to Martha's Vineyard, 0:24:26.119 --> 0:24:30.720 which Atkinson intentionally sailed past. When he discovered the disobedience, 0:24:30.760 --> 0:24:34.199