Forget Jack Sparrow and Captain Hook. Piracy is far more fearsome

THE VERY word “pirate” has a cheery ring. It evokes wooden legs, eyepatches, coins and cutlasses, as well as the likes of Francis Drake, William Kidd, Blackbeard and Henry Morgan. Children’s and adult fantasy is pirate-packed, from Captain Hook in “Peter Pan” to Johnny Depp’s swashbuckling turn as Jack Sparrow in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” films. In Gilbert and Sullivan’s “The Pirates of Penzance”, an opera, the obliging pirates release any captives claiming to be orphans.

The reality is more sordid than that, as Richard Blakemore, a lecturer at the University of Reading, argues in a new book. Labels like “buccaneer”, “corsair” or “privateer” sound even more romantic than “pirate”. So those practising piracy used them. This is not just a question of etymology. In the early part of the golden era of piracy—from roughly the late 17th to the early 18th centuries—pirates under respectable labels often had at least the tacit approval of monarchs and states.

Piracy itself is as old as seamanship. But in the author’s telling, it took off after the European discovery of the Americas. The gold, silver and slaves brought back by Portuguese and Spanish ships proved irresistible targets. As well as the lure of booty came the knowledge that, in frequent times of war, pirates were inflicting damage on a sovereign’s opponents. Hence the search for vaguely written official “commissions”, documents that created a veneer of government endorsement for privateering against a state’s declared enemies. Many well-known pirates forswore attacks on ships flying their own national flags.

None of this made their acts of piracy any less bestial. British, Dutch and French pirates, often based outside legally constituted colonies, such as off the Azores or on the island of Tortuga near Haiti, lay in wait for Iberian fleets before attacking them. They would raid newly established forts and settlements on the American mainland. No quarter was given: those sailing on captured ships were tortured to reveal where treasure was; slaves were tossed overboard or sold; any women found were treated as mere spoils of battle.

As the flow of bullion from Latin America started to dry up, pirates looked elsewhere, often following shipping routes. Some sought to ingratiate themselves with colonial authorities: after making a fortune as a privateer, Henry Morgan (who became the namesake of Captain Morgan rum) even served as lieutenant-governor of Jamaica. As its wealth increased, the North American seaboard became a target, with pirates operating out of the Bahamas. Another hunting ground was the Indian Ocean. Mr Blakemore includes a harrowing account of how pirates flying English flags captured a ship bringing Muslim pilgrims back to India. For days the buccaneers pillaged the ship, tortured victims and raped the female passengers, plundering loot worth some 5m rupees (over £500,000, or $635,000, at the time).

As shipping and colonial ambitions shifted, piracy moved too: to the Pacific, to the Barbary Coast of north Africa and indeed to anywhere suitable for plundering. But by the early 18th century, European states had lost patience with these vicious criminals. State-built navies started tackling pirate ships in their lairs.

This coincided with the publication 300 years ago of “A General History of the Pyrates”, a book that sold so well that it had four editions and many translations. Mr Blakemore draws on the book extensively, as did Robert Louis Stevenson for “Treasure Island” and J.M. Barrie for “Peter Pan”. Its most intriguing characters were two female pirate leaders, Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who fooled many of their crews into believing they were men and were later rumoured to have been lovers.

Piracy continues even today. The author closes his story not just with reflections on the inaccuracies of Hollywood’s romantic portrayal of pirates, but also with a look at those still operating, including off Somalia. Nowadays profits come more from ransoming ships and crews than from plunder and rape. But the evil of these aquatic enemies persists all the same. ■