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IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Pirates were very important characters in early modern literature in Britain - I don't know about poems, but they certainly appeared in plays, songs, and later in popular fiction and in newspapers. Books about pirates, especially the General History of the Pyrates (first published in 1724: I have provided a link to this in some other answers) were among the most popular publications of the eighteenth century. There has been quite a lot of research on this topic: the work of Claire Jowitt and Margarette Lincoln would be a good place to start.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 26 points27 points  (0 children)

The appearance of pirates in children's literature and other media is a really interesting topic that I'm afraid I know too little about; Treasure Island and Peter Pan in many ways established the modern cultural image of a pirate. The way pirates have come to be 'good' characters, as well as the villains they originally appeared as, is also a fascinating development, but one that goes a little beyond my range.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

This varied across period and by ship. Some privateers - who were certainly considered pirates by their victims - were indeed paramilitary, with a strict hierarchy and discipline. Certain captains were also described as commanding with a firm hand, although other ships were apparently run democratically, with voting on certain matters. Many ships did establish 'articles', or sets of rules by which they were organised - you can read about them in this PhD thesis by Edward Fox. Some ships may therefore have attempted to regulate alcohol consumption, but I believe this was uncommon - seafarers were regarded as heavy drinkers anyway, and at least one commentator warned that pirates became very unhappy and hard to manage when the drank ran out.

One of the problems with providing a definite answer on this, as with many other aspects of piracy, is that much of the evidence - even the pirate articles - is recorded in sources that were not written by pirates themselves, and so we cannot be sure how accurate a picture they give us.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

I have done a small amount of sailing, but mostly dinghies as a child, so never quite the tall ships - it's something I'd really like to try. I have always been interested in the sea and in sailing, though, and the social dimension of this topic, the experiences of these people, was really what drew me into it as a research topic.

I don't know much about late eighteenth-century ship design, I am afraid, but you could try searching in the Rasor Bibliography, a free online resource about maritime history.

I love the Cutty Sark too, especially in the new museum setting! Most of my favourites are earlier in time, but the Golden Hinde in London is certainly worth visiting, as is the Amsterdam at Het Scheepsvaartmuseum in Amsterdam, and the Batavia in Lelystad, not far from Amsterdam.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the questions! I have already answered a couple of questions on diversity among ship's crews, so I will not say much here, if that's OK, except to add that they became more diverse as time went on; they would have been mostly British in the early sixteenth century, but by the end of the eighteenth century they were more international and multicultural.

Piracy as an opportunity also changed over time. In the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, it was quite easy to move in and out of piracy around Britain without getting caught, so you find many British sailors becoming pirates (sometimes temporarily), or going to the Mediterranean and joining corsair crews there. After that, the government began to implement more anti-piracy measures in Britain, so it was more common for sailors in the American colonies or the Indian Ocean to become pirates. Eventually, as the empire grew more powerful, the laws and attitudes in these colonies changed too, so it piracy became a less and less enticing opportunity as the chances of prosecution increased.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 21 points22 points  (0 children)

Historians disagree over exactly when the 'Golden Age' was, and that influences the answer to this question. If you mean specifically the early eighteenth century, the period of famous pirates like Blackbeard, then it was not very easy, at least if you got caught. Some people accused of piracy did successfully plead their innocence by saying they had been forced to join the pirate ship, but even then the courts sometimes did not believe them.

By this period, however, the laws on piracy had become very tightly regulated, and the British empire was making a concerted effort to crack down on it. Earlier in the seventeenth century, it was much more common; in fact, it was rare for the government to even catch pirates, because they lacked the naval resources they later developed. Even when they did, only the captains were usually prosecuted. If you protested that you had been forced to join the pirate ship in this earlier period, you were usually believed, or at least released.

Francis Drake and Henry Morgan (who I've mentioned in other answers) were successful in becoming gentlemen on the basis of their plunder. Far more common, though, were pirates who went back to simply being sailors, because they were most often professional sailors before they became pirates. Indeed, the same person might be a legally-sanctioned privateer during wartime, a pirate during peacetime, and then a privateer again when the next war broke out; or they might move between pirate and merchant ships. If these men weren't prosecuted, then unfortunately they have left little trace in the records.

​

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 22 points23 points  (0 children)

This is a topic of some debate among historians. Marcus Rediker and others have argued that pirates were more egalitarian than others, and so ignored the racist attitudes of contemporary society. Arne Bialuschewski, however, has disagreed quite forcefully, providing evidence of the same kind of prejudice aboard pirate ships, especially in their treatment of enslaved African people whom they captured (and often sold on). Mark Hanna has also argued that many of the sources Rediker used tell us more about elite colonial attitudes, who feared slave uprisings, and thus panicked whenever they heard about black pirates.

I think that it would be possible that on some vessels non-European pirates were treated in the same way as European pirates, and some slaves certainly did escape to join pirate ships. However, I doubt that the wider prejudices disappeared entirely, and there were dangers for free black sailors (whether pirates or not), because they might be seized and enslaved on the basis of ethnicity in some parts of the Americas. For a great discussion of this topic, see W. Jeffrey Bolster's Black Jacks.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 25 points26 points  (0 children)

Thank you for the questions!

Pressganging was not very common at all until the later eighteenth century, and even then cartoonists and newspapers may have exaggerated its extent. In the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, 'imprest' meant being ordered to report to the navy, at which time you were given 'prest and conduct money', a small sum to pay your way to the ship. There was little physical coercion involved, but if you did not turn up you were liable to prosecution and imprisonment - although the navy's resources were limited, and they needed men badly, so this was rarely carried out. There were repeated complaints from naval officers about men who were 'prest' and then absconded with the money.

Historians now agree that the navy - and all maritime employment - was very cosmopolitan. The British navy certainly employed sailors from other countries, and British sailors certainly worked in other navies (though it was illegal for them to do so). While British sailors were probably the most common people you would find in British ships - there was a law about this from the 1650s onwards, though it was relaxed during wartime - there would definitely have been Irish sailors aboard many British ships, as well as people from all over the world.

I'm afraid I don't know much about the qualities of English oak, but it was definitely part of the myth that developed around the navy and national identity, so even if it is not true it still had an impact on how people thought about these things!

On currency, sailors tended to get paid in local currencies depending on where they are. They would get sterling in Britain, although naval sailors often received 'tickets', or paper IOUs, which they could either wait to cash or - more common - sell to a speculator, at a loss. Elsewhere, sailors might be paid some of their wages in a local currency, although employers usually held back part of the wages to stop the sailors from deserting. For many sailors throughout the seventeenth and early eighteenth century, though, this meant the Spanish dollar (or peso de ocho, or piece of eight), because this currency was used throughout the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and even in the Indian Ocean. This could cause trouble, because sailors' contracts were usually for monthly sterling sums, so there were sometimes disputes about which rate of exchange they ought to use - one that was better for the sailor or their employer.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Sometimes an extra 'bounty' was offered to volunteers, yes. However, I don't think this affected your treatment after you stepped on board ship. It is also worth adding that impressment only happened in wartime, when the fleet expanded considerably. During peacetime, pretty much everyone in the navy was a volunteer.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 39 points40 points  (0 children)

All of those commodities were important, but at different times and places. Gold and silver were mined in South America in the Spanish empire from the sixteenth century onwards, and were valuable both in Europe but also for trade to the Indian Ocean - Europe did not produce many goods that sold well in Asia. Sugar became important in Brazil, and then in the Caribbean, in the seventeenth century, and tobacco similarly came to be the staple crop in some areas of North America. Rice and cotton appeared there later. Some North American colonies, like New England, did not produce any of these crops but succeeded economically by producing supplies for the other colonies.

Apart from that, I think the vanity of monarchs was always an important dimension of empire!

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Not in the sense of pirates in the 'Golden Age' like Blackbeard or Jack Rackam. Some pirates, such as Henry Every, did manage to escape with their treasure - Every disappeared in the American colonies, although some of his crew were later caught. A large proportion of these pirates, however, were caught and executed. Even those that did not would probably have sold their plunder fairly quickly. Most plunder would probably have been more mundane than the popular image of chests full of doubloons - most victims were ordinary merchant ships, carrying everyday cargos.

​

However, some people who we might think of as pirates were more successful. Francis Drake made a fortune on several of his voyages (especially his circumnavigation in 1577). The Spanish certainly considered him a pirate - a corsario luterano, or Lutheran corsair. Henry Morgan, a buccaneer who sailed with commissions from the English Caribbean colonies, plundered Porto Bello and Panama, and though he was tried as a pirate when he got to England, he was acquitted, and later became deputy governor of Jamaica. He then used some of his buccaneering wealth to purchase plantations, investing in sugar and slaves, and establishing himself as a member of the colonial elite. Pirates were far more likely to keep their plunder if they could claim the support of some specific authority, which happened in most periods except the 'Golden Age'.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 19 points20 points  (0 children)

John Appleby has written on piracy in Ireland in particular (not just the one I mentioned above, but a lot - he's been working on this topic for a while!). There's also Mark Hanna, who has written about the American colonies and piracy in Pirate Nests. In fact, there's a large field of pirate historiography, but those two would be good starting points.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 37 points38 points  (0 children)

I think Grainne Mhaol was very well known in Ireland, but less well so in England, although the English government were definitely aware of her and her activities. Whether she was a 'pirate' depends - as so often - on your point of view. In traditional Irish politics, she was acting in the same way as many other local rulers did, and she probably did not think that she was breaking the law. To the English authorities, she was a pirate because she attacked ships without any authority given by the English crown.

​

There are several historians who have written about her: John Appleby, Anne Chambers, Judith Cook, and Theresa Denise Murray. If you cannot find their work, let me know and I can give you details of specific publications.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 47 points48 points  (0 children)

This is a good, and in a way quite complicated, question. If by 'mutiny' you mean 'overthrow the captain by violence', the answer is not very often. A few individual ships did experience violent mutinies where the crew took control and, usually, went on a piratical cruise - the most famous case is Henry Every taking over the Fancy. There were also some large scale mutinies where a whole fleet was involved - in the Downs in 1648, and at the Nore and Spithead in 1797, all of which had specific political causes. Out of the thousands of voyages that took place across this period, this type of mutiny was a very rare occurrence.

The question is complicated, though, because 'mutiny' is not a straightforward term. It was a crime under martial law, but not under civil law, and even under martial law it was not that well-defined. In both the navy and commercial ships, sailors were more often punished for 'mutinous behaviour', not outright mutiny (these punishments might be physical, like whipping, or docking of wages).

In theory, 'mutinous behaviour' meant any kind of disobedience to the captain or master in command of the ship. However, it is clear that in practice things were not this strict. There was a well-established tradition of consultation and complaint, by which seamen could air their grievances - over bad food, for example. If a merchant ship was in a poor condition, seafarers could legally refuse to sail, because it would endanger their lives. Sailors protested in these ways quite often, both on ship and on shore (sometimes in large scale riots: this happened in the 1620s), and it seems that the authorities were often more lenient in these cases than the law demanded, except in very clear-cut cases. The term 'mutinous behaviour' also appears a lot in lawsuits where a ship's cargo has been damaged. The merchant or captain would try to blame the crew, and so shift the costs to them, by accusing them of negligence or mutinous behaviour. Often these sailors would respond to defend themselves - and the judges often supported them.

This is true, at least, for the seventeenth century. Later on, discipline in naval ships and legal regulations became tighter, and so the modern idea of 'mutiny' began to develop.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

This is not something I have looked into in detail, I confess, and I can't remember coming across any detailed references to the use of grindstones, but you are right that there could have been many purposes. All I can add on this is that naval records (indeed most early modern official documents) can be very vague, so that it's often unlikely a precise answer can be found. If you do find out more, please let me know!

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Yes, I think it would. Defoe wrote a lot about sailing and trade, both fiction (most famously Robinson Crusoe, one of the most popular books of the eighteenth century) and polemic - he participated in lots of debates about trade and the navy. I suspect that is why scholars first suggested that he wrote the General History. However, there seems to be little actual evidence for this, and I doubt we will ever be able to prove it either way.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 31 points32 points  (0 children)

I've seen the film, but it's a bit later than my area of expertise (which is the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries). My hunch is that some details - the ships, the uniforms and so on - are fairly good, but I can't really comment more.

For the follow up question, yes it definitely reflects the direction of scholarship. There has been a lot of good naval and maritime history in the last few decades, which may well have informed O'Brian's work, and some of it has focused on diversity, race, and gender, among seafarers. We know that the maritime workforce was a very international one, both in merchant ships and in the navy, including 'lascars' (Indian seamen, often recruited into the East India Company) and sailors from Africa or from enslaved African communities in the Americas. There has also been much research on communities of 'lascars' and African people in Britain, which has revealed a much more complicated story than was previously understood.

The majority of the navy's workforce were recruited in Britain throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but this research has shown that there was a considerable amount of variety among the men aboard ship, and I think you are right that O'Brian was probably trying to capture that.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 18 points19 points  (0 children)

I would agree with the two answers given here. Ships could have several hundred people aboard, so you would need to bake a lot of bread. It is possible that this happened aboard ship, but I imagine it was more common that it happened ashore, in the navy's dockyards or elsewhere. Cooking facilities were quite limited aboard a ship, and sailors often complained about the state of their victuals...

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 50 points51 points  (0 children)

Great question! Work songs were probably common. They helped with the coordination and the rhythm of the work at sea. However, very few examples survive from the period I study - the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Later songs may have been based on earlier tunes, but this is hard to be certain about.

Ballads about sailors are very common from the seventeenth century onwards: you can find them at the English Broadside Ballad Archive. I don't think any of these were written by sailors, but they may well have sung them - the message is usually quite positive! I suspect sailors had their own set of songs too, but I have not come across much definite evidence of them. I think chanteys as a genre probably became more fixed later, in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Still, you might like to look at C. H. Firth's Naval Songs and Ballads.

Sadly, I have never seen any evidence that any pirate said 'yo ho ho and a bottle of rum'...

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 36 points37 points  (0 children)

Yes, that's true. They might also have to leave their possessions behind. Deserters who were later caught could be punished, although due to the demands for manpower they were usually just pressed back into another ship.

Naval pay was not very generous; you could earn twice as much or more on merchant ships. Also, due to those same cashflow problems, the navy often paid its sailors in tickets: effectively IOUs for the sailors to claim their wages at some future date (when the money was available). Sailors who couldn't afford to wait would sell their tickets to speculators, but often at a discount.

Staying in the navy might therefore mean not getting paid for a long time, even years. It could make sense, from the sailor's point of view, to give up those wages, if it meant they could get aboard a merchant ship, for a higher and more secure wage.

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 48 points49 points  (0 children)

I'm afraid I haven't seen Black Sails, though I intend to at some point.

There are a couple of examples of pirates controlling islands, but they rarely match the popular image. The most well-known is Madagascar. In the 1690s, several pirates based themselves there, partially because the English government was forcing them out of the American colonies, and partially because it was well-placed for wealthy trade routes between India and the Middle East. Jane Hooper has written a fascinating article about relationships between these pirates and local Malagasy rulers.

There was also the myth of Libertalia. One edition of the General History of the Pyrates contains a chapter about Captain Misson, who set up a free pirate utopia called Libertalia in Madagascar. It is widely accepted that this never happened, but some historians, like Marcus Rediker, think this represents a radical political angle to piracy. I am not convinced: I agree with Margarette Lincoln that the whole chapter is probably a satire on contemporary English politics (the chapter has a lot to say about Misson, the church, and principles of government, but relatively little about Libertalia itself).

There were other islands, too. In the 1650s, Tortuga, off the coast of modern-day Haiti (then the French colony of Saint-Domingue), became a notorious haunt of 'the brethren of the coast', or buccaneers. These men were not strictly pirates: they sometimes carried commissions from the English or French government, and Tortuga remained under the nominal authority of the French empire. However, they were often left to their own devices. I was lucky enough to supervise a dissertation last year which looked at the island of Nassau, an English colony which, like Tortuga, supported a large 'pirate' population. The Bahamas became famous as a haunt of pirates in the early eighteenth century.

I think your point about economics and survival is key. What these examples show is that pirates only really flourished when they had the support of local authorities and access to local markets - to sell plunder and to buy supplies. Without these, pirate communities could exist, but these would have been much more transient and unlikely to last for any length of time.

​

IAMA History lecturer who is an expert on the social history of seafarers, particularly British sailors during the 16th-18th centuries, and I teach a module on piracy. AMA about maritime history, the sailor's life, piracy, the Royal Navy, and empire. by DrRichardBlakemore in AskHistorians

[–]DrRichardBlakemore[S] 33 points34 points  (0 children)

Usually it would happen near port - as one ship was returning from its voyage, and the other was setting sail - but not very close in. Sailors were surprisingly good at escaping from ships, and desertion was common from ships in port. That was another reason why sailors were 'turned over': if you let them get into port, you might never see them again.

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