FAMOUS PIRATES

Long John Silver? Jack Sparrow? Captain Hook? Those movie pirates don’t begin to compare to the real deal.

BLACKBEARD

The Big Daddy of all pirates was Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard. For five years, until he met his end in 1718, he terrorized the Atlantic Coast from the Bahamas all the way to Maryland. Blackbeard liked to look as terrifying as possible. Standing 6′ 5″ tall, he was a huge man of great strength. To look even more fierce, he would braid lit bomb fuses into his long black hair and beard before an attack.

The sight of this wild-haired giant standing on his ship, sword in one hand and pistol in the other, with clouds of smoke pouring from his head, laughing like a maniac, convinced sailors that the Devil himself was after them. They usually surrendered their ships without a fight, which was exactly what Blackbeard wanted.

Like most pirates, Blackbeard had only a brief reign as scourge of the seas. During a furious naval battle near his base in Bath, North Carolina, he was finally beaten on November 22, 1718. The victorious British captain cut off Blackbeard’s head and tossed his body overboard to the sharks. Legend has it that the headless body swam around the ship three times looking for its head before sinking beneath the waves.

HENRY MORGAN

This is one pirate captain who beat the odds and came out on top. Born in Wales in 1635, Henry Morgan shipped out to the Caribbean to seek his fortune as a privateer—a pirate who is given permission by one country to raid the ships of its enemies.

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By 1668 Morgan was the commander of a fleet of pirate vessels working for England against their archrivals, the Dutch and the Spanish. At one point Morgan had 36 ships and 2,000 sailors under his command. He raided ships from Venezuela to Cuba, and was feared by his enemies for his brutality.

In 1671 he invaded Panama, the heart of Spain’s American empire, and brought back looted treasure to his base in Jamaica. But unbeknownst to Morgan, Spain and England had declared peace. Suddenly, he was no longer a legal privateer fighting for England but was considered a criminal raiding the ships of England’s friend and ally. Result: He was arrested and sent back to England to stand trial.

Fortunately for Morgan, the Spanish and English started fighting again, and he was knighted for his heroic actions on behalf of the crown. He returned to Jamaica as Lieutenant Governor, and retired to his plantation a wealthy man.

CAPTAIN KIDD

It was William Kidd’s bad luck to become a pirate at the wrong time. Captain Kidd sailed from London in 1695 as a privateer, with permission from the British government to raid the pirates of the Red Sea. He was to bring the loot home to England, where the investors who paid for his trip (including the king of England) would split the plunder.

By the time Kidd reached the Red Sea, two years had passed and the British government had changed its policy—it now wanted nothing to do with privateers. Why? Because these legalized pirates were too hard to control, brought complaints from other nations, and (most importantly) were no longer a major source of income to the crown.

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Unfortunately, Kidd didn’t know that change was in the wind, and captured a rich merchant vessel from India. India promptly complained, and British authorities declared Kidd a pirate and a criminal. The British Navy chased Kidd all the way across the Atlantic to New York City, where he was arrested and sent back to England in chains.

The trial lasted all of one day; Kidd was found guilty and hanged. (There’s no record of what happened to the loot…or if the king of England got his share.)

SCIENTIFIC NAMES FOR GROSS STUFF

Runny nose: Rhinorrhea

Scab: Fibrinogen

Throwing up: Emesis

Dandruff: Pityriasis capitis

Belch: Eructation

Pus: Purulence

Ear wax: Cerumen

Zits: Acne vulgaris

Old-strich? An ostrich can live to be 70.