Post-Spanish Succession Period > Fate of the Pirates
Fate of the Pirates
Most pirates did not live to see retirement. The few that did often retired successful, however most were eventually caught by the Imperial navies, tried, convicted and sentenced to death by hanging at places like Port Royal. Others were killed in combat and even other disappeared into the ocean in a storm. The fate of each pirate is different but what connects them is the limited span of their career before the odds eventually caught up to them.
The pirates of the caribbean will always live in infamy as a group of defiant sailors in an age of monarchs and kingdoms. Here is a list of the most Flying Gang and the various fates that befell them.
Buccaneers
Henry Morgan
Henry Morgan was probably one of the only pirates to live out his days in relative peace and quiet on his plantations in Jamaica. After being knighted for his conquests against the Spanish he returned to Jamaica as Lieutenant Governor and ended up dying a few years before the Port Royal earthquake of possible tuberculosis.
Francois L’Ollonais
Francois L’Ollonais was killed when he escaped from Spanish troops only to encounter native cannibals near the Gulf of Darien. He was ripped apart and eaten alive, a brutal end for a vicious buccaneer.
Flying Gang
Henry Jennings
Henry Jennings was another pirate who most likely lived out the rest of his days as a successful pirate in Bermuda, however this is an unknown fact and he may well have ended up dying in a Spanish prison.
Stede Bonnet
Stede Bonnet was captured by authorities and hung in Charleston, South Carolina.
'Calico' Jack Rackham
'Calico' Jack Rackham was caught along with partners Anne Bonny and Mary Read and hung in 1720. He was gibbeted in an area now known as Rackham's Cay for several days after his death.
Anne Bonny
Mary Read
Anne Bonny and Mary Read would escape the hangman's noose by claiming childbirth and getting a stay of execution. Mary Read ended up dying of a fever during childbirth, however Anne Bonny disappeared from the record inspiring wonder and curiosity to her fate.
Charles Vane
Charles Vane was caught and turned over to the authorities who quickly tried and executed him.
Edward 'Blackbeard' Teach
Edward 'Blackbeard' Teach was slain by British forces at his hideout in the Province of North Carolina in 1718. Pirate hunter Robert Maynard Blackbeard's reduced crew and killed him in hand to hand combat. Blackbeard's head was hung off the bow of Maynard's ship as he redeemed it for the bounty set on his head by the Governor of Virginia.
Bartholomew Roberts
Bartholomew Roberts was killed in a naval battle by grapeshot to the neck. His crew took his body and threw it overboard afterwards to prevent the authorities from getting it. To this day no one has ever recovered his body and most likely never will. This prevented the authorities from displaying his body like the pirates of the previous years.
