0:00

So much. History is wrapped up around the singular topic of piracy.

0:03

We found that out after realizing a need to split this episode into two separate ones.

0:07

Make sure I didn't have hours for one episode of this brand new show.

0:11

Apparently that's a bad thing until you become popular.

0:13

Who would have guessed? Last week, we delve into the ancient origins of

0:16

piratical waters, looking at the ancient Egyptians, Greek Romans

0:20

and into the early Middle Ages or the dark Ages to some and some run

0:24

ins with some men from the north. We'll get ready for more tales from the high seas.

0:27

The East Asian piracy, global exploration and the so-called golden age of piracy.

0:32

The real meat and potatoes, if you will. All that more on another episode of the remedial scholar.

0:38

Bad sanction Headmistress. Mr..

0:42

I feel I was denied

0:44

credit critically need to know

0:48

in information

0:54

belongs to CMC

1:02

now step in your community we last last

1:06

we left off at a very interesting place last week and if you're listening

1:09

to this one, before you listen to that, I before listening to that,

1:12

I recommend you go back and listen strictly based off of chronological order.

1:16

Before we go back, first into another massive sea of stories about pirates.

1:21

Some nautical humor for you, some quick requests. And thanks.

1:23

Thank you for everyone who continues to review us on Apple Podcasts.

1:27

Spotify, a pod chaser. If you don't know how to go to Pod Chaser, it's on our website.

1:32

Link in the link treats the first big link.

1:35

Click that and then at the top it says Review On Pod.

1:38

You click that and that'll take you there. Super easy, quick.

1:41

Just make an account and review us. You can add words to your reviews too.

1:45

You know, build it a little bit, make it make a little more punch to it.

1:50

Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate it. Also to any of the dads listening. What's up?

1:54

Thank you for joining and thank you for everybody for the support.

1:59

Share with people that's the best way to share like share support without spending any money.

2:04

If you want to spend some money, there's also in the link tree, there's a little Birch Store

2:08

and they have a couple designs up there so far. But I'll be adding more as the show goes on.

2:12

There's also a tip section on the Captivate

2:16

website for the show and also in the link tree.

2:19

So if you want to donate some money, you know, help,

2:22

you know, go towards the hosting fees and things like that.

2:26

I appreciate that, but it's not no big deal. Share it.

2:29

Tell your friends that's the best way you can help me.

2:31

So and then also go to the Facebook and Instagram.

2:35

Those are also in the link tree. You can see the reference images from the episode

2:39

that are also going to be in the YouTube video as well.

2:42

And like I said, all the links can be found in the link tree.

2:45

So anyway, with that being said, on to the fun stuff, back to the Pirates.

2:49

Let's get into it. And we left off in the Middle Ages around the 13th century in Europe, Vikings

2:54

were beginning to settle down. No more raiding really for them

2:57

as they were living in the lands that they once raided.

3:00

Piracy was not really over, but it looked a lot less like Vikings from the north and more

3:04

just like typical 12th century vessels stealing from one another.

3:09

What was once a section of the continent.

3:11

Due to the Crusades, the Western European nations began to trade

3:14

and mingle with those in the Middle East, albeit a little violently.

3:17

They spent more trading across the sea as it was

3:19

still the fastest way to cut across the map.

3:21

Boats went from being single, masted and small

3:23

to being more rotund and having to mass while still having rowing capacity.

3:28

The battle versions often had little stands on the front

3:30

and back that looked like castle walls at the top with the

3:33

little grooves cut out called the four Castle and Half Castle.

3:37

Except for being front aft. Being back is actually a term that still used in different ways.

3:42

When I was in the Navy. They obviously use language that predates them, the modern ships.

3:47

But there's a section of the ship called the Foxhole,

3:50

which is an abbreviated version of for Castle.

3:52

And I was on an aircraft carrier and this is a sections, a big room

3:56

where there's sections of the chain for the anchor that weaves through it.

4:01

And we would have like meetings and stuff in there.

4:04

I'm not really used how it used to be.

4:06

How it used to be used was a covered section for people

4:10

to sleep basically on the ship and it evolved as ships evolved.

4:14

It was no like the castle jets.

4:17

Like those things wouldn't, wouldn't be part of its design for a super long time.

4:22

But that's just how it started and that's super important.

4:25

But I wanted to describe the types of ships as we kind of move forward

4:28

as the size of the cruise will begin to change pretty drastically

4:31

in the next couple hundred years. Now, as much history is involved in the European front of piracy, areas

4:36

in the China Sea experienced a lot of piracy dating back just as far as the European counterparts should be.

4:42

No surprise, since I stated last week that the history of stealing people's

4:45

things with a boat is not a new concept, and many of the Asian communities sit

4:49

very tightly on the water and have a rich history of balance with ocean fishing, that sort of thing.

4:54

According to the Chinese sources, history of piracy can be traced as far back as the fifth century BCE.

5:01

You know, the Romans had learned about power in vessel waters of the Indian Ocean,

5:04

which is not, you know, the Super East Asia, but in the Asian continent

5:08

document known as the tabula up went to get arena went printing

5:12

gear in a man Latin or the pointing or map

5:16

is a copy of a map thought to be made from the fifth century.

5:19

CE and it describes dangers off the coast of India, which is fun to think about these areas as.

5:25

You don't typically think about them intermingling in that sort of way.

5:28

Of course, like the proud naval traditions of the Scandinavians or the Rhodes

5:32

or Athenian people, people of eastern edges of Asia

5:35

became quite adept with traveling and trading along the water,

5:38

fishing as a major source of food. To this day in these communities.

5:41

And and something that comes to mind almost instantly when thinking of Eastern

5:45

Asian nations. In my opinion, around the 11th century, ships called Junks began

5:49

being used by the Chinese, and the name is a little bit of a misnomer.

5:52

They weren't junk. They were unassuming by having low decks that were long and thin.

5:57

But prowess of the rigging of the sails was far more superior

6:00

to the Western versions. Around the same time period, the holes were excellent for shallow waters.

6:05

A theme I think fits with the fishing history of the region.

6:09

Ship even had a frame of sorts.

6:11

Instead of having walls make up the rigidity of the ship,

6:14

junks featured these walls on the inside of the hole

6:16

that would make up compartments along the length of the ship

6:19

used for storage and different things like that. Imagine like a 70 style standing shelf with all these like different shaped

6:25

rectangular compartments laid down and made watertight

6:30

with a whole wall around it and then underneath.

6:32

And that kind of gives you an idea of what what this might have looked like,

6:36

that framework throughout the length of the ship

6:40

actually made it more strong to resist the harsh China seawater.

6:44

So more advances would make these ships be some of the best

6:47

by the time like by the fifth century compared to the rigging,

6:50

like the rigging of other ships in Europe kind of caught up by that time.

6:54

And so, conversely, the Chinese junks, the actual like ship

6:59

part of it caught up to the rigging and they're pretty good by that time.

7:04

Of course, there's a lot of instances of piracy

7:06

before the events I'm about to describe happened,

7:08

but this is kind of when it becomes an issue that the emperors of these places began to take action.

7:12

And that's why we have documented, you know, documentation about it

7:16

in an almost directly mirrored event of what was happening with the Danes in Europe.

7:20

A tribe called the church and left the frozen northern lands and end ships to raid Japan around 1019 C.E.

7:26

slaughtering Japanese men and taking women for prisoners.

7:30

The governor was killed. An estimated 1200

7:32

Japanese were taken prisoner, while almost 400 were killed in the raid.

7:36

After this, it seems that things really set off

7:38

not directly because of it, but definitely ramped up after in the 13th century,

7:42

Mongols were terrorizing pretty much anyone and everything

7:45

Korea included with their need to defend the inland from the ravenous Mongol hordes.

7:49

This left their coastlines, what with less than optimum defenses.

7:53

And we all know what that means with hungry neighbors who knew these places would be open

7:57

that left the Korean Peninsula open for writing in 1226 Governing bodies of Korea

8:02

at the time sent letters to the Japanese asking why people from

8:05

their island of Tsushima were cluttering their bays and causing mischief.

8:09

The response of the Japanese was to execute 90 individuals, to

8:12

essentially create the fear for others and repair diplomatic relations as well.

8:16

Through this interaction, the term of the pirates was created.

8:19

Waku in Korean or Wako in Japanese,

8:23

is how pirates of any descent in these waters will be known until about the 17th century famine

8:28

and war surrounding in the surrounding areas were forcing people into piracy.

8:32

This accelerated in 1275 when the Mongols had finally taken Korea

8:36

as a vassal state with the bolstered presence

8:38

of Mongol warriors in the coastal waters, Japanese pirates pretty much dared

8:42

not to raid this area, which really speaks to the presence of the Mongols.

8:45

The Mongols even won ships from places they conquered, but were composed

8:49

mostly of pirates because they were not familiar with the ships at all.

8:53

Mercenary vessels now sailed against Chinese coast,

8:56

and it was the mercenary vessels now sailed against the Japanese coast,

8:59

and it was Japanese pirates who were skilled enough to defend their country.

9:03

So in a weird turn of events, pirates fought against one another.

9:06

After several failed attempts, the Mongols gave up on the attack

9:09

on Japan, partially due to the fact that their ships were being wiped out in what the Japanese would call divine winds.

9:15

The typhoon, the legend says, destroyed the Mongol fleet.

9:18

These divine winds also known as kamikaze.

9:21

And that's kind of where that term comes from.

9:23

And they appeared twice and twice defeated Mongol ships.

9:26

So either the gods were watching over the island of Japan or the Mongols sucked

9:30

acid trip planning these defeats came at a cost to the Mongols and led to more defeats.

9:35

They're even beaten back by the Chinese, by the Mid-14th century,

9:38

Japan would be having its own government trouble and piracy was once again rampant.

9:42

The Ming Dynasty was beginning in China, and the last thing Emperor

9:45

Hong Lou wanted to deal with was pirates from their island neighbors.

9:48

Another letter was sent out. I love how many letters were exchanged between these kingdoms

9:52

because not only just in general, but it also gives a lot of context

9:56

to what's happening. But I just love that that's how we used to keep.

9:59

Yeah, anybody could write that, but you got to trust this one.

10:02

I don't know. In the letter, a threat was made basically saying, You're going to fix this problem

10:06

or I will, but as Hong Wu had a coup thwarted against him

10:10

and was dealing with roughly 30,000 people involved, which is an insane

10:14

coup, Japan was realigning themselves to become stable once again.

10:17

As far as the Chicago Shogunate was repairing the damage done,

10:21

trade was once again established between the Three Kingdoms,

10:23

and there was even a short exchange of prisoners

10:25

when diplomats would come to visit, not to free them at all, but

10:29

for their home country to deal with how they saw fit.

10:32

Moving back to Europe and things eventually get tied together here in a little bit by the 13th

10:36

century, different factions had different ways of dealing with pirates.

10:40

The Hanseatic League, for instance, was created in a weird type of naval

10:43

association where they would watch over trade routes and ports

10:46

maintain security in the Balkan seas.

10:48

There was also a standard of having armed men aboard ships to prevent or defend from pirate activity.

10:53

Others began to take advantage of major wars like the 100 Years

10:57

War English Channel, rife with pirates now waiting for movement

11:00

of any kind of jump, for we even have the first real solid versions

11:04

of some privateers the virtual brothers was a band of pirates

11:07

who on their own caused some major damage in the trade.

11:10

In the 14th century, fighting between Mecklenburg and Denmark had led to the hiring of the

11:15

actual brothers. By way of Duke of Mecklenburg and his lack of a proper navy

11:19

wishing to wage what is called a copper krieg or privateers.

11:22

War against Queen Margaret of Denmark offering

11:25

a letter of Marque, which we'll learn about a little more later.

11:28

It's a legal note that essentially gives you permission

11:32

to be a pirate on behalf of the royal request.

11:34

These brothers would smuggle goods to besieged places, take food to others,

11:38

and even engage in full on naval battles.

11:40

They're especially brutal in nature, allegedly slaying most of the people

11:43

on the vessels that they boarded, taking what they wanted.

11:46

Pretty much they got a little too greedy and attacked Burger King in Norway in

11:50

1393, forcing the Hanseatic League, Denmark,

11:54

Mecklenburg and others to sign a treaty forcing them from the Baltic Sea.

11:57

The Victor brothers had a haven in Gotland and they simply just went there.

12:01

But a man named Conrad von Jungen of the Teutonic Knights

12:05

invaded Gotland and slaughtered most of the pirates who were there jumping back slightly in 1241, Allegedly

12:10

the first man to be executed by hanging, drawn and quartered was done to a pirate.

12:14

There's definitely a writing on the wall for kingdoms like England

12:17

and how they would deal with pirates in the future. But all crime was punished pretty graphically back then.

12:21

Yet crimes continued and even still happened anyway.

12:24

A man named William Morris was a pirate who apparently was very dangerous,

12:28

although there's not a lot of information on him other than the name, title and type of death.

12:32

King Henry, the third hated pirates and ordered the man's death by hanging,

12:37

drawn and quartered is the same thing that they would end up doing to William Wallace of Braveheart fame.

12:41

It consisted of the subject being dragged,

12:44

which is the drawn part to the gallows, which could be miles at some point.

12:48

Once there, they were hanged, but not really in the same way that we normally think.

12:51

The short drop in some stop type, more like a suspended choking

12:56

where they were dangled and strangled, I guess is the best way to do it

13:01

or describe it until they were either completely or mostly dead.

13:05

After that, they're either, you know, they're chop their head was either chopped off

13:09

and then they cut the body or they cut off the genitals,

13:12

disemboweled the individual and burnt them while they hanged.

13:15

Then they would cut the body into quarters, which is where the quarter come from

13:18

and sounds like some good, wholesome family entertainment.

13:22

And people did all join up and watch.

13:25

This thing happened back in the day.

13:27

People say that we're violent as a society now, but holy cow, can you imagine?

13:31

Let's get the kids wife, honey, let's go.

13:33

Let's go. Watch this guy get cut up in pieces.

13:36

All right, There's my popcorn. Some of the other things besides insane punishment to deter pirates

13:41

were innovations on ships. A ship that dates back to the ninth century called the COG would evolve

13:47

from different techniques that would make it more resistant

13:49

to pirate attack, while the walls of the ships

13:51

were pretty standard for boats at that time,

13:54

they featured high sides that would make it harder to board

13:56

and see fights, especially if the pirates had shorter vessels,

14:00

the extra extra height on the walls, making it, you know, more difficult.

14:04

They could be up to 82 feet long and up to 26 feet wide and had a crew size of 50 for the ocean.

14:09

Travel would lead to need for bigger ships that could handle strong waters.

14:12

The ocean Portuguese developed a ship called the Caravel

14:15

in around the 13th century featuring multi mass sails, the name

14:19

potentially stemming from the Caravel method of building as opposed to

14:22

the clinker built style where the planks and the whole lap over one another.

14:26

Similar to how like Viking long boats have.

14:29

If you look at pictures of the sides of them, you can see the the lap.

14:32

The caravel is a smooth way of the whole to be built.

14:35

The Nina and the pinto were caravel and they sailed across the ocean with Columbus.

14:39

Of course, in 1492 the other ship was a little more modern, built in the 15th century.

14:44

Santa maria was a Carrick style model, also a Portuguese design.

14:48

These do love ships like a lot.

14:51

Anyway, as they began to cruise around the coasts of Africa, they needed

14:54

bigger ships to the Carrick was their idea length of 150 feet, which is double

14:58

that of the average caravel displacing a thousand tons, which is ten times

15:02

as much as the caravel displacement is used to define ships

15:05

in the weight of the water displaced by the vessel at sea.

15:08

Think of, you know, when you sink, when you like sink some large toy

15:13

in the bathtub, you know, when you're little anyway, and the water goes up.

15:16

That's the those placement physics, you know, I mean, science.

15:20

The Carrick also had a large round hole that curved upward

15:24

to combat the high seas. These things are really funny looking and honestly, like

15:29

I thought they were fake when I was looking at pictures like that.

15:32

There's no way that's what the ships look like. And then you see like authentic recreations and like, I guess that's

15:37

that is what it looked like in my brain. It's just all like mid 18th century ships.

15:43

That's all the sailing ships. That's what they looked like.

15:46

So anyway, the Carrick would hold up to 200 sailors,

15:50

which is massive compared to the 30 at the Caravel.

15:52

All these ships featured mass and were not rowed.

15:55

The Carrick featured three and sometimes four mass

15:58

to hold a many different variations of sails and ratings to pull them along

16:02

the water thing that always made me curious about how ship sails

16:05

operated because, you know, the wind's not always at your back, right?

16:09

Well, I saw a video explaining how it worked and I think I can explain it through that.

16:13

So they explained that the sails could push the ship forward as long as the wind doesn't.

16:17

Wasn't at a certain degree. I can't remember the exact specific degrees,

16:22

but it's directly in front of you. And then plus or minus, I know I want to say

16:26

I want to say 40 on either side, but that could be wrong.

16:29

That might be I don't know, maybe 20.

16:31

So 40 total. Anyway, so the the really only thing you could do

16:35

was a method called tacking where you would basically

16:38

instead of going straight ahead, because that's where your destination was,

16:41

you would go off to either direction and let the wind kind of work

16:45

around the sail in a weird way, similar to like how an airplane wing would work

16:50

and you would use the rudder of the ship to counteract that movement,

16:54

and then that would kind of propel you forward.

16:56

It's very confusing, but you know, it is what it is now.

16:59

The advances of the ship were not just in how they were pushed forward,

17:03

but also, you know, the gunpowder on them.

17:06

Arrows were starting to lose their thrill with the advance

17:09

of gunpowder leading to cannons originating in the ninth century.

17:12

In China, gunpowder led to cannons and cannons in the field. Led

17:16

cannons on the ships makes ship battles more exciting, but also more dangerous.

17:20

Large blasts in the wooden hull spelling certain doom for those on board.

17:24

This meant that the powder powder in the shot had to be perfect

17:27

in the distance, perfect in the tactics and maneuvers, also perfect or death.

17:30

Also, we took a shot to where your powder storage is here.

17:35

You got a real bad day going because that's that's a michael Bay explosion if I've ever seen one.

17:40

Anyway, this is just the life of the people on the water

17:43

and something to consider as we enter the next phase of our story.

17:45

Although at first combat was simple, it would take a while to change very drastically.

17:50

So in the crux, the 15th and 16th centuries,

17:53

things began to take shape in terms of how we view the world,

17:56

the Byzantine or Byzantine Empire was mentioned in the last episode,

18:00

began to be pressed from civil wars and outside attacks after the 12th century.

18:06

Former Eastern Roman Empire collapsed after the fall of Constantinople

18:09

in 1453 to the Muslim Ottoman Empire.

18:13

The rift between Muslim nations and Christian ones

18:16

caused the Ottoman Empire to essentially shut off the access to the Silk Road of the former Mongolian empire.

18:22

What does that mean? Longer trips for shorter distances sailing around the Horn of Africa.

18:26

The first to do this? That's right.

18:28

The God damn Portuguese. And if you think I've been too hard on them for no reason, give it a second.

18:33

While Columbus was sailing west to go east, Vasco

18:36

da Gama sailed around the Horn of Africa, connecting Europe to Asia.

18:40

Big time. Big. It's a big move. While Portugal worked their way around Africa,

18:44

they left bases and forts to claim their land.

18:46

Getting a century long head start on the transatlantic slave trade.

18:50

That's right. They were exporting around 800 slaves from Africa annually, which is not that much.

18:56

But when you realize the major market was not really there yet, that's a lot.

19:00

I mean, any is a lot now. But, you know, they were mainly just taking these people back to Portugal.

19:06

So it's a lot and it's a lot, like I said.

19:08

But after Columbus returned from his technically failed expedition,

19:12

he still believed the route to exist to Asia.

19:15

Because of this, treaties began to be drawn and make some peace among the chaotic waters.

19:21

The Treaty of tortoises divided the ocean and thus the world between

19:24

Portugal and Spain, which is pretty funny because nobody in these areas knew this

19:28

except for them. Columbus, as we know, went to the Americas well, really mainly just Cuba

19:33

and the Caribbean. Several times over ten years.

19:36

And this would really open the world up to travel

19:38

and thus giving our topic prime real estate in the future.

19:41

I want to stop for a second and really drive home the point about how

19:44

insane it was to navigate uncharted waters across wide open oceans.

19:48

Entire concept with the technology at the time is just mind blowing to me.

19:53

They had familiarity with sailing. Sure, some people navigated

19:56

the northern Atlantic before with Greenland, Iceland in the actual

20:00

the Viking exploration that got to North America.

20:02

But to think about where Columbus was going, the Caribbean,

20:06

the place that gets hit by hurricanes constantly in certain months of the year.

20:09

Like sure, storms hit the western edge of Europe, but the

20:12

massive swells in the Atlantic were ships that were really not that big in reality.

20:16

The Carrick style Santa maria being almost 120 feet long,

20:20

we measure waves in the Atlantic that approached 60 feet

20:23

and they had no way of tracking anything like that. Basically just going off of like, well,

20:27

we know that there's storms in this time of year

20:29

and we're going to kind of we're going to do that.

20:32

They could barely see in front of them.

20:34

You know, they had their telescopes and that's kind of it.

20:37

An issue also being when the winds stop, I mentioned how they sailed

20:40

with front winds. But how about no wind? The doldrums are a phenomenon in which there's no wind in the ship,

20:45

just kind of sits and waits until the wind comes back.

20:48

Could be days or longer before they're able to move.

20:50

And if they're in a ship that was not fitted with hours,

20:54

you know, it's a hard time. So with wind, they're still out months at a time, rocking back and forth,

20:59

only using buckets for the bathroom needed salted meats and pickled goods.

21:03

They had dried out grains. The worst of all these was hardtack or ship biscuits,

21:08

the multi cooked, useless bread that can last long spans of time.

21:12

It's kept out of the fresh air.

21:14

They had to smash it so ground water or milk or beer

21:18

before they could actually bite it. And they did drink at sea.

21:21

And it's not because they were like, Oh, we're sailors, we got to get hammered.

21:24

It's actually, weirdly enough, makes sense.

21:28

They would drink beer because beer does have, you know, nutritional value.

21:32

It does have carbs and vitamins, things like that.

21:35

And also it's more resistant to micro bacteria

21:38

than water would be kept in the same condition.

21:41

So that's a little fun fact that I learned today.

21:44

Anyway, back to our story. While most of the Renaissance is

21:47

looked at as peaceful, there's still plenty of shenanigans

21:49

going on with the routes around Africa set by the Portuguese.

21:52

They met up to the China Sea after potentially being blown off course.

21:56

Chinese refer to these people as southern barbarians,

21:58

and this would connect the powers across the lands together now via oceans

22:02

and begin to usher in a big bulk of the pirate action.

22:05

Portuguese placed a base essentially in Malacca and tried to spread Christianity,

22:09

as well as introducing more unsavory things into the Southeast Asian countries.

22:14

As I mentioned before, the growing Ottoman Empire had a cold chokehold on the Silk Road

22:18

and was also a place that had its own pirates, Barbary pirates

22:22

or corsairs, as they're sometimes referred to as operated in the areas

22:26

around the Ottoman Empire, lands that were considered

22:29

part of the Ottoman Empire, but also ones that were republics on their own and chose their own rulers

22:34

were massive in attacking the Portuguese and the Spanish.

22:37

The northern coastline of Africa was where these pirates would hail places like Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli.

22:42

The pirates seeking slaves to add to the rich Barbary slave trade,

22:45

which I guess I had forgotten about or never learned about.

22:48

Either way, this was far less organized than the slave trades.

22:51

Later on, but estimates are around 1 to 1 point

22:54

to 5 million from the 16th and 18th century.

22:57

They're pretty indiscriminate in their choosing,

23:01

unlike the people who took slaves around the same time and later

23:03

equal opportunity slaves, if you will, they would seize merchant ships as well as

23:07

attack towns along the coast, even going as far north as the Netherlands.

23:11

These actions actually go back a few hundred years,

23:14

but the real rampant nature of them caused people

23:16

to look at them a little more closely. Some European men even left or were shunned and decided to join up

23:21

with these Barbary pirates and put their skills to use.

23:24

I mentioned Algiers, and they even had a pair of pirate rulers

23:27

in the name of hatred in Barbosa and Oruc, Greece.

23:31

The brothers rose to prominence due to their impressive naval skills

23:34

and took and took control of Algiers. For the Ottomans, Barabas is the same name.

23:38

Is that Geoffrey Rush character in Pirates of the Caribbean.

23:40

But I don't think they were related at all.

23:42

Now, there were attempts at legitimacy across the globe.

23:45

For Japan and China, the colony was illegitimate.

23:48

It scroll or messages carried by parties wishing

23:51

to do business, signed and dated for the correct time in which to do so.

23:55

Basically giving you a timeline in which you were allowed to legally trade

23:58

in China to rival clans arrive at the same time to do a trade.

24:02

But one carried outdated papers and the other one was within their range.

24:06

The clan that had outdated papers bribed the Chinese officials and won the bid essentially.

24:10

And this did not sit well with the other guys.

24:13

He and his men killed. The main delegator of the Chinese burn the ship down that they were on

24:18

and then scorched earth tactic like move through the land that they traveled

24:22

as they went back to Ningbo and then they stole

24:26

a bunch of ships in the process, which is pretty gnarly.

24:29

But I get it. The main issue, the con system, was that Japan was struggling with the warring states at hand

24:35

and having no central government power to back the colonies.

24:38

And with that the official trade ability for Japan was kind of,

24:41

you know, dead in the water. The people had a need for goods and luckily for them, pirates

24:46

were happy to oblige, many of which held refuge and fortification fortified nations

24:50

along the coast, bands of different ethnic groups kind of banding together.

24:55

Portuguese pirates even joined them because there's nothing

24:58

the Portuguese love more and cruelty on the water?

25:01

No, I don't think so. But it's fun to speculate.

25:05

By the middle of the 15th century, Magellan's mission to circumnavigate

25:08

the globe was accomplished not by him, because he died after

25:12

some indigenous people in the Philippines showed him

25:14

what for his successor became the actual first one to do so.

25:17

Juan Sebastian Okano This was the first circumnavigation of the globe, a feat not many have claimed.

25:23

I mean, I have, but I am no ordinary man.

25:26

Just kidding. But I did do it. I got myself a little certificate and everything.

25:30

Anyway, we don't know the story. It's pretty gnarly.

25:32

Magellan had five ships and was off the course of route around the globe

25:36

because they all knew it was round and could end up on the other side.

25:38

There's just no proof that it wasn't dangerous to do so.

25:41

They thought crossing the Atlantic was dangerous, not because there is a cliff

25:44

on the other side, but because there was no it was not known to be done.

25:48

It was so hard to do, especially with the ships that they had back then.

25:51

What they now knew was that there was land in the way of a straight shot,

25:55

which is fine. Just go around. Right. Well, they also did not know how far down this land

26:00

stretched or up or whatever, and therefore massively underprepared.

26:03

Remember when I said it was a little crazy to do something so wild with a little idea of what awaited

26:09

this is why they had five ships, 270 men, give or take a left in September of 1519

26:14

and returned in September 1522, which is not not good.

26:19

They also only returned with one ship

26:21

to Victoria, which was that carrier style, similar to the Santa maria,

26:25

and they had 18 men with them and it took them three years.

26:28

So granted, not all of them died. 12 got captured by the damned Portuguese and one returned a year end of the voyage.

26:34

Upwards of 60 were slaughtered in the Philippines with Magellan

26:37

when he tried to spread the word of Jesus over there.

26:39

Although it wasn't a complete loss, Magellan and the Armada tried to find

26:42

the ship that ended up turning back after a year and in that search noticed

26:47

how common the Pacific Ocean was and named it such Mar Pacifica.

26:51

And so that's that's where that came from.

26:53

LEE After that, he was like, Hey, guys, we rounded through this super cool

26:57

strait of Magellan named after named after a cool guy, I guess

27:01

should only be, you know, three or four days to the East Indies.

27:04

And then it took four months for them to reach the Philippines.

27:07

And he died, like I mentioned before, basically all that to really drive home

27:10

the point of how treacherous and insane the journey was.

27:13

It's no wonder why, you know, piracy was able to thrive in this time period.

27:17

He's not the only person around this time to do so.

27:19

A pirate, a real major one, also decided to take on this task.

27:23

Sir Francis Drake C Francis Drake.

27:26

He was raised by the seas. He's a he's a real sail boy.

27:29

And he sailed with a man named John Hopkins.

27:31

When in his youth we had a similar kind of persona.

27:34

The pair had their roots in the slave trade, which is always a great way to start your career.

27:38

You know, they they're both some of the more

27:41

notable privateers of the years leading up to the golden age of piracy.

27:45

But before turning our attention to Drake, I want to explain privateers

27:48

a little more. I have mentioned them both in last week's episode and a little bit earlier on and this one.

27:53

But I haven't really given like a full exploration explanation or exploration

27:58

privateers, our commission sailors who perform actions of war

28:01

on behalf of whoever is paying them against another nation.

28:04

The only thing that made a privateer privateer and not a pirate was these commissions, similar to how legal trade

28:09

was only allowed with those with colonies in Japan.

28:12

As I mentioned before, many of the most famous pirates often started out

28:15

as sailors or captains on privateer contracts or letters of marque.

28:19

These letters essentially put the king or queen signature on whatever nation

28:23

or whatever nation that commissioned you on the actions that you carried out.

28:26

The argument can and has been made that to the nations being attacked,

28:30

there's really no difference between a privateer or a pirate.

28:33

The gains of the loot taken was also divided differently,

28:36

with more wealth spread to the sponsors and also the issuer

28:40

of the letter of Marque than the captains and, you know, whoever may ownership.

28:44

And then lastly, you know, the crew, because of this, especially during the golden age,

28:48

many would rather take the risk and sail on a pirate vessel than for some privateer

28:53

that splits as the splits were a little more favorable.

28:55

There's also similar how many would choose privateer

28:58

over being just a typical merchant sailor due to better pay?

29:01

So if you're looking at it as a scale, Royal Navy is probably the lowest paying

29:06

and then merchant and then privateer and then pirate pirate being better

29:10

shares, not necessarily better pay because you still have to

29:13

you still have to earn your keep. Right. Anyway, looping back to Francis Drake is he is one of the more famous

29:18

and pretty brutal the privateers of the 16th century,

29:21

earning his stripes while supposedly sailing under John Hawkins,

29:24

while the ships under his command attacked Portuguese slave ships in African towns

29:28

and selling those taken from the attacks in different ports in both Europe and the Caribbean.

29:33

The more success they had, the more that Hawkins

29:35

gained favor of the Queen Elizabeth, the first.

29:37

Naturally, the Portuguese were angry not just because their vessels

29:40

were being attacked, but also due to the fact that they were now competing and the human selling business.

29:45

And unfortunately for the people being sold, this just kind of meant a lot more of that happening.

29:50

A competition not good anyway.

29:53

By 1567, though, Hopkins had some failures and lost public support of the Queen

29:57

if she wanted to keep wars from erupting against both Spain and Portugal.

30:01

Drake joined him in 1566 on an expedition that resulted in the release

30:06

of all 90 slaves without any money gain, which I think is okay.

30:09

And I think the slaves probably think it's okay to this

30:12

led Hopkins to pursue more wins and that was really mixed for the next

30:15

few years, you know, joining forces with some local kings

30:19

in the Sierra Leone and received a portion of the captives from their victory.

30:23

But the thought is that he was not given, you know,

30:25

the lion's share since he really needed their help as they

30:30

didn't really need his help, you know, So they they could have overpowered him.

30:34

They're like, you're going to just give up. You're just going to get what we give you.

30:37

Pretty much this led directly to Hopkins and his up

30:41

eventually being hit up with storms split up, eventually Hopkins and Drake

30:45

being among those remaining captains who are forced

30:48

to poor and San Juan de Zulia to Ula Ultra.

30:52

Oh, I don't know. While here, there,

30:55

while here. There's a massive battle between the Spanish,

30:57

the privateers with English papers. There's a truce between the two while the English worked on their ships,

31:02

repairing them from the damage from storms.

31:05

But obviously things did not hold.

31:07

Following some hostage exchanges, the Spanish began

31:09

to arrange people on the shore, as did the English.

31:12

But the Spanish force was secretly there to prevent any English

31:16

trade in the new world, and the English did not know this, which makes sense.

31:20

Thus, secretly, the Spanish had hidden troops on the shore

31:23

and then also on a transport vessel that they wedged between the two forces.

31:27

Suspicion arose while the English had seen forces moving around

31:30

carrying weapons and such before the Spanish signaled for the attack.

31:34

Spanish attackers quickly overwhelmed the English on the shore before

31:37

taking over the cannons that they had. Spanish ship boarded an English one and the cannons on the shore

31:42

began firing at the English ships. The once six ship band of English ships was quickly turned to to and the 13 ship

31:48

Armada only lost one ship and the two English ships became overcrowded

31:53

with fleeing Englishmen, Drake captaining one and Hawkins leading the other.

31:56

Drake fled slightly before Hawkins, which, you know, he was kind of like, Hey, man, what?

32:01

You abandoned me. And when they both returned to England,

32:06

Hawkins was not super pumped, which makes sense.

32:09

Things did not improve between the Spanish and the English.

32:12

And the English really did not have their own navy in terms of how we typically think of.

32:16

They relied heavily on privateers like Drake to hit Spanish and Portuguese.

32:20

What is interesting is you can kind of look at the lists of famous privateers

32:23

and the timeframe between the 16th and mid-17th century,

32:26

and there's only one Spanish privateer, and he was mainly enlisted

32:29

to fight against the Turks. There's probably some others.

32:32

But, you know, on the whole, it's mostly just English

32:35

and there's like a few Dutch ones, but like I said, mostly English.

32:38

This kind of hearkens back to the fact that England did not have a major Navy until, you know, the 17th and 18th centuries.

32:44

And not not to say that there are not any from other countries,

32:47

but there's a strong correlation between the lack of other countries

32:50

represented and their naval presence like Spain and Portugal.

32:53

Other famous ones from England are Sir Walter Riley and Captain Charles Newport,

32:58

both of which had places in American colonies named after them,

33:01

like Raleigh, North Carolina and Newport News, Virginia, respectively.

33:05

It's actually disputed that Newport News is named after him, but

33:08

there's a university there called Charles Newport University in Newport News.

33:12

So kind of feel like it's probably named after him.

33:15

Like I can go and make that. Guess why the English were attacking the Spanish and Portuguese.

33:20

Spain had conquistadors in the Americas, but also in the East, often typical

33:25

to think about the conquistadors in the Americas ruining Aztec and Incan empires.

33:29

But they also tore up the Philippines in the late 16th century.

33:32

Japanese silver was all the rage, and there was especially great fortune

33:35

in the Philippine Islands. And there was also a place

33:37

where some Japanese pirates loved to hide from the greater Chinese navy.

33:41

These pirates ended up taking over a province that was rich

33:44

with silver called Kaguya or the Cagayan Province,

33:47

and the Spanish, who had made a governor in the Philippines already had enough.

33:52

He commissioned a naval captain named Juan Pablo to carry on to take care of these pirates.

33:56

A wako ship was destroyed by carrion, but then there was more on the way.

34:01

Carrion had a hand, a handful of ships and less men.

34:04

But they had cannons, guns and better training.

34:06

What to do, which led them to becoming victorious against the pirates.

34:10

But the pirates, the China Sea, would not make it an easy life for the Western visitors.

34:14

It should also be noted that the details of this event

34:16

come directly from the Spanish as they attempt attempted to secure the more reinforcements and ships.

34:21

And they say that they were outnumbered yet one but needed the reinforcements.

34:26

So I don't know. It sounds like they were like they made it sound like they just slaughtered

34:30

these people super easy. So they either were outnumbered and won or they barely won.

34:36

And to me, it sounds like the ragtag pirates gave the pristine Spanish

34:40

conquistadors pretty good run for their money

34:42

and they had to write some nonsense to cover their. But Japan began to get their things

34:46

sorted out by 1591 and a reunification had taken place.

34:49

With this, the governing powers decided that they should use pirate use the pirate

34:53

infested waters to their advantage, and they began to pay the former pirates

34:57

for their goods instead of leaning away of it.

34:59

Yes, there was piracy in the waters, but now, instead of paying money to fix it,

35:02

they would let the pirates, whose income might be tarnished

35:05

by the actions of others, deal with these issues as they came up.

35:08

Some self-governing, which is kind of interesting.

35:10

In the Mediterranean, the chaos between different European conflicts

35:13

allowed the Barbary pirates to flourish more until each opposing country

35:16

kind of got tired of them individually and decided to take their own actions,

35:20

or really just urging these pirates to attack their rivals.

35:23

For them, France would tell them to attack Spain and Britain,

35:26

and the Dutch would tell them to attack France so on.

35:29

It wouldn't be until the golden Age that these pirates would be pacified with treaties with the British

35:34

Slavic regions had their own interesting encounters.

35:36

A small pirate faction struggle for independence.

35:39

The zapper reason existed in Ukrainian and Polish regions.

35:43

This place was full of runaway slave peasants and pirates alike.

35:46

They attack shores of the Ottoman Empire and places near Crimea,

35:49

even allegedly raising settlements near Istanbul as colonies

35:53

for the Spanish began to take hold. I mentioned St Augustine in Florida before, which was founded in 1565,

35:59

but there are others in this created a network of trade and thus other nations began to focus on this area

36:04

places like Hispaniola, Tortuga, among the Caribbean islands

36:07

that people would begin to try and lay claim failed English colonies like Roanoke

36:11

led to permanent ones like Jamestown and Jamestown, and had its own struggles, but not as bad.

36:16

It's grown up dead, so much so that when a traveling armada

36:19

aiming to get more settled settlers into Jamestown

36:22

was blown off course due to storms ended up in Bermuda Triangle.

36:26

People elected just to stay there. Instead of dealing with the issues that Jamestown was experiencing,

36:31

they had droughts and some other things going on and it wasn't super great.

36:35

The settlement on the archipelago of Bermuda

36:37

put an English foothold in the Caribbean, which would lead to a lot of

36:40

interesting exchanges for pirates and merchants.

36:42

Like there's a boom for the 17th century of settlements along the east coast of

36:47

of America and in the Caribbean as well, pretty much all over the place.

36:50

But, you know, it is what is all this means a lot of transatlantic trade,

36:54

which means a lot of both noble and less than noble sailors.

36:57

In the mid 17th century, groups began to take initiative on their own.

37:01

The Buccaneers, which is you know, we know that is a popular name now,

37:05

but the history is kind of unique, stemming from a group of French

37:08

that lived on Hispaniola and then later into Tortuga.

37:11

Its people eat meat from the Yukon, which is a so sort of frame

37:16

I think is how I saw described as like a rotisserie

37:19

tile type thing that they used to cook in Maine, became Buccaneer

37:23

one who used Buchanan and then Buccaneer

37:27

because English language ruins everything.

37:29

So these men moved to Tortuga full time and would make their mark by attacking

37:33

Spanish ships returning to Spain with whatever their reward might be.

37:37

This is really one of the first instances of lawless attack,

37:40

meaning no crown and force or direct directed incidents within the Caribbean.

37:45

The Bahamas become a home base of sorts for the Buccaneers, allowing them

37:48

to resupply an attack a little more rapidly than others would be able to.

37:52

The English crown began to sanction these Buccaneers and to go

37:56

after Spain exclusively, as the Crown often did.

37:59

England even sent special naval officers to lead these Buccaneers

38:03

to make sure things work smoothly. One notable example of these was a Welsh captain by the name of Henry Morgan.

38:09

That name sounds familiar to you. Then you have a drinking problem? No, just kidding.

38:13

But that is the believe namesake of the beloved Rum Captain Morgan.

38:17

Anyway, Henry Morgan was a privateer who made his name in the Caribbean.

38:21

In fact, we really don't know a lot of his life before his joining in the Caribbean.

38:26

But we do know he arrived and was part of some small raiding parties in the 1660s.

38:31

After being in the Caribbean for a while, he became friends with the local governor,

38:34

getting letters of Marque in attacking different Spanish ships

38:37

around Cuba and Panama. By 1668, you raided towns all the way down to Venezuela,

38:43

even destroying a Spanish squadron of ships in the process.

38:46

Pretty impressive. He attacked Panama directly and did quite well.

38:49

Spanish allegedly lost 500 men to the 15 privateers killed in the action.

38:54

English wanted to make sure the Spanish weren't mad about what Captain Morgan was doing, make sense.

38:58

So he was arrested and sent back to England.

39:01

The current English law on piracy was hefty, but only the captain could be charged and

39:05

also required him to be tried in England, which is important to note in the future.

39:09

When he arrived in England, he was praised by everyone, even the King,

39:12

and two years later he was even knighted and given his professional title

39:15

back in Jamaica. And in a weird turn of events

39:17

appointed to get rid of piracy in the ports, which is kind of funny,

39:21

he wasn't so quick to do so as many of the men that he was friendly

39:25

with would have been charged. Some of his old buddies and he, you know, started taking bribes to look

39:31

the other way from the pirate activities, which is that's a that's a real one.

39:34

As a good friend, he also took to the slave trade,

39:37

not a good friend and plantation life owning three plantations by the time he died in 1688.

39:42

Story really sets up fact that the long arm of the European rule was not quite long enough

39:47

to control the Caribbean and the colonies that it would have liked, and that led

39:51

to plenty of lawlessness in the area and even the east coast of the colonies.

39:55

As time moved forward, Buccaneers continue to play a part in the piratical events

39:59

until 1690s, until when the friction between them and the English, Spanish

40:04

and now the French made things increasingly more risky.

40:07

That's drove them to be either, you know,

40:09

regular legal maritime workers or just straight up piracy.

40:13

They're tired overhead and line. I guess this also marks a point where privateers begin to slip into privacy.

40:18

Granted, it wouldn't be until after Queen Anne's War

40:21

that the big hitters would come. But this is you know, crack in the proverbial armor of privateering.

40:25

There's a lot of risk, whether it be from opposing countries

40:28

or just in general of seafaring and warfare on the high seas.

40:31

Yet in that fighting itself is treacherous.

40:34

And the pay to be a sailor on a naval warship was low privateering only paid

40:38

slightly more that the you know, true piracy really flourished

40:41

bridge years of the late 6090s before Queen Anne's war saw Henry

40:45

Avery go from Royal Navy sailor to slave trader to pirate.

40:49

He became one of the biggest pirates after gaining

40:51

the command of a ship following the mutiny aboard it in 1694.

40:55

A quick rename of the ship from Charles, the second to fancy, and they were off.

41:00

Avery told his men of the riches to be had in the Indian Ocean and major scores

41:04

happening there, and the crew was ready for a new captain to lead them to glory.

41:08

His methods of persuasion and enslavement amassed his crew and soon

41:12

they made modifications to the ship in form of raising some unnecessary

41:16

portions of the ship to make it lighter and faster.

41:18

They captured different vessels in the Atlantic and even some privateer vessels.

41:22

They rounded the Horn of Africa and made their way into the Indian Ocean

41:25

and other areas and gained the attention of the East India Company.

41:28

In 1695, a coalition of five other pirates joined Avery to attack

41:32

the Grand Mughal fleet and then smuggle and make ale, not mug Ali.

41:38

Harry Potter people out. That fleet included the Fatah Muhammad and 894 cannon massive ship.

41:44

This compared to the 46 gun frigate that sent the fancy

41:49

a few of the ships joining every proved not to be fast enough for the chase.

41:53

The Fatah Muhammad actually did not fight much when they arrived,

41:56

potentially due to a battle prior, but a treasure was captured

41:59

from a reign upwards of £60,000 on the high end.

42:03

Another ship was Insights, and Avery might have got lucky

42:07

when that ship backfired aboard, the cannon must have exploded and blew up

42:12

some of the powder charges and things and the crew was shook.

42:16

The Indian crew aboard not ready.

42:18

And that gave time for another pirate vessel to join up.

42:21

And they all climbed board in some hand-to-hand combat, which allegedly took 3 hours.

42:26

There are some accounts of which alleged the Indian captain running below and then arming slave women

42:31

he had aboard before sending them up to fight the pirates, which is wild.

42:35

Others said there's no reason why Captain Ibrahim was not victorious against them.

42:40

While the massive ship had blades, muskets ready all over the place and more people.

42:45

Despite this, the ship eventually surrendered.

42:47

And another report says that the pirates subjected the survivors to some horrific actions.

42:52

Assault and death all around. The romanticism of pirates has led to some of these accounts being written off.

42:57

But their confessions of the captured men from Avery's crew that say

43:00

to be true, estimated 90 to 130000.

43:03

And today's British pound was said to be split among the crew.

43:07

But the East India company was on their tail eventually

43:09

the first worldwide manhunt was issued after them, £1,000 for his capture alone.

43:14

And the Crown said that he was even qualified for any sweeping

43:18

pardon of any of the pirates that was offered at the time.

43:21

All that withstanding, Avery was never found.

43:23

Some suggest he escaped and lived a life after selling his riches.

43:28

Others say he was cheated from his money and died penniless.

43:31

Either way, pretty fascinating that he just disappeared.

43:34

In the years following outbreaks of the war and forms of the war, Spain succession

43:38

and the various so-called French and Indian wars, privateers on the side

43:42

of the French worked on taking vessels in the New England area of the colonies.

43:46

English and Indigenous fought on the land against the French.

43:49

I mentioned privateers for the French, but the big uptake was more privateers for the British and colonial forces.

43:55

So this spike of more privateers had work for the war.

43:58

But following the war's conclusion around 1713,

44:01

there were a lot of privateers with very little work.

44:03

Now the war, Spain and secession I mentioned, is also known as Queen

44:07

Anne's War to the British and the colonists at the time.

44:10

So that's why there's both. You use both names, I guess.

44:13

I don't know now. Well, this is where a lot of the Golden Age pirates make their debut.

44:17

I want to stop for a second and talk about the methodology of them.

44:21

Firstly, before this point, there's a lot of Red Baron style

44:24

class and chivalry in regards to the way pirates behave.

44:27

I think this is more romanticism, but when you think about the way of life

44:30

that they had, there's really no options but to live by certain rules.

44:34

You're sailing in the open waters. Do you risk your life in the life of everyone

44:37

you have a board firing cannons and getting a rest blown to hell?

44:40

Or do you take to the sword and board the vessel and fight the good fight?

44:44

Also, I think fight the good fight might be my unofficial slogan because I've said it a bunch.

44:50

Anyway, not only that, but most of the time

44:52

the Pirates were too smart to go against any fully armed ships, typically

44:56

aiming at the lesser armed or unarmed merchant vessels.

44:59

Also, the pirate code that is referred to so often, and things of fiction

45:03

like Pirates of the Caribbean. The actual thing

45:05

finding out cover different things, how the crew should keep their weapons,

45:10

which is, you know, good in good condition, watch and work shifts,

45:14

shipboard laws, desertion, fighting, splitting earnings, such things like that.

45:19

One of the things that people think about, you know,

45:21

some of these ships, they list as 300 people.

45:24

Well, that doesn't mean 300 people on deck at one time.

45:26

There's people sleeping so they can sail in the night,

45:29

you know, things like that just to consider.

45:31

There's also prices to be paid for those who are injured.

45:33

Typically the weight of the Lin and pieces of eight.

45:36

What is a piece of eight, you ask? Well, that's a Spanish dollar

45:39

that is worth eight reales and can literally be cut up.

45:42

Like legally they're like, yeah, go ahead, cut our money out, which is

45:46

which is weird. But one of the one whole Spanish dollar was a dollar.

45:50

But with it being silver, be worth a little more today than it was back then.

45:55

But either way, if your arm got blown off, your right arm got blown off 600 pieces

45:59

in eight for you, 500 for the left, 500 for the right leg and 400 for the left one

46:04

and then 100 per eye and finger respectively.

46:08

So these buried ship to ship. Captain. Captain.

46:10

But more or less, hey, you know, that's how they went.

46:13

You know, things had to be a little organized. They almost always had sailing backgrounds.

46:17

The sailors, the ones who did not, were most likely pressed into service.

46:21

But that's a pretty small fraction. And they learned quickly. They got used to the lifestyle.

46:25

And not every crewmember was just a sword swinging warrior.

46:29

You know, every man had specific trades.

46:31

Typically, you know, you had to have carpenters to repair the ship.

46:34

Bookkeepers to track the money coming in and out, tailors

46:37

for repairing sails or, you know, outfitting the crew,

46:42

you know, all these things to keep the ship running smoothly

46:45

meant that the crew was typically used to, you know, these kinds of rules despite

46:48

having the ravaging, ruthless reputations that they like people put on them.

46:52

And then their union Jackson Country flag swapped out for Jolly Rogers, which are,

46:56

you know, the skull and crossbones, a black flag with the skull and crossbones,

47:00

although each pirate kind of had different versions of it.

47:03

And they customize it to show their unique vision.

47:06

A lot of this seems very familiar to me, having been in the Navy,

47:09

There's a lot of rules for everything, even like the little things,

47:12

not to mention with sailors being super superstitious.

47:14

Ships are strictly really superstitious, so every little thing would be followed up

47:19

pretty well because, you know, if you don't on the bag happen,

47:22

that's not a good quote. That also speaks to the attitude of the pirates who would soon rage on the seas.

47:26

The quote goes, There's nothing so desperately monotonous as the sea.

47:30

And I no longer wonder at the cruelty of pirates,

47:33

and that by author and poet James Russell Lowell.

47:36

And I think having seen the very thing that Lowell mentions,

47:39

this can be very true, you know, as the but also,

47:42

you know, the hostility definitely stemmed from a combination of resistance

47:46

as well as tactics and scorn and from their look,

47:49

from their former lives, as well as just how things were back then, but especially,

47:54

you know, in the golden lands, these pirates were pretty brutal.

47:57

So with that, let's go on to the big boys, the major dudes, the bros.

48:01

Anyway, Captain William Kidd is the first up.

48:04

A pirate hunter turned pirate himself after a few years of sailing

48:07

and after a few years of sailing for others and working his way into a sponsored ship

48:12

called the Adventure Galley, kids ill view of traditional royalty

48:16

was pretty obvious an incident of refusal to give salute to a Royal Navy ship

48:20

after being, you know, indicated to do so, ended up in his crew

48:24

smacking their backsides as their ship sailed past.

48:27

They were essentially pulled over after that and a lot of his crew

48:32

was pressed into service on the royal crew on the royal ship, which is yeah.

48:36

Despite this, he hunted pirate vessels in the colonies, New York in particular.

48:41

That was kind of where his commission was. But he went into the different places

48:45

attempting to locate pirate strongholds in places like Madagascar.

48:48

A few years into his voyage, he was accused of piracy due to avoiding being his crew being impressed.

48:54

But his rationale was that his letter of Marque protected his crew from that.

48:58

Shortly after that, he took the crew dog merchant, a medium

49:01

sized ship, hired by Armenians, which had quite the bounty.

49:05

He did so with the French flag, raised the cute dog having French papers,

49:09

and thus probably were less suspicious of colors at the time he lost seamen.

49:14

Man After encountering another pirate, Robert Clifford.

49:16

Not through battle, but just some kind of just left

49:19

and joined up with Clifford because I guess he was

49:22

he sold on and I don't know, he abandoned the adventure galley as it was

49:25

rotten at this point and returned to the Caribbean with his adventure prize.

49:29

That's the crew dog merchant that he renamed.

49:32

He knew he knew that he was in the crosshairs of the crown

49:35

and thus ditched the ship in the Caribbean and then sailed to New York in a different way.

49:38

The governor of New York at the time was an investor of kids and thus with that

49:42

he wanted to have kid sent to England.

49:45

As the laws were beginning to change in the colonies to combat piracy

49:48

and were no longer worried about only the captain.

49:50

But any as well. So this guy's kind of covering his own, but at this time and charged

49:57

it and wanted to charge Kidd and have him sent on his own like, Hey,

50:00

I caught him so. Don't, don't get me.

50:03

He used a false pardon for Kidd tricked him to getting into Boston

50:07

where he was arrested he was found guilty of murder and five counts of piracy.

50:12

He was hanged and displayed for others to see four pirates to be warned, essentially.

50:16

And he he left behind a treasure that many have tried to find.

50:19

Even the weirdos in the Oak Island.

50:21

Like if you've ever seen that show on the History Channel,

50:24

they haven't found it anyway. Spoiler alert has not been found,

50:28

and many of his exploits have been shrouded in legend.

50:31

So another pirate shrouded in legend is known as Black Caesar.

50:35

Not my name for him, but, you know, he was allegedly a African pirate,

50:39

West African pirate, who found his way onto Blackbeard's ship.

50:43

Only not a lot is known for certain, but he is known to be in service

50:47

aboard the Queen Anne's Revenge, which is Blackbeard's ship.

50:49

And generally thought to be an ex-slave, but also has a legendary status

50:52

of being a chieftain where he hails from, though no real record of this exist.

50:56

All that segueing into Blackbeard, who has a similar story

51:00

vague and full of guesses, Edward teaches his suspected name.

51:03

Although there are many variations of this and sometimes include teak or thatch

51:07

is also very likely to have been a sailor or a privateer in the war of Spanish succession.

51:12

Given the name he would later rename the ship

51:15

Queen Anne's Revenge as the name points to the alternate name for the war.

51:19

From the English perspective, I guess though, it could also be

51:22

a reference to the now dead Queen Anne, who was succeeded by George,

51:25

who is of German ancestry and also was disliked by quite a few people.

51:30

The ship itself, a captured French slave ship called the Concorde, a frigate

51:34

which was a more modern interpretation of the characters I'd mentioned before.

51:37

TEACH had upgraded the ship with more guns after taking it over and added

51:41

black flags to it. Often, Blackbeard's Jolly Roger is depicted as a horn skeleton

51:46

implicating a devil or death,

51:48

holding an hourglass in one hand and a spear in the other

51:51

while stabbing a heart, showing that time is almost out on death comes for you.

51:55

Unfortunately, this imagery came out many years after his time

51:59

to the tune of 200 years, and most depictions only hold

52:02

that it was Black flag with death's head or skulls essentially on it

52:07

and all of that on his Jolly Roger coming from

52:09

the people who are studying the shipwreck of this very ship right now.

52:13

So anyway, after the war's conclusion, as I mentioned, many former sailors

52:17

turned pirate, one of the anyway, after the war's conclusion, as I mentioned, many former

52:21

sailors turned pirate and him being one of these legendary sailors,

52:25

a lot of his exploits make it sound like he reigned

52:27

for like 30 years in the Caribbean. But in reality, his brutality was only a few years long.

52:32

In 1717, Blackbeard sailed with others.

52:35

Benjamin Horner Gold Steve Bannon's notorious Pirates of Their Own

52:38

and two sloops, which are, you know, smaller warships and overtook the Concord in the Caribbean

52:43

after sailing from Chesapeake after a year of activity in the Bahamas

52:46

following this, Blackbeard, followed by three sloops, got aggressive

52:49

and blockaded the water blockade of the harbor of Charleston.

52:54

This and many other instances would inspire the crown

52:56

to send British dignitaries to the American colonies to see that laws

53:00

were followed exactly as the Crown issued when it came to pirates.

53:03

Especially, this would be a theme in which the colonies resisted the rule.

53:06

Since the laws of the Crown were written did not really fit

53:10

with how the way of life was in the colonies.

53:13

You know, you're making a law for us over here,

53:15

but you don't understand how life is over here.

53:17

Blackbeard had begun to cause some major damage and was definitely being targeted by the crown

53:22

After blockade of Charleston, the Queen Anne's revenge was spotted

53:25

run aground alongside another ship off the coast of North Carolina.

53:29

Some speculate that he received a pardon and this was his retirement boat.

53:33

What gold did he have to do? So, you know, what was he using the money from.

53:36

This Charleston shakedown

53:38

is speculated that his treasure was not merely that of golden variety,

53:42

but it came in the but that he came to the shore with slaves and sold them within the area of Bath,

53:47

North Carolina. Witnesses claim no lives were lost when the ships were wrecked.

53:51

So as points to possible intentional crash.

53:54

Other evidence of this slave trade was that North

53:56

Carolina was struggling prior to this point economically.

53:59

But following his arrival, there was an improvement in in the economy.

54:03

When I read this originally, I thought that this was important,

54:05

you know, implying that his improvement on the economy was his gold like he is

54:11

spending a lot of money, is dumping money into the local shops

54:15

and things you know, with the gold that he earned at sea.

54:18

But, you know, it's no secret that a large portion of pirates did deal with like enslaved.

54:23

They could be bought for less from pirates than from a typical dealer,

54:27

like an official source, which, you know, is silly because you're literally selling people.

54:32

It's such an unofficial thing to do.

54:34

Anyway, after six months of retirement,

54:36

he yearned for the seas and thus return to piracy.

54:38

Despite having been given a royal pardon.

54:41

This brought some major attention to him and he was pursued

54:44

by a Lieutenant Robert maynard of the Royal Navy.

54:47

It was very much still concerned with Blackbeard.

54:49

Their battle took place on Ocracoke Island with teach thinking it was a place

54:54

that larger Royal Navy vessels not really be able to approach due to the shallow waters.

54:58

And he was kind of right. One ship pursued him and ended up getting stuck, ran aground,

55:04

and he shot the, you know, he shot that one out of service

55:07

and then he found the other one to be empty on the deck thinking

55:10

maybe they jump ship or it was a skeleton crew.

55:12

The pirate crew boarded and only to be found

55:15

with a surprise attack from underneath the deck. Massive battle happened and an English sailor hacked at Blackbeard's

55:20

neck with a broadsword, and Blackbeard allegedly remarked something to the effect

55:24

of well done, lads, before attempting to fire one of his six pistols

55:27

at Lieutenant Maynard before another blow killed him.

55:31

And Maynard also pretty sure shot him.

55:33

The royal sailors claim to have shot him some five times and stabbed him

55:36

20, I guess, to make sure that he was really dead.

55:39

And I think this also speaks to both the disdain and also maybe

55:43

the fear from these pirates, but mostly to this disdain from the crown.

55:48

And they took his head off, you know, hacked it off,

55:52

threw his body over the wall, over the side,

55:55

and is legend that it swam around the ship six times.

55:59

His head brought back to Virginia and put on a pike

56:02

to stir fear for other pirates. Others include Calico Jack and Bonnie, who are quoted

56:06

And Bonnie, At the beginning of the first episode,

56:09

Jack Rackham had taken another Pirates vessel, Charles Vane, and his love

56:12

interest, and Bonnie joined him as they terrorized ships in the Caribbean.

56:16

They also had another lady on board, Mary Reed, who was said to have dressed like a man in battle.

56:21

But many suspect that the crew would have been than aware that she was a female.

56:25

The rest of the time, it's kind of hard to hide in those close quarters situation.

56:29

I feel like operating around 17, 18 to 1720, Calico Jack

56:33

got his name from the colorful clothes that he wore, which I find kind of funny.

56:37

Old timey nicknames always cracked me up. Blackbeard He had a big Blackbeard Calico Jack.

56:42

He dressed like a colorful cat, and Jack was pretty clever.

56:45

Well, I'll give him that. Will probably totally didn't mean to do that.

56:49

I did not mean that. That's pretty funny. Anyway, he was clever.

56:53

There was an incident that I found where he was being pursued by a Spanish warship

56:57

and Jack was in a smaller sloop, was definitely outgunned, outmanned, outnumbered, but not out.

57:02

Plant Hamilton fans, you get it. Anyway, the larger ship was pressed further from the coast due to the low tide

57:08

and that they could not follow the ship in because, you know,

57:11

that's just how it worked. The big ship couldn't go was a you know, would get ran aground, stuck, whatever.

57:16

So they anchored out waited. But during the night, Jack

57:19

and his crew rode out on the smaller boats to capture an English sloop

57:23

that the Spanish had with them and overpowered the Spanish aboard.

57:26

And when the sun broke over the horizon, the Spanish warship began

57:29

its assault on an empty ship and Calico Jack sailed away with them.

57:33

Pretty clever, if you ask me. Column Jack Fox instead. You know I'm saying.

57:37

Anyway, after many misadventures, the governor of Woods Rogers declared war

57:41

on Jack and crew declaring them pirates.

57:44

And so hunters began to give chase. In 1720, after a quick battle on Halloween, Jack gave a quarter

57:50

pirate lingo for surrender and they were captured, tried, sentenced to hang.

57:55

And Bonnie and Mary Reed both claimed to be pregnant and thus were granted a stay of execution.

57:59

And Bonnie also allegedly chastised Jack's actions

58:02

during the battle, saying he gave up too quickly.

58:05

She said, quote, We had fought like a man.

58:07

You'd need not have been hanged like a dog, which is brutal but truthful,

58:11

you know? Come on, Jack, get just get your stuff together.

58:14

You the way Jack was hanged, Reed died in her cell, perhaps due to childbirth.

58:18

But maybe anything being is how people died from all the things back then.

58:22

But Bonnie vanished from the records.

58:25

There's no record of death release, Escape Aliens, Nothing.

58:29

She's got so interesting. We also had the likes of Black Sam Bellamy, who is said to have captured

58:35

some 50 ships and coins worth of upwards of $100 million in modern day money.

58:40

He was named black not because of cultural appropriation, as Deadpool might suggest, but simply

58:45

because his hair was long and black and he wore black stuff sometimes.

58:50

And instead of using wig, which was the fashion at the time,

58:53

he was like, Nah, I'm just going to have my regular glorious hair anyway.

58:58

Yeah, another nickname because of hair, which is, you know, hilarious.

59:01

Sam actually became very popular due to his more gentle approach.

59:04

It's pirating off and not using violence, if not necessary.

59:07

And also very generous. Another nickname given was Prince of Pirates,

59:11

as well as the Robin Hood of the Sea. First major score came in the taking of a slaving ship that had just completed

59:17

its sail full of new cargo and from said sail captain surrendered fairly quickly

59:21

and Jack took his new ship for his own, adding guns from his old ship,

59:25

as well as removing the captain's quarters, probably to decrease the weight and increase speed.

59:30

As a young pirate, only 28 at the time, his career was cut

59:33

short by a storm after a few more ships that he had taken.

59:38

The storm occurred in April of 1717.

59:41

He was never found, but the remnants of a ship were in 1982.

59:45

I don't think he was. I don't even know if they would have found him.

59:48

I don't think he would have been alive. I don't know. I mentioned him,

59:50

but the last major golden age pirate I wanted to talk about was Charles Vane.

59:54

The story is kind of interesting. He ended up being one of the leader lead Pirates of Nassau, the famous Pirate Port.

1:00:01

He's especially brutal, killing many and torturing others.

1:00:04

Vane was even one of the few who said no

1:00:06

to a royal pardon by King George, leading others to do the same thing.

1:00:10

He feigned interest after being captured and was released.

1:00:13

But a month later he was kind of back at it.

1:00:15

A few months after that, in July of 1718, Vane was blockaded in Nassau by Woods.

1:00:20

Rodgers then had a smaller ship retrofitted to be

1:00:23

turned into a fire ship, and this ship only caused damage to really one.

1:00:27

But the other ships kind of moved out of the way in evasive action

1:00:30

and thus a big hole was made so the ship could escape, working

1:00:35

at taking other ships in the Bahamas for the next few months,

1:00:37

even meeting up with his old friend Blackbeard. And potentially trying to get him back in the game.

1:00:41

One last straw man. We could do it before departing.

1:00:44

Once again, they tried to attack a vessel, but then found out that

1:00:48

it was a French royal Navy ship and he turned and ran turn tail.

1:00:52

He's out of here. And Calico Jack use this opportunity to instigate a mutiny.

1:00:57

And Vane was voted out and the people who voted for Vane

1:01:01

and Vane were given a different ship, which I guess is probably the nicest way

1:01:05

they could have gone. But I find it pretty ironic that Calico Jack instigated

1:01:09

a mutiny over cowardice given how his end came.

1:01:12

But, you know, just a little.

1:01:14

Just a little silly. After taking different ships for the next few months into 17, 19,

1:01:18

they was caught in a hurricane and stranded on an island, allegedly,

1:01:22

according to the book, A General History of Pirates by a supposed

1:01:25

captain, Charles Johnson, which is assumed to be a pseudonym,

1:01:29

then was spotted by turtle hunters who gave him some of their haul to survive on this island

1:01:33

before leaving because they were like, I don't know, this guy seems sketchy.

1:01:36

We'll just give them some turtle meat, I guess. And and then later an English vessel came up and this guy,

1:01:42

the captain of this ship, was a former pirate hunter who knew who Vane was.

1:01:47

He recognized and he said, All right, man, well, this is it.

1:01:50

I'll be back in a little bit. I'm going to go hit a port and I'm coming back.

1:01:53

You know, however long that takes, if you're here when I come back, I'm taken

1:01:57

yet. And so, you know, Vane was like, I got to get off this island, dude.

1:02:01

So another ship, he managed to flag another ship down,

1:02:05

and this ship actually took him. He gave them a fake name and joined the crew.

1:02:08

And, you know, having been a sailor, I'm sure it was easy for him to be like,

1:02:11

Yeah, I can do this grunt work if it means survival.

1:02:14

Well, by pure happenstance, that ship ended up crossing paths with the first English Navy ship.

1:02:19

That or the English ship with the pirate hunter on.

1:02:22

And the two captains were friends. And so they pulled alongside each other and like the crews kind of hung out

1:02:28

and the captain was like, Hey, come over to my ship.

1:02:30

The pirate owner said, All right, cool. Yeah, I'll come over for dinner. And so they had dinner.

1:02:35

And during that dinner he was leaving and he

1:02:38

he saw Charles Vane, like, swap on a deck or something in the back.

1:02:41

And he was like, Hey, man, I know that guy.

1:02:43

I know that dude. And I'm sure that one captain who picked him up was like, Oh, oh, that's Charles.

1:02:49

My bad. Yeah. Anyway, so he he got caught and he got cut through that

1:02:54

and he was brought to Jamaica and then hanged. And then you know, his corpse was displayed for all to see,

1:02:59

which is a pretty common thing to do at that time.

1:03:02

Various powers now focused heavily on pirates, and they began

1:03:05

to take major precautions, estimated at 3 to 5000 pirates at work

1:03:10

between 1708, 17, 17 and 1718.

1:03:13

But as the response changed and the punishments became more cruel towards pirates in their crews,

1:03:19

those numbers dropped to a reported less than 200 by 1726

1:03:23

increase in different navies and harsh tactics and the anti-piracy

1:03:27

certainly helped alongside the Piracy Act of 1717,

1:03:31

which enabled local governments to do a lot more in line with the Crown's view.

1:03:35

The last nail in the Golden Age coffin being the death of Black Bart Roberts, who

1:03:40

by the time of his death had taken 470 ships over the course of his adventures.

1:03:44

He didn't have them in a fleet he had just, you know, captured them

1:03:48

and took their money. He was killed when his ship was broadsided by cannon fire in 1722.

1:03:54

And many see this as the end as Rob Roberts was,

1:03:57

you know, one of the most successful pirates at the time.

1:04:00

A different pirates still operated Barbary pirates

1:04:03

still active on the north side of Africa with the 18th century

1:04:06

becoming more hostile between the colonists and the English.

1:04:09

The Declaration of Independence was signed. And then when war broke out, America lost

1:04:14

the support of the British Navy against these Barbary pirates.

1:04:17

But after gaining independence, America was recognized

1:04:21

by these pirates as an official like you're a your country now.

1:04:24

But they also extorted them for protection on the seas,

1:04:27

which is, you know, whatever. Eventually, the price grew too heavy and thus began a Barbary Wars

1:04:32

in which the U.S., Sweden and Sicily joined together to fight these pirates.

1:04:36

Now, the final blow came in the 1830s when French conquered Algeria and Asia.

1:04:41

The most fascinating story in piracy comes from 19th century.

1:04:45

A pirate named John Guy. His father and brother were both also pirates.

1:04:48

So as in his family, in his early or in his years, he would impress upon

1:04:55

like put a 15 year old pressed into service, basically kidnaping them.

1:05:00

But this kid would eventually be adopted by him a few years later.

1:05:03

And Zheng ended up going to a brothel.

1:05:07

And in this brothel he found a bride in the form of the Madame there.

1:05:11

And some speculate that she was pretty good at giving him some secrets from the men visiting the establishment.

1:05:17

All the same, you know, pillow talking, which was actually pretty common for

1:05:21

brothels at the time. A lot of a lot of secrets being spilled there.

1:05:24

Either way, they got married, she came in the fold, born

1:05:27

she Yang Little is known about her until the marriage, after which she is

1:05:31

known as Genghis Out or wife of Shanghai, which is interesting.

1:05:36

I get that she just changed her whole name.

1:05:39

That's. That's who you are. You are the wife, and that's it.

1:05:41

They were together and decided to adopt that younger sailor

1:05:44

that I mentioned before. But she would go on to marry that guy after Zheng his death, which is, you know,

1:05:49

this family tree is a mess. So before that, Shanghai and Shanghai South spent nearly six years together.

1:05:56

As as their fleets grew and their fortune grew, Zhang

1:06:01

was eventually lost at sea, either due to a storm

1:06:04

or an accident or murder.

1:06:07

Or was he pushed? We don't know either way. Zheng You saw become Zheng She, which is the widow of Zhang,

1:06:14

and before marrying that stepson Pal.

1:06:17

Now she's also been known as Ching. She just to make things more confusing or interesting, I don't know.

1:06:24

But that's what I'm going to use that name Ching Ching chief for from now on,

1:06:27

because she's no longer the widow of that guy or the wife of that guy.

1:06:31

So after this power grew even further and she had to act quick,

1:06:35

you know, to solidify the control over the inherited power that she possessed.

1:06:39

A year following her taking power, she made a name for herself

1:06:43

by taking out a ship or a fleet of 35 ships.

1:06:46

And soon after her stepson turned husband took out a fleet of his own,

1:06:49

allegedly splitting the Chinese fleet in half.

1:06:52

It's pretty aggressive. This this resulted in an increase activity of pirates further contributing

1:06:57

to the confederation, which was now under her leadership.

1:07:00

She quickly became a concern not only for the Qing dynasty,

1:07:03

but also for the Portuguese and English powers in the area.

1:07:06

English still kind of sore from their loss of the American colonies

1:07:10

during the Revolutionary War. We're reluctant to forfeit the lucrative opium

1:07:15

trade that they maintained in East Asia by 1809.

1:07:18

Both sides united with the Chinese in a joint effort to overcome this sizable pirate force.

1:07:23

Pirate fleet was believed to

1:07:26

be composed of around 400 ships and upwards of 40,000 pirates

1:07:29

on the lower end estimates and these pirates, you know, they would

1:07:33

evade blockades, you know, without losing ships and destroying others.

1:07:37

And a lot of different interesting situations.

1:07:40

These pirate junks vary in size and design, resembled the characters

1:07:44

and sloops used by the Atlantic Pirates at the same time or from years

1:07:48

a little bit prior. There's also some speculation is now there is some speculation

1:07:52

as to what inspired her eventual surrender. Like you had all this power. What's the deal?

1:07:56

But the most prominent theory being that with all the power that she had,

1:08:00

she was able to negotiate better, She had a better stance to go, okay,

1:08:04

listen, it's not looking great for you, so you better just give me what I want.

1:08:08

So in 1810, negotiations were started where in response to their surrender,

1:08:14

Bowe, her son slash husband guy, would receive an official title

1:08:18

and keep ships for his private fleet while they gave up a large portion of the

1:08:22

their bulk fleet, almost 20,000 men who would essentially be commissioned

1:08:26

in a service along with the 200 some ships that they surrendered.

1:08:30

She was able to retire and Bowe competed against some of the former coalition

1:08:34

and which defeated them and continued to improve his standing with the government.

1:08:38

He died in 1822 in battle and King She passed away

1:08:41

in 1844 at the age of 68, which is one of the oldest ages

1:08:46

of pirates, pirate captains that I've found.

1:08:48

Like, obviously, there's probably some other ones.

1:08:50

But it's pretty impressive. You know, one of the most powerful and influential pirates

1:08:54

who was able to take three powerful nations and basically

1:08:58

ban them to her will and negotiate full pardon and all these things.

1:09:02

And and it was a lady who was doing it, which stereotypically

1:09:05

you wouldn't think of. Right. Our story is massive and there's so much more.

1:09:08

So I would suggest look into it, you know, yourself, but choose

1:09:12

even the basis for one of the pirates in the Pirates of Caribbean movies,

1:09:15

which I think is cool that they included that.

1:09:18

Now, after this, there's some pirates in the Gulf,

1:09:20

but these were kind of quelled by British and American navies teaming up against them.

1:09:25

But 1870s piracy in Asia kind of died down drastically to the superpower

1:09:29

that had become England Navy and also America's Navy helping.

1:09:33

There are some cases of river privacy in the United States along the Mississippi and other locations.

1:09:37

There's a man named Dan Seavey, which perfect pirate name Seavey, anyway,

1:09:42

became a pirate on the Great Lakes, which is kind of hilarious.

1:09:44

Like, it's not where I would think it would happen, but it makes sense because they're big.

1:09:48

He moved to Wisconsin after joining the Navy at 13,

1:09:53

so he left home 13, joined the Navy, moved to Wisconsin, got married,

1:09:56

and then then went to the Klondike Gold Rush in 1898, Failed at that move back,

1:10:01

then moved to Michigan, got a ship, but he began to steal cargo

1:10:04

at night from other ships on on the Great Lakes.

1:10:08

He'd also sabotage different sea lights and then cause other ships to wreck

1:10:12

and then steal the cargo from that. Well, he had ended his life, had like, he was like 80

1:10:17

something when he ended up dying. And he was a marshal later in life, taking

1:10:21

chasing after poachers, which is kind of funny

1:10:23

because he was a poacher at one point himself.

1:10:25

I guess. Who better to hunt him than a former poacher?

1:10:28

You know, there's a there's big gap between then and more modern times.

1:10:32

Obviously, everybody's pretty familiar with the modern stories of piracy

1:10:35

off the coast of Somalia, Malacca and Asia.

1:10:38

Some estimates range up to $16 billion

1:10:42

loss per year to piracy, which is way more than I thought.

1:10:45

Honestly, I could put a number on it if I was going to guess, but

1:10:48

that is a lot. Whether they take a ship and ransom it or just take it, steal the cargo,

1:10:53

sell it on their own, who knows?

1:10:55

Then tactics often include force boarding, blockading, hostage taking,

1:10:59

hiding around the banks on the coast. The smaller boats approach often cargo ships with little defenses.

1:11:03

You know, if you seen Captain Phillips, you know, I'm talking about that movie

1:11:06

being based on the real life taking of the Maersk Alabama by Somali pirates.

1:11:11

One of Tom Hanks best movies, if you ask me.

1:11:14

And the ending sequence where the real life

1:11:17

Navy corpsman is taking him through intake and he's like a trauma patient

1:11:21

at this point that like always gets me, I'm like, okay, anyway,

1:11:25

other acts of piracy that can be thought to translate to

1:11:28

are things like hijacking an airplane, you know, more modern

1:11:31

take on piracy, which carries, you know, its own kind of thing.

1:11:34

But D.B. Cooper, air pirate did.

1:11:38

There's also a different kind of air piracy and World War one, which is kind of interesting.

1:11:42

This case involves Germans using a Zeppelin

1:11:45

to fly over a Norwegian ship and then propel

1:11:48

and take over the Norwegian ship, which is a wild story.

1:11:52

And I don't know how that hasn't been in a movie or a whole movie itself.

1:11:55

But anyway, that about wraps it up not quite to equal hands,

1:11:59

but I think if I left out parts the beginning of this one,

1:12:01

it would not have flowed as well as I would have liked.

1:12:04

Hopefully you all enjoyed it with that.

1:12:06

You know, let's discuss some interesting things we learned in the

1:12:10

this episode and then we'll get into the remedial remedial rant section.

1:12:14

A first thought is just how awful the conditions were compared to our lives.

1:12:17

Now, like in general, life is better, more comfortable.

1:12:20

But on a ship, especially, holy cow, cramped, stinky, bad food, sometimes months at sea.

1:12:25

Longest I was ever out at sea on deployment was like 40 days, I think, which is short of the 40 day mark.

1:12:30

That a 45 day mark for a beer day in the US Navy, which kind of sucked.

1:12:36

We missed it. The other part is that the stereotypical alcohol that they drank wasn't just for fun there.

1:12:41

I mentioned, you know, that the beer could give them nutrition, be

1:12:44

kept longer due to not being able to hold bad microorganisms.

1:12:48

Yeah. Need those times. You know what I'm saying?

1:12:50

Another thing I liked learning about was that the pirates really had a code

1:12:53

that they live by. I assume it emanates from a code of conduct

1:12:56

that other legitimate ship operations would have, and it was just a good way

1:13:00

to keep things organized and keep people accountable for their actions.

1:13:04

With that let's get into the remedial rant section.

1:13:11

The first and really, I guess kind of only thing I'm thinking about is a lot of romanticism

1:13:15

between pirates like in general and also the specific groups.

1:13:20

Like you've got a lot of romanticism and Golden Age Pirates is also Vikings.

1:13:23

So descriptions of both have been taken as sort of like Hobo Shi

1:13:28

type style with the dreadlocks and I paint, I'm sure with how

1:13:31

well mast fire crews were that there are some sort of diverse style going on.

1:13:36

But a large portion of these men were once

1:13:38

Royal Navy sailors and still had views of fashion at that time.

1:13:42

There are, of course, some who don't. And there's all those lifelong sailors who are very scrappy looking and often

1:13:48

tattoos indicating. So, you know, not every pirate looked like Jack Sparrow.

1:13:52

Not every pirate looked like George Washington.

1:13:54

But there's a lot of mixing going on Now.

1:13:56

As for the Vikings, well you're not one.

1:13:59

I'm sorry if you're listening to this, you're not a Viking.

1:14:01

You know, I'm sorry that they weren't really.

1:14:04

And like, if you think about it, they're just normal dudes.