When Benerson Little — former Navy SEAL, fencer, and pirate historian — gives a book a high recommendation, I pay heed. Thus, I will be ordering up Angus Konstam’s forthcoming release through Osprey:
This new account explores the most notorious pirates in history and how their rise and fall can be traced back to a single pirate haven, Nassau.
Angus Konstam, one of the world’s leading pirate experts, has brought his 30 years of research to create the definitive book on the Golden Age of Piracy. Many of the privateers the British had used to prey on French and Spanish shipping during the War of the Spanish Succession turned to piracy. The pirates took over Nassau on the Bahamian island of New Providence and turned it into their own pirate haven, where shady merchants were happy to buy their plunder. It became the hub of a pirate network that included some of the most notorious pirates in history: Blackbeard, ‘Calico Jack’ Rackam, Charles Vane and Bartholomew Roberts.
The growth of piracy led to a major surge in attacks in the Caribbean and along North America’s Atlantic seaboard. With the fragile maritime economy of the Americas threatened with collapse, major ports were threatened and trade brought to a standstill, the British government finally declared war on the pirates. The Pirate Menace draws on extensive research, as well as a wide range of first-hand accounts, to produce a new history of the heyday of historical piracy.
It’ll probably go into the old sea chest for another time; I’ve got a lot of other reading to do. But have it I must. I read Konstam’s worthy biography of Blackbeard, which is really more of a “life and times” history since little is known for sure about the life of Edward Teach (Thatch) — including his true name and origins. Anyway, Konstam is quite good, and as you are all aware, I do love Pirate Deadwood (aka Nassau) and the maritime frontier.
Consider pairing reading this with bingeing Black Sails on Netflix. And do not anger Charles Vane.
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The Man Who Got Away With It rated another new biography:
Henry Avery of Devon pillaged a fortune from a Mughal ship off the coast of India and then vanished into thin air—and into legend. More ballads, plays, biographies and books were written about Avery’s adventures than any other pirate. His contemporaries crowned him “the pirate king” for pulling off the richest heist in pirate history and escaping with his head intact (unlike Blackbeard and his infamous Flying Gang). Avery was now the most wanted criminal on earth. To the authorities, Avery was the enemy of all mankind. To the people he was a hero. Rumors swirled about his disappearance. The only certainty is that Henry Avery became a ghost.
What happened to the notorious Avery has been pirate history’s most baffling cold case for centuries. Now, in a remote archive, a coded letter written by “Avery the Pirate” himself, years after he disappeared, reveals a stunning truth. He was a pirate that came in from the cold . . .
In The Pirate King, Sean Kingsley and Rex Cowan brilliantly tie Avery to the shadowy lives of two other icons of the early 18th century, including Daniel Defoe, the world-famous novelist and—as few people know—a deep-cover spy with more than a hundred pseudonyms, and Archbishop Thomas Tenison, a Protestant with a hatred of Catholic France.
Sean Kingsley and Rex Cowan’s The Pirate King brilliantly reveals the untold epic story of Henry Avery in all it’s colorful glory—his exploits, his survival, his secret double life, and how he inspired the golden age of piracy.
I’ll be interested to see if this volume has a different take or new information that Stephen Johnson didn’t cover in his excellent book on Avery, Enemy of All Mankind, which came out just four years ago. I’ll be plunderin’ the library, fer this one, so I will. Then we’ll decide if she’s seaworthy…
Matthew says
I’ll definitely have to read The Pirate King since I read Enemy of All Mankind. Avery was definitely a fascinating figure, whatever else he might be.