Blackbeard was one of the most infamous pirates of all time. He lived toward the end of the Golden Age of Piracy, and became feared by many. Sailing merchants knew of his name and trembled at the thought of encountering the pirate captain.
Before Piracy
Edward Teach was presumably born in England in 1680. However, most of his early life is unknown. Some historians argue that he was born in Jamaica, which was a British colony at the time.
Either way, Teach was British and had joined the Royal Navy around 1706. He most likely served as a privateer, which may have given him a taste of the pirate life.
Teach is believed to have fought in Queen Anne’s War, which lasted from 1702 to 1713. The war was primarily fought in North America, and Teach likely made his way to sail the Caribbean Sea.
A New Life
In 1716, Teach decided to give up the Royal Navy life and switched to piracy. He joined the pirate crew of Captain Benjamin Hornigold, and together they sailed the seas, robbing merchant ships and ports.
Captain Hornigold retired from piracy just a year after Teach had joined up. Left without a leader, Teach became the new pirate captain and took charge of the crew.
Not long after this, Teach and his new crew famously stole French merchant vessel La Concorde. Teach immediately renamed it to Queen Anne’s Revenge (possibly from the war he once fought in) and equipped it with forty cannons and a crew of over three hundred men.
It was around this time that Edward Teach began to go by his new name: Blackbeard.
Life of a Pirate
Blackbeard was the real-life pirate of the Caribbean, as he sailed Caribbean and Atlantic waters, robbing vulnerable ships and ports.
Though he was feared, Blackbeard rarely killed any of his victims. Instead, the pirate captain decided to scare people into handing over their valuables. He was said to occasionally light the ends of his beard on fire, as to appear more intimidating.
This allowed Blackbeard to gain a notorious reputation, especially throughout the North American colonies. He also committed notable acts of crime, such as once blockading an entire port.
Attracting Attention
After about a year of enjoying the pirate captain’s life, Teach began to attract the attention of the British in North America, as they largely fell victim to the pirate’s raids. Specifically, Virginia Governor Alexander Spotswood had enough of Blackbeard’s attacks throughout his colony, and funded an operation to capture the pirate captain and his crew.
Spotswood gave an incentive to the Royal Navy to find and arrest Edward Teach, offering a valuable reward for the capture. At the time, Blackbeard and his crew had been hiding out in the North Carolina colony.
Ambushed
The same Royal Navy that Edward Teach had once served had now been hunting him down. Lieutenant Robert Maynard of HMS Pearl eventually found Blackbeard and his crew at Ocracoke Island in November 1718.
Blackbeard was caught by complete surprise when Maynard’s men rushed in to ambush the crew. As the British opened fire, much of the pirate crew dropped dead within minutes.
Teach was outnumbered. Despite this, he attempted to hold his ground for as long as possible.
The Final Duel
Lieutenant Maynard fought his way to Blackbeard during the heat of battle. Realizing his enemy, the pirate captain turned and opened fire with his flintlock pistol, missing. Maynard returned fire with his pistol, though he also missed. All that was left was for the pair to draw their cutlasses and engage in a final duel.
Cutlasses clashed as the two men attempted to kill one another. As Blackbeard moved to deliver a strike to Maynard, a slash to the neck stopped the pirate in his tracks. One of Maynard’s men had come up from behind and got the best of the pirate, who was now surrounded. Bloody, tired, and beaten, Blackbeard kept up the fight for as long as he could. The smoke cleared when Maynard’s men had dealt the finishing strikes.
It is said that Blackbeard was shot at least five times and stabbed at least twenty times before dying. Maynard then stood up, victorious, towering over his fallen enemy. The Lieutenant cut off Blackbeard’s head, as to return it to Governor Spotswood as proof of the pirate captain’s defeat.
Maynard collected his reward, and Blackbeard’s reign of terror was brought to an end.
Conclusion
Though his pirate life was short (only about two years), Blackbeard managed to build a reputation in that time as one of the most feared pirate captains in history. He even found his way into pop culture centuries later. The film series “Pirates of the Caribbean” was largely inspired by real-life pirates such as Blackbeard.
