History
The 300-ton vessel, originally named Concord, was a frigate built in England in 1710. She was captured by the French one year later. The ship was modified to hold more cargo, including slaves, and renamed La Concorde de Nantes. Sailing as a slave ship, she was captured by the pirate Captain Benjamin Hornigold on November 28, 1717, near the island of Martinique. Hornigold turned her over to one of his men —Edward Teach, later known as Blackbeard—and made him her captain. Teach's first mate, Christopher Blackwood (known as Blackbeard's Claw), was feared as a ferocious fighter and led many of Blackbeard's boarding parties.
Blackbeard made La Concorde into his flagship, adding cannons and renaming her Queen Anne's Revenge. The name may come from the War of the Spanish Succession, known in the Americas as Queen Anne's War, in which Blackbeard had served in the Royal Navy, or possibly from sympathy for Queen Anne, the last Stuart monarch. Blackbeard sailed this ship from the west coast of Africa to the Caribbean, attacking British, Dutch and Portuguese merchant ships along the way.
Shortly after blockading Charleston harbor in May 1718, and refusing to accept the Governor's offer of a pardon, Blackbeard ran Queen Anne's Revenge aground while entering Beaufort Inlet. He disbanded his flotilla and escaped by transferring supplies onto a smaller ship, the Adventure. He stranded several crew members on a small island nearby, where they were later rescued by Captain Stede Bonnet. Some suggest Blackbeard deliberately grounded the ship as an excuse to disperse the crew. Shortly afterward, Blackbeard did surrender and accepted a royal pardon for himself and his remaining crewmen from Governor Charles Eden at Bath, North Carolina. However, he eventually returned to piracy and was killed in combat.
Read more about this topic: Queen Anne's Revenge
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“We have need of history in its entirety, not to fall back into it, but to see if we can escape from it.”
—José Ortega Y Gasset (1883–1955)
“It is the true office of history to represent the events themselves, together with the counsels, and to leave the observations and conclusions thereupon to the liberty and faculty of every man’s judgement.”
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626)
“Jesus Christ belonged to the true race of the prophets. He saw with an open eye the mystery of the soul. Drawn by its severe harmony, ravished with its beauty, he lived in it, and had his being there. Alone in all history he estimated the greatness of man.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)