Blackbeard, the Pirate Vs the Outer Banks Boy from Nowhere

© 2012 Capt. Gardner Martin Kelley. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 1/25/2012

ISBN: 978-1-4685-0036-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4685-0035-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4685-0034-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011960209

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Contents

Preface

Synopsis

List of Chapters

Cast of Characters

Chapter 1

Blackbeard

Chapter 2

The Boy Washed Ashore at the Outer Banks

Chapter 3

The Sound

Chapter 4

The Indians Visit

Chapter 5

The Fall Storm

Chapter 6

Noah and the sheep

Chapter 7

The Winter Passes

Chapter 8

A New Shelter

Chapter 9

Time Passes & The Sea Chest

Chapter 10

The Poop Deck

Chapter 11

Winter Again

Chapter 12

Spring in the Air

Chapter 13

A Girl for His Lifetime

Chapter 14

Heaven; Thy Name is Heather

Chapter 15

Peace with the Indians

Chapter 16

Tootsie Bird and Topknot

Chapter 17

One More for our Side

Epilogue

About the Author

Preface

The people of the lost colony were left at Roanoke Island in 1587 and were not known to be missing until 1590.

The first permanent English colony in America was Jamestown that started in 1607 when three ships landed on the James River in Virginia.

The Pilgrim settlement at Plymouth in Massachusetts that began in 1620 was the first English permanent settlement in America that never abandoned its colony. That makes it the first successful permanent English colony, known as Jamestown, Virginia.

Blackbeard’s real name was Edward Teach known as the meanest pirate of them all. Blackbeard and his crew of pirates attacked a lot of ships and stole everything they could from the crews and passengers from 1715 through 1718. They attacked the ships when the pirate’s ship was hard to see, like in the fog or in early mornings.

Blackbeard as a young man had sailed on a British privateer. Queen Anne of Britain allowed Teach’s privateer to attack ships during the war and to keep and sell the stolen goods he took from the ships.

The pirates would raise the flag of the county that the cargo ship was from; to let them think the pirates were friendly. When the pirate ship was close to the cargo ship, the pirates would be ready to raise Blackbeard’s flag only at the last minute.

Crews and passengers would sometimes give up without fighting the minute they saw the pirate’s flag. If the ship and crew did not give up after they saw the pirate flag, the pirates would move in for the kill and the treasure. They would shoot the sailor at the ship’s wheel first. Once the pirates had the ship with no control man, and the boat was helpless the pirates would throw grappling hooks on to the ship. The pirates would pull the ship close and using rope that they hung in the rigging the pirates would swing aboard. The pirates would ransack the cabins looking for treasures like coins, gold and jewelry.

Blackbeard was captain of his own ship now, one that he had stolen! It was the LA CONCORDE; the ship was a built in England in 1710. She was captured by the French and modified to hold more cargo, which was including room for slaves.

The French ship was attacked by Blackbeard and his crew. With the French ship missing around sixteen men that died and another thirty or so was seriously ill from disease. The French ship and small crew was no match to the pirates. After Blackbeard’s crew fired two cannons at the French ship, the French Captain gave up the ship to Blackbeard.

Blackbeard took the LA CONCORDE to an island to search the ship for treasures. The pirates searched the officers and crew and took all their jewelry and seized the gold they had on board. Blackbeard and his crew decided to steal the LA CONCORDE to keep it for their own.

Blackbeard renamed the sailing ship the QUEEN ANNE’S REVENGE. Blackbeard made his new ship the way he wanted by adding cannons to his ship and he had his crew reinforce the ship’s sides to hold up better when they were fired on. His ship would hold around two hundred and fifty pirates and it moved pretty well threw the water.

Now that he was calling himself Blackbeard, he braided his beard and tied black ribbons in it. He would put burning rope under his hat to smoke and make him look ferocious and mean.

Merchant ships carrier cargo such as grain and barrels of rum. They also carried supplies of tools and ammunition. The pirates enjoyed taken over ships to find what they can. Sometimes the pirates stole the ship and other times they burnt the ship to cover up the evidence. Blackbeard did not put up with back talk, once a passenger told Blackbeard that he could not have his diamond ring, so Blackbeard took the passengers hand and sliced off his finger to get the ring.

Blackbeard went to Charleston, South Carolina and took hostage a large cargo ship. The prisoners were kept in the dark hold of the ship. Blackbeard was going to kill them all if the people in Charleston did not come up with the ransom he wanted, which was a wooden chest full of medicine. The time for the delivery of ransom passed on by. The hostages were in trouble as the pirates prepared the passengers for their deaths.

With only a few minutes left, the town’s people came up with the ransom Blackbeard had asked for, but before releasing the hostages, the pirates stole all their clothing, jewelry and anything else they had.

While Blackbeard was sailing northward toward Ocracoke inlet, he marooned about 30 men (for not being loyal pirates) on a small island about two miles from Cape Lookout Lighthouse on the southeastern tip of the Outer Banks.

Cape Lookout Lighthouse on the Southern Outer Banks of North Carolina. Photo Credit by Big Jim Kelley

The pirates were ruff on the QUEEN ANNE’S REVENGE and it was in bad shape. Coming along with two sloops now in his fleet the pirates ran the QUEEN ANNE’S REVENGE aground on a sand bar and put a big hole in the weakened hull. The pirates were off Beaufort Inlet when Blackbeard’s first pirate ship sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

Governor Eden gave Blackbeard the right to seek a commission as a privateer and he was given official title to his remaining sloop, which he renamed the ADENTURE.

Ocracoke Inlet was Blackbeard’s number one anchorage. It was a good location from which to view the ships traveling around the coast line of the Outer Banks. Ships were coming from the north to bring supplies and lumber to the southern states. When the ships came around Cape Hatteras Lighthouse which is not very far from Ocracoke Inlet, Blackbeard and crew would be ready to attack.

Blackbeard prayed easily on ships traveling the coast. The town’s people put up with him because they liked to buy the stolen products, such as cloth, food and sugar, sometimes they could even buy the barrels of rum, if the pirates had not drink it all.

Blackbeard in 1718 returned from sea to his anchorage off Ocracoke Island. He planned a wild pirate party with music, dancing and a lot of drinking. Other pirates sailed in for the party knowing that Blackbeard would put on a good throw down.

The word of the pirate’s party was sent to Alexander Spotswood, Governor of Virginia. He made his mind up that it was time to stop Blackbeard and show the other pirates that robbing and stealing was against the law. He spent the next several days planning on how to stop or kill Blackbeard.

The governor sent two sailing sloops ran by Lieutenant Robert Maynard of the Royal Navy to search for Blackbeard as he hoped to catch him in the inlet of Ocracoke, North Carolina.

The pirates saw two ships sailing in, when they noticed the navy flags and sails. The two sloops had to wait until the tide came in so they could get over the shoals to get in the inlet. Blackbeard and his pirates knew they were in trouble because they had no way out the inlet to escape. Only the sandbars lay between the pirates and the navy.

Soon the tide would rise and the sloops would glide over the sandbars. While Maynard’s men prepared for the fighting, laughter and howling from the pirates echoed on the water. Blackbeard did not worried about the battle, but the crew was. They soaked blankets in water in case their ship caught on fire.

Morning came as the tide was high enough for the sloops to enter the inlet. Blackbeard waited at his ship’s wheel. When Maynard’s ships started to get close to the pirates, Blackbeard told his crew to prepare to sail. He was steering the ship into the beach! Right before the beach, Blackbeard steered the ADVENTURE through a small channel between the beach and a sandbar. The navy ships chasing the pirates ran right into the sandbar.

The pirates