Bartholomew Roberts

Compare and contrast the careers of the pirate captains in the first phase of piracy with that of Bartholomew Roberts. What similarities can we detect? Differences? Why did the careers of the early pirates differ so much from that of Roberts?

It is said that Bartholomew Roberts didn’t even want to be a pirate. Bartholomew was stationed onboard a slave ship named the Princessen when it was captured by pirates. This pirate ship was captained by Howell Davis, who was a Welshman. Roberts, also being Welsh, was forced to join the pirates even though he didn’t want to. While being onboard the pirate ship, he quickly gained the respect of the crew. After Howell Davis was killed, the crew elected Roberts to be the captain. He embraced the role,

He was successful in part because he was very smart, and he thought big, usually commanding a fleet of anywhere from two to four pirate ships which could surround and catch victims. Defoe tells us of many ships that were captured by Roberts throughout the Atlantic. Bartholomew Roberts differed from most pirates as he covered a wide surface area instead of being restricted to one geographic location which resulted in him being able to capture more ships than any other pirate. Most pirates only stuck with regions of water that they were familiar with, such as the Caribbean. Roberts sailed all throughout the Atlantic from Newfoundland, to South America, to the Caribbean and to the west coast of Africa. Black Bart was also very cunning, in Brazil he managed to sneak up on a fleet of ships and capture one without anyone noticing. Defoe says “they found this ship exceeding rich, being loaden chiefly with sugar, skins, and tobacco, and in gold 90,000 moidores.” The jewelry held on board also included a cross with diamonds that was designed for the King of Portugal. This made Roberts a good leader and someone that his men looked up to. Being a leader also meant he had to

But when we take into account the historical reality of pirates’ ships, we can see that this is not really the case. There were ships that were used to transport slaves from Africa. These ships would be captured by pirates and the crew would either be set free, forced into piracy, or killed. Either way I believe that African Americans were considered equal on pirate ships. Pennell says “concepts such as nationality, race, ethnicity, and creed were not as static, immutable, and/or insurmountable in the early modern period as they would become later. On the eighteenth-century maritime frontier, merit at least occasionally became a more important marker.” Race at the time wasn’t an issue. Pennell continues and says “Blacks are accordingly found as leaders of predominantly white crews.” African Americans were able to carry firearms and were frequently active combatants. In this respect, piracy was ahead of the times as far as tolerance. As long as a person was able-bodied and could perform the grueling tasks required by the seafaring life, the color of their skin was not an