“Great Pirate Roberts”, or Bartholomew Roberts as his friends knew him, was a pirate of the 18th century.

Trawling up and down the coasts of North and South America, he built such a reputation for himself that guard ships in the West indies would sail away as soon as they spotted him rather than risk a confrontation.

Bartholomew Roberts was known to be tall, dark and handsome and he had a penchant for the outrageous - he could usually be found wearing a rich crimson waistcoat along with a hat with a red feather in it. He also wore a heavy gold chain from which hung a large diamond cross. most strikingly, perhaps, he wore a silk sling over his shoulder from which he hung two pairs of pistols.

Roberts employed variable tactics to his advantage, ranging from the bold to the clever or even to the downright unusual. On one occassion he sailed straight into the harbour of Trepassey in Newfoundland with his men playing trumpets and drums. He also boldly flew his black colours whilst on approach. In response, the twenty-two ships anchored there promptly fled!

The black flag that Bartholomew flew was quite unique - it depicted him standing on two human skulls, one initialled A.S.H. and the other A.M.H, This stood for ‘A Barbadian’s Head’ and ‘A Marinician’s Head’ and reflected upon the hatred that Roberts had for these two sets of people. Also on his flag, he was depicted with a dagger in one hand and a flaming sword in the other.

Robert’s pirate days came to an end off the coast of Africa when he perished in a sea conflict.

(1 votes, average: 1 out of 5)

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Samuel Bellamy was believed to have been an English sailor who travelled to the New World to seek his fortune.

After arriving there he somehow secured some financial backing from a wealthy merchant in order to persue sunken Spanish treasure to the south. This expedition, however, proved to be totally fruitless.

Returning penniless, Bellamy married for a short time before leaving his wife and children in order to set sail once again in order to try and find his fortune.

Bellamy fell in with Benjamin Hornigold, a well known pirate who had enough honour to treat his prisoners well and refrain from attacking English shipping. After a short while Harigold was deposed and Bellamy was voted into the position of captain.

He took the crew to the West Indies where he had great success as a pirate. Like Hornigold, Bellamy looked after his prisoners but also knew how to take care of his men too.

In April 1717 Bellamy’s fleet became engulfed in an intense storm during which his flagship, the Whydah, capsized and was destroyed. Only two men survived the incident, one of which went into obscurity, the other, Thomas Davis, would go on to tell the story until it entered folklore.

(1 votes, average: 1 out of 5)

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Baron Maurice de Bentowski, also known as the Count Maurycy Beniowski, was a native of Poland, born into nobility. At the time of his birth Poland was occupied, in part, by Russia. Beniowski became involved in the struggle to rid his country of these Russians and during this time he was taken captive.

Sent to the mines in Serbia, he somehow managed to escape and then went on to establish a stronghold in what is now known as Madagascar.

Beniowski appears here as a pirate because it was well known that he would attack any and all shipping around his base if Madagascar, the land over which he had by then pronounced himself king of.

Considering himself head of a nation state, Beniowski answered to no-one and obeyed no flag but his own. Though his legacy in Madagascar was not that strong, Maurycy Beniowski was well remembered in the region with a nearby island naming themselves Mauritius in his honour.

(3 votes, average: 3.67 out of 5)

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‘Calico’ Jack Rackham is probably more famous than he should be, due to his association with the female pirates, Anne Bonny and Mary Reed.

Jack Rackham was a fairly insignificant pirate who attacked shipping around the coastal regions of the Caribbean. He was caught in May of 1719 but somehow managed to gain a pardon. Taking some time off from piracy, he met Anne Bonny and Mary Reed.

Jack took the two women on as crew members and, having not learned from his close encounter with the gallows, began terrorising the Caribbean. After just a year his ship was attacked by a British captain. jack and his men were either drunk or scared and were easily captured.

All were taken to Port Royal were they were put on trial. With the exception of Anne Bonny who was pardoned and Mary Reed who died in jail, all were hanged.

Whilst not a proveable fact, Rackham is said to have been the original adopter of the ‘Jolly Roger’, or skull and crossbones, as his flag, designed to incite fear in the ships he attacked.

(1 votes, average: 4 out of 5)

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Captain William Kidd has gone down in history as one of the most famous pirates of all time, a fact he totally denied right up until his execution.

Born in Greenock in 1645, he would go on to become a successful merchant and privateer, but was he a pirate? By today’s standards, his trial was anything but fair and vital evidence most definitely went astray.

Based in New York, Kidd had a small fleet of trading vessels by 1680. Beginning as a merchant he went on to become a privateer, hunting the French whilst protecting the local trade routes.

In 1691 his efforts were recognised by New York city and in 1695 he arrived in London where he was charged with hunting down pirates in the Indian Ocean.

On the 27th February 1696 he departed Deptford with a commission from William III, on his new ship, the Adventure Galley, which was a modified galley with 34 guns.

In 1697 he arrived at Madagascar. Instead of eradicating piracy he seems to have embraced it at this point, taking a liking to the easy spoils.

He would often fly the French flag to trick merchants of that land into coming near his vessel before launching an attack on them. Over the next year or two Kidd continued to plague French shipping, capturing the Quedah Merchant complete with it’s cargo of silks, sugar, muslin and opium.

Shortly afterwards Kidd decided to return to the West Indies, Upon his arrival he was shocked to discover that he had been declared a pirate.

After burning the Quedah Merchant, Kidd took a small boat to Boston in order to meet with the British Governor. He intended to convince him of his innocence where piracy was concerned. The meeting did not go to plan and Kidd found himself on his way back to London to stand trial.

Along with nine of his crew, Kidd stood trial at the Old Bailey on March 8th and 9th 1701. The nine crew members were found guilty of piracy and were sentenced to death. Kidd was additionally charged with murdering a crew member, William Moore, whom he had bludgeoned to death. William Kidd was also sentenced to death by hanging.

Posthumous research into the case shows that there were many grey areas and vital pieces of evidence were left out, unavailable or maybe just plain hidden from the trial judge.

Eight of the nine crewmen were reprieved but Kidd and Darby Mullins were executed on May 18th 1701. They were taken to Execution Dock in Wapping, a common spot for hanging pirates at the time. During the hanging, Kidd’s rope broke and he had to be strung up again - a difficult task since he was paraletic drunk at the time.

After his death, Kidd’s body was chained up at Tillbury Point for two years.

At the time of Kidd’s arrest it was widely believed that he had acquired around £30000 worth of jewels and other treasure. An official account of the items located on his ship places their value at around £6500.

This huge discrepancy (around £8m in today’s money) has led to many stories of buried treasure and hidden coves, caves and islands. Is Captain William Kidd’s fortune still out there, waiting to be found?

(1 votes, average: 5 out of 5)

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Welcome to tinattitude, the site that will look at the lives and deaths of the famous pirates throughout history.

Romanticised by films, especially the recent Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy, pirates are often idealised as loveable rogues who are brash, witty and brave.

However, we will look at just what lengths they would go to to acquire a bit of tin - most pirates were murderers, rapists and other low lifes.