Could anyone be captain?

[RoyalJames]

As most crews elected their captains, I came to wonder if there is any example of a captain not being an educated naval officer. Could perhaps a strong leader among the crew master the role, even if he had no nautical knowledge?

[William Brand]

There are examples of Captains not being 'navigators' or of high position aboard ship ascending to the place of Captain, but with no nautical knowledge at all? That, I don't know.

[Fox]

I recently did an analysis of the career paths of 82 pirate captains active between 1690 and 1726. Of those 82:

38 had been officers in legitimate service (mostly merchant, some privateer) immediately before becoming pirate captains; 8 had been 'officers' on a pirate ship; 5 had been petty officers in legitimate service; 2 had been pirate petty officers; 29 unknown.

19 had captaincy conferred on them by their crew (including by popular election; 6 had captaincy awarded to them by a more senior pirate officer, such as the 'commodore' of a pirate squadron; 18 progressed to command by dint of being the senior available officer at the time, without any evidence of popular election; 21 retained command that they had previously held, such as when a privateer captain led his company into piracy; 18 unknown.

8 were killed in action; 27 were captured by the authorities; 19 retired; 6 were deposed by popular vote; 4 were deposed by violence; 7 died a natural death while still captain; 11 unknown.

FWIW, the captains were: George Cusack, Nicholas Clough, Joseph Bannister, Henry Every, Thomas Wake, Richard Want, Joseph Farrell, William Maze, Thomas Tew, Robert Culliford, Richard Shivers, William Kidd, John Halsey, Richard Glover, Jacob Mason, George/Josiah Raynor, Edward Coats, Captain Bobbington, John Hore, John Kelley, George Booth, John Bowen, Thomas Howard, Nathaniel North, Thomas White, Thomas Mostyn, Joseph Bradish, Captain Burk, John Quelch, Thomas Pound, Thomas Shafto, James Allison, Blackbeard, Charles Vane, John Rackham, Walter Kennedy, Howell Davis, Bartholomew Roberts, Thomas Anstis, John Fenn, Stede Bonnet, Henry Jennings, Leigh Ashworth, Francis Fernandez, Captain Leslie, Thomas Nichols, Porter, James Fife, Benjamin Hornigold, Samuel Bellamy, Paul Williams, Thomas Cocklyn, William Moody, Edward England, John Taylor, Jasper Seagar, Robert Sample, Captain Lane, Edmund Condent, James Skyrm, John Phillips, John Cockram, John Martel, Captain (not Walter) Kennedy, Ignatius Pell , Richard Worley, Burgess, John Augur, George Lowther, Ned Low, Charles Harris, Shipton, Frank Spriggs, Phillip Lyne, Joseph Cooper, William Fly, John Gow , Philip Roche , John Evans, Edward Williams, John Vidal, and Alexander Wyat.

[Mission]

19 of 82 captains retired. That is not what I would have guessed.

[William Brand]

Just because...the most common first names among the 82 (if listed). John comes in first at 15, followed by Thomas at 10 and Edward, George, Joseph, Richard and William tying for Third.

Alexander Wyat

Bartholomew Roberts

Benjamin Hornigold

Charles Vane
Charles Harris

Edmund Condent

Edward Coats
Edward England
Edward Williams
Edward Teach

Francis Fernandez

Frank Spriggs

George Cusack
George Booth
George/Josiah Raynor
George Lowther

Henry Every
Henry Jennings

Howell Davis

Ignatius Pell

Jacob Mason

James Skyrm
James Allison
James Fife

Jasper Seagar

John Halsey
John Hore
John Kelley
John Bowen
John Quelch
John Phillips
John Cockram
John Martel
John Vidal
John Augur
John Gow
John Evans
John Fenn
John Taylor
John Rackham

Joseph Bannister
Joseph Farrell
Joseph Bradish
Joseph Cooper

Leigh Ashworth

Nathaniel North

Ned Low

Nicholas Clough

Paul Williams

Phillip Lyne
Philip Roche

Richard Want
Richard Glover
Richard Shivers
Richard Worley

Robert Culliford
Robert Sample

Samuel Bellamy

Stede Bonnet

Thomas Wake
Thomas Tew
Thomas Howard
Thomas White
Thomas Mostyn
Thomas Pound
Thomas Shafto
Thomas Nichols
Thomas Anstis
Thomas Cocklyn

Walter Kennedy

William Kidd
William Maze
William Moody
William Fly

[RoyalJames]

Thank you Foxe!

These are very interesting figures. I think this shows that pirate captains most probably had some nautical education. Is there any on-line register of graduated officers from that time?

[Fox]

Not as far as I know, and if there was it would be unlikely to be complete because there were different ways of becoming an officer. There is a Navy Records Society volume listing all commissioned officers in the Royal Navy within certain dates, which covers the GAoP, but it's only captains and lieutenants. Merchant officer tended to go through apprenticeships, either with one of the big companies like the East India Company, or with an individual officer, so the records of merchant officers have long since been scattered to the winds.

[Silver]

in the mid 1800"s england started keeping track of it marniers in case of war. many marnier signed on under the name john smith. 19 pirates retired, "retired pirate" i like the sound of that.

[RoyalJames]

Snelgrave writes:

”This proclamation I had on board, with a declaration of war against Spain. The quarter-master finding them amongst my papers, and not being able to read, he brought them to me..”

I am a little surprised to find a quarter-master not being able to read. I thought the quarter-master would be the one keeping records of the goods onboard, etc. This person is not named, but I believe he belonged to Cocklyn’s crew.

In accordance to the originally question, this person would probably not be able to navigate a ship, and thus not a candidate for captain. At least in this crew the list of possible candidates must have been quite thin, which would somewhat question the “democratic elections” of captains.

It would be interesting to hear any thoughts about this!

[Fox]

An illiterate quarter-master is slightly surprising, for the reasons you give, but the role of QM varied from company to company so it may be that in Cocklyn's company somebody else kept the accounts.

And although a captain who was unable to navigate would be of limited effectiveness it was not necessarily an essential requirement, as long as one of the other officer could. Most pirate ships were run along rather military lines, and the role of captain was usually more of a military appointment among pirates. Many pirate companies are known to have also appointed sailing masters who were predominantly responsible for the navigation. After the surgeon, the master was probably the person most likely to have been forced, which may suggest a lower-than-average number of navigators on board the typical pirate ship.

[Brit.Privateer]

That counting of common first names in a previous post reminds me, John being the most common first name is a pattern not unique to pirates - it was the most prevalent of sailors too in this period. This is just off the top of my head right now, but I remember when working on the 1691 English sailor's register that had some 5,000 sailors on it, the numbers came out almost exactly to 1 out of every 5 sailors had the first name John. With that many with the same name - I'm wondering if it's an anomaly, something cultural, something in the way surveying was done (I suspect John might have been a common name filler for unknown first names and/or the go to name for people who couldn't exactly remember the first name of someone), or something I haven't taken into account yet.

[Coastie04]

Could John have also just been a slang name for any British sailor, in the same way that Joe was synonymous with U.S. soldier, Tommy was a British soldier, and Fritz or Jerry were German soldiers? I seem to remember (a long time ago, so this is very rusty trivia) that John was used to describe American sailors and Jack or Jack Tar was used for limejuicers. Of course, I believe that this was closer to the packet days of the mid 1800's-1900's. I wouldn't be too surprised, either, if John was taken on as a name when going to sea or turning to piracy, if it were a common one, much like 'John Doe' in order to maintain some anonymity in the event of trying to evade authorities. Of course, this is mostly just speculation on my part.

[RoyalJames]

Thanks, that gives me a better understanding of the roles on the ships!

Regarding the “Johns”, I recently noticed that there was another John Taylor around West Africa in the 1720’s. At the “tryal of pirates” in Cabo Corso 1722 a John Taylor is present as a witness, who I doubt is the pirate captain with the same name.

[Coastie04]

I had another revelation about the frequency of 'John' on these muster roles. 1 in 5 does is a rather high proportion, but maybe not quite so high as it might seem. I was once serving on a CG cutter with a compliment of about 50. We had 4 Michaels (or some derivation) and one Michelle. That's a 1 in 10 ratio (if you count Michelle), and considering 25-35% of the crew was female and we had more than just English descendants on board, I wouldn't be too surprised at that 1 in 5 ratio. If it was the most common name overall, then it makes sense that the commonality transferred over to sailors as well. I'm not too well versed in names of that era, but I would assume (dangerous, I know) that they probably had a bit smaller pool of names, probably largely biblical-based ones, and thus a higher ratio of the most common name is not out of the question.

[sea haugh]

An assumption ; perhaps not illiterate , rather unable to read a different language?

[Fox]

I haven't counted them all, but I'm not surprised by the number of Johns in this list or the Seamen's Registry - in general there were a lot of Johns around, it was a very common name.

[Cod Rotten Bandlesworth]

Is there a list somewhere of every captain during 1690-1730??

[William Brand]

There are lists, some more comprehensive than others.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pirates

[Fox]

That counting of common first names in a previous post reminds me, John being the most common first name is a pattern not unique to pirates - it was the most prevalent of sailors too in this period. This is just off the top of my head right now, but I remember when working on the 1691 English sailor's register that had some 5,000 sailors on it, the numbers came out almost exactly to 1 out of every 5 sailors had the first name John. With that many with the same name - I'm wondering if it's an anomaly, something cultural, something in the way surveying was done (I suspect John might have been a common name filler for unknown first names and/or the go to name for people who couldn't exactly remember the first name of someone), or something I haven't taken into account yet.

I'm just reading the incomparable Voices of Morebath by Eamon Duffy, not piracy but an extremely good analysis of an English rural village in the 16th century, and I came across this:

"This brutally high level of mortality among their children may explain the custom, maddening to the historian trying to pick his way through meagre documentation, of naming several children of the same generation of the same family with the same name.In 1534 the branch of the Timewell family farming at Wood in Morebath had three unmarried sons, all called John, identified by the priest in a note of that year as John maior, John minor, and John minimus."