Dreaded Spirits

[Olaf Grumby]

This be a small survey of the most terrible legends, haunts, and hells of the pirates world.

I be looking for the most feared "ghost" and or metephysical location historical pirates feared.

Thanks for all the terrible tales.

Olaf Grumby

[Red Maria]

A few years back someone on the e-pirates list post some tales leading up to Halloween. I'll post some of them

First tale

In the worst shipwreck which ever occurred on the shores of Cape Cod, the Whydah went down with 144 men aboard on April 26, 1717.

[by the way, never set sail on the first Monday in April for that is when old Cain killed Abel, and it’s a day for marking your own death if you’re not careful].

Be that as it may, a disaster that horrible is bound to give birth to many legends, stories and folklore. They say that golden-haired Goody Hallett, disgraced lover of Black Bellamy the Pirate, was out walking the storm-tossed night the Whydah went down. They say she heard the crash of the great ship as it rode up on the sand bar, and the sickening crack of the mainmast as it went by the board. And, through the howling wind and thundering surf, she heard a graveyard groan as the ship broke loose from the sand bar, and as the ship slowly began to capsize, they say she could hear the last frantic clang of the ship’s bell and the screams of dying sailors. And then her own screams split the night with all the anguish of all the lost souls that ever were or are--for she recognized her lover Sam Bellamy’s voice among the dying. And from that time to this old sailors sometimes speak of the clang of a bell coming through the fog from where there ain’t no buoy, or the wailing of a woman cutting through the wild winds of springtime storms from cliff-tops where no woman lives.

[Red Maria]

Off Cotuit on Cape Cod lies Screecham’s Island, now called Grand Island. For years no one live there, for the ghost of Hannah Screecham frightened people away. She and her sister, Sarah, lived alone on the island at first; but one day they quarreled, and Sarah moved to South Mashpee and built herself a hut in the forest by the place called the "Witches' Pond". Both sisters were evil, and while Sarah became a witch, Hannah befriended pirates who sailed along that coast.

Captain Kidd, Black Bellamy, Paul Williams, Ned Low, all of them knew her and feared her, yet they trusted her with their gold. When a pirate ship came lay off shore, the Captain would run up a signal to Hannah. Then a boat put out from the pirate ship, a boat with the Captain and one sailor and a treasure of Spanish Pieces-of-Eight or perhaps bars of bullion, or caskets of jewelsn. Hannah went down to the beach, kissed the captain, and nodded to the sailor. The Captain would give her a shawl, or a locket of hair, or a finger ring. At her direction, the sailor carried the treasure into the interior of the island where a deep pit had been dug. When the last bar was laid in place, and the last coin safe in its box, Hannah pushed the sailor into the yawning pit. Quick-running sands seeped over him, and he was buried alive. Then she would scream like the gull in storm, a cry that mingled with the wind in stunted trees, or the waves shrilling on the outer beach. At that signal, the Captain put back to his ship; and even Ned Low, cruelest of the pirates, shivered as he heard her wail. Yet he knew that his treasure was safe, its whereabouts known to only two, Hannah Screecham and himself.

She was never able to dig for gold herself. She tried once--the moment that earth-buried metal touched her, the sand-pits on the Island opened and the ghosts of the men she had murdered put their blue hands to her throat.

She has been dead a good long time now, but at evening, when you hear her calling over the waters from Grand Island, you will know that she warns the pirates that someone approaches their treasure.

[Capt. Tarkanius De Morte']

I dont be know'n much about no tales But i do know that iffen ye go to Blackbeards marker ye can still here the cannons and feel the wind.

I happened to visit a Friend of mine last year over in Charleston NC. and got to go to Blackbeards Grave. It was a hair raising experiance I recomend it to anyone in the area!

Capt Tark

[Nigel]

The most terrible location in all the known world is up here......more'n a thousand miles away from "Olaf's Magic Elixir!!!"

Now THAT is scary!!!

Brrrr......I gets a chill jest thinkin' about it!

[Olaf Grumby]

Thanks fer the stories if there be anymore out there please share

Oh, Nigel don't worry there always be elixir fer everyone

[Nigel]

Arrgh...terrific!

Have some handy...I'm on my way....

[KW Pirate]

That must be some fine drink!

Deadly Aim

Key West Pirate

[Nigel]

The finest, KW....nectar of the gods themselves.

We shall avail you of its exceelence at the earliest opportunity.

"To Olaf's Elixirs!"

...are better than one!

[Black Syren]

This is'nt a place pirates feared but in Corpus Christi next to the U.S.S. Lexington there is a small resteraunt named Blackbeards that is haunted by a ghostly pirate..It always smells in there and sometimes things just fly off the walls for no reason. might be intresting to get the full history behind that. There's a place in New Orleans as well but I cant remember off hand..Ill have to look it up but it's on their haunted Halloweens tour. The Pirates alley or something like that..

[captscurvyscrew]

My favorie collection of pirate stories were written by a man named charles henry wheedbee. He wrote a series of books called "Outer Banks Tales to Remember" Most of the storeis dealt with Blackbeards Ghos and the Flaming ship of Ocracoke. I used to love living int he Outer Banks around Halloween because there are so many pirate themed parties. North Carolina as a stae is really a great place filled with loads of pirate lore adn ghost stories.

[Olaf Grumby]

Thar be some good tales here but I be needin' the true horrors of piratical lore, with all them gory details.