Camp Gagnon - What Were the Horrifying Things Blackbeard Did to His Enemies

Episode Date: November 26, 2025

Who was Blackbeard, and was he the most brutal pirate ever? Today, we take a closer look at the life of Blackbeard. We’ll talk about the origins of Blackbeard, how he became a pirate, how he rose to captain, his attempts at domination, his downfall, and other interesting topics... Welcome to History Camp! 🏕️Shoutout to our sponsor: RelayJoin the Relay App community HERE: http://www.joinrelay.app/cam👕🧢 GET YOUR CAMP DRIP HERE: http://camp-rd.com🎟️ 🎫 Comedy Tour Tickets Here: https://markgagnonlive.com🎩👽 Daily Dose Of History Here: https://www.dailytodayinhistory.comTimestamps:0:00 Origins of Blackbeard5:21 Blackbeards Life Before Pirating7:19 How Blackbeard Became a Pirate9:30 Blackbeard Becomes Captain + Queen Anne’s Revenge14:07 Blackbeard’s Appearance + Shooting His Crewmate15:57 The Charleston Blockade17:57 Blackbeard Loses His Ship + Stranding Crewmates20:49 Abandoning Stede Bonnet23:21 Blackbeard’s Government Protection + Final Battle26:38 The Legend of Blackbeard32:37 Rasputin’s Similarities to Blackbeard34:25 Legends Greater Than The Story41:40 Modern Day Pirates#history #podcast #battle #war #camping #mystery #knowledge

300 years ago, the most feared man in America wasn't a king, wasn't a general, or a politician, he was a pirate. A man so feared that even the strongest navy in the world couldn't take him down. And a man whose flag alone could make an entire crew surrender. His name was Blackbeard. He wasn't rich. He wasn't royal. He was just so terrifying that in under two years, he built a reputation that defined how we imagine pirates today. From lighting his beard on fire to scare enemies to legends of his headless body swimming in

circles. This is the legend of Blackbeard. So, sit back, relax, and welcome to History Camp. What's up people? Welcome back to Camp. My name is Mark Gagnon. And thank you for joining me in my tent where every single week we explore the most interesting, fascinating controversial stories throughout all history forever. Yes, there's been a lot of stuff that's happened on this planet ever since it starts spinning like, what, 2,000 years ago, whatever the Bible says. And I'm trying to figure it all out, okay? I've ever since the dawn of humankind, there's a There's been so much stuff going on in this, you know, history camp is my little, my little playbox to figure out everything that's ever happened, okay? And I can't do it alone.

Obviously, I need you wonderful people at home. I'm also joined my pal David. How's it going? Hey, man. And I'm also here with Christos Pacabaparos, Calamera Christos. How about you matter, boys? Oh, hell yeah, dude. Honestly, I'll let that one slide.

Guys, today we're talking about Blackbeard, one of the most infamous pirates to ever sail the Seven Seas. And this is a good old-fashioned, fun history deep dive. Because you've heard the name Blackbeard. Sure have. That's what the ladies call you. You've heard the name Blackbeard. Yeah. All of us know this guy, but no one actually knows anything about him.

Before we begin. Is there a character in Pirates of the Caribbean that's modeled after him? Yes. I'll tell you at the end. After Christos looks it up because I don't know, but I'm sure there's got to be. I'm sure there is. Yeah. Have you ever seen?

Wait, you have never seen the movies, though, right? I read the books. Are there books? I don't remember. No, I have seen Pirates of the Caribbean. But I don't know which characters modeled after him. Let's find out. So, Creasius, just hit us with a nice little Google search. In Pirates of the Caribbean, the fourth installment in 2011, Captain Edward Teach, also known as Edward Thatch, which will explain the delineation of why there's no actual consensus on his name. He's the main antagonist of the 2011 Swashbuckler film Pirates of the Caribbean. Sick as hell. Stranger Tides. So don't watch that movie until you've listened to this episode,

understand everything about Blackbeard. Okay? What's crazy about Blackbeard is that he legit only spent two years as a pirate captain. But he became so well known in that little two-year stretch that people talk about him 300 years later. He's kind of like the Takashi 6-9 of his day, right? Like a short little run where he ran New York. Everyone knew him. He was on top of the world.

And even though, you know, he's not doing the numbers he was doing back in the day, people still revere him as one of the most fearsome tattooed bandits of the land. Kind of sick, right? What was that? I said so many, I forgot I wasn't on my mic. That's jazz. Anyway, there's actually, to be honestly, Blackbird's not like the Jordan of pirates. There's a bunch of pirates that are way more successful.

Bartholomey Roberts captured 400 ships during his career. That's like a ship every three days. Henry Every pulled off what might be the biggest heist in history. He stole millions of dollars of treasure and then vanished completely no one ever found him. Literal pirate treasure. There's even a

woman pirate, Chinese pirate from back in the day known as Ching Shi. Her first name was literally Qing. Chah Ching Shi. And she was commanding 80,000 pirates in China and basically just ran her own navy. But somehow Blackbeard's

one everyone knows. So what makes him so special? I'm going to go ahead and say branding, right? Like, just like in terms of like a sick name, like, look, Qing Shi is probably solid, but like, you know, American audience, it's kind of hard. But Blackbeard, I mean, it's like a alt, like it's just seared in your brain. You know exactly who we're talking about. So when we look at his life, you're trying to start at the very beginning, right? Well, that's where it doesn't start because we don't really know anything about him. Now, most of what we know about this guy comes from a book known as a general history of the pirates written by Captain Charles Johnson in 1724. But a lot of historians think that the stories in that book are just basically made up.

What's even crazier is that the guy that wrote that book, people dispute if that's even a real guy. Charles Johnson might just be a fake name used by a guy known as Daniel DeFoe. Now, if you know Daniel DeFoe, this is the guy that wrote Robinson Crusoe. So technically the only major historical source we have on this guy Blackbeard from a historical perspective might have been written by the same dude that wrote Robinson Crusoe. And maybe it's not even him, but no one even knows who the guy that wrote the book is. So you can see the issue here. But what we do know is that Blackbeard was likely born around 1680, most likely in Bristol,

England. And he probably, I mean, frankly, could have come from like any English coastal town, but we know that a lot of the pirate activities coming out of Bristol. Now, what we do know is that he used the name Edward Teach, also sometimes spelled thatch, but also spelled a bunch of different ways of thatch, like TH-A-C-H, T-H-A-T-C-H, regardless. He used a bunch of fake names, and pirates, you know, historically did this all the time. And a lot of times pirates would use different family names when they were doing piracy-type activities because they didn't want to bring dishonor amongst their family, which is kind of funny.

They're like, you know, even pirates have a code of the seas. They're like, hey, we're going to steal and rob and pillage and murder, but I don't want to make my dad way bad. So there you go. The most famous pirate in history, and we don't really know anything about his early life, and we don't even really know what to call him. So thus, we will stick with Blackbeard. Now, Bristol, if you don't know, it's a major port city, specifically in that time for, you know, slave trading ships across the Atlantic. So it's most likely that Blackbeard probably started working on ships when he was very young. Now, something interesting, some historians think that he might have actually come from a good family, and he may have even gotten a decent education.

So it's possible that he was actually literate, which would have been pretty strange for a pirate at that time. But there's actually not even a ton of evidence of that. This is just conjecture from different historians. So if true, it would have made him very strange in the pirate world because most pirates kind of were vagabonds, you know, sort of wayward criminals with no formal education. What's up, guys? We're going to take a break really quick because you might need a little bit of help, all right? As we know, our society is very sexual, right? It is in everything.

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We're all in this journey together, trying to be better men. So if you're interested, go to joinrelay.app slash camp and become the person that you know you can be. Now, let's get back to the show. Now, what we do know about Blackbears is that before officially becoming a pirate, he worked as a privateer during Queen Anne's War. Now, a privateer is basically a legal pirate, okay? Like, it was like government-sanctioned piracy. Their jobs were basically to control, you know, like an armed ship, and they would go around

and try to take other ships from enemy nations and steal all their stuff. But it was sanctioned by the government, so it was legal. And that's kind of what he was doing during wartime. So a privateer would pull up on, you know, an enemy ship, and they would take part of the stolen goods, give it to the government, but they got to keep, you know, a little side. pot, right? A little sidebed, little, you know, wet their beaks a little bit. And if the people didn't give it over, then they would just hang them. So now the difference between pirates and privateers is pretty simple, right? Because pirates would just attack anyone that they wanted

and keep everything that they stole for themselves. Privateers only attacked enemy ships and then had to share the loot with the government that actually hired them. But when the war ended, many of these privateers just became pirates because, one, it's the hustle that they know. And two, you can make insane money off it. So Blackbeard's pirate career actually started in 1716. Remember, he only got to be a pirate for like two years total, okay? But that's enough time to become one of the most famous, you know, outlaws in world history and certainly American history. So when Queen Anne's War ended in 1713, Blackbeard basically lost his legal right to attack ships.

And like many of the other privateers during the time, he turned to piracy. And by 1716, he left Jamaica and went to New Providence, Ireland. which became basically like pirate HQ. Now, NASA, the capital of this island, had been abandoned after being attacked during the war. So a lot of pirates kind of moved in and still, you know, they had some infrastructure. There was building. So it was literally like finding a bunch of empty military bases and just kind of like making it yours. You know, insert Afghanistan, current political hot take.

Anyway, at one point, over a thousand pirates actually lived in NASA, making it probably the most dangerous place in the Caribbean. Because again, these people were just bag chasing. They were just like, yeah, we're going to make money however we can. And as a result, a bunch of different pirates would use this as, you know, as their base. And it was here that Blackbeard actually met a man that would shape him into the future pirate that we know. Now, 1716, Blackbeard joins a crew of a man named Captain Benjamin Hornigold. Yes, that is his actual name, Hornigold. And that's exactly what he was. He was also formerly a privateer. Now, Hornigold was impressed with his, you know, sailing abilities

and basically gave Blackbeard command of a small ship that they had captured. And it was just like a, you know, small little, what they call a sloop. There's just like a tiny little boat with like two or three mass. I said sloop, okay? Oh, no. Now it makes sense. The song Sloop John B. Oh, I thought you were making a slut joke.

No. What is Sloop John B? You know the song on Pet Sounds? Okay. Anyway, so they basically, are taking over these ships and they have one. He's like, all right, Blackbeard, you take this little boat and see what you can do. Now, Hornigold had a rule.

He said never attack British ships. That was his one job. Don't attack any British ships. Because one, Hornigold still saw himself as like a loyal Englishman. And on top of that, you attack the British Navy. You're probably going to get destroyed. You know, you take over one of their ships. All of a sudden, you have the full force of the Brits on your ass.

So the crew, on the other hand, did not really care about this. So after about a year of sailing under Captain Hornigold, he and Blackbeard would cross paths was one of the strangest characters in all of pirate history that we honestly probably should do our own episode on. And his name is Steed Bonnet. Now, Bonnet wasn't just any old sailor. He wasn't just, he wasn't a criminal in any, you know, sort of modern sense. He was a wealthy landowner in Barbados. And one day, out of nowhere, he decided that he was just sick of his marriage, sick of his wife. And he wanted adventure, a little bit of a midlife crisis.

So instead of buying a Corvette, he bought a ship, hired a crew, and declared himself as a pirate. And he had basically zero nautical experience and even less crime experience. And even his own men admitted that he knew nothing about being a pirate. And they basically had to pretend that he did. Now, nobody knows exactly why he did this. Some authors during the era claimed that Bonnet suffered from discomforts in a married state. Basically saying that his wife was so crazy that he was like, you know what? Getting murdered by the British would be better than this.

Now, if the rumors were true, he basically thought that, you know, this pirate life would be better than hanging out with his dumb wife. That's a nice little rhyme. Write that down. However, when Blackbeard met Bonnet, he immediately recognized this situation, right? This is a rich guy that is playing pirate and everyone on his ship hated him. Now, Blackbeard quickly figured out that Bonnet was clueless, and with Bond's permission, he just took command over his ship. Now, at this point, Hornigold was still Blackbeard's mentor, but that was about to do. changed because Hornigold's crew had hit their breaking point. There was British ships full of the best loot, the most wealth, all the treasure, and it kept on passing by, completely untouched because Hornigold refused to attack them. So the crew, getting pissed off by this, voted him out. He was literally like demoted and kind of like mutinyed by his own people and, you know, sailed away

with a small ship, leaving Blackbeard in command of the remaining fleet. But Hornigold didn't simply just leave because around this time, the king's pardon had been issued. Now, this was basically a legal doctrine from the British crown, basically saying, if you stop pirating right now, if you just leave it all behind, we won't kill you. Now, some captains saw this as a lifeline, and others saw it as a trap. However, Captain Hornigold saw this as, you know, his way out. So he sailed to New Providence, accepted the king's pardon, and then flip sides. And then within months, he was now working for the British as a pirate hunter, literally tracking down the very men that he once mentored and sailed with. So by late 1717, this was a pretty good time for Blackbeard, right? He captured several

merchant ships along the American coast, but now he was about to face the biggest battle yet. This was a French slave ship called La Concord. Now, this wasn't just any ship. This was massive. It was heading to Martinique. It had 16 cannons, 75 crew members, and 500 enslaved people. The French captain Pierre D'Ause said that they had about 20 pounds of gold dust, which would be worth, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars in, you know, today's money. Now, the voyage for them had been brutal. The ship was ravaged by disease. Dozens on the crew were dead. I mean, scurvy.

It was an awful situation. So the French really couldn't put up much of a fight. And after just two rounds of cannon fire, Captain Dosei actually surrendered to Blackbeard. Now, here's where Blackbeard made a decision that would make him famous. Instead of sinking the French ship, he just took it. He literally just took it and made it his own, and he renamed it Queen Anne's Revenge, literally after the war that he had fought in. Now, here's the crazy part.

He actually turned this French ship into one of the most heavily armed pirate vessels of the era. He actually added more cannons to this already fortified vessel and added all the way up to 40 guns, making it strong enough to fight actual warships. Now, Blackbeard used this ship to terrorize the Caribbean and the American coast. Now, interesting fact, most ships would actually just surrender when they saw Blackbeard and his flag. That's how terrifying he was and how well-fortified the ship had become. One of the most famous stories associated with Queen Anne comes out of Barbados, when Blackbeard reportedly fought against HMS Scarborough.

This was a British warship with 30 cannons. Captain Johnson, the guy we mentioned in the beginning, who allegedly wrote the book about Blackbeard says that Blackbeard won this battle, though the Navy had, you know, to this day never really confirmed the details. However, if it really happened, it meant that Blackbeard had literally beaten the Royal British Navy in open combat. Now, the first half of 1718 is when Blackbeard reached his peak power. He captured ship after ship with basically no resistance.

And here's the crazy part. He rarely killed anyone during these captures. Blackbeard understood that looking terrifying was more effective than actually being a killer. I mean, physically, he was intimidating. He was this tall dude with broad shoulders. He had that famous long black beard. And he took this scary appearance to the next level. So he would wear these leather straps across his chest loaded with pistols.

He had six of them just like strapped in, John Wick style. And he would do this because reloading during a sea battle is basically impossible. And then he took things to a different level. So before combat, he would actually light slow-burning hemp fuses and then weave them into his beard and tuck him under his hat. And this was done so that when he stepped onto the deck, smoke would like literally curl around his head like he had just walked out of hell. So to the sailors who were already like hearing myths and sea stories about this dude,

they would look at him and they didn't see a man. They saw like this horrifying creature from hell itself. Now another weird detail is that he braided his beard into like these little like pig tail ties and he would put like colored ribbons at the end and it was believed that he would do this to look like kind of unpredictable and unhinged just like this wild man that's been out at sea with nothing to lose and that was exactly the point now another interesting thing to show how blackbeard would control his crew at one point blackbeard shot his own first mate a guy by the name of israel hands now he shot him in the knee during a card game just to basically remind everyone that he's the boss

And he doesn't really give an F about anyone else. Now, when people asked him why he did this, he supposedly said, if I don't shoot one of you every now and then, you'll forget who I am. Now, out of all the Blackbeard stories, none are as famous as the Charleston blockade. Now, for nearly seven days, Blackbeard's fleet stopped every ship trying to enter or leave the harbor. I mean, literally, everyone coming in and out, merchant vessels, passenger ships, anything that was moving in the water, he wanted it. So by the end of the week, he had seized nine ships, including the Crowley, which was carrying

several wealthy Charleston citizens on their way to London. Now, Blackbeard took the passenger's hostage and actually sent a message to the governor. He says literally, meet my demands, or I will send their heads back to you in a basket and burn every ship that I've captured. Now, here's where it gets weird. He doesn't ask for gold. He doesn't ask for weapons or even supplies. What he asked for is kind of interesting.

He asks for medicine, specifically a large chest fit. with medical treatments that sailors commonly used to treat, you know, syphilis and scurvy and other infections. The most feared pirate in the world literally just wanted like antibiotics. So Blackbeard sent one of the hostages, a man named Mr. Marks, along with two pirates, to deliver this demand on shore. And the governor at the time had two days to comply. Now, when those two days passed and nobody returned, the hostages on Blackbeard's ship assumed that they were about to be dead. But they didn't know Blaheard's ship. Blackbeard well enough because Blackbeard didn't execute anyone. He actually waited. And this wasn't

because, you know, he was soft or scared. It was because he wasn't the mindless killer that people thought he was. He understood how leverage worked. And eventually, Marks finally returned with the medicine chest and revealed why he was late. He claimed the pirates that he brought with him got so drunk in Charleston that actually disappeared in the city. And that was literally what the excuse was. And Blackbeard accepted it. He then released all the hostages, completely unarmed. and sailed away with their valuables. It was the perfect example of his strategy. Terrify everyone, look unpredictable and sort of untamed,

kill nobody, and still get exactly what you want. Now, after Charleston, something really strange happened at the Beaufort Inlet in North Carolina. Blackbeard lost his ship. Yeah, the Queen Anne's revenge. And the weird thing, a lot of historians think that he actually did it on purpose. Now, the official story goes like this.

The crew wanted to careen the ships, which is basically when they run a boat on shore shore during high tides so that they could, you know, clean and repair the bottom of the boat at low tide. And pirates would do this all the time. But during the maneuver, Blackbeard ship went too far into the sandbar and got stuck. When another ship tried to pull it free, that ship got stuck too. And just like that, Blackbeard's two largest vessels, the most fortified ships, maybe in pirate history up until this time, were ruined beyond repair. Now, here's why this story doesn't really add up. Blackbeard was an extremely skilled navigator.

I mean, this dude was a privateer for the British Navy, had fought in numerous wars, had been a pirate in this area for at this point, almost two years. And this is a guy who could sail through these, you know, shallow Caribbean channels in the dark without ever hitting a reef. So accidentally wrecking one ship would have been embarrassing enough, but wrecking two just seems like difficult to even fathom that such a skilled navigator would do this.

So some historians think that he didn't lose the ships. He just simply retired them. Now, behind the scenes, Blackbeard had a problem. The crew that he had assembled had gotten too big. Now, after this Charleston blockade, he had hundreds of men. And a lot of people wanted to sail for him because, you know, he was the richest dude. He was getting the most money. And they wanted a piece.

But the big crews means big payrolls. And as we know, more mouths to feed, more people taking cuts to loot, and more potential for mutiny. Now, Blackbeard may have realized that, you know, it was time. to scale down and slip away with the best men and the best loot. And sure enough, right after grounding these ships, he handpicked a small group of his most loyal pirates, loaded the most valuable treasure onto two smaller ships, and disappeared. Literally just like in the middle of the night and left the rest of his crew stranded on the island. Now, some of those abandoned men were later captured and testified that Blackbeard had sabotaged those ships on purpose.

Now, whatever the truth is, the effect was the same. Blackbeard went from commanding. a four-ship pirate fleet to being the captain of two small, you know, vessels with a tight, really elite crew. And it seems like he was just kind of downsizing and preparing for whatever comes next. Now, the coolest part of this whole thing is that in 1996, archaeologists discovered the wreck of Queen Anne's revenge. It's one of the only pirate ships that were ever found and excavated. And they recovered cannons and anchors, gold dust, beads, medical tools, and thousands of artifacts related to this one specific pirate. Blackbeard may have grounded on purpose, but that one wreck literally kept his legend alive. So now with the Queen Anne completely surrendered,

his small crew picked, and he loads a ball's loot onto these small boats and dips away towards North Carolina. For most people, you know, they would see this at the end, but it wasn't for him. This was more of like a reset. Now at this point, the Charleston blockade had made Blackbeard you know, even more famous than he was. Everyone knew about him, and the British Navy was cracking down harder than ever. Pirate crews everywhere were shrinking, scattering, they were getting hung. I mean, these pirate hunters from, you know, the British Navy were actually finding pirates all over the region and taking them out.

And NASA, once a pirate's paradise, was being cleaned out by the new governor, Woods Rogers. Now, Blackbeard understood something that a lot of pirates didn't. This golden age of piracy was coming to an end. However, the king's pardon was still being allowed for any pirate who surrendered by September 5th. So Blackbeard quietly discussed it with Steed Bonnet and kind of used him as a test case to see whether the governor of North Carolina, Charles Eden, could be trusted. Bonnet agreed and went to North Carolina in one of their sloops to surrender, and it worked. He got a pardon with no trouble. But while he was gone, Blackbeard betrayed him.

He stripped Bonnet's ships of all of its valuables, marooned his crew members near Beaufort Inlet, and sailed away with the best men and all the loot. So when Bonnet showed up to retrieve his ships and get his crew, which again, this is part of the king's partner, is that you're able to surrender and keep all your money. It's like kind of the best deal ever. But if someone screws you over, then you kind of shit out of luck. So he goes back to get his stuff and realizes that he's been screwed over by Blackbeard.

But here's the thing. Bonnet, despite having no piracy experience, it was just kind of like this wealthy dude, you know, living in Barbados. While he was working with Blackbeard, he actually learned some pirate skills. Now, those skills were, you know, how to operate, you know, small vessel, and more importantly, that you want revenge. So, he actually managed to get his ship working again. This wealthy dude, Bonnet, was like, you know what, I'm going to go get it back. And he actually went looking for Blackbeard, but he never was successful.

Now, this single act drove Bonnet to continue pirating despite receiving a pardoned literally hours earlier. He was eventually captured by the authorities, and despite begging for mercy and even trying to fake like a mental breakdown, he was hung. for piracy. How crazy is that? This dude literally was like, I'm going to turn myself in, I'm going to keep my money. Realizing he got screwed over, he was like, actually, I got to keep being a pirate so I can get Blackbeard and recoup all the money that I lost. And at this point, you know, the British were like, dude, we just gave you a pardon. And then you went immediately back to crime. You're done for. And they killed him. Now, Blackbeard, on the other hand, was heading straight for North Carolina, a small town called Bath. And this was the perfect place to just disappear in plain sight. Blackbeard arrived with, you know, his charming little pirate swag. He had some money, some political leverage, and he started throwing parties and handing out gifts and just kind of acted like a man ready to change his ways. Blackbeard saw an opportunity to take the king's pardon, clean his record, and keep operating in sort of this gray zone where he could like pirate while pretending not to. So he formally

applied for the pardon. Governor Eden approved it instantly. And suddenly Blackbeard went from being one of the most wanted men in the Atlantic, one of the most dangerous and terrifying pirates ever, to being legally free. But here's the twist. Blackbeard wasn't retiring. He was just reorganizing, right? Once a pirate, always a pirate. So within weeks, he was back at sea in smaller vessels, raiding ships under the guise of being a privateer. Now, Eden, the governor and the corrupt customs officer stamped whatever paperwork was needed and eventually everyone got a cut. It was quite literally a sort of colonial version of organized crime. He was working with the governor and sort of of the political system at the time to continue stealing from nearby ships.

Now, Blackbeard spent the summer of 1718 living like a absolute rock star. I mean, he's drinking, he's sailing, he's throwing these parties, and he's literally smuggling with this government protection. I mean, the locals loved him. The merchants sort of tolerated him because he wasn't screwing them over as much. And as long as Governor Eden got paid, nobody was asking questions. But Virginia's governor, Alexander Spotswood, saw the scam for what it was. Blackbeard wasn't reformed. He was now just freelancing for the government with protection of the governor. And his presence was still destabilizing the entire coastline. It was the worst of all worlds. So Spotswood made a decision that was technically illegal but politically necessary. He was going to end Blackbeard himself, despite not having any jurisdiction in North Carolina waters.

So Spotswood secretly hired two armed sloops and put Lieutenant Robert Maynard in command, ordering him to find Blackbeard. Blackbeard and take them out. On November 22nd, 1718, Maynard actually tracked Blackbeard to Ockrocoat Island, where Blackbeard's ship, the adventure, was anchored in a shallow inlet. Now, what happened next was one of the most brutal close quarters fights in pirate history. Blackbeard opened the battle with a blast of a cannon and musket fire that tore through Maynard's ships, killing and wounding dozens. The deck of Maynard's vessel was now littered with dead bodies, and from a distance, it looked like the fight was done. So thinking that he won, Blackbeard boarded Maynard ships to finish off all the survivors.

But it was a trap. Before the battle, Maynard had ordered his remaining men to hide below deck, leaving only a few sailors actually standing in sight. So when Blackbeard and his pirates climbed aboard, expecting, you know, an easy kill and everyone else to surrender like they always had, the hidden soldiers actually came out of the hatches and surrounded them. Now, according to Maynard's official report,

the final clash only lasted six minutes. Literally, six minutes of knives, pistols, smoke hand-to-hand combat in these close quarters, and it said that Blackbeard fought with an insane amount of strength, even snapping Maynard's sword with his bare hands. But even legends have their limits. So by the end of the fight, Blackbeard had been shot five times, cut at least 20 times before he eventually fell into the deck and died. But even in his death, his legend continued to grow. Now, the legend claims that Maynard cut off Blackbeard's head and hung it from the ship's bow as proof of the kill.

And then he tossed the headless body into the water. Now, according to local folklore, it's almost obviously a myth, but it's just too good to not bring it up. Maynard's corpse swam around the ship three full times before sinking. So even in death, people believe that Blackbeard was supernatural or just, you know, greater than any human had been. Now, over the next three centuries, towns, sailors, storytellers, added their own little pieces to the myth of Blackbeard until it became.

became impossible to separate fact from folklore. According to old coastal traditions, Blackbeard was married several times. Some of the stories claim as many as 14 wives throughout his life. Not all at once, but still 14 different women supposedly, you know, agreed to marry the most feared man on the American coast, which is not that hard to believe, right? I mean, criminals and, you know, gangsters, mob guys, they all have a bunch of wives and mistresses. But local stories say that his final wife was just, you know, a young woman, around 16 at the time when he married just months before he died. And there aren't surviving records

to prove much of this, but many historians think that he married her as a part of his plan to look sort of respectable and, you know, retire from piracy under the king's pardon. But then there's the legend that refuses to die. The buried treasure conspiracy. Now, again, I just want to point out, there's no strong, you know, perfect historical evidence that Blackbeard actually buried treasure. You know, pirates usually spent their loot pretty quickly, but Blackbeard loved creating mystery. And rumor says that before his final battle, he told his men, only he and the devil know where the treasure was. Adding that the longest liver should take all.

Literally the person that lived the longest should be allowed to have it. And since he didn't survive the day, the secret allegedly died with him. So for over 300 years, treasure hunters have searched the Carolinas hoping to uncover Blackbeard's lost fortune. And to this day, no one ever has, which only keeps the myth even more alive. Another popular legend claims that Blackbeard's severed head was eventually turned into a silver-lined drinking cup and was passed around kind of like a war trophy. Again, there's no proof of this, but like all great pirate stories, people continue to tell

it because it's just too good to let go. Now, one of the most famous legends is actually a mystery that people still argue about today. What was Blackbeard's flag? There's one design that shows a skeleton with horns holding like an hourglass and a spear piercing a heart, which looked pretty sick, to be honest. But the famous devil horn skeleton flag is almost certainly not authentic. It was likely invented in 1912 almost 200 years after Blackbeard died. The only real description we have from Blackbeard's time appeared in a newspaper describing an attack by his fleet. It said that there were five pirate ships total.

Two had black flags with skulls and three had solid. red flags. Red flags would typically mean no quarter. This basically means that, you know, surrender now or everybody dies. So Blackbeard probably used the classic skull and crossbones, but we will never know for sure. Now, why is Blackbeard more famous than these other pirates that are more successful or more prominent? And it really comes down to perfect timing and brilliant self-promotion. Once again, he is a master of psychological warfare. He understood that the reputation of a pirate is actually more powerful than the cannons. His wild appearance and theatrical behavior made people surrender without fighting, which actually saved a lot of lives on both sides and

made his job as a pirate much easier. He was probably one of the first people to understand this power of personal branding when it came to executing a military operation. Secondly, he died at exactly the right moment. His death came right at the end of the Golden Age of Piracy, making him sort of this symbol or almost like an anti-hero of the era. You know, dying in battle instead of being hung, like a lot of pirates made him seem more heroic and kind of romanticized his story. And finally, his story had everything that people love in a legend, right?

There's mystery about this treasure. There's violence. There's looting. There's, you know, crime. There's this dramatic ending in this close quarter shootout. Writers have been retelling and adding to the story for 300 years, making the legend bigger and bigger than the man. ever was. I think it's also worth adding that the fact that this was happening in the Atlantic

off the coast of the United States with sort of the colonial government, I think also really adds to the lore that this is imbued with American history. And like most of the history that gets exported around the world, the American story gets aggrandized. I mean, even today, Blackbeard is built into the landscape of North Carolina. You can actually walk through the town where he lived after taking the King's pardon. You can visit a place known as the Bonner House, which sits on the land where Blackbeard is believed to have stayed. And just down the road from the house is St. Thomas Episcopal Church, the oldest church in the state. Now, the current building wasn't finished until 1734, 16 years after Blackbeard had died, but the parish itself existed while he was living in Bath,

in North Carolina. And local tradition says that he actually attended early services while he was, you know, sort of pretending that his life had changed. And if you head out to the coast, you can stand on Ocricote Island, right by what is known as Teach's Hole, which is the exact waters where he is thought to have fought his final battle. So, 300 years after his death, Blackbeard is still drawing crowds, still generating money for North Carolina, and still growing as a legend. And honestly, I mean, that just might be the most fitting end for a pirate ever. And ladies and gentlemen, that is the abridged legend of Blackbeard, the pirate. I mean, pretty wild. I mean, it's kind of a sick life, right?

Like, there's so many comparisons. I feel like you could draw with other historical figures. The first one that sticks out of my mind, Rasputin, right? No, the wandering holy man of, like, you know, early 1900s of Russian history right before the revolution. I mean, if you look at Rasputin's legend, he was literally this traveling, you know, holy dude that was going through Siberia and Russia. And he had this sort of, like, crazy, sort of mangled kind of appearance that he intentionally sort of leaned into to give himself this more mystical. aura and he's able to get in with sort of the government at the time he gets close with you know czar peter and zarina um and uh i think it's katherine zarina katherine and he gets close with them

and you know cures their kid with the heophilia thing all that to say is that you know he becomes sort of like this mystical wandering holy man that everyone is going to for information and then when they try to kill him they apparently have to kill him three times they stab them once they shoot him They try to poison him. None of it works. They throw his body into the river. And then even then, people are like, you know, he refused to die. So there's the same sort of like mystique around his character, the way he looked.

And then, you know, this infamous death story, the man who refused to be killed. And Blackbeard kind of has those same sort of legendary elements, right? He, like, leaned into this look. He put this hemp in his beard that burned and smoked while he was fighting. And really created an aura that, you know, he was not of this earth. And granted, he used a lot of this earth. his, you know, abilities and skills for piracy and looting, whereas Rasputin was using it for, you know, getting close to, you know, the Tsarina and stuff like that. But to me, I think

there's some obvious parallels. I'm trying to think, I'm like, I feel like there's been other people like this in history who's the lore around them and sort of the aura kind of precede their whole, their whole vibe. Jack the Ripper's another one, right? He's tricky, though, because, like, they try to solve it in the time, you know, like, they try to, like, figure. out who he was, which apparently people think that they did figure it out. That was a recent story, right? It's like recent-ish. But even that, like, the data is, like, not great because it was like, okay, they tested

the, one of the people that they suspected was Jack the Ripper, was this dude. I forget his name. But he was sort of like this crazy, like Polish immigrant that was living in London at the time. And they traced the DNA of his, like, great, great, great, great, great, great-grandson. And they also tested one of the pieces of evidence. the scarf that was found at the crime scene from one of the women. And they tested it and they found that there was like a DNA match. But other people are like, well, this was not found in Aaron Kaminsky.

That was the name, Cosminski. And they're like, okay, well, you know, this wasn't actually like held and like evidence. This was like passed around like road shows and like sold to like antique shops and or like auctions and stuff like that as a piece of history. So it wasn't super credible. And then on top of that, the DNA analysis doesn't say like, oh, the DNA. found on the scarf was Jack the Rippers. It just says, like, the DNA on the scarf has a match to someone in Jack the Ripper's

family line. Oh, okay. Which wouldn't, you know, be enough to be like, it's probably him. But it's not enough to be like, it was absolutely this dude. But I think it was probably Kaminsky, right? What year was Blackbeard doing this thing? Blackbeard was basically, like, 1717, was like his heyday. 17, 17, 17, 18.

What a time. Yeah. It'd be kind of a sick time, right? If everyone wasn't so gross, I would have loved to be a pirate. Being a pirate would you though? Go to the Caribbean. Cool. Vives.

Warm weather. Yep. Steel stuff. Yep. Break stuff. Bown. I mean, it would be cool, but at the same time, it's like being a pirate is nasty work. Like, it's just, like, gross.

Sick old teeth. You are getting sick old teeth. Okay, you're basically a pirate now. But, like, I don't know. I don't know if you actually want to be a pirate. pirate though. Like, sure, there's upside. I think I'm just, like, I'm jealous of back then where you can just like seek

adventure that way. Yeah, that's true. You know, that part is kind of true. Because now if you're trying to, like, being organized criminal, you're just like, you get stopped by the law, DNA. You literally have to steal jewels from, like, the best museum in the world to get a thrill.

And then even that, it's like, oh, you get caught three days later. There's no, like, two-year period where it's like, oh, the greatest heist of all time. This guy's just robbing museums left and right. to shoot a healthcare CEO just to get a thrill just to feel something one time you know what I mean

it's just crazy but yeah dude I don't know the life of a pirate is it is interesting how romanticized it is right like people have made this joke before but like it is true that like kids will dress up as pirates

now and it's like they were literally like robbing graping just remember YouTube monetization policy robbing

uh non consensually interacting and also just like terrorizing innocent people all the time but then kids will be like I want to be a pirate

Yeah like really Sounds sick as hell In 300 years What are kids gonna be dressing up as now Why did you cover the mic Leave that Chris though Okay we don't know what David just said

But it was surely not Racialant sensitive I mean what January 6 protesters Yeah yeah yeah that's exactly For all intents of purposes Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I'm going to make my kid dress up as a J-6er for sure, dude. Maybe that's too close. What are we're going to say, Chris does?

People are kids are going to be dressing up as comedians. Oh, oh, he did it. Give your kid a zero fade, make him Schultz? Can we fire. But, you know, like, people romance, like, the movie is about Jack Sparrow, and he was sick as hell. That's why people, like, romanticize being a pirate's, like, this guy doesn't live under any rules. He does what he wants. He goes on adventures, like.

I think Cowboys also kind of took that a little bit. Like, American history is just sort of like imbued with this, like, romantic criminal mindset. Yeah, cowboys were assholes. Cowboys were the exact same thing, right? Like, they would go around, no rules, they would get in fights. They were drunk all the time. Yeah, gamble. Which, Hot Take.

This is why I've always felt the, like, a specific era of, like, rap music also epitomized that same feeling. So, like, T.K. Oh, dude. Can we talk about Taked for 20 minutes? I've made this point before, okay? So, TayK is, I think, the quintessential example of this, okay? That, like, all right, what are pirates? They're criminals.

They're on the run. They're trying to get hunted by the government. But they're going around and they're stealing and they're doing what they want because they're pirates, right? And then Cowboys do the same thing. And people are just, like, obsessed with these guys. They're just, like, taking the law in their own hands. And TayK, specifically, is sort of doing the same thing. All right?

He's on the run for murder. He's getting, he's wrapping in front of his own wanted sign. I don't want to split hairs but I think he didn't physically kill someone he was just involved in an armed robbery Are you part of the council? No, I just love TAKE so I know every detail about the trial.

Was he sentenced? Oh yeah, he's in jail for 55 years I think. Oof, all right, poor one out, free TAKEA. Unless, actually maybe keep him there for a little bit. No, did he hear? Have you ever listened to Santander World? No. It might be like one of the best

rap albums of the 21st century. Oh, he's connected to two murders. Whoops. All that to say, though, I mean, again, I'm not saying that, you know, pirates are the greatest people ever in the same way that, you know, Taked is not the greatest. But I'm just saying, like, this guy does a crime. He's on the run. He's, like, making music and, like, putting out content and, like, the aura and the legend of him is getting put out over beats. Yeah. And people love.

And people are, like, wanting to see, they want to be a part of this. And so as a result, they're like, you know, he's literally in front of like a wanted sign. You can imagine, like, a cowboy doing that. Yeah, yeah. And instead of, and like literally sea shanties and like country music is like born from this era of like cowboys doing whatever they want. Like these ballads of like the greatest shoot out ever. You know, what is it? Wyatt Earp and like, you know, Doc Holliday.

Like that whole mystique is built out of like this cowboy era. And I think rappers, the ones that are like actually like live in their raps, I think are the modern day version of Cowboys and Pirates. Y&W. Mellie. Exactly. That's a great analogy. I get to watch and be a part of. this crazy like moment, crime, drama, money, women, violence, all by proxy through this type of art form. And you get to live it on social media. Yeah, it's insane. Is that a crazy

take? I feel like that's... T.K., modern day pirate. I think he's a modern day pirate. Old black hair. Fuck a beat. What is T.K.'s pirate name? Oh, God. Don't be racist. I'm not going to be racist. I'm just trying to think of something funny. Did he have dreads at the time? No, he's always kept it clean. He's never had dreads. They should have a sick name. It also was funny to me to like, they're still modern day pirates, but we just like aren't stoked on them because they're Somali.

Like that's kind of racist that we loved pirates as Americans when they were like British guys. But now there's literal pirates to this day that are sailing their old seven seas. They're run for Senate in Minnesota. You can't say that. But like, We have pirates say they should make a new Jack Sparrow, but he's just a Somali guy.

It's all Somalis. How far would that be? Oh, God. That would be... I am Blackbeard. The clit cutter, hark. Is that too poor? I'm sorry, Somalis.

Look, that was just an insensitive joke. But it is funny. There are drug smugglers and pirates in the, like, smuggling drugs into Saudi Arabia, read this article. Really? Yeah, like, basically, like, poor immigrants from, like, Egypt and Northern Africa. these pirates will be like, hey, we'll give you $3,000 if you smuggled like a million dollars into Saudi Arabia. They get caught.

Great deal. Arabia has a pretty harsh penalty for drug smugglers. I can imagine. I mean, for the record, so does America. Not really. For drug smugglers? For some reason, I thought a drug dealer. No, drug smugglers, dude.

What do we do to them? You might get a hellfire missile from a giant bird in the sky that, you might get a hellfire missile from a giant bird in the sky. blows you up. I'm all for stopping drug trafficking. Yeah, honestly, to all of them. But the thing is... But not the one that gets me a bag

every Saturday night. What the heck? Yeah, I mean, it's crazy. Like, we have modern day... That's the thing. If these guys could just learn how to drop a beat, I think they would be, like, world-renowned famous. What is this Somali rapper go?

That's the only thing they're missing. That's the only thing they're missing. missing. I mean, think about it, Coritos. Literally, like, Mexican music about cartel leaders is, like, the same with, like, these sea shanties of these famous pirates. It's the same as rap music of these famous bandits on the run. Old Western country songs. So I'm saying ballads about this crazy shootout. Rocky Raccoon. Rocky Raccoon. Yeah. Anyway, I think we solved the case. This is an interesting cultural analysis between pirates and all the other criminals of our time. Anyway, I appreciate y'all. If there's anything I missed about Blackbeard or any other

details you think are important, if you're a historian or a scholar on the legend of old Robert Teach, please drop a comment. I read all of them. And the top comment on this video and all future videos will be getting free merchandise. That is right. We will send you some loot, all right? We will find you. We'll find you somehow. We'll get your address probably through an email. But if that doesn't work, I'm going to hand deliver this to your apartment or house. So, I'll show up in the night and give you your hoodie. Jack the Ripper South. Exactly.

Anyway, thank you guys so much for tuning into another episode of History Camp. I will see you guys in the future to talk about the past. Thank you so much. I'll see you next time.