A General History of the Robberies & Murders of the Most Notorious Pirates

The bloodthirsty biographies of the world’s most infamous pirates are reproduced in this Folio edition of Captain Charles Johnson’s renowned work. The biographies include notorious names such as Blackbeard, Captain Kidd and Major Bonnet. The legendary Blackbeard battled his foes ‘till the sea was tinctured with blood’ and eventually died in battle; Kidd terrorised trading ships off the coast of America until hanged for his crimes; and Bonnet, ‘the gentleman pirate’, swapped privateering for outright pillaging, many speculating that an unhappy marriage led to his career change. The inclusion of female pirates Mary Read and Anne Bonny delighted readers and helped propel the book to bestseller status. Bonny’s fearsome facade even remained intact during the public execution of her lover Captain Jack Rackham. Johnson’s work rapidly became a bestseller but nothing is known about the author himself: one theory is that Daniel Defoe wrote the book under a nom de plume. Whatever his identity his rollcall of rogues went on to influence writers such as J. M. Barrie and Robert Louis Stevenson. Indeed, their antics still captivate; the popularity of Pirates of the Caribbean proving our enduring fascination with these ne'er-do-wells.