From: owner-gm7thsea@darkedge.com on behalf of Peter Baldwin [pgbaldwin@bigpond.com]
Sent: Saturday, September 04, 1999 6:38 PM
Subject: [7th Sea RPG GM] Pirates against regular Naval vessels

I was finally able to get hold of a copy of Pirate Nations recently. I read with 
considerable amusement (and growing annoyance) the following sentence:
 
    "Treatment in a navy ship was so bad, when a pirate came into sight, 
the navies usually mutinied against the officers, turned their ship over 
tot the pirates and asked to join up." (page 110).
 
This is utter rubbish of the worst kind and appears to demonstrate a total 
lack of research on 17th and early 18th century piracy. I am aware of no 
instance where a regular warship of any nation in europe mutinied and joined 
pirates. Naval crews were more than happy to fight pirates - quite appart 
from anything else there was generally a bounty on them. Popular views of 
the cruelty of naval discipline are rather more popular than accurate.
 
Pirates avoided naval vessels for the following reasons:
1. navy ships did not carry money or goods,
2. they were heavily armed and manned - many times better than the pirates,
3. naval officers were better ship handlers than pirate crews - pirates 
generally lacked trained officers,
4. navy crews were perfectly happy to fight anyone. That was what they were trained to do. 
 
The entry of 4 Royal Navy ships into the Indian Ocean in 1719 (under Commodore Matthews) 
caused most pirates to leave for lower risk areas. They were thieves and thieves do 
not fight where there is no profit.
 
Just to take three brief examples of "famous" pirates - Blackbeard, Bartholomew Roberts 
and "Calico Jack" Rackham.
 
Blackbeard was hunted down by parties from HMS Lyme and Pearl and was killed in a 
fight with Lieutenant Robert Maynard (of HMS Pearl). 21 of Maynard's 35 men were 
wounded by cannon fire (they were in a small unarmed sloop) before they boarded 
Blackbeard's ship. There was noting wrong with their morale.
 
Bartholomew Roberts - "Black Bart" is regarded by many as the greatest of the 
pirate captains. He fought the Royal Navy once and once only when his crew 
misidentifed HMS Swallow under Captain Ogle and failed to flee. Roberts was 
killed by a grapeshot that tore out his throat. The navy men killed 50 
or so pirates, 254 surrendered. There were no navy casualties at all.
 
Calico Jack is famous as the partner of Anne Bonney. When suprised by a 
navy sloop his first reaction was to surrender. Of his crew only Anne Bonney 
and Mary Read (two of the very few female pirates known to record) were the 
only ones to try and fight.

I close with the comment that this post is not intended as a personal 
attack on any person. I have confined my comments to european pirates 
of the 17th and 18th century but the basic truth holds for the 16th century 
as well (although the barbary corsairs and Red Sea pirates were more 
aggressive, presumably for religious reasons). Thean pirates 
(certainly the Heroes) are larger than life. Let then fight men'o'war 
with success if you as the GM want, that is what Heroes do. As the 
authors of Pirate nations say mix history and myth until you find a 
combination that works perfectly for their individual tastes. But if 
you do mix history and myth make sure that you get the history right.