The Republic of Pirates

An entrancing tale of piracy colored with gold, treachery and double-dealing (Portland Press Herald), Pulitzer Prize-finalist Colin Woodward’s The Republic of Pirates is the historical biography of the exploits of infamous Caribbean buccaneers. In the early eighteenth century, the Pirate Republic was home to some of the great pirate captains, including Edward Blackbeard Teach, Black Sam Bellamy, and Charles Vane. Along with their fellow pirates — former sailors, indentured servants, and runaway slaves — this Flying Gang established a crude but distinctive democracy in the Bahamas, carving out their own zone of freedom in which servants were free, blacks could be equal citizens, and leaders were chosen or deposed by a vote. They cut off trade routes, sacked slave ships, and severed Europe from its New World empires. For a brief, glorious period the Republic was a success as the pirates became heroes in the eyes of the people. Drawing on extensive research in the archives of Britain and the Americas, award-winning author Colin Woodard tells the dramatic untold story of the Pirate Republic that shook the very foundations of the British and Spanish Empires and fanned the democratic sentiments that would one day drive the American revolution.