BLACKBEARD

Blackbeard the pirate is said to have had a hideout in coastal North Carolina. Other pirates, who were more fortunate and literate than he, set up their piratical havens in Virginia, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York. As representatives of Western European crowns, their "piracy" was to acquire gold from the land, rather than from the Spanish Main, or each other at sea. Sir Francis Drake and Sir Henry Morgan were other British pirates whom historians remember more kindly than they do Blackbeard or Edward Teach, of Bristol, England. Letters Marquis and Reprisal are in the United States Constitution as carryovers from the era of official piracy approved by governments. Pirates, of course, are despicable , except when they steal, rob, kill for governments, religions, or to live. One man's piracy is another's life. To speak directly "Thou shalt not kill" does not apply in war, nor any religious holidays or when needed! Consequently former pirates were frequently forgiven by their crowns or governments for ghastly deeds. "Blackbeard", Edward Teach, had evidently fallen from royal favor, so he was killed in 1718, before his form of egalitarian piracy involving his use certain recaptured slaves from cargo holds as "equal" crew members could become vogue. Meanwhile other English pirates who settled on land, stole it from the natives, whom they robbed and killed or enslaved with the blacks to enrich England, until true to their piratical heritage and traditions they saw fit to sever ties with their "Mother Country" after the 1772 James Somerset slave-liberation decision threatened their colonial power, profits, empires in America! So, one need no longer wonder what manner of men would or could stab in the back, again and again, betrayal by troth, repeatedly, those who had done them no harm; such men, such people, are pirates! What is worse, such magisterial "pirates" as these were they who actually slew Blackbeard, on royal command, who were in character worse than Blackbeard; who had at least merit-based parity among his "pirates" such as the Founding Father pirates of North America never had, dreamed of, cared for!