For this course of study we will be discussing piracy in the New World.

With the end of the seventeenth century came the greatest outburst of piracy in history.  This influx of pirate activity was called “the Golden Age of Piracy”, the era lasted from around 1700 until 1730.  Most pirate attacks occurred in the Caribbean. Piracy was also prevalent along the Eastern seaboard of America, in the Indian Ocean and off the West Coast of Africa.

This increase in pirate activity was encouraged by the many valuable cargoes were being shipped across the Atlantic to Europe and trade between the Caribbean and the American Colonies. The bulk of cargos included gold, silver, hides, rum and slaves.  Peace had closed the long series of conflicts between England, France and Spain which allowed the respective Navies to downsize and left ports full of unemployed sailors with no job prospects.  Most pirates were American or English, and lack of strong colonial government made the American coast Caribbean islands an ideal pirate hunting ground.

With merchants and colonial governments petitioning for assistance in stopping piracy, naval power was applied to end to the outbreak, and by 1730 it was all but over.  Later outbreaks of piracy certainly occurred but, this short era would come to be known as the “Golden Age of Piracy”.

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