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Benjamin Hornigold

Nassau captain of 1714 to 1718 who would not take English ships, accepted the King's pardon in 1718 and afterwards hunted pirates for Woodes Rogers.

BornNot establishedDiedNot establishedAlso writtenHornigold (Vickers deposition, 1716; Heywood letter, 7 February 1718); Hornygold (Woodes Rogers' letter, 31 October 1718; Johnson, General History, 1724); Horngold (reported in one account of Musson's letter of 5 July 1717; not found when the documents were searched); Hornagold (modern genealogical variant only)

Hornigold is the one Nassau captain to be seen from both sides: the man the Bahamas complained about, and then the man the governor fitted out to catch pirates.

The name holds steady. Hornigold is the form in John Vickers's deposition of 1716 and in Peter Heywood's Jamaica letter of 7 February 1718; Hornygold is Woodes Rogers' spelling in 1718 and Johnson's in 1724. A third form, Horngold, is reported in one account of Mathew Musson's letter of 5 July 1717, and the letter as it survives does not carry it; Hornagold is modern genealogy. He carries no nickname. Thache had Blackbeard and Bellamy had Black Sam; this man is Hornigold and nothing else.5,6

He starts late

He comes into the story as a name on a list. Thomas Walker sent the Council of Trade and Plantations an account of the pirates in the Bahamas with a letter of 14 March 1714/15, and Hornigold was on it, among the men then at Eleuthera. The raiding usually placed a winter earlier is reconstruction.7

John Vickers swore what he had seen, and his deposition went to London with a letter of 3 July 1716. Hornigold was at Providence in November 1715 in the sloop Mary of Jamaica, owner Augustine Golding, taken on the Spanish coast; he sailed in January with 140 men, six guns and eight pattararas, and was back in March in a captured Spanish sloop with near two hundred men. He gave out that all the pirates there were under his protection. Vickers had the company calling itself the flying gang.8

Walker kept writing. Through 1716 he complained that Hornigold was mounting guns in the ruined fort at Nassau and threatening him. By 5 July 1717 Musson was reporting him as one of five captains using Providence as a rendezvous, with a sloop of ten guns and about eighty men. The thirty-gun Ranger that later writers give him is not in the letter.9,10

Blackbeard, and the sloop he is supposed to have given him

Edward Thache sailed as his consort from late 1716. Henry Timberlake swore at Jamaica on 17 December 1716, four days after the plundering of the sloop Lamb, that the two of them had been in it together. The part everyone remembers, that Hornigold made Blackbeard a captain by handing him a prize sloop, comes out of the 1724 General History and nowhere in the period papers.1,3,11

The refusal

His one recorded policy is a refusal. He would not take English vessels, and it cost him the command in 1716, when his men chose Samuel Bellamy in his room and he left with twenty-six hands in a prize sloop. John Brown swore to that refusal at his trial.2,4,12

His piracies were small. Spanish prizes. Provisions taken out of ships. A logwood vessel let go. One raid that came away with hats. No surviving paper lays a killing, a torture or a serious hurt to a prisoner to his name. The twelve thousand pounds of cargo and the hundred thousand in pesos that later writers hang on him have no muster and no invoice behind them.13,14

The pardon

Peter Heywood, commanding at Jamaica, wrote to the Council of Trade on 7 February 1718 that he had sent two vessels out with the King's proclamation, and that one "came up with Hornigold, and one or two more his consorts, who sent me their resolution in the inclos'd copy". The enclosure is a single line: "Wee embrace H.M. act of grace and return H.M. our hearty thanks for the same".15

The governor's man

Woodes Rogers had him back at sea within months. By 31 October 1718 he had a sloop from the governor and orders to look for Charles Vane, and had seized a vessel that had traded with Vane. Rogers reckoned the seizure had disobliged Hornigold's old friends and left the governor stronger than he expected.16

On 24 December 1718 Rogers wrote from Nassau to Secretary Craggs. He had equipped a sloop under Hornigold and John Cockram, "who had themselves been pirates, but accepted of H.M. Act of Grace", and the two had brought in thirteen, three of whom died of their wounds. Then: "I am glad of this new proof Capt. Hornigold has given the world to wipe off the infamous name he has hitherto been known by." Ten of them were tried at Nassau on 9 and 10 December and eight hanged on the twelfth, George Rounsivell reprieved under the gallows.17,18

After 1718

Nothing firm is heard of him alive after that December. The employment usually given him for 1719, protecting Spanish trade, is a later framing. He was lost at sea when his ship went on rocks a great way from land, five of his men getting off in a canoe. Later writers put those rocks on a reef off Mexico and the voyage on a passage to New Spain; the one period account of the wreck gives neither a date nor a destination.19,20,21

The record gives him no birth, no death, no likeness and not one sentence in his own hand; the nearest thing is that line of collective thanks, whose senders the calendar supplies in brackets. Vickers, Timberlake and Walker have been read at second hand; the two Colonial Office references given for Vickers, CO 5/1264 No. 17i and CO 5/1317 Part 1 f.52, have not been reconciled; the trial papers enclosed with Rogers' letter of 24 December 1718 have not been opened; and the Spanish side of his prizes, at Seville, has not been looked for.

What the evidence does not settle

Death of Hornigold

  • Death account rests solely on one Johnson passage lacking a dateUnverified
  • Mexico reef and New Spain voyage details are later additionsSpeculative

Archival reference for Vickers's deposition

  • Two Colonial Office citations for the Vickers deposition are unreconciledConfirmed

Trial and Spanish records

  • What the trial papers enclosed with Rogers's 1718 letter add to the printed recordLikely
  • What Seville records show about Hornigold's raids between 1713 and 1715Likely

Each line is one question with its own grade, taken from the register where a claim carries it. Nothing here is graded as a whole.

Sources for this record

Every statement above that rests on a checked claim carries a small number; the numbers lead here. Each entry gives what is claimed, how far the record supports it, and where it comes from.

  1. Thache operated as a consort of Benjamin Hornigold from late 1716, taking his own command by 1717. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Deposition and colonial report: Timberlake deposition, 17 December 1716, placing Thache with Hornigold's company; Capt. Matthew Musson's report of 5 July 1717 lists 'Thatch' among the captains based at New Providence
  2. Benjamin Hornigold lost the command of his pirate company in 1716 and Samuel Bellamy was put in his place by the majority of the men. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Trial pamphlet: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy (Boston, 1718), appendix of examinations taken 6 May 1717
  3. Edward Thache's earliest documented appearance as a pirate is 13 December 1716, when he was in a separate sloop of eight guns and about ninety men in company with Hornigold's sloop Delight at the plundering of the sloop Lamb off western Hispaniola; the assertion by later writers that Thache was present at the division and left with Hornigold rests on no contemporary document. Unverified Reported, not yet checked against the record. Colonial deposition: Deposition of Henry Timberlake, master of the Lamb, Jamaica, 17 December 1716
  4. The removals documented for this period share three features, a vote carrying the removal, the minority that supported the deposed man leaving with him, and that party being given a vessel and stores rather than killed, as with Benjamin Hornigold and his twenty-six hands in a prize sloop; the outcome could be harsher, Edward England being on the 1724 book's account "soon abdicated or pulled out of his Government, and marooned with three more on the Island of Mauritius" and a deposition transcribed by E. T. Fox and quoted at second hand saying that he "was turned out of Comand", while Snelgrave reports William Moody's own people forcing him with twelve others into an open boat in which they were never heard of again. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Period narrative and transcribed deposition: A General History of the Pyrates, 1724; William Snelgrave, A New Account of Some Parts of Guinea, 1734; deposition transcribed in E. T. Fox, Pirates in Their Own Words, 2014, quoted at second hand
  5. The period spellings of the name are Hornigold, in the deposition of John Vickers (1716) and in Peter Heywood's Jamaica letter of 7 February 1718, and Hornygold, in Governor Woodes Rogers' letter of 31 October 1718 and in Johnson's General History (1724); a third form, Horngold, is reported in one account of Capt. Mathew Musson's letter of 5 July 1717 but was not found in the documents when searched for, and Hornagold appears only as a modern genealogical variant. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers and period narrative: Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 29, July 1716, item 240.i (Deposition of John Vickers); vol 30, February 1718 1-15, item 357 (Peter Heywood to Council of Trade, 7 Feb 1718); vol 30, October 1718, item 737 (Gov Woodes Rogers to Council of Trade and Plantations, 31 Oct 1718); Capt. Mathew Musson to the Council of Trade and Plantations, CSP vol 29 item 635; A General History of the Pyrates (vol 1, Introduction and chapter Of Captain Teach alias Black-beard)
  6. Hornigold bears no attested contemporary nickname or epithet: the state papers and Johnson's General History name him only as Hornigold or Hornygold. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Calendared state papers and period narrative: Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 29, July 1716, item 240.i (Deposition of John Vickers); vol 30, October 1718, item 737 (Gov Woodes Rogers to Council of Trade and Plantations, 31 Oct 1718); A General History of the Pyrates (vol 1, Introduction and chapter Of Captain Teach alias Black-beard)
  7. The earliest naming of Hornigold in an official record is Thomas Walker's list of Eleuthera pirates, enclosed with his letter to the Council of Trade and Plantations of 14 March 1714/15; the raiding of the previous winter usually given him is reconstructed from later material rather than documented. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, vol. 28 (1714-1715), Thomas Walker to the Council of Trade and Plantations, item 276 with enclosures 276.i, 276.iii, 276.v (vol28 pp110-122)
  8. The deposition of John Vickers, enclosed with a letter of 3 July 1716, records Hornigold arriving at Providence in November 1715 in the sloop Mary of Jamaica belonging to Augustine Golding, which he had taken on the Spanish coast, sailing from Providence in January with 140 men, six guns and eight pattararas, returning in March in a captured Spanish sloop with near 200 men, declaring that all the pirates there were under his protection, and describing the company as the self-styled flying gang. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 29, July 1716, item 240 and enclosure 240.i (Deposition of John Vickers), C.O. 5, 1317 Nos. 45, 45 i.-iii. (vol29 pp139-159)
  9. Thomas Walker's complaint letters of 1716 record Hornigold mounting guns in the ruined fort at Nassau and threatening Walker. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Colonial Office manuscripts, reported at second hand: Thomas Walker correspondence to the Council of Trade and Plantations, C.O. 5, 1265 No. 52, and the copy of Thomas Walker's deposition, C.O. 5, 382 Part 1 (item 021), both as reported in "The Strongest Man Carries the Day: Life in New Providence 1716-1717", csphistorical.com
  10. Capt. Mathew Musson's letter to the Council of Trade and Plantations of 5 July 1717 names Hornigold as one of five pirate captains using Providence as a rendezvous, with a sloop of ten guns and about eighty men; the thirty-gun Ranger given him for that year by secondary accounts is not in the document. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Capt. Mathew Musson to the Council of Trade and Plantations, Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 29 item 635, C.O. 5, 1265 No. 73 (vol29 pp336-344)
  11. The story that Hornigold gave Edward Thache his first command by handing him one of his prize sloops rests on Johnson's General History alone and is not corroborated by period evidence. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative against modern research: A General History of the Pyrates (vol 1, chapter Of Captain Teach alias Black-beard), Gutenberg ebook 40580; "The Firsts of Blackbeard: Exploring Edward Thatch's Early Days as a Pirate", csphistorical.com
  12. Hornigold's refusal to take and plunder English vessels is the one policy documented for him, and it rests on John Brown's sworn trial deposition rather than on Johnson's narrative alone. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Trial pamphlet and calendared state papers: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy &c. (Boston, 1718), examination of John Brown; Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 30, October 1718, item 737 (Gov Woodes Rogers to Council of Trade and Plantations, 31 Oct 1718)
  13. The acts documented against Hornigold are modest, Spanish prizes, provisioning plunder such as the sloop Lamb, a released logwood ship and one taking that came away with hats, and no killing, torture or serious injury of a captive is recorded in any source consulted. Likely More likely than not on the evidence we have. Trial pamphlet with secondary accounts: The Trials of Eight Persons Indited for Piracy &c. (Boston, 1718); "The Strongest Man Carries the Day: Life in New Providence 1716-1717", csphistorical.com; "Did You Know Blackbeard's Mentor Was a Pirate Hunter?", qaronline.org
  14. The large prize values attached to Hornigold, the Marianne with 12,000 pounds of cargo and the Revenge with over 100,000 pounds in pesos, rest on thin secondary sourcing, and no muster or invoice supporting them has been produced. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Secondary website: "Benjamin Hornigold" (The Golden Age of Piracy mirror), waynesavage.com
  15. Peter Heywood reported to the Council of Trade from Jamaica on 7 February 1718 that one of the two vessels he had sent out with the King's proclamation of pardon "came up with Hornigold, and one or two more his consorts, who sent me their resolution in the inclos'd copy", the enclosure reading "Wee embrace H.M. act of grace and return H.M. our hearty thanks for the same". Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 30, February 1718 1-15, item 357 (Peter Heywood to the Council of Trade, Jamaica, 7 Feb 1718) and enclosure 357.i, C.O. 137, 13. Nos. 5, 5 i. (vol30 pp168-186)
  16. Governor Woodes Rogers' despatch of 31 October 1718 records a sloop fitted out under Hornigold to scout Charles Vane and Hornigold seizing a vessel that had traded with Vane, which Rogers reckoned had disobliged Hornigold's old friends and left the governor stronger than he had expected. Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Governor Woodes Rogers to the Council of Trade and Plantations, 31 October 1718, Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 30 item 737, C.O. 23, 1 Nos. 10, 10 i.-viii. (vol30 pp359-381)
  17. Governor Woodes Rogers wrote to Mr Secretary Craggs from Nassau on 24 December 1718 that he had equipped a sloop under Capt. Hornigold and Cockram, "who had themselves been pirates, but accepted of H.M. Act of Grace", that they had apprehended pirates "to the number of 13, three whereof dyed of their wounds", and that he was "glad of this new proof Capt. Hornigold has given the world to wipe off the infamous name he has hitherto been known by". Confirmed Directly supported by the record. Calendared state papers: Governor Woodes Rogers to Mr Secretary Craggs, Nassau, 24 December 1718, Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 30 item 807, C.O. 23, 13 ff. 20-24v. (vol30 pp424-446)
  18. Ten of the pirates taken by Hornigold and Cockram were tried at Nassau on 9 and 10 December 1718 and eight were hanged on 12 December, George Rounsivell being reprieved under the gallows. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Calendared state paper: Governor Woodes Rogers to Mr Secretary Craggs, Nassau, 24 December 1718, Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 30 item 807
  19. Rogers' letter of 24 December 1718 is the last firm documentary appearance of Hornigold alive, and the 1719 employment protecting Spanish trade often given him is a secondary framing with no document produced for it. Very likely Strong evidence, short of proof. Calendared state papers with secondary chronology: Governor Woodes Rogers to Mr Secretary Craggs, Nassau, 24 December 1718, Calendar of State Papers Colonial America and West Indies vol 30 item 807; Governor Woodes Rogers to the Council of Trade and Plantations, 31 October 1718, vol 30 item 737; "The Chronology of Captain Benjamin Hornigold", thepiratehaven.com
  20. Johnson's General History, Vol. 1 (1724), has Hornigold's ship cast away on rocks a great way from land, with five of his men escaping by canoe; it gives neither a destination nor a date. Possible Consistent with the evidence, not established. Period narrative: A General History of the Pyrates (vol 1, Introduction and chapter Of Captain Teach alias Black-beard), Gutenberg ebook 40580
  21. Johnson gives no destination for the rocks on which Hornigold's ship was lost. Speculative An inference, not a finding. Period narrative: A General History of the Pyrates (vol 1), Gutenberg ebook 40580