How the age was ended

Large-scale Atlantic piracy did not fade. It was ended, in about ten years, by a deliberate programme: a pardon to thin the ranks, a law that let colonies try and hang without sending men to England, a navy sent to hunt, and executions staged to be seen. This trail takes the four instruments in turn and ends with the last trial, the last hangings and the name a Victorian historian gave the whole period long afterwards.

1. 1 Event The Act of Grace, the King's Pardon (1717 to 1718) The first instrument: mercy with a deadline and a bounty attached.
2. 2 Institution The Privy Council and the Secretaries of State The machinery that issued the proclamations and sent them out.
3. 3 Event Woodes Rogers Takes Nassau (1718) The pardon enforced in the one harbour that mattered most.
4. 4 Institution The Colonial Vice-Admiralty Courts The second instrument: courts that could try, condemn and execute overseas, without a jury.
5. 5 Institution The Royal Navy The third: station ships, escorts and the occasional hunting cruise.
6. 6 Event The Trials of Rackham's Company A colonial court at work: Rackham's company, then Read and Bonny, at St Jago de la Vega.
7. 7 Ship HMS Swallow The ship that ended the company Roberts led; notice what her own logs can and cannot tell.
8. 8 Event The Battle of Cape Lopez (1722) Cape Lopez, February 1722, and why it is taken as the turning point.
9. 9 Event The Cape Coast Trial and Executions, 1722 The fourth instrument at its largest: the trial at Cape Coast Castle and its tallies.
10. 10 Institution Newgate, the Marshalsea and Admiralty Execution The London end of the same apparatus: gaol, court and tideline gallows.
11. 11 Event The Mutiny and Execution of William Fly (1726) The last of it: a mutiny, a short cruise, and a Boston trial in July 1726.
12. 12 Event The Final Anti-Piracy Campaigns (1726 to 1728) The closing phase, the last statute, and the beginning of the legend trade.
13. 13 Theme The End of the Golden Age The label itself: who coined it, when, and what it does to the events.