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A drawing of a photo of Edward Low torturing a Yankee by Geo. S. Harris and Sons –

10 Renowned Pirates in History

Did you know that piracy is not only a feature in movies but also a real-life theme in the oceans that surround the landmasses of the earth? Even though movies depict piracy more than we have heard or seen it happen, well piracy is happening in our seas and oceans in the world today or may today a ship is being hijacked. You can’t know but be aware it is real.

Edward Low is linked as to be the first man to be a pirate. He was a notorious pirate of English origin during the latter days of the Golden Age of Piracy, in the early 18th century. Low was born into poverty in Westminster, London, and was a thief from an early age.

Low captained several ships, usually maintaining a small fleet of three or four. Low and his pirate crews captured at least a hundred ships during his short career, burning most of them. Although he was active for only three years, Low remains notorious as one of the most vicious pirates of the age with a reputation for violently torturing his victims before murdering them. In the article are the ten renowned pirates in history.

1. James Alday

James Alday was a 16th-century English navigator, explorer and privateer. He participated in raids against the Spanish with fellow privateers James Logan and William Cooke during the 1540s. He is credited, along with Sebastian Cabot and Henry Ostrich, with the start of regular trading between England and the Barbary coast.

He claimed that he is the one who organised the earliest known voyage to the Barbary coast “inventing the Barbary trade”. Unfortunately, he claimed that he was forced to turn his command to another due to illness.

This voyage was not successful however and a rival expedition commanded by Thomas Windham became the first to arrive there in 1551. His claim has generally been dismissed partly due to his involvement in piracy as well as lack of evidence.

2. John Hawley

John Hawley photo by James Grant –

John Hawley also called the elder of Dartmouth in Devon, was a wealthy ship owner who served fourteen times as Mayor of Dartmouth and was elected four times as a Member of Parliament for Dartmouth. He is reputed to have been the inspiration for Chaucer’s “shipman”. His magnificent monumental brass survives in St Saviour’s Church, Dartmouth.

Hawley was both a merchant and licensed privateer though he was often accused of piracy. He conducted several naval operations in the English Channel and briefly held the post of deputy to the Admiral of England under King Henry IV. He organised the defence of Dartmouth in 1404 against an attack by a Breton fleet, which culminated in the Battle of Blackpool Sands.

3. Román Delgado Chalbaud

Román Delgado Chalbaud was a Venezuelan naval officer, founder, admiral, and commander in chief of the Venezuelan navy, businessman and politician. Hero of the battle of “Ciudad Bolívar”, which sealed the pacification of Venezuela in 1903.

He led a failed conspiracy against Juan Vicente Gómez, he was imprisoned for 14 years in 1913. He again attempted a naval invasion in 1929 to overthrow Gómez’s regime and his Presidential frontman.

4. Paul del Rio

Paul del Río Canales was a Venezuelan sculptor, painter and revolutionary. Paul del Rio combined modernism, cubism and surrealism to create enigmatic paintings that are usually a social commentary on the harshness of modern urban life for ordinary people, and their longing for a different life.

On 13 February 1963, Paul del Rio at the age of 19 was the leader of a Venezuelan revolutionary group, the Armed Forces of National Liberation, that seized the Venezuelan cargo ship Anzoategui in the Caribbean, in a failed attempt to overthrow President Romulo Betancourt. Involving 25 men, the ship was hauled off to the Brazilian coast, evading both the Venezuelan Navy and the U.S. Navy.

5. Henrique Galvão

Henrique Galvão photo by Vida Gallega –

Henrique Carlos da Mata Galvão was a Portuguese military officer, writer and politician. He was initially a supporter but later become one of the strongest opponents of the Portuguese Estado Novo under António de Oliveira Salazar.

On January 22, 1961, Henrique Galvão led the Santa Maria hijacking, also known as Operation Dulcinea. The Portuguese revolutionaries isolated the vessel by cutting off all communication, killing one officer and wounding several others.

Galvão used the hijacking to send radio broadcasts from the ship calling attention to his concerns and views on what he characterized as President Salazar’s regime of fascism. The liner evaded both the U.S. Navy and British Royal Navy for eleven days before docking safely at Recife, Brazil.

6. Ben Pease

Ben Pease or Benjamin Pease, was a notorious blackbirder, engaged in recruiting and kidnapping Pacific Islanders to provide labour for the plantations of Fiji. Pease was a ship captain operating in the Pacific during the 1850s and 1860s.

His elder brother was Captain Henry A. Pease Jr. who became a whaling ship master and was involved in the Whaling Disaster of 1871 and was later the U. S. Consul to Santiago, Cape Verde.

Pease was a New England sea captain who kidnapped Pacific Islanders aboard the Pioneer, providing labour for the plantations of Fiji. When Bully Hayes was arrested for piracy in Samoa, Pease helped him to escape. When next the Pioneer returned to port, Hayes was at the helm and was rumoured to have killed Pease during a fight.

7. Bully Hayes

William Henry “Bully” Hayes was a notorious American ship captain who engaged in blackbirding in the 1860s and 1870s. Hayes operated across the breadth of the Pacific Ocean from the 1850s until his murder on 31 March 1877.

He has been described as a South Sea pirate and “the last of the buccaneers”. However, in their account of his life, James A. Michener and A. Grove Day warn that it is almost impossible to separate fact from a legend regarding Hayes.

He was described as “a cheap swindler, a bully, a minor confidence man, a thief, a ready bigamist” and commented that there is no evidence that he ever took a ship by force in the tradition of a pirate or privateer. The Pirate of the South Sea was a notorious blackbirder in the South Pacific.

8. Ching Shih

A picture drawing of Ching Shih carrying out piracy expeditions by Anonymous –

Ching Shih was a prominent female pirate in late Qing China. She was a prostitute who married a pirate and rose to prominence after his death. Regarded as one of the most powerful pirates in human history, she commanded her husband’s fleet after his death. While the fleet she inherited was already large, she further increased the number of ships and crew.

At its height that her fleet was composed of more than 1,500 ships and 80,000 sailors. She controlled much of the waters of the South China Sea. After years of piracy during which she defeated several attempts to capture her, the Qing government offered her peace in 1810 and she was able to retire. She married her second-in-command.

9. Wang Zhi

Wang Zhi was a Chinese pirate lord of the 16th century, one of the main figures among the wokou pirates prevalent during the reign of the Jiajing Emperor. Originally a salt merchant, Wang Zhi turned to smuggle during the Ming dynasty’s period of maritime prohibitions banning all private overseas trade, and eventually became the head of a pirate syndicate stretching across the East and South China Seas, from Japan to Thailand.

Through his clandestine trade, he is credited for spreading European firearms throughout East Asia, and for his role in leading the Portuguese to reach Japan in 1543. The Ming emperor and government blamed Wang Zhi for the ravages of the Jiajing wokou raids, for which they imprisoned and later executed Wang Zhi in 1560 when he was ashore in China trying to negotiate a relaxation of its maritime prohibitions.

10. Chen Zuyi

Chen Zuyi was a 15th-century Chinese pirate from Guangdong and was one of the most feared pirates to infest the seas of Southeast Asia. He ruled the city of Palembang and raided the Strait of Malacca to plunder shipping and prey on both native and foreign merchants for several years.

His fleet was defeated by the Ming dynasty Admiral Zheng He at the Battle of Palembang (1407). Chen was captured and sent to the Chinese capital Nanjing for execution.