From about the 1650’s to about the 1720’s many people were
joining pirate crews. This caused the number of pirates on sea to increase and the
Golden Age of Piracy to occur. But what was the reason behind this? Did people
just one day decide they were going to become pirates or was there an underlying
cause for all of it?
With further research came some answer; many people around
this time were jobless and there was an overcrowding in England. This was
because of the interregnum period which means “between kings.” King Charles I
was executed which left the people without a king, which was what all the
common people wanted for themselves. They did not want to live as a monarchy anymore,
so they were trying to put together a new constitution. After 11 years, Charles
II took his place back in the kingdom, but that was not the end of their
worries in England.
Right after Charles II took back England, the bubonic plague
struck. This caused many people to become ill and die. England then began to
shut down their business, so many of the English lost their jobs on land. Piracy
had existed prior to this and many people knew that pirates made good money and
they were “hiring” all the time. Many of the men who had families to provide
for, decided they would do just that; become pirates.
Another reason why many people were becoming pirates during this
time was because black men and women were forced to be slaves and they did not
want to continue living that way. A lot of the black men would escape from the
slave owners and find their way into pirate ship because they knew they would
not be found there. Black men were treated better on the pirate ship then they
were being treated on land, so this caused them to prefer committing crimes and
breaking laws than living on plantations owned by other men.
The final reason why many of these men and women took on
piracy was because many of them had fathers who owned pirate ships throughout
these years. Their fathers lived their lives as pirates, and they wanted to
carry the “family business” on and continue to run the ships. These people thought
that piracy was their birthright and that it was a job they had to take on. An
example of a pirate who was born into piracy and inherited a ship from her
father was Grace O’Malley who was a very known female pirate.
These are three reason that will be furthered researched,
although I am sure there was other reasons as well. Piracy continued for all those
years and continues to happen now. I still wonder… will piracy every become a
big thing again and will the pirates be fiercer now?
