Quote:
Originally Posted by Taltarzac725
Blackbeard had to think of a locale for a bunker to hold the riches stolen from the hostages he had taken from the ships exiting and trying to enter Charleston harbor. From his kidnapping victims he took every coin he could find even the dump ha' penny from 4 year old William Wragg and then stuck every innocent into the hold of the captured ship the Crowley. This was not enough treasure though and he demanded that the citizens of Charleston provide him and his pirate force with a treasure chest of medicine as the pirates' very heavy partying had spread various diseases within their ranks.
(William Wragg would become a staunch loyalist during the Revolutionary War, give up his SC estates and drown while trying to resettle in England in 1777 William Wragg - Westminster Abbey). |
The pirates had to
elicit a response from the townspeople of Charleston about the pirates' needed ransom's
lading of the chest of medicine. They sent envoys who took their sweet time returning. While the captive hostages waited in the
musty hold many got very restless. Some historians even
quote them as saying: "they would stand by [the pirates] to the last man" if the people of Charleston "put a greater value on the chest of medicines than on the lives of the fourscore men now on the verge of destruction." Some of victims of the kidnappers even said that they would pilot the pirates' ships into the harbor and help them set fire to Charleston. Fortunately for the fate of the captured Charlestonians, the Governor's Council of Charleston had decided to meet the demands of the pirates for the medicine. Unfortunately for the kidnapped victims, the pirate envoys had decided to get rip roaring drunk and could not be found to send back the Council's response.
http://librivox.org/a-general-histor...arles-johnson/