Teach's Hole Exhibit - Stede Bonnet

The Pyrate Shoppe

Pyrate Merchandise

Blackbeard's Features

Blackbeard Exhibit

Weapons

Flags of Terror

Blackbeard's Hangout

Women Pirates

Blackbeard's Treasure

Blackbeard's Log

Blackbeard's Notes

Pyrate Links

Outer Banks Info.

Lighthouses

Wedding Planer

Weather

Tides

The Pyrate Shoppe

Stede Bonnet

It was early March in 1718 when Blackbeard met Major Stede Bonnet and invited him onboard the Queen Anne’s Revenge.

      Bonnet was a retired army officer who owned a large sugar plantation on the island of Barbados. To escape a nagging wife, he purchased his own sloop and recruited a crew of seventy men. He named his sloop the Revenge.
      Blackbeard and Bonnet decided to sail together but within a few days Blackbeard was convinced that Bonnet knew nothing about maritime life. Bonnet’s own crew had little confidence in his leadership.
      Blackbeard calmly took over Bonnet’s sloop and persuaded him to stay aboard the Queen Anne’s Revenge.
     While off Charleston, Blackbeard made the decision to disband his fleet and accept the King’s Pardon from Governor Charles Eden of North Carolina.
      He informed Bonnet of his plan to go to Bath and receive his pardon and suggested that Bonnet do the same. Blackbeard also offered to return command of the Revenge to him. Bonnet left immediately in a small boat for Bath.
      When he returned, Blackbeard and the Adventure were gone, along with all the booty. Bonnet was furious and set out to seek revenge. But Blackbeard was too crafty and the two were never to meet again.
     Bonnet, unsuccessful in locating the crafty Blackbeard, sailed northward. He is known to have captured as many as twelve ships before returning to the Cape Fear River in North Carolina to clean the hull of his ship.

Colonel William Rhett, the Receiver General of the Carolina Province, who had been commissioned to track down the pirates who had humiliated the people of Charleston, found Bonnet on September 27, 1718 in the Cape Fear. After a fierce battle with 42 casualties, Bonnet was taken prisoner and was returned to Charleston for trial. On November 10 he was found guilty of piracy and sentenced to hang the following month.
While in prison, Bonnet wrote a highly emotional letter to the Governor, pleading for his life. Unfortunately for the pirate, his well written letter did not change his fate. He was hung at White Point on December 10, 1718, and his body was left hanging four days as a warning to anyone considering piracy as a career.