A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pirates

by Charles Johnson, David Cordingly (Introduction)

Originally published in 1724, this famous account chronicles the lives and exploits of the most notorious pirates from Anne Bonny to Blackbeard.

Genres: History, Pirates, Nonfiction, Classics, Historical, Crime, Research

384 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1724

About the author

Captain Charles Johnson, the author of the 1724 book A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates, has not been identified.

It has often been assumed that the name Captain Charles Johnson was a pseudonym, but nothing definitive has been determined about who he may have been. For a period of nearly fifty years, the prevailing theory was that the author's true identity was Daniel Defoe, author of Robinson Crusoe. But that theory has been challenged and invalidated based on a lack of supporting evidence. Nonetheless, his book, which is in the public domain, has been published in a large number of editions by various publishers and in translations around the world, often employing the name Daniel Defoe on the cover.

Reviews

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

"If [the pirates] meet with prosperous voyages, they set down at Madagascar, or the neighboring islands, and enjoy their ill gotten wealth, among their elder brethren, with impunity. But that I may not give too much encouragement to the profession, I must inform my readers, that the far greater part of these rovers are cut short in the pursuit, by a sudden precipitation into the other world."

Thank you, Captain Charles Johnson, whoever you maybe be - and you must know that your identity remains a mystery, however much we wish it otherwise - for documenting the lives of these true and villainous pirates, and all of their verifiable rogueries, so that those of us in the current century may enjoy Treasure Island, Peter Pan, and the full saga of Pirates of the Caribbean, all of which surely possess equivalent cultural value, and for giving us the opportunity to delight in your long and wandering sentences, various digressions, and moral exhortations. And also for your dry sense of humor, which has verily survived the ravages of time. Exempli gratia:

"The majority of the commissioners being of opinion, that they were all guilty of the piracy and felony they were charged with...they were all received sentence of death; which everybody must allow proved somewhat unlucky to the poor fellows."

Somewhat unlucky, indeed. But those poor fellows live long in our memory, and far beyond their most decent contemporaries, owing to the words by which you have enshrined them. A salute to you, Captain! From you, we learn the hard consequences of stealing precious cargo and then feeding a man his own ears.

"For though a voluntary entry with the pirates may be doubtful, yet his consequent actions are not, and it is not so material how a man comes among pirates, as how he acts, when he is there."

Huzzah!

[Rupert Matthews · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you are even remotely interested in pirates then you absolutely must read this book.

It was written back in the 1720s, during the heyday of the pirates. The text is written by Captain Charles Johnson about whom very little is known. he was clearly a seamen as he gives a lot of details about ships and the sea. He may have been a pirate himself, and Charles Johnson may not be his real name. Some of the accounts are obviously based on the trials of the men who were hanged, but he also draws on first hand accounts of battles, robberies and adventures. The writing style is lively and gripping.

Blackbeard and Captain Kidd are here, as are Henry Avery - perhaps the most successful pirate ever - and the female pirates Mary Read and Anne Bonney. Plus several characters that I had never heard of.

There are anecdotes aplenty, lots of action and some astonishing incidents. some of these pirates seem to have been relatively honorable chaps who kept promises and spared the lives of those who surrendered without a fight. Others were absolutely terrible - indulging in sadistic killings and tortures merely for the fun of it.

As so often with contemporary accounts, it is the throw away lines that can be as interesting as the main subject. The number of native Americans found among crews surprised me, as did the sheer scale of some of these pirate voyages - ranging from the West Indies to the Arctic Circle to India and the Malay Peninsula. The seamanship of the pirates must be admired.

A great read.

[Ulysses · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is interesting enough as an account of the misdeeds of the most famous personalities from the Golden Age of Piracy, but its greater value is its meta value as a historical document contemporaneous with the people and events it describes. The book is a mixture of history, recent events of that time, Herodotean second-hand reports ("we shall give our reader an account of the Portugueze settlements on this coast, as they were communicated to me by an ingenious gentleman, lately arrived from those parts"), and correspondences provided as supporting exhibits-- all of which is livened significantly with authorial moralizing, deadpan humor, and delightful turns of 18th-century English phrase ("I now find the Port of Trinidado a Receptacle to Villains of all Nations", "It must be observed that the captain was one of those who are mightily addicted to punch", "They made bold and went aboard the sloop, and Evans informed the folks that belonged to her, that he was captain of the vessel, which was a piece of news they knew not before", etc.). The book fades a bit towards the end, but at the very least, this is a far more entertaining account than any modern histories of pirates that I've read.

[Darlene · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the book that started it all. Adventure! Swordfights! Pirates! Woodcuts of nekkid ladies! Captain Johnson's book has something for everyone. Is "Charles Johnson" really a pseudonym for Daniel Defoe? No one knows for certain, but most of our pirate tales start here, with this volume that captivated audiences in the 18th Century and hasn't been out of print since.

[Pachu Valle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Este libro cuenta de una manera enciclopédica exactamente lo que promete, las vidas y las fechorías de los piratas más conocidos en el momento de su publicación, 1724 es la fecha de la primera edición (lo sé, no es precisamente una novedad). En efecto, ahí aparecen entre otros el Capitán Teach, más conocido como Barbanegra, El Capitán Avery, Bartholomeu Roberts, las famosísimas Anny Bonny y Mary Read y un largo etcétera, descritos con todo lujo de detalles. Se cuentan sus biografías, las rutinas en la mar, los barcos que apresaron, como fueron capturados y llevados ante la justicia y, finalmente, cómo murieron de manera civilizada; en la horca, y colgados luego sus cuerpos en el dique de las ejecuciones, entre las marcas de las mareas hasta que se pudrieran o la mar se los llevase tal como estipulaba la Ley Contra la Piratería. Como lectura resulta bastante repetitiva y una vez que te has leído un par de biografías de piratas comienza a ser un siempre lo mismo, claro, tal que así debía ser. Le pongo por eso solo tres estrellas y lo hago con dolor porque, a mí particularmente, los piratas no me cansan nunca.
Lo verdaderamente interesante de este libro es que, además de sentar toda la cosmogonía pirata tal y como hoy la conocemos; parche en el ojo y pata de madera, a día de hoy, no se sabe a ciencia cierta quién lo escribió.
Originalmente su autoría se atribuye al capitán Charles Johnson, Así aparece en la portada de la primera edición, 1724, publicada por Charles Rivington en Rivington & Co, Londres, pero posteriores estudios confirman que no hubo ningún capitán Charles Johnson al servicio de su majestad en tal periodo. Tampoco se conoce ningún pirata que se atribuyera tal nombre y grado por lo que está totalmente aceptado que se trata de un seudónimo. La lista de sospechosos se presenta entonces infinita pues era práctica habitual en la Gran Bretaña del XVIII publicar bajo seudónimo, prácticamente todos los autores lo hicieron en mayor o menor medida lo que parece que supuso para los estudiosos del tema un auténtico calvario a la hora de atribuir cada obra a su autor. Esta es un ejemplo claro.
En 1923, no obstante, el profesor de literatura inglesa John Robert Moore, atribuye la Historia general de la piratería, a Daniel Defoe, autor en el que está especializado y del que es biógrafo. Cómo no podía ser de otra manera, estalla la polémica en las esferas literarias y desde entonces hay una batalla sesuda y eruditísima sobre si Daniel Defoe sí o si Daniel Defoe no.
Los argumentos a favor son principalmente que Defoe era particularmente aficionado a los seudónimos, se le conocen más de ciento veinte. También el estilo es muy similar, especialmente en algunos de los relatos que resultaron ser ficticios y dramatizados, aunque la mayoría son casos reales y los detalles de los juicios son tan precisos y verificables que es innegable que el autor haya estado presente en todos y cada uno de ellos. Defoe era por entonces un escritor de gacetas y panfletos que deambulaba de un diario a otro y es muy posible que asistiera a los juicios de los piratas pues era la moda del momento.
Los argumentos en contra se centran en la circunstancialidad de las alegaciones de Moore, en que el estilo no es el característico de Defoe sino de la época y en que prácticamente todos sus coetáneos podrían ser candidatos según esas mismas premisas. A favor, que cualquier otro habría reclamado la autoría pues el libro fue un éxito con varias ediciones en un año, pero solo Defoe que tras dos bancarrotas estaba sumido en deudas y pleitos no lo haría por temor a ser embargado. En contra, que en realidad nadie lo reclamaría por no desvelar su carácter novelístico cuando el principal atractivo del libro era ser un documento de primera mano de un marino veterano. Argumentos a favor y en contra se fueron sucediendo entre estudiosos todos de alta credibilidad.
Ya en este siglo XXI, Arne Bialuschewski, en su ensayo Historia general de la piratería, marzo de 2004, propone un segundo sospechoso que les había pasado desapercibido a los especialistas focalizados en el estilo literario de la obra, Nathaniel Mist. Nathaniel Mist era por aquel entonces, 1724, recordemos, un periodista de gacetas y también editor o librero, el término publisher en ese momento era muy ambiguo. Sería por tanto asiduo, no podía ser de otra manera, a los juicios contra piratas, que era el trending topic del momento. Había sido además marino en la compañía de las indias occidentales, conocía los barcos, las tareas, los oficios... y tenía, por último, relaciones profesionales con Charles Rivington, de Rivington & co. La editora de la primera edición de nuestro libro misterioso. Su nombre es el que figura en el registro de publicaciones de Su Majestad para ese libro en cuestión. Esto, lejos de despejar dudas tal vez enconó más la discusión entre los nuevos eruditos que arguyen que si Defoe hubiera querido permanecer en el anonimato no iba a ser tan estúpido de registrar el libro a su nombre...
A día de hoy el debate continúa aunque, a nivel editorial, la mayoría se haya decantado por Daniel Defoe, no por ninguna conclusión historiográfica de amplio consenso sino, más bien, por motivos promocionales. Esta misma edición de Valdemar, llevó en esa misma portada el nombre de Capitán Charles Johnson.

[E Owen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A riveting glimpse into the golden age of piracy (however questionably accurate) and it still remains one of our best sources for their history. The question still stands: who was Captain Charles Johnson?

[Katy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Extremely challenging to read, and very repetitive. I would find myself reading sections over and over again trying to make heads or tails of it but there were also many chapters which I found absolutely fascinating and which really interested me. Very heavy reading, but interesting and insightful.

[Robin · Rating 2 out of 5]

More a historical curiosity than anything else. Other books on the topic can offer better overviews of the subject and more detailed portrayals of the pirates' exploits.

[Adam Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some chapters are a bit slow, with just court records. However, there is enough detail and action to make for an interesting read over all.

[Sophie (RedheadReading) · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting account of the lives of some of the most famous pirates from the Golden Age of Piracy! Given the time it was written in, I was pleasantly surprised at how readable it was.

[feste_thejester · Rating 4 out of 5]

Been wanting to read this for years, and it was definitely worth it! Very long and very dense, but that was expected going into it because of its age, etc. Each account was exciting and unique, and whilst it's debatable whether a lot of it was actually true, there's no doubt that it's a series of good adventure stories.

[Tom Laskey · Rating 2 out of 5]

not great

[Samuel Valentino · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rafael Sabatini this is not.

I have to admit, I was hoping for some good, swashbuckling fun when I first picked up this book. However, it was written in a time when pirates were a common occurrence; several pirates in the book were recorded as still being alive at publication; and their depredations got more and more savage. While pirates may be heroic or fun figures now, at that time they were closer to terrorists, and not likely to be glorified by a contemporary author. So I got a bit of a reality check there.

That doesn't mean that the book wasn't entertaining. There were a number of pirates whose lives were fascinating - Anne Bonny, Mary Read, Captain Avery, to name a few. Howell Davis's adventures are actually funny, though I won't spoil it by saying why. But my favorite all-time pirate is Stede Bonnet. He is, without a doubt, the worst pirate in the whole book, and amazing because of it.

Oddly enough, Blackbeard and Captain Bartholomew were not as interesting as I would have thought, at least not in comparison to the names mentioned previously. I get the feeling that Blackbeard has all the fame because of the name (shades of Dread Pirate Roberts, yes?). Davis stood out much more for me.

The biggest drawback is the writing style - almost newspaper-reporting like. Informative, but often a catalog of robberies rather than a true narrative. Along with the events described, there is additional info, which made reading Captain Bartholomew's account in particular especially tedious. The author put in all the court testimony of the pirates captured when his ship was taken. An incredible resource if one were researching this type of thing, and I'm not sorry that it's included, but unbelievably mind-numbing to get through in any other circumstance. Imagine reading court documents of robberies as entertainment and you get the idea.

Nonetheless, there are other unexpected details of pirate life that I've not come across elsewhere, including the various flavors of sea turtle!

One thing that I liked about the edition I picked up was that it was a facsimile of an early edition, which meant it had the original letters. In other words, it was a print so old that some of the "s" letters were rendered as "f." Pirates were always "failing out of Jamaica" with the "wrong fort," as it were. And then sometimes people DID fail, and I'd have to figure out that they didn't sail. It made reading it like a game!

[Luke Schwiebert · Rating 3 out of 5]

As far as 300-year-old books go, this is a darn good read. Looking past the oft-confusing archaic spelling (not the least of which being the use of "pyrate" instead of "pirate"), the odd syntax, the unusual grammar (seemingly EVERY noun is capitalized, and every name - of a person, place, ship, or month - is italicized), the fact of the matter is that this is where the myth of the pirate began, and easy read or no, that makes this book absolutely fascinating. All the most famous - indeed, most notorious - pirates are here, from Blackbeard to Bonny & Read, and though Johnson may have been heavily stretching the truth, you'd never guess at it from the encyclopedic, list-heavy way he writes the chapters. If you want to truly grasp what pirates were about, you'd do best to seek out a newer, more accurate and readable tome, but if you want to see the legend in its infancy, look no further.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

This strikes me as sort of like the Grimm's fairy tale collection, but about pirates, in that each chapter feels more like the summary of a tale than a full story. I imagine even those summaries represent a significant amount of work on the author's part, so I don't mean this as a slight, just that I always wished for more detail.

That said, this book is one of our main sources of information about classical European pirates, and I muchly enjoyed reading about Blackbeard, Black Bart, Captain Kidd, and especially Anne Bonny and Mary Read. My primary reason for purchasing the book was, in fact, to read about the latter, and the chapters covering them are among the longest and most detailed.

[Becky · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the classic and pretty much perfect history of the pirates of the 18th century. A must read for Blacksails fans. Practically nothing is known about 'Captain Charles Johnson' there are no contemporary records of any such person in the Royal Navy at the time and it is generally assumed that the good Captain was probably a pirate himself. This gives the book an added bit of excitement, to my mind. These are near contemporary accounts of the lives of all of the biggest names in piracy at the time and is 100% fascinating. The new edition combines both volumes of Captain Johnson's bestseller as well as beautiful illustrations from his original books and from other contemporary sources. Simply brilliant.

[Toni · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lo leí hace ya años, allá por 1999, y en aquel entonces me gustó, aunque comprendo que tal vez no resulte tan ameno a quienes no estén interesados en tantos detalles históricos (listas de tripulantes, ejecutados, etc).

Me resultó curioso que algunas tripulaciones tenían una especie de "seguridad social" interna: tenían acordadas cuáles serían las indemnizaciones de los tripulantes en caso de perder un ojo, un brazo, una pierna, etc. durante las batallas.

La edición que tengo es esta misma de Valdemar pero en una impresión anterior, la mía es de abril de 1999 (1ª edición) y el título era ligeramente diferente: Historia general de los robos y asesinatos de los más famosos piratas.

[Rick Brindle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written nearly 300 years ago, this book was always going to be difficult to read and understand. But hey, if you're into your pirates, that's not why we're here, right? This is a book that tells it like it was back then, and if it's not all easy to work out, you still get the feel for the times, and what really happened back then. Not the same as the films, but then what is? A short life, but a merry one, or maybe too short to be merry at all?

[Janastasia Whydra · Rating 3 out of 5]

When you are either reading the original, or a copy that uses the original dialect, it can be difficult because language and speech has changed over the past couple of centuries, but if you're just getting into the pirate genre or looking for a new pirate's tale outside of Captain Jack Sparrow than I would recommend this.

[Olivia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a well researched and easily digestible book that does exactly what it says on the package. It is broken down into individual biographies that may as well be fiction they are so strange in places. Many of the people's lives overlap in unexpected ways. This is how popular history should be written.

[Chuck · Rating 4 out of 5]

They used to attribute this to Daniel Defoe but I agree with the current thought - there was a Captain Charles Johnson out there who knew these pirates. The Bahamas were a breeding ground for pirates at one time who got tired of being privateers who only plundered the Spanish fleet. Fun romp with the original Pirates of the Caribbean!

[Max Gwynne · Rating 4 out of 5]

a brilliant book charting the history of some of the world most notorious pirates. from blackbeard to bonnet, bonny to read this is a fantastic read but a challenging one as the book's language remains unedited from when it was originally published back in the 1740s. regardless, it is an incredibly enlightening book full of gripping life stories of adventure and plunder.

[Halool Angela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading "A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most Notorious Pirates " by Charles Johnson was a delightful way of time spending. I never came across of such a subject, until now. It was a new experience which took me back to my childhood and reminds me the old times when I was reading all kinds of adventure novels.

[Jostein · Rating 5 out of 5]

This 1724 book is fascinating as it is the only source of information (at least semi-contemporary) about several of the most known pirates. If you were to read it as fiction, I would definitely call it slow at times. Reading it as true history is more fun, even though the veracity of several of the stories are impossible to confirm. But I give it 5 stars for historical and cultural importance.

[Sebastian · Rating 4 out of 5]

as kind of a pirate nerd i was really looking forward to reading this book and i got what i wanted but, and this might be just a personal issue, the over describing of places and the style of the narrative really made me want to read anything but this sometimes. but despite that it was still a fun and educational experience!

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not the most accessible book but once you get going with it, it does open your eyes as to how we think of pirates and how they actually were. This book covers some famous and less famous names and the introduction is rather good too.

[Raving Redcoat · Rating 3 out of 5]

The writing is rather dry, and the organization is somewhat chaotic. Still, this work remains one of the most important sources for information on piracy. Not for the casual reader, but devoted fans of the "Golden Age of Piracy" will find it rewarding.

[Emma · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read most of this in a weekend one summer during a brief pirate obsession, then got round to skim-reading the rest in December so that I could mark it as finished. Interesting stuff about the people, interspersed with dryer accounts of ship manifests, etc.
2.5 stars

[Chuck · Rating 2 out of 5]

My dad had this in the basement. No idea why. Pretty standard pirate information.

[Douglas Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating.