The Black Pearl

Lord_Dreagon - Welcome to the Forum!  I think you'll find it an interesting, friendly place.  It's inhabited by some rather strange people, but most of us seem to be relatively harmless.

We've had quite a few discussions about "pirate ships."  Here's a link to a thread in which (several posts down from the top) we took up the "Captain Kidd" connection:  /forums/615846/ShowPost.aspx

The kit Lindberg is currently selling with the name "Captain Kidd" on it is in fact a reasonably accurate model of the late-seventeenth-century German warship Wappen von Hamburg.  That kit originated in the early or mid-1960s.  For its time it wasn't a bad kit; it still holds up pretty well in comparison with most plastic sailing ship kits (and, for that matter, most wood ones).  In labeling it a "pirate ship," however, Lindberg is just pulling a marketing stunt.  So far as I can tell, the only thing the company changed when it applied the new label is the nameplate on the mounting stand.

The kit Lindberg calls "Jolly Roger" is a reissue of the French eighteenth-century frigate La Flore - again, a reasonably competent 1960s-vintage kit with no actual connection to piracy.  I think the Lindberg "Flying Dutchman" was/is another incarnation of the Wappen von Hamburg kit, in a different color of plastic.  (For a while Revell was also selling its excellent Golden Hind kit as a "Flying Dutchman."  It glowed in the dark.)  Lindberg has been selling two other old kits with piratical names.  The one with the name "Blackbeard" is the old Pyro Sovereign of the Seas, and the one labeled "Sir Henry Morgan" used to be Pyro's version of the French warship St. Louis.  Again, no genuine pirate connection except what originated in the minds of Lindberg's marketing people.  The idea of a pirate operating a ship of the size - and cost - of either of those enormous vessels is, of course, preposterous. 

The movies, of course, are nothing more or less than fantasies - and great fun when perceived as such.  I do get a tiny bit (only a tiny bit) uncomfortable when viewers (including some of my students) get the notion that the movies have anything to do with actual maritime history.  (In fact they have as much to do with history as Star Wars has to do with NASA - maybe less.)  I have no quarrel with anybody who uses an existing plastic kit to represent a completely imaginary object (which all the ships in those movies are).  I do, however, have some reservations about model companies that try to recyle their products by putting new, slightly deceptive labels on them.  Somewhere in there is a line between good clean fun and false advertising.

So much for curmudgeonly caveats.  The movies are fun entertainment - and if they inspire a few people to read some genuine maritime history, so much the better.

 Agreed. There has been a lot of dispute as what these ships looked like exactly, as not many reliable sketches or descriptions exist and descriptions and sketches often contradict each other. With the discovery of the supposed remains of certain Pirate ships a general picture can be constructed as to armament, masting, and other hardware but the wood in most cases is long gone and any reconstruction of its configuration is well educated speculation at best and details are transitory. When it comes to wooden ship from 300 + years ago you are kind of screwed when it comes to true and historical detail. To bad the Greeks did not invent photography, a photographic history of old wooden ships would go along way to settling a lot of questions. Since there is no photographic evidence tough the use of words like, possibly, supposedly, allegedly, may have, and other non specific phrases and words show up a lot in discussions about these old ships. 

 That Lindberg is cleverly reselling models is with out a doubt. That they may be close on some and way off on others is an unknown. I however do not fault them as the details of the actual ships are lost to the relentless march of time and the literature that comes with the models is vague and does not claim historical accuracy. 

Thank you for you welcome and the information.

Lord D

Lord_Dreagen wrote:

To bad the Greeks did not invent photography, a photographic history of old wooden ships would go along way to settling a lot of questions.

I believe the Arabs did invent some sort of primitive "photography" somewhere in the 12th century.

Ok, on to ships, I keep having little problems when people talk about "pirate ships" as a specific type of ship.  Pirates used whatever ship they could lay there hands (obviously, mostly small vessels) on (or on rare occasion, was trusted to them (of course, that would have been before they turned to piracy)).

As for the legendary "Flying Dutchman", the legend itself is pretty old but if one would take the legend seriously and build a "replica" of the Dutchman, than the appropriate model would be a mid 15th century Dutch merchand.

At the risk of appearing curmudgeonly (not for the first time), I agree with Dan Cooper.  The public, spurred on by novelists and Hollywood, seems to suffer from a highly romanticized conception of piracy that's taken leave of reality.  Historically, people referred to as "pirates" were a collection of unsavory criminals who shared one major thing in common:  a desire for an easy way to make money.  Piracy, like most forms of criminal activity over the centuries, had (and continues to have) money at its root.

I'm aware of one vessel that actually may have been built as what could be called a "pirate ship."  In 1717 a wealthy businessman named Stede Bonnet decided, for reasons now unclear, to take up piracy.  He apparently had a two-masted sloop, which he called the Revenge, built for the purpose.  Here's a version of the story:  http://www.thewayofthepirates.com/famous-pirates/stede-bonnet.php

But the vast majority of people who resorted to piracy did so with ships they took from the legitimate owners.  The ideal pirate vessel, so far as most practitioners were concerned, was small, fast, and maneuverable, and carried a few guns so as to overpower unarmed or lightly armed merchantmen.  The pirate ship had to be small, because (among other considerations) the people who operated it got paid out of the proceeds of their criminal activity.  "Blackbeard's" Queen Anne's Revenge, the remains of which may (or may not) have been found recently near Beaufort, NC, appears to have been one of the largest vesels used for the purpose.  The notion of a huge, clumsy, expensive warship like the Wappen von Hamburg, the Sovereign of the Seas, the St. Louis, or even La Flore serving as a pirate vessel is utterly absurd; it makes about as much sense as a group of modern pirates (they're out there, all right - in considerable numbers) operating the U.S.S. Nimitz or the QE2.  Those Lindberg kits are, in terms of historical reality, sheer nonsense - a marketing ploy (or, perhaps we could say, modern corporate piracy) with a gullible public as its target.

Professional maritime historians and museum curators tend to roll their eyes or grimace when the subject of piracy comes up.  I don't exactly blame them.  I can remember, during my brief museum career, getting mighty tired of visitors who walked right by some of the most interesting and important maritime artifacts in the world, saying "ok, but where are the pirate cutlasses?" 

People who are serious about maritime and naval history tend to blame the current "piracy" fad on Disney.  Actually those people are, in many ways, wrong.  One of my favorite books on the history of piracy (I don't have many; it's not a subject in which I've ever been particularly interested) is David Cordingly's Under the Black Flag.  Mr. Cordingly was the curator at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich who organized a blockbuster exhibition about the history of piracy there in the early1990s.  Visitors flocked to see such things as the coat Dustin Hoffman wore in the movie "Hook."  Few of them noticed that the exhibition contained scarcely any genuine historical artifacts connected with piracy - for the simple reason that such artifacts don't exist.  But it was a terrific show.  I walked out of the gift shop with an inflatable plastic parrot on my shoulder.  (I still don't know which of my kids, or their friends, eventually absconded with that parrot.)  Mr. Cordingly's book not only reviews the actual history of piracy but considers in some detail the public's fascination with it down the centuries.  The Disney people are, in a real sense, just carrying on a tradition that goes back to Daniel Defoe, James Barrie, and Robert Louis Stephenson - among others.

The word "pirate" seems to have a near-magnetic force as far as the public is concerned - and there's no point in trying to resist it.  I do hope at least some of the people who go to those movies will be inspired to pick up a genuine maritime history book.  Or at least dig into the fictional literature about the subject.  It's as enticing as it ever was.  A few months ago I spent some hours at my workbench with an unabridged audiobook version of Treasure Island.  My wife has a slight crush on Johnny Depp; I think he's an interesting and extremely talented actor.  And Captain Jack Sparrow certainly is an interesting creation.  But as far as pirates go, there's just no way he can play in the same league as Long John Silver.

Yup, I agree with most of what has been said.  Another point that I have always found somewhat bizarre is the idea that pirates somehow disappeared after about 1725, when of course, nothing could be further from the truth!  In fact, the major construction of warships by the US Navy shortly after the 1812 war was specifically focussed on pirate hunting in the Caribbean, as the independence movements of a number of South and Central American countries spawned the usual horde of privateers that were for the most part simple pirates.  Pirates were in most cases spawned from privateers, who worked as auxilliaries for one navy or another during the interminable wars of the 17th and 18th centuries.  The piracy problem would invariably arise once peace was signed, as suddenly hundreds, if not thousands of formerly gainfully employed sailors and small warships were suddenly unemployed.  'Stick with what you know' was the motto, and many of these men turned to piracy as a way of staying dubiously employed until the next war would come along. 

If you want to make a model of something approaching either a historic type of pirate craft (and pirate hunter), you might try something like the 'Roger B. Taney,' or the 'Sandpiper.'  Think small, fast and well-armed schooners!  You might also wish to investigate the various Chebec models around to represent a Barbary Corsair (and these guys raided far and wide, not just the Mediterranean, even once all the way to Iceland!).  If you want a ship from the 'golden age' of piracy, the old Aurora 'Black Falcon' kit isn't too far off (though pretty weak on detail because of its age).  As Professor Tilley suggests, even in the 'golden age' of piracy, most pirate ships were quite small, though in a number of cases they got together into sizeable fleets to take large objectives, such as Cartegena, Porto Bello and Panama.  That said, there WERE a few individual pirate ships that were a fair bit larger, such as the aforementioned 'Queen Annes' Revenge' of Blackbeard, and of course Bartholemew Roberts flagship, 'Royal Fortune' were both sizeable French Indiamen captured out of the slave trade and modified to carry up to 50 guns (for one of these you might consider the old 'Dutch Man o' War Gouda' as a good baseline).  But in both cases, these acted primarily as flagships/motherships to a pirate squadron of smaller and more agile ships that did most of the pirating work.....

jtilley wrote:

Actually those people are, in many ways, wrong.  One of my favorite books on the history of piracy (I don't have many; it's not a subject in which I've ever been particularly interested) is David Cordingly's Under the Black Flag. ...

And actually the "original" "Pirates"-flag was blood-red   Only later came the black (and even later the "Jolly Roger") flag.

Sorry just had to say this, I'm fully aware that mister Tilley has a degree in maritime history, while I'm just a simple train engineer, but with an edge on maritime stuff

jtilley wrote:

My wife has a slight crush on Johnny Depp;

How bizarre, my wife has the same crush....

One more remark though...

Who one considers a  patriot might be considered a pirate in the eyes of another...

Ok, the spelleing may be waaaaaay wrong (hey my mother language isn't english) but, chars lile "Sir" Francis Drake are considered patriots by the English, but were not more than pirates, with the exception of course that they did not attack ships of friendly nations, but besides that, there is absolutely no difference between Captain Kidd and Francis Drake... (ok, this remark maybe a bit political loaded, but it's the truth, isn't it)  This leading of course to the fact that the Navy with the most honored history in the world, is actually "founded" by a "pirate", however, this being said, not all pirates ended at the swinging end of a rope... one former pirate (too bad I don't recall the name at the moment... I'll have to dig in my books for that) ended up being Her Majesty's Gouvernour on Jamaica.... (again... sorry for the spelling, I know I wright it wrong, but somehow I don't know how to write it  right )

Oh, and when on the subject of pirates, you will find that "Caribian" pirates will somtimes be referred to as "Buccaneers", now this is an interesting word when looked at closely.

"Buccaneers" seems to come from the French word "boucain", which in turn means dried (and mostly smoked) lard (ok, I'm not exactly sure if the word "lard" exist in English, but it's to be compared with "bacon"), so the first buccaneers were definately French, and had some kind of fame on thair dried, smoked bacon (lucky for my family, I don't base my coocking on the "famous" french "cuisine" )

Oh btw, my english may be ok to blabber a bit, but... ok, I can't compete with a professor... so : what does the word "curmudgeonly" mean ??? please, please, pretty please ...

From the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (my favorite):  "curmudgeon:...n.  An ill-tempered person, full of resentment and stubborn opinions.  (Origin unknown.)  - curmudgeonly adj.  - curmudgeonry n."  A note on "word history" explains that the editors of the dictionary haven't been able to figure out where the term originated, but "although its origin is unknown, curmudgeon has been around for some time, being first recorded in a work published in 1577."

My students and colleagues will confirm that it's extemely applicable in this case.

Drake may actually have deserved the label "pirate" more than Kidd did.  It's worth noting that the latest major scholarly biography, by Harry Kelsey, is titled Sir Francis Drake:  The Queen's Pirate.  Kelsey paints a considerably less attractive picture of the man than most earlier writers have.  There is, on the other hand, a fairly general consensus that William Kidd never committed a genuine act of piracy in his life.  (There's some room for doubt about some of his behavior in the latter part of his famous voyage, but certainly no firm evidence that any of it was illegal - and there's plenty of evidence that the evidence used to convict and hang him was bogus.)

Dan Cooper - I probably would be considerably less curmudgeonly if half my students (nearly all of whom are supposedly native English speakers) wrote English half as well as you do.  I'm continually amazed, and embarrassed, at how well European schools teach English as a second language.  If I ever tried to communicate in a web forum like this in French or German (both of which I studied - briefly - in college), I undoubtedly would either make a fool of myself or accidentally get into some serious legal trouble.

'Buccaneers' DOES come from the French 'Boucan,' which is a form of smoked beef (think beef jerky).  Originally, these 'Boucaniers' were French colonists (many of them Huguenots) that had been kicked out of their homes and settlements in Western Hispaniola by the Spanish.  Retreating in very small groups into the uninhabited wilderness of Eastern Hispaniola, these evicted men survived by hunting wild cattle for beef, which they cut into thin strips, smoked, and sold to passing ships as opportunity allowed (beef jerky tastes better and has a longer 'shelf-life' than salt beef!).  Others joined them, including Dutchmen, English and others, making the Boucaniers a true mix of all kinds of ne'er do wells eking out a rough, but independent life in the wilderness. 

The Spanish made periodic forays into the interior to eliminate these Boucaniers, but these were quite small expeditions that did little more than hone the marksmanship of the Boucaniers, who would ambush the Spanish at every opportunity.  The society of these Boucaniers was very strange from a contemporary point of view, in that they practiced a form of quite socialist democracy among themselves, sharing all property (even wives!) in common.  As the Boucaniers primary customers for their jerky were passing ships, they soon began to build small and very fast boats to deliver the goods and escape the Spanish Costa Garda who were always looking to intercept them.  As time went by, the Boucaniers became Buccaneers in truth, by joining together in larger groups and attacking and looting some of the passing Spanish ships in revenge for their own losses.  The depredations of these 'Bretheren of the Coast' eventually caused the Spanish to launch a large-scale expedition to crush these buccaneers once and for all.  To a large extent, the Spanish succeeded in clearing Hispaniola of these pirates, but instead of destroying them, the buccaneers simply fled to the island of Tortuga just to the Northwest of Hispaniola, re-established themselves as a quite powerful and unified force for their own defense, and began their new trade as full-blown pirates of the type now well known in film and fable...... But even the egalitarian pirates of the Caribbean had their own hierarchy, and those that could claim some connection with the old buccaneers of Hispaniola generally were rated of higher status than late-comers to the trade.

Actually yes, here is a very nice card model of the Black Pearl.

http://uhu02.way-nifty.com/photos/kansei/a2.html

Hope you enjoy...you do need to be a pro at models though to construct this.

 Best of luck

 This one looks a lot like the Black Pearl and made of wood.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sanantonyu94/3809240383/