The Republic of Pirates: Being the True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down by Colin Woodard is a fun overview of the so-called Pirates Republic that operated out of the Bahamas during the Golden Age of Piracy from 1715–1725. It explores how notorious outlaws, including Blackbeard, Samuel Bellamy, and Charles Vane, formed the "Flying Gang" to establish a pirates' haven before their continuous predations on regional merchant shipping forced a crackdown on their activities. Buy it on Amazon: https://amzn.to/4xhlCfd The Republic of Pirates isn’t just a narrative history of the Golden Age of Piracy. Woodward advances the argument that the Pirates Republic was a political, possibly revolutionary project, based on democratic and egalitarian values. While pirates often behaved in ways that were more egalitarian than on navy or merchant vessels, I found it difficult to buy into the narrative that the pirates were there...
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