Today I welcome back my friend and fellow-author Emma Rose Millar. Emma has already appeared on my blog (and you can read her interview here), but today she is going to tell us about John Rackham (also known as Calico Jack), who appears in her amazing novel Five Guns Blazing.
Welcome back, Emma. Please, tell us more...
John
Rackham – Casanova of the Seas
His
notoriety came from his gentlemanly conduct and his outlandish dress sense
rather than from his treacherous exploits. He was a mystery, a romantic hero,
the Lothario of the seas. (Five Guns Blazing – Emma Rose Millar and Kevin
Allen).
John Rackham was probably the least successful
pirate ever to captain a ship. However, his garish fashion sense, womanising
and general flouting of every rule in the pirate code have made him one of the
best loved pirates of the Caribbean and Latin America. He is also the man responsible for designing
the iconic Jolly Roger flag, a symbol we recognise to this day.
Rackham began his villianous career as quartermaster
for the infamous Charles Vane, who made his living looting ships off New York.
During their spree of law-breaking and criminality they came across a huge
French man-o-war, from which Vane, out of caution, ordered a retreat. But
Rackham, tempted by the riches on board, led a mutiny against the captain and
usurped him at the helm. Being the gentleman he was, though, he still furnished
Vane and his supporters with a small sloop, sufficient ammunition and a variety
of other goods.
In probably the most daring of his piratical
escapades, Rackham found himself trapped off the coast of Cuba by a Spanish war
ship which had entered the harbour along with a captured English ship. The
Spaniards were unable to get to Rackham’s sloop due to the low tide but decided
to sit it out until morning. At dead of night, Rackham and his crew took rowing
boats over to the English ship and claimed it as their own. In the morning, the
Spanish crew open fired on the now deserted pirate sloop and Rackham and his
crew sailed away unnoticed aboard the English vessel.
But this was in no way typical of John Rackham’s
career. He made his living picking off smaller vessels close to shore. The
bigger prizes, he said were armed to the hilt and would speed him straight to
the gallows. It was better to acquire one’s riches slowly and with caution.
In 1718, Rackham sailed to the pirate haven Nassau
in the Bahamas to take the blanket pardon offered to all pirates by Governor
Woodes Rogers. Rackham claimed Charles Vane had forced him into a life of
piracy and was granted the pardon and his freedom, but his legitimate life was
not set to last.
Rackham soon took up with a beautiful, flame-haired
female pirate, Anne Bonny. But Anne was married and when her husband discovered
their affair, Woodes Rogers had her flogged for adultery. Rackham escaped to
sea with Anne Bonny and the two resumed
their criminal lifestyle.
But Anne was not to be the only female to sail on
board one of Rackham’s sloops. Captured sailor Mark Read was invited to join
the crew and Anne soon befriended him, igniting Rackham’s rage. It was not
until he discovered the pair undressed in Anne’s quarters that Rackham
discovered Mark was actually a woman, the treacherous Mary Read.
In October 1720, Governor Woodes Rogers sent pirate
hunter Jonathan Barnet after Rackham’s sloop. Barnet attacked in the early
hours of the morning while most of the crew were drunk below deck. Barnet’s men
faced little resistance from the outlaws, apart from Bonny and Read who fought
viciously with another unknown pirate. It seemed the vagabond Rackham preferred
his women to do his dirty work to the end! The King offered a reward for any
information leading to the arrest of this mystery pirate, but he (or she) was
never caught.
John Rackham and eleven of his crew including Anne
Bonny and Mary Read were sentenced to death. Rackham was hanged in Port Royal
on November 18th 1720. His body was gibbeted and placed at the main entrance of
the city to serve as a warning to all. He is fondly remembered as ‘Calico Jack’
after his brightly coloured striped pants, made of the same fabric.
Five Guns Blazing is now available on Amazon
"Never had she imagined she would be brought so low, and all for the love of a very bad man."
1710
Convict's daughter Laetitia Beedham is set on an epic journey from the back streets of London, through transportation to Barbados and gruelling plantation life, into the clutches of notorious pirates John 'Calico Jack' Rackham, Mary Read and the treacherous Anne Bonny.
In a world of villainy and deceit, where black men are kept in chains and a woman will sell her daughter for a few gold coins, Laetitia can find no one in whom to place her trust.
As the King's men close in on the pirates and the noose begins to tighten around their necks, who will win her loyalty and her heart?
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