Did slaves become pirates or were they slaves on pirate ships?

by americanplant
Takeoffdpantsnjaket

Yes to both. Perhaps the most well known occurance of slavery and piracy intermingling started in May of 1717, when a French ship named La Concorde began it's first leg of the Atlantic Triangle in Nantes, France.

Ships would leave Europe typically with fine goods or weapons, sail South to the Western coast of Africa, and then trade their European cargo for enslaved Africans. Once loaded up, they would then sail West, cross the Atlantic, and sell the humans they held as cargo (minus those who died in the crossing, of course). With an empty ship, they would load up with the raw materials available in the Americas (often sugar) and return to Europe with them, where they would be consumed and/or processed into finished goods (which were sometimes used as cargo to continue the cycle). La Concorde had made this loop at least once as a slave ship already, and in May of 1717 started another trip with Captain Pierre Dosset in command.

All went well, at first. She sailed to Africa and traded her cargo off. The crew loaded 561 newly enslaved people (and some gold for the officers) and sailed West, bound for the slave markets of the Caribbean. The trip - known as the middle passage - was often brutal and on this particular one at least 61 Africans and 16 crew members died before reaching the Caribbean, sailing as close as 50-100 miles from Martinique before those sails were spotted by two pirate sloops on Nov 17. With more than half of the remaining crew, reduced to about 60 men at that point, too sick to work, the French ship did not stand a chance against over 200 pirates split between two sloops, with both sloops adequately armed for the task. The sloops quickly overtook the much larger ship, and, as was the case very commonly at that time, she gave up rather easily after two small broadsides from the sloops. The pirate Blackbeard had taken another prize ship, one of over 200 tons, and this one he liked. The pirates took all three ships to Bequia, a small island nearby, and unloaded most of the crew plus 455 of the enslaved passengers. 157 would remain aboard La Concorde along with about a dozen of its crewmen, some pressed and some volunteers, which would soon be refitted and renamed as Queen Anne's Revenge. Not being entirely unreasonable (and, more influentially, not having the need for it), Blackbeard left one of the sloops, a 40 ton vessel, at Bequia as he sailed off in their ship. Dosset named the abandoned sloop appropriately - Mauvaise Rencontre, which means "Bad Encounter" in English - and used it to ferry the stranded sailers and remaining Africans off the island, and in multiple trips. Much of this encounter we learned from Capt Dosset upon his return to Europe.

It's impossible to say exactly what the fate of those specific 157 people was, but without a doubt Blackbeard had both folks that had runaway and folks that had been captured by the pirates from ships (or plantations) on board in his crew from his first day as captain until his last (though he also resold some folks captured on ships). They even found "slave shackles" in the wreck of the QAR. By some estimates, roughly 1/3 of the pirates during the golden age were such people, the formerly enslaved, and they served on many different crews.

The punishment for them wasn't equal; when captured it was common to hang the European crewmen and re-enslave the African crewmen, but all else was. While chattel slavery was kicking into high gear, on those decks color was mostly irrelevant. Each man had a vote, a weapon, and a share, though ultimately the captain had "veto" of votes and many formerly enslaved got the worst jobs on board. Still, they were crew and would pull a share of profit, something not possible in the sugar plantations of the Caribbean. As such, whether still making their Atlantic crossing or having run from a plantation, it isn't hard to see what would motivate them in joining pirate crews.

They had ample opportunity to do so as well. As many as 15 pirate vessels in the Golden Age were prize (captured) slave ships, with many more raided for their goods in every part of the triangle.

Other pirates would actively engage in the slave trade for profit, meaning they transported both bought and stolen slaves as cargo on pirate ships. While some were big names, some were small time raiders and smugglers. One particular example happened in the Gulf of Mexico when two English privateers, named the White Lion and the Treasurer, attacked and raided a Spanish slave ship named the San Juan Bautista as she traveled from Angola with 350 enslaved passengers, headed to Vera Cruz to sell them. The English ships would take over 50 of the Africans and sail north, arriving in modern day Hampton Roads, Virginia just a few days later and bartering some 20 of them for food.

According to Jamestown settler John Rolfe;

About the latter end of August, a Dutch man of Warr of the burden of a 160 tunnes arrived at Point-Comfort, the Comandors name Capt Jope, his Pilott for the West Indies one Mr Marmaduke an Englishman. They mett with the Treasurer in the West Indyes, and determined to hold consort shipp hetherward, but in their passage lost one the other. He brought not any thing but 20. and odd Negroes, which the Governor and Cape Marchant bought for victualls (whereof he was in greate need as he pretended) at the best and easyest rates they could. He hadd a lardge and ample Commyssion from his Excellency to range and to take purchase in the West Indyes.

This was in the summer of 1619, and is the source of that date being commonly linked to the foundation of American slavery (such as by project 1619 of the NYT).