Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America's Most Notorious Pirates

By Eric Jay Dolin

Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America's Most Notorious Pirates - Eric Jay Dolin
  • Release Date: 2018-09-18
  • Genre: U.S. History
Score: 3.5
3.5
From 130 Ratings

Description

With surprising tales of vicious mutineers, imperial riches, and high-seas intrigue, Black Flags, Blue Waters is “rumbustious enough for the adventure-hungry” (Peter Lewis, San Francisco Chronicle).
Set against the backdrop of the Age of Exploration, Black Flags, Blue Waters reveals the surprising history of American piracy’s “Golden Age” - spanning the late 1600s through the early 1700s - when lawless pirates plied the coastal waters of North America and beyond. “Deftly blending scholarship and drama” (Richard Zacks), best-selling author Eric Jay Dolin illustrates how American colonists at first supported these outrageous pirates in an early display of solidarity against the Crown, and then violently opposed them. Through engrossing episodes of roguish glamour and extreme brutality, Dolin depicts the star pirates of this period, among them the towering Blackbeard, the ill-fated Captain Kidd, and sadistic Edward Low, who delighted in torturing his prey. Upending popular misconceptions and cartoonish stereotypes, Black Flags, Blue Waters is a “tour de force history” (Michael Pierce, Midwestern Rewind) of the seafaring outlaws whose raids reflect the precarious nature of American colonial life.

Reviews

  • A fun read

    3
    By #CLJ
    While entertaining it does seem to lack its own discovery of many topics and discussions. Never the less gives great summary of how in many instances many of those who were labeled pirates were nothing more than extensions of government militaries of the time that ultimately were turned on once no longer needed.