William Kidd, also known as Captain William Kidd or simply Captain Kidd, was a Scottish privateer. Conflicting accounts exist regarding his early life, but he was likely born in Dundee and later settled in New York City. By 1690, Kidd had become a highly successful privateer, commissioned to protect English interests in North America and the West Indies.
1698 (MDCXCVIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar, the 1698th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 698th year of the 2nd millennium, the 98th year of the 17th century, and the 9th year of the 1690s decade. As of the start of 1698, the Gregorian calendar was 10 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.
Treasure is a concentration of wealth — often originating from ancient history — that is considered lost and/or forgotten until rediscovered. Some jurisdictions legally define what constitutes treasure, such as in the British Treasure Act 1996.
Catalina Island or Isla Catalina is a tropical island located 1.5 miles from the mainland on the south-east corner of the Dominican Republic, near La Altagracia and La Romana. It is an occasional destination for cruise ships on Caribbean routes. In particular, Costa Cruises has a private beach on the island. Their ships anchor offshore and transport passengers to shore via tender.
Mary Read, fictionally known as Mark Read, was an English pirate about whom there is very little factual documentation. She and Anne Bonny were two famous female pirates from the 18th century, and among the few women known to have been convicted of piracy at the height of the "Golden Age of Piracy".
Anne Bonny, sometimes Ann Fulford, was an Irish pirate operating in the Caribbean, and one of the few female pirates in recorded history. What little that is known of her life comes largely from Captain Charles Johnson's 1724 book A General History of the Pyrates.
Adventure Galley, also known as Adventure, was an English merchant ship captained by Scottish sea captain William Kidd. She was a type of hybrid ship that combined square rigged sails with oars to give her manoeuvrability in both windy and calm conditions. The vessel was launched at the end of 1695 and was acquired by Kidd the following year to serve in his privateering venture. Between April 1696 and April 1698, she travelled thousands of miles across the Atlantic and Indian Oceans in search of pirates but failed to find any until nearly the end of her travels. Instead, Kidd himself turned pirate in desperation at not having obtained any prizes. Adventure Galley succeeded in capturing two vessels off India and brought them back to Madagascar, but by the spring of 1698 the ship's hull had become so rotten and leaky that she was no longer seaworthy. She was stripped of anything movable and sunk off the north-eastern coast of Madagascar. Her remains have not yet been located.
Captain J. Flint is a fictional golden age pirate captain who features in a number of novels, television series, and films. The original character was created by the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894). Flint first appears in the classic adventure yarn Treasure Island, which was first serialised in a children's magazine in 1881, and later published as a novel in 1883.
Charles Henry Pywell Daniell was an English actor who had a long career in the United States on stage and in cinema. He came to prominence for his portrayal of villainous roles in films such as Camille (1936), The Great Dictator (1940), Holiday (1938) and The Sea Hawk (1940). Daniell was given few opportunities to play sympathetic or 'good guy' roles; an exception was his portrayal of Franz Liszt in the biographical film of Robert and Clara Schumann, Song of Love (1947). His name is sometimes spelled "Daniel".
Henry Every, also known as Henry Avery, sometimes erroneously given as Jack Avery or John Avery, was an English pirate who operated in the Atlantic and Indian oceans in the mid-1690s. He probably used several aliases throughout his career, including Benjamin Bridgeman, and was known as Long Ben to his crewmen and associates.
Richard Coote, 1st Earl of Bellomont, known as The Lord Coote between 1683–89, was an Irish nobleman and colonial administrator who represented Droitwich in the English Parliament from 1688 to 1695. He was a prominent Williamite, supporting William III and Mary II during the Glorious Revolution.
John Reginald Owen was a British actor, known for his many roles in British and American films and television programs.
Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd is a 1952 comedy film directed by Charles Lamont and starring the comedy team of Abbott and Costello, along with Charles Laughton, who reprised his role as the infamous pirate from the 1945 film Captain Kidd. It was the second film in SuperCineColor, a three-color version of the two-color Cinecolor process, and which utilized an Eastmancolor negative as Cinecolor did not offer three-color origination, only two-color origination via bipack.
A treasure map is a map that marks the location of buried treasure, a lost mine, a valuable secret or a hidden locale. More common in fiction than in reality, "pirate treasure maps" are often depicted in works of fiction as hand drawn and containing arcane clues for the characters to follow. Regardless of the term's literary use, anything that meets the broad definition of a "map" that describes the location of a "treasure" could appropriately be called a "treasure map."
Blackbeard the Pirate is a 1952 Technicolor adventure film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Robert Newton, Linda Darnell, William Bendix, Keith Andes, and Torin Thatcher. The film was made by RKO Radio Pictures and produced by Edmund Grainger from a screenplay by Alan Le May based on the story by DeVallon Scott.
In English-speaking popular culture, the modern pirate stereotype owes its attributes mostly to the imagined tradition of the 18th-century Caribbean pirate sailing off the Spanish Main and to such celebrated 20th-century depictions as Captain Hook and his crew in the theatrical and film versions of J. M. Barrie's children's book Peter Pan, Robert Newton's portrayal of Long John Silver in the 1950 film adaptation of the Robert Louis Stevenson novel Treasure Island, and various adaptations of the Middle Eastern pirate, Sinbad the Sailor. In these and countless other books, films, and legends, pirates are portrayed as "swashbucklers" and "plunderers". They are shown on ships, often wearing eyepatches or peg legs, having a parrot perched on their shoulder, speaking in a West Country accent, and saying phrases like "Arr, matey" and "Avast, me hearty". Pirates have retained their image through pirate-themed tourist attractions, film, toys, books and plays.
Barry Clifford is an American underwater archaeological explorer, best known for discovering the remains of Samuel Bellamy's wrecked pirate ship Whydah [pronounced wih-duh] which, together with La Louise of French pirate La Buse, is a fully verified and authenticated pirate shipwreck of the Golden Age of Piracy discovered in the world – as such, artifacts from the wreck provide historians with unique insights into the material, political and social culture of early 18th-century piracy.
The Pirate Round was a sailing route followed by certain, mainly English, pirates, during the late 17th century and early 18th century. The course led from the western Atlantic, parallel to the Cape Route around the southern tip of Africa, stopping at Madagascar, then on to targets such as the coast of Yemen and India. The Pirate Round was briefly used again during the early 1720s. Pirates who followed the route are sometimes referred to as Roundsmen. The Pirate Round was largely co-extensive with the routes of the East India Company ships, of Britain and other nations.
Quedagh Merchant, also known as the Cara Merchant and the Adventure Prize, was an Indian merchant vessel famously captured by Scottish privateer William Kidd on 30 January 1698.
Hector William "Harry" Cording was an English-American actor. He is perhaps best remembered for his roles in the films The Black Cat (1934) and The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938).
