Reclaiming Bahamas for the Crown[edit]

Starting in 1713, Woodes Rogers had conceived the idea of leading an

expedition to Madagascar to suppress the pirates there and establish it as
a British colony. Rogers' friends Richard Steele and Joseph
Addison eventually convinced him to tackle the pirates nest in the
Bahamas, instead. Rogers and others formed a company to fund the
venture. They persuaded the Proprietors of Carolina to surrender the
government of the Bahamas to the king, while retaining title to the land. In
1717 King George appointed Rogers governor of the Bahamas and issued
a proclamation granting a pardon to any pirate who surrendered to a British
governor within one year.[11]
Word of the appointment of a new governor and of the offer of pardons
reached Nassau ahead of Rogers and his forces. Some of the pirates were
willing to accept a pardon and retire from piracy. Henry Jennings and
Christopher Winter, sailed off to find British authorities to confirm their
acceptance of the amnesty.
Others were not ready to give up. Many of those were Jacobites,
supporters of the House of Stuart, who identified as enemies of
the Hanoverian King George. Still others simply identified as rebels, or
thought they were better off as pirates than trying to earn an honest living.
When a Royal Navy ship brought official word to Nassau of the pardon
offer, many pirates planned to accept. Soon, however, the recalcitrant
parties gained the upper hand, eventually forcing the Navy ship to leave. [12]
Blackbeard, Stede Bonnet, Nicholas Brown and Edmond Condent left the
Bahamas for other territories. Charles Vane, with "Calico Jack" Rackham
and Edward England in his crew, came to prominence at this time. Vane
worked to organize resistance to the anticipated arrival of Royal authority,
even appealing to James Francis Edward Stuart, the Stuart pretender, for
aid in holding the Bahamas and capturing Bermuda for the Stuarts. As aid
from the Stuarts failed to materialize and the date for Rogers' arrival
approached, Vane and his crew prepared to leave Nassau. [13]
Woodes Rogers arrived in Nassau in late July 1718, with his own 460-ton
warship, three ships belonging to his company, and an escort of three ships
of the Royal Navy. Vane's ship was trapped in Nassau harbor. His crew set
that ship on fire, sending it towards Rogers' ships, and escaped in the
ensuing confusion in a smaller ship they had seized from another pirate.
The remaining population welcomed Rogers; they comprised about 200
settlers and 500 to 700 pirates who wanted to receive pardons, most
prominently Benjamin Hornigold.[14] After the pirates' surrender, the
Proprietors leased their land in the Bahamas to Rogers' company for 21
years.
Rogers controlled Nassau, but Charles Vane was loose and threatening to
drive the governor and his forces out. Learning that the King of Spain
wanted to expel English from the islands, Rogers worked to improve the
defenses of Nassau. He lost nearly 100 men of the new forces due to an
unidentified disease, and the Navy ships left for other assignments. Rogers
sent four of his ships to Havana to assure the Spanish governor that he
was suppressing piracy and to trade for supplies. The crews of ex-pirates
and men who had come with Rogers all turned to piracy. The ex-pirate
Benjamin Hornigold later caught ten men at Green Turtle Cay as part of
Rogers' suppression effort. Eight were found guilty and hanged in front of
the fort.[15]
Vane attacked several small settlements in the Bahamas but, after he
refused to attack a stronger French frigate, he was deposed for cowardice
and replaced as captain by "Calico Jack" Rackham. Vane never returned to
the Bahamas; he was eventually caught, convicted and executed in
Jamaica. After nearly being captured by Jamaican privateers, and hearing
that the king had extended the deadline for pardons for piracy, Rackham
and his crew returned to Nassau to surrender to Woodes Rogers.
In Nassau Rackham became involved with Anne Bonny; he tried to arrange
an annulment of her marriage to another ex-pirate, James Bonny. Rogers
blocked the annulment, and Rackham and Bonny left Nassau to be pirates
again, taking a small crew and Bonny's friend Mary Read with them. Within
months, Rackham, Bonny and Read were captured and taken to Jamaica.
They were convicted of piracy, and Rackham was executed. Bonny and
Read were sent to prison, as both were pregnant and therefore excluded
from execution. Read died in prison, while Bonny's fate is unknown. [16]
When Britain and Spain went to war again in 1719, many of the ex-pirates
were commissioned by the British government as privateers. A Spanish
invasion fleet set out for the Bahamas, but was diverted to Pensacola,
Florida when it was seized by the French. Rogers continued to improve the
defenses of Nassau, spending his personal fortune and going heavily into
debt to do so. In 1720, the Spaniards finally attacked Nassau. Rogers
returned to Britain in 1722 to plead for repayment of the money he had
borrowed to build up Nassau, only to find he had been replaced as
governor. He was sent to debtors' prison, although his creditors later
absolved his debts, gaining him release.
After the publication in 1724 of A General History of the Robberies and
Murders of the Most Notorious Pirates, which praised Rogers' efforts to
suppress piracy in the Bahamas, his fortunes began to improve. The king
awarded him a pension, retroactive to 1721. In 1728 Rogers was appointed
Governor of the Bahamas for a second term. He dissolved the colony's
assembly when it would not approve taxes to repair Nassau's defenses. He
died in Nassau in 1732.[17]