America’s Pirate Past

In the last year, Somalian pirates have featured prominently in the news. When a Maltese flagged, russian-owned freighter was hijacked off Sweden in late July, it made me very curious about piratery. It turns out that the United States has a long history of pirating:

In the late 1700s and early 1800s, Baltimore’s shipbuilders produced a generation of fast topsail schooners known as Baltimore Clippers. Designed for speed rather than carrying capacity, the Baltimore Clippers were ideally suited to long voyages carrying precious metals and for semilegal activities. Privateering (a nice word for pirating) was a Baltimore specialty; during the War of 1812 the city was home port to 126 privateers. In British eyes it was simply a “nest of pirates”. In September 1814 General Ross’ British Army, having just burned Washington, DC, turned its attention to Baltimore. When the ground forces were stalled outside the city, an invasion fleet stood in the harbor and pounded Fort McHenry for twenty-five hours. The fort and its men held firm, saving Baltimore from destruction. A lawyer named Francis Scott Key watched the bombardment and paid tribute to the defenders of the flag by writing the four verses of “The Star Spangled Banner”.

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