Ward had stolen a vessel with no valuables whatsoever. The ship’s Catholic owner had got wind of their plot and moved all his possessions ashore. When Ward went to examine his ill-gotten treasure, he received a rude awakening. Sir Francis Drake was the most famous, but others were no less successful. Privateering reached its zenith in the aftermath of the Spanish Armada, when many of England’s illustrious sea captains turned to privateering. This semi-legal commission empowers the privateer to attack enemy shipping, on the understanding that the booty will be shared between the crown, ship owner, captain and crew. A privateer is acting under a commission, known as a letter of marque. A pirate is a lawless robber who preys on ships with the intention of stealing the vessel and its cargo. The distinction between pirate and privateer is subtle but important. Pirate or privateer: what’s the difference?

They then set sail into the English Channel. His little band stormed the ship that very night, overpowering the two watchmen and clamping them in irons. Ward persuaded 30 of his seafaring comrades to seize the vessel and its treasure. A small merchant ship was anchored in the harbour, and it was stashed with the possessions of a Catholic merchant about to move from England to France. Ward was lodging in Portsmouth when he heard a rumour that was to change his life. What is the origin and meaning of the pirate expression ‘shiver me timbers’?.“Where are the days that have been … when we might sing, swear, drink, drab and kill men as freely as your cake-makers do flies?” Ward yearned for the recent past, “when the whole sea was our empire, where we rob at will”. According to an acquaintance, Andrew Barker, he bemoaned his ill fortune. James VI and I – successor to Elizabeth I – banned all privateering expeditions and Ward found himself out of work. Ward’s seafaring life took a knock in the summer of 1604 when the Anglo-Spanish war came to an end. Yet it was certainly during this time that he learned his piratical tricks. It is not known whether Ward was successful as a privateer, for these formative years of his career have been lost to history. The rest was divided between the ship’s owner and the crew. The deal was simple: the Crown received five per cent of the loot and the Lord Admiral’s agents took 10 per cent. Ward was one of many mariners who turned to privateering – a semi-legalised form of piracy in which Elizabeth I issued licences to anyone intending to plunder ships that belonged to the hated Spanish. The first inkling of his future talents came with the defeat of the Spanish Armada. An out-and-out wastrel who spent much of his time getting drunk, he would “sit melancholy, speak doggedly … repine at other men’s good fortunes”. Born into an impoverished family c1553, his early life was spent fishing the tidal waters of his native Kent.

Pirate storm death of glory