Black Sam Bellamy: The Story of the Richest Pirate in History

On this episode of Our American Stories, Samuel Bellamy was a pirate who operated off the coast of New England and throughout the Caribbean. Later known as "Black Sam,” he became one of the wealthiest pirates before his untimely death in 1717. Here to tell the story is Ashley Hlebinsky.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
Samuel Bellamy was a pirate who operated off the coast
of New England and throughout the Caribbean. Later known as
Black Sam, he became one of the wealthiest pirates before
his untimely death in seventeen seventeen. Here to tell the

(00:32):
story is Ashley Lebinski. She's the former co host of
the Discovery Channel's Master of Arms, and she's a frequent
contributor here on Our American Stories. Take it away, Ashley.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
When one thinks of pirates, images of Johnny Depp and
Eyeliner and dreadlocks tend to come to mind. But the
history is far more complicated than that. In fact, one
pirate from the early seventeen hundreds is considered far more
robin Hood than Jack Sparrow. But perhaps that too, is
romanticized lore.

Speaker 3 (01:04):
This story actually.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Begins at the end. In nineteen eighty four, an American
underwater archaeologist named Barry Clifford discovered a shipwreck not too
far from the Massachusetts coastline.

Speaker 3 (01:16):
There was a story here that was much more valuable
than any of the artifacts. You know, of all the
treasures in the world, it's the only documented pirate treasure period,
all of the treasures that we've heard about, you know,
in the Caribbean. It's not pirate treasure Spanish galleons. This
is real pirate treasure. This is the stuff that Robert
Louis Stevenson wrote about. It's the stuff that I dreamt about.

Speaker 2 (01:39):
And the shipwreck was actually only under fourteen feet of
water and five feet of sand. A year later, the
ship's bell was recovered and the bell had the name
of the ship on it, so it made this the
first fully authenticated pirate ship from the Golden Age that
was found in North America. The ship's name was the
Woodha and at the time of sinking it held the

(02:01):
largest pirate prize with treasure that was weighing about five
tons and that included indigo, precious metals, and tens of
thousands of pounds of sterling. The wood A sank one
faithful night on April twenty sixth, seventeen seventeen, after it
capsized during a nor'easter, which drove the boat onto a
sandbar by Wellfleet, Massachusetts, just after midnight. The masts broke,

(02:25):
and according to first hand accounts from the few survivors,
the dozens upon dozens of cannons on the ship helped
rip through the deck, driving the Wooded down into thirty
feet of water and with it. One hundred and forty
six men.

Speaker 3 (02:39):
And the mooncussers showed up the next day. These are
people who cursed the moon because they wanted things dark
so that they could rub ships that came ashore.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
It was not the only ship to go down that night.
Its sister ship, the Marianne, also wrecked. In total, two
survived the Wooda and seven on the Marianne. The captain, though,
went down with the ship. Captain Samuel Bellamy is known
as one of the wealthiest pirates in recorded history. Black Sam,
as he was called, was known for his long black

(03:12):
hair and an odd sympathy and generosity to those he captured,
well as generous as a pirate can be. In the
one year he was a pirate, he and his crew
captured over fifty ships. Known also as the Prince of Pirates,
Bellamy's life actually began in service. Born in Devon, England

(03:32):
in sixteen eighty nine, Bellamy initially sailed for the British
Royal Navy, and according to lore, while he was in
Cape Cod, he had an affair with a woman named
Goody Hallett, and this woman also would be a historical
figure in her own right and earn the moniker the
Witch of Wellfleet. There are several stories that exist as
to why Bellamy left her for a life of piracy,

(03:54):
one being that he was looking for treasure to better
their life together. Another was that she was already married
and he had to get out of town regardless. After
Bellamy left, Hallett gave birth to a child who did
not survive the night due to choking. Despite the fact
that this was an accident, she was charged with murder
and thrown in jail, although she constantly escaped, and then

(04:15):
after she escaped so many times, they let her just
go out during the evenings and she would wander the
beaches at night, as some say, looking for Captain Bellamy
and gaining her nickname in the process. Bellamy left Cape
Cod in early seventeen sixteen with his crew. He was
initially more of a treasure hunter, and he was in

(04:36):
search of an infamous treasure that was supposed to exist
at the bottom of the ocean. In South Florida from
a very famous sunken fleet, but they quickly turned to
piracy and joined the crew of Benjamin Hornigold and is
second in command Edward Teach, who's better known as Blackbeard.
Not long after, though, the crew voted Horner, Goold and
Teach out of command, electing Bellamy as the new captain.

(05:00):
He quickly captured other ships, and in spring of seventeen seventeen,
he captured his prize, the Woda Galley, when sailing through
the Windward Passage. The Woodah was originally a slave ship
built in England two years prior. It was three hundred
tons and one hundred and two feet long and had
eighteen guns and could reach speeds of fifteen miles an hour,

(05:21):
which doesn't seem like a lot today, but back then
was quite significant. It began its voyage in the Atlantic
slave trade, selling a total of three hundred and twelve
enslaved peoples before its capture. Bellamy chased the ship for
three days and he only had to fire one shot
for the captain to surrender. As an award for the
captain's lack of resistance, Bellamy actually gave him one of

(05:43):
his other ships. He would not stay captain long though,
as he was killed in that faithful storm that took
down most of his what was actually a pretty diverse crew.

Speaker 3 (05:53):
A third of these people were of African origin. They
were black, and some of them were being elected by
per dominantly European crews as officers and even captains on
board slave ships. We had absolute proof of this, but
a third of the pirates in the Golden Age of
piracy were of African origin, most of whom will former slaves.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
The nine survivors were captured and prosecuted in Boston. Involved
in the trial was actually none other than Reverend Cotton Mather,
whom a lot of people know better for his involvement
in the Salem witch trials. Of the nine, two were
pardoned because it was believed they were forced into piracy,
and six were hanged, and then there was a sixteen
year old boy who they believe was sold into slavery.

(06:38):
In total, around one hundred and four bodies were found
washed upon the shore after the wreck, and the governor
of Massachusetts was concerned about looting, so he sent his
own captain and cartographer, whose name was Cypriy and Southakt
to salvage what he could there South Act created a
map and what's neat about that is the map is
the same one that Barry Clifford used in the nineteen eighties,

(07:01):
and that would be what he would follow to find
the remains of the ship. And this ship is one
of those ships that has an incredibly ugly past, especially
with the slave trade, but briefly sailed for one of
the most notorious pirates in history.

Speaker 1 (07:17):
And a terrific job by the production, editing and storytelling
by our own Greg Hangler. A special thanks to Ashley
Libinski the story of Samuel Bellamy. Here on Our American Stories.
This is Lee Habib, host of Our American Stories, the
show where America is the star and the American people,
and we do it all from the heart of the
South Oxford, Mississippi. But we truly can't do this show

(07:40):
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