Blackbeard's Treasure

The Claim

There are millions worth of treasure hidden “somewhere” by the famous pirate Blackbeard.

If you know what a pirate is, then you’ve most likely heard of Blackbeard. Real name Edward Teach, he was an English pirate who operated in the early 1700s, leading a large group of pirates on a spree of pillaging ships and towns.

Little is known of his early life, and his exact age is a mystery, though he is believed to have been between 35 and 40 when he died on 22nd November 1718.

He is thought to have served in the English navy at some point before settling on New Providence, an island in the Bahamas, where he met Captain Benjamin Hornigold, who was stationed there. Teach joined his crew in 1716 and was placed in charge of a single-masted sailing boat he had previously captured.

Hornigold and Teach had no intention of sitting around on the island living off the meagre navy pay they had saved up, and decided to plunder to make their riches. They engaged in numerous acts of piracy and captured 2 more ships during their raids, but Horningold retired at the end of 1717, taking 2 of the ships with him. Edward Teach was now in charge of the other 2 ships and the majority of the pirates who had followed them. It was from this point onwards that he became captain and started to be known as Blackbeard.

Blackbeard had many successful raids all around the West Indies and the Eastern coast of the North American colonies, and at one point captured a large French merchant ship, arming it with 40 cannons and renaming it “Queen Anne’s Revenge”.

After blockading the port of Charles Town and demanding a huge ransom to stop, he ran the “Queen Anne’s Revenge” into a sandbar and got it stuck, losing it from his fleet. After this, he settled in Bath, North Carolina, and accepted a royal pardon from the crown to stop his activities.

He couldn’t stay away from the easy money and was soon back to his tricks, attacking merchant ships along the east coast of the country, which caught the attention of the governor of Virginia. The governor organized a group of soldiers to find and capture Blackbeard, which they did on the 22nd November 1718. The battle was said to be quite fierce, and Blackbeard and several of his crew were killed by a small force led by Lieutenant Robert Maynard.

But what about the treasure?

Well, the thing is, it has never been found, any of it. Pirates generally live quite short lives, but the ones who are good at it stand to get very rich very fast.

One thing it’s important to remember is that gold was the best currency at the time, as there was no paper money and coins were normally in short supply or lost value for various reasons, so when people traded with other nations, gold spoke globally. Ships would carry huge amounts of wealth and relied on simply not being seen or the authority of who they worked for to protect them, as opposed to a small fleet of escort ships, but none of this mattered to a pirate.

Capturing one decent merchant ship would be enough for a captain to retire on, and Blackbeard was one of the best pirates out there, capturing many ships and being known to have seized a tremendous amount of wealth, so where is it?

There are various stories about it being hidden in various spots, but none of them come from reliable sources and appear to be nothing more than a story; however, it has to be somewhere.

One of the most popular tales is that it’s somewhere in Bath, California, where Blackbeard settled briefly. It’s believed that he previously stashed his wealth in various spots and eventually brought it to Bath for safer keeping, though again, this is just a story.

The treasure is most likely buried on an isolated island or section of coast, as pirates often used to bury their treasure. The reason was 2 fold, first they didn’t have the option of putting it in any sort of bank or buying large amounts of land, as a peasant walking up to a town governor and placing a sack of French gold on the desk would raise questions to say the least.

Secondly, they did this to protect themselves in the event of capture. Any wealth on board a captured ship would be seized by whoever captured it, so having a large stash of ransom money hidden elsewhere would be a good option to have.

Sadly, the treasure could be in a million different places as the length of coastline he operated on was enormous, making it purely luck should anyone ever find it.