Many Escaped Slaves Joined Pirate Crews
A common misconception about pirates is that they were all white Europeans or men of European descent. Runaway slaves found that joining a pirate crew was the best way to truly escape their bondage. Many either ran away from plantations or joined maroon communities of escaped slaves, eventually traveling to port cities to find a pirate crew to join. It is estimated that 25-30% of the former slaves who were serving on pirate ships between 1715 and 1726 were runaway slaves owned by the Spanish, called cimarrons. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, black sailors were common knowledge, so much so that runaway slaves would disguise themselves as sailors to escape the American South. In the 1830s, Frederick Douglass wore sailor’s clothes and held papers that were given to him by a sailor to escape slavery in the South.
Although blacks could get more autonomy and freedom through life on the sea, becoming a pirate was ideal for them. Boarding a pirate ship was a way for runaway slaves to escape the North, where there was still a chance he could be kidnapped and resold into slavery or returned to his owners. In 1643, the New England Federation of colonies of Massachusetts, New Haven, Connecticut, and Plymouth passed an article that allowed for fugitive slaves to be returned to their owners. While there wasn’t an official Fugitive Slave Law until the late eighteenth century, many runaway slaves always lived in fear of discovery and being returned to their masters: boarding a pirate vessel or choosing a life on the sea was a way to escape North America and the chances of being returned to slavery.