

Jordan settled in Gaspe and took out a loan to buy a schooner named Three Sisters. When the Irish discovered his treachery, he fled to America to make a new life as a fisherman. He escaped, was captured again, and finally slipped the noose by trading valuable rebel secrets in exchange for a king’s pardon. In 1798, he was captured and sentenced to hang. Afterward, it only took a short time for the Danish and Swedish governments to dismantle and destroy the remaining members of the Victual Brotherhood.Įdward Jordan’s short but ruthless career as a pirate began in Ireland as a rebel fighting the British Crown. Stortebeker, along with many of his crew members, was beheaded.
#DANGEROUS PIRATE WATERS TRIAL#
In 1400, the royal forces successfully captured Klaus Stortebeker, one of the guild’s primary leaders, and sent him to trial in Hamburg. In response, King Albert and Queen Margaret temporarily united forces to oust the Victual Brothers. They attacked any unfortunate ships that they encountered, causing such terror among merchant and government vessels that trade on the Baltic Sea came to a virtual standstill. Instead of robbing and ransacking foreign ships for the Crown, however, the guild quickly became the Robin Hood of the Baltic Sea, plundering rich merchant ships to feed the hungry and provide for the poor.ĭuring the siege of Stockholm by Danish Queen Margaret, the Victual Brothers led a daring attack and broke through the enemy’s blockade to deliver food, supplies, and military relief to the city’s inhabitants.Īfterward, the guild set up a permanent camp on Gotland Island and preyed the icy waters. The Victual Brothers were a squadron of German mercenaries hired by King Albert of Sweden to fight against Denmark during the 14th century. The Kuna were cannibals and devoured both him and his crew. This proved to be the end of the fearsome l’Olonnais. When he and his crew set out to find food and supplies, they were captured by the native Kuna tribe. While escaping an attack by Spanish soldiers, l’Olonnais ran his damaged ship aground on the coast of Panama.

A couple of his favorite methods were slicing off portions of prisoners’ flesh with his sword and “woolding,” a process in which a rope was tightened around a person’s head until his eyes popped out. Renowned for his cruelty, l’Olonnais enjoyed torturing prisoners. L’Olonnais spared only one sailor, a witness to tell the horrid tale. He led the remainder of his men to the island of Tortuga where they raided and ransacked the town, destroying an entire rescue crew sent by the governor of Havana. L’Olonnais was at home in the rowdy colonial settlement and became a buccaneer, targeting ships with goods coming from Spain and the West Indies.Īfter a shipwreck in which his crew was attacked and nearly destroyed by Spanish soldiers, l’Olonnais swore revenge. Once his servitude was complete, he ultimately traveled to Saint-Domingue (modern-day Haiti). Although Farrell was forced to return to life on land, she was known forever afterward as the “ Queen of the Waterfront.”ĭuring the 1600s, Francois l’Olonnais was born in France as Jean-David Nau to poor parents who were forced to place him into indentured servitude. Along with reputedly making prisoners “ walk the plank,” Sadie the Goat was known for wearing an ear around her neck, a trophy that had been bitten off a rival gangster during a fight.įarrell’s vicious crew continued their raids for several months before local farmers banded together in strong enough numbers to fight them off. Farrell jumped to the aid of the gang and successfully led the takeover of a much larger ship within a few days.įarrell’s crew was known for their vulgarity and recklessness-openly sailing up and down the Hudson and Harlem Rivers to rob other ships, raid villages, and kidnap people for ransom. Although she began her life of crime with petty thievery, she was inspired to become a pirate while witnessing the botched robbery of a sloop by the Charlton Street Gang. Sadie Farrell was a gang leader from New York who was known for headbutting male victims in the stomach and then robbing them blind.
