What Netflix's "Lost Pirate Kingdom" Got Right (and wrong) About the Golden Age Pirates

I greatly enjoyed being an on-camera expert for Netflix's hit docudrama series "Lost Pirate Kingdom," which essentially tells the story of the Golden Age pirate gang related in my 2007 work of history, The Republic of Pirates.

But how accurate was the six-part series, which has reignited interest in Blackbeard and his peers in the Flying Gang?

I wrote up my thoughts on that over at Talking Points Memo. Hope you enjoy it and the series.

Talking pirates on a forthcoming Netflix series

A few months before the pandemic struck I travelled to a Manhattan studio to film an hours-long interview with a British production company working on a documentary-drama on the Bahamas-based pirate gang who are the subject of one of works of history, The Republic of Pirates.

I'm pleased to see that that series, for Netflix, is being released March 15th and is entitled "Lost Pirate Kingdom." Based on the trailer it should be a hoot.

If you find yourself hankering for more of Blackbeard and his gang's story, do consider checking out the book. And either way enjoy the show.

[Update, 3/15/21: Episode 1 out now.]

Talking the Republic of Pirates in, yes, Nassau, The Bahamas, Feb. 24

My third book, The Republic of Pirates: Being the True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down is the most comprehensive, back-to-the-archives account of the most famous pirate outbreak in history, the one that's responsible for virtually all of our pirate pop culture imagery and the inspiration for the pirates of Robert Louis Stevenson and the Walt Disney Company.

That pirate gang was able to become as fearsome as it did because they had a fortified base, a pirate republic if you will, at Nassau in the failed British colony of the Bahamas, which had been sacked and destroyed by the enemy in the War of Spanish Succession. Blackbeard, Sam Bellamy, Calico Jack Rackham, Stede Bonnet, Mary Read, Anne Bonny and many other infamous pirates gathered together there, protected by the repurposed fort, supported by a population of rogues, escaped slaves, and opportunists, and supplied by the unscrupulous merchants of Harbour Island. Its a remarkable tale from start to finish, and the book has inspired an NBC series (Crossbones with John Malkovich and Kate Foy) and Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, which recreated early 18th century Nassau in great detail (and for which I served as a historical consultant.)

So it's with great pleasure to announce that on Monday, February 24, I'll be speaking on the pirates in Nassau at the Pirate Republic Brewery Taproom, located, appropriately enough, on Woodes Rogers Walk on a site that would have been smack in the middle of the old pirate village. It's at 6pm and free and open to the public. Parrots optional.