In 1695, William Kidd received a royal commission from the Earl of Bellomont, the governor of New York, Massachusetts Bay and New Hampshire, to hunt down pirates and enemy French ships in the Indian Ocean.
35 Facts About William Kidd
2.
William Kidd received a letter of marque and set sail on a new ship, Adventure Galley, the following year.
3.
In 1698, William Kidd captured his greatest prize, the 400-ton Quedagh Merchant, a ship hired by Armenian merchants and captained by an Englishman.
4.
William Kidd was romanticized after his death and his exploits became a popular subject of pirate-themed works of fiction.
5.
Later, during the War of the Grand Alliance, on commissions from the provinces of New York and Massachusetts Bay, William Kidd captured an enemy privateer off the New England coast.
6.
In New York City, William Kidd was active in financially supporting the construction of Trinity Church, New York.
7.
William Kidd had already been twice widowed and was one of the wealthiest women in New York, based on an inheritance from her first husband.
8.
William Kidd's request had the weight of the Crown behind it, and Kidd would have been considered disloyal, carrying much social stigma, to refuse Bellomont.
9.
William Kidd took pride in personally selecting the crew, choosing only those whom he deemed to be the best and most loyal officers.
10.
Short-handed, William Kidd sailed for New York City, capturing a French vessel en route.
11.
The latter would have been considered out of bounds because New York was part of the territories of the Crown, and William Kidd was authorised in part by the New York governor.
12.
Kidd's gunner William Moore was on deck sharpening a chisel when a Dutch ship appeared.
13.
Moore urged Kidd to attack the Dutchman, an act that would have been considered piratical, since the nation was not at war with England, but certain to anger Dutch-born King William.
14.
William Kidd said to his ship's surgeon that he had "good friends in England, that will bring me off for that".
15.
William Kidd was declared a pirate very early in his voyage by a Royal Navy officer, to whom he had promised "thirty men or so".
16.
William Kidd sailed away during the night to preserve his crew, rather than subject them to Royal Navy impressment.
17.
William Kidd kept the French sea passes of the Quedagh Merchant, as well as the vessel itself.
18.
William Kidd might have hoped that the passes would provide the legal fig leaf that would allow him to keep Quedagh Merchant and her cargo.
19.
William Kidd decided to leave Culliford alone until these reinforcements arrived.
20.
The 1698 Act of Grace, which offered a royal pardon to pirates in the Indian Ocean, specifically exempted William Kidd from receiving a pardon, in William Kidd's case due to his association with prominent Whig statesmen.
21.
William Kidd deposited some of his treasure on Gardiners Island, hoping to use his knowledge of its location as a bargaining tool.
22.
William Kidd landed in Oyster Bay to avoid mutinous crew who had gathered in New York City.
23.
William Kidd felt this was a safer passage than the highly trafficked Narrows between Staten Island and Brooklyn.
24.
Aware of the accusations against William Kidd, Bellomont was afraid of being implicated in piracy himself and believed that presenting William Kidd to England in chains was his best chance to survive.
25.
William Kidd was placed in Stone Prison, spending most of the time in solitary confinement.
26.
The conditions of William Kidd's imprisonment were extremely harsh, and were said to have driven him at least temporarily insane.
27.
Whilst awaiting trial, William Kidd was confined in the infamous Newgate Prison.
28.
William Kidd was shocked to learn at his trial that he was charged with murder.
29.
William Kidd was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to death.
30.
The belief that William Kidd had left buried treasure contributed greatly to the growth of his legend.
31.
William Kidd was alleged to have buried treasure on the Rahway River in New Jersey across the Arthur Kill from Staten Island.
32.
Captain William Kidd did bury a small cache of treasure on Gardiners Island off the eastern coast of Long Island, New York, in a spot known as Cherry Tree Field.
33.
Some time in the 1690s, William Kidd visited Block Island where he was supplied with provisions by Mrs Mercy Raymond, daughter of the mariner James Sands.
34.
In 1983, Cork Graham and Richard Knight searched for Captain William Kidd's buried treasure off the Vietnamese island of Phu Quoc.
35.
William Kidd said that it was "remarkable that the wreck has remained undiscovered all these years given its location," and that the ship has been the subject of so many prior failed searches.