Topics Related to Cultural Resources (DCR)

As a pirate, Blackbeard would have been very aware of his need to be well armed. It was all well and good to catch another ship, but if you couldn’t overpower them your career as a pirate would be short and unsuccessful.

In March 1718, the HMS Phoenix arrived in New Providence carrying the King’s Pardon, and among the first to sign was none other than Blackbeard’s former commander Benjamin Hornigold.

If you thought this would be a post about Blackbeard’s thought process or piratical tactics... you would be wrong. Instead, this post will discuss arguably one of the most important structural features of Blackbeard’s flagship: the head, or toilet, commonly referred to as the “seat of ease.”

When we think of glass today, we mostly think of something like clear, flat window glass – impervious to water and unchanging across the years. Sure, if someone hits a baseball through it the window will break, but there’s not much you can do to chemically damage the glass itself… right?