Anne Bonny

Overview

Anne Bonny (born Anne Cormac, c.1697–1698 – traditionally said to have died 25 April 1782) was an Irish‑born pirate active in the Caribbean between about 1718 and 1720, best known for sailing with John “Calico Jack” Rackham and for standing trial for piracy alongside fellow woman pirate Mary Read. Although her documented career at sea was brief, she has become one of the most famous figures of the so‑called Golden Age of Piracy and a central icon in the history of women at sea.

Reliable contemporary information about Bonny is sparse. The main early narrative source is Captain Charles Johnson’s 1724 book A General History of the Pyrates, which mixes fact with anecdote and has shaped later legends. Modern scholars supplement this with Jamaican court records, colonial correspondence, and research in South Carolina parish and probate archives. These materials confirm that an Irish woman named Anne Cormac/Bonny participated in piracy under Rackham, was captured and tried in Jamaica in 1720, escaped execution by pleading pregnancy, and—according to later record‑based reconstructions—likely spent her remaining decades in South Carolina rather than on the gallows or at sea.

Early life and background

Most modern accounts agree that Anne Bonny was born near Cork or Kinsale in County Cork, Ireland, around 1697–1698, the illegitimate child of lawyer William Cormac and his servant Mary Brennan.[3][4][11] Her precise birth date is unknown; approximate years are inferred from later age statements and the timing of her marriage and piracy, and no baptismal record with a full date has been securely identified.

Cormac’s relationship with Brennan reportedly scandalized his professional and social standing. To avoid local censure, he eventually left his wife and legitimate family and set up household with Anne and her mother. By the early eighteenth century, sources indicate that the family emigrated to the Americas, settling near Charles Towne (now Charleston), South Carolina.[3][4] There, Cormac appears in colonial records as a practicing lawyer and planter, suggesting that the family attained a measure of economic stability in the expanding British colony.

Little is definitively known about Anne’s childhood in South Carolina beyond later anecdotes: Johnson’s account describes her as strong‑willed, quick‑tempered, and resistant to expected female roles. Some stories claim she attacked a would‑be suitor or clashed violently with a servant; however, these incidents are not independently documented and may reflect popular tropes about unruly women rather than verifiable events. What can be said with more confidence is that she grew up in a slaveholding plantation society, in which gender norms prescribed domesticity and obedience for white women, and that she later rejected many of those expectations by going to sea, wearing male clothing in battle, and bearing arms.

Marriage and move to the Bahamas

By around 1715, Bonny married a small‑time sailor named James Bonny in or near Ireland, probably against her father’s wishes.[1][2][3] The marriage gave her the surname by which she is historically remembered. Soon afterward, the couple emigrated to the Caribbean, settling in the Bahamas, then a notorious haven for pirates and former privateers.

At this time, the Bahamian port of Nassau had recently been declared a British crown colony and was in the process of being pacified by Governor Woodes Rogers, who offered royal pardons to pirates willing to surrender. Johnson and later writers describe James Bonny as working as an informant for the governor, identifying pirates for possible arrest.[1][2] Anne, by contrast, is portrayed as sympathizing with or socializing among the pirate community, an alignment that allegedly strained the marriage. While these characterizations draw heavily from Johnson and cannot all be verified in detail, surviving colonial records confirm Nassau’s role as a center of pirate surrender and imperial reassertion during these years, making it a plausible setting for Anne’s turn toward piracy.

Entry into piracy and partnership with John Rackham

Around 1718–1719, Anne Bonny became associated with the English pirate John Rackham, known as “Calico Jack” for his flamboyant clothing.[1][3][10] Rackham had previously sailed under the better‑known pirate Charles Vane before striking out on his own. According to Johnson, Bonny and Rackham began an affair while she was still married, leading to a permanent break with James Bonny. The exact circumstances are uncertain, but by about April 1719 Rackham and Bonny had stolen a vessel in the Bahamas and embarked on a new cruise, assembling a crew and resuming piracy in the Caribbean.[10]

During this period, Bonny began to live and work full‑time aboard ship, an environment formally hostile to women by both maritime custom and superstition. Many pirate articles explicitly barred women from vessels, and women at sea were widely considered bad luck. To circumvent such restrictions and avoid harassment, Bonny reportedly dressed in male clothing and fought as an armed member of the crew. Contemporaries later emphasized her courage and ferocity in battle, traits that would feature prominently in her legend.

Piracy in the Caribbean, 1718–1720

Bonny’s active piratical career appears to have spanned roughly 1718–1720, the waning years of the Golden Age of Piracy.[1][3] During this time, Rackham’s ship operated largely in the waters between the Bahamas and Jamaica, targeting small merchantmen, coastal traders, and fishing vessels. Legal and narrative sources indicate that the crew took a modest number of prizes compared with more notorious contemporaries such as Blackbeard or Bartholomew Roberts, but their exploits gained disproportionate notoriety because of the presence of women among the crew.

Sometime during these cruises, the crew was joined by another woman, Mary Read, who had lived for years disguised as a man in military and maritime settings.[5][11] Read shipped under a male alias and initially concealed her sex from most of the crew. According to Johnson’s account, Bonny discovered Read’s identity and the two became close companions; when Rackham grew suspicious, Read revealed herself to him as well. The verifiable record confirms that both women were captured with Rackham, tried together, and described as having "disguised" themselves, but the precise dynamics of their relationships remain a matter of speculation.

Despite romanticized portrayals, Rackham’s crew was relatively small and lightly armed. Their piracy relied on surprise and intimidation rather than sustained combat. Still, later testimonies and Johnson’s narrative describe Bonny and Read as active participants in boarding actions and as willing to fight when confronted by armed resistance. Their presence complicates popular images of piracy as an exclusively male enterprise and illustrates how some women navigated rigid gender norms to seize opportunities—however violent or precarious—at sea.

Capture off Jamaica, October 1720

The turning point in Bonny’s career came on 22 October 1720, when Rackham’s sloop was surprised and captured off the coast of Jamaica near Negril Point by a vessel commanded by Jonathan Barnet, commissioned by Governor Nicholas Lawes to hunt pirates.[3][4][10] Colonial authorities had grown increasingly determined to stamp out piracy, which threatened trade and undermined imperial control. Rackham’s crew, active near Jamaica, drew official attention after seizing several small vessels in local waters.

According to later accounts, many of Rackham’s male crew were intoxicated when Barnet’s ship approached at night and offered little resistance once the engagement began. Bonny and Read, however, were remembered for remaining on deck, firing their weapons, and urging the men to fight. Whether embellished or not, this depiction of two women making a last stand while male pirates retreated below deck became one of the most enduring images associated with Bonny. The capture led to the immediate imprisonment of the crew and set in motion the legal proceedings that would fix Bonny’s existence in the historical record.

Trial for piracy and the plea of pregnancy

After a brief imprisonment, Rackham and his crew were brought before the Vice‑Admiralty Court at St. Jago de la Vega (Spanish Town), Jamaica. Rackham and most of his male associates were tried first, convicted, and hanged in November 1720.[4][10] Their executions served as a warning to other pirates and were widely publicized.

Anne Bonny and Mary Read were tried separately on 16 November 1720.[4][10] The court proceedings, preserved in a published transcript, charged them with "piracies, felonies, and robberies" committed on the high seas. Witnesses testified that both women had sailed openly as part of Rackham’s crew and had been seen armed and active during attacks. The women argued, according to the trial report, that they had been compelled by Rackham and had not willingly engaged in piracy. The court rejected this defense, and the jury found both guilty. The judge pronounced the standard sentence for piracy—death by hanging.

On the following day, 17 November 1720, the court reconvened when it emerged that both women claimed to be pregnant. They formally "pleaded their bellies," invoking a well‑established principle of English law that prohibited the execution of a pregnant woman until after childbirth.[4][10] A jury of matrons or equivalent examination would have confirmed their condition. The court accepted the plea and ordered a stay of execution. This legal maneuver did not pardon them, but it spared them from immediate death and introduced an element of uncertainty into their subsequent fates.

The trial and reprieve are historically important for several reasons. They provide the clearest contemporary evidence of Bonny’s existence and activities; they illustrate how gender and reproductive status could shape the application of capital punishment; and they contributed to enduring cultural fascination with Bonny and Read as rare female pirates whose cases required the colonial legal system to adapt standard practices to unusual defendants.

Imprisonment and the fate of Mary Read

Following the trial, Bonny and Read were remanded to prison in Jamaica to await the birth of their children. In 1721, Mary Read died in custody, reportedly of a fever, before she could be executed.[1][5] Records suggest that she may have suffered complications tied to her pregnancy or to the harsh conditions of confinement. A burial entry for a "Mary Read" in Jamaica supports this account, though it does not elaborate on the circumstances.

Anne Bonny’s immediate fate after 1721 is more obscure. There is no surviving record of her execution in Jamaican sources, and no documented transportation order or further trial concerning her. This absence of evidence opened the way for a variety of legends in which she is alternately said to have died in prison, returned to piracy under another name, or escaped through the influence of a powerful father. Modern archival research, however, points toward a less dramatic but more historically grounded scenario involving her return to South Carolina.

Later life in South Carolina: evidence and reconstruction

For many years, historians believed that Bonny’s fate after 1720 was unknown. More recent work with South Carolina parish and probate records has suggested that she may be identifiable with an Anne Cormac (or similar spelling) who appears in the records of the Charleston area and is linked to her father’s family.[2][4][11] According to this reconstruction, Bonny left Jamaica—possibly through her father’s intervention or after a quiet release—and returned to the mainland colonies.

These records indicate that a woman of the right name, approximate age, and family context married a man called Joseph Burleigh (also Burleigh/Burdie), had several children, and lived out the rest of her life as a planter’s wife or respectable colonist.[2][11] Her death is placed in 1782, often specified in later genealogies as 25 April 1782, though the exact day is not clearly attested in surviving primary documents and appears to be a later harmonization of fragmentary evidence.[2][11] Encyclopedic sources such as Britannica acknowledge both the 1782 date and the uncertainty surrounding its precision.

If this identification is correct, Bonny would have reached her early eighties, a striking contrast to the fate of many pirates who died violently or in poverty. Her trajectory would resemble that of some male pirates who, after accepting royal pardons or escaping prosecution, blended back into colonial society. For women’s history, this possibility underscores how a woman could move from notorious criminality—cross‑dressing, wielding weapons, defying maritime gender norms—to a more conventional life in a patriarchal colony, leaving only a faint paper trail behind her earlier notoriety.

Assessment of sources and uncertainty

The study of Anne Bonny’s life highlights broader methodological challenges in reconstructing the histories of marginalized and criminal women. The earliest and most influential narrative source, Captain Charles Johnson’s A General History of the Pyrates (1724), vividly recounts Bonny’s supposed fiery temperament, early violence, romantic entanglements, and witty remarks—including the often‑quoted rebuke to Rackham, "if you had fought like a man, you needn’t have been hanged like a dog." However, modern scholars treat Johnson with caution: while some elements are corroborated by court records and official documents, others cannot be independently verified and likely reflect literary embellishment.

By contrast, the Jamaican trial transcripts and related official documents provide more reliable anchors: they confirm her presence in Rackham’s crew, her participation in piracy, her gender, and the legal outcomes of her case.[4][10] Colonial legal records, such as the proceedings of the Vice‑Admiralty Court and registers of executions, are generally considered dependable, although they are limited in scope and often omit personal detail.

Modern biographical entries from institutions such as the U.S. National Park Service, the Royal Museums Greenwich, and generalist encyclopedias synthesize these materials, often explicitly noting where details derive primarily from Johnson or later tradition and where archival documentation exists.[3][5][11][16] They also emphasize the speculative nature of specific birth dates, early anecdotes, and the exact circumstances of her later life and death. This careful separation of documented fact from legend is crucial in an era when popular culture frequently blurs the boundary between the two.

Personal life and relationships

What can be said with confidence about Bonny’s personal life is fragmentary but revealing. She likely grew up in a household marked by social scandal due to her illegitimacy and her father’s departure from his first family. Her marriage to James Bonny around 1715 appears to have been either impulsive or at odds with her father’s wishes, reinforcing the impression of a young woman resistant to parental control.[1][2][3]

Her later partnership with John Rackham was both romantic and professional; she sailed as an acknowledged member of his crew. Johnson’s account suggests that the relationship strained conventional gender and marital norms: she left her husband, lived aboard ship, and bore a child at some point while affiliated with Rackham, although the timing and fate of the child are uncertain and poorly documented. Some later stories claim that the child was born in Cuba and left with caretakers, but no contemporary records substantiate this.

Bonny’s friendship and alliance with Mary Read have received considerable attention in both academic and popular literature. Their shared experiences as women disguised as men in violent, male‑dominated environments have made them enduring figures in discussions of gender nonconformity, queerness, and the history of cross‑dressing. While it is unclear whether their relationship included a romantic or sexual dimension, modern interpretations often explore this possibility as a counterpoint to strictly heteronormative readings of their lives.

Reputation, legend, and cultural afterlives

Anne Bonny’s historical impact far exceeds the scale of her actual piratical activities. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, her story—transmitted largely through Johnson’s General History—circulated in chapbooks, moralizing tales, and later collections of pirate biographies.[1][5] These narratives cast her alternately as a warning against female waywardness and as a thrilling exemplar of oceanic adventure.

In the twentieth and twenty‑first centuries, Bonny has increasingly been reinterpreted as a figure of women’s resistance to rigid gender roles. Historians of piracy cite her as one of the comparatively few women whose participation in Atlantic piracy is firmly documented, alongside Mary Read and a small number of others.[11] She occupies a prominent place in discussions of women in piracy as a rare example of a woman who crossed gender boundaries to join a profession coded as violently masculine, at significant risk to herself.

Bonny’s image has also been widely appropriated in popular culture. She appears as a character in novels, films, television series, comics, video games, and historical fiction, often portrayed as a fiercely independent woman wielding swords or pistols, dressed in masculine garb but retaining conventionally feminine features. These portrayals range from historically informed to highly fantastical, sometimes adding supernatural elements or drastically altering her biography. While such works shape public perception, they often blend or distort historical fact for dramatic effect.

Legacy and historical significance

From the perspective of women’s history and maritime history, Anne Bonny is significant less for the scale of her criminal achievements than for the way her life illuminates the possibilities and constraints facing women in the early eighteenth‑century Atlantic world. Her documented activities show that at least some women could and did become full participants in maritime violence, not merely camp followers or victims. Her willingness to live aboard ship, carry arms, and fight alongside men challenges assumptions about the impermeability of gender boundaries in seafaring communities.

Her case also highlights how legal systems responded to such transgressions. The Jamaican court’s treatment of Bonny and Read demonstrates that women could be prosecuted and condemned for piracy on the same terms as men, yet also that gender‑specific doctrines, such as the reprieve for pregnant women, shaped the administration of capital punishment. The fact that Bonny likely avoided execution—whether through pregnancy, paternal influence, or both—underscores the importance of social networks and gendered legal norms in determining the outcomes of criminal cases.

Modern scholarship continues to debate aspects of Bonny’s life, especially her early years and later fate. Some historians emphasize the thinness of the documentary record and caution against over‑interpreting her as a feminist heroine; others argue that, regardless of intent, her actions had transgressive implications in a deeply patriarchal society. Either way, she remains a compelling example of how women could occupy and negotiate spaces of power, risk, and illegality in the early modern Atlantic.

Commemoration and historiography

Institutional recognition of Anne Bonny has grown in recent decades. Museums devoted to maritime history and piracy—such as the Royal Museums Greenwich—include her in exhibitions and online resources discussing women at sea and the realities behind pirate legends.[5][11] The U.S. National Park Service has produced interpretive material on her life and trial, situating her within broader narratives of Atlantic piracy and colonial law enforcement.[3] Academic articles, encyclopedia entries, and research guides in women’s and gender studies frequently reference her as a case study in transgressive femininity.

At the same time, critical commentary—including detailed analyses of her Wikipedia entries and popular biographies—has drawn attention to how modern media can amplify speculative or erroneous details. Scholars and historically minded commentators have documented how unsourced claims, invented exact birth dates, or romantic embellishments have entered and circulated in online accounts, prompting calls for rigorous source evaluation. This historiographical debate around Bonny’s biography serves as an instructive example of the challenges of doing women’s history where documentation is fragmentary and myth‑making is intense.

In sum, Anne Bonny occupies a liminal space between history and legend. The core documented facts—her Irish origin, brief career as a pirate under John Rackham, trial and sentence in Jamaica, reprieve due to pregnancy, and probable later life in South Carolina—are surrounded by layers of storytelling that reflect changing cultural preoccupations with gender, crime, and the sea. For an editorial almanac of women’s history, she stands as a vivid illustration of how one woman’s short, violent episode of maritime rebellion left a long wake in law, literature, and popular imagination.