Bristol Ships captured by Pirates

Morning Star - 1721
Thomas Anstis

The Morning Star, a Bristol slaver left Bristol in February 1721 with Captain James Cochett and 16 crew members, for Africa and Charles Town, South Carolina.

One of Bartholemew Roberts’ lieutenants, Thomas Anstis, had broken away from Roberts’ gang in Africa and had returned to the Caribbean.

In late 1721 he attacked and captured the Morning Star. He kept the ship, complete with its Bristol crew, and he sailed the Caribbean waters looting ships for a year. 

By accident they wrecked it on a reef on the Grand Cayman Islands. Everybody got off the ship and onto the shore, including forty pirates and the members of the Morning Star’s original crew. They were all rounded up but not charged with piracy as it was determined that they were all coerced into participating. 

Anstis and a few men escaped on another ship but he was killed on land. 

Just a few of the pirates managed to hide on an island and eventually stole a sloop that visited into the harbor. They sailed this sloop all the way to England and sank it near Bristol, and then quietly returned to their homes.