The Pirates Own Book: Authentic Narratives of the Most Celebrated Sea Robbers.

In these delightfully melodramatic accounts, originally published in an extremely rare 1837 volume, you'll find true stories of the diabolical desperadoes who plundered ships on the high seas and murdered their passengers and crews. The stories — based on contemporary newspaper accounts, trial proceedings, and Admiralty records — describe in lurid detail the life, atrocities, and bloody death of the infamous Black Beard as well as the cold-blooded exploits of Jean Lafitte, Robert Kidd, Edward Low, Thomas White, Anne Bonney, Mary Read, and scores of other maritime marauders.

The first edition of The Pirates Own Book was published in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1837, and during the next 25 years it was followed by at least eight other editions. Today it is a rarity among collectors and has long been considered a hard-to-find rarity of Piratology. Now available once again in this inexpensive quality edition, it will thrill lovers of drama on the high seas or any reader interested in the true-life adventures of the ruthless men and women who sailed under the black flag so long ago.

Conjured and culled from various accounts, Ellms’ tales show a curious ambivalence toward pirates and pirating in that they are emphatic about the harm and evil of piracy, and yet equally inclined to advocate piracy as a credible human endeavor.