News Flash

While you are in Downtown Hampton enjoying all there is to do and see at the Blackbeard Pirate Festival, take some time visit historic St. John’s Church and hear our guests, historians and authors Dr. Jamie Goodall and Jeremy R. Moss, share their tales of pirates.

2 pm, Virginia - The Colony, the Crown and Pirates (1630-1700)
Dr. Jamie Goodall
Virginia and other colonies along the Chesapeake Bay were developed as a means to an economic end: money. The maritime communities of early colonial Virginia were intimately tied to a fascinating history of intrigue, plunder and illicit commerce raiding. Historian Dr. Jamie Goodall, author of Pirates of the Chesapeake Bay: From the Colonial Era to the Oyster Wars, explores the fascinating tales of piracy in Virginia through the year 1700, including tales about Richard Ingle, the founding of the College of William and Mary, Richard Makeele and the "pirate with the golden toothpick," John James.

3 pm, Blackbeard, Bonnet and the Golden Age of Piracy in Virginia
Jeremy R. Moss
Author and historian Jeremy R. Moss brings to life the golden age of piracy through the intertwined stories of two of the most interesting pirates of the Golden Age, Blackbeard and Major Stede Bonnet.

Using his book, The Life and Tryals of the Gentleman Pirate, Major Stede Bonnet as a backdrop, Moss tells the real story of the real pirates of the Golden Age, sharing accounts of their daily life, social issues, natural disasters, political intrigues, bloody battles, walking the plank, flying the Jolly Roger, pirate-speak, and, of course buried treasure, all while weaving in interesting connections to the history of Hampton Roads. 

Visit the museum gift shop for these books and others on pirates.