by Edward Ellis, Special Correspondent
Call it pirate envy.
While Beaufort, Bath, and Ocracoke have history on their side, there’s a long-burning desire in New Bern to claim Blackbeard as a former resident.
As we wrote in New Bern History 101, during the last century, schoolchildren here were told that an ivy-covered, two-story brick home beside the river on East Front Street was Blackbeard’s house. That the place was built after the brigand’s death didn’t matter a whit to anyone. It was “common knowledge” among us kids – which means no basis in fact at all – that there were chains and shackles on the basement walls and floors, and dark stains, surely the blood of unfortunate pirate victims. The house was unceremoniously demolished c. 1974, bloodstains and all.
While some have claimed New Bern – one of the great seaports of its day – would have been a natural habitat for the likes of Blackbeard, other meritorious scholars say he never set foot here. That doesn’t stop New Bernians from telling stories that the fourteen-times-married pirate hung a troublesome girlfriend from a local tree, or from naming roads, restaurants, bars, and the area’s sailing club in honor of a rapscallion whose real name we aren’t even sure of. Was he Edward Teach or Edward Thatch?
The man who probably knows the most about the renowned pirate is North Carolina research historian Kevin Duffus. And no less than Mr. Duffus says: “Most everything you’ve ever read about Blackbeard is wrong.” But even Kevin will confirm a few facts. Around 1716, Blackbeard seized a French slave ship, renamed it Queen Anne’s Revenge, armed it with 40 cannons and over 300 hearty seamen, and then did what pirates do. Big time. He later accepted and then violated a governor’s pardon at Bath, which resulted in his pursuit by the British Navy to Ocracoke where in 1718 he was shot, stabbed, and, just to make sure, beheaded. In 1996, his sunken flagship was discovered in shallow waters off Fort Macon and is now a highlight of the Mariner’s Museum in Beaufort.
Be all that as it may, no solid evidence is required for locals to imagine Blackbeard sailing up the Neuse, docking on the New Bern waterfront, and swaggering through our streets. So, we do.