Thread by @marinamaral2

Anne Bonny was born #OnThisDay in sometime around 1700. She was an Irish pirate operating in the Caribbean, and one of the most famous female pirates of all time. #InternationalWomensDay

It is recorded that Bonny had red hair and was considered a "good catch" but may have had a fiery temper; at age 13, she supposedly stabbed a servant girl with a knife.

She married a poor sailor and small-time pirate named James Bonny. James hoped to win possession of his father-in-law's estate, but Bonny was disowned by her father. Anne's father did not approve of James Bonny as a husband for his daughter, and he kicked Anne out of their house.

There is a story that Bonny set fire to her father's plantation in retaliation; but no evidence exists in support. It is known that, some time between 1714 and 1718, she and James Bonny moved to Nassau, known as a sanctuary for English pirates called the Republic of Pirates.

While in the Bahamas, Bonny began mingling with pirates in the local taverns. She met John "Calico Jack" Rackham, captain of the pirate sloop Revenge, and Rackham became her lover.

Rackham offered Bonny's husband, James Bonny, money in exchange for her with the purpose of divorcing, but her husband refused. Anne and Rackham escaped the island together, and Bonny became a member of Rackham's crew.

She disguised herself as a man on the ship, and only Rackham and eventually Mary Read, another female pirate, were privy to her true sex. When it became clear that Anne was pregnant, Rackam landed her on the island of Cuba, and there she had a son.

Many different theories state that he was left with his family or simply abandoned. Bonny rejoined Rackham and continued the pirate life, having divorced her husband and married Rackham while at sea.

Bonny, Rackham, and Mary Read stole the ship William, then at anchor in Nassau harbor, and put out to sea. Their crew spent years in Jamaica and the surrounding area.

Over the next several months, they enjoyed success, capturing many vessels and bringing in abundant treasure. Bonny took part in combat alongside the men, and the accounts of her exploits present her as competent, effective in combat, and respected by her shipmates.

In October 1720, Rackham and his crew were attacked by a "King's ship", a sloop captained by Jonathan Barnet under a commission from Nicholas Lawes, Governor of Jamaica. Most of Rackham's pirates put up little resistance as many of them were too drunk to fight.

However, Read and Bonny fought fiercely and managed to hold off Barnet's troops for a short time. Rackham and his crew were taken to Jamaica, where they were convicted and sentenced by Governor Lawes to be hanged.

According to Johnson, Bonny's last words to the imprisoned Rackham were: "Had you fought like a man, you need not have been hang'd like a dog."

After being sentenced, Read and Bonny both "pleaded their bellies," asking for mercy because they were pregnant.

In accordance with English common law, both women received a temporary stay of execution until they gave birth. Read died in prison, most likely from a fever from childbirth. Anne stayed in prison until she gave birth and was later released.

In his "A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates", published in 1724, Captain Charles Johnson states: "She was continued in Prison, to the Time of her lying in, and afterwards reprieved from Time to Time; but what is become of her since...

... we cannot tell; only this we know, that she was not executed." There is no historical record of Bonny's release or of her execution. This has fed speculation that her father ransomed her, that she might have returned to her husband, or even that she resumed a life of...

... piracy under a new identity. An article from 2015 called Anne Bonny: Irish American Pirate stated that after Bonny's release from prison, she returned to South Carolina where she wed and started a family.

Although there is no official account of Bonny's death, some historians have claimed that Bonny died sometime around April 1782 in South Carolina.