Anne Bonney, born 1698, near Cork, Ireland, was an Irish American pirate whose brief period of marauding the Caribbean and the Bahamas during the 18th century enshrined her in legend as one of the few female pirates. Female pirates were not really welcome and meant bad luck.

Anne was thought to be the illegitimate daughter of Irish lawyer William Cormac and a maid working in his household. Cormac separated from his wife following the discovery of his infidelity and later assumed custody of Anne. Following his cohabitation with her mother, he lost much of his clientele, and the trio emigrated to Charles Towne (now Charleston, S.C.). Anne’s mother died of typhoid fever when Anne was 13.

Her father wanted to marry her off to a local man, but Anne resisted. Instead, in 1718 she married sailor John Bonney, with whom she traveled to the island of New Providence in the Bahamas. Her husband became an informant for the governor of the Bahamas, privateer Woodes Rogers. Disenchanted by her marriage, she became involved with pirate John (“Calico Jack”) Rackham. He offered to pay her husband to divorce her—a common practice at the time—but John Bonney refused to let Anne go.

In August 1720 Anne Bonney abandoned her husband and assisted

Rackham in commandeering the sloop William from Nassau Harbour on New Providence. Along with a dozen others, the pair began pirating merchant vessels along the coast of Jamaica. Rackham’s decision to have Bonney accompany him was highly unusual, as
women were considered bad luck aboard ship.

He may have been swayed by her fierce disposition: she had, in her youth, beaten an attempted rapist so badly that he was hospitalized.

Bonney did not conceal her gender from her shipmates, though when pillaging she disguised herself as a man and participated in armed conflict. 

Accounts differ on when her female compatriot Mary Read joined the crew. Some state that Read—who had served as a mercenary while disguised as a man—was among the original hijackers of the William, while others claim that she was aboard a Dutch merchant ship that Rackham’s crew captured.

The exploits of the crew aboard the William had not gone unnoticed by Rogers, who soon sent privateer Capt. Jonathan Barnet in pursuit. On Nov. 15, 1720, Barnet caught up with the William at Negril Point, Jamaica. Save Bonney and Read, who fiercely battled their pursuers, their fellow crew were too inebriated to resist, and they was captured and brought to Spanish Town, Jamaica, for trial.

Rackham and the male crew members were immediately found guilty and hung. Bonney and Read were tried on November 28. Though they too were found guilty and sentenced to death, their recently discovered pregnancies won them stays of execution. Read died in prison the next year, but Bonney was released, likely due to her father’s influence.

She returned to Charles Towne, where she married, had children, and lived out the remainder of her life. She died when she was 84 years old.