1683 In Piracy

EVENTS

---The Jamaica Act Of 1683 is passed by the English Parliament prohibiting trade with pirates.

---March - Pirate hunter Thomas Pain , allegedly commissioned by Jamaican Governor Thomas Lynch , leads a group of privateers in a raid against St. Augustine , Florida however they soon withdraw to New Providence after looting several nearby villages.

--- May 17 - 21 - Captain Michel De Grammont leads a group of six Privateers totaling over 1,000 men, including Dutch privateers Laurens De Graff and Nicholas Van Hoorn , in an attack on Veracruz looting the town for four days and ransoming several prominent citizens, including Governor Don Luis De Cordova and visiting Irish merchant John Murphy , before returning to Petit Goave with over 800 Pesos a man. On the return voyage Nicholas van Hoorn is killed while fighting over the shares from the raid by de Graff.

---May - Jean Hamlin raids shipping off the coast of Sierra Leone capturing English and Dutch ships. Later that year Hamlin's band split into separate bands with Hamlin returning to the Caribbean . Arriving in St. Thomas in late 1683 or early 1684 Hamlin's ship La Trompeuse was burned in the island's harbor by English naval officer Captain Carlile commanding the HMS Francis . Hamlin would be granted refuge in St. Thomas by Danish Governor Adolf Esmit until his removal by the English in October 1684.

BIRTHS

DEATHS

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