Joseph Faro (

fl. ''Floruit'' ( ; usually abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for 'flourished') denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indic ...

1694–1696, last name occasionally Farrell, Firra, Farrow, or Faroe) was a pirate from

Newport, Rhode Island Newport is a seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Rhode Island, United States. It is located in Narragansett Bay, approximately southeast of Providence, Rhode Island, Providence, south of Fall River, Massachusetts, south of Boston, and nort ...

active during the

Golden Age of Piracy The Golden Age of Piracy was the period between the 1650s and the 1730s, when maritime piracy was a significant factor in the histories of the North Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Histories of piracy often subdivide the Golden Age of Piracy into th ...

, primarily in the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or approximately 20% of the water area of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia (continent), ...

. He is best known for sailing alongside

Thomas Tew Thomas Tew (died September 1695), also known as the Rhode Island Pirate, was a 17th-century English privateer-turned- pirate. He embarked on two major pirate voyages and met a bloody death on the second, and he pioneered the route which became ...

to join

Henry Every Henry Every, also known as Henry Avery (20 August 1659Disappeared: June 1696), sometimes erroneously given as Jack Avery or John Avery, was an English pirate who operated in the Atlantic and Indian oceans in the mid-1690s. He probably used s ...

’s pirate fleet which captured and looted the fabulously rich

Mughal Mughal or Moghul may refer to: Related to the Mughal Empire * Mughal Empire of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries * Mughal dynasty * Mughal emperors * Mughal people, a social group of Central and South Asia * Mughal architecture * Mug ...

ship ''

Gunsway The ''Ganj-i-Sawai'' (Persian language, Persian/Hindustani language, Hindustani:''Ganj-i-Sawai'', in English "Exceeding Treasure", often anglicized as ''Gunsway'') was an armed Ghanjah dhow (trading ship) belonging to the Mughal Empire, Mughals ...

''.

History

In 1694 a number of Newport pirate vessels prepared to set sail with Tew, among them Joseph Bankes’ ''Black Barke'', later renamed ''Portsmouth Adventure''. Bankes (or Banks) transferred his commission to Joseph Faro, who captained the 90-ton 6-gun ''Portsmouth Adventure'' with a crew of 60. Among his crew was future pirate captain

Dirk Chivers Dirk Chivers (, last name occasionally Shivers) was a Dutch pirate active in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean. Early career Dirk Chivers is first recorded as a crew member of the ''Portsmouth Adventure'', , under Captain Joseph Faro (or Farrell) arou ...

. After nearly a year on voyage, in 1695 Tew, Faro, and three other captains ( William Mayes,

Richard Want Richard Want ( fl. 1692–1696) was a pirate active in the Indian Ocean. He is best known for sailing alongside Thomas Tew and Henry Avery. History Thomas Tew's first voyage from Rhode Island, around the Cape of Good Hope, and into the Indian O ...

, and Thomas Wake) joined up with Every and his ship ''Fancy'' and waited for the Mughal's treasure-laden convoy. Most of the convoy escaped, but the ''Gunsway'' and her escort ''Fateh Mohammed'' were straggling behind and after a protracted fight were overtaken and brutally looted by Every and his crew. Tew had been killed during the battle with ''Fateh Mohammed''; Wake's slower ''Susannah'' was left behind, while Want's ''Dolphin'' was sunk and its crew transferred to ''Fancy''. Only Faro and Mayes arrived in time to help Every, but Every denied Faro and his crew a full share of the vast riches, claiming they had never joined in the fighting. Afterward, Faro was deposed as Captain by his crew and replaced with Want, who took ''Portsmouth Adventure'' into the Persian Gulf, and then back to

Madagascar Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar, is an island country that includes the island of Madagascar and numerous smaller peripheral islands. Lying off the southeastern coast of Africa, it is the world's List of islands by area, f ...

, where the ship was wrecked on

Mayotte Mayotte ( ; , ; , ; , ), officially the Department of Mayotte (), is an Overseas France, overseas Overseas departments and regions of France, department and region and single territorial collectivity of France. It is one of the Overseas departm ...

. Every rescued Faro and some of his crew en route to the

Bahamas The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of its population. ...

; some of Faro's crew joined Every, and a few even made it back to Newport, while Chivers and others remained behind to be later rescued by Robert Glover in the ''Resolution''. Faro later captained the sloop '' Seaflower'' which transported Every back to Ireland when the latter chose to retire.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Faro, Joseph American pirates 17th-century pirates 17th-century American criminals People from colonial Rhode Island Piracy in the Indian Ocean 1696 deaths Year of birth missing People from Newport, Rhode Island

History

See also

References