Leigh Ashworth (

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 ...

1716-1719) was a

pirate Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and valuable goods, or taking hostages. Those who conduct acts of piracy are call ...

and

privateer A privateer is a private person or vessel which engages in commerce raiding under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign o ...

operating in the

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

in the early 1700s.

History

Leigh Ashworth was captain of a sloop named ''Mary'', originally outfitted for privateering with a commission from

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

n governor

Lord Archibald Hamilton Lord Archibald Hamilton (1673 – 5 April 1754) was a Royal Navy officer, nobleman and Whigs (British political party), Whig politician who sat in the House of Commons of Great Britain, House of Commons from 1708 to 1747. In the 1690's, he was ...

. Alongside Henry Jennings, James Carnegie, and Samuel Liddell, they took a pair of French vessels in early 1716 in the Bay of Hounds. They also had to chase down

Benjamin Hornigold Benjamin Hornigold (c. 1680–1719) was an English pirate towards the end of the Golden Age of Piracy. Born in England in the late 17th century, Hornigold began his pirate career in 1713, attacking merchant ships in the Bahamas. He helped to e ...

, who'd made off with one of the French ships shortly afterwards. This caused a dispute with French officials in the area, who protested that the English ships were effectively pirates. In Jamaica Ashworth's quartermaster Joseph Eels was arrested, and on the testimony of Eels and others – given in exchange for a promise of avoiding prosecution - the ''Mary'' was seized by the authorities in Jamaica in 1716 on suspicion of piracy. His brother Jasper and his partner Daniel Axtell were also arrested, having acted as fences for Ashworth's stolen goods. The ill-equipped local government declared that they had uncertain authority to deal with the situation: "what to do with these men, we know not as yett, not having a Commission … nor Admiral, Vice Admiral or a deputy". When a

general amnesty Amnesty () is defined as "A pardon extended by the government to a group or class of people, usually for a political offense; the act of a sovereign power officially forgiving certain classes of people who are subject to trial but have not yet be ...

was offered in 1718 to pirates who gave up their ways, Ashworth, Jennings, Hornigold, and over 200 others accepted. Ashworth next spent time ferrying ships and goods back and forth from

South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...

to Jamaica, encountering

Blackbeard Edward Teach (or Thatch; – 22 November 1718), better known as Blackbeard, was an English pirate who operated around the West Indies and the eastern coast of Britain's North American colonies. Little is known about his early life, but he ma ...

. Late that year, Ashworth accepted another privateering commission against the Spanish and French. He was still attacking ships on flimsy pretenses: a former pirate operating a sloop out of

New Providence New Providence is the most populous island in The Bahamas, containing more than 70% of the total population. On the eastern side of the island is the national capital, national capital city of Nassau, Bahamas, Nassau; it had a population of 246 ...

testified that Ashworth "pretended to take him for a Spaniard" because his ship ''Endeavour'' had formerly been a Spanish sloop. Ashworth was still privateering as of 1719 but there are few records of his activities beyond that point, though his brother Jasper Ashworth settled near

Port Royal Port Royal () was a town located at the end of the Palisadoes, at the mouth of Kingston Harbour, in southeastern Jamaica. Founded in 1494 by the Spanish, it was once the largest and most prosperous city in the Caribbean, functioning as the cen ...

, married, and became a regional official.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ashworth, Leigh Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown British pirates 18th-century pirates British privateers Caribbean pirates Pardoned pirates

History

See also

References