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S1E4 - Pirate Queens

Join Cody and Audrey on the high seas where cannons fire and swords clash! We are highlighting pirate lores most infamous women every to sail the deep blue. We'll tell you about the Pirate Queen of China who had a major character influence in a large movie franchise, and the story of two women leading similar lives, whose path's eventually cross. 

Ching Shih
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mistress_ching.jpeg

In the city of Canton there is a young girl who is a prostitute in a floating brothel. She has had a rough upbringing that has led her to this point of her life, and this life is all she knows in order to survive. As she works her way up the hierarchy of the brothel, she meets many men who she has manipulated during “pillow talk” to help her obtain a very elite social status. She is so convincing to these men that she can get them to do whatever she wants from them. 

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Through these connections, she is able to obtain a large fleet of ships which she turns into a sophisticated armada of pirate ships. Her fleet and her tenacity attract one of the most famous pirates in China known as Cheng I. Cheng I was the commander of what is known as the Red Flag Fleet, which he put together by allying rival Chinese pirate groups. Cheng I, impressed with the woman’s power and business tactics, marries her to combine their fleets and lead together one of the largest pirate operations in the world.  Ching I’s death is speculated by historians. Some say he was swept away by a tsunami, some say he was murdered in Vietnam. However, with his passing, The Pirate Queen of China inherited the Red Flag Fleet for herself, but in a peculiar way.

 

Her name is Ching Shih.

Mistress Ching

Pirates of the Caribbean:
At Worlds End

The character inspired by Ching Shih
Anne Bonny
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Anne Bonny was born in Kinsale, County Cork, Ireland around the year 1698 to a lawyer named William Cormac and his scandalous house maid Mary Brennan. William had an affair with Mary Brennan and got her pregnant with Anne which led his wife to leave him. To cover up his scandalous affair, William dressed Anne as a boy and led people to believe that Anne was a relative’s child, in which he was caring for. As most secrets of infidelity do, William and Mary’s affair was eventually found out and Anne’s true identity was revealed. In the wake of this, William, Mary and Anne emigrated and moved to Charleston, South Carolina.

Anne Bonny depiction in Little House of Horrors

Cover photo: Anushka Holding via commons.wikimedia CC BY-SA 2.0

Mary Read
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Mary Read was an illegitimate child. Mary’s mother first had a son named Mark. Mark was born shortly after his father had died at sea. Mark’s grandmother agreed to help her daughter in law with financial support until Mark was a grown man. Mark died shortly after his father and Mary’s mother became pregnant with her shortly after. Mary’s mother, being desperate for the financial support from her mother-in-law, dressed Mary up as a boy and portrayed her as Mark to hide Mark’s death from the grandmother. The grandmother caught on to the ruse and cut Mary’s mother off indefinitely. Mary’s mother continued to dress her as a boy and even rented her out as a servant to make money.

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