David Stapleton has written a nice short biography of a minor pirate name John Phillips. Mr. Phillips' pirating career spanned from 1721 to 1724. Apparently, he was also a bit of a tyrant. This apparently led to his demise:

Going north from Tobago, the pirates took a Portugueze ship and two or three sloops; Fern again tried to quit the crew in one of these ships and was killed by Captain Phillips in accordance with the articles. On the 25th of March they took another two ships. Taking several more ships, including a sloop and schooner in early April, they made their way to Newfoundland, where they planned to take on more crew. Along the way they replaced their ship with sloop out of Cape Ann.

It was at this time that several of the crew, anxious to be done with pirating, mutinied and tossed several of the officers over the side. Taking control of the ship they changed course for Boston, where they arrived the 3rd of May. As there is no mention of John Phillips being tried with several others of the pirate crew, it can only be assumed that he died during the mutiny on April 18th, 1724.


Once again, the case of Mr. Phillips shows that pirating was a short-term profession. Few pirate careers lasted more than a couple of years, even for the most successful and notorious.

Of particular interest to history buffs will be the Articles for their pirate ship The Revenge under the command of Philllips. Mr. Stapleton has posted the ARticles here, and they are a quick interesting read.

 

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