'One That's More Torrid': The Pirates of Madagascar

[Contemporary Docs] "An Act for the more effectuall Suppressions of Piracy"

If King James II's earlier "Proclamation for the more Effectual Reducing and Suppressing of Pirates and Privateers" was the proverbial carrot to entice pirates into surrendering themselves to the authorities, Parliament's subsequent "Act for the more Effectuall Suppressions of Piracy" was the stick.  It clearly states that even acts of piracy against other nations would be punished with all severity, that withholding evidence about piratical activities would be classified as a crime, and that those sailors who resisted pirates would be rewarded out of the plunder the government obtained by their capture. 

Perhaps most important, however, is the formal recognition that "Persons committing Piracies Robberies and Felonies on the Seas in or neare the East and West Indies and in Places very remote cannot be brought to condign Punishment without great Trouble" all the way back in the courts of England." As a result, "all Piracies Felonies and Robberies committed in or upon the Sea, or in any Haven River Creeke or Place where the Admirall or Admiralls have Power Authority or Jurisdiction may be examined inquired of tryed heard and determined and adjudged according to the Directions of this Act in any Place at Sea or upon the Land in any of His Majesties Islands Plantations Colonies Dominions Forts of Factories." This essentially allowed the court to follow the crime and would be the final death knell for English piracy in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.

Interestingly, the document also seeks to address the root causes of piracy - which Daniel Defoe and others had long pointed to as a necessity in dealing with the practice.  While the treatment of men aboard ship was still not addressed, the Act does install a punishment for merchants who abandon their sailors (whether it be because they found cheaper labor, or because they simply did not want to pay their wages).  

The open-access database (provided by the Institute for Historical Research & the History of Parliament Trust) does not load well here in Scalar, so please follow the link to the external site: https://www.british-history.ac.uk/statutes-realm/vol7/pp590-594
 

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