1683 in piracy

[edit] Events

- The Jamaica Act of 1683 is passed by the English Parliament prohibiting trade with pirates.
- January - French pirate Jean Hamlin takes the British ship Thomas and William, Richard North commander, near the Isle of Ash, off Hispaniola. Later, the crew reluctantly lets a French man-of-war escorting two Guinea ships continue unharmed. After trading peacefully with the Governor of St. Thomas, Hamlin captures a ketch out of Nevin.¹
- March - Pirate hunter Thomas Pain, allegedly commissioned by Jamaican Governor Thomas Lynch, leads a group of privateers in a raid against St. Augustine, Florida however they soon withdraw to New Providence after looting several nearby villages.
- May 17-21 - Captain Michel de Grammont leads a group of six privateers totaling over 1,000 men, including Dutch privateers Laurens de Graff and Nicholas van Hoorn, in an attack on Veracruz looting the town for four days and ransoming several prominent citizens, including Governor Don Luis de Cordova and visiting Irish merchant John Murphy, before returning to Petit Goave with over 800 pesos a man. On the return voyage Nicholas van Hoorn is mortally wounded while fighting over the shares from the raid by de Graff.

Africa
- May - Jean Hamlin raids shipping off the coast of Sierra Leone capturing English and Dutch ships. Later that year Hamlin's band split into separate bands with Hamlin returning to the Caribbean. Arriving in St. Thomas in late 1683 or early 1684 Hamlin's ship La Trompeuse was burned in the island's harbor by English naval officer Captain Carlile commanding the HMS Francis. Hamlin would be granted refuge in St. Thomas by Danish Governor Adolf Esmit until his removal by the English in October 1684.

¹ Calendar of State Papers, Colonial: America and the West Indies, 1574-1739, CD-ROM, London: Routledge, 2000. p. 519-520