It was a once-in-a-lifetime deal, and Washington sweetened the pot by offering privateers the opportunity to keep one-third of all the goods they captured and sold. George Washington leased the ships and set out to man them with competent sailors up to the task. These sailors-for-hire also promised not to knowingly raid American or neutral ships. Privateers were required to post bonds of up to 5,000 pounds as collateral to ensure that captives taken from British ships wouldn’t be mistreated. It issued money to privateers as guerrilla-style naval disruptors and told them to do whatever it took to stop British ships. So the Continental Congress decided to capitalize on that. Early American leaders knew that there was no way the nation's inexperienced Navy would ever be able to challenge Britain on the seas, but they did have one specific advantage: Americans didn’t really have anything to lose. The colonies were attempting to extricate themselves from British rule, which was understandably expensive. Related: 8 Military History Books Every History Buff Should Have on Their BookshelfĮarly America was as cash-strapped as one would expect a fledgling country to be. But either way, the privateers at the helms of ships in the days of the Revolutionary War had one goal in mind: destroy as many British ships as possible. Admittedly, the difference between pirates and privateers seems a little murky at best. Privateers had official letters from governments condoning their actions. It’s important here to note that privateers were different from pirates because pirates didn’t have legal authorization to plunder ships. A tradition that dates back to the Middle Ages allowed countries at war to license private seamen to seize and plunder enemy vessels.
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