"Thomas Nichols (pirate) Thomas Nichols (fl. 1717–1718) was a pirate active in the Caribbean and off the American east coast. He is best known as a leader among the ""Flying Gang"" of pirates operating out of New Providence. Very little is known of Nichols’ life or career. He is recorded as attacking Nathaniel Brooker’s snow ""Restoration"" in his 6-gun, 80-man sloop alongside Captain Napin (Napping) in August 1717 en route to Boston, from which the pirates took cargo, sails, rigging, and general goods before releasing it. Brooker described Nichols’ jolly roger flag: he “had in his flag a dart and"
"Jolly Roger Jolly Roger is the traditional English name for the flags flown to identify a pirate ship about to attack, during the early 18th century (the later part of the Golden Age of Piracy). The flag most commonly identified as the Jolly Roger today, the skull and crossbones symbol on a black flag, was used during the 1710s by a number of pirate captains including Black Sam Bellamy, Edward England, and John Taylor. It went on to become the most commonly used pirate flag during the 1720s, although other designs were also in use. Use of the term ""Jolly"
"time of ""Osiris"" return, and influenced the flotilla leader's decision. Jolly Roger Jolly Roger is the traditional English name for the flags flown to identify a pirate ship about to attack, during the early 18th century (the later part of the Golden Age of Piracy). The flag most commonly identified as the Jolly Roger today, the skull and crossbones symbol on a black flag, was used during the 1710s by a number of pirate captains including Black Sam Bellamy, Edward England, and John Taylor. It went on to become the most commonly used pirate flag during the 1720s, although other"
"the piratical black flag among a group of men operating across thousands of miles of ocean"", suggesting that the skull-and-crossbone design became standardized at about the same time as the term ""Jolly Roger"" was adopted as its name. By 1730, the diversity of symbols in prior use had been mostly replaced by the standard design. The gallery below showing pirate flags in use from 1693 (Thomas Tew's) to 1724 (Edward Low's) appears in multiple extant works on the history of piracy. All the secondary sources cited in the gallery below are in agreement except as to the background color of"
"to it. Their black Flag, under which they had committed abundance of Pyracies and Murders, was affix'd to one Corner of the Gallows. It had in it the Portraiture of Death, with an Hour-Glass in one Hand, and a Dart in the other, striking into a Heart, and three Drops of Blood delineated as falling from it. This Flag they called ""Old Roger"", and us'd to say, ""They would live and die under it"". The first recorded uses of the skull-and-crossbones symbol on naval flags date to the 17th century. It possibly originated among the Barbary pirates of the period,"
"Roger"" in reference to pirate flags goes back to at least Charles Johnson's ""A General History of the Pyrates,"" published in Britain in 1724. Johnson specifically cites two pirates as having named their flag ""Jolly Roger"": Bartholomew Roberts in June 1721 and Francis Spriggs in December 1723. While Spriggs and Roberts used the same name for their flags, their flag designs were very different, suggesting that already ""Jolly Roger"" was a generic term for black pirate flags rather than a name for any single specific design. Neither Spriggs' nor Roberts' Jolly Roger consisted of a skull and crossbones. Richard Hawkins,"
"Pirate Parrot The Pirate Parrot is a costumed mascot of the Pittsburgh Pirates of Major League Baseball. He was introduced in 1979 in response to the popularity of the Phillie Phanatic introduced one year earlier, as the Pirates and Philadelphia Phillies had a fierce intrastate rivalry at the time. The character of a parrot was derived from the classic story ""Treasure Island"" by Robert Louis Stevenson, most notably the one owned by Long John Silver named ""Captain Flint"". The Parrot debuted on April Fools' Day, 1979 when he ""hatched"" at Three Rivers Stadium. That year, the ""We Are Family"" Bucs"
"form of the jolly roger. His flag, showing the distinctive skull and crossbones motif, was augmented with another common pirate symbol: an hourglass, meant to signify to his prey that their time was running out and only by timely surrender could they evade death. There were no other reports at the time of pirates using similar flags, but within 15 years the skull and crossbones design and its many variants would become the standard flag of Golden Age pirates. Emanuel Wynn Emanuel Wynn was a French pirate of the 18th century, and is often considered the first pirate to fly"
"Richard Worley Richard Worley (d.1718–19) was a pirate who was active in the Caribbean Sea and the east coast of the American colonies during the early 18th century. He is credited as one of the earliest pirates to fly the first version of the skull and crossbones pirate flag. He is first recorded leaving New York with a small boat and a crew of eight men hoping to make their fortune in the so-called Golden Age of Piracy. However, their first prize resulted in the capture of household goods from a shallop in the Delaware River near New Castle in"
"been used for military flags or insignia and as a warning of the ferocity of the unit displaying it. It became associated with piracy from the 14th century onwards, possibly even earlier. By the 15th century, the symbol had developed into its familiar form. The Knights Templar organisation, active from the 12th century until their demise in 1307, adopted a skull-and-crossbones flag to identify ships belonging to their vast fleet. The skull and crossbones as a pirate's flag could well predate the Knights Templar The symbol came to be used to mark the entrances of many graveyards, particularly Spanish cemeteries"
"Saint Piran's Flag Saint Piran's Flag () is the flag of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The earliest known description of the flag as the Standard of Cornwall was written in 1838. It is used by some Cornish people as a symbol of their identity. It is a white cross, which has a similar design to that of Saint George on the English flag, that is laid on top of a black background. The flag is attributed to Saint Piran, a 6th-century Cornish abbot. One early use of a white cross and black background design is the 15th-century coat of arms"
"Skull and crossbones (military) Variations on the skull and crossbones have been used by several military forces. The largest is on the ""Jolly Roger"" flags used by submarines. The Jolly Roger is the name given to any of various flags flown to identify a ship's crew as pirates. Since the decline of piracy, various military units have used the Jolly Roger, usually in skull-and-crossbones design, as a unit identification insignia or a victory flag to ascribe to themselves the proverbial ferocity and toughness of pirates. Admiral Sir Arthur Wilson VC, the Controller of the Royal Navy, summed up the opinion"
"for some years, possibly later destroyed on orders from King Louis XV. His flag is often confused with that of Walter Kennedy, which was described in similar terms. Because the original flag is missing and the extant drawings do not entirely agree, the actual flag’s design is not known with certainty. Jean Thomas Dulaien Jean Thomas Dulaien (fl. 1727-1728, last name also Dulaiën or du Lain) was a French pirate active in the Caribbean. He is known for preserved copies of his Articles (pirate code) and black flag). Born in 1704, Dulaien received a respectable education in France and was"
"Flag of Kiribati The flag of Kiribati is red in the upper half with a gold frigatebird (""Fregata minor"", in Gilbertese: ""te eitei"") flying over a gold rising sun (""otintaai""), and the lower half is blue with three horizontal wavy white stripes to represent the ocean and the three groups (Gilbert, Phoenix and Line Islands). The 17 rays of the sun represent the 16 Gilbert Islands and Banaba (former Ocean Island). The frigatebird symbolises command of the sea, power, freedom and Kiribati cultural dance patterns, the blue and white wavy bands represent the Pacific Ocean, which surrounds Kiribati and the"
"Pine Tree Flag The Tree Flag (or Appeal to Heaven Flag) was one of the flags used during the American Revolution. The flag, featuring a pine tree flag with the motto ""An Appeal to God"" or, more usually, ""An Appeal to Heaven"" was used originally by a squadron of six cruisers commissioned under George Washington's authority as commander in chief of the Continental Army in October 1775. It was also used by Massachusetts state navy vessels in addition to privateers sailing from Massachusetts. The design of the flag came from General Washington's secretary, Colonel Joseph Reed. In a letter dated"
"a heart and a dagger, all on a black field. Despite the frequent appearance of this flag in modern pirate literature, no known early-Georgian period source describes any such device, much less attributes it to Bonnet. This version of Bonnet's flag is probably one of a number of pirate flags appearing on an undated manuscript with unknown provenance in Britain's National Maritime Museum, which was donated by Dr. Philip Gosse in 1939. Bonnet's crew and contemporaries generally referred to him flying a ""bloody flag"", which likely means a dark red flag. There is also a report from the 1718 ""Boston"
"kept the Parrot, although Koch himself was fired. Pirate Parrot The Pirate Parrot is a costumed mascot of the Pittsburgh Pirates of Major League Baseball. He was introduced in 1979 in response to the popularity of the Phillie Phanatic introduced one year earlier, as the Pirates and Philadelphia Phillies had a fierce intrastate rivalry at the time. The character of a parrot was derived from the classic story ""Treasure Island"" by Robert Louis Stevenson, most notably the one owned by Long John Silver named ""Captain Flint"". The Parrot debuted on April Fools' Day, 1979 when he ""hatched"" at Three Rivers"
"Bartholomew Roberts. While top-right hand cornered of the even pages included a picture of that pirate’s flag. Lego Pirates Pirates is a Lego theme launched in 1989 featuring pirates, soldiers, islanders and sailing ships. The theme has been seen in minifigure scale, Duplo and the 4+ theme. The original Pirates sets included the first Lego minifigures without the traditional head with simply two eyes and a smile; they had a variety of different printed features including hair, eyepatches and facial hair. Alongside the Pirates released for 1989 were Governor Broadside's blue-coated troops who were to fight the Pirates. These forces"
"Pirates, use a modified skull and crossbones flag as their symbol. (The skull wears a purple tricornered hat.) Skull and crossbones (fraternities and sports) The skull and crossbones was a common fraternal motif as a symbol of mortality and warning in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The symbol was adopted, for various reasons, by many sporting teams, clubs and societies in both America and Europe. The skull and crossbones motif was used by many American college fraternities, sororities and secret societies founded in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The most well-known example of this usage is the Skull"
"Gadsden flag The Gadsden flag is a historical American flag with a yellow field depicting a rattlesnake coiled and ready to strike. Positioned below the rattlesnake are the words ""DONT TREAD ON ME."" The flag is named after American general and politician Christopher Gadsden (1724–1805), who designed it in 1775 during the American Revolution. It was used by the Continental Marines as an early motto flag, along with the Moultrie flag. The timber rattlesnake can be found in the area of the original Thirteen Colonies. Its use as a symbol of the American colonies can be traced back to the"
"the name of the pirate flag the Jolly Roger, and shows the skull and bones design. First appearing in Charles Rivington's shop in London, the book sold so well that by 1726 an enlarged fourth edition had appeared. It pandered to the British public's taste for the exotic; revelling in graphic stories on the high seas. English naval historian David Cordingly writes: ""it has been said, and there seems no reason to question this, that Captain Johnson created the modern conception of pirates."" Scottish novelists Robert Louis Stevenson (author of ""Treasure Island"") and J. M. Barrie (author of ""Peter Pan"""
"lamps, which represent her 11,000 virgin followers. The islands were named after these virgin followers by Christopher Columbus when he discovered the islands in 1493, the multiplicity of islands reminding him of the numerous followers. The motto present on the flag reads ""Vigilate"", which translated from Latin is ""be watchful"". The flag was modified in 1999, when the shield was enlargened and outlined in white. The flag of the British Virgin Islands must never been flown above another flag, indicating superiority, or vice versa, indicating inferiority, nor should it be allowed to drag along the ground. The flag must always"
"field. The original source in which this flag first appears is not known, but it does not appear in publications until the 1920s or early 1930s. If the flag is genuine, it contradicts the generally accepted belief that French pirate Emanuel Wynn was the first to use the skull and crossbones motif, in 1700. Furthermore, earrings and bandanas were generally not associated with pirates until the artwork of Howard Pyle in the 1880s, so it is almost certain that this flag is a 20th-century invention. Henry Every Henry Every, also Avery or Evory (20 August 1659 – time of death"
"to simply ""Gold and Blue"" in 1879, before taking on their current form in 1881. The current version of the Fraternity Flag was established in 1911 and consists of three vertical bars, blue, gold, and blue. The gold section is charged with the fraternity's badge. A flag of a solid gold field charged with a visual representation of the pledge pin is used by colonies. The fraternity's by-laws formerly prescribed a puggaree to band a boater hat that is black silk with the middle third occupied by alternating stripes of gold, blue, and gold. The hat band was initially only"
"has featured on stamps and commemorative currency around the Caribbean. A postage stamp featuring Low was commissioned by the Cayman Islands in 1975, and in 1994 the government of Antigua and Barbuda featured Low and his brigantine, ""Rebecca"", on a legal tender one hundred-dollar bill made of gold leaf. ""Ned Low"" is one of the pirates featured on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at the Disneyland theme park in California. A duplicate of Low's flag was used for the flag of the fictional pirate Sao Feng in Disney's ""Pirates of the Caribbean"" films. Ned Low was played by Tadhg"
"crossed trident and a shepherd's crook. The early development team of the Apple Macintosh used a pirate flag to maintain a ""rebellious"" spirit. Unicode uses a sequence of and to display this flag. Before changing to a stylized 'P', the Pirate Party used the Jolly Roger as its symbol; it is still used extensively in the Pirate movement. The Piratbyrån and The Pirate Bay also use either the skull and crossbones symbol, or derivatives of it, such as the logo of Home Taping Is Killing Music. One account states that Horton, now Commander in Chief Submarines, was visiting at the"
"121, and 133 all sent detachments of men and equipment to get the job done. Those detachments dubbed themselves the Ghost Battalion and chose the Jolly Roger for the Battalion's colors. At least twice in 2017, the USS Jimmy Carter, an American attack submarine which has been modified to support special forces operations has returned to its home port flying a Jolly Roger. The reason for the flag in both cases is not known. The Jolly Roger flag became a cliché of pirate fiction in the 19th century. The ""Golden Age of Piracy"" was over by the mid-18th century, and"
"depicted on the national flag, but with the stars in different proportions); in the second quarter, a golden fleece; in the third, a wheat sheaf; and in the fourth, two hammers. (See symbolism below.) Overall this is a pale—a broad vertical strip—with three ships representing the importance of maritime trade and ""recalling the 19th-century settlement of the country by European migrants"". In 1956, some of the features surrounding the shield were changed. In the original design, the crest was a demi-lion (the upper half of a rampant lion) holding the Union Flag, and the scroll at the shield's base featured"
"a British flag whose origins had remained a mystery for 187 years. On 6 August 1829, the brig ""Cyprus"", a government-owned vessel used to transport goods, people, and convicts, set sail from Hobart Town for Macquarie Harbour Penal Station on a routine voyage carrying supplies and convicts under a guard commanded by Army Lt Carew. There were 62 people on board, including wives and children of some personnel, and 31 convicts. On reaching Recherche Bay, isolated from the main settlement, the vessel was becalmed. Convicts allowed on deck attacked their guards and took control of the brig. The convicts marooned"
"flag was probably intended as communication of the pirates' identity, which may have given target ships an opportunity to change their mind and surrender without a fight. For example, in June 1720 when Bartholomew Roberts sailed into the harbour at Trepassey, Newfoundland with black flags flying, the crews of all 22 vessels in the harbour abandoned them in panic. If a ship then decided to resist, the Jolly Roger was taken down and a red flag was flown, indicating that the pirates intended to take the ship by force and without mercy. In the mid-18th century, Sir Richard Hawkins confirmed"
"who was captured by pirates in 1724, reported that the pirates had a black flag bearing the figure of a skeleton stabbing a heart with a spear, which they named ""Jolly Roger."" This description closely resembles the infamous flag of Edward Teach/Thatch, otherwise known as Blackbeard, who flew a similar design six years prior. It is sometimes claimed that the term derives from ""Jolie Rouge"" (""Pretty Red"") in reference to a red flag used by French privateers. This hypothesis is considered a false etymology, as the phrase ""Jolie Rouge"" in reference to a pirate flag does not appear in any"
"Others, though, wanted to keep the traditional red saltire that had been used since time immemorial. A third influential body of opinion campaigned for the adoption of a banner of the three leopards (leopard being the heraldic term for a lion passant guardant), the island's heraldic device. The current flag can therefore be seen as a compromise between the various strands of opinion. Although the flag is flown in Jersey, the three leopards are much more widely used as a national symbol by the authorities and civil population alike. A civil ensign for use by Jersey registered merchant ships was"
"red. It also has an hourglass with wings, to express to his victims that their time to live was flying away. In the middle is a white arm holding a dagger. In addition, blood-red pennants were often tied to the ship's mainmast to show deadly intent. While popularly attributed to Christopher Moody, the flag may have been another pirate's, or may have been fictional: the flag had been described in the 18th century, but first record of its being attributed to Moody appeared in 1923. Christopher Moody Christopher Moody (1694–1722) was an 18th-century pirate who held a policy of no"