![]() Jill Morgan, of Purple House Press, thoughtfully chooses which books to reprint and does extensive research on the authors, the stories, and their publication history. ![]() It is available in paperback and hardcover, both reasonably priced so everyone can enjoy it again. It has now been beautifully reprinted by Purple House Press. This particular book in the Landmark series has been scarce, therefore, expensive for many years. For more information about Landmark Books, see. The Mysterious Voyage of Captain Kidd was part of the Landmark Book series that was published between 19. The injustice of it is troubling, but the event is not described in graphic detail. It isn’t really a spoiler to say that Captain Kidd is hanged in the end. But how much and where? People have wondered and searched ever since.Īs might be expected in a book about pirates, some people in the story do die, but there are no graphic descriptions. In an attempt at some sort of insurance for his life, he buried treasure along the way. What’s a captain to do when sailors from his own country board his ship and take all of his best crew members? Shorthanded in the middle of the ocean thousands of miles from home would be a difficult predicament.Īfter more than three years at sea, Captain Kid returned home to discover that he had been declared a pirate. British press gangs who kidnaped men and forced them into the British navy were rampant on the seas. The Colonies were still governed by Britain. But what if the crew has burned his meticulously kept ship’s log? And what if crew members have been bribed with their lives to lie?Ĭaptain Kidd’s voyage began in 1696, long before the American Revolution. What’s a captain to do when his crew rebels in the middle of the ocean thousands of miles from home? And whose testimony will be believed if the matter comes to trial. There seems always to be a risk of mutiny when sailors get too discontent. This meant the crew was away from home working for nothing. But somehow, Kidd was able to sail for months in pirate-infested waters and never encounter a pirate. This type of venture could be extremely profitable for everyone involved in the voyage, from the financial backers to individual sailors, as each of them would receive some percentage of the take. Privateers sailed with official papers from the country that sponsored their voyage to avoid capture by their own countrymen.Ĭaptain Kidd was commissioned to capture pirates and, as Britain was perpetually at war with France, he was also authorized to capture French ships. Privateering is government-sanctioned capture, either of pirate ships or of ships from a country a captain’s country is at war with. Whipple is careful to define the difference between piracy and privateering. ![]() From the beginning, Whipple draws a map of conspiracy, greed, government corruption, and bad luck. Whipple’s book, The Mysterious Voyage of Captain Kidd, is written from a different perspective. Overall, it's something of a disappointment.Captain William Kidd was a pirate. Compared to Laughton's earlier "Bounty" this seemed much older in terms of production values and quality, in spite of it being made 10 years later. The performances here were all right - headed of course by Laughton - but the story honestly didn't really capture me. Laughton's Kidd is not an historical treatment of the legendary pirate, but rather a mythical yarn about Kidd's attempt to reclaim a treasure stashed away near Madagascar, and his attempts to gain even more treasure by selling himself to King William III as a protector and escort of one of His Majesty's ships en route from India to England laden with riches. Even when the movie is set on the high seas, we rarely see the sea, the story being confined to the inner parts of the ship. There's not really much "nautical" adventure in this. ![]() Unfortunately, aside from another good performance from Laughton, this bears little resemblance to that earlier masterpiece. Seeing Charles Laughton in a nautical-themed movie, I was hoping for something akin to his brilliant turn in "Mutiny On The Bounty" made 10 years earlier. ![]()
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