Edward Coates (pirate)

Edward Coates was a colonial American privateer in English service during the King William's War and later a pirate operating in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean during the mid-1690s.

In 1689, Coates originally signed aboard the Jacob as a sailor in a privateer expedition, then under the command of Captain William Mason, and commissioned by the colonial officials in New York to raid French shipping off the coast of Quebec "to war as in his wisdom should seem fit". However, unable to find French vessels, Mason began raiding English shipping and distributing the spoils among his crew, including Coates, eventually adding up to 1,800 pieces-of-eight per crewman.

Possibly withholding a portion of the crew's shares, Mason disappeared after stopping at an uninhabited island in the Indian Ocean; he had actually returned to New York to divide the spoils, later returning to the area aboard the Pearl. Coates, later suspected to have murdered Mason, assumed command of the ship, stopping at St. Mary's Island (near Madagascar) along with the 16-gun Nassau in October 1692 [1], before returning to New York. When he returned to New York he carried some of the crew of pirate James Allison, whom Coates had picked up after Allison's ship Good Hope was wrecked near Madagascar; Allison himself was not recorded among them. Upon their arrival in April of the following year, Coates arranged a deal with Governor Benjamin Fletcher to pardon their former acts of piracy, as well as assuring no interference from New York authorities against further attacks, in exchange for $1,800 which would be divided between the Governor and other colonial officials (as well as presenting Fletcher's wife with jewels, silks, and cashmere shawls [2]).

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