George Raynor (pirate)

George Raynor (1665-1743?, first name occasionally Georg or Josiah, last name also spelled Raynor, Reiner, or Rayner) was a pirate active in the Red Sea. Before he was briefly a pirate captain, he was a sailor on the Batchelor’s Delight which circumnavigated the globe with William Dampier.

In 1683 near Guinea, privateer John Cook captured the Dutch merchantman Batchelor’s Delight, which itself had been the Portsmouth when captured by Dutch privateers from its English owners. With Cook were William Dampier and Edward Davis, who would later captain the ship after Cook died in 1684, as well as sailor George Raynor. They sailed around South America raiding Spanish shipping and towns in concert with Charles Swan's Cygnet and others.

After scarce success and meeting defeat near Panama, the buccaneer fleet broke up in August 1685. Davis took the Batchelor’s Delight westward to the East Indies, eventually returning to the West Indies in 1688 and Philadelphia by that May.

Shortly afterwards the 14-gun, 80-man ship was sold to its former crew, and Raynor had now become Captain the Batchelor’s Delight, taking ships in the Indian Ocean. He put in at Adam Baldridge’s pirate trading post near Madagascar in late 1691. After resupplying and repairing the ship, renamed Loyal Jamaica, they shared out treasure from their voyage and sailed back to the Province of South Carolina. Raynor ran the ship aground and gave its guns to Charles Town. Absolved of piracy by 1692, he and the crew settled locally. Records show him recognized as a merchant, having been indemnified against accusations stemming from his pirate days; he eventually moved to Cape Fear.

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