Hunting Pirate Heaven In Search of the Lost Pirate Utopias of the Indian Ocean

by Rushby, Kevin

• ISBN13: 9780802714237
• ISBN10: 0802714234
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2003-09-01
• Publisher: Walker Books

Summary

A chance meeting on the muddy foreshore of the Thames River launched Kevin Rushby on a voyage to rediscover the lost pirate settlements that once dotted the islands and atolls of the Indian Ocean. Hitching rides on a motley assortment of freighters, dhows, yachts, and fishing smacks, Rushby sailed up the east coast of Africa, then turned east to the islands of Comoros and Madagascar, his ultimate objective being to locate the descendants of the infamous sixteenth-century pirates--such as Captain Misson, the legendary French pirate who may have been dreamed up by Daniel Defoe; English sailor-turnedbuccaneer Thomas White; and Rhode Islander Thomas Tew--who carved kingdoms for themselves in the remote jungles of northeast Madagascar. As he traveled, Rushby met up with the crackpot dreamers, the tough settlers, the fighters and the failures, who live on the coasts and islands now. His is a romantic story in the old-fashioned sense of the word, full of adventure and colorful incident: voyages to islands where forgotten Portuguese forts lie covered in jungle, where some have tried to shoot their way to paradise, and where the ocean can destroy lives and dreams as quickly as men and women create them.

Author Biography

Kevin Rushby has lived and worked in Sudan, Malaysia, Thailand, and Yemen. He is the author of Eating the Flowers of Paradise: A Journey through the Drug Fields of Ethiopia and Yemen, Chasing the Mountain of Light: Across India on the Trail of the Koh-I-Noor Diamond, and Hunting Pirate Heaven: In Search of the Lost Pirate Utopias of the Indian Ocean. He lives in York, England.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	viii
Maps	ix
1 Introduction: Cape Canaveral, AD 1601	1	(20)
PART ONE MOZAMBIQUE
2 Captain Carvalho	21	(22)
3 The Scarlet Sinners	43	(22)
4 A Dance to the Music of Chains	65	(18)
PART TWO THE QUERRIMBAS
5 A Hard Heaven	83	(18)
6 Of Piss and Eggshells	101	(14)
7 Shani's Dream	115	(28)
PART THREE COMOROS
8 Per's Dream	143	(28)
9 Marooned	171	(22)
PART FOUR ANJOUAN
10 An Island at the Edge	193	(28)
11 The Year Zero	221	(24)
PART FIVE MADAGASCAR
12 To the Pirate Coast	245	(24)
13 A Drink for the Dead	269	(20)
Index	289