They knew him as Henry Avery (or Every), Ben Long or Benjamin Bridgeman and his contemporaries nicknamed him “The King of the Pirates”. Born in Devon, England in 1659, this ruthless buccaneer was the most wanted on the planet. Especially after his last hit, a robbery so extraordinary that it made him go down in history.
From his base in Madagascar, Avery targeted the fleet of Aurangzeb, the sixth Mughal emperor of India. He first raided the escort ship Fath Mahmamadi and made off with the more than £60,000 he had on board. And then he cruised to board the flagship, the Ganj-i-Sawai.
Recent estimates indicate that this royal ship, which was attacked on January 7, 1695, was carrying loot of approximately 200,000 pounds, which at current exchange rates would be about 20 million euros. After this robbery on the high seas, little else was heard about Henry Avery. He disappeared without a trace. Until now.
A weathered silver coin found in the United States has provided details indicating that the bloodthirsty pirate hid in the American colony of New England in the late 17th century, before sailing to Ireland and lost to history.
The historian and fan of metal detectors Jim Bailey was the one who found the money in 2014 in an orchard in Middletown (Rhode Island). As soon as the piece was seen, it already attracted attention, because it was engraved with an ancient inscription in Arabic. It was just the tip of the iceberg.
Bailey investigated further and discovered that it had been minted in 1693 in Yemen and would form part of the Ganj-i-Sawai hoard. Chronicles of the time noted that Avery’s gang tortured and killed the passengers on the Indian ship and raped many of the women before escaping to the Bahamas, which, like Madagascar, was a haven for pirates.
When word of these crimes got out, English King William III, under enormous pressure from a scandalized India and the influence of the East India Company, a trading giant, put a price on the heads of the buccaneers.
From 2014 to now, a total of 26 similar coins have been located between Maine and the Carolinas, most of which appeared in New England. “When I heard about this I was like, ‘Wait a minute, this can’t be true,'” a California rare coin specialist named Steve Album told The Associated Press.
Album, who has lived in Iran and traveled extensively in the Middle East, seized the opportunity and helped identify all the Arab silver pieces found and also a gold piece weighing three grams. “Each one of them predates the looting of Emperor Aurangzeb’s ship,” he adds.
There is more evidence that places Avery on American soil. Ancient records discovered by Jim Bailey show that the Sea Flower, the ship used by the bloodthirsty buccaneer and his crew after the Mughal raids, arrived in Newport, Rhode Island in 1696.
Other documents he has unearthed show that the pirate captain was accompanied by three people from Rhode Island who came aboard his ship when he fled India. The four landed in the Bahamas on March 30, 1696. Additionally, William Phillips and Edward Savill, two captured pirates, testified on August 27, 1696, that one of the two ships that left the Bahamas headed for Virginia and New England before coming to Ireland.
“Avery was by no means staying in the Bahamas to sit on the beach and tan while waiting to be captured,” Bailey says. “In fact, he was in New England for over a month weighing his options to start a new life in the colonies or return to England,” she adds based on his findings.
The historian’s next challenge is to find out what happened to Henry Avery after he was lost on his arrival in Ireland on June 20, 1696. seventeenth century,” he concludes.
