Wednesday, July 04, 2018

The Pirate:

The Pirate:  the Bloodlands series by: Harold Schechter
Non-fiction: History, E-book
E-book Count:19
Book Count:28

This book is the story of Albert Hicks, who became known as the Pirate Hicks.  He was known for murdering the rest of the crew of a sloop for the money he thought was on board.  He was also famous because P. T. Barnum made a wax figure of him for his figures of famous killers and even bought his suit off of him so that the wax figure had "the actual clothes of the killer" on it.  Because of this he was also the only American killer in an episode of the "Twilight Zone" where the wax figures of serial killers come alive.  As he threw all of the bodies overboard he wasn't actually charged with murder, as at the time you couldn't charge people with murder without a body except when out to sea, and so although he could be charged with murder, they didn't think they could convict him without bodies.  They could charge him with the theft which could also carry a death sentence as it was considered a worst crime when out to sea as people were limited in their  ability to escape/protect themselves on the water.  So although his murdering the others in the crew was a major point in the trial, that wasn't what he hung for.  

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