Venganza

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The Venganza was a pirate ship, originally a frigate produced by the Blackwall shipyard and procured by the British Royal Navy as HMS Peregrine. Her name translates to "revenge" or "vengeance" in Spanish. At some point during the Age of Piracy, the British naval vessel ran around on a sandbar near the Florida Keys and was later salvaged by Don Rafael, a Spanish captain and Pirate Lord of the Caribbean. Rafael abandoned his old ship and took the frigate as his flagship until his death, leaving his granddaughter Lady Esmeralda captain of Venganza and the new Pirate Lord of the Caribbean, becoming known as the infamous Doña Pirata. Although the idea of a pirate having a Blackwall frigate as a vessel was far-fetched, several individuals mistook the Venganza as a British ship, namely Captain Nathaniel Bainbridge of the East India Trading Company merchant vessel Fair Wind, despite the warnings of his first mate Jack Sparrow. Robert Greene, Sparrow's friend and first mate, once said that the Wicked Wench, an EITC merchant vessel that later became the pirate vessel Black Pearl, could be every bit as good as Venganza.

History

Royal Navy ship

By the Age of Piracy, a frigate was built in Blackwall, a shipyard on the shore of River Thames in London, where many of the best ships were made and set sail from the ports of England. As the British Royal Navy owned the majority of frigates produced by the Blackwall shipyard, having produced and purchased them, this Blackwall frigate was identified with the His Majesty's Ship (HMS) prefix under the name Peregrine.^[3] As was intended, the HMS Peregrine began its career as a British ship.

At some point in time, while the HMS Peregrine was sailing in the Caribbean, the crew caught yellow fever, and all crewmen onboard were soon dead. The Peregrine continued sailing with no one at the helm, until she ran aground on a sandbar near the Florida Keys. From there the ship stayed, with her sails flogged to pieces by the wind, and all her boats gone.

Sometime afterwards, a pirate vessel, Venganza, came along and found the British naval vessel there. The pirate captain, a Spaniard named Don Rafael, rowed over alone to investigate the grounded frigate, and saw the corpses on board. Rafael survived having yellow fever in his youth, and knew that he couldn't get it twice, so he assembled his crew, and demanded to know which of them had had it. He wound up with nearly ten men to go over to the vessel to salvage her. They disposed of the bodies, cleaned up the ship, and towed her off the sandbar. Rafael then abandoned his old pirate ship, and took the frigate as his flagship, giving her a new name, the same as his old ship had, Venganza.^[2]

Pirate ship

Rafael's ship

The new Venganza soon proved to be a perfect pirate ship. Fast and maneuverable, no merchant ship in the Caribbean could escape her. With her twenty-eight cannons, she was even a match for the warships of the European navies. With the Venganza, Don Rafael sailed from the Caribbean to Portugal and back, even taking his granddaughter Esmeralda onboard the ship, when she was fifteen, to learn some pirating. At some point in time, by the early 1710s, Don Rafael encountered his old friend, James, who told him that he found a sailor whose ship was destroyed by a rogue pirate ship off the coast of India.

Some time later, the Venganza made port in Tortuga, where Don Rafael encountered Hector Barbossa, a pirate captain whose ship, Cobra, was destroyed two months earlier by rogue pirates. When he learned of such Code breaking, Don Rafael took Barbossa and his men onboard the Venganza, and sailed for Shipwreck Cove, where Barbossa told the tale of his disaster to the assembled Pirate Lords of the Brethren Court, where Rafael served as Lord of the Caribbean. The Venganza would be used in pursuit of the rogue pirates until Rafael's death.

Esmeralda's ship

After Don Rafael's untimely death at the hands of the French rogue pirate Christophe-Julien de Rapièr, Lady Esmeralda inherited his titles and ship as her own. Esmeralda became a successful pirate, as the new captain of the Venganza, Pirate Lord of the Caribbean, as well as earning the nickname Doña Pirata. Three years later, the Venganza attacked the Fair Wind, an merchant vessel of the East India Trading Company, on which Esmeralda's former love interest Jack Sparrow served as a First Mate. Although Captain Nathaniel Bainbridge believed the idea of a pirate having a Blackwall frigate as a vessel was far-fetched, Esmeralda killed Bainbridge, and took one third of the ship's cargo, but the Venganza crew let the Fair Wind go.

A few months later, the Venganza was sailing in the Bahamas, looking for the Koldunya, a ship of Boris "Borya" Palachnik, the Russian rogue pirate captain and former Pirate Lord of the Caspian Sea. Esmeralda wanted to capture Borya so she could ask him about Christophe's whereabouts. But instead, the Venganza encountered the Wicked Wench, an EITC merchant ship captained by Sparrow. The Wench fought a battle with the Koldunya, which ended with the destruction of the rogue pirate ship. The crew of the Venganza helped the wounded crewmen of the Wench, and Esmeralda even offered Jack to steal his ship from the Company and join her as a pirate partner, but he refused.

A few days later, as the Wicked Wench sailed for Savannah, the Venganza escorted the Wench for two days and then sailed in another direction. Shortly after Jack Sparrow returned to a pirate's life with the resurrected and transformed Wicked Wench, rechristened as the Black Pearl, Sparrow considered himself captain of the fastest pirate vessel in the Caribbean, specifically faster than Venganza. The ship's further fate is unknown.

Design and appearance

The Venganza was a frigate was built in Blackwall, a three-masted ship that served the British Royal Navy and the Brethren Court. With her long, black hull and twenty-eight (28) cannons, she was built for battle and notable for her speed. She was so fast that she could sail rings around most ships. Her cargo hold was big enough to carry a lot of stolen booty. The captain's cabin was large and richly furnished. Her crew might be pirates, but the frigate was as well maintained as she had been back in her days as part of the Royal Navy.

Some sailors, namely Captain Nathaniel Bainbridge and Lucius Featherstone, believed the idea of a pirate having a Blackwall frigate as a vessel was far-fetched. Although Jack Sparrow told Esmeralda that Venganza was the perfect pirate ship fit for the Pirate Lord of the Caribbean, Robert Greene, Sparrow's first mate aboard the East India Trading Company merchant vessel Wicked Wench, suggested that if the Wench was properly armed, she could be every bit as good as Venganza, though Sparrow shot his first mate a quelling glance. Despite this, after Jack Sparrow returned to a pirate's life with the resurrected and transformed Wicked Wench, now rechristened as the pirate vessel Black Pearl, Sparrow considered himself captain of the fastest pirate vessel in the Caribbean, specifically faster than Venganza.

Behind the scenes

The Venganza appeared in the 2011 novel Pirates of the Caribbean: The Price of Freedom by A. C. Crispin. While it was never addressed in the book, "Venganza" is a Spanish word that translates to "revenge" or "vengeance" in English.

The original name for Venganza, HMS Peregrine, was never mentioned in The Price of Freedom. As the pirate ship was described as originally being a British Royal Navy vessel, author A. C. Crispin was asked about the ship's original British name after the release of the novel, though the author said she didn't make up a name at the time of writing the novel. As such, at Keep to the Code forums, Crispin suggested that the original British name for the Venganza was HMS Peregrine.^[3]

In The Price of Freedom, the Venganza is described as a Blackwall frigate. In real-world history, the first Blackwall frigates were built in the late 1830s, over a century after the events of the novel.^[4]

Appearances

• The Price of Freedom (First appearance)

Notes and references

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6} The Price of Freedom, Chapter One: Fair Winds and Black Ships
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3} The Price of Freedom, Chapter Two: Lady Esmeralda
3. ↑ ^{3.0 3.1} KeepToTheCode.com: View topic - Pirates of the Caribbean: The Price of Freedom - Archived
4. ↑ Blackwall frigate on Wikipedia

British Royal Navy ships in Pirates of the Caribbean
Royal Navy ships Albion – HMS Achilles – HMS Adventure – Arabella – Battle-Royale – Bastion – Belette – HMS Blazer – British galleon – British warship – Bulwark – Centurion – HMS Century – Colossus – HMS Comet – HMS Dauntless – HMS Diamond – Dreadnought – Elite – HMS Endeavour – En-Garde – Essex – Ferret – Goliath – Greyhound – HMS Hound – HMS Hyena – HMS Interceptor – HMS Invincible – Jack Sparrow's corvette – Kingfisher – Lawrence Norrington's ship – Man O' War – Monarch – HMS Newcastle – Panther – HMS Peregrine – Perseverance – HMS Phoenix – Predator – Pride of London – HMS Providence – HMS Raven – HMS Resistance – HMS Rose – HMS Success – Tally-ho – HMS Trepassey – Vanguard – HMS Victor – HMS Victory
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Pirate ships in Pirates of the Caribbean
Pirate ships Adventure – Black Barnacle – Black Bart's ship – Black Dog – Black Harbinger – Black Pearl – Black Pearl (frigate) – Buzzard – Centurion – Ching's flagship – Cobra – Cursed crew's pirate ship – Cutlass – Death Omen – Dolphin – Dragon – Dying Gull – Empress – Fancy – Fleur de la Mort – Fortune – Fuchuan – Ghostly Seadog – Gretchen – Grim Reaper – Hai Peng – Hanyu Pinyin – Harkaway – HMS Interceptor – Jack Sparrow's bilander – Jack Sparrow's corvette – Jack Sparrow's galleon – Jack Sparrow's sloop – King George's Amnesty – Kin Tai Fong – Kirbac – Koldunya – La Vipère – Misty Lady – Monkeebutt – Nemesis – Neptune – Ningpo – Otter – Paradox – Pearl – Phantom – Pirate galleon – Princess – Queen Anne's Revenge – Ranger – Red Dragon – Revenant – Revenge – Royal Fortune – Ruddy Rose – Satisfaction – Sea Nymph – Sea Star – Seref – Siren's Revenge – Smilin' Jack's ship – Song – Sparrow – Storm Reaper – Swift – Troubadour – Venganza –Victory – Wicked Wench (Isla Tesoro) – Wicked Wench (Captain Morgan)
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