Samuel Bellamy’s flagship Whydah was originally a slave ship.
The Whydah Gally was built in England and launched in 1715. It entered the Atlantic slave trade, carrying enslaved Africans from West Africa to the Caribbean before sailing toward Britain with trade goods and profits.
Samuel Bellamy captured the vessel in February 1717 after pursuing it in the Bahamas. He converted it into a pirate flagship and used its speed and cargo capacity during raids across the Caribbean and along the American coast.
The ship’s earlier role is an important part of its history. The wreck is remembered not only as a major pirate discovery but also as physical evidence of the Atlantic slave trade. Its archaeological remains connect piracy, colonial commerce, and human trafficking in the early eighteenth-century Atlantic.