Libertalia: Legendary Pirate Utopia

Libertalia, which, in truth, may be completely fictional, is called a pirate settlement, though the man who spearheaded it claimed he wasn't actually a pirate. And it was set up as a sort of utopia, where men governed themselves, and every man was equal.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff you Missed in History Class from how
Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Holly Fry and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. And today
I thought we were due for a little bit of
fun summer pirate time. Uh. This one is kind of

(00:24):
a fun story. It's a little kookie. Uh. This is
a subject that goes by two names, depending on the
source you're looking at. Sometimes you will hear it as
Libertatia the t I A ending. Some of it is
Libertalia with an L A ending. That's one of those
things that even in different printings of the same book,
you will see it both ways, depending on the printer's decision,

(00:46):
I presume. Uh. The other part that's fun is that
this may or may not have been a real thing. Yep,
but it is an interesting thing to examine. Um. The
primary account that we have of Libertalia is from a
general History of the Robberies and Murders of the most
notorious Pirates. This is in volume two, So if you
go looking online and you only get volume one, you

(01:06):
will not find this and be like what you said,
this was in here volume two. That one published in
sev The writing lists. It's author as Captain Charles Johnson,
and we're going to circle back to more specifics about
its authorship at the end. We've talked about it on
the show before as well, but we will revisit it.
And the idea that a bunch of pirates wanted to
create a utopia of equality, which is what this story is,

(01:31):
might seem a little bit far fetched, but it does
sound a lot like other utopian experiments we've talked about,
just set earlier on the timeline and with a high
seas theme, and there are also some instances we know
about of pirates kind of trying to do that, which
we'll talk about at the end. And it's also in
a place in the world that there were definitely a
lot of pirates, Yes, we talked about that at the

(01:52):
end as well. Um and Libertalia, which in truth, as
we said, might be completely fictional, would have been settled
sometime probably in the late seventeenth century, and that's just
based kind of on back dating from when the book
was published, because we don't have much in terms of
specific dates beyond that. So we're going to go through
this whole story of this unique pirate settlement as laid

(02:15):
out in the general history by Johnson, and then we
will talk about the other author who usually gets credit
for writing his story and whether that history has roots
in reality. The story of Libertalia begins with a man
named Mison, who was a Frenchman born in Provence to
a good family. The true name of the family is

(02:36):
purposefully left out of the general history of pirates to
safeguard their reputation. Well, Misson's father did pretty well. There
were so many children in the family that he knew
he needed to go make his own way in the
world rather than depending on any inheritance, which is a
popular pirate origin story. Yes, indeed, this one kind of

(02:57):
as we go through you'll find checks kind of all
the boxes of popular pirate story ease, but it also
has the fun one of we're not pirates. Uh so.
Misson was educated in humanity, logic, and mathematics, and then
at age fifteen, was sent to Angier in western France
for a year of military training. And per Charles Johnson's account,

(03:19):
which he claims is sourced from Misson's own writing about
his life, Misson's father had a life as a musketeer
in mind for his son, but Misson had decided on
a life at sea, so Misson's father set him up
with letters of recommendation all of the items he might need,
and then arranged for a volunteer stent aboard the Victoire,
which was a ship commanded by a relative named Monsieur Forbett.

(03:43):
The young Misson aboard the Victoire departed the port at
Marseilles and ventured into the Mediterranean. Misson learned about navigation
and life at sea, and he spent his early time
on the Victoire learning all that he could from the
more experienced men aboard. According to the story, he just
was constantly asking them questions uh. And he loved being

(04:04):
a sailor, and he was well regarded because of his
really well mannered demeanor. But when the Victoires set into
Ports and Naples, Misson's life course changed. He got permission
from the captain to go ashore and to travel inland
to Rome. But what he found there was really disheartening.
He was really chagrined at all the licentiousness and the

(04:25):
indulgence of the papal court. He really lost his faith,
deciding that quote all religion was no more than a
curb upon the minds of the weaker, which the wiser
sort yield to an appearance only. And while in Rome, Misson,
who was pretty devout at that point, went to confession,
and in doing so he meant a quote lewd priest

(04:47):
by the name of Carraccioli, who was Dominican, and while
making the acquaintance of a man of the church who
was not exactly a pillar of piety, solidified Mission's perceptions
that the church was corrupt. He and Carraccio le became friends,
and they actually would remain companions for the rest of
their lives. Carraccioli told me son that a life in
the church was a pretty good gig and came with

(05:09):
friends and opportunities, and quote the ecclesiastical state was governed
with the same policy as were secular principalities and kingdoms,
that what was beneficial, not what was meritorious and virtuous,
would be alone regarded. He likened the papacy to a
monarchy to explain the situation to my son, and he
explained his own contempt at the whole structure, saying, quote,

(05:32):
for my part, I am quite tired of the farce
and will lay hold on the first opportunity to throw
off this masquerading habit. The priest went on to say
that he was worried that by the time he stayed
in the church long enough to make a tidy living
so that he could leave, that he would be too
old to enjoy any of it. So Misson proposed that
the priest joined him on the seas, and so the

(05:55):
two men traveled together to Livorno, Italy to meet back
up with the Victoire, and with Misson's recommendation, Carraccioli was
welcomed onto the crew. Almost immediately, Carraccioli got a taste
of the dangers of sailing life. The Victoire was engaged
in a long and brutal battle with two other ships.
Craccioli was shot in the leg in this conflict, and

(06:17):
it was a massive struggle, but ultimately the vict war one.
There wasn't much of value to take from the bested opponents,
but an estimated fifteen Christian slaves were freed in the process.
After the battle, the battle, damage to Victoire headed back
into Marseilles for repair, and Misson used the downtime to
visit his family, bringing karacci Only along with him. He

(06:40):
also brought with him word from the captain that Musson
had conducted himself admirably at sea. Yeah, he had a
nice little letter to show his parents that he was
doing a good job. After a month of rest, the
captain of the Victoire sent word to Misson and his
friend that they were to set sail again, leaving from
Marseilles to go to Rochelle to pick up merchantmen and

(07:02):
sail for the West Indies. And as the crew waited
at Rochelle for the next phase of the journey, the
merchant ships that they were to join with weren't ready
to set sail. Misson and Carraccioli decided to take work
on another vessel in the meantime because he did not
like to be idle at all. They got into some
adventures along the way, but the more important part of
their escapades, as related in the general History, was their

(07:25):
ongoing discussion of religion and God. Through these discussions, Misson
was adopting a deist philosophy and continuing to just turn
away from all organized religion. There's a chunk of text
that several paragraphs long, in which the writer seems to
be sorting out his own thoughts on the matter of
God and the soul. Cracciola continued to speak on religion

(07:48):
both with Misson and with the other sailors on their journeys,
and as such he became something of a religious leader simultaneously,
because both Caraccioli and Misson had become a highly skilled sailor.
There's a lot of the men they traveled with we're
really looking up to both of them. Yeah, there's a
sort of wonderful irony that Carraccioli wants to leave the

(08:08):
church because he thinks the organized religion is not for
him either, and then he sort of becomes a religious
leader after that. It's kind of a fascinating twist. So
on a cruise to Martinique, the Victoire was engaged in
battle by an english man of war with forty guns
called the wind Chelsea. The early battle took a serious

(08:29):
toll on the leadership of the Victoire. The captain, second captain,
and three lieutenants were all killed very early on. So
short on officers, Misson and Carraccioli, who had always been
quick to step up when needed, began giving orders and
leading the remaining Victoire crew. They were victorious, but this
was actually by accident because for reasons unknown, the wind

(08:52):
Chelsea exploded, killing all of its crew, save one lieutenant
who died two days later aboard the Victoire that to
the conflict with the wind Chelsea. Caraccioli saluted Misson as
captain and told him that he must make a choice
to return support and be at the mercy of other
men's decisions, or to take the Victoire as his own

(09:12):
and make his fortune. Misson opted for freedom, but stated
to the assembled crew that quote a great number of
them had resolved with him upon a life of liberty,
and had done him the honor to create him chief.
That he designed to force no man, and be guilty
of that injustice he blamed in others. Therefore, if any
were reversed to the following his fortune, which he promised

(09:35):
should be the same to all he desired, they would
declare themselves and he would set them ashore, whence they
might return with conveniency. They could basically opt out of
this sort of life of piracy, but his offer was
instead met with shouts of vive la capita Misson, which
is also the origin story of most of pirate crews. Yes,

(09:58):
I'm gonna be cool you guys is. You don't have
to come with me, but if you want to let's go.
Let's all go. We're going to talk about Misson's life
and leadership, but first we will pause for a quick
sponsor break. So Misson immediately set the tone of his

(10:22):
leadership by giving the crew the power to select their
own officers. Then their next destination was agreed upon as
a group. Misson suggested the coast of Spain. All of
the men were going to accord with that course. Then
they had to decide on their colors. And at this
point Carraccioli was quick to clarify that they were in
fact not pirates quote, but men who were resolved to

(10:43):
assert that liberty which God and Nature gave them, and
own no subjection to any farther than was for the
common good of all. So he advised that they fly
under a white flag quote with liberty painted on the fly. Next,
the belongings of all the office ors who were slain
in the fight with the wind Chelsea were brought on
the deck, and the money on board was put into

(11:04):
a chest which was declared to belong equally to all
the men. The lieutenants were asked to make an assessment
of the men on board and determine who had immediate
need of clothes that they could be prioritized to receive
the clothes of the deceased men. Mason followed this up
with a speech that the men should all show one
another brotherly love and cast aside any grudges they had,

(11:26):
and that they should see one another as equals. Quote
for when equity was trodden underfoot, misery, confusion, and mutual
distrust naturally followed. It sounds so idyllic. Everybody loved one another,
We're all in this together. But it was not all
hippie love from me song as. He also declared war

(11:46):
on any ports that would deny them entry and any
who would not give them what they needed. He was
basically saying, so, we know we're not pirates, but other
people might not get that, and if they treat us
like we're pirates, we're gonna have to get piratical. Uh.
He did also admonish his men to always treat prisoners
humanely and generously for the sakes of their immortal souls.

(12:09):
The Victoire and its crew then did some plundering in
the most polite way possible. They took sugar and rum
from a ship without violence and then let it go.
They made fake runs at privateers with no intent to
actually engage them, betting that the ship would try to
take them, which meant that they could then defend themselves.
At one point, Missan told a privateer captain that he

(12:29):
would plunder nothing from the captured ship, but that they
would strip it of guns, and the privateers had to
promise not to engage in piracy for six months. They
made their way around the globe for a while, and
eventually Misson had two ships under his command. He had
taken a ship whose crew was so charmed that they
all opted to join with him, and at this point

(12:49):
Correctioli was named captain of the second ship, which was
named the Biju, and the two vessels made their way
around the Cape of Good Hope and then on to Madagascar.
Miss allied himself to the royal family of an island
near Madagascar and a conflict with a neighboring kingdom. He
also married into the royal family, and so did Carraccioli.

(13:10):
Men of the crew married nod royal women of the
island of Johanna, which is modern day An Juan, and
Misson and his men helped to defend people of the
island against invaders. Yeah there was actually an invasion by
the queen's brother that they defended against uh and they
were always the good guys in this story. So not
long after those events, Missol made his way to nearby

(13:33):
northern Madagascar, and he scoped out an area of land
that appealed to him, and then he went ashore, and
he found good soil there and available fresh water, and
he decided that he wanted to settle a town there
in this place that he envisioned would have docks, and
it would be an asylum, a place for aging men
of the sea to live out the remainder of their

(13:53):
lives in peace, and he would call it Libertalia. Missol
waited for his entire crew to agree to his lands
before he actually began the project. All of the men
agreed to the plan, and they immediately set to work
on his designs, and within ten days they had cleared
a hundred and fifty large trees from the area. He
requested that the royal family of Johanna loan him three

(14:16):
hundred men to help with the project and return for
the assistance that had been provided in their defense. And
after a great deal of debate among the leaders of
that island, some of whom feared that enabling the settlement
could lead to their own enslavement down the road. The
three hundred men were loaned for labor. Yeah, a lot
of that discussion centered around, wait, we're going to help

(14:38):
them build a place from which they could actually come
after us. Uh. And it was like, well maybe, but
that's better than saying no to them and having them
come after us now, right Like, this way we at
least have a chance that will still all be friends.
And Libertilia was set on a harbor, and the first
structures that were built were armed forts on either side

(15:01):
of it, and then homes and shops were built in
the town slowly began to take shape. Efforts were made
to make friends with the native peoples of Madagascar. Of course,
that is one of those things that is also always
framed from a very European perspective, So take that as
a note if you go looking for this story. Uh.
And Libertalia was on its way to becoming the peaceful

(15:22):
settlement that Misson had envisioned when he first ventured onto
the land. Libertalia was anti slavery. This is something that
comes up throughout this account. Misson and his men liberated
slave ships whenever they came across them, and on occasions
when slaves were offered to them as barter, they would
always accept them and then immediately set them free. Misson

(15:43):
wanted the people who chose to settle in Libertalia to
be called Liberty. The idea was that it was open
to all and that it transcended any prior nationality and
signaled a community of equals. Libertalia wasn't Misson's only focused
during this formative time, though. He still took the Vics
what the Victoire out to challenge ships and take their goods,
and he met with a mix of good and bad

(16:04):
luck on the sea, and one skirmish with a Portuguese ship.
He was able to take a large sum of money,
which was about two thousand pounds, but he also lost
fifty six men in the process, making it the greatest
loss of life that he experienced in this kind of conflict.
But he made his way home to the developing town
of Libertalia, and from its rudimentary beginnings, the land was

(16:27):
worked to grow food and the town was able to
barter with other villages. They ended up with several hundred
head of cattle, but in addition to growing its footprint
and its own crops. Libertalia also grew in population because
other people came to live there, including the English privateer
Captain Thomas Too. Missole had first encountered Two when the

(16:48):
latter sloop appeared in the waters off the coast of Madagascar.
It appeared there might have been a potential idea that
they were going to take this new town, but eventually
things led to Two and his in joining the colony
at Libertalia. If his name sounds familiar, he was part
of our episode about Henry every and the raid on
the Mughal fleet. He pops up in a lot of places.

(17:11):
He was a very busy world traveler. He was Misson
and two didn't always see things in the same light. Though.
Even when Two first arrived in Libertalia, Misson was also
coming in with a Portuguese ship that he had taken.
Misson quickly realized that if they were going to keep
the prisoners they had taken, they would need men to
be on guard against an uprising, which meant he wouldn't

(17:32):
have enough men to go back out to sea. And
while he had established the settlement as a whole base
and as a place where any mariner could call home.
He wanted to continue his voyages as long as he could.
He was still building his settlement and was to be
clear getting supplies and fortifications and wealth by taking them
from ships that he bested, even if he was being

(17:52):
polite about it. Yeah, I don't want to lose sight
of the fact that he was stealing from people, even
if he seems like a great magnanimous dude. Yeah, I'm
gonna build a pirate utopia funded by piracy, but I'm
not calling it that. You guys, we are not pirates
unless people treat us like pirates, and then we kind

(18:14):
of got to be pirates a little bit. Uh. It's
there's a moral flexibility in the mix of this whole story.
So he had planned to just let the ship, the
Portuguese ship that he had taken and its prisoners go.
He also just didn't want to take on the load
of having to see to the needs of all those
captured men. Like to him, this was just way too
great a burden for any value they were going to

(18:34):
get out of it. But too and even Carraccioli, we're
not fans of this idea of letting everybody go. They
knew that if they set those prisoners free, all of
Europe would soon know about Libertalia and would invade. A
Song called a council and explained his position, and the
men of the council agreed with him. All the prisoners
were brought before me Song. He told them that he

(18:56):
knew that they would cause his demise, but that he
could cause they our deaths if he wished, and that
he needed them each to swear an oath not to
work against him. Then he gave each to them back
any belongings that have been taken from them and set
them to sail on a ship that was stripped of
all of its guns. Yeah. I feel like so much
of his leadership is based on the like we cool.

(19:19):
Like that's his whole approach. Are are we cool? Uh?
The next move for Libertalia was actually away from this
everybody be cool freedom and no rules approach that it
began with. But we will talk about that after we
first hear from one of our sponsors. While the idea

(19:43):
of a utopia always sounds great in theory, in practice
it is really hard to throw a bunch of humans
together tell them they all equally share in the land
and in in the work and have the whole thing chug
along without any conflict. They are humans, after all, And
while things seem to work with Misson's original group, after
two and his men became part of Libertalia, conflicts started

(20:05):
to arise. On one occasion, Libertalia was invaded by Portuguese sloops.
The battle played out and Missan's men were victorious, and
they treated the defeated men who survived with kindness and
hospitality until they saw two of the men who had
been set free under oath not to bring any trouble
into the settlement. These two men were tried for perjury,

(20:26):
found guilty, and executed, and this caused some men to
question Missan's leadership. While Missan and Caraccioli saw this execution
as a matter of self preservation of their way of life,
some of the men saw it as a contradiction of
everything they've been told about Libertalia and about its values. Eventually,
Carraccioli was able to convince everyone of the necessity of

(20:48):
the execution, but it took a lot of effort and rhetoric. Yeah,
he sounds, based on this account like he was really
quite a good public speaker, but he was often convincing
all of the men of of what should be done.
But then not long after this, there was an argument
between twos men and Misson's The nature of this argument

(21:09):
is a little unclear, although the account says that twos
men started it. Uh two thought that the matter should
be solved with swords, but Misson and Carraccioli wanted to
negotiate some sort of accord. They did not want to
set up their new little utopia as a place where
you settled your disagreements by potentially killing each other. And
while they sorted out the matter at hand, and they

(21:30):
figured out how to settle this particular argument, all three
of the captains came to the conclusion that it was
actually time for Libertalia to have some actual laws. So
everyone the entire colony was gathered so that the three
commanders could explain this plan. They had to have some
sort of government, and Misson Caraccioli into proposed a democratic

(21:54):
system with laws made by the people. The men were
to divide themselves into groups of ten, and from each
one representative was to be chosen who would assist in
setting up the laws and the government of the settlement.
Property and land were to be divided evenly, but then
it would be owned by each man. It would no
longer be a system of collective ownership. On the first

(22:15):
day that the newly selected lawmakers met, Carraccioli made a
speech and proposed that there should be a lord conservator
basically a president that would be elected and would serve
for terms of three years, so he could be re elected,
but every three years they would revisit that and all agreed,
and of course Misson was immediately made conservator, and two

(22:36):
was named as Conservator Admiral, and Carraccioli was Secretary of State.
And for ten full days, this new governing body worked
to set up the laws of Libertalia. They began, under
Caraccioli's office to even develop a new language for Libertalia
that incorporated the various native languages of the many people
who had settled there. They carefully balanced the manpower that

(22:58):
was needed to maintain animals and their crops against their
needs for naval reinforcements. Yeah too, was like, let's build
our navy, and they were like, hey, somebody's got to
feed the cows. Uh. So they kind of were figuring out, uh,
some pretty advanced kind of balancing systems about what their
society can handle. Uh An Admiral too then set out

(23:20):
to gather more members of the colony, hoping to meet
with ships at sea and offer to take volunteers to
bolster Libertalia's numbers. He also went and visited places he
knew and sort of told people about it, and as
part of his canvassing for new citizens, which he first
began by finding a settlement of his former men who
had not joined up with Libertalia but had started their

(23:42):
own camp. He spoke really passionately about Libertalia and its
government built around fairness and equality, but also he was
clear to say that the settlement was also willing to
work with other governments, saying, quote, if you will go
to America or Europe and show the advantage which a
crew to the English by fixing a colony here out

(24:03):
of the love we bear our country and to wipe
away the odious appellation of pirates, with pleasure, we will
submit to any who shall come with a commission from
a lawful government. But it is ridiculous to think we
will become subjects of greater rogues than ourselves. But while
he was visiting with his friends and potential recruits to

(24:24):
their small paradise. He was surprised when Misson himself found
him and told him that everything they had built had
been lost. Song told to that the Native people's had
attacked the settlement, killed Corectioli and many others, and that
only he and forty five other men had managed to
escape aboard the Bijou. Yeah, this was at a point

(24:45):
when two was kind of stranded. There had been a
big storm and the Victoire had actually capsized and many
of the crew were killed, but they were able to
to get the ship, and too thought that they should
head to America and make a fresh start, and there
was even discussion that, like, hey, we know how to
do this now, let's make another settlement. But Misson was

(25:06):
so devastated at having lost all of his work that
he just had no heart for another attempt. So Misson
took the Victoire and set out with a plan that
he would meet to again on the Guinta coast to regroup.
But that meeting never happened. The Victoire sank during a
storm and Misson went down with a ship. So it
has come up on the show before, but just to recap,

(25:29):
since the nineteen thirties, the history of the lives and
bloody exploits of the most noted pirates, sometimes the General
History of Pirates. You'll see it listed in a number
of different ways because on some republications that has gotten
new titles has been attributed to journalist, spy and novelist
Daniel Dafoe, and that attribution came about through the work
of John Robert Moore, who was a Defoe biographer, and

(25:51):
it has been pretty widely accepted as truth at this point. Yeah,
there are some other candidates that people name, um, including
Nathaniel Missed, he was a sailor a publisher, but it's
so frequently associated with Daniel Dafoe that a lot of
times that is who the author is listed as in
the library or wherever, with like no little asterisk or anything. Yeah,

(26:12):
there are definitely versions that don't really even talk about
how it came to be that it gets that attribution. So,
remembering that the Foe's most famous works were novels like Robinson,
Crusoe and mal Flanders with little evidence to back up,
and he uh to back up, what's it containing it?
This account in a general History of the Robberies and

(26:34):
Murderers of the most notorious pirates is pretty much believed
to be fictional. I mean, it's we've talked about this
book in a bunch of different episodes, and it's all.
They all involve people. We know, we're real and we're
involved in piracy, but the details a lot of times
are very questionable. And an introduction to the modern printing

(26:55):
of this work, Maximilian in Novak wrote that the account
of the crew and the captained that founded the Libertalia
as one of the quote most remarkable and neglected works
of fiction among the foes work. But there were, as
we said Tracy mentioned, there were definitely in many cases
real people that these stories pulled in, and we don't

(27:15):
there's not a good way to verify or not. It's
not like people that were living a privateering life. We're
keeping great records, which is probably why some of these
fanciful stories grew to fill the void of people that
wanted to know about them. But there were a few
pirate settlements in the seventeenth and eighteenth century, so the
idea of Libertalia is not entirely outside the bounds of possibility.

(27:38):
And Madagascar, as Tracy mentioned at the top of the show,
was a popular destination for pirates looking for at times
a bit of freedom and peace and sometimes to take
a break from things, and also to attack other ships.
Well yeah, I mean, you can't live by rest alone.
There was a lot of piratical action happening in that area.

(28:01):
Ranters Bay in Madagascar was founded by pirate John Plantain
in seventeen twenty, although he had more of a kingdom
in mind than a democracy. And Eel sam Marie, which
is four miles east of the island of Madagascar, is
also believed to have been inhabited by pirates for almost
a century and a much looser sort of set up
than Missan's purported settlement. So there's a pirate cemetery on

(28:25):
that island that continues to be a tourist attraction. And
in two thousand one, author Kevin Rushby published a book
called Hunting Pirate Heaven, which was part travelog and part
investigative journalism. And he himself was basically traveling the roots
of privateers, seeking out the sites of the various legendary
utopias that have been part of pirate lore. And he

(28:47):
didn't find Libertalia, and no one else has any hard
evidence or record of it. Either that does live on
in popular culture, though it has shown up in lots
of books and movies and video games, including Uncharted four
and Fallout four. I haven't played Uncharted for, but in
Fallout for it's kind of a cobbled together radar settlement
off the coast of Massachusetts. Yeah, it's not. It's not

(29:10):
so much of the utopia hug fest. No, it's definitely
not a hug fest. If you go there, people shooting you.
Uh yeah. William Burrows wrote about it at one point.
It's shown up. It's one of those like handy uh
kind of touchstones that people pull in when they're talking
about piracy and privateering to give it a feel of authenticity,

(29:32):
even though uh that that feel may be based on
something completely fictional. But it's a fascinating idea. I do
think it's interesting to examine why someone would want to write,
presuming its fiction, to write a story that is so um,
sort of progressive in this idea of all men being

(29:52):
equal and like so anti slavery. It's an interesting thing
that that would be framed along with the idea of
piracy and freedom and from government and we're gonna go
to this ship into attacking us so that we can
then fight back and take their stuff. Right. Like I said,
there's some moral flexibility baked into the whole thing. Uh,

(30:14):
but that does become an interesting thing to look at,
like why would that be such an appealing piece of
fiction at a time that we don't often think of
as being uh really rooted in all men being equal.
It's fascinating and it's a fun read. It's a little
bit tricky to get through it because the language is
clunky to our modern ear. Uh. There's some you know,

(30:36):
fast and loose use of capitalization and yeah, some things
you're like, wait, is that a properness? Oh no, it's not.
He just likes the word prize. Okay. Uh So yeah,
there's stuff like that to contend with. But it is
a really fun read. Yeah. Well, having read chunks of
the book for research of various episodes of the podcast,
it does tend to be a fun read, if not

(30:58):
necessarily an historically accurate one. There's part of me there,
there is a doofy part of me that wants in
my heart for some piece of evidence to appear to
prove that everything in the general history is actually accurate
and true, because it would be mind blowing if that
were the case. Like, here is all of my notes,
like my big file, my binder, full newspaper clippings, et cetera,

(31:23):
that I used to research this book. Yet No, I
don't think it would be great. Wouldn't it be hilarious? Uh?
My listener mail is not about piracy at all. It
is about legal matters. It is from our listener Greg,
and it is about our Elizabeth Jennings Graham episode. And
he writes, Hi, Dear Holly and Tracy. I'm a longtime listener,

(31:44):
first time writing in. I love the episode about Elizabeth
Jennings Graham as a practicing attorney in New York City.
Listening to your podcast as I traveled from court in
the Bronx to court in Brooklyn, I felt as though
you were describing my everyday routine, even though the case
you were describing was a d the years ago. An
important point of clarification, I know this makes absolutely no sense,

(32:04):
but the Supreme Court in the New York State unified
court system is actually the lowest level of general jurisdiction,
i e. A trial court. The highest court in New York,
even more confusingly, is called the Court of Appeals. I
can't tell you how confusing that was in law school
to have to reconcile that New York is the only
state where court labels make no sense from the highest
to lowest. So when the state Supreme Court judge in

(32:26):
Brooklyn gave the jury instructions you describe, while they were
surely notable, especially for that time, it was not actually
the highest court in a state making such a pronouncement,
the Supreme Court judge in this case being the functional
equivalent of a trial judge in any other state. The
pedantic lawyer in me literally had to stop the podcast
and write this email before I could continue, lest the

(32:46):
brainage it wrought distract me from the rest of the episode.
Please keep up with you all you do. I travel
between courts on public transportation every day, sometimes as much
as five hours, and your podcasts are a staple of
ample train time. Thank you so much, Greg, I would
never have known that. No at this uh Now, I
will be pedantic and say that we have also gotten
notes about the court systems layers from other states that

(33:09):
are not New York that also did not make sense,
but they didn't make sense in a different way than
this one. I know it becomes really apparent how much
there was never a discussion about uniformity. Yes, and I don't.
I think if they tried to make a uniform labeling
system now it would create utter chaos. So thank you

(33:30):
for that point of clarification. And it's a um a
good thing to have that fixed because I don't want
to misrepresent. Thank you so much. Greg. If you would
like to write to us, you can do so at
history podcast at how stuff works dot com. If you
can find us across the spectrum of social media as
missed in History, We are also available at missed in

(33:54):
History dot com, where every episode of the show from
its very beginnings before Tracy and I were part of
it are all there, as well as show notes for
any of the shows that Tracy and I have worked on.
So come and visit us at missed in History dot
com and you can subscribe to the podcast at Apple
Podcasts or anywhere else you get your podcast. For more

(34:16):
on this and thousands of other topics, visit how staff
works dot com.