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Privateer   Listen
noun
Privateer  n.  
1.
An armed private vessel which bears the commission of the sovereign power to cruise against the enemy. See Letters of marque, under Marque.
2.
The commander of a privateer. "Kidd soon threw off the character of a privateer and became a pirate."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Privateer" Quotes from Famous Books



... intermingled in one chronological order, lest the impression be created that piracy and privateering were much the same. It is true that, in theory and in legal definition, they are widely different things and stand on totally different bases. Legally, a privateer is an armed vessel (or its commander) which, in time of war, though owners and officers and crew are private persons, has a commission from a belligerent government to commit acts of warfare on vessels of its enemy. Legally, a pirate is one who commits robbery or other ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various

... war, is not the merchant's trade carried on, likewise, at greater hazard? Is not the freight, equally with the sailors, threatened at once by the ocean and the enemy? And is not the owner's fortune equally impaired, whether the ship is dashed upon a rock, or seized by a privateer? ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 10. - Parlimentary Debates I. • Samuel Johnson

... good father, who from the habits of his life, being of the Quaker profession, looked on me as lost; but the impression, much as it affected me at the time, wore away, and I entered afterwards in the King of Prussia privateer, Captain Mender, and went ...
— Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers - Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With - The Freethinkers." • Charles Bradlaugh, A. Collins, and J. Watts

... expected to. In the Gulf, at the mouth of the river, a Confederate privateer"—the narrator's voice faded out. She began to rise. Her ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable

... in motion, for he felt he had a family to provide for, and he wished to make one more mark on the enemy in return for the beauty-spot his wife so gloried in. He accordingly got a commission in a privateer, made two or three fortunate cruises, and was able at the peace to purchase a prize-brig, which he sailed, as master and owner, until the year 1790, when he was recalled to the paternal roof by the death of my grandfather. Being an only ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper

... Banff, commanded the Hastings man-of war in 1742 and 1743, and captured, during that time, a valuable outward-bound Spanish register-ship, a Spanish privateer of twenty guns, a French polacca with a rich cargo, and other vessels. He died at Lisbon in November 1746, at the early ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... Gentlemen: Permit me to call your attention to this beautiful group, which has lately been added, at an enormous expense, to my collection. You here behold the first privateer and the first victim of his murderous propensities. Captain Kidd, the robber of the main, is supposed to have originated somewhere down east. His whole life being spent upon the stormy deep, he amassed an immense fortune, and buried it in the sand ...
— Entertainments for Home, Church and School • Frederica Seeger

... Ouseburn Lassie. The Blacketts did what they could to console the bereaved parents, but father and mother would not be comforted. At length, months afterwards, they learnt in a casual way that a collier had been captured off Yarmouth by a French privateer, about the time the Ouseburn Lassie was making her trip; at least that was the construction the Yarmouth salts who saw the affair from the shore put upon the movements of the two vessels. So a ray of hope came to ...
— With Marlborough to Malplaquet • Herbert Strang and Richard Stead

... Irish robbers and the French privateers,' then swarming the Irish coast. From eight to ten of these desperate characters were sent to Cork for trial at every assize of Bear Haven. They swore vengeance upon the upright magistrate; and in the year 1704, a French privateer hove in sight—soon anchoring, he faced M. Fontaine's house. The vessel mounted ten guns, with a crew of eighty seamen. The Huguenot mustered all his men, amounting to twenty, and, sending the Papists away, he supplied the Protestants with muskets. ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... the loading of the artillery, the rule should be to place all common and machine guns on deck. A certain amount of ammunition should be stowed so as to be quickly accessible. This is an essential measure to afford the transport protection from some privateer. The guns should be securely placed to prevent their movement by the motion of the sea and to render feasible their use on deck. Trials will soon be made to find the suitable means whereby field artillery may be put to successful use on shipboard, ...
— Operations Upon the Sea - A Study • Franz Edelsheim



Words linked to "Privateer" :   Sir John Hawkyns, Sir John Hawkins, war vessel, privateersman, ship's officer, warship



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