Explore Bristol’s swashbuckling past with ‘Pirates and Prejudice’

Explore Bristol’s swashbuckling past with ‘Pirates and Prejudice’

Posted on: 21 Jul 2023

This Historical Walk will allow tourists and Bristolians alike to explore the city’s old dockside haunts where smugglers and slavers, pirates and privateers used to spend their dastardly days.

 

Historical Walk: Pirates and Prejudice will take place each Thursday at 11 AM until 31 August 2023.

 

Beginning yesterday and run as a collaboration between the Bristol Radical History Group and the Long John Silver Trust, this new walk aims to shatter some of the myths around Bristol’s literary and piratical past. All for a suggested donation of £5.

 

To book in advance call 0117 352 6600. On the day sign-ups will be taken if there is available space.

 

 

Find out more about the lives of real-life buccaneers including Edward Teach (better known as Blackbeard) and William Dampier as well as connections to the world of fiction such as world-famous anti-hero Long John Silver from local history experts.

 

You will also discover Bristol’s significance to literary staples such as Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, Jonathan Swift’s legendary riposte Gulliver’s Travels, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s epic poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

 

The walk will stop off at locations including the Gipp, the quay that diarist Samuel Pepys visited in 1668 and, according to local folklore, pirates were executed for their crimes in addition to the site of prolific Bristol privateer, Woodes Rogers’, Queen Square home.

 

On King Street, experience a retelling of Treasure Island and discover links between people and places in the book and real-life Bristol spots The Llandoger Trow, Welsh Back, the Hole-in-the-Wall, Redcliffe Wharf, Redcliffe Caves, The Ostrich, Bathurst Basin and Merchants Landing – this swashbuckling tale touches all parts of Bristol’s historic harbourside!

 

The route will begin at M Shed before dropping by Narrow Quay, Queen Square, King Street, Welsh Back, The Grove and finally Redcliffe Wharf.

Historical Walk: Pirates and Prejudice will take place each Thursday from 11 AM until 31 August 2023. Book in advance by calling 0117 352 6600. 

 

On the day sign-ups will be taken if there is available space.

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Article by:

Stanley Gray

Stan is a born and bred Bristolian, recently graduated from studying English Literature in Sheffield. His passions are music and literature and he spends the majority of his time in venues all over the city, immersing himself in Bristol’s alternative music scene. A lifelong Bristol City fan, Stan’s Saturdays are spent watching his team both home and away.