The depictions of Ann Bonny and Mary Read in Johnson’s General History of the Pyrates remained the same in the first two English editions of his book. Since the two women were known to dress as men, Benjamin Cole, the book’s artist, faced the challenge of how to portray them as pirates that were also recognisably women.
Like the other pirates pictured, he drew them with a sword in hand to signal their propensity for violence. To signal their femininity, he also chose to depict them with long, flowing hair and the standard hair covering a woman always sported in public. More natural hair was the trend in Anne and Mary’s day, but a respectable woman would NEVER have been seen in public with the loose waves depicted above.
For Cole to depict the women this way may seem rather benign to us today, but in 1724 it would have been quite scandalous. It would have sent a clear message these women were rebels against the society they lived in.
What Cole obviously couldn’t bring himself to do was depict them in the usual frockcoats and breeches he drew on Blackbeard, Stede Bonnet, Henry Avery and the others in the book. For a woman to show ANY of her legs above the ankle was considered overtly sexual and downright immoral. Cole may well have been accused of creating pornography if he dared portray them this way. Instead, he drew them in loose trousers to signal their independence and freedom.
These images come from the 1725 Dutch edition. In Ann’s picture, the sword is replaced by a pistol and a far more action-oriented stance. But most notably, the artist has decided to show both women as immediately female by portraying them with their breasts exposed.
Was this intended to provide titillation (pun intended) for the reader’s enjoyment and undermine the capability and bravery of the two women by reducing them to sexual objectification? Or was it to show that women could be powerful, imposing and still unashamedly female?
Historians are still debating this one!
Up next: John “Calico Jack” Rackam