Pirate Captain. Best known as "Blackbeard", he was born about 1680 in Bristol, England, little is known about his early life. About 1716 he met his first real pirate, Benjamin Hornigold, who took him on as his apprentice and taught him the pirating trade. In late 1717, the English King gave a pardon to all pirates who gave up their trade, and Hornigold decided to retire, leaving Teach on his own. Taking a recently captured merchant ship "Concord", he refitted it as a pirate ship with 40 guns, and re-christened her "Queen Anne's Revenge". His reputation gained prominence when the Queen Anne's Revenge defeated a British 30 gun Man-of-War "HMS Scarborough" which had been dispatched to deal with the pirates. Thinking that a fierce image would make ships surrender faster, Edward Teach grew his beard and hair long, tying colored ribbons in it, and wearing up to six pistols, to make his appearance fiercer. In 1718, he met the pirate sloop "Revenge" under the command of Stede Bonnet, and the two captains agreed to work together as partners. When Teach realized that Bonnet was a poor seaman, he took over the other ship, appointing Israel Hands to command it, and Bonnet was made a "permanent guest" aboard the "Queen Anne's Revenge." Both ships were used to blockade and attack merchant ships in Charleston, South Carolina. In early 1718, he accepted the King's Pardon and settled in Bath, North Carolina, where he married 16 year old Mary Ormond. He remained allured by pirating, and tiring of married life, returned to the seas, pretending to be a merchant to hide his pirate trade. In November 1718, the Virginia governor requested British naval aide at eliminating the pirates, and Edward Teach's hideout at Ocracoke Island was attacked by four British ships. In a hand-to-hand fight, First Lieutenant Robert Maynard, commanding the sloop "HMS Jane", killed Teach and hung his severed head from the yardarm of the sloop to prove that he was dead.