Graveyard of the Atlantic then drive his ship ashore following the false light. The first recorded shipwreck off the coast of North Carolina was in the early 16th century. This wreck was reported in 1526, off the mouth of Cape Fear River. The large numbers of explorers who came to the area in subsequent years had to travel through the rough waters to get to the coast of North Carolina. In June 1718, Edward Teach — better known as Blackbeard the pirate — ran his flagship, the "Queen Anne's Revenge", aground near present-day Beaufort Inlet, NC. Thirty two years later, in August 1750, at
Henry Strangways (pirate) Henry Strangways (pirate) Henry Strangways (died 1562), also sometimes known as Strangwish, was an English "Gentleman Pirate" who attacked Spanish and other shipping. He was repeatedly imprisoned, and pardoned by highly placed friends, during his approximately eight-year piratical career, from about 1552 to 1560. His portrait painted by a fellow prisoner, Gerlach Flicke, resides today in the National Portrait Gallery in London. Strangways was born in Dorset to a well-known family of good standing, thus he is sometimes referred to as a "Gentleman Pirate". Strangways began his career as a pirate in 1552–53, plying the Irish Sea for plunder. There