Editing Privateer (section)

=== United States ===
====British Colonial period====
[[File:Chasseur vs St Lawrence.jpg|thumb|''[[Chasseur (1812 clipper)|Chasseur]]'', one of the most famous American privateers of the War of 1812, capturing {{HMS|St Lawrence|1813|6}}]]

During [[King George's War]], approximately 36,000 Americans served aboard privateers at one time or another.<ref name=Privateer/> During the [[Nine Years War]], the French adopted a policy of strongly encouraging privateers, including the famous [[Jean Bart]], to attack English and Dutch shipping. England lost roughly 4,000 merchant ships during the war.<ref name=Privateer>[https://web.archive.org/web/20031211221516/http://www.cato.org/pubs/journal/cj11n1/cj11n1-8.pdf Privateering and the Private Production of Naval Power], ''Gary M. Anderson and Adam Gifford Jr.''</ref> In the following [[War of Spanish Succession]], privateer attacks continued, Britain losing 3,250 merchant ships.<ref>Brewer, John. ''The Sinews of Power: War, Money, and the English State, 1688–1783.'' New York.: Alfred A. Knopf, 1989. p. 197</ref>

In the subsequent conflict, the [[War of Austrian Succession]], the Royal Navy was able to concentrate more on defending British ships. Britain lost 3,238 merchantmen, a smaller fraction of her merchant marine than the enemy losses of 3,434.<ref name=Privateer/> While French losses were proportionally severe, the smaller but better protected Spanish trade suffered the least and it was Spanish privateers who enjoyed much of the best-allied plunder of British trade, particularly in the West Indies.

==== American Revolutionary War ====
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{{main|American Revolutionary War}}
{{further|Naval battles of the American Revolutionary War}}
{{also|Whaleboat War}}
During the [[American Revolutionary War]], the [[Continental Congress]], and some state governments (on their own initiative), issued privateering licenses, authorizing "legal piracy", to merchant captains in an effort to take prizes from the British Navy and [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Tory]] (Loyalist) privateers. This was done due to the relatively small number of commissioned American naval vessels and the pressing need for [[prisoner exchange]].[[File:BriggObserveregagingtheJack29May1782HalifaxPublRDodd1Sept1784BerleyRobisonCollectionUSNavalAcademy.jpg|upright=1.35|thumb|left|[[Naval battle off Halifax]], [[Nova Scotia]]]]
About 55,000 American seamen served aboard the privateers.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.usmm.org/revolution.html|title=Privateers or Merchant Mariners help win the Revolutionary War|website=www.usmm.org|access-date=6 February 2019}}</ref> They quickly sold their prizes, dividing their profits with the financier (persons or company) and the state (colony). [[Long Island Sound]] became a hornets' nest of privateering activity during the [[American Revolution]] (1775–1783), as most transports to and from New York went through the Sound. [[New London, Connecticut]] was a chief privateering port for the American colonies, leading to the British Navy blockading it in 1778–1779. Chief financiers of privateering included Thomas & Nathaniel Shaw of New London and John McCurdy of [[Lyme, Connecticut|Lyme]]. In the months before the British raid on New London and Groton, a New London privateer took ''Hannah'' in what is regarded as the largest prize taken by any American privateer during the war. Retribution was likely part of Gov. Clinton's (NY) motivation for [[Arnold's Raid]], as the ''Hannah'' had carried many of his most cherished items.

American privateers are thought to have seized up to 300 British ships during the war. The British ship ''Jack'' was [[Naval battle off Cape Breton|captured]] and turned into an American privateer, only to be captured again by the British in the [[naval battle off Halifax]], [[Nova Scotia]]. American privateers not only fought naval battles but also raided numerous communities in British colonies, such as the [[Raid on Lunenburg, Nova Scotia (1782)]].

The [[United States Constitution]] authorized the [[Congress of the United States|U.S. Congress]] to grant letters of marque and reprisal. Between the end of the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812, less than 30 years, Britain, France, [[Naples]], the [[Barbary States]], Spain, and the Netherlands seized approximately 2,500 American ships.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://orbat.com/site/history/historical/usa/usn1812.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090109000731/http://orbat.com/site/history/historical/usa/usn1812.html|title=US Navy Fleet List War of 1812|archive-date=January 9, 2009}}</ref> Payments in ransom and tribute to the Barbary states amounted to 20% of United States government annual revenues in 1800<ref>{{cite web|last=Oren|first=Michael B.|title=The Middle East and the Making of the United States, 1776 to 1815|date=2005-11-03|url=http://www.columbia.edu/cu/news/05/11/michaelOren.html| access-date=2007-02-18}}</ref> and would lead the United States to fight the Barbary states in the [[First Barbary War]] and [[Second Barbary War]]s.

==== War of 1812 ====

During the [[War of 1812]], both the British and the American governments used privateers, and the established system was very similar.<ref name=":0">{{Cite magazine |url=https://www.independent.org/pdf/tir/tir_11_04_06_tabarrok.pdf|author=Tabarrok, Alexander |date=Winter 2007 |title=The Rise, Fall, and Rise Again of Privateers |magazine=The Independent Review |volume=XI |issue=3 |pages=565–577 |issn=1086-1653}}</ref> U.S. Congress declared <blockquote>that war be and the same is hereby declared to exist between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the dependencies thereof, and the United States of America and their Territories; and that the President of the United States is herby authorized to use the whole land and naval force of the United States to carry the same into effect, and to issue to private armed vessels of the United States commissions of marque and general reprisal, in such forms as he shall think proper, and under the seal of the United States, against the vessels, goods, and effects of the Government of the said United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and the subjects thereof.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwac.html|title=Annals of Congress Home Page: U.S. Congressional Documents|website=American Memory - Library of Congress }}</ref></blockquote>[[James Madison|President Madison]] issued 500 [[Letter of marque|letters of marque]] authorizing privateers. Overall some 200 of the ships took prizes. The cost of buying and fitting of a large privateer was about $40,000 and prizes could net $100,000.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://npg.si.edu/object/npg_EXH.WR.21|title=12 at Midnight; the Hibernia attempting to run the Comet down|website=npg.si.edu|access-date=2019-04-27|archive-date=2019-04-27|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190427090411/https://npg.si.edu/object/npg_EXH.WR.21|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Captain [[Thomas Boyle]] was one of the famous and successful American privateers. He commanded the Baltimore schooner [[Comet (1810 clipper)|''Comet'']] and then later in the war the Baltimore clipper [[Chasseur (1812 clipper)|''Chasseur'']]. He captured over 50 British merchant ships during the war. One source<ref>{{Cite book|title=History of the American privateers, and letters-of-marque during our war with England in the years 1812, '13 and '14 interspersed with several naval battles between American and British ships of war|last=Coggeshall, George|date=1861|publisher=G. Coggeshall|isbn=0665443757|oclc=1084236819}}</ref> estimated a total damage to the British merchant navy from ''Chasseur''<nowiki/>'s 1813-1815 activities at one and a half million dollars. In total, the Baltimore privateer fleet of 122 ships sunk or seized 500 British ships with an estimated value of $16&nbsp;million, which accounts about one-third of all the value of all prizes taken over the course of the whole war.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Maryland privateers, War of 1812|last=Huntsberry, Thomas Vincent|date=1983|publisher=J. Mart|oclc=16870651}}</ref> 

[[File:JDe Wolf.jpg|thumb|left|[[James De Wolf]]]]
On April 8, 1814, the British [[Essex, Connecticut#The Great Attack|attacked Essex, Connecticut, and burned the ships in the harbor]], due to the construction there of a number of privateers. This was the greatest financial loss of the entire War of 1812 suffered by the Americans. However, the private fleet of [[James De Wolf]], which sailed under the flag of the American government in 1812, was most likely a key factor in the naval campaign of the war. De Wolf's ship, the ''Yankee'', was possibly the most financially successful ship of the war. Privateers proved to be far more successful than their US Navy counterparts, claiming three-quarters of the 1600 British merchant ships taken during the war (although a third of these were recaptured prior to making landfall). One of the more successful of these ships was the ''[[Prince de Neufchatel]]'', which once captured nine British prizes in swift succession in the [[English Channel]].{{Citation needed|date=November 2008}}

[[Jean Lafitte]] and his privateers aided US General [[Andrew Jackson]] in the defeat of the British in the [[Battle of New Orleans]] in order to receive full pardons for their previous crimes.<ref name="ramsay62">Ramsay (1996), p. 62.</ref><ref name="ramsay69">Ramsay (1996), p. 69.</ref><ref name="ramsay70">Ramsay (1996), p. 70.</ref><ref name="ramsay71">Ramsay (1996), p. 71.</ref><ref name="ramsay77">Ramsay (1996), p. 77.</ref> Jackson formally requested clemency for Lafitte and the men who had served under him, and the US government granted them all a full pardon on February 6, 1815.<ref name="ramsay82">Ramsay (1996), p. 82.</ref><ref>Ingersoll (1852) pp. 82–83</ref>

However, many of the ships captured by the Americans were recaptured by the Royal Navy. British convoy systems honed during the Napoleonic Wars limited losses to singleton ships, and the effective blockade of American and continental ports prevented captured ships being taken in for sale. This ultimately led to orders forbidding US privateers from attempting to bring their prizes in to port, with captured ships instead having to be burnt. Over 200 American privateer ships were captured by the Royal Navy, many of which were turned on their former owners and used by the British blockading forces. Nonetheless, during the War of 1812 the privateers "swept out from America's coasts, capturing and sinking as many as 2,500 British ships and doing approximately $40 million worth of damage to the British economy."<ref name=":0" />
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==== 1856 Declaration of Paris ====
The US was not one of the initial signatories of the 1856 [[Declaration of Paris]] which outlawed privateering, and the [[Constitution of the Confederate States|Confederate Constitution]] authorized use of privateers. However, the US did offer to adopt the terms of the Declaration during the [[American Civil War]], when the [[Confederate States of America|Confederates]] sent several [[Confederate privateer|privateers]] to sea before putting their main effort in the more effective commissioned raiders.

==== American Civil War ====
[[File:Privateer Savannah.jpg|thumb|CSS ''Savannah'', a [[Confederate privateer]].]]

During the [[American Civil War]], privateering took on several forms including [[Blockade runners of the American Civil War|blockade running]], while privateering generally occurred in the interests of both the North and the South. [[Letters of marque]] would often be issued to private shipping companies and other private owners of ships, authorizing them to engage vessels deemed to be unfriendly to the issuing government. Crews of ships were awarded the cargo and other prizes aboard any captured vessel as an incentive to search far and wide for ships attempting to supply the Confederacy, or aid the Union, as the case may be.

During the [[American Civil War|Civil War]] Confederate President [[Jefferson Davis]] issued letters of marque to anyone who would employ their ship to either attack Union shipping or bring badly needed supplies through the Union blockade into southern ports.<ref>{{cite journal | first = Brainerd | last = Dyer | title = Confederate Naval and Privateering Activities in the Pacific | journal = Pacific Historical Review | volume = 3 | number = 4 | date = 1934 | pages = 433–443 | jstor = 3633146 | doi = 10.2307/3633146}}</ref>

Most of the supplies brought into the Confederacy were carried aboard privately owned vessels. When word came about that the Confederacy was willing to pay almost any price for military supplies, various interested parties designed and built specially designed lightweight seagoing steamers, [[Blockade runners of the American Civil War|blockade runners]] specifically designed and built to outrun Union ships on [[Union blockade|blockade]] patrol.<ref>Hamilton Cochran, ''Blockade Runners of the Confederacy'' (U of Alabama Press, 2005).</ref>

Neither the United States nor Spain authorized privateers in their  war in 1898.<ref>Scott D. Wagner, "Why there was no privateering in the Spanish-American War." ''International Journal of Naval History'' 14.1 (2018).</ref>