10/27/2026
How cool is this, The Queen Ann Revenge!
For nearly 300 years, this cannon rested beneath the sea — until divers brought it back from the wreck of one of history’s most infamous pirate ships.
The cannon was recovered from the Queen Anne’s Revenge, the flagship of the pirate Blackbeard, who terrorized the Atlantic coast in the early 18th century. The ship was originally a French vessel called La Concorde, before Blackbeard captured it and transformed it into a heavily armed pirate warship.
In 1718, the Queen Anne’s Revenge ran aground on a sandbar near Beaufort Inlet, North Carolina. Only months later, Blackbeard — whose real name was likely Edward Teach or Edward Thatch — was killed in battle by Lieutenant Robert Maynard and his men.
The wreck was rediscovered in 1996, and since then, archaeologists have recovered hundreds of thousands of artifacts from the site, including anchors, weapons, medical tools, ship fittings, and multiple cannons.
This photo, taken in October 2013, shows one of those cannons being raised from the water during a recovery operation involving the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources and the crew of the Coast Guard Cutter Smilax.
It was not just a piece of metal.
It was a weapon from the age of piracy.
A cannon from Blackbeard’s lost flagship — lifted from the sea after nearly three centuries in silence.
