A pirate's life for some Jews

More than 40 years ago, Edward Kritzler came across a journal kept by a 17th century English buccaneer in which he found an intriguing reference to "divers Portuguese of the Hebrew nation." Thus began his research into an obscure and mostly forgotten aspect of Jewish history. "Forget the Merchant of Venice," writes Kritzler. "[H]is New World cousins were adventurers after my own heart: Jewish explorers, conquistadors, cowboys and, yes, pirates."

"Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean" begins with one of the enduring horrors of history -- the Inquisition. Driven out of Spain and Portugal by royal decrees that compelled them to convert or leave, the Jews of the Iberian peninsula sought refuge wherever they could find it, including the far-flung colonies in the Americas. But the friar-inquisitors inevitably followed the conquistadors, and so the Jewish refugees found themselves at risk even in the New World.

Strictly speaking, only Jews who had converted to Christianity came under the jurisdiction of the Inquisition, but the inquisitors acted on the assumption that few if any Jews ever submitted themselves to an earnest conversion. So it was that conversos with Jewish blood in their veins were routinely searched out and condemned as "secret Jews" by the Inquisition. A new refuge was needed, and the most daring ones managed to make their way to various colonial backwaters.

"Since all Spanish conversos were forbidden in the New World, it made no difference if one was a true convert, an atheist, or a covert Jew," Kritzler writes. "All were there illegally and therefore subject to persecution."

The real theme of Kritzler's book, in fact, is the startling variety of strategies for survival that Jewish refugees embraced. Some pursued the traditional roles of broker, trader and financier, but others were considerably more inventive. "Outlawed in the civilized world and vulnerable in the Diaspora, Jews became skilled in ways to find and explore new lands," explains the author, who points out that Jews were especially in demand as pilots, cartographers, and makers and users of astronomical tables and nautical instruments. "When Jewish expertise was needed, prejudice took a backseat to expediency. . . ."