Richard Coyle

Richard Coyle (died 1738) was an English pirate active in the Mediterranean Sea. He is known for a single incident involving the murder of the Captain of the ship St. John.

History

Coyle was first mate aboard the St. John, a fish-hauler pink under Captain Benjamin Hartley. At Ancona, they took aboard American John Richardson as their new ship’s carpenter. Richardson had been a thief, con man, and womanizer. Together they conspired to take over the ship, and off Turkey they staged a mutiny. They attacked Hartley with an axe, a blunderbuss, and even a feed trough, chasing him across the deck and through the rigging. Finally, they threw him overboard where he clung to a rope until they hit him with an axe, causing him to fall into the sea and drown.

Coyle was elected captain of the St. John but was rebuffed by the crew when he proposed sailing for Malta. Instead they sailed for Menorca Coyle had tried to paint himself as an innocent man, victim of accidents and circumstances, but testimony from several other crewmen sealed his fate.