In 1726, an anonymous pamphlet published in London lamented the impact of Spanish maritime predation on Jamaican trade following the cessation of arms between Britain and Spain in 1712, which preceded the close of the War of the Spanish Succession (1702–13) one year later. In this pamphlet, the writer – identified only as “a person who resided several years at Jamaica” – described the predatory activities of Spanish guardacostas (coastguards) who were commissioned to suppress contraband trade on Spanish coasts, but who were accused of indefensible and violent assaults on British shipping throughout the Caribbean, particularly along the sea routes leading to and from Jamaica. According to the author, it was the immediate post-war actions of the guardacosta that “occassion[e]d the Rise of the English Pyrates, and laid the Foundation of all the Mischiefs which have happened by their Means”. By this account, the surge of piracy that occurred after 1716 was attributed to the geopolitical disputes that arose between British and Spanish subjects in the peacetime Caribbean concerning freedom of navigation and contraband trade.

Although recognised by contemporaries, the impact of Anglo-Spanish disputes in the peacetime Caribbean has not received attention within current understandings of early eighteenth-century piracy. Instead, there are two existing explanations for this surge. The first focuses on the centrality of privateering commissions issued by Archibald Hamilton, governor of Jamaica from 1710 to 1716, following the shipwreck of a Spanish flotilla in July 1715. After receiving their commissions, two Jamaican privateers sailed directly to the site of the wrecks and raided a Spanish salvaging camp that had been established on the adjacent shore. According to contemporary accounts, this raid netted the privateers 120,000 pieces of eight, which they carried back to Jamaica in January 1716. This then created a treasure-hunting sensation, which encouraged further voyages of British colonial vessels to the wrecks. In May, Hamilton's governorship was annulled and Jamaican privateers, as well as non-commissioned treasure hunters from Jamaica and elsewhere, were recalled to their respective ports and prohibited from salvaging the Spanish wrecks. Rather than return to colonial ports and face the potential loss of their accumulated plunder, these displaced mariners instead gathered at the Bahamas and turned to piracy.