Hello listeners! I just wanted you to know that my soundtrack in this interview is sounding a little off because of a malfunction, and I didn't find out until it went to edit.

The interview is solid. Eric J. Dolan's track is fine, and since these interviews are not about me, I'm going with it.

My apologies for the sound quality on my track. Thanks for your support and understanding.

Welcome back everyone to One Thousand One Heroes, Legends, Histories, and Mysteries podcast. This is your host.

John Haggador, and this is the story of a largely unsung group of American heroes during the American Revolution who fought the British at sea.

American privateers, they were, nearly 2000 of them, who were given a license to attack and seize British ships, from warships to merchant ships, and greatly contributed to our winning or independence.

Author Eric J. Dolan is about to share this untold story in his new book Rebels at Sea. Eric, it's great to have you with us today.

I'm great to be here. Thanks. I was greatly impressed by this book Rebels at Sea. Your research and this subject matter are pledgedly navy, and there are many privateers in the world.

Did a lot to bring us the necessary supplies that they captured from the British, from warships, from merchant ships, you name it. Just a fantastic story.

And it's a page turner because you add a lot of action to it. Thanks. I appreciate that. And one thing you said is particularly important to me, and that is that the story is largely unknown. And that's what got me most interested in this book.

Because I didn't want to just hash over history that it already been talked about in numerous books. And the idea for this book actually came from an earlier book of mine called Black Flags Blue Waters, the epic history of America's most notorious pirates, because in that book, I talk a lot about privateering, but during that era, the late 1600s and early 1700s, many quote unquote privateers were actually pirates.

But they acted just like pirates, and a lot of people assume privateering is legalized piracy. And I got interested in what was privateering like during the American Revolution, or what I found is that the privateers that operated during the American Revolution were most definitely not pirates.

They were fighting on behalf of patriotic cause, the creation of their new nation. They also had a profit motive, but they weren't like pirates, enemies of all mankind attacking any ship out there and taking the proceeds just for themselves.

There was a larger cause implied and that was involved. So that's how I got interested in the story. And the comment you made is one that I've heard many times in the talks had given on the book so far.

Somebody just the other night I was on Nantucket and he asked a question. He said, I have read a lot about American history. I know a lot about the American Revolution.

I've never heard about these privateers and privateers men. How could that be? And we got to an extended back and forth about how I think that could be.

But that's what I'm hoping people's reaction is to reading the book is this sort of flushes out a little bit the larger story about the American Revolution.

And the fact that as George Washington said, it was a standing miracle that we won. There are many different factors that went into it.

There were land battles. There was a continental Navy. There was Washington secret Navy. But my point is there are also privateers and privateers men. And without them, I truly believe that the outcome of the war might have been different.

Would you give us a little bit about your background? What brought you to this? What inspired you to do the book?

Sure. Well, my background is kind of unusual for writing books about maritime history. My undergraduate masters and PhD are all in biology and environmental policy.

And I worked. I had a number of jobs in the environmental field, public policy field. I worked in London. I worked in the United States. I did consulting. I worked for academic groups.

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