Captain Blood

England, 1685. Peter Blood, an Irish doctor settled in the quiet town of Bridgewater, wants nothing to do with the Duke of Monmouth's rebellion. But when he treats a wounded rebel — a doctor's plain duty — he is arrested, condemned by the terrible Judge Jeffreys, and sold as a slave on the sugar island of Barbados.

There the cruel planter Colonel Bishop buys him for ten pounds, at the urging of his niece Arabella, whose kindness Blood never forgets. When Spanish raiders sack the town, Blood and his fellow slaves seize the attackers' great red ship in the night and escape. Renaming the ship the Arabella, Blood becomes the most feared buccaneer captain of the Caribbean — yet he fights by his own strict code, robbing only Spain and keeping his hands as clean as an outlaw can.

His fame grows: he kills the brutal pirate Levasseur in a duel to save a stolen girl, and out-tricks the vengeful Spanish admiral Don Miguel in the trap of Maracaibo. But when he rescues Arabella herself from that same admiral, she wounds him more deeply than any battle: to her he is only a thief and a pirate.

To protect her, Blood briefly wears the King's coat, then escapes the gallows of her uncle — now Deputy-Governor of Jamaica — by taking Bishop hostage, and sinks into despair in Tortuga. Service under a French baron ends in betrayal: Rivarol steals the treasure of Cartagena and races to plunder defenseless Port Royal. Racing after the traitor, Blood pulls the new governor-general from a burning ship and learns that King James has fallen — his outlawry can end. In one last desperate battle he loses his beloved ship but saves the colony. The new King's governor-general pardons Blood and names him Governor of Jamaica. He spares the arrested Bishop for Arabella's sake, and Arabella, who has learned the truth of him at last, chooses Peter over every other future.