India Company and the Crown.”The skull and crossbones may not have fluttered over ships in the Thames, but many of the pirates themselves were here at one time or another,” said Wareham, alluding to the fact that many seamen and women went crooked and turned pirate.An able and brave sea captain by all accounts, Kidd started his career in the Caribbean where he fought successful actions against the French. His problems started when he took a government-backed private commission to clear the Indian Ocean of piracy.He left London in 1695 in the Adventure Galley, a 284-tonner with a crew of 150 and 34 cannon. Late in 1696, he attacked a British East India Company convoy and was branded a pirate.The Crown nfl jerseys was supposed to get 10 percent of privateers’ pickings, but Kidd was accused of keeping most of the loot.In 1698, he took his greatest prize, the Quedah Merchant, a Moorish trading vessel from Armenia laden with gold, jewels, silver, silks, spices and guns.The ship, which Kidd said was a legitimate prize because it was under French control, had an English captain and a cargo owned by Indians. Her taking enraged the ruling Mogul who threatened to close down trade routes for good and thus jeopardized the position of the East India Company.Museum of London curator Hillary Davidson says it was Kidd’s ultimate undoing.The exhibition displays papers which Kidd claimed were vital for his defense against piracy charges but which mysteriously vanished before his trial and