If you missed the last one….
Space pirates are a given in any system where goods are transported between planets. Like the buccaneers of old, what you got, I can take. Space offers so many more places to hide, too. Moons, asteroids, any remote place from which to operate. Not surprising, most space pirate characters seem to be based on Long John Silver and other famous pirates of nautical fiction. They range from bash and sexy to outright loathsome and evil. Sometimes they are slavers. (When you think about that one, the Orion Slave Girls of Star Trek are a left over from the Pulps.)
I’ve selected mostly stories from the 1930s here. There were pirates after 1939 but the 1930s was the heydey of cosmic corsairs. I credit Harry Bates and Astounding Stories of Super-Science. Bates’ version of SF was largely based on other forms of adventure fiction (the Western, for instance) and so pirate yarns were an easy conversion. The Hawk Carse series (which I haven’t used here) featured a pirate named Ku Sui but it really was Ray Cummings’ first novel Brigands of the Moon that got things going.
The comic strips weren’t slow to follow. Buck Rogers had Space Pirates to deal with in “Mystery of the Atlantean Gold Ships” (May 12-August 15, 1931). Flash Gordon was much later to chase pirates with “Moon Pirates” (March 1, 1953 to May 31, 1953). With all the galactic wars and invasions, a few pirates barely rate.
“The Invisible Raiders” (Air Wonder Stories, October 1929) by Ed Earl Repp has invisible space pirates with ships painted in infra-red paint. “Beyond the Aura” (Air Wonder Stories, December 1929) is a sequel but doesn’t feature space pirates.
Brigands of the Moon (Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March April May June 1930) by Ray Cummings has the Martians (the brigands of the title) highjacking the space liner Planaetara that carries radium from the Moon to the Earth. This novel launched both Cummings’ SF career as well as novels in the Clayton Astounding. It was reprinted in Science Fiction Quarterly, Fall 1942.
“Evans of the Earth-Guard” (Air Wonder Stories, April 1930) by Edmond Hamilton has Moon mining protected from pirates by the Earth-Guard. The pirate in question is the Hawk. That name is interesting since Harry Bates and Desmond Hall would name their space hero “Hawk Carse”. Both might be referencing Rafael Sabatini’s popular nautical novel, The Sea Hawk from 1915. For more on Edmond Hamilton, go here.
“The Hornets of Space (Wonder Stories, November 1930) by R. F. Starzl has the liner Medusa attacked by pirates. The I. F. P. officers must deal with the threat near Eros. For more on R. F. Starzl, go here.
“The Prince of Space” (Amazing Stories, January 1931) by Jack Willamson gets its title from the pirate who calls himself that. Typical pirate stuff but Williamson’s blood-sucking Martians save this from being dull. For more on the early Jack Williamson, go here.
“The Terrors of Aryl” (Wonder Stories, March 1931) by R. F. Starzl has the I. F. P. dealing with a pirate base near Mercury.
“Vandals of the Void” (Wonder Stories Quarterly, Summer 1931) by J. M. Walsh is the first novel after Ray Cummings, featuring both Martians and Mercurians.
“The Asteroid of Death” (Wonder Stories Quarterly, Fall 1931) by Neil R. Jones is part of Jones’ other famous Durna Rangue series. It has a love triangle that ends with Nez Hulan becoming a cybernetic freak and a pirate. For more on Jones’ more famous Professor Jameson stories, go here.
“Twelve Hours to Live” (Wonder Stories, August 1931) by Jack Williamson features the pirate, the Black Hawk (there’s that Sabatini thing again). The cruel pirate places the hero into a tank with a flesh-eating fungus, giving him 720 minutes to live! Reprinted in Startling Stories, March 1946
“The Pirates of Space” (Amazing Stories, December 1931) by B. X. Berry is a pretty standard adventure tale by a writer who is a bit of a mystery. In T. O’Conor Sloane’s intro he says: “In this story by a well-known writer — new to our pages–” I can find no mention of a B. X. Berry in other genres so I guess this well-known author chose to hide his identity.
“The Moon Destroyers” (Wonder Stories Quarterly, Winter 1932) by Monroe K. Ruch has Moon pirates devastating the Earth with earthquakes. A one-hit wonder!
“Shipwrecked on Venus” (Wonder Stories Quarterly, Winter 1932) by Neil R. Jones has a ship filled with wealth attacked by space pirates. As the title implies, they end up crashing on Venus.
“Invaders From the Infinite” (Amazing Stories Quarterly, Spring-Summer 1932) by John W. Campbell is an episodic novel from the Arcot, Morey and Wade series. The planetary system Campbell uses has pirates though most of the book is not about them. For more on Campbell’s other famous series, the Penton & Blake stories, go here.
“Pirates of Gorm” (Astounding Stories, May 1932) by Nat Schachner has space pirates capturing a space liner then getting sucked into Jupiter’s Red Spot where the Gorm is kept. For Nat Schachner’s early tales with Arthur Leo Zagat, go here.
“Beyond the Planetoids” (Amazing Stories, August 1932) by Edwin K. Sloat has a space pirate named Corvus who is a slaver.
“Loot of the Void” (Astounding Stories, September 1932) by Edwin K. Sloat has pirates and giant poisonous arachnids. For more on Edwin K. Sloat. go here.
“Asteroid of Gold” (Wonder Stories, November 1932) by Clifford D. Simak has space pirates stranding two men in an asteroid field. For more on the early Clifford D. Simak, go here.
“Dead Star Station” (Astounding Stories, November 1933) by Jack Williamson is a space base and I think you can guess where it sits. The pirate Skal Doon spices up what is largely a human interest story.
“The Corsairs of the Cosmos” (Weird Tales, April 1934) by Edmond Hamilton is the last of the Interstellar Patrol stories, what is most likely the first Pulp Space Opera series. Hamilton improves a bland pirate tale by making his pirates robots! For more on the Interstellar Patrol series, go here.
“Scouts of Space” (Scoops, May 5, 1934) by Moore Raymond is an unusual British entry. The Silver Star is a scout ship that takes on pirates. Pretty much what the Yanks were doing. (On the last page of the story, SF writer Laurence Manning got a plug as President of the American Inter-Planetary Society.)
“Adrift in the Void” (Wonder Stories, June 1934) by John Pierce B. S. has a ship seemingly wrecked by an asteroid but was actually struck by Martian pirates. For the characters who missed the last lifeboat, this is bad because the pirates are coming for their loot.
“Spoor of the Bat” (Astounding Stories, July 1934) by Arthur Leo Zagat features a pirate called The Black Bat who turns out to be a secret agent. The name Black Bat is interesting because there was a famous hero Pulp character with that name. The original run in Black Bat Detective was written by SF writer, Murray Leinster in 1933 and 1934. Later in 1939, Black Book Detective, had Norman A. Daniels write short novels about the Bat under the house name G. Wayman Jones. For Zagat’s early work with Nat Schachner, go here.
“The Moon Pirates” (Amazing Stories, September October 1934) by Neil R. Jones is a longer sequel to “Asteroid of Death”. It features the space pirate Carconte and the return of Nez Hulan.
“The Red Peri” (Astounding Stories, November 1935) by Stanley G. Weinbaum gets the title from the name of the pirate vessel. Romance and a tour of Pluto make this “his best yet”. E. F. Bleiler in Science Fiction: The Gernsback Years (1998) says the romantic element is kin to “shopgirl pulps”. For more on Stanley G. Weinbaum, go here.
“Outlaws on Callisto” (Astounding Stories, April 1936) by Manly Wade Wellman begins with the spaceship Rook being captured by pirates. The captain is given the choice to join or die. The woman he saves from the crew turns out to be the queen of the buccaneers, Jahree herself. For more on Wellman’s early SF, go here.
“Blood of the Moon” (Thrilling Wonder Stories, August 1936) by Ray Cummings has the men of a Nomad ship attacking the Lunites on the Moon, trying to steal the riches of their mines. Cummings sold to many different markets. What he couldn’t sell to Argosy, he could pawn off on Mort Weisinger at Thrilling Wonder or Farnsworth Wright at Weird Tales. This was Thrilling Wonder‘s first story!
“The Space Marines and the Slavers” (Amazing Stories, December 1936) by Bob Olsen has a special crew of space marines selected to deal with the pirates. The term “space marine” that has become part of the SF vernacular was coined by Olsen in “Captain Brink of the Space Marines” (Amazing Stories, November 1932) and this story which is a sequel.
“The Raider of the Spaceway” (Weird Tales, July 1937) by Henry Kuttner has a pirate who get stranded with two heroes on a planet with a terrible plant monster. For the full story on this tale, go here.
“The Space Pirate” (Amazing Stories, June 1938) by Eando Binder has Major Wright of the Ether Patrol (Just for you, MDJ!) captured by a space pirate, Barly Moque. Wright is imprisoned inside a secret base on the Moon. Daring-do must follow if he is to escape!
“The World With a Thousand Moons” (Amazing Stories, December 1942) by Edmond Hamilton has Lance Kenniston taking a ship load of rich kids to the danger moon of Vesta. Kenniston is one of John Dark’s space pirates. The moon is plagued with the mysterious Vestans as well as stranded pirates.
“The End” (Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1946) by Murray Leinster has our good earth people attacked by raiders from Erdath.
Conclusion
Certainly, I haven’t got every space pirate ever here. The space pirate idea became less and less common as Science Fiction moved into the War Years and out the other side. A good indication of its relegation to the kiddie table was the fact that pirates continued to show up in SF for juvenile readers. Isaac Asimov’s Lucky Star and the Pirates of the Asteroids (1953) is a good example. The Good Doctor would never have written such a book for adults, Foundation and the Space Pirates, for example.
We really do owe George Lucas and his Star Wars universe for bringing so many old Space Opera ideas back into the public eye. No matter what your current gripe is with Disney or what have you, we are better off than the kids back in the early 1970s (I was one) who had to make due with Star Trek reruns and Space 1999. Which is just another old man saying, “You kids these days….”
Next time…Space Invaders!
Love the “Swashbucklers Of SPAAAAAACE!” GREAT Article!
Wish that you would continue the list into the later years (just for those “Kids”. ) that predate SW with their SPACE VIKINGS, STAR WOLVES, etc. There were still a few who would pop up in the serials, and later flicks and tv shows. = BABYLON-5 had some “Raiders” to deal with. Also, FIREFLY, THE EXPANSE and even FUTURAMA had a few. And who can forget the “Classic” space pirate film “ICE PIRATES”? LOL!
That might be fun…. Golden Age Comics first.
Great article! Lots of titles to add to my retro space adventure reading list that I’ll probably never get through.
I hadn’t heard of “Pirates of the Gorm” before, but I’ve noticed that 1930s writers were preoccupied with Jupiter’s Great Red Spot (e.g. “Children of the Ray,” “Life Disinherited”). I guess it makes sense if you’re writing stories about the Solar System during a time when the Outer Planets aren’t much to look at.