Captain J. Flint is a fictional golden age pirate captain who features in a number of novels, television series, and films. The original character was created by the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894). Flint first appears in the classic adventure yarn Treasure Island, which was first serialised in a children's magazine in 1881, and later published as a novel in 1883.
In Treasure Island
Captain Flint is a fictional character in the book Treasure Island, created by Robert Louis Stevenson in 1883. In Stevenson's book, Flint, whose first name is not given, was the captain of a pirate ship, The Walrus, which accumulated an enormous amount of captured treasure, approximately £700,000. On August 1, 1750, Flint and six members of his crew bury the plunder on an island located somewhere in the Caribbean Sea. Flint then murders his six assistants, leaving the corpse of one, Allardyce, with its arms outstretched in the direction of the buried treasure.
The only person Flint was said to fear was his quartermaster John Silver, who later even called his parrot "Captain Flint" in mockery.
Flint is said to have died in Savannah, many years before the book's central plot takes place, with his last words being, "Darby M'Graw - fetch aft the rum...." His death was said in the book to have been caused by the effects of drinking too much rum. The inscription on the map suggests that he died on July 28, 1754. The location of the treasure had been marked by Flint on a map and while he was dying it was entrusted to his first mate William "Billy" Bones. With the exception of Long John Silver many of Flint's crew spend all their ill-gotten booty and end up begging (e.g. Blind Pew). Bones however is too much of a drunken bully of a miser to either find the rest of the treasure or give up the map for his former crewmates and becomes a marked man on the run for 3 years after Flint's death by Flint's old crew (Blind Pew; Black Dog; Job Anderson; Israel Hands; Dirk), of whom the ringleader is Long John Silver. They track Bones down (who like Flint dies of drinking too much rum); however before they can get the map it falls into the hands of the protagonist of the novel, Jim Hawkins.
Other novels
Flint has a major part in the 1924 prequel Porto Bello Gold, by A. D. Howden Smith, which depicts the way that the treasure was captured from a Spanish galleon. In this version, Flint is described as having started his piratical career as the junior partner of Andrew Murray, an idealistic Jacobite turned pirate, who is not referenced in Stevenson's original book. Flint gradually becomes the dominant partner. The book describes how Flint secretly buries the treasure which would be recovered a generation later by the protagonists of Treasure Island.
John Drake's prequels: Flint and Silver (2008), Pieces of Eight (2009), and Skull and Bones (2010), all heavily feature Captain Flint and give his Christian name as Joseph.
Flint is mentioned in the novel Peter and Wendy by J. M. Barrie, a friend of Stevenson. The first mention is in a passage introducing Captain Hook's pirate crew: "Here is Bill Jukes, every inch of him tattooed, the same Bill Jukes who got six dozen on the WALRUS from Flint before he would drop the bag of moidores." The second mention is as Hook is attempting to intimidate the Darling children and the Lost Boys, but is heckled by his inner demons: "'I am the only man whom Barbecue feared,' he urged, 'and Flint feared Barbecue.' 'Barbecue, Flint—what house?' came the cutting retort."
In Arthur Ransome's book Swallows and Amazons, the Blacketts' uncle James Turner is nicknamed Captain Flint by the Walkers. This is because they believed that he looked like a retired pirate and took the name from Treasure Island. He is nearly always referred to by this name in the rest of the books.