Rogers granted Hornigold's request for a pardon, but he commissioned him to hunt down other pirates, including his former lieutenant, Teach (Blackbeard). Hornigold was to spend the next eighteen months cruising the Bahamas in pursuit of Stede Bonnet and Jack Rackham. In December 1718 Governor Rogers wrote to the Board of Trade in London commending Hornigold's efforts to remedy his reputation as a pirate by hunting his former allies.[11]
In late 1719, Hornigold's ship was caught in a hurricane somewhere between New Providence and Mexico, and was wrecked on an uncharted reef. The incident is referred to in the contemporary account A General History of the Pyrates by Captain Charles Johnson, which states, "in one of which voyages ... Captain Hornigold, another of the famous pirates, was cast away upon rocks, a great way from land, and perished, but five of his men got into a canoe and were saved."[12] The specific location of the reef remains unknown.