Turn'd Turk was written about his conversion by the English dramatist Robert Daborne. It is doubtful that English converts to Islam in Tunis had to follow the religion strictly: French traveller Laurent d'Arvieux visited the city later that century, and made note of its liberal attitude to religion. Later years An English sailor who saw him in Tunis in 1608 allegedly described Ward as "very short with little hair, and that quite white, bald in front; swarthy face and beard. Speaks little and almost always swearing. Drunk from morn till night...The habits of a thorough salt. A fool and an idiot out of his trade." During the next few years ballads and pamphleteers condemned John Ward for turning corsair. Ward continued raiding Mediterranean shipping, eventually commanding a whole fleet of corsairs, whose flagship was a Venetian sixty-gunner. After 1612 he ended his career in piracy, electing to teach younger corsairs gunnery and navigation. He profited greatly by his piracy, retiring to Tunis to live a life of opulent comfort until his death in 1622, at the age of 70, possibly from the plague. Legacy From 1609 until 1615 dozens of plays, ballads, memoirs, pamphlets, and books would be written about England's Arch-Pirate. The most prominent include A Christian Turn'd Turk by Robert Daborne, Nevves from Sea, Of two notorious Pyrats Ward the Englishman and Danseker the Dutchman, Captain Ward and the Rainbow, and A True and Certain Report of the Beginning, Proceedings, Overthrows, and Now Present Estate of Captain Ward and Danseker, the Two Late Famous Pirates from their First Setting forth to this Present Time by Andrew Barker. It has been suggested that his nickname was "Sharkey" and was the origin of this nickname, now given to anyone in the Royal Navy with the surname "Ward". Numerous TV series and movies have been based on Jack Ward. To his contemporaries, Ward was an enigmatic figure, in some ways like a Robin Hood, but in the 16th and 17th centuries, many English pirates operated out of the mouth of the Sebou River and preyed on Mediterranean shipping. Ward was supposed to have spared English ships while attacking "papist" vessels. John Ward and Simon Danseker are credited with introducing Barbary corsairs to the use of square-rigged ships of northern Europe. The ballad "Captain Ward and the Rainbow" is very likely based on Jack Ward. A fictionalized account of Ward's career appears