Did pirates have funerals?

[mermaidwithaquill]

I'm more curious than anything, but I thought I'd ask the history side of the sight. Would they just toss the corpse in a burlap sack overboard with a prayer or two, Or was it fancier for someone like the first mate or captain? Or would they go so far as to come to land with the body (which seems pretty unlikely due to decomposition rate) to give them a proper burial?

[Elena]

I think it depends on where they were. You know, if close to an uninhabited island/ cay or to Tortuga (close like one day distance or less), they might want to burry the body. If not, the traditional sew him in his hammock and send him overboard. I think there were prayers said (as accurately or not as they could remember, but they wouldn't risk to send a man on his last trip without a prayer at all - sailors of all kind were a superstitious bunch) then eventually say something about him, drink a glass in his memory and... see about his goods (which might be sold at the main mast).

[Mission]

This is actually not a very easy question to answer because of the limited evidence. However, Elena makes a good point, it would most likely depend on the circumstances of the ship. A ship would probably not make landfall just to bury the dead, even though the Christian ecclesiastical tradition said that burials of Christians must be in consecrated ground. (Most golden age pirates were originally from Christian nations, so despite the modern idea that they would be godless, they would most likely have a Christian background and largely Christian beliefs.) However, stopping in port caused all sorts of delays in a journey, so the tendency would be not to do so unless absolutely necessary. Since a body could not be well preserved and putrifying flesh was thought to poison the air and cause illness, it wouldn't make sense to keep the body on board if they couldn't stop.

Merchant ship captain Edward Barlow expresses this tendency not to stop for the burial of dead sailors in his Journal in an entry from 1672 [emphasis mine]:

"[1672] …and whilst we were in sight of that island [‘Anyam’] died on board of us a merchant, one Master Cook, which we brought from Bantam along with us, having long been sick of a consumption... And he being dead, had a coffin made for him and was thrown overboard, his honor being washed away, and all his riches affording him no better grave than the wide ocean…" (Edward Barlow, Barlow’s Journal of his Life at Sea in King’s Ships, East and West Indiamen & Other Merchantman From 1659 to 1703, Volume I, 1659-1677, 1934, p. 214), p. 223)

Barlow also gave a (typical for him) rather dour account of the burial at sea of an average sailor:

"[1672] And when he is dead then they did not think that he had been so bad as he was, nor so near his end. And when he is dead, he is quickly buried, saving his friends and acquaintance that trouble to go to the church and have his passing bell rung, nor to be at the charges of making his grave and his coffin, or to bid his friends and acquaintance to his burial, or to buy wine or bread for them to drink or eat before they go to the church, and none of all this trouble, but when he is dead to sew him up in an old blanket or piece of old canvas, and tie to his feet two or three cannon bullets, and so to heave him overboard, wishing his poor soul at rest, not having a minister to read over his grave, nor any other ceremonies, but praying to God for the forgiveness of his sins, and there he hath a grave many times wide and big enough, being made meat for the fishes of the sea as well as for the worms on land." (Barlow, p. 214)

You might argue that rank or standing on a ship might make it more likely for a crew to want to bury an officer, but from British Royal Navy Reverend Henry Teonge's Journal we have this account:

"[Mar 20, 1679] About sunsetting we went out about two leagues to sea, carrying our Captain in our barge, and there put him overboard, for we have no burying place on shore. We were accompanied with eight more boats, and all the commanders of the Hollanders, and English in the Road, and all the English merchants in Alicante. At our going off our ship fired forty guns; the Holldanders at least a hundred." (Henry Teonge, The Diary of Henry Teonge, Chaplain on Board H.M.’s Ships Assistance, Bristol, and Royal Oak, 1675-1679 Teonge, 1825, p. 246)

In his Dialogues, Nathaniel Boteler suggests a bit more ceremony for rank, but not for burial:

"It is a general custom also (as aforesaid) upon the death either of the Captain, Master, Master-Gunner, or any chief officer, that when the corpse is thrown overboard to its sea grave, to ring the knell and farewell with some guns; the which (as aforenoted) are always to be of an even number." (Nathaniel Boteler [butler], Boteler’s Dialogues, Edited by W. G. Perrin, Navy Records Society, 1929, p. 268)

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I have a lot of notes from period sea journal on how the body was disposed of because it indirectly affects medicine. There's limited info on what pirates did with their dead because there are limited period sources for it. Here are some for buccaneers, pirates and privateers:

"They [the buccaneers - note that these are not technically golden age pirates] spent the rest of the day [after taking el Fuerte del la Berra] demolishing the fort, burning the gun-carriages, spiking the guns, carrying their wounded on board their ships and buying their dead." (Alexander O. Exquemelin, Translated by Alexis Brown, The Buccaneers of America, 1969, p. 98)

"The 28^th of December, Mr. James Wase our [privateers - 'licensed' pirates, if you will, so technically not GAoP pirates] chief Surgeon died, and we buried him decently next Day, with our Naval Ceremonies as usual, being a very honest useful Man, a good Surgeon, and bred up at Leyden, in the Study of Physick as well as Surgery." (Woodes Rogers, A Cruising Voyage Round the World, 2004, p. 215-6)

"[April 16, 1709] About twelve we [privateers] read the Prayers for the Dead, and threw my dear Brother over-board, with one of our Sailors, another lying dangerously ill. We hoisted our Colours but half-mast up: We being first, and the rest, follow’d, firing each some Vollyes of small Arms." (Woodes Rogers, A Cruising Voyage Round the World, 2004, p. 89-90)

And our one golden age pirate account. This depicts a burial, but being the only account I have in my notes suggests that it is recorded because it is not typical. So make of that what you will.

"Here, Captain [John] Halsey fell sick of a fever and died in 1716 and was buried with great ceremony. His sword and pistols were laid on his coffin, which was covered with a ship’s jack, and minute guns were fired. He was a brave man and died regretted by his men and the friends he had made in Madagascar. ‘His Grave was made in a garden of Water Melons and fenced in with Pallisades to prevent his being rooted up by wild Hogs, of which there are plenty in those Parts.’ [Johnson, The History of the Pirates, London, 1726]" (George Francis Dow and John Henry Edmonds, The Pirates of the New England Coast 1630-1730, 1996, p. 40)

Note that the buccaneer and pirate accounts recorded burial when the ship had already made landfall. This may also be true for the burial account by Rogers, although I am not certain of that.

In my records of how the dead are disposed from period sea journals (the majority of which are merchant ship accounts) and of 18 recorded burials I have in my notes, 8 were on land and 10 were at sea. It should be noted that many of the burials on land occurred when the ship was already in port.

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Pirates often operated close to land around close to land more than most merchant ships which were traveling from point A to point B. So they seem to be more likely to bury the dead on land from an opportunity perspective. They may or may not have been disciplined enough to bother with a more tedious land burial, although there is no evidence to support this either way. The one true pirate account I've found shows them more than willing to engage in the usual ceremony required to send off a dead sailor.

Speaking of ceremony, here is a fairly detailed account of the ceremony accompanying the land burial of the supercargo [an individual hired to oversee the owner's rights on a merchant vessel]. Note the similarities to the burial of pirate Halsey:

"[July 3, 1702] We buried our Super-Cargo here, (at) the back of the town among the Jews and Bannians’ burying place, as permitted by the Governor, with the usual ceremony of our colours and this sword and scabbard over the coffin, with 3 volleys of small shot over the grave, to the no small astonishment of the admiring Arabians [in the city of Aden]." (Francis Rogers, "The Journal of Francis Rogers", Three Sea Journals of Stuart Times, Bruce S. Ingram, editor, 1936, p. 169)

As I said at the beginning, it's not really that easy a question to answer. If pressed, I'd say if they were on land (or about to make land), they would bury the body there. If not, it would be buried at sea. There would be ceremony in the form of shots being fired (this is mentioned in several accounts of burial both on land and at sea) and possibly the dead's weapons being placed on their body.

I had always intended to write an article about this, but there's just not that much material. It would make a good October (Halloween) article though...

[Capt. Bo of the WTF co.]

William Dampier also recorded the burial on land of a Captain Cook after leaving the Galapagos Islands. Cook had taken sick after a successful capture of some prize vessels and never fully recovered, died within sight of landfall and was buried with simple ceremony on land by the crew.

Bo

[RoyalJames]

Interesting question and interesting answers!

As for gravestones and cemeteries, on the island St Marie outside Madagascar there is a grave yard which is called the “pirate cemetery”. It is situated in the bay just inside of the former pirate town at île aux Forbans, which was used by pirates during several decades. It is not unlikely that the pirates used this spot to bury their dead, but a little surprising there seem not to be any documented study of it (at least not what I have found).

Another thing related to graves is Captain Carpenter’s tomb, which shall have been situated on Mauritius in Carpenter’s Bay just north of Port Louis. I don’t know anything about Carpenter, but apparently he was a captain and buried on land (and not at sea). Pirates however used his tomb to write a message on the wall. Perhaps it says something about their respect of the dead and their graves?

[Mission]

So I decided to go ahead and research death at sea so I could write my October Halloween article about burial of those who died on a ship. It includes information about autopsies, burial location, burial preparation, how the burial was performed and superstitions about death and sailors. You can read it by following this hotlink.

[Mission]

Wow... I think it was this topic that in part sparked my interest in the pirate surgeon's role in death and burial. I eventually wrote a whole article about it. You can see it here: http://www.piratesurgeon.com/pages/surgeon_pages/deceased1.html.