Origin of "Dead Man's Chest"

[John Maddox Roberts]

Cordingly, in "Under the Black Flag" states that Stevenson "---took the Dead Man's Chest from At Last by Charles Kingsley." Has anyone seen this book and know how it relates to the song?

Many years ago I read an article, I no longer remember where, by a man who claimed to have tracked down the song's origin. He said that Dead Man's Chest was a tiny island in the Caribbean and that the song commemorates a shipwreck there, not a mutiny. After the wreck, the marooned crew got into the ship's cargo of rum. Some drank themselves to death, or killed each other in fights. When relief arrived, there were only fifteen survivors, thus: "drink and the devil had done for the rest." In this version, the fifteen were still alive, not among the killed.

Of course, I have no way of knowing if this guy is just blowing smoke up our poopdeck.

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

This is going to open a VERY interesting can o' worms indeed!!

I had recalled reading somewhere that Dead Man's Chest was written by Robt. Lewis Stevenson and that it was his creation for his novel, Treasure Island and that it had no basis in factual history. But I wanted to double check my facts before I spouted it off here.

But check this out...

Fern Canyon Press has a brief article stating the origin to be unknown, and that Stevenson is believed to have adapted it from an actual island called Dead Man's Chest as John mentioned above.

And then I found this amazing little article in which a guy claims to have found an untouched and misfiled naval record from 1777 in which a seaman's ballad is entered into evidence and the name of the ballad is "Fifteen Men on the Dead Man's Chest". John, is this the article you are looking for?

Click here for the article

Who else has some more info?!!! This is interestin' stuff mates!!

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

Here is another article, published in the London Daily Telegraph in 1995 saying that Blackbeard marooned a mutinous crew on Dead Man's Chest Island. There is also a 1997 article saying that "dead chest" is sailor's slang for a coffin.

Click to see the brief article

[John Maddox Roberts]

Dear Tales of the Seven Seas (may I call you Tales for short?) The second article sounds more like the one I read, though I read it back in the 60s or 70s and it was longer, but told about the same story, only with a shipwreck.

As for the first article, I detect an odor of snake oil. In folklore, there is nothing more common that the treasure that is unexpectedly discovered, only to have vanished when the finder returned for it. This sounds like an Admiralty version of the Lost Dutchman's mine.

Incidentally, in "Treasure Island" "Dead Man's Chest" seems to be a capstan chanty. When the Hispaniola weighs anchor in Bristol, the crew heaves on the bars just as Long John hits the third "ho!"

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

Thanks for the info! I'm curious about the info on the first article also. What lends it some credibility in my book, is that it appears in Cindy Vallar's lair. She's a reasearch librarian, pirate historian and author of a couple of books. I took a class from her and have a great deal of respect for her research. I doubt she would have an article on her info site that was soaked in snake oil. I may have to drop her an email and ask her about that one!!

[Pirate Lass Suliel]

Well this is interestin'!

I've been wondering about the origins of the song for some time myself.

I always though the "dead man's chest" was simply in reference to a coffin, didn't know there was an island called that! I figured the fifteen "men" were the iron nails. Though aren't there traditionally 16 nails? Or maybe there's less. I don't know.

Marooning mutineers on an island? Hmm...I'm going to have to go back through the whole song to see if that fits, now. Iiiiinteresting.

[Jolie Rouge]

Now I don't rightly remember where's I read this, but I saw somewhere a bit what said Stevenson only wrote the chorus o' the song. The rest was written by a poet several years after the book was published. I'll see if I can't find that someweres.

[redhand]

The whole thing just smacks a little of of RLS to me,

and as quaint as that little verse is, I think

he probably made it up in reference to a seaman's

slang for a coffin. There may indeed be an island by

that name but I doubt it had anything to do

with the song, especially if there is mention

either of Blackbeard or buried treasure-that is just

to much a tidy little package for me.

The "15 men" might possibly be a reference to nails,

but it sounds more like RLS at work to me, from the

man that gave us the myth of buried treasure.

Interesting at any rate!

Cheers

Redhand

[BlueBert]

Hi ho,

If you haven't been in the parts: The small island of Dead man's chest lies south of Tortola, British Virgin Islands. The local tradition on BVI is that 15 men were marooned on the islet, but I haven't heard anything about Blackbeard outside of tourist brochures. Seems to be a recent addition to the story. But in any case, the story exists on the islands and so there may well lie some truth in it.

Good wind to you from new member!

[Mad Woman Cheryl]

I thought that the song as we know it today was written for a 1903 musical. I could be wrong.

[the Royaliste]

:) History Channel has an episode that explains it as the sung record of the location of Blackbeards treasures, claiming you will know it by the bones of the fifteen men killed on top of the treasure after placing it in the hole....who knows?Could be how 'the island' was named... Pyrate lore as accurate as the teller wants it to be.....

[Mad Woman Cheryl]

Shows you wot I know....Thanks for the info!

[Tar Bucket Bill]

Ahoy! Permission to come aboard.

This bein' me first posting, I'm not quite familiar with the site yet.

Anybody know where to find an MP3 downloadable file of the melody of the version of "Fifteen Men on the Dead Man's Chest" that Billy Bones (Lionel Barrymore) was so fond of singin' in the 1934 version of "Treasure Island"? So far, I've been on a lee shore with this search.

Me shipmates is much obliged.

Wm. Tarkett

[crow]

Welcome aboard there tarbucket and have ye ever been to sea Billy ....?

[MadMaryFlint]

welcome aboard, mate! 'ave cold one.. 'ave ye tried Kazaa fer that song? Otherwise, I 'ave no idee..

[Tar Bucket Bill]

To Master Crow:

Alas, nay, unless'ye counts crossin' the English Channel. I don't counts 'er.

To Mad Mary Flint:

Thank'ye kindly fer the suggestion. I shall give 'er a try.

Wm. Tarkett

[the Royaliste]

:) BLOODY 'ECK..RENT IT, AND PIRATE IT....

[Captain Sage]

I always had a picture in me mind's eye (as a child, that is) of 15 surly rogues sitting on the literal chest (ribs, etc.) of a dead man. I suppose I thot that would keep him from gettin up and havin' words wit the ones what did 'im in.

I'm not bein too scholarly, am I?

Captain Sage

[Red Maria]

I went and checked one of the atlaes here and there is a Deamans Cay in the Bahamas on Long Island 23.15N 116.09W. I have no idea is that's Deadman's Chest. It doesn't look anything like a coffin. Chat I need to get is a better map to the Caribbean maybe 18th century and check it. I won't able to do that till Monday, but if I find anything I'll let you know.

As far as Cindy Valler is concerned I have known her online for a few years (we're both on the same academic pirate e-list together) and she doesn't put out anything that she would not consider reliable. Things have gone *missing* from British records offices for centuries. Just look at Kidd's French passports! :)

[Jamaica Rose]

In "Treasure Island" by RLS, the only part of the song given is the chorus. If the explanation is true that the "Dead Man's Chest" is an island, I wonder if RLS was aware of it -- for he does not use initials for those words when he quotes them. It may be a song fragment he overheard and didn't fully understand, but thought it sounded good for the story.

Here's a couple of excerpts, about the song, one containing the song fragment:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"There were nights when he took a deal more rum and water than his head would carry; and then he would sometimes sit and sing his wicked, old, wild sea-songs, minding nobody; but sometimes he would call for glasses round, and force all the trembling company to listen to his stories or bear a chorus to his singing. Often I have heard the house shaking with "Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum"; all the neighbours joining in for dear life, with the fear of death upon them, and each singing louder than the other, to avoid remark. For in these fits he was the most overriding companion ever known' he would slap his hand on the table for silence all roudnd' he would fly up in a passion of anger at a question, or sometimes because none was put, and so he judged the company was not following his sotyr. Nor would heallow any one to leave the inn till he had drunk himself sleepy and reeled off to bed."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On the next page over...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"... that filthy, heavy, bleared scarecrow of a pirate of ours, sitting far gone in rum, with his arms on the table. Suddenly he -- the captain, that is -- began to pipe up his eternal song:

"Fifteen men on the dead man's chest ---

Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!

Drink and the devil had done for the rest --

Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!"

At first I had supposed "the dead man's chest" to be that identical big box of his up-stairs in the front room, and the thought had been mingled in my nightmares with that of the one-legged seafaring man. But by this time we had all long ceased to pay any particular notice to the song; it was new, that night, to nobody but Dr. Livesey, and on him I observed it did not produce an agreeable effect, for he looked up for a moment quite angrily before he went on with his talk to old Taylor, the gardener, on a new cure for the rheumatics."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Near the end of the story:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"All of a sudden, out of the middle of the trees in front of us, a thin, high, trembling voice struck up the well-known air and words:

"Fifteen men on the dead man's chest --

Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!"

I never have seen men more dreadfully affected than the pirates. The colour went from their six faces like enchantment; some leaped to their feet, some clawed hold of others; Morgan grovelled on the ground.

"It's Flint, by -----!" cried Merry.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[No -- it turns out to be Ben Gunn singing, but that's too much for me to transcribe here]

On the next to last page, there is a fragment of a song that is different than the one we generally sing nowadays. But I think it is a completely different song. Here's the excerpt:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Five men only of those who had sailed returned with her. "Drink and the devil had done for the rest," with a vengeance; although, to be sure, we were not quite in so bad a case as that other ship they sang about:

"With one man of her crew alive,

What put to sea with seventy-five."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This same song is referred to earlier, in the middle of the book, pg. 177 of my copy (the one with the Wyeth painting on the cover):

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Some one was singing, a dull, old droning sailor's song, with a droop and a quaver at the end of every verse, and seemingly no end to it at all but the patience of the singer. I had heard it on the voyage more than once, and remembered these words:

"But one man of her crew alive,

What put to sea with seventy-five."

And I thought it was a ditty rather too dolefully appropriate for a company that had met such cruel losses in the morning.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On pg. 179, there is the chorus again:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The endless ballad had come to an end at last, and the whole diminished company about the camp fire had broken into the chous I had heard so often:

"Fifteen men on the dead man's chest --

Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!

Drink and the devil had done for the rest --

Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!"

I was just thinking how busy drink and the devil were at the very moment in the cabin of the Hispaniola, when I was surprised by a sudden lurch of the coracle."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So -- where did the rest of the song come from? In "Pirate Songs" by Stuart M. Frank, he explains:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In 1891 a Louisville jornalist named Young Ewing Allison expanded Stevenson's ditty into a much longer affair of five stanzas. These he first entitled "A Piratifcal Ballad" and later called "Derelict", which is the title by which it was known and sung at the US Naval Academy at Annapolis, in a musical setting composed for the stage by Henry Waller in 1901. According to the editor of "Bawdy Ballads and Lusty Lyrics", for the rest of his life Allison continued to add to and polish his lyrics, until he had six significantly altered full-length stanzas (trascribed from the author's manuscript in J.H. Johnson, 1935, 66-69). "The Dead Man's Chest" refers to neither to human anatomy nor to luggage, but to an island reef in the Caribbean where pirates are supposed to have consorted and shipping come to grief.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Blackheartedly yrs,

--Jamaica Rose

"Like break o' day in a boozing ken,

Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!"

[Corvos]

BlueBert is right about the island in the BVI; it shows on my chart as "Dead Chest". And it's not too far from Norman Island, the island that supposedly is the basis for the island in Treasure Island. The Bight on Norman Island was a pirate hangout from what I've heard; due to the position of this bay in relation to the Sir Francis Drake channel it made a good place for one square rigger to wait in ambush for another coming down the channel.

Has anyone ever heard different words to the "Dead Man's Chest" tune? If so, that might be an indication of the origin and date of the song. "Maui" or "Rolling Down to Old Maui" was, for example, a French fife and drum tune before words were added to make it a song about whalers.

[Deacon Frye]

Cordingly, in "Under the Black Flag" states that Stevenson "---took the Dead Man's Chest from At Last by Charles Kingsley." Has anyone seen this book and know how it relates to the song?

Many years ago I read an article, I no longer remember where, by a man who claimed to have tracked down the song's origin. He said that Dead Man's Chest was a tiny island in the Caribbean and that the song commemorates a shipwreck there, not a mutiny. After the wreck, the marooned crew got into the ship's cargo of rum. Some drank themselves to death, or killed each other in fights. When relief arrived, there were only fifteen survivors, thus: "drink and the devil had done for the rest." In this version, the fifteen were still alive, not among the killed.

Of course, I have no way of knowing if this guy is just blowing smoke up our poopdeck.

Letter: TO SIDNEY COLVIN

[ROYAT, JULY 1884.]

. . . HERE is a quaint thing, I have read ROBINSON, COLONEL JACK, MOLL FLANDERS, MEMOIRS OF A CAVALIER, HISTORY OF THE PLAGUE, HISTORY OF THE GREAT STORM, SCOTCH CHURCH AND UNION. And there my knowledge of Defoe ends - except a book, the name of which I forget, about Peterborough in Spain, which Defoe obviously did not write, and could not have written if he wanted. To which of these does B. J. refer? I guess it must be the history of the Scottish Church. I jest; for, of course, I KNOW it must be a book I have never read, and which this makes me keen to read - I mean CAPTAIN SINGLETON. Can it be got and sent to me? If TREASURE ISLAND is at all like it, it will be delightful. I was just the other day wondering at my folly in not remembering it, when I was writing T. I., as a mine for pirate tips. T. I. came out of Kingsley's AT LAST, where I got the Dead Man's Chest - and that was the seed - and out of the great Captain Johnson's HISTORY OF NOTORIOUS PIRATES. The scenery is Californian in part, and in part CHIC.

I was downstairs to-day! So now I am a made man - till the next time.

R. L. STEVENSON.

If it was CAPTAIN SINGLETON, send it to me, won't you?

LATER. - My life dwindles into a kind of valley of the shadow picnic. I cannot read; so much of the time (as to-day) I must not speak above my breath, that to play patience, or to see my wife play it, is become the be-all and the end-all of my dim career. To add to my gaiety, I may write letters, but there are few to answer. Patience and Poesy are thus my rod and staff; with these I not unpleasantly support my days.

I am very dim, dumb, dowie, and damnable. I hate to be silenced; and if to talk by signs is my forte (as I contend), to understand them cannot be my wife's. Do not think me unhappy; I have not been so for years; but I am blurred, inhabit the debatable frontier of sleep, and have but dim designs upon activity. All is at a standstill; books closed, paper put aside, the voice, the eternal voice of R. L. S., well silenced. Hence this plaint reaches you with no very great meaning, no very great purpose, and written part in slumber by a heavy, dull, somnolent, superannuated son of a bedpost.

From: World Wide School

John, I haven't seen At Last: A Christmas in The West Indies, but it seems to have been popular and widely known in its time.

The shipwreck story does seem to fit better with the "Drink and the Devil did for the rest" line.

[Deacon Frye]

And then I found this amazing little article in which a guy claims to have found an untouched and misfiled naval record from 1777 in which a seaman's ballad is entered into evidence and the name of the ballad is "Fifteen Men on the Dead Man's Chest".  John, is this the article you are looking for?

Click here for the article

Who else has some more info?!!!  This is interestin' stuff mates!!

Claire, I believe this is the preface to Johnson's fictional novel of the same name.

He appears to be simply setting up his story with a time-honored literary convention.

Has anyone read the book? The idea of mixing John Paul Jones and Treasure Island doesn't appeal to me much.

[Jamaica Rose]

Claire, I believe this is the preface to Johnson's fictional novel of the same name.

You are correct. This is from the preface of "Dead Man's Chest". I have not read the book, but my husband did, and here is his review from the July 2001 No Quarter Given:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Treasure of Dead Man's Chest

By Roger L. Johnson, Commander USN Retired

A Review by Michael MacLeod

A unique book, if I’ve ever read one. The story is well written, the charaters are believeable, but the story has more twists & turns than a 20 ft anaconda. Basically, Long John Silver has retired and is now the owner of the Man-O’-War tavern in Kings Town, Jamaica. He hatches a plot to get John Paul Jones to retrieve his long lost treasure off of Dead Man’s Chest. In order to do it, he obtains commissions in the new Continental Navy for John Paul (it seems Jones is an alias), along with his nephew David Noble. He then persuades them, along with Patrick Henry & Thomas Jefferson, that it would be in their best interests to find the treasure. You see, Long John’s step-brother Charles Noble {David’s father} has a warehouse full of over a thousand naval cannon that the colonies desperately need, and having no love for the British, he’s willing to trade them for the treasure. Of course, things are not that simple. To get it, Capt. Jones must contend with Joshua Smoot(nicknamed “Fishbone” for his habit of picking his teeth with the rib bone of a barracuda), once described as the sort of man that looked like he was thrown out of Hell for meanness. It seems Capt. Smoot had inherited The Walrus, John Flint’s old vessel, from Billy Bones when the former took off for England with Flint’s treasure map, and he, along with his scurvy band of cutthroats, intended to use it to take Flint’s treasure for himself!

Will John Paul find the treasure & save the American colonies? Will Long John remember to oil his artificial leg, before that telltale squeak gives him away? And what of Cap’n Flint, Long John’s parrot, what DID happen to him? Read this here fine nautical yarn & learn how the American Navy was saved by the machinations of a connivin’ pirate.

[The Treasure of Dead Man's Chest is currently available as an E-book from Zander Books. Log on to their website at: www.ZANDEREBOOKS.COM/FICTION/NOVELS/. If you would like an autographed copy of the First Edition, send an E-mail to the author Cmdr. Johnson at: hiouchi@earthlink.net. I recently heard that the screenplay is being promoted at the Caan film festival for a possible movie or musical]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Blackheartedly yrs,

--Jamaica Rose

"Buckets of Blood"

[El Pirata]

Click here for the article

That was a great article. I'll blame it on making me late returning from lunch.