While the land lubbers of the time were yoked by an oppressive legal system imposed on them by so called 'noblemen', the men of the sea were far freer to live in a truer form of democracy. As time at sea was a rather perilous excursion into the unknown, surrounded by all forms of danger with very few policeman rowing their boats about, and the lawyers on land loathe to consort with smelly seamen, the men of the sea developed their own set of generally agreed upon principles for dealing with each other and legal matters at sea. This took into account the need for them all to work closely together as a team, for that was the best way for them to survive, and also took into account the seriousness of non team play and the implications of losing a vessel at sea to damage or plunderers.
This was also further refined on pirate ships and some merchantmen with a set of specific principles which were agreed upon by the crew and were called Ships's Articles, which were written to cover things specific to the ship, or general sea laws which needed reinforcement or modification.
Money, Pay Rates & Plunder
As quaint as it may seem, the merchants & pirates of the time set their own pay rates.
Battle & Cowardice
All men were expected to have their weapons in working order for use in battle at any time. (Refer Ships Articles for examples)
Men fleeing battle or not putting their effort into it could expect serious repercussions. (Refer Ships Articles for examples) On pirate vessels this would mean at least marooning, and generally could mean death by some colourful means. On naval vessels expect a good flogging and probable dishonourable discharge. Merchant crewmen would expect not to be hired again by that captain, and probably by not many other captains either.
Men found killing other pirates in cowardly ways due to personal disputes could expect death if caught. For example, shooting another pirate in the back before a duel was started was considered punishable by hanging. Duels were considered a perfectly natural part of the law, and killing another person in a duel was considered an end to the matter with no dishonour to either party.
Prisoners & Mutineers
Generally women received some form of protection at sea, (refer ships article 9 for Captain John Phillips). Also, when Vane captured two women and detained them, it was said it was against their (the pirate) custom to do so. However, because men could be at sea for extended periods, this did not mean that individual pirates did not molest the women. Pirate records show many examples of atrocious behaviour towards women, though I can't think of too many in the Caribbean in this period. Naval vessels generally accorded women all due respect, whether they were captured as part of a crew, or as liberated prisoners. Some French & Spanish naval crews could be known to cause female prisoners some harm, but this was very rare. Female passengers on merchantmen were always treated with due respect, unless of course the crew mutineed and went pirate, in which case anything could happen depending on the circumstances. Women in earlier periods, particularly the early 1600's, could expect nothing but the worst from pirate incursions. Some few were able to ransom themselves out of immediate danger, but those that couldn't were subject to particularly rough treatment.
Prisoners were tortured for a variety of reasons, including the women. The main reason was to make the prisoner reveal special hiding places of treasure on the ship, or because there was no items of value on the ship and the pirates needed to vent their rage. Examples exist of prisoners being lifted by block and tackle into the rigging of the ship and then being dropped to their death on the deck below. They could also be stripped and used at target practice. Captain Lowther (d1723) used to torture his prisoners by placing slow burning matches between their fingers which would burn down to the bone if the prisoner didn't give in and squeal where his valuables were hidden. His equally evil cohort Captain Low would lop of prisoners heads without a second though. These two were among the most evil of the pirate captains. Low on board the 'Merry Christmas', with a gang of equally evil & drunken men cut off a whaling captains ears, seasoned them with pepper & salt and forced him to eat them. They maimed and cut open men with abandon and strung up two Portugese friars to the yard arms and left them to dangle there after playing games with them.
Pirates also kept prisoners, particularly captains and masters. I am not clear why, but they detained captains, particularly when they kept their ship as a prize. It may have to do with local knowledge, but it does not appear to be the general case. It may be because generally only captains and masters could navigate, and prize ships needed their own navigator, so maybe they were kept to look after these ships while the pirates crew her with their own captain who didn't know navigation. The captain could be released at any time: put ashore in small boats, placed on captured and released ships, or kept indefinately until the pirate was captured.
Pirates also invented a rather neat little game called 'Sweating'. It involved arranging candles and such around the deck and forcing the prisoners to run the gauntlet among the candles one after the other, while all about the pirates gathered with blades, knives, forks and swords and stabbed the passers by in the buttocks until they collapsed through exhaustion, all the while the frivolity was accompanied by the ships musicians. They also forced men to drink with them, most likely toasting the pirates skills and the devil. When John Phillips captured a ship who's captain had tried to outrun him, he forced the poor man to dance for their benefit until he collapsed.
That is not to say all pirates were evil, or even evil all the time. Some pirates showed particular generosity to captains of vessels whose crew spoke very highly of them, and it was quite common for pirates to ransack a ship of valuables and be on their way with the captured ship & crew left to go on their way.
Discipline
Naval punishment was accompanied by ceremony, and as many sailors served both in merchant and naval ships, customs were most likely also conducted similarly on pirate and merchant vessels. Offenders were dealt with publicly, with the crew watching and accompanied with drum beats and bugles for effect. The British regulated punishment with 'Articles of War' in 1653, with a maximum of 48 lashes. In 1731 revisions a court martial was required before any sentence over 12 lashes could ordered, but cases of up to 36 for multiple punishments still occured. The captains log books were audited to check they were staying within the articles. In many cases the men were prepared for the punishment but reprieved at the last moment, depending on the captain. Eventually later in the 1700's the British would institute a system whereby officers were directly responsible for a group of sailors in their command. This helped to bond the crew. Good officers genuinely cared for their men, tending the sick and passing on their property to their family if they died. They also ensured the men were clean and in good condition. They also exercised their men at their jobs and duties and oversaw the training of the novices. Also in time the captains evolved a nobility concept of war actions more concerned with image than the claiming of prizes.
As men had to work as a team at sea, those breaking the accepted behavior were seen as a threat to the safety of the ship. Discipline was seen as a reminder of their duties. Men were required to make the lash that would be used on them. This gave them an opportunity to think over whatever they had done during its contruction.
The laws on the land did not cater well for incarceration, and at sea it was harder to imprison anyone. Punishment took direct physical means - floggings, denial of rations or in dire circumstances - hanging on the yard arm.
English laws of the time dictated hanging for most major felonies. Particularly vicous criminals were hung, their body displayed near where they had committed the offence, as a deterrent to others, and to remind the populace that justice was being done.
Walking the Plank
This particular punishment, though long popularly considered a definite pirate custom, has no discernable historical reference. Conjecture puts it practiced only by Stede Bonnet in his later career, but there is no records to say so. That being said, judging by the efforts of men like Low and Lowther, such a punishment could easily have occured in an unrecorded incident and made its way into folklore, much as the alien infiltration of the US government has become. The unfortunate recipient was blindfolded and forced to walk along a timber plank cantilvered over the rails of the ships. In some cases he was shot before he reached the end.
Marooning
Marooning was a time honoured practice, and used in many cases historically. If a pirate crew captured another ship and wished to either keep or destroy it completely, those sailors unwilling to join their crew were marooned. In some cases this was in places of safety, in other cases on lonely sand bars far at sea. If a small jolly boat was suitable, they might instead be set adrift in it, or given one of the pirates existing prize vessels. It was at the pirate crews discretion how much provisions they were left with, and how safe a location they were left in. For example, Edward Teach marooned members of his crew far at sea on a sand bar, surely to die though they were later rescued by Stede Bonnet, while Charles Vane and his compatriots, after being voted out of the company after being branded cowards, were given a sloop with enough provisions and ammunition to suit them.
Marooning was also used against dissident pirate crewmen. It was a symbolic gesture whereby the crew discarded the sailor. Again, they might be left in safe locations, or deserted islands and sand bars. Those left in the traditional way on a deserted island were left with a bottle of drink, a pistol, and some powder and shot, enough for them to make some sort of life for themselves in the short term, or alternatively, enough to kill themselves before depression set in. Some men were left marooned for many years before they were discovered.
Marooning did not guarantee safety either. Some pirate crews returned to beat the marooned crews, returning on a number of occassions. Unfriendly indians were also a concern.
For example: In 1718, a crew mutineed, leaving 8 men naked and without food on Green Key, a coral and scrub island in the Bahamas. Fortunately for the men, the pirates returned and put the men aboard a captured sloop a mile from shore. They slashed the main sail, cut the foresail down, and caused great mischief to her ability to sail before they departed. The marooned were now marooned a mile off shore to compound their problems, for only one of them could swim. Fortunately they found a broken axe head in the sloop, and the one man who could swim was able to find enough fruits on the island to survive, and to construct a raft to ferry them back to the ship. Cutting the small trees up for wood, and patching the sails, they would soon be on their way. To their horror, the pirates returned, the marooned taking to the raft and paddling hurriedly to shore where they hid. The pirates cut up the sloop again, sinking her in deep water, before sailing away. The men subsisted on the palms, fruits, berries and what fish they could catch. The pirates returned to the island a number of times, calling for them to come out, but they refused to come out. Eventually, the pirates promised them safety, and the marooned came out of hiding, only to find themselves tricked. Three were impressed into service, while the rest were left behind. For two weeks the last 5 fed on what little they could find, until the pirates returned, and mercifully left a cask of flour, salt, bottles of gunpowder, 2 muskets, shot, an axe, knives and some pots and pans. They were also left three hunting dogs which were trained to catch pigs. The pirates left again, and the 5 lived better on the fare left to them. They built a hut and fed on captured pork. The pirates returned again, tearing down the hut and eating their pork. The pirates left a bottle of rum, and then sailed away again, promising to never return. They didn't, they were captured by the Spanish shortly after, and one of the impressed men told the tale of the marooned men. The Spanish sent a rescue boat under John Sims from Bahama to rescue them.
Marooning as a practice was not limited to pirates. In fact it greatly pre dated the piracy era I am dealing with here, and was employed as a tactic by normal merchants. As a practice it was legally outlawed by the English as part of the Piracy Act of 1698, coming into effect on the 29th of September 1700.
Strappado & The Rack
When plundering towns, particularly in earlier periods, the pirates found the Spanish often hid their valuables prior to a pirate assault if there was time. Preferably the goods were taken out of town to the nearby forest and hills where the Spanish hid with their goods. Once they had fled, they continually moved about so that their fellows who knew the general idea of where things could be hidden would not betray them when tortured. To find these hidden locations, pirates made use of the local Spanish facilities to torture Spaniards to extract the locations of their comrades or their hidden valuables. There was no let up for the victims until they revealed actual locations where actual goods were recovered.
Those that did not immediately surredner their valuables were tortured on the rack. Many unfortunates were killed because either they did not have valuables, did not know where others had hidden theirs, or the original goods had been quickly relocated by others so they could not be discovered and therefore the pirates assumed they had lied.
A variation of the rack was strappadoing, where a man was staked out with straps which were continually pulled like a rack intil he was literally pulled apart.
Other variation included placing lit fuses between toes and fingers to burn down to the sensitive skin, and another method was to wrap a belt so tightly around a victims head until theirs eyes almost popped out.
Here is an extract from Exquemelin on Henry Morgan's sack of Gibraltar: "Among those who suffered most heavily was an old Portuguese in his sixties, because a Negro had denounced him as being very rich. This old man was seized and asked where his money was. He swore by every oath that all the money he'd had in the world was a hundred pieces of eight, and that a young man who lived near him had taken his money and run off with it.
The rovers did not believe him, but strappado'd him so that his arms were pulled right out of joint. He still would not confess, so they tied long chords to his thumbs and his big toes and spread eagled him to four stakes. Then four of them came and beat on the chords with their sticks, making his body jerk and shudder and stretching his sinews. Still not satisfied, they put a stone weighting at least two hundred weight on his loins and lit a fire of palm leaves under him, burning his face and setting his hair alight - yet despite all these torments he would not confess to having money.
Then they took him and bound him to one of the pillars of the church, which they were using as a guardhouse, and gave him one little bit of meat a day, just enough to keep him alive....
Yet even this man had not suffered all the torments which the buccaneers inflicted on the Spaniards to make them divulge their hidden wealth. Some they hung up by their genitals until the weight of their bodies tore them loose. Then they would give the wretches three or four stabs through the body with a cutlass, and leave them lying in that condition until God released them from their miserable plight by death. Some poor creatures continued on for four or five days. Others they crucified, with burning fuses between their fingers and their toes. Others they bound, smeared their feet with grease, and stuck them in the fire."
Women, Pregnancy & Children
Women at sea was not an unheard of thing. There were captains and senior offciers who often took their wives with them, which of course was not possible for the regular sailor. Women did travel as passengers, and in this time period, they had no associated luxury for the voyage besides whatever concessions may be made by the captain and their fare. There is some debate about how many women acted as sailors, with Mary Read and Ann Bonny being noteable historically, and this because they were pirates. No mention is made of their non pirating duties and whether they climbed the rigging. Their ability to be unrecogniseable as women on long voyages is hard to believe, and some question needs to be asked as whether or not the fact was known and not discussed or admitted, or of not great interest for the times or only to be hidden during the act of pirating. Women at sea tended to be noted when they did something extraordinarily noteworthy. In later periods women were taken to sea without any apparent superstition. These women were generally the wives of the ships permanent officers, and were often shown navigation to fill in the time. On naval vessels the wives could aid the surgeon or the powder monkeys, and in British naval regulations their number on board and duties were regulated
In Captain Johnson's book, mention is made of 2 women captured by Captain Kennedy. "The Weymouth [a ship under Captain Saunders from Boston bound for Jamaica with a load of fish and lumber] had two women passengers on board. How they passed their time I need not say, though I fancy, as they had formerly made a trip or two to the bay, there was no rape committed."
It is a common superstition that pregnant women on board bring bad luck at sea. As such, generally a ship will not sail with one on board. If they do, apply a random jinx from the the magic page. This does not apply in dock, where wives were quite welcome depending on the captain. As such, it was possible for babies to be born onboard in dock, the delivery usually taking place on the gun deck, and is in theory one of the origins for the expression 'son of a gun'.
I can find no evidence of superstition relating to children onboard. Considering it was quite normal for cabin boys as young as 9 to be on board, I would not expect it to be of any effect. I would guess they would raise morale and at least break the boredom of a voyage for some of the crew.
Women in captured towns were largely defenceless and at the mercy of the pirates. While plundering towns is not really applicable historically to this period, in earlier times the Spanish women could expect anything from their captors. Some were treated well, others used as ransoming tools to extract valuables from their men or their own estates, others could expect nothing but torture until they surrendered their valuables, and others subjected to the whims of their captors lust.
Here is an example from Exquemelin's Buccaneers of America on Morgan's plundering of Panama: "Nor did they spare the women, except for those who yielded themselves completely. The rovers had a way of dealing with those women who held out. They let them leave the church, which was being used as their prison, as if giving them a chance to go and wash themselves - but once a woman was in their hands they would work their will upon her, or beat her, starve her, or similarly torment her. Morgan, being the general, should have set a better example, but he was no better than the rest. When a beautiful prisoner was brought in, he at once sought to dishonour her."