No written accounts exist of pirates tying a murderer to his victim, weighting down both bodies, and tossing them overboard, but the Royal Navy punished seamen in this manner. Navies also used keelhauling as a form of punishment. Bound at the wrists, a seaman was hoisted out to the mainyard while a weighted line was attached to his bound feet. The other end of the line was passed under the hull and attached to the opposite end of the mainyard. Someone covered the guilty man's face with an oily rag to prevent drowning, then he was dropped into the sea and the line was hauled in, dragging him under the water against the ship's hull where barnacles slashed his skin before he resurfaced on the opposite side. Since he suffered this punishment three times, few survived.
Towing, a variation of keelhauling, involved tying the accused to a line fastened to the stern. As the ship continued its voyage, the accused was dragged through the ocean. Often, he endured this punishment for days before succumbing to exhaustion and hypothermia.
The punishment most inflicted on seamen was a flogging, using a special whip known as the cat o' nine tails. The nine strands of a rope were unwound, knotted, and then covered with tar. Sometimes fish hooks or metal balls were affixed to the ends of the cat, which was kept in a red bag. The person wielding the cat cleaned the ends between each lash, but not always. The man to be whipped had his shirt removed before being tied to a grate or a gun. In the navy after a flogging, salt and vinegar might be applied to the open wounds. Moses' Law meant the guilty man endured forty stripes minus one as Jesus was punished.
Infractions that merited the severest consequence among pirates involved stealing from the crew or abandoning one's post in battle. Offenders received the most dreaded of all punishments - marooning. This slow, cruel death was included in the articles Bartholomew Roberts' and John Phillips' crews signed. The disgraced pirate was abandoned on a deserted island, preferably a sand bar without fresh water, food, or shelter. He had with him the clothes he wore, one day's worth of water, a pistol, powder, and shot. His mates returned to their ship and sailed away, leaving him to die. If he preferred a quick death, he could kill himself with the pistol. To do that, however, damned his soul forever.
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