Walking the plank was a method of execution practiced on special occasion by pirates, mutineers, and other rogue

seafarers A sailor, seaman, mariner, or seafarer is a person who works aboard a watercraft as part of its crew, and may work in any one of a number of different fields that are related to the operation and maintenance of a ship. The profession of the s ...

. For the amusement of the perpetrators and the

psychological torture Psychological torture or mental torture is a type of torture that relies primarily on psychological effects, and only secondarily on any physical harm inflicted. Although not all psychological torture involves the use of physical violence, there ...

of the victims, captives were bound so they could not swim or tread water and forced to walk off a wooden plank or beam extended over the side of a ship. Although forcing captives to walk the plank has been a motif of

pirates in popular culture In English-speaking popular culture, the modern pirate stereotype owes its attributes mostly to the imagined tradition of the 18th century Caribbean pirate sailing off the Spanish Main and to such celebrated 20th century depictions as Ca ...

since the 19th century, few instances are documented.

Earliest documented record of the phrase

The phrase is recorded in the second edition of English lexicographer

Francis Grose Francis Grose (born before 11 June 1731 – 12 May 1791) was an English antiquary, draughtsman, and lexicographer. He produced ''A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue'' (1785) and ''A Provincial Glossary, with a Collection of Local Pr ...

's ''Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue'', which was published in 1788. Grose wrote:

Walking the plank. A mode of destroying devoted persons or officers in a mutiny on ship-board, by blind-folding them, and obliging them to walk on a plank laid over the ship's side; by this means, as the mutineers suppose, avoiding the penalty of murder.

Historical instances of plank walking

In 1769, a mutineer, George Wood, confessed to his chaplain at London's Newgate Prison that he and his fellow mutineers had sent their officers to walk the plank. Author Douglas Botting, in describing the account, characterized it as an "alleged confession" and an "obscure account ..which may or may not be true, and in any case had nothing to do with pirates". A Mr. Claxton, surgeons-mate aboard the Garland in 1788, testified to a committee at the House of Commons about the use of the plank by slavers:

The food, notwithstanding the mortality, was so little, that if ten more days at sea, they should, as the captain and others said, have made the slaves walk the plank, that is, throw themselves overboard, or have eaten those slaves that died.

Pirate John Derdrake, active in the Baltic in the late 1700s, was said to have drowned all his victims by forcing them to walk the plank. In July 1822, William Smith, captain of the British sloop ''Blessing'', was forced to walk the plank by the Spanish pirate crew of the schooner ''Emanuel'' in the

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. ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...

'' of London reported on 14 February 1829 that the

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''Redpole'' (Bullock, master) was captured by the pirate schooner ''President'' and sunk. The commander was shot and the crew were made to walk the plank. In 1829, pirates intercepted the

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brig ''Vhan Fredericka'' in the Leeward Passage between the

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, and murdered most of the crew by making them walk the plank with cannonballs tied to their feet.

In literature

Despite the likely rarity of the practice in actual history, walking the plank entered popular myth and folklore via depictions in popular literature.

Captain Charles Johnson Captain Charles Johnson was the British author of the 1724 book '' A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates'', whose identity remains a mystery. No record exists of a captain by this name, and "Captain Charles ...

, in his 1724 book ''

A General History of the Pyrates ''A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates'' is a 1724 book published in Britain containing biographies of contemporary pirates,

'', described a similar practice (using a ladder rather than a plank) in the

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classical antiquity Classical antiquity (also the classical era, classical period or classical age) is the period of cultural history between the 8th century BC and the 5th century AD centred on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ...

–

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

captives were offered the ladder and given their freedom, provided they were willing to swim for it. The title page of Charles Ellms's sensationalist 1837 work ''The Pirates Own Book'', apparently drawing on Charles Johnson's description, contains an illustration titled "A Piratical Scene – 'Walking the Death Plank'". In Charles Gayarré's 1872 novel ''Fernando de Lemos: Truth and Fiction'', the pirate Dominique Youx confessed to capturing the schooner ''Patriot'', killing its crew and making its passenger

Theodosia Burr Alston Theodosia Burr Alston (June 21, 1783 – January 2 or 3, 1813) was an American socialite and the daughter of the third U.S. Vice President, Aaron Burr, and Theodosia Bartow Prevost. Her husband, Joseph Alston, was governor of South Carolina dur ...

(June 21, 1783 – approximately January 2 or 3, 1813) walk the plank. "She stepped on it and descended into the sea with graceful composure, as if she had been alighting from a carriage," Gayarré wrote in Youx's voice. "She sank, and rising again, she, with an indescribable smile of angelic sweetness, waved her hand to me as if she meant to say: 'Farewell, and thanks again'; and then sank forever." Because Gayarré mixed fact with fiction, it unknown whether Youx's confession was real or not.

Robert Louis Stevenson Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as ''Treasure Island'', ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll a ...

's 1884 classic ''

Treasure Island ''Treasure Island'' (originally titled ''The Sea Cook: A Story for Boys''Hammond, J. R. 1984. "Treasure Island." In ''A Robert Louis Stevenson Companion'', Palgrave Macmillan Literary Companions. London: Palgrave Macmillan. .) is an adventure no ...

'' contains at least three mentions of walking the plank, including at the beginning where

Billy Bones Billy Bones is a fictional character appearing in the first section of Robert Louis Stevenson's 1883 novel ''Treasure Island''.''Treasure Island.'' In The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English (2000).Stevenson, Robert Louis. 1883 994The Old Se ...

tells bone-chilling stories of the practice to Jim Hawkins. (''Treasure Island'' also popularized other now-common pirate motifs such as parrots, peglegs, and buried treasure.) The concept also appears in

J. M. Barrie Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, (; 9 May 1860 19 June 1937) was a Scottish novelist and playwright, best remembered as the creator of Peter Pan. He was born and educated in Scotland and then moved to London, where he wrote several succ ...

's ''

Peter Pan Peter Pan is a fictional character created by Scottish novelist and playwright J. M. Barrie. A free-spirited and mischievous young boy who can fly and never grows up, Peter Pan spends his never-ending childhood having adventures on the mythi ...

'', where

Captain Hook Captain James Hook is a fictional character and the main antagonist of J. M. Barrie's 1904 play ''Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up'' and its various adaptations, in which he is Peter Pan's archenemy. The character is a pirate capta ...

's pirates helped define the archetype.

Earliest documented record of the phrase

Historical instances of plank walking

In literature

See also

References

Further reading