Throughout the centuries there have been many different execution methods used, from the
incredibly savage and barbaric hanging, drawing and quartering, to even using animals such
as Elephants to crush a condemned person.
Different equipment and animals were even used to administer justice onto a criminal,
but one of the most brutal and savage methods of execution that caused great pain was Keelhauling.
This was where a sailor would be thrown overboard a ship and dragged under the keel of the ship.
It was used as a punishment method, but was so severe that the torture caused by it easily
resulted in death.
Join us today as we look at one of History’s most brutal execution methods, Keelhauling.
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Keelhauling, also known as Kielhalen in Dutch was a form of punishment, torture and execution
enacted upon sailors who were at sea.
If a sailor committed an offence onboard a ship, then they would be tied to a line which
was then looped underneath the ship that they were sailing on.
The prisoner would then be thrown overboard over one side of the ship, and would be dragged
underneath the ship’s keel, from one side to another.
This would be incredibly painful, and very dangerous and would often result in the person
suffering very serious injuries and psychological pain.
The first thing they would think is that they were drowning, and this often happened if
the victim was dragged slowly, and if they did not emerge out of the sea quickly the
were often pulled out of the water dead having succumbed to the ocean.
Also underneath the bottom of the ship on the gull were barnacles and other pieces of
marine growth such as shells, and when a victim was keelhauled, they would often smash against
the hull of the boat, and this would then lead the barnacles to stab in their lack,
causing many wounds on their body.
As the ship was at sea, there would be no immediate medical attention available, and
these wounds would then get infected and would often lead to death also.
Victims would also smash their head against the ship’s hull or keel if the ship was
moving which could knock them unconscious and also result in their drowning.
It’s believed that keelhauling was mostly used by pirates and onboard pirate vessels,
and the first known recording of the practice comes from the Greeks who used it to punish
those found guilty of piracy around 700 BC.
But during the 17th century, many English writers wrote of the practice being used on
English naval ships.
Because of how brutal keelhauling was, there were no records of it being carried out in
ships records of logs from the 1600s, and some historians doubt that it ever occurred
in Britain and onboard British ships.
There was an account in Britain of Keelhauling on HMS Alexandria which was debated in Parliament
in 1880, however in Europe in the Netherlands it was used as a recorded punishment inside
of the Dutch Navy.
On painting named ‘The Keelhauling of the Ships surgeon of Admiral Jan van Nes shows
a huge crowd gathered to watch the practice being performed on a surgeon.
It was used as a intimidating form of show punishment with the purpose of causing great
fear to other sailors and possible offenders.
An account of Keelhauling states that, ‘Keel-Hauling, a punishment inflicted for various offences
in the Dutch Navy.
It is performed by plunging the delinquent repeatedly under the ship's bottom on one
side, and hoisting him up on the other, after having passed under the keel.
The blocks, or pullies, by which he is suspended, are fastened to the opposite extremities of
the main-yard, and a weight of lead or iron is hung upon his legs to sink him to a competent
depth.
By this apparatus he is drawn close up to the yard-arm, and thence let fall suddenly
into the sea, where, passing under the ship's bottom, he is hoisted up on the opposite side
of the vessel.
As this extraordinary sentence is executed with a serenity of temper peculiar to the
Dutch, the culprit is allowed sufficient intervals to recover the sense of pain, of which indeed
he is frequently deprived during the operation.
In truth, a temporary insensibility to his sufferings ought by no means to be construed
into a disrespect of his judges, when we consider that this punishment is supposed to have peculiar
propriety in the depth of winter, whilst the flakes of ice are floating on the stream;
and that it is continued till the culprit is almost suffocated for want of air, benumbed
with the cold of water, or stunned with the blows his head received by striking the ship's
bottom.’
It’s believed that Keelhauling was an evolution of the medieval punishment of ducking, which
was where an accused criminal would be submerged in water from a ducking stool or a chair.
Many women were accused of witchcraft and were subsequently ducked and actually died
from being drowned by the practice.
Keelhauling was a brutal and barbaric method of punishment and execution which was used
by navies and sailors to punish unruly staff onboard a ship and pirates.
There were other methods of execution used to punish pirates such as gibbetting in which
their remains were displayed on the shores of prominent docks, but keelhauling was rare
in the fact it used a ship as the executioners axe.
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