darren redparty said:
I didn't know that libcom had done that, though I am pleased that they did- I am inordinately proud of that article which I feel is the best I ever wrote.
you can read it in full
here
Hi Darren - I wrote the below, did you know that? Attica
The Class War symbol, The Deaths Head, Jolly Roger, Motley Crew and King Death
The Class War logo is one of the most famous anarchist symbols in Britain, including the circled @, the black flag, and the balaclava. Pirate flags of different descriptions have also been used on demonstrations in Britain and around the world recently. Piracy images are also used in Dover and in Northern France and Belgium as an emblem for smuggling. While the Class War logo itself was taken from an old record around 1983, what the emblem stands for has never been talked about. The Class War logo is a symbol of Piracy, and at the time it is estimated that 5000 men sailed beneath these colours, and it has never been more topical today given the worldwide resurgence of actual piracy, and video/CD/DVD piracy too.
Common on the black pirate flags were the human skull, or ‘deaths head’, with sometimes the entire skeleton, and a weapon such as a cutlass, sword or dart, and an hourglass (like an egg-timer). It was intended to terrify the pirates prey, but its triple interlocking themes of death, limited time, and violence also pointed out to meaningful aspects of the seaman’s life, and it is from common seamen from whom pirates originated. It also eloquently spoke of the pirate consciousness of themselves as preyed upon in turn.
What is less well known is where the original symbol came from. While piracy was used by merchants, royal, and other leaders prior to the early eighteenth century. It was then taken by the common people for their own purposes, and given it’s own flag. This is the period that we are talking about in this article, 1680-1720.
The Class War researcher has found out that it originates from the record books despotic captains used on board boats in the early 18th century to record crew members who had been killed, sometimes by the captain himself, or who had otherwise died. Pirates seized the symbol of mortality from these ship captains who used the skull as a marginal appendage in their logs to indicate a record of death, and turned it into a symbol of the class war. As pirates, and some believed it was only possible as pirates, these men were able to fight back beneath the sombre colours of King Death against those captains, merchants, governors and officials who waved the banners of brutal authority.
Pirates served in the navy, for merchantmen, privateers, and got a close look at death, brutality, fraud and other pay irregularities. Sailors usually became pirates when their ship was taken, though sometimes an entire ship would mutiny. Sailors knew life on board the pirate ship was better in several respects; the pay was better, the hours shorter, food more plentiful and of higher quality, and the discipline was egalitarian rather than hierarchical.
The social organisation of the ship was a rough egalitarianism that placed the power in the hands of the ship assembly, or ‘council of war’ as it was known. These determined strategy, and elected the captain who received no special privileges and slept with the crew. Roger was not jolly for nothing! And there’s more than a grain of truth in that smart Alec remark. Many pirates were black men too, 60 out of 100 of Blackbeards crew were black, and as many as 400 black pirates were executed by state powers. Black crewmen also made up part of the pirate vanguard, the most trusted and fearsome men who boarded prospective prizes, and some were captains.
Absolute power only resided with the captain in fighting, chasing, or being chased. At all other times he was governed by the will of the collective. This was written down in the articles of association that determined pay (decidedly levelling it), allocated authority, distributed plunder, and enforced discipline. There was a welfare scheme where a portion of the booty would go into a common fund for the needy, and by this method it also enhanced loyalty and recruitment. It took until the 20th century for pension provision to become widespread after all in advanced capitalist countries.
Pirates were class conscious and had a distinctive sense of justice too. The ‘Distribution of justice’ was a specific practice of pirates. One ship even had its own nominated ‘Dispencer of Justice’ – of course backed by the crew. Upon taking a ship they asked the crew whether the captain had been harsh, and those who were could expect to be whipped, pickled and worse. Though there is no evidence of the plank being used, it is too well known a symbol not to have been. Pirates also used abandonment on an isolated island as punishment, ‘marooning’. Fights amongst pirates were only allowed onshore that served to promote other methods of dispute resolution, and pirates also had a developed consciousness of kind, uniting in spontaneous alliances
Drawn out of the international market economy piracy was a strategy for survival and a better way of life in many ways. Pirates never managed to establish free territories or commonwealths but there is evidence of this being a desire. Authority also feared that since “no Power in those Parts of the World could have been able to dispute it with them.” The social relations of piracy were marked by loud, and sometimes violent antipathy toward traditional authority. Greeting the Royal pardon for piracy in 1717 with ‘curses for the king and all higher powers’. The pervasive anti authoritarian spirit in the culture of the common seafarer found many expressions in exuberant egalitarianism beneath the banner of King Death, but in effect this was a bastardised libertarianism. Resisting brutality and exploitation with occasional brutalities of their own, trapped in a dialectical struggle, and perhaps doomed because of it. The powers of capitalism and the state eventually swamping the social spaces for piracy.
Pirates constructed a culture of masterless men, as far removed from traditional authority as men could be in the 18th century. Beyond the church, beyond the family, beyond disciplinary labour, and using the sea to distance themselves from state power they carried out an experiment in alternative ways of living. Pirates were a floating mob with their own sense of justice. There have been features of piracy within Class War practice, and pirates and Class War have been called a ‘Motley Crew’. This is similar to the urban mob and revolutionary crowd, where different groups had their own mobility and motility. The participants rather than members having different backgrounds, with pirates often multiethnic, and always being independent of leadership from above. Long may the tradition continue.
To get more detail try;
Marcus Rediker “Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: Merchant Seamen, Pirates and the Anglo American Maritime World 1700-1750” Cambridge University Press, 1987.
Peter Linebaugh and M. Rediker, “ The Many Headed Hydra”, Verso, 2000.
Christopher Hill, ‘Radical Pirates’ in “The Collected Essays of Christopher Hill”, Harvester Press, 1985.
C. Pennell, “Bandits at Sea”, New York University Press, 2001.
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