Half-Hanged Sue
You were named for the sun, my dear heart. May it blaze in you for all your days.
For a 12 year period from 1708 - 1720, the most feared pirate in the Caribbean was the woman known as Half-Hanged Sue. She sailed under a black flag and attacked merchant ships without mercy.
Sue preferred not to kill her targets' crews. After all, her job was easier if they surrendered as soon as she approached and strung up her flag. After a battle to take a ship, anyone who surrendered before or during the fight would be left alone, and left on the ship with a weeks' worth of food and water. Anyone who had fought to the end would brought back to her ship, The Golden Sun, and tied to the prow with ropes. Left there to die, their skeletons would serve as a warning to future crews: surrender, or you'll be here next.
In 1712, she was captured by Dutch forces, put on trial, and sentenced to death. In punishment for several years of raiding and murdering, she was hanged. And hanged. And hanged a little bit more. But no matter how long they left her dangling at the end of the rope, the pirate queen refused to die. They eventually cut her down and took her back to her cell, and spent the rest of the afternoon debating if it was some trick, if the hangman was incompetent, or if this was God's will and fate decreed she must live longer.
Either way, by the next morning, she had disappeared from her cell. No one knows how she escaped, but soon after, her ship was spotted once again and she resumed her reign of terror. She had acquired the nickname Half-Hanged Sue, and her approach was met with more fear than ever now that the rumour had spread that she had either had dark magical powers, or was unbound.
She was captured again in 1715, and once again sentenced to death. This time, to ensure the execution stuck amid rumours that she was unbound and, thus, immortal, she was killed by decapitation. Her body was then cut into five pieces, each piece and her head was placed in a separate box, and each box was dropped in the sea, miles apart.
Sue was a terrifying figure in the Caribbean, but farther south, among the Muisca people, there's another story about her.
Summary
Sua was born into slavery. Her parents, along with hundreds of others of the the Muisca people, toiled in an emerald mine operated by French colonists. She was put to work breaking rocks as soon as she was big enough to pick up a hammer. The mine was filled with misery, but among it all, Sua blazed with life.
In the Chibcha language, 'sua' means sun, and her parents named her for a reason. In the depths of the mines, slaves rarely saw the sun, as they worked from daybreak to dusk.
- "Why am I named Sua," the little girl asked one day, "when the sun is so barely part of my life?"
And her mother replied, "When all around you is dark, you must be your own sun."
A Light in the Dark
Sua grew up in the mines, toughening her hands and her heart. She lived surrounded by cold stone, abusive foremen, and backbreaking labour. Many children did not survive in the mines, and by the time she was almost grown, hardly any of her childhood friends still lived. Those that did were as broken as their parents before them had been, resigned to a short lifetime of misery in bondage.
But amid the darkness of the mines, the story goes, Sua burned with a sun of her own. She was beloved by all around her for her ability to laugh int he darkest of hours, for her unwavering confidence, and for her stubborn pride that refused to submit to the French. Though her mother had died years before, she had taken her words to heart and created for herself her own sun, which blazed for everyone around her.
When she was 18 years old, Sua heard a man crying out. She ran to the sound and found a worker lying on the floor next to a dropped basket of stones, and a foreman standing over him with a whip. When the foreman lashed out again, Sua threw herself at the foreman to protect the fallen man. With surprise on her side, she tore the whip from his hand and struck him in the face, giving the fallen worker time to pick himself up and flee.
The foreman's shouts attracted others, and Sua was quickly overpowered. The French workers dragged her out of the mine to report her defiance to the owner. He declared that she was to be beaten and left hanging by her wrists from a tree for a full 24 hours in punishment. Sua was beaten until her face bled and her bones cracked, and then suspended from the branch of a tree with her feet off the ground.
Promise to the Sun
The mine's owner wanted her to hang there in agony as punishment for her crime, but just after the foremen left, she began to pray. With the sun burning her face, she looked to it and asked the mighty god Zuhe to help her. She tried to be the sun, but she could feel her light draining. Because she had kept his light strong even in the darkness underground, Zuhe smiled upon her and scorched the ropes off her wrists. But his help came with a price, he told her. Zuhe grieved to see his people suffering underground, and desired her to use her new freedom to bring the Muisca slaves back to the light.
Sua was free, but knew she was too weak to even attempt to confront the French. Even if she were at her full strength, it would be impossible to help the others. After all, look at what had happened when she tried to stop just one man from abusing another. She would never be able to help her people and follow Zuhe's wishes as a powerless little girl. She had to leave the mines now, make herself into someone capable of fulfilling Zuhe's wish, and return to liberate the mines.
With that goal in mind, she walked down the mountain and toward the sea. For many day and nights, and wandered through the jungle. By the time she arrived at a port town, her injuries were healed and she was deemed fit enough to join the crew of an English merchant ship as a cook. Her crewmates, unused to the Chibcha language, named her "Sue".
Life at Sea
Over the next few years, Sua became a competent sailor in her own right. While on shore leave on a Dutch island in the Caribbean, she came across a crew of privateers who had orders from the Dutch crown to attack French ships. Thinking that this could be a chance to strike back against the French who operated the mine, signed up.
Sua - or Sue, as her crew knew her - rose through the ranks on the ship. After their captain died in battle, the crew elected her his successor. As captain, she renamed the ship The Golden Sun and began her reign of terror throughout the Caribbean. She threw out the Letter of Marque and attacked Dutch ships, French ships, Andalusi ships - anything that looked profitable.
Fulfilling the Promise
But Sua never forgot her promise to Zuhe. She never spent her share of the money they acquired, not until she had enough to return to the mine in the mountains of French Muisca and purchase a slave. The slave she bought, remembering her from years before, rejoiced at her new freedom and joined her crew. Sua knew she would never be able to raid the mine and rescue every slave at once - not while her power lay on a ship and the mine was in the mountains - but she could rescue her people bit by bit, just like how even a small child was useful in a mine to chip away at a rock a tiny bit at a time.
She continued her mission of rescuing her people from the mine, acquiring the money to purchase the slaves by any means possible, until she was finally captured and killed by the French.
Historical Basis
There are no records of most of the events in the Muiscan version of the story. No one knows which mine she allegedly came from, and no mine owner has come forward to say he did business with notorious pirate Half-Hanged Sue.
It is known, however, that Sue was a Muisca, and she did get her start on an English merchant vessel. There are no records of her existence before she joined that ship, so it isn't unbelievable that she was an escaped slave. Several other crewmembers were confirmed to be former Musica slaves as well.
Even those who believe the bulk of the Muiscan story discredit the divine interference part of the plot, and allege that she escaped her binds by dislocating her thumbs and slipping out of the ropes, or something similar.
Whether or not her story of escaping slavery and working to rescue her people is true, some argue, it doesn't change the fact that she was a violent, ruthless pirate responsible for many innocent deaths.
Spread
The story of Half-Hanged Sue is common knowledge around the Caribbean Sea. The Muisca version of the story is less well-known, though among their people, it is widespread. She was one of the most feared pirates during the Golden Age of Piracy, and her name is spoken alongside the likes of Blackbeard and Calico Jack.
The details of the story got muddled on their way to Europe. She's still known there, primarily in the countries that have a Caribbean presence like France, Ireland, or the Netherlands. On the other side of the Atlantic, safe from roving pirates, stories about her became more vibrant, and more bloody. The facts of her case were less important than the terrifying tales one could share about her.
The most significant addition was the idea that Sue is still alive, with her body split into six pieces. If anyone were to find the six boxes and bring them together, she would sew herself back together and show her rescuer where she hid her last stash of gold.
Date of Setting
Late 1600s to 1720
The Golden Sun
Sue's ship, The Golden Sun, was a Dutch frigate. She typically flew the Dutch flag while sailing, only hoisting her true colours when they got close. Her flag was recognizable for the skull topped in a classical Muisca crown.
