Surgery on a pirate ship in the late 17th century.

>One account of a shipboard operation on a pirate named Phillips reveals the level of care a patient might receive. The ship’s surgeon was absent, so it was decided that the carpenter would have to remove the man’s wounded leg. The carpenter fetched his biggest saw, secured the man’s ankle underneath his arm, and cut off the leg “in as little time as he could have cut a… Board in two.” There is no mention of anesthesia, and the stump was treated by heating an ax in the fire and then cauterizing the wound, but the carpenter burned the patient’s flesh “distant from the Place of Amputation, that it had like to have morify’d.” >A patient had to pray that the surgeon was competent and sober, two attributers that were quite rare on a buccaneer ship. But most of all, he had to hope that his wounds did not get infected; once they did, death almost always followed. Bradley was an example; his wounds turned gangrenous, and he lingered in agony for ten days before succumbing to his injuries. _____________________________ **Source:** Talty, Stephan. “The Isthmus.” *Empire of Blue Water: Captain Morgan’s Great Pirate Army, the Epic Battle for the Americas, and the Catastrophe That Ended the Outlaws’ Bloody Reign*. New York: Crown Publishing Group (NY), 2007. 218. Print.