Cursed crew

"Look! The moonlight shows us for what we really are. We are not among the living, and so we cannot die. But neither are we dead. For too long I've been parched of thirst and unable to quench it. Too long I've been starving to death and haven't died. I feel nothing. Not the wind on my face, nor the spray of the sea...nor the warmth of a woman's flesh. You best start believing in ghost stories, Miss Turner. You're in one!"

- Hector Barbossa to Elizabeth Swann.

The Cursed crew was a pirate crew of the Black Pearl. A notorious band of scoundrels, cutthroats, murderers, drunkards and desperadoes, this crew of miscreants was most notably led by the nefarious Captain Hector Barbossa.

Originally sailing under Jack Sparrow, the crew participated in the quest to find the Treasure of Cortés at Isla de Muerta. Barbossa, who was Jack's first mate aboard the Black Pearl, led a mutiny against Jack and marooned him on a desert island. Sometime after finding the treasure, the crew suffered under the Aztec curse; a curse they originally thought to be ridiculous superstition and didn't believe to be true. Barbossa's crew were doomed to live forever as the undead, the moonlight eerily transforming them into living skeletons. To lift the curse, Barbossa led his crew in search of all 882 pieces of the Aztec gold, which must be restored in total with a blood debt repaid. The crew would spend ten years finding all the gold and trying to lift the curse. After the curse was lifted, the crew was taken as prisoners of the British Royal Navy. They later escaped from their prison and would be led by Bo'sun following Barbossa's death.

Recruiting a Crew
"Finding a new crew in Tortuga...I feel like we've been here before, Hector, don't you? What do they call that? Deja-booty?" "You leave it to me, Captain. I'll find us a new crew. I'll take care of everything."

- Jack Sparrow and Hector Barbossa

Jack Sparrow showed up in Tortuga, at which time he was captain of the Black Pearl, where he recruited a crew with the intention of going after the treasure of Isla de Muerta with the help of his compass. At this point in time, Bootstrap Bill Turner was a member of Jack's crew, and Hector Barbossa was Jack's first mate. A bunch of pirates were recruited in Tortuga, who would take part in Barbossa's own sinister plans. At least two members of the crew, Pintel and Ragetti, who had previously sailed with Barbossa on the Cobra, were more loyal to Barbossa than Jack. With the new crew assembled, the Black Pearl then embarked on its quest to find the treasure.

The Mutiny
"See, three days into the venture, the first mate comes up to him and says everything's an equal share. That should mean the location of the treasure too. So, Jack gives up the bearings. That night, there was a mutiny. They marooned Jack on an island and left him to die, but not before he'd gone mad with the heat."

- Joshamee Gibbs concerning Jack Sparrow

The crew of the Black Pearl go sailing out in their quest, using coordinates that Jack Sparrow was able to get from his unique compass. Three days into the voyage, Barbossa coerced Jack into giving up the exact location of the island, saying that if the crew was going to have a share of the treasure, they should know where they're going. And so, Jack gave Barbossa the bearings to Isla de Muerta. It was by this point that Jack had already told the crew the tales surrounding Isla de Muerta, including the curse that lied upon the treasure. The crew ended up not believing in the curse, with Barbossa himself having said, "Ridiculous superstition!" That night, Barbossa led the crew in a mutiny against Jack Sparrow, in which Barbossa assumed command as the new captain of the Black Pearl. Jack, who hated Barbossa for violating the Code, would be thrown overboard. Barbossa would have given Jack a pistol with a single shot before marooning his former captain on a desert island, where he would be left to die. Bootstrap Bill, while he probably didn't participate in the mutiny, given that he had a good relationship with Jack Sparrow, he stayed on board with Barbossa's crew.

Finding the cursed treasure
"I hardly believe in ghost stories anymore, Captain Barbossa." "Aye. That's exactly what I thought when we were first told the tale. Buried on an island of dead what cannot be found, except for those who know where it is. Find it, we did. There be the chest. Inside be the gold. And we took 'em all. We spent 'em and traded 'em and frittered 'em away on drink and food and pleasurable company. The more we gave 'em away, the more we came to realize...the drink would not satisfy, food turned to ash in our mouths, and all the pleasurable company in the world could not slake our lust. We are cursed men, Miss Turner. Compelled by greed, we were, but now...we are consumed by it."

- Elizabeth Swann and Hector Barbossa



Although having believed that the curse that former captain Jack Sparrow spoke of was a mere ghost story, Captain Barbossa's crew had the Black Pearl sail on, pressing towards Isla de Muerta. Locating the island of the dead, the crew found and plundered its treasure: 882 pieces of Aztec gold that lied on the stone chest of Cortés. At some point prior to finding the island, Barbossa would get a pet monkey that he would name "Jack", after his old captain, who also took at least one piece of the treasure. They then go out spending and trading every bit on food, drink and pleasurable company, eventually ridding themselves of all gold pieces. It was only at this point that the crew began to discover that they were cursed. They suffered a living death, in which no amount of food, drink or pleasurable company would satisfy. When they step into the moonlight, the grim effects of the curse were plain to see: the crew's flesh vanished from their bones, eerily transforming them into walking skeletons; while in the daytime, their true decayed selves were covered by appearance of their former selves. Therefore, each member of the crew was doomed to reside as members of the undead for their transgression.

Losing Bootstrap Bill
"Never sat well with Bootstrap, what we did to Jack Sparrow. The mutiny and all. He said it wasn't right with the Code. That's why he sent off a piece of the treasure to you, as it were. He said we deserved to be cursed...and remain cursed."

- Pintel to Will Turner

Barbossa's crew soon learned, possibly through reading the Aztec writing on the stone chest, that the only way to undo their curse was by putting all the Aztec gold back into the chest. And so the now-cursed crew attempted to reclaim all 882 pieces of the Aztec gold, in order to lift their curse. Bootstrap Bill Turner, on the other hand, did not join this desperate search. He had been feeling guilty because of what they did to Jack Sparrow, believing that it wasn't right with the Code, so far as to say that the crew deserved to be cursed for what they did and to remain cursed. That was when Bootstrap sent his piece of the treasure to his child in England, because he never wanted Barbossa's crew to be able to lift the curse. In response, an angered Barbossa had Bootstrap Bill tied to a cannon and thrown overboard, eternally drowning but unable to die because of the Aztec curse. He was left to suffer at the crushing depths of the bottom of the ocean. It wasn't until after Bootstrap was thrown overboard did the crew learn of an additional requirement to lift the curse: all who stole but a single coin from the chest had to pay the heathen gods in blood, which now seemed impossible with Bootstrap lost to them. However, a chance of salvation lied in Bootstrap's child, who had both his coin and Turner blood in his veins.

Reclaiming all pieces
"881 we found but despaired of ever finding the last. We've paid the blood sacrifice owed the heathen gods."

- Hector Barbossa to his crew



And so, with their slight ray of hope of lifting their curse, the cursed crew set out to find down all the scattered pieces of the Aztec gold, using the caves of Isla de Muerta as a base to store their plundered loot. The treasure on Isla de Muerta included huge quantities of gold and silver bars and coins, which came from raids on Spanish ships heading back to Seville from the country's colonies in Mexico and Peru. But some of the most valuable pieces are jewelry stolen from wealthy passengers on ships the Black Pearl attacked. Sightings of the Black Pearl had been reported all over the world, ranging from Madagascar to Newport to Singapore, where the infamous pirate ship preyed on ships and settlements, and was believed to have left no survivors. Due to their immortality and prior fighting experience of most of the crew members, the crew was a deadly threat. Stories and legends arose about the Black Pearl, being "crewed by the damned" and Barbossa himself characterized as "a man so evil that Hell itself spat him back out".

Even members of the British Royal Navy were not above superstition; Joshamee Gibbs was particularly mindful of drawing the attention of the "cursed pirates" during the HMS Dauntless's crossing from England to Port Royal. It was during this voyage that the Black Pearl destroyed a merchant vessel that carried young Will Turner, who had set out to find his father while wearing the Aztec gold medallion around his neck. Drawn by Will's medallion, the crew left a burning wreck in their wake, though were unable to recover the gold because Will, along with his piece of gold, had drifted towards the Dauntless, the power of those waters. And so the Black Pearl left without getting Will and the coin, which was taken by a young Elizabeth Swann took the gold medallion away from him, believing that if it were discovered he would be treated as a pirate and be killed. While looking at the medallion, Elizabeth Swann also saw the Black Pearl sailing away from the Dauntless through an unnatural fog. For the next eight years, the cursed pirates continued looking for all the gold.

Sometime during their desperate search for the gold, Barbossa's crew of cutthroats came across a mysterious castaway who was floating in the water. It was from him that Barbossa learned of the Fountain of Youth, a legendary spring that grants oneself immortality, believing that the Fountain might hold the key to lifting the curse they're under. However, the idea was soon left aside and the crew continued searching for the gold.

Attack on Port Royal
"Me holds are bursting with swag. That bit of shine matters to us? Why?" "It's what you've been searching for. I recognize this ship. I saw it eight years ago on the crossing from England." "Did you, now?"

- Hector Barbossa and Elizabeth Swann

About eight years after the Black Pearl's voyage from the crossing of England, and ten years after the curse was upon them, the cursed crew of the Black Pearl had returned all but one of the 882 pieces of the Aztec gold, though despaired of ever finding the last piece. However, after the gold called to the pirates after the medallion fell in the water. Knowing it was the last medallion, the last piece they needed to lift their curse, the pirates came after it. They followed the call of the gold piece to the British colony of Port Royal.

The crew of Black Pearl arrived to Port Royal at night, blending in perfectly with the dark and cloudy night, followed by an eerie fog. Due to the cover, the Pearl was able to attack Port Royal unhindered. While cannonneers fired at Fort Charles, occupying the fort's attention, Captain Barbossa sent a raiding party to collect the final Aztec coin. Longboats emerge out of the fog, carrying armed pirates that began raiding and ransacking the town. Lured by the medallion's "call", a group of pirates storm into the governor's mansion.

As the Black Pearl laid siege to the town, two of the crew, Pintel and Ragetti, brought a woman aboard the Pearl. The woman, who had the last Aztec gold medallion, introduced herself as "Elizabeth Turner" and persuaded the pirates to stop the attack in exchange for the medallion. Barbossa reacted to the name "Turner", which confirmed what he had suspected: she was the child of Bootstrap Bill Turner. Believing Elizabeth had "Turner blood", which they needed to lift their curse, but Barbossa had her kept aboard as captive. Captain Barbossa welcomed Elizabeth aboard the Pearl as the crew set sail for Isla de Muerta.

Ghost stories
"There is one way we can end our curse. All the scattered pieces of the Aztec gold must be restored and the blood repaid. Thanks to ye, we have the final piece." "And the blood to be repaid?" "That's why there's no sense to be killin' you...yet."

- Hector Barbossa and Elizabeth Swann

As the Black Pearl cut through the dark waves under a moonlit sky, Elizabeth had dinner with Captain Barbossa, wearing a red dress he requested she wear. At first Elizabeth was "disinclined to acquiesce to his request", but reconsidered after Pintel said that her alternative would be dining with the crew naked. After Elizabeth thought the food was poisoned, Barbossa said there was no sense in killing her before talking about Elizabeth's medallion. Barbossa then told the story of how he and his crew became cursed, after taking the gold from the stone chest and spending it all. Despite Elizabeth believing this to be a "ghost story", Barbossa continued telling her his tale, adding that the curse could only be lifted when all the scattered gold pieces were returned in full and the blood repaid. Finally getting to his point, Barbossa told Elizabeth that she was the last blood sacrifice needed to lift the curse, saying "that's why there's no sense to be killing you. Yet."

Still seated in her chair, Elizabeth stared at Barbossa, horrified, as he again offered her an apple. Elizabeth then came up out of her chair, trying to get away from Barbossa, until she used a knife she took from the table and stabbed Barbossa in his chest. Unaffected by Elizabeth's knife, Barbossa pulled it out with little effort, with blood on the blade. Elizabeth expected Barbossa to fall to the ground, but he didn't. "I'm curious," he said instead. "After killing me, what is it you're planning on doing next?"

Turning in terror, Elizabeth burst through the doors of the cabin onto the main deck, where she saw Barbossa's now-skeletal crew working at their stations. Right in front of here, the crew of skeletons were at work swabbing the decks and coiling the lines. Screeching, Elizabeth tried to get away, but she fell, landing on a blanket in the cargo hold. A moment later, she was flung high into the air as skeletons pulled the blanket from beneath her. She came down, only to be caught by another skeleton as he swung by on a mast line. Terrified, she screamed again as she fell to the deck, while the skeletons kept working. Elizabeth ran over and hid under a stairway, until she let out another scream when Barbossa's monkey swung down beside her, scaring her with its skeletal appearance. Once more, Elizabeth jumped up, heading for the safety of the captain's cabin. But Barbossa was waiting for her just inside the doorway, out of the moonlight, and grabbed her roughly before jerking her back around and pulling her close. Barbossa explained the curse's effect on the crew before putting his hand in the moonlight. He revealed his full skeletal form as he said saying "You best start believing in ghost stories, Miss Turner. You're in one!" Barbossa took a bottle of wine, uncorked it with his teeth, and drank from the bottle&mdash;the wine running through his rib cage. Witnessing all this, Elizabeth ran back into the cabin. While Barbossa ordered his crew to get back to work, a terrified Elizabeth huddled in the far corner of the cabin, where she remained for the rest of the voyage.

Isla de Muerta
"Gents, you all remember Captain Jack Sparrow? Kill him." "The girl's blood didn't work, did it?" "Hold your fire! You know whose blood we need." "I know whose blood you need."

- Hector Barbossa and Jack Sparrow



Upon reaching the caverns of Isla de Muerta, the crew unloaded all of their booty, while Barbossa prepared the blood ritual. Barbossa gave a speech to the crew, reminiscing of their search for the 882 pieces of the Aztec gold, and turned to Elizabeth to perform the ritual to lift the curse. He cut Elizabeth's palm with a knife, covered the medallion with her blood, and dropped it into the stone chest. Although they performed the ritual, the crew didn't feel any different. As a test, Barbossa shot Pintel with his pistol to see if the curse was lifted; but Pintel didn't die. Barbossa confronted Elizabeth, realizing that Elizabeth was not the child of Bootstrap Bill. A frustrated Barbossa then knocked Elizabeth unconscious, dropping Elizabeth's medallion as well. The crew then began to argue amongst themselves on their unsuccessful attempt to lift the curse. They blamed Pintel and Ragetti for bringing the wrong person, and then turned their attention to Barbossa, claiming every decision he had made has led them from bad to worse. But, when Barbossa brandished his sword, none of the crewmen dared to fight against their skilled captain.

The confrontation was interrupted by Barbossa realizing that Elizabeth escaped with the gold medallion. While searching for the oars to their longboats, which had gone missing, Barbossa's crew were surprised to see their old captain Jack Sparrow waltzing through the caves. Invoking the right of parley, Jack was brought before Barbossa, who was also shocked by Jack's survival. Barbossa then ordered the crew to kill him. However, as Jack had knowledge on whose blood the crew needed, Barbossa had no choice but to bring his former captain aboard the Black Pearl to find the medallion.

Retrieving the medallion
"Gents, our hope is restored!"

- Hector Barbossa to his crew



While aboard the Pearl, Barbossa and Jack negotiated in the captain's cabin, until Bo'sun informed Barbossa that they were closing in on the HMS Interceptor, the ship that Elizabeth and the medallion were on. And so Barbossa sent Jack to the brig as the Pearl gaining on the Interceptor. After engaging the Interceptor in battle, which resulted in Barbossa's monkey Jack retrieving the medallion and the Interceptor's destruction, the crew was confronted by the real child of Bootstrap Bill Turner&mdash;Will Turner, who requested the safety of Elizabeth and Jack's crew. Barbossa agreed to those terms, but with a price: Will was taken as prisoner, while Jack's crew was sent the brig, and Elizabeth was sent with Jack Sparrow to the same island Jack was previously marooned on.

Battle of the Isla de Muerta
"All hands to the boats! Apologies, you give the orders." "Gents, take a walk." "...Not to the boats?"

- Jack Sparrow and Hector Barbossa



With Barbossa's crew having reclaimed the medallion, the Black Pearl had set sail towards Isla de Muerta once again, this time with Will Turner as their prisoner. Entering the caves, Barbossa once again aimed to lift their curse, this time with the intention of killing Will and using his blood in the blood ritual. However, his plans fell apart when Captain Jack Sparrow himself entered the cavern. Although Barbossa was initially shocked of Jack's reappearance, he resumed in his plan to kill Will, but not before Jack warned that the HMS Dauntless, captained by Commodore James Norrington, was waiting for the crew. Upon this revelation, Barbossa listened to Jack's proposal, which involved killing Norrington's men, thereby gaining a new ship for a fleet.

Agreeing to the matter, Barbossa sent his crew for attack, save for three of his men, Jacoby, Clubba, and Monk. But to Jack's dismay, having planned on Barbossa's men using the longboats to fight Norrington's men aboard the Dauntless, Barbossa ordered the crew to go walk underwater, and ambush the Dauntless from below. Pintel and Ragetti were forced to distract the Dauntless crew before the other crewmen gave the full attack. Meanwhile, back at the caverns, just as Barbossa was beginning to trust Jack, a duel ensued between the two within the treasure cave. Although Barbossa was able to stab Jack, mortally wounding him, Jack revealed himself to be cursed, having taken an Aztec coin while he and Barbossa negotiated. Even though the duel was now pointless, Jack and Barbossa continued fighting throughout the caves.

The rest of the crew continued fighting Norrington's men of the Royal Navy aboard the Dauntless. Pintel and Ragetti soon came aboard, where they would discover that, while two of their men stood guard, the Black Pearl was sailing away, stolen from them by Jack's motley crew after being freed by Elizabeth. Nevertheless, they continued fighting on the Dauntless.

The Curse Lifted
"Wait to lift the curse until the opportune moment."

- Jack Sparrow

Later in the battle, Elizabeth, who escaped from the Dauntless before it was attacked, arrived to the caves and aided Will in defeating Jacoby, Clubba and Monk. Upon seeing this from his stalemate duel with Barbossa, Jack cut his hand and threw his coin, smeared with his blood, to Will, who dropped his own coin into the chest, lifting the curse at the most opportune moment: Barbossa was caught off-guard and shot in the heart by Jack himself with his pistol. Although Barbossa finally got what he wanted for the past ten years, to be able to feel again, he died from Jack's one shot that was still in his heart.

Simultaneously, the rest of Barbossa's crew fought the Dauntless crew until they noticed that each of them reverted back to normal, even though they were out in the moonlight. One of their own, Koehler, was mortally wounded by Norrington before this sudden change, and died. Realizing that they were now mortal, the crew found themselves surrounded by Norrington's men of the Royal Navy, and so they were forced to surrender.

Second curse
"Scurvy cutthroats who turn into the bony undead under moonlight! Looks like your old crew is back from the grave again, Jack! Let's see to it that they rest in pieces, shall we?" "Easier said than done, I'm afraid! It's bloody hard to kill something that's already dead!"

- Will Turner and Jack Sparrow

The surviving crew members were taken back to Fort Charles to be executed, but soon escaped the clutches of the Royal Navy. They would return to Isla de Muerta to become cursed once more, vowing revenge against Jack Sparrow. They first made their reappearance at the Faithful Bride in Tortuga, where they kidnapped Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann, though Jack saw to their rescue with the aid of St. Piran's Blade. By this point, Bo'sun was serving as the leader of the crew, and set off on a quest to steal an Aztec Idol in Mexico. Bo'sun was briefly rendered invincible by the artifact, though it was immediately stolen by Jack, who left the crew marooned at sea.

The crew later tried more subtle ways of getting revenge on Jack, such as ambushing him aboard a merchant vessel. However, the ingenious use of chain-shot by Jack's crew saw the cursed pirates sent overboard, and forced to make a long walk back to shore. At some point following this, the entire crew returned to Isla de Muerta and lifted their curse. They were arrested soon afterwards; it is possible that pirate hunters were sent after them following this. It is presumed that they were all hanged, with the exception of Pintel and Ragetti, who escaped and later joined Jack Sparrow's crew aboard the Black Pearl.

Everyday life
"You've seen a ship with black sails, that's crewed by the damned and captained by a man so evil that Hell itself spat him back out?"

- Mullroy



The crew was characterized as a group of scoundrels, murderers, malefactors, drunkards and desperadoes. They hailed from a dozen nations, including escaped slaves from West Africa and Hispaniola, and former members of the British Royal Navy. Some members once operated as privateers before peace-time saw the loss of their employment, forcing them to turn to piracy.

Though they were described to be cutthroats by many, this depiction of them was biased. Like most pirates, many of them were mutual acquaintences, and many were known to have a sense of humor, even if their jokes were dry. One example was Jacoby's self sense of satisfaction after revealing to Will that he was not dead during the attack on Port Royal as well as Pintel and Ragetti's constant playful banter.

Although all crewmembers had the same dream&mdash;to remove their curse&mdash;they did not show real team spirit. Nevertheless, there were some groups of two pirates who normally worked together, including:
 * Pintel and Ragetti
 * Koehler and Twigg
 * Mallot and Grapple
 * Maximo and Clubba

The nature of these pairings is unknown, while some of them are relatives (Pintel and Ragetti are uncle and nephew), other seems to be not related, perhaps they are matelots

There was an antagony between Bo'sun on one side and Pintel and Ragetti on the other. The crew also seemed to have a dislike their captain, Hector Barbossa, who led the crew in a quite tyrannic way, because they made him responsible for their misfortune. Despite this, all crew members worked together out of mutual necessity to find all 882 Aztec coins, and they handled their victims with extreme brutality. The crew cared about their ship and kept it clean; while the crew worked, Mallot and Jacoby performed music with a fiddle and a concertine. The fact that the Pearl's sails were in a very bad condition hints that the crew lacked a sailmaker.

On board the Black Pearl, where human sailors should be, a crew of skeletons was at work swabbing the decks and coiling the lines. In the moonlight, their bones glowed a bluish-white, and they were draped in tattered pieces of clothing. Only in the shadows, or daytime, could they go back to their human form. Despite this, the pirates look forward to becoming human again. Barbossa, along with his entire crew, long to taste food once more, which was why they kept a large amount of food, so that they have a variety about what they would eat first when the curse is lifted.

Sometimes the curse had its advantages. Though the pirates were wandering the world as skeletons that cannot be killed, they were also indestructible phantoms that don't float in seawater the way mortals do. An example of this was when the crew staged a surprise attack on the Dauntless, moored in the shallows off the coast of Isla de Muerta, they simply walk upon the sea bed and climb up the ship's anchor. Their longing to lift the curse had also given them a sixth sense, that lured them to the scattered Aztec gold pieces. "The gold calls to us," they tell Elizabeth Swann as they find her with the Aztec medallion in the governor's house.

Behind the scenes



 * In The Curse of the Black Pearl, there were many more crewmembers apart of the credited ones, their overall number is unknown but could be estimated to about 100 men as seen in the movie. An actual number of men revealed in The Curse of the Black Pearl video game for the Gameboy Advance was approximately 150 souls.
 * The skeletal crewmembers were created by Industrial Light and Magic. Therefore all scenes involving the skeletal crew were filmed twice: one time with the actors and the second time without them.
 * Some members of the cursed crew including their leader Barbossa are pictured on the cover of WAS IST WAS band 71: Piraten.
 * In the non-canonical Disney Adventures comic book The Buccaneer's Heart!, the Cursed crew, led by Bo'sun, commandeers the HMS Dauntless, but they were later defeated by the ghosts of Blackbeard, Mary Reade, Henry Morgan, and Bartholomew Roberts.
 * A group of similarly cursed pirates crewed the ghost ship known as the Black Pearl in the 1630s, though they were cursed under different circumstances involving an enchantment by an Incan priest-king who was crossed by their captain.

Appearances

 * Pirates of the Caribbean: Six Sea Shanties
 * Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
 * Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (video game)
 * Pirates of the Caribbean: The Legend of Jack Sparrow
 * Revenge of the Pirates!
 * The Capture of Jack Sparrow!
 * Legend of the Aztec Idol!
 * Open Sesame!
 * The Buccaneer's Heart!
 * Chain Reaction!
 * Kingdom Hearts II
 * LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game