Klein Henszlein
'Klaus Hanslein''(died 1573) was a German pirate active from 1560 to 1573 who raided shipping in the
North Sea
The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. A sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian Se ...
until his defeat and capture by a fleet from
Hamburg
Hamburg (, ; ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg,. is the List of cities in Germany by population, second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, 7th-lar ...
. Taken back to Hamburg, Henszlein and his men were paraded through the city streets before being
beheaded on September 10, 1573; their heads were then impaled on stakes. In a later account, the executioner described how he "flicked off" the heads of the thirty-three pirates (not including Henszlein) in only 45 minutes, then proceeding to behead the bodies of those pirates killed during their capture. He later claimed to have been "standing in blood so deep that it well nigh in his shoes did creep".
References
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German pirates
People executed in the Holy Roman Empire by decapitation
1573 deaths
Executed German people
Year of birth unknown
16th-century executions in the Holy Roman Empire
16th-century criminals from the Holy Roman Empire
People executed for piracy
16th-century pirates
People from Hamburg
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