It is evident from an incident that occurred during the capture of the Island of Goree by Commodore Keppel in 1758 that the precise significance of hauling down the flag was in doubt even at that comparatively late date. The fire of the British Squadron was so overpowering that the enemy's flag was hauled down and the fire thereupon ceased.
A lieutenant being ordered ashore, attended by the Commodore's Secretary ... was surprised on being asked before they quitted the boat on what terms the surrender was "expected." The lieutenant astonished at this question asked if they had not struck their flag, intimating an unconditional submission resting merely on the clemency of the victor? He was answered "No: lowering of the flag was intended only as a signal for a parley."
The action was thereupon renewed and finally the Governor ordered the regimental colours to be dropped over the walls as a signal of surrender at discretion[404].
The captor's flag is not hoisted above the colours of a neutral vessel seized for breach of blockade or similar reasons; in such a case the captor's flag (if hoisted) should be hoisted in another part of the ship.
The custom of "half-masting" the flag, that is, of lowering it to a position halfway or more down the flagstaff as a sign of mourning, does not seem to be very ancient, but it is probably older than the seventeenth century. The earliest instance in which I have met it occurred in July, 1612, on the occasion of the murder of James Hall by the Esquimoes during the first expedition in search of the North-West Passage in which Baffin took part, when the 'Heart's Ease' rejoined the 'Patience' with "her flag hanging down and her ancient hanging over the poop, which was a sign of death." On entering the Thames two months later the 'Heart's Ease' again lowered her flag and ensign "in token and sign of the death of Mr Hall," so that it was at that date well understood to signify the death of the commanding officer of a ship. It was the custom in the navy after the Restoration to observe the anniversary of the execution of Charles I in a similar manner, for Teonge twice records the fact in his Diary:
30 Jan. 1675. This day being the day of our King's marterdome wee shew all the signs of morning as possible wee can, viz. our jacks and flaggs only halfe staff high;
and again:
30 Jan. 1678. A solemn day, and wee keep it accordingly with jacks and pendents loared halfeway.
Evidently the practice of half-masting the flags was well understood both in the English navy and in the merchant service, but it is doubtful if it became a universal custom until comparatively modern times. The 'Black Pinnace,' which brought the body of Sir Philip Sydney from Holland in 1586, had black sails, but the illustration in the contemporary account of his funeral[405] shows the flags at the masthead, and the Danish ship which brought over the Duke of Richmond's body in 1673 had a "black Flagg at his Main Top Masthead and black colours[406]." Black as a sign of mourning is of great antiquity, and a black sail was used for this purpose among the ancient Greeks, but a black flag was used by Drake at Cartagena in 1585 as a sign of war to the death, and was commonly adopted by pirates with a like meaning. It was never used in the navy in the sinister connection in which it is used ashore; an execution in one of H.M. ships was signalised by the display of a yellow flag at the masthead.