Historians of empire have devoted much attention to labour intermediaries. These individuals – known variously as ‘jobbers’, ‘kanganis’, ‘sardars’ and ‘mistris’ – proved essential to the mobilisation of labour across the Indian subcontinent and beyond. They provided employers with an important means of recruiting, managing and disciplining their workforces. They wielded considerable control – both formal and informal – over their subordinates, which was often exercised through brutal, extortionate and manipulative practices. Such figures occupy a highly ambivalent position, both in contemporary sources and in subsequent historiography, since they were also to be found at the forefront of protests on behalf of those beneath them.

Labour intermediaries working in maritime industries have not been overlooked. Gopalan Balachandran and Ravi Ahuja have provided comprehensive studies of the steamship serang. They have explored his role as a recruiter, disciplinarian, creditor and trade unionist in the world of intercontinental steam shipping. They have also shed light upon the problems that he caused his employers, the ways in which he was portrayed and the limits of his power.

This chapter explores the roles that similar individuals played aboard sailing vessels. Their influence on mutiny, as we shall see, was a unique and defining characteristic of shipboard unrest in the Indian Ocean. The first section focuses on the position that serangs occupied aboard country ships and East Indiamen. The second section examines their involvement in day-to-day protest at sea. The third section explores their ability to manipulate mutiny and depose captains.

Spheres of responsibility

The captain was the primary centre of authority aboard European merchant ships. Shipping laws granted him wide-ranging powers over the crew whilst he was at sea and in port. Crucial matters such as punishment, the settlement of disputes and the right to leave the ship were subject to his discretion. Captains working with men hired east of the Cape of Good Hope nonetheless faced many more problems of recruitment, management and control compared to their counterparts in land-based industries. Major social, racial and linguistic divides existed between them and their non-European crews. Hiring serangs and tindals helped captains to overcome many of these problems but it also created new ones. At the root of this was the considerable overlap between their spheres of responsibility. The areas of navigation, command, punishment, finance and religion demonstrate this particularly well.