清朝嘉慶年間，有一個叱吒風雲的奇女子，姓石，名香姑，曾名震中外，清政府和西方國家均視之為洪水猛獸，聞其人至而要退避三舍。這鄭一嫂，其實就是石香姑！
張保仔能稱雄海上，全仗石香姑一手提攜。石香姑之所以又叫鄭一嫂，是因為她的丈夫就叫鄭一。石香姑原是青樓女子，嬌艷美貌，與鄭一相識於風塵，恍如紅拂女之識李靖、梁紅玉之識韓世忠，將自己的後半生託付給鄭一，成了鄭一的夫人，人稱鄭一嫂。
鄭一嫂雖是女兒身，卻慷慨磊落、驍勇多謀，不輸男兒。憑藉著過人的膽識和伶俐的口才，陪伴丈夫鄭一多次下龍潭、闖虎穴，幫助丈夫精心謀劃，終於完成了合併「大業」，整個海盜大聯盟擁有海船1800艘，海盜人數超過十萬，橫行海上，勢力範圍從珠江口直達瓊州海峽。
關於鄭一嫂的海盜管理政策，原本是沒有什麼文字記錄的。
有一位名叫格拉斯普爾（Richard Glasspoole）的東印度公司的官員，曾於1809年9月和7位海員一同被鄭一嫂他們綁架為肉票，從而耳聞目睹海盜的日常生活種種。等他被以7654西班牙銀元贖出並回到倫敦之後，寫出了一本獨一無二的回憶錄《可怕的海盜（The terrible Ladrones）》，將鄭一嫂的逸事公諸天下。
鄭一嫂制定的海盜條令被嚴格執行，違反者嚴懲不貸，這一點「幾乎令人難以置信」。他斷定，如此嚴格的約束，會造就一股攻則勇猛，防則頑強，即便位處劣勢也會死拼到底的力量。
事實的確如此。鄭一嫂所領導的海盜群不但裝備精良，而且號令分明、行動統一，不僅屢敗大清水師，還重創葡澳艦隊(其中有美國僱傭兵)，把澳門圍困得幾近斷糧。甚至還在1809年痛擊了在廣州內河橫衝直闖、囂張跋扈的英國船隻，俘獲一艘英艦，斬殺數十英國士兵，狠狠地教訓了這伙入侵者，震驚英國海軍。
格拉斯普爾把鄭一嫂這支人數超過十萬人隊伍稱為全世界最大的海盜集團，驚嘆於一個裹著小腳的中國婦女竟會坐上全世界最大海盜集團的頭把交椅。
回憶錄《可怕的海盜（The terrible Ladrones）》一經出版，便成為了年度暢銷書，鄭一嫂因此成為了西方人崇拜的英雄人物。
義大利導演埃曼諾•奧爾米根據博爾赫斯的小說，在2003年拍攝了以鄭一嫂為主角的電影《屏風後面的歌聲》。
The Terror of South China: Madame Ching was a prostitute who became a highly successful, feared pirate captain
Royal sea captains such as Sir Francis Drake, Queen Elizabeth’s personal “Sea Dog,” raised the black flag to launch surprise attacks on the Spanish Armada. Aruj and Hizir Barbarossa, the read bearded ruthless corsairs of the Mediterranean, sailed under it upon their Sultan’s demand.
Captain Henry Morgan, Edward Teach aka Blackbeard, John Rackham (better known as Calico Jack), and Francois L’Ollonais, probably the cruelest buccaneer that ever set sail and troubled the waters of the Caribbean, all raised theirs because “land was created to provide a place for boats to visit.” Sailing under the black flag offered a greater chance to visit as much land as they liked, and of course, to raid, plunder, rape, and wreak havoc along the way.
Among all these state-sponsored privateers, marauders, corsairs, pillagers, and swashbuckling outlaws that roved the high seas, vicious men that are now romanticized as heroes in movies and literature, there is but one lady, a dame who once might have raised the black flag but instead raised a red one.
A Cantonese prostitute who walked away from the bed inside a floating brothel, she set foot on deck and turned out to be the greatest sea captain and perhaps the most ruthless pirate of them all. Madame Ching, the Terror of South China and commander of the notorious Red Flag Fleet, was recently brought to life in the popular franchise Pirates of the Caribbean, as Mistress Ching, one of the nine powerful lords to rule the “Seven Seas.”
Born 1775, in Guangzhou (Canton), it is as if she had no life nor history before she was captured by pirates and sold to a brothel ship on the deck in her hometown at the age of 15, where her name, Shin, is first mentioned alongside her job description as a prostitute.
Selling her self perhaps but sharp as a tack, she used her occupation and her skills to gain valuable pieces of information from her customers, some of them the elites of Southern China who let slip a secret or two during their “pillow talks.” Using these precious little secrets, the fille de joie moved up the ranks inside the brothel and set up a smuggling backdoor operation of her own on the outside.
By 1801, she owned the place and caught the eye of one of the most fearsome pirates, Cheng I, the grand commander of the Red Flag Fleet.
He had the ships and an already established pirate network, and she had invaluable information about some respected individuals. So their pillow talks soon turned into business talks and very soon led to a marriage for the infamous couple.
Side by side, the couple roved the seas with their powerful armada that steadily grew stronger and stronger. “Pirates consciously used violence and brutality to obtain money and goods, to seek vengeance against their enemies, and to instill fear in anyone who might resist them,” writes Robert J. Antony in his 2012 publication Bloodthirsty Pirates? Violence and Terror in the South China Sea in Early Modern Times. And although violence speaks louder than words in the books of many historians on this matter, it was words and perfectly played out extortion games against Ching Shin’s former wealthy and politically connected clients, as well as other mighty pirate captains, that gave them control over almost every single ship, and turned every previous enemy into a subordinate ally.
But before this even became a reality, Shin did what every shrewd businesswoman would do before pulling all the aces out of her sleeve and risking her savviness in vain. She struck a deal with her beloved soon-to-be-husband. A so-called premarital agreement that by the pirate code would grant her joint control over the whole fleet, an equal share of the loot, and a co-captain spot out on the deck.
With power and shrewdness now joined in wedlock, together they managed in no more than six years to form an alliance with almost every other large Cantonese pirate fleet and bring them under their command. In 1807, her husband died at the age of 42, lost at sea and was never to be found again, having been struck by a harsh tsunami in Vietnam. Vague news reached the ear of a grieving widow suggesting that parts of his ship appeared on the coast of a nearby island, but there weren’t any actual survivors left to tell the tale in more detail.
