Wikipedia
Prize crew is a term used to indicate a number of crew members of a ship chosen to take over the operations of a captured ship. Prize crews were required to take their prize to appropriate prize courts, which would determine whether the ship's officers and crew had sufficient cause to have the value of the prize awarded to them.
In the Age of Sail and up into the American Civil War, capturing enemy ships was quite common. As a result, warships optimistically carried extra crew members for use as prize crews. More recently, as evidenced by results of sea battles during World War I and World War II, ships generally were sunk, not captured. If, however, a ship is captured, a prize crew would be selected from the winning ship’s complement.
Usage examples of "prize crew".
I can't spare a prize crew to sail (and pump) her to Jamaica, and anyway she'd probably sink in the first gale she met But, problem two, I can't leave her drifting.
Once she's struck her colors I put a prize crew aboard and bring her back to Yedo.
She went slowly at first, for her prize crew was small and it took them over half an hour to loose all the Indiaman's sails, but by dusk the great ship was sailing smoothly eastward in a light wind.
She went slowly at first, for her prize crew was small and it took them over half an hour to loose all the Indiaman’.
But the Norfolk must have taken her, since she is manned with a prize crew.
It was not until he returned to England that he heard of how the Danish captain had hanged himself in the hold wherein he and his crew had been cast while the prize crew manhandled the cranky, overloaded, unfamiliarly rigged flute back to friendly waters.