The estimable Gold & Gunpowder channel has produced a profile of an undersung pioneer of the Pirate Republic of Nassau — Benjamin Hornigold.
Hornigold is portrayed as a primary antagonist of Captain Flint in my beloved Black Sails. This is based on the historical fact that Hornigold was pushed out from his position as the recognized leader of the pirates of Nassau, took the King’s Pardon and became a pirate hunter.
He’s a character we end up despising in Black Sails, but how can I not have a certain sympathy a gentleman of a certain age who just wants to sit in his Sir Francis Drake Chair in his damn fort and smoke his church warden pipe?
Both the history and the yarn spun from it make a helluva story.
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The most “Frontier Partisan” episode yet of the History Channel’s The Revolution has dropped: Brutal Civil War in the Carolinas. There’s a strong focus on the great Frontier Partisans Daniel Morgan and his victory at Cowpens, which Captain Rick Schwertfeger wrote about here back in 2017.
The theaters of the War of independence I find most fascinating are the Carolina backcountry and New York’s Mohawk Valley. In both cases, the conflict was more a Whig/Tory civil war than an insurgency against an Empire, fought in semi-settled regions.
I reckon the next episode will take us to King’s Mountain….
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One of those video games I have never played, but whose soundtrack I really enjoy. I will tune in The Last of Us if for no other reason than Pedro Pascal. He was great in Narcos. Well, yeah, and the Zombie Apocalypse is inevitably a Frontier Partisans event.
The series takes place 20 years after modern civilization has been destroyed. Joel, a hardened survivor, is hired to smuggle Ellie, a 14-year-old girl, out of an oppressive quarantine zone. What starts as a small job soon becomes a brutal, heartbreaking journey, as they both must traverse the U.S. and depend on each other for survival.
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Lady Marilyn and I have been on adventure. Will report in a couple of days…
Matthew says
I haven’t gotten to that part of Black Sails yet, but I can’t help think that in reality becoming a pirate hunter is an improvement over being a pirate ethically.
I stopped playing video games when I realized that there were other things for me to do that I enjoyed better.
Matthew says
Here’s a short video about Native American tactics. It’s about twelve minutes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_VQC1tkQ_k
JimC says
Thx Matthew.
Quixotic Mainer says
Hornigold always struck me as yearning to be apart of the old order, grasping for some contemporary “legitimacy” in the eyes of the world that was. He just wasn’t actually down for democratic/anarchic kind of sea water feudalism that Flint and Vane and Teach were about. Even though he got back on the King’s shilling, he remained one of my favorite characters to the end. That was a good version of his tale!
I just finished “The English”, in its entirety. Boy was that grim, but beautifully shot on the landscapes. However, they sorely needed a firearms historian on retainer, and I believe much of the production was inspired by Red Dead Redemption 2.
JimC says
Yep.
Matthew says
Speaking of Red Dead Redemption 2, there’s a podcast about it and Existentialism at Art of Manliness. I haven’t listened to it, since I never played the game. ( I haven’t played electronic games in decades.)
https://www.artofmanliness.com/character/manly-lessons/podcast-854-the-existential-in-red-dead-redemption-2/
Quixotic Mainer says
Same, I will likely give it a listen anyhow. It brought the time period into the zeitgeist for a while certainly. When it was popular I had quite a few younger coworkers hit me up with questions like; “Do horses actually do X?” or “Do Spencer rifles Y?”
I haven’t played video games since I was in undergrad, but the more developed free choice ones can definitely be a personality revealer along with the power fantasy. AOM does a lot of great stuff.
Matthew says
I probably won’t listen to it, but I thought it might interest people here.
Yes, AOM is a great site. A lot of men’s sites are BS, but AOM gets it.
Wayne says
Good description for it.
Joe says
The Last of Us looks better than i would have guessed after some of the recent Walking Dead apocalypse fatigue. Looks like a unique take on the genre with a more decisive theme.