hitman

Thats seems to me odd Mission. To be honest I am a much better story teller than writer but I scratch that praticular itch with short stories I share amongst my friends (those who will look past my spelling grammer and punctuation errors). I find my vocabulary actually remains my own. I normally write from a first person perspective and with the exception of period statments talk and think as I would. Pherhaps this is due to why I write. Witch I find mostly to answer questions I have. As an example I wrote a story about and ECW soldier found in a mass grave body number 16. I wanted to know what he thought saw did how he lived so I made it up. There are other stories I wanna write but keep running into trouble with one about the German Zepplin Mission to Africa during WW1 the damn near obliguatory World War two alt. history and so forth but always to answer a question. Must be just me.

Black Jack the second post is the Famous Patton speech Less I miss my guess. Here is one for you should be simple enough . " They've taken human error out of war! They've taken human out of war!"

Music Lynard Skynard 30 Hank Williams Jr. Greatest hits Jhon Lee Hookers Greatest hits Metallicas Black Album Jay-Z's Black Album Book Clive Cusslers Valhalla Rising Pleasure Marlboros lots of Marlboros

A question mates? I would suppose that grenades would be made cheap in period as lets face it there was no real need for a perfect sphere or anything like that I can see you are going to be throwing this orb of death away and then it explodes so no biggy if it ain't exactly top notch work as opposed to say a cannon ball that has to fly true. Yet most of the grenades I see from the period appear to be well made and in good shape for their age so my question is WHY? A sphere isn't exactly the easiest shape to cast and this extra worksmanship seems misplaced .

An intresting fact about the Titanic to me is that she was I belive the first ship to send the now famous distress S.O.S (save our souls) as opposed to the original marconi operators distress code of CQ (seeking you). As a bit of faimly history on my part my great great great (think thats right cant rember if it's 3 greats or 4) grandfather was asleep in his bunk on the California the night Titanic sank. Least according to faimly lore have yet to research that one my self.As an aside does anyone else here find the H.M.S. Britanic to be as intresting a story. True no where near the death toll nor is there a large number of high class deaths to report but still a bloody beautiful ship.

Son of a Son of a Sailor by Jimmy buffet. "As a dreamer of dreams and a traveling man I've read dozens of books about heros and crooks and learned much from both of their styles."

Hand, Quick thought here mate you can save the dough you'd spend on a bench grinder by taking the electric moter out of an old appliance (washing machine dryer dish washer) picking up an arbor at the local hardware store as well as a switch and a stone and presto cheap effeciant and in my experiance more reliable than the wal mart variety. Other than that my compliments on your rig it gets better every time you post a pic and your determination is impressive.

As for me my first knowledge of the Titanic came when B. Ballared discovered her the resulting media attention was heaven for a five year old enthralled with the mysteries of the ocean and even more so the machines that plied their trade above and below her waters. Since then I have found her slightly less intresting in that I have moved to older vessels and slightly less well known incidents. For example the General Slocaum disater or Roman era Pirates. This is not to say her and her sisters don't have an incredible pull upon me just less of one than in that simpler time so long ago. As for the controversy surrounding her today (removal and or retrival of artifacts) I hold little opinion we cannot see them lying in state on the bottom yet we cannot truly appreciate them on the surface. One of the more intresting things about the Titanic to me on a personal level is she setup my love of old books. Here in Georgia especially at the time of my youth that was pretty much all we had on naval matters at the local library. I spent alot of time with those old cloth covered wonders reading about her birth and demise. I quess you can say my love of history is in no small part due to the Titanic.

If you scroll down to the bottom of the captian twill page (or any other forum) you will find a set of guidelines for the threads one of witch limits the threads displayed to those of the last 90 days. change it to "the beginning" In total the line reads like this Showing xx of xx topics sorted by "last post date" in "descending order" from "the last 90 days" GO *everything in "" is selectable. Hope this helps mate.

We covered a lot of the press gang history a while back here is the link to the thread (Press Gang History). http://pyracy.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=1222

One of the topics discussed in this book (at least from what I gather in their presentation) is this immunity as I recall they linked it to a certian chemical in ones skin that if present repels flea's.

I saw a bit on book TV (cspan2 during the weekend) about a book entitled "The Great Plague". I wasn't able to watch all of it but I did catch this little facto. It turns out that one of the most likely occupations for a plague victim was a sail maker. Interestingly enough the town that had the highest mortality rate was a sail making town and the second most listed occupation in the parish death records (Note as I recall only one of the parishes continued to note occupation during the height of the plague) was cloth worker. Now according to "flea experts" the most likely reason for this is that fleas prefer to travel on lighter colored cloth (kinda like oh say white sails). Now although I haven't read it yet the authors put on a good show while on TV and I'll be purchasing the book next paycheck. For those that are interested the title is again The Great Plague subtitle The Story of London's Most Deadly Year written by the husband and wife team of A. Lloyd Moote and Dorothy C. Moote. (He is a 17th century historian and she is a microbiologist.) Here is the amazon link. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/080...7123577-5988741

This may help with the Royal marine ? http://www.royal-marines.mod.uk/static/pages/2215.html

Happy Birthday mate

Agreed all the way around. However and this is borderline on topic. I did a short story on a roman pirate once. (No I never could find many good sources for them and streched what I did have to the breaking point.) One of the few refrence's I could find though mentioned the Roman army in Gaul and Britian preffered to ship everything by boat wether in river systems or by sea. So my question is By the Tudor age had the river systems been surpassed by roads for transport. Obviously this has no bearing on pirates at the Cloth of Gold but as a curious aside. Oh and although I can't say as I have yet had any luck I am looking into orgins for supplies at the Cloth of Gold.

I was thinking more along the lines of ships supplying the event than the actual King's court Foxe, although I do take your point with one minor exception as the Spanish consider Sir Francis Drake a pirate and he did indeed rob from the king of Spian. To me it seems natural that given three weeks of royal one upsmanship the sheer amount of goods leaving Europe's major supply centers and the natrual habit to ship these supplies by sea would be a tempting target. Although raiding the king's jewels would be quite a story I agree it is almost certian to have never happened but I was and to some degree still am intrested in the surronding supply ships. Conceviably these would be bringing supplies from most of Europe and hence traveling well known shipping lanes and hence pirate havens. True this may indeed be more my writers imagination than a historical hunt but the idea does intrigue.

I echo the remarks of Capt. William excellent analysis. A while back I posted a BBC story in responce to a topic that delt with the rapid rise of piracy. However I do have one question..... In certian areas of the world like say the East China Sea region can it really be said that piracy ever declined?

Ok lets lay the scene here a little bit, In 1520 Henry the VIII and Francis the I hold a huge Tournament in France known today as "Cloth of Gold". As one might imagine these two young rival Kings nearly bankrupted their respective countries in order to put on a better show. "For three weeks (June 7-June 24) the two courts strove to outdo each other in displays of wealth and splendor. There were jousts and processions, masques, balls, banquets, sporting events, and even fireworks. Queen Catherine sat beneath a canopy of estate entirely lined with pearls to watch her husband and King Francis joust against one another. Each day the monarchs and their entourages appeared in more sumptuous and elaborate costumes." Now my question is given the sheer amount of money not only in the respective courts but also amongst the spectators and the inevitable sea voyages to get many of the goods and people to Calais where this event was held were there any pirate attacks? I haven't found any indications of them but I can't belive that kind of traffic wouldn't garner attention. Lets face it pick pockets love Disney land and this kind of opportunity would be hard to resist so any body got some info on this? P.S. Sorry to leave the golden age again but then I have a weird fascination with pirates in various time frames and places.

Me personally I just use black beard. It's not a great way to prove your historical knowledge or differantiate yourself from others but to me thats who the man is. Wether he be Teach,Thatch, or Red Foxxx. Yes his early life is a mystery and I won't lie if some one comes out with a respectable book on it they can count my money now but to me the man is Black Beard no and's, if's, or but's about it.

Sad news for us this is. Deacon was I am sure many things but from his posts here I'd say cheif amongst them was helpful. Fair winds and calm seas when they serve ya mate God's speed Deacon

Sorry about the delayed post but I haven't looked back in this thread for a while now. In answer to your request Boot strap I must admit this answer will be woefully inadequate as is generally the case with me I didn't keep track of exactly where I came across that particular piece of info. I do however remember it was from a history channel program on mental illness. I went back and checked some of my notes (also woefully inadequate) and basically found out this much. The use of ones looks as a method of Diagnosis was used most in the Medieval time period but continued to hold sway both with the general population and the lower classes of Surgeons until the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The more enlighten class of Doctors had through that time period varying opinions and methods of the cause and treatment of mental illness. While DocF225 is right in the main there are a few shining examples of better tretment for the mentally ill. I quess how enlightened your doc is is the defineing chacteristic of what type of diagnosses and treatment he gives. A few web links on the topic are as follows, http://www.ktb.net/~psycrime/pc-324.htm http://www.mncdd.org/parallels/three/4.html http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761566...al_Illness.html I apologize for my lack of specific info and source material but most of my research is done either as a hobby or for my writing neither of witch require the documentation necessary for re enactors.

Aint entirley sure this'll help but..... http://www.bonaventure.org.uk/ I found this site a while back as one of the groups members posted here frequently at the time. Unfortunatly I haven't seen him as of late or I would point you to him ( His name is Foxey). The gallery of the sight has several photos and the group he belongs to is to my understanding fairly stringent about documentation so between these pics and contacting them I hope you get what you need. I know the period is on the outside edge of correct and the pics of buttons ain't to good but.........

Ahh Deacon you're normally more precise than that. lol Yes not only the Marines but the Navy owe much of their early fame (and at the time the reason for their excistance) to pirates. You might rember the slogan "Millions for defence but not one penny for tribute" well that is a refrence to the tribute the U.S. was paying to the Barbry Corsairs before Old Ironsides and her sisters went out and cleaned their clocks. It was while returning from these expeditions that Lord Nelson saw our heavy frigates and predicted that England would have some "trouble" with them.

Hey this is a little late but I found this program a few days ago and so far it's been great. Its free and uses the server blackjohn mentioned and allows the creation of both photo and topo maps. Also and most importantly ...it's free here is the length but beware it ain't 56k friendly as it downloads the pics from the terrain server. http://jdmcox.com/ Its a good program hope you like it.

As a question that may be a litle off topic, I've heard that the scrimshaw done by sailors was in general more crude than the work being done today. Is there any truth to this and is the scrimshaw you posted new or old Royaliste?