Monterey Jack

Pardon me ignorance ma'am....how d' ye...um.....replenish a cherry?

Welcome, sez I! <trims over William and crashes headlong inta th' bar> I'll have wot he had...less'n its the plague.....

Shoulda known I'd find Cap'n Bo in here, lookin t replace the drinks he had t'buy not that long ago! Welcome here ye are Maggie! ....an'.....er......I'll be havin a mai tai with a twist o mango and not too tart mind ye, as I'm watchin me wei......er I mean, RUM! straight up!!!

Sounds like a lengthy but worthwhile project to do it up right in ye have the time, Cap'n. I'd hang on to the parts and eBay em. Then take the profits and put em toward doin the thing up your way.

Great stuff! How did you find it?!!

Mine is a British Dragoon flintlock from Loyalist Arms. .62 caliber and bout 19 inches long. You can get a period belt hook for it for about $8 or they'll mount it for you for $20. I ended up making a non-period hip holster for mine and its nearly the length of my thigh! Beautiful piece; certainly an attention-getter. Its stamped 1738, but was one of the forerunners of the sea service pistol, so I figured if infantry hangers could double as cutlasses, dragoon pistols will work just fine at sea.

I'll keep on it up here in the PNW; I agree we don't need the ocean, but I figured if we found a campsite in the forest and could legally go down to the beach to shoot, using the rocks as a safety backdrop we'd be better off. No worries, though; something will come up with a few of us involved in the quest.

Yep and apparently to ease fever as well. Dampier recorded that the wife of a chieftan had such a high fever that the natives laid her out and shot her full of little arrows til they hit a vein and she bled profusely. Then they all cheered for the "doctor" with the best aim. Guess its comparable to todays HMOs in some respects.......

I have a friend who owns a few acres outside of LaPine, OR where we could hold a buccaneer shoot-off and a campout, but its nowhere near the Ocean. Even some range to use th' longbows if ye have em ( I shoot a 60 lb Welsh bow m'self), but I haven't found any evidence o bows with the buccs. Figure it be hard to cart one around and shoot in the jungle.

Really looking forward to seeing those pictures Hawkyns; I'm nowhere near as far along as I'd like to be and that's a damn good list ye have!

I'm still working on my kit, though I'm sitting at about 1700-1720 for most of my gear; basically the tail end of the bucc period. The Heritage Faire I attended last weekend was nearly all voyageurs and longhunters and only one guy didn't agree with me being there. My clothes were a pre FI period waistcoat, long linen shirt , seaman's slops over leather leggings (and breeches) with centerseam mocs, handmade sash and leg ties, leather haversack, old tricorne and a few knives. Didn't carry the dragoon pistol or dutch cutlass/dirk but had them nearby. Got invited to join one muzzleloader group though who liked the idea of having a buccaneer around. Still working up to a period camp out and I figure that much of the camp gear used in the colonies at the time would work just fine in the Caribbean as well, though for a wrap (in lieu of a groundcloth ) I have a huge blanket handwoven in Guatemala. Very warm but won't keep the rains out. Dampier details a lot fo the daily life of the buccs; food, traditions, and even some basic structures. Should be something usable in his memoirs for you.

Looks like it'd be acceptable; I've been thru that area m'self two years ago. But how keen are they on muskets? I didn't see any mention of a target range or firearms permits. Bully, as ye may be familiar with the place can ye look into it? Cap'n Bo, no worries, we all do the best we can and I think all the fellow Traditonal Buccs out here 'd be willing to help one another gear wise, and be forgivin of certain exceptions....'specially the first year out. I'm workin on a traditional Bucc kit similar to Patricks but a tad later period (1690-1720)and me other kit is a 1750s colonial ranger outfit. I'm also on a couple of muzzleloader lists so I'll be watchin t see if there be any good places up here. 'Course, Mendocino ain't all that far from.....Monterey(!), least not to someone who grew up down there so I'd feel right at home.

Well, hell; we could make this work! we have the blacksmith (Capt Bo) we have the leatherworker (meself) and we have the historian (Patrick); now all we'd need is a place near the sea that they'd let us shoot. We could pack in our own supplies from a designated meeting point (the rendezvous folk call it a "drive n dump"). Of course anyone interested in traditional buccaneerin is more'n welcome to come along and make a weekend of it (or more). Granted we won't be takin any ships nor shootin any Spaniards but it'd be an interesting few days comparin notes, fighting styles, shooting styles and campin in the wild with period gear. I won't be available til 2007 due to the HMCA seminars but I could even scout fer locations up here in the Pacific NW. Not exactly tropical I suppose, but no Guinea worms and maggots t 'infest yer flesh either. And the closest we'de to a viper would be a garter snake......

Aye, its a real perk t' have hobbies and employment that overlap. Whenever I need new gear, I make it in the shop on company time. The boss loves it cuz it generates business. Now I'm working the buccaneer angle we've attracted a whole new mess o customers. San Francisco's basically me adopted hometown; lived there fer a number o years and still have to go back fer a fix every so often, but I'd welcome ye in our local waters anytime! Patrick, a ye a denizen o that part o the country? Perhaps we should organize a Traditional Buccaneer get-together down that way next year.

On closer look, its mentioned with a hat, and if I remember the pictures I saw, a cap was an additional piece that went under the hat, like an arming cap went under a helm. I could be way off, so I'll shut up and go look it up again!

What if its just a misspelling of "cap", i.e., some sort of headgear in use at the time? There was a tennis cap used in France in the 1600s I think, so this could be related.

The big concern around the outlying areas by my home are nutria and beaver, but we do get the occasional bear or big cat. Fortunately I work for a leather shop so if I can't get around to making it I can purchase something similar in appearance for a decent cost. Just got the new Smoke n Fire catalog yesterday, so I'll give er a look!

I know what you mean; even tho my kit was more 1720s, everyone just opted for "pirate". There was nothing "hollywood" about it and I figured at least to get recognized as a sailor. The leather leggins/centerseam mocs under the slops threw em, though. Also I was the only one at the event with a tricorne, which weirdly enough turned a few heads. The local muzzleloaders(all but one) have no problem with me going buccaneer, since its accurate for period if not region. But I'll plan on doing some explaining if I wear it to a rendezvous. Like you, I still need a musket, but at least I have a pistol, so that helps. I'l have to remember the "staking in a creek" method of stripping the hair. What do you do after that to cure it, though?

Two shots o Captain Morgans and a handful o peanuts in case I run into th' boss.....

Cuz otherwise ther'd be a mess o' plastered 8-year olds stumblin round the street corners operatin' some seriously popular "lemonade" stands in the summertime.....

<stumbles through the door, squints in the dim light> There ye be Cap'n! We've run across one 'nother elsewhere in this fine establishment. I be buccaneerin' now inthe Pacific Northwest if ever ye veer that far off course! say.....is that a bit o kill-devil ye be drinkin? I'd like t' be havin a bit o that meself as now........ :)

I subscribed to it for a year or so, but there wasn't enough "middle history" for me. It seemed to deal with either the Huns, Romans and knights or world war 1 through Korea. When they did deal with the GAoP they did a great job, though. Just not often enough.

That could well be said of humans too! We know just enough to get ourselves in a mess o trouble.....

I found the import/export info as well, though not in as great a detail. Still, many of the sources expound on how valuable it was without saying what they were using it for, which is irritating at best. My inquiries with Arawak tribal reps went unanswered, so with luck they'll respond to your posts. I may just have asked the wrong questions or they may be very protective of their tribal history. It'll be interesting to see what they send you.

I think that going back to a certain point a lot of primitive techniques are going to be similar; what we need to look for caribbean-wise are the local equivalents for the tanning chemicals that were, by the 1800s being imported. I'm figuring bark-tanning and smoke-tanning as being the most likely methods; now aside from Manzanita what else would they use by way of wood? Dampier mentions that the buccaneers cut and sold something called logwood, but I don't know the various uses for it. I think we're onto something here....