Capt Thighbiter

The closing tune in Master and Commander,

Boccarini's " Night Music on the Streets Of Madrid"

I get the chills every time listening to it, Hell I get the chills when WE play it!

'appy Whelpin' Day, Mate. Take yer ease, grab a wench and bring on the rum!

Hmm notice the striped frock coat on the fellow in the back. Pinstripes? And all ( except the sitting gent) are wearing sashes!

Well these are doable with kit I pretty much have already, for ship board wear.

For shore use, though... I was looking at the paintings in the link above. No foofy wig of course, but a jabot would not be out of line, do you think? What kind of collar is used when a jabot is worn?

What would a fairly well to do officer in HMRN wear in this time period? At sea and when ashore?

Well to do, but not rich or wealthy. Son of a successfull sea merchant. I know there were no standardized uniforms at this point.

Over on the Greybeard BP site, they talk a lot about anvil shoots. What I find amusing, the way you win is if your anvil lands on top of the mortar that shot it. Talk about lighting the fuse and running like HELL away from the piece.

We can attest to Cutters impressive skills, he made the quarterboard for The Hellion.

It gets comments where ever we park it, I mean moor it and the quarterboard gets the most!

Well with the final day of the Connecticut Renaissance Faire, The Brigands performance season ends for 2009. We have had one hell of a season this year, and we want to thank so many people for coming out and supporting us, and for spreading the 'word' about The Brigands. We have picked up some new faires and festivals this year and just enjoyed the hell out of the ones we already were performing at. Next year will be our 9th year bringing our combination of period music, famous pirate 'movie' music, traditional fiddle tunes and a faire number of original music and songs to faire and festival goers. We hope to continue that for many years to come.

So thanks go to:

All the Brigandettes ( Diane, Lori, Becky, Marlene et al)

The Brigands Black Powder Brigade

Tattoo Missy ( official Brigands Tattoo artist) and Sam ( ODD of CTRF)

The Bawdy Buccaneers

Capt Crudbeard and the crew of the Dark Rose

Management of CTRF

All the folks who fought with the Pirates at the Battle of Lions Field part III

HSE ghits, who have one hell of a good sense of humor

And last but certainly not least, our purser, Delwyn Rustleleaves ( Delwyn rusty knees, etc etc). Delwyn has shown exemplary purser skills over the last year she has occupied the pursers position aboard the Hellion. Her term of service aboard is now up and she is moving off to search for treasure among the Spanish wrecks off the coast of Florida. Delwyn is thanked most heartily by the crew of Hellion, what with putting up with 4 crazy musicians, our insane performance schedule, traveling and rooming with 4 ( or 5 or 6) disfunctional pirates ( get up! it;s 6:00 AM, we gotta be on stage in 4 hours!!!). THe Brigands have had other pursers and will continue in the future, but Delwyn has touched us all and we hold a special place in our piratey hearts for her.

Having said that , the Pursers position is open for the 2010 season! Contact us thru our website if you are interested and think you have what it takes to be a pirate.

Without everyones support in the Renn community, The Brigands would not enjoy the popularity we do within the Renn Faire / Pirate Festival realm. Huzzah, Huzzah, Huzzah for you all!

Thanks to all and we hope you have a wonderful Fall and Winter.

Nice job on the carriage , sir. But it looks a bit nekid without its divers tackles on her. THe wood working must have been a bi**h, oak kills tools quickly. If ye are intending on firing shot from her, ye may want to do up the trunion caps a bit heavier, and make sure the cap bolts go all the way through the cheeks of the carriage to the bottom. Good Luck!

Vera nice VS, you and your mate do wonderful work, i wishes I had the scratch to buy one of your creations. The cannnon ye had was just mind blowing!

We, The Brigands, last weekend went a piratin' at , dare I say, the most eastern of all Pirate Festivals, In Eastport Maine, along with the crew of the Dark Rose. Great festival in its 4th year, where the whole Island city of Eastport goes pirate nuts. Not even allowed into the downtwn area unless ye be wearing pirate something! One helluva drive for us ( 12 hours) and one o' our crew came up from FLorida!

THis weekend we starts our run at the Conecticut Renaissance Faire, bringing pirate music to the poor uninformed patrons there. 4 Weeks and then our season be over and time to start recording our 5th CD,

" Inner Buccaneer" in time for Yule.

Ahoy HarborMaster!

A guy over on Greybeard Cannon site says that welding 4140 is very difficult and needs pre and post weld HT to make a good weld. Have to look into that.

Another gent there used the same tubing and makes a threaded 2-5/8 end plug, with a smaller 1-1/2 powder chamber machined into it, so using a sleeve or band wouldnt be needed ( those are way out of my production means anyways).

First step is to figure out how to cut this stuff! A hand hacksaw would take me a few weeks to cut 1x through!

Kinda funny, when the company who gave this to me delivered it ( by fork lift from next door). The President of our company saw it and said " What the hell is he making NOW???".

Great post, Bess!

Why are the English always so barking mad when it comes to religious matters?

I just came into some bar stock, 4-1/2" OD x 2-1/2" ID alloy steel 4140 , already NDT'd by the Navy. 10 feet of it.

Enough to turn 4 swivel guns or 3 carriage guns, or 10 hellacious thundermugs. Any ideas, folks?

French pirates - pfffft "Monos de entrega de comer queso"

I've said it time and time again, Baltimore makes the most awesome swords that you will likely lay hands upon.

Old world workmanship, old school appearence and state of the art designs. Well nigh indestructable too, as my crew has found out. Your run of the mill 'live steel' swords from the catalog houses simply do not hold up against my Baltimore blade.

I occasionally use an accept at faire or festival. But I think peppering your speach with appropriate shipboard terms actually conveys a bit more then the ubiquitous English/Irish accent found at fair. Telling a patron that he'll be 'brought by the lee' if he follows that path to the head kinda does more than an accent. IMHO of course.

'sides - accents are hard to keep up continuously, for me anyways.

Whale Bacon - one sure fire way to piss off Greenpeace!

Hear Ye! Pictures of the Hellion, the ship of The Brigands sought!

Seeking the best picture of yon bonny vessel and the winner gets .... A signed copy of thier choice of our CDs and .... drum roll... the flag right off the Hellion when we retire it later this year!

And of course credit for the photograph on our webpage, where the winning picture will be displayed on the new website that is in the making.

Please submit pictures in JPG format and send them to wrench13@aol.com - make sure you include your real name and contact information.

Come on over and check out our new opening video ( a small little file) at thebrigands.com

Our compliments to the Dark Rose and Capt Crudbeard ( Tom) and also Keith of NERennies , the webmaster at NERennies.com , for the code.

We musta watched this silly little video 100 times at our house, laughing harder each time!

thebrigands.com

Nuther funny story re: run cake.

When i were married the first time, we brought back 'overproof' rum from Jamaica, warranted to be at least 180 proof.

She made a rum cake shortly after that for a (new) family getogether and used that as the rum, aye, an liberally used it.

All my young nephews and nieces LOVED it ( ages 7 and under) so much, they started sneaking into the pantry to take more, with the result that all of them were good'n plastered.

New family rule - no rum cake for the wee ones!

THanks mate!

We are trying to identify this song, from Master and Commander, by the lyric sung in the movie, but no luck so far. Any one know the title of this tune?

"Come all you bold young sailors,

A warning take by me

and never leave your happy home

to sail the raging sea"

Thanks mates!

NEVER put a finer grade of black powder into a cannon barrel. Yes, you get a bigger boom with FFF grade, thats because the finer the grade the quicker burning it is. Quicker burning means more pressure in the barrel. Using FFF is a good way to blow up your barrel. Depending on the bore size, either cannon grade F or at most FF for the smaller bores should be used. I suggest you peruse

http://www.graybeardoutdoors.com/phpbb2/vi...34756e50afc6f0c The cannon forum there. It has information on blank loads for various bore sizes, safe ignition methods, making cartridges and a host of other very useful information.

I would also suggest you obtain a copy of "THe More Complete Cannoneer" by Switlik. Cannon are not small arms and need to treated with a LOT more respect. When small arms blow up, they rarely injur anyone else then the shooter. Cannon, however, can explode and spread fragments over a wide area. The key word with cannon is safety.

Any one else care to give the First Mate here some advice, so we don't loose a new member of the form?

Likely it was a concious decision to use 'coals' in lieu of hot shot. Using hot shot was a known technique.

But live coals looks much better on camera!

Thankee Bess! My compliments to Mr Henderson on a thundering well writ song.

I believe the Denex guns metal parts are all pot metal, ie cast zinc. Very soft.