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Fort Taylor Pyrate Invasion, Dec 2013 - Key West, FL
Chapter 9th: Sunday, December 8th, Afternoon. Of the surgeon's journey on the Jolly II Rover boat during the battle, including several vignettes from that, including getting to the boat and 
Photo: Mission
The Sea-Going Crew Gathers Around Braze's Van. (OK, not the most
dynamic shot. It's sort of reminiscent of those pictures often taken by
summer campers getting
on the bus, doesn't it?)recruiting paying customers to sail with them to help balance all the freeloading pirates; Speaking of Kelsea - one of the crew members; An account of the battle as best as can be told while watching it from the water; Firing on a cruise ship and a bunch of condos; Notes on the sludge and Why the surgeon had to change clothes.
The group going out on the ship– which included Mercury crew members Captain Jim, William, madPete and me – all trotted out to the Braze's van. I had forgotten my fish mug, which I wanted to return and get, but Captain Jim warned me that Braze would stand for no lateness. So I stayed with the group.
Eventually the rest of them assembled including Cascabel and Jaye, a couple of pirates from Marathon whose name I did not write down, Braze and Cannibal Chrispy. Just for he record, Chrispy was the last to arrive and I would have had plenty of time to go and get my mug, despite Captain Jim's stern warning. (I'm not saying anything against Chrispy, mind you.)
Photo: Mission
The Cannibuss In Its Leather Strap
Chrispy brought his gigantic Cannibuss, which readers of last year's FTPI Surgeon's Journal will probably remember is basically a small cannon on a leather strap. (For those who were wondering, Cannibuss = Cannibal + Blunderbuss. So whatever you were thinking it meant, you were wrong. Well, maybe you were wrong and maybe you weren't.)
I can't imagine having that monster suspended from my shoulder all day. In fact, later in the day, I overheard Chrispy telling someone that the leather shoulder strap holding the Cannibuss had stretched enough that it was now resting a good two inches lower than it had been at the beginning of the weekend. "It's not very comfortable there." Ah huh.
We got to the pier and boarded the Jolly II Rover. We were the only ones there! Either Captain Jim or William volunteered to go down to the dock and drum up business for them, which was part of our role as pirate freeloaders. So most of us headed back onto the dock to try and earn our keep. It was either that or fend for ourselves.
 Photo: Mission William Shows Capt. Jim How To Fend For Yourself |
 Photo: MissionHe's Getting Closer.... |
 Photo: Mission He's Almost Got It! |
Photo: Mission
Braze Fifes & Chrispy Harps to Attract Customers
The Jolly II Rover sits right outside the open-sided Conch Republic Seafood Restaurant which is an area that has a lot of foot traffic. This is probably by design, because day-trippers like the Rover rely on a steady supply of tourists to keep afloat. (So to speak.) We pirates wandered up and down the dock, pausing to have photos taken of us and trying to convince the photographers to board the ship.
From my experience last year, this is a tough sell. I suspect this is mostly because the tourists quickly learn to put up a good defense against the hard sell in Key West. Even so, we managed to convince a few people to board
Photo: Mission
Chrispy, Agave & Braze Hardly Working to Attract Customers
(The Corner Couple are directly behind Agave.)
the Jolly II Rover with us which was better than I recall us doing the year before.
The most notable sale we made was to a couple sitting in the corner of the restaurant. We had tried to cajole them into going early in the proceedings, but they declined. So we went about our business, pitching the voyage to people walking past. Eventually the female of the couple got to talking with some of the pirates who were standing near her corner seat. They explained who we were, why we were dressed like we were and what we were doing there. At what must have been the last possible moment, they decided to join our charter. Chatting with them on the boat, I learned that they were here courtesy of the Key West Express out of Fort Myers. So they had come down to Key West on a boat to take a 2 hour cruise on a boat!
Just as they had on Friday, the crew offered to let anyone who wanted steer the boat and haul the lines. I wasn't interested in guiding the boat, but I wanted to try my hand at hauling on the lines, if only to see how difficult it was. (For the record, not too difficult.)
 Photo: Mission's Camera The Author Awaiting His Chance to Pull the Sail Up |
 Photo: Mission's CameraAndrew Watches the Sail |
 Photo: Mission The Crew Not Pulling Up the Sail |
The trip was nice, first wandering about the bay and area near Sunset Key and then heading over towards the fort in preparation for the battle. When I first started coming to Key West, Sunset Key was a scrubby little island off of Mallory Square with the ignoble name of Tank Island. It was so called because the Navy planned to put a bunch of fuel tanks on it and make it into a fueling depot during the 60s. The Navy had put two of the planned twelve tanks on the island and then abandoned the whole project. Sometime in the 80s or 90s someone bought it, removed the tanks and gentrified it, adding landscaping, roads, guest cottages and a restaurant. It is only reachable by boat. I have always wanted to dine at the restaurant but the island sounded sort of stuffy from what I'd read, so I've never made it.
 Photo: Marc Averette - Sunset Key/Tank Island as Seen from Mallory Square |
The Jolly II Rover had two crew members and the captain. One of the crew members was Andrew and the other was Kelsea. I chatted with Kelsea. She is from Atlanta and was down in Key West, crewing on ships. She went out on the boat "nearly every day" and seemed to be one of those people who just takes life as it comes to her, not worrying too much about what comes next.
She said she was tired, to which I replied, "Late night, eh?" She laughed and said she had found a neat like jazz club called the 90 Mile Lounge. "They had big comfortable couches and cool jazz music and before you know it, it is way later than you thought. It was like being transported back in time." Kelsea went barefoot around the ship and by the end of it her feet were black with spent powder. (I got a really cool photo of this which I accidentally deleted. Ah well.)
 Photo: Mission Kelsea Chatting With a Tourist |
 Photo: Mission Chelsea With Braze and Cascabel Looking at Fort Taylor |
Arriving in the water fronting the fort, we watched as people on shore prepared the battlefield. Well, OK, many of them were ambling about, waiting for the battle proper to begin, but some were actually working to get the battlefield ready.
Photo: Mission
The British Getting Ready to Attack the Pirates and/or Ambling About
There was a contingent of folks down from Tallahassee who were there to see how the Fort Taylor Pirate Invasion did things. I had heard that there was a feeling amongst the state park folks that pirate events were unsafe, an opinion the event organizers had been trying to change. I don't know if the Tallahassee folks presence had anything to do with us trying to show them or a request by the Fort Taylor Personnel, but they were there. (I had a friendly chat with some of them during my time at the surgeon's table about surgical instruments that they seemed to enjoy.)
One of the Tallahassee folks happened to be standing by the cannons that were out on the field, observing what was going on. Drake Francis with the Crew of the Harbinger appeared and inspected a cannon from top to bottom, making sure that it was ready for the battle. Thinking the park person standing near him was a Fort Taylor ranger (they were dressed in similar clothes), he asked her to keep and eye on the gun and let him know if anyone touched it. The Tallahassee park person was so impressed that she went up to one of the organizers and said, "I get it now." Rumor has it that we'll once again be able to do live action combat on the field next year, although we will have to use LARP swords. Score one for us.
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The Park Folks Watching Over the British Cannons on Sunday |
 Photo: Sandi Bilbo Drake Francis With One of the Field-Mounted Deck Guns |
Photo: Mission
Barnacle Beau and Fenris Chase Engaging in Antics Even We Could See
The first part of the land-based battle plan was for the British to march out on the field and take the three large guns (including El Jefe) from the pirates.
Two pirates were supposed to be guarding the large cannons in the shape of Barnacle Beau and Fenris Chase. (The exact shape of them, in fact, because it was them. See how that works?)
Beau and Fenris were dancing around and drinking in ways that were so exaggerated that we could see it from our ship as you can see in the photo I took of them at left. This is definitely the sort of stuff for a Surgeon's Journal and so it is worth a closer look for those reading at home.
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey Beau & Fenris Acting Drunk and Stupid |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey Yes, I Did Say Acting |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey Why is This Even in Question? |
Being ill-prepared (and clearly undermanned) for taking on the whole of the British soldiers who marched onto the field, Beau and Fenris fled as soon as the British got near them.
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The British Troop Marching Smartly Onto the Field of Battle |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey Not Wanting to Tangle With Them, Our Pirates Run Away |
Once the British took the guns from them, the cannons were turned around and pointed at the fort so the Brits could attack the pirates. This left the pirates with only their smaller guns lined up near the fort moat. (The same smaller guns which the pirates had had all weekend.) The battle ensued with the usual back and forth between the two sets of cannons and folks with small arms.
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The British Firing Their Cannons at the Pirates |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The Pirates Returning the Favor For the British |
Once the battle had begun on land, we on the boat could join in with our guns. The crew of Jolly II Rover had given us all ear plugs to use while firing the guns, a luxury I'm not used to. (I must say, there's nothing quite like ear plugs to remind you that you really should clean your ears out.) We made at least a half dozen passes in front of the fort for this purpose, our gun crew merrily blazing away. I took lots of photos of this, but they were unfortunately among those I accidentally deleted. Fortunately William Pace got photos, and I can almost guarantee you they are better than mine were anyhow.
 Photo: William Pace Don Maitz Gets Ready to Spark the Touchhole on His Deck Gun |
 Photo: William Pace Captain Jim Assays the Battle and Prepares His Pistol |
William also got a bunch of folks guns sparking as they fired, which is something I'm lucky to get one time in fifty photos.
 Photo: William Pace Jaye Firing Cascabel's Piece |
 Photo: William Pace Braze Firing His Blunderbuss |
 Photo: William Pace Chrispy Firing the Cannibuss |
I didn't salvage one series of photos of Braze showing Kelsea how to fire his blunderbuss. I did not get a shot of her actually firing it, however. (Even when I don't accidentally delete my photos I usually miss that shot.)
 Photo: Mission Kelsea Watching Braze Prepare His Gun |
 Photo: Mission Waiting for the Opportune Moment |
 Photo: Mission Chelsea Preparing to Fire |
Photo: Mission - Captain Jim: Keeper of the Powder
Captain Jim was the safety officer for our ship. He also happened to be the only one who had remembered to bring a powder flask. (One way to assure safety is to be the only one with powder.) (Actually, it's not his fault everyone else forgot their powder.)
Since no one had thought to roll paper cartridges of black powder, everyone had to rely on Captain Jim's powder flask and its measuring cap to load their guns. I figured this was going to be a huge mess, but it actually went quite well given that there were 5 or 6 guns of varying sizes on the ship. Jim simply assessed each person's gun, asked them their load and calculated how much powder was needed based on his measuring cap. Neat.
The battle on land ended when the last standing British cannon crew fired El Jefe and all the pirates were killed. I guess they used grapeshot or something on that last firing because I can't imagine any other way they would have killed the lot of them based on the cannons' performance in the previous two battles.
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey - The End - And I Do Mean END - of the Battle on Sunday |
Of course, everyone got up once the battle was over because no one dies in these things, just like in the cartoons. (Knock on wood.)
 Photo: Pirated Sam Blasted in Bunker Hill Bunny |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The Dead Revived - Even Without the Surgeon's Help! |
 Photo: Pirated Sam Always Survives! |
Poppa Ratsey was on the battlefield on Sunday, so there were a series of very nice pictures of various cannon crews and the small arms group. So I thought I'd close the battle section with a few of those.
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The British Force on Sunday |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey Some of the Pirates in the Muskets and Pistols Group |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The (Mostly) Florida-Based Crew |
 Photo: Poppa Ratsey The (Again Mostly) Searle's Buccaneer Cannon Crew |
Photo: Poppa Ratsey
The Giant Ship We Fired On - Some Pirates Are Eternal Optimists
With the battle over, we headed back out to sea for a bit. Our captain, Captain Ron (of course that was his name), wanted to get us along side a very large cruise ship that was parked at one of the piers on Key West. He went around Sunset Key and stopped the ship in a very particular position. This was all very odd until he explained what was going on. "We're going to fire our (the Jolly II Rover's) large gun first. When you hear the echo, you guys can fire." They fired the Rover's gun as promised. The echo
Photo: William Pace
Chrispy Fires the Cannibuss
At the Cruise Ship
made it sound as if they had hit the side of the cruise ship. Everyone then followed suit, taking turns so that they could hear the reverberation. (The cruise ship was a monster. There are 10 story buildings that are not that tall. El Jefe might not be able to damage it.)
This was also the opportunity for anyone who wanted to climb in the rigging. I went up a short way so that William could snap some photos. I took my clyster syringe with me because… I really don't know why I did that. It just seemed appropriate. When I got back down, Captain Ron asked me about it, so I gave a
Photo: William Pace
Mission in the Ropes with the Clyster
short presentation on the clyster for the crowd. If the restaurant couple hadn't felt they were getting their money's worth by now, that no doubt pushed them over the edge.
The Jolly II Rover's crew wanted to do another reverberation fire by some condos on the water, but the Coast Guard was between us and the shore, keeping pace with our ship. If we slowed, they slowed. Captain Ron didn't want to fire with them sitting there, but he finally threw caution to the wind and had us fire anyhow. After that the Coast Guard boat zipped around us and went out to the open sea! They knew what we were going to do and were waiting to hear the reverberation off the condos as well!
The Jolly II Rover docked and we all headed back to the boardwalk to wait for Braze to go and get the van. While we stood there, we were enlisted to pose for a dozen or more photos with folks passing by. I'd have asked more tourists to take reciprocal
Photo: Mission - A Recip Photo From the Pier
photos by way of payment, but I was just too tired. What I thought was a sore throat was apparently more than that.
I should explain that I was in Paris with my family the week before, where we had eaten outrageously rich food. Two days later, I was in Key West, which involved another substantial change in diet. Whenever I go off my typical diet, I nearly always come down with a cold-like thing I call "the sludge." It feels sort of miserable for the first two or three days, then it sounds really miserable for the next two weeks. I often lose my voice and cough like I have the croup. This was day 2 and I was dragging butt, especially with all that sun and sea behind me. (Plus Robert the Doll was probably cursing me for my general crimes of disbelief by making me sick. Robert sure makes a great scapegoat.)
 Photo: William Pace "Do you want rum?" "Do I?" "Yes, have some." "Yes, have some.". |
 Photo: William Pace Jenny Wurtz, Piping |
 Photo: Captain Jim William and Some Guy |
During the boat trip, I learned from Braze that my brand new pair of slops had ripped down the middle. (I had thought it had been quite breezy out at sea.) Between that and the sludge, I decided to have Braze drop me off near the condos so I could change into something a little less ventilated and relax a bit. I chose my pink flamingo slops, which required a complete wardrobe change. (While I don't know much about matching clothes - regular readers of my web page will instantly recognize this - I do know green socks with pink flamingo breeches and a red waistcoat are a poor fashion choice - unless you're going for the 17th Century Caribbean Santa look.)