The Pirates of St Piran

Image copyright The Pirates of St Piran

I love the gothic fashions and style of the eighteenth century, I would have also loved the freedom and adventure of the high seas. A pirate's life was not a glamorous one, but they lived by a code that meant they were considered equals – every man had a say in things and a share of the spoils. The Captain was voted in and it was in his interest to keep the crew happy or face mutiny: crew were treated far better aboard a pirate ship than a naval ship.

How did you first put together the Pirates of St Piran, and what sort of people are involved?
I had previously been a member of a Roman Gladiator re-enactment group which had ended, my fiancée and myself both shared a love of pirates and most things eighteenth century, so decided to start our own group earlier this year: 'The Pirates Of St Piran'. We knew a couple of people from the Gladiators and some friends that loved pirates that would come aboard and put an advert in the local paper for volunteers. We now have almost 30 members and even two parrots that come to events with us!
Our members are from all different walks of life, many of us are goths and pagans but we are all different. The one thing I belive we all share is the love of escapism – modern life can be so monotonous at times and brings with it so many unnecessary pressures, Our group gives its members, and hopefully our audience, the chance to escape the pressures of modern life (If only briefly) and be your 'Pirate Self' or even someone completely different.

Image copyright The Pirates of St Piran

You also have female pirates in your group. Is it not bad luck to have women aboard a ship?

Personally I’d consider years at sea without having women aboard to be pretty bad luck myself! And there were many very successful female pirates in history such as 'Mary Reid' and 'Ann Bonny' – It was the military that considered it bad luck – pirates were not swayed by such superstitions and often took their women (and anyone) to sea with them. Our female pirates are just as good as the men and I wouldn’t dream of saying any different (Gulp!)

How much do you try to ensure historical accuracy of your characters, costumes and re-enactments?
Historical accuracy - In the words of Barbossa 'is more what you'd call 'guidelines' than actual rules.' We want to give the public what they want to see – the stylish Hollywood pirate rather than totally historically accurate one. If we were totally historically correct people would not recognise us as pirates; we would be running around barefoot in white canvas shorts made out of sails. We use the weapons and wear clothes in the style of the era but we are not anal about the historical accuracy as long as we look like 'pirates as they are imagined by our audience', which is basically the Treasure Island and Pirates of the Caribbean image. Our pirate characters are made up and also our re-enactments – be it a mutiny aboard a ship, a tavern brawl, or an execution escape we like to keep it varied and born of our own imagination.

What kind of sword-fighting training do you provide to new recruits?
As re-enactors the sword fighting is different from martial arts or competition fighting so all our training is done in-house. We start by demonstrating basic attacks and blocks and when the recruit is controlled and safe with those moves we expand into slow choreographed fights and everyone can work at their own pace getting faster and more elaborate with time.