But my darling dear, please have no fear
For I think that it’s fair to warn you
That I’ll return to claim your hand
As the King of California

— Dave Alvin, King of California

*

The vision of a continent-spanning nation stretching from sea to shining sea was built into the very founding of the American Republic. The American Revolution was — in both causes and outcomes — fundamentally about westward expansion.

But even the most fervent visionary, Thomas Jefferson, thought it would take centuries to conquer and fill the western lands with his beloved yeomen. It took decades; one long lifetime. And, while yeomen did find lands to till in the West, the impetus for this explosive expansion was industrial. Steam-powered transport on river and rail, and steam-powered extraction of mineral resources on a heretofore unprecedented scale.

The frontier did not march in a line across the continent, it leaped and bounded, first with pioneers trekking to Oregon, and then… the California Gold Rush.

The Gold Rush was the single greatest accelerator of the conquest of the American frontier, and it contained within its story all of America in its colossal technical achievement, its vast energy, its dark impulses toward violence, racial hatred and exclusion, its… everything.

The Gold Rush turned California from a laid-back paradise of ranchos into an entirely different kind of promised land, which it would continue to represent through most of the 20th Century. My own people, virtually all of them, migrated there from the Midwest, seeking the promise of economic prosperity California held in its rich farmlands and burgeoning cities. I would not exist had not James Marshall looked down and spotted golden flecks in the water at a mill. That’s a goofy, solipsistic way of looking at the blast radius of the event — but it’s true, and it is true for millions of people.

The California Gold Rush was a world-shaking and world-shaping event, from the geopolitical level down to the most intimate and humble lives.

One of America’s finest popular narrative historians is taking up this story in a new volume to be released on October 6. I am all the way in…

In January 1848, a carpenter spotted flecks of gold in a shallow stream at Sutter’s Mill in California, triggering the greatest voluntary migration in U.S. history, as hundreds of thousands raced west in pursuit of sudden wealth, reinvention, and power.

From the feverish gold-mining camps of the Sierra Nevada mountains to the wharves and vigilance committees of San Francisco, Nathaniel Philbrick renders a combustible, all-world society: Chilean brothers reinventing themselves to outrun prejudice; Native communities navigating dispossession and violence; the merchant-showman Samuel Brannan, drawn into the center of early vigilantism; and the politicians vying for control of California’s future—the ambitious Free-Soil political boss David Broderick, who squared off against William Gwin, the Southern power broker intent on tilting the state toward slavery and the Confederacy.

In The Rush, Nathaniel Philbrick transforms the Gold Rush from a tale of sudden riches into the origin story of America’s modern contradictions—capital consolidated at dizzying speed, democracy in thrall to private power, xenophobia weaponized in the name of liberty—and a stubborn belief in the American experiment that refuses to die. This is the story of a nation tearing at the seams and a republic tested by its own ideals. Not until a year after the outbreak of the Civil War, when President Lincoln signed legislation that would unite the nation east to west by building a transcontinental railroad, was California’s loyalty secured.

Philbrick follows the gold as it moves from riverbed to countinghouse to the halls of power, revealing how vigilantism hardened into law and how debates over slavery in the West tipped the balance in Washington. The result is a clear, human story of how a scramble for wealth reshaped ideas of freedom, labor, and belonging — and how California’s rise helped push a fractured nation toward war. The Rush is alive with characters whose choices still reverberate: a searing, panoramic epic that captures both the fury and the promise of America.

*

There’s a playlist. Of course there is…

Most of all, I revel in the close proximity of Fennario, that American land where history and folklore meet and tryst, where the wolves are running ’round… along with ***other*** creatures.

Thus, I welcome our first real glimpse of Hammer Films forthcoming tale of frontier horror, Ithaqua.

As a brutal winter grips the Canadian wilderness and the fur trade begins its collapse, the isolated inhabitants of a remote trading outpost enlist Cole Franklin, an American mercenary haunted by his past, to investigate the silence that has fallen over a nearby Indigenous settlement. What he discovers is a scene of unimaginable terror and an overwhelming sense that something ancient and unnatural still lingers in the wilderness.

As fear spreads back to Fort William, an unseen presence begins to take hold. Paranoia, hunger and violence consume the isolated community, driving neighbour against neighbour as reason gives way to madness. With the fort descending into chaos and survival hanging by a thread, Cole must draw upon his military experience to lead a desperate band of survivors against a force that cannot easily be understood – or escaped.

Sounds like a Wendigo tale… but it’s not, exactly. Ithaqua is a part of the Lovecraftian Cthulhu Mythos, first unveiled in an August Derleth tale. Per the Lovecraft Wiki:

The Thing That Walked on the Wind is a short Cthulhu Mythos story by the late American author August Derleth. It was first published in Strange Tales of Mystery and Terror in January 1933. It has since entered the public domain, and has been reprinted many times in both periodicals and anthologies.

The story is notable as featuring the first appearance of the Great Old One Ithaqua, a creature which has been extensively reused in later Mythos works, perhaps most notably in Brian Lumley’s Titus Crow series, where it acts as the main antagonist.

Derleth’s tale is set in 1931.

Filmmaker Casey Walker conceived of a tale set earlier, in a frontier outpost of a declining 19th Century Fur Trade. He described the project in a lengthy interview with Jennie Kermode:

I came up with the story initially and wrote a pass on the script, but then there was a significant amount of indigenous lore, and quite frankly, pure history that I was not aware of. My friend Pascal Trottier brought on his writing partner, Peter Vicaire, who’s a First Nations Canadian unpublished author. Because he’d been working for the American government, he’s a dual citizen. That’s where it started to flesh out on the historical side, but also the accurate elements of the wendigo. It was not inspired by Algernon Blackwood and stuff. I grew up around the religion and the lore my whole life, so it was already there. It’s just, like, I’m not Catholic, so I’m not going to write a movie about Catholicism. So Peter brought a lot of that to the table. We were discussing it. He’s indigenous, I’m a white dude. And we’re like, ‘Are we going to make something here that, when it comes out, the conversation’s not going to be about the movie, it’s going to be about that fact that this white dude made a movie about indigenous culture?

Peter and I are both huge Lovecraft fans, and he was like, ‘What about Ithaqua?’ And it just clicked. Someone else had already taken all those things down the line to create something new that was already part of the thing were doing. So then we blended the Ithaqua lore and the wendigo lore together to become our own thing.

We found a doctor who specialises in indigenous religious iconography and studies at the University of Nebraska. We sent him the script and our process and everything, and he gave us a glowing review on how we didn’t fuck it up.

Well, that all sounds good to me. I look forward to donning the snowshoes and trekking out on a long, strange trip to this frozen Fennario as soon as it’s available for streaming.

*

The Undiscovered Country, Paul Andrew Hutton’s magnum opus, is now available in paperback.

I consider this a mandatory volume for any Frontier Partisans library. If I was to hand a neophyte one book to give him or her a clear picture of the triumph and tragedy, the glory and the sorrow of the American frontier story, this would be it. And a seasoned student of this rich history will find it worthy and revelatory, too.

*

We are approaching the 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks — and they still echo. This Wall Street Journal doco digs into one of the elements of fallout: the ugly, shambolic collapse of our presence in Afghanistan.

The Path to Zero is an unflinching account of America’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, told by the people who lived it. Structured around President Biden’s 2021decision to draw down to “zero” troops, the film traces how one choice cascaded into a chaotic, deadly ending—the closure of Bagram, the collapse of the Afghan army, and a frantic evacuation through three Kabul airport gates, culminating in the tragic Abbey Gate suicide bombing attack. Through candid interviews with the diplomats, generals, and soldiers who were there, the film tells the riveting story of the unfolding tragedy—and gives voice to the moral injury many young Marines who manned the gates still carry.

*

Maybe tomahawk-wielding ex-Navy SEAL poacher-punisher James Reece needs to book a trip back to Mozambique in a ** professional capacity.**

Per CNN:

Americans are being warned to avoid parts of an African safari destination where terrorists have targeted upscale lodges frequented by international big-game hunters. Mozambique, a southeastern African country across from the island of Madagascar, is the subject of an Aug. 21 updated “Level 2: Exercise Increased Caution” advisory from the U.S. State Department. Officials have also designated multiple areas “Level 4: Do Not Travel” — citing heightened terrorism risks.

A Brit foreign correspondent refers to the small ISIS contingent in the country as “spectacularly nasty.”

Here’s the plan: Smoke those assholes — all of ’em — and get the place back to the magical, romantic land Dylan sang of in 1976…

*

Well, y’all know that I have a very high opinion of Ethan Becker’s knives, as distributed by KA-BAR. A while back, knife-maker David C. Andersen announced that he..

… is joining forces with Becker Knife & Tool to collaborate with the legendary Ethan Becker on future designs. The first is the BK25 Outpost, a frontier-style Bowie knife that can handle everything at base camp, on the front lines, and even at the camp kitchen

Crom is pleased. This is one good-lookin’ knife. Many plews, but mighty tempting.

The USA-made Outpost measures 10.918″ overall and features a 6.125″ bowie blade.  The handle is made from G10 and the Kydex  sheath is made in America. 

*

The Season 2 trailer for Blood Of My Blood has dropped. The advent of autumn is a good time to re-enter the world of Outlander. This is a prequel story, which takes place around the Jacobite Uprising of 1715.

Synchronicity. The mighty Dash Rendar has weighed in on the viability of archery in the era of the blackpowder firearm. Dash Rendar serves up most entertaining YouTube videos around medieval/medieval fantasy weapons use — particularly the war bow. He’s built himself into an impressive tactical athlete and he’s quite proficient. Drawing a 160# war bow is no joke, and shooting accurately with it… well, that’s part of the story, ain’t it?

He’s keeping all of this fun, including some collaborations with Administrative Results (some footage from this is in this video).

*

Joseph Brant by Don Troiani.

A newly dropped clip from Ken Burns’ The American Revolution introduces the Mohawk War Captain Thayendanegea — Joseph Brant — who is ever-present in our exploration of the Revolutionary War on the frontier in the Frontier Partisans Podcast.

*

There are several reasons why The Troubles in Northern Ireland c. 1969-1998 are of interest to Frontier Partisans. Paramilitary organizations and insurgency and counter-insurgency are obviously primary focuses and reflect a remarkable degree of Continuity & Persistence.

THE BRITISH ARMY IN NORTHERN IRELAND, 1969 – 2007 (TR 32970-1) 2nd Lieutenant James Dean (foreground) with Rifleman Peter Edge of 1st Royal Green Jackets man a street barricade in Belfast during the Battalion’s first tour of duty in Northern Ireland. The tour lasted from 20 August – 18 December 1969. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205189950

The Northern Ireland conflict is of particular interest because the people and history of Ulster are tied directly to the history and people of the American Frontier. The Protestant Loyalist population of the Six Counties that made up Northern Ireland are blood relatives of the Scots-Irish who formed the cultural backbone of the early frontier, and carried their culture west with the early expansion of the United States.

Tim Murphy, who will figure prominently in the next episode of the American Revolution on the Frontier podcast, came from a Donegal family — a county that was part of Ulster, but kept out of Northern Ireland when Ireland was partitioned in 1921, because it had more Catholics than were wanted in the new political entity.

Was Murphy of Protestant or Catholic heritage? Orange or Green? Historians can’t be sure. Most early histories assume he was a Scots-Irish Presbyterian, like his backcountry peers. But the Ancient Order of Hibernians ain’t having it. They claim him for a Catholic Gael:

As a sniper, Murphy killed Sir Francis Clerke and General Simon Fraser, throwing the British into disarray at a decisive moment [allegedly during the Battle of Saratoga; FP has an analysis]. His parents were from Donegal—then, as now, overwhelmingly Catholic and Gaelic. Even his name is telling: Timothy comes from Tadhg, a name so associated with Irish Catholics that Ulster Scots Protestants used it as a slur for their Catholic neighbors. Even today [in] some sections of Northern Ireland and Scotland an Irish Catholic is called a “Tim.”

Yet 19th-century writers confidently rebranded Murphy as “Scots-Irish.” Why? Because there are no Catholic parish records for his family. But Catholic priests and parishes were outlawed in colonial New York, so baptismal and marriage records were often never kept. Later historians twisted this silence into “proof” that Murphy couldn’t have been Catholic.

This is the double standard: when records are silent, Protestant identity is assumed; Catholic identity requires extraordinary documentation. Apply the same rule consistently, and Murphy’s Donegal origins, Catholic name, and historical context make him far more likely Catholic Irish than Protestant.

Something to fight over.

Anyways… The Rest is History is two episodes in on multi-part podcast on how The Troubles ignited and turned into a low-level civil war that blighted two generations. As always, first rate:

*

One of the oddest of Sergio Leone’s Westerns features James Coburn as an Irish Republican Brotherhood bomber in Mexico during the Revolution. Duck, You Sucker (aka A Fistful of Dynamite, aka Once Upon a Time… The Revolution) was released in 1971/72, just as The Troubles were kicking off in earnest, and around the world there was music in the cafés at night and revolution in the air.

“…In those parts it was wiser to travel … well-armed and with a crew who all slept with one eye open and who understood each other like brothers.”

— Captain Alonso de Contreras

*

I have never really given the Spaniards their due. Blame Anglophile tendencies. From tales of the Armada to Sir Henry Morgan’s exploits in Panama in 1671, up through Black Sails, and on to Teddy Roosevelt in Cuba, I have always tended to view the Spaniard as “the Adversary.” Faceless, and cruel but sort of hapless.

That’s a prejudiced, inaccurate view that sells the adventurous spirit and martial prowess of these men considerable short.

It was the Spanish who kicked the whole thing off in the Age of Discovery (them and the Portuguese). And you’d be hard-pressed to find a more hard-bitten, adventure-mad set of Frontier Partisans in all of history.

Take Captain Alonso de Contreras: Privateer. Soldier. Knight of St. John. Navigator. Lover of women. Killer of men.

Contreras operated from the Mediterranean to Mexico in the early 17th Century in the last decades of Spain’s glory days, when they were the preeminent military power in Europe and the great imperial power in the New World. He wrote a memoir in 1630 — and it’s a magnificent read. Historians have lined it up with known events and declared it an accurate depiction of a violent life on multiple frontiers.

The memoir is straightforward and plain-spoken. Contreras makes no effort to gloss his reputation. He reports matter-of-factly on his life of violence — he kills often and seldom with any compunction, does not hesitate to resort to torture to obtain needed intelligence, and his amorous exploits tend to be transactional, and sometimes end in violence, too.

For all that, he was clearly a masterful navigator and seaman, a skilled man-at-arms, an outstanding small-unit combat leader, beloved of his men, and an easy man to like — as long as you were not an enemy.

Oh, and if you’re getting a strong Captain Alatriste vibe here, you’re right. Contreras was a primary inspiration for Arturo Perez-Reverte’s swashbuckling hero.

Captain Diego Alatriste, by Pedro Outeiral.

Contreras was born and raised in a poor family in Madrid. His father was not in the picture. He was exiled from Madrid for a year after he stabbed another boy to death in a street fight. When he returned, his mother apprenticed him to a silversmith, but that lasted three days. Alonso begged his mother to let him enlist in the army, and she eventually relented. At 15, he became a soldier. Or, at least, a soldier’s servant.

He was marched off to the wars in Flanders, but the man he served deserted, and he ended up in the Mediterranean. After a series of misadventures, which included brawls and other assorted violent trouble, he found himself at sea, serving as a corsair in the never-ending war between the Ottoman Empire and the Knights Hospitaller, the Order of St. John, aka the Knights of Malta, aka The Religion.

In the early 17th Century, the eastern Mediterranean Sea was a maritime frontier, a contested zone between the fleets of the Ottoman Empire, allied Muslim corsairs, and the fleets of Christian kingdoms and the Order of St. John. Raids were constant.

Contreras made his bones as a privateer, attacking Muslim shipping and battling corsairs. He “fell in love with navigation,” and embarked on an intensive study of the art and science, becoming so skilled that he would develop a set of maps and charts that would serve his military masters well. He also had a knack for languages, and he learned that of the Turkish enemy, which was a useful tool in the trade he would soon embark upon.

Still in his teens, he was given command of a ship and assigned the classic role of a Frontier Partisan.

He became a scout.

His memoirs recount a key mission:

After I had been a few days in Malta, his highness Grand Master Vignacourt sent for me. He had heard that I was very familiar with the Levant and that I spoke the language well. He gave me orders to go to the Levant to spy out all I could about the Turkish fleet.

Contreras secured the intel required, including the target of the Turks’ annual naval raid-in-force. That led to a second mission:

The governor of Reggio, a knight of the Religion called Rotinel, received me well. He quickly made his preparations and massed his knights and his troops, who were then spread around the countryside, as well he might. The Turks were already anchoring off San Giovanni (in the Straits of Messina) only fifteen miles away.

After three days, we got news from the knights who were riding between San Giovanni and Reggio that the Turks had landed their troops.

The governor set an ambush for them and slaughtered three hundred Turks and took sixty prisoners. After this defeat, they reembarked and gave no further trouble.

The governor instructed me to go aboard my frigate, to cross the straits, and to alert Taormina, Syracuse, and Augusta. All these towns were on the Sicilian coast. Taormina, the nearest, was only twenty miles away from San Giovanni. This I did by fighting my way through the middle of the Turkish fleet. I carried out my orders and then went on to Malta to tell them the news.

The knights there immediately prepared to defend themselves. Shortly after my arrival, the Turkish fleet arrived off the isle of Gozo, the well-fortified island that lay next to Malta. They had been warned in good time, so that when the Turks tried to get ashore, our garrison of knights prevented them from landing in force and did not even give them the opportunity of getting fresh water. And that was how the Turkish expedition of that year ended.

Contreras became a highly successful raider, and won the love and loyalty of his crew through astute combat leadership that got them into tight places and out again, and a generous division of loot. Contreras was a prodigious looter, and he blew it all on good times and fast women. One woman in particular, on Malta, whom he refers to has his quiraca, a courtesan and mistress. She wound up with the lioness’ share of the proceeds of his loot and used it to build herself a very fine home.

The Grand Master of Malta sent Contreras out on numerous recon missions, and he undertook the occasional covert op — such as kidnapping the Hungarian concubine of a corsair warlord of the Aegean Sea named Soliman. The op was successful, and Contreras ran off with the Hungarian woman, whom he described as the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

Art by Remzi Taskiran.

The Hungarian was not the legitimate wife but only the concubine of Soliman. But I treated her with great courtesy. I learned later that Soliman, thinking that I had slept with her, condemned me in my absence and swore to search me out and have me outraged by six negroes and then impaled. But he did not have the good luck to catch me, even though he finally had portraits of me made and put up in various Levant and Barbary ports.

Contreras was not a man to be fucked with. When a former comrade-in-arms ripped off a prize cargo of grain, Contreras kidnapped him, stripped him and had him lashed 100 times across the ass with a rope dipped in tar, followed by a dousing with salt water and vinegar. He then told him to send to his men for a ransom payment or he would be hanged. Contreras got his ransom payment, and his humiliated and very sore former comrade was allowed to swim to shore.

Contreras served as a maritime scout and corsair for six years. The gig went sour on him when his quiraca betrayed him.

While I was in Malta squandering my money, which had been earned the hard way, I surprised my quiraca in bed with a friend of mine. Imagine, being in bed with my acquaintance while I was being good enough to build her a house! Well, she ran away and hid.

I ran my sword through him twice and left him for dead. But he recovered and, before he was mended, fled from Malta fearing that I would kill him.

Though everybody begged me, men and women alike, to take her back, I could not see why I should. Especially as I was then able to take my pick of the other quiracas, who were fighting over me as though I were some vacant post in the government.

Despite the charms on hand, Contreras decided to move on. He had not been home to Spain in years, and wanted to see his mother. The Grand Master of the Knights of Malta was, for obvious reasons, loathe to lose an asset of his quality. Contreras describes the end of his corsair career.

I stayed in Malta, without leaving once, for many months; it was a miracle. Then, at last, I was sent to Barbary with a frigate. I went and returned in nine days, bringing back a coaster loaded with enough fine cotton to open a shop, and fourteen slaves as well. It was, for me, a very profitable voyage.

In the days that followed, a Catalan galleon arrived. It was on its way from Alexandria to Spain and was loaded with all sorts of luxuries. This ship reminded me of my country, and I thought of my mother to whom I had never written and who had had no news of me. I decided to ask the grand master for permission to go home. He agreed, though he did not wish to lose me. And when the time came for our farewells, he put his arms around me and laid his cheek against mine.

Conteras made it back home for a family reunion, but it didn’t take him long to get restless, and soon he was a Lieutenant recruiting troops for the Spanish Army and seeking the rank of Captain. The warrior’s career had moved to land.

And that, amigos, is another story…

The Almighty Algorithm knows this…

Last night, I cut sign of a YouTube fantasy content creator who goes by the handle The Drow Historian, who serves up a nice treatise on The Ranger Archetype. Mostly in the realm of fantasy, since that’s his bailiwick, but he ties the archetype in with medieval and colonial American frontier history.

I quite liked this bit:

“They live on the threshold. They guide others through danger, then return to their isolation. They stand between the Wild and the World. Praise passes them by. Still, they keep the fire burning long after others have forgotten it. The Ranger is, at heart, a liminal figure, a keeper of crossing places, a necessary, often unseen presence who reads the signs before others know there’s danger at all… The town fears the forest, and the forest suffers the town. The Ranger loves them both and answers to the balance between them.”

Drow makes note of Natty Bumppo — Hawkeye, Pathfinder, Deerslayer —  of The Leatherstocking Tales as a representative of the archetype. Which, of course, he is; pretty much the foundational one in American literature. It got me ponderating on how deeply Tolkien — medievalist though he was — drew from that archetype in creating the character of Strider. We don’t know for certain that Tollers read The Leatherstocking Tales, but the great Tom Shippey makes a compelling case that he did, highlighting, among other elements, the clear influence in the Fellowship’s canoe trek down the River Anduin.

Art by Heather Castle.

In his essay On Fairy Stories, Tolkien talked about the tales that tripped his trigger as a youth. He wasn’t interested in pirates and buried treasure, and was cool toward Treasure Island, which, I must say, is a black mark (Black Spot?) for him. But he did respond to tales set in the North American woods — though he did not specify which ones.

Red Indians were better: there were bows and arrows (I had and have a wholly unsatisfied desire to shoot well with a bow), and strange languages, and glimpses of an archaic mode of life, and, above all, forests in such stories.

Methinks that Shippey is on solid ground in citing the subtle influence of American frontier yarns — almost certainly Cooper’s — on the wilderness journey of the Fellowship and the Ranger archetype Tolkien’s work did so much to set into the foundation of fantasy literature.

The 1992 film version of Last of the Mohicans, where Hawkeye is known as  Nathaniel Poe, is strikingly archetypal. Peter Jackson’s film trilogy of The Lord of the Rings shares some visual language with LOTM. You could swap Daniel Day-Lewis and Viggo Mortensen in their iconic roles quite effectively.

And either way, you get lots of running… (#JarodGatley).

Historically, men like Simon Kenton and Samuel Brady certainly fit the archetype — defenders of settlements (in Kenton’s case, a founder of a settlement) from which they remain somewhat separated by the nature of their temperament and work. Lewis Wetzel and Jesse Hughes are darker figures, but they also fit the archetype. Consummate skill as tactical athletes and woodsmen is deployed in defense of the “small folk” against terrifying foes that are as demons to those whom they terrorize.

But…. one man’s Ranger is another man’s orc…

The Ranger Archetype casts the Rangers as a town-defender, but the historical Ranger was also a town-destroyer. Take, for example, the riflemen who formed the vanguard and the scouting corps of the Sullivan Expedition, who burned 40 Iroquois towns during the American Revolution. And the Loyalist Butler’s Rangers repeatedly scourged the Mohawk, Schoharie and Wyoming valleys. The Texas Rangers of the  19th and early 20th Century truly were defenders of American small folk — and also terrors to Mexican small folk, committing dark deeds that did not distinguish too finely between bandits and guerrillas and ordinary folk.

Wolves of the Mohawk Valley by Don Troiani. The Loyalist Butler’s Rangers were not town-defenders in the American Revolution — they were vengeful town-destroyers.

In his massive and yet-to-be-completed magnum opus A Song of Ice and Fire, George RR Martin deliberately sets out to deconstruct and subvert the Ranger Archetype through his depiction of a decrepit and decaying Night’s Watch on the northern Wall. I suppose I should engage with this subversion, but I find Martin so frustrating that I just can’t do it (***nod to Deuce Richardson***).

I do think it is useful and valuable to grapple at the archetypal level with the paradox of town-defender/town destroyer, to challenge the kind of literal demonization of the “Enemy” that is common in Tolkien-based fantasy. First, it must be acknowledged that it is natural, human and legitimate to view howling terrors coming out of the wilderness to slay you, burn your homestead and steal your children as demons. Comanche raiders certainly looked that way to Texans and Mexicans. Not for nothing do Ukrainians call Russian invaders orcs.

But, of course, they are not truly demons — they are men. Exploring this on the mythic and archetypal level is a worthy undertaking. Unfortunately, Martin ain’t the man to do it. But wait… somebody did do it — before Tolkien.

Yeah, you knew I was going to get here. I am speaking, of course, of Robert E. Howard. In Beyond the Black River, The Black Stranger and the fragment Wolves Beyond the Border, Howard and his hero Conan of Cimmeria operate in a Hyborian Age analog of the very frontier we’ve been operating on in the AmRev podcast. While it is doubtless true that Howard drew from his love of Texas frontier history for the tales, the place names of the Pictish Wilderness like Conajohara are derived from Iroquoia and the New York frontier, almost certainly through Howard’s reading of the American Revolution frontier novels of Robert W. Chambers.

In this setting Conan plays the same role as the historical dark-haired Celt, Rifleman Tim Murphy, patrolling aggressively to counter incursions of a stealthy and dangerous foe.

In BTBR, Conan is a Ranger. Not the heir to a line of kings — the son of a blacksmith, a mercenary wanderer, a professional paramilitary warrior. He encounters a young settler named Balthus on the trail on the border of the Pictish Wilderness. When Balthus mistakes him for a man of the garrison of a local fort, Conan sets him straight:

“I’m no soldier. I draw the pay and rations of an officer of the line, but I do my work in the woods. Valannus knows I’m of more use ranging along the river than cooped up in the fort.”

I’m hearing an echo…

“I ain’t your scout. And we sure ain’t in no damn militia!”

Conan is a sworn enemy of the Picts, thanks to an ancient blood feud between his people and the Picts, but he does not see them as demons. In fact, he is capable of seeing them through a lens of strategic empathy. As a Cimmerian, he has his own experience of colonialist imperial encroachment, and he was once among the “screeching devils” who pushed back. He knows that the “devils” are men. Savage, dangerous men — but men all the same.

“The best land near Thunder River is already taken,” grunted the slayer. “Plenty of good land between Scalp Creek—you crossed it a few miles back—and the fort, but that’s getting too devilish close to the river. The Picts steal over to burn and murder—as that one did. They don’t always come singly. Some day they’ll try to sweep the settlers out of Conajohara. And they may succeed—probably will succeed. This colonization business is mad, anyway. There’s plenty of good land east of the Bossonian marches. If the Aquilonians would cut up some of the big estates of their barons, and plant wheat where now only deer are hunted, they wouldn’t have to cross the border and take the land of the Picts away from them.”

“That’s queer talk from a man in the service of the Governor of Conajohara,” objected Balthus.

“It’s nothing to me,” the other retorted. “I’m a mercenary. I sell my sword to the highest bidder. I never planted wheat and never will, so long as there are other harvests to be reaped with the sword. But you Hyborians have expanded as far as you’ll be allowed to expand. You’ve crossed the marches, burned a few villages, exterminated a few clans and pushed back the frontier to Black River; but I doubt if you’ll even be able to hold what you’ve conquered, and you’ll never push the frontier any further westward. Your idiotic king doesn’t understand conditions here. He won’t send you enough reinforcements, and there are not enough settlers to withstand the shock of a concerted attack from across the river.”

*

Strider/Aragorn will always and forever be the Ranger Archetype of the mythic realm. I do not contest his stature, nor do I wish to. But in my personal mythos, I prefer the hard-boiled, never-ennobled Conan. I am closer to REH than to Tolkien in world-view, and Howard was much closer to the frontier roots of the archetype than Tolkien could be. It is interesting to note that in his version of Strider/Aragorn, Peter Jackson approached a more hard-boiled version of the archetype. In a deleted scene (included in the Extended Edition) of Return of the King, Aragorn beheads Sauron’s emissary, the Mouth of Sauron.

Tolkien’s Aragorn did not do this — would not  do this. But Conan the Cimmerian would have, by Crom! And the historical Timothy Murphy famously fired (twice) on a British emissary demanding the surrender of Middle Fort in the 1780 Burning of the Valleys Campaign — a gross violation of military ethics and protocol, about which Murphy was entirely Zero Foxtrot.

I am not pleading a case for the superiority of one version of the archetype over another. For many people, Aragorn has come to be an avatar of “positive masculinity,” a virtuous hero in a cultural climate that tends to devalue and even to deride virtue. I do not wish to participate in such doings, which I find distasteful. A preference and predilection for rougher-hewn archetypes does not signal a rejection of virtue (see Notes in the Margin below for more on this).

Cooper’s Leatherstocking is also a virtuous hero.

It is worth noting that Leatherstocking and Aragorn are both chaste figures; Natty Bumppo famously born to be a lifelong bachelor, wedded to the wilderness, while Aragorn took decades to fulfill his destiny before being able to marry the Elven Arwen. In the LOTM movie version, Nathaniel, is not at all constrained by chastity; he and Cora are intimate on the battlements of Fort William Henry, in a scene that many regard as one of the most romantic and erotic (though not explicit) in cinema. If you’re not using The Gael/The Kiss for mood music, you’re doing it wrong:

And Conan is… well, he’s Conan, isn’t he?

Conan and Natala in Xuthal of the Dusk. Art by Mark Schutlz

*

Strider will never be supplanted as the primary Ranger Archetype. There is, however, room for other versions, perhaps grittier, more hard-boiled, and tied more directly to a American history and folklore than to that of Northern Europe, where the town-defender is also a town-destroyer. I am not well-versed enough in the broad range of fantasy literature to know if that has been done. I’d be interested to hear about it, because the Ranger Archetype is and will remain at the very heart of the Frontier Partisan mythos.

Notes in the Margin:

• Tim Willocks is the author of The Religion, a novel of the 1565 Great Siege of Malta. His hero, Mattias Tannhauser, is an archetypal figure, a Frontier Partisan if not explicitly a Ranger — one who challenges the concept of virtue in a martial hero. I cannot locate the quote, but Willocks stated in an interview that he grew frustrated reading heroes that seemed to him to be virtuous in a way that would get them killed in an actual martial confrontation — be it street fight or battle. Tannhauser (not chaste BTW) was deliberately created as an antidote to that. He has Code — there is no more loyal friend — but he is an absolute survivor and pragmatist, who does not balk at treachery and extreme violence to save his own life and — more importantly — those he loves. In Willocks’ (and Tannhauser’s) moral universe, virtue that gets you and your loved ones slaughtered by harder men is not virtue at all.

This sensibility bothers some folks, especially in the context of mythic or fantasy fiction (Willocks is writing historical fiction), and appeals to others. For some, the moral ambiguity that Tannhauser’s ethos demands is a dangerous kind of moral relativism that ultimately erodes any sense of right or wrong. Martin and others have operated in this territory, with varied success. Willocks’ work does not, however, sit alongside the fantasy category of “grimdark.” There is healing and there is grace, and hope that is found in the love of immediate and found family.

• It has long graveled me that Professor Tolkien did not care for Treasure Island. Who doesn’t love that pirate yarn (and the basis for the Best TV Show Ever)? This is symptomatic of some breaks in compatibility between myself and Tolkien. I realized many years back, in my 20s, that as much as I had loved Tolkien in my early youth, and though I will always appreciate and respect his work, Robert E. Howard is truly my lodestar as a fantasy writer. He had a bigger impact on me as a prose stylist, and I find his worldview more compatible and compelling than Tolkien’s, strangely comforting in chaotic times. And Howard loved him some pirates…

Conan in gloriously anachronistic pirate regalia, from from The Black Stranger. Art by Greg Manchess.

• There is a clear “vibe” connection between Howard’s Pictish Wilderness tales and Last of the Mohicans. The composers of the Conan Exiles game soundtrack apparently decided to play on that vibe connection — quite brazenly. Homage? Piracy? Your call.

A parable of Frontier Partisan warfare and revenge, set in an unnamed country, clearly in the early decades of the 20th Century….

Without Blood is based on an Italian novella, directed by Angelina Jolie, and stars Salma Hayek and Demián Bichir.

Per the Toronto Film Festival:

In a frontier landscape at the beginning of the 20th century, gunmen descend on a remote farmhouse, determined to exact revenge. Their target, a doctor — alone with his son and daughter — tries desperately to protect his children. Inevitably, bullets fly.

Years later, Nina engages Tito, a lottery seller, in what seems like casual conversation at his kiosk. But the encounter is anything but chance. It soon dawns on him. “I know who you are,” Tito says, “and I know why you’ve come.“ As their conversation continues, it becomes clear that revenge casts a long shadow, and takes many forms.

Strong MexRev vibes here… (UPDATE: Black Tyrone notes Cristero War vibes, too — which may be even more on point).

Six-guns, slouch hats, bandoliers and Mauser rifles. Anachronistic World War II-era Mauser rifles, but still…

WTF is this thing?

The historical vagueness appeals to me — while at the same time, I really want to know what novelist Alessandro Baricco was mining. The era depicted is my favorite aesthetic and material culture in all of Frontier Partisans history, and I have secretly explored using a MexRev analog as a setting for a fantasy story. I refer to the MexRev as the Mexican Game of Thrones for reasons. I may yet go down that long, dark trail…

Anyways. I will, of course, investigate…