Yakuza Toys: December 2016

La Comtesse Issabelle de Bouchard

Lizzie butcher, as she was once known, was born into poverty in Cheapside, London. Somehow, she ended up in Jamaica working for the English there. After absconding with a set of fine jewels form an English lady, she began to dress as a man and took up with pirates under the fearsome Captain Edward Harker. Through assassination, and natural progression, Bouchard became Harker’s right hand ‘man’ until one day, with the crew fully behind her, Bouchard slit the Captain’s throat and took his ship, revealing herself finally as a woman. For the next twelve years, Bouchard, now calling herself a Countess, was the terror of Spanish and English merchant shipping. She was caught many times, and branded on the hand. She had a demon’s head tattooed on her back, and it was reported that the art snaked down her arms all the way to her feet. During her time in Tortuga, she took up with another notorious female pirate, Lady Evangeline Marley, and the two began a business partnership.

While they were seeking a vast treasure, Bouchard double crossed Marley and left her on an island, taking the treasure for herself. For a few more years, Bouchard continued her piratical career until finally her luck ran out and her ship was sunk after a battle with the Royal navy. Bouchard was never seen again, and her body was never discovered, though it was said, years later, that an elderly lady living is the well to do part of London had, upon removed her silken glove, revealed the most beautiful demon tattoo. She was never traced, but stories of Captain Bouchard being alive and well and living under the noses of the authorities are all over the older parts of the capital to this day.

Lady Evangeline Tremblay

Not really a lady, Evie Tremblay was born in Port Royal to a minor government official of French origin. Captured by pirates at the age of sixteen, her father and mother refused to pay the ransom. They never saw their daughter again. Lady Evangeline fought so fiercely for the pirates that they accepted her. It was said that she never held a treasure map, instead she had an inker in Tortuga tattoo her entire body and arms with maps and co-ordinates. It was said that she was covered from neck to toes, but of course she was always covered.

Tremblay’s ship was sunk after eight successful years after an encounter with a reef, and she became the first mate on board The Bluebird, under the command of a Welshman named Red Ghent. After a few more years of piracy under the command of Ghent, Tremblay met up with Bouchard and jumped from The Bluebird onto Bouchard’s ship, the Kestrel. At first they were moderately successful, but eventually Bouchard got tired of the chaos that followed Lady Evangeline Tremblay around, and left her on an island, standing on a crate with a noose around her neck.

Marley did not jump off the crate. As luck would have it, the island was inhabited by a hermit, who rescued her. He was former Governor John Marley of the East islands. Lady Evangeline Tremblay killed him, took his boat and his title, and sailed away to the East Islands where she made a triumphant entry as Lady Evangeline Marley, daughter of the governor. As soon as she had removed the existing governor (she sneaked into his mansion and pushed him through a glass window in the third floor), Lady Evangeline, thanks to her ‘father’, was installed as Governor and she ruled the East islands for nine years.

Evangeline Marley would, no doubt, have retired there were it not for the sudden appearance of a captured female pirate by the name of Bouchard. As if she hadn’t recognised her old comrade, Marley, as governor, had Bouchard branded on the hand and flogged in the dungeons before throwing her into the sea. Back aboard her ship, Bouchard vowed revenge. She sailed to Port Royal, where she seduced a local Lord, whispering in his ear that he should go and see the Governor of the East Islands for some real fun, as the good Governor was formerly a pirate. This, Bouchard claimed, could be proven by the map tattoos covering her body. The Lord did indeed visit Governor Marley, saw the tattoos before she sent him packing with feigned innocence. Back home in London, the Lord could not help but tell the story of the governor who was really a pirate.

As Bouchard had planned, Marley’s masquerade was rumbled, and she was arrested at her mansion on East Island and taken in chains to England, where she was tried at Bristol assizes. Convicted of piracy and sentenced to death, Evangeline Marley escaped briefly on her way to her execution, but she was recaptured, and hanged at Wapping the same day.

Postscript.

Historians obtained permission to exhume the grave of Marley during 1991. They were surprised to find that the remains, dressed in what had been Marley’s clothes and prison shackles, belonged to a male. The remains of Evangeline Marley have never been found, nor has any trace of her actual final whereabouts or resting place. Was there a switch during the brief escape, or was it before then? The guards and soldiers in the East Islands would certainly have been loyal to her as opposed to the crown. We may never know.

After a while of trying to normalise the cast for the comic strips and having them have regular jobs, I figured it might be nice to return them to their occasional creepiness at times. And so here is Cousin Hurtsinside, now known as Lucretia, speaking as if she's been shopping for beautiful designer jewellery. Also starring Claudine Ticktock and Audrey.

What are you waiting here for, Lucretia?