Captain Pugwash is a fictional pirate who appears in a series of British children’s comic strips, books and television shows created by John Ryan.
The eponymous hero – Captain Horatio Pugwash – sails the high seas in his ship called the Black Pig, assisted by cabin boy Tom, pirates Willy and Barnabas, and Master Mate. His mortal enemy is Cut-Throat Jake, captain of the Flying Dustman.
History
At John Ryan’s wedding in 1950, he was introduced by a friend to Marcus Morris, who was launching Eagle, and asked the artist to create a strip for it. When John returned home, he claimed that Captain Pugwash appeared without explanation. It ran for the first nineteen issues of Eagle, but was dropped due to being considered too childish, and John replaced it with Harris Tweed.
The first Captain Pugwash picture book, subtitled A Pirate Story and featuring Tom’s debut, was rejected by twelve publishers until The Bodley Head picked it up in 1957. The book became successful, and was translated around the world. That same year, the BBC commissioned it to be adapted into an animated short film, made using “captions”. This was a form of cutout animation that involved levers attached to the back of characters.
All the voices were provided by Peter Hawkins, who had to be hidden behind a monitor due to his facial expressions made while recording being too distracting for the animators. What this did mean was that he could write notes in his script about incidental characters and be reminded of them as they appeared onscreen. Further short films would be produced and broadcast until 1966, and in 1960 a popular and regularly released Radio Times strip was launched to promote the series, running until 1965. In 1974 a new colour series was commissioned, with Peter Hawkins reprising his roles, and wider-reaching than its sporadically produced predecessor.
In 1997, John Ryan licensed the franchise to John Cary Films, followed by The Britt Allcroft Company purchasing the rights to the character, with the intensions of producing a revival series. The new series of 26 episodes, animated traditionally, aired in 1998.
A related book by John Ryan is Admiral Fatso Fitzpugwash, in which it is revealed that Pugwash had a medieval ancestor who was First Sea Lord but was terrified of water.
Characters
Captain Pugwash
The pompous but likeable captain of the Black Pig. Although he boasts of being the "bravest buccaneer", he is actually quite cowardly and stupid. His greed often gets him into trouble. Nevertheless, he usually wins the day – either with the help of Tom the Cabin Boy or by sheer luck. Despite being a pirate, he is rarely seen committing any acts of piracy.
The Mate/Master Mate/Mr. Mate
A somewhat dopey character, who has a tendency to use malapropisms and to mispronounce common words. He has a teddy bear in his bunk and is quite mild-mannered. It is not entirely clear why he is the mate, as he does not appear to have any authority over the rest of the crew. He was present in the first ever Pugwash story, in which he was depicted as being constantly sleepy. Pugwash's adenoidal pronunciation of Master Mate's name appears to be the main source of the urban legend about characters' sexually suggestive names.
Barnabas
The most aggressive of the pirates, but in reality just as harmless. He is quite rebellious and grumpy, and is perhaps marginally more intelligent than Willy, the Mate or the Captain. He was not present in the 1998 series.
Willy
A simple sailor from Wigan. He appears to be the youngest crew member (apart from Tom). He is against using violence, and has been the crew's saviour on occasion (more by luck than by design).
Tom the Cabin Boy
It might be argued that without Tom, Pugwash would have been sunk long ago. He is the most intelligent and resourceful member of the crew, the only one who can cook and the only one who can actually sail a ship. Although Pugwash never admits it, Tom's ability to think up schemes is probably the only thing that prevents him from being a total failure as a pirate, though Tom is never angry at him stealing the spotlight. The rest of the crew also found they were unable to operate without Tom, after he left with the captain when the crew mutinied. Tom is an expert concertina player, despite this being a 19th-century anachronism for an 18th-century pirate, and part of his repertoire is "The Trumpet Hornpipe" (the Captain Pugwash theme).
He was portrayed with a Home Counties accent in the first television adaptation, and with an Irish accent in the 1998 series.
