Welcome to Not Another Crime Podcast.

I'm Georgia La, I'm Peterson.

I'm a journalist.

I am not, but tell you what.

We are joined today by the wonderful Joel Zamat.

Welcome.

Thank you very much for having me.

Are you a journalist?

Yes or no?

Please?

Not at all?

Know?

But I did study media.

Okay, exactly the same pitch.

Very cool, very cool.

Yeah.

I realized when we say that intro in front of guests, they're like, it just really looks like I'm kind of I'm.

Really good at.

I'm just not.

I am not.

Can you give us a beautiful introduction to yourself for our listeners?

Right?

Sure, I am not Joel Zamma.

I I do a bunch of podcasts.

The more well known one is Plumbing the Death Star, and I guess D and D is for nerds.

I run a podcast network called Sandspans Radio, and we doing that for well and truly over a decade.

Now.

It's crazy to think how long we've been in this industry.

But here we are.

You are and you started.

We're just learning from Jackson that you guys started because you found an old, abandoned studio at Latrobe.

Units where you were studying media.

I suppose where I was not just studying, but no, this is where I was teaching, saying you are, I was teaching the the the audio or the radio stream at Latrobe University to teach out the the I guess that whole stream when it got made redundant.

Great, those who can't do teach.

But in that case it was can't do because it doesn't exist.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, my wonderful mentor he got fired and then they were like, hmm, well we still have promised all these students that this thing exists and we can't do it without there you Yeah, what would you like a job?

Oh?

Yes, that is incredible, And the rest of history decades long media career to be.

Like, okay, it's coming up to definitely we are being made redundant.

I'm now being made redundant.

What am I doing?

Hey?

Can we can we keep this thing that we're doing here?

Look?

I really like, you know, pull an effort and time into the whole thing at Latrobe University to kind of go, right, hey, I understand that you want to cut arts.

I get it.

I understand, and they get You've built a new science building that's wonderful.

But what if we just you know.

Kept my job for a bit funny idea, look selfishly, that would be nice.

And I do notice in like a lot of the open days, like hey, for even after you made me redundant, you kept doing what I was doing to entice people to come anyway, it would be nice to but they did it, and well, thankfully.

The Sands Pans radio stuff was sort of on the upswings.

And so people haven't heard Sandspans before.

What what like for Plumbing the Death Star?

He gives a picture Plumbing the Death Start.

It's such a great podcast.

Yeah, it's been.

Going for so long.

It's over six hundred episodes.

Yeah, it's it's an irreverent look at pop culture where we ask not a Star Wars podcast.

No, it's not a Star Wars podcast.

It is.

It is definitely not a Star Wars podcast, but we will ask sort of you know, you're speaking of Star Wars.

You can ask questions about like, well, what are the implications of you know, being your own dad?

I ear a clone like if you were a Jango fed or Bubba feed to be like, oh cool, I just saw my dad die in front of me and that me that might mess me up in the future.

I reckon, I reckon just a little bit.

Yeah, a little bit as there used to be.

I think a bit more.

I guess serious is not the right word, but definitely a little bit more in depth look into culture where we would kind of go like, well, we know a bit about this thing, and kind of look more into it.

And then I think, like, especially for Star Wars, if you ever go on like Wikipedia, a horrible website I do not recommend.

Yeah, it's like Wikipedia for everything Star Wars, horrible, horrible, horrible, absolute cesspool, and you find these information like why they do that, why they do it?

I can promise you I won't go on Yeah, yeah, yeah, who.

I've never seen a Star Wars one.

I've never seen one Star Wars Wars.

You're fine, Yeah, you're fine enough.

I'm fine.

I appreciate that.

I really don't.

You don't need to like I know about it.

All the wars were Star War one, War two.

Yeah, the great Star Wars.

Big Style, biggest Star Wars, Little Star Wars.

I know them all.

I just haven't seen him.

Is that your fault?

We asked mister Jackson as well, which is your favorite podcast of the multitude.

That you have, I think, weirdly, I guess for shooting the shit it is yeah, Plumbing Ster Plumbing with a Star, because that's a very fun show that we just shoot the shit on.

But I think one of the we also have like the storytelling aspect of what we do.

Hence were we like the D and D is for nerds, which is like an actual play podcast, but we do one which is like a World of Darkness, which is more spooky, kind of like setting the real with like a little bit of a supernatural element that I edit most of, Like I mostly edit that one and occasionally I'm in that one.

But it is really great to hear Jackson and Adam our other like DM telling these like cool stories and we have like you know, the guests that come in and they just kind of go wild with and have a lot of fun time because you're like, hey, here we do we do do a D and D podcast.

I think that's enough to like in this public sphere to people to understand what that is.

But then they go like, hey, yeah, come along, you can be an elf, and right there, that's like a little barrier for people.

But you're like, hey, come on over.

We're doing this thing the Darkness, and you know you're just going to be a guy and one day you see a goblin and that's gonna freak you out.

You can make whatever guy you want.

You will be a journalist.

You want to be a firefighter, you want to be whatever you want to be.

You go ham and you have to be a goblin as well.

Well no, no, no, no.

It's got to be a firefighter and see a goblin and then be like, well, mom, everything I know about the world is a little wrong.

I'm gonna choose to ignore that thing.

But it's a really fun yeah podcast.

We actually had a atb Alistair Trembley virtill On recently.

We did like one based on the Alien rule play system and it was a lot of fun and that should hopefully be out sometime next year.

Oh my god, I did Alistairs.

Alistairs and Andy do a every everywhere is it every year?

Or every so many episodes?

Is milestone episodes?

They do like twenty four hours live stream of coming up with sketch ideas.

So they have a podcast called two in the think Tank and they come up with as many sketch ideas as they can and this was a twenty hour It was a twenty hour live stream, and I joined them right at the start.

But time they did it, I joined them kind of as they were on the cusp of like going insane.

That was a lot of it's like fourteen hour mark.

Yeah.

Yeah, I took digs with me, my beautiful dog digs and he just kind of tore apart the set as but yeah, but it was such a fun When did you go?

Me and Zoey we did it.

I think it was at six o'clock.

Yeah, okay, it's I've been going for like twelve years at that point.

Yeah.

I think Jack was there at like eleven, Yeah, yeah, Yeah.

Adam came in at like three am for some insane reason, and I'm like, why would you do that?

Would you going at three am?

And why would they do it?

Opposite the opposite of the conversation where you just had Sammy before you got hit Jel.

Sammy said, Okay, so you know, record the next episode after this one and then tomorrow, why don't we record then and for contact Tomorrow's Sunday.

He goes, why don't we record another episode and tomorrow then we can do on a Monday and I went, I want awake Ken, can we just.

Not record tomorrow?

And he was like, oh, okay about this, but I wonder why they're wildly more successful that put literally twenty four hours hours.

Yeah, we're going to do just for our listeners.

We're never going to do it.

One didn't.

We did a twenty four hour stream, yeah, a couple of years ago.

It was a lot of fun.

But I think the next day I gave myself a migrain that lasted maybe several days.

So it was very much like did you like.

Take shift or was it all of you did the twenty four hours?

There was yeah, me, Jack, Adam, and Cass and we were basically on camera for Yes, that full.

I think we ended up making it to maybe twenty something hours, and I don't think we did the full.

Twenty four might be like twenty two and change.

It's still it was too.

Exhausted and know how much cocaine too many?

I think too many cocain too many?

And I was like, oh this was this was like before I even got like diagnosed and prescribed for like ADHD, so I didn't even have like my sweet medicine.

I was just yeah, like I don't know.

Again, a regular day back then was yeah, eight coffee, so a regular kind I guess.

But yeah, we did have a few people coming in, dropping in and like you know, having something like you just keep you going, keeping us going.

Yeah, but we're putting it out to our listeners right now.

We are never doing it.

It's never happening.

It's all online and now like a YouTube channel somewhere.

And there are some great moments where you can see cass especially like disassociate as she starts.

Talking, seeing things flying around it like.

Yeah, it's And then there's like a moment where she orders us like some beautiful macers for lunch, but she makes the most insane order.

I don't remember what it was, something like it was it was, you know, for four of us, and it was like say, you know, two cheeseburgers, one big mac, two large fries, six.

Nuggets, something like just something that was just enough to be like, what did you do?

Why did you do?

I ordered anything before?

That's so funny.

And what is your relationship with true crime?

Like we asked you to come on this trip.

Right, I get.

I used to listen to a few different yeah true crime podcast.

Yeah, they don't exist anymore.

This is the only one.

He thankfully, Yeah, thank thank god.

You guys are still like the last bastion.

And then occasionally, if there's like a murder docco that my wife will put on, I'll be like, what's happening.

That's a very it's a very wife thing to put on, and a husband to say, oh, I don't want to watch another one of these, and then kind of just stand behind the couch.

I don't want it, my best friend.

Yeah, do you like, do you find yourself interested in it?

Like if you hear a story in the news that's kind of about a crime that's going on at the moment, do you get interested in that?

I think it's more like the more historical ones.

So the more one where enough time has passed where it's a little bit yeah, it doesn't feel too icky, I guess.

So then there's like a Wikipedia thing and like a lot of evidence has come out or something like that where you can kind of like find information.

The worst ones is when there is not much information out there, like some of the serial killers in Australia, and you're like, oh, yeah, I shouldn't have read that.

Yeah, and it's so frustrating as well, because we consume so much like media and entertainment and everything these days, when there is a real story that doesn't have a conclusion, it's even more frustrating because it's like, no, no, you're meant to give me the ending.

I feel unsatisfied.

So we do another show called Jackson Bailey Spooks America, which is.

He's Shocked to find out America.

And it's a it's a subscriber only show that we do.

And yeah, so Jack will kind of like a spooky story or a mystery or whatever that is.

And sometimes, of course, so it's going to be like, let me tell you a story that's gonna We're gonna blue bully you all like, thanks, Jack, And my role often in that show is to just build a narrative based on nothing at all, all the slightest little sliver of a thing, and I'm just like, okay, let me okay, what about this instead?

And you go from there, because again, we're like storytelling apes.

We love a good story.

Yeah.

Yeah, so it's always like, well, no, no, let me make it up.

Makes it makes sense to me.

We'll brought a story in for us today.

Yes, very very very exciting.

So yeah, we could.

We could do it.

We could do twenty four hour stream of these, Yeah we could.

Yeah, are sitting on the count with digs in between people telling us stories.

You easy, you line up twenty four people to come in to tell your story and easy as a child, that's all level lining up.

So yeah, So were you like, hey, come in with a crime and I'm like, what crime are?

Do I know of that on?

Or even like thinking about whatever, And I'm like, oh, you know, hey, this is not necessarily a crime per se.

It's a very fascinating story that I learned about recently and then went a bit about you you find something a.

Bit of a rabbit, Yeah, this is crazy, Yeah.

And then you find more information like wow, that's wow.

We came close to this anyway.

So the story, the story I'm going to tell you guys today.

But the crime I guess is it's about the pig War of eighteen fifty nine.

It just sounded like you said pig war.

I did say the pig War, Big War of eighteen fifty nine.

That one of the star wars I wish Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, less popular wars.

Okay, I don't know this pig.

I'm excited.

The Pig War is also known as the Pig episode, the pig and call this one perfect the pig and Potato Wall.

And then, rather boringly, the San Juan Boundary Dispute or the Northwestern Boundary dispute.

Both of those are a bit boring.

Yeah, but yeah, boring.

Be Also, you've got miss Piggy looking over you as you we're gonna miss Piggy over there right now, into which you tell this beautiful stories today, right.

So it's a confrontration between the US and the UK over the British US border that was in the San Juan Islands.

So our story begins with the Oregon Treaty on June fifteenth, eighteen forty six.

And it was a treaty that was aimed to put to rest any sort of border disputes between the US and the British North America, which is, you know, to later be Canada, but this was you know, pre Canada, and it was concerning the land that was between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific coastline.

And so the treaty divided the Oregon County slash Columbia District between the US and Britain along the forty ninth parallel from the Rocky Mountains to the middle of the Channel which separates the continent from offshore Vancouver Island, and then southerly through the middle of the Said's Channel and the Strait of One the future to the Pacific Ocean.

The problem was that the the channel described was actually two channels, the Harrow Strait which was nearest to Vancouver Island on the west side, and the Rosario Street which was along the east, and then the San Juan Islands lay between them, and both sides laid claim to this entire island group, with the largest island being and the most important one, the San Juan Island.

Is this what Sans Pants is named after.

The s A M.

Weirdly, so, Sanspans was named after a World of Warcraft character that back in the day.

But then I found out listening back to because I found I used to listen to a lot of Martin molloy back in the day, and so listening to I think it was the Martin Maloy Eup's album or the Brown album, one of them two, and listening back to that, and there was one moment where they're talking about someone that was like tried to smuggle coins by shoving their puppies.

Ass thought that's where there was going on there, when exactly rather.

And then I think Nick Willoy starts talking about them, like you know why, you know, well, why go to the pokes when you could play you know the one arm bandit here?

He just drops Trau sands pants and pulls the thing and I'm like, oh, is that where I got this from?

Pants?

So yeah, I was able to find out many years later, I guess the etymology of your own.

How do you spell this.

Island San Juan so j u a j was very wrong?

Ony like Star Wars one yes sand one yes.

So in eighteen fifty six, so the US and Britain set up a boundary commission to resolve any issues about this, and this went through to December of eighteen fifty seven.

So will you find out this whole story is so so much just take it just takes so long for things to happen.

And so the final offer was was the UK compromising, being like, hey, you can take everything of all the islands, except if we can just take the one large main San Juan Island.

Everything else in the island chain can be yours and we'll just take this one thing.

How's that for a compromise, And the US said, no, I would rather die in hell, no thing reasonable, no thing.

Who was the president at the time, was that.

Jefferson Buchanan, who will make an appearance?

Now?

Why was it?

Because it was the largest so yeah, so yeah, why would you want this?

Why would you even want this?

Was?

It wasn't anything one particularly special about it.

However, it was militarily strategic.

So whoever held the island will be able to dominate all the straits connecting the Straight of like the one the Fuca.

I think it's that's how you've pronounced it.

The gays as well.

Are only the straits.

Yeah, nice, nice and the Straight of Georgia.

So these are the So that was why people wanted this particular So both both claimed sovereignty and nothing really happened for a.

While, just it's mine, No, it's mine.

Yeah, and then and then well, we'll have this commission and we'll keep going back and forth.

I think it's this, well, I think it's this.

You want to compromise.

That old test where they go, we'll cut it in half.

The true owner will speak up, We'll cut it in half.

Yes, they both say yes.

So now we enter the the Britain's Hudson Bay Company, which was like, hey, this island.

Hey, can we just we'll pay you a little bit of like think like sevens a year if we can just use it for things.

Yeah, just rent this whole island the Brits and they were like, yeah, no one's doing anything with it, but we do want it, like we don't want the Americans to have it, but we so like sweet.

So they set up like I think it was a salmon curing station.

So you's wrong with the salmon.

So sick, So.

I just think it time.

Have you seen like when this when the salmon's like they they go back to their breeding they swim up streams up everything and they go back to their breeding pool.

And how much they change it's insane.

So they go like a bright red and like an insanely bright like it looks fake.

It looks just fake it if if I hadn't seen any of this prior to like the rise of Ai every year, but they go this bright red from their like almost their neck down, and the males because they stop eating and their males have this like there they develop a beak, the really hard sharp I guess beak to to fight off the other males because all they do because they don't need anything else right now, they're just basically swimming to their spawning grounds to be like we're fucking and we're dying and that's it.

And well solus also the women do they fucking die as well.

It's equal opportunity salmon.

I love about them.

So they all go to this like yeah, they're back to their ancestral spawning and they change dramatically and then they fight and then they fuck and then they die.

Yeah, it's crazy, crazy, So maybe we're being cured of that because it's wrong.

What happens Like you see one, you're like, you're not a fish.

That ain't right.

That ain't right, you know, right, So they set up this salmon quing station and then by eighteen fifty three, Washington was like, no, no, no, no, we're gonna, we're gonna, we're claiming these arens.

They're part of the US.

And so then in response, the Hudson Bay Company were like, okay, well, let's establish a sheep branch the Bellevue Sheep Farm.

And it was a little out of like you know, politically motivated should be just like no, no, no, where we own this.

But it was also very profitable, as the flock went from thirteen hundred to more than four thy five hundred in about six years, even though.

We're doing it not dying, ye right, so.

Like we're doing this despite the Americans, but we're making money on the side.

Isn't this wonderful?

What a wonderful thing, wonderful everything if everyone involved.

And then the the the Fraser River gold rush happened in around about eighteen fifty eight in a sort of near that sort of area, which meant a lot of people flocked to that area.

But then it wasn't really like a gold rush that lasted a while.

It was one of those kind of like a flash of the pan.

It wasn't like you know, the I actually don't know much about gold rushers now think about it, but it just seemed to be they just fizzled out.

Sure so rather than like you know, going back to you know, where they came from, a lot of the people that were went there decided to settle there instead.

And reports of good soil, bountiful resources on this San Juan island were started to circulate among these American settlers, and so by spring of eighteen fifty nine, eighteen Americans had settled on the land that was also prime sheep grazing land.

And when I say settled, I when you're thinking like, oh, like whether they stake this little claim over here?

No?

No, no, in the middle of like the sheep run like they were just like oh yeah, he is good.

Yeah, while like the Hudson Bay Company running this whole cheap things like but that's in the middle of this, what do you do?

Yeah?

So the British cans these claims are legal, and these settlers little more than I guess squatters or trespasses.

And the settlers expected the US government to recognize the valibility because like, well, this is this is US soil, So this newly formed like the America where this is so this is our land.

So tempers grew.

And then on the faithful Day June fifteenth, eighteen fifty nine, a wonderful American farmer who had originated from Kentucky, Lyman Cutler what name, found a pig rooting around his garden and eating his potatoes.

He won't stand for that.

If I know him.

This was not the first time that this had happened.

So Cutler I really believed that the land was his by American right.

So when he settled there, he didn't go like, right, I'm going to find a nice little plot that's like bit secluded.

No one else has made claim to this, I'm just going to settle it.

No.

He was both parts lazy and incompetent that I respect.

Yes, so he dug up a third of an acre of one of the sheep runs that was like pre existing there.

And he was also very bad at building fences.

So so he built like rather than you know, enclosing his his land for lack of a better term.

Uh, it was a three sided fence.

What a famous three I hope he didn't build his house.

For the purpose.

And and so yeah, so one of the pigs that.

Charles Griffin, he couldn't blame the pig for that.

Wow, But how did he get out?

Well just over there, so uh yeah.

So so the one of these pigs was like, oh, is that some delicious potatoes that you've planted for me to start eating on?

And so he did.

And Cutler would later claim that the animal had yeh been at several times, a great annoyance SoCal sentence.

So finally getting like enough, enough is enough, and really just like at the end of his tether, in a moment of I guess anger, which he regrets.

I believe he does regret for a moment and then he turns face like he about faces the whole thing.

So he in a moment of anger, he grabs his rifle and he shoots the pig.

Oh my god, you can't be doing that.

We actually always say you can't be.

You shouldn't.

It is a crime.

It is ah.

Now, the pig was owned by Charles Griffin, and he was an irishman who was employed by the Hudson Bay Company to run the sheep ranch.

And he also had several pigs that he allowed to just roam freely.

Hence why you know, while if you see, I was going to say an enclosed you know, basic like by three fences, not at all, an enclosed area with some kind of potatoes the tubers that were growing there.

And you're like, I'm a pig I love who doesn't.

Plus you know, well he's an also, he was a pig from an irishman.

And there's one thing I know about the Irish.

So this was like, you know, Griffin's pig, and he was of course very very miffed.

Uh so he was like, what the hey, actually no, I think it was cuddler.

In a moment of like okay, I did bad, he goes there, he's like, hey, your pig was my potatoes.

Once again, I got a little bit.

I shot you pig.

I've reacted, loops daisies, too late for apologized side.

We want to come around for a roast pork tonight.

Yea delicious I'm sorry, hey, full of full of potato, Like you know, we get like when things like you know, how we torture an animal for flavor, So like with pigs, I think it's like if we give them lots of acorn, they'll have a delicious like acorny flavor.

And then, like the things we do with a goose, to be like, oh, if we were just like forcedpeaking for this delicious because so delicious, we're horrible people.

Yeah, exactly exactly.

It works, Shake them up a bit, a bit delicious.

Before drinking someone like the cow.

Like a potato diet for pigs, Like is that early starchy?

I don't know.

She was like, I'm very sorry.

As an apology, Hey, look, I'll give you ten bucks, which is not nothing like ten dollars in today's term, is around about I think it's like three hundred and fifty like USD I think as well, so it's like, actually like three fifty for a pig.

I actually don't know like the price of a pig currently, but I'm assuming like three fifty sounds pretty well.

Depend on the pig, miss Piggy, much more than that, oh, miss Piggy, babe, Yeah, quite a bit more.

Very I'd like I've got a grand I reckon.

Joe's looking at picture of Miss Piggy.

He's trying to work out how much it would be working.

Yeah, he has not taken his eye.

Griffin was like, no, no, no, no, ten dollars is not enough.

I want one hundred dollars, which is about three thy five hundred of today's money, because not only did I love that pig, that is a prize breeding ball that you have killed.

So how dare you do this?

Was it actually or was this his negotiating who knows?

Either way, he was incensed, and then and then.

Businessman and then Cutler.

In this moment of like remorse where he felt guilty to the point where he went and was like, I did this thing, and I'm sorry.

I will give you some compensation because I I, you know, lost my temper here it is went.

You know what, No, I rescind my offer.

In fact, though I don't know you shit, that pig was trespassing on my land.

So you know what, I'm glad I shot it, and I do it again.

In fact, if any pig comes around, I will shoot that pig and any sheep.

Let me alone.

So one account, Cutlass was said to Griffin, it was eating my potatoes, and then Griffith replied with rubbish, it's up to you to keep your potatoes out of my pig.

That is an amazing difference.

And the argument ended with Cutler saying that he just assume just as soon shoot Griffin as he would a hog if Griffin trespassed on his land.

That's the good thing about that is that it's a normal reaction.

There's nothing emotional motive about it.

And not everyone everyone in this story.

You must realize, it's just very smart moving, very subtly getting and he's such a small puppy you.

Probably couldn't say but he was he was actually very you.

Yes, So later on Cutler was would tell others that the pig was worthless, and when confronted further brandished his rifle and said, this is American soil.

Not English Jesus, so.

I do love this, going from yeah nest dab hairs ten barks.

I apologize like it's a lot of money for today.

So look, hey, I'm so sorry to actually my land.

Yes, I'm going to dig in.

And so the British authorities threatened to arrest Cutler and then evict all Americans from the island as trespassed the American all over a pig.

The American says, called for military protection.

Oh my, this is very trump.

This is very trump coded.

Sadly sounds reminiscent of something that could.

Well, yes, you're speaking of Trump.

And now let's let's introduce the next player of this story, General William S.

Harney.

So the fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you view this story, the pleas of the American settlers hit the ears of a very well known British hater, General William S.

Harney, and without so much of a second thought, sent company d the ninth U S infantry under Captain George Picketts to sand One, now Harney.

He was a He was a known individual at the time, mostly for being an idiot.

He invaded Mexico without orders.

He had one of his own men arrested for writing the wrong header on a report.

That's very me though, you mispronounced the you're out.

And then yes, he once found a dog digging on his lawn and then he proceeded to chase it for a mile and a half just to beat it, beat it in a race.

I would say that learning a little bit more about this man, a bit of a monster he was.

He was acquitted, but he did do it, so you know, hey, times are different.

So he did beat one of his slaves to death with a what do you call it, like a just a strip of animal hide?

Oh my god.

Yeah, So she died because of her injuries.

And when he was a younger man, he fled a bit, and then when we finally went to trial, he was acquitted because you know, times are different back then.

This was like again earlier in his career, let's say, and then eventually he was kept being promoted through the military.

Any hang on this, he's now a general.

Oh, my fucking god.

Yeah, it's it's it's not great.

Uh, it's not great.

It's really not right.

Yeah, it was a oh yeah, it was in eighteen thirty four, so many many decades before this whole thing conspirers was the murder of Hannah, where he was a major at the time.

Oh my god, major dickhead.

Major dickheads.

So yeah, and it wasn't the only time that maybe he was yeah, known for brutalizing the slaves he owned.

Yeah, so again not a great guy, not a great guy.

Yeah.

So here at this time, I think, yes, he'd been he'd been caught martialed four times for disobeying orders as well.

His contemporaries at the time we were to say, it's just about this man, was that he was an imbecile all matter in no mind, an arrogant humbug, a laughing stock.

Umbug is great.

So so once again this this guy, not many people liked him, and an idiot by the most there there are.

There there are rumors that then he started this war on purpose because his whole idea was like, look, yes, an American did shoot a pig.

That is, we can't dispute this.

This is what happened, but it was an American on American soil, and that was a British pig.

And now the British wanting to arrest an American on American soil?

How their dare they?

What we're going to do is we're going to send like a hob We're gonna send like the troops over there, and then what's gonna happen is what's gonna happen is well, the the the the British, they're going to send their troops in there, and we're going to be like, you know, hey, you know, we're gonna shake our sabers.

But then they're gonna attack us, which is at a which they're going to basically do an active war, which means we can then retaliate, which means we can then take that island.

Because it's going to take six weeks for any correspondence from where we are back to like the capital, for anyone to tell me, don't do this, stop doing this, No, no, And that's six weeks.

There're six weeks back.

We've got twelve weeks.

We got twelve weeks to do what we're not only wouldn't do that, they're gonna do that and then we're to conquer the land.

We're gonna then go over to Vancouver Island.

I can take that, and then maybe what if we go north?

What if we take all of North America?

Fuh my god.

That's the some of the theory there, and and people were like, one pig, why why was he doing this?

Some and again we don't really know.

Some people were like, well, the whole thing about the expand expanding American territories, the whole thing about well, you know, it's the America's it's it's the it's their divine right, its manifest destiny, as it were, which is a thing that they genuinely believe back then, was that that, you know, we have to do this because you know, we have spoken to God and God is like, you need to keep expanding.

Another one was that he wanted to play the hero to be come in there so that he would kind of lay the groundwork for him to be president one day.

God.

Another thing, because I think he was originally from Virginia, was that well, yeah, well that this was again this was just prior to the Civil War.

And so another theory was that this was there to create a diversion to help the South, you know, secede.

The prevailing theory as well is that he was just a very stupid man.

Let's not forget he's an idiot.

So sixty four US soldiers arriving in the warship the USS Massachues, touchdown on San Juan on July twenty seven with orders to prevent the British from landing.

He set his camp out in the open and put down a sign saying, only American laws apply to this.

Clever.

All you need is a sign back then or a flag.

You're a great job.

So why did we get this?

Guest?

I understand because I know where this ends, and I'm like, I'm with you.

It gets worse.

So hearing this, James Douglas, the governor of British Columbia, angered by the Pickets landing and now concerned a squatter population of Americans would occupy San Juan Island if they weren't kept in check.

You know, it's kind of like you let one, then they're gonna keep breeding, and then they're gonna suddenly you're infested with Americans.

So he sent three Royal Navy warships down there as a show of First I saw a show of force.

First it was the HMS Tribune, then the HMS satellite, and then the wonderfully named HMS Plumper Plumper Plumper, the ship plumper, beautiful ships plumping the deskto and we get a real fat, real nice twitterm after Juice Juicy.

So Douglas he was just kind of fed up with America's bullshit, Like, okay, the Americans, they had forced him out of Oregon, they had really pissed him off during the gold Rush, and now here they were on his island doing more bullshit of the same.

And if you ever do any sort of research to find out like how America came to be, especially with like Mexico or what is now I think Texas and then also Hawaii, and you realize, just like.

Ah dogs, yeah, okay, wow, they play that same card so often of just like oh wow docs.

So yeah, he was really done with their bullshit.

So things continued to escalet.

So by July, and I remember this started with a pig getting shot.

So by July thirty.

First it is giving John Wick a bit.

Yeah yeah, and like fair enough.

It's like I love that pig, you know, and that you need to like compensate at war, you ne need a war.

So by August thirty first, remember sixty sixty five troops were sent first.

So by August thirty first, the Americans had four hundred and sixty one men with fourteen field cannons, and the British had a flotilla of five Royal Navy warships which happened.

I think it was seven anty guns and the total was carrying two thousand and forty men.

Oh my god, Oh my god.

To paid that three thousand and five hundred and everything would have been.

Now the here is I guess A cooler head comes in Captain Jeffrey Hornby, and he was commanding the British fleet.

He was ordered by James Douglas to dislodge the American troops, to stop any more Americans from landing on the island uh and to go in there and arrest Captain Pickett and use force if necessary, but avoid armed conflict if possible.

To My response is what how how do you do that?

That makes no sense?

But okay, but I get it.

He was very, very irate and enraged with the audacity of the Americans here.

But Captain Hornby felt that this was a pretty bad idea.

There were a lot more American troops than they had originally thought when they went to do some recon and you know, marching in there and arresting an American captain probably wasn't the most well thought out plan.

So so things just kind of stated a bit of a stalemate for a while.

So the Americans they dug in, and the British continued with like you know, on their ships to conduct drills, which was often described as hurling solid shot into the bluffs and raised rocks along Griffin Bay.

Now all this was apparently really great fun for tourists.

What uh what great questions?

Well, if there's a war about to break out and not nothing else is really happening around the world, and like you know, you're there, you're like, let's happen.

Why not?

I don't think TVs were around yet, So you got what.

You got oop and stick, cup and ball.

So you're like, pig, this would be fun to me, and like imagine that.

You're like, I want to know what's going on.

So it's you know, got a lot of tourists to come down and have a bit of a fun, uh, which A gift shop which managed to piss off Charles Griffin further because firstly, you know, these Americans, they come in, they set up on you his like in the middle of my sheep run.

They don't even do a good job building a fence.

They plant delicious potatoes and blame my pig for eating said potatoes, and they shoot my pig.

Don't give me my money for my prize ball, and you know, and now you've got these American troops and you're walking around this island, and now you've got these tourists walking around this island causing more of this disruption escalator.

He's just getting frustrated and so he goes to Douglas and is like, do something so so Douglas is like, you know what, you are so right?

How very dare they?

How dare they just take this is basically this is a stab at the Union jacket itself.

This is British pride on the line here and so.

Ancestors, that isn't gentlement.

The beautiful If American troops can be around in gullavanting around on that island and these tourists, well why not the British Why not the British troops?

We should be able to do the same thing.

If you're doing that, we want to be there.

So it's our island by, right, damn it.

So Douglas ordered Hornby to put British boots on the ground to make it a joint military occupation.

A Hornby here's this.

He's like, Okay, I'm gonna go parley with Captain Pickett and just be like, hey, he's going to put British troops on the ground.

We need to like maybe just chill, calm this down.

Everything is going to be like this, we should do something now.

A picket was he goes on after all of this to to fight for the South, and I get I don't know much about the like the American Civil War, but one thing that was like pointed out was like this guy goes on and called like pickets charge or whatever, which is a very I think it's like a seminal moment in the Civil War where he sucks up royally and like a lot of people die under his command.

Because maybe the only historical references I have from Hamilton the musical and this, the Pig War wasn't in that as far as I know, not in any musical.

So yeah, new to me.

When yes, my wife when she was watching Hamilton for during COVID for like the upteenth time, shall we say, and then eventually Sidney watching all this and then finding out that like, yeah, it was the once again the whole thing to be like, you know, hey, France, help us out now, and we promise, we I owe you.

Yeah, we'll help you when you're in trouble, don't you worry.

Fascinating the thing is they signed a treaty with the king whose head is now in your basket?

Would you like me to take it out and ask it?

Hey?

Would you.

Do whatever you want?

I'm super dead.

Yeah, so you do the rest of the show.

No, no, you go the Virgin But yeah, so it's it's really like they really used like a through line here of like how America was formed or the United States was formed.

So he's like, hey, Pricket, they're going to do this, so we should probably like before this escalates, maybe we should just.

Figure this out right and then and then Captain Prickett said, if.

The British land one foot on this island, I will open fire.

Oh my god.

So the British ordered to land America were ordered to prevent that, and we are now at the precipice of war.

A war over a shot pig, you might be thinking that this is very silly.

Not just a shot pig, but and a missing potato.

And missing potato we know where it went missing.

So it also dawned on Captain Hornbury that this may be in fact extremely stupid.

He's just thinking that now, and he's like, we can't do this.

I can't.

I can't be the one to to cause our war to break out over a peak.

So he refused to take any action until the British Rear, Admiral Lambert Baines arrived, who was like the Lambert Baines b a y any Bains, who was the commander of all the British fleet in the Pacific area at the time.

So it's like, I Am not gonna do anything until this guy gets here, because I think at the moment how it all works is that I think Douglas maybe out ranks Hornby, but Bains will outrank everyone.

So it's like, I'm not doing anything until he arrives because I just I feel in my heart of hearts this is stupid and we shouldn't do this.

So Bains arrived, he took stock of everything, that was happening, was appalled at the situation and told Douglas that he would not involved two great nations in a war over a squabble about a pig.

Great call ye god something finally.

Said it so so so things calm down a little bit.

And maybe some insults were hurled by by each other across the different time of sledging things, But it's fine by all reports, like, it was pretty chill like with everyone's like having a good time.

Uh, to the point where officers from from both sides attended like church services aboard the HMS satellite and they like shared whiskey and cigars, like everyone was just having a good time.

Correct.

And then and then unfortunately news hit the capitals hit London and Washington about how war it was about to happen because of the pig.

Oh no, and everyone in charge went, what the fuck doing this is insane?

Why are we doing this?

Oh my god, this should not be a full blown international incident.

So in September, US President James Buchanan sent the US Armies General in Chief, General Winfred Scott to go negotiate because at this time the US wanted this to just go away, because tensions within the US was rapidly arising.

Buchanan was busy trying to prevent the outbreak of war between the Northern and Southern States, and so this was like, you know, an unwanted distraction.

So it's like, if our troops are over there, we're not doing this.

And so it's like, we just just just figured it out.

So they send this guy.

It took you know, six weeks to get there.

So both sides agreed to withdraw their reinforcements.

But it is now, yes, a joint military occupation.

So you've got the British camp on one side, you've got the American camp on the other, and that's they're going to have that.

You can have like one hundred million apiece and that's it.

Don't escalate it no more.

So it's like, cool, we're going to do that and everyone will leave.

And then yes, a a one British warship was anchored and everything was a bit chill.

The US has their military camp to the south, British to the north, and everyone was like we're going to figure this out like adults here.

So over the next twelve years, the British and Americans kind of have that bit of a again a chill mutual social life.

They've visited each other's camps.

They celebrated their holidays, like the British went over and celebrated the Fourth of July with the Americans.

The Americans went over and celebrated it was the Queen Victoria's birthday, and they when they wanted to do that, and so everything was like pretty good, like there was no real like bad things that have happened there.

There was athletic competitions between the two camps, and they they really made a mockery of the concept of war in my opinion.

There were like some on again, off again negotiations, but again all of this was held up by that you know, pesky American Civil War that was happening, and it was reported that the biggest threat to peace was the large amounts of alcohol available.

So in eighteen seventy one, the Colony of the West Coast joined the newly formed Canada, and the UK and US signed the Treaty of Washington, all of eight teen seventy one to deal with various minor differences between the two nations, one of them being this border issue with Canada.

I didn't realize the time.

But at one point Britain were almost kind of like because of the cotton disrupt disruption during the Civil War, they were like, what if we side with the South.

So the British actually like sent or sold like a warship to the South and helped them in other kind of ways.

So when you know, the South lost the American like you know, hey, we aren't happy with what you did.

Yes, yeah, let's talk about that.

Should we talk about that?

Talk about you are some reparations and so we have a list and on this list, one of them being the San Juan border dispute.

Huh.

So they were like, okay, we need to finally solve this.

It's like they say, get like a bunch of others, like you know, the where the border was of Canada and US except for this one tiny area is the last one they had to figure out there, Like we need to figure this one out, and like, look, you have your side, we have outside.

We are not budging, we do not compromise.

So we we need an impartial uh in international arbitration here.

So we need to we need to find somebody to rule over this impartially to kind of be like right, who gets what and so they they got an an arbitrary arpetrator which was from the newly established nation of Germany, Kaiser Willheim the first.

Right, yeah, sure.

The Kaiser enters the story.

Now did they call him that the first?

Then?

I don't know.

That is very that is very it's very confident that you.

I'm guessing you must have had like, surely, surely you don't just preemptively I'm.

Going to start calling myself George and Ruth Love the first first.

Yeah, I think you should just like, you know, hey, get ahead of a game.

So the Kaiser referred to the issue the issue to a three man operation commission who met in Geneva for nearly a year.

Once again, everything in this whole time, so much time has passed for this whole thing, that nothing happens quickly, and everything happens at this weird slow base, but also involving these giant like figures of history that you're like, what are.

You doing this exactly?

I think Also, the pig probably would have seen out the end of its natural life by now.

Let's move on.

And so so the Kaiser was there to basically be like, let me hear both sides of this argument.

And then you know, well, we will then lay judgment rational.

So to represent the country's case, the Americans sent a man named George Bancroft, and he was a man who had studied in Germany and he had many powerful German connections.

The British sent Admiral James Previst, who was Yes, he was very good at negotiating, but he was unknown in Germany.

So on October twenty first, eighteen seventy two, the Commission ruled in favor of the US, establishing the boundary line through the Harrow Strait, leading to the San Juan Islands becoming Americans possession, and the final boundary between Canada and US was set.

Please remind me of the year of the pig shooting incident, the.

Peag shooting of eighteen fifty nine.

So this is really two decades years for them to just rule America.

Yes, So, then on November twenty fifth, eighteen seventy two, the British with drew their Royal Marines from the British camp, and by July eighteen seventy four, two years later, the last US troops had left the American camp and at long last, this horrible and devastating war had finally come to an end.

Peace was returning to the forty ninth parallel, and the only casualty remains an unnamed pig.

Oh my god.

And in a little bit of a look, I actually don't know if this is still the case, because I'm due to the current state of things.

I wouldn't it wouldn't shock this has changed.

So this place, the San Juan Island, is the only place in a US national park where a foreign flag is regularly flown over US soil.

So both the flag and the flag pole were provided by the British governments as a sign of sort of friend ship.

And so the American troops will flag a Union Jack.

They will fly a Union Jack over the over the camp, which is kind of like the only places happens.

At tribute to the pig.

Yeah, like a little tribute to the pig.

And and and they use it as a case of like, hey, sometimes you know, wars don't necessarily need to end in conflict.

And that is sure a lesson you can take from this.

You want doesn't mean if you want, they will, but.

Yeah, And that is the story of the Pig War of eighteen fifty nine, where a man got irate, shot a pig and nearly started a world war.

Oh my, that was exhausting.

That was so long.

That's amazing.

Yeah, that was that was incredible.

I can like, I can.

Feel through your storytelling you're getting in the web of researching this because he start out by saying like I heard this thing, and I was like, I want to know more about that, and then you got lost in this rabbit hole.

You have to you can't just read a headline about that.

A move on.

There is so much like like, yeah, you realize how much we as a humanity are just holding out by a thread, right.

Yeah, one little thing.

Wow, Like you hear about like your conspiracy theories and all this kind of stuff to be like, oh, this happened, This happened.

This happening when reality is stupid.

Than exactly exactly.

It's just one of those things where like.

No one knows what they're doing.

That's something that you learn.

No one knows what they're doing, no trying their best.

Yeah, and it's just it's just fascinating to me where you got this.

Like, you know, one person had like a little bee in their bonnet about how much they hated the British and was like maybe maybe seeing this in a dumb way to be like, oh yeah, if I do this, I'll look like, oh, look so good, and then that's going to be my path to presidency or like just you know, or if I do this, we can then take more land for America and I'll be held a hero and just to kind of like we just need any excuse.

Yeah, yeah, she's just waiting for it.

Literally shot.

So it's so embarrassed.

Story is really embarrassing right now.

Yeah, I know, And it's like it's it's it's nice to know that like we've learned so much from history that nothing like this could ever could happen again, like where one tiny thing maybe not is blown out of proportion and yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh my god, thank you, thank you so much.

That is a piece of history that I wish I didn't like, I wish it wasn't a part of history.

But what an incredible.

Story it is.

Yeah, when when you learn about these tiny, little almost insignificant moments in history of how close we came to another exactly, and like there there's like there's so many of them, like I again, and they haven't even like you know, you got to stop yourself at some point because if I keep going to go down to bu like a rabbit hole and I can't get I can't get back.

But there was like like like a lost a runaway dog almost caused another international incident on the border of likenk.

It was Greece and I forget which other country was, but like yeah, like a man was like, oh my dog run across this country line.

I got to go and get it.

They're like act of he got shot.

And then suddenly we're like, okay, now we're preparing for war.

And then I think with all that we can't trust animals.

I think that's what I think.

So maybe the pig knew this.

Maybe how dam I mean to the pig?

Credit?

But tats are delicious.

Yeah, I'm going to kill you if you eat.

That's right, little differences.

Thank you so much for coming on today.

That was amazing.

Where can our find you and every wonderful thing that you do?

Oh yeah, so you could you can find us if you got sandspans ready dot com and all all our podcasts are there.

You could on your on your podcast app of choice if you want to search for plumbing the desta base of speculation.

DANDU is for nerds, all those kinds of things you could.

You can find us there.

We're on YouTube, I think at Plumbing Pod maybe not sure, something like that.

Maybe Instagram.

I think I'm.

Personally want to find us, You'll find us.

Think on Instagram, God, damn It Zammat.

I maybe post occasionally, but not really promise, not at all.

People ever sing the song damn It Janet to you about damn It Zammitt.

Yeah, I love that every day, every day so much.

Thank you for having me great.

Yes,