Redmarsh Hostage Crisis
| Redmarsh Hostage Crisis | |||||||
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| Part of Saint Augustine Crosstown Rivalry | |||||||
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| Broadmoore FC | Saint Augustine FC | ||||||
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The Redmarsh Hostage Crisis is the tongue and cheek name for a massive sports riot which occurred during (and resulted in the cancellation of) a 1979 regular season football match between Broadmoore FC and Saint Augustine FC. The event has been characterized as simultaneously the most notorious and destructive incident of drunken hooliganism and the most ill-conceived publicity stunt in the history of Maximusian football. In their first head-to-head regular-season match of the 1979 football season, a cadre of inebriated Broadmoore FC fans rushed their home-pitch (Redmarsh Stadium) after it was revealed that a Saint Augustine FC supporter had kidnapped "Big Red," the duck mascot of Broadmoore. In response, visiting Saint Augustine FC supporters took the field to defend their players, leading to a massive brawl. Despite over a hundred arrests and numerous hospitalizations, no lives were lost during the fight and, surprisingly, Big Red was returned unharmed to the Broadmoore locker room. Following police investigation, it was revealed that Broadmoore and Saint Augustine managers had conspired to stage Big Red's kidnapping in order to revitalize the rivalry between the crosstown teams. Both teams were given a one year suspension by the Maximusian League of Association Football for the conspiracy and both teams' GMs were fired, but no club officials were indicted criminally.
Background[edit | edit source]
Broadmoore and Saint Augustine are twin cities in northern Libertas Omnium Maximus, separated by the Marshal River. Both cities also host their own MLAF clubs, Broadmoore Football Club and Saint Augustine Football Club, two of the oldest teams in the MLAF. A twin-city rivalry, naturally emerged between the two teams in the mid 20th century. In the late 1970s, consistently poor performance by both teams seriously eroded attendance. By the end of the 1978-79 season, Saint Augustine and Broadmoore languished at the bottom of the league, suffering humiliating defeat after humiliating defeat and narrowly avoiding relegation. By April, both teams played in nearly empty stadiums. In order to boost attendance, Redmarsh, Broadmoore's home stadium, instituted major discounts on beer at their concession stands for the 1979-1980 season. The team also adopted a portly merganser duck, nicknamed "Big Red," as their official mascot.
Match and Brawl[edit | edit source]
On Sunday, September 30, 1979, Saint Augustine and Broadmoore met to play their first regular season head-to-head match at Redmarsh. Generous discounts on booze and concessions, paired with the usual buzz of a rivalry showdown, brought in around 30,000 spectators, nearly filling the stadium. A speculated 7 or 8 thousand of these spectators were Saint Augustine supporters, who made the short drive or bus trip across the metropolitan region to Redmarsh. Wildly underestimating the turnout, Redmarsh did not bring on any additional security staff to handle the anomalously large and rambunctious crowd.
Shortly after kickoff, two spectators were ejected from the stadium for attempting to bludgeon a security guard with a dislodged bleacher railing. Despite a number of admirable plays on the pitch, the match's first half was remarkably unremarkable. Tensions heightened as supporters grew increasingly bored, drunk, and frustrated by their teams' respectively poor performances. As the half drew to a close, a number of players began roughhousing and engaging in unsportsmanlike conduct, for which three bookings were issued. Stalemated with no goals on record for either team, both teams dejectedly retreated to their respective lockers after the half time whistle blew. It was during this intermission that the levy finally broke.
Interrupting a prerecorded rendition of the Broadmoore fight song a few minutes before players returned to the pitch, on-site announcer William Brandt noted a slew of incoming reports indicating that Big Red had been abducted and that the beloved duck's fate might well rest on the outcome of the match. Naturally, Broadmoore fans interpreted this to mean that a Saint Augustine supporter was responsible for the kidnapping and planned to harm Big Red if Broadmoore did not throw the game. The stadium immediately flew into an uproar upon hearing the announcement. A number of families, recognizing that the situation was about to dissolve into chaos, reportedly fled so quickly that many portable radios and hats were left behind. Just as players reemerged from their lockers, a contingent of about thirty Broadmoore fans rushed the pitch, ostensibly in order to rescue Big Red, charging at the Saint Augustine squad with an assortment of weapons ranging from chunks of mortar to switchblades. The Broadmoore squad, along with a few intrepid security guards, attempted to stop their own supporters from advancing on the Saints, but were scattered by the growing mob.
Within minutes, complete anarchy reigned across the entire stadium. Most of the Saint Augustine squad were able to retreat to their locker room and barricade the doors, but several players were caught up in the mob, receiving merciless beatings, contusions, and blunt force trauma injuries. Hundreds of Saint Augustine fans also took the field, either to defend their own players or simply to throw a few punches, and were countered by an onslaught of even more angry Broadmoore supporters. Fearing a crowd crush would occur, an assistant stadium manager had arena workers open a number of service gates and loading docks, allowing fleeing spectators to escape through employee only access points. As the brawl escalated, Brandt attempted to end the fighting by reassuring fans via the PA system that Big Red had been found in good health, but his recovery attempt was far to little, far too late to pacify the mob.
The first wave of police arrived around five minutes after spectators rushed the field, but were outmatched by the swarm of belligerent rioters. The stadium's lights were shut off shortly thereafter, but even this measure was unsuccessful in ending the brawl. Crowd control devices, including tear gas, were ultimately used to pacify the crowd. As the dust settled, nearly an hour after the start of the fight, hundreds were hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries and 103 were arrested. In response to the brawl, a number of bars and clubs reported fighting among patrons throughout the evening. From the arrival of the first officers until around 5 AM the next morning, the cities of Broadmoore and Saint Augustine were placed under states of emergency. Then-Broadmoore mayor, Edward Caraway, delivered a televised and radio-broadcasted address at 10 PM that evening, explaining that he had personally received confirmation that Big Red was safe, in the possession of Broadmoore, and aired his personal suspicion that the kidnapping of the duck was a hoax. Despite his assertions, several Broadmoore players attested that, during halftime, Big Red and all of his accoutrements were missing from the locker room, but that they initially thought nothing of his absence.
Investigation[edit | edit source]
Conspiracy[edit | edit source]
Following the successful exfiltration of the Saint Augustine squad from their barricaded locker room by first responders, the game was formally declared cancelled, with both teams having the match reported as a loss on their official league record. Investigators combed over the entire stadium, the offices of managers and coaches from both teams, and conducted dozens of interviews in the days following the incident, attempting to get to the bottom of why Big Red was initially reported as missing. Ultimately, based on the testimony of Brandt, two assistant coaches, and a series of recovered handwritten memos between the general managers of Broadmoore and Saint Augustine, investigators established the following official narrative of events: 1) On September 30, the day of the match, Broadmoore general manager Paul Jarvis contacted Saint Augustine general manager Sam Harper, explaining that the image of Big Red had tested well with marketing focus groups, and that Red's image could be used for a season-long narrative to promote both teams. 2) Harper was intrigued, and the two developed a convoluted premise centering around the shanghaiing of Big Red, wherein one of Harper's assistants would take Red during the Sep. 30 match. In subsequent faceoffs that season, the whereabouts and status of Big Red would be teased following every goal scored by Broadmoore against Saint Augustine, and, if Broadmoore finished the season ahead of Saint Augustine, Big Red would be "rescued" by his rightful team. However, if Saint Augustine were to finish the season ahead of Broadmoore, they would claim Big Red as their own. 3) During the first half of the match, Harper's assistant did successfully abscond with Big Red, slipping undetected into the locker room and taking the duck in his crate back to the Saint Augustine bus. 4) Jarvis notified Brandt only that Big Red had been stolen, never letting the announcer in on the conspiracy, so as to elicit as convincing a reaction as possible. 5) The Broadmoore fans took Big Red's kidnapping personally. In the chaos, Harper's assistant reunited Big Red with Jarvis, so as to make it seem as though Brandt had fallen victim to a fan hoax, rather than a conspiracy by his own employer, and suggest that Big Red had never been kidnapped at all.
Fallout[edit | edit source]
Naturally, MLAF followed the criminal investigation closely, and ultimately mandated the firing of both Jarvis and Harper. Both teams were also banned from playing for the rest of the season, and were automatically relegated to the lower Contender's League, where Broadmoore remained for many years due to continued mismanagement. MLAF also fined both teams an undisclosed penalty for jeopardizing safety of their players, fans, and "besmirching the venerable image of Maximusian football." Jarvis and Harper had some luck working as administrators for a number of minor league football teams in the following years, but the Redmarsh hostage crisis effectively ended both of their careers.
Despite initial speculation that both participating teams would be found criminally liable for inciting a riot, no charges were presented. In a 1980 interview about the impact of the brawl and the lack of criminal prosecution, Mayor Caraway dryly remarked that Jarvis and Harper were "criminally stupid, but not quite criminally negligent." A Bradmoore city ordinance was passed almost immediately after the riot compelling Redmarsh Stadium to roll back some of their discounts on booze in order to decrease the likelihood of another brawl.
As for Big Red, the duck remained Broadmoore's mascot until his natural death in 1990. Although "Big Red's" name was given in reference to Redmarsh Stadium, not the color, Broadmoore FC's club kits and logo were updated in 1973 to feature three red feathers and a brick-red primary color scheme.
Cultural Impact[edit | edit source]
In 1987, director and satirist Andy Waterson released a mocumentary memorializing the event entitled "Operation Big Red." Parodying the then-popular Maximusian film trend of releasing cheaply made, gory biopics based on Great War narratives, the film follows the fictional account of a Broadmoore supporter and his two adolescent sons as they attempt to fight their way through the massive Redmarsh brawl and secure Big Red from the Saint Augustine locker room. The film released to critical acclaim.
By 1999, both teams were reinstated and made their way back into the MLAF's top league. To commemorate the 20th anniversary of the brawl, a charity exhibition rematch (benefiting Broadmoore emergency services) was hosted on September 30, 1999. Saint Augustine won the match 2-3, and the entire Saint Augustine roster reportedly feasted on curried duck that evening to spite Broadmoore.