West Indies Rite of the Templar Order

Edward: "So it's you lot them Templars have been chasing, then?"

Mary: "Until you came along and mucked things up, it was us chasing them. We had them running scared. But they have the upper hand now."

—Edward Kenway and Mary Read discussing the Caribbean Templars, 1716.

The West Indies Rite of the Templar Order, sometimes referred to simply as the Caribbean Rite, is the rite of the Templar Order that presides over the West Indies region.

Founded by Laureano de Torres y Ayala, the two-time governor of Cuba, in the midst of the Golden Age of Piracy, the branch was tasked to locate the Observatory, an ancient Precursor site that served as a surveillance facility for the Isu. Accordingly, one of their primary objectives was the acquisition of the Sage Bartholomew Roberts, from whom they hoped to learn the location of the Observatory.

During the 1710s, the Caribbean Templars' efforts were complicated by the meddlings of the pirate Edward Kenway, who learned of their secret goals after they accidentally inducted him in the mistaken belief he was the Assassin defector Duncan Walpole. Upon becoming allied with the West Indies Brotherhood of Assassins, Edward began systematically eliminating the high-ranking members of the Caribbean Rite until only Torres remained. In 1722, after having endeavored for over two decades, the Grand Master finally managed to find and access the Observatory, only to be killed by Edward inside the complex before he could put it to meaningful use.

Although Edward's actions dealt a crippling blow to the Templars in the West Indies, they would eventually rebuild their strength by the end of the 18th century and continue to operate in the region until modern times.

History

Age of Discovery

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Juan Ponce de León killed by Miguel

By 1503, the Templars had begun expanding their reach towards the New World.

In 1521, the Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León, under the influence of the Spanish Rite of the Templar Order, journeyed to Florida in search of the Fountain of Youth. However, the Assassins in Florida stopped Ponce de León by sending one of their agents, Miguel Ramón Carlo de Lugo, to convince him to abandon his quest and turn back. When Ponce de León refused, the Assassins struck him with a poisoned arrow that would soon afterwards result in his demise, thereby ending his quest.

Golden Age of Piracy

Establishment of the West Indies Rite

"For two decades now I have endeavored to locate this Observatory... a place rumored to contain a tool of incredible utility and power. [...] With this device, there would be no secrets among men. No lies. No trickery. Only justice. Pure justice."

―Laureano Torres, on his mission to find the Observatory, 1715.

Laureano Torres

The West Indies Rite was established sometime around the last quarter of the 17th century by the Spanish Templar Laureano de Torres y Ayala, who arrived in the region in 1673. Torres, having been inducted into the Order in his twenties, was a veteran member who simultaneously served as Governor of La Florida for the Spanish Empire from 1693 to 1699. In this capacity, Torres became well acquainted with the West Indies, enough to effectively found a new branch for the Templar Order in the region.

Around 1707, the Templar commander Alejandro Ortega de Márquez, operating out of his base in Isla de la Juventud, led the West Indies Rite in an attack against a Taíno village with ties to the Assassins. Though he successfully destroyed the entire village, he perished in the battle.

The primary goal for the West Indies Rite from its inception was the search for the Observatory, an ancient surveillance facility built by the Isu. By 1715, at least two decades since the mission had been assigned to Torres, the site had still not been located, though the Grand Master managed to capture the Sage Bartholomew Roberts, who he correctly believed knew the Observatory's whereabouts.

Interference by Edward Kenway

Torres: "Take him to the ports. Send him to Seville with the Treasure Fleet."

Edward: "Wait now! I delivered your treasures, didn't I?"

Torres: "You did, yes. But you robbed us of Duncan Walpole."

—Torres and Edward, after the latter's true identity was exposed, 1715.

That same year, Torres organized the induction of several new recruits at once, including the British privateer Woodes Rogers, the French mercenary Julien du Casse, and the Assassin defector Duncan Walpole. All three were to meet with him at his estate in Havana, with Duncan specifically delivering blood vials for the Observatory and maps detailing the secret locations of all bureaus of the West Indies Assassins. Unbeknownst to the others, Duncan was waylaid by pirates en route to Cuba and killed by Edward Kenway, who proceeded to steal the Assassin's identity, planning to collect Duncan's reward for delivering the blood vials and maps.

Edward meeting the Templars while posing as Walpole

At the meeting, none of the Templars saw through Edward's disguise, having never met Duncan in person, and the induction ceremony proceeded without incident. Edward handed over the maps of Assassin bases and the blood vials to Torres, not caring for what they were, only that he would be paid for them. At the induction, Torres briefed his guests on the main goal of locating the Observatory as well as revealing to them that the Sage he had captive would lead them to it.

The next day, the Templars gathered at the Havana docks to receive Roberts and extract his blood into a vial, rumored to be necessary as the key to the Observatory. While escorting the Sage to the governor's mansion, the group was ambushed by several West Indies Assassins, but all the assailants were dispatched thanks to Edward, and subsequently Torres handed Edward his first payment, a sum of 1,000 reales from the Spanish Treasure Fleet.

Edward taken captive by the Templars

This reward was unsatisfactory to Edward, who then turned his prospects towards the Observatory, believing that its sale to the highest bidder would ensure his financial well-being for life. That night, in violation of Torres's request to help interrogate Roberts the next morning, the pirate sneaked into the governor's mansion in the hopes of freeing the Sage and learning the Observatory's locationg from him. However, Roberts had already escaped, and the Templars, alerted to Edward's infiltration, caught him in Roberts' now empty cell.

Realizing that Edward was an impostor and had most likely killed Duncan, Torres ordered that he be sent to Seville in Spain with the treasure fleet. However, Edward and the other prisoners held aboard the ships staged an escape and managed to steal one of the vessels for themselves, which was renamed the Jackdaw, while the rest of the fleet was sunk by a hurricane.

Assassination of du Casse

"I'm sorry about this, mate. But I can't risk you telling your Templar friends about me still kicking around."

―Edward to Julien du Casse after mortally wounding him, 1715.

Du Casse's final moments

The sinking of the Spanish Treasure Fleet led the Templars to erroneously assume Edward was dead. As a result, Julien du Casse did not expect to encounter him again a few months later, when his flagship, the El Arca del Maestro, became a target for Edward and his friend Edward Thatch in the hopes of procuring the galleon's weapons for their Pirate Republic.

During one of his supply runs for the Templars, du Casse was attacked by the two pirates, as well as Charles Vane, but managed to escape and docked the El Arca del Maestro at his base in Great Inagua. There, the Templar took to overseeing the loading of weapon shipments onto his ship, but his preoccupation with this affair allowed him to be assassinated by Edward, who wished to prevent du Casse from informing his fellow Templars of his survival.

Assault on Tulum

"This is your doing, Captain Kenway. The maps you sold to the Templars have led them straight to us. And now the agents of two empires know exactly where we operate."

―Ah Tabai to Edward during the attack on Tulum, 1716.

Edward and Ah Tabai observing a group of British soldiers during the assault

Following du Casse's death, Edward seized his mansion in the Great Inagua as his personal base of operations. In the meantime, guided by the maps Edward had given them, the Templars launched attacks on Assassin bases throughout the Caribbean in 1716. These included a major assault on Tulum, the main headquarters of the West Indies Brotherhood and the residence of its Mentor, Ah Tabai.

A contingent of the British Army overran the Assassins' defenses and took many of them hostage alongside the crew of the Jackdaw, which happened to be visiting. They were accompanied by Laurens Prins, a Dutch slaver and associate of the Templars acting under letter of marque from Governor Archibald Hamilton of Jamaica. Edward killed the British captors, freeing Assassins and his pirates alike, and Ah Tabai rallied a counter-attack that saw the British forces routed from Tulum.

Defeats on multiple fronts

Edward: "There is a key I'm looking for. Belongs to a set I've been stripping off Templars."

Antó: "The Templar keys? I thought they'd been destroyed."

—Edward and Antó discussing the Templar keys, 1716.

While the Templars carried out similar attacks on the other Assassin bureaus in the Caribbean from 1716 to 1717, they all saw the same outcome as the failed assault on Tulum. In each case, the losses owed to the assistance of Edward Kenway, who had been convinced by his friend Mary Read to make amends for exposing the bureaus' locations. However, Edward's main objective was obtaining the keys that the leaders of each Templar assault held, which unlocked a vault containing a powerful suit of Templar armor.

Edward and Opía with a dying Lucia

Upon learning of the Taíno Assassin Opía Apito's location in the Cayman Islands, Lucia Márquez, daughter of the late Alejandro Ortega de Márquez, returned to her father's former base on the Isla de la Juventud to rally her Templar army for an assault. Opía was alerted by Edward before this plot could take place, and the two tracked Lucia to the island and assassinated her.

In Havana, a Templar assault on the local Assassin bureau led by Rhona Dinsmore was repelled with the timely arrival of Edward. The leader of the Templars in Havana, Hilary Flint, had by that point skirmished with Dinsmore's agents for years. He waged an arms race against her by employing pickpockets, but with the help of Edward, she was able to destroy his weapons stores, depriving his forces of a large portion of its power. Soon after, Flint was assassinated by Edward while he was distracted by a duel against Dinsmore.

In Nassau, the Chinese Templar and pirate Jing Lang seduced Vance Travers, brother of the local Assassin bureau leader, Upton Travers. Both brothers held one half of a valuable treasure map, and Jing was ordered to acquire the complete map. Rather than invading with her forces outright, Jing hoped to convince Vance to murder his brother, which he attempted twice, first by lying to Edward that Upton was a Templar, and the second with an assailant of his own. After the failure of both attempts, Upton turned the tables by instructing Edward to eliminate both Vance and Jing, which the pirate did successfully.

Edward assassinating Abraham

For many years, the Templar Kenneth Abraham, a commander in the Royal Navy, had been in charge of the war against the Maroons in Jamaica, who were in turn led by the Assassin Antó. Despite the Maroons' technological inferiority, Abraham's forces continuously failed to dislodge them from the mountains. With the location of Antó's bureau, there was a chance for the tide to turn, but a critical strike against the base failed due the intervention of Edward. This setback did little to buckle the morale of the British, for large shipments of weapons were expected to arrive shortly to bolster their forces. In anticipation of their victory, the British soldiers staged a ball one evening, but it was during this event that Abraham met his end at Edward's blade.

The Fragment of Eden

Torres: "The pirate fleet has crippled our trade and evaded our justice for too long. If we want this province to rise to serve its true purpose... their leader has to be eradicated!"

Hume: "His current position has come to my knowledge, governor... My brigs are on their way..."

Torres: "Good... this time the Prince of Pirates shall embark upon his eternal rest."

—Torres ordering Francis Hume to eliminate Samuel Bellamy, 1717.

Francis Hume

By 1716, the Templars came into the possession of the Fragment of Eden, a Piece of Eden with special capabilities. The Fragment was also sought by the Assassin Samuel Bellamy, who took up the guise of a pirate and appointed a significant crew after overthrowing the pirate leader, Benjamin Hornigold. Laureano Torres assigned Christopher Condent, Francis Hume, Hornigold and John Barnes to protect the Piece of Eden from the Assassin.

Believing that the artifact was being transported aboard the Spanish Treasure Fleet, Bellamy attacked the fleet, with the assistance of fellow pirates Alonzo Batilla and Olivier Levasseur. Finding out that the Piece of Eden was not aboard the fleet, Batilla tailed Barnes and Hume and spied on a Templar meeting, where he learned that the Templars planned to kill Bellamy. Meanwhile, Bellamy found the location of the Fragment of Eden, which was with the Templar ally Laurens Prins. The pirates soon managed to attack and steal the Piece of Eden, capturing Prins' ship, the Whydah, and killing Hume in the process.

Believing Bellamy to hold the artifact, the Templars sank the Whydah off the coast of Massachusetts in April 1717, killing him. In the meantime, Condent had infiltrated the Pirate Republic in Nassau to steal back the Fragment of Eden. However, Levasseur sensed Condent was a Templar and left the island, leaving clues for Batilla to find him. The Templars ambushed and sunk his ship while he was attempting to flee, but the pirate used the powers of the Piece of Eden and escaped on another ship. Barnes was later killed by Condent, after he failed to give away the location of Olivier Levasseur.

Deal with the slaver

Torres: "Two years ago we offered a reward for the Sage's recapture. Today someone claims to have found him. This gold is his ransom."

Edward: "Who found him?"

Torres: "A slaver by the name of Laurens Prins. He lives in Kingston."

—Torres and Edward discussing Roberts and Prins, 1717.

Edward questioning Torres

In January 1717, Torres received word that Laurens Prins had found Bartholomew Roberts and was planning to sell him for the bounty the Templars had placed on his head two years prior. Torres arranged to meet Prins in Kingston and buy Roberts from him, but while he was visiting Punta Guarico to acquire gold for the transaction, the fort came under attack by Edward Kenway and his crew. After the pirates captured the fort, Edward interrogated Torres and learned what the gold was intended for.

Still seeking the Sage himself in the hopes he would lead him to the Observatory, Edward pressured Torres into conducting the transaction on his terms. Thus, when Torres met with Prins in Kingston a few months later, Edward was following closely behind with a portion of the ransom. The plan was for him to bring up the rest of the money once Prins had proven he had Roberts in his possession.

Prins reneging on his deal with Torres

Unbeknownst to Torres and Prins, the Assassin Mary Read was also in Kingston, where she intended to eliminate Prins on the Brotherhood's behalf. Edward learned of his friend's assassination contract and convinced her not to kill the slaver until they found the Sage. As the two tailed Torres and Prins, the latter spotted them and, upon reaching a secluded spot, told the Grand Master that he had been followed. He then promptly reneged on their deal and ordered his guards to deal with Edward and Mary while Torres was forced to flee empty-handed. Later that night, Prins was assassinated by Edward, and Roberts escaped once again.

Hornigold's efforts

Edward: "A pox on you, traitor! You sold us down river!"

Hornigold: "Because I found a better path! The Templars know order. Discipline. Structure. But you never could fathom these subtleties."

—Hornigold justifying his reasons for joining the Templars to Edward, 1719.

In 1718, Woodes Rogers was appointed Governor of the Bahamas and sought to reestablish order to to the anarchic Nassau, which had hitherto hosted what pirates such as Edward Kenway, Benjamin Hornigold, and Edward Thatch romanticized as the Pirate Republic. Rogers arrived in Nassau on 22 July, bringing with him news of the King's pardon that offered clemency to pirates who accepted it on or before 5 September 1718. Hornigold, disillusioned with the failure of the Pirate Republic, was receptive to Rogers and inducted into the Templar Order not long afterwards.

Hornigold informing his fellow Templars of Roberts' location

In the meantime, the Templars discovered that Roberts had been working on a slave ship called the Princess which regularly sailed out of Kingston. In May 1719, Rogers and Hornigold learned from their investigations in Kingston that the Princess had been assailed by pirates six weeks previously off the coast of Principe. Hornigold dispatched his men under the command of trusted subordinates Josiah Burgess and John Cockram to Principe to recapture Roberts, but their conversation was eavesdropped by Edward. Having failed to prevent Edward's escape upon discovering him, the Templars were now in a race against the pirate to Principe for the Sage.

Although Burgess and Cockram arrived first, they were killed on 19 June 1719 by Edward to prevent news of Roberts' escape from reaching the Templars. Months later in September, the Portugueuse galleon Nosso Senhor da Compreensão, which carried the blood vials of the leading Templars of the West Indies Rite, was lost to Roberts and Edward. Subsequently, the two pirates were tracked by Hornigold just as they were traveling to the Observatory. A naval battle ensued that quickly saw Hornigold's defeat; his ship, the Benjamin, was run aground on outcroppings called "The Devil's Backbone". There, Hornigold met his end at the hands of his former comrade Edward.

Final developments

Torres: "Captain Kenway. Ever a splinter in my side. Does this murder fulfill you?"

Edward: "I'm only seeing a job done, Torres. As you'd have done with me."

Torres: "As we have done, I think. You have no family anymore, no friends, no future. Your losses are far greater than ours."

Edward: "That may be. But killing you rights a far greater wrong than ever I did."

—Torres and Edward in the former's final moments, 1722.

Rogers and Torres interrogating Edward

In November 1720, Rogers and Torres attended the trial of Mary Read and Anne Bonny for piracy, where they met with Edward. The pirate had languished at the prison in Port Royal for more than a year after having been betrayed by Roberts and turned over to the British authorities. Aware of Edward's former partnership with Roberts, the Templars offered to whisk him out of prison if he revealed the location of the Observatory. For this recourse, they used their influence to delay Edward's own trial and execution but knew they could not do so indefinitely.

In April 1721, however, the Assassins finally made their move to rescue Mary and Anne, freeing Edward at the same time; the pirate formally joined the Assassins shortly afterwads. A month later, displeased with the poor financial management of the Bahamas, King George I recalled Rogers to England. Before his voyage home, Rogers hosted a farewell party in Kingston where he was nearly assassinated by Edward in the guise of the Italian diplomat Ruggiero Ferraro. In return for sharing his lead on Roberts' location – Principe – Edward spared the Templar's life.

Despite the subsequent death of Roberts at the hands of Edward, Torres finally managed to locate the Observatory by August 1722. While he launched an expedition there, he left behind a decoy in Havana to deceive the Assassins, knowing they were likely to target him. At the Castillo de San Salvador de la Punta, the decoy was assassinated by Edward, who was then ambushed by Toress' bodyguard El Tiburón, though the Assassin managed to slay him after a duel.

Torres' demise

On 1 September 1722, Torres arrived at the Observatory. His soldiers massacred the Guardians that defended the site and forced their way through the jungle to their destination. As he pushed his way through the complex, however, his forces were decimated by its defense mechanisms. Torres himself made it to the central chamber unscathed, but was unceremoniously killed by Edward while stranded by the shifting platforms and traps.

Struggle to revive the Rite

With the demise of Torres and all leading members of the West Indies Rite, the branch had been all but destroyed. Assassin control of the Caribbean remained uncontested by the Templars for the next several decades.

In 1742, in light of erroneous rumors that the Precursor box of the legendary Assassin Ezio Auditore had been transported on a Manila galleon to Acapulco, the British Templar John Harrison reported to his Grand Master, Reginald Birch, that the West Indies were enormously difficult for Templars to penetrate. Similarly in 1750, Rafael Joaquín de Ferrer of the Louisiana Rite wrote to his father expressing fears that the region was utterly lost to the Templars, failing to find means of re-establishing the former West Indies Rite. In spite of this, de Ferrer managed to steal maps of the Yucatán Peninsula and some messages between Assassins from the aging Rhona Dinsmore after seducing her. The former would be instrumental in his search for the Chichen Itza Temples.

In 1741, the Templar Lawrence Washington arrived in Jamaica and was part of the expeditions against Cartagena, New Granada, Cuba, and Panama in what became known as the War of Jenkins' Ear, as part of the infantry regiment created by the British Parliament in 1739.

During the Seven Years' War, the Templar Shay Cormac sent emissaries to Francisco Cajigal de la Vega, the governor of Cuba, in order to maintain the Order's relation with him.

In 1773, just prior to the American Revolutionary War, the British warship Windermere sailed around the Bahamas carrying a mysterious shipment of Templar interest. The ship and her fleet were destroyed by the Aquila, a Colonial Assassin ship under the command of Ratonhnhaké:ton and Robert Faulkner. Later that same year, the Leviathan, another British warship, attempted to sail from the Bahamas to England with an important Templar emissary, but it too was destroyed by the Aquila.

Modern times

In 2014, there was a Grand Master operating in Cuba. That year, Alan Rikkin, CEO of Abstergo Industries and head of the Inner Sanctum, sent a memo to Álvaro Gramática informing him that should they proceed with his plan to excavate the Observatory and retrieve the missing vials of Isu blood critical to the Phoenix Project, and that he would contact the Grand Masters in Cuba, Mexico, and the United States for assistance.

Members

Golden Age of Piracy

• Kenneth Abraham
• Renardo Aguilar (Spanish Rite)
• John Barnes
• Josiah Burgess
• Julien du Casse
• John Cockram
• Christopher Condent (British Rite)
• Cuali
• Hilary Flint (British Rite)
• Benjamin Hornigold
• Francis Hume (British Rite)
• Jing Lang (Chinese Rite)

• Alphonse de Marigot
• Lucia Márquez
• Alejandro Ortega de Márquez
• Felicia Moreno
• Charlie Oliver
• Benjamin Pritchard (British Rite)
• Woodes Rogers
• Sylvia Seabrooke
• Mancomb Seepgood
• Laureano de Torres y Ayala (Grand Master; 1673 – 1722)
• Vargas

Modern times

• Cuban Grand Master (Grand Master; c. 2014)

Allies and puppets

Golden Age of Piracy

• Arispe
• Peter Chamberlaine
• Laurens Prins
• Antonio Rueda
• El Tiburón
• Vance Travers (West Indies Brotherhood)
• Francisco Cajigal de la Vega
• Duncan Walpole (British Brotherhood)

Seven Years' War

• Shay Cormac (Colonial Rite)
• Lawrence Washington (British Rite)

Appearances

• Assassin's Creed: Revelations – Discover Your Legacy (first mentioned) (indirect mention only)
• Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag (first appearance)
• Assassin's Creed: Black Flag
• Assassin's Creed: Pirates
• Assassin's Creed: Memories
• Assassin's Creed: Unity (indirect mention only)
• Assassin's Creed: Rebellion – Dead Men's Gold