One of the many TIE Fighter Wings (up to 5,000 craft) were stationed upon the first Imperial Battle Station known to many now as the “First Death Star” under the command of Grand Moff Tarkin, was the 37th TIE Fighter Wing.
This unit was one privileged to have been trained at the Academy by the great TIE Ace Soontir Fel, and one of it’s Squadrons got the moniker “Jolly Rogers” from a single graduating class of TIE Pilots in the Academy. They were very tight-knit and over-eager to carry out their duties with almost a “partying” demeanour.
The then-newly-formed “Jolly Roger” Squadron assigned to the 37th Wing on board the Death Star under Grand Moff Tarkin flew enough missions with unusual success that Lord Vader personally selected this tight-knit Squadron when he formed his elite personal Stormtrooper unit, the 501st Legion. The Jolly Rogers were to serve as “combat air support” for the 501st!
The remaining 37th TIE Wing was destroyed with the first Death Star but not until after a Squadron of their fellows almost spoiled the attack by the Rebel X-Wings that fateful morning of the Battle of Yavin. Long after the loss of their mother WING at the Battle of Yavin, the JRS still mutters the motto “37 GO!” before they fly off the racks into battle, honouring their fallen comrades.
Under the leadership of Capt. Clyatt , the Jolly Roger Squadron pursued the Millennium Falcon through a meteor shower, running the rebel craft to ground in the canyons of the largest asteroid where the JRS TIE Bombers flushed out the Falcon and made it flee for Bespin’s Cloud City.
The TIE Fighters that chased the Millennium Falcon from Cloud City and to the waiting cannons of Lord Vader’s Executor Super Star Destroyer were from the Jolly Roger Squadron since 501st Troops were securing Cloud City for Lord Vader. Immediately following the Cloud City incident and after JRS TIE Bombers crippled Cloud City semi-permanently with a bombing raid, Capt. Clyatt received orders for another duty-station. The JRS’s TIE Bomber Ace Pax Lode took command of the Squadron and was allowed to personally fly a TIE Advancedx1 like Lord Vader’s. The JRS went on to serve Lord Vader personally in the struggle against Black Sun and Prince Xizor, even wiping out a Falleen colony on Vader’s orders, making a name for themselves as “war criminals” with Rebel Alliance commanders. Other “war crimes” attributed to the 501st and their TIE Squadron by the Rebel Alliance was the destruction of a Cruiser full of Twileks bound for the Outer Rim and a bombing run against the Rebel supporters on Ando where the 501st was deployed to stop financial harvests going to the Rebel Alliance.
The Jolly Roger Squadron was at the Battle of Endor alongside the famed 181st under the command of Baron Fel and fought valiantly against the Rebel Fleet. When their Star Destroyer was disabled during the Battle of Endor, the JRS ditched their TIEs on another Star Destroyer escaping the explosion of the second Death Star and made it back to the greater Imperial Fleet.
Vader and The Emperor were dead, so the JRS among the rest of the Fleet’s Forces ended up in the hands of several Imperial Officers whom became “warlords” such as Zsinji, Isard, and Thrawn. The Jolly Roger Squadron wound-up under the command of Director of Imperial Intelligence Ysanne Isard after the death of
Emperor Palpatine at the Battle of Endor. Rumor had it that the JRS Squadron leader Captain Pax Lode was one of Ysanne Isard’s lovers during this time but that didn’t stop “Iceheart” Isard from ordering he and the JRS into near-suicidal battle conditions and missions that were doomed to fail. Isard had the JRS flying the new and superior TIE Craft such as the Defender.
After the death of Isard, the JRS was assigned away from the elite 501st and ended up under the command of Grand Admiral Thrawn in the unknown regions of the galaxy during the “Hand of Thrawn” period as Rebels have called it.
Grand Admiral Thrawn, like Isard, used the elite Jolly Roger Squadron for the most difficult missions and even had the entire Squadron piloting TIE Defenders before Thrawn’s demise.
Following the Thrawn years, the JRS wasn’t heard from again until the VONG invasion years later, when a Squadron of Chiss Clawcraft bore the markings of the JRS in battle against the alien invaders, the infamous “skull and bones” white and black insignia of the Jolly Roger Squadron flying into battle once more.