The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-01-26
PIECES OF EIGHT
 STILL LURE MEN
Seekers Of Millions Spurred On By Legends Of Kidds 8 Hidden Gold

dores, doubloons, pieces of eight :, slowed in copper-bound sea chests and buried in the sands on lonely coasts or banked in bags in the holds of sunken Spanish galleons call today, as they have called down the centuries, to the search for buried treasures. It is the one adventure lure that will never die out so long as the cays of the Caribbean and the hidden reefs of tropical seas conceal the loot of plate ship and mer-. chantman. Sir Henry Morgan, Lolo-i nois, Captain Kidd, Blackboard, La fitte, Roberts, Avery still are names the mention of which conjure up the vision of riches in bullion and jewels lying where the old freq ,ooters sank them. Every now and then newspapers chronicle the setting out of an expedi- tion for buried treasure, even if the re- suit of tlAt expedition seldom sees print.
 \ Cocos 4sland, off the west shore of Costa Rica, where, legend has it, close to $12,O00,O0O worth of gold, plate and gems lie hidden in the cave that has held 1t since it was taken from the treasure ships of Lima, is probably the best known pirates lode. Until the World war broke out expeditions to Cocos were of regular occurrence. Ad- venturers essayed the island until from practically one end to the Other it was spaded, blasted and torn up. And yet the hidden hoard evaded them-to the best of knowledge it remains there to this day.
 The Tale of Cocos Island
 Two men, it is said, have seen it-a mountain of treasuse piled up in sacks and chests. That was back in the 1S40s. The discovery cost the life of one of the seekers, who had sailed down from Newfoundland with full belief in the tale of certain Captain Thompson, former member of the piratical band of Benito Benito, the harrier of the - South Amercan seas.
 This Captain Thompson, so tler~taie ~ ran, when entrusted with the 12,000,- 900 treasure by the Spanish of Lima at the time they were fleeing the revolt that ended their rule in Peru, appro- priated it and buried it on the island. When the career of Benito, whom he then joined, was cut short by destruc- tion he escaped with his maps and charts of Cocos island to London, where he became friendly with a Newfound- lander, Keating, and eventually dis closed his story. Thompson died and left his friend the clues.
 Heating and a Captain Rogue of Newfoundland set sail and found the treasure. Their crew mutinied and de- manded a share. Loaded down with gold, Heating and Rogue were endeavor- ing to reach their ship when their surf boat capsized and Rogue sank with his plumber. Carried out to sea on the capsized craft Heating was rescued by a passing craft and came home. The mutineers, left behind to explore by themselves, never turned up a single piece of gold.
 But the story had leaked out-the treasure seekers began to prepare for descent on the island. One of them sseven went so far as to obtain a patent Sas governor of the island from the Re public of Costa Rica and for decades spent his days in frpitless digging. Hardly twenty years ago two rival ex- petitions of Englishmen arrived on the island at the same time. and their fever ish competition and distrust wound up in combat. Benito himself, according to another story, left vast treasure hid- den on Cocos.
 < Greatest Pirate of Them All
 So, it is said, did Sir Henry Morgan. who is reputed to have left trail of buried treasure all through the seas. where for years he hlazed a path of. . terror. In his wake lay the pillage of Puerto Bello, rich in ransom: the cap eture of AIaracaibo on the Venezuelan coast; the destructoin of the castle of Chagre, and the famous overland march at the head of 1.200 freebooters, which ended in the firing and sack of the City of Panama. Relentlessly he waged his war on the Spaniards, their. treasure citieskand galleons. Down the years Sir Henry Morgan has stood out as the greatest pirate of them all. The pas sage of time has tended to gloss over the cruelty and blOodthirstiness of his acts and emphasize rather the super human daring that sent him at .he head of small but deckless forces to storm fortified walls and meet overwhelming superiority in numbers and cannon.
 1t was Fracois LolOnois. the imme- diate predecessor of Morgan. who was probably the first of the pirates to spread fear through the Spanish Main It is told of him that he cut the hearts out of his victims and gave no quarter to Spaniard. Ill the end he met fate us terrible as any which he meted out to hisvictims. Captured by the Indians of Darien he was torn in pieces and his body thrown into the fire.
 The treasure islands where pirate plumber yet lies are scattered the world over, ranging from the Caribbean to the Indian ocean. where the Jolly Roger in the old footing days bellied out from many masthead. There are other troves of treasure also. Many coast towns of England and Scotland have their stories of galleOns of the Spanish Armada. laden with gold which went down in the great storm that followed the battle when the sea power of England and Spain met in combat:
 In the Bay of Tobermory, in the island of Null, off the west coast of Scotland deep in mud, lies the wreck of one # these Armada galleOns, re- puted to be the payship of the fleet and { have in it's hold no less than S30,0t 1000 worth of treasure. It has @ "i' uere since 15SS, when a gallant
 r'ansman, being carried out to o. hostage, set match to the ' !, si4 { .n;lg,ll, 1"i blew Ter up. ac- x orlinE 10 the local story Thei villagers since have seen n long procession of treasure seekers dive and probe for the hulk of the old galleon. none of them meeting with any worthwhile success.