WIKI TIKI WEDNESDAY = BLACKBEARD

'The Saint'
"The Old Treasure Story"

From the IMDb:
In a pub in Cornwall, the Saint meets three men, each of whom owns a third of a map that allegedly shows the whereabouts of sunken treasure in the West Indies. He joins their party to discover whether the treasure is a myth or a reality. On arriving at the supposed location of the treasure he quickly comes to see that there is - literally - a deadly rivalry among the group members.  

The treasure - which did exist, at least in Toobworld - was reportedly hidden away by Blackbeard.

From Wikipedia:
Edward Teach or Edward Thatch (c. 1680 – 22 November 1718), better known as Blackbeard, was an English pirate who operated around the West Indies and the eastern coast of Britain's North American colonies. Little is known about his early life, but he may have been a sailor on privateer ships during Queen Anne's War before settling on the Bahamian island of New Providence, a base for Captain Benjamin Hornigold, whose crew Teach joined around 1716. Hornigold placed him in command of a sloop that he had captured, and the two engaged in numerous acts of piracy. Their numbers were boosted by the addition to their fleet of two more ships, one of which was commanded by Stede Bonnet; but Hornigold retired from piracy towards the end of 1717, taking two vessels with him.

Teach captured a French merchant vessel known as La Concorde, renamed her Queen Anne's Revenge, and equipped her with 40 guns. He became a renowned pirate, his nickname derived from his thick black beard and fearsome appearance; he was reported to have tied lit fuses (slow matches) under his hat to frighten his enemies. He formed an alliance of pirates and blockaded the port of Charles Town, South Carolina, ransoming the port's inhabitants. He then ran Queen Anne's Revenge aground on a sandbar near Beaufort, North Carolina. He parted company with Bonnet and settled in Bath, North Carolina, also known as Bath Town where he accepted a royal pardon. But he was soon back at sea, where he attracted the attention of Alexander Spotswood, the Governor of Virginia. Spotswood arranged for a party of soldiers and sailors to capture the pirate, which they did on 22 November 1718 following a ferocious battle. Teach and several of his crew were killed by a small force of sailors led by Lieutenant Robert Maynard.

Teach was a shrewd and calculating leader who spurned the use of force, relying instead on his fearsome image to elicit the response that he desired from those whom he robbed. Contrary to the modern-day picture of the traditional tyrannical pirate, he commanded his vessels with the consent of their crews and there is no known account of his ever having harmed or murdered those whom he held captive. He was romanticized after his death and became the inspiration for an archetypal pirate in works of fiction across many genres.

Treasure hunters have long busied themselves searching for any trace of his rumoured hoard of gold and silver, but nothing found in the numerous sites explored along the east coast of the US has ever been connected to him. Some tales suggest that pirates often killed a prisoner on the spot where they buried their loot, and Teach is no exception in these stories, but that no finds have come to light is not exceptional; buried pirate treasure is often considered a modern myth for which almost no supporting evidence exists. The available records include nothing to suggest that the burial of treasure was a common practice, except in the imaginations of the writers of fictional accounts such as Treasure Island. Such hoards would necessitate a wealthy owner, and their supposed existence ignores the command structure of a pirate vessel, in which the crew served for a share of the profit. The only pirate ever known to bury treasure was William Kidd; the only treasure so far recovered from Teach's exploits is that taken from the wreckage of what is presumed to be the Queen Anne's Revenge, which was found in 1996.  As of 2009 more than 250,000 artifacts had been recovered.  A selection is on public display at the North Carolina Maritime Museum. 

• In the 1968 Doctor Who serial, The Mind Robber, the Master of the Land of Fiction summons Blackbeard in his mental battle with the Second Doctor.
• In the 2000 action-comedy series Jack of All Trades Blackbeard appears in two episodes played by Hori Ahipene.
• In the 2005 BBC miniseries Blackbeard, Blackbeard was played by James Purefoy.
• In the 2006 Hallmark Channel miniseries Blackbeard, the famed pirate (Angus Macfadyen) searches for Captain Kidd's treasure.
• The 2006 Bones episode "The Man with the Bones" centers around a murder on Assateague Island, the legendary home of Blackbeard's hidden treasure.
• In the 2014 Once Upon a Time episodes "The Jolly Roger", "Snow Drifts" and "Fall", Blackbeard is featured as an enemy of Captain Hook. He is portrayed by Charles Mesure.
• The 2014 series Crossbones features Blackbeard (John Malkovich) as the main character.
• Ray Stevenson portrays Blackbeard in the third and fourth season of the Starz series Black Sails.
• The 2018 DC's Legends of Tomorrow third season episode "The Curse of the Earth Totem" features Blackbeard, portrayed by Jonathan Cake, after coming into possession of the mystical Earth Totem. Cake reprises his role in the season's finale "The Good, the Bad, and the Cuddly".

Maybe in the Real Word, Blackbeard didn't kill members of the crew to "guard" the treasure, but it certainly happened in Toobworld.  And on this particular excursion, they found proof of that.

And traps were set which would have been worthy of Indiana Jones' attention. For instance, this beautiful diamond necklace:

The plan was for the necklace to be grabbed by somebody who stumbled on the treasure.  And that would trigger a stalactite to crash down and kill the thief.

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Unfortunately for Simon Templar and his fellow treasure hunters, Blackbeard's treasure was lost forever.  

But at least most of them escaped with their lives....

BCnU!