Latest / In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson / Panhandle Pirates Pt. 2 - TPR's In Focus - May 28, 2026

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Panhandle Pirates Pt. 2 - TPR's In Focus - May 28, 2026 · In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson

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  Support comes from the Janice Hawkins Cultural Arts Park
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  on the main campus of Troy University,
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  featuring the International Arts Center,
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  the Fred Nall Hollis Museum, and the Hua Bao Zhu Gallery.
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  More information at troy.edu slash arts park.
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  From Troy Public Radio, this is In Focus,
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  and I'm Carolyn Hutcheson.
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  In our History in Your Hands series,
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  we talk with archaeologist Michael Thomin
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  about the exploits of pirate Charles Gibbs.
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  Michael serves as assistant director
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  of education and interpretation
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  for the Florida Public Archaeology Network
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  at the University of West Florida.
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  Mike, welcome back to Troy Public Radio.
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  Thanks so much for having me back.
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  Mike, you told one of the most intriguing stories
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  in one of our previous interviews.
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  You grew up loving pirate stories,
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  and your first story was about a very famous pirate
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  along the Panhandle, Jean Lafitte.
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  Of course, Lafitte is probably the better known,
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  but there was also a famous or infamous pirate
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  that had some connections to the Florida Panhandle
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  in the 1830s, so a little bit later on than the Lafittes,
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  but his alias was Charles Gibbs.
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  Did you ever find out his real name?
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  Yes, we do know his real name was James Jeffers
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  or James Jeffries.
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  Basically, what happened is after his whole trial,
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  which was splashed across newspapers all across the country,
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  it was a sensational news story
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  in all the major newspapers,
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  but during the course of his trial and conviction,
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  and then later on his execution,
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  it came out during some reporting
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  that his real name was actually James Jeffers
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  and that Charles Gibbs was an alias.
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  Can you compare Charles Gibbs with Jean Lafitte?
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  Yes, probably the biggest thing,
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  obviously other than their involvement with piracy,
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  is the fact that these two pirates
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  operated in the early 19th century,
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  so unlike what most people are familiar with,
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  pirates during what's known as the golden age of piracy,
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  so this is late 1600s throughout the early 1700s,
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  but 100 years after that in the late 1700s, early 1800s,
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  piracy kind of spiraled back out of control
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  in the Gulf and Caribbean.
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  These two operated around that time.
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  Charles Gibbs was a mariner.
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  He had spent most of his life at sea,
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  but there's a lot of questions about the story
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  that eventually came out because of this trial.
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  In 1831, there was this sensational trial
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  that was beginning to be reported on,
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  and it involved Charles Gibbs,
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  and he was on board a vessel, a brig,
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  called the Vineyard.
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  It was carrying cargo from New Orleans,
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  and its plan was to sail from New Orleans
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  up to Philadelphia.
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  Well, during the voyage,
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  it came out that the brig, the Vineyard,
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  was actually also carrying several kegs
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  full of Mexican dollars that were valued
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  anywhere between $15,000 to $20,000 at the time,
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  so worth a lot of money.
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  When some of the crew members figured this out,
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  including Charles Gibbs,
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  they conspired that they would steal the money.
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  It was just too much of a valuable opportunity
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  for them to pass up,
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  so they killed the captain,
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  they killed the first mate,
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  and then they eventually took the ship to New York,
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  and when they got to New York,
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  they decided that they needed to cover up their crime,
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  so they put the money that they got off the vessel
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  onto two small longboats,
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  and then they set the brig, Vineyard,
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  on fire and let it sink.
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  So what happened after they sank the ship?
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  They were trying to row to shore
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  to what's now Long Island, New York,
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  but the weather kicked up,
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  and one of the boats capsized,
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  and they lost most of their money except for one keg.
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  Eventually, they were able to make it to shore,
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  and they were able to bury one of the kegs,
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  and then they made it to a tavern
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  and then tried to sort of cover it up from there,
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  but unfortunately for them,
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  they were eventually caught,
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  and then they were put on trial,
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  and actually two of the individuals,
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  Charles Gibbs and one of his co-conspirators,
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  Thomas Wainsley, were convicted
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  because two of the other co-conspirators
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  actually cooperated with the state prosecutor
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  and bore witness testimony against them.
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  Were the coins ever found?
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  This is such an interesting case.
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  It is one of the very few documented cases
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  where pirates actually buried treasure.
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  Pirates burying treasure is kind of the trope, right?
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  When we think of Treasure Island, right?
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  That's kind of really what started that trope.
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  When that book was written by Robert Louis Stevenson,
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  he probably got that idea
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  for burying treasure from this case.
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  It wasn't typical for pirates
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  to even get things like gold and silver dollars,
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  and most of what pirates were capturing
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  were things like the Lafittes,
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  where they were enslaved people,
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  or the cargo that the ship was actually carrying.
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  Very few pirates were successfully able
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  to actually get hold of money.
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  One of the only actual documented cases
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  that we have where pirates were burying treasure,
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  but the pirates actually came back and dug it up.
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  So there was never left.
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  When people buried things that were valuable,
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  typically they didn't plan
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  to just never come and get it again.
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  And that's one of my favorite things about Treasure Island.
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  If you read the story at the end of the book,
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  when they finally get to the X marks the spot on the map
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  and they get to the buried treasure,
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  the buried treasure had already been found, been dug up.
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  So yes, it was found by the pirates who buried it.
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  How did the law catch up with him?
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  When they had gone to a tavern,
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  they had to get their stories straight.
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  And one of the co-conspirators felt
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  that they were about to be swindled
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  out of their fair share of the money.
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  So he basically ratted on them.
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  He told the authorities,
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  and then the one co-conspirator
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  who had told the authorities,
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  the marshal who then arrested everybody,
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  agreed to testify against the two individuals
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  who were eventually charged with murder and piracy
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  and then hanged.
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  And Charles Gibbs was one of those people.
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  What happened to his body?
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  Well, Charles Gibbs and Thomas Wainsley
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  were taken to Ellis Island.
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  There's a fort there called Fort Gibson,
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  and that is where they had this very public execution.
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  Public executions throughout this time period
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  were very common.
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  Papers often reported in very graphic detail.
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  And so they were taken to Fort Gibson
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  and they were hanged there.
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  Charles Gibbs' body, it was basically donated to science.
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  They went to the medical college for dissection,
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  and then they performed just autopsies
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  for scientific reasons.
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  And actually, there's a piece of his cranium
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  that is in a collection at a museum.
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  This mutiny and piracy during this period,
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  I mean, it's kind of peculiar
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  because the 1830s is kind of late.
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  But really what drove the media sort of frenzy
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  over this case was the things that Charles Gibbs
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  admitted to doing, the different piratical acts
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  that he committed throughout his very long career.
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  And that's where really the sensationalization
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  of this story took root.
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  And so a local magistrate visits him,
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  and it's there where Gibbs confesses to 15 years
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  of being involved in piracy throughout the Gulf and Caribbean
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  and it's just an incredible story.
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  Charles Gibbs, according to his testimony
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  and to what he later confesses to,
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  he originally served on the USS Chesapeake
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  during the War of 1812.
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  And it was involved in a very famous battle
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  with a ship called HMS Shannon,
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  where the Chesapeake was actually captured.
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  Not long after that, according to Gibbs' account,
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  he's captured, he spends a couple years
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  in Nova Scotia as a prisoner.
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  But after the War of 1812 ends in 1815,
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  Charles Gibbs joins a privateer ship
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  that has a commission to fight against
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  some of the Spanish-American countries
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  that are revolting against Spain.
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  He joins a schooner called Maria,
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  gets involved in piracy, according to his own account.
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  And he says that when they were on Maria,
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  they weren't getting as much action
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  as they were hoping to get, so they decided to mutiny.
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  And that's where he gets his connection to the panhandle,
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  because based on his testimony,
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  they actually dropped off the officers in Pensacola
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  and decided they would just become full-fledged pirates.
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  And from there, he basically claims
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  to have been involved in many different incidents of piracy
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  throughout the Gulf and Caribbean,
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  where he claims to have captured over 40 ships
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  and admits to executing most of the crews on those ships.
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  We know that most of the things that Charles Gibbs claims
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  in those confessions, including his claim
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  that he served on USS Chesapeake, are just not true.
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  There's been several historians that have tried to verify
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  some of the claims that he makes,
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  and so far, very few of the things that he's said
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  in his confession have been corroborated.
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  Obviously, he was burnishing his legend.
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  Mike, I want to thank you for joining us today
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  with the story of Pirate Charles Gibbs.
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  Thanks so much for having me back.
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  That was archaeologist Michael Thoman,
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  Director of Research and Education
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  at the University of West Florida
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  and Senior Research Associate
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  with the Florida Public Archaeology Network.
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  Thanks for joining us
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  for the History in Your Hands archaeology series
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  here on In Focus.
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  I'm Carolyn Hutcheson,
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  and this is listener-supported Troy Public Radio.