Jose Gasper is the talk of this episode. He was a famed pirate in 1700’s known for his ruthlessness and his many looted treasures. Born in 1756, Gasper quickly rose among the ranks of the Florida navy, but his thirst for power and greed got the best of him. He led a mutiny, and to escape, he eventually stole Florida’s priced vessel ‘’Florida Blanca,’’ and sailed away to live a life of full blown piracy. He sailed around the golf in the late 1900’s, attacking ships and looting treasure. His decided reign of terror earned him fame and a huge fortune estimated to be around 30 million dollars today.
As the story goes, his reign sent fear into the hearts of many. He conquered many other ships, relieving them of their treasures, which he buried before deciding to attack another oncoming ship that turned out to be a U.S. enterprise and he met his demise. As his men were being conquered, he reportedly tied an iron chain round his body, yelled something about how he was the only person who can end his life, then jumps into the sea. The question remains to this day, was Jose Gasper real? Did he do all the things history says he did? Where is his buried treasure?
To find out, Josh Gates heads to the city of Tampa, Florida on a most glorious and significant day. The city is abuzz with thousands of people celebrating the great Jose Gasper. The whole town is in a sort of Pirates festival, dressed in appearances of different great pirates, real and fictional. Josh joins the celebration and realizes that these people hold high hopes that Jose Gasper was real, and Josh is bent on finding out for sure.
He visits the Tampa Bay historical centre where he meets Rodney Kate Powell, who informs him a little bit more about the legend of the great Gasper. He shows Josh some proof of Jose’s existence and pulls out of the archives a pamphlet testifying to Gasper’s stories and existence. While Josh is skeptical about believing a story out of a pamphlet, he learns that the stories in the pamphlet were from a man named Juan Gomez – a famed fisherman who is known for telling stories and interesting tales. He claims that in his youth, he served as the cabin boy to the great Jose Gasper and was there when the treasures were buried. He sells treasure maps and claims he was Jose’s right hand man.
To find this treasure, Josh heads to Charlotte Harbor where he meets with two of the world’s leading enthusiasts on the life and movements of Jose Gasper. They sail on the Peace River headed towards the treasure. They hand Josh a book that points at where Gasper hid the treasure. The book names three landmarks – a wooden bridge, an iron bridge, and a tree marked with roman numerals. Josh and the men actually find these landmarks and begin digging for the treasure. After a hectic search, they find nothing. Josh calls it a day and both the other men would have to return another day. In the meantime, Josh heads on another search.
Gasper was known to have visited several places – islands during his reign. It’s possible he even hid some treasure in some of these islands. Josh decides to infiltrate some of Gasper’s strongholds in search of some treasure. He heads for Gasper’s most popular island – Gasperilla Islands. This was his main base of operations during his lifetime. Josh meets Captain Bradley Williamson and another explorer well versed in the great pirate’s life. They believe that some treasures must have been buried here. Previous searches haven’t revealed anything, but their resolve remains unshakable.
They head to Key West, a few miles west of (Gasperilla island) on speedboat and begin their search with metal detectors to find any signs of treasure buried underground. They find several metals, but useless metals like nails, beer cans, and other not so useful materials, until Josh digs up a musket ball fitting the description of a material from the 1700’s. Their hopes are renewed, so they continue their search and eventually find another artifact – a chest padlock. These are maybe irrefutable evidence that there actually was a treasure chest buried here, but where is the chest this padlock locked? Unfortunately, it is possible that the chest is long gone. Another dead end.
Again, due to some of the legends that claim Gasper threw himself into the ocean, some believe he didn’t bury the treasures, but they sank with the ship. To find out, Josh heads with some other explorers towards the ocean where the ship sank. They detect metal in the bottom of the sea and Josh dives in with another diver to scout out what was detected. They found unbelievable sight – debris from a shipwreck. From the looks of it, it fit a ship around the late 1700’s. They swim further into the sea and find a massive anchor – all proof that there was a shipwreck here, but where was the treasure? No sign of it.
In the end, one has to wonder, was Jose Gasper even real? I mean the archives present a pamphlet as proof of his existence. A pamphlet? They say that more proof of his existence is from tales told by a storyteller who fishes and sells treasure maps for a living. These make his existence seem highly unlikely. However, there is the issue of the padlock, musket ball, and the anchors and shipwrecks found in the sea. Do these prove Jose Gaspers existence? Or just the existence of a pirate, not necessarily Jose Gasper.?
