Joseph Bannister started out as a well-respected merchant captain in the mid 17th century. In 1684, Bannister ran away with the ship and its thirty to forty guns, picked up a hundred men to serve as his crew, and began his career as a pirate, based in Port Royal, Jamaica, with his ship, The Golden Fleece. He was finally captured in 1687 on the Mosquito Coast and was taken back to Port Royal, Jamaica, where, he was hanged without trial. During the Golden Age of Piracy in the seventeenth century, Bannister should have been immortalized in the lore of the sea -- his exploits more notorious than Blackbeard's, more daring than Kidd's. But his story, and his ship, have been lost to time. If Chatterton and Mattera succeed, they will make history -- it will be just the second time ever that a pirate ship has been discovered and positively identified. They travel the globe in search of historic documents and accounts of the great pirate's exploits, face down dangerous rivals, and battle the tides of nations and governments and experts.