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The wreck of the Quedah Merch­ant, a treasure ship captured by the Scottish pirate Captain William Kidd, has been found in the Caribbean. It lies in just 10ft (3m) of water off the tiny island of Catalina in the Dominican Republic. Its scattered cannons and anchors, barnacle-covered and partially hidden by swirling sands, were spotted by a local man. The wreck was scuttled in 1699. “I couldn’t believe everybody had missed it for 300 years,” said Charles Beeker, an Indiana University marine archæologist called in by the Dominican government. “I’ve dived on thousands of wrecks and this is one of the first that has not been looted.” Historians believe the ship was stripped of treasure and burned shortly after Kidd abandoned it.

Born around 1645, Kidd was said to be a clergyman’s son from Greenock, near Glasgow, although recent genealogical research suggests he was born in Dundee. He partly inspired Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow character in the Pirates of the Caribbean film trilogy. At first, Kidd was a privateer – a mercenary licensed by William III to hunt Britain’s enemies, usually the French or Spanish. The Crown was supposed to get 10 per cent of the plunder, but Kidd often kept all his loot. In 1695, he left London in the Adventure Galley, a 284-tonner with a crew of 150 and 34 cannon. Late in 1696, he attacked a British East India company convoy and was declared a pirate.

While sailing the Indian Ocean in 1698, he took his greatest prize, the Quedah Merchant, a 500-ton Moorish trader from Arm­enia loaded with gold, silver and fine silks. He scuttled the rotting and leaky Adventure Galley and renamed the Quedah Merchant the Adventure Prize. He sailed it to the Caribbean, where he is said to have buried his treasure, although this is widely thought to be romantic fiction. He was then lured to Boston by his one-time backer, the Earl of Bellomont, and put in solitary confinement. Found guilty of piracy and murder, he was hanged at Execution Dock in Wapping, London, on 23 May 1701 and his body suspended in a gibbet over the Thames for two years. [AP] 14 Dec; D.Mail, 15 Dec 2007.