One of Mr. Hawker's parishioners, Peter Barrow, had been for full forty years a wrecker, but of a much more harmless description: he had been a watcher of the coast for such objects as the waves might turn up to reward his patience. Another was Tristam Pentire, a hero of contraband adventure, and agent for sale of smuggled cargoes in bygone times. With a merry twinkle of the eye, and in a sharp and ringing tone, he loved to tell such tales of wild adventure and of "derring do," as would make the foot of the exciseman falter and his cheek turn pale.
During the latter years of last century there lived in Wellcombe, one of Mr. Hawker's parishes, a man whose name is still remembered with terror--Cruel Coppinger. There are people still alive who remember his wife.
Local recollections of the man have molded themselves into the rhyme--
Will you hear of Cruel Coppinger?
He came from a foreign land:
He was brought to us by the salt water,
He was carried away by the wind!"
His arrival on the north coast of Cornwall was signalized by a terrific hurricane. The storm came up Channel from the south-west. A strange vessel of foreign rig went on the reefs of Harty Race, and was broken to pieces by the waves. The only man who came ashore was the skipper. A crowd was gathered on the sand, on horseback and on foot, women as well as men, drawn together by the tidings of a probable wreck. Into their midst rushed the dripping stranger, and bounded suddenly upon the crupper of a young damsel who had ridden to the beach to see the sight. He grasped her bridle, and shouting in some foreign tongue, urged the double-laden animal into full speed, and the horse naturally took his homeward way. The damsel was Miss Dinah Hamlyn. The stranger descended at her father's door, and lifted her off her saddle. He then announced himself as a Dane, named Coppinger. He took his place at the family board, and there remained until he had secured the affections and hand of Dinah. The father died, and Coppinger at once succeeded to the management and control of the house, which thenceforth became a den and refuge of every lawless character along the coast. All kinds of wild uproar and reckless revelry appalled the neighborhood day and night. It was discovered that an organized band of smugglers, wreckers, and poachers made this house their rendezvous, and that "Cruel Coppinger" was their captain. In those days, and in that far-away region, the peaceable inhabitants were unprotected. There was not a single resident gentleman of property and weight in the entire district. No revenue officer durst exercise vigilance west of the Tamar; and to put an end to all such surveillance at once, the head of a gauger was chopped off by one of Coppinger's gang on the gunwale of a boat.
Strange vessels began to appear at regular intervals on the coast, and signals were flashed from the headlands to lead them into the safest creek or cove. Amongst these vessels, one, a full-rigged schooner, soon became ominously conspicuous. She was for long the chief terror of the Cornish Channel. Her name was The Black Prince. Once, with Coppinger on board, she led a revenue-cutter into an intricate channel near the Bull Rock, where, from knowledge of the bearings, The Black Prince escaped scathless, while the king's vessel perished with all on board. In those times, if any landsman became obnoxious to Coppinger's men, he was seized and carried on board The Black Prince, and obliged to save his life by enrolling himself in the crew. In 1835, an old man of the age of ninety-seven related to Mr. Hawker that he had been so abducted, and after two years' service had been ransomed by his friends with a large sum. "And all," said the old man very simply, "because I happened to see one man kill another, and they thought I would mention it."
Amid such practices, ill-gotten gold began to flow and ebb in the hands of Coppinger. At one time he had enough money to purchase a freehold farm bordering on the sea. When the day of transfer came, he and one of his followers appeared before the lawyer and paid the money in dollars, ducats, doubloons, and pistoles. The man of law demurred, but Coppinger with an oath bade him take this or none. The document bearing Coppinger's name is still extant. His signature is traced in stern bold characters, and under his autograph is the word "Thuro" (thorough) also in his own handwriting.
Long impunity increased Coppinger's daring. There were certain bridle roads along the fields over which he exercised exclusive control. He issued orders that no man was to pass over them by night, and accordingly from that hour none ever did. They were called "Coppinger's Tracks." They all converged at a headland which had the name of Steeple Brink. Here the cliff sheered off, and stood three hundred feet of perpendicular height, a precipice of smooth rock towards the beach, with an overhanging face one hundred feet down from the brow. Under this was a cave, only reached by a cable ladder lowered from above, and made fast below on a projecting crag. It received the name of "Coppinger's Cave." Here sheep were tethered to the rock, and fed on stolen hay and corn till slaughtered; kegs of brandy and hollands were piled around; chests of tea; and iron-bound sea-chests contained the chattels and revenues of the Coppinger royalty of the sea....
But the end arrived. Money became scarce, and more than one armed king's cutter was seen day and night hovering off the land. So he "who came with the water went with the wind." His disappearance, like his arrival, was commemorated by a storm.
A wrecker who had gone to watch the shore, saw, as the sun went down, a full-rigged vessel standing off and on. Coppinger came to the beach, put off in a boat to the vessel, and jumped on board. She spread canvas, stood off shore, and with Coppinger in her was seen no more. That night was one of storm. Whether the vessel rode it out, or was lost, none knew.