Outer Banks to represent clear water and a ship ahead; the unsuspecting captain would then drive his ship ashore following this false light. The islands are home to herds of feral horses, sometimes called "banker ponies," which according to local legend are descended from Spanish Mustangs washed ashore centuries ago in shipwrecks. Populations are found on Ocracoke Island, Shackleford Banks, Currituck Banks, and in the Rachel Carson Estuarine Sanctuary. Ocracoke was the last refuge of pirate Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard. It is also where the infamous pirate was killed November 22, 1718 in a fierce battle with troops from Virginia.
Edward Coates (pirate) Robert Culliford, operating for several years before his eventual capture and execution several years later. Edward Coates (pirate) Edward Coates was a colonial American privateer in English service during the King William's War and later a pirate operating in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean during the mid-1690s. In 1689, Coates originally signed aboard the "Jacob" as a sailor in a privateer expedition, then under the command of Captain William Mason, and commissioned by the colonial officials in New York to raid French shipping off the coast of Quebec ""to war as in his wisdom should seem fit"". However, unable