In May 1968 not long after the club had become established and the money had started to roll in we became intimately involved in the unusual, and unlikely and somewhat romantic occupation of hunting for Spanish Gold! No, I know that I've never mentioned it before, so maybe it's time that I did.
I hope that I may amuse you with my reminiscences and recollections of that exciting time. It all started so casually, things like that always do. It's a long time ago now. The occurrences still seem as fresh in my memory now as if it all happened yesterday. What happened that warm afternoon over thirty-five years ago was to lead to our arraignment in the High Court in Dublin - it was to take me to a back-street flat in Paris to meet the son of the man who defended Prince Yusipof - the murderer of Rasputin. My tales are true - and I've the newspaper cuttings to prove it all! Important and dramatic episodes in ones life often begin very innocently - that isn't to say that we were innocent - in fact I sometimes think that I was born streetwise - and like most 'scousers' I suppose I was.

Anyway - it happened like this. It was late one afternoon. Lunch, was long finished, and the last stragglers had clattered down the gangplank and disappeared back to their various offices and work places, to breathe fiery fumes into the faces of their employees and colleagues. Colin and I were sitting at a table in the empty restaurant of our floating restaurant tied up in the Liverpool Saltines Dock discussing business. We heard a cough. Looking up we saw two tall, rather badly dressed, well-built men with short haircuts looming over us. The older of the two men looked down at us and spoke.

'Are you two interested in getting your hands on £10,000,000?' He said with a huge grin.

We looked up and saw a man with the big blue eyes and a dark unshaven chin.

'How do you answer a question like that?' said Colin.

We both appraised the men who stood before us. The duo oozed self-confidence, and the smell of whisky! Our first impression of the pair was that they were probably petty-criminals, clearly confidence tricksters of some sort. However, what an opening line! Not £1,000,000, but £10,000,000! They certainly were out to impress.

They sat down without invitation, forcing us both to transfer over to the chairs nearest to the bulkhead, leaving us with no way of escape. We felt threatened. Our space had been invaded. We were indeed a 'captive audience'

'What are you having to drink?' asked the second, slightly younger man brusquely, ignoring the fact that neither were members of our private club, and technically not allowed by law to purchase alcohol. We answered warily that if he were buying we would have two halves of lager. We took this opportunity to look more closely at the two strangers. They were very alike in appearance, and spoke in the harsh guttural accent of Liverpool, with its typical glottalised vowels and sibilant terminals. Soon their huge fists were cradling the dimpled half - pint glasses of chilled amber liquid - they lapsed into a silent reverie, their shoulders hunched, their bulky frames seemed to sigh - to surrender - like birds after a long flight.

'Well, what's it all about lads?'

Colin said, and he sat and inhaled slowly on his cigarette, trying to appear relaxed in spite of the tense atmosphere, which the sudden intrusion had created.

I glanced at their large, rough hands. The broken fingernails were black - the skin red and ugly with the blemishes of half- healed cuts and scratches. The older man looked about forty, over six foot in height and slightly overweight. His companion was in his mid - thirties, also tall, rather slimmer, but solid, well muscled and darkly handsome. They smelt strongly of sweat. They smelt of the sea. They smelt also of Whisky. The older man raised his glass into the beam of smoke-wreathed sunlight streamed down through a porthole and squinted at the bubbling liquid that sparkled invitingly.

'You certainly have a good cellarman - the beer is as clear as a bell! Anyhow, 'Cheers! Oh! By the way, my name is Terry, and this is my brother Joe. Which of you is Colin?'

Colin indicated that he was indeed Colin Peers and asked his interlocutor how it was that he knew his name.

'A mutual friend of ours called 'Ronnie Potter' mentioned that you two may be interested in hearing what we've to say - so if you're Colin - then you must be George?' Terry pointed a finger in my direction and leaned backwards in his chair nonchalantly.

I answered that I was George Evans and that we would both be interested to know where and when they'd met Ronnie Potter, as we had not seen him for over a week! Joe, the younger brother, grimaced at us through rings of tobacco smoke and smiled wryly. Smoothing back his tousled hair, he leaned over the table and said,

" We got talking to Ron in THE STEERING WHEEL BAR' in Wood Street. He was in there last Thursday night with his wife Maureen. He happened to hear us talking about our diving experiences. He was interested, we chatted, and it just developed from there. After Ron had heard our story, he suggested that we come along here to see you two, to see if you were interested in getting involved in helping to put some money up for a Diving Expedition to Ireland - The Blanket Sound actually - off the coast of County Kerry in south west Ireland.' Joe's voice dropped to a whisper and he looked around the room conspiratorially, - There are millions of pounds worth of gold lying on the bottom just waiting to be brought to the surface! He continued,' We've proof that it's the Flagship of The Spanish Armada THE SANTA MARIA DELLA ROSA. We know that, because last year we were diving on the wreck and we brought up a pewter plate with the name 'MATUTA' engraved on it - and that was the name of one of the Spanish noblemen that were recorded as having sailed with the Armada!'

Joe banged his hand on the table triumphantly and swallowed what remained of the liquid. He looked at us expectantly.

'Well?' Said Terry, swilling the remainder of the beer down his throat in one gulp. My partner and I stared at the two men with a sudden expansion of interest. We edged our chairs closer to the edge of the table. I beckoned the waitress Maria -

'Maria, get these lads the same again please!' I smiled and turned my head to glance at Colin. He was smiling back! The McCormack brothers were Celts like so many Liverpool folk. They were of Irish extraction. A glance at the names in the Liverpool Telephone Book will tell you immediately that the vast majority of citizens are of either Irish or Welsh ancestry. They were accomplished linguistic magicians. Words were like play-clay in their mouths. GOLD', whispered the two Gaelic warlocks, with wet lips - their emerald- green eyes aglow! We could already see and feel the gleaming metal! They repeated the word constantly - toyed with it - dangled it - extruded it and span it into a fine glistening gossamer thread of golden probability with which they coldly lassoed us. They body-wrapped our opportunism into a tight armature of dream-like acquiescence and agreement.

The afternoon drifted toward evening. It was useless to argue. Colin and I were hooked! All that was needed now, was the hand of destiny to pull the handle and release our jackpot of golden fantasy! From that moment forth we were 'Treasure Hunters' - lost souls inhabiting a tortured underwater landscape. Arrangements were made for another meeting. Before doing so however, we gave our word to participate in the adventure, and agreed that we would purchase an air-pump to recharge the divers bottles, and that Compass Catering would assume responsibility for victualling the expedition's personnel, and provide a cook for the divers and crew.

We promised that we would make immediate attempts to recruit more businessmen to join the venture. The next day we reconsidered the two divers' story in our minds. Terry and Joe had told us that they'd been out to the Blasket Sound as part of a team of divers organised and led by a certain Mr. Sidney Wignall. Wignall had apparently been researching the Spanish Armada wrecks that are strung out like a string of pearls all down the West Coast of Ireland. During his perusal of the Spanish Naval Records in La Prado in Madrid, he'd identified the flagship 'The Santa Maria della Rosa' as the command vessel of a certain Spanish aristocrat by the name of Matuta, which he reasoned would have carried most of the gold with which to pay the invasion force and to buy the support of the English Catholics in the event of a satisfactory outcome to the invasion, from King Philip of Spain's point of view.

Quite how Wignall got involved with the particular wreck that lay in the Blasket Sound, I can't remember after all these years. Very probably, it was from reading a book by an English Clergyman/Scholar - whose name escapes me just now. The clever Cleric had written a well-researched volume in the eighteenth century, which plotted the probable final resting-places of most of the doomed Spanish, vessels . THE SPANISH ARMADA The Spanish Armada, was conceived in the spirit of a religious crusade, and prepared at an alarming cost, set sail from Lisbon on the 30th of May 1588, under the Duke of Medina Sidonia, a foolish and cowardly landsman, who was selected on the ground of his rank alone.

The plan was that the fleet should proceed up the Channel to Dunkirk and Nieuport, and thence convoy the army of the Duke of Parma to England, where Queen Elizabeth was to be deposed, and the Infanta of Spain set up in her place. A more chimerical or fantastic scheme it would have been difficult to devise. Exiles are always bad counsellors, as any modern Cuban will tell you, and the English Catholics on the continent, who had the ear of the Pope and the King of Spain, had not reckoned upon the change which had come over the temper of the English people during the last two decades. The Puritan spirit had grown strong: the Catholic spirit had diminished. The Protestant ascendancy was secure. A generation of peace and prosperity had consolidated the loyalty of the nation to the crown. Persecution there had been, but not before the Pope's Bull of deposition in 1570, and then upon a scale which contrasted favourably with the burnings of humans of the previous reign.

Elizabeth's chastisement of her Catholic subjects was far removed from the terrible holocaust of victims exacted by Catholicism in the Netherlands, in France, and in Spain. There was no party in the country that would have favoured a Spanish landing or tolerated a Spanish Queen. Even if Parma's army had been disembarked in England with the military reinforcements brought overseas from Spain, they would have found themselves opposed by the united force of a resolute and valiant people. According to British historians the whole scheme foundered on the incompetence of the Spanish navy. The vast galleons, crowded with soldiers, and obsessed by the antiquated tradition of 'Galley Tactics' were outmanoeuvred and outsailed in the Channel by their nimbler English opponents, and beaten in the great sea battle when the fleets met at Gravelines. One could be mistaken for believing that Errol Flynn, Douglas Fairbanks Junior and Anthony Quinn in their roles as Drake, Hawkins, and Frobisher were responsible for the Spaniards ignominy and not the true mad strategist Grand Admiral Gale and his Captains Bluster, Gust, and not forgetting good old Lieutenant Zephyr!

As a British schoolchild of course, I'd always been told that the brave Sir Francis Drake and the valiant little fleet of English Fire ships defeated the Armada. According to the myth - the noble Francis was informed of the approach of the huge foreign fleet, which had been sighted by the lookouts on Plymouth Ho. Rather than panicking, as no doubt you and I would have done, he insisted on finishing the game of bowls with which he was involved at the time before joining battle. What really happened was unfortunate for the attackers. The Spanish fleet sailed into what was later to be recorded as the worst storms of the sixteenth century! English Fire ships with barrels of tar tied to their sterns on long projecting poles were let loose amongst the top-heavy, overloaded and under-ballasted Spanish vessels. A fierce wind arose from a westerly direction. The helpless Spaniards were blown east towards The North Forehand, and to escape the tempest, headed north to shelter on the eastern seaboard of Kent.

Sadly, for the brave Iberians the wind then veered to the south, blowing them impotently up the East Coast of Britain. The helpless captains of the invading ships would have no doubt preferred to beat south toward the Dutch Coast - particularly the Dutch participants. There were in fact, lots of Dutch vessels seconded by the Spanish as part of the Armada. One of them was a Flemish hulk (hulk meant 'freight vessel' in those days.), called 'El Falco Blanco' the wreck of which figures later in the narrative. The weather wouldn't permit such a dangerous course however, and the flotilla was driven remorselessly on, further up the coast towards the North.

At this stage, and because there was no indication of any abatement in the ferocity of the wind, the decision was made that weather permitting, they would continue Northward, then beat Westward around the top of Scotland. The plan then, was to pass to the North of the Irish coast and to head due south again and make for Cads. By the time that the fleet had reached the northernmost limits of the British mainland, the men were tired and hungry. Provisions had only been loaded for a limited Channel crossing. Tired navigators make mistakes; cold fingers on freezing rigging aren't as strong and quick to respond to hoarse commands. Some of the vessels perished on the cruel shores of Northern Scotland, whilst others managed to make enough westerly to sail free into the wide Atlantic. It was then that God played his meanest trick on the exhausted Catholics! The wind turned once more, and blew with even more vehemence from the West, forcing the wretched Spaniards to a watery grave on the unforgiving rocks of the Irish West Coast. Depending on how much westerly each vessel had achieved - so it befell that the vessel made more progress down the coast in a southerly direction before suffering its inevitable destruction - hence the Reverend 's choice of the descriptive term 'A string of pearls'. The wild inhabitants of the Irish west mostly massacred what few Spanish seamen managed to scramble ashore.

A few were spared, and married local Colleen's. It's claimed that many of the inhabitants of the West Coast areas have dark complexions and flashing white teeth! President De Valera himself claims to be descended from one of the survivors. So ended the Great Armada - but it was God's will - and not Drake's. Testimony to the English recognition of the influence of the weather in the defeat of the invasion force was borne out by a medal that was struck shortly afterwards on the orders of Queen Elizabeth the First, which was presented to the British sailors and marines. The words said something like - "God blew and they were dispersed." The coin was engraved with the face of a benign old man with puffed-out cheeks blowing some puny galleons to illustrate the point. I'm not sure if I've got the words on the coin right - but you get my drift Anyway - I'm sorry - I'm getting off the subject - though I suppose it does provide a back-cloth - an historical framework for the events that I am relating.