The discovery of a small 1693 silver coin from Yemen in a field in Middletown, Rhode Island has helped an amateur historian determine that Rhode Island's first slave ship was a cover for the biggest pirate heist of all time.
James Bailey, 52, of Warwick, who works in security for the Rhode Island Department of Corrections, took his metal detector to the site of a former colonial home and came upon the rare coin, known as a comassee. It was taken from a ship from an Islamic empire
The discovery of a small 1693 silver coin from Yemen in a field in Middletown, Rhode Island has helped an amateur historian determine that Rhode Island's first slave ship was a cover for the biggest pirate heist of all time.
James Bailey, 52, of Warwick, who works in security for the Rhode Island Department of Corrections, took his metal detector to the site of a former colonial home and came upon the rare coin, known as a comassee. It was taken from a ship from an Islamic empire in India that…
