Penzance is a coastal town and port situated in Mount's Bay on the English Channel in Cornwall, England, lying approximately 9 miles (14 km) east of Land's End and 64 miles (103 km) west-southwest of Plymouth. With a parish population of 20,734 at the 2021 census, it is the westernmost and southernmost railway terminus in England, making it a genuine edge-of-the-country destination. Despite its global reputation for swashbuckling villainy — cemented by Gilbert and Sullivan's 1879 operetta "The Pirates of Penzance" — the town never actually harbored real pirates; the name was chosen deliberately for its ironic, exotic-sounding quality. Today, Penzance leans cheerfully into that fictional heritage, with pirate-themed shops and tourism lining its streets. In Season 12 of Expedition Unknown, Gates passed through the town while chasing the trail of the legendary 17th-century pirate Henry Every and the treasure he allegedly left behind somewhere off the Cornish coast.
Penzance is mentioned in early historical records as a settlement on the Cornish coast.
Penzance received its royal charter, establishing it as a formal market town and port.
Spanish forces raided and burned much of Penzance during a naval attack on the Cornish coast.
Gilbert and Sullivan's operetta "The Pirates of Penzance" premieres, ironically attaching the town's name to pirate lore for generations.
Gates visits Penzance during the filming of Expedition Unknown S12E04 "Riches of Spain's Pirate King," investigating the legend of pirate Henry Every's lost treasure.
Penzance's association with pirates is almost entirely fictional, a product of theatrical invention rather than historical record. Gilbert and Sullivan selected the name for their 1879 comic operetta precisely because it sounded exotic and vaguely menacing to Victorian audiences — not because the town had any genuine buccaneering past. As Gates himself notes on camera, the concept was "meant to be ironic," and historians of Cornish maritime history generally concur that Penzance was a modest fishing and trading port, not a pirate haven.
The real pirate at the heart of Gates' investigation is Henry Every, a 17th-century English buccaneer who pulled off one of the most audacious heists in maritime history when he seized the treasure-laden Mughal ship Ganj-i-Sawai in 1695. What happened to Every and his plunder after that remains one of history's genuinely open questions — he vanished from the historical record, and his treasure has never been conclusively located. The episode leans into a specific clue: a letter attributed to Every hinting that the treasure was "either buried or shipwrecked," which Gates says he can't shake the feeling points toward something "washed ashore" rather than buried inland.
The connection to Cornwall is grounded in historical context. Every was an Englishman with West Country ties, and the idea that some portion of his loot might have ended up along the Cornish coast — whether by design or shipwreck — is not dismissed out of hand by researchers. The episode introduces salvage divers Rob Stacey and Don Russell as investigators who share Gates' working theory and believe they may be close to a discovery, though no confirmed find is presented in the episode.
For Penzance itself, the episode contributes more color than archaeology — Gates' impromptu performance of "I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General" in a pirate shop is more Gilbert and Sullivan tribute than investigative breakthrough. The town functions in the episode as a thematic waypoint, a place where the myth of piracy and the reality of historical investigation briefly and humorously collide.
Penzance railway station is both the southernmost and westernmost mainline railway terminus in England.
The town lies just 9 miles (14 km) east of Land's End, the most southwesterly point of mainland Great Britain.
The name 'Penzance' derives from the Cornish words meaning 'holy headland,' a far more ecclesiastical origin than its piratical reputation suggests.
Spanish forces raided and burned much of Penzance in 1595, making it one of the few English towns to be attacked on home soil during the Elizabethan era.
Penzance is generally accessible to visitors year-round as a working town and tourist destination, served by the Cornish Main Line railway from London Paddington. The town center, harbor, and surrounding villages including Newlyn and Mousehole are walkable and open to the public, with the nearby St. Michael's Mount a popular day-trip destination visible across Mount's Bay.
Plymouth is the nearest major city, approximately 64 miles (103 km) to the east-northeast.
Late spring through early autumn (May to September) typically offers the most reliable weather for exploring the Cornish coast, though the town draws visitors in all seasons. Summer months can be busy with tourists.
Whydah Pirate Museum, Yarmouth
The Whydah Pirate Museum in Yarmouth focuses on recovered pirate artifacts and the real history of Golden Age piracy, directly paralleling Gates' investigation into Henry Every's legend and the gap between pirate myth and historical fact.
RAF Dunino Airfield
RAF Dunino Airfield appeared in another Expedition Unknown investigation with British Isles connections, linking it geographically and thematically to Gates' UK-based episodes.
Scotland
Scotland appeared in Expedition Unknown investigations exploring British Isles history and legend, sharing the same regional investigative thread as Gates' Cornish pirate treasure hunt.
Historical data sourced from Wikipedia