Cruel Coppinger  Cruel Coppinger () is a semi-legendary figure in Cornish folklore. Coppinger was a real person, but various legends grew up around him, lending him near superhuman powers and a fearsome reputation. He is portrayed as huge and fearsome Dane who after being shipwrecked off Cornwall became the leader of a feared band of smugglers. The legend of Cruel Coppinger recognised today, is that recorded by Rev. Robert Stephen Hawker, the composer of the Cornish anthem "The Song of the Western Men", who collected the existing legends and, with a few additions of his own, published them in Charles Dickens' magazine "Household Words" in 1866. His story was prefaced with the verse: "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!" According to the legend, one night, during a great storm, a ship got into trouble near the shore of Cornwall. The local inhabitants turned out to the beach as they often would when there was a chance that a ship would be wrecked and valuable commodities washed up on shore. On the deck of the ship they saw the lone figure of huge man, who, leaping into the sea, waded through the surf until he reached the shore. There he grabbed the cloak of an old woman and leapt up on the horse of a young woman who had come down to the shore. Shouting something in a foreign tongue, later held to be the language of the Vikings, he rode off with the girl and made his way to her house where he installed himself, uninvited. He announced himself as Coppinger from Denmark, and little-by-little secured the favour of Dinah Hamlyn, the girl he had carried off. Eventually he secured her hand in marriage. He mysteriously raised enough money to buy himself a house and lands, and set himself up as the leader of a feared band of smugglers, wreckers and pirates in Cornwall. He controlled a number of bridle paths and footpaths which converged at a steep cliff, at the foot of which was a cave where he kept his booty and stolen livestock. To discourage surveillance by the Revenue Officers, one of his gang beheaded one of them. Among the ships used by the "Cruel" gang was the "Black Prince", a ship built to Coppinger's own design in the shipyards of Denmark, with which he terrorised the English Channel.