I stumbled across an interesting fact today. It had never occured to me why Pirates wear eye patches. I just assumed they had lost sight in that eye.

However almost all pirates had two perfectly good eyes. By wearing an eyepatch at all times, the covered eye would become highly sensitive, making it ideal to navigate at night using the stars.

Modern day soldiers are taught a similar night vision technique during basic training, to assist them when fighting under the cover of darkness.

Strange what you learn from the back of a crisp packet!

Please note this is not me!