If you’ve ever taken a walking tour of Boston’s North End, or if you’ve talked to the old timers in the neighborhood, you’ve probably heard stories about the network of so-called secret pirate tunnels or smugglers’ tunnels that connects the wharves to the basements of houses, Old North Church, and even crypts in Copp’s Hill burying ground. Sometimes the tunnels are attributed to a Captain Gruchy, who’s often called a pirate or a smuggler, and who is portrayed as a shadowy figure. The legends of pirate tunnels in the North End were inspired by a few subterranean discoveries in the late 1800s, but the fantastic details in stories told by tour guides and popular authors are just that: fantasy. However, there is truth underlying the legends, and there are tunnels underlying the streets of the North End.