MYTHICAL MILLIONS

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 80, 5 April 1933, Page 7

MYTHICAL MILLIONS

SIR FRANCIS DRAKE'S ESTATE

The United States Government has barred the use of tho mails to a number of men said to be collecting sub-! scriptions to help recover mythical millions of the estate of Sir Francis Drake, who died over 350 years ago. Tho authorities are'considering prose-! cution. t ' It is officially announced that there is no unsettled estate that has come down from Drake. The information is a little late for thousands of expectant Americans, who have, during tho past ton years, contributed 1,300,000 dollars (about £260,000 at p;ir) to this huge swindle. . v This action is the direct result of long investigation and diplomatic correspondence, in which the Stato Department at Washington requested tho co-operation of the British Government in exploding tho myth that a £1,000,000,000' estate, accrued from Drake's so-called privateering operations, was to be recovered. Representations to the contributors, whether they had a shadowy claim to descent from the famous navigator or not, were that they would share in the eventual division of tho proceeds. Evidence gathered by Federal investigators indicated that tho funds already contributed had gone to an American, who had operated for a time'in the United States and later launched a renewed campaign.of solicitation from London, through agents.