HIDDEN TREASURE

Evening Star, Issue 18138, 30 November 1922, Page 3

HIDDEN TREASURE

NORTH AMERICAN CACHES. In North. America (here arc three great areas where much treasure—minted coin, gold and silver, plate, family Jewels, etc.— remains buried in the ground (says a writer in ‘ Chambers’ Journal ’). Again apd again a fanner corn© across such a cache when ploughing. In each of these areas it has been" war that brought about the sudden concealing of family fortunes. During the 'War of Secession there was much looting by the Federate and tho Confederates alike. When General Sherman effected his famous march to the sea, plantation owners and many of the towns north and south of and along the line of his most devastating operations buried tlreir money and valuables for fear of confiscation by the Federate. The havoc done by the military, fires bringing about tho disappearance of the landmarks indicating the sites of the caches, the damage done by heavy weather, and the death of Hose concerned all combined against relocation of the treasures. , The second great area was stocked m much the same way. When Washington, in the War of Independence, turned the hostilities in favor of the Americans, the rich Royalists from New Jersey to the Maine were taken by surprise. Many of them, finding it was too late to get tlreir family treasures and cash boxes safely away, confined them to the soil and fled l — a Russian nobleman in 1917. In the majority of instances they were not recovered, "in Connecticut are several families who owe their sudden rise in the world to finds of Royalist family possessions. A notable instance was the recovery of Lord Edmeston’s china a few years ago. A farmer's plough, uncovered the wooden case containing it. Because of its rare quality and design it brought him a fortune.

The thud 1 great area owes its caches to the same reason —war. In the War ot Independence, and to a larger extent in the 1312-14 hostilities, between Britain and the United States, many of British sympathies in Maine, New York, New Hampshire, and Vermont trekked for Lower Canada and Cape Breton. In many instances, when pursued by troops or tho Redskins, or when faced by great difficulties in crossing .the St. Lawrence, they buried their belongings on tho bank of tho river. Several of those caches have come to light. Among the latest was that discovered several years ago by a land owner who waa making a tour of inspection after the heavy spring freshets. He came upon a cache, which the weather and the water had unearthed, with the Delaval crest on the silver. Tradition had l it for generations that treasure of this kind was hidden on Carleton Island, in the St. Lawrence. Not long before the war a stranger borrowed a skiff and rowed over to the island, which fo-day is uninhabited and is let for grazing. When he returned the next forenoon to the village of Capa St. Vincent it was noted that lie bad with him a short, heavy chest, stained with clay. With it he boarded the regular river steamboat just then calling at the landingstage, and disappeared from ken. That afternoon a fanner sent his hired man across to round up the cattle pasturing on the island, and just by the west shore he found a spado, much loose earth, and the hols in which the treasure chest had rested.