BURIED TREASURE

Evening Star, Issue 22382, 4 July 1936, Page 22

BURIED TREASURE

Almost every pirate who achieved notoriety by his misdeeds is credited by tradition with having buried much or his ill-gotten treasure, and the localities chosen by them for hiding their loot cover a very wide area. From time to time treasure hunting expeditions are still fitted out. The question arises : lias anyone ever found any of the treasure buried by pirates!' There is one recent case on record of the discovery of a treasure chest buried by the notorious pirate, Captain Teach, but so much mystery surrounds the discovery that it is not known who discovered the chest or what was the value of the treasure it contained.

In the closing days of December, 1928, American newspapers published a sensational story of this discovery of the treasure buried by Teach, who, in his ' own days was known as Captaiii Beard This treasure was discovered in the sand at Plum Point, a narrow neck of land in North Carolina, U.S.A., where Bath Creek flows into the Pimlico lliver. The end of Plum Point is low and sandy, and is cut off from the mainland by a marsh. For more than 200 years the story that Tench buried his treasure in the vicinity had survived, and from time to time attempts were made to find it by digging. On Christmas Day, 1928. two trappers went to Plum Point to examine some traps they had set in the marsh. In the sand they found a hole which had recently been dug, and there were broken bricks scattered about it. The searchers who had made the hole had found at a depth of about Bft a small brick vault, which they had broken open. The vault had been made of hand-made bricks, of a larger size than are/ commonly used in building. The top of the vault had been rounded like a roof, and the floor consisted of three layers of bricks. The treasure chest had been placed on the floor, and the sides of the vault had been built around it. Plentv of mortar had been used, with the result that a great deal had been squeezed into the inside walls. This mortar clinging to the walls retained many impressions of the chest with its handforged iron clasps, criss-crossing one another, and its large round rivet heads. Except for the top and part of one side, the vault was intact. The chest, which measured about 40in by 30in, with a depth of about 30in, had been raised out of the vault by means of a pulley fixed on a tripod. There were'footmarks of three men round the hole, and it appeared that the chest, after'being raised, had been placed on a large plank, and dragged to the river, where the searchers had moored a boat. They must have known exactly where to dig for the chest, lor there were no other signs of digging operations in the sand. Who the seai'chers were was never discovered; and the value of the treasure they obtained can only be guessed at. According to local gossip the treasure chest contained thousands upon thousands of doubloons, pieces of eight, and many valuable jewels. Captain Teach, whose piratical activities created terror along the Atlantic coast of America from Newfoundland to Trinidad in 1716-18, believed in dressing for his part when about to board a, ship. He was more than 6ft tall, hroad-shonldered, and had long arms like an ape. He wore a Jong sash of scarlet silk, which was wrapped twice round his waist and carried over one shoulder. In this waistband he carried three pistols, ami three more were stuck in the sash across his chest. Several knives were also stuck in his licit, and from the left side hung a cutlass in a scabbard. Ho had a naked*cutlass in his right hand and a pistol in his left, and between his teeth he carried a knife with a blade about 2ft long. His black beard, which covered his cheeks up to his eyes, was long, and before going into action be had it plaited and tied back over his ears with coloured ribbons. He put lighted slow matchess under his hat. “ Edward Teach was one of the biggest ruffians that has ever sailed the seas,” writes Mr J. G-. Lockhart. “ The ferocity of his appearance, his great strength, his cruelty, his treachery. Ins drunkenness, and his daring have combined to make him the pattern pirate of fiction. ... No good thing can be said of him save that, although he liv.ed like a beast, he died like a man. His character \vas as black as the beard which gave him his nickname. Ho knew neither mercy nor faith, and into his short career he crowded a series of crimes so outrageous as to he almost without parallel in the stormy records of the buccaneers.” He was killed on November 17, 1718, in a fight between his ship and two small sloops which had been sent in search for him under the command of Lieutenant Robert Maynard, of the British Navy. Blackboard is said to have received 25 wounds, of which five were pistol shots. The fight took place in Okerecock Bay, off Bathtown. and after it was Maynard returned to Bathtnwu witu Blackbeard's head fastenoiVto the end of the bowsprit of his sloop. TREASURE OF THE INCAS. There H a great deal of hurled treasure in various places, apart from that which pirates are supposed to have buried, but so far the repeated attempts to recover treasure have seldom paid expenses. Peru is richer in buried treasure than any other country in the world, according to tradition, and in no other country in the world has treasure hunting been carried on so persistently. The legends concerning the buried treasure of Peru centre round the Spanish conquest of the country 400 years ago. After the Spanish commander, Francisco Pizarro. had induced Atahualpha, the Inca of Peru, to visit him in state and had made the Indian monarch a prisoner, Atahualpha offered to fill a room full of gold in exchange for his freedom. This room is now shown to visitors to the city of Caxamalca, in Peru. It is 20ft long by 37ft wide, and it was to be filled with gold plate and ornaments to a height of 9ft. The Inca sent messengers to his capital of Cuzco and throughout his kingdom to collect treasure from the temples and palaces, hut they had to proceed on foot (the horses' the Spanish cavalry rode were the first animals of the kind seen by the Indians), and to travel long distances. Atahualpha had stipulated for a period of two months to obtain the treasure for bis ransom, but the treasure came in too slowly lor the impatient .Spaniards Among that re, ceived were many large gold vessels and gold plate, in pieces weighing as much as 751 b. Two hundred men wore required to carry all the treasure of the despoiled Temple of the Sun at Cuzco. It included a massive gold throne, a gold fountain, and many beautiful ornaments

Before the room had been filled the Spaniards accused Atahualpha of stirring up a rebellion against them, and after a hurried farcical trial he was sentenced to death and executed the same day. The value of the treasure that hail been received up to that time was about £3,500.000 when melted into gold ingots. According to tradition the Indians, who were on their way to Caxamalca with gold for tho ransom of the Inca, buried the treasure or threw it into mountain lakes in the vicinity

when they learned that the Inca had been executed. It is said that a great gold chain 233yds long, which had stretched round the market place at Cuzco for the Indians to grasp in their religious dances, was among the treasure thrown info Lake Orcos, in the Andes. Another mountain lake which was said to contain much treasure is Guatayita, 10,000 ft up, in the Cordilleras Mountains, north of Santa Fe de Bogota, in Columbia, which lies north of Peru. According to an old legend, the lake was the scene of-Indian ceremonies for generations. Each Indian chieftain was covered with gold (Inst before plunging into the lake, the banks being lined with thousands of Indians who threw gold and jewels into the water to propitiate the goddess of (jnatavita. Tho treasure lying in the bed of the lake was estimated to he worth many millions of pounds, and repeated attempts wore made to recover it. In 1900 a British company was formed to drain the lake. It was 46ft deep at the lowest point, and the plan of the British engineers was to drain it by means of a tunnel through the mountains, I,oooft long, and, carried down 70ft below the level of the water. . After some years tho lake was drained, and it was then found that the; bed of the Jake consisted of nnul 25ft deep. A few ornaments and jewels were found, and this encouraged the promoters of the enterprise to raise more capital and continue the work. The mud set hard under the tropical sun. and there was no water available to sluice it down the tunnel, fhe engineers sank the mud and drove channels through it at various poits. By this means some small gold ornaments and precious stones were obtained, but the total value of the treasure recovered in the course of 13 years’ work, at a cost of £15,000, was a little over £2,000. The treasure found consisted of finely worked gold pendants representing birds, a serpent of fine gold, a warrior’s cap of gold, gold howls, gold snakes, and some emeralds.

OCEAN TREASURE. The search for treasure carried by ships which have sunk, has been equally unsuccessful, except in two recent cases, that the the White Star liner Laurentic, from which £5,416,000 was recovered, and the P. and 0. liner Egypt, from which £940,000 was salvaged. For more than .‘3OO years attempts have been made to recover treasure from the Spanish galleon Almirante do Florencia, which was blown up in Tobermory Ray, in Argyllshire, in 1588. She was one of the ships of the Spanish Armada which were car-, ried northwards by stress of weather, and she put in to Tobermory Bay for shelter. It was said that she was the payship of the Armada, and carried a great deal of treasure, but the attempts to recover it from the sands in which the wreck lies buried have been fruitless. _ ■ Little success has been met with in the many attempts to recover £1,000,000 in specie, which the British frigate Lutine had on board when she was wrecked in the shallows between Terschelling and Viieland, off the Dutch coast, in October, 1799. Dutch fishermen are supposed to have recovered about £56,000 in two years’ work on the wreck, but storms carried her out to a depth at which the fishermen could not work. For five years, from 1857 to 1861, salvage operations were carried on by a British company, and about £40,000 was recovered. Many attempts have since been made to obtain the remainder, but most of these have been fruitless. Owing to frequent storms in the locality, salvage work can he carried on only at intervals, and the currents sweep sand over the wreck, and undo in a few hours the work of days. In the church of St. Mary Woolnoth. in London, near the Bank of England, there is a memorial to Sir William Phips, who, in the year 1687, ns its inscription records, by his great industry, discovered among the rocks near the Banks of Babanin, on the north side of Hispaniola, a Spanish plate ship which had been tinder water 44 years, out ol which he took gold and silver to the value of £300.000, and divided between himself and the rest of the adventurers. —Melbourne ‘ Age.’