QUEBEC’S LOST TREASURE

Greymouth Evening Star, 26 January 1929, Page 4

QUEBEC’S LOST TREASURE

SEARCHERS’ VAIN QUEST.

Lost treasure, amounting in value to several million dollars, lies awaiting discovery near the Plains of Abraham in old Quebec. Toward the fall of 1758 the French authorities, says a writer in Chambers’ Journal, having received news of the coming invasion of Canada by the British, set about then' preparations. The citadel at Quebec was looked on by them and other nations’ military experts as a fortress impregnable, and not to be taken exdept through starvation or gross mishap. Into the citadel then they gathered a vast amount of specie and valuables —money belonging to the state and money belonging to merchants and others, together with the gold and silver plate, family jawels, and heirlooms of the grand seigneurs, exiled or otherwise, living in the colony. Altogether, a most admirable collection, and worth keeping out of the enemy’s hands. , _ When, next year ,an attack on Quebec citadel became certain, Montcalm, although the British venture appeared to bo foolhardy and doomed to fail, had qualms concerning this great storeful, and sought to secure its safety; for this hitherto unrenowned Frenchman was of that fine military genius which weighs each and evei y contingency in hostilities. Ho directed the treasure to be sewn up in hides and pigskins, taken away in boats, and concealed until the dangers were passed. When, shortly afterward, Quebec was captured, the town and citadel were practically devoid of specie and valuables. Montcalm’s orders had been carried out successfully. Much searching and a great deal of questioning by the British brought forth nothing. In the spring of 1908 an old chateau near Quebec was being repaired, and behind the back of the great open fireplace in the hall a small cavity was revealed. Tn it a little silver-bound box was found, containing a sheet of skin-parchment yellow with age and brittle as spun glass with the heat of generations of fires. It bore certain directions written in a scholarly hand and in mid-eighteenth century French. “At the Little Bay on River St. Charles, ten feet up the east bank, and five feet deep in the earth, you shall find buried in plaster, burnt wood, plate aiid ingots, and the skull of a sheep. Beneath is the secret of a great treasure.” Such is the English of it. The finder took counsel with the parish priest, and they two went secretly to work. At some little depth under the surface they came across the burnt wood, plate and ingot of silver, and beneath the sheep’s head they unearthed a little rusty iron box. On is bing burst open a small and very roughly drawn chart was discovered, with the following information written in French, apparently by the same hand as drew up the first directions: “Across the River St. Charles at the wood neai’ the little bay and peninsula. Twenty feet north-south-west by north toward the clump of pines. Fifty feet as the sun sets. Five feet deep and embedded in plaster, the great treasure from the citadel. May God save us all!”

Labour for Nothing.

The two seekers took thought with themselves for several days; the padre, in particular, had qualms of conscience, for the area in question now belongs to the Roman Catholic Church. However, the habitant arrived at an arrangement appeasing the priestly conscience, and they began to dig, secretly and at night time. They dug, and they dug in vain. Many nights they pursued their self-appoint-ed task, the father spurred on by the hopes of great gains for the Church, and the habitant of acquiring more wealth than evei' he had thought of, even in dreams. Then in the bitterness of their hearts they divulged the secret, and others went energetically to work. They had the common sense to get exact reckonings as to the settings

of the sun during the first week in September of 1759. All the labour went for nothing. It has been recognised that nature herself has hidden this most inestimable deposit of moneys and valuables the loss of which beggared more than one seigneurial family for several generations. That peninsula jutting into the St. Charles, like Cocos Island and its millions, stands altered by the winds and weathers of more than one hundred and fifty years, and only through blind-eyed chance will the Montcalm treasure ever be recovered. The estuary shores of the St. Lawrence also shroud a number of deposits. The instance of the so-called

Kingston treasure is illustrative as to the “why” and “wherefore.” It deals -with five or six caskfuls of gold and silver coins which lie in the river at the mouth of Chippeway Creek. Somewhat more than a century ago the bank in Kingston was broken into and looted one night by a gang. Later three of the marauders were overheard by a, Canadian .Samuel Patterson, who had fled to the United States side in 1812 to escape the militia enforcement on war breaking out. He followed them to the Chippeway Creek where they pushed off in a boat, and witnessed them sinking the barrelfuls of coin where the waters of the creek meet the river. Patterson told his wife of his discovery, and himself three days later took a skiff out into the creek, intending to recover a kegful of specie. Watched from the shore Patterson was shot in the small craft, and died before anyone found him. Mrs Patterson told his story to the sheriff ,and he with a posse secretly

watched the creek, till some two weeks later some of the band, coming along in a scow with rough and ready contrivances to retrieve their plunder, were laid hold of successfully. Ultimately, they were heavily sentenced. But the impression being,very strong that their confederates were lurking around the creek ,no one made a search for the casks. And in the sludge and bottom roughage they and their riches remain.

A Stranger’s Iron Chest.

During the 1812-14 hostilities several pajy-chests disappeared on both sides, their loss being put down to the activity of the guerillists. In the autumin of 1879 a stranger came to Cape St. Vincent, bororwed the use of a small boat, and, declining assistance, pulled himself across to Carleton Island. An hour or two later the stranger returned ,and in the skiff he had a short flat iron chest, daubed here and there with earth, and showing signs of erosion. St. Vincent folk helped him to hustle with his box for the steam-bdat landing, where a vessel had called just then for freight and passengers. The stranger was hurriedly put on

board the vessel, no one thinking for a moment but that all was shipshape with him; and he went off to busy haunts of men and vanished from ken. Some days later, when a local inhabitant had occasion to land on Carleton ,he stumbled not far from the shore into a big hole in the ground, which had been very hastily dug, the spade or mattock still lying where it had been flung down. The bottom and sides of the cavity were lined with flat stones and decayed wood, and the dimensions corresponded roughly

to the dimensions of the iron box with which he also had helped the tired, struggling Mr Stranger. A heavy burden of specie!

Chief, though ,and most romantic of obtainable treasures in North American waters north of latitude forty-two is that of the Primrose. M. Dupleix, of Pondicherry, had combined with his duties as governor of that FrenchIndian colony the enterprise of privateering; amassing so great a fortune that he, keeping in view the very just complaints of French merchants concerning his maladministration for private ends, was afraid to remit it to France, lest it be seized by the authorities pending his arrival and trial. He shipped most of it, then, in the Primrose, a captured English vessel, to his brother in Quebec, for transmission to France in several separate consignments, so as to evade arousing suspicions.

When in October, 1759, the privateer reached the Gulf of St. Lawrence, she was informed by fishermen that Quebec had been captured by the British, and a strong ■ force of British naval vessels was in her vicinity. The Primrose was lacking in stores and water, and then unable to proceed forthwith. M. le Capitaine acordingly, was extremely glad in his dilemma to accept the pilotage of a fisherman toward comparative safety in the Bay of Islands, where their compatriots would readily give assistance. Some hours later a heavy and prolonged gale sprang up. It thrust the privateer among the reefs inside the bay, and there she went to the bottom with all hbr treasure and her crew, except some three men, went with her.

To-day it is known through the labours of marine surveyors, correcting and amplifying charts, that two hulks lie there, and in comparatively shallow soundings. That which is marked as being more to the open is probably the wreck of Dupleix’s vessel. And if the treasures among her rot_tin,g timbers correspond in amount to but a lithe of the notorious Frenchman’s avarice, they ought to afford a rather surprising sum to the retrievers.