PIRATES GOLD

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 59, Issue 4220, 6 December 1939, Page 9

PIRATES GOLD

MODERNIST SEARCH FOR ANCIENT TREASURE. Pirates’ gold still casts its spell. Near Queenscliff, in Victoria, and on Cosos Island, •where, if the recent survey from the flying boat Guiba is a true indication, freight and passenger laden craft will soon alight on th<eir way to Australia across the Indian Ocean, keen searches have been and are still to be made for what is reputed to be a vast fortune brought by prorates from Lima many years ago. When Samuel Bolivar, the Liberator, raised the banner of revolt against Spain’s dominion of the States of South Africa, freed Venezuela from the Spanish yoke, and then Columbia, be turned his eyes towards Peru. The Spanish Lords of Lima, surrounded by the g'old they had collected, grew uneasy. From the Governor downwards. including the clergy, they trembled for what the rebellion might mean to them. Lima was calk'd the treasure capital, and many of the Spaniards were multimillionaires.

These rich Spaniards, in an attempt to prevent their treasure from falling into the hands of Bolivar, lodged them at the fort of Lima. But the clergy decided otherwise. When the revolt seemed imminent at Lima the treasures at the cathedral, estimated to be 'worth more than £12,000,000 — now probably valued at considerably more than £20,000,000 —twere lodged on board a ship lying in the port of Lima, The vessel was flying the British flag and was in charge of a Scotsmam named Thompson. The faith of the Peruvian clergy in the flag of Britain was to be shattered. The gold, silver and valuable church ornaments proved too tempting a bait to be resisted. Captain Thompson, of the good ship Mary Dear, decided to make sail at once.

While the ecclesiastical dignitaries were conferring Captain Thompson stood out to sea. When he had reached a safe distance he and his meh decended on the protesting clergy, shot some of them down and stabbed others, throwing the wounded and dead into the sea. Having gone so far there was only one thing for Thompson to do—turn pirate. He hoisted the Skull and Crossbones. A few days later the ship was chased by a British frigate and forced to take refuge. The vessel pul in at Cocos Island, where the treasure was said to have been unshipped. Since then, although many expeditions have searched assiduously, no trace of the millions of pounds’ worth of valuables has been discovered.

Accoiding to a document now sa d to be in the possession of a syndicate of Australian (business men, the loot was not buried at Cocos Island, or, if it was, it was reshipped later. Thompson’s ship, it is believed, was forced into the South Seas and finally was beached on the South Coast of Australia. The treasure was canned up a river for several miles and then stored in four immense chambers. A plan was then drawn up, providing full details of the hiding place, and copies made for each of the ship’s officers. To put unauthorised treasure seekers off the scent several

dummy mounds of earth were arranged artd other false cities provided. AUSTRALIAN SYNDICATE. One of these plans is now engaging the attention of the Australian syndicate. Dummy mounds have been found and tested. Several likely spots have been uncovered, and what may have been the remains of an emptystone chamber have been turned up by the picks of the searchers. It still remains for the party to locate the Lima millions. It is significant that a flat rock, several feet below the surface, was uncovered, bearing a replica of tho main directions fo the plan. These were cut deeply into the rock, and were discovered by accident when one of the party while resting, idly scratched at the rock’s surface with ithe point of a pick. The hiding place of the treasure, if such is this, is in the heart of dense forest. The river is merely a sluggishly-moving stream, too small to carry a flat-bottomed boat, even during the wet season. The problem of transporting the valuables to the spot, therefore, must have been great. The plain was found among some old papers by a direct descendant of Benito Bonito, the infamous pirate—himself a shipmate of Captain Thompson for some years. That many expeditions have visitM Cocos Island without finding anything of value supiports the theory that the treasure is hidden alsewhete, although Sir Malcolm Campbell, the speed driver, who made a visit to the island in search of the hidden treasure, declares he has passed over the exact spot where the treasure is buried. “I have walked over the place scores of times,” he declared. "My camp was only 30 yards away. I could kick myself for not summing up the position better when I was there.” •

Another party of seekers has been searching for the Lima treasure at Quenscliff. Here some minor encouragement has been attained. Several antient cutlasses have Ibcen unearthed, but nothing of any real value—except historically.

Whether the treasure is still at Cocos Island, buried at some point inland from Wafer Bay—one of the

two landing places on the island, and named wifter the buccaneer writer. Lionel Wafer—or is now resting in some remote spot on Australia’s coast, it is impossible to say. The flat rock, with its peculiar markings, was a hopeful sign that at least some of the treasure is hidden in the vicinity. Whether iti is that stolen from Lima about a century ago by Captain Thompson, or the hidden hoard of some other sea raider, may'soon oc known. An Australian author, a few- weeks before he died, claimed that he knew the spot where a pirate ship was buried. The meagre was able to provide coincided with those available to the syndicate now- Searching According to him, the vessel became unsailable and was beached deliberately-, being covered with sand to hide the treasure in its hoM 1 atcr, a passing ship picked up the survivors—four men only. Two of these died during the voyage, and tfie other two are believed to have returned to Australia after some years. But there is no known record of any attempt on their part to visit the buried ship.