LOST GOLD MINE

Waipukurau Press, Volume XXX, Issue 190, 20 August 1935, Page 3

LOST GOLD MINE

SHOP ASSISTANT TO SEARCH LAPLAND ADVENTURES LONDON, July (>. A young Manchester shop assistant, James Ingram, is leaving his counter to search for a lost gold mine somewhere ire the mountains of Finnish Lapland, near the shore of the Polar sea. If legend is correct, a river bank littered with golden nuggets awaits him. Guarded by the monks of an ancient Russian monastery, the location of the mine has remained a secret for nearly four centuries. Last year Mr Ingram, becoming bored with life, set out alone . with only £8 to tramp across Finland and Lapland from the Baltic Sea to the Arctic Ocean. He was) arrested for wearing a. red shirt at a remote outpost on the Finnish-Russian frontier. A bear hunt in .the frontier forests led to his becoming lost and nearly losing his life by starvation. While prospecting for gold in central DajpFand, Mr Ingram and his Finnish partner nursed a sick miner, and from him learned the story of the mine.

Four hundred years ago a Russian adventurer, named Trifona, founded a monastery on the shore of the Polar Sea, the most northerly religious establishment in the world. The monks

mined for gold in the mountain: streams, but when the monastery was destroyed by Swedish raiders all trace of it was lost to the invaders. The secret of the gold-mine was kept by certain Lapps. In return for the kindness of the young men in nursing him through his illness, the miner passed on the secret to them.