MODERN TREASURE HUNTS

Evening Star, Issue 21743, 11 June 1934, Page 6

MODERN TREASURE HUNTS

THEIR TRAGEDIES AND TRIUMPHS STILL ATTRACTING SEEKERS Hard upon the heels of recent reports by cable of the discovery of trea sure valued at £20,000,000, the prodigious cache of old-time pirates, m an island of the Society group, comes information that in the United States a syndicate is being formed to prospect the mysterious Cocos Island, in the Pacific Ocean, north of Galapagos Island, in search of the pirate booty long thought to _bo hidden there (writes Gordon Williams, in the Melbourne ‘ Argus ’). This treasure has attracted, among other seekers, Sir Malcolm Campbell. In Argentina, according to jinghsh journals, an expedition subsidised by tbe Government is being organised to seek the lost treasures of the Incas; a Peruvian mission is hastening its preparations to find the wreck of a galleon of Spain, said to have been discovered by aviators, 'lying on the sea bed off the South American coast. In Russia there are .continual official and unofficial sorties seeking jewels and gold reputedly hidden by the emigrated aristocracy. Nearer still, in Australia, thousands of men, under Government auspices, are seeking gold —and the prospectors are indeed kin with those who search for a more romantic, but possibly less material, treasure in fabled lands, seas, and islands, where once the company of the lolly Roger lived, diced, drank, and died.

The treasure of Cocos, like that of uhe recent discovery reported from the Society Islands, is valued at £20,000,)00, and, like all Gaul, it is divided into three parts. One hoard is reputedly that of Captain Edward Davies, who partnered Dampier in a buccaneering expedition when the City of Leon, in Nicaragua—the names suggest an exotic romance—was sacked in 1685. L’ho second cache is that of a Scottish merchant. Captain Thompson, who turned pirate, and joined Benito Bonito, an infamous sea rover, and who buried his loot on Cocos. The third is the hoard of Bonito himself, which was, supposedly, planted on Cocos in the eighteenth century. Sir Malcolm Campbell, narrating his venture on Cocos, says that by chance be learned of the treasure when a chart, formerly in the possession of Captain Thompson, came into his bands, complete with mysterious clues —in the fashion approved by fiction. So the motor-racer set off in Mr Lee luinness’s yacht to unearth the hoard. sirs Malcolm Campbell says that the island exerts an undeniable influence for evil, which he associates somehow with the records of the buried loot, in which “ murder and treachery play an all too important part.” He tells of che strange manner in which this atmosphere of foreboding affected his dog, which would rush to his tent-flap it night barking “ furiously, in a paroxysm of terror,” his voice “ viirant with fear and defiance.” Sir Malcolm Campbell investigated _ these strange disturbances, but each time he ■ ound nothing, although he writes that m such occasions, in the almost tropic ■ilackness, he had the feeling that -omeone or something was watching. Ho found nothing—not even treasure. He advances, however, the theory ihat the island is still inhabited by a ost race of tbe Incas, and that spies were sent down each night to keep watch upon the treasure seekers. The chsory is almost untenable, though in Jooos’s narrow expanse—it is six nautical miles long and six wide—there are peaks which no white man has -caled. Maybe Incas do inhabit these mlitudes; maybe they are myths. After a series of amazing misfortunes Sir .Malcolm Campbell’s party left the is.and and its uncanniness—but he will, io says, go back some day. The hunt ■a in his blood.

Fate plays some cruel pranks upon treasure-seekers. None has been more spiteful than that which concerned the Italian salvage steamer Artiglio’s attempt in 1929-30 to reclaim the bullion! lost off the coast of Brittany when the P. and 0. liner Egypt was sunk. The Artiglio found the wreck, and worked throughout a summer with heartening results. Then the change of season caused the postponement of operations until the following spring. In .the meantime the Artiglio and her sister ship, the Rostro, found the wreck of the Americaip munitions ship Florence, and decided, after several tests, that the Florence’s cargo had become harmless as the result of thirteen years’ immersion. Several charges had been fired in the Florence, to clear the shipping channel of the obstruction, and nothing happened. Then the Artiglio and the Rostro drew nearer the wreck, until they were within 300yds of it. There they awaited the explosion of the last charge. Instead of a mild explosion a crater 300yds wide was blown in the water. The Florence’s entire cargo had been exploded, and the crater “ engulfed the Artiglio, and she sank like a stone.” There were but seven survivors. The story of the Artiglio is one of the most disheartening and tragic in the modern annals of the sea. The treasure was recovered subsequently by the Artiglio 11. A modern romance is that which surrounds the search of a party, headed by a Spanish nobleman, for a treasure cave said to lie on the shores of Spain. They set out in a small craft, but uproar began when the venture was but a week old. The crew, who had believed that they were on a commercial mission, demanded a share of the loot. In the squabble four men, including the mate and the owner of the original chart, were killed. The second misadventure happened when the cave was found. There was no safe entrance from the sea, so a shaft was sunk from the cliff-head to the opening. Then arose a dispute concerning who should make the first* descent. Lots, pistols, and knives were drawn—the lots after the pistols and knives had whittled down the number who might claim a share in the final distribution. A man was lowered, and he failed to reappear. A second man was sent down at the pistol’s point, and he, too, apparently, went the way of the first. Then an entrance was forced from the sea,, with the aid of explosives, and the party entered in close formation. The first to enter solved the mystery of the disappearance of the men lowered from the cliff head. A “ devil fish ” presumably an octopus—seized him when he stumbled into a pool beneath the opening of the shaft. Ultimately three chests were found. The first contained tea; the second was filled with silks that powdered on exposure; and the third held nothing but a mass of sodden, mildewed documents. A more pleasant story by far is that which tells how Franz Lehar, of 1 Merry Widow ’ fame, came across a treasure in a house he had bought in Budapest. He had, in his contract to purchase, a clause pioviding that with the dwelling he bought everything in it. It was fortunate that he had such a contract, for a workman found a spring which, on pressure, revealed the hiding place of “ chests crammed with gold and silver plate.” Comparatively recently a schoolboy of Durban found a treasure chest oii a reef just outside the town,

and a Mexican labourer ploughed up a box containing trinkets > worth £BO,OOO. Somewhere, all the time, the search for treasure is proceeding. In Russia the Government has recruited 10,000 gold “ diviners ” to unearth the treasures buried by the aristocrats of Tsarist times. In China an effort will be made to find the hidden stores of gold of the peasantry, who are reputed to store away, in small amounts, more than 6,000,000 dollars annually. In California the hoard of a miner of the brave days of 1849, which is reputed to contain specie worth 4,000,000 dollars (normally £800,000), is the subject of sporadic searching.