America’s great treasures still waiting to be found
Daniel Coughlin
11 April 2019
The most spectacular missing valuables in the USA
Nothing beats the allure of hidden treasure: with its promise of shedding a light on history and being worth huge sums of money, it’s no wonder so many are drawn to hunt for it. Here are America’s treasures that are still waiting to be unearthed.
San Miguel Treasure
In 1712, King Philip V of Spain required substantial sums of cash to fund the War of Succession. To bankroll the conflict, the Spanish authorities in the New World set about assembling a stockpile of silver, gold, gemstones and other valuables.
San Miguel Treasure
By 1715, enough treasure had been collected to fund the war, and a fleet of 12 ships was organized to transport the goods to Spain. To avoid pirates stealing the precious cargo, the authorities decided to make the journey in hurricane season.
San Miguel Treasure
The decision was a foolish one. On 31 July 1715, a week after the convoy of ships had set sail from Havana, Cuba, an almighty hurricane whipped up and destroyed 11 of the 12 vessels with the loss of over 1,000 lives.
San Miguel Treasure
A lighter carrack ship called the San Miguel is thought to have separated from the convoy and sank near Amelia Island, Florida. Carrack ships tended to transport the most precious cargo, as they could easily outrun pirates.
San Miguel Treasure
Incredibly, the San Miguel may have stored a whopping $2 billion-worth of valuables. Several of the ships that went down in the tempest have been recovered over the years, including the Urca de Lima and Nuestra Señora de las Nieves. But, to this day, the San Miguel has never been found.
Blackbeard's Treasure
Notorious pirate Edward Teach, aka Blackbeard, terrorized the Caribbean in his flagship the Queen Anne's Revenge for years until one fateful day in May 1718 when it ran aground near Beaufort Inlet, North Carolina, and the buccaneer was killed.
Blackbeard's Treasure
During his criminal career, Blackbeard looted ship after ship, and collected a great many treasures, from gold bars to fine jewelry worth millions of dollars in today's money. The pirate is said to have buried the bulk of it on islands around the Caribbean and parts of North Carolina.
Blackbeard's Treasure
The wreck of the Queen Anne's Revenge was discovered in November 1996, and a number of valuables were retrieved, including a wine glass stem decorated with diamonds and tiny gold crowns, an ornate sword guard and coins depicting Queen Anne.
Blackbeard's Treasure
Historians insist that Blackbeard didn't bury most of his booty, and the relatively modest haul of items salvaged from the Queen Anne's Revenge are his actual treasure, but many fortune hunters beg to differ, and believe the riches are still out there somewhere.
Blackbeard's Treasure
The treasure, if indeed it does exist, is likely to be buried on one or more of Blackbeard's stomping grounds. The most likely locations include the area around Blackbeard's Castle on the US Virgin Island of St. Thomas, and Plum Point in North Carolina.
Beale Stash
Like the challenge of cracking codes? Then you may want to have a stab at deciphering the two unsolved Beale ciphers. The codes first appeared in a pamphlet published in 1885 and are said to contain directions to a stash of gold, silver and jewels, which are said to be worth in the region of $43-$54 million.
Beale Stash
According to the pamphlet, a group of 30 adventurers led by a Thomas J. Beale discovered an abundantly rich mine near Sante Fe, New Mexico sometime during the early 1800s, and spent 18 months extracting thousands of pounds of precious metals and stones.
Beale Stash
Beale was tasked with transporting and concealing the haul, which he ended up hiding near the town of Montvale in Bedford County, Virginia. Beale made three ciphers with details of the treasure. The first reveals the location, the second is a description of its contents and the third lists the owners.
Beale Stash
In 1822, Beale handed a sealed box containing the cyphers to a Lynchburg innkeeper called Robert Morriss with directions to open it if he hadn't heard from him within 10 years. A decade passed with no word from Beale but Morriss waited until 1845 to open the box.
Beale Stash
Unable to decipher the codes, Morriss passed the box to a friend, who managed to decode the second cipher describing the treasure and went on to publish the pamphlet in 1885. Since then, nobody has cracked the two unsolved ciphers and some experts have even argued the whole thing is an elaborate hoax.
San Saba Treasure
Remember the Alamo? Most Americans are aware of the infamous siege and battle that took place in 1836 during the Texas Revolution at the Alamo Mission in San Antonio when Mexican troops massacred every single one of the mission's Texian defenders, including Davy Crockett (pictured) and Jim Bowie.
San Saba Treasure
The battle may be well known but fewer people have heard about the treasure that is said to have been buried on the grounds of the Alamo. According to the legend, the Texans had amassed piles of gold, silver and other precious objects to fund the revolution.
San Saba Treasure
When Mexican forces besieged the Alamo, the Texan bigwigs buried the valuables on the mission's grounds to stop the invading troops seizing them. Now called the San Saba Treasure, the valuables are allegedly worth millions of dollars.
San Saba Treasure
In February 1894, a young medium called Mary Mareschal hit the headlines after convening with the dead Texians at the Alamo. The San Antonio Express News reported that the ghosts told her $540,000-worth of gold and treasures had been buried on the site.
San Saba Treasure
The news story ignited interest in the treasure. Yet, despite numerous excavations of the site, no sign of the San Saba Treasure has ever been discovered, and it's likely the story is a fanciful fabrication.
Lost Civil War Union Gold
Eye-watering amounts of gold and other precious items went missing during the American Civil War. One of the most notable cases concerns a shipment of gold that went astray in June 1863 in Elk County, Pennsylvania.
Lost Civil War Union Gold
The gold was being transported from Wheeling, West Virginia to Philadelphia on a Union wagon train, which had taken a northern detour to avoid advancing Confederate troops. Details are very sketchy, but the precious shipment appears to have vanished near remote Dents Run.
Lost Civil War Union Gold
Rumor has it the gold was buried somewhere in the area. The train was carrying a total of 52 bars weighing 50 pounds apiece. Given today's gold prices, the haul is worth $55.6 million so, as you can imagine, Dents Run has become a magnet for treasure hunters.
Lost Civil War Union Gold
Dennis Parada, the founder of treasure hunting website Finders Keepers, found a vague map of the stash in the 1970s, but has only managed to recover several modestly valuable Civil War-era artifacts, despite years of searching. Other treasure hunters have been equally unlucky.
Lost Civil War Union Gold
The public requires permission to dig and getting the all-clear is no mean feat, which is unfortunate as the plot thickened last year. A team of FBI agents was spotted on the site, apparently searching for the missing gold, confirming many treasure hunters' suspicions that million of dollars worth of gold is buried in Dents Run.
Mosby's Stolen Civil War Treasure
Historic Fairfax, Virginia attracts more than its fair share of treasure hunters searching for the stash of Civil War valuables that is supposedly hidden there. In total, the hoard of precious items is said to be worth $6 million today.
Mosby's Stolen Civil War Treasure
In March 1863, Confederate ranger John Singleton Mosby and his men launched an audacious night raid on the Fairfax County Courthouse and captured 42 Union soldiers without even firing a shot.
Mosby's Stolen Civil War Treasure
Searching the courthouse, Mosby and his men came across a bulging burlap sack full of valuables belonging to Fairfax County's most prominent families. The bag is thought to have contained gold, silver, jewels and other family heirlooms worth $350,000 at the time.
Mosby's Stolen Civil War Treasure
On their way back to Confederate lines, Mosby was so worried he and his men would be captured by Union soldiers and lose the booty, he ordered one of his sergeants to bury the treasure in the woods between two pine trees, which were marked with an X.
Mosby's Stolen Civil War Treasure
Mosby and his men reached safety and, after a few months, the ranger sent the sergeant and six privates to retrieve the treasure only for the men to be captured by Union soldiers and hanged. Mosby never made it back to Fairfax, and the cache remains buried there to this day.
Looted Civil War Confederate Gold
A humongous stash of Confederate gold bullion worth upwards of $140 million is sitting at the bottom of Lake Michigan somewhere, say a pair of treasure hunters from the eastern shore city of Muskegon, Michigan.
Looted Civil War Confederate Gold
According to treasure enthusiasts Kevin Dykstra and Frederick J. Monroe, $2 million in gold bullion was stolen in 1865 by Union soldiers from Confederate President Jefferson Davis, who had been captured in Georgia and imprisoned in Virginia.
Looted Civil War Confederate Gold
A deathbed confession in 1921 uttered by a local banker called George Alexander Abbott revealed the bullion had been packed onto a train boxcar and smuggled more than 1,000 miles north in the utmost secrecy.
Looted Civil War Confederate Gold
When it reached Lake Michigan, the boxcar was loaded onto a ferry. Whether a storm forced the crew of the ferry to offload cargo is uncertain, but somewhere during the crossing the boxcar of bullion was thrown overboard to lighten the load.
Looted Civil War Confederate Gold
The lost gold was the subject of a History Channel documentary in 2018 that followed Dykstra and Monroe's search. The show ended with a cliffhanger – in the season finale, the pair chanced upon a boxcar rivet and what they think might be a gold bar, so the hunt for the gold could very well be over. History Channel has announced that there will be a second season of the show coming out in Summer 2019.
Cahuenga Pass Treasure
This cursed treasure is buried somewhere along the Cahuenga Pass in Los Angeles. In 1864, four agents working for Mexican politician Benito Juarez left Mexico City and set out for San Francisco with a treasure trove of gold, diamonds, pearls and other valuables that they were planning to exchange for weapons.
Cahuenga Pass Treasure
The agents were said to be carrying a total of $200,000-worth of luxury items. Adjusted for inflation, the treasure trove is likely to have a value of $3.2 million today, possibly a lot higher given the valuables have important historical value.
Cahuenga Pass Treasure
One of the agents died en route to San Francisco, the first death associated with the treasure. Worried the treasure would be confiscated by the authorities, the surviving trio buried it and fled. Little did they know, a fugitive shepherd named Diego Moreno had been watching. Seizing the moment, Moreno dug up the stash and fled.
Cahuenga Pass Treasure
When the agents returned for their loot and discovered the theft, they pointed the finger at one another. Two of the agents ended up killing each other and the third died in a bar fight not long after. Moreno was just as unlucky. He reburied the treasure on the Cahuenga Pass for safekeeping but died before he could retrieve it.
Cahuenga Pass Treasure
Before he passed away, Moreno revealed the location of the treasure to a close friend who ended up dying on his first dig. A further two deaths are linked to the treasure which, despite a plethora of searches, has never been retrieved.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
If you're ever lucky enough to visit the Little Bighorn River in Montana, you might want to bring a metal detector and shovel. Two super-valuable lost treasures are associated with the famous battle that took place along the river back in June 1876.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
A month before the battle, General Custer's Seventh Calvary, which was made up of 700 troops, were given four months' back pay in the form of banknotes, silver and gold. All in all, the pay bonanza is estimated to have been worth $25,000, which is just shy of $600,000 in today's money.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
The troops, including General Custer (pictured), were carrying the precious coins and bills when they were defeated resoundingly by Lakota, Arapaho and Cheyenne warriors, who stripped the dead soldiers of their belongings. The hoard was gathered together and hidden away in a secret location.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
Years later, Cheyenne chief Two Moons revealed to trader Walker P. Moncure that he knew the whereabouts of the treasure. Two Moons died in 1917 and the tale passed into legend. In the late 1950s, journalist Kathryn Wright investigated the story and eventually discovered a hidden vault in Two Moons' tomb on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation in Montana.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
Wright found a sealed envelope supposedly containing the location of the haul and sought permission from the Cheyenne to open it, but when she returned to the tomb the envelope had been stolen. What became of it and the soldiers' valuables remains a bewildering mystery.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
There's another lost Little Bighorn treasure which is even more valuable: a hoard of gold bars worth $18.8 million. In the aftermath of the battle, Far West steamboat captain Grant Marsh picked up 50 wounded soldiers and set off at breakneck speed down the river toward Bismarck, North Dakota.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
According to local legend, Marsh had been entrusted with solid gold bars worth $375,000, which he'd been given by a group of miners for safekeeping. Weighed down by heavy cargo and passengers, the Far West was dangerously overloaded and Marsh is said to have removed much of the gold and buried it somewhere along the Bighorn River, which meets the Little Bighorn near Hardin, Montana, downstream from the battle site.
Battle of Little Bighorn Treasures
Marsh navigated the Far West via the Yellowstone River to reach the Missouri River and the city of Bismarck. After arriving, Marsh brought the first news of the Battle of Little Bighorn, which quickly spread nationwide. As for the gold, whether it actually existed is doubtful but the legend has persisted and some treasure hunters believe the precious bars are still out there awaiting discovery.
Flagstaff dead outlaws' loot
On 10 May 1881, a stagecoach loaded with silver and gold bars and coins worth over $3 million in today's money was ambushed on a mountain outcrop near Flagstaff, Arizona. The property of Wells Fargo bank, the gold and silver was being transported to a branch in San Francisco.
Flagstaff dead outlaws' loot
After a spate of holdups, the bank decided to transport the silver and gold in unmarked mail sacks in an effort to thwart criminals, but a group of five thieves were tipped-off by a crooked bank insider, and intercepted the bullion.
Flagstaff dead outlaws' loot
The robbers made off with the sacks, with a large posse of local sheriffs and army cavalry in hot pursuit. The bandits were eventually tracked to a remote cabin in the mountains above Flagstaff.
Flagstaff dead outlaws' loot
The posse stormed the cabin, and a frenzied shootout followed. All five robbers were killed, but despite numerous searches of the cabin and surrounding area there was zero sign of the silver or gold.
Flagstaff dead outlaws' loot
The owner of the cabin spent 30 years searching for the treasure. In 1913, a local character called Short Jimmy McGuire claimed he'd found several gold coins but dropped dead of a heart attack before he could share its location. Needless to say, the loot remains AWOL.
Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine
Tales of ridiculously rich lost mines packed with gold, silver and gemstones have fascinated treasure hunters for centuries. America's most famous example is the Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine, which is said to be located somewhere near Weaver's Needle in Arizona's rugged Superstition Mountains.
Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine
The mine is named after 19th-century immigrant Jacob Waltz, who reportedly extracted tons of gold over a period of 18 years. After his death in 1891, legend has it the prospector had left gold in the mine worth around $200 million in today's money.
Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine
Depending on which story you believe, Waltz either died without revealing its whereabouts or 'fessed up on his deathbed and sketched a crude map detailing the location. In fact, there are scores of variants of the tale, which has been embellished like crazy over the years.
Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine
That hasn't put off thousands of treasure seekers, and a shocking number of adventurers are thought to have died searching for the lost mine. In June 1931, amateur explorer Adolph Ruth vanished during his search and may have been murdered for his map, the first of the deaths.
Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine
To date, it's thought that around 600 adventurers are estimated to have perished, making the Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine America's most dangerous treasure hunt. Currently, an intrepid pair of explorers, Jesse and John Feldman, are on the hunt for the mine, with their efforts being documented in a recent TV show called Lost Gold.
Leon Trabuco's Gold
A millionaire Mexican attorney called Leon Trabuco and four of his associates are thought to have buried an incredible 16 tons of gold somewhere in the New Mexican desert, which would be worth in the region of $750 million today.
Leon Trabuco's Gold
Back in 1933, the US was in the depths of the Great Depression. Trabuco and co were convinced the dollar would be devalued and the price of gold would surge as a result, so they set about smuggling tons of the precious metal into the US to cash in on the potential bonanza.
Leon Trabuco's Gold
The smugglers chose a spot in the New Mexican desert near the Ute and Navajo Indian Reservations to bury the gold and hired a private plane to transport it, a ton at a time. The Gold Reserve Act was passed in 1934, pushing up the commodity's price, but there was one major spanner in the works.
Leon Trabuco's Gold
The act outlawed the private ownership of gold in the US. The hoard was now strictly illegal, and the moneyed attorney and his associates risked confiscation and long jail terms if they attempted to sell it.
Leon Trabuco's Gold
As the years passed, the gold remained buried. Trabuco tried to sell the gold on the black market, but was never able to get the price he wanted, and the stash stayed buried. Let's hope it makes someone very rich someday.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Stolen Masterpieces
In what turned out to be the biggest art heist and theft of private property in history, a total of 13 treasured artworks valued at $500 million were stolen from Boston's Stewart Gardner Museum on 18 March 1990.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Stolen Masterpieces
Two thieves posing as cops gained access to the museum during the early hours of the morning. They handcuffed and tied up the guards, and made a beeline for Rembrandt's Self-Portrait from 1629, but they couldn't prise the painting from its frame.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Stolen Masterpieces
The crooks had better luck with the Dutch master's The Storm on the Sea of Galilee painting, which they cut from its frame, and then swiped The Concert by Vermeer, the most valuable of the pilfered artworks, and two Rembrandts: A Lady and a Gentleman in Black and a self-portrait from 1634.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Stolen Masterpieces
They went on to steal Impressionist pioneer Édouard Manet's Chez Tortoni, Landscape with Obelisk by Govaert Flinck, five Degas drawings, a Chinese bronze gu wine cup from the Shang dynasty, and a bronze eagle finial.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Stolen Masterpieces
The pair made a quick getaway and, despite a thorough FBI investigation, neither the duo or the artworks have ever been found, though the Feds suspect East Coast mobsters were behind the heist. The museum is currently offering a reward of $20 million for information leading to the recovery of the artworks.
Fenn Treasure
In 1988, New Mexico antiques dealer Forrest Fenn was diagnosed with terminal cancer. He decided to be buried with a chest packed with $2 million-worth of gold, gemstones and jewelry in an undisclosed remote location in the west of the US.
Fenn Treasure
Fenn had a miraculous recovery and change of heart. After sitting on the treasure for years, he finally decided to bury it in 2010 and create a treasure hunt instead to inspire others to spend more time outdoors and give them something to hope and strive for.
Fenn Treasure
That same year, Fenn presented nine clues in the form of a poem along with a treasure map in his autobiography The Thrill of the Chase, and went on to capture the public imagination when he appeared on NBC's Today Show in 2013. As publicity surrounding the treasure reached fever pitch, fortune hunters began to risk life and limb searching for the 40-pound chest. To date, four people have died searching for the treasure, including Colorado adventurer Randy Bilyeu (pictured).
The greatest lost treasure in US history and the incredible story behind it
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