FRENCHMENS GOLD (Coudersport, Potter County)

[jeff of pa]

I do remember reading about it and it intrgued me enough to catch my attention as to it's closeness to the area. Like I said...I don't remember exactly where it was...but it wasn't far from Pitts. This was back in the late 70's or early 80's I believe when I read the article..but again, it was so long ago I don't remember exactly when the plate was found.....could have been an article of some past history or some current event...

My point...one was found somewhere and it wasn't too, too far from Pittsburgh. I disinctly rememer the pic in the paper with a large section missing from the plate. This i was got me started on my quest to find another.

Al

Al where does
the Kanawha and Ohio Rivers meet ?

Céloron plate   |   Becoming Virginians   |   The Story of Virginia, An American Experience

 

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[jeff of pa]

Also see


https://www.google.com/search?q=Cél...n5IKXq6gGNmIHwCg&ved=0CFAQsAQ&biw=800&bih=437

 

[deepskyal]

Ok...Point Plesant...Mount Pleasant...I'm getting senile....
Point Plesant, West Virginia...

The Pittsburgh Press - Google News Archive Search

Funny...didn't seem far to me back then. Guess that isn't exactly that close to Pittsburgh...but close enough it wouldn't be a long drive either.

Al

 

[deepskyal]

Maybe cause it was in a Pittsburgh Paper when I read it I made a bad assumption....and you know what happens when you assume...

No puters back in em days...lol and over years a memory fogs.

You're right Dave...not near Pitts...my bad.

Al

 

[TreasureWriter]

Do you realize that there is a photograph of the "cross on the rock" taken by Rev. Sholl of Rebersberg in the late 1800's along the Sinnemahonning.
It's right along the route that Gov. Frontenac's fur trading troop was taking on their way back to Montreal. It also coincides with the location described in a Seneca Indian legend. It's not in Borie; nowhere near it. It's almost too easy to find if you have a copy of the legend and the picture....3 others on TreasureNet in the Ghost Town Group have been shown this, have visited the site with me and can verify it. It is on private property today but the owner doesn't know of the legends or the possibility of buried gold. If you're in this area watch for rattlesnakes...they're everywhere on sunny days.

Cheers

 

[doverturtle]

TreasureWriter,
I know you said a two box would not work due to the close proximity of the railroad tracks. What about gpr?

 

[TreasureWriter]

Hi DoverTurtle,

I don't know about GPR; never used one. I have seen them in use to identify unmarked graves in old forgotten cemeteries and it's quite possible that it may work but then if the cache is there and it's under the tracks; maybe not. If you are really interested in this one...I can take you right to the spot and show you how all of the terrain features line up with those in the Photo and distances coincide with the story that was recorded by a famous Pennsylvania historian. I'm pretty certain that this is it.....if it in fact exists.

 

[Holly_squirrel]

Lol, I wouldn't suggest anyone go close to any privately owned land up there looking for treasure , you'd end up with a bullet in your butt ( and it might be my father in law's) . Folks don't go by traditional law up there. Ask how they handle poachers up there. If a deer out of season gets your cabin burnt down... Try digging up gold..

 

[FinderKeeper]

I wish I could show you what we located 5 years ago. We believe we have located the French Gold site but again we can not remove anything from this site until we get the Museum Commissoners to let us have a finders fee. We do have artifacts from the site and we been trying to get this site dug up but again its all bull **** with the gov. My lawyer is working on a deal with DCNR and the Museum Commisoners to dig at our Dents Run site and the French Gold site we call Frontenac near Coudersport. If they work out something this summer I will invite some of you to be on site before the dig. The paper work from DCNR has to many dead ends for us to agree to at this time, so we gave them our offer. Now we wait We want to know what is at this site to but we will not just give it up with out a reward . The gov. wants every thing we find and that's why we are in Canada working now. We will just sit on the sites we have and move on until the law changes.

 

[FinderKeeper]

Check out this link Divers begin Lake Michigan search for Griffin ship They may of found the ship owned by Robert Cavelier La Salle. Cavelier and Frontenac both owned the French Gold that was lost in the Coudersport area. It took them over 10 years to get a permit to dig under water. I will be talking to the Great Lakes Exploration Group to see if they can help to get our site looked at now that the French are in the area. For 5 years we been wanting DCNR to let someone dig at our site near Coudersport. They may of found Cavelier's ship and we may of found Cavelier's gold. Its time to dig.

Update/ July 19th- No our site is not connected to Cavelier or Frontenac, the dates do not line up. This story of lost French gold is from the 1720's and Cavelier and Frontenac where both dead by this time.

 

[FinderKeeper]

OK I just spoke to Steve and his experts from the Great Lakes Exploration Group on this hunt and there are many problems with dates and names in this story. They only thing that is true is the large stone and its carvings. What has happen over the years is the Indians saw the stone and some time in history they told the white men about the stone. Over the years the story changed and more was added. Most of the story is wrong. The stone has a 5 foot cross on it but there are other carvings on the stone that proves the French where on site at the time the carvings were done. From the info I gave them they said this site is from 1720's to 1740's and not from the 1690's. They said there was no gold coins out west in the amount as told in this story. The indians did not want gold , they wanted trade goods. So if the French were headed south we have trade goods at our site and if they where headed north we have religous gold and silver artifacts and furs. Frontenac never traveled south towards the Mississippi River and some of the forts in the story were built later in time. If we prove this camp site is from the period with carbon dating from the artifacts we have the French Gov. will demand DCNR allow a dig and the French do pay rewards . So now we work with the French on this one.

The Griffin project in the Great Lakes with the Cavelier ship is on hold for now and we offered to help them with one of our methods to locate some brass canons at the site. The method we use is new and not tested in waters deeper than 6'. We can scan under small lakes, rivers, and ponds and the site of the Cavelier ship sits in 50' of water . We had plan to use our method in Nova Scotia at one of our sites to scan for gold under the bottom of lake beds but brass cannons would be easy to locate if it works at their site.
If our method works Steve wants us on site by end of summer.

 

[MtLaffeeBottleDigger]

FRENCHMEN'S GOLD (Coudersport, Potter County)

FRENCHMEN'S GOLD (Coudersport, Potter County) Ah, another legend of lost gold. Late in the 1690s, a group of French Canadians and Jesuits, led by Louis Frontenac, left New Orleans for Montreal. They sailed up the Mississippi to the Ohio, past what is now Pittsburgh and up the Allegheny. Their rafts were loaded with kegs filled with gold coins, worth $350,000 today, destined for the Royal Governor of Canada's treasury. After reaching present-day Potter County, they started overland, hoping to reach the Gennesee River and a straight shot to Montreal, but the heavy coins made the going slow. Fearing an Indian attack (the Senecas were long time enemies of the French), they decided to bury the booty just north of present-day Coudersport. They marked the spot with a cross chipped onto a large rock. The Senecas are said to have seen the marking, but left it alone because they feared the religious significance. In time, the marker eroded and the site was forgotten. The Frenchmen made it home, but never returned for their gold and to this day it's still buried.