BURIED PIRATE TREASURE

[Silveraith]

Yes, the family story is compelling starting with my great great grandfather but stories change from the re-telling over time I suppose. The refinery in Marysville would have been the closest & most logical refinery but if the ore was in hard rock it would have needed to go to a stamp mill & then be refined. If they didn't have a stamp mill at the mine they would have to have shipped it somewhere. But if it was placer gold they would have taken it straight away to be smelted.Something more for me to check LOL. The more I am learning about all this the more I need to know.

 

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[KANACKI]

The initial gold rush was for placer alluvial gold in rivers and mining later with water jets. this displaced early small artisan mines and eventually pushed them out by buying up their claims and even claim jumping. As finding gold got harder miners formed companies to follow quartz leads by tunneling. Hence the term hardrock mining. However there was a need to acquire a stamp mill to crush the ore. Thus the mines that had their own usually a 5 stamp mill very simple affair began to mill gold for other mines for a percentage. This led to creation of multi stamp mill some mines had crushing ore not just for themselves but others nearby.

By 1853, the tent city had been replaced by brick buildings. In addition to the brick merchant buildings, Marysville had developed mills, iron works, factories, machine shops, schools, churches and two daily newspapers. The population was almost 10,000. By 1857, Marysville had become one of the largest cities in California, due to its strategic location. Over $10 million in gold was shipped from the banks in Marysville to the U.S. Mint in San Francisco.

There was in 1856 $100000 gold robbery but not of ore but bullion on Clamptonville Marysville stage route. But not raw gold ore. Perhaps your families story is connected to that? They sent the gold ore to Marysville to be processed and refined only to be Hijacked after been turned into bullion? Only part of the gang was captured and hung. I do not know if there was any recovery. Riverboats used to come up Marysville and no doubt some of the stolen Gold made it way down river. Hence a story on possible connection to rogue English mariner?

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

Based on 1856 prices of gold that would equate to 5253 ounces of gold. In today's prices roughly $7769187.00 USD. Over 7 and half million not a bad haul.

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

Here is Marysville advertisement on refining.



Kanacki

 

[Honest Samuel]

Another consideration - I am putting the cart way before the horse here - if I were fortunate enough to find this lost gold shipment, what should I do? Notify the proper authorities I presume? Then what? Would it be mine or fought over in some old estate settlement from 150 yrs ago?

First thing, hire a good lawyer and take their advice and always pay state and federal income taxes. You presume wrong, notify the proper authorities, never. Let your lawyer do it.

 

[Silveraith]

First of all, please let me extend a most sincere thank you to KANACKI. You are indeed a hero member & extremely helpful. In a brief period of time you have helped connect what I feel are missing elements of my grandfather's story.

My great great grandfather the gold mine owner had several other partners as well as anywhere from 5 - 20 employees depending on the mining season & other factors. I think the timeline & facts of this old story are lining up pretty well. The only thing i'm not sure of is the value of the gold shipment as told to me. I don't know where my grandfather got his numbers from & I have no way of validating them now but everything else seems to fit. I am totally amazed & excited beyond words as to the possibility that this lost gold shipment may still be sitting in the ground somewhere in NW Washington near the Canadian border.

What started my renewed interest in this old family story was a letter I received about a year ago. There was no name on the letter & no return address. The writer told me one of his descendants had been a partner in the gold mine operation back in the day. He conveyed a story very close to what my grandfather had told me. This person told me he had cancer & a very short time to live & wanted the gold to be found. He had traced my family lineage & sent the letter to me as I am the last living person left from that side of our family. This whole thing is beginning to give me chills as I sit here typing this out. I am no expert when it comes to treasure hunting but I have this feeling that keeps telling me to go out there & find it. What to do?? Where to start & how to go about it?? I will keep trying to find more information for now.

 

[KANACKI]

Hello Silveraith

Well you need to get all your priorities in order. I understand and do not expect you posting why you believe where this alleged gold is. But you need to make sure this alleged location is not just a later rumor connected to the story.

Anyway have fun researching the story and you never know..............

Kanacki

 

[Dave Rishar]

As he told the story, Captain Shears took the ore into the harbor at Bellingham, Washington where it was off loaded into a freight wagon to be transported into Canada which is only 30 miles or so the the north of that town. Bellingham is the northernmost city in the U.S so it makes sense if Canada was their destination.

It might have made more sense to just sail directly to Canada. Overland travel in the PNW was a serious PITA during the 19th century. Heck, it's still a bit of a PITA in 2019. Most travel was (and a lot of travel still is) done around here via water. But then again, sailing directly to Canada may not have been desirable or even possible. More on that below.

Supposedly something happened on the way to Canada with the gold.

Depending on the exact time period that we're discussing, Americans attempting to enter Canada would have encountered problems. We'll get back to this in a moment. But first...

There are several old roads up there heading north & they wouldn't have been able to move the ore very far off the road so now I think it's a matter of how much time it would take to search possibly using metal detectors.

Lots. Those old roads from Whatcom (the Whatcom and Skagit Trails) were not an easy trip. The Whatcom Trail, being significantly shorter than the Skagit, runs probably 60 or 70 miles before you even get to the border; then you're looking at another 15 miles or so before you get to anything resembling civilization (Fort Hope, where modern day Hope is located). The Skagit is quite a bit longer. Both run through the Cascades for essentially their entire lengths. This would not have been a fun jaunt through the woods.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whatcom_Trail

The Skagit Trail doesn't have a Wiki entry but it's easy enough to find: fire up Google Earth or Google Maps and pan down around 20 miles south of Bellingham. The mouth of the Skagit River starts where modern day Conway is. Now follow the Skagit up through Burlington, NE up to Ross Lake, then north through the Skagit Valley up to Hope. Both of these routes involve a lot of walking through rough terrain, but those were probably your only choices if you wanted to take a carriage from Whatcom to Canada. Remember, what you see today as gorgeous farmland north of Bellingham was, back then, impenetrable old growth forest, swamps, and Lake Sumas.

That's a heck of a journey. As I asked earlier, why not simply sail to Canada? I'm not saying that there's no possible reason for an overland journey, but there aren't many good ones. It's a question that needs to be answered if you're looking to "firm up" the story. Also, that's a heck of a lot of ground to cover with a metal detector.

However, let's assume that they unloaded in Whatcom and took one of those trails. What sorts of problems might they have encountered? It could have been something as simple as a disabled wagon; that's rough terrain that they're moving through. There was a lot of stuff going on in Washington Territory around this time, though...multiple wars against the Natives (Yakima War, Puget Sound War, Battle of Seattle, and periodic raids from the Haida up north), the Fraser River Gold Rush, etc. As for what could go wrong when entering Canada, the US had two tiffs with Canada around this time: Ned McGowan's War, 1858, and the Pig War of 1859, the latter having technically been a showdown with the UK but Canada was dragged into it. During both of these "wars," both the US and Canada put troops on the trails where they crossed the border. Would that have been a problem for some American bandits attempting to flee into Canada? Absolutely.

Admittedly I went into this in an effort to knock holes in this story, but I don't think that I did. If anything, I convinced myself that it's at least plausible. I even have a possible scenario for why it wound up buried, and why they never returned for it.

 

[Robot]

Early Day Money Laundering...Or...Should I Say...Gold!

The logic with the direction this ship took from California to possibly Canada would suggest to me that they were taking the ore to a receiving location to drop it off and then have it sent back to the US for refining.

The Captain probably already was ferrying ore from the Barkerville Gold Rush in Central BC were I now live.

The Cariboo Gold Rush Barkerville Section

I would believe this gold was relabeled and return to the culprits as spendable currency!

 

[Honest Samuel]

Everyone buried everything... all the time.

No offense,,, but the statement of "The truth be known, pirates rarely buried their plunder"... is moot.

Obviously copied from one of "those sites". heh

Very true, most pirates spend their shares on booze and wild women.

 

[Red-Coat]

There is Captain William Shears is recorded in the 1851 census records. His Address: Elliott Court Enumeration District: Malborough King. In the County of Devonshire...

His Occupation is listed as Master Mariner.

I searched through All UK and Ireland, Masters and Mates Certificates, 1850-1927 results for William Spears. And there was none recorded as being a registered skipper.

However it not to say before 1850 skipper was never tested or registered.

Kanacki

There is a record of the fruit schooner “Queen Esther” under Captain William Shears putting into Salcombe in Devon on 3rd December 1865, en route from Shields in NE England to Valencia in Spain. She was likely going to pick up Spanish raisins and almonds and delivered her cargo to Hull in E Yorkshire on 24th March 1866.

The Queen Esther was a 138 ton ship, built by John Jordain of Dodbrooke, Devon in 1843 and registered under number 4540. Shears is listed as master for the vessel between 1862-1868. She was abandoned in a sinking condition on 12 November 1870, about 200 miles west of Scilly in SW England, on her way home from Tarragona with a cargo of wine and fruit, bound for Bristol. All hands saved.

 

[Red-Coat]

I’m not necessarily supporting the story… more providing information that might help determine how much of what you have been told might be true.

If this is the same Williiam Shears, and he died in England, then the most likely grave would be in Exeter, Devon (Higher Cemetery). There’s a William Shears buried there (born 1827 with no date given; died 22 March 1894, age given as 67). He’s interred with his wife (joint headstone) Ann Blackmore Shears (born 1824; died 31 December 1891).

Ann’s inscription reads “Hath Done What She Could” and William’s reads “Fell Asleep”, so there’s no indication of him having been hanged. More suggestive that he died peacefully. There’s an inscription at the bottom of the headstone that reads “Peace…” and some indecipherable words.

I’ve no idea what he was doing before 1862, or between 1869 and 1894, or whether he ever went to America.