The OI story is one that has changed with the times. In its most humble beginnings, it is exploiting a documented tale of a possible recuperated treasure (chest) in a sunken depression under a block and tackle hanging from a tree branch on an island in Mahone bay, ca 1830, called Hobson's Nose. That's the first historical allusion to a treasure island in Mahone Bay. No mention of any other are made prior to 1830 in two very local histories written in the 1820s. There is a later a story written ca. 1840 by Thomas Haliburton which builds on the idea of a treasure island in Chester Bay, without specifically naming Oak Island. That fiction (Haliburton refers to it as a fiction) makes the suggestion that men will die in a shaft on an island in Mahone Bay looking for something that they cannot even name, and that no one will understand why. The first known searcher efforts at OI are subsequent to these accounts and they are likely an effort to locate what is already circulating to a specific location owned by colonials that was used to defraud individuals associated with the Truro group who were relatives of Anthony Vaughn's young wife. Details that may have been used as confidence ploys appear to have been created to correspond with Masonic details of stories that the public may have recognized. One thing is for certain; the stories were back dated to a time when it would have appeared to be possible, but later scrutinizing does show that the dates mentioned, the events described and the people in question are not compatible. The area on the mainland at OI was a French colonial settlement, Mirligueche, which had long been a native place of congregation during the summer months. The French had been around these parts since 1632 and Nicholas Denys had worked the area between the La Have river and Mirligueche for Oak during the latter part of the 17th century. Razilly had explored the coast there for minerals, since it was known since 1608 that the area held important deposits of mineralization (the Ovens area). The first detailed charting of Mahone Bay by the English was done in 1751 by Charles Morris. He noted only the remnants of the old French Fort at the mouth of the La Have river and the village of Mirligueche (occupied by Europeans since 1681). In 1752 the survey was used to plan a grant for German colonials at what became Lunenburg. In 1762, post the deportation of the French, the English proceeded to colonize by importing New England settlers from the colony of Rhode Island. The area around Chester was mapped and surveyed for the Shoreham grant which included OI. All known European features on OI, roads and markers, can be related to the surveying that was done there in preparation for the colonials. In 1795 lot 18 was owned by German merchant. The lot was sold that year to Smith who had been living a few lots over with his mother, which disproves the story of three young men sailing to OI to a pristine area and discovering a well-hidden, but easily identifiable site of a much earlier burial. It is very likely that Smith and Ball had worked for the German, Wollenhaupt, on his lot 18 prior to Smith acquiring it. Ball had been acquiring land on OI since he came in 1783, something that was easily doable if you petitioned the colonial government for any with taxes owing and could demonstrate that you would farm the land. OI lots had been abandoned by the New Englanders, many who had returned to the US after the Revolution or who were chased out of NS by British loyalists. The relations between Ball, Smith and Wollenhaupt may have extended to the provisioning of the local native population which had been thrown onto reserves and were starving in the winter. Wollenhaupt had a government contract to supply the natives with essential foodstuffs. At any rate, not, much else was available to the early colonials but that and to provision the garrison at Halifax also. Records show that times were very tough at OI in the 1790-1820 period. Vaughn, for what it was worth, had essentially no prospects. He was a poor scoundrel and had been written up and shamed in the local papers for having been a philanderer and a man of ill repute. The possibility exists that a ploy to defraud Vaughn's wife's rich relatives from Truro was hatched and that this was done in a way that was not dissimilar to other known treasure hoaxes that were somewhat popular in New England at that time. Vaughn, arguably, has been the most quoted of the sources for the details at OI since he later produced a signed affidavit for allegations made post 1850. It remains today that he was an undesirable fellow and that he kept the company of a known wildcat miner who was selling claims to bogus coal mines in Cape Breton. What is truly remarkable about the OI story is that it fizzled out on more than one occasion, the public largely accepting that the whole things was a scam, only to reappear years later in embellished forms stating even grander theories and finding new audiences further from the seat of the stories. There's no doubt that the initial accounts were not merely treasure related. They involved details that made the alleged shaft coincide in detail with a very famous Biblical shaft whose discovery was supposed to announce the Second Coming. This made an awful lot of sense since much of NA had latched on to the Millerite frenzy that predicted that this legendary shaft containing a stone should be discovered in 1843 or 1844. What ensured in those years is what is called The Great Disappointment. There was no Second Coming and the shaft legend needed a new story in order to survive. Subsequent variations on it would include Kidd, but the initial story seems to have resonated with Masons who, for a long time, pursued the mystery with the idea that it was not involving a material treasure. The story has just never stopped morphing ever since. I credit Masons with keeping it alive since it is they who exported it to the great US Masonic Conferences of the late 19th century where it gained a large following. Many of the printed details of the Money Pit shaft reproduced numerology of Masonic interest. Perhaps no one assisted in that more than the Rosicrucian Reginal Harris who was the long time custodian of OI histories. Have fun with it. You can use this mystery to discover interesting true history.
