American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1875-07-03
A Rich Haul-RecOyery Of the Safe
from the Wreck of the Cumberland.

The iron safe lately taken from the
| wreck OF the ill -fated United States ship-of.
war Cumberland, run into and sunk by
the Confederate ram Merrimac, in Hamp-
ton Roads, in 1862, is now on exhibition
in this city. 1t is an old fashioned con-
Germ, square, about the size of a common
sized tea-chest, and built of cast-iron.
When found it was lying on its side,
buried in about four feet of mud on deck
next to the one where it stood when the
skip went down. Rust has eaten through
1t in several places, and there is an open
Ing on its side about three inches wide,
caused, it is supposed by the explosion of
a torpedo. 1t is said that through this
opening shower of $S, 900 in gold coin
marked the track of its ascent from the
wreck to the schooner. None of it of
course can be recovered, as the water there
is nearly 100 feet deep and the tide very
swift The parties are silent in regard to
its contents, and are not likely to- tell the
amount of its treasure, but it is confidently
believed that their banking account has
been increased about $75, 200 in gold.
Fully this amount has been expended in
various vain endeavors to find it before
these parties undertook the job. One
company alone, at the head of which was
ex-Gov. Gilbert G. Walker, is known to
have sunk $25, 900 in the fruitless enter
prise. 1t is known now that those who
formerly searched for this money were
many times either standing on the very
spot or very near it, and had they known
it could have easily put their hands on it.
The deck around it had been shattered
and the safe itself been partly blown
open by torpedoes being exploded beside
it. While Capt. Brown was searching for
the spot where he supposed the safe to be
he stumbled against what he supposed to
be a log of wood, but what he subsequent
ly was mortified to find was the CHASTITY
remains of a man, hardened and petrified
into stone, standing solid and erect, a lone
sentinel, watching, as ii were, the treas
urcs of the deep surrounded by the bones
of his lost comrades who died with him
whilst vainly and nobly battling for the
preservation of their good and beloved old
ship. 1t was when endeayoring TO raise
this strange object out of its grave of mud
he found the safe, which was Immediately
taken up and brought to Norfolk. Brown
has been a most successful diver having
performed many dangerous and difficult
operations of this kind, both here and in
England. o. E. c. Maltby, who employs
him and who gets the bulk of this money,
is a merchant of this city and is largely
engaged in wrecking operations in all
parts of the United States. He will doubt
less put the gold where it will do the most
good. Several suspicious characters, at
tracted here, it is supposed, by the an
nOuncement that the safe would not be
opened until the arrival of certain inter
ested Detroit parties, have been put under
the surveillance of the police. Three of
them, two nights before the safe was
opened, were found secreted in the back
yard of the Atlantic Hotel, where the safe
is kept, but made their escape before they
could be Washington National