Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1890-05-30
: A BURIED TREASURE.

Five Hundred Guineas Buried in Della
ware, County Awaits a Finder.
Among the early settlers within the limits
of Delaware county were few Scotch plo-
neers, who located themselves in the valley
of Wright's brook, within short distance
of the site of the present village OF Bloom
vile. After the war broke out the murders
and lawless depredations committed upon
the lives and property of the frontier set
tiers gave them a timely warning. They
saw safety only in flight. Although favor
ably inclined to the British government,
heavy bounty had been offered for scalps,
and the Indians were as likely to sacrifice
friend as foe, and they consequently pre-
pared to leave. The arrangements were
soon completed, their goods boxed and
buried or otherwise secreted in places rec
ognized by themselves through the agency
of marked trees, intending to return and
possess themselves of their property as soon
as peace should be restored.
One Scotchman, fearing to take much
money with him in his flight pondered long
and earnestly in what manner most effect
ually to conceal his 'pile." At last he be-
thought himself to bury it, Selecting a
spot favorable to his purpose, he sank an
excavation at the roots of a hollow tree, in
as he asserted upon his dying bed, 500 gui-
meas, and carefully replaced the dirt and
designated the spot by a marked line of
trees to the junction of Wright's brook
with the Delaware river.
The party sought refuge in Canada, and
while there the family of this Scotchman
became the fated victims of a contagious
disease One by one was consigned to the
grave until he alone remained. At last he
was taken i'll himself, and when upon his
dying bed he called the physician who had
kindly attended him during his illness and
revealed to him the secret Of his hidden
treasure and all the attending circum-
stances.
Immediately after the declaration of
peace the physician, not doubling from the
minute statement Of the dying man but
that he could easily discover the concealed
treasure, made a journey into the country
in search of it. He arrived at the place
then and until recently known by the ap-
pellation of "Four Corners concealing
the object of his mission from every one,
and accounting for his strange conduct / 7
pretending to be searching for herbs of
rare medicinal properties which friendly
Indian had told him abounded in that
region He readily discovered the line of
marked trees-but alas! he had come too
late, and the Improvements of the Scotch
man were now occupied by an enterprising
settler, and upon the identical spot where
the treasure was concealed years before
was now waving heavy crop of wheat.
The physician made careful inquiries of
the present occupant, who stated that in
blowing the field over there pointing to
the same LOTT the plowshare had struck
and smashed in the end of a wooden box,
which, upon examination, he found to
have once contained clothing, but of which
only few decayed remnants remained.
He had also plowed up a set of harrow
teeth and an iron wedge, and that these
were all that he had discovered. After a
futile search of nearly a week the physician
was compelled to abandon the enterprise
and return to meet other engagements.
Before his departure, however, he made a
revelation of the facts to one Gregory, a
merchant at the Corners" but to this day
the treasure remains undiscovered, al
though many persons have searched for it
since that time.-Jay Gould's History of
Delaware County.