The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1892-08-04
Dredging for Treasure.


Dredging Tor treasure.
EFFORTS AGAIN BEING MADE TO FIND THE
BRITISH WAR SHIP HUssAR's GOLFERS.
The little tlotilla anchored off Port Nor
ris, waiting to pick up from the bottom
of the Sound 81, 800, 900 reported to have
been dragged down in the Golfers of the
British man of war Hussar in 1850, has so
far met with little encouragement. For
three weeks the promoters of the enter
prise have been laboring without any re-
turn.
All they have succeeded in getting is a
few coins. few bits of porcelain and con-
siderable flint, which was used as ballast
in the last century The tlotilla COM
prises the equipment of the Little Giant
Hussar Wrecking Company. They are
not the first who have attempted the re-
covery of the millions supposed to be be-
meath mud and sand at the bottom of the
Sound. eighty feet under the surface of
the water.
The Hussar, as recorded. was a thirty
two gun ship, POO feet long with a 5S-foot
beam. She and the British war ship Mer-
curry arrived in this port November %,
| 1880. each with money to pay Off the
British soldiers here The Mercury is
said to have carried $3.50, 600 and the
Hussar $3.50 600, amounting in all to 81,
800, 800 in American money The money
on the Mercury was transferred to the
Hussar while both vessels We're in New
/ y DIRK harDor.
The Hussar set sail with all this money
for New London. Seventy prisoners We're
taken from the prison ship and placed
aboard the Hussar, where they were
manacled to the gun deck The Hus-
| ,,'e ntai, or1a, 10 of
tempted a short cut through He'll Gate.
But the Hussar struck on sunken reef
and received such damage that the only
hope was to beach the vessel. With that
object in view her captain made for the
shore.
SANK IN EIGHTY FEET.
1t is believed he started toward Port
Morris. Hawsers were sent out and fasten-
ed to trees and the attempt made to haul
the ship on to the beach. The vessel sank
in eighty feet Of water and pulled the
trees up by the roots. Her prisoners,
chained to the deck, We're carried down
with her and number Of her crew We're
lost. The money, which was in British
guineas, was carried to the bottom and
never recovered.
No one to-day can tell just where the
to be the place, but there is a long shore,
and it is a tedious task to fix the location
of a vessel that sank so many years ago
and which the tides have had such a
chance to work upon.
Two briggs from the British government
arrived at Port Morris in 1894 and started
TO delve for the lost treasure. They
| searched for two years. when the nited
States government concluded they had no
right there and ordered them away. In
1919 company composed of English CAPT
talists was organized to search for the
vast wealth. They were not successful
From hat time several companies have
been formed They searched for time
and finally gave it up.
The search was abandoned for long
| time. Twenty-siX years ago the Norces-
ter Hussar Wrecking Company found the
wreck and tore away the upper part OF
the ship with dynamite.
THEY FOUND SOMETHING.
Enough was found to convince people
that the Hussar had sunk in that locality.
Probably had the present apparatus been
in existence then, they would have found
whether or not the vast treasure was
secreted there. Several cannon We're
found, and so were leather buckets mark
ed ''Hussar
The present dredging outfit is under
the command of Captain Thomas SimondS,
of Leominster, Mass. 1t consists of two
scows, Tug, hydraulic bucket. and a
floating house where all employed in the
work bunk The bucket weighs about
one ton. The company has a capital
stock of so, 900. Their forces also in
clude diver. On the dredging scow is a
dynamo with a Is, 600 candle power electric
search light used by the diver at the bot
tom. Captain Simonds says that he still
has hope.
GOT course he said, 'the great
trouble is. we don know just where oul
object lies. They have tried to tell me,
but | have found out more since | started
work than | was told. There doesn' I
seem to be anybody who can tell where
the treasure lies. We have been digging
over aspace fully one hundred feet square.
Oul work in one day with the apparatus
We have amounts to more than the pre-
viouS companies did in two weeks, anC
I q n