The Portland daily press., 1896-11-26
FOUND A SKELETON.
A New Chapter in JEWELS Islands
Tale Of Mystery.
MAY BE THE BONES OF A SEARCH.
Err FOR PIRATE GOLD.

The Bones We're Found Some Time Aao
IN what was Once the Cellar of a
House-Their. Discovery Recalls Old
Legends and Superstitions.
Nearly every Portlandsr has heard the
story OF the buried gold ON Jewell's
island, gold that once belonged to
Captain Kidd gathered Gas he sailed, as
ne salled," on those famous piratioal
voyages. To Jewell's island have gone
many of the credulous and the holes in
the surface of the land there tell how
carefully they have searched for those
chests containing fabulous wealth in
Spanish doubloons and other coin current
i'll the days when piracy ranked among
the professions. Now from Jewell's
island comes story which makes a
new chapter in the search for the treasure
OF Captain Kidd. The island is owned
by Mrs. McKeen of New York and last
August there was man in their employ
there, who, it is said, when he should
have been working as a farmer was
pl0Wing with spade for crop of gold,
He would start out apparently bent on
the work for which he was hired, but
would vary it's monotony by turning up
the soil In various parts of the ISLAND.
On hill. there is a depression, once the
cellar OF house. as is shown by the
stones of the foundation walls, and the
bricks which are all that remain of the
great square chimney. The house was
burned or torn down many years ago. In
this cellar, she man who longed for the
pirate gold WAS digging one day last
August, when he turned up human
skull. Nearby he found the leg bones of
a human skeleton. The bones had evil
IDENTIFY lain there for many years. They
were covered only by thin layer of soil
and leaves. In the side of the skull was
a small hole, which may have been made
by bullet, although it in more probable
that 1t is the result Of long exposure to
the elements. Mr.. ". A. Rollins, who
has charge of the property for Mrs. Nc
Keen, took the skull. Mr.. Rollins says
that the man who found it, carried the
other bones away when he left for parts
unknown. Since last summer the skull
has been in barn ON the island. It Is
there yet and it generally has the barn
all to itself. Nobody on the island
knows to whom the skeleton belonged
when 1t was still this frame work of
living body but there is a story told by
:" Uncle SAM" an elderly man who has
spent many years there, which offers,
remembers that thirty or forty years ago.
there came to the island from New
Brunswick man who brought with
him chart, or plan of some sort, and
who used it TO help him in his search for
Captain Kidd's treasure. This man had
brown waiskers of the cut which is de-
scribed by MIR. Rollins as ssside
sluggers. Now, Mr.. Rollins says that
on one side of the skull found last sum-
mer, there was lying bunch of brown
hair which m az have once been part of
the "side sluggers" worn by the man
from New Brunswick, which is an in.
teresting theory and may be taken for
what you think it is worth. However,
the parts of the skeleton were found as
related and the skull is now in the barn.
The women ON the island refuse to enter
the barn, but Mr.. Rollins does not mind
skeletons. In fact, Mr.. Rollins
once sat up all night to see the ghosts
which are said to dance by moonlight
over several old graves on the island.
It's nothing but superstition, said Mr..
Rollins, and his opinion should settle the
matter of the spook ball on the graves,
for be Is probably the only man who ever
sat up all night to see them.