Unread post
Sat Nov 25, 2017 10:58 pm
Background
On an island just of Nova Scotia, Canada, is what is called Oak Island.
In 1795 a young man named Daniel McInnis (or McGinnis) was roaming Oak Island when he came upon a large round shallow depression in the ground where no trees grew. As there was always talks of Pirates in those days he thought it may have been where some pirates had hidden their loot, so he started digging. After finding a layer of flagstones he gave up, but returned with more friends the next day. They got down another 10 feet and found a layer of rotten oak logs. They dug another 15 feet but gave up looking, still convinced there was something down there.
They returned in 1803 with a businessman as the Onslow Company and did a lot of excavation. layers of logs were found about every 10 feet, along with clay, charcoal and coconut fibres.
Then at around 90 feet they discovered a stone with strange markings in code, and probing beneath it some kind of wooden chest, but left it for the next day. By morning the pit had flooded with over 60 feet of water.
Attempts to bail it out proved futile as it kept flooding.
Another pit was sunk adjacent to the first, but this too was flooded. Eventually they gave up.
in 1849 another group, the Truro Company, used a hand-operated auger to remove cores of material. They found clay, bits of wood, and three links of gold chain-supposed evidence of buried treasure. They dug additional shafts, but these, too, were inundated with water, and work stopped 1850. Other operations continued during which time a workman was scalded to death by a ruptured boiler.
Decades passed. In 1897 the Oak Island Treasure Company found the long-sought after “pirate tunnel” that led from Smith's Cove to the Money Pit. They drilled and dynamited to close off the tunnel that was responsible for flooding the pit with sea water.. Subsequent borings found a fragment of parchment upon which was penned portions of two letters (possibly “ri").Later this same year Oak Island's second tragedy struck when a worker was being lifted from one of the pits and the rope slipped from its pulley, plunging him to his death.
In 1965 there came yet another tragedy when four men died in a shaft after being overcome either by swamp gas or engine fumes.
