Incredible Metal Detecting Discoveries: True Stories of Amazing Treasures Found by Everyday People (10 page)

Captain Ed started his
pirate days at the bottom of the rung when he and twelve other crew
members were cast aside after a failed mutiny attempt. Ed tried to
shoot his commanding officer in the face, but somehow missed. Not a
very good way to start off as a pirate is it?

Ed and his entire crew
were set adrift in the ocean with no food and water. This was
basically a death sentence, but Captain Ed and his crew of 12 managed
to capture an entire ship, kill the captain and take over. This was
Ed's first taste of piracy success. He liked what he was doing and it
was not long until he had created quite a nasty reputation for
himself. I won't even list the things he did to people in this book.
His atrocities were sick and evil.

During his years of
pillaging and plundering any ship in his path, he amassed quite an
amount of treasure. Like any good pirate, Ed needed a place to hide
his treasure. The hiding place would have to be the closest thing to
hell on earth, and he found it in a little island located in the Bay
of Fundy. The island was called Isle Haute.

The shore of this spit of
land was only accessible a couple hours each day. The island had a
vicious tide cycle where the water rose and fell over 50 feet with
each tide change. These tidal movements are said to be the strongest
in the entire world.

To make things even worse,
this little island had cliffs over 300 feet tall and a thick
population of over 30 different spider species. This was not the
average spider hanging in the corner type of population. This was the
ground crunching underneath your feet as you walked on spider after
spider population. This is an island that time forgot. This sounded
like the perfect place for mean old Captain Ed to hide his vast
amounts of loot.

Captain Ed was successful
at hiding his gold on the island, but he was never successful at
retrieving it. Eventually he was captured and hung for his crimes of
the high seas. His unclaimed treasure was said to be haunted by his
ghost, but there were other possible ghostly apparitions that
inhabited Isle Haute as well.

The island is also the
location of a rather brutal murder by the evil Captain. Legend says
that he beheaded an unruly crew member on the island. There have been
several eyewitness reports of a headless ghost haunting the island
made by various lighthouse keepers who were unfortunate enough to
spend any length of time on this creepy island. Does this sound like
a place you would like to metal detect? Wait, there is more!

An area of the island has
been nicknamed Indian Flat. This area was named after an Indian woman
who died of starvation.

So let's look at this
island from a scary standpoint.

• 50 foot tidal surges.
  

• 300 feet rock cliffs.
  

• A spider population
  large enough to give anyone a severe case of arachnophobia.
  

• A Indian woman died
  of starvation on the island.
  

• A person was beheaded
  on the island and his headless ghost has been seen multiple times by
  multiple people.
  

• It was the location
  where one of the most notoriously brutal pirates to ever sail the
  seven seas buried his treasure.
  

• Said pirate never
  recovered his treasure and now his ghost haunts the island.
  

There are two ways of
looking at these things. You could choose to believe all of these
horrid facts and steer clear of the island, or you could look at it a
little differently. Maybe all of these stories are really just
stories. Maybe these stories were created to keep people away from
the vast amounts of gold buried on the island. What better way to
keep people away from your treasure than by creating some really
believable frightening stories.

An adventurer by the name
of Edward Rowe Snow chose the latter. He chose to pursue the treasure
when he got his hands on an old treasure map that he believed led to
the location of Captain Edward's secret stash.

In 1947, Edward Rowe Snow
purchased a treasure map. The map was analyzed by experts who said
the map was drawn on 17
^th
century paper. It took Mr. Snow
7 years to get his hands on this map, and it took him another 5 years
to decipher it. His old treasure map pointed right towards Isle
Haute.

Snow managed to get his
hands on a very early model metal detector. It was not something that
you or I would have used. It was used by plumbers to help them locate
pipes, but it would prove to be good enough for Snow.

When Snow arrived on the
island, the lighthouse keeper told him that he was not the first
person to come searching for treasure, but like any good treasure
hunter Snow did not let this stop him.

The day was growing
shorter when Snow started his search. He was using his metal detector
near a hole a looter had previously uncovered when his detector
alerted him to possible treasure. Snow looked over his shoulder at
the setting sun and started digging in the already deep hole with his
pickaxe. For 20 minutes he managed to carve out a deep hole.

As the sun sank below the
horizon, Snow's pickaxe became snagged in the ground. He pulled and
struggled until a human ribcage protruded from the side of the hole.
Snow kept digging and on his next swing recovered more than he
wanted. His pick caught something in the darkness. Once again he
pulled. This time a human skull rolled out of the earth and across
his feet where it came to a stop. The skull was staring right at him!
This proved to be enough for Mr. Snow as he scrambled out of the pit
in the weak light of the setting sun.

Snow returned the next
morning to finish his dig. He managed to uncover a total of eight
gold coins that were over 200 years old. Initially Snow was not
allowed to take the coins with him, but he eventually obtained an
export license that allowed him to claim the gold.

This could not have been
all of Captain Ed's buried treasure. Perhaps it all still remains
buried on Isle Haute. Let me know if you find it!

Indian burial grounds have
been part of American folklore for many years. People in Hollywood
have cashed in on some of these stories with horror movies like House
and Poltergeist. In these movies, homes were built on top of ancient
Indian burial grounds and as a result, the houses were haunted. These
might be Hollywood movie stories, but who in their right mind would
want to disturb any sort of burial grounds, let alone an Indian
burial site.

Most people would choose
to not willingly tamper with any type of grave site. Never mind the
possibility of ghosts and poltergeists. It has to do with respect,
but that has not stopped people from accidentally uncovering graves
with a metal detector.

There are countless
unmarked Indian burial sites across the United States. There really
is no way of knowing you are about to dig one up until it is too
late. This still doesn't make matters any better for the unfortunate
person who accidentally uncovers a grave.

Eventually someone is
going to find an old Indian burial ground, and that is exactly what
Ray Camp did on December 15
^th
2013.

Ray stumbled upon his find
on accident. He had no intentions on finding anything. He was simply
testing out a metal detector near his house. Ray is a member of the
Alabama Archeometalology Historical Society and the members of this
society often receive new metal detectors for testing purposes. The
members of this society are no strangers to metal detecting. Some of
the founding members have been avid treasure hunters for over 40
years, and they have made some pretty incredible finds over those 40
years, but let's get back to the point at hand: Indian burial
grounds.

All of this happened in a
small town in Alabama by the name of Wetumpka.

Ray was testing out this
metal detector when he got a good signal. Not expecting to find much,
Ray started to recover the target. To his surprise, he unearthed a
couple of copper bracelets. As he tried to recover the bracelets, Ray
got yet another surprise. The bracelets were still attached to bones.
Arm bones to be exact.

At this point Ray decided
he had better stop the recovery. He made a few phone calls and
decided to call the local law enforcement. He wanted to make sure he
did not stumble upon a crime scene.

Once the local law
authorities declared that the area was not a crime scene, a team of
state archeologists were called in to survey the area and remove any
other remaining artifacts.

Several bones were
recovered along with some beads and a few human teeth. Ray and other
members of the Alabama Archeometalology Historical Society have been
quoted saying, “This is the find of a lifetime!”

This might be the find of
a lifetime, but I don't think I would like to be the one who made
this discovery. You can call me superstitious. You can call me silly
and you can call me a chicken. I would much rather be a silly
superstitious guy in a chicken suit than dig up an Indian burial
site. Let's just hope that no Hollywood type ghost stories rise from
this possible Indian burial mound.

On April 7
^th
2010, Ken Mordle was having a great time during an organized metal
detecting exhibition. The exhibition was organized by a metal
detecting club called: Digging Up the Past Metal Detecting Club. The
club and its lucky members organize routine digs on the English
countryside. This particular dig was taking place near Chichester
West Sussex, UK.

Ken
was happily hunting an area when his metal detector signaled
treasure. Ken started digging up his find. Thoughts of old hoards
raced through his head. Could he have just stumbled upon the next big
Roman hoard? Would his find go down in the history books? It
definitely would, but he did not find the next big Roman hoard.

He
found a coffin. This was not just any coffin either. It was the
coffin of a Roman child that was over 1900 years old. The entire
coffin and its contents were removed by a team of archeologists for
further study.

A
team of four archeologists painstakingly combed through the remains
looking for any clues to help them identify the find. The first
attempt involved a camera being pushed down into the coffin. They
quickly learned the entire coffin was filled with silt. This meant
they would have to remove the silt very slowly while analyzing every
tiny speck.

Their
work revealed bones, small bracelets and one small bead. The coffin
belonged to a little girl, but it was the only coffin found in the
area. Why was she buried here all alone? It is this question that
makes the story a little more interesting. The question remains
unanswered.

Once
the find was made public, people were allowed to vote on a name for
the little girl. The name that was chosen is Oriens. This word comes
from the Latin verb which means “to rise.” I hope this
little girl's spirit does not live up to her newly appointed name.

They
always say that you should leave the best for last, and this
particular metal detecting story is the best or worst depending on
how you look at things. Crematory tags, rings with fingers attached,
Indian burial sites and coffins with the remains of children don't
even come close to the supernatural qualities of this find. If you
found any of the prior finds even the slightest bit frightening, then
hold on tight because this one makes a 5 star Hollywood horror film
seem like a nice cozy children's bedtime story.