LadyDigger
Bronze Member
Hamilton Evening Journal
Hamilton, Ohio
7 June 1924
The Girl in "Iron Pajamas" Defies the "Ghost" of the Spanish Gold
A BEAUTIFUL, twenty-year-old girl is about to attempt a task that has brought failure, disaster and death to scores of men.
Clad in a pair of iron "pajamas", she is going to the bottom of the ocean to wrest from it a vast treasure that has been hidden there for three-and-a-half centuries.
These iron "pajamas", it is expected, will protect her from the manifold dangers of the most terrifying sea floor in the universe.
BUT......
Will they protect her from the wrath of the ghost of the old Spanish admiral who, according to tradition, has guarded this treasure through the centuries --- guarded it so faithfully that death usually comes to anyone foolhardy enough to cross his path?
Margaret Naylor, "a bonnie, bonnie lassie," as Harry Lauder would sing, is now at Tobermory, Scotland, with her iron "pajamas", concluding the preliminary arrangements for her daring undertaking.
Off the bleak, rocky coast of Tobermory, with the Orkney Islands frowning dangerously close on the north, there rests at the bottom of the ocean, in the mud and silt, the Spanish treasure ship, Almirante de Forencia. When Spain was great, she was the pride of their navy -- the flagship of the 'invincible' armada. Now she is a mass of mud-coated wood, hardened like Sheffield teel by the waters of ages, but still holding fast the Spanish doubloon's, the pieces-of-eight and the reales, to say nothing of a royal diadem and gold and silver plate, the whole valued at more than $10,000,000 in American money, entrusted to her in the days of her glory. And near her is the wraith of her commander, who lost his life through treachery, faithful to his trust even in death.
It was toward the end of 1588 that Philip of Spain sent his great "conquering" armada into the English Channel. Only a few days later the "invicible" fleet was scattered like chaff.
The Almirante de Forencia was not only the flag-ship of the fleet but the treasure storehouse. Spain's wealth was then the scandal of the world, her navy the best paid. In the strong-boxes of the treasure ship was the pay of the fleet, which amounted to 65,000 ducats, or $150,000 a day.
In the commotion following the attack, the Almirante de Forencia managed to slip away, up through the end of the channel and into the North Sea. Then she turned west, through the forbidding eddies between the north coast of Scotland and the Orkney Islands. A terrific storm came and the treasure ship sought safety in the shelter of Tobremory Bay.
When the winds died down, she found herself surrounded by small boats of the wild inhabitants of the lawless district of the Island of Mull. These Scots were on far from friendly terms with the English, and extended a cordial welcome to the Spaniards. They came aboard the treasure ship in large numbers, saw some of her riches and imagined the rest, and from that moment on, the fate of the proud Spanish galleon was doomed.
The Maclean, redoubtable chieftain of the Scottish clan bearing his name, conceived the plan, and tradition reltates that the crime was actually committed by one Smollett, an ancestor of Tobias Smollett, celebrated author. One evening Smollett went aboard the warship, set a fire train to her powder room, and then stole silently ashore. There was a terrific explosion, and the pride of the Spanish armada, with her admiral and 400 men, many of them cruelly maimed, went to the bottom.
And that's the story of the loss of the Almirante de Forencia. "Full ten fathoms deep she lies" to day just as she has lain these three centuries and more. Time after time attempts have been made to salvage her, or to at least recover some of her treasure. But misfortune attended each attempt. Navigators know exactly where she lies. Divers have gone down and brought up pieces-of-eight and odd gold cups and small guns. But they also brought up blanched skins and shaky nerves and never has the same diver gone down twice.
In addition to the money and plate carried by the treasure ship, it is generally believed that she also has in her strong room the diamond-studded royal diadem with which Philip of Spain intended he should be crowned the king of the conquered English in London. So generally is this believed that immediately following the wreck, efforts were started to recover the treasure, particularly the diadem. No less than five crowned heads participated in these attempts - Elizabeth, James I, Charles I, Charles II, and James II. But all met with failure.
The galleon sank in waters claimed by the Earls of Argyll, Charles II beheaded two of these Earls following disputes as to the ownership of the wreck. James II, needing money on one occasion, offered to "sell" his interest in it to a succeeding Earl for an enormous sum of money, reserving for himself the diadem and a percentange of all else. The Earl of Argyll knew if he did not accept, he would lose his head. He fled to Holland and his estates were confiscated. But he cast his lot with the Prince of ORange, returned with him, assisted in driving James off the throne, got back his title and estates and was made a duke.
Ever since then, the Dukes of Argyll have been recongnized as the owners of the treasure at the bottom of "their" ocean. It was from the present Duke that Margaret Naylor acquired the "lease" to the old galleon. She personnally posesses all the rights, but will, of course, share all profits with the Duke.
Miss Naylor is the daughter of a Scottish vicar, petite, blonde and very feminine, despiter her unusual calling. During the war, she was connected with the British Navy Department, and had not been in it very long when she became interested in deep-sea diving. She did some remarkable work on some of the sunken war-ships, and became recongized as the leading diver of Europe, male or female.
In 1922, she attempted to recover the treasure of the Spanish galleon in an ordinary deep-sea diving suit. But she found that it was unable to withstand the terrific pressure of the water and the swift swirling currents. She brought up some of the gold coin, plate and guns, which were later sold for $4,000. Despite this comparatively rich haul, she announced that she would give up her efforts.
A few months ago, she became interested in the iron "pajamas" diving suit, the invention of a German. It can withstand any pressure, and, although so clumsy in appearance, it is amazingly practical. It's really an iron case. Tubes to the surface furnish air, and wires carry signals. The suit is so heavy that she cannot walk in it, but she will be moved from one spot to another by an iron crane on the "mother" ship. The pressure of the water will enable her to move her arms and wires controlling the "fingers" will permit her to pick up tiny articles.
All earthly obstacles that have stood in the way of recovering the treasure of the sunken Spanish galleon seem to have been overcome. But there is still to be reckoned with the ghost of the old admiral, who for three and half centuries has stood guard over his shp, pistol in hand, ready to avenge the treachery that sent him down to the bottom of the sea.
Here's a website I found about Tobermory, Scotland......... http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/mull/tobermory/index.html
Another article I found:
San Antonio Light
San Antonio, Texas
3 September 1950
PIECES OF EIGHT
By Watson Crews Jr.
After the supposedly invincible Spanish Armada had been routed by the English in the Summer of 1588, "a great ship of Spaigne beaten with shote and weather" put into landlocked Tobermory Bay on the Scottish Isle of Mull.
She stayed there many weeks, provisioning, mending the rents in her painted sails, plugging the holes in her high stern castle. One evening in November she blew up and sank 80 yards offshore, thereby starting perhaps the longest and probably the most consistent treasure hunt in history. Today, 362 years later, it is still going on and may be drawing to a climax.
Records seem to indicate that the mishap occurred to the 960-ton galleon Duke Florencia, which reputedly was the paymaster's ship for the entire invasion expedition. Estimates of her cargo run as high as $84,000,000 in gold, silver and jewels.
Several reasons have been given for the explosion. According to one account, the captain of the galleon requistioned supplies from the Clan MacLean, which was fighting the Campbells. When he started to sail away without paying, Lachlan MacLean, the chieftain, held three Spanish officers as hostages and sent young Donald MacLean aboard to collect.
Donald was disarmed and locked in a cabin while the ship pulled anchor. He found he was next to the powder magazineand, breaking through, struck a spark which killed him and most of the 380 aboard.
A less romantic story credits the English, who, hearing the Florencia was in Tobermory Bay, sent two men to destroy her. It was said they managed to float a powder keg and explode it next to the hull.
In 1641, the Earl of Argyll, head of the Clan Campbell, persuaded King Charles I of England, for a price, to grant salvage rights to himself and his heirs. The MacLeans thereupon erected a fort on the shore and announced they would shoot any Campbell diving or working near it.
"Ownership" of the wreck has been handed down through the Argyll's for centuries and innumerable attempts have been made to bring up the treasure, starting with an early diving bell in 1665. Most of the adventurers took leases from the Argyll lords guaranteeing a percentage of what was recovered.
James Mauld of Melgund in 1666 raised three large guns, two of bronze and one of iron. A year or two later, six guns were recovered, the most valuable being a beautiful bronze cannon credited to Benvenuto Cellini.
Between 1680 and 1683, a Greenock contractor, Archibald Millar, brought up nine bronze cannons, three anchors, a silver bell and a 28-foot rudder. Except for a few handfuls of old "pieces of eight" and a gold medallion or two, the treausre remained 50 feet down.
Gradually the wreck was covered with silt and a hard crust formed. By the time a syndicate of Glasgow merchants obtained a concession from the Duke of Argyll in 1903, nobody knew exactly where the buried bulk lay.
All the lore and science of the time was employed to no effect. John Stears of Yorkshire, a noted dowser or diviner, had a hawthorn twig which was supposed to dip over gold, but it didn't bob. A "famous expert" amed Cosar took borings as deep as 140 feet. Steam suction dredges puffed and panted but got nowhere.
Col. Kenneth MacKenzie Foss took up the challenge in 1912 and had excavated to what he was sure was only a few feet from the wreck when one of the hydraulic jets twisted and injured him internally. His secretary, Margaret Naylor, took diving lessons and was given a concession by the Duke, but she quit in 1924 after almost losing her life.
The present Duke, a 46-year-old peer who says "This drab old world could do with a little romance," interested the British Navy last Spring in testi its newest salvage equipment on the floor of Tobermory Bay.
A dozen divers, working in 60-minute shifts with jets that shoot water into the clay at 250 pounds a square inch, began clearing away the deposit above the approximate site of the treasure galleon. After they had gone 20 feet over a 100,000-square-foot area, they discovered a Spanish dirk, several pieces of charred timber and two silver medallions of apparent Spanish origin.
"We have found the Florencia." they wired the Admiralty and turned the rest of the job over to the Duke.
Any gold he may bring up will have to be surrendered to the British treasury to augment the nation's gold reserves, but he will get it's equivalent in British pounds. The Spanish government doesn't seem interested.
Hamilton, Ohio
7 June 1924
The Girl in "Iron Pajamas" Defies the "Ghost" of the Spanish Gold
A BEAUTIFUL, twenty-year-old girl is about to attempt a task that has brought failure, disaster and death to scores of men.
Clad in a pair of iron "pajamas", she is going to the bottom of the ocean to wrest from it a vast treasure that has been hidden there for three-and-a-half centuries.
These iron "pajamas", it is expected, will protect her from the manifold dangers of the most terrifying sea floor in the universe.
BUT......
Will they protect her from the wrath of the ghost of the old Spanish admiral who, according to tradition, has guarded this treasure through the centuries --- guarded it so faithfully that death usually comes to anyone foolhardy enough to cross his path?
Margaret Naylor, "a bonnie, bonnie lassie," as Harry Lauder would sing, is now at Tobermory, Scotland, with her iron "pajamas", concluding the preliminary arrangements for her daring undertaking.
Off the bleak, rocky coast of Tobermory, with the Orkney Islands frowning dangerously close on the north, there rests at the bottom of the ocean, in the mud and silt, the Spanish treasure ship, Almirante de Forencia. When Spain was great, she was the pride of their navy -- the flagship of the 'invincible' armada. Now she is a mass of mud-coated wood, hardened like Sheffield teel by the waters of ages, but still holding fast the Spanish doubloon's, the pieces-of-eight and the reales, to say nothing of a royal diadem and gold and silver plate, the whole valued at more than $10,000,000 in American money, entrusted to her in the days of her glory. And near her is the wraith of her commander, who lost his life through treachery, faithful to his trust even in death.
It was toward the end of 1588 that Philip of Spain sent his great "conquering" armada into the English Channel. Only a few days later the "invicible" fleet was scattered like chaff.
The Almirante de Forencia was not only the flag-ship of the fleet but the treasure storehouse. Spain's wealth was then the scandal of the world, her navy the best paid. In the strong-boxes of the treasure ship was the pay of the fleet, which amounted to 65,000 ducats, or $150,000 a day.
In the commotion following the attack, the Almirante de Forencia managed to slip away, up through the end of the channel and into the North Sea. Then she turned west, through the forbidding eddies between the north coast of Scotland and the Orkney Islands. A terrific storm came and the treasure ship sought safety in the shelter of Tobremory Bay.
When the winds died down, she found herself surrounded by small boats of the wild inhabitants of the lawless district of the Island of Mull. These Scots were on far from friendly terms with the English, and extended a cordial welcome to the Spaniards. They came aboard the treasure ship in large numbers, saw some of her riches and imagined the rest, and from that moment on, the fate of the proud Spanish galleon was doomed.
The Maclean, redoubtable chieftain of the Scottish clan bearing his name, conceived the plan, and tradition reltates that the crime was actually committed by one Smollett, an ancestor of Tobias Smollett, celebrated author. One evening Smollett went aboard the warship, set a fire train to her powder room, and then stole silently ashore. There was a terrific explosion, and the pride of the Spanish armada, with her admiral and 400 men, many of them cruelly maimed, went to the bottom.
And that's the story of the loss of the Almirante de Forencia. "Full ten fathoms deep she lies" to day just as she has lain these three centuries and more. Time after time attempts have been made to salvage her, or to at least recover some of her treasure. But misfortune attended each attempt. Navigators know exactly where she lies. Divers have gone down and brought up pieces-of-eight and odd gold cups and small guns. But they also brought up blanched skins and shaky nerves and never has the same diver gone down twice.
In addition to the money and plate carried by the treasure ship, it is generally believed that she also has in her strong room the diamond-studded royal diadem with which Philip of Spain intended he should be crowned the king of the conquered English in London. So generally is this believed that immediately following the wreck, efforts were started to recover the treasure, particularly the diadem. No less than five crowned heads participated in these attempts - Elizabeth, James I, Charles I, Charles II, and James II. But all met with failure.
The galleon sank in waters claimed by the Earls of Argyll, Charles II beheaded two of these Earls following disputes as to the ownership of the wreck. James II, needing money on one occasion, offered to "sell" his interest in it to a succeeding Earl for an enormous sum of money, reserving for himself the diadem and a percentange of all else. The Earl of Argyll knew if he did not accept, he would lose his head. He fled to Holland and his estates were confiscated. But he cast his lot with the Prince of ORange, returned with him, assisted in driving James off the throne, got back his title and estates and was made a duke.
Ever since then, the Dukes of Argyll have been recongnized as the owners of the treasure at the bottom of "their" ocean. It was from the present Duke that Margaret Naylor acquired the "lease" to the old galleon. She personnally posesses all the rights, but will, of course, share all profits with the Duke.
Miss Naylor is the daughter of a Scottish vicar, petite, blonde and very feminine, despiter her unusual calling. During the war, she was connected with the British Navy Department, and had not been in it very long when she became interested in deep-sea diving. She did some remarkable work on some of the sunken war-ships, and became recongized as the leading diver of Europe, male or female.
In 1922, she attempted to recover the treasure of the Spanish galleon in an ordinary deep-sea diving suit. But she found that it was unable to withstand the terrific pressure of the water and the swift swirling currents. She brought up some of the gold coin, plate and guns, which were later sold for $4,000. Despite this comparatively rich haul, she announced that she would give up her efforts.
A few months ago, she became interested in the iron "pajamas" diving suit, the invention of a German. It can withstand any pressure, and, although so clumsy in appearance, it is amazingly practical. It's really an iron case. Tubes to the surface furnish air, and wires carry signals. The suit is so heavy that she cannot walk in it, but she will be moved from one spot to another by an iron crane on the "mother" ship. The pressure of the water will enable her to move her arms and wires controlling the "fingers" will permit her to pick up tiny articles.
All earthly obstacles that have stood in the way of recovering the treasure of the sunken Spanish galleon seem to have been overcome. But there is still to be reckoned with the ghost of the old admiral, who for three and half centuries has stood guard over his shp, pistol in hand, ready to avenge the treachery that sent him down to the bottom of the sea.
Here's a website I found about Tobermory, Scotland......... http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/mull/tobermory/index.html
Another article I found:
San Antonio Light
San Antonio, Texas
3 September 1950
PIECES OF EIGHT
By Watson Crews Jr.
After the supposedly invincible Spanish Armada had been routed by the English in the Summer of 1588, "a great ship of Spaigne beaten with shote and weather" put into landlocked Tobermory Bay on the Scottish Isle of Mull.
She stayed there many weeks, provisioning, mending the rents in her painted sails, plugging the holes in her high stern castle. One evening in November she blew up and sank 80 yards offshore, thereby starting perhaps the longest and probably the most consistent treasure hunt in history. Today, 362 years later, it is still going on and may be drawing to a climax.
Records seem to indicate that the mishap occurred to the 960-ton galleon Duke Florencia, which reputedly was the paymaster's ship for the entire invasion expedition. Estimates of her cargo run as high as $84,000,000 in gold, silver and jewels.
Several reasons have been given for the explosion. According to one account, the captain of the galleon requistioned supplies from the Clan MacLean, which was fighting the Campbells. When he started to sail away without paying, Lachlan MacLean, the chieftain, held three Spanish officers as hostages and sent young Donald MacLean aboard to collect.
Donald was disarmed and locked in a cabin while the ship pulled anchor. He found he was next to the powder magazineand, breaking through, struck a spark which killed him and most of the 380 aboard.
A less romantic story credits the English, who, hearing the Florencia was in Tobermory Bay, sent two men to destroy her. It was said they managed to float a powder keg and explode it next to the hull.
In 1641, the Earl of Argyll, head of the Clan Campbell, persuaded King Charles I of England, for a price, to grant salvage rights to himself and his heirs. The MacLeans thereupon erected a fort on the shore and announced they would shoot any Campbell diving or working near it.
"Ownership" of the wreck has been handed down through the Argyll's for centuries and innumerable attempts have been made to bring up the treasure, starting with an early diving bell in 1665. Most of the adventurers took leases from the Argyll lords guaranteeing a percentage of what was recovered.
James Mauld of Melgund in 1666 raised three large guns, two of bronze and one of iron. A year or two later, six guns were recovered, the most valuable being a beautiful bronze cannon credited to Benvenuto Cellini.
Between 1680 and 1683, a Greenock contractor, Archibald Millar, brought up nine bronze cannons, three anchors, a silver bell and a 28-foot rudder. Except for a few handfuls of old "pieces of eight" and a gold medallion or two, the treausre remained 50 feet down.
Gradually the wreck was covered with silt and a hard crust formed. By the time a syndicate of Glasgow merchants obtained a concession from the Duke of Argyll in 1903, nobody knew exactly where the buried bulk lay.
All the lore and science of the time was employed to no effect. John Stears of Yorkshire, a noted dowser or diviner, had a hawthorn twig which was supposed to dip over gold, but it didn't bob. A "famous expert" amed Cosar took borings as deep as 140 feet. Steam suction dredges puffed and panted but got nowhere.
Col. Kenneth MacKenzie Foss took up the challenge in 1912 and had excavated to what he was sure was only a few feet from the wreck when one of the hydraulic jets twisted and injured him internally. His secretary, Margaret Naylor, took diving lessons and was given a concession by the Duke, but she quit in 1924 after almost losing her life.
The present Duke, a 46-year-old peer who says "This drab old world could do with a little romance," interested the British Navy last Spring in testi its newest salvage equipment on the floor of Tobermory Bay.
A dozen divers, working in 60-minute shifts with jets that shoot water into the clay at 250 pounds a square inch, began clearing away the deposit above the approximate site of the treasure galleon. After they had gone 20 feet over a 100,000-square-foot area, they discovered a Spanish dirk, several pieces of charred timber and two silver medallions of apparent Spanish origin.
"We have found the Florencia." they wired the Admiralty and turned the rest of the job over to the Duke.
Any gold he may bring up will have to be surrendered to the British treasury to augment the nation's gold reserves, but he will get it's equivalent in British pounds. The Spanish government doesn't seem interested.
