A rant about treasure legends

... is there any way an old rum pirate could get a glimpse of say, a few more of those golden beauties. ...


Nah, don't wanna distract from my post here. All were found fumble fingers one at a time. Not in a cache. From places like stage stops, old-town urban demolition, trading posts, emigrant camp spots, etc... But they would have no bearing on this post, since this is about caches.
 

Now...

Lets talk another thing...

Caves. :)

These have been ideal places to "hide" things for eons.
 

The oldest written accounts of the time of Christ were found just sitting in a cave.

Like the day they were placed there.
 

Having treasure can sometimes be more of a curse than being broke in some cases.

Especially when it comes to protecting it.
 

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I know that at the mere mention of pirates attacking that many spanish settlers would flee to the countryside hastily burying there valuables. This is documented by rigrose , dampier, exqualimen etc.etc.... so maybe pirates didnt bury much loot but the spanish under fear of attack surley did.
 

Hey Tom, on the Yamishita Gold recovery, I saw proof on a documentary, years a go, the guy that found it had a picture of himself, in his home, posing with a roughly 30 inch tall gold Buddah. I believe he found it.
 

One of the best hidding places there is, is in plain sight, looking ordinary and non-important, there for all the world to see and pass by.

And the best lie is one that comes closest to the truth.

...uh hmmm...pass the rum will ya

Sent from my VS810PP using Tapatalk
 

One of the best hidding places there is, is in plain sight, looking ordinary and non-important, there for all the world to see and pass by.

And the best lie is one that comes closest to the truth.

...uh hmmm...pass the rum will ya

Sent from my VS810PP using Tapatalk

What rum ? ? ? this is ice tea in a rum bottle... for effect.

***ARC smiles***
 

Hey Tom, on the Yamishita Gold recovery, I saw proof on a documentary, years a go, the guy that found it had a picture of himself, in his home, posing with a roughly 30 inch tall gold Buddah. I believe he found it.

Long before that TV show (and remember it was TV) showed the guy with the golden Bhudda (my father was a movie and TV set painter and sometimes did props, those guys could easily make your Bhudda) it was said that Yamashita's treasure was aboard a Jap military vessel that was sunk in Manila harbor by allied bombing. Many years ago it was thought that Marcos got wind of it and recovered it and that was how he amassed his great wealth. Bart, never you mind what was in the spackle buckets. I did once stash (bury) an item in the woods and went someplace for a year and when I returned there had been a huge storm that blew down the big trees I had used for triangulation for recovery when needed and a few months later while I was still away there was a forest fire which removed all trace of my trees and when I returned the landscape looked nothing like when I buried the item. I believe it is still out there. It was metal but the forest it sits in is in a region of colonial iron mines and much of the local rock is good enough ore to make a detector sing out or at least render one useless, believe me I tried. It wouldn't change anybody's lifestyle if they found it but it is a real lost buried item. ARRC and Bart, arrrrggghhhh, pass the rum mateys, but please make it Cruzan single barrel!!
 

Here is an undocumented one found 2 years ago by a friend of mine while metal detecting. It was about 1 foot down in hard pack dirt out in texas photo-314.JPG
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I found one just like this about 25 years ago. Mine was about double this size and was in a chok-ful-o-nuts coffee can buried in loose rock and leaf litter here in key largo. I have found 2 caches of jewlery too. Yesterday was my first day on a new propperty and I thought I had one. This property is very old and has the foundations of several buildings. One is the remanents of a large plantation house on the water. The land was a sapadilla plantation that dates to the 1890s. About a half mile up from the main house were the remains of about 4 cottages for the help. I just started in on this site when I got this about a foot down at the base of a large mahogany tree.photo-311.JPG
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I had to pry open this bucket to see what was inside. The bottom was filled with dry tar and the rest of the bucket was filled with hinges, nails, old bits of crockery and rusted bits of iron and dirt.photo-310.JPG this is a sample of what was in the bucket the rest is outside in a big ole pile. Oh well maybe next time !! The only banks around here were in miami or key west for many years. Im sure there are more caches around here just got to stumble on to them. Wait till you see the cistern I found .ill take pics. Tomorrow. Ill have to squeeze into this one but it looks good. The lid fell in yesterday when I messed with it. Its a death trap right now.
 

Hey Tom, on the Yamishita Gold recovery, I saw proof on a documentary, years a go, the guy that found it had a picture of himself, in his home, posing with a roughly 30 inch tall gold Buddah. I believe he found it.

You're talking about that TV show right ? I saw that too. Hollywood sensationalism generates viewers. So too are there shows that ..... once you finish watching them, you're compelled to believe in Big foot, UFO's, templar treasures, oak island, and all the other silly stuff like some of these shows coming out now profile.

And if you read the md'rs thoughts on some of those shows, you see how the "proofs" fall apart under scrutiny. And they fail to give alternate explanations throughout history on the treasure Legends. Some have outright been debunked, and the counter evidence is as close as your google search button. But those are left out of the shows, because they don't make for treasure thrill sensation.

So too is it with the Yamashita show you reference. Yup, complete with the "golden buddah' and so forth. All have alternate explanations. Notice it's all word of mouth, and nothing can ever been seen and looked at. Because, sure, mean govt. people came and took it all, so it's a grand conspiracy, right (conspiracy theories make for great shows as well).
 

I had read that there were many stash spots for yamashitas gold spread throughout the Phillipines, both large and small ? I also thought that individual groups of Japanese soliders had stashed small caches of looted objects all over too? I cant even remember where I read this stuff it was so long ago but there was somthing about the marcos regime tracking down much of this booty. Also somthing about marcos people salvageing several rich manilla galleons ? Didnt the u.s. recover a large amount of gold bars too?. I have vague memory of a picture of a u.s. solider standing on a pile of gold bars in a cave , that were piled almost to the ceiling. And pictures of treasure recovered from manilla galleons. I dont know..... cant remember where , when , or how I remember this. Didnt marcos go on a spree of trying to recover all the treasure he could for a few years in the 80s ? I could be wayyy wrong on this just asking you guys ????
 

.... I could be wayyy wrong on this just asking you guys ????

Last I checked, there was wealth to be had in any government's capitol offices. The USA's White house, last I check, was pretty durned ornate. Does this mean that past presidents got their bounty by capitalizing on some particular treasure legend ?

How about Bill Gates ? He got some bucks last I heard. Did his come from grand conspiracy ?

As for soldiers looting and stashing: Sure. But why is the Philippines any different ? I mean .... history is FILLED with wars, over every continent. So what you're saying should hold equally true for all the other wars and continents they covered for thousands of years. Ie.: just because something was possible, doesn't mean: Ergo, it happened, or is necessarily true. It doesn't change the fact that camp-fire stories go awry.
 

Good thread Tom,
It seems when it comes to riches all common sense goes right out the door.
I'm from Nova Scotia, and that whole Oak Island ____ makes me near vomit.
Very briefly here's why, The original legend says "some woman saw a light one night". So nothing is deeper than 20 feet OK. Get a clue, TV crew....should need no more proof than that, anyway common sense goes out the door...common sense...what in tar nation is common sense ?
I like to MD, and do OK, if I hadn't found more than a couple of links of chain, and one coin (likely planted as well) in a few hours I'd be moving on to a more productive site. Let alone 200 years of digging.
Absolutely ridiculous to the power of 10.
 

Uhhhhh ..... what.....white house? Presidents recovering treasure ? Bill gates and grand conspiracy ? Im a bit confused ?? I was really asking questions here. All the stuff I mentioned I really thought I had read in actual legitimate news articles and reputable periodicals. I was not being fecious and trying to state somthing by posing it as a question. Sorry I was not more direct with my line of questioning. You may have read to far into my post. Thats alright ill try again.
1. does anyone know if the U.S. recovered a large amount of gold from the Phillipines that was left by the Japanese at the end of ww2 ?

2. Does any one know if ferdinand marcos recovered treasure in the 80s that came from manilla galleons ?

3. Does anyone know if ferdinand marcos activley searched for and recovered gold that was hidden in the Phillipines by the Japanese in ww2.

4. Does anyone know if the Japanese hid gold and looted wealth in the Philippines during ww2

I thought there was documented proof of all this? Am I wrong ? Sorry to ask questions that sound dumb but I truly cant recall if these things were written as fact or legand. Truth or bull.
 

Uhhhhh ..... what.....white house? Presidents recovering treasure ? Bill gates and grand conspiracy ? Im a bit confused ?? I was really asking questions here. All the stuff I mentioned I really thought I had read in actual legitimate news articles and reputable periodicals. I was not being fecious and trying to state somthing by posing it as a question. Sorry I was not more direct with my line of questioning. You may have read to far into my post. Thats alright ill try again.
1. does anyone know if the U.S. recovered a large amount of gold from the Phillipines that was left by the Japanese at the end of ww2 ?

2. Does any one know if ferdinand marcos recovered treasure in the 80s that came from manilla galleons ?

3. Does anyone know if ferdinand marcos activley searched for and recovered gold that was hidden in the Phillipines by the Japanese in ww2.

4. Does anyone know if the Japanese hid gold and looted wealth in the Philippines during ww2

I thought there was documented proof of all this? Am I wrong ? Sorry to ask questions that sound dumb but I truly cant recall if these things were written as fact or legand. Truth or bull.

Whooops....... never mind ive read enough in the last 10 minutes to understand your response now tom. I guess its all very hotly debated still. Sorry I really hadnt read anything on the subject in many many years. Oh well fogive me I was busy hunting down cans of dimes nickles and quaters. Lol !!! I thought that stuff was all fact at this point. Oh well ill just pick a side and say I belive it !!!!
 

Black Bart, re.: those 4 questions: The burden of proof of those things, rests on the person making the claim . The rhetorical force of asking the question doesn't make it any more true.
 

In order to bury a treasure, a hole must often be dug first. It must then be filled in. I must then be able to find the treasure and recover it later, unless I'm simply trying to make it disappear for good. (In that case, I'd probably throw it in a lake or something.)

So, the hole...I have to dig one. Let's think about this for a moment. Those of you who have dug holes know that this takes time even in favorable ground; in unfavorable ground, it takes a lot of time. Who might wander by while I'm digging? I'm reminded of a Joe Pesci quote from Casino. You probably remember the line. ("A lot of holes in the desert, and a lot of problems buried in those holes. But you gotta do it right. I mean, you gotta have the hole already dug before you show up with the package in the trunk. Otherwise, you're talking about a half hour to fourty five minutes worth of digging. And who knows who's gonna come along in that time? Pretty soon, you gotta dig a few more holes. You could be there all f-ing night.") When those bandits stole that gold, or that Confederate paymaster decided to bury the money that he was going to pay the troops with, time was of the essence - that's why the loot was buried in the first place, as if there wasn't a concern about being caught by pursuers, they would have just kept the damned treasure in the first place and kept moving. How much time did they have? What was the ground like? Did those bandits even have a shovel with them in the first place? How long does it take to dig a hole without a shovel, and who might show up during that time?

Okay, I've got a hole. Now I have to get the treasure in there, cover it up, and make it look like something wasn't buried there or else this was all for nothing. How long does that take? And again, who might show up while I'm doing this?

I have to have a way to find it again, and I may be in a hurry. How do I locate it again? Do I spend a few days carving intricate signs and symbols all over the countryside that explain where to find the next set of signs and symbols leading to the treasure (that some rando may interpret a few centuries later), or do I simplify things? ("Do you remember that big tree on the bend in the trail, right by the lake? The big forked one? Yeah, I buried it on the south side of that tree. It's about a foot down.") One of these is a lot less work and will NOT be found by anyone that I didn't talk to, unless accidently.

Now, a guy that's already secured the treasure and is simply looking for a place to bury it has it easier. He's not on the run. Nobody is looking for him. He can take his time and dig the hole first, making sure that nobody saw him doing it or saw the hole itself. That's the cache near the house, the one that seems to make the news most often. I get that. But the really juicy legends aren't about that, are they?

Humans are not always logical. I know that, you know that. People do some really stupid stuff sometimes. But place yourself in the shoes of that bandit. You and I just pulled off a good score, but the posse is on our asses and we've got to hide this loot someplace so we can move more quickly. We don't know how much time we have, but it can't be much, and if our guess is wrong, we're going to hang AND we don't get to keep the money. We just happen to have shovels enough for everyone, so we find a good spot and start digging. How deep do we go? Have you ever done something that maybe you weren't supposed to have done? I know that I have. I also know that if the act takes more than a few minutes, people start getting antsey about it.

"Hey, Dave, we've been digging for five minutes now. I think I hear horses. We need to get moving. This is deep enough, right?"
"Dave? Twenty minutes now. They're RIGHT BEHIND US. We need another five minutes to cover this up. Dave! This is good enough! Let's bury it!"
"DAVE! WHAT THE HELL! THE F-ING HOLE IS TWO FEET DEEP! IT'S NOT LIKE THEY HAVE METAL DETECTORS OR ANYTHING! LET'S COVER THE DAMNED HOLE AND GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE! THEY'LL BE HERE ANY SECOND!"

10 foot holes are not dug in a hurry...at least, not without heavy machinery. Scratching out a depression and covering it with leaves or sand? That can be done in a hurry. Chucking a box in a cave? That can also be done in a hurry. 10 foot hole? That requires preparation. A 100 foot hole with water traps and planks and cipher stones? That requires a large crew and a couple of months, and while the folks that they were running from were not much of a threat, the locals certainly were. Pirate treasure at thirty feet is one thing. A farmer stashing a few hundred bucks under a fencepost (hole is already dug, and no one would think twice about it if they saw it being dug) is another matter entirely.

This is the prism that I view these stories through. I haven't recovered any great treasures, but I haven't looked for any either. Others have and were unsuccessful. Was the time that I saved by spending on more productive ventures ill spent? That depends on who you ask.
 

Hey tom I am really just seeking your opinion on those 4 questions. I will get back to you after work with a more detailed explanation of what im looking for from you on this subject. I was hoping to get a yes/no/or not sure answer on those questions. I honestly am not informed on this subject and thought asking those questions might give me a better idea of what is fact and what is legand reguarding this subject.i am on the fence (so to speak). What do you think tom on the subject ?? I am humbly asking your opinion, not trying to make anything more true or false. My tone is one of curiosity not forcefulness. All I could figure out in a brief search was that it is hotly debated. Ill get back to the thred after work. Thanks for your help, hopefully you can help me sort out the info. Or perhaps others can help for that matter. Ill go point to point as iread and learn more asking your opinion if thats ok?
 

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