Hal,
I am at work right now, and will post the page I sent to ISTG. But for right now, you REALLY need to follow this link:
OLBERS MANIFEST
Read everything. It was all very well hashed out there. In the meantime, I will give you two little pieces of Kibble to chew on:
1. From the ISTG Website, this is a list of the available records of the Ship Olbers:
View attachment 1133205
If you look carefully, you will see on your posted copy of the Olbers Manifest, that it is from 1839. The ISTG does not have any records of the OLbers making port in New Orleans in 1839.
2. Is a list from the ISTG Website showing the voyages by year and Ship Name:
View attachment 1133206
I grabbed 1837 through most of 1840. Do you see an Olbers?
I will say again that the Olbers Manifest that was provided to Helen Corbin for her book "The Bible on the Lost Dutchman Gold Mine and Jacob Waltz" was a forgery meant to deceive! There is not a chance of misinformation or accidental inclusion. The list was parsed from several other lists. A couple of those lists were in blocks of multiple names. The manifest was invented. There is not one shred of doubt.
That being said, I have known MKR for quite a while, and I have found him to be extremely knowledgeable and very generous in sharing some of his information. Knowing that he was the source for this document was very disturbing to me. I am not one to jump on a bandwagon. I don't put it past the realm of possibility that someone hoaxed the document and gave it to him, but being one of the most knowledgeable people around on a subject is a TWO EDGED SWORD! If you are THAT knowledgeable, then how could someone put that kind of thing over on you? It just took us a couple of days to see that something smelled fishy about the manifest as presented, then a little sleuth work showed it as such.
Mike
Mike, I read the 42 pages. I am going to read it again on the train but my first response is... That was a mean trick, making me revisit page after page of OZ! What, you couldn't just send me directly to Paul's post?
Thats a joke.
Seems that Paul did some great work.
Why isn't that surprising.
But... I would still need more convincing before I closed the door on that list. There are a few things that need to be checked.
Olbers arrival date for 1839 is incorrect. Not a big deal but an example of explainable errors inherent at the time.
Olbers returned to Germany, and it's crew made and effort to find her missing sister ship. A return departure date, cleared port, would be interesting. From this we know she return home. But if you do the math, she had more than enough time to make a second voyage that year.
And she did.
The question is, where did she go? From 38' to 48' she "visits American ports of call" Her captain remained constant until her grounding in 48'. BTW, says on some of these sites that a second journey was not uncommon. Olbers made 2 voyages to New Orleans in 48'.
According to the list in Mrs. Corbin's book, the Olbers captain was correctly named.
It seems to me that the Olbers log book is what everyone is after. Or, even the captains journal if he kept one. If that is available, and it probably is since she was only grounded and not lost, it needs to be checked.
When I see that log book, that's when I will make my final call on that list.
In all honesty, outside of Paul's research, it still seems like you guys were quick to cast judgement on the source. The list may be a composite. It may have been made to deceive and to support a deception. But it in no way resembles and official ISTG document. I read the link and see where that suggestion came from.
But let's say it is a bogus composite list, made to deceive. You have absolutely zero proof that Mr. Roberts created it. The man admits to being the source, admits that it was an unreliable document, says he made his concerns known, and still, because it was in his possession, he is labeled a liar?
In court, even Paul's ingenious work wold not be enough to convict the source of intentional fraud. And, from where I sit, as an outsider trying to remain neutral, if I were that source, and I had been treated publicly this way, I would be on the phone with an attorney, talking about a slander case against ANYONE who publicly denounced me as a liar.
All he would have to do is prove that the statements were made. That those statement damaged his reputation is obvious. The fact that he never filed against his one time friends speaks volumes to me about his character.
So, where am I on this? The Olbers argument is a false one.
I don't know anything about Franks complaint about misrepresented service to the country except that it has nothing to do with this conversation. A mans personal problems are his alone and it has no place here.
I will do a little look'en around and let you know.