Hi J.J.A, we went off topic. I searched my files on this topic as i remembered i conducted a back ground search and family history search on "John Doig". Here is what i have.... starting with -
Of more import is the strange but true claim made upon the Royal Bank of Scotland in 1965. The story of a ship named the ‘El Pensamiento’ (The Thought) and its fantastic cargo gives a fascinating demonstration
of how the cross pollination of details can occur from one story to another. However unlike most associated stories where a treasure ship is said to go to some unknown location this one has a mysterious treasure
arriving at a very well known location.
In 1965, a legal action was raised by Senora Violeta Aguilar de Caceras of Lima, Peru, who claimed from the bank "598 large merchant bags which were dispatched from Lima, Peru, in 1803 by the ship El Pensamiento
under Captain J Fanning and J Doigg to the Royal Bank of Scotland and delivery entrusted to Castillo de Rosa".
Another simultaneous claim of the treasure said it had been shipped from Lambayeque, Peru by a Corregidor named Antonio Pastor y Marin de Segura, Marques de Llosa. John Fanning and John Doig jointly commanded
the ship, ‘El Pensamiento’. It was the descendants of de Segura, who died in 1804, that were also laying stake to the treasure pursuant to a 5th generation will. Contained in 90 wicker baskets the treasure was
said to be deposited in the bank by a Sir Francis Mollinson or Mollison.
Bank of Scotland officials had to deal with solicitors, South American banks, the Peruvian consul, the Procurator Fiscal of Edinburgh and tellingly the Masonic Grand Lodge of Scotland acting for its South
American brothers.
A search made of the bank’s vault and strongrooms in Edinburgh and Glasgow did not turn up the missing treasure but enabled the bank to say they had checked. Safe custody books were of no use either in
settling this strange case as these only went back to 1860.
No treasure or settlement was forthcoming and all ended up viewing the incident as an ‘experincia simpatico’, an interesting shared experience.
De Segur and Fanning are all real persons and along with Doig were well known seafarers.
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The following article refers to John Doig and his brother William:
The Cocos Island Pirates: Excerpt from book 'Romance of the Sea,' (National Geographic Society, Washington: 1981) chapter 'Fortunes from the Spaniards,' page 57-58:
The story of the Cocos Island treasure dump begins about the year 1818 when a British pirate, Bennet Graham, or Benito Bonita as he preferred to call himself, brought the loot from Peruvian churches and merchant ships to be buried on Cocos Island until he could collect it later. It is fairly certain that more wealth was added to this dump later.
With Bonita was William Thompson, who turned up at Cocos Island again in 1824. The Spaniards had managed to get away much of their treasure from Lima when Peru was in revolt against the rule of Spain. Lord Cochrane, then in command of the Chilean Navy and giving help to Peru, went to the port of Callao, to which the treasure had gone, and demanded two-thirds of the money with which to pay his men. On the scene appeared Thompson, now in command of a trading brig 'Mary Read.' He arranged to take off some of the Spanish grandees with their enormous fortune and avoid Lord Cochrane's attentions. What had happened to Bennet Graham nobody apparently knew. It may be that William Thompson knew, but, if he did, he certainly never revealed anything.
As soon as the 'Mary Read,' with the escaping Spaniards and their wealth, was well clear of the port the helpful Captain Thomson killed the Spaniards and flung them overboard, then set sail for Cocos Island to bury his share of this additional loot. Unfortunately it was many years before Thompson had a chance of returning to collect his vast wealth. When he did at last manage the return voyage he took a partner with him and discovered that both the treasure of Bonita (Graham) and Thompson's own were untouched. It was too risky to take away just then and Thompson and his partner, Doig, made careful preparations for another voyage.
Thompson died without ever seeing his treasure again, but in due course some years later, his partner, Doig, with his son, went out to Cocos once more, all prepared to bring home their great fortune. Unfortunately a landslide had occurred and made the recovery of the treasure a serious engineering task. They were totally unprepared for anything of that sort and had to return home to consider their plans.
The elder Doig died and the son never had a chance of going out again, but he left clear directions regarding the location of the treasure hoards. Many expeditions have been made and a few coins and ornaments have been found in circumstances which certainly help to confirm the story. Most of the seekers, however, have done just as much to obliterate helpful landmarks as have the storms and natural changes through the long years which have elapsed since Thompson buried his loot.
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John Doig, born 24 Jun 1792 in Maybole, Ayr, Scotland; died after 1865 in Peru. He married 1824 in Peru to Mercedes Astigarraga, born 1804 in Peru.
Notes for John Doig
1817, July 9 - Extracted Processes, National Archives of Scotland, CS32/15/47
Decreet in absence, David Stewart, junior, WS, as factor on the estates of the deceased Hugh Doig Hutchison v John Doig.
John appears to have left home before his father's death in 1819. He was a weapons merchant. He arrived in Carabobo, Venezuela in 1820, then moving on to Columbia. He soon moved to Lambayeque, Peru where he lived until his death.
One family document mentions: 'John Doig el Corsario y su hermano William que se va a Chile' which translates 'John Doig the Privateer and his brother William who goes away to Chile.' The story goes that John served the Peruvian Navy in their bid for freedom from Spain, and he commanded a privately owned warship that preyed on the commercial shipping or warships of Spain.
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The Lost Treasure of the El Pensamiento,' by Jim Gilchrist in 'The Scotsman' dated 24 Dec 2003. J.A.A this is the story you posted.
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Treasures are made to frustrate people,' he remarks, and introduces into the story a tantalizing document known as the Derrotero, a document presented to King Carlos IV of Spain by a man named Valverde before his death in 1792, which gave directions established by another, earlier Valverde, to a vast cache of Inca treasure, reputedly hidden in a cave in Ecuador's wild Llanganati region. It is said to have been dispatched there by Ruminahui, one of Atahualpa's generals, after the Inca leader had been baptized then strangled by the good Christian invaders of his country. De Segura, he says, would have used the Derrotero in obtaining his treasure.
Hall, 67, is no stranger to caves: in fact he has one named after him, one of the mysterious Tayos caves to which he led a British-Ecuadorian expedition in 1976, which included as patron and member the astronaut and moon walker Neil Armstrong. The treasure of the Llanganti he regards as a side-issue, if an intriguing one, to his real interest, the ancient civilizations of South America, but believes the treasure almost certainly exists - and that some of it may have come to Scotland.
So far as its subsequent disappearance, he believes 'the defining hand' could be the eminent Scots banker Thomas Coutts, another Montrose man, who may well have known Doig, and certainly Mollien. Coutts, says Hall, became banker to George III - and was known to assist the Bourbons. Hall, as did Gilhooley and other researchers, points to a 'mysterious absence' of Leith cargo manifests for the years 1795-1805, and suggests that as Coutts is thought to have disposed of George lll's financial ledgers after the monarch's death, well, perhaps he turned his attention to cargo manifests.
In Ecuador, countless explorers have tried to find that Llanganati cave, sometimes with fatal consequences, while following copies of the Derrotero (which Hall believes to have been altered to confuse treasure-hunters), along with a map of the Llanganati region, made in 1827 by a pharmacologist, Atanasio Guzman, who himself perished in the area.
That didn't stop the veteran Scottish mountain man, Hamish MacInnes, from making three trips to the Llanganati, also equipped with the Derrotero and the Guzman map. MacInnes also made fruitless enquiries about the El Pensamiento and has tried, so far without success, to trace the Spanish royal warrant which would have authorized the original expedition into the Llanganati to procure the treasure, ostensibly for Spain but also for de Segura.
You won't find MacInnes's Glencoe home crammed with Inca gold - he didn't find any, but he does believe that Atahualpa's riches may well lie within the Llanganti. In his book Beyond the Ranges, he expresses his belief that the Valverde Derrotero is genuine, however, he warns that the Llanganati, high on the Altiplano and near the Equator, is unforgiving country: 'Not a place for a bucket-and-spade visit.'
But what about those who believed they were the rightful inheritors of de Segura's treasure? In Quito, capital of Ecuador, an old friend of Hall's, Dr Michel Merlyn spoke last week to Cesar and Hector Pástor, the sons of Hector Plaza Salvador, who directed the family committee formed to make the claims in 1965. 'They said they didn't feel cheated or enraged at all,' recounts Merlyn. 'Most of the Pástors, the two of them included, were not disillusioned, although some were, of course. 'They described the whole affair as an experiencia simpática - an interesting and funny experience. They haven't been investigating since the 1965-1966 episode, but I'm sure they are still interested.' But the story of the lost Pástor millions won't lie down and die. Another story in El Comercio in May 1965 added a further, intriguing element by recounting how, as far back as 1686, an infamous pirate, Eduardo David, plundered the mansion of the Obaya family in Lambeyeque, stealing, among other things, 598 bags or containers of gold and silver.
Then, as this article was going to press, a Peruvian woman living in Edinburgh, who had helped MacInnes translate the Llanganati documents, told her version, which mentioned Doig and Fanning, and a fast British ship laden with treasure, but had one of the partners taking his third of the treasure to France - where it was used in the purchase of Louisiana. And, she claimed, the treasure was still lying in the Royal Bank: 'But the descendants of the man who put it there cannot prove they are his real descendant, because in Peru there was a fire in the registry office. *****"Notice how tracks are covered when treasure is involved!"*****
So, amid blazing documents and ricocheting conspiracy theories, the lost treasure of the El Pensamiento sails into the sunset - and seems likely to stay there, unless someone locates some vital documents.
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I have much more on the subject but reluctant to release as i'm still researching
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food for thought, are there vital documents or a "Certain Cave"? for the Brave......
Jones
not necessarilly from intelligence.
.Of course some treasures are buried to see them easily but your research and boots on the ground in any case would help you to narrow the search.But for treasures that are hidden in caves etc these approach is very straightforward.
