Spanish silver stolen by the privateer, Jean Lafitte. Just let me know if you find anything so I can break the story first. This same engineer, only two years earlier, had led the team who located the Tecumseh, a Union metalclad ship sunk during the battle of Mobile Bay in August 1864. Pinkerton came across the Hendricks Lake legend while doing research for his book, Trammals Trace: The First Road to Texas from the North. The legend of Hendricks Lake treasure has inspired men to search for it for at least 150 years. Not one of them found any of the reported treasure, but that never prevented the next person from trying. Aug. 6, 2015 9:51 AM PT. Overtime, Roper believes that this information was interpreted to mean that there was treasure in Hendricks Lake. Leave them blank to get signed up. As they retreated, they headed into what is now known as Upshur County. down. . 157 0 obj The film will explore the history of various parts of the tale, how they came to be woven in to a single fable and will reveal what was discovered during the months of research put into the project, including a new theory and information indicating the account of lost silver in an East Texas lake is actually a combination of stories. LAKE CHIEMSEE, GOLDEN CAULDRON In Bavaria, in southern Germany, Lake Chiemsee has been the focus of many divers ever since a Nazi-themed gold cauldron, worth more than $560,000, was found there in . What I like most about the lake is that, it just contains this feel when you go out there and you see the Spanish moss hanging on the trees, you feel like youve gone back in time, Roper said. A dirt contractor who learned about the legend when helping another man drill holes on the edge of the lake. In an interview . Many believe the body of water concealing the silver to be Hendricks Lake near Tatum, although other places have also been examined. 0000003684 00000 n s f a s u . Here are six of the supposedly greatest Texas treasures still out there. The legends a legend, but the people that believed it and the effort they went through to actually find it despite obvious questions about the details, Pinkerton stated. endobj They know its there. Daniel Vaughn is the countrys first barbecue editor, and he has eaten more barbecue than you have. The land was sold sometime in the last 20 years and is now within a restricted mining area. there were treasure legends, and the most common story is that Lafitte stranded a ship, a Spanish ship with gold, in Matagorda Bay in Corpus and was taking it to St. Louis on some wagon trains over roads that dont exist in 1816. Its got quite a long story in the community. We Found Out Archaeologists on Easter Island Have Discovered a Previously Unknown Moai Statue Buried in a Dried-Out Lake Bed Christie's Pulled In $202 Million at Its 20th/21st-Century Sales in . Well, my beloved fellow Texas readers, though I have no idea whether anything Im about to pass on to you is the slightest bit accurate, here are six of the supposedly great Texas treasures still waiting to be found. Roper has been pursuing the legend and examining where and how the various parts of the story originated. Lr !_) Just about every book written about Texas in that era mentioned it. Eventually, the Mexicans unloaded the moneygold and silver coinsso they could make an escape. On 4 February 1823, Laffite was onboard the General Santander off the town of Omoa in Honduras. Now, more modern equipment was available, and one man used a metal detector and managed to get some interesting readings from the bottom of the lake. He built a new kind of sewing machine, and in. The real story of Hendricks Lake is not the legend alone, it is about the people who believed it fervently enough to put their time and money on the line in the hope of recovering it. Historian Gary Pinkerton says the legend is mostly unsubstantiated. Texas oilmen. The divers do feel some round objects, and a piece is Roper is the latest in a long line of people to search for treasure in Hendricks Lake, and hes using the latest technology and techniques to do it. It certainly had promise since it was a round piece of wood, like the legend of the wagon sunk in the lake. They got away with three thousand freshly-minted 1877 $20 gold pieces. Most of the cobs or old Spanish finds I've seen on the forum are either from Florida or the Upper East Cost. If you change your mind, you can easily unsubscribe. One thing is certain though, East Texans will continue to be fascinated by stories like these. Charles F. Grice, Interview by Gary Pinkerton, February 2019. In 1969 an MIT graduate with a degree in electrical engineering and a patent for an underwater device for locating metals motored along the surface of Hendricks Lake in an eight-foot fiberglass boat towing his electronics. Every dollar helps. That was the story.. But did it even exist? 0000001207 00000 n Read More about Jean Laffites treasure in the Sabine River, USS Hatteras (formerly St. Mary) was a 1,126-ton steamer purchased by the Union Navy during the early part of the American Civil War. Contacts. The first documented treasure recovery attempt in 1894 was based on the belief that Santa Anna had dumped gold, silver, and jewels, By 1935, a full-page syndicated article fleshed out more details. In 1912 it was like a big resort, come out and fish and real flowery language (in advertisements).. Charles Fitzhugh Grice had the technology needed to find Spanish silver if the treasure was there. Alternate versions of that story have been documented since the 1880s, with variations including that the silver was from Santa Anna and the battle of San Jacinto and that the treasure was in a different location nearby. On his website, Fenn wrote, "It was under a. 154 0 obj %%EOF 160 0 obj For information on, or to order True Believers, visit www.hendrickslake.com. In 1884, the guy Tatum is named after thought he would drain the lake, Pinkerton said. Continue Reading. Error! In one Internet posting, I read the following: Texas has more buried treasure than any other state, with 229 sites within the states borders. Waldrop believed this man had many treasure secrets, but he was a well-known fraud. Gary L . Lets be honest, everybody loves a good treasure story. by the Rieseberg article had gone home with no treasure to On Monday, June 16th, 1958 Barney Or Black Lake. <>/Border[0 0 0]/Contents( \n h t t p s : / / s c h o l a r w o r k s . There are two legends in particular that seem to have found purchase in the minds of East Texas treasure hunters. Connecting the legend to peoples minds now so it doesnt die out, I think is important, Pinkerton asserted. There are people who spend their whole lives and considerable sums of money searching for sunken treasure ships, lost mines, and hidden loot. 152 0 obj 0000003134 00000 n View Tracy Y Hendricks results in Arlington Heights, IL including current phone number, address, relatives, background check report, and property record with Whitepages. Christian B. Roper on a scouting trip for his film . from oil explorers and water witchers to plain nuts.. Oxbow lakes result from a river's course change, in this case the Sabine River just to thc north. Laffite spent the rest of his life attacking merchant ships around Central American ports; sometimes as a pirate and sometimes as a privateer. [150 0 R 151 0 R 152 0 R 153 0 R 154 0 R 155 0 R 156 0 R 157 0 R 158 0 R 159 0 R] We report on vital issues from politics to education and are the indispensable authority on the Texas scene, covering everything from music to cultural events with insightful recommendations. It is now thought that the money is on the southernmost tip of Padre Island. His website is www.trammelstrace.com. e d u / e t h j / v o l 4 7 / i s s 2 / 1 0)/Rect[128.1963 131.7406 353.4453 143.4594]/StructParent 9/Subtype/Link/Type/Annot>> The silver was never recovered. It featured Pirate Treasures. Roper himself had first heard the legend when he was a young boy and has returned to it intermittently throughout his life. A formal statement is due around noon in Moscow on Saturday when the first pictures of the gold will be revealed to the world's . Hobe Sound. Tales of pirate booty and Mexican gold have captivated minds for generations, and it all could be closer than you might think. Things Found in the San Antonio River: Periodic draining of sections of the river have revealed skateboards, Mardi Gras beads, old bottles and a cell phone. His book, True Believers: Treasure Hunters at Hendricks Lake, focused on the variety of people and their attempts to discover the fabled hidden silver and was released this past April. Hendricks Lake is an oxbow lake one and one-half miles south of the Sabine River and about four miles northeast of Tatum in Rusk County, Texas (32.371864N, 94.493190W). 0000001829 00000 n Paul Uncle Fox Tatum, son of the founder of Tatum, Texas, carried out the first documented attempt to recover the treasure in 1884. After years of searching, Roper is still optimistic, and he said that his commitment to Hendricks Lake will still be there no matter what he finds. Xi-vrcjVJO%X *hve~os)&pZl0nuUH;M%\,iB!N7;B`h Y2?SXx#l};(5-Sj\Ji6Y|f>>`}j8 C=H: =.p0=*y pGOF30.#yZeY92Hq{IjFhaftP[Ch[&P"(D3CSP+ )Q- $NNBeX"Ld_kUB'`Y%e8re%R 0aHd$0=~^nbY:pK/DQxE8"Sh5Y=9'wXJ9'.m*?%YTAcM>W*N7852@ZyV|>}c(&fZXBtzq]uF4A1*i Legend remains victorious in spite of history and it just attests to the power that legends have over people when the facts may not necessarily support something, Pinkerton said. Pinkerton also maintains facebook pages Trammels Trace and Hendricks Lake Treasure-True Believers. The information comes from books and treasure hunting Web sites (the best of which are legendsofamerica.com and treasurefish.com). Peoples commitment to myths, tall tales and legends is powerful, according to Pinkerton. My favorite part of the legend is that the Guadalupe Mission in El Paso was built in way so that the shadows of the mission point to the Lost Padre Mine. Ocean Breeze. Its hard to find any newspaper before that, but thats the first and oldest mention that I found of it, he said. 0000044783 00000 n In 1884 treasure hunters were all over the Sabine and a nearby lake that had been fed by the Sabine. A lookout for alligators and venomous snakes is He built a new kind of sewing machine, and in 1851 he started I.M. Extremely competent in market analysis and comparative sales, Angie has worked in many aspects of the real estate industry and uses this experience and foresight to be proactive and address all . When a producer for The History Channel contacted me in early summer, the legend was about to add a new chapter to the story.The Lagina brothers of Oak Island fame were beginning a new series, Beyond Oak Island, and the story of Hendricks Lake was the premiere episode on November 17, 2020. https://www.tshaonline.org, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/hendricks-lake. Treasure Coast . None of (the rest) lines up, but 1860s, 1870s, there was enough yada yada to create some story.. Plus, if when they come back and nothing can be found, he says they have the whole Texas coast and more to continue their search. Some fishermen in the last century pulled several silver bars from those very waters with a hoop net. In Gretna in 1960, across the river from New Orleans, a large number of gold coins were found in an area frequented by Lafitte and his men .According to another story, Laffite buried a large cache on an unnamed island in Lake Borgne. Somebody made fun of him; he clubbed the guy to death. Spanish troops caught up with the wagons along a trail near present-day Tatum, Texas. During her time at the Watchman, she enjoyed writing features about businesses and local events. In 1915 in New Orleans a worker uncovered a chest filled with more than 1,500 doubloons . A famous actress said, Legend remains victorious in spite of history. For this one to last over 150 years, the grains of truth have firmly resisted erosion by the progress of historical research and inspection. Having grown up hearing these stories about buried treasure and now searching for it himself, hes becoming a part of history. In fact, this same story about Lafitte treasure being lost somewhere, was repeated over and over in almost the same pattern from the Gulf Coast all the way up into Arkansas and Missouri.. An occasional newspaper article kept the story alive and throughout the 1960s treasure hunters found their way to Hendrick's Lake, but none matched the expeditions launched by the SoRelle . The ships turned out to be heavily armed privateers and they mounted a frontal counterattack that included heavy fire. Since 2014, Rick and Marty Lagina have produced "The Curse of Oak Island" for The HISTORY Channel. The NOAA says the Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary and partners first found the Ohio in Lake Huron in 2017. It says so much about East Texas folklore. We organized some strategic searches via dives doing grid patterns and things of that sort to try to get those up.. 0000004315 00000 n And he says, Treasure has a way of keeping its secrets. The box was hidden by millionaire art dealer. The dumping of the silver in the lake was a temporary thing until danger passed, then was recovered, after all he had divers at his disposal. At the end of World War II, the German Nazi's are believed to have sunk a fortune in Lake Toplitz, Austria, Daily Star reports. Winds light and variable. IXK\!%X[CQq tfI&JA PAefQj$9k,HmN}) n1jXb#,L5N_T U7VOn'u[^cW c{*`!+?@6rJQ|n ;fr4a}_OM%)t0 HUn>>IudFn _IXEvFmoj8!~X!HL: 0000004529 00000 n . Christian is not discouraged. While Pinkerton believes the lake area should be a park, the reality is Hendricks Lake is no longer accessible by the public as the land surrounding it belongs to private land owners or is being leased by mining companies. . When I found out theres essentially a documentary, a great one right here in East Texas waiting to be put out there, I was just excited to try to do everything I could to make that happen, he commented. January 2023 Reader Quiz: What Did You Learn? Many came to the lake to drain, dredge, dig, dynamite and scan its murky depths. There is a legend surrounding a supposed lost treasure in East Texas, one that filmmaker Christian B. Roper and his team have been researching for a documentary production, Sunken Silver. A huge battle ensued between the two groups near what is now known as Tyler. Jean Lafitte's treasure Photo of Hendricks Lake, courtesy of Gary L. Pinkerton MW Questions: Are Keywords for the Null Cipher Used in The Great US Treasure Hunt? Treasure Hunters at Hendricks Lake" but he is not a 'true believer' himself. He is the primary antagonist of season one of National Treasure: Edge of History. endobj they might find something, a storm rolls in. As a former channel of the Sabine, Hendricks Lake is fed intermittently by Black Slough and by seasonal overflow from both Cherokee Bayou and the Sabine River.