When Costa Rica Pounced!

that the leaders of the expedition con sulted the Foreign Office concerning the ownership of the island and were informed that, although its status had never been

Amusing Story of Cocos Island

Treasure-Seekers The Thing

the Expedition Forgot

A RECENT news item is as follows: A new attempt to locate the treasure . worth £25,000,000, reputed to have been buried on Cocos Island in the Pacific by old-time buccaneers, commenced in February with the departure from Lowestoft in the motor drifter Veracity (45 tons ) of Commander F. Worsley, the Antarctic explorer, who is leading the expedition. The trouble with the Costa Rican Government, which impeded pre vious expeditions, has now been over come. The rights on Cocos Island have been secured from the Costa Rican Government, who in return will take a third of any treasure found. The Costa Rican Government has provided a police guard of ten for the expedition, which is expected to be there for about a year.

The following article was written before the above news item arrived.

IT is reported that the English company known as Treasure Recovery Ltd., is to make another visit to Cocos Island, in an attempt to retrieve the disaster it suffered last year when the members of the expedition were arrested and depor ted by the Costa Rican police.

In the circumstances it may be worth while retelling the romantic story of the search for the Cocos Island treasure.

Altogether there have been 14 expe ditions organised to seek for the pirates’ hoard. It is believed by many people that there are two or three separate hoards buried upon Cocos Island; and it is stated in the Foreign Office Handbook that the probable value of the treasure buried there at various times by various people —mostly pirates—is £12,000,000. Other estimates have placed it as high as £25,000,000. It is clear that the main treasure upon which these estimates are based is that supposed to have been taken from the city of Lima early last century.

As a matter of fact there is now the gravest doubt as to whether the Lima treasure actually was taken away by sea to Cocos Island. But of that more anon.

The English company called Treasure Recovery Ltd. was organised about the end of 1933. The men at its head —who ultimately became the four directors and who led the expedition to Cocos Island —are Commander F. A. Worsley, D.S.O., O.B.E., R.N.R. (who is famous as one of the joint leaders of the Shackleton Polar Expedition of 1925); Commander J. R.

Stenhouse, D.S.O., O.B.E., D.S.C., R.N.R. (who was the commander of the “Aurora,” also famous in connection with Antarctic exploration); Mr. Stratford D. A. Jolly (who is noted as a seeker of buried treasure and who spent 10 months on Cocos Island in 1932); and Captain Charles O. Polkinghorne. The shares were sold publicly in London in December and January, 1933-34, and the expedition re ceived an extraordinary amount of pub licity. Some of the newspaper financial writers were very critical.

However, a substantial sum (said to have been £80,000) was subscribed and the expedition was organised in a very businesslike manner. It sailed for Cocos Island at the end of September 1934, in the beautiful green and white yacht Queen

of Scots, a 600-tons twin screw vessel which had been loaned for the purpose by Mr. A. J. Drexel. The official leader of the expedition, which numbered 20, was Mr. S. MacFarlane Arthur, and the personnel included Colonel J. E. Leckie,

C.M.G., C.B.E., D.S.O., F.R.G.S. (A Min-

ing engineer who was connected with the Pacific Treasure Exploration, which sailed on M.V. Silver Wave in 1932-33); Dr. J. W. Harris, B.Sc., Ph. D. (geologist); Mr. J. T. Marten (a radio operator and aviator); and there were also various other gentlemen with scientific qualifica tions, in addition to Commanders Wors ley and Stenhouse, Captain Polkinghorne, and Mr. Jolly.

The expedition was luxuriously equipped with scientific apparatus. It was intended to locate treasure in the following manner: “Our experts will tackle the hunt as an engineering problem. We have definite evi dence as to where the treasure is buried close to the shore. We shall electrify an area and probe the ground with in struments and on getting a response we shall send down a core drill. If there is anything there we shall get a sample of it. We are using an aeroplane for sur vey purposes and telephones will link up the camp and the works. We shall apply geo-electrical methods, used in the detec tion of mineral deposits.”

The expedition’s plans appear to have been made with great thoroughness, and its departure from London aroused much public interest.

Only one thing appears to have been overlooked—but it was vital.

It seems to have been assumed by all previous expeditions, and by everyone in terested, that Cocos Island (which lies about 500 miles due west of the Panama Canal) was a no-man’s land. It appears

defined internationally, the republic of Costa Rica claimed sovereignty over it; and the Foreign Office suggested that Costa Rica should be asked for permis sion to make a landing.

But no one seems to have troubled about Costa Rica. That, perhaps, is not to be wondered at. Costa Rica is a tiny comic opera republic near the Panama Canal zone, in Central America.

But, if the expedition was not con cerned about Costa Rica, Costa Rica was passionately interested in the expedition, and its confident hope of recovering any thing up to £25,000,000 worth of treasure.

So far as Costa Rica was concerned, the share-selling publicity of Treasure Re covery Ltd.—and particularly the bits about £25,000,000, and the value of the new scientific methods of recovery—had registered 100 per cent!

So much treasure, it was calculated would pay off the national debt of Costa Rica and make most of the Costa Ricans millionaires for life. So Costa Rica bided its time.

The luxurious yacht, Queen of Scots, duly passed through the Suez Canal and landed the expedition on Cocos Island early in October, 1934. No one went near Punta Arenas, which is the port of Costa Rica, nor was any courtesy call made at San Jose, where the President of Costa Rica resides.

Thereupon the Government of Costa Rica became very busy indeed.

On October 13, 1934, the Government of Costa Rica assembled the Costa Rican navy (two small motor vessels) embarked a section of the army (26 soldiers and four colonels) and despatched the lot from Punta Arenas to Cocos Island “to re move the 19 members of the British treasure hunting expedition which, by

Photograph reproduced from one of the London daily newspapers, when the treasure-seekers sailed for Cocos Island in September, 1934.

in search of buried treasure of old-time pirates of the Spanish Main, an expedition left West India Docks, London, aboard the yacht Queen of Scots. The commander, Captain Bellingham (centre) is seen, showing the charts to friends and crew before sailing yester day for Cocoa Island.

landing there recently, have infringed Costa Rican territory.”

Meanwhile the yacht, Queen of Scots, had landed the expedition and had re turned to the Panama Canal en route to England. She was promptly held up in Cristobal, Panama, by the American authorities on the ground that, if they allowed her to sail, the treasure seekers who were being ejected from Cocos Island would be thrown as a charge upon the Panama authorities, and with no means of getting home.

It was a most startling development which aroused world wide attention, in view of the publicity which had been given previously to the departure of the expedition.

The expedition’s leaders had early radio advice of what was brewing. They came to Panama on the Queen of Scots, and rushed across to Costa Rica, and made due obeisance to the Costa Rican authorities, offering all sort of undertak ings and promises.

But it was too late. Costa Rica was on the warpath. If there was any treasure in Cocos Island, Costa Rica was going to have it. Costa Rica, for once, was sit ting on top of the world.

There was anti-climax when the Costa Rican expedition, which had sailed from Punta Arenas, did not arrive at Cocos Island when expected; and it was feared that the gallant troops had been lost. But it transpired afterwards that the radio had gone out of order and that the Costa Ricans had become very sea-sick. They eventually reached Cocos Island, and duly arrested the 19 British treasure seekers —by whom they were entertained with courtesy and much hospitality.

Troops and treasure-seekers arrived in Punta Arenas on October 28, 1934. It was understood that the treasure-seek ers were to be gaoled; but Costa Rica found a formula by which they were im mediately set free, because they were “‘merely the servants of Treasure Recovery Ltd.,” and they were allowed to proceed to Cristobal, where they rejoined the Queen of Scots.

The whole expedition thereupon re turned disconsolately to England.

The far-seeing Republic of Costa Rica seized the whole of the expedition’s equipment and stores which had been dis embarked on Cocos Island, on the ground that, as no steps had been taken to clear the vessel at the Costa Rican customs office, the material was contraband.

Naturally, there was a good deal of in dignation expressed in London, when a funny little country like Costa Rica was allowed to act in this “outrageous” man ner: but the British Government refused to interfere. It was quite clear from what had been done —or what had not been done —that Costa Rica had the law on its side.

Since the return of the Queen of Scots the organisers of the expedition have been doing their best to placate Costa Rica and secure permission to resume the search. But, of course, that is not easy.

Costa Rica holds the whip-hand; and in this case the whip-hand means a large portion of any treasure which may be recovered.

But a letter that was published In the London Daily Telegraph in August, 1934, from Admiral B. M. Chambers, has cast very grave doubt upon the whole story of the Cocos Island treasure.

The story is that, about 1820, Lima, a city of almost unbelievable riches, was

(Continued On Page 74.)

in danger of being raided; and that an enormous mass of gold and silver articles was placed for safe keeping upon a British vessel called the Mary Dier, under the command of Captain Thompson, in the belief that the English reputation for fair-dealing and honesty could always be trusted. The Mary Dier sailed away with the treasure; but the temptation was too much for Captain Thompson, and he and his men one night seized their passengers and murdered them; and the Mary Dier was eventually taken to Cocos Island, where 12 boat-loads of gold and silver were taken ashore and buried. It was estimated that the Mary Dier treasure was worth between £7,000,000 and £8,000,000.

Admiral Chambers has stated, in most emphatic manner, that he has devoted much time and industry to the investi gation of this story and he is convinced that it is completely a myth. He says that this “horrible act of piracy” is un known at the Peruvian Legation: it was

equally unknown in Peru, where he spent many months in the port of Callao, only 60 years after it was supposed to have occurred; it is not mentioned in any con tempory publication, in Spanish or Eng lish, although he examined many of them: neither the Registrar of Shipping nor Lloyd’s Register knows anything about a ship named the Mary Dier, or anything like it; the journal of Captain Basil Hall (H.M.S. Conway), written in 1820-22 at the time of the occupation of Lima by San Martine, contains nothing about the Mary Dier incident, but there is instead a statement that the treasures of the city were sent away into the interior.

In other words, says Admiral Chambers, there is not anywhere in official history a single word to support the story of the fabulous Cocos Island treasure —or the main section of it, at any rate.