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Show Seek Millions In Old Panama Dig for Treasure Burled When Henry Morgan's Pirates Pi-rates Sacked Town. Balboa, Canal Zone. In the Jungle-covered Jungle-covered ruing of the ancient city of Old Panama, English and American explorers are now engaged in a scientific scien-tific search for several million dollars' worth of buried treasure which, history his-tory records, was hidden there when the pirate, Henry Morgan, sacked and burned the town in 1071, writes Hoy G. Blank In the Chicago Tribune. A remarkable radio gold locater, invented in-vented by Thomas Fahie of Colchester, Colches-ter, England, Is being used by the explorers, ex-plorers, who have already unearthed three minor troves containing golden ornaments worth thousands of dollars. The Instrument is like a radio receiving re-ceiving set in appearance. It is, In fact, a sort of ground radio, nnd it records re-cords accurately the presence of nonmagnetic non-magnetic metals underground. One wire, attached to a rod, is grounded. Another rod is passed over the surface sur-face of the ground. When gold or other oth-er nonmagnetic metals occfir .beneath the surface between the two poles a needle indicates Its presence, which Is also recorded by a distinct humming hum-ming in the ear phones. British Officer In Charge. Lieut. George Williams, R. N. V. It., is at the head of the treasure hunting expedition. He has jl four- comment. Other pieces of treasure Include gold collars, necklaces studded T.'lth precious stones, solid gold balls two Inches in diameter, attached to chains which are quite puzzling, crucifixes, cru-cifixes, and n miniature ark of the covenant nearly six inches square. AU gold has been locked up in the Pnna-man Pnna-man treasury for division after the end .of the four years of work. Mysterious Tunnel. The explorers are now engaged In pumping the water out of a mysterious mysteri-ous subterranean tunnel which has many passages branching out from beneath be-neath an old monastery toward the other churcjies, convents and schools. The tunnel is as yet inaccessible, but it promises to reveal some startling architecture as well as, perhaps, the biggest gold hoard. Prescott records the fabulous millions mil-lions which were brought across the Isthmus from the conquered Incus. From Pern and Potosi and from the mines of Veraguas -canve the gold for transportation across the narrow neck of land which separates the Caribbean Ca-ribbean from the Great South sea. Pedraria the Cruel, who is said to have accounted for over 2,000,000 Indians, In-dians, founded the ancient city of Old Panama, which became the storehouse for the bullion of Peru nnd the silks and spices of the Orient. Diego de Albltes. stranded on the north coast, founded, quite by accident, what became be-came the stronghold of Nombre de Dios. plied them with arms to the common end, nnd the flow of gold paid a steady tribute to these adventurers. , Marauders Die -With Spoils. . In this way not all thu gold that left Old Panama reached Nombre de Dios; nor did all that fell Into the hands of the pirates reach the Atlantic. Competent Com-petent authorities pronounce the present pres-ent Jungle as being infinitely more - difficult- to traverse today than it was in those days, but even then It must have been, a terrible task for these marauders, many of whom failed to get clear of the Jungle, dying with their spoils in the silence of the forest. Sir Francis Drake's second attack on the road, under the command of Sir Thomas Baskerville. failed dismally. dismal-ly. Baskerville and 700 men traveled down t':.9. road from Nombre de Dios, but they met with such opposition, dangers, nnd difficulties that remnant rem-nant crawled back. "The march was so sore as never Englishmen marched before," said the commander on his ro'urn, history records. The Spaniards, however, continued using the rend until Sir Henry Morgan. Mor-gan. sacked Porto Hello In IOoS. That experience was enough for the Spaniards, Span-iards, and ever afterward they sent their gold over the trail to Crnces and thence down the Chngrcs river to Fort Lorcn::o. Had to Fight for Possession. It Is little wonder that the enormous enor-mous wealth which the Spaniards were extracting from the new world should attract attention of others, and' it was not long before they realized that they had to fight constantly to retain what they so cruelly extracted from the Indians. After suffering repeated re-peated successful uttacks on Nombre de Dios, Porto Bello nnd Koyal fond, the Spaniards took special precautions for tlie safety of their wealth. These precautions are responsible for the discovery, after so many centuries, of the gold at Old Panama. When Parker attacked and took Porto Hello the wealthy Inhabitants of Old Panama realized that It would not be long before the pirates would pay them a visit. Using hundreds of slaves, they constructed galleries In the rock below their houses. Into which they placed their valuable. One might call them private land banks, and the Spaniards, no doubt, thought them eminently safe. As the years went by the rVposlta Increased until the threat of Sir Henry Hen-ry Morgan whs made against them. News was brought over the gold trull by a few members of the garrison nt Fort Lorenzo. The dreaded Morgan was approaching. Preparations were made to defeat him In his attack on Old Panama, nnd recent discoveries disclose that the galleries were cemented ce-mented In until the danger was over. Unfortunately for the Spaniards, Morgan Mor-gan won. The Hidalgos who hud secreted se-creted their wealth were kliled In the battle before Old Panama, nnd their secret died with them. Morgan Burns City. Chagrined nt the small amount of wealth he found nt Old Panama. Morgan Mor-gan burned the city nnd killed nil who did not escape. Some of the wealth had been hidden away 20 allien from the city, Rome was placed hurriedly on board ships nnd sent to sea, while the Inhabitants nnd wealthy traders had burled theirs beneath their bouses und thrown It down the wells, which were later caved In by falling debris from the flaming city. In the tunnels of Old Panama there pre, according to old documents, secret se-cret hilling places where the priests concealed the treasures of the church and of the people, who gave It to the priests fur safe keeping when they learned that Morgan was coming. The people trusted the priests nnd Morgan knew this. He tiled to extort from the priests the location of the treasure, treas-ure, but rather than give up the gold of their church the priests suffered death at the hands of the buccaneers. The secret recesses of the underground under-ground tunnels at Old Panama have been i (-discovered. Ill n few months they will be opened up. According to history, there Is, somewhere In these tunnels, it life-size Image of the Virgin Vir-gin Mary, made of solid gold. The Image Is supposed to have been secreted se-creted In the tunnels and the hldors (o have perished Willi their secret. year concession from the government of Panama with the understanding that Panama is to retain one-fourth of all treasure located during that period. pe-riod. Other members of the expedition, expedi-tion, are Wallace Bain, American; Commander David Blair, F. I. G. S.. and Lieut F. W. Kealey, R. N. V. R. At the request of Lieutenant Williams, Wil-liams, the fanaman government has detailed armed police guards for day nnd night duty In the Jungles where the explorers are encamped. A representative of the President of Panama has also pitched a tent alongside along-side their camp and Is watching their work to see that the treasure Is divided di-vided evenly. The police guards were requested by Lieutenant Williams when he discovered dis-covered that large-scale unauthorized excavations were being carried out on sites where his instruments had Indicated the presence of gold. Finds Gold Ornaments. After testing among the ruins to . convince himself that there was gold there. Lieutenant Williams delivered to the president of Panamn several hundred dollars' worth of antique golden ornaments which he had unearthed. un-earthed. He marked many other sltei where his instrument indicated the presence of gold nnd returned to the city for more laborers and udequate camping equipment. Road Across Isthmus Built. Between these two points n road across the Isthmus was constructed, passing over the great Continental divide, through the der.;e tropical Jungle, over swamps, and up the steep sides of hills down to the open savannah savan-nah country around the olden city of Panama. The trail was known ns the Camlno Real or royal road, but a more fitting name for it would have been the Blood road. For more than 100 years the loug mule trains packed gold across this road like cordwood. A gold train usually consisted of 1,000 uiules. gayly caparisoned nnd with Jingling bells, each with Its load of gold. In the van nnd nt the rear marched armed men, while with the mules strings of Indians and African slaves stumbled along under the lashes of their drivers, and It can well he said that the Camlno Ileal was paved with dead men's bones nnd every Inch of the wny was stained with blood. Many of the slaves escaped, taking to the Jungles, where they banded to-gathpr to-gathpr ns the CI mn rones, to harass their former masters. As Clmn rones the former slaves attacked nnd robbed the gold trains repeatedly. Later, ruled by n black king and commanded by captains, they became the allies of English and French pirates who sup- To his surprise, on returning to the jungles a fortnight Inter with scores cf laborers ready to begin dlgglnz, Lieutenant Williams found six enormous enor-mous excavations among the ruins and lit the exact sites where his Instrument's Instru-ment's indications were positive. One l ole had been dug 13 feet deep. Another, An-other, drilled through solid rock, disclosed dis-closed the presence of a large subterranean subter-ranean tunnel and revealed that secret se-cret excavations had been carried out in b large scale during his absence. It was then that Lieutenant Williams requested police protection. Sees Signs of Success. When the explorers ngaln tested these places the instrument registered negative. Indicating that nonmagnetic metals, believed by Lieutenant Williams Wil-liams to have been gold treasure, had been removed. The fact that the re-cret re-cret excavations were carried .out on such a large scale and that the diggers continued to work In six different places after they had opened the first hole, leads Lieutenant Williams to believe be-lieve that the excavations met with encouraging success. K::qulslt; golden ornaments of very undent design, studded with diamonds, dia-monds, emeralds, snppblres find rubles, have been unearthed already. -A golden gold-en butterfly three Inches across, with rubied for eyes, nnd the wing designs of oilier precious stones. Is one of the criiameuts that hau attracted much |
