Cocos Island: A Real Life ‘Treasure Island’

Cocos Island: A Real Life ‘Treasure Island’

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this video is brought to you by  surfshark safety and security   online are critically important and you can  protect yourself online with surfshark get 83   off in three months for free through the link  in the description below and now today's video it is a trite cliche of most pirate stories a  chest bursting with gold and jewels buried deep   in a cave on a remote oceanic island x marks  the spot when looking at the lives of the most   famous buccaneers and corsairs of the caribbean  they very rarely if at all hid their stashes   of doubloons they would rather squander them on  new ships and weapons or reinvest them wisely on   run tobacco and women the idea of a buried  pirate treasure may have been originated by   a work of fiction treasure island by robert  louis stevenson and yet stevenson may have   gotten some inspiration from a real-life  place somewhere in the pacific a tiny   tropical island may conceal practical riches  to the tune of more than a billion dollars   this is the story of cocos island and  the cursed lives of its treasure hunters cocos island should not be confused with the  cocos islands also known as the keeling islands   the killing archipelago is an australian territory  in the indian ocean whereas today's destination   is in the pacific ocean and it belongs to  costa rica it's located some 297 nautical   miles southwest of its administrative mainland  that's 342 miles or 550 kilometers the service   of the island is only 9 square miles or 24 square  kilometers despite its tiny size cocos boasts an   astounding variety of animal and plant species it  contains 235 plant species 400 different insects   and 100 species of birds its crystalline waters  are home to sea turtles corals and 360 varieties   of fish mollusks and crustaceans its bays are  understandably very popular with scuba divers   who come to admire hammerhead sharks whale sharks  and giant manta rays the island is also graced   by the presence of fresh water streaming in  waterfalls and creeks as clear as diamonds   there are also plentiful coconut trees surrounded  by a thick and lush jungle it's no wonder then   the costa rican government declared kokos a  national park in 1978 and unesco designated   it a world heritage site in 1997. what helped to  preserve the natural environment of the island   was the absence of permanent settlers for such  a long period of its history the island had been   uninhabited for centuries until it was discovered  by the spanish explorer juan de cabezas in 1526   since then sailors traders and whalers have used  co-cursus a rest stop for their travels but the   island was especially popular among a certain  professional category pirates they headed to   cocos surely because of its natural beauty natural  springs and endless supply of coconut water which   once fermented makes for an intoxicating drink  more than anything else kokos lacked a little   something and that something was spanish  soldiers hence the popularity of co-cast with   oceanic criminals it was a perfect place to  rest refit and also hide ill-gotten gains let's now get into the meat of our story the  pirate treasures hidden and allegedly found   on cocos island first a word of warning the  accounts about these booties are often convoluted   contradictory confusing and plain infuriating from  a research standpoint we've done our best here to   seek out the most reliable sources and come up  with a narrative that makes sense if experts   on cocos island or piracy out there don't agree  with our findings please feel free to correct us   in the comments and state your source if possible  the first alleged treasure made its way to kokos   in 1685 aboard a pirate ship wonderfully named  bachelor's delight the vessel was commanded by   captain edward davis his second in command was  william dampier and was also the surgeon lionel   wafer the crew of the delight had successfully  blockaded and ransacked the city of lyon nicaragua   heading off into the pacific with a sizable loot  we don't know much more about the treasure of   bachelor's delights i'm going to skip to the next  trove the ill-gotten gains of captain bennett   graham in the early 1800s captain graham was a  distinguished british naval officer in charge of   surveying the coasts of the south pacific aboard  the hms devonshire apparently being a coastal   surveyor was not exciting enough for bennett and  he'd drastically change career paths turning to   piracy of course in 1818 captain graham was  caught and executed with most of his sailors   being sent to a penal colony in tasmania one  of his crew a woman called mary welch spent   20 years in prison but on her release she had  some promising retirement plans in mind she   claimed to have a chart showing where graham  had buried his treasure the stash amounted to   350 tons of gold bullion buried of course in  cocos british colonial authorities in tasmania   believed her story and mounted an expedition to  find the devonshire gold but in the previous 20   years the layout of the island had changed  so much that mary could barely recognize it   where was the huge cedar tree she had marked with  an x on a map with that and other landmarks gone   it was impossible to retrieve the treasure  and the expedition left kokos empty-handed now in some accounts of caucus's pirates  benigram is said to have changed his name   into the spanish-sounding benito bonito but in  other stories this rascal is a completely separate   character sometimes called benita benito benita  benitez bonita benito or some other variation   of that same theme we'll go with the version  that the story narrated by a colorado newspaper   moflat county courier in december of 1911  went with benito an assumed name was a spanish   privateer of aristocratic origins who had fought  in the peninsula war after napoleon's defeat he   murdered a portuguese captain and stole his  vessel he then seized an english ship in the   west indies the lightning which he renamed the  relampargo which is spanish for lightning well   two sailors of the lightning asked to join  benito's crew their names were bugs thompson   and chappelle sometime between 1818 and 1820 el  capitan bonito staged his criminal masterpiece   he learned a consignment of spanish gold was  to be transported by a company of soldiers   to acapulco he and his men then ambushed  the guards wore their uniforms and   showed up to collect the gold the perfect heist  worth 300 million dollars in today's money and   can you guess where the crew buried it caucus  island but benito's men were not happy they   wanted their part of the loot there and then the  luscious greenery of coach became the theater of   a bloody battle between benito's loyal pirates  and the mutineers armed with pistol and cutlass   the spanish captain personally enriched the  green backdrop with vivid splashes of red after   pretending to forgive the remaining 17 rebels  the crafty bonito abandoned them in valparaiso   chile they were all captured and hanged except for  bugs thompson and chappelle who offered to guide a   british expedition against benito in the caribbean  the raid was successful and with capture looming   benito bonito shot himself on the quarter deck of  the real empargo the thought of benito's gold may   be mouth-watering but it pales in comparison to  the largest treasure known to be hidden in cocos   in 1820 the spanish viceroy in lima peru was  preparing defenses against the revolutionary   forces of jose de san marta fighting for  independence against spain the viceroy collected   the vast treasure of lima which included the gold  and silver reserves as well as the jewels statues   and other artifacts from the city's 50 churches he  then entrusted the valuables to a well-known and   respected british merchant captain named william  thompson no relation to the previous bugs thompson   we've encountered even though one source claims  that they were actually the same person anyway   this captain thompson loaded the treasure  of lima into his ship the mary dear and   set sail into the pacific his instructions were to  keep traveling until the situation had normalized   in peru but thompson and his men must have felt  the unease of sitting on such a horde they did the   only reasonable thing they slipped the throats of  the six viceroy guards on board and sailed towards   koko to bury the treasure the merry deer dropped  anchor in wafer bay named after the surgeon   of the bachelor's delight here thompson  distributed some of the spoils to the crew   then with the help of two sailors he carried the  bulk of the treasure on shore he found the perfect   hiding spot a cave halfway between wafer bay and  chatham bay which according to the moffat county   courier was also the home to the treasure of  benito benito thompson then fittingly rewarded the   two sailors with their severance pay each received  a ball of lead straight into their skulls lest   they reveal the location of the cave the nefarious  captain then set sail with the mary deer planning   to return when the heat had died down shortly  after leaving kokas behind a spanish gunboat   gave chase and thompson quickly surrendered  the entire crew was put on trial for piracy   found guilty and sentenced to hang all sailors  were swung from the news except for two   thompson and his first mate who agreed to reveal  the location of the treasure thompson and the mate   returned to cocos escorted by spanish soldiers but  as soon as the party started the search the two   pirates gave them the slip and disappeared into  the jungle the soldiers looked for them for days   before giving up and leaving in frustration the  escapees were presumed dead but they survived for   weeks eating berries and eggs the two scoundrels  were eventually picked up by a whaler that had   stopped at kokos to stock up on water they  pretended to be shipwrecked sailors and were   welcomed on board the first mate was taken to  puntarenas costa rica where he later died of   yellow fever but how about our main man captain  thompson now just before we continue with today's   video let me tell you about today's fantastic  sponsor surf shark do you use the internet of   course you do it's 2022. you also got personal  information that you'd rather remain private and   personal well who doesn't well let me tell you  something the internet's a weird place there are   people out there that are on a ruin your day they  want to take your details steal your identity etc   surfshark has hack clock this search is database  for your password which sounds bad but don't worry   surf shark are the good guys if they see that  your data has been linked they'll be like yo yo yo   your data got leaked in it maybe you should do  something about that also what's great about   surf shark is of course it's vpn features that  lets you get a whole bunch of streaming options   that you didn't have 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good loads of options on there try helping on a  server from europe or asia or anywhere else and   you'll probably find that you get a whole lot of  stuff that isn't available to you right now also   surf shark is totally unlimited so you can watch  and download as much as you like of course there   are no logs there's great support and there's a  30-day money-back guarantee if you don't like it   go to surfshark.deals forward slash geographics  for 83 off and three extra months for free it's now the year 1844 we're in an unconfirmed  port city in cuba a canadian sailor named john   keating has just arrived in town thirsty for  adventure money and booze he soon meets a new   friend who may quench all three desires batman  is no other than william thompson thompson   took a liking to keating and the two sea dogs  bonded until the former captain made a shocking   revelation to the canadian he would point him to  the fabled treasure of lima by 1846 keating had   recruited a crew and launched an expedition co-led  by one captain bogue the two landed in cocos and   apparently found the treasure near wafer bay or  at least a treasure part of a treasure in fact   bogue and keating retrieved only a small quantity  of gold coins and jewels bogue stuffed his share   in his boots and pockets which sealed his doom  while boarding a rowboat the added weight caused   him to drown in the surf well that's what keating  said it's plausible that the canadian sailor just   straight up murdered his partner over what  happened next we only know that keating arranged   a second expedition this time he returned with  the equivalent of four million dollars in today's   money not bad at all but that would be just a  fraction of the treasure of lima why didn't he   recover more keating revealed that a mutinous crew  prevented him from collecting the remaining horde   which he described in great detail on his deathbed  bunches for example contained four thousand   spanish doubloons and five thousand gold mexican  crowns another contained 1244 altar ornaments   including chowsers coated with gemstones and then  there were more containers teaming with thousands   of diamonds rubies topazes solid gold candelabra  and relic containers to stop it all off a seven   foot tall statue of the virgin mary with the baby  jesus in solid gold the virgin was adorned with 1   684 jewels and 7 crosses made of diamonds it's  no wonder then that hundreds of expeditions   were mounted after keating's death to recover  this mouth-watering trove the next note were   the treasure hunt was led by captain william  tucker in september 1869. this explorer did not   find anything but he is remembered for tagging  along to the official expedition ordered by dr   jesus yemena zamora president of costa rica it was  with that mission that dr zamora took possession   of curcus ireland in the name of the costa rican  government people tucker's footsteps were followed   by a german sailor captain august gisla but now  we must take a step back for a second remember the   first mate of captain thompson the one who died  of yellow fever well according to some sources   he survived the disease and moved to kona hawaii  assuming the name of makoma also known as old mac   to his drinking buddies in 1888 gisler landed in  kona and met old mack surely over endless shots of   whiskey the ancient mariner told a wondrous tale  about a buried spanish treasure in wafer bay gisla   was so convinced by his tale that he first moved  to costa rica in 1889 and then decamped to kokos   for the following 20 years the obsessed gistler  gave all he had to finding the treasure combing   every square meter of the territory the costa  rica government was so impressed by his tenacity   they gave him a commission as governor of the  island with permission to establish and manage   a colony yet by 1908 gisler had to admit defeat  he had poured all his energy time and money into   an unattainable dream he left kokos for good  and died completely broke in new york in 1935. three years after gisler's departure kokos was  visited by one captain frederick hackett he sailed   off eagle harbor washington at the helm of the  bark hesperus his story was told by our friends   at the moffatt county courier in december of 1911  who described hackett as a bluff ruddy bearded   old sea dog hail and vigorous despite his three  score years that's the most radical description   i've ever read by the way it smells like rum and  probably scurvy according to moffat hackett and   his older brother thomas had been friends with  john keating the old treasure hunter shortly   before his death in 1883 keating had drawn up a  map of the island leading to the jewels and gold   of lima two years later thomas hackett had sailed  to coccos for a first attempt but he had died in   havana cuba of yellow fever it was now time for  that ruddy frederick to break the curse of kokos   and find the treasure hackett raised a hundred  thousand dollars from investors equivalent to 2.8   million dollars in today's money with these funds  he fitted and staffed the hesperus and purchased   some state-of-the-art hydraulic mining equipment  the only thing we know about his attempt is that   it was fruitless the american press reported about  kokos treasure hunting once again on the 13th   of april 1932 the new york times announced the  composition of the next search party so malcolm   campbell automobile speed king campbell in fact  was a racer who held both the land and water speed   records during the 20s and 30s next up colonel j  e leckie cmg dso cbe without forgetting frgs we   did not check his whole resume but we found that  he had a degree in mining engineering and was a   veteran of both the anglo-bar war and world war  one the last mission lead was s clayton inventor   of the clayton metallophone in our dictionary  metalophone is an alternative spelling for   metallophone which is a type of large xylophone  but according to the new york times clayton's   invention was some contraption which could locate  the lima riches so there you have them a cast of   characters worthy of the best 1930s cliffhanger  film serials the adventurer the stern military man   and the oddball inventor did they succeed well  i'm sure they found some friends along the way   let's put it that way campbell certainly  found a publishing contract along the way he   narrated the unsuccessful expedition in his memoir  searching for pirate treasure in cocos island maybe it was about time that some professionals  got involved the members of the california society   for archaeological investigations who may have  found the treasure at least according to a short   article published by the examiner of lawnston  tasmania australia on the 8th of january 1940.  

as we know around that time nothing of note was  happening around the world sarcasm by the way   so the examiner filled in a slow news day by  reporting on a message by mr sydney field the   costa rican consul on november of 1939 the  california archaeologists had sailed to cocos   according to mr field they had found  the treasure valued at a whopping   60 million dollars which is about 1.153 billion  dollars in today's money the expedition however   reported that the treasure was buried so  deeply that they had to return to california   to secure digging equipment we couldn't find any  further mention of that voyage the next documented   stab finding that solid gold madonna happened in  1949 the costa rican government received a letter   from san diego resident paul stashwick who claimed  to have been shipwrecked near cocos in 1931 having   found safety on shore stashwick had located the  treasure he offered to lead a government-funded   search party and claimed he didn't want to make  one cent out of the venture his only wish was   for the pieces stolen from peruvian churches  to be returned to their rightful place was   he onto something well we'll never know as the  government archived the letter and never replied in the 1980s cocos island was visited  several times by jacques cousteau the   legendary french explorer diver oceanographer and  filmmaker he fell in love with it describing it   as the most beautiful island in the world cousteau  dedicated his efforts to filming the local schools   of sharks which appeared in his 1988 documentary  sharks of treasure island during filming members   of his crew had to go finding the lima trove with  an underwater pulse-induction metal detector again   no success but their intuition was right modern  technology was the key to finding the buried gold   in 1996 costa rican historian rale aries proposed  the ministry of energy and the environment to use   air images system technology in other words  he wanted to enlist help from nasa and their   satellite imagery the government did not sanction  the plan which ended up being put in place by a   private citizen in 1998 an optical technology  firm called alcor international received a   commission from one alan david shepard they were  to acquire satellite images of cocos islands using   a technology called geovision which allowed  them to identify particles of specific metals   gold for example mr shepard was almost a namesake  for alan bartlett shepard the first american in   space that might explain why alcor obliged the  request the company's technicians found evidence   of three gold deposits one under the waters of  wafer bay and two on land when mr shepard received   an invoice for ten thousand dollars he promised  to involve the costa rican government in san jose   and they would foot the bill as far as we know  our corps is still 10 grand short and no other   action was taken as we know san jose had declared  cocos to be a national park in 1978 to protect its   natural habitat and fornet worried about the habit  caused by gold diggers in the 2010s the government   forbade further expeditions yet in 2012 british  and canadian media reported that engineer sean   whitehead was preparing a major archaeological  survey using ground penetrating radar   and snake cameras whitehead had obtained a special  six-month permission to conduct the inspection but   while he waited for a tv production company to  sort out things on their end the permit lapsed   and was not renewed another promising attempt  just dead in the water since then there have   been more stories of how the treasure of lima has  been recovered but according to jenna marie davis   from adventure diving company undersea hunter  group this may be misinformation purposefully   spread by treasure hunters trying to throw other  treasure hunters off the track it's also possible   that the costa rican government created some  fake news to divert attention away from kokos   and preserve its natural riches in recent times  in fact the presence of overnight visitors is   forbidden on the island only scuba divers are  allowed for short trips in its pristine bays and   only park rangers can live on cocos while  protecting the natural reserve if the one   brilliant stash from lima and other treasures  are indeed still present on cocos island we hope   that hunters and explorers will leave this unesco  heritage site alone ill-conceived expeditions have   not only endangered species and their habitats but  have also exacted a significant toll in terms of   human life we've only explored the major events  surrounding the island and even so the cocos   curse has racked up a significant body count four  captains lost to execution suicide drowning and   disease six slain spanish soldiers two pirates  shot two entire crews executed by hanging and a   german governor left broke and broken instead  of considering digging up those 1 684 jewels   how about just playing the lottery so i really  hope you found this video interesting if you did   please do hit that thumbs up button below don't  forget to subscribe and thank you for watching

2022-01-19 18:32

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