Griffin

By Bonnie K. Goodman - Examiner

By accident, two treasure hunters have found the holy grail of all shipwrecks Le Griffon that vanished on its maiden voyage in 1679, and its location not discovered until now.

In 2011, Kevin Dykstra and Frederick Monroe looking for the mythical $2 million in Confederate gold lost as well in Lake Michigan, instead they hit on another treasure one with less monetary value.

The treasure seekers kept their find a secret for nearly four years until they could confirm it was the famed lost ship.

They waited all the way until December 2014 to take their incredible finding public.

The news was met with skepticism from historians and archeologists. Still Dykstra and Monroe are convinced they solved one of North American history's great mysteries.

The French explorer Robert LaSalle embarked on the maiden voyage on Sept. 18, 1679 in his new 40-foot ship with a crew of six travelling from today's Green Bay, Wisconsin to Niagara.

The New France explorer's ship was full of furs, and it was during their return trip that they hit troubled waters.

The ship vanished after a storm somewhere in the waters of Northern Lake Michigan. Since the ship was never found nor any of the crew conspiracies sprung up, among the most popular theories, natives captured the vessel, mutiny by the ship's crew and the most probable reason, a storm.

An account of the voyage explained why it was impossible to find in over 330 years "with a light and very favorable wind from the West. It has not been possible to ascertain since what course they steered."

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