Buried treasure stories of wrecked Dutch ship Gilt Dragon
- On 07/10/2017
- In Famous Wrecks
- 0 comments
By Chris Lewis - ABC
For some, there's nothing more exciting than hunting and searching for buried treasure from a shipwreck that happened almost four centuries ago off the coast of Western Australia.
But for archaeologist, author and historian Bob Sheppard, the real treasure is discovering the tales associated with the legend of the wrecked Dutch ship — the Gilt Dragon. But he's reaching out to the public in the hope that someone, somewhere may be able to shed more light on the stories, particularly the event that happened at Dynamite Bay in Green Head in 1964 — so he can include the stories in a book.
"Following the discovery of the [Gilt Dragon] wreck in 1963 there was another party who believed that there was a treasure buried at Green Head which was also related to the Gilt Dragon," Mr Sheppard said.
"They said that the wreck that was found at Ledge Point was not the Gilt Dragon but another ship and the Gilt Dragon was actually wrecked in Dynamite Bay at Green Head.
"This was a story put around by a Dutch man who had a map of where the treasure was buried."
The story goes that Frank Moore helped out this Dutchman who was quite ill.
As a sign of goodwill the Dutchman, named only as Harry, later showed Frank a piece of old yellow parchment and told him it was a map that indicated where chests of coins from the Gilt Dragon were buried.
He claimed to be a direct descendent of one of the survivors of the Gilt Dragon. After showing Frank the map, he then burnt the parchment, saying no-one else has ever seen this and no-one will. The Dutchman later died.
Add a comment