The following piece was written by Oak Island researcher, Graham Harris. It remains formatted for print material and is not ideal in web format, so please bear with us at this time.

The Treasure and Treason of William Phips

This article originally appeared in three parts in "No Quarter Given" (2004-5).
It is reproduced by permission of Christine Lampe, Editor, www.noquartergiven.net.

William Phips (1651-95) accomplished much in his short life. Born into a pioneering settlement in the backwoods of Maine, he became one of New England's most colourful adventurers. He attained fame by discovering the wreck of a Spanish galleon off the coasts of Hispaniola in 1687, an achievement for which he was knighted by King James II of England after he returned with 28 tons of silver. A return expedition failed to recover more treasure, and many reasons were given at the time. However, newly discovered archival information confirms a previously expounded thesis that the treasure from the return expedition was cached upon Oak Island, Nova Scotia, as part of the plans for the 'Glorious Revolution' of 1688 intended to oust King James off the throne of England, and to replace him with William, Prince of Orange. The treasure was lost by a quirk of nature, and some sixty years later the British government, unable to recover it for themselves, took steps to ensure the treasure remained 'lost'.

This article is the synopsis of the background to a book in preparation titled The Golden Reef: Exploits of Sir William Phips. It tells the life of a man who was torn between his obsession to recover treasure from the deep, and the treason into which he was irrevocably drawn as a result of his success.

Several biographers have written about the life of William Phips, describing his impoverished background in a pioneering settlement on the banks of the Sheepscot River, his early apprenticeship as a ship's carpenter, his obstinacy in seeking out and finding the wreck of the Concepción, and his subsequent career as governor of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay. What emerges from these scholarly works is a portrait of a man who was crude and bullying, of violent disposition, full of pride and arrogance, a bombastic man who exulted in self-adulation. The Dictionary of American Biography describes him thus - "A self-made man, he made a display of fraternizing with ship's carpenters and former friends of lowly station, a trait as irritating to the aristocracy as his pompous manner or the undignified outbursts of temper with which he met opposition to his will. At times he could not resist resorting to brute force." This sounds like a man imbued with more commonsense than implied vanity! A man who would not stoop to fawn or flatter - a man, therefore, who knew his true friends' worth. As a mariner Phips could rule a fractious and insolent crew, and if strong language and bullying was needed, then he was no different from countless sea captains of the age in which he lived. Phips had many friends and allies during his tempestuous life, and not all were of 'lowly station'. One of these was the impetuous Lord Charles Mordaunt, later 3rd Earl of Peterborough, a man as enigmatic as Phips himself, and one who played a crucial role in plotting the course of revolution.

The Formative Years

The setting where William Phips was born is idyllic. A big white house sits on a knoll where, not far distant, the blue of ocean laps the rockbound edge of an expanse of carefully mown grass. This is Phipp's Point, Maine, where almost four hundred years ago James and Mary Phips of Bristol, England, settled to make a new home in the New World. It was far different then – no big house or carefully tended grass. The land was to prove barren and friendless, and hostile it was to become.

William was born February 2nd 1651, and midwinter was not a good time for a frontierswoman to give birth in an isolated settlement in the wilderness, in a cabin where icicles festooned the walls, with windows boarded up and chinks stuffed with straw in a vain attempt to keep out the winter's freezing draughts, and where the only light came from smoking oil lamps and an equally smoky fire. William was lucky to have an elder sister, some fourteen years his senior, that assisted his birth. If later behaviour is any indication he was a lusty babe, as he was described in later years as being vocal and bellicose, but though he has also been described as 'pushy' one would hesitate to infer his birth was premature. There is some uncertainty regarding the number of children born to Mary Phips, a figure of twenty-six often being quoted! Whatever the true number, and recognizing the fact that she was to remarry after the death of her husband, it is virtually certain there were a great number of children in that struggling settlement along the banks of the Sheepscot.

There was little opportunity for William to receive any formal education, for there was nowhere to go and no money available. William's education was of the practical kind, learning to use his hands and how to survive in the wilderness. However, he was apprenticed to a local shipyard, and that was to prove a stepping-stone to greater things. We will never know what ambitions his mind nurtured as he first tended the sheep, and then diligently toiled away in the boatyard. But we can imagine what might have gone through the mind of a sturdy lad such as he with innate commonsense, and brought up in the self-sufficiency and independence of frontier life! As soon as his four year apprenticeship was over he went to Boston harbouring an ambition to become a builder of ships. The year was 1673 and he was twenty-two years old. Shortly after his arrival he married a young widow with no money but good connections, which resulted in his obtaining his first contract, a ship of some 117 tons. He decided to start his own yard back home on the banks of the Sheepscot River.

In 1675 war broke out in New England. Led by an Indian, known as King Philip, a concerted effort was made by a confederacy of Indian tribes to drive the colonists back from where they had come, viz the sea. Aided by the French, sporadic attacks were mounted on outlying settlements, and those on the Sheepscot were not spared. The first attack was in the summer of 1676, and directed at the shipyard where William had learned his carpentry skills.

News of the ensuing massacre was carried by a young girl who ran twelve miles barefoot through the forest, swimming a river in her flight, to alert other settlers. One of the settlements she reached was that on Phipp's Point. William's newly completed ship was preparing for its maiden voyage, and in the process of taking on a load of lumber. The lumber was promptly abandoned, and instead the ship took aboard a full complement of fearful settlers. His actions and magnanimity saved everyone's lives that day, but this was of little consequence to William's creditors. The lumber had been lost! There were debts to be repaid! He was hounded mercilessly, and dragged ignominiously through the courts. The legal harrassment he suffered lasted eighteen months before he finally managed to wriggle out of the clutches of the law and its harsh excesses. The humiliation he suffered at the hands of the high and mighty Bostonians would have rankled, and with his proud disposition he could never have remained in the city an object of contempt. Urged on by his wife he effected his escape in the winter of 1677-78 to seek his fortune farther afield.

With no learning, writing, or navigational skills, to whom could William Phips turn? What might he have done to help restore the family fortunes and his own dignity? A ship's carpenter was an exceedingly valuable member of any ship's crew, and with the skills William possessed he could keep a vessel afloat when others could not. A New England coast rife with pirates, from Boston to New York and far beyond, offered a tempting prospect, and William Phips would have soon found himself a berth in which to make a 'good voyage'. Here we have a man scarred and bruised from the treatment he'd received at the hands of authority, and little concerned with scruples. It comes as no surprise that ever after he remained distrustful of Boston society, and enjoyed immensely pricking the bubble of vanity that pervaded it.

The First Voyage - Disaster

The story of how the treasure-laden Spanish galleon, the Concepción, came to be wrecked off the coast of Hispaniola in 1641 on the voyage back to Spain, has been told a number of times, the account by Peter Earle being especially noteworthy. What is not known are the circumstances under which William Phips learned of this wreck, which was one of the most fabulous of the age, but learn about he did, most probably beneath a palm tree on some sun-drenched isle in the Caribbean. Obsessed with finding the wreck and recovering its treasure he voyaged to England in 1683 in search of a sponsor. Many dreary months passed plodding the dismal streets of the metropolis. With the gold in his pocket being rapidly depleted, and forced to consider an imminent and ignominious retreat to Boston, he received a summons to the Palace of Whitehall. None other than King Charles II demanded his presence! Aided by the good offices of Sir John Narbrough, perhaps the greatest British admiral of the period, the enthusiastic treasure-seeker from Boston soon found himself in command of the Rose of Algeree, one of the king's ships which had been captured a few years earlier from the Moors off the Barbary Coast.

The voyage of the Rose was not auspicious. Saddled with men who had been recruited with little discrimination from the taverns and watering-holes of the Thames on a 'no prey, no pay' basis, and having one of the king's spies placed on board to report his every action, the Rose became an unhappy command for William Phips. He was to face mutiny on at least one occasion from a fractious and insolent crew. On the occasion we know about, he put down the mutiny by the sheer force of his personality and the persuasive power of his blunt and forthright language. His size and strength may also have helped, for he was as big as an ox with enough brute force to match.

The difficulties with which he was beset, at Limerick and Boston on the outward voyage, and Jamaica and Bermuda on the return, are well known and documented. These difficulties were a direct result of his own boastful and vainglorious disposition, for William Phips, the scarcely literate boy from the backwoods, now he had been given the command of a king's ship, missed no opportunity to let everyone know the fact – particularly when he deliberately sailed into Boston. There he strutted around like a prize turkeycock for all to see! He might have been forgiven his arrogance later if the Rose had found some treasure worth boasting about! But a bit of silver from diving on a wreck in New Providence was the meagre sum! The rest of the voyage, between weighing anchor in England in September 1683, and the return almost two years later in July 1685, was spent fruitlessly wandering the waters of the Caribbean, or so it would seem. But William Phips, despite the shortcomings of his personality, was a shrewd and skilful mariner. That barren period of searching, when the sea obstinately refused to yield up her bounty, was more likely spent diligently pursuing the goal of his dreams. His resolute nature would have made him criss-cross the ocean in methodical manner, surveying those empty quarters where few had gone before, dividing and sub-dividing it into sections, each one of which had to be traversed, for in that age the Rose truly sailed upon uncharted waters.

Immediately after the return of the Rose William Phips was thrown into the Tower of London. While he had been voyaging in the Caribbean, King Charles II had died and James had assumed the throne, and King James was made of sterner stuff than his more pliant brother. King James demanded to know why William Phips had been given a ship in the first place, to go off seeking for a treasure-laden wreck whose very existence was in dispute. Officers from the treasury poked their noses into every activity associated with the voyage in an attempt to ferret out instances of wrong-doing, but they found nothing. He was dragged up in front of officials and interrogated, but there was nothing that could be found to contradict his testimonies. Why he was cast into the Tower in the first place cannot be fully ascertained, but the suspicion arises that Sir John Narbrough, who had assisted him in obtaining the Rose, took the opportunity to have him put out of the way while the ship was torn apart by the king's officials in their zealous search for smuggled treasure. As little or no treasure had been found by the Rose during her voyage William Phips had nothing to hide and, naturally, nothing could be found to incriminate him. Thanks to Narbrough's shrewd but necessary action Phips's reputation remained untarnished. But finding another sponsor, and another ship for a second voyage, was to prove as difficult as finding one for the first. Eventually, however, a sponsor was found. He came in the form of a lusty fun-loving duke – Christopher Monck, Second Duke of Albemarle.

The Second Voyage - Triumph

Christopher Monck was not one of your ordinary dukes. He loved spending money on wining and dining, lavish entertainment, and recklessly indulging in wagers on the race track, in the field and in the ring. He also had a good friend in the form of Sir Henry Morgan of Jamaica. The men had been friends a long time, and on two occasions during the reign of the previous king the duke had managed to extricate Morgan from the legal consequences of some of his rasher actions on Jamaica. From the ex-buccaneer the duke had developed an academic interest in both the island, and the treasure-laden wrecks of the Caribbean that surrounded it. Shortly after King James had assumed the crown the duke was shorn of all official appointments, and that academic interest was soon translated into resolve of a more practical kind. Being a natural born gambler the duke saw little reason why the treasure from the fabled wreck, being touted around London by William Phips, couldn't be found and the proceeds used to clear his own not inconsiderable debts. What his good duchess might have said can be imagined! However, it was a gambling decision that was to pay off handsomely, not only for Albemarle and Narbrough, but all the others they persuaded to invest in the venture.

In September 1686, a little over a year since his ignominious return, William Phips sailed off again, this time in command of two vessels, the newly named James and Mary of 200 tons, ostensibly named in honour of the king and queen (but might equally have been named after William's parents), and the Henry, a cockleshell of 40 tons. On this voyage the crews had been selected more prudently than before, though a smattering of men were retained from that earlier, and less happy, voyage. This time everyone was to receive wages instead of to the old dictum of 'no prey, no pay'.

By November they were anchored off Mona, an island lying between Cuba and Hispaniola (where a decade later Captain Kidd was to sojourn after his return from the Indian Ocean in the Queddah Merchant). The next two months saw the two ships trading brandy, cloth, hats, kitchen utensils, tools and other merchandise, to the Spanish and native inhabitants on the north coast of Hispaniola. This was, in part, a subterfuge for their clandestine search for the wreck, but also to help pay the costs of the voyage. As one of the stakeholders in the project had ventured to ask, "why go in empty bottoms?"

In January 1686/87, William Phips dispatched the tiny Henry from Porto Plata with instructions to reconnoitre an area of ocean to the north not previously visited, while he continued to masquerade as a trader. For some days the Henry, under Francis Rogers, diligently pursued the monotonous task that had been allotted to them, when the quiet was suddenly broken by a shrill cry from the lookout at the foremast top, who gesticulated wildly. Breakers lay ahead! The sea boiled with foam as waves swirled around venomous pinnacles of coral that just broke the surface. The wind veered suddenly, the tropical night fell swiftly, and amidst the perils of the reef there was little the Henry could do but lay to, set out her anchors, and pray they held. They did!

Dawn broke with hardly a breath of wind. The sea was like a millpond, and barely a ripple broke its satiny sheen, except where the waters were ruffled where monstrous heads of coral broke surface like stumps of rotten teeth. No one knew it at the time, but Wednesday, January 19th 1686/87 was to become a red-letter day in the history of treasure-hunting. They had found a reef - had they found the wreck?

The feelings of all aboard the Henry are reflected by the entries in the logbook:
Wednesday, January 19th. Att four in ye afternoon ye boats and crews returned again having searcht att least six miles in length from ye east end towards ye westward; not so much as passing one boyler without a dilligent inspection, all last night and ye day small aires of wind from ye southeast to ye south-southeast with faire weather and smooth water, saw severall whailes.

Thursday, January 20th. Att noon observed and made latitude 20°37' N. Soon after ye boats and crews went asearching and in two hours time our boats returned on board again bringing us happy and joyfull news of ye cannoes findeing ye wreck, there being in her Mr Covill, Francis and Jona, ye two dievers. For which blessing we return infinite praise and thanks to Allmighty God.

Those thanks were indeed justly rendered, as the Henry took on board before sunset that day a small fortune in silver –
3 sows, a champein, a barr, 51 dollars, 21 half-dollars and 10 quarter-pieces, tangible evidence that the Henry had indeed found the wreck! There was not a man aboard who did not dream of riches, as a steady trickle of silver began to be brought up. But two days later storm clouds gathered on the horizon, and Captain Rogers decided discretion was the better part of valour, the Henry must clear the reef and take the good news back to William Phips.

The return to Porto Plata took a tedious two weeks for they were forced to elude vessels they thought were pirates. The logbook of the James and Mary records receiving the good news thus:
February 7th. This day towards 4 a clock Mr Rogers came in [to Porto Plata] who gave us to understand that they had been on ye banck and told us they had don as much as any men could doe ...

February 8th. This morning our Captain sent our longboat on board Mr. Rogers which in a shoart time returned with what made our hearts very glad to see which was 4 shows, 1 bar, 1 champene, 2 dowboys, 2000 and odd dollars by which wee understand that they had found ye wreck.

The jubilation can be imagined! After four years of voyaging, with countless sea miles in his wake, in pursuit of a goal that often seemed more like pursuing a will o' the wisp in a dream of nightmarish proportions, William Phips now had solid evidence of the existence of that fantastic wreck and, more importantly, knew exactly where it lay. Nine days later the two ships slipped out to sea their trading activities at an end. Their priorities lay elsewhere! By February 21st they are at the wreck site. Ensuing entries in the logbook of the James and Mary are typical as a bounty of wealth immediately began to be reaped from the wreck:
February 22nd. [Relating to events of the previous day] Mr. Covell, Mr. Strong and two of ye divers went in her [the pinnace] to ye wreck and just as daylight began to shut in they came on board bringing with them out of ye wreck 189 whole dollars and 51 half dollars. This night ye wind blew fresh but making a snugg ship by lowering down our yards and topmasts, by God's assistance we rode very secure.

February 26th. Yesterday about 2 PM our longboat came on board with a brass gun...[it] was a twelve pounder and about 4 PM our pinnace came ... having taken out of ye wreck 3 sows, a small dowboy, 11009 dollars, 1700 half-dollars and a small quantity of broken wrought plate.....About noon [today] our longboat came aboard with another brass gun, bigger than ye former one.

March 4th. Our boats went to work on ye wreck and in ye evening brought on board 2399 pounds weight of coyned silver which we suppose were [once] in chests which we putt into 32 baggs.

The harvest was to become prodigious. In fact it was to prove unique in the annals of recovering sunken treasure. On March 14th alone more than one and a half tons of silver was reclaimed. By the end of the month William Phips was beset with a monumental headache. He now had on board more wealth than he could have ever conceived. His two ships were vulnerable to capture by pirates, or privateers of other nations, and they were virtually defenceless. On April 19th the James and Mary and the Henry hoisted up their anchors and set their sails, the prelude to a long voyage home. On board was twenty-eight tons of silver (at today's price worth about five million dollars). There was not a man who did not anticipate a triumphal reception on reaching the shores of England. They also expected a well-earned bonus! On neither account were they disappointed.

Lord Mordaunt

Charles Mordaunt (1658-1735) was one of those eccentric individuals that flit across the Anglo-Saxon stage from time to time, fascinating us with their strange antics, but mystifying us even more as to why they act as they do. There are ten pages in the Dictionary of National Biography devoted to Mordaunt, with precious little of it relating to the first thirty years of his life, i.e. the years before the revolution of 1688. Before the revolution Mordaunt achieved nothing to any purpose, and even less with any lasting effect. But immediately after the revolution his fortunes were suddenly transformed, and he was heaped with honours from the new king, William III, including being given the post of First Lord of the Treasury. This particular appointment has perplexed historians unable to determine what Mordaunt actually did to deserve his good fortune, especially as he was one of the most improvident individuals of the age, unable to keep his own financial affairs in order let alone those of the nation! One biographer wrote of him - "...when not engaged in more honourable or adequate employment, he was perpetually mixed up in conspiracy and intrigue. His conduct could neither be foreseen nor trusted. He was as dangerous to his friends as to his foes." His passion for conspiracy and intrigue was to prove his greatest asset in the cause of revolution, for revolution was indeed brewing, the populace of England was seething with discontent towards their monarch.

Mordaunt had been forced to flee England shortly after the accession of King James to the throne in 1685, for he had spoken out boldly and rashly against the avowed politics of the new king. For this he had placed his life in peril. He sought refuge at the court of William, Prince of Orange, and thereafter devoted himself with considerable recklessness to his adopted cause, constantly beseeching William to undertake the invasion of England. In this he was not alone. In the vanguard of growing public dissent were seven prominent men, one of whom was a bishop. This group became the nucleus around which the strategy of revolution revolved. (Interestingly, three of the plotters later took up shares in Captain William Kidd's fateful voyage to the Indian Ocean!) Mordaunt, ever eager for intrigue, made numerous clandestine visits to England to foment a groundswell of public strife and disorder, a necessary prelude to successful revolution. Even with a price on his head, and the king's officers on the lookout for him at every seaport, Mordaunt managed to evade capture on each occasion for he had become adept at disguise.

It was into this wellspring of turbulent politics that William Phips was unexpectedly plunged when the treasure-laden James and Mary, followed by the Henry, arrived at the Downs in June 1687. Mordaunt's ardent love of political conspiracy and intrigue, had already envisaged a vital rôle for Phips. Money was needed to pay soldiers, sailors, hire ships, to purchase weapons, powder and ammunition, uniforms, rations for men, fodder for horses, and the seemingly infinite array of stores and supplies required to support an army on the move. One thing was desperately lacking for an assured outcome to the planned revolution - it was money! An acquisitive eye was turned upon the booty that could be recovered from the wreck by a third expedition, booty that could quickly be used to pay the inevitable bills.

Conspiracy

The Duke of Albemarle detested King James, his repugnance stemming from a bitter row that had taken place shortly after the king's accession two years earlier. From being a staunch supporter of the royal House of Stuart the duke quickly became a reluctant, but sullen, and bitter foe. He took little convincing by Lord Mordaunt to throw in his lot with the conspirators. So also did Narbrough, but he did not do it without qualms. Before his accession to the throne James, then Duke of York and Admiral of the Fleet, had participated in many sea battles with great fortitude and courage, and Narbrough, who admired the same fighting temperament in others that he possessed himself, had fought alongside him on those occasions. He respected and admired the king as a former sailor who had fearlessly faced shot and shell, but as a bigoted ruler Narbrough's puritan convictions were repelled. Torn between personal friendship on the one hand, and a sense of duty on the other, there was no doubt regarding the outcome. Two of the most influential investors in the expedition had now thrown in their lot with Mordaunt. But the plan could not work without William Phips!

William Phips really had no opportunity to decide for himself. Streaks of obstinacy may have run through his nature, but when confronted by the two leading stakeholders, men who had supported from the very start, he could do little but waver and finally acquiesce. A sense of disloyalty may have weighed heavily on his conscience, but this would have soon evaporated with the memory of the treatment he had received from the king's officers during his incarceration in the Tower of London after returning from that first disastrous voyage. And the treatment by those selfsame officers after this second voyage was no better, even though he had returned triumphant! The nation may have rejoiced, as it had never rejoiced since Francis Drake brought back his treasure-laden Golden Hind a century earlier, but the James and Mary and the Henry were kept under constant guard at Deptford while the king's countless clerks, scribes, assessors and 'bean-counters' itemized, weighed, and evaluated the treasure, prying and prodding into every nook and cranny in their search for concealed items of value. The ignominious treatment he, and his crews, suffered at the hands of the zealous minions of King James, may have done much to undermine any loyalty William Phips bore towards his monarch.

Despite these undercurrents William Phips was duly knighted, for the success of his exploit warranted such an honour. This was bestowed upon him at Windsor Castle on June 28th 1687, three weeks after his triumphant return. On that day William Phips obediently went down on bended knee before his king, and arose 'Sir William Phips', the first native-born American ever to receive such an honour. A commemorative medal was also struck, and the humble lad from that poverty-stricken settlement in the backwoods of Maine could now hold his head high, for his fortunes had risen like a comet. How this news must have irritated high society back home in Boston! Many a self-opinionated citizen must have felt a twinge of remorse in not having treated William Phips a little better in those days when he truly had been 'down and out'.

The Final Voyage

A return expedition was mounted swiftly, or at least as swiftly as possible, for now it wasn't just a matter of dispatching ships back to the wreck to dredge more booty from the deep. Other plans had to be laid, this time in secret, for the king's spies would be eager to learn the details. An orgy of blood-letting could be expected if whispers of those plans ever escaped, since the object of the enterprise was treasonous. The axe would fall swiftly upon Tower Hill and reap a grim harvest of heads! The plans were laid carefully by that crafty master of intrigue - Lord Mordaunt!

A year earlier the Duke of Albemarle had sought the governorship of Jamaica, for no greater reason than to satisfy a personal whim. As mentioned his fascination with the island, and the treasure wrecks that lay thereabouts, was largely academic, having been fostered by his friendship with Sir Henry Morgan. Governors in those days were rarely forced to reside in the territories they officially administered in the king's name, but now a golden opportunity had arisen for the duke to place himself at the centre of the web of intrigue spun by Mordaunt. By actually taking up the reigns of government on the island the duke could exclude all unwanted movements of British ships from the wreck, leaving William Phips and his divers to get on with the important business of raising treasure from the ocean's depths. Treasure intended for revolution!

A flotilla of ships finally sailed from England in September that year. There was HMS Assistance (520 tons) under the command of Captain Lawrence Wright, which carried the duke, the duchess, his personal physician, Doctor Hans Sloane, and their considerable retinue of attendants, for the duke was moving to the tropical paradise of Jamaica for good, or at least intent on giving that impression. A second naval vessel, HMS Foresight (also 520 tons) under Sir John Narbrough himself, was intended to provide protection for the vessels at the wreck site, which included the James and Mary and Henry as before, with a third smaller vessel, the Princess. Two others were part of the overall contingent, firstly a merchantman called the Good Luck (400 tons) under the direct command of Sir William Phips, which had been outfitted with diving bells, to which the duke had made ingenious improvements to the basic principle of the 'Bermuda Tub', and other equipment to facilitate diving on the wreck, and secondly the Boy (more correctly the Boy Huzzar) which was the duke's personal yacht. This latter named vessel was under the command of Captain Thomas Monck, the duke's nephew. It is interesting to note that the naval captains, and subordinate officers, on all the ships involved in treasure recovery activities, each received promotion shortly after the revolution which greatly enhanced their naval careers.

The Foresight and her companion vessels arrived at the wreck on December 15th 1687 and the duke disembarked from the Assistance at Port Royal, Jamaica, on the 20th. There was only one party missing, Lord Charles Mordaunt with the protective contingent of Dutch men o' war that had been promised. The Duke of Albemarle may have been able to control the movement of British ships in the Caribbean, but he had no control over those of other, more hostile, nations, nor those of piratical or privateering persuasion. Despite the presence of the Foresight with her fifty-two guns, the wreck site was extremely vulnerable, as news had spread like wildfire about the success of the earlier voyage and the golden prospects for this return expedition. There were many interlopers who boldly wished to follow hard upon the heels of that success, either reaping their own rewards from the depths of ocean, or to take it the easy way using force. Mordaunt was two months late in arriving, only after that could a ring of security be thrown up around the wreck. In the meantime treasure once again began to be recovered from the deep.

At the Wreck

Much has been made of the plundering of the wreck that had taken place during the interval between the departure of William Phips in the James and Mary and the Henry, eight months earlier, and their return in force with the added security of the Foresight for protection. Several reports exist, some made by the duke himself, others by the naval officers at the wreck that treasure seekers drawn from Jamaica, Bermuda and the North American colonies were reaping a rich harvest when the flotilla returned to the reef. The veracity of these reports is difficult to determine. Certainly news had spread and, more certainly, treasure had been garnered as a consequence. Altogether about five tons of silver was tracked down later as having been won from the wreck, before the arrival of the Foresight abruptly terminated this plundering. The true amount was possibly double or triple that figure, but bearing in mind the vast wealth still on the wreck it was little enough. Knowing that the journals of all naval vessels were subject to scrutiny on return to England, the suspicion arises that many of these reports of alleged pillaging by interlopers were deliberately exaggerated.

What no one seems to have known, even William Phips himself, is that when she had foundered almost fifty years earlier, the Concepción had broken in two halves. Sinking by the head after striking the reef the stern had risen high out of the water, had been twisted beam on to the wind and the torsion broke her back amidships. As a result the stern section was swept over the reef to sink some five hundred feet from where the bow had first struck. The holds had spewed out their bounty to form a trail of bullion, plate, chests of jewels, cargo, personal possessions and oddments of all kinds linking bow with stern. This broad, but erratic trail of treasure, mingled with ballast stones, now lay shrouded in coral upon the ocean bed. William Phips previously had only discovered the bow section, the section in which was stored the less valuable silver bullion and coinage. The stern section still awaited discovery, in the holds of which reposed treasure a hundred times more costly. This part of the wreck had not been found by any who had had the temerity to plunder it in the interval while William Phips was absent.

Rising up steeply from the shadowy depths, the coral reef was like a labyrinth of ancient teeth, worn and broken, lying in wait to entrap the rash and unwary. Schools of brightly coloured fish, sting rays, electric rays, eels, octopuses and crustaceans, with the odd inquisitive shark, intruded upon this beautiful underwater world, in which the divers operated with scant regard for either its grandeur or its kaleidoscopic hues. After it had been realised that the wreck they had been working was merely the detached bow a search was made for the stern. Casting a wide net the divers began to pick up the trail of cannon, round shot, muskets, bits and pieces of iron, remains of crates, fragments of porcelain, and this led towards a huge pile of rotting timbers overlaid with limey concretions. They had found the richer stern! Before long the treasure beginning to make its way aboard the Good Luck was not of silver, but of gold, plate, and jewels. Brass cannons were recovered whose barrel lengths were almost nine feet long. The volume of treasure of all kinds being recovered from the wreck, which had once fallen to a trickle, now became a veritable torrent.

Lord Mordaunt and his Dutch men o' war finally arrived towards the end of February and, it must be supposed, the Duke also took the opportunity to visit on his yacht unable to resist the tempting sight of treasure being dragged from the deep. There is a interesting entry in one of the minutes of council meetings held at Jamaica shortly after Mordaunt's arrival had become public. It reads:

Friday, February 25th 1687/88. Duke present at council meeting when his Grace acquainted
the council with the fact that intelligence had arrived regarding the presence of the Dutch
at the wreck, and that Sir John Narbrough might have to fight. The Duke recommended
that he go to the wrecksite to direct any battle. The council were strongly opposed to his going as it wouldn't be safe and there were no frigates to send in support.

It was a nice try on the part of the duke! On that particular occasion the Duke of Albemarle had to rely on the information he received from his nephew Captain Thomas Monck, who constantly sailed back and forth from Jamaica to the wreck site in the Boy Huzzar.

Fever Strikes

Typhus, or 'ship fever' as it used to be known, was a constant scourge at sea. The disease, spread by lice in unhygienic and cramped quarters on board, was an invariable accompaniment to shipboard life. Many sailors died as a consequence. Whether it was typhus that struck the wreck site, or whether it was typhoid, (which shows the same symptoms with the same tragic results) will never be known. But men began to fall ill in large numbers. On May 4th Richard Binhallock, a gunner on the Foresight, was the first to die. This first death was followed by others, and Lieutenant Stanley recorded in his log the names of the deceased, adding the sombre phrase ".. could have a sickly ship." Even Sir John Narbrough fell ill and knew his own fate was sealed. Since many more were likely to die and the infection could quickly spread, he promptly ordered William Phips to sail immediately with the Good Luck before they too succumbed to the disease, for if that happened it could scupper the revolution. Phips finally sailed on May 8th, and with him that day sailed Lord Mordaunt and his Dutch men o' war to protect him, and also to trans-ship some of the bullion back to Holland. It was a sorrowful end to the expedition, for though the holds of the Good Luck were brimming with treasure, there was no rejoicing.

Some half-hearted diving continued after the Good Luck had sailed, but the men's enthusiasm for more treasure evaporated with the grim spectre of death now overshadowing them. However, they persisted until eventually Sir John Narbrough himself passed away, his shivering body emaciated and wracked by pain. He died at three o'clock in the morning of May 27th, and was buried at sea that same day with full honours for he was a much-loved man, one who had climbed the ranks from cabin boy to admiral and seen much fighting. The following morning the Foresight and the remaining ships, with the exception of the Boy Huzzar, weighed anchor and turned towards England to make their excuses as to why they returned with such little treasure in their holds. One of those excuses was that the coral shrouding the wreck was so thick and hard it was impenetrable. King James might have believed that tale, but a marine scientist or engineer of today wouldn't give it much credence!
While all this was passing the Good Luck was slipping far far away to the north in the company of Lord Mordaunt and his Dutch frigates. She disappeared, her holds full of treasure, into the steely blue-grey waters of the North Atlantic.

The Cover Up

The town of Lunenburg is located ten miles from Oak Island as the crow flies, and was first settled in June 1753. Large numbers of Protestant settlers had been induced to emigrate from Germany, Switzerland and Holland to a new British colony in North America, one which had been wrested from the French forty years earlier. A dusty and tattered volume in the archives tells the tales of those plucky, but perhaps over-optimistic, souls who voyaged to this frontier wilderness in the expectations of a new and better life. There is a tragic tale written between the lines in this dry correspondence between government officials in London, and their numerous agents scattered throughout Europe and at Chebucto (now Halifax, Nova Scotia). It tells the sorry story of recruitment, of families split asunder, of the long lists of men, women and children that ventured to this new land, of the baggage they brought with them, and of those who became sick and perished on the voyage. A truly moving saga can be drawn from these raw statistics of hope and misery.

Within that same volume there is also a strange sheaf of papers relating to William Phips, his family, neighbours and friends. They are certified as true copies of original documents made between 1625 and 1738, and duly sworn and attested as such. All are written on the same type of paper with the same kind of ink, and painstakingly copied by the same pair of hands belonging to two clerks, both of whom were official recorders. The copies were made in November 1750. Why would a volume of government correspondence, relating almost in its entirety to the settlement of Lunenburg in 1753, contain copies of documents relating to William Phips? Especially as Phips had died in 1695, almost sixty years earlier! No covering letter accompanies this curious bundle of papers, which individually are entirely innocuous, but with phrases encountered elsewhere, such as "My orders were given to me verbally" and "You may like to burn after reading", one may be forgiven for suspecting that revealing and, possibly, more insinuating papers once existed marked "To be burned after reading." It is a valuable discovery, for it shows that the name of William Phips can be directly linked to the same stretch of coastline as Oak Island Concern, verging upon panic, must have prevailed in the higher echelons of government, at the nightmarish prospect that some of the new immigrants might retrieve the treasure that Phips had lost, and which they had been unable to recover for themselves! Most governments seem to begrudge their common citizens gaining instant fortunes, and in this the British government of the mid-eighteenth century was no different than any other –– past or present! Something had to be done, and it had to be done fast!

In the same volume as the above, there is a report explaining why Lunenburg was selected as the first site for British settlement in the new colony (after Chebucto), and the tone of those explanations by the colonial governor, Peregrine Hopson, is defensive, almost to the point of grovelling as if in response to some lordly reprimand (which is not duplicated in the records). Within a few months of the first settlers arriving in Lunenburg the writer of this apology, and the person who had selected the site for settlement in the first place, felt compelled to resign his post and was swiftly transferred back to England. In 1754, within a year after settlement had commenced, rumours began to circulate among the Lunenburgers about the presence of gold and silver in the region, and they immediately demanded appropriate mining rights. Such demands were firmly resisted by the administration, and from June 1754 onwards the following shrewdly worded exclusion clause appeared in all subsequent land grants regarding the rights of settlers to certain minerals:

... The township is to consist with all and all manner of Mines unopened excepting
Mines of Gold and Silver, precious Stones and Lapis Lazuli in & upon the said
Shares or Rights.

Nova Scotia is unknown as a source of any precious stone, least of all lapis lazuli, a bright blue gem that originates solely in Central Asia. But lapis lazuli did constitute part of the cargo carried by the Concepción that sank on its homeward voyage, the wreck of which was found by William Phips! What the British government is referring to in the above phraseology is 'treasure', but for patently obvious reasons they don't want to use that particular word. Who can blame them? They wanted to settle Nova Scotia not turn it into a treasure-seekers theme park!

The British Army of the early eighteenth century included a number of mining and sapping units, whose main purpose was to undermine (or sap) enemy fortifications and blow them up. Typically, a company of miners was composed of two engineering officers, two sergeants, four corporals and thirty-four miners. They were recruited from the several mining areas of Great Britain, one of which was Cornwall, a region well known for its tin-mining since the days of the PhÉnicians. In 1752 one such company was dispatched from Cornwall to Annapolis Royal (previously Port Royal), Nova Scotia. Annapolis had been the centre of British government in the new colony since 1713, though was later to be superceded by Halifax., which was under construction at the time. One of the officers of this particular company had achieved great distinction in the practice of his art, and considerably enhanced his reputation, after he sprang one of his mines during the recent war in Flanders, killing two hundred of the enemy in the process. His instructions included the phrase "To be dismissed from first of June 1752 and thence to receive four shillings per day more out of money for the works." What this means is that he was taken out of active service and put onto a project, for which there was a budget from which he was to be paid.

The Oak Island Workings

The saga of Oak Island and speculation on the hoard of treasure considered buried there commenced in 1795. A young lad exploring the dense forest growth stumbled upon a clearing in the midst of which stood an ancient oak from which dangled an old tackle-block. Beneath was a depression in the ground which inspired hopes that here indeed lay buried treasure. The rest as they say is history! That discovery two centuries ago has spawned numerous treasure-seeking ventures with a steady stream of individuals and consortia eager to risk fortune and reputation by pitting their wits against the vagaries of nature in the hope of recovering vast riches. Regrettably few have had any idea of the geological conditions underlying the island, and even less of "who" might have buried "what", "why" and "when".

Exploratory digging on the island since 1795 has disclosed two main elements of the underground workings. These are the "Money Pit" shaft, which extends to 210 feet below surface, i.e. 175 feet below sea level; and a "Flood Tunnel" linking the former to the sea some 500 feet away. The tunnel has exactly the same dimensions as those typical of Cornish tin mines of the eighteenth century, viz 2½ feet wide by 4 feet high. A mining tool retrieved from the underground workings in 1931 has been recently identified as a 'poll-pick', of a distinctive type most favoured by Cornish tin miners. From the information available, the suspicion is strengthened that the probable purpose for which the company of miners was sent to Nova Scotia in 1752, was to construct the 'Flood Tunnel' and its appurtenant features. The existence of this tunnel, designed to maintain the workings in a permanently flooded state, considerably hindered excavation of the "Money Pit". Much has been written of the so-called 'genius' who constructed that tunnel. Now the identities are known of the engineers and the group of miners sent by the British in 1752 to carry out this clandestine work. It is hoped the archives will reveal the journals, diaries and reports relating to the construction of the "Flood Tunnel". If the search proves successful a valuable contribution will be made to the literature of Oak Island.

The Historical Enigma

Historians have failed to explain why Lord Mordaunt arrived at the wreck site in mid-February 1687/88 with five men o' war and other vessels, one of which was a merchantman. Suggestions have been made he sailed across the Atlantic in search of treasure himself, or to take it by force from Phips and Narbrough. Both of these are possibilities of course, but since Mordaunt appears neither to have been equipped for a diving operation, nor looked for any treasure, nor attempted to take it by force, such arguments are implausible.

Another suggestion was that he sailed to the wreck to use his past friendship with Narbrough (for they had fought in the Mediterranean together) and try to wean him over to the cause of the Prince of Orange. If so there was little need for five heavily armed vessels. One would have been enough! Mordaunt's rapid rise in political influence in Britain, following the triumph of the revolution, can only be explained by his achievement in bringing vast wealth into the grasp of William, Prince of Orange, for that cause.

Commonsense reasoning suggests some of the treasure from the wreck would have been required in Holland to pay for the preparations of revolution, preferably in ready silver or gold. Armed vessels were needed to transport back to Europe some of the more disposable wealth, particularly the bullion in gold and silver and the minted coins, whether the latter were pieces-of-eight or doubloons being of little consequence. Armed vessels were needed also to escort William Phips in his treasure-laden ship, the Good Luck, to some secret hiding place among the many creeks and backwaters of North America, where the bulkier items of treasure could be cached until the revolution had been proved successful. This portion of the treasure was less easily converted into wealth of the type desired by soldiers, sailors, arms manufacturers, ship-owners and the like. The wreck of the Concepcióón held a king's ransom in jewels, crates of emeralds, pearls, lapis lazuli, as well as plate, Chinese trade goods, mercury and ambergrease. These items were of little immediate use, but they had great value. Bluntly stated that part of the treasure, likely to be the greater and more costly, was the insurance the plotters needed to ensure the invasion of England took place. The Prince of Orange would receive no part of it until he won and held the crown of England, and the memory of King James and the House of Stuart relegated to no more than a bad dream. The bulkier part of the treasure from the Concepción, therefore, constituted no part of the treasure sent back to Holland with Mordaunt.

The Loss of the Treasure

Each year thousands of visitors to Nova Scotia travel the picturesque rockbound coasts of the province, and many learn (often for the first time) about the 'mystery' of Oak Island. Often they are perplexed by the endless stories surrounding the search for treasure on the island, for such a search has gone on since signs were first discovered in 1795 that 'someone' did indeed bury 'something' there. They may scratch their heads in bewilderment at the apparent complexity of the underground workings beneath the island since that discovery was made over two centuries ago, and scratch even harder when they hear the numerous speculations about 'who dunnit.'

A detailed chronology of treasure-seeking activities on the island, the technical clues that can be gleaned from this record, and the nature of the catastrophe that overwhelmed the "Money Pit", is given in Oak Island and its Lost Treasure (also see reference 3). The reason why the treasure was lost is not difficult to comprehend as it was stored in underground chambers in water-soluble rock below sea level! The scale of the ensuing disaster is obviously disputable, but it had the effect of catastrophically entombing the treasure in a morass of gypsum and anhydrite, two associated rock types which are annually responsible for millions of dollars of damage to structures throughout North America. The hazardous predicament created by William Phips in penetrating the anhydrite bedrock in that first digging is excusable, for he was no geologist. But treasure-seekers on the island since then have made a bad situation worse, by their attempts to pump the underground workings dry. As a consequence large sinkholes have appeared offshore.

The reasoning will never be known which led William Phips to select Oak Island as a cache for the treasure carried in the Good Luck. As he was a ship's carpenter by trade, one possibility is he recognized the high quality oak timber on the island as being eminently suitable for underground support work. It is also possible the island reminded him of that other island on the Sheepscot River, from which he cut timbers for his first ship. That island is also now called Oak Island! If he had selected any other island in Mahone Bay, other than the one he actually did, it is virtually certain his gamble would have paid off, for within the bay there is no other island underlain by such treacherous rock types. The legacy he would have left to future generations would have been a big hole in the ground, and we would have scratched our heads and asked –– "now who might've done that?"

The hunt for treasure on Oak Island has now lasted for over two centuries. Fruitless though that search has been, the story is fascinating. As this is a detective story further technical and historical research is continuing, and the numerous scraps of evidence slowly being accumulated supports the contention that William Phips did indeed bury treasure from the Concepción upon Oak Island, and his period on the island can be dated as August 1688 to January 1688/89. It is believed that eventually the island will be recognized as an historic site, not only for the treasure buried there (which one day will be recovered) but for the important role it played in the revolution of 1688 and its consequent impact upon European politics. Bloodless though that revolution was, it proved no less important a world event as those more bloody.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks are extended to the Oak Island Exploration Company, Montréal, for allowing ready access to their files at all times, and to my colleague Les MacPhie for persistently processing the files, gleaning them for technical clues, and planning the next phase of exploration.

REFERENCES
(1) Earle, Peter, The Treasure of the Concepción: The Wreck of the Almiranta. New York: The
Viking Press, 1980.
(2) Harris, Graham and MacPhie, Les, Oak Island and its Lost Treasure. Halifax, Nova Scotia: Formac Publishing, 1999. See also Recovering the Oak Island Treasure, "Imperial College Engineer", Spring 2002 - reproduced (in part) on website www.cgca.org.uk/magazine/spring2002.
(3) Harris, Graham, The Golden Reef: Exploits of Sir William Phips. In preparation.