Secrets of Neahkahnie Mountain (Beeswax & Buried Treasure)
The legendary Spanish gold of Neahkahnie Mountain:
A Native American story tells of a galleon coming to the bluff, just south of Astoria, and its crew burying a mysterious chest there — guarded by the body of a murdered crew member. Is it true? And has the treasure already been found?
Stories about buried treasure are, of course, almost never true. But there’s one buried-treasure story, dating back to the 1600s on the northern Oregon coast, that might actually be the real thing.
The story has been passed down through generations of Native Americans in the area of Nehalem Bay, and has almost certainly been corrupted over the centuries by exaggerations and simplifications. But here’s the gist of it:
Mysterious Spanish mariners arrive
In the late 1600s, a Spanish sailing ship came into Nehalem Bay. Some versions of the story say it dropped anchor there; in others, the galleon was shipwrecked. Both versions go on to say a group of men climbed into a small boat and rowed through the breakers to shore. The men then walked straight inland and up the side of a shoreside bluff called Neahkahnie Mountain, carrying a heavy chest. At some point, on the side of the mountain, they stopped, set the chest down and started digging; the whole time, the local natives had been watching with curiosity.
Murder by the sea ...
At last, the hole was deep enough, and the chest was lowered into it. Then, apparently knowing the natives would not disturb a man’s grave, one of the bearded strangers drew his cutlass and plunged it into another, a dark-skinned man — apparently an African slave. This unfortunate fellow, once he finished dying, was then tossed in on top of the chest, and man and chest were buried together.
... then they sailed away
From here, the stories diverge again. One has the ship hoisting anchor and disappearing over the horizon. In another, several sailors are left behind to guard the ship, but quarrel with the natives over women and are killed in the ensuing fights. Perhaps the most ludicrous version, a shipwreck scenario, has the captain of the ship killing all his crew members who won’t fit in the lifeboat and then setting out on the open sea in it, rowing to Baja California.
The legend begins to grow
A century passed. Then, in the early 1800s, British and American expeditions started to arrive: Lewis and Clark, the Astorian party and the Hudson’s Bay Company by land, and captains Gray and Vancouver by sea, though not in that order. Trading with the natives, they learned of the buried gold.
Hordes of treasure hunters
Poor Neahkahnie Mountain hasn’t been the same since. One settler after another has become obsessed with the legend and gone to try and retrieve the Spanish gold. People have spent years, decades, whole lifetimes digging hopeful holes in the bluff. In the 1870s, a treasure hunter named Pat Smith found some stones marked with arrows, crosses and the letters “DEW,” but nothing more. During the 1930s, two treasure hunters even died in the attempt, when an excavation they were working on collapsed on them.
The legend is still very much alive today. In 2006, a movie was even made about it – “The Tillamook Treasure” (also known as "The Legend of Tillamook's Gold"), an indie children’s film that won an impressive bevy of awards. People are still digging holes in the bluff, although a lot of it is going on in secret now, because the part of the bluff owned by Oregon Parks is officially off-limits to treasure hunters.
But these latter-day treasure hunters may be barking up an empty tree. There’s some reason to believe the treasure was real, but was found long ago.
Thomas McKay, treasure hunter
It seems back in the early 1800s, a fur trapper named Thomas McKay arrived with the Astorian party on the ill-fated sailing ship Tonquin. Here, he must have heard about the treasure, because after he became an employee of Hudson’s Bay Company, he started coming to the mountain, spade in hand. He worked obsessively, digging and scrounging every spare moment.
Then one day he suddenly walked away from the mountain, quit his job and disappeared. Years later, when he settled at French Prairie by the Willamette River, he seemed oddly flush with cash — not to the point of being flashy about it, but never worried about money either, and quite generous with it among his friends. And this was before the 1848 gold rush, when other residents of the Willamette Valley were using bushels of wheat and “Abernethy rocks” as currency.
Thomas McKay, treasure finder?
Could it be that Thomas McKay found that chest, secretly slipped away with it, quit his job and went somewhere else to enjoy it, free of the notoriety and envy that always seem to accompany found money? In fact, isn’t that what any of us would do?
If that’s what happened, one has to hope that he treated the bones of that poor murdered slave with some respect.
A Native American story tells of a galleon coming to the bluff, just south of Astoria, and its crew burying a mysterious chest there — guarded by the body of a murdered crew member. Is it true? And has the treasure already been found?
Stories about buried treasure are, of course, almost never true. But there’s one buried-treasure story, dating back to the 1600s on the northern Oregon coast, that might actually be the real thing.
The story has been passed down through generations of Native Americans in the area of Nehalem Bay, and has almost certainly been corrupted over the centuries by exaggerations and simplifications. But here’s the gist of it:
Mysterious Spanish mariners arrive
In the late 1600s, a Spanish sailing ship came into Nehalem Bay. Some versions of the story say it dropped anchor there; in others, the galleon was shipwrecked. Both versions go on to say a group of men climbed into a small boat and rowed through the breakers to shore. The men then walked straight inland and up the side of a shoreside bluff called Neahkahnie Mountain, carrying a heavy chest. At some point, on the side of the mountain, they stopped, set the chest down and started digging; the whole time, the local natives had been watching with curiosity.
Murder by the sea ...
At last, the hole was deep enough, and the chest was lowered into it. Then, apparently knowing the natives would not disturb a man’s grave, one of the bearded strangers drew his cutlass and plunged it into another, a dark-skinned man — apparently an African slave. This unfortunate fellow, once he finished dying, was then tossed in on top of the chest, and man and chest were buried together.
... then they sailed away
From here, the stories diverge again. One has the ship hoisting anchor and disappearing over the horizon. In another, several sailors are left behind to guard the ship, but quarrel with the natives over women and are killed in the ensuing fights. Perhaps the most ludicrous version, a shipwreck scenario, has the captain of the ship killing all his crew members who won’t fit in the lifeboat and then setting out on the open sea in it, rowing to Baja California.
The legend begins to grow
A century passed. Then, in the early 1800s, British and American expeditions started to arrive: Lewis and Clark, the Astorian party and the Hudson’s Bay Company by land, and captains Gray and Vancouver by sea, though not in that order. Trading with the natives, they learned of the buried gold.
Hordes of treasure hunters
Poor Neahkahnie Mountain hasn’t been the same since. One settler after another has become obsessed with the legend and gone to try and retrieve the Spanish gold. People have spent years, decades, whole lifetimes digging hopeful holes in the bluff. In the 1870s, a treasure hunter named Pat Smith found some stones marked with arrows, crosses and the letters “DEW,” but nothing more. During the 1930s, two treasure hunters even died in the attempt, when an excavation they were working on collapsed on them.
The legend is still very much alive today. In 2006, a movie was even made about it – “The Tillamook Treasure” (also known as "The Legend of Tillamook's Gold"), an indie children’s film that won an impressive bevy of awards. People are still digging holes in the bluff, although a lot of it is going on in secret now, because the part of the bluff owned by Oregon Parks is officially off-limits to treasure hunters.
But these latter-day treasure hunters may be barking up an empty tree. There’s some reason to believe the treasure was real, but was found long ago.
Thomas McKay, treasure hunter
It seems back in the early 1800s, a fur trapper named Thomas McKay arrived with the Astorian party on the ill-fated sailing ship Tonquin. Here, he must have heard about the treasure, because after he became an employee of Hudson’s Bay Company, he started coming to the mountain, spade in hand. He worked obsessively, digging and scrounging every spare moment.
Then one day he suddenly walked away from the mountain, quit his job and disappeared. Years later, when he settled at French Prairie by the Willamette River, he seemed oddly flush with cash — not to the point of being flashy about it, but never worried about money either, and quite generous with it among his friends. And this was before the 1848 gold rush, when other residents of the Willamette Valley were using bushels of wheat and “Abernethy rocks” as currency.
Thomas McKay, treasure finder?
Could it be that Thomas McKay found that chest, secretly slipped away with it, quit his job and went somewhere else to enjoy it, free of the notoriety and envy that always seem to accompany found money? In fact, isn’t that what any of us would do?
If that’s what happened, one has to hope that he treated the bones of that poor murdered slave with some respect.
Secrets of Neahkahnie Mountain (Beeswax & Buried Treasure)
By J. D. Adams
Neahkahnie Mountain
Neahkahnie Mountain...
Oregon's quaint coastal towns were born of historic legends emerging from the ocean mist. With unique character and features, every village has a story to tell. Perhaps the most cryptic area on the Oregon Coast is Neahkahnie Mountain, just north of the town of Manzanita. It is here that coastal lore and recovered artifacts intersect in a tangled web of mystery.
Clatsop Indian legends speak of two ships, one that wrecked on Nehalem Beach with a cargo of beeswax (See link at bottom), and a second ship that anchored offshore of Neahkahnie Mountain. A landing party from the ship buried a treasure chest on the slopes of Neahkahnie, marking the spot with an inscribed rock. Yet unfound, to this day it is guarded by the ghost of a black man who was killed and buried along with the treasure.
In another possibly related twist, the skeleton of a Negro giant was unearthed near the mouth of the Salmon River several years ago, and the remains of a ship are said to lie in the estuary. Further clouding the issue is the fact that the skeletal remains mysteriously disappeared afterward.
Many industrious and resourceful people have attempted to find the lost wealth of Neahkahnie Mountain, literally honeycombing parts of it. The depression years were a flurry of activity. The many intriguing artifacts they have unearthed have only deepened the mystery. On display at the Tillamook County Museum are rocks found on Neahkahnie Mountain that bear cryptic symbols, as if mapping the treasure's location. Only a few people know the original locations of these rocks. Also on display are some of the blocks of beeswax that were obtained by early settlers. These bear stamped trade markings that were in use in the 1600's. Spanish galleons plied Pacific waters until the 1800's, with cargoes of beeswax destined for Catholic missions. When Lewis and Clark came upon the scene, local Indians had been finding and trading the beeswax for many years.
My wife and I made Neahkahnie Beach our destination, armed only with our curiosity and a good map. (Unfortunately, not a treasure map.) We arrived at bustling Manzanita, a town clinging to the southern slope of Neahkahnie Mountain and spilling down into a plain of wind sculpted pines. Neahkahnie's forested dome held seaward a vertical rock face with a distant archway that captivated the eyes. An April day, the clouds had parted; it was comfortable with almost no wind. Rolling on toward the wide beach, we parked and then walked northward as if pulled by the mystic gravity of Neahkahnie Mountain. Ahead, waves hurled against its sheer cliffs and flew skyward.
As we beach combed languidly, my wife found it first, a piece of soft, translucent light gray material. We inspected it closely, noting the rough and battered exterior. Many other objects had been rejected; pieces of plastic, wood, cork, and Styrofoam, but realization dawned on us. Amazingly, it was nothing less than the historic beeswax from the 1600's, carried partway around the world, shipwrecked, and lost for centuries. We got serious and found several more palm-sized pieces. It's especially rewarding to hold a tangible link to the past in your hand, one that has spanned cultures and verified one of Oregon's oldest legends. The wind still whispers to the seekers of treasure. In the moon shadows of Neahkahnie Mountain more secrets wait to be revealed.
Care of http://www.travel-to-oregon-tips.com
Current news about the Spanish Galleon Santo Cristo de Burgo (The Beeswax Wreck)
http://ohs.org/research-and-library/oregon-historical-quarterly/current-issue.cfm
By J. D. Adams
Neahkahnie Mountain
Neahkahnie Mountain...
Oregon's quaint coastal towns were born of historic legends emerging from the ocean mist. With unique character and features, every village has a story to tell. Perhaps the most cryptic area on the Oregon Coast is Neahkahnie Mountain, just north of the town of Manzanita. It is here that coastal lore and recovered artifacts intersect in a tangled web of mystery.
Clatsop Indian legends speak of two ships, one that wrecked on Nehalem Beach with a cargo of beeswax (See link at bottom), and a second ship that anchored offshore of Neahkahnie Mountain. A landing party from the ship buried a treasure chest on the slopes of Neahkahnie, marking the spot with an inscribed rock. Yet unfound, to this day it is guarded by the ghost of a black man who was killed and buried along with the treasure.
In another possibly related twist, the skeleton of a Negro giant was unearthed near the mouth of the Salmon River several years ago, and the remains of a ship are said to lie in the estuary. Further clouding the issue is the fact that the skeletal remains mysteriously disappeared afterward.
Many industrious and resourceful people have attempted to find the lost wealth of Neahkahnie Mountain, literally honeycombing parts of it. The depression years were a flurry of activity. The many intriguing artifacts they have unearthed have only deepened the mystery. On display at the Tillamook County Museum are rocks found on Neahkahnie Mountain that bear cryptic symbols, as if mapping the treasure's location. Only a few people know the original locations of these rocks. Also on display are some of the blocks of beeswax that were obtained by early settlers. These bear stamped trade markings that were in use in the 1600's. Spanish galleons plied Pacific waters until the 1800's, with cargoes of beeswax destined for Catholic missions. When Lewis and Clark came upon the scene, local Indians had been finding and trading the beeswax for many years.
My wife and I made Neahkahnie Beach our destination, armed only with our curiosity and a good map. (Unfortunately, not a treasure map.) We arrived at bustling Manzanita, a town clinging to the southern slope of Neahkahnie Mountain and spilling down into a plain of wind sculpted pines. Neahkahnie's forested dome held seaward a vertical rock face with a distant archway that captivated the eyes. An April day, the clouds had parted; it was comfortable with almost no wind. Rolling on toward the wide beach, we parked and then walked northward as if pulled by the mystic gravity of Neahkahnie Mountain. Ahead, waves hurled against its sheer cliffs and flew skyward.
As we beach combed languidly, my wife found it first, a piece of soft, translucent light gray material. We inspected it closely, noting the rough and battered exterior. Many other objects had been rejected; pieces of plastic, wood, cork, and Styrofoam, but realization dawned on us. Amazingly, it was nothing less than the historic beeswax from the 1600's, carried partway around the world, shipwrecked, and lost for centuries. We got serious and found several more palm-sized pieces. It's especially rewarding to hold a tangible link to the past in your hand, one that has spanned cultures and verified one of Oregon's oldest legends. The wind still whispers to the seekers of treasure. In the moon shadows of Neahkahnie Mountain more secrets wait to be revealed.
Care of http://www.travel-to-oregon-tips.com
Current news about the Spanish Galleon Santo Cristo de Burgo (The Beeswax Wreck)
http://ohs.org/research-and-library/oregon-historical-quarterly/current-issue.cfm
