Or, a Top Secret Human Experiment Gone Wild? JUDES CHILDRENS HOSPITAL /GOOD LUCK to all Treasure Hunters Everywhere. The most popular origin for the story of Poverty Island's lost treasure begins in 1863, during the American Civil War. Scientists stunned at 'perfect' Ice Age discovery: 'Could have died Mary Rose breakthrough: Ship was 'six minutes from being saved', Archaeology: Shipwreck so well preserved you could walk down steps, 'Ship swallower' off British coast has claimed '50,000 lives', Bermuda Triangle bombshell as probe uncovered 80-year-old shipwreck. During its voyage, the ship was discovered and chased. Steve is scheduled to talk about the couple's lifelong questand sign booksat 7 p.m. Thursday at the Rochester Hills Public Library. Poverty Island lighthouse. The U.S. Lighthouse Board commissioned a Lighthouse to be built on Poverty island in 1874 using the same design as the Lighthouse on Sturgeon Point near Harrisville on Lake Huron, ( you can read my post HERE) The Light was automated in 1958 and by 1965 the Lantern room at the top of the tower and the lens had been removed and replaced with an exposed electric light. As long as you dont take advantage of someone either by money or reputation I dont see how it can hurt. The ship was 64.8 metres (212 ft 7 in) long, with a beam of 9.9 metres (32 ft 6 in) and a draft of 3.7 metres (12 ft 2 in). Poverty Island is a small island in the U.S. state of Michigan. Only then did Mr Libert and various archaeologists discover that the bowsprit and the remainder of the vessel were separate. By early 1864 the Union blockade was so strong only one in three blockade runners made it though. i beleve the boxis of gold will never be found or brat up for the simpel fakt Extra Notes: This case originally ran on the November 11, 1994 episode. The location and reason of her sinking has remained a mystery ever since.[5]. The Liberts say the wreck lies neartiny, uninhabited Poverty Island, part of a chain of islands that runssouthwestinto Lake Michigan from Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Its an individual achievement. Links: Manage all your favorite fandoms in one place! SSI Platinum 5000 Diving Award 1993, 518 Water Street Sheboygan Falls, WI 53085, Second Saturdays - Journeys Into Local History, The Sunken Treasure of Poverty Island with Richard Bennett. "They weren't locked down. sure some funds would help with equipment. The advantage today is the sophisticated equipment available for such endeavors its available however not inexpensive. That in itself is rewarding. In 1883, a retaining wall was built around . If they survive 100 years, they probably have an 80, 85% chance of being true. The keelson structure with mast steps, paired floors and futtocks, and ceiling timbers all suggest a sailing craft, probably a schooner or schooner-barge, that was built and operated during the last half of the 1800s. More: Travel the Great Lakes on a floating mansion with new Viking cruise ships, More: Report: Recycling in Michigan reaches 19.3%, up 35.4% in 3 years. I remember when we were working on raising the Alvin Clark from Green Bay Wisc.someone took our buoy off. The Liberts say the wreck lies near tiny, uninhabited Poverty Island, part of a chain of islands that runs southwest into Lake Michigan from Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Poverty Island is currently owned by the federal government. Cargo is scattered on the bottom with visibility typically ranging from 5 to 25 feet. The Poverty Island Treasure story has been arranged and rearranged with the same slim two sentences or at most a few paragraphs. Years later, he was shipwrecked off the coast of Texas and killed in 1687 by mutinous soldiers, according to historians cited by the Liberts. This video by Steve and Kathie Libert is from the location where they found the wreckage from the Le Griffon. . The show would be dramatic enough, but in the end, it came down to the same question: is the legend true? Unless it can be shown that someone built a ship on the Upper Great Lakes before 1790 that includes all these characteristics-then this wreck is La Salle's "Griffon." This year, the Discovery Channel aired an episode of their series, 'Expedition Unknown,' filmed in part at the Mississagi site of the wreck off Manitoulin Island. While this sounds like just an old sailor's legend, there are some historical accounts that somewhat give the story credence. It is believed to be the location of a treasure of five chests filled with gold bullion and coins worth today around $400 million. It disappeared with a crew of six on its maiden voyage in 1679 after La Salle had disembarked near the mouth of Wisconsin's Green Bay. The action steadily rises, but Bodeen . La Salle never found out what happened to his ship. They just sat there (on gun carriages). Investigations: None The beleaguered South, strapped for capital, put out a desperate call for relief to France. Until that day, Lake Michigan will keep its grip on the five wooden treasure chests hidden far beneath its surface. Theyve vowed to take nothing atthe dive site that is, nothing butunderwater photos and video. It looked like a ship sitting upright on the lake bottom. The namehonoredCount Frontenac, the governor of all French territoriesin North America, whose coat of arms featured the symbol. But Im a dreamer, and Im a gambler. Richard T. Bennett, Master Scuba Diver Trainer presents the legendary story The Sunken Treasure of Poverty Island, a treasure that has haunted diving treasure hunters since the first documented report in 1904. People believed the earth was flat for longer than that. La Salle was certain that the captain and his men committed mutiny, sank the ship and absconded with all the furs.. The Griffin, Mr Libert believes, was caught in a four-day storm. We're just hoping and praying, if we could find one of those in the sand somewhere, that would prove everything," she said. It is called Poverty Island, an apt name, especially when treacherous storms sweep in across the lake without warning. But then again, what if? The wreck was found near Poverty Island on Lake . By Hannah Pennington, Published on Jul 28, 2022. At the couples condo, they showed the Free Press their underwater metal detectors, a wall of research books, and a sculpture of a Griffon the French coat of arms symbol for which the ill-fated ship was named as they made plans for Steve to dive again this summer. Those have been around since the story broke into the diving industry by Skin Diver Magazine in 1969. The leader of our scuba diving club dove many times looking for the gold with no luck. Dear Richard, Ive also have read, years ago, in newspapers about the five sunken treasure chests linked together in bottom of Lake Michigan. That might just be the case for Oak Island, an island off Nova Scotia that's only 140 acres but is home to some incredible findings. The ship lays upside down in 80 feet of water and rises 25 feet from the bottom. Despite that belief, there is a story that a group of sailors might have accidentally snagged one of the trunks in 1929. Reports by French explorers and missionaries said Native Americans told them they saw the ship go down with all hands. in shallow water near Poverty Island and Summer Island. This San Diego County beach is also locally nicknamed Shipwreck . There are always five chests, and its always the same scenario., Records of 1863 shipwrecks are well preserved. Carbon dating of the bowsprit estimated an age range within a year of The Griffins sinking in 1679. On November 21, 1996, a search team from the private research firm Intersal, Inc., operating under a permit from the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources found a cluster of cannon and anchors on the seabed near historic Beaufort Inlet. Charlevoix diver Steve Libert says he's 99.99% sure he has found the wreckage of a French ship that sank in 1679 in Lake Michigan. (The program is free to the public but advance registration is required; search under calendar.rhpl.org, move the cursor to May 12 and click on "Solving the First Great Lakes Maritime Mystery."). Contact Bill Laitner: blaitner@freepress.com, Diving couple say they've found Great Lakes' oldest shipwreck, but doubters abound. Results: Unsolved. We are confident the ship was wrecked due to a severe storm. A 400-year-old silk dress discovered in a shipwreck off the Dutch coast has shed new light on a daring top-secret mission to pawn the crown jewels on the eve of the English civil war. Location: Michigan Any story that survives 100 years has to have some validity to it. The PADI DIVING Excellence Award 1994 It is difficult to tell how many people actually dived near Poverty Island over the years. Subscribe Today! In 1984 he found an anchor. The Mystery of New York's Renegade Subway Psychic, Forget About What We Know About Roswell: It's What's Missing About the Case That We Need to Look For, Archeologists Discover Another Secret Corridor Inside the Great Pyramid of Giza, Why and How John Keels The Mothman Prophecies Got its Name, "What's the Creepiest Thing You've Ever Seen or Heard?" He recalled: I was emotionally drained of all my energy, and was in a complete state of relief and exhaustion, but I could still yell out the words We found it! once I broke the surface.. In Gytheio, you can find 'Dimitrios', a 67-meter-long ship, sunk and rusty, quite near the shore, easy to explore up close and swim nearby. Steve Harrington, a maritime historian, is convinced the treasure is still located off the coast of Poverty Island: I think thats one of the most intriguing things about this legend is that its consistent in that the loss is always at Poverty Island. In order to aid his driven search, he has enlisted the best equipment he can get his hands on, including a fiberglass homemade mini-sub to comb the gloomy depths at the bottom. Poverty Island. Weve not been able to find any evidence that any of these vessels that were recorded to have been lost were sunk in the vicinity of Poverty Island or that they were French vessels, as the legend would have it to be.. Whether the Liberts found the Griffonor merely stumbled on the watery wreckage of some unidentified old ship, their book and the saga of their search open a door to the fascinating earliest days of European exploration inthe Great Lakes, before the founding of Detroit in 1701. Today, Richard Bennett feels confident that he will succeed where others have failed. One crew braved overcast skies and choppy waters to venture out to Poverty Island and film underwater terrain while another film crew worked just north of Cana Island. Privacy | Terms | DCMA | FAQ. The production of cotton made the Confederacy's success of prime importance to the French leader. Thats the legend. Never give upand God go with you! True or not, the legend lives on for those who believe it and are brave enough to attempt the search in the cold and often stormy weather. Having a museum historian carbon-date it to the same era left them eager for the adventure. Watch this case now on Amazon Prime in season seven with Robert Stack and in season five with Dennis Farina. The story was convincing enough that several treasure hunters had tried and failed to find the reputed five or more chests of gold supposedly located somewhere on the islands coastline. The Griffin is believed to be the first ship of European design to sail the upper Great Lakes. According to the legend, the French emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte III, secretly dispatched a shipment of gold across the Atlantic to Canada. Ive heard this story many times. The ship was built in Ireland and was considered to be "unsinkable.". Hahahahahaha Now, the celebrity part of the story. Join MU Plus+ and get exclusive shows and extensions & much more! Dimitrios Shipwreck. It is only a speck of rocky land just east of Wisconsin, surrounded by the chilly waters of Lake Michigan. In the early 1920s,a freighter ran aground on Poverty Island. In 2001, a famous Great Lakes shipwreck hunter, Steve Libert, claimed her wreck in Northern Lake Michigan near Poverty Island. Poor guy. Mr Libert said: The ship has no indications of fire damage to the wooden remains. Poverty Island is a small island in the U.S. state of Michigan. If they survive 100 years, they probably have an 80, 85% chance of being true.. Thousands of vessels from canoes to car ferries and steamers to modern ore boats have sailed these "inland seas" and unknown numbers still remain - settled on the lakes bottom in watery graves. Similarly, in 2014, treasure hunters Kevin Dykstra and Frederick J. Monroe claimed the discovery of the wreck near Frankfort, Michigan. . You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. said a Chicago man named Frank Pea spent three summers in the late 1930s and early 1940s exploring the depths around Poverty Island with a ship named the St. Lawrence and a diving bell. If your research has been exhaustive then you know that it does exist. 'The Poverty Island Treasure Brief' can be found at. I think it was cases of rifles, now they would be contraband. Prominent historians and shipwreck experts in Michigan doubt the Liberts' claim. In the 1860s, this place was in the middle of a huge boom in maritime shipping and commerce, as the area has many steel mills and was connected to the booming Peninsula Railroad. Even with modern search equipment it took wreck hunters many years to find the Captain Lawrence and she was a schooner length ship. Hopefully in the way the actual history may have unfolded. The ship was assessed . Nov 01, 2022 | 41m 57s | tv-pg | CC. There is a reason why this book is accruate if not so well definded. Paul Paul Heersink has also been collecting data on sunken ships during World War II for seven years. Is there a fortune worth of gold lying out there just waiting to be found? www.boxingaddictions.net > Blog > Uncategorized > poverty island shipwreck. Brent Swancer is an author and crypto expert living in Japan. Their findings are detailed in the 2021 book Le Griffon and the Huron Islands 1679: Our Story of Explorations and Discovery. Courtesy Steve Libert "Probably 99 percent of that . As we know the story of Poverty Island treasure has been around a long time. French archeologists who visited the site at the Liberts' invitation have said they believe the couple is on to something; they even staked a claim for France for whatever wreckage turns up, Steve and Kathie Libert say in their 2021 book, "Le Griffon and the Huron Islands," published by Traverse City's Mission Point Press (about $26in softcover and$35in newly released hardcover). A fourth-order Fresnel lens was used in the lantern room to produce a flashing red light at a focal plane of seventy-eight feet above the lake. Ferries to Zakynthos run 7 times per day between 5:30am and 10:30pm and cost . The Liberts arewell-known in northern Michigan for their decades-long campaign to find the Griffon, but this week's talk is Steve's first appearance in metro Detroit. The Griffin is believed to be the first ship of European design to sail the upper Great Lakes. It was then spirited down the St. Lawrence River and into Lake Michigan. Behrens and his crew of four escaped and took refuge on Poverty Island. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding. Often, we likely went over the same spot or at least part of the same spot. The orginal 8 minute program was cut to 6 minutes because the program was moved into their 200th Anniversary Show. Decades after the 1933 shipwreck and Behrens's death in 1959, Steven Libert, president of Fairport, learned of the legend of the lost gold. In 1994, a TV program investigated the Door County legend that $400 million in gold lies submerged near Poverty Island. . Many people dream about winning the lottery or being a great sports figure. Door County is also known for are shipwrecks, Deaths Doorand legends. An estimated 500 to 1,000 vessels fell victim to its whims, mostly in the 18th and 19th Centuries. OFF POVERTY ISLAND, Mich. Ever since the Griffin, a 40-foot-long ship built by the French explorer Ren-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, in his quest to find the mouth of the Mississippi . So coming in the back door was longer, but had higher odds of succeeding. The bowsprit is believed to have broken off before the rest of the ship sank. A few years later, a group of investors in Chicago raised $50,000 to try their luck at Poverty Island. Ive always wanted to pull my sidescan around there a bit as it has phenomenal definition. I have read alot about this. Funny, as I was just thinking about this wreckI have to get Richard's info this week so I can research it. There have been numerous quote-unquote discoveries of the Griffon that were neverproven," Adkins said. The discipline it takes to write a screenplay is daunting at best. It sank in the North Atlantic Ocean during its maiden voyage from Southampton to New York City on April 14th, 1912. One day, Karl would claim that he had seen a salvage ship out in the water, allegedly excitedly working on dredging something up from the depths, after which the crews could be heard loudly rejoicing, but a storm would come in and sink the ship to send them and whatever they had found back to the bottom. You are using an out of date browser. Only time will tell. And dont even get me started on the whole God thing, singular or plural. The treasure is believed to rest deep beneath the cold waters of Lake Michigan. Who knows? One could hardly walk into a bank with hundreds of pounds of gold and cash it in. His belief in the treasure has been bolstered by Steve Harrington, a maritime historian, but another historian, Chuck Feltner, debates the veracity of the treasure since there is no record of a ship sinking there despite flawlessly kept records of ships lost on Lake Michigan. He has said of his search: I am sincere; this is not a hoax. This wreck is unusual for being buried entirely in the sandit's now stranded about a quarter mile away from shore. It's the oldest mystery on the Great Lakes: Whatever happened to the Griffon? Michigan Brothers Finally Unearth 220-Year-Old Secret Hidden In Oak Island. the souls of the sukin ship dont want the trezer found and lotid so the souls A 2272-ton cargo ship that wrecked off Namibia's . It is available here. enter your email address, I promise I won't send you any spam, I hate spam, its just an automated system that lets you know there is a new post, You must be logged in to post a comment, Enter your Email to receive new posts notifications, If you like this post click on the buttons to share with your friends, Lost In Michigan books are ON SALE this weekend, The Mystery of Poverty Islands Sunken Treasure Chests, The Lonely Lighthouse Keeper and the Dahlia, The Two Sisters and the Magical Little Island Near Detroit. The Lake Serpent, an eight-year-old, 47-foot schooner, left Cleveland in September 1829 for the 55-mile trip to the Lake Erie Islands.Upon arriving at the island rich with limestone, the ship's . The Griffin is then said to have become a ghost ship, with the crew apparently heard chanting as she sails among the clouds on moonlit evenings. It's an exciting story of missing treasurepassed down through time, a tale that is intriguing and, well, maybetrue. The plausibletheory is that during the Civil War, a shipment of gold from NapoleonBonapartewas being transported thru the great lakes down the Mississippi to fund the Confederate army. A few years later, Karl Jesson, the son of the Poverty Island lighthouse keeper, reported watching a salvage crew that seemed to make an exciting discovery in Lake Michigan just before their ship was sunk by a storm. The treasure plummeted back to its watery grave. We are only talking about adding weeks to delivery time. Up it came, just seconds away, a fortune in gold, when suddenly the chains broke. Fire Island, N.Y.: Tony . 37: Poverty Island", "Feature Detail Report for: Poverty Island", Seeing The Light Poverty Island Lighthouse, Inventory of Historic Light Stations-Michigan-Poverty Island Light, Le Griffon: The Great Lakes' greatest mystery, "Divers begin Lake Michigan search for Griffin ship - Yahoo! Pounded to pieces, the ship eventually sank. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. The wreckage lies approx. The plausible theory is that during the Civil War, a shipment of gold from Napoleon Bonaparte was being transported thru the great lakes down the Mississippi to fund the Confederate army. The story says several chests of gold, worth an approximate $400 million, were brought overland through Canada and loaded onto a schooner on Lake Michigan. All, I am currently finishing a screenplay on the Poverty Island Gold. The content is about the subject and little else. Nevertheless, Bennett is quite confident that he is very close to the treasure. Libert has been diving around Poverty Island since 1983. Or my brother Jim. Rum Runner, You are correct about many people looking for the Treasure of Poverty Island. As long as I have those things working for me, Ill probably continue to do it. Thisship was the first decked vessel to sail the upper Great Lakes of a scale and design in keeping with 17th Century shipbuilding.". The heartless tides of Lake Michigan had once again reclaimed the Poverty Island treasure. "Many of them didn't even know that an island was there," said coastguard Charles Cormier . At any rate it was lost. When a reporter mentioned that, Adkinssaid, "I think we'll be removingthat today. This might seem like wishful thinking until you realize that in that era France coveted the steady cotton crop they received from the South, something it was thought would be disrupted with a Union victory. Also available on YouTube with Dennis Farina. Archaeology: Discovery of 'grand old' Pearl Harbour ship, Archaeologists stunned at shipwreck 'frozen in time', Nostradamus makes chilling 2022 'prediction' for EU collapse, Mountain range disappeared into Yellowstone supervolcano magma chamber. Door County has long been a magnet for famous people who have sought itsnatural beauty and long, lovely coastline.