Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 138, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 June 1911 — WOMEN HUNT FOR GOLD [ARTICLE]

WOMEN HUNT FOR GOLD

Clergyman's Widow and Authoress Plan to Aid Poor With $20,000,000 Cocos Treasure. San Francisco.—Although numerous tales involving the search for hidden treasure on the little - island called Cocos, off the west coast of Costa Rica, have been related, none is as strange as that told upon the arrival here of the steamship Stanley Dollar from Ancon. Seven men and two women were taken from Ancon aboard the Stanley Dollar and landed upon the treasure island, which for over half a century has been the Mecca for adventurers from all over the world. The party possesses two tons of supplies, boats and a chart of the treasure. Not only is the band of adventurers led by the women, but in case the search for the reputed $20,000,000 treasure is successful the entire amount is to be used for the benefit of the London poor. Mrs. B. Till, commander in chief, is the widow of a noted London clergyman, while Miss L. B. Davis, the chief aid to Mrs. Till, ie said to be a literary woman of note. Intensely religious, both women have been connected with philanthropic "work in London for the last decade, and it is with the expectation" of so expending the vast lost wealth of the Peruvians that the expedition was organized. The women believe it especially appropriate that the treasure should be used for religious purposes, for the bulk of it was taken from the Lima cathedral when the Peruvian capital was threatened by Chileans. For safe keeping all the altar pieces, consisting of the rails, Images, the Madonna and the 12 apostles, were placed on board the American ship Mary Deer. The figures were all of solid gold and life sized. Besides there were millions in precious gems. The manner in which the chart came into the possession of the women is strange. Cared for during his last illness in Landon by Mrs. Till and Miss Davis, an aged and dying former pirate confessed his complicity in the stealing of the treasure when he and the crew of the Mary Doer mutinied.

killed the officers of the ship and sailed away from Callao. The mutineers hastened toward the Galapagos islands, but, being intercepted by d man-o’-war, went to Cocos island, where the treasure was hastily cached, and the pirate sailed away. The Mary Deer was overtaken by a Peruclan war ship, and with the exception of two men all were put to death. One of these was the dying pirate. In proof of the truth of his story, it is said, the aged man surrendered to his nurses a portion of one of the Madonna’s ears, which was found to be made of pure golft.