The Money Pit - In recent years!

The pit was untouched until 1849. A new corporation was formed with the financial backing to continue the dig. This group ran into the same flooding problems that occurred back in 1802. However they did manage to use a drill to probe what was below the money pit floor. A platform was constructed in the shaft just above the water level and the drill operated from there. The drill seemed to bore through levels of oak, spruce and clay. One sample recovered what appeared to be several links of chain made of gold.

While the drilling was going on, someone noticed that the water in the pit was salty and rose and fell with the tide. This led to speculation that the builders of the pit had conceived a clever trap designed to flood the pit with water if someone got to close too the treasure. Just who built this and what is it guarding?

The existence of the flood trap was confirmed by the discovery that the beach of Smith's Cove, located some 500 feet away from the money pit, was artificial. Examination showed that the original clay of the cove had been dug away and in its place laid round beach stones, covered by four or five inches of dead eel grass, which was covered by coconut fiber two inches thick and finally the sand of the beach. At the bottom of all this were five box drains that apparently merged somewhere well back from the coast into a single tunnel that ran the distance to the money pit. The system was apparently designed so that the filtering action of the coconut fiber and the eel grass would ensure the drains would never be clogged by sand or gravel from the beach. It worked well.

Attempts were made to put the flood trap out of business by building a cofferdam around the cove to by holding the tides back. Later, pits were dug to intersect and plug the tunnel on its route to the money pit. These failed, and this try at reaching the treasure was given up in 1851 when the money ran out.

The next attempt in 1861 cost the first human life. The searchers tried to pump out the money pit using the steam engine-powered pumps. A boiler burst and one worker was scalded to death while others were injured. Further fatalities were barely avoided when the money pit's bottom, weakened by attempts to get at the treasure by digging up underneath from other shafts, collapsed. If there were any treasure chests they were probably carried much deeper by this crash. This dig did succeed in discovering where the flood tunnel entered the money pit, but there was still no way to turn off the water. By 1864 these searchers were also out of money.

In 1866, 1893, 1909, 1931 and 1936 additional excavations were started. Extreme methods were used including setting dynamite charges to destroy the flood tunnel, building a dam to keep the water out of Smith's Cove, and bringing in a crane with an excavation bucket. None of these approaches recovered a single coin while costing the backers a small fortune and one worker his life. One of these efforts did manage to block off the flood tunnel from Smith's Cove, only to discover more water was pouring in from the opposite direction via a natural or man-made route from the south shore. Drilling also indicated that there might be some kind of cement vault at the 153-foot level. By this time the south end of the island was full of old shafts, though, and it was increasingly hard to tell were the original money pit was located. Searchers often ran out of money just trying to figure out where the old shaft had been.

Oak Island Mysteries

For hundreds of years, treasure hunters have ventured to Nova Scotia, Canada and tried to recover the treasure lies in the Money Pit, protected by a series of ingenious traps. As treasure hunters have attempted to recover the bounty from the Money Pit, cleverly engineered flood tunnels flood the shaft with sea water.

Strange man made artifacts have been recovered from the pit over the years, but to this day, the treasure still remains buried. Pirates, the Knights Templar or Francis Bacon - no one is sure exactly who created this mysterious Money Pit or why. With excavations now taking place, discover the World's greatest treasure hunt for yourself.

Oak Island

Lets go back to the beginning and retell the whole story.

The year is 1795 and a young Canadian called Daniel McGinnis has been seeing strange lights coming from nearby Oak Island, a few days after the event he travels to the island and after a bit of exploring he finds an impression in the ground, with a tackle block rigged to a tree branch above it. Daniel returns to the island a few days later with 2 friends (Anthony Vaughan and John Smith) to begin digging for what has been disturbed in the ground. On the pit walls there were visible markings from a pick. As they dug down they discovered layers of logs at about every 10 feet (3.0 m). They abandoned the excavation at 30 feet (9.1 m) as they did not have the equipment or man power to continue.

Roughly eight years after the 1795 excavation, according to the original articles and the memories of Vaughan, another company examined what was to become known as the "Money Pit." The Onslow Company sailed 300 nautical miles (560 km) from central Nova Scotia near Truro to Oak Island with the goal of recovering what they believed to be secret treasure. They continued the excavation down to approximately 90 feet (27.43 m) and found layers of logs or "marks" about every ten feet (3 m) and layers of charcoal, putty and coconut fibre at 40, 50 and 60 feet.

According to one of the earliest written accounts, at 80–90 feet (24–27 m), they recovered a large stone bearing an inscription of symbols.  Several researchers apparently attempted to decipher the symbols. One translated them as saying: "forty feet below, two million pounds lie buried." The symbols currently associated with the "forty feet down..." At 93 feet deep, the floor of the pit began to turn into soft mud. Before the end of that day the crew probed the bottom of the shaft with a crowbar hoping to find something. They hit a barrier as wide and as long as the shaft. The group speculated that they'd finally reached the treasure vault and went to bed with the expectations that tomorrow a fortune would be theirs.

Returning the next day, the crew was shocked to find that overnight the pit had filled with 60 feet of water. Bailing was useless. As soon as water was removed from the pit, more flowed in to take its place. An attempt was made to dig another shaft nearby and get at the treasure by running a tunnel underneath the pit, but the new shaft flooded as soon as the tunnel got close to its objective.