Tales surrounding this lost gold and the never-ending search for it seem to surface again from time to time, leading me to believe that there might actually be something to the whole thing. I'd sure like to find it, ya know?
Lost Confederate Gold
When the South eventually lost the war In April 1865, a major mystery was shadowing the Union’s great victory. The country was torn by the conflict, and they desperately needed all the money they could get their hands on to rebuild. This is why the North was more than eager to get their hands on the Confederate war treasury. But the ”damn Yankees” were in for a surprise: The gold was nowhere to be found.
To this day, no one truly knows what happened to the Confederate gold. Many theorize that it was divided up and buried by many plantation owners, to wait for the day when the South would rise again. Others say it was robbed by a ragtag team of Confederate and Union deserters, never to be seen again. Others still maintain that it just . . . disappeared.
There are many legends about the location of this great treasure. One stash is said to be in Savannah, Georgia, buried in a cemetery under the name of a fake general. Another is supposedly in West Central Broward County, buried by an ambushed general who was trying to take it to Cuba.
However, most of those stashes are probably nothing more than legends. Although no one truly knows where the gold is hidden, the actual value of the treasury was probably somewhere around $500,000—many times less than many Union generals reported. This means that if there indeed are stashes, there are either a lot less of them than most people think, or they’re much smaller. Still, that doesn’t stop people from theorizing.
One particularly juicy rumor concerns a town called Danville, Virginia. Fairly reliable historical proof suggests that a former Confederate Navy official, James A. Semple, hid a large amount of Mexican silver dollars—thought to be a part of the Confederate treasure—in the area. Some say they have even found some of these coins.
What would the average citizen do if they ran across some of this gold? Wonder just how much the government would allow them to keep? My guess is that we will never truly know, because if anyone does ever find any of it, they probably would keep it a secret from just about everybody!
Coffee out on the patio this morning. I'm game if you are! I have some 7-up cake to share!
