Divers Recover More Than $1 Million Worth of Gold and Silver Coins From 310-Year-Old ‘Treasure Fleet’ Shipwrecks
The vessels sank in a violent hurricane off the coast of Florida in July 1715, when they were traveling from Cuba to Spain with an estimated $400 million worth of coins and jewels from the New World
In July 1715, 11 ships sailing from Cuba to Spain encountered a violent hurricane off the coast of Florida. The vessels, which were laden with an estimated $400 million worth of coins and jewels from the New World, sank to the bottom of the Atlantic, killing more than 1,000 people. The shipwrecks—known collectively as the “Treasure Fleet” or the “Plate Fleet”—have remained a source of fascination ever since.
Now, 310 years later, salvors say they have recovered more than 1,000 silver and gold coins from the submerged vessels. The company that holds the exclusive salvaging rights to the vessels, 1715 Fleet-Queens Jewels, announced the haul this week.
Throughout the summer, a team of divers pulled up 1,051 silver coins known as reales, five gold coins called escudos and other gold artifacts. They say the trove is worth around $1 million.
“The best way I can describe it is if you lose something that you really, really like and you’ve almost come to terms with it just never being found again, and then, all of a sudden, it shows up,” says Levin Shavers, one of the salvors and the captain of the M/V Just Right, to WTSP-TV. “It’s just such an awesome feeling.”
Technically, the treasure belongs to the United States District Court, reports Treasure Coast Newspapers’ Kaila Jones. The State of Florida can take up to 20 percent of the findings, and the rest will be divided among the salvors.
Dates and mint marks are still visible on many of the coins, which appear to have been minted in the Spanish colonies of Mexico, Bolivia and Peru, per WPTV’s Emma Romano.
“Each coin has a story,” Shavers tells Treasure Coast Newspapers. “They’re all different dates. We’ve seen coins from 1698 all the way up to 1714. These coins were being used in the New World. What were they going to purchase on their way home?”
The salvors suspect the coins were once tucked safely inside a container that broke apart in the storm. Some appear to be encrusted with the remains of a burlap sack, which suggests even more coins might be scattered across the seafloor. “In the past, there’s evidence of them finding a chest which contained three burlap sacks, and each sack had about 1,000 coins,” Shavers tells Treasure Coast Newspapers.
Last year, the same group of salvors recovered 200 silver coins, a flintlock pistol, a ceramic vase, a set of bronze keys and the remains of a wooden box from the Treasure Fleet wrecks, according to McClatchy News’ Mark Price. The hammer of the pistol was in the cocked position, likely a result of being jostled around by ocean currents over the centuries.
In 2018, the group recovered a cannon from one of the ships, known as the Sandy Point shipwreck. Rare, intact glass “onion bottles” have also been pulled from the wreckage and are now part of Florida’s artifact loan program, which includes nearly 100,000 objects that have been lent to researchers and institutions.
Recovering more than 1,000 coins this summer was a major win for the salvors. However, they say their work is far from complete. At least five of the ships that sank in 1715 haven’t been found, and the salvors are hopeful that even more treasures and artifacts are waiting to be discovered.
“I’ll never finish in my lifetime. We have barely scratched the surface,” Mike Perna, one of the salvors and the operator of the Mighty Mo, told McClatchy News last year. “The storm took ten minutes to deposit what is taking us years to find.”
By Sarah Kuta