There is a faint whisper among traditional historians that North America, the New World, was regularly visited not only by the Vikings and Irish, but by pre-Christian mariners such as the Egyptians, Greeks, Phoenicians, Carthagenians and the Celts. Hints of these visits now appear to be slowly revealing themselves through a variety of sources including classic mythology, Indian legend, and even maritime folklore.

If true, one would expect a wealth of solid evidence to have been found suggesting at the very least temporary settlement, specifically along the eastern seaboard of North America. But hard physical evidence has yet to be found in any great detail. Could it be that those who came before Columbus and Champlain, men like the enlightened 14th century Prince Henry Sinclair of Orkney, were agents of the secret Order of the Knights of the Temple of Solomon and other earlier secret societies? And could it be that these same Knights Templar, whose secrets and mysteries provided the basis of Freemasonry in Scotland, purposely covered their tracks throughout the New World?

Perhaps this "New World" secret was part of a more ancient mystery that involved the Royal Merovingian Bloodline of France, the suggested "Grail Family" of Jesus Christ, and the Royal House of David and King Solomon?

These unanswered questions have followed me for many years and as I searched for the answers, I began to unravel the thick tapestry of intrigue that hides the keys to these and many other secrets of the Knights Templar in Nova Scotia.

My story begins with my own bloodline and its peculiar interests. The Mann family is steeped in military and Masonic history. From my earliest times I can remember my great uncles and father confusing me with little stories of intrigue and honour, both on the battlefield and amongst the shadows. They constantly enthralled me with unusual puzzles and games. It was as though I was being challenged. Yet challenged for what purpose I didn’t know.

Unfortunately, every time it appeared that I was starting to understand the symbolism behind their stories, the philosophy of love and harmony that was being exuded to me, someone would die before I could ask the right questions. I soon learned that to discover the answers to these secrets I would have to follow my own course.

As a career path I choose forestry and landscape architecture over the more conventional occupations and as fate would have it, I married a lovely woman from Nova Scotia. It was as though I was being drawn to some inexplicable conclusion, to interpret the Grail landscape across Nova Scotia.

That conclusion came in May 1992. Shortly following my mother's death from cancer I took a trip to Nova Scotia. My objective was twofold. First of all, I needed to get away and to gather my thoughts following such a personal ordeal. Secondly, it was an excuse to explore an area that I had identified in relation to the pre-Columbian explorations of Prince Henry Sinclair.

Although not in the best frame of mind, when I finally came to stand on the very point that I had developed two-dimensionally, I knew that I had arrived at a higher level. It was on top of a hill in Nova Scotia, that for the first time since my childhood, I experienced a sense of peace.

The setting was idyllic. With the sun shining and a slight breeze rippling through the trees, I had a profound sense of security and comfort. It was as though I had discovered the mythical land of the Greek Arcadia.

Some may say this was a sub-conscious release from all of the tension and anxieties I had been experiencing during a particularly troubling time. This was partly true, but there was more.

There was the sudden realization that the landscape had been altered. Majestic white oaks were growing on the south-facing hillside where the natural cover is spruce and birch. But this was not all. The tidal stream that ran through the adjacent valley appeared to have had its natural course altered to faintly depict the heads of certain animals.

Not to be outdone, as I descended into the valley, a huge limestone outcrop took on the form of a "bear" that appeared to be drinking from a waterfall. Later, back on top of the bear's head, amidst a rich cover of hemlock and cedar, I discovered the stone remains of what appeared to be a man-made structure or "crown" of some sort. What was even more amazing at the time was that the stream into which the waterfall emptied appeared to disappear underground where it enters the larger Shubenacadie River.

Completing a natural circuit, deep on the valley floor, I experienced the same sense of inner harmony and peacefulness as I had on the highest hill. It was as if I had stepped back in time, to the earliest times of the Neolithic hunter when his life was ruled by the elements of nature. The site is a natural refuge from the elements and is positioned in a manner so that it is invisible from any position on the Shubenacadie River. Even to this day, if an anxious explorer was traveling by boat, there would appear to be no access by water into the valley because the stream disappears underground.

I now realize that it was at this very moment that I pinpointed the mysterious lost settlement of Prince Henry Sinclair -- a settlement that was established as the centre of a New Jerusalem of the displaced Bouillon dynasty. But also a settlement that had an unbroken connection to earlier Celtic, Bronze Age and even Neolithic origins. I had been preparing for this moment all my life without ever sensing it.

Even when I was thirteen years old, I was experiencing life's little ironies. Thinking that I could impress an older girl, I got into a fight at a Halloween party and broke a plate over a rival's head. Unfortunately, a piece of glass from the plate flew and struck me in the eye, severely blinding me. Luckily, it was only temporary. But for a month I laid in the hospital with patches over both eyes, unable to see. It was terrifying, not knowing whether the sight in my right eye would be saved.

At that moment, I felt that I had become a complete and utter failure. Yet two things saved my spirit. Most important, both my mother and father, everyday, rain or shine, made the effort to come and visit me. Also, I received a visit from my great-uncle George, who along with his brother Frank, were as close to me as the grandfather that I never knew.

My great-uncle was a gentle and understanding man. He explained to me that everyone possesses the ability for good and evil. In this way, all individuals have to search for their own balance of human nature, a balance between good and evil. I never questioned why my great-uncle always talked in a moral, philosophical manner. Perhaps I was exposed so much to the spiritual level of thinking that I considered it to be second nature.

What my great-uncle did to raise my spirit was to ask me if I wanted to know a secret, a secret that no one knew, except him. With patches over my eyes I could not see what he was describing so I made him promise that if I regained my eyesight, then he would show me. This he did.

What he described and ultimately showed me was his Masonic ring, a ring that to a thirteen-year-old appeared magical and secretive. Frederic George Mann was showing me a ring of the Supreme Grand Master of the Knights Templar of Canada. I discovered this fact during the sorting of my mother’s personal things following her death. I now know that it was my great-uncle's instilling in me of the notion of good and evil and the balance of nature that started me on my quest -- a quest that ended at a secret Templar refuge in Nova Scotia.

What had intrigued me and set me on a mosaic of fascinating geometric patterns was a map within the book by Michael Bradley, Holy Grail Across The Atlantic, which illustrated what was thought to be Prince Henry Sinclair's travels and exploration throughout Nova Scotia. Somehow, I traveled back to the ring of my great-uncle. The ring had a secret compartment. The setting was the standard Masonic emblem of a set-square and compass; but when manipulated and opened on hinges, underneath, set on a pale blue jeweled background was the intertwining of two golden rings centred on a gold bar with a round purple stone (amethyst) setting in the middle.

Don’t ask me how I made the mental connection but what was truly startling was that I could apply this configuration to the mainland portion of a map of Nova Scotia with the centre of the jewel falling precisely on its centre at a place called Mt. Uniacke. In my mind I turned over the name Uniacke -- "one axis." Was it possible that this symbol related specifically to Nova Scotia?

I was hooked! I rushed to the local library and gathered as much reading material as I could. The primary trail was through the many references to the Freemasons. However, I was unaware of my great-uncle's position within the Freemasons/Knights Templar at that time. I was like a blind man in a train station, not knowing which way to turn. Still, a nagging feeling made me feel that someone was guiding my hand. It was as though my great-uncle had planted a seed and that I had to feed and nourish and tend to the plant and follow its growth.

At the library I zeroed in on two books. One was the Royal Masonic Cyclopedia (sic) by Kenneth MacKenzie and the other the more recent, Holy Blood, Holy Grail by the British authors, Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln

Whereas The Royal Masonic Cyclopedia is the reference book to this story and Holy Grail Across The Atlantic provides the compulsory background, Holy Blood, Holy Grail must be considered the "ultimate travel guide." Holy Blood, Holy Grail implies that the mother goddess of Christianity would not appear to be the Virgin Mary but Mary Magdalene; and, that the Grail is not an object but direct descendants of the House of David through Jesus Christ and a French Merovingian lineage. The funny thing is, however, that the authors of Holy Blood, Holy Grail failed to recognize the journeys of Prince Henry Sinclair, and the possibility that the Holy Grail was brought to the New World.

This is the beauty of the notion: Where else would you hide the world's greatest treasure but at a place that was thought to be the end of the earth? And where else would you hide what you considered to be a direct connection to God and Heaven but in a place you considered to be a paradise on earth, a Garden of Eden, or more simply put, a refuge or sanctuary?

It is quite conceivable, as this book will demonstrate that Prince Henry Sinclair knew exactly where he was going and that there were signposts along the way directing him. Indeed, the mysterious Oak Island, which is located on the South Shore of Nova Scotia, acted as one of the signposts.

Quickly becoming an international bestseller, Holy Blood, Holy Grail, is centered on a "treasure story" that is linked to a part of southern France -- more specifically, the small village of Rennes-le-Chateau, where it has attracted considerable interest over the last century. However, Rennes-le-Chateau did not receive any great amount of interest until Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln, first pieced together a number of varying factors and related it to the present-day activities of the rather mysterious European "fraternity" known as the Priory of Sion.

Part of the story begins on June 1st, 1885, when the village received a new parish priest, Abbe (Father) Berenger Sauniere. In 1891, Sauniere started a modest restoration of the village church that was consecrated to the Magdalene in 1059. Then the first of many strange events occurred. During renovations Sauniere discovered that one of the two archaic Visigoth columns that supported the altar stone was hollow and inside were supposedly four parchments preserved in sealed wooden tubes.

Two parchments were comprised genealogies, and the other two had apparently been composed in the 1780's by an earlier priest of Rennes-le-Chateau, the Abbe Antoine Bigou. One genealogy dated from 1244, the year that Montsegur, the last heretical fortress, surrendered to northern forces, while the other was from 1644.

The two parchments appear to be encoded Latin texts. Both have been deciphered and the following interpretation has appeared in many books devoted to Rennes-le-Chateau:

BERGERE PAS DE TENTATION QUE POUSSIN TENIERS GARDENT

LA CLEF PAX DCLXXXI PAR LA CROIX ET CE CHEVAL DE DIEU

J'ACHEVE CE DAEMON DE GARDIEN A MIDI POMMES BLUES

(SHEPHERDESS, NO TEMPTATION, THAT POUSSIN, TENIERS,

HOLD THE KEY; PEACE 681, BY THE CROSS AND THIS HORSE OF

GOD, I COMPLETE - or DESTROY - THIS DAEMON OF THE

GUARDIAN AT NOON. BLUE APPLES.)

Another interpretation from the second parchment reads:

A DAGOBERT II ROI ET A SION EST CE TRESOR ET IL EST LA

MORT.

(TO DAGOBERT II, KING, AND TO SION BELONGS THIS TREASURE

AND HE IS THERE DEAD.)

Following his discovery, the story goes that Sauniere was sent to Paris by his superior, the Bishop of Carcassone, with instructions to seek out the Abbe Bieil, Director General of the Seminary of Saint Sulpice. Having presented himself to Bieil, Sauniere spent three weeks in Paris in the company of Bieil's nephew, Emile Hoffet. He also spent time in the Louvre where he purchased reproductions of three paintings. One was a portrait, by an unidentified artist, of Pope Celestin V. The second was an unknown work by David Teniers, and the third was the most famous painting of the artist Nicolas Poussin -- his second version of a painting based on the theme of Et in Arcadia Ego.

Upon his return to Rennes-le-Chateau Sauniere undertook rather mysterious projects, as he appeared to have acquired a great deal of money and a newly-defiant attitude towards the Church. In the churchyard, for example, Sauniere erased the headstone inscription found on the sepulchre of Marie de Blanchefort, the Marquise d'Hautpoul, not knowing that the inscriptions on the tomb had already been copied.

Some of Sauniere's unexplained wealth was devoted to curious constructions and practices. A replica of a medieval tower -- the Tour Magdala, was built to house Sauniere’s ever-growing library. As well, a rather grand country house was constructed, called the Villa Bethania, which Sauniere himself never occupied. In addition, the village church was restored in a most unusual fashion including a Latin inscription that was carved in the arch above the entrance:

TERRIBILIS EST LOCUS ISTE

(THIS PLACE IS TERRIBLE)

Inside the church, reliefs were installed depicting the Stations of the Cross, but which deviated from accepted Scriptural account in some manner. Just as odd, on January 22nd, 1917, Sauniere died, after unexplainably falling ill on the 17th. Somewhat more mysterious, the morning following his death, his body was placed upright in an armchair on the terrace of the Tour Magdala, clad in an ornate robe adorned with scarlet tassels. And, one by one, as mourners filed past, many of them plucked a tassel from the garment.

Holy Blood, Holy Grail's conclusion is as unorthodox, yet as fascinating as the Rennes-le-Chateau mystery itself. Baigent, Leigh and Lincoln's theory supports the old Cathar belief that Mary Magdalene was the wife of Jesus and that offspring were produced. It continues to hypothesize that after the crucifixion, Magdalene, either pregnant or with at least one child, was smuggled to an overseas refuge by her uncle, Joseph of Arimathea.

This means that there is, perhaps, a hereditary bloodline descended directly from Jesus and that this "Holy Blood" may have perpetuated itself to this very day. One recent result of this theory is the "spawning" of a rash of books on this very subject including Laurence Gardner’s Bloodline of the Holy Grail, Keith Laidler’s The Head of God, and many more.

If this theory is in any sense true, then it serves to explain a great many elements in the Rennes-le-Chateau mystery. It would explain the cult-like significance that Mary Magdalene attained during the Crusades and also explain the "Grail Family" in the Grail Romances. It would also explain the status accorded the Merovingians by the present-day Priory of Sion and their neo-political activities in Europe.

Unfortunately, as the authors have noted themselves, the Jesus material tended to outweigh all of the other information presented in Holy Blood, Holy Grail. For this reason, The Messianic Legacy -- Baigent, Leigh and Lincoln's follow-up to Holy Blood, Holy Grail, concentrates primarily on the concept of Jesus as the Messiah, and how any Messiahship concept could be relevant to the twentieth century.

Through a gradual process of shifting through a maze or labyrinth of deliberately disseminated disinformation, the authors have discerned another possibility: that Jesus survived his crucifixion and was nursed back to health by Joseph of Arimathea. Yet, as the authors have also noted, as soon as any such claim is made, it is as if each new possibility is singularly dismissed by the Church.

For Baigent, Leigh and Lincoln, the Jesus theory was not the only aspect of their research, nor was it the most important one. Their attention was ultimately focused upon the Priory of Sion's true aim. But if restoration of the Merovingian bloodline was the ultimate end, what were the means to be? In any case, the authors are convinced that the Priory of Sion can substantiate a claim on behalf of the families it represents, that there exists to this day a dynastic succession extending back to the Old Testament House of David.

Another book by Henry Lincoln, The Holy Place, continues the notion of a hidden forbidden secret by suggesting that there is an underlying geometric layout to one of the parchments that Sauniere purportedly found. The geometry that he found is pentagonal -- an irregular five-pointed star, and when Lincoln later uncovered a complex hidden geometry in Poussin's The Shepherds of Arcadia, this, too, proved to be pentagonal. Furthermore, this work led Lincoln to the discovery of a natural pentagon of mountains within the landscape surrounding Rennes-le-Chateau. And amazingly, this led Lincoln to the identification of a tomb near Rennes-le-Chateau which, in its construction and mountain setting, is identical to the tomb depicted in Poussin's most famous painting. Thus, the circle was complete. Or was it?

When the geometric design was first found by Lincoln in 1971, he felt that perhaps the circle and crescent were meant to represent the astrological and alchemical signs for the Sun and the Moon -- gold and silver. Yet in his mind there was also the fact that the five-pointed star was breaking through its surrounding circle. He realized that this too had implications in the realm of magic, the occult and secret societies.

Following this train of thought for a moment, another recent book, The Temple and the Lodge, by Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, is an investigation into Freemasonry from its Templar beginnings to modern day. In The Temple and the Lodge, the authors indeed attempt to make the definitive connection between the Knights Templar of the First Crusade and Robert the Bruce's reign in Scotland, to the emergence of Masonic lodges and ritual in the latter part of the seventeenth century.

Using the discovery of what appeared to be a coherent pattern linking the earliest Templar graves throughout France, Spain and the Middle East with later ones found throughout England and Scotland, Baigent and Leigh weave an intricate mosaic of Templar/Freemason influence on British politics, military campaigns, and royal intrigue. Of special note is the Masonic history that leads up to the American Revolution and the way in which the Ancient and Scottish Rites (Jacobite) branch of the Freemason movement, was absorbed by the much smaller, outwardly Protestant, Grand Lodge of England, to become the United Grand Lodge of Freemasonry on June 24th, 1717.

Unfortunately, most Masonic history that exists today has been written by scholars working under the influence of United Grand Lodge who present Jacobite Freemasonry and the proliferation of "higher degrees" as deviations from the mainstream of which they themselves are representative. However, according to the authors of The Temple and the Lodge, this would appear to be precisely the opposite of what actually occurred, with Jacobite Freemasonry apparently forming the original mainstream and United Grand Lodge the deviation which eventually became the mainstream itself.

In itself, this is an important concept which should be kept in mind as The Labyrinth Of The Grail explores many instances where one group's ideals are absorbed by another. For instance, the Priory of Sion seems to have begun as a deviation of the mainstream, although it has (recently?) displaced the Knights Templar and became the main central body itself. It is for this very reason, by seeking a direct connection with the Knights Templar of the Holy Crusades, the Grand Lodge has tried so very hard over the years to assert its claim -- much like the Priory of Sion is attempting in Europe through its many activities.

Another book that tries to make the connection between the Knights Templar and modern-day Freemasonry is The Sword and The Grail, by Andrew Sinclair. The Sword and The Grail theorizes that if not since the Battle of Bannockburn, then from the fifteenth century, the St. Clairs of Rosslyn became the hereditary Grand Master Masons of Scotland. More importantly, from The Labyrinth Of The Grail's perspective, Sinclair explains that Nordic and Celtic influences as well as Templar and Masonic symbols decorate the magnificient Rosslyn Chapel. And within the Chapel can be found the famous "Apprentice Pillar" -- a carving that is rich in both pagan and Masonic symbolism, reflective of ancient teachings and beliefs.

In Masonic tradition it is believed that the secret of the Shamir, a worm or serpent of wisdom whose touch slit and shaped stone, was the secret that the martyr Hiram, the architect of the Temple, refused to surrender. Therefore, as Masonic tradition dictates, eight worms or serpents or Shamirs are grouped in a rough octagon around the base of the Apprentice Pillar. According to Andrew Sinclair, these comprise the number of points and the shape of the Maltese Cross of the Knights of the Order of the Temple of Solomon.

The Sword and The Grail attempts to answer all of the following questions: What happened to the Templars and their treasure after their suppression and official disbanding following the execution of their Grand Master? What were the Templar's secret rituals and upon what were they based? Were these ceremonies passed on to the Freemasons as they developed in the seventeenth century? What is the meaning of the Grail on the St. Clair tombstone and are further clues in stone to be found? Why is Rosslyn viewed specifically as a Chapel of the Holy Grail, with its dedication to the mystic quest written in stone within its walls?

These are just some of the questions that prompted me to pursue my quest. But first credit must go to Michael Bradley, since it is his book that transports Prince Henry Sinclair across the Atlantic to a refuge in Nova Scotia, Canada. Although, in turn, Bradley’s book is based in part on Fredric Pohl’s earlier book, Prince Henry Sinclair, His Expedition to the New World in 1398.

Bradley's own story starts in 1982, when he first saw "castle ruins" at what he identifies as "The Cross" (New Ross), Nova Scotia. Although he has not said for certain, it appears Bradley is convinced that the ruins hint at a hidden pattern of historical relationships. He suggests that the Royal Stuarts were intimately connected with the early history of Nova Scotia and North America.

The Stuarts were originally Scottish and had a great deal of contact with the Norse who controlled much of Scotland and the Isles from the eighth to the thirteenth centuries. Interestingly enough, the Stuarts also spent an immense amount of gold on doomed military adventures. In support of this, Bradley notes that the Gold River in Nova Scotia flows from the castle ruins down to the Atlantic Ocean at Mahone Bay. (And located at the mouth of the Gold River within Mahone Bay is the most famous treasure mystery of all time, the infamous "Money Pit" of Oak Island.)

Bradley also makes the connection that Prince Henry Sinclair acted as an agent to the so-called "Holy Bloodline" and, along with approximately 500 Knight Templars, occupied in Nova Scotia (New Scotland) an agricultural settlement of possibly unbelievable importance during the late 1300's. Bradley supports this claim with a study of early Maritime and North American maps that make reference to a certain "refuge" in the vicinity of Mahone Bay and that, rather cryptically, spell out sentences or secret messages.

Since maps exist as physical artifacts to vast explorations, I consider Michael Bradley's work within his "Map Memorials" chapter to be his most crucial in relation to identifying Nova Scotia as the New Jerusalem. Indeed, as Bradley surmises, it appears that some of the early cartographers were "in on the secret."

Bradley suggests that an example of a map that provides this connection is the Caspar Vopell map of 1545, which illustrates the coast of Nova Scotia with a Templar Knight and the legend "Agricolae pro Sev. C.d. labrador" -- which could be interpreted literally as "farms (or farmers) for the Lord of the Cape of Labourers." According to Bradley, we are stuck with the idea of some Lord who controlled a Cape of Labourers, and who had some farms.

Bradley also highlights the fact that two levels of mapping existed at this time and possibly before. There were the conventional Ptolemic maps of the 1500's and 1600's which appeared crude and distorted; and there were the more accurate and therefore, more mysterious, maps called "portolans." Most significantly, most of the portolans covered the area of the Mediterranean and the European Atlantic Coast. The main problem demonstrated by the Ptolemic maps was finding longitude (the vertical lines on a map denoting how far east or west one is). Latitude could be fixed according to the relative position of the stars, but longitude needed the invention of an accurate method of telling the time.

However, some medieval sailors had used reasonably accurate maps based on grids that radiated like spokes on a wheel. For example, the Piri Re'is portolan map of 1513 illustrates a shape of North America and South America that is based on an "azimuthal equidistant projection" of the world. Remarkably, the American coastline is similar to the same coastline shown in a modern strategic air command azimuthal equidistant projection of the world.

Whatever the source, Bradley makes a strong argument that the Templars obtained such maps in the Holy Lands during the Crusades and that the maps led them to the Americas and Oak Island, Nova Scotia -- at least 100 years before Columbus, if not earlier.

OAK ISLAND AND THE MONEY PIT

The longest and probably most famous treasure hunt in history deals with Oak Island and the Money Pit. Incredibly, for more than two hundred years since its initial discovery in 1795, the Money Pit has become the centre of speculation for untold riches including pirate booty, Marie Antoinette's jewels, the treasure of lost civilizations, and even the original Shakespeare manuscripts allegedly written by Francis Bacon.

Although numerous artifacts have been recovered on the island, none of these finds provide the identity of who originally constructed the Money Pit, or to the nature of their treasure. In fact, the only profit recognized to date is by those who have bought and resold the island, published numerous books or articles on the subject, or by those local residents who reside on the South Shore and who have capitalized on its intriguing history.

The official story of Oak Island began in 1795, when three boys from the small town of Chester on the eastern shore of Mahone Bay, paddled across the bay to a small island where a large number of red oak trees grew. By following a path they found themselves at an old oak tree in the centre of a clearing. Inspecting the tree, they saw that a severed branch overhung a depression in the ground and from this limb dangled a ship's block.

Excited by stories that the island was the legendary haunt of pirates, it did not take the boys long to dig beneath the tree. Shoveling out the loose earth, they found a thirteen-foot wide, well-defined circular shaft, and at four feet they unearthed a layer of flagstones uncommon to the island.

At a depth of every ten feet they found a platform made of oak logs, extending across the shaft. Finally realizing that the task was too much for them, the three boys returned to the mainland to seek help. A task that took them nine years to find backers to provide the equipment they required.

Work on the site was resumed in 1804 when a company was formed to assist the boys in the search for the treasure. The newly-formed company had only just begun when they struck a second tier of oak logs, similar to the first. Ten feet lower they supposedly found a tier of charcoal, and ten feet further a tier of putty. Another version states that the putty was found at the forty-foot level, and that coconut fibre and yet another oak platform was discovered.

At a depth of ninety feet the searchers uncovered a flat stone, three feet long and one foot wide, and on the reverse side, crude letters and figures had been cut into the stone. According to tradition, the syndicate had hopes that this inscription would throw some valuable light on their search, but unfortunately they could not decipher it. Eventually, however, in 1864 the stone was interpreted to read: "TEN FEET BELOW TWO MILLION POUNDS."

Yet, in 1804, when the searchers returned the next morning they found that the Money Pit was flooded to within thirty-three feet of the top (coincidentally, the highest level in the Masonic Scottish Rite is the 33rd degree). Despite all their efforts, the water level remained at the same height. As a result, their work was abandoned for the year.

The story continues that in the spring of 1805, with the idea of draining the Money Pit, the treasure-hunters dug another shaft alongside the original. Overnight the second shaft also filled with water, again to within thirty-three feet of the top, and that was the end of the first organized treasure hunt on Oak Island.

In 1897, the probe drill of another company of treasure-seekers apparently encountered two oak chests at the 150-160 foot level. It was also from this depth that a scrap of parchment was brought to the surface with writing on it that looked like the letters "vi" in an Elizabethan script. At the 171 foot level, the same probe drill supposedly encountered an iron plate or hard-cast cement which seemed to be a floor or ceiling.

In 1909, a young Franklin D. Roosevelt bought shares in the Old Gold Salvage and Wrecking Company, whose subsequent effort was no more successful than any of the others. What had fascinated the young Roosevelt most was the idea that someone had constructed such an ingenious and deadly labyrinth. FDR retained a life-long interest in the Money Pit and even during the activities of World War II, Roosevelt wrote letters of enquiry concerning the latest attempt to recover the presumed treasure.

In The Money Pit Mystery, author Rupert Furneaux presents a very interesting theory as to who exactly was "Mr. X" -- the "evil" genius who seems to have enjoyed the thought that the Money Pit might be found. Still, nobody has been able to confirm the two clues that Furneaux relies most heavily upon to establish Mr. X's year of endeavour. First, it has never been verified that one or all of the flood tunnels run precisely fourteen degrees south of east from Smith's Cove to the Money Pit. Secondly, that the angle of declination demonstrated by a stone triangle found on the island was exactly seven degrees and not six and one half or six -- or even seven and one-half.

What Furneaux fails to realize, although he does inadvertently hint at it in several places, is that the stone triangle may have been built by someone other than Mr. X, and that not only military engineers of the highest rank possessed the necessary skills to develop such an intricate system of flood works. Perhaps it is even possible that the original builders of the Money Pit left their ground markings, the stone triangle and drilled rocks, for later groups so that they could recover the treasure, or to tantalize them beyond frustration. It is also possible that the original works have been elaborated upon by subsequent groups who also were "in on the secret."

The mystery of Oak Island has not been solved for lack of investment in time or money, which is rather ironic when you think about it. Unfortunately, due to the foolishness of many of the treasure-seekers during the past 200 years, the site has been disturbed to such an extent that most of the evidence that could have led to the identity of the original architects of the Money Pit has been lost.

On another level, other hidden clues that hint at the true purpose of the greatest ruse on earth (which now appears to have been perpetrated by, among others, the Knights Templar) can still be found on Oak Island -- and within such diverse sources as the Bible and ancient myth, and through some of the oldest imagery and symbols known to man.