UNESCO dismisses adventurer’s shipwreck, treasure find as false

HE got the world’s attention by claiming to have solved a 300-year-old mystery. But an adventurer’s “treasure” has turned out to be anything but.

HE is fabled as one of the most notorious pirates in history, so when an American explorer announced in May that he had found his sunken treasure deep in the Indian Ocean, it was rather a big deal.

But UNESCO has thrown cold water over Barry Clifford’s claims he has discovered the bounty of 17th-century pirate William Kidd off the coast of Madagascar.

Marine archeologist Mr Clifford declared he had solved an enduring mystery of the high seas by locating the wreck of Kidd’s “Adventure Galley” ship and a 50kg silver ingot.

But a team from UNESCO, the United Nations’ cultural body, visited the site to verify his claims and brusquely dismissed his highly-publicised announcement.

The UNESCO report said the “silver” ingot was just a lead weight, and that the supposed shipwreck was old rubble in a bay of Sainte Marie, a small island east of Madagascar.

The silver ‘ingot’ has turned out to be boring old lead ballast.

“What had been identified as the Adventure Galley of the pirate Captain Kidd has been found ... to be a broken part of the Sainte-Marie port constructions. No ship remains have been found,” the report said.

“Also the metal ingot, recovered apparently from the above site, is not a ‘silver treasure’, but is constituted of 95 per cent lead. “It does not contain silver and has been identified as a lead-ballast piece.”

Mr Clifford, who is making a television documentary based on his hunt, garnered world headlines in May where he unveiled the “ingot” before Madagascan President Hery Rajaonarimampianina and the US and British ambassadors.

But UNESCO soon raised doubts about Mr Clifford’s work, and criticised him for not having a professional archeologist supervising the dive.

The legendary Captain Kidd, who was born in Scotland in about 1645, was first employed by British authorities to hunt pirates, before he himself turned into a ruthless criminal.

He is thought to have scuttled the Adventure Galley, which was armed with 34 big guns, during an expedition to the Indian Ocean. After looting a ship laden with valuable cargo in 1698, Kidd was caught, imprisoned and questioned by the British parliament before being executed in 1701.

The fate of much of his booty has remained a mystery, sparking intrigue and excitement for generations of treasure-hunters. Mr Clifford’s team said it stood by its claims.

Documentary producer Sam Browne insisted the team had conducted “the most comprehensive geophysical study ever done” of the bay.

The ‘discovery’ was made off Sainte Marie, near Madagascar. PICTURE: Flickr