Editor’s note: Jim Watson is the author of “Mysterious Island: Catalina,” available at Amazon, Kindle and in stores in Avalon.
On a Spring day in 1829, a New England-native named Samuel Prentiss, carpenter by trade, found himself sitting alone on a wind-swept beach on Catalina Island’s West End.
He was, quite possibly, the only soul on Catalina Island at that particular moment.
Editor’s note: Jim Watson is the author of “Mysterious Island: Catalina,” available at Amazon, Kindle and in stores in Avalon.
On a Spring day in 1829, a New England-native named Samuel Prentiss, carpenter by trade, found himself sitting alone on a wind-swept beach on Catalina Island’s West End.
He was, quite possibly, the only soul on Catalina Island at that particular moment.
The Island Tongva had by this time vanished for the most part from their ancestral homeland, “recruited” for jobs in mainland missions and ranchos, and most of the white miners and goat herders were still a few years away from establishing their enterprises on Catalina.
In the preceding six months, Prentiss had left his home, lost his girlfriend, lost all the tools of his trade and very nearly lost his life in two separate shipwrecks, the last of which found him stranded on Catalina.
What was this castaway possibly going to do now? Why, dig for buried treasure, of course!
The story of Samuel Prentiss and his hunt for a fabled treasure purportedly belonging to an Island chieftain named Turie (or possibly Turia), has all the elements of a great “lost treasure” story.
Perhaps too many great elements, in fact, and the truth as we shall see may have been quite different from the story that has been handed down through the past two centuries.
Nevertheless, it is one of my favorites in a lifetime of pursuing such tales and if only half of it is true it rightfully deserves its place in Island lore.
Our story begins on Christmas Eve in 1828 aboard the Yankee brig Danube anchored off the coast of Point Fermin in San Pedro.
It was, as they say, a dark and stormy night, and a vicious southeaster had sprung up leaving the Danube no time to get underway. She was very quickly run aground and, according to the legend, all hands were lost save four sailors, including our hero Mr. Prentiss. Prentiss, who had left his homeand his sweetheart Back East, had joined the Danube in Peru after deserting an American man-of-war in South America. No doubt, he was feeling the Hand of Providence at this point.
The survivors of the wreck made their way to what passed for civilization on the California coast in those days and Prentiss eventually found himself at Mission San Gabriel.
Here, it is said, he befriended the dying Chief Turie who divulged to him the location of an enormously valuable treasure buried on Catalina Island, reportedly interred in Turie’s old stomping grounds by an English privateer named Sir Thomas Cavendish.
Prentiss eventually made his way back to the wreck of the Danube, still strewn about the beaches of San Pedro. Turning his carpentry skills to hand, he fashioned himself a small sloop in between occasional glances at the distant silhouette of Catalina which he believed held his yet-to-be-discovered treasure.
In the Spring of 1829, Prentiss’ craft was ready for sea and preparations were made for the voyage across the channel.
However the sea had a few more tricks in store for the young carpenter.
Halfway across the channel, it is said, a fickle wind blew his crude treasure map overboard and into the sea.
Not satisfied with that, the devious Northwesterly winds proceeded to kick up the seas enough to swamp Prentiss’ little boat, sending it to the bottom along with all of Prentiss’ provisions and carpentry tools. Prentiss, who was apparently better at swimming than sailing, eventually dragged his weary bones upon the shores of the West End. Foodless, shelterless and—perhaps most importantly—mapless, Prentiss no doubt scanned the lonely scrub-oak hills of Catalina and wondered what was to become of him. The only thing he remembered from the map was that the treasure was buried “under a tree.”
Undeterred by this latest catastrophe, Prentiss rolled up his sea-soaked sleeves and began his new life: a treasure-hunting life that would span another 30 years.
NEXT WEEK: The Hunt for Turie’s treasure, part 2.
