Article by Rick McAllister and OCL Staff
Photos by Kate Gardiner
Salvage Photos by John Bamberg
Spanish galleons, hurricanes, shipwrecks, treasure hunters… and a healthy dose of intrigue make this one of those meaty stories where it is difficult to find a place to start. Often when that happens, going back to the beginning is the best course of action. To better set the stage for this tale, it would seem that a little history is in order.
HURRICANES AND SHIPWRECKS
It’s easy to argue that this story really starts in 1733, when Spanish fleet commander Lieutenant General Don Rodrigo de Torres y Morales departed Mexico in a “Flota” consisting of seventeen vessels bound for Spain, with a planned stop for Cuba. The three main ships had a registered manifest of about 13 million pesos in gold, silver, and copper. In the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries, these types of voyages were a regular occurrence — Spain would send a fleet of vessels to Vera Cruz to bring back a wealth of items from the New World, all of which included gold, silver, gems, and riches from the Far East. The return trip to Spain generally included a stopover in Havana to resupply and to give the crew some rest.
After being newly provisioned on the Caribbean island, the fleet left Havana Harbor the morning of July 13, headed through the Bahama Channel and up toward the Florida Keys. Two days later, the flotilla met with a brewing hurricane that ultimately resulted in the destruction of the fleet, with the exception of one vessel, the San Joseph de las Animas (commonly referred to as the San Jose). The 60-gun warship was new to the fleet and survived, only to run aground shortly thereafter in the sand flats that stretch toward Hawks Channel just off modern-day Tavernier. All her crew managed to reach shore, but the San Jose sank in roughly 30 feet of water, deeper than the rest of the fleet, rendering her lost cargo out of reach for recovery at the time. While Spain immediately salvaged and recovered a large portion of the rest of the fleet’s sunken manifest, much remained underwater, including that of San Jose, which later became the focus of many of the great treasure hunters, including Mel Fisher (of the Atocha fame), and a gentleman by the name of Tom Gurr.
TREASURE HUNTERS
It’s widely known that treasure hunting and salvage operations can wrack up heavy expenses. Boats, fuel, equipment, divers, are just some of the things which make a single- investor-funded salvage operation out of reach for most treasure seekers. Often, operators will reach out to investors for help in absorbing the debts incurred in searching for a wreck and, once found, in retrieving its “booty.” A common practice is to offer shares of whatever recovered to those willing to take a chance on finding what sometimes can seem like a needle in a haystack.
This is where St. Augustine resident and retired attorney John Bamberg comes into the picture.
In 1968, Gurr, aboard his boat El Capitan, discovered the wreck of the San Jose in the Florida Keys. Through a third party, Bamberg was asked to go to the Florida Keys to evaluate the investment potential of the discovery. His extensive background in setting up corporations, as well as being an experienced diver himself, made him infinitely qualified to navigate the legal waters in regards to this wreck. In 1971, he formed Underseas Mining, Incorporated, and, along with a handful of other divers, became a part of the company as well as a part of Captain Gurr’s salvage diving team. In no time, they began recovering treasure and artifacts from about ten feet below the surface of the sand floor.
News rapidly spread of the discovery, and eventually the State of Florida found out about it. According to Florida state laws at that time, as long as the wreck site was at least 3 nautical miles offshore, the salvager of any vessel or wreck could retain for himself all that was found and recovered. Fortunately, the location of the San Jose met those prescribed measuring parameters at the time, so it looked as though Gurr, Bamberg and the rest of the crew
and investors were going to see their investment pay off in a big way. Not so fast. Soon after hearing about the dive, the State sent an archaeological agent to the site, and, along with some assistance from the U.S. Coast Guard, recalculated the site location to be inside that three-mile-limit. This now gave the State of Florida jurisdiction over the site and everything recovered from it. This meant that once an inventory had been completed and values assigned to each artifact, distribution would be seventy-five percent to the salvage firm and twenty-five percent retained by the State.
INTRIGUE
Understandably, Gurr was not happy about and a legal battle ensued. Underseas
Mining, Inc. had accumulated significant financial obligations and expenses, and Gurr objected to turning over so much to the State. In order to combat “confiscation” of the company’s this development,treasure, he came up with an unusual plan — simply throw it back into the ocean.
In ’74, Gurr told Bamberg that he had contacted CBS television to set up a news documentary showing himself throwing the treasure back into the ocean.”If I can’t have it, the State can’t have it either,” Gurr is recorded as saying on-camera as he defiantly dumps the treasure and artifacts back into the sea.
Additionally, much like Geraldo Rivera’s opening of Al Capone’s empty vault in Chicago back in the 1980s, the television report included a scene of Bamberg opening the treasure company’s empty safety deposit box. Not to be outdone, the State of Florida filed additional charges against Gurr for “destroying State property.” Adding to the controversy, there was much speculation at the time that the entire thing was a publicity stunt and nothing more than rocks and useless items were thrown back into the ocean. Many of the actual artifacts from the San Jose which were not turned over to the State remained unaccounted for, only escalating the cause for suspicion. In fact, a 1974 story in the New York Times reported that approximately $100,000 worth of sunken treasure was ultimately found in a canal behind Captain Gurr’s home. Gurr was eventually arrested and charged with larceny by the state of Florida, as well as sued by his former partners in Underseas Mining, Inc, which, of course, included Bamberg.
What should have been a relatively normal arrangement between the State and Underseas Mining, now had involved national entities like the Smithsonian Institute and the FBI. The resulting notoriety and furor over the treasure Bamberg and his team brought up caused Florida officials to place a complete moratorium on treasure hunting in the Florida Keys which lasted for over a year. From that point on, treasure hunters realized that if they were going to work wrecks in Florida waters, they would have to enter into a contract with the State. What was turned over to Tallahassee was eventually distributed in 1980, with seventy- five percent going to Underseas Mining, Inc. and twenty-five percent (plus a deduction for legal matters) retained by the State. When the State’s Division of Archives, History and Records Management (Bureau of Historic Sites and Properties) inventoried the collected artifacts, each one was assigned a tag number and number of points based upon their evaluation of the value of each item. These points were totaled up and it was upon that basis that the 75/25 split was made. The actual dollar value is determined by historians,
private collectors, and auctioneers who deal in antiquities. Although it’s hard to nail down a firm number, in Bamberg’s opinion, a value of $250,000 in 1972 dollars could be assigned to the listed inventory.
In the end, the majority of the remaining artifacts are now the property of the State of Florida, some which are held at the Museum of Florida History in Tallahassee. These days, Bamberg, who is now 87, lives with his lovely wife, Jeanette, on Anastasia Island, and unfortunately lost a good bit of his documentation for this story in the flood waters from Hurricane Matthew. Fortunately, his memory is sharp, and his tales bring vivid images of his treasure hunting past on the wreck of the San Jose. He made approximately 50 dives on the site and was instrumental in recovering some incredible artifacts. Perhaps the most beautiful and unusual find was an intact Oriental gin jar, which was highlighted in National Geographic Magazine’s December 1977 issue. Bamberg’s eventual take, which he keeps in a bank safe deposit box, included some of the coins brought up from the wreck, a few emerald rings and other jewelry. Possibly the most notable of all was the ship’s beautiful medal, which the Captain of the San Jose himself probably wore. Although, for all of his dedication and hard work on the operation Bamberg deserved much more than what he ended up with, it’s safe to say that this particular medal wound up in the hands of the right man.
