Treasure trove of silver and gold coins found on Florida shipwreck, salvager says

Florida’s “Treasure Coast” continues to prove its name fits, with wreck divers reporting the discovery of 1,051 silver coins and five gold coins on the seafloor.

The 300-year-old coins were found over the summer on a shipwreck believed to have been part of the notorious 1715 Fleet, a group of about a dozen Spanish treasure ships that sank during a hurricane, historians say.

Collectively, the pile of coins is estimated to be worth about $1 million, according to the salvage company Queens Jewels, LLC.

“The coins, preserved beneath centuries of sand and sea, are part of the vast fortune carried by the fleet, which was transporting New World riches back to Spain when disaster struck on July 31, 1715,” the company said in a Sept. 30 news release.

“Historians estimate that as much as $400 million worth of gold, silver, and jewels were lost in the storm, making it one of the greatest maritime tragedies — and treasures — of the Americas.”

It is believed the silver coins, known as Reales, were largely minted in Mexico City, which was home to a Spanish colony, officials said.

The coins remain encrusted and must undergo conservation to determine if they are rare or unusual in some way. However, many have visible pre-1715 dates and mint marks, “making them important to historians and collectors alike,” Queens Jewels said in the release.

Divers found the silver coins under “several feet of sand,” and the recovery was handled while adhering to strict state archaeological guidelines.

The silver coins were concentrated in a 25-square-foot area, suggesting they were in a chest “that spilled when the ship broke apart in the hurricane’s fury,” officials said.

“This discovery is not only about the treasure itself, but the stories it tells,” Queens Jewels director of operations Sal Guttuso said in the news release.

“Each coin is a piece of history, a tangible link to the people who lived, worked, and sailed during the Golden Age of the Spanish Empire. Finding 1,000 of them in a single recovery is both rare and extraordinary.”

The coins were found along a mile-long “trail of treasure” associated with the 1715 Fleet’s trek north up Florida’s Atlantic Coast, officials said.

Divers have been following the trail for six years, and gold coins — known as Escudos — continue to be tougher to find than silver, according to Capt. Mike Perna, a wreck diver and board member of Queens Jewels.

“But this year’s (gold) discoveries prove yet again that there are still many treasures yet to be located lying in wait in the waters off of the Treasure Coast,” Perna told McClatchy News in an email.

“The two larger gold coins represent the fourteenth and fifteenth 1714 Mexico 8 escudos that have come from amongst 2500 silver coins deposited along this trail. … Discovering 300-year-old gold coins underwater is always exciting. There is really no other thrill quite like it.”

Clues indicate more silver coins are waiting to be found at the same wreck site, Perna said.

“The thousand coins represent roughly 1/3 of a chest of coins from the time period. This points to the possibility that there could be many more coins left to be found in this area,” he said.

Divers also recovered some “rare gold artifacts” over the summer, but Queens Jewels did not elaborate on those discoveries.

“Select pieces” among the discoveries will be put on exhibition at area museums after cleaning and preservation is complete, the salvage company says.

Queens Jewels, LLC is the U.S. District Courts’ custodian of the wrecks and has exclusive salvaging company of the historic 1715 Treasure Fleet.