Famous treasures that are waiting for their heroes
In any troubled time, be it a revolution, wars or dispossession of kulaks, some secret dungeon or land was considered the most reliable place to preserve values. The acquired property was transferred to chests, barrels, and they buried their treasures somewhere in a deep forest in a secret place.
This way of storing more or less large sums of money was considered in the order of things until the middle of the last century. However, it was far from always possible to return for riches, often no one except the one who had hidden the treasure knew exactly where it was buried, and the treasures remained lying and waiting in the wings. A considerable number of such forgotten coin caches in Russia are scattered from the Far East to Siberia. We decided to recall several legendary treasures that have not yet been found by anyone.
Treasure of Khan Ediger Magmet
Where to look: Kazan, Lake Kaban
Back in 1552, Ivan the Terrible decided to take Kazan. At first, the Tatar wars tried to attack the troops besieging the fortress of the Kazan Khanate, but after a while they realized that they could not resist the troops of Grozny. Then Chapkun Otuchev, who was responsible for the khan's treasury, decided to hide all the khan's values in a safe place. Lake Kaban seemed most suitable for him: the jewels were rolled into barrels, taken out of the fortress at night and thrown into the lake. During the storming of the city, everyone who knew about the exact location of the treasures perished. And countless riches to this day rest at the bottom, under a layer of many meters of silt that has grown over hundreds of years.
Promotional video:
Napoleon's treasure
Where to look: the village of Zhernovka, Kasplya lakes, Svaditskoye, Velisto; Lake Mutnoe in the Demidovsky district of the Smolensk region, Lake Semlevskoe
Leaving Moscow, Napoleon took with him several carts with gold, valuable things and a collection of ancient weapons. According to various archival data, in total he took out about 18 pounds of gold, 325 pounds of silver and countless other valuable things. However, he never brought the trophies to the appointed place. Periodic attacks by Russian troops and the approaching cold weather forced the French to start throwing off the looted goods in order to increase the speed of the army's movement. On the way, values were buried in the ground and flooded in the nearest lakes. Historians suggest that Napoleon continued to drag the carts at least to the Berezina River. The first such treasure was found near the Nara River.
Kolchak's gold
Where to look: Taiga village, Lake Baikal, Tura river, Tyumen region
At the beginning of the First World War, Russia's gold reserves were redirected to Kazan. The leader of the White movement, Admiral Kolchak, in turn, took him out of Kazan and transported him by train to Siberia. On the way, the train was attacked, during which the attackers each time stole some part of the treasure. Some, according to eyewitnesses, Kolchak hid. The Bolsheviks got only half of the exported stock. Gold bars, with a total weight of about 200 tons, lie somewhere in the chests hidden in Siberia.
Sigismund III's Treasure
Where to look: Moscow region Mozhaisk, Aprelevka
The Polish troops invading Russia in 1604 stuffed their chests with anything of any value. As a result, the good was accumulated on 923 freight carts, which were sent along the Mozhaisk road to Poland. But all the treasures disappeared almost without a trace, even before reaching Smolensk. According to one version, this happened because the person who sent the valuables himself had views on them and planned to stay in Russia. The records mention that they were buried near a certain churchyard. But it was not possible to establish exactly what it was and where it was, therefore the geography of the treasure's location is rather blurred, which stretched the search for many, many years.
Emelyan Pugachev's treasure
Where to look: along the route of the troops - Orenburg, Berda, Yaitsky town, Samara, Kazan, Simbirsk, Ufa, Magnetic fortress, Iletsk defense, Beloretsk factories, Zlatoust, Orsk, Osa, Izhevsk plant, Botkin plant, Tsivilsk, Kurmysh, Saransk, Penza.
During the uprising, Yemelyan Pugachev's "treasury" was regularly replenished at the expense of the values of estates and property of local landowners. Prioritizing the mobility of rebel troops, Pugachev periodically hid wealth along the way. According to rumors, he did it in a conspicuous place, so that later it would be easier to find. Some of these caches were found in the vicinity of Orenburg. But the main treasures continue to excite the imagination of treasure hunters, hiding somewhere under a layer of earth or water.
Treasure from the ship "Varyagin"
Where to look: in the Ussuri Bay, between the Three Stones section, Mount Vargli and Sukhodol Bay
In 1906, the cargo-passenger ship "Varyagin", en route from Vladivostok to the Sukhodol Bay, collided with a mine left after the Russo-Japanese War and sank. On board there were 250 passengers and 60 thousand rubles in gold, along with "especially valuable cargo." Only 15 were saved, including the captain. In 1913, he made an attempt to find and raise the ship. The ship was found, but the lifting operation turned out to be too expensive, so only part of the valuable cargo was pulled to the surface. The gold remained in the holds of the ship at the bottom of the bay.
Treasure of Hetman Mazepa
Where to look: Baturin, the place where Mazepa crossed the Dnieper, Mazepa's castle - Goncharovka, Country Palace - on the farm Porosyuchka
In October 1708, Mazepa was supposed to meet with Charles XII, crossing the Desna. To go light, before leaving Baturin, he partially buried his untold treasures. He tried to ferry other parts in a wagon train that followed along with the troops to Charles, and also to hide in other places known to him. One of these attempts, when crossing to the other side of the Dnieper, ended with the fact that some boats with valuable cargo simply sank.
Treasure of Count Rostopchin
Where to look: the Voronovo sanatorium on the 61st kilometer of the Staro-Kaluzhskoye highway, 37 kilometers from the Moscow Ring Road
During the war of 1812, the Voronovo estate, located 37 km from Moscow, became the residence of the Governor-General of Moscow, Count Rostopchin. He brought works of art and various values into it, turning the estate into a kind of miniature Versailles. After Napoleon's troops arrived in Moscow, he set fire to his estate, staging everything in such a way that supposedly all the wealth he had accumulated was destroyed. In fact, on the territory of the estate there were underground passages, through which, presumably, all the good was carried out and hidden in the district.
Smolensk bank treasure
Where to look: the village of Otnosovo in the Smolensk region
Before the invasion of Smolensk by German troops, it was decided to take out all their funds and valuables from the bank vaults. In eight trucks, the wealth was sent to Vyazma, but the convoy came under fire and only 5 cars reached the nearest settlement. There are different versions of how further events developed, but the most popular is the assumption that gold and silver were buried. This theory is supported by the facts of finding individual coins of the 1924 issue near the village of Otnosovo. And all the treasure so lies somewhere in a secluded place.
Treasure of Ataman Semyonov
Where to look: near the Russian-Chinese border, Dauria region
Preparing an escape from Chita, Ataman Semyonov decided to take out the stock of the Russian Empire, which was brought by Kappel's army, and hide it in the Daurian steppe. The valuable cargo was delivered to the Dauria station and safely buried, but during the return of the Cossacks to the armored train, they were attacked and everyone who was privy to the secret of placing the treasure died. According to the assumptions of counterintelligence officers, the size of the territory in which the treasure may be located is 150 square kilometers. The treasure itself is estimated at about $ 500 million.