Salvage divers working for Queen’s Jewels LLC have pulled over 1,000 silver and gold coins worth approximately $1 million from a Spanish treasure fleet that sank off Florida’s coast in 1715 when a hurricane sent 11 ships carrying an estimated $400 million in gold, silver, and jewels to the bottom of the ocean. The haul includes five gold escudos that surfaced just as gold prices hit all-time record highs, along with silver Reales known as pieces of eight that were minted in the Imperial colonies of Peru, Bolivia, and Mexico, each telling a story through visible minting dates, designs, and mill marks. Captain Levin Shavers and the crew of the M/V Just Right discovered the bonafide pirate treasure at a site along Florida’s “Treasure Coast,” pulling up coin after coin in what Director of Operations Saul Guttuso calls both rare and extraordinary for finding 1,000 pieces in a single recovery.
The discovery represents tangible links to people who lived, worked, and sailed during the Golden Age of the Spanish Empire, with each coin serving as a piece of history from the ill-fated Plate Fleet that lost every penny and all hands when the hurricane struck. Evidence suggests the coins were held in a burlap sack, which might mean up to 2,000 more coins are still waiting on the seafloor where divers have already looked, still waiting to be found after three centuries underwater. Salvager Mike Perna admits he’ll never finish in his lifetime because they’ve barely scratched the surface, noting that the storm took 10 minutes to deposit what is taking them years to find. This incredible discovery proves that sometimes the ocean holds onto its secrets for centuries before deciding the time is right to reveal treasures that connect us directly to dramatic moments in history when fortunes were made, lost, and now miraculously recovered.
