FLOR DE LA MAR - Wrecked in 1511, the Portuguese had a field day when they overran the ancient kingdom of Malacca in present-day Malaysia after its sultan declined a request for permission to trade there. Admiral Alfonso d'Albuquerque's men spent three days sacking the city and relieving it of 60 tons of gold booty plus the sultan's throne - not to mention his ingots and coinage - and more than 200 chests of diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and sapphires. The admiral called it "the richest treasure on earth that I have ever seen," and loaded it aboard the Flor de la Mar. The Portuguese didn't get far with it, though; she went down in a storm off the northern coast of Sumatra along with riches estimated to be worth $1.7 to $3 billion.

NEW SPAIN FLEET - In 1567, before the New Spain Flota of Captain-General Juan Velasco de Barrio sailed from Veracruz for Spain it received word that there were two English fleets waiting to intercept the flota-one near Havana and the other near the mouth of the Bahama Channel. To protect the treasure they decided to sail back to Spain by a very unusual route. Hugging the coast of Yucatan they turned south, passing south of Jamaica. They planned to sail toward the Virgin Islands, then head directly for Spain. However, when nearing Puerto Rico they were struck by a bad storm and forced to run before it. Six of the major ships of the flota, carrying over 3 million pesos in treasure were wrecked near the northwest tip of Dominica. The lost ships were: the Capitana, San Juan, 150 tons, Captain Benito de Santana; the Almiranta, Santa Barbola, 150 tons, Captain Vicencio Garullo; galleon San Felipe, 120 tons, Captain Juan Lopez de Sosa; nao El Espiritu Santo, 120 tons, Captain Juan de Rosales; and two unidentified naos of 120 tons each. Due to the storm, none of the other ships in the flota could stop to pick up the treasure or the survivors, most of whom reached shore, where they were all cruelly massacred by the Carib Indians.

NAU CHAGAS - Sunk on June 13th, 1594, the Portuguese carrack (merchant ship) Nau Chagas was returning home from the East Indies in June of 1594 bulging with treasure that included bounty rescued from two other wrecked ships. 3,500,000 cruzadoes, plus an unknown number of chests of diamonds, rubies and pearls. The overloaded vessel sailed into the Azores to replenish stocks, pulled out the next day, and came under protracted attack by four English warships. She went down in deep waters about 18 miles south of the channel between Pico and Fayal, in the Azores. The riches that sank with her is believed to have been thousands of tons of the richest cargo (including diamonds, rubies, and pearls) ever to leave an Asian port. Reputed value more than 1 Billion US Dollars.

NEUSTRA SENORA DE BEGONA, SANTO DOMINGO, SAN AMBROSIO & SAN ROQUE - The seven galleons of the Terra Firma Fleet left Cartagena in January 1605, confident that it was well past the hurricane season, and headed north toward Havana. As the fleet passed the Serranilla banks, halfway between Jamaica and Yucatan, a surprise storm struck. One ship was able to make it back to Cartagena, two pressed on and found shelter in Jamaica, but four galleons-carrying by some estimates about eight million pesos worth of gold, silver and emeralds went down on the Serranilla Banks. All of the crew and passengers, some 1,300 people in all were lost.

SANTISSIMA TRINIDAD - In 1616, Santissima Trinidad, a Spanish Manila Galleon, on her way to Acapulco, went down in a typhoon, somewhere around the Osumi Strait, off the southern extremity of Japan. Her cargo is estimated to have been 3,000,000 pesos (94 tons of coins).

SANTA CATALINA - In 1636, the Santa Catalina, only a few miles from her destination of Lisbon, Portugal, went down due to faulty navigation. She carried more than 3,500,000 cruzadoes in gold coin plus 22 chests of diamonds, rubies, and other precious stones.

MERCHANT ROYAL - Possibly the greatest hoard of sunken treasure still waiting to be found on the seabed around Great Britain is that which went down in the Merchant Royal, of Dartmouth, on 23 September, 1641. Returning to England with a king's ransom in Spanish treasure, her sinking in bad weather was witnessed by another vessel in company which reported the location as "ten leagues from Land's End" (21 miles). Carrying thirty-six bronze cannon, a crew of eighty and a few passengers under the command of Captain John Limbrey, in her hold lay "£300,000 in silver, £100,000 in gold, and as much again in jewel." By present standards of inflation, such a sum must be the twentieth century equivalent of £20M at least. The loss of the treasure made headlines. Back in 1641, the ship's hold was equivalent to one-third of the national exchequer. Samuel Pepys refers to the event in his diary, and proceedings in the House of Commons were interrupted for the sad news to be announced.

SAN FRANCISCO XAVIER - In 1656, the San Francisco Xavier was lost in Spain's Bay of Cadiz. After battling with an English squadron, she made for port and just before reaching her destination, blew up. She went down with more than 2,000,000 pesos (63 tons of coins).

LA VIERGE DU BON PORT - This East Indiaman is probably one of the richest French vessel ever lost at sea and never found. The La Vierge du Bon Port was bought in Saint Malo in 1664, armed with 30 cannons and 300 tons of cargo space. Her captain, Truchot de la Chesnaie, from Saint Malo also, was commanding this vessel on a special order from the Minister Colbert, a dedicated Minister for the Marine Affairs, appointed by Louis XIV, the Sun King.

At this time, France was far from the main European military power on land and sea. This mission was the first expedition to Madagascar for the creation of a strong colony on the island, under the privileged of the newly created French East India Company. For this purpose, four ships were being prepared in Le Havre, La Rochelle and Saint Malo and gathered together at Brest for a cost to the Company of more than 500,000 Livres.

With 230 elite crew and 288 passengers (soldiers, high rank civil servants, etc.), the little squadron left Brest on 7 of March 1665, and reach Madagascar on the 10th of July, for the "Le Saint Paul" and at the end of August, "Le Taureau" and "La Vierge du Bon Port" also reach their destination. The goals for this first expedition, were principally to send to France, in the shortest times, a ship fully loaded with a large variety of samples which could be found in Madagascar and the islands in its vicinity. It was vital to show to everybody a first good result for the future expeditions.

On the 20th of February 1666, the ship "La Vierge du Bon Port", full of goods and merchandise, was ready to sails on a voyage back to Le Havre, in France. Unfortunately, several month later, on the 9th of July, her voyage almost completed, she was attacked by an English corsair and sunk off Guernsey, with her 120 crew, the remaining survivors taken as prisoners and brought to England. With this event, perished all hopes for a rich colony to be raised and the commercial loss resulting from this expedition was immense, as all her treasures were lost forever. She sank fast, and thirty six English crewmen drowned while trying to save the treasure.

Although the initial report valued her cargo and contents at £1,500,000, a Channel Islander stated that this was a gross underestimate, since one chest alone of precious stones known to be aboard was valued at £40,000, and ambergris and other things were equal to a further £400,000. No record exists of any salvage on the wreck, so her remains probably lie on the seabed near the Channel Isles, awaiting discovery by some future generation of treasure seekers or salvage divers.

ISABELA - Somewhere south of Cape Santa Maria, Portugal, is the hull of the 600 ton Isabela, perhaps five miles from shore at a depth of 400 feet. The galleon, part of Duke de Veragua's armada of 1672, capsized and foundered there en route to Seville during a tempest. Her captain, Juan de Ugarte, and all 400 aboard were drowned. There is something like $1,000,000 in Colombian and Peruvian gold lying in the her waterlogged beams and ribs.

SOLEIL D'ORIENT - A vessel of the French East India Company, 1000 tons, one of the three most important and richest shipwrecks in the world. The 'Soleil d'Orient' set sail in 1681 with gifts from the King of Siam (Thailand) to King Louis XIV of France, the Pope, wife of the eldest son of Louis XIV, Duke of Burgundy, Duke of Anjou, Marquis of Croissy, Marquis of Sergnelay, Abbot of Choisy; three ambassadors and 20 valets accompanied the gifts including 60 crates of royal magnificent presents; major gifts from M. Constance and King of Bantam (including 'hundreds of diamonds') were also part of the cargo. Most accounts say she hit land and broke up near the southeast tip of Madagascar, so the wreckage may be in shallow water. Inside, the first to find it will discover a 1,000-piece gold dinner set (a gift from the Emperor of Japan), as well as silver, and porcelain. Some of the porcelain was a gift from the Chinese emperor, so the historical value is enormous.

HMS SUSSEX - On December 27, 1693, a mighty fleet of 166 merchant vessels and more than 40 men-of-war gathered off Portsmouth. At their head was the pride of the Royal Navy: HMS Sussex, an 80-gun ship of the line launched just eight months earlier, to destroy the forces of Britain's enemy, those of Louis XIV, the Sun King.

All but the lowliest crew member among the ship's company of 560 or so had some idea of where they were heading: to trading ports around the coasts of Lebanon and Turkey. In the privacy of his cabin, however, as the Sussex prepared to set sail, Admiral Sir Francis Wheeler was contemplating the envelope that contained his secret orders. On behalf of William III, and amid utmost secrecy, Admiral Wheeler was to bribe the Duke of Savoy with the gold to keep him in the Nine Years' War with France, and allow the Grand Alliance to attack Louis XIV through his weakly-defended southern border.

But the gold never reached the Duke. A day out of Gibraltar, the Sussex was caught in a gale that sprang from nowhere, and grew to an unprecedented ferocity. In modern parlance, it came close to being "the perfect storm," of the kind seen only once in 100 years. In the early morning gloom on February 19, 1694, as the log of HMS Carlisle recorded: "The Admiral was foundered and not a soul saved but two Turks." Somewhere in the bowels of the ship were iron chests packed with nine tons of gold coin, worth £1 million in the 17th century, and much, much more now - some estimates have suggested £2.6 billion.

SAN JOSE - The San José is considered to be the richest treasure ships ever lost in the Western Hemisphere. She sank in about 1,000 feet of water on June 8th, 1708. This loss resulted from a battle with an English squadron. Due to the ongoing War of the Spanish Succession, no treasure had been sent from South America to Spain for a period of six years. English Commodore Charles Wager tracked down the treasure-laden ship 16 miles off Cartagena and sunk it in 1000 feet of water. The San José was loaded with eleven million pesos (about 344 tons of gold and silver coins). 116 chests of emeralds, and the personal wealth of the Viceroy of Peru. Admiral Wager described the action, "It was just sunset when I engaged the Admiral [San Jose], and in about an hour and a half, it being them quite dark, the Admiral blew up. I being than along his side, not a half pistol's shot from him, so that the heat of the blast came very hot upon us, and several splinters of plank and timber came on board us afire. We soon threw them overboard. I believe the ship's side blew out, for she caused a sea that came in our ports. She immediately sank with all her riches." An eyewitness report indicates that it went down off Baru Island, between the Isla del Tesoro (known as Treasure Island) and Baru Peninsula, in an area near Cartagena, in what is today known as Colombia. The estimated Value of the cargo today is more than 1 Billion US dollars.

SANTA ROSA - In 1726, the Santa Rosa a Portuguese ship carrying registered gold bullion and coins she had picked up in Salvador, caught fire and blew up off the coast of Brazil. Weighed down by more than five tons of gold, the galleon Santa Rosa, the mightiest ship in colonial Portugal's fleet, set sail for Europe from the Brazilian port of Salvador in late August 1726. On Sept. 6, just as the ship passed Recife, the gunpowder in its hold blew up and it sank, killing all but seven of the 700 men, women and children aboard. The explosion probably was an accident, but it could have been sabotage. No one knows for sure.

LA VICTORIA - Sank on Anegada in 1738, with the loss of all her cargo. She was carrying on board treasure to the value of $1,750,000.00, which if multiplied with inflation would represent a vast sum today. There was no recorded salvage of this ship and to the best of anybody’s knowledge, the vessel is still lying on the bottom with her cargo intact.

EL SALVADOR - The Spanish merchant ship was one of a fleet of vessels traveling from Colombia to Spain when it was pushed ashore between North Carolina and Maryland during the August 1750 storm. Some historical references say the El Salvador went down near Topsail Inlet (Beaufort Inlet was known as Old Topsail Inlet at the time), and other accounts put the wreck near Cape Lookout. The other ships sustained varying degrees of damage, but their crews and most of their treasures were saved.

According to historical records the El Salvador was carrying 16 chests of silver and four of gold when she went down in the area of Cape Lookout during a 1750 hurricane. A conservative estimate would put the value at $124 million in today's money. That makes the El Salvador one of the richest shipwrecks to be found along the American East Coast.

NOTRE DAME DE DELIVERANCE - When the French West Indies merchant ship Notre Dame de Deliverance departed Havana in October 1755, she was packed with 1,200 pounds of gold bullion, 15,000 gold doubloons, six chests of gems, and more than a million silver pieces. The vessel was chartered by Spain to haul treasures from mines in Mexico, Peru, and Columbia. A hurricane sent her to her fate about 40 miles off the coast of Key West.

L'ORRIFLAMME - In 1770, the largest ship to sail directly from Spain to Chile was the 1,200 ton galleon L'Orriflamme, which originally was a French warship. Her cargo was valued at over 4 million pesos, and she carried a crew and passengers numbering over 700. During a storm she was totally lost on the coast near Valparaiso, and there were only a few survivors. Salvage attempts were made, but very little was recovered.

GROSVENOR - The Grosvenor is considered to be the richest British East Indiaman ship ever lost. It wrecked on a reef August 4th, 1782, broke apart and sank on a deserted coast known as Pondoland, north of Port St. John, about 700 miles northeast of Cape Town, South Africa. The loss included 2,600,000 gold Pagoda coins (weight unknown), 1,400 gold ingots (weight unknown), nineteen chests of diamonds, emeralds, rubies and sapphires and an extremely valuable jewel encrusted gold peacock throne from India. Many have tried to find the treasure, and the ship is claimed to have been found on a very inhospitable part of the coast, but the treasure is still to be located.

LA LUTINE - Wrecked in 1799, it isn't always deep water that keeps shipwrecked treasure hidden. The British frigate Lutine was carrying 1,000 bars of gold and 500 bars of silver from London to Hamburg in 1799, when she went down in a gale the sandbank covered waters between the islands of Vlieland and Terschelling in Holland's West Frisian Islands, her cargo swallowed by the eternally shifting sand banks that have digested thousands of other ships. A few gold and silver bars were salvaged, and the ship's bell was recovered in 1858. The rest of the buried riches are estimated to be worth some $30 million dollars today. The Lloyd's of London insurance payout was the largest ever at the time.

MERCEDES - While traveling in a small fleet of four ships returning to Spain from South America in 1804, the Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes, carrying enormous quantities of gold, silver and jewels, was blown up by the British off Cape Santa Maria, Portugal. Spain was at the time a neutral country, but was showing strong signs of declaring war in alliance with Napoleonic France. Acting on Admiralty orders Vice-Admiral Sir Graham Moore required the Spaniards to change their course and sail for England. The senior Spanish officer, Rear-Admiral Don José Bustamente, refused and opened fire on the British, leading to a short battle during which the Mercedes exploded. A Spanish account of the Mercedes describes her as "breaking like an egg, dumping her yolk into the deep." The account also goes on to say that the Mercedes didn't sink, but that "the decks were awash save for the poop." Most of the survivors were rescued from the Mercedes' forecastle after it had separated from the remainder of the hull. In a letter to Cornwallis, Admiral Moore stated that the four Spanish ships carried 4,436,519 gold and silver pesos, 1,307,634 of which belonged to the king of Spain. After the incident Spain declared war on England.

SS ANCONA - The SS Ancona, a popular Italian-American liner, which had been making frequent trips between Naples and New York since it had been launched from Glasgow in 1908. Beginning in 1915, German U-boats were lurking in the Mediterranean with the intention of attacking allied war ships transporting troops and munitions to the European front. However, according to ship manifests, when the Ancona left Naples on Saturday November 6, 1915, to make a brief stop at Messina, Sicily, she was carrying no guns or munitions. On board were mostly women and children immigrants along with 83 first class passengers, 12 barrels of gold sovereigns, and a shipment of silver bars.

At 1:00 p. m. off the coast of Cape Carbonara, Sardinia, Captain Massardo spotted two white turrets and four guns from which flew a German flag, which was lowered and quickly replaced by an Austrian flag. Sensing danger, the captain ordered the ship full steam ahead. What happened next depends upon who was telling the story. In testimony given by the captain, the submarine fired a warning shot, at which point the captain immediately stopped his vessel. In spite of his compliance, the U-boat expelled two shots striking the Ancona both forward and aft. As the Ancona radioed for help, an explosion resulted causing the liner to begin to sink rapidly before any life boats could be lowered. Later, German authorities would claim that the reason why the submarine attacked was precisely because the Ancona refused to stop.