Essential Cache hunting is looking for a buried stash of cash that was never recovered by its owner. Usually due to a sudden demise or forgetfulness in old age. Let me explain why this cache is there…
People Bury Money in Caches
Banking is a fairly new invention in civilization. Many still don’t trust it. Having seen two banking collapses, I’ll step up and say I’m one who doesn’t trust them very much. The Italians invented modern banking in the 1300’s, and if you showed up at the bank and they couldn’t give you your money, bad things happened. The public tended to drag the bankers into the streets and kill them. Ahh…Some of us still pine for the old ways.
Back in the old days in the US, banks weren’t within a reasonable distance to do typical banking, nor were they insured by the US government, so folks didn’t use them. They hid their money instead.
The famous post hole bank is a side effect of no reliable (or trusted) banking facility in the region. Post hole banks are the quintessential mason jar filled with silver dollars and buried under or next to a fence post. Usually within sight of the bedroom window and at a depth less than 3 feet as that is the length of a man’s arm reaching into a hole.
Many Caches are never found
Now I’ve got news for you. People die. It is a fact that we can’t avoid the endgame part of life.
For treasure hunters, an opportunity arises when someone passed away unexpectedly and the heirs didn’t find or even know about the deceased money. This happens quite a bit more than you think. Take 300 years which covers 8 generations or more, and statistically a few people place deposits in the earth that are not recovered. Many stashes are stumbled upon by detectorists, and some by research.
One trend that greatly improves your odds of finding a cache, is war. The dangerous times and uncertainty caused by an invading army greatly increases the number of people who bury wealth. Any student of troves in Great Britain can attest to this.
If you research for wealthy persons who met a sudden death, your odds go up quite a bit. Old newspaper obituaries are very good for this kind of research, as they mention murders and facts of the victim’s life that can become a lead.
