Grosvenor Treasure A Scam From Yesteryear

frankp57By
Oct-24-2020
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A few days ago I was having a bit of an online conversation with a few other posters in a local forum. We were talking about online scams. More specifically, the topic was triggered by a post I made about an email scam I received. You may have read it. If not, or if you need reminding, you can read it HERE. From that, one of the participants in the chat, Peter, mentioned something called the Grosvenor Treasure. What’s the Grosvenor Treasure you may be asking? I know I was. Well anyway, have a read of this summary. It’s a fascinating story.

Grosvenor Treasure

Here’s how Peter summarised it:

“An early example of a related scam was the “Grosvenor Treasure” back in the early 1900’s. The Grosvenor was a ship which seems to have had nothing to do with the family of the same name, except that the connection implied great wealth.

In 1782, the ship was returning from India and was wrecked on a remote part of the African coast. Almost all of the crew and passengers died trying to reach “civilisation”.

In 1880 an expedition found a few coins and over the following years the story of the wealth up for grabs grew until it was a vast amount of money, diamonds and other treasure.

Several companies (all with the name “Grosvenor” somewhere in the title) were set up to collect funding to finance recovery of the treasure. Some with helpful “treasure maps” and other forged documents.

The idea was that people would invest in the recovery and then get a share in the profits.

Guess what – all the money was “spent” and no treasure was found. One of the victims of the scam was Arthur Conan-Doyle, writer of the Sherlock Holmes stories. Not the only treasure scam ever, but one with an association with Chester.”

Grosvenor Treasure-Scams Are Not A New Thing

As I say, fascinating stuff. Arthur Conan Doyle hey, copped a good ‘un it would seem. The summary story related by Peter is only a snippet. You can read the full version – and a lot more – on Peter’s Chester Wiki website. You can read the full version of the Grosvenor Treasure by clicking this link HERE. Go and have a read, it really is fascinating stuff. As is so much more on Peter’s website.

Thanks for sharing this great story Peter. It just goes to show, scams have been with us for generations. Today’s ‘new’ digital approach is now so well known to some, or many. It seems to be that the underlying basis is still there but only the perceived players change. From the unsuspecting Grosvenor’s all those years ago to today’s O2, or Amazon, or DVLA etc.

Thanks for reading folks and thanks for visiting my website. Much appreciated.

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