Treasure – we live on a
river that just oozes with it. Okay – so here’s
a hint of the next installment I am going to
write – like I promised something about the
pirate, Jean Lafitte. Legend has it that Jean
Lafitte, the famous pirate, has left some of his
treasure in the banks of the San Bernard. There
are a couple of versions to this legend.
Around
the time Stephen F. Austin and company were
colonizing this part of Texas, the Mexican
government thought having a pirate on Galveston
Isle was bad for their public image. So, they
forced him to leave his home. Being the pirate
that he was, he had a lot of gold to get off of
the island. He was known to take a
strong-backed, weak-minded sailor in a skiff up
various local rivers and relocate parts of his
treasure. He’d make note of the location, and
bury the treasure – and the sailor.
Another
version of this tale has one of Lafitte’s
captains sailing up the San Bernard River to
escape the hurricane of 1816. In this version,
the captain of the pirate boat knew the
hurricane was going to be a bad one, so he
ordered his men to bury the treasure to protect
it from the storm. None of the pirates survived
this storm, but the clue to where the treasure
is hidden is said to be found in another one of
Lafitte’s treasure holds. The interesting thing
about this version is that it perfectly lines up
with the evidence of the Theodosia Burr legend –
that she was found in a wrecked pirate ship
after a bad hurricane just up from the mouth of
the San Bernard River by an English speaking
Karankawa Indian Chief. The treasure on
Theodosia’s boat was supposed to have been
great, but the Indian Chief did not find it. In
one or two of the stories I’ve been told, some
of Lafitte’s treasure was buried at Music Bend
in the San Bernard. That’s where River’s End is
today. While watching the silver trout jump in
the river, it’s nice to fantasize that there is
still pirate’s treasure near at hand, just
waiting to be uncovered.
And the mysterious music
heard at Music Bend is a local treasure. Legend
claims that this music has a ghostly origin, and
- I have been doing a little research on this
subject – the story of the music has been told
orally and written about since Stephen F.
Austin’s colonists heard the creepy strains.
There are numerous ghost stories associated with
this music – all of them have a fiddler being
mysteriously killed and dumped into the San
Bernard. There have been various scientific
attempts to explain the phenomena, but no theory
has become a definitive explanation. But, I’ve
definitely heard the ghostly strains and so have
Harold and Pearlie Caudill, our neighbors. If
you hear the music, it’ll make the hair on the
back of your neck stand on end and you’ll find
goose bumps inexplicably crawling up your arms.
And the fact that the music still plays, and is
still a mystery, is a treasure.
Back in the early days of
River’s End shrimpers often took 5,000 pounds of
shrimp from these waters a day - a treasure, a
fortune, in tasty morsels seemingly in endless
supply. But, too much of that fortune was
withdrawn before deposits were made in the
account, so it might take an open mouth, a
little time and some river feeding to bring back
that overdrawn account. That just goes to show
that you just can’t spend too much of a fortune
without thinking about the future.
My
husband, Roy, talks about a treasure he
experienced down here in the 70’s. Back then,
if you were lucky enough to get invited, you
could find yourself fishing in DuCros City. On
the beach between the mouth of the San Bernard
and Sargent behind Cedar Lakes, each year, in
the late summer, DuCros City would be built. And
each year, by the weekend before Thanksgiving,
it would be gone. Someone would bring in
port-a-cans, and someone with a 4-wheel drive
would bring in some travel trailers, someone
would bring in food and libations, and a little
fishing community would be born. Fishermen would
come in and enjoy time fishing, relaxing, eating
fresh fish, shrimp and oysters, and telling the
stories that only “old salts” could tell younger
men. These moments were treasure. One vivid
golden moment was a memory of one of the fishing
elders. He spoke of a time when redfish were so
plentiful that when the sun set over the Gulf of
Mexico, the waters would turn gold from the
tailing of the redfish. Gold in the water –
untold treasure.
But there’s still treasure
to be found at River’s End. Roy and I have been
fortunate enough to get to know some of our
neighbors on the river. Some of them grew up
here, and have seen the glory days of our
community and some of them are newly
transplanted into our fair community. But best
of all is, they have endless stories to tell
about this river – and every one of them is pure
treasure, just like their friendship.
So, what’s happening at
the end of the river now? Check back in a while
and see what treasure about Lafitte I’ve dug up.
Here’s wishing you an early Spring, Martins
singing at your house, your own treasure chest
filled with friendships, a full belly, a
stretched fishing line, a good story and your
own River’s End
