By Dianna Brown
With the shift in seasons, I wholeheartedly welcome the longer evenings of fall; the cool chill in the air, and cosying up in a warm sweater or blanket to enjoy a hot cup of tea or a bowl of steaming beef stew. Living out west in the city, I miss the rich, vibrant colours of red, orange and gold of the maple, birch and poplar trees in parts of Newfoundland. I love autumn most of all, because it’s the season of thrills and chills, and I love a good ghost story, especially in October.
I’ve always been drawn to buried treasure. I recall how my curiosity for pirates and buried treasure was often provoked by the repetitive music-box melodies from the ice cream truck that would drive around our block. My eyes would scan the menu for Buried Treasure ice creams. Do you remember those? The cold treat consisted of orange sorbet with swirls of vanilla ice cream on a coloured plastic stick. It was the most exciting indulgence because after you finished, an intricately designed character on the front and back of the stick would be uncovered. I kept a small collection of these sticks in my treasure chest jewelry box. It was a scarce treat, so the collection of colourful characters was as good as any loot I could keep in that chest.
I went to school in Kelligrews, C.B.S., and I remember time spent in the schoolyard gazing out over the bay to Kelly’s Island. Tales of pirates, especially pirate Peter Easton and Captain Alphonsus Kelly, mesmerized my mind, and I craved to hear their blood-curdling legends. Kelly’s Island was a fortified base for these pirates, and I dreamed of one day unearthing their buried fortunes of gold coins. However, I was more fascinated by the pirate ghosts that guarded the loot.
It was said that Captain Kelly, a lieu- tenant of Easton, shot one of his men with a flintlock pistol and buried him on top of the treasure, so that his ghost would protect the gold from thieving hands for eternity.
Schoolyard stories warned that if you took anything off of Kelly’s Island, the pirate ghost would haunt you until you gave it back. Whether that part was true or not, no one I knew had the means to venture over the frigid waters, so it was always fun to scare the living daylights out of each other be- cause there was no danger of actually taking something from the island. The thought of instigating the ghosts was fun, but only because we were at a safe distance, or at least we hoped so.
My obsession with pirate stories intensified when my family took sum- mer vacations around Newfoundland in the 90s. My mom, Nellie, grew up in Happy Adventure, Eastport, and I learned this town was named after Pirate Peter Easton’s flagship, The Happy Adventure. I’ve also heard a different story, where Easton and his crew sought refuge in one of its coves, escaping capture by the French Navy. He later referred to his quest as a ‘Happy Adventure!’ Easton’s legend followed me further around the island when my family visited my great aunt in Codroy Valley. We’d always stop alongside the TransCanada Highway, just outside of Corner Brook, to search for the carved face of a man in the 40- foot-tall cliff of Breakfast Head.
To this day, I still think the image is a pirate. It’s said that pirate Peter Easton used the ‘Old Man in the Mountain’ as a marker, and that the face peers down in the direction of where three treasure chests were buried on Shellbird Island in the Humber River. Legend has it that all of Easton’s sites for buried treasure are guarded by ghastly pirate ghosts, ready to protect or seek vengeance on anyone who tries to take the treasure. Two of these chests are said to have been found, one in the late 1800s and another in the early 1900s, raising the hopes of treasure hunters to find the third undiscovered chest of gold.
I believe this fascination with buried treasure is why I love beach combing, searching for deep ocean secrets reluctantly given up by the rolling tides. You’ll find me with pockets stuffed full of interesting rocks, sea glass, drift- wood, seashells and bits of rusted metal. I love treasure hunting with metal detectors along coastlines and magnet fishing from wharves and boats. I’ve only ever pulled up the odd fish hook or metal bottle cap, but the idea of discovering something unique is thrilling. The closest I’ve ever come to treasure, and my absolute favourite find, is a cobalt blue sea glass marble. Ghostly pirate stories have followed me into adulthood as I recently finished my second novel, Saltwater Stranger, which is stitched together with underlying pirate stories that have fascinated me my entire life. During my summer visit back home, I finally set foot on Kelly’s Island.
My childhood fantasy and grown-up imagination merged, and I could see the characters and scenes from my book play out in my mind’s eye. I would love to return to the island with a metal detector and hike the Kelly’s Island Trail.
I’d love to hear your ghastly pirate stories and the greatest treasure you’ve ever unearthed to add to my favourite Halloween tales!
Dianna Brown is a hockey mom, an elementary school teacher and author of two novels: Saltwater Joys and Saltwater Stranger. She was born in Gander, currently resides in Calgary, and loves to visit her hometown, Kelligrews, C.B.S. You can reach her at diannabrown.tiestohome@gmail.com
