THE BOSSALL TREASURE
An Armchair Treasure Hunt
Overview
In January 2014 Douglas George Pearson published an armchair treasure hunt book titled ‘The Bossall Treasure’. Unlike most armchair treasure hunt books this book was centred around Pearson’s own family history and their connection to a real life treasure of the Knights Templar!
The exciting real life story of Peason’s ancestors is complemented by the armchair treasure hunt scattered throughout the pages. Cryptic images which would lead a worthy treasure hunter to a precise location somewhere in England where Pearson had buried an ornate gold plated Lorraine cross.
After almost 10 years the Croix de Lorraine remained hidden despite the efforts of many armchair treasure hunt enthusiasts. That was until September 2021 when the clues were finally solved and the treasure was found!
The Front Cover for The Bossall Treasure Treasure Hunt Book.
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The Legend
A Picture of Bossall Hall, home of the Belt family.
While researching his family history Douglas Pearson was inspired to write The Bossall Treasure when he discovered that a distant relative, John Pearson who was the steward to Sir Robert Belt in the 1600’s was directly connected to a real life treasure legend which could be traced all the way back to the Knights Templar. The story of The Bossall Treasure is a rollercoaster and has everything from power plays, deceitful acts, murder, ambitious characters who will stop at nothing, political and religious differences and closely guarded family secrets.
The tale follows the Pearson family through the generations, their quest for justice after being denied the status of gentry which they firmly believed they deserved, and their connection to this treasure of the Knights Templar and covers its connection to the Freemasons and many historically significant characters such as Sir Robert Belt and the Belt family.
Other characters included in the story are Jaques de Morley the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, Elias Ashmole, a man who stopped at nothing and who’s enduring legacy is the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology in Oxford, Darley’s of Buttercrambe, well known members of the horse racing fraternity, the Read family of Sand Hutton, the Bawtry family, Charles I and Charles II.
This isn’t just a well researched and well written story you could read over and over for entertainment, it is also a book filled with clues leading people to find a gold Lorraine cross buried somewhere in England.
Engraving of Lytham St Annes with the famous windmill landmark from the 19th century.
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The Treasure
The Lorraine Cross As Depicted In The Prize Page Of The Bossall Treasure Book.
While the Pearson legacy revolves around a real life treasure legend in which the ancestor John Pearson while working as the steward to Sir Robert Belt, Lord of the Manor of Bossall Hall near York during the civil war in the mid 1600’s conspired with Sir Robert Belt to hide a hoard of gold and silver plat in the moat surrounding Bossall Hall. It is said that later John Pearson returned to the moat and stole the treasures from the moat.
The prize of The Bossall Treasure armchair treasure hunt is a gold plated bronze Lorraine cross encrusted with jewels measuring approximately 75mm x 55mm. While the treasure may not be worth thousands, hundreds of thousands, or millions like some of the more well known armchair treasure hunts like the Thrill of the Chase this treasure will surely be a symbol of achievement and a conversation piece for whoever does find it for they will have solved a treasure hunt that has gone unsolved for almost a decade!
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The Clues
The Bossall Treasure book is 297 pages detailing the historical story of Pearson’s family history and their connection with a treasure legend. Tucked away in the eleven chapters of the book are 11 clues and puzzles which when solved would point someone directly to the location of a gold plated Lorraine cross which Pearson buried somewhere in England.
The puzzles & clues range in difficulty and complexity with some requiring some serious thought, but Pearson found a way to keep the puzzles engaging and challenging enough that you could spend days working on them and not give up out of frustration.
Pearson spent three years creating the book and the puzzles. With no one to test the clues on, Pearson needed to spend hours looking at other types of puzzles, brain teasers and even the solutions to Kit Williams’ treasure hunt Masquerade in order to gauge the difficulty levels of the clues.
Artwork for one of the puzzles of the Bossall Treasure hunt book.
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Conclusion
The Golden Lorraine Cross, Prize Of The Bossall Treasure Hunt.
In 2020 The Bossall Treasure’s official website was shut down and Pearson had begun working on other projects. This didn’t deter some of the treasure seekers who had been on the case of the Bossall Treasure since it began in 2014 and rightfully so. Pearson was still accepting emails with proposed solutions for the treasure hunt.
Over seven years had passed and no one was close to solving the mystery of the Bossall Treasure hunt. That was until September 2021 when a small team of plucky treasure hunters including Lisa Finch, Robert Jenner, Nick Spera, and yours truly, finally cracked the Bossall Treasure after collectively trying for years.
THE BOSSALL TREASURE SOLUTION
BY
NICK SPERA
The solution to The Bossall Treasure was divided into 11 chapters. Each chapter’s text and image either by itself or with info from a preceding chapter would give the reader one or more words that ultimately made up the solution to the puzzle. Here is the solution chapter by chapter and then at the end, how it ties into the final chapter text for a confirmer.
CHAPTER 1:
The solution for this chapter is used by taking the first letter of each component of the image which is backed by the chapter text. We have a map of Lombardy, which is the origin of the Belt family. Next is the Arms of the Medici Family. After that, we have the Indenture or Deed. Finally, the image shows York Minster. All 4 components are then used with their first letter: Lombardy Arms Deed York
The clue derived from Chapter 1 is LADY
CHAPTER 2:
The solution for this chapter is solved almost the same as the first chapter. You again use the first letter of all the image components. We have a Graveyard, the arms of Robert, Elias Ashmole, two chests, and Queen Elizabeth. The first letters of each image component are used to then spell a word: Graveyard Robert Ashmole Chests Elizabeth
The clue derived from Chapter 2 is GRACE
CHAPTER 3:
The solution for this chapter deals with a grid full of letters and 3 images. The reader will learn about the characters’ trip, who they meet, and the treasure they carry to identify the 3 pictures in the image. The 3 images are London, Renzo, and Plate. The solver is to then spell those three words by eliminating letters from the letter grid. They should also notice all three of those words are spelled with letters from the inner box of the grid. To help the solver, the first letter of each of those 3 words were colored red. After eliminating the letters of those 3 words, now match each letter to the letter next to it in the outer box by going through the same order again: LONDON RENZO PLATE. The letters on the outer box next to each will spell WORD CHAPTER THREE. Now, notice next to each letter that started the original three words: L, R, P; there is a number. Going in order, the solver will get 833. The last thing to do is to count the 833rd word of Chapter 3. That word is “Cross”.
The clue derived from this chapter is CROSS.
CHAPTER 4:
The solution for this chapter is solved by using the dates of the six events in the image (gravestones) and then number/letter subbing them to the alphabet. The solver only needs to use the day, not the month or year. In the text, the author changed one of the dates to alert the reader of the potential clue. All the reader needs to do is go by the days on the headstones in the image. Those numbers are: 9th, 4th, 18th, 21st, 5th, 2nd. Subbed to letters in the alphabet gives the letters I D R U E B. Those letters are an anagram to the word: Buried.
The clue derived from this chapter is BURIED
CHAPTER 5
The solution to this chapter is solved by using the image. The image shows Selby Abbey, a market cross scene, and a map in the background. The key is to look at how the cross on top of the market cross is shaded so it overlays perfectly onto the map. By doing this, it looks like it’s a symbol for a church on that map. Next to the cross are the words “on the marsh”.
The clue derived from this chapter is ON THE MARSH
CHAPTER 6
The solution to this chapter is solved with a shift cipher and then anagram. Use the first letter of each characters first name and shift it so A=O. If you use the order from left to right on the page, the answer will still be jumbled, but if you can see pretty easily the jumbled letters will spell the word Opposite.
The clue derived from this chapter is the word OPPOSITE
CHAPTER 7
The solution to this chapter is solved by viewing the image and using the components to create 3 words. From the text we know Picklington lives in Micklegate York. The text states it’s the south gate of the city. In the image we have a map of York with an arrow pointing to its southern “gate”. The last component is John Anstis in the image, who has the meeting at Mickelgate in the chapter. John Anstis is an anagram for Saint John’s. This anagram is used along with “gate” derived from the arrow indicator.
The clue derived from this chapter is SAINT JOHN’S GATE
CHAPTER 8
The solution to this chapter has a short and long way to solve the puzzle. Once again, there is a grid with letters and numbers. This is the first chapter that uses a piece from an earlier chapter that helps align the numbers. The short way to solve this puzzle is to ignore the numbers completely and attempt to anagram the letters to get the term EIGHTY FIVE FT.
The longer way involves the numbers and three marriage dates that are mentioned in the chapter Those dates are: 14th February 1687, 19th May 1710, and 20th July 1719. The solver should notice that 14, 19, and 20 are all numbers in the grid. The key is to solve the puzzle using multiplication to arrive at the other numbers. The pattern is Day= x1, Month= x2, Year is split into two numbers and the first number is x3 and the second is x4. Here is an example of the first marriage date of 14th February 1687: 14×1=14 2×2=4 16×3=48 87×4=384. The solver will now notice all the resulting numbers appear in the grid. Do the same process with the other two marriage dates. By using the letters adjacent to those numbers using the dates in that order, it will spell EIGHTY FIVE FT.
The clue derived from this chapter is EIGHTY FIVE FT
CHAPTER 9
The solution from this chapter is solved with the image and some text in the beginning of the chapter. The chapter describes Belt looking at a document the in the morning. His desk had a window that looked true south over the hills. The image shows the character looking up from the document and out the window. There is also a compass in the corner. Compasses usually denote North if they only show one direction. However, this one shows South. The reader at this time should gather that the clue is True South. The clock shows 2:42. This doesn’t match the time of day the character is sitting at his desk. The key is to understand the difference between True South and Magnetic South. If one looks at the publication of the book which is 2012 and checks the declination between True South and Magnetic South at that point in time, they will see that it is 2 degrees 42 minutes. This is used later on with the final walking steps to the burial of the treasure along with Ch 10’s solution to confirm
The clue derived from this chapter is TRUE SOUTH
CHAPTER 10
The solution from this chapter is derived from the text and image. The image shows a compass with names as well as death years. The reader should notice also an arrow on the East direction of the compass, as well as numbers in the inner circle. The first step to solve the puzzle is to determine the order by matching the proper death year to the right name using Ch 10’s text. After that is complete it should look like this:
Elizabeth Cutler 1745
John Pearson 1781
William Read 1798
Elizabeth Pearson 1809
Henry Pearson 1810
Thomas Cutler Rudson Read 1838
Now that the order is established, line up the numbers in the inner circle with the name order shown above. The result will be 3 .6 6 5&5 20. The reader will notice the 3 . 6 is in blue. Leave these as is. The black numbers are then number/letter subbed to the word FEET. Now combine it with the 3.6 and the arrow indicating East to get 3.6 FEET EAST. The 3.6 feet east is the difference between walking 85ft true south from the gate and walking magnetic south 85ft and then turning east and walking 3.6 feet. The 3.6 feet covers the declination between the two at the 85ft mark at time of the burial of the cross.
The clue derived from this chapter is 3.6 FEET EAST
CHAPTER 11
The solution from this chapter is gained from the family tree in the image along with confirmation from the text. The Pearson’s from this chapter have 8 children but only six of them survive. In the family tree, if you take the first letter of the names of children who survived, you get the word LYTHAM.
At this point you have all the clues solved and should have this message:
LADY GRACE CROSS BURIED ON THE MARSH OPPOSITE ST JOHN’S GATE EIGHTY FIVE FT TRUE SOUTH 3.6 FEET EAST LYTHAM.
The image for chapter 11 also confirms the area by showing St Johns the Divine Church and Lytham Marsh. The BOTG portion would be to stand at the center of the gate of St John’s, and face magnetic south. Walk 85ft in that direction. Then turn east and walk 3.6 feet. That was the burial location of the cross. One could also just walk true south from the gate, which is about 171 deg bearing. This is also confirmed in the text of Ch 11 where it describes the cross being buried in the passage below where the character realizes the curse the cross brings and how he wishes to rid himself of it.
“He entered the Church (St John’s) and took a moment to pray for less troubled times and the new life he was to embark on. On his way out, he walked slowly down the path and he paused under the lichgate. He then continued onto the marsh and paused again, re-affirming to himself his intention for a change of fortune.”
This concludes the solution for the Bossall Treasure. A big thanks to my team of Robert, Lisa, and Adam. Another big thanks to Doug Pearson for creating the hunt that stood the test of time unsolved for almost a decade. I hope you enjoyed reading the solution and that it answers your questions.
Sadly, while writing this post I was informed that Douglas G Pearson had passed away.
Douglas G Pearson made a huge impact on our lives, his book The Bossall Treasure is what brought our little team together, making friends for life. He gave us an adventure, a treasure, a story to tell, but most of all ignited the imagination and inspired not just us but countless others to challenge ourselves and dare to dream.
He will be sorely missed, but never forgotten by the community he touched with his creativity.
Information for this article has been provided by various sources and are referenced here:
Primary Source: Atlantis of the Sands – Wikipedia
REFERENCES:
- “The Incense Road: Ubar”. Nabataea.net. Retrieved 27 June 2013.
- “Atlantis: The Lost Empire”. IMDb.
- “Atlantis: Milo’s Return”. IMDb.
- Wilford, John Noble (5 February 1992). “On the Trail From the Sky: Roads Point to a Lost City”. The New York Times. Retrieved 17 November 2019.
- Fiennes, Ranulph (1993). Atlantis of the sands: The Search for the Lost City of Ubar. Harmondsworth: Signet Books. ISBN 0-451-17577-8. OL 17393459M.
- Glassé, Cyril; Huston Smith (2003). “ʿĀd”. The New Encyclopedia of Islam (Revised ed.). AltaMira Press. p. 26. ISBN 978-0759101906.
- Clapp, Nicholas (1999). The road to Ubar: Finding the Atlantis of the Sands. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 978-0-395-95786-8. OCLC 41557131.
- Zarins, Juris (May–June 1997). “Atlantis of the Sands”. Archaeology. Vol. 50 no. 3. New York: Archaeological Institute of America. pp. 51–53. Retrieved 17 November 2019.
- Andy in Oman. “Is “The Lost City of Ubar” Found or Still Lost?!”. Retrieved 17 November 2019.
- Thomas, Bertram (1933). “Ubar – the Atlantis of the sands of the Rub’ al Khali”. Journal of the Royal Central Asian Society. Royal Society for Asian Affairs. 20 (2): 259–265. doi:10.1080/03068379308725252.
- Lawrence, T. E. (1964). The letters of T.E. Lawrence. London: Spring Books. OL 17198428M.
- Thesiger, Wilfred (October–December 1946). “A New Journey in Southern Arabia”. The Geographical Journal. Royal Geographical Society. 108 (4/6): 135. doi:10.2307/1789822. JSTOR 1789822.
- Morton, Michael Quentin (2006). In the Heart of the Desert (2nd ed.). Aylesford, Kent, UK: Green Mountain Press. ISBN 0-9552212-0-X. OL 24229851M.
- Phillips, Wendell (June 1972). Unknown Oman. Librairie Du Liban Publications. ISBN 978-0-86685-025-4. OL 9339953M.
- “The lost city of Ubar”. Islam 101. Retrieved 27 June 2013.
- Thomas, Bertram (September 1931). “A Camel Journey Across the Rub al-Khali”. The Geographical Journal. Royal Geographical Society. 78 (3): 209–38. doi:10.2307/1784895. JSTOR 1784895.
- Wynn, Jeffrey C.; Shoemaker, Eugene M. (November 1998). “The Day the Sands Caught Fire” (PDF). Scientific American. Springer Nature. pp. 64–71. Retrieved 17 November 2019.
- Edgell, H. Stewart (2004). “The myth of the lost city of the Arabian Sands”. Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies. Archaeopress. 34: 105–120. JSTOR 41223810.
- Stark, Freya (1936). The southern gates of Arabia. New York: E. P. Dutton. OCLC 557374. OL 6342012M.
- Zarins, Juris (September 1996). “Interview with Dr. Juris Zarins”. PBS Nova Online (Interview). Retrieved 27 June 2013.
- Zarins, Juris (2000). Bawden, Garth; Reycraft, Richard Martin (eds.). “Environmental disruption and human response: an archaeological-historical example from south Arabia”. Environmental Disaster and the Archaeology of Human Response. Anthropological papers. Albuquerque, NM: Maxwell Museum of Anthropology. 7: 35–49. OCLC 45708208.
- Blom, Ronald G.; Crippen, Robert; Elachi, Charles; Clapp, Nicholas; Hedges, George R.; Zarins, Juris (2006). Wiseman, James; El-Baz, Farouk (eds.). “Southern Arabian Desert Trade Routes, Frankincense, Myrrh, and the Ubar Legend”. Remote Sensing in Archaeology. Interdisciplinary Contributions to Archaeology. New York: Springer: 71–87. doi:10.1007/0-387-44455-6_3. ISBN 978-0-387-44455-0. S2CID 128081354.
- Lawton, John (May–June 1983). “Oman: Frankincense”. Saudi Aramco World. Vol. 34 no. 3. pp. 26–27. Retrieved 1 January 2015.
- Kakutani, Michiko (27 February 1998). “Stumbling Upon the Desert’s Secret”. The New York Times. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
- Groom, Nigel (August 1994). “Oman and the Emirates in Ptolemy’s map”. Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy. Blackwell Publishing. 5 (3): 198–214. doi:10.1111/j.1600-0471.1994.tb00067.x.
- Groom, Nigel (Spring 2000). “The Road to Ubar—Pros and Cons”. Bulletin of the Society for Arabian Studies. Society for Arabian Studies. 5: 42–43.
- Jones, Barri (July–August 1992). “On the Incense Trail” (PDF). Minerva. Vol. 3 no. 4. Myles Poulton. p. 17. Retrieved 17 November 2019.
- “Information on tentative lists and examination of nominations of cultural and natural properties to the List of World Heritage in Danger and World Heritage List” (PDF). UNESCO.org. Retrieved 24 May 2012.
- Sasson, Jack M., ed. (1994). Civilizations of the Ancient Near East. London: Hendrickson Publishers. p. 1351.
Other sources of information:
Bertram Thomas: Bertram Thomas – Wikipedia
Major Wilfred Thesiger: Wilfred Thesiger – Wikipedia
The Road to Ubar – Finding the Atlantis of the Sands by Nicholas Clapp: http://thereaderdiary.blogspot.com/2011/01/
Wadi Rum: Wadi Rum – Wikipedia
Nizwa: Nizwa – Wikipedia
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ADAM L C
Director of Areas Grey
Adam is an avid treasure hunter, seeker of adventure and the creator of Areas Grey. After travelling for almost half his life and cataloguing over 100 treasure legends along the way. He decided this was simply far too much treasure for one person to chase! As a result he created Areas Grey so he could share his stories, connect with other treasure hunters and put a little more adventure in the lives of the treasure hunting community.
Adam is a Private Investigator and former Wilderness Guide with a passion for history and archaeology. With the skills, knowledge and gear, Adam is always eager to go on the next fortune seeking adventure and connect with fellow treasure hunters along the way.
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