Having received the King's express Orders for Seizing and Securing the body of Capt. Kidd and all his associates together with all their effects till I should receive his Majesty's Royal pleasure how to dispose of the same, I have accordingly secured Capt. Kidd in the Gaol of this Town and some of his men. He has been examined by myself and the Council and has confessed among other things that he left with you a parcel of gold made up in a box and some other parcels besides, all of which I require you in his Majesty's name immediately to fetch hither to me, that I may secure them for his Majesty's use, and I shall recompense your pains in coming hither.
I am,
Your friend and servant,
BELLOMONT.
The official inventory of the Kidd treasure found on Gardiner's Island. This is the only original and authenticated record of any treasure belonging to Captain Kidd. (From the British State Papers in the Public Record Office, London.)
The box and the chest were promptly delivered by honest John Gardiner, who had no mind to be mixed in the affairs of the now notorious Kidd, together with the bales of goods left in his care. This booty was inventoried by order of Bellomont and the Governor's Council and the original document is photographed herewith, as found in the Public Record Office, London. It possessed a singular interest because it records and vouches for the only Kidd treasure ever discovered. Nor are its detailed items a mere dusty catalogue of figures and merchandise. This is a document to gloat over. If one has a spark of imagination, he smacks his lips. Instead of legend and myth, here is a veritable pirate's hoard, exactly as it should be, with its bags of gold, bars of silver, "Rubies great and small," candlesticks and porringers, diamonds and so on. The inventory contains also other booty found in the course of the treasure hunt, and lest the document itself may prove too hard reading, its contents are transcribed as follows to convince the most skeptical mind that there was a real Kidd treasure and that it was found in the Year of our Lord, 1699.