“[It’s] the greatest sunken treasure in the history of humanity,” Julian Sancton, author of a fascinating new account of the discovery, “Neptune’s Fortune: The Billion-Dollar Shipwreck and the Ghosts of the Spanish Empire,” told The Post in an exclusive interview. The Court of Permanent Arbitration in The Hague is expected to rule this year on competing claims, including whether one American salvage company deserves half the treasure, and whether Dooley’s own backers — a British company called Maritime Archaeology Consultants (MAC) formed by hedge-fund titan Anthony Clarke — are entitled to a 45% share after Colombia declared the wreck “objects of cultural interest.” Casa Alegre, the San José’s 71-year-old commander who went down with his vessel, might have “felt honor-bound to send the ship and its treasure to the seabed — and himself and his men to kingdom come — rather than face the humiliation of returning to Spain empty-handed, having lost a fortune that could tilt the war in England’s favor,” Sancton said.
Author: Eric Spitznagel
Published at: 2026-01-27 22:37:04
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