Sunken treasure could be a costly find

Finding sunken treasure was a lifelong dream for Harry Noyes, a lobsterman and former commercial diver who was raised near the water in Marblehead. Two decades ago, he even bought an underwater metal detector and went out diving 10 or 20 times, but located only spikes used to hold planks to a ship's hull.

Then last winter, he and his dive partner were harvesting sea urchins off Marblehead Neck when they stumbled upon a rare find, a cannon believed to be 300 years old. It was sheer "dumb luck," as he describes it.

But so far, their find isn't proving to be a lucrative discovery. Massachusetts law dictates that the cannon officially belongs to the state; technically, they needed a permit to retrieve it. Though under state law Noyes and his partner could get a reward worth 75 percent of the cannon's value, estimated to be little, they are also liable for its restoration, which could cost thousands. And Noyes is having second thoughts about his dream.

"I've got a major headache," Noyes said. "This has all been dumped on my shoulders."

It's a far cry from the big- money strikes that some hunters have come up with. Just last month, a Tampa-based company announced it had collected more than 500,000 silver coins, gold, and other artifacts, a stunning find worth an estimated $500 million, from a Colonial-era shipwreck whose location they would not identify. It may be worth pointing out that headaches came with that find, too; on Wednesday, the Spanish government filed suit in federal court demanding that the treasure be returned to Spain if the ship is Spanish or was removed from the country's waters.

In 1982, treasure hunter Barry Clifford found the wreck of the pirate ship Whydah off Wellfleet and laid claim to the prize, after courts later agreed that his recoveries should be exempt from a state law enacted four years later.

Far from letting his passion be squelched by his trials with the cannon, Noyes still hopes that a big cache is still waiting for him beneath the waters off Marblehead. In March, he and his dive partner, Dennis McGrath, won a state permit to continue searching the area, which he suspects will yield more treasures.

"If I was to be a betting person, I say there's better than 50-50 chance that there's more artifacts down there, and there could potentially be some really neat artifacts, not necessarily gold and silver but the bell, more cannons," said Noyes. "We run into a bronze cannon, you're looking at some valuable stuff."

While the cannon Noyes recovered is not a big-money find, it's of great interest in Massachusetts. The Marblehead Museum and Historical Society, which last night opened an exhibit called "Pirates and Privateers of Marblehead," is asking Noyes to lend the cannon.

"That was kind of exciting, even for me as an archeologist," said Victor Mastone, director of the Massachusetts Board of Underwater Archaeological Resources, which regulates such finds. "I'm used to broken pottery, broken bottles. I'm not used to seeing things like cannons that often."

Mastone said he first heard by rumor that someone had found a cannon off the coast of Marblehead and sent a "veiled threat" through word of mouth, warning the diving duo that they were required to report it.

"We kind of goofed," said Noyes, recalling how they pulled up the cannon and took it out of state for examination. "We found out that was illegal. There was a bunch of stuff we did wrong."

Finders are not keepers in Massachusetts. The state owns anything you find at underwater archeological sites and regulates its retrieval. Since many divers don't know this, Mastone goes hunting himself on eBay, looking for miscreants. The state can seize divers' loot and assess a penalty of up to $1,000, though it has pursued someone only once, resulting in an out-of-court settlement, Mastone said.

Mastone said the cannon will require professional conservation and could be dangerous; the muzzle end is blocked and could still be loaded. As a result, Noyes has been advised to keep the cannon moist and has been keeping it in a plastic fish tub. He asks those with restoration expertise to contact him by calling 978-317-3923.

The small swivel-gun Noyes found was designed to hurt people, not sink ships, and the specialists who have seen photos of it so far believe it is of English design dating before 1718, when a standard pattern took hold. (The back end of the cannon has a mushroom shape, and the placement of the trunnions that held it in place indicate an earlier design, Mastone said.)

Valuation , based on dating and archeological value, has not yet begun. But Mastone believes that the cannon is worth only about $1,000 and that restoring it could cost as much as $7,000.

"They've taken on an obligation without any guarantee of a reward," Mastone said. "That's very good of them, but I didn't encourage this. My encouragement would have been, 'Think about this.' We would have told them to leave it in place, take a picture of it, come in and get a permit, as opposed to collecting it."

Still, Noyes thinks it's worth the hunt. And he refuses to divulge the exact location of his potential shipwreck. "I'm gonna tell you where I got a gold mine and I'm making huge piles of money?" he joked.

It could happen.

Stephanie Ebbert can be reached at ebbert@globe.com.