Page 11 : Beale Ciphers Analyses
THE HART PAPERSThis is not an analysis so much as an important historical document. The brothers Clayton I. and George L. Hart were the first Beale researchers to leave us a journal of their findings. They worked on the project from 1898 to 1912, and had direct access to the agent for the author, James Beverly Ward. Their study was published by George Hart in 1964, and is the oldest record of the Beale mystery.
It contains a transcript of The Beale Papers obtained by Clayton Hart directly from James B. Ward. For many years, until an original copy of the booklet was found, it was the only source of the text of The Beale Papers. It is 67 pages long, and the cover page is reproduced below:
This is not easy to read. It relates in detail their sessions with a psychic, and his verbatim recollection of the events surrounding Beale's burial of the treasure. Excerpts from the Hart Papers, including this particular portion, can be read here: http://smd173.tripod.com/Beale/HartPapers.htm
Yet, they do contain important contributions. These include:
As noted regarding the Washington Hotel, George Hart was not exempt from errors. The following is an excerpt from Page 52 of The Hart Papers:
In fact, Virginian Job Print was located in the same building as The Lynchburg Virginian newspaper, and both were destroyed in the fire of 1883. The Beale Papers pamphlet went on sale in April 1885 and was continually advertised for sale until August 1886.
Unfortunately, the full work seems not available on the internet. The original is at Roanoke Valley Libraries in Roanoke, Virginia, http://www.rvl.info/uhtbin/webcat . From that website, a library search for "Beale, Thomas" will produce the following list of documents in reverse publication dates:
| The Beale treasure : new history of a mystery | Viemeister, Peter | 1997 |
| The Beale Ciphers : containing research findings, and documents and data, as well as several predictions about how the ciphers were constructed | Matyas, Stephen M. | 1996 |
| In search of a golden vault : the Beale treasure mystery | Easterling, E. J. | 1995 |
| Not so Beale | Williams, Carl E. | 1993 |
| Going in circles, straight lines too | Greaves, Richard H. | 1991 |
| Lined with stone, filled with dreams | Greaves, Richard H. | 1990 |
| The 30 million dollar Beale treasure is a hoax | Kenny, Tom (Thomas Michael) | 1990 |
| About four miles from Buford's | Greaves, Richard H. | 1988 |
| The treasure trail of Virginia | Meininger, Donald E. | 1987 |
| The Beale treasure : a history of a mystery | Viemeister, Peter | 1987 |
| One letter, one enclosure, subject : the Beale Treasure | Greaves, Richard H. | 1986 |
| Treasure legends of Virginia | Mills, Charles A. | 1984 |
| Gold in the Blue Ridge : the true story of the Beale treasure | Innis, Pauline B. | 1973 |
| Mystery treasure : details and facts of the unfound treasure of Thomas Jefferson Beale | Timm, John W. | 1973 |
| The Beale papers : presenting details of an alleged burial of gold, silver and jewels near Goose Creek, Bedford County, Virginia, by Thomas Jefferson Beale and associates in November 1819 and December 1821....in an attempt to bring up-to-date all that is known and surmised about the the subject | Hart, George L. | 1964 |
| The genealogy of the Beal family, 1399-1956 | Hodges, Frances Beal Smith | 1956 |
Comments
The software download from Page 5 includes the Hart versions of the ciphers (in My C1, My C2, and My C3) and the Hart DOI. This data, the image above, and the Roanoke library references were supplied by a contributor to this website and long-time Beale researcher.
Clayton I. Hart died September 6, 1949, one century less a month and a day after Edgar Allan Poe.
