About This Artifact
During Season 6, Doug Crowell spotted a small fragment of bone in the spoils of borehole S-6, which the team had drilled to intersect the Shaft Six tunnel, the searcher tunnel dug in 1861 toward the original Money Pit. Crowell was sorting S-6 material at the wash table with Jack Begley and Paul Troutman, shortly after Begley recovered an iron chain link from the same spoils (S6E17, "Clue or False?"). Gary Drayton pointed to its porous texture and visible capillary holes, and Rick Lagina confirmed on inspection that it was bone.
Crowell argued that bone in the Shaft Six spoils suggested debris had drifted north from borehole H-8, where the team had recovered two fragments of human bone the previous season. DNA sequencing identified those as one European and one Middle Eastern individual (S5E7), and carbon dating placed both in the late 1600s to mid-1700s (S5E8). Whether the S-6 fragment is human, or related to the H-8 individuals, is unknown. Lagina asked for it to be bagged and sent for DNA analysis, but no result was reported in Season 6 or in later episodes.
The team's position was that material from the original Money Pit was scattered along the connecting tunnel during the 1861 collapse. On its own, the fragment cannot establish that: its species, age, and origin have not been tested.
Historical Context
Doug Crowell, Gary Drayton, Rick Lagina; The Curse of Oak Island S6E17
Where It Was Found
Found at Borehole S-6 spoils (Shaft Six tunnel target), Money Pit area. Location: the original 1795 excavation shaft on Oak Island, Nova Scotia.
