A strike by unionized Nova Scotia crane operators brings Money Pit drilling to an abrupt halt, with the walkout potentially lasting three weeks. In the War Room, Rick and Marty Lagina and Craig Tester decide to redirect efforts toward Smith's Cove excavation, wash table processing, and metal detection. At Smith's Cove, Rick, Marty, Charles Barkhouse, and Gary Drayton watch as heavy equipment operator Billy Gerhardt uncovers an old wooden shaft at the edge of the beach while digging near the so-called convergence point. Water pours steadily through the structure, and the team suspects it may have been dug by Robert Restall, who moved to Oak Island in 1959 with his wife Mildred and sons Bobby Jr. and Ricky, and who died along with Bobby Jr. and two coworkers in a 1965 accident near this same area. The shaft's location also falls near the spot where red dye, pumped into borehole C-1 five weeks earlier, was detected flowing into Smith's Cove.
On the western shore at Lot 1, Jack Begley and metal detection expert Gary Drayton find blue-glazed pottery from the 1700s, similar to pieces found deep underground in the Money Pit. Gary then uncovers a gold-gilded military cuff button, also from the 1700s, closely matching the gold-plated British military button discovered two years earlier in spoils from borehole GAL-1. The appearance of matching artifacts on opposite ends of the island raises questions about who left them behind and why.
In the War Room, author and researcher James McQuiston, a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, presents a theory linking the Knights Baronet of Nova Scotia to the Knights Templar. McQuiston explains that King James I of England, also King James VI of Scotland, enlisted Sir William Alexander to recruit Scottish settlers, leading to the creation of a new hereditary knighthood in 1625. Each title was sold for 3,000 marks, and the Latin charter rendered "New Scotland" as "Nova Scotia." Among the earliest Baronets, all had connections to the Templars through land grants, clan histories, or battlefield alliances. McQuiston traces a treasure listed in five ancient books, including the History of the Lodge of Edinburgh, cataloging items such as 36 dozen gold buttons, diamond-set jewels, and gold bracelets valued at 600 pounds per pair, with an estimated total reaching half a billion dollars. Gary observes that Oak Island discoveries already match items on the list. McQuiston also connects title deeds kept in waxed canvas bags, the final item listed, to the parchment bearing the letters V-I that William Chappell and Frederick Blair recovered from 153 feet in the Money Pit in 1897.
Marty and Gary then investigate an old stone well on Lot 16 near the Money Pit, a structure with construction similarities to a well examined two years prior near the alleged Templar castle ruins in New Ross. After receiving phone permission from archaeologist Laird Niven to remove the modern cap, Gary detects both ferrous and nonferrous signals inside. They pump the well dry overnight and return the next day, recovering a piece of decorated lead with a visible design. A natural spring steadily refills the well, forcing them to suspend the search and plan a new approach.
At Smith's Cove, Rick and Marty join Laird to collect wood samples from the season's extensive excavations, including the U-shaped and L-shaped structures first found by Dan Blankenship in the 1970s, along with wooden and concrete walls and a slipway believed to have been used for offloading cargo centuries ago. Billy assists with his excavator to extract timbers for dendrochronology, a tree-ring dating method that can determine both the age of the wood and the approximate year it was cut. If the results show these structures predate the discovery of the Money Pit in 1795, the team may finally identify who built it and why.
