Monday
September 16, 2024 
A stone with the inscription “1775 M” – possibly carved by the famous outlaw Moses Doan – has been recovered from Buckingham Cave, ending a search that millions of television viewers witnessed on a recent episode of the Discovery Channel’s “Expedition Unknown.”
Additionally, a Colonial-era bottle, also recovered from the cave, is the first object found that dates to the period of the Doan Gang and suggests that the cave was open when Moses Doan and the Gang were active.
Clint Flack, Bucks County Historical Society exhibit specialist, along with property owner Frank Lamitina, rediscovered and excavated Buckingham Cave beginning in 2019. The story received local news coverage and eventually piqued the interest of producers at the Discovery Channel’s hit show, “Expedition Unknown.”
In the recent one-hour episode featuring the Doan Gang story that premiered on the Discovery Channel on July 3, called “Traitors’ Treasure of 1776, Flack and Josh Gates of “Expedition Unknown” visit the Mercer Museum, operated by the Bucks County Historical Society, and search for the inscription in the cave.
Excavations at the cave continued after filming, and Flack and Lamitina, along with Mercer Museum librarian Rayna Polsky, uncovered the “1775 M” carving and the colonial bottle on a subsequent search.
According to local legend, members of the Doan Gang hid – and possibly buried treasure – in caves, and this story has inspired generations of locals to search for the cave and initials.
The stone with the inscription confirms a sensational newspaper story from over 160 years ago. In January 1859, local schoolteacher Joseph Fell wrote to the Bucks County Intelligencer to announce that his son and several friends had descended into Buckingham Cave on Christmas Eve. There they found the inscription “1775 M. DOAN” carved into one of the walls. Joseph Fell then visited the cave and saw the initials himself. The cave was filled in with dirt and debris sometime after Fell’s visit, starting in the 1860s.
Moses Doan was a member of the infamous “Doan Gang,” a network of Loyalists in Bucks County who supported Great Britain during the Revolutionary War. The Gang robbed tax collectors, militia members, and other citizens who supported the revolutionary cause. Moses Doan was ultimately killed in shoot-out at a cabin along Tohickon Creek in 1783.
Flack called the discovery “his life’s dream“ and added, “I grew up reading about this cave and this alleged inscription, and to actually find it has just been incredible. The inscription leaves open the possibility that Moses Doan may have actually been in this cave. We may ultimately never know for sure, but just finding these pieces of evidence suggests intriguing possibilities.”
Rediscovering the cave and the inscription has not been an easy road.
“We found the ‘1775 M’ stone deep in the cave, near the chamber when Josh Gates and I were digging on the show,” Flack said. “It was part of a pile of debris that had fallen off the wall over the years. It was actually Frank Lamitina who saw the carving on a stone lifted out of a bucket and said, ‘Hey, is this something?’ It was just the most amazing moment.”
The newly discovered stone and Colonial bottle were unveiled to the public for the first time on July 28 at a special Mercer Museum community program called, “Outlaws in the Underworld: Bucks County Caves and the Doan Gang.”
The Mercer Museum will offer it again on Monday, Aug. 5, via Zoom for global audiences or those who were unable to attend Saturday’s event. For information, visit doangang.org.
In the near future, the stone with the inscription and the bottle will be on display as part of the Mercer Museum’s exhibition “The Doan Gang: Outlaws of the Revolution,” open to the public until December 2026.
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