"secret Messages" On Sea Charts

[woofgang]

Many years ago when I travelled at sea with DH, the charts used to navigate by were paper and required continual correction as buoys and lights moved and new shallow spots or rocks were identified. It was one of the jobs that some of us wives did.

Many of the charts were still the ones made by the original explorers and some of those original chart makers had hidden messages in things like the naming of islands and mountain ranges, usually their names. One particular one had written "May ***** be damned" backwards across a range of mountains and it was believed that the name of the One to be damned was either his boss or the ship's captain.

The thing is I cannot find anywhere where this story has been written down, although I can remember seeing the actual chart with it on. It would help if I could remember which chart it was but of course I can't.

So can anyone corroborate that story and find me any kind of link to it online please? or maybe you know the title of a book with the info in?

[Marshwarble]

Why hasn't Pirates of the Caribbean used this yet?

[KindThoughts]

I took pity on this thread that only one person answered. Now you have two replies. :-)