Every time they find one of these hoards, I think to myself... Those poor SOB’s... They buried that stuff and they planned on coming back for it... But they obviously met a ‘sudden’ and likely violent end... Some may have died from accidents, but most were likely killed by whomever they were hiding their fortune from.
That old adage... ‘You can’t take it with you’... Holds as true today, as it did back then... You really can’t take it with you.
Perhaps more likely, they had it hidden and either lived alone, or kept the secret from other family members — then died of natural causes.