(CNN) -- As a young freedom fighter, Nelson Mandela stepped out of a farmhouse hideout in South Africa, took 20 strides and dug a hole on the sprawling land. He leaned over, put in a semiautomatic pistol and 200 rounds of ammunition, and carefully put a khaki uniform over them. After covering them with heaps of soil, he sauntered back into his rural hideout in northern Johannesburg -- hoping to retrieve them soon. He never got a chance to fire a shot with the Makarov pistol. A few weeks after he buried it at the farm in Rivonia, he was hurled into prison for the next 27 years.
@highlight
He buries the gun before he is thrown into prison in 1962
@highlight
The Makarov pistol was a gift to him by an Ethiopian colonel
@highlight
It's worth about $3 million, according to a museum official
@highlight
Group hires military experts to try and pinpoint its exact location
A scramble to find the gun has sparked a frenzy among collectors, historians and @placeholder fans.