New Mexico does not have a sales tax. On each trip, Doc would retrieve two gold bars and as many artifacts as he could carry. Among those who attested to the accessibility of the peaks treasure was Lynn Porter, a businessman now residing in San Diego, California. In 1797, when the work of the Spanish missionaries had almost come to an end, there was an old Spanish soldier who was at his death bed. Holes were drilled and it assayed at $20.67 an ounce, said Mrs. Noss. Recreational mining continues intermittently in the White Oaks, Pittsburg, Hillsboro, Orogrande and Jicarilla districts to the present day. You just couldn't trust anybody and still can't, she said. The sources of this threat, according to the man who relayed the threat to Scott, were two agents of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Testing the old wooden pole attached to one side of the passage, Doc rejected the idea of using it and dropped into the shaft with a rope instead. And a fourth story, pieced together recently by Howard Bryan, a reporter for The Albuquerque Tribune, centers on another Apache war chief named Victorio. Hearing about the story, Captain Swanner, who was stationed at White Sands Missile Range in the early 1960s, came forward. [3] Noss was ultimately killed by an associate, Charley Ryan, in 1949 after Ryan accused Noss of fraud and Noss threatened to kill Ryan and his family. Neither the Denver Mint nor the Federal records center in Denver, which has copies of gold receints for that period, could find the Noss receipt, spokesmen there said. ", According to the family, Mr. Noss took some gold bars when he found the cavern in 1937, and planned to return for the rest. They found nothing. Gold Bar Found Beneath Mexico City was Loot from Cortes' Aztec Retreat. The soldiers, Airman First Class Thomas Berlett and Captain Leonard V. Fiege said they had found approximately 100 gold bars weighing between 40 and 80 pounds each in a small cavern. Finally, others believe that the treasures were hidden by Chief Victorio, for whom the peak is named. During fluvial events, large volumes of sediment containing free gold are transported and deposited in relatively poorly-sorted alluvial and stream deposits. This is a digitized version of an article from The Timess print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. During World War II, he divorced his wife, Ova, and disappeared for several years. As the years passed, Babe Noss held onto her claim at Victorio Peak, occasionally hiring men to help her clear the shaft. Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology (INAH) says it has now confirmed that a 1.93-kilogram gold bar was part of looted Aztec treasure (AFP Photo/Jesus VALDOVINOS) A gold bar, found 15 feet down in a Mexico City park in 1981, was just announced to have been part of Montezuma's treasure. Did they even exist at all? That while visiting Foss, a man we both knew, E.M. Guthrie, drove in to the station in a late model Ford Thunderbird. Porter and his friends were amused at his story and McDonald, to prove that what he was saying was true, took the two other hunters on a moonlit drive to Victorio Peak. A gold bar found in a Mexico City park in 1981 was part of the Aztec treasure looted by Hernan Cortes and the Spanish conquistadors 500 years ago, a new study says. An affidavit dated October 28, 1961, was signed to this effect, also claiming to have seen a military jeep and a weapons carrier on the mountain. Patterson, Don Breech, Edgar F. Foreman, Leo D. OConnell, Eppie Montoya and B.D. Peering into the darkness, Doc saw an old man-made shaft with a thick, wooden pole attached at one side. She appealed to state officials, who forced the search to stop. He also asserts that military security officers censored out of his report all references to military searches for the treasure. His warriors raided southern New Mexico and Texasin an all-out war against the U.S. Army and the Texas Rangers. Noss traveled down, passing caverns with Native American designs until he reached a room with hoards of gold, jewels, pouches, documents and 27 skeletons. Background research into the enormous wealth contained in the caverns of Victorio Peak revealed many eyewitness reports of the gold. The actual movement of the gold in this last, largest shipment, Shriver said, was done by [U.S.] military aircraft. Independent of Shriver, another source traced a number of large removals from Victorio Peak. Moon, said that he was from the White House Secret Service detail and he showed the officer a green, laminated card which stated Secret Service, Division of the White House. Another man, an engineer named Dick Richardson, told the officer that he was a boyhood friend of Lyndon Johnsons and that he had personally counted 18,888 gold bars in one stack in a cavern at Victorio Peak, each bar weighing about 60 pounds. McGuires Place Now, scientists confirm it was part of a plunder by Spanish conquistador Hernn. It is one of the most celebrated legends of buried treasure in the history of the American West, a thriller that includes a gunfight, nuclear weapons and the Watergate hearings. On the night of September 1, 1968, Porter drove to the peak with a friend and a civilian security guard from White Sands Missile Range named Clarence McDonald. Although the originals have never been recovered, a copy of one of the documents proved to be a translation from Pope Pius III. Still another source reported knowledge of aircraft movements of the gold from Chihuahua to Vancouver, British Columbia, during the period of Johnsons presidency. "We're treating the gold searchers just like any other client," said Jim Eckles, a spokesman for the White Sands range. Berlett viewed this as substantiation for the theory that Spaniards had been responsible for stashing the gold. Although a suitable path fit for wagons couldn't be found, traces of gold were found somewhere close to Silver City to the north. For the next few years, Mr. Noss sought partners to help him find the gold. Berlett and Fiege formed a corporation to protect what they had found and make a formal application to enter White Sands for a search and retrieval of the gold. 'Like Any Other Client'. Sometime around the year 1830, travelers were trying to find a new way to reach California from the newly opened route of Santa Fe. Mr. Mitchell is said to have forwarded the matter to the White House. He used too much dynamite, and the cave collapsed, sealing in the treasure. But the matter would not rest. Bill Shriver, before his death, told this writer that he had a copy of a transcribed order from Lyndon Johnson describing in detail how the president wanted a military escort to handle the supply of gold taken out of Victorio Peak and taken to his ranch. There is evidence to indicate that many gold bars were removed from Victorio Peak a short time after Lynn Porter brought the bar to the Fort Bliss provost marshals office. Begrudgingly, he did so. After 35 years of localized dispute, the Great White Sands Missile Range Lost Gold Treasure Affair has blossomed into a national mystery. In addition, Victorio Peak lay on land owned by the state of New Mexico, and removal of gold without permission of the state violated New Mexico law.4. Victorio knew how much the white man valued gold and had little use for it himself; he amassed vast amounts of treasure by attacking the white settlers. Now, cleared to go by an act of Congress, the best-equipped search ever is under way with $1 million in backing from the descendants and some investors. All Rights Reserved. In 1981, a construction worker discovered the gold bar, weighing 4.25 lbs. Noss refused to obey, and Ryan fired again, hitting Noss in the head, killing him instantly. In 2019, evidence to support the theory that the gold never left Mexico was revealed when archaeologists confirmed that a gold bar found in 1981 was from Montezuma's treasure. The reports of the massive treasure would consume his marriage and eventually his life, and mysteries around the treasure persist to this day (via Legends of America). After the death of Doc Noss, Ova and her family continued efforts to regain access to the big treasure room. Mrs. Noss believes Mr. Bailey's clients to be mili tary officers and perhaps some of her husband's old partners. The night before his death, perhaps sensing that a business deal was going sour, Doc enlisted the aid of a cowboy named Tony Jolley to shuffle the locations of various stashes of the bars. But before that happened, he must have hauled 500 or 600 bars of gold out of there and hid them, contended Mrs. Guthrie. On the night of March 4, 1949, I went with Doc Noss and dug up 20 bars of gold at a windmill in the desert east of Hatch, New Mexico, and reburied them in the basin where Victorio Peak is. Ova convinced Doc to return to the big cave and bring one of the heavy bars back up. Docs object at the time of discovery, of course, was more than old bones. Mr. Fertig denied that the report had been censored. Doc was trying to obey the law but they grabbed our gold, Mrs. Noss said, He blew up. In 1979, he sold a small mail-order business to devote full time to the search. They come in a variety of weights, fineness and designs. Nearly choking, the two men hastily marked their claim and made their exit. He stood guard while McDonald and the other man descended into a large cavern, returning with a crudely formed gold bar roughly 2 1/2 inches wide by 7 inches long. Ryan was charged with murder but was later acquitted. He said he often grew angry that his grandmother was ignored or ridiculed for her efforts. This was one of Apache Chief Victorios hideouts and was the site of a battle in 1880 between Victorios warriors and the U.S. Army Ninth Cavalry Buffalo Soldiers.. McLemore, V.T., 2001, Silver and gold resources in New Mexico: New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources, Resource Map 21, 60 p. Luterbach, T.D., and McLemore, V.T. If nothing else, he said, an exhaustive search would lay to rest a question that has driven the family for more than 50 years. In the meantime, Mrs. Noss said her spies, illegally visited the peak and found military men excavating it. 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