gold bars found in new mexico

CNN Almost four decades ago, a gold bar was found on land that used to be Aztec ruins in Mexico. Decades of Searching. These materials, including tape-recorded sessions wherein Lyndon Johnson discussed the disposition of some of the gold bars on his ranch, disappeared from Holmes office at the time of his death in February 1977. A treaty was reached between the tribe and the Federal government in Washington that the Indians could stay upon the land in New Mexico. Treasure Net Forum Shriver also said that he had copies of other presidential messages, several initialed by LBJ, dealing with the clandestine, illegal removal of the gold. ", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Victorio_Peak_treasure&oldid=1133710645, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 15 January 2023, at 04:22. Three days later the Nosses went back, and in the months that followed, Noss hauled gold bars, one at a time, with enormous effort up the narrow passageway, according to Mrs. Noss's daughter, Mrs. Letha Guthrie of Clovis, who said she was also there part of the, time. On August 5, Fiege and his party returned to Victorio Peak, accompanied by the commander of the Missile Range, a secret service agent, and 14 military police. He used too much dynamite, and the cave collapsed, sealing in the treasure. That after he had been beaten to death, according to the information I received, his body was put back into his car, the car was doused with kerosene or gasoline, and then set aflame.. Within moments he found more skeletons, most of them bound and secured to stakes like the first. Occasionally the digitization process introduces transcription errors or other problems; we are continuing to work to improve these archived versions. Ova Noss took up the search, without success. Before leaving, both men had observed an old wooden cross on one of the walls. Gold bullion bars are struck continuously to meet the demand for gold, with the following refineries and mints representing some of the greatest refiners of gold bars: Credit Suisse PAMP Suisse Republic Metals Corporation Sunshine Minting Valcambi Suisse Buying Gold Bullion from JM Bullion This was shortly before a much-publicized expedition, entitled Operation Goldfinder, took place at the site in March 1977. However, Terry Delonas, her grandson, continued the family tradition and formed the Ova Noss Family Partnership. Lost Treasures, Recent Posts. South Pass City - A Look into Wyoming's Past. In 1981, a construction worker discovered the gold bar, weighing 4.25 lbs. After the death of Doc Noss, Ova and her family continued efforts to regain access to the big treasure room. Dangerous unexploded 20mm shells from Phantom jet target practice dot the range, the Army insists. They found nothing. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them. 7 Louisiana Ghost Towns Hidden Deep in the Bayou. In one of the most closely guarded crimes of recent history, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of tons of gold bullion were secretly and illegally removed from caverns on White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, the beneficiaries allegedly including former President Lyndon Johnson and individuals connected with the U.S. Army, the Central Intelligence Agency and organized crime. Now, scientists confirm it was part of a plunder by Spanish conquistador Hernn. All told, he reportedly found 27 human skeletons in the caverns of the mountain. Begrudgingly, he did so. Immediately reporting the activity to Babe Noss, Babe contacted Oscar Jordan with the New Mexico State Land Office, who, in turn, contacted the Judge Advocates Office at White Sands. Alleged gold cache in the U.S. state of New Mexico, "Hunt for Fabulous Cache of Gold Lands in Court", "Following 1937 Story of Buried Gold, Family Searches New Mexico's Sands", "Seekers of fabled southern N.M. treasure sue Army", "Authors re-examine Victorio Peak storyand think gold really may be there", "Treasure or Treachery? And, on March 4, 1949, the day before Doc was shot, a small plane crashed near Victoria Peak killing the pilot and severely injuring Marvin Beckwith, son of the, first Mrs. Noss. Near the bottom, he encountered a huge boulder hanging from the ceiling, almost blocking his way. Another woman, now Mrs. Violet Yancy of Fort Worth, says she married Noss in 1947, that she is his legal widow, and that he gave her 76 per cent interest in the treasure. Many people believe the search points to the area of the four corners. After the discovery, Fiege told several people that he had caved in the roof and walls to make it look like the tunnel ended. They had trekked in from Hot Springs, New Mexico, a town since renamed Truth or Consequences. Doc Noss was born in Oklahoma and traveled all over the Southwest, seeking excitement. 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. Leon Trabuco's Gold A Mexican businessman buries 16 tons of gold in the New Mexico desert and then dies before telling anyone where it is. All four men Fiege, Thomas Berlett, Ken Prather and Milleadge Wessel were, at the time of their find, employees at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico. 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. Stepping into the eerie darkness, Doc was alarmed when he saw a human skeleton, kneeling and securely tied to a stake, driven into the ground. Bill Shriver, an international dealer in precious metals who proved very helpful in the initial stages of this investigation until his death, brought the total still higher. Because of this natural concentration, some placers are richer in gold than the original lode deposits. Chester Stout, for example, a retired Army sergeant, traced the removal of two large truckloads of gold from Victorio Peak, but later had to move out of New Mexico; his life was threatened because, as he was told, he knew too much.. In the summer of 1961, upon the advice of the Director of the Mint, Major General John Shinkle of White Sands allowed Captain Fiege, Captain Orby Swanner, Major Kelly, and Colonel Gorman to work the claim. Discovered by a . CNN Almost four decades ago, a gold bar was found on land that used to be Aztec ruins in Mexico. A retired White Sands Missile Range security guard, residing in El Paso, Texas, indicated that he observed Johnson and former Texas Governor John Connally spending about 10 days in the desolate area around Victorio Peak in the late 1960s. They bore the Spanish stamp. Another source, who asked to remain unidentified, stated that he had personally interviewed several men who had brought a large load of the peaks gold to Johnsons ranch. Forrest . Word of the Doc Noss treasure spread, and keeping people out of the area was no easy chore. 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. One story involves a Jesuit missionary named Padre LaRue whose band of 40 gold mining families was massacred in a punitive raid by Spanish soldiers in the early eighteenhundreds. 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. In the room were two large stacks of gold bars, each roughly six feet high, three feet wide and eight feet long. 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. The two decided to keep the discovery between themselves and return to inspect the shaft later. He worked with a succession of partners, the last of whom, Charlie Ryan of Alice, Texas, shot and killed Noss in an altercation in Hatch, New Mexico, on March 5, 1949. It is estimated that 662,000 oz of gold have been produced from placer deposits throughout New Mexico from 1828 to 1991. He supposedly told his wife: "We can make John D. Rockefeller look like a tramp. now. (Reuters) 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.For 39 years, its origins remained a mystery.INAH - National Institute of Anthropology and History/Handout via REUTERS Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History Though caught trespassing and escorted from the area, the men reported observing several men in Army fatigues upon the peak. The skeletons hands were bound behind its back apparently, the person had been deliberately left there to die. ): GSA Annual Meeting in Denver, Colorado, USA, Luterbach, T. and McLemore, V.T., 2016, Trace element analysis of placer gold samples: Society for Mining, Metallurgy, and Exploration, 2016 Annual meeting. That about a month after that, I heard E.M. had been beaten to death in California. 2003-2008 Church of Scientology International. Victorio Peak, located in northern Dona Ana County, now lies within the White Sands Missile Range in south-central New Mexico. She appealed to state officials, who forced the search to stop. Caballo Mountains - Also called Horse Mountains, the peaks are located 35 miles north of Las Cruces, New Mexico. Patterson, Don Breech, Edgar F. Foreman, Leo D. OConnell, Eppie Montoya and B.D. Docs object at the time of discovery, of course, was more than old bones. Gold Bars Dozens of people claim a piece of the actionthat is, gold bars and treasure said to be hidden on the missile range, and worth from a few million dollars to $1.5billion. Now, scientists confirm it was part of a plunder by Spanish conquistador Hernn. This Nevada Gold Mine Produces Amazing Crystalline Gold Nuggets! Today, the Armys official position on the whereabouts of the gold remains cautious, maintaining that the burden of proof rests with the accusers. Seeking out the Seven Cities of Gold, Onate was said to have been a cruel man, brutally subjugating the Indians to do his bidding by beating and torturing them. We all dream of stumbling onto a map or riddle that will lead us on an adventure to find a treasure of glittering gold and jewels, but most of those tales only exist in bedtime stories and movies. In 1972, F. Lee Bailey became involved in the dispute, representing some 50 clients, including Babe Noss, the Fiege group, Violet Noss Yancy, Expeditions Unlimited (a Florida-based treasure hunting group), and many others. After three years they were given permission to go back to Victoria. Ferdig, adding, The trouble with treasure stories is that there's always a little truth in them.. The affidavit states: I, Thayer Snipes, first being duly sworn, on my oath state: That in the latter part of 1972, I had stopped by the Airport Chevron Station at the corner of Airway Blvd. Finally, others believe that the treasures were hidden by Chief Victorio, for whom the peak is named. With legal ownership established, Noss began to work the claim openly, but he also became increasingly paranoid, hiding the gold bars all over the desert. Unable to sell the gold bars on the open market, Noss was stymied but continued to work steadily to remove the treasure. Most deposits are thin and less than 45 ft below the surface, but thicker deposits are found in the Elizabethtown-Baldy district (up to 275 ft) and in the Rio Grande Valley district (up to 370 ft). The gold was then shipped to Switzerland and sold in a new form in Zurich. Now, instead of having thousands of gold bars to draw from, Noss had only a few hundred that he had hidden in the desert. A narrow passage through rocks kept the bulky Porter from following the other two men into the depths of the peak. In one room he discovered a large stash of old swords and guns, papers and letters from the 19th century, and a kings ransom in jewels and coins. Using ropes for support and guided by his flashlights wavering beam, Doc Noss descended a series of interconnecting chambers which led downward for 186 feet. Over the weekend, he said, someone found the chest he had buried with gold nuggets, coins, gems and artifacts. A four-pound gold bar found on a building site in downtown Mexico City last month is believed to be part of the treasure seized from the Aztec Emperor Montezuma II by the Spanish. After some airmen from a nearby air force base claimed they found some gold at Victorio Peak, the Army and Secret Service began a secret search in 1961. 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. Thayer Snipes of El Paso, Texas, swore to an affidavit regarding another death. A small town was built near the place The fortune of a Mexican emperor? Returning through the main cavern, he noticed an immense stack of metal bars off to one side. Others believe that Noss found the treasure of Don Juan de Onate, who, in 1598, founded New Mexico as a Spanish colony. Fueled by suspicions that the military was working her claim, Babe Noss hired four men to enter the range secretly. Recreational mining continues intermittently in the White Oaks, Pittsburg, Hillsboro, Orogrande and Jicarilla districts to the present day. Among the artifacts, Doc is reported to have retrieved documents dated 1797, which he buried in the desert in a Wells Fargo chest along with various other treasures. The Army put those fellows in there blind knowing they wouldn't find anything.. John Dean, the former lawyer for President Richard M. Nixon, mentioned that Attorney General John Mitchell had been asked to pull strings to allow some searchers to look for the gold. The flamboyant lawyer F. Lee Bailey once said he represented 50 unnamed clients. Becoming desperate for cash, Doc and a man named Joseph Andregg transported gold bars, coins, jewels, and artifacts into Arizona, selling them on the black market. Only four districts have each yielded more than 100,000 oz of placer gold production: Elizabethtown-Baldy (DIS019), Hillsboro (DIS197), Old Placers (DIS187), and New Placers (DIS186). Fearing a Federal swindle at the time, Noss returned to Victoria Peak, carrying out gold bars and hiding them, Mrs. Guthrie said. It was on Nov. 7, we had 11 families on a hunting trip and I was doing the cooking, she said in an interview at her daughter's home in Clovis, N. M. She said her husband, called Doc, had come back, to the camp that night and secretly told her of lowering himself with ropes down a crevice on Victoria Peak into caverns laden with coins, jewelry, guns, swords, letters, 27 human skeletons, and hundreds of metal bars that turned out to be gold. Berlett viewed this as substantiation for the theory that Spaniards had been responsible for stashing the gold. In 1955, the missile range was expanded and, the Army closed Victoria Peak to outsiders. Later, Fiege would take a lie detector test, which would allow Fiege back on the missile range. Now, researchers say the bar was. He also told his wife that there were enough gold and silver coins to load 60 to 80 mules.. Article content. ", According to the family, Mr. Noss took some gold bars when he found the cavern in 1937, and planned to return for the rest. Parts of the treasure were described as gold, silver, jewels and as many as 16,000 gold bars estimated around $1.7 billion dollars. He also asserts that military security officers censored out of his report all references to military searches for the treasure. When Maxmillian heard of the plot to assassinate him, he moved his gold and treasures out of Mexico. TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. The Army, which controls the missile range, insists there is no treasure and has never been any. Noss soon deserted Babe, and in November 1945, a divorce was granted. According to accounts from members of the Noss family, Doc bagged no deer, but he found something that whetted his appetite for the area a shaft near the top of Victorio Peak which led into the bowels of the mountain. The gold concentrates by gravity in incised stream valleys and alluvial fans in deeply weathered highlands. 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. 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gold bars found in new mexico