The Silver Madonna and Other Tales of America's Greatest Lost Treasures

The Silver Madonna

and Other Tales of America’s Greatest Lost Treasures

Other Books by W.C. Jameson

Buried Treasures of America Series

Treasure Hunter: Caches, Curses, and Deadly Confrontations

Buried Treasures of the American Southwest

Buried Treasures of Texas

Buried Treasures of the Ozarks

Buried Treasures of the Appalachians

Buried Treasures of California

Buried Treasures of the Rocky Mountain West

Buried Treasures of the Great Plains

Buried Treasures of the South

Buried Treasures of the Pacific Northwest

Buried Treasures of New England

Buried Treasures of the Atlantic Coast

Buried Treasures of the Mid-Atlantic States

New Mexico Treasure Tales

Colorado Treasure Tales

Florida’s Lost and Buried Treasures

Lost Mines and Buried Treasures of Arizona

Lost Mines and Buried Treasures of Old Wyoming

Lost Mines and Buried Treasures of Arkansas

Lost Mines and Buried Treasures of Missouri

Texas Tales of Lost Mines and Buried Treasures

Legend and Lore of the Guadalupe Mountains

Lost Mines and Buried Treasures of the Guadalupe Mountains

Lost Treasures in American History

Buried Treasures of the Ozarks and Appalachians

Finding Treasure: A Field Guide

Outlaw Treasures
(audio)

Buried Treasures of the Civil War
(audio)

Beyond the Grave Series

Butch Cassidy: Beyond the Grave

Billy the Kid: Beyond the Grave

John Wilkes Booth: Beyond the Grave

Books on Writing

Hot Coffee and Cold Truth: Living and Writing the West

Notes From Texas: On Writing in the Lone Star State

Want to be a Successful Writer? Do This Stuff

An Elevated View: Colorado Writers on Writing

Poetry

Bones of the Mountain

I Missed the Train to Little Rock

Open Range: Poetry of the Re-imagined West
(edited with Laurie Wagner Buyer)

Food

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The Ultimate Chili Cookbook

Fiction

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Other

Unsolved Mysteries of the Old West

A Sense of Place: Essays on the Ozarks

Ozark Tales of Ghosts, Spirits, Hauntings, and Monsters

The Silver Madonna

and Other Tales of America’s Greatest Lost Treasures

W.C. Jameson

TAYLOR TRADE PUBLISHING

Lanham • New York • Boulder • Toronto • Plymouth, UK

Published by Taylor Trade Publishing

An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.

4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706

www.rowman.com

10 Thornbury Road, Plymouth PL6 7PP, United Kingdom

Distributed by National Book Network

Copyright © 2013 by W.C. Jameson

All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Jameson, W. C., 1942–

The Silver Madonna and Other Tales of America’s Greatest Lost Treasures / W.C. Jameson.

pages cm

ISBN 978-1-58979-839-7 (pbk. : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-58979-840-3 (electronic) 1. Treasure troves—United States. I. Title.

G525.J357 2013

917.3—dc23

2013012809

™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

For Laurie

Contents

Contents

Map

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Silver Madonna

Chapter 2: The Lost Treasure Ship of the California Desert

Chapter 3: The Goat Herder’s Lost Treasure

Chapter 4: The Lost Treasure of Shafter Lake

Chapter 5: The Lost Dutchman Mine of the Superstition Mountains

Chapter 6: The Huachuca Canyon Treasure

Chapter 7: Seventeen Tons of Gold at Lost Mesa

Chapter 8: The Lost Treasure of Cancino Arroyo

Chapter 9: The Lost Grierson Fortune

Chapter 10: The Red Bone Cave Treasure

Chapter 11: The Silver Bullets

Chapter 12: The Lost Gold Mine of the Cossatot

Chapter 13: The Lost Treasure of Skeleton Canyon

Chapter 14: The Lost Yoachum Dollars

Chapter 15: The Beale Treasure

Chapter 16: Incan Treasure in Texas and America’s First Bible

Chapter 17: Lost Treasure in the Monahans Sandhills

Chapter 18: Chief Victorio’s Gold

Chapter 19: The Lost Billy Bowlegs Treasure

Chapter 20: Gasparilla’s Lost Treasure

Chapter 21: Colonel Dunham’s Lost Payroll

Chapter 22: Cumberland Mountain Silver Mines

Chapter 23: Devil’s Canyon Gold

Chapter 24: The Incredible Journey of the Confederate Treasury

A Word about Sources

About the Author

The Silver Madonna

and Other Tales of America’s Greatest Lost Treasures

Introduction

The Silver Madonna, the inspiration for the title of this book, is a two-foot-tall statue fashioned from almost pure silver. It was stolen from a Canadian Indian village in 1759 and transported across the national border to a remote area in New Hampshire where it was lost. Its worth—both the silver and the historical—is inestimable. As a result of years of careful research, the location of this valuable object is likely known to within twenty feet. As you will discover, however, on reading about this and other lost treasures in this book, recovery sometimes offers greater challenges than discovery. As enhanced research opportunities and technology improve over time, however, the possibilities of locating and retrieving the Silver Madonna, as well as other treasures in this book, are growing.

For generations, Americans have thrilled at the prospect of mounting an expedition to go in search of some lost mine or buried treasure. Who has not longed to find a buried chest of gold coins, a cache of silver ingots, a stash of diamonds and emeralds? Who has never experienced the excitement of the quest for such things?

Tales of lost mines and buried treasures have captivated man’s imagination since the dawn of civilization. A number of overland odysseys and dramatic sea voyages were initially undertaken as a search for riches of one kind or another. Many of the most popular myths and legends handed down over time from Greek, Roman, Scandinavian, and other cultures were about the quest for lost treasure. Dozens of the most enduring novels of the past decades deal with the search for lost and buried treasure:
Treasure Island
,
King Solomon’s Mines
, and
Treasure of the Sierra Madre
, to name a few
.
Contemporary author Clive Cussler’s novels relating to searches for lost treasure hit the best-seller lists with each release. My own Buried Treasures of America series includes over thirty books that have enjoyed robust sales for over two decades. A memoir,
Treasure Hunter: Caches, Curses, and Deadly Confrontations
, was named Indie Reader Best Book of 2011.

Hollywood has long capitalized on the public’s fascination with lost mines and buried treasures. Some of the most successful films in recent years include the Indiana Jones series,
National Treasure
,
Sahara
,
Fool’s Gold
, and more. Additional films are being planned, as are a number of television series. There are five national magazines devoted specifically to treasure hunting.

Lost mines and buried treasures exist. I have made a career of searching for, locating, and writing about them. In recent years, significant discoveries have been reported: hundreds of millions of dollars in gold bullion from the sunken S.S.
Central America
off the Carolina coast; the discovery of thirty bars of buried gold ingots by an Arizona rancher; the amazing treasure recoveries from the Spanish vessel
Atocha
off the coast of Florida; 880 silver ingots found in a cave in the Mexican Sierra Madres.

For every lost treasure that is found, dozens, perhaps hundreds, more await discovery. Because of advances in detecting technology, research, and recovery techniques, more lost mines and buried treasures have been located in the past fifty years in the United States than ever before in history. The twenty-four tales included in this book are among the most famous and remain the most inviting to treasure hunters, professional and amateur. Not only are the stories compelling; the treasures themselves afford remarkable chances for discovery.

1

The Silver Madonna

One of the greatest lost treasures in the history of the United States is a two-foot-tall statue crafted from what researchers maintain is pure silver. The figure, representing a mother and child, was called the Silver Madonna and was looted from a Canadian chapel in 1759 by a group of Robert Rogers’ Rangers. While fleeing pursuit, the troopers carried the valuable idol to a location in New Hampshire where it was pushed into a river where, perhaps, it lies today. Between the silver content and the historical value, experts insist the Silver Madonna is worth several million dollars.

Captain Robert Rogers is identified in history books as the founder of Rogers’ Rangers. The Rangers, initially composed of farmers, herders, and tradesmen from small New England villages, were brought together during the early 1750s by Rogers, who taught them the fundamental skills of fighting and warfare he had earlier learned from the Indians. He taught them how to track, the art of guerilla fighting, how to organize and conduct surprise raids, and how to endure a variety of adverse conditions. Rogers’ Rangers served with the British Army during the French and Indian War (1754–1763) and were primarily responsible for scouting and conducting raids on enemy positions.

Though technically soldiers, the Rangers disdained rules, authority, and uniforms. They have been described as mercenaries, but some researchers regard the Rangers as little more than hired killers, in part because Rogers allowed his men to take scalps and loot villages and camps. Still others disagree and apply labels of “heroes” and “valuable assets” to the Rangers.

Rogers was born on November 7, 1731, in Methuen, Massachusetts. As a youth, he volunteered as a scout during conflicts between the settlers and Indians. From these same Indians, Rogers learned stealth, courage, camouflage, and survival techniques—skills that were to eventually serve him well during his period of leadership of the Rangers, the United States Army’s first commandoes.

At the onset of the French and Indian War, the country of France, its Canadian colonies, and several allied American Indian tribes, waged war against Great Britain and the American colonies. The construction of Fort Duquesne by the French near the present-day city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is believed by most historians to have initiated the hostilities. The Virginia colony sent out a force to evict the French from the territory, at the time claimed by Virginia. The contingent was led by a twenty-two-year-old lieutenant named George Washington.

Major General William Shirley, realizing a need for the skills and services provided by Rogers’ woods-wise and fearless fighting force, commissioned the group of sixty men in 1756. By July of 1758, Rogers was given the rank of major and the command of six hundred men.

During the war, relations between the French Canadians and the British and American colonies grew tense along the border between the two countries. Confrontations and conflict grew more frequent and violent, and General Jeffrey Amherst, commander of the British troops at Fort Ticonderoga, was becoming annoyed and concerned with the growing number of raids launched across the international border by the French and their Indian allies. Amherst knew of Rogers’ Rangers and regarded them as an undisciplined and insubordinate gaggle of riff-raff. Furthermore, he despised Major Rogers.

In the final analysis, however, Amherst determined a retaliative strike across the Canadian border was in order and was well aware that his own troops were not up to the task and that no one, he was convinced, could carry it out but Rogers. The general met with Rogers and told him he wanted him to cross the border into Canada and launch a raid on an Abenaki Indian village known as St. Francis. Amherst instructed Rogers to give no quarter.

Twenty-two days following the meeting with Amherst, Rogers led a contingent of seven hundred Rangers to the outskirts of the Indian village in the middle of an October night in 1759. Thirty of his men were on horseback, the rest on foot. Packhorses transported supplies. After receiving a report from his scouts, Rogers issued instructions to his command. A short time later the Rangers had surrounded the village. Just as the rising sun illuminated the treetops of the adjacent forest, Rogers fired his musket, the signal to commence the assault.

The Rangers streamed into the village shooting and clubbing the surprised and confused Indians. Several were shot and killed as they slept on their pallets. Others were pulled from their shelters and executed on the spot. Women and children were slaughtered indiscriminately. A Catholic priest was dragged from the sanctuary of the chapel and killed.

So complete was the surprise attack that after only twenty minutes, more than two hundred Abenaki Indians lay dead in the village. The Indians’ lodges were then set afire. While they blazed in the morning light, the Rangers went among the dead taking scalps and mutilating the corpses.

At this time, two dozen Rangers entered the chapel with the intention of sacking it. Golden candleholders, chalices, and crosses were snatched up and stuffed into canvas packs. On reaching the altar, a number of the Rangers halted and stared, stunned, at a remarkable statue perched on a wooden pedestal just behind it.

They had heard tales of this amazing statue but were not certain whether to believe them or not. It had been presented as a gift to the Abenakis a few years earlier. Just over two feet tall and crafted from native silver, a polished figure of a woman holding a child reflected the flickering light of the burning village. It was called the Silver Madonna. Once the initial surprise of encountering the statue had passed, several of the Rangers lifted it from the pedestal, carried it outside, and strapped it to the back of a packhorse.

Rogers surveyed the village to make certain that there were no survivors. This done, he assembled his troops and informed them that a handful of the Indians had escaped and would no doubt alert any French soldiers and other Indians nearby. He told them pursuit was imminent and that it was imperative they return immediately to Fort Ticonderoga.

With adrenalin still running high, Rogers’ command set out, the officers mounted and the soldiers afoot. Supplies and munitions were reloaded onto the packhorses. The last two horses in the caravan carried the spoils taken from the chapel, including the Silver Madonna.

After two hours of brisk marching, a rear scout informed Rogers of a large force of armed and mounted French soldiers approaching rapidly from the direction of the village. Accompanying them, he said, were one hundred Indians. Realizing that his troops were growing exhausted from the long trek from Fort Ticonderoga, the battle, and the previous two hours of marching, Rogers considered that he needed an advantage. He split his force in order to confuse the pursuers. Rogers led one-half of the Rangers southward toward the border and the colonies. The remaining half was to leave the trail, enter the deep forest, and continue eastward for several miles before turning south. The packhorses carrying the loot from the chapel and the Silver Madonna followed the group that traveled to the east.

Rogers’ attempt to confuse the pursuers was ineffective. On reaching the point in the trail where the force had separated, the French commanders wasted no time in dividing their own, sending one contingent to the south and the other to the east. Knowing they were closing in on the Americans, the French increased their pace in anticipation of overtaking them at any time. Only minutes later they caught up with both groups. Stragglers at the end of the fleeing columns were shot and killed, and the French soon closed in and engaged the remainder in hand-to-hand combat.

Finding themselves at a distinct disadvantage as a result of fatigue and surprise at the rapidity with which the French and Indians caught up with them, the Rangers suffered heavy casualties. The group fleeing toward the east suffered the most. Engaged in two full days of running and fighting with the French, they found no time to rest and eat. In addition, a severe snowstorm struck the region, which added to their hardship. Ill prepared to fight the French as well as protect themselves from the freezing temperatures, members of this Ranger party began deserting, fleeing southward through the woods in small groups at every opportunity.

The eastward-bound party of Rangers eventually arrived at the southwestern edge of Lake Memphremagog on the Vermont–Quebec border. The packhorse transporting the candlesticks, chalices, and other gold and silver church artifacts was tiring under the heavy weight. Rather than take the time to cache the treasures, the Rangers simply abandoned them. They continued, however, to lead the packhorse carrying the Silver Madonna. Burdened by its load, the horse struggled, growing weaker with every mile. At one point where the lake was quite shallow, they decided to save time by crossing it. On reaching the opposite shore, the party, now much reduced in size as a result of desertion and death at the hands of their pursuers, turned southward and headed toward the Connecticut River. During their flight, the French and their Indian allies remained close behind, sometimes coming to within twenty yards of the Rangers, picking off a half-dozen of them each day.

The contingent of Rangers grew smaller, hungrier, more exhausted, and more desperate with each passing hour as they fled through the Vermont woods. By the time they reached the Connecticut River, only four of them survived, and they had run out of food. All they had in their possession were their guns and the packhorse carrying the Silver Madonna.

One of the Rangers, a sergeant named Amos Parsons, had some knowledge of the region through which they traveled and told his fellows that he was certain he could elude the pursuing French. After crossing the river and entering New Hampshire near the present-day town of Lancaster, the exhausted Rangers followed the Israel River upstream and into the foothills of the White Mountains.

For two days they had experienced no pursuit. They assumed they had either eluded the French or, equally exhausted and out of provisions, their enemy simply turned back. For another two days, Parsons led his companions on a slow and difficult trek through the rugged foothills. The packhorse carrying the Silver Madonna had gone lame and had difficulty walking.

As wild game and berries were scarce to nonexistent because of the storm and the below-freezing weather, the soldiers were reduced to making soup out of strips of their buckskins. Weak and starved, they left the game trail that paralleled the river and ascended a narrow path with a number of switchbacks. After several minutes they found themselves in the shelter of an overhanging rock forty feet above the river. Here, they decided to stop and rest.

They unstrapped the Silver Madonna from the packhorse and carried it to the rear of the shelter. They then killed the animal, hacked off pieces of flesh with their hunting knives, and ate them raw. When their bellies were filled, they lay down on the floor of the shelter and slept for the first time in days.

Just before sunrise of the following morning, two of the Rangers awoke with severe stomach cramps. Parsons experienced a high fever accompanied by delirium. During one raging episode he became confused. He spotted the Silver Madonna at the rear of the shelter and crawled toward it. In his excited, manic stage, he reasoned that the idol was somehow responsible for all of the trials and troubles he and his companions had suffered. He pulled the statue from its hiding place, dragged it to the edge of the shelter, and pushed it over, letting it bounce and roll down the steep bank and into the Israel River. After watching the Madonna disappear beneath the waters of the stream, Parsons, now screaming and pulling clumps of hair from his head, dashed down the trail and into the woods. He was never seen again.

For another two days and nights, the three surviving Rangers lay in the rock shelter fighting their sickness and exhaustion. On the third morning, one of them awoke to find his companions had died during the night. Desperate, he fled from the shelter and resumed plodding up the trail that paralleled the Israel River. When darkness arrived, he sought shelter in a hollow log for the night. The following morning he rose and resumed his trek in hopes of encountering a farm or settlement where he might find help.

Around midmorning, the Ranger arrived at a small settlement of woodcutters consisting of five families. On spotting the pathetic, emaciated wretch wearing clothes that were little more than rags, the settlers took him in, fed him, and tried to make him comfortable.

Nearly two weeks passed before the Ranger was able to sit up and talk. He was lucid for only short periods at a time, but woke often during the night screaming and delirious. During his period of recovery, he told his caregivers about the Rangers’ raid on the Abenaki village in Canada, the theft of the Silver Madonna, and the ordeal of fleeing from the French soldiers and Indians through the wilderness. In a very detailed narrative, he related how he and his companions lay in the rock shelter trying to recover from their illness and exhaustion. He told of how trooper Parsons pushed the Silver Madonna off the edge of the shelter and into the river.

With the passage of a few more days, the Ranger regained much of his health, but his mind never recovered from the ordeal. During his second month of living among the woodcutters he went completely insane.

On hearing the story of the Silver Madonna and its fate at the hands of trooper Parsons, one of the woodcutters said he knew the location of the rock shelter that was described by the Ranger. Two weeks later, he and three other men left the settlement one morning, followed the trail that paralleled the Israel River, and arrived at the specified location. They climbed the steep, switch-backing trail that led to the shelter and found the decayed remains of two men and a horse. They walked back and forth along the riverbank just below the shelter searching for some sign of the Silver Madonna, but the stream was too deep and swift at this location for them to spot anything. They returned to the settlement by dusk, empty-handed.