The Silver Madonna and Other Tales of America's Greatest Lost Treasures (9 page)

Weeks passed, and when it became apparent to Cancino that Upholt would not be returning, he decided to resume the excavation himself. On arriving back at the arroyo, however, Cancino was discouraged to discover that subsequent flash floods had refilled Upholt’s excavations and further modified the channel. Not long afterward, Cancino sold his ranch and his sheep herd and moved to Santa Fe, where he purchased and operated a grocery store. He remained there until he passed away thirteen years later. He never retuned to Cancino Arroyo.

Cancino Arroyo, as it is still known today, remains remote to most travelers. It is, however, occasionally visited by hopeful treasure hunters who believe they might have a chance at recovering what remains of the lost gold ingots which are certain to lie several feet below the surface of the channel. The gold, estimated to be worth several million dollars, remains elusive.

9

The Lost Grierson Fortune

During his lifetime as a successful farmer and businessman, John Grierson amassed an impressive fortune. Grierson, described as eccentric, inherited substantial wealth and then proceeded to make an additional fortune from cotton and livestock on his farm in Tazewell County, Virginia. Grierson owned thirty slaves, and around the time the War Between the States broke out he was thought to be one of the wealthiest men in Virginia. He was regarded as a millionaire, a staggering amount of money at the time.

As the war gained momentum, Grierson grew concerned that his farm, his home, and his fortune would attract raiding soldiers and renegades. He was also worried that the bank in town where most of his money was deposited would be a target for outlaws and Union troops. Grierson withdrew all of his money, converted it into gold coins, placed them into leather sacks, and with the help of a slave, buried them on his property behind his barn. There, this impressive treasure would have likely lain unknown to any and all were it not for the discovery of the diary of an old cowhand in West Texas.

One autumn morning in 1887 on a remote ranch near Pecos, Texas, a young cowboy who had just been assigned to repair some fence at the east end of the ranch walked into the bunkhouse to wake his companion, an elderly man named John Crismo. When Crismo didn’t respond, the boy walked over to his bunk and shook him. In a moment, he realized the old man was dead.

The ranch foreman was summoned. There was little to do but arrange for a burial. That afternoon, the owner of the ranch went through Crismo’s belongings in search of the name of a relative who needed to be informed of the old man’s death. He found nothing of interest until he came upon a diary. The rancher read it, and learned the fascinating details of Crismo’s life along with a description of a buried treasure in faraway Virginia, a fortune worth millions of dollars lying buried beneath only a few inches of soil.

In 1846, when the United States declared war on Mexico, John Crismo enlisted in the army in his home state of New York. Before leaving with his company, Crismo became engaged to a young girl, and the two agreed to marry on his return. While Crismo was in Mexico, however, the young lady fell ill and died only days before he was to be mustered out of the military.

Dejected, Crismo made the long journey back to New York, visited the grave of his betrothed, and rode away, never to return. For years Crismo wandered about in the wilderness of Pennsylvania and Ohio, always keeping to himself and living deep in the woods, craving neither the sight nor company of other men.

When the War Between the States erupted, Crismo, harboring a desire to return to combat, rode into a Pennsylvania town and enlisted in the Union Army. He was assigned to a cavalry regiment and ordered to Virginia.

Crismo’s unit made several successful raids on farms and small communities in western Virginia, taking livestock, food, arms, and often filling their pockets with stolen money. In time, the cavalry contingent became little more than a gang of bandits robbing and looting its way across the Appalachian landscape.

One morning the unit was ordered to patrol an area in southwestern Virginia in Tazewell County. The cavalrymen, twenty-four in number, camped on the side of a mountain that overlooked a long, narrow valley. From the signs of agriculture, the valley was rich and productive. At the far end of the valley was a mansion, and the troopers began to consider the prospect of finding something of value there. The farm and the mansion belonged to the wealthy James Grierson.

Anticipating a successful raid with little to no resistance, the cavalrymen rode into the yard, stormed the house, and took Grierson prisoner. They dragged him outside and hung him by the wrists from the limb of a large tree in the front yard. There ensued a lengthy and rather brutal interrogation. Despite being whipped, Grierson steadfastly refused to reveal where his fortune was hidden. It soon became clear to the soldiers that the farmer would rather die than yield his wealth. Frustrated, one of the officers drew his pistol and shot and killed Grierson.

While Grierson was being tortured, John Crismo befriended an old slave. It turned out he was the one who helped the farmer hide his fortune. The slave confessed to Crismo that he knew where the gold coins were buried. At first, the slave refused to show Crismo the location, but subsequent cajoling and a promise of freedom convinced him to cooperate. The slave took Crismo behind the barn, dug about two feet down into the ground, and pulled up one of the heavy sacks of gold coins. Crismo took the sack and warned the slave not to tell any of the other soldiers about the treasure.

Several days later, the cavalry unit was assigned to another location several miles away. After they had arrived at their new destination and established camp, Crismo rode back to the Grierson farm under cover of night and, with the help of the old slave, dug up all of the sacks of gold coins that had been buried behind the barn. The gold was loaded onto some packhorses, which were then led to the location where the cavalry had camped just prior to raiding the Grierson plantation. Several paces from the campground, Crismo and the slave excavated a hole and placed all of the gold coins within, then refilled it and covered it over with rocks and forest debris. On the way back to the farm, Crismo handed the black man several gold coins he had retrieved from one of the sacks and told him to take the money and his family and flee to the North.

Crismo told none of his fellow cavalrymen about the treasure. The following night, Crismo sat by the light of the campfire, withdrew his diary, and sketched a crude map showing the location of the buried coins. Over several pages, he added a description of the terrain and noted certain landmarks. The following day, the cavalry unit left Tazewell County for a new assignment in the eastern part of the state.

As the Civil War raged on, Crismo’s regiment engaged in several skirmishes. In one, Crismo was seriously wounded. After a lengthy recovery in a field hospital, he was granted an honorable discharge and sent on his way. At first, Crismo thought about returning to Tazewell County and digging up the gold, but ongoing military action there made it difficult. Crismo gathered his few belongings and traveled westward. He decided to continue his recovery exploring the country. When the war was over, he decided, he would return to the mountain overlooking Grierson’s plantation and retrieve the treasure he buried there.

For reasons unexplained, Crismo wandered throughout sparsely settled regions west of the Mississippi River, eventually making his way to Texas. Traveling from town to town and taking odd jobs, the former cavalryman barely made enough to get by. His sparse diary entries during this time suggest that Crismo never entirely recovered from his wound, and that it gave him problems and caused him pain. His writings also suggested that he was not mentally sound.

Years passed, and Crismo landed a job as a cowhand on an isolated ranch several miles out from the town of Pecos, Texas. Though much older than most of the cowhands and quite infirm, Crismo nevertheless proved himself a capable and loyal employee up to the day he passed away in his sleep.

During the months that followed Crismo’s death, his diary passed through several hands before winding up in the possession of a Pecos County man who decided to go in search of the buried cache of coins. Following the somewhat vague directions and referring to the clumsily drawn, faded map, the searcher arrived at a small Virginia settlement called Aberdeen. Just north of this hamlet, the man located a narrow valley that had once been part of the Grierson plantation. The land was now state property, having reverted to government ownership after Grierson died leaving no heirs.

A short distance north of the plantation was a prominent mountain, no doubt the one on which Crismo and his cavalry unit camped prior to attacking Grierson’s mansion. After exploring the area for several days, the searcher discovered what he deduced must have been an old campsite. Here he found two Union Army canteens, numerous shell casings, and other items suggesting a temporary cavalry bivouac. While Crismo’s directions were clear enough to this point, his diary entries never stated on which side of the camp the treasure was buried. For weeks the searcher excavated holes in the area around the old encampment but found nothing. Discouraged, he gave up and went back to Texas.

When he returned home, the searcher placed Crismo’s diary on a high dusty shelf in a storeroom where it remained for years. In time, it became lost and no one knows what became of it.

Others, on learning the tale of the buried coin cache on the mountain overlooking Grierson’s old plantation, have arrived in the area employing metal detectors and dowsing rods. They have combed the mountains near the old cavalry encampment trying to locate what researchers have suggested is a multimillion-dollar cache, but with no luck.

The treasure, consisting of hundreds of gold coins, remains hidden to this day.

10

The Red Bone Cave Treasure

A lost treasure of gold that has attracted the attention of professional treasure hunters over many decades is one associated with a location called Red Bone Cave located on the Tennessee River, not far from Muscle Shoals, Alabama.

A popular legend attributes the origin of this gold to Spanish explorers who arrived in the region under the leadership of Hernando de Soto. In 1538, King Charles V of Spain provided de Soto with enough funding to support a company of more than six hundred men. They were charged with traveling to the New World and, among other things, to search for precious metals, in particular gold and silver. The ore was to be processed, cast into ingots, and shipped back to Spain to fill the country’s treasury.

Following a several-month-long voyage across the Atlantic Ocean, de Soto and his company—soldiers, miners, and priests—traveled, explored, and prospected throughout vast portions of the southern United States from the east coast of Florida to the Ozark Mountains. According to very old documents that have since been found in Spanish monasteries, de Soto was successful, for he eventually shipped millions of dollars’ worth of gold and silver back to Spain.

In addition to mining gold, de Soto also acquired quantities of the ore from several of the Indian villages he encountered during his explorations. Though the Cherokee did not measure their wealth with precious metals, they valued gold and silver for fashioning jewelry and ornaments, which the Spaniard added to the accumulating wealth. When de Soto observed the abundance of gold the Indians possessed, he ordered it taken by force. The ornaments were melted down and formed into ingots.

One of the Spanish detachments that had completed a series of successful raids on Cherokee Indian villages was herding a pack train consisting of forty mules laden with gold along a narrow trail through a forested portion of what was to eventually become the state of Alabama. An hour before nightfall, the party came to a village of Chickasaw Indians. During previous encounters, the Chickasaw proved to be friendly, and this occasion was no exception. The encampment was located a few miles south of the Tennessee River along a tributary that provided good, clear water for drinking.

As winter approached, the Chickasaw invited the Spaniards to remain in their village until the cold weather passed. The Spaniards accepted the invitation, enjoying their time with the Indians and helping them hunt for game.

When spring arrived, the Spaniards began to prepare for departure. Their intention was to travel to the southwest and rendezvous with the main part of de Soto’s force. Before they left, the leader of the contingent of Spaniards demanded that the chief send one hundred of the tribe’s young women to accompany them. The chief refused, and the Spanish grew threatening.

As the Spaniards loaded the gold onto the packhorses, they were surprised by a sudden attack from the now enraged Indians. Panicked, the soldiers mounted their horses and fled from the village. They had no time to finish packing the gold.

The Chickasaw chased the Spaniards northward to the banks of the Tennessee River. The water was high and impossible to cross. With their retreat cut off, the soldiers turned to fight. The battle lasted for almost an hour. When it was over, most of the Spaniards had been killed. The survivors fled into the forest and were never seen again.

When the Chickasaw returned to the village, the chief ordered all of the treasure loaded onto the packhorses and transported north across the river where it would be deposited inside a cave and the entrance sealed.

The ensuing years were good ones for the thriving Chickasaw village. When a white trapper arrived in the area in 1720 to search for beaver in the nearby streams, he first sought permission to do so from the chief of the tribe. Impressed by the young trapper, the chief granted permission and invited him to live in the village while he remained in the area. The trapper chose to do so, and during the following weeks, he and the chief became close friends.

The chief had only one child, a daughter, and as he was very old he grew concerned. He wanted her to find a husband and provide him with grandchildren before he died. The daughter had rejected the courtship of several of the tribe’s braves, and the chief was worried that she would never take a mate. The daughter, however, found the young trapper to her liking. Before long the two of them were spending time together.

Late one night about two months after the trapper had come to the village, he was awakened by a pair of Indians. Speaking not a word, they tied his hands behind his back and placed a blindfold over his eyes before he could identify them. The trapper tried to fight them off, but their combined strength was too much for him. As he ceased his struggles, the Indians told him no harm was to come to him if he did what he was told.

For the rest of the night and into the morning of the following day, the trapper was led through the woods. Once, when the group had paused to rest, the trapper could hear the sound of flowing water. A few moments later, the blindfold slipped slightly and he spotted a wide expanse of the Tennessee River before him, along with high limestone bluffs that rose in the distance beyond.

When the Indians were ready to resume their trek, the trapper was placed in a canoe and rowed across the river. Following a brief hike, the three men arrived at a place where the air was cold and the ground damp. The trapper could hear the chirping of bats and realized he was inside a large cave. The three negotiated passages in the cave, then the Indians called a halt. The trapper was untied and the blindfold removed.

In the flickering light of torches carried by the Indians, the trapper looked around a low-ceilinged chamber of a cave. When his eyes adjusted, he recognized the chief of the tribe along with one of the braves. The chief pointed toward the back of the chamber. Hundreds of gold ingots were stacked against the far wall, reaching nearly to the ceiling. Several wooden chests filled with golden jewelry had been placed at the foot of the stack.

After giving the trapper a few minutes to take it all in, the chief told him this place was called Red Bone Cave. He related a tale of the long-ago visiting Spaniards and their conflict with his tribe. The chief also told him that the gold he saw in the chamber was only part of the total amount hidden in the cave.

The chief guided the trapper into another chamber and pointed to several skeletons propped up against a wall. He explained that they were the bones of the warriors that had died during the fight with the fleeing Spaniards. He said the bodies were placed in this cave to guard the treasure against intruders.

The chief stepped up to the trapper, laid a hand upon his shoulder, and told him that all of the treasure in this cave would belong to him if he agreed to marry his daughter and live in the village. If he should chose not to marry the daughter, he would be allowed to leave the village unharmed, but was forbidden to share the location of the treasure cave with anyone.

The tapper considered his options. If he married the daughter, he would be required to live in the village. Possessing the wealth of a king, however, would do him little good, for he would have no opportunity to spend it. Recalling his view of the river and the limestone bluff when the blindfold slipped earlier, the trapper was convinced that he could return to Red Bone Cave on his own and retrieve the treasure for himself.

The trapper explained to the chief that he would like to have a few days to ponder the offer. The chief agreed. The trapper was tied up again, the blindfold reattached, and he was led from the cave and onto the trail back to the village.

It was dark long before the three men returned to the Chickasaw village. Tired from a full day of walking, the chief decided to make camp at a location alongside the trail near a river and spend the night. Three hours before sunrise, the trapper freed himself of his bonds and the blindfold, crept up to the two sleeping Indians, and killed them. This done, he dragged the bodies to the river and threw them in. At dawn, he began the long trek that would take him to Fort Rosalie in the Natchez Territory. He reached his destination several days later.

At the fort, the trapper ran into an old friend. He told him the story of the great treasure lying in the remote cave near the Tennessee River. The friend agreed to accompany him, and the two men spent the next few days preparing to return to Red Bone Cave. Traveling by night and hiding from Indians during the day, the men were weeks on the trail when the trapper’s friend wearied of the search and returned to Fort Rosalie.

Now alone, and unable to relocate the cave, the trapper decided to return to the Chickasaw village. At first afraid, the trapper was surprised when he was warmly welcomed by the Indians. He later learned that no one ever knew that the chief and one of the braves had taken him from the village that night a few months earlier. The disappearance of the chief and the warrior remained a mystery to the Chickasaw.

Using the excuse of trapping for furs, the trapper undertook his search for Red Bone Cave. He eventually married the daughter of the chief and lived in the village. Though he searched for Red Bone Cave for years, he was never able to find it.

In 1723, the trapper’s wife died from fever. He decided to return to Fort Rosalie. On arriving, however, he found the old settlement had long been abandoned. All was in ruins. It had been attacked years earlier by the Natchez Indians, the inhabitants massacred, and all of the buildings burned to the ground.

The trapper took up residence in the abandoned fort and lived there for the rest of his life. During the ensuing years, he made several forays into the wilderness in attempts to relocate Red Bone Cave and the treasure that lay therein, but he never succeeded.