IN SEARCH OF THE AUTHENTIC ORIGIN OF THE BEALE TREASURE STORY

[Rebel - KGC]

By Robert Morriss giving away by Deed all of his furniture and items to keep house in the 1850's to his niece and sister of Anzoletta. Also his wife, Sarah dying at the home of James Beverly Ward in 1861 makes me believe that both were convalescent and unable to care for each other especially Robert Morriss. All the years that Robert Morriss stayed at his nieces home of Anzoletta there is no one saying anything about meeting Robert Morriss or of him ever saying anything to anyone. RM could have had an early stroke before his wife's death. He may have not been able to talk, do or say anything at all. That may be the reason that James Beverly Ward had to make the arrangements for her funeral and pay for the funeral himself. Also Robert Morriss left no Will, rich as he was he had no possessions and while staying at Anzoletta's home, according to court documents she and her family were poor during the Civil War. If Robert Morriss had so much and had a story of treasure to tell surely he would have told his loving niece, Anzoletta.

James Beverly Ward visited the area and farms near where Robert Morriss died, he even purchased a slave girl from Robert Morriss' Doctor. The slave girl was to attend and take care of his mother. The Doctor's brother did go to St. Louis in 1861 on a private business adventure for he and his brother. And then just a couple years before the Doctor died he too longed to go to St. Louis on a business adventure and he borrowed $50. dollars from his brother that had already been there in 1861. This would have been around 1874 or 1875. The Doctor's brother also had a son and it was through him that his father could have went to St. Louis. He could be the author because under testimony he would not state what the business adventure his father or his uncle went to St. Louis for?

Also James Beverly Ward lost Hunter's Hill Plantation in 1870 over debts he owed totaling over eight thousand dollars. All of his lands, his two saw mills, slaves, furniture and farm equipment was not enough to compensate for the amount owed. He needed money as he and his family were staying with his daughter at her home in Lynchburg. JBW was a surveyor after that to make a living. He most likely felt he could write a good treasure story. View attachment 1503952 View attachment 1503953

GREAT R & I, franklin!

 

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[ECS]

... James Beverly Ward lost Hunter's Hill Plantation in 1870 over debts he owed totaling over eight thousand dollars. All of his lands, his two saw mills, slaves, furniture and farm equipment was not enough to compensate for the amount owed.
He needed money as he and his family were staying with his daughter at her home in Lynchburg. JBW was a surveyor after that to make a living. He most likely felt he could write a good treasure story.

...and indeed he did - a story that still continues to beguile the unwary reader to this day.

 

[ECS]

...

James Beverly Ward visited the area and farms near where Robert Morriss died, he even purchased a slave girl from Robert Morriss' Doctor. The slave girl was to attend and take care of his mother.
The Doctor's brother did go to St. Louis in 1861 on a private business adventure for he and his brother. And then just a couple years before the Doctor died he too longed to go to St. Louis on a business adventure and he borrowed $50. dollars from his brother that had already been there in 1861. This would have been around 1874 or 1875
The Doctor's brother also had a son and it was through him that his father could have went to St. Louis. He could be the author because under testimony he would not state what the business adventure his father or his uncle went to St. Louis for?...

...and the connection to the Beale treasure story is the possibility that this doctor was the "unknown author"?

 

[bigscoop]

I'm sure "a lot" of people from the region had gone to St. Louis in the 1800's. I'm sure "a lot" of them had experienced money issues, etc., etc. I'm sure Ward and his family and Morriss and his family and others in the region personally knew some of those people. So what? How does any of this make any direct connection to the narration?

 

[franklin]

Nothing at all except Robert Morriss and the place he died is very remote. Seeing anyone at all to tell this treasure story burden to would have been very few. There were a couple of miles off the main roads and then they were over one half of mile down a farm road of which their farm was at the dead end. They were about mid-point between Lynchburg and Bedford City. Robert Morriss died in Bedford County not Lynchburg. I could see very little visitors coming here to see Robert Morriss unless he sent for them, they were distant neighbors or kin and/or his doctors or nurses. Other than these few people Robert Morriss would have to send a letter and invite them to come and see him.

 

[ECS]

Robert Morriss telling this unnamed "unknown author" the Beale treasure story is the entire basis and only source of the treasure story, and MOST IMPOTRANT, is a part of the story presented in the BEALE PAPERS.
There exists NO outside collaborating evidence that this meeting ever occurred beyond the pages of the job print pamphlet.

 

[franklin]

Robert Morriss telling this unnamed "unknown author" the Beale treasure story is the entire basis and only source of the treasure story, and MOST IMPOTRANT, is a part of the story presented in the BEALE PAPERS.
There exists NO outside collaborating evidence that this meeting ever occurred beyond the pages of the job print pamphlet.

If the meeting did happen it was with one of Anzoletta Saunder's sons or one of his Doctors. They were in a very remote area not in the City of Lynchburg as everyone thought?

 

[ECS]

The important word is "IF".
If this Morriss meeting and telling of the Beale treasure tale never happened, then the 1885 BEALE PAPERS were nothing more than a period adventure/treasure novel with play along parlor entertainment ciphers.

 

[audigger53]

The important word is "IF".
If this Morriss meeting and telling of the Beale treasure tale never happened, then the 1885 BEALE PAPERS were nothing more than a period adventure/treasure novel with play along parlor entertainment ciphers.

The single biggest problem I have about the story is, how can you have 30 men that have been away from home and family for years not take their share of the rewards for their labor to their homes?
"Look at all that gold, silver, and gems. Let's just bury it and not take any home to pay bills." LOL

 

[franklin]

That is the message behind the whole story. Sure men like to hunt and have fun as they already were well off money wise. But finding that much would have only been about $25,000. (each divided among 30 men_). If these men were after adventure of hunting I think that much money would afford a hunt in Africa. Also they must have had families as audigger53 said and they would not stay away from family more than four years time. The whole story is a sham and the author knew it. That is why he said he deciphered paper number two and then he found paper number one and paper number three in the decipherment- IMPOSSIBLE. Also he miss counted at 480 two times and about 73 cipher numbers above 480 still hit on the exact cipher though he should have been off by a count of ten at least seventy three times. Nothing but a novel to make money.

 

[bigscoop]

When we first read the tale it sounds reasonable, but upon closer scrutiny we discover that it's so full of holes it would sink if it were a ship. This is the essence of a good old fashion treasure tale, to which there exist many, "bait the hook and reel them in." Today there are still a lot of people trying to assemble the bits and pieces of these fabricated treasure tale events that never took place.

 

[Rebel - KGC]

DORK FISH!

 

[audigger53]

BTW when I was living in Waynesboro, I did go looking for it. Thinking money! Then I talked with a guy I knew, who I trusted NOT to kill me when we found it and was talking about how to convert the gold and gems into money without paying treasure trove tax, and just leaving the silver. Then his wife who was listening said, "No, we will take it all!". I looked at her and than at him and said, OK, No problem. Shortly after that I left and never brought up the subject again to him. Too much greed can be just as scary as a loaded gun behind you. Later I thought about those guys coming home after extra years away "Hunting". "Hi Honey, I'm home!" "Your Late. What's her name? Who have you been seeing? How are we going to pay the tax bills? Where are the Trophies if you were hunting?" "We found gold and silver and were mining, that's why we are 2-3 years late." "Sure you did, where's the money?"
Wives think very different than men do. Mine gets after me any time I go "Gold Hunting" for just a couple weeks. Now if I found gold and brought it home that would be a different story. Some how I don't think all of the party were single men, that means they had to do a lot of talking to their wives when they came home later than they had planed in the beginning. Just human nature, IMO.

 

[bigscoop]

What "party?" What men? What gold & silver? These events clearly never happened as described in the narration, couldn't have. So why still romance these possibilities?

 

[franklin]

Because even our possibilities in themselves prove that the story never actually happened.

 

[ECS]

... Nothing but a novel to make money.

...and that makes the "authentic origin" 1885 after John William Sherman printed for cousin James Beverly Ward the published job print pamphlet in 1885.

 

[Rebel - KGC]

You mean James Beverly Ward...?

 

[ECS]

Yes, TY.

 

[Rebel - KGC]

YW.

 

[ECS]

Because even our possibilities in themselves prove that the story never actually happened.

One can find the influences of events and stories from the extended Risqué family bloodline beginning with that duel with Thomas Beale concerning Risqué niece Julia Hancock to the massacre of John Pickrell Risqué by Indians while inspecting gold and silver mines in Arizona, genealogy searches of people named or alluded to, the journals of Lewis & Clark (husband of Julia Hancock), Edward F Beale, Pike, Carson and others, newspaper articles on buried treasure, the Gold Bug and cipher articles by Edgar Allen Poe, Confederate cipher codes, Shakespeare candle references, adventure western dime novels,
BUT :
Not one minimal shred of evidence proving that a Thomas J Beale ever led a Party on a perilous adventure out west much less discovered gold and silver, traded silver for jewels in St Louis, stayed with Robert Morriss and the Bufords, and dug a treasure vault 4 miles from Buford's in Bedford county.