Research Material on the Mine

boomer

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The Bowie MineA Literature Review by Bill Townsley
The search for the legendary Lost Bowie Mine has been the topic of ... Rezin Bowie said the battle occurred "six miles east of the old fort" which would ...

http://www.texfiles.com/texashistory/bowiemine.htm

Handbook of Texas Online: LOS ALMAGRES MINE
Los Almagres was transformed into the "lost San Saba mine," then the "lost Bowie ... In 1842 two Anglo-Texans found the old Spanish diggings on the cerro de ...

http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/LL/dkl5.html
 

popeye2002

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Oct 30, 2007
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My dad and I got permission from the landowner and MD'd the site about 1965. At age 12 I was just the shovel man. We found two pieces of ore and a lead ball and a piece of a crucible. Dad's buddy the chemist said ore was hi-grade silver. I still have the stuff!

Bob
 

cedarratt

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Bowie didn't have a mine he just took already mined and cast silver bars from the mission at San Saba. And he carved his name into the wall it can still be seen in the ruins.
 

RELICDUDE07

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I think bowie was from the same area and friends with this guy ,could this be the loot?The story of $2 million dollars worth of Spanish treasure, stolen by the Pirate Jean Lafitte and dumped into Hendricks Lake near Tatum, has persisted in Rusk County for over 150 years --- and, according to many Tatum residents, "has given rise to about that many treasure hunts".
This romantic story goes that Lafitte and his band robbed the "Santa Rosa" in 1816 in Matagorda Bay on the Texas Gulf of pure silver bars and headed for St. Louis with their loot. The pirates are supposed to have joined with one of Nicholas Trammel's caravans in an attempt to transport the silver to safety. In a mad flight from pursuing Mexican soldiers, Trammel himself was reported to order the six wagons carrying the silver to the edge of Hendricks Lake. There the mules were cut loose and the wagons allowed to roll down the bank into the lake.
Over the years, the legend has undergone many variations. Dates differ --- with dumping said to have happened in 1812, 1816, or 1818. Gossip has it silver bars have been taken from the lake --- three in 1913 by loggers, two by fishermen in the 1920's. Others say the treasure was not silver bars, but silver ingots, gold nuggets, hogshead of gold of rare silver Spanish coins.
At any rate, treasure hunters persist in the belief that something of value may have been dumped into Hendricks Lake in the early 1800's.
One of the first attacks on the lake was by the colorful "Fox" Tatum (who named the nearby town) in the 1890's. Tatum and friends tried to pump the lake dry using a wood-fed boiler pump. Hendricks Lake is spring-fed, and the group abandoned the idea after a month of steady pumping that didn't lower the lake a whit. Since that time, a steady stream of both professional treasure hunters' combines, scuba divers and local amateurs have prowled the steep banks and clear waters of the lake....................... By 1817 the privateers of Jean Lafitte and his predecessor, Luis de Aury, were capturing numerous Spanish slavers off the coast of Cuba. The pirate's barracoons, or slave pens, on Galveston Island were often swelled beyond capacity, containing a thousand or more African chattels. Many buyers came to the island to buy slaves at $1.00 per pound, and three brothers, John, Rezin, and James Bowie, were among the pirate's best customers.
 

austin

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Great stories. UPDATES ?????

If you want the real update and the truth, you need to read C.F. Eckhardt's book, The Lost San Saba Mines. Charley still lives in Sequin, Texas and got the whole story( when he was very young) from the grandson of one of the men with Bowie. Might have to go to a university library's special collections to find it, but you will at least know the truth and the truth will set you free. That and keep you from wasting time following BS treasure stories believed by the uneducated and unwashed...
 

Rebel - KGC

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Jun 15, 2007
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If you want the real update and the truth, you need to read C.F. Eckhardt's book, The Lost San Saba Mines. Charley still lives in Sequin, Texas and got the whole story( when he was very young) from the grandson of one of the men with Bowie. Might have to go to a university library's special collections to find it, but you will at least know the truth and the truth will set you free. That and keep you from wasting time following BS treasure stories believed by the uneducated and unwashed...

NOT in TX; if YOU know, please share... THANKS!
 

usernotfound

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What evidence is there to show it is not in Texas?
 

Bowsertxhunter

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May 14, 2016
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Has anyone visited the smelter on top of the hill not for from the calf creek monument
 

EccentricInTexas

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Old Bookaroo

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Dec 4, 2008
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The link to Bill Townsley's research bibliography has been dead for some time. He's moved on to Spider Rock.

For anyone seriously interested in the Lost San Saba/Lost Bowie Mine, I highly recommend David C. Lewis' first rate The San Saba Treasure; Legends of Silver Creek (Denton, Texas: University of North Texas Press, 2018) - Number 26: Texas Folklore Society Extra Book. Mr. Lewis maintains a blog with updated, additional information he's uncovered. This fine book is also recommended in a post below.

John Warren Hunter's Rise and Fall of the Mission San Saba (Grand Prairie, Texas: Frontier Times Publishing House, 1905 - Reprinted 1935) remains an essential book on the subject. It fell out of favor for decades, but recent research has shown much of it is quite accurate. Copies of the original run in the $100 range, but a reprint publisher in India has reasonably priced editions in both hard- and softcover.

Good luck to all,

The Old Bookaroo
 

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