Treasure Tales of California Part 4

[pegleglooker]

And the last.. Part 4


60. Toby Bierce was an elderly stockman who sold horses in the Sacramento Valley around 1900. On one of his trips, he returned to his camp
at Bierce Meadow, now called Cleveland Meadow, on the S Fork of the Trinity River with 800 silver dollars which he buried near his cabin.
Shortly afterwards he became ill and was taken to Redding where he died. His cache of silver dollars was never found.
61. In the 1860's, 2 miners were attacked and robbed of $40,000 in gold along Beegum Creek near today's Wildwood. Later captured by
lawmen, the Indians confessed that the gold was placed in a pool of water in limestone cave along Beegum Creek, but were hanged when they
refused to take the posse to the site. It has never been found.
62. In 1863, 8 soldiers played a long-session poker game using their 7-months' back pay as their stakes. Lt. Jonas Wilson won all the gold
coins, some $10,000 worth, and buried the money in the roots of a "two pronged black oak charred by lightening" for safekeeping, not wanting to
take the heavy coins into battle with the Indians. Wilson was killed the next day and his cache went un-recovered. The search area is at the foot of
Hamen Ridge at the upper end of Hoaglin Valley near Zinia.
63. In 1911, a train was robbed at a curve within sight of Delta. A large quantity of gold was taken from the Wells Fargo box and from a large
number of loggers on board who had just been paid their wages in gold coins. Because of the considerable weight involved, it is believed that
much of the loot was buried in the immediate area.
64. An express man was robbed of $17,000 in gold dust at the base of Trinity Mountain in 1856. The 5 outlaws took off with the gold and, near
the head of Clear Creek, split up the loot, each burying his own individual share. The bandits were all captured later and the confessions of the
men sent the sheriff to the site where he recovered $14,000 in gold. The other $3,000 was never found.
65. When in route from Redding to Weaverville, an army payroll detachment was attacked by Indians. The gold payroll was buried and only
one solider managed to survive the ambush and he was badly wounded. He marked the payroll site by sticking a rifle into the ground and crawled
away from the site. He was found and taken to French Gulch. Before he died he told the stories, but subsequent searches failed. Many years later, 2
deer hunters came across the rifle in the French Gulch area without knowing the story.
66. In 1892, John Ruggles and his brother Charles robbed a stagecoach in the Blue Cut. One of the men was wounded in the holdup and a
guard on the stage killed. The 2 were captured by lawmen later and revealed that they had open the Wells Fargo strongbox, taken out enough
money to make their getaway and buried the rest down the side of a gulch to a creek which paralleled the stage road to Redding on Red Bluff.
After their confessions, the pair was lynched by an angry mob and the search was underway for the treasure cache. It was never recovered and
remains buried somewhere in the area of what is known today as "Ruggles Boys Gulch". Some sources place the value at $17,000 in gold bars
while others claimed it contained between $25,000 and $75,000 in gold coins.
67. Loot from a September, 1890 stage holdup was buried in the vicinity of the robbery, 1/2 mile off the road and about 6 miles out of Redding
heading towards Centerville. A large cache of gold coins were taken from the strongbox as well as about $800 in passenger's valuables. None was
recovered.
68. A prospector once came upon a cave in the area of Bear Creek SE of Redding a few miles N of the county line. Crawling into the narrow
entrance he found it to be filled with relics, gold and a large fortune of an un-described nature. He took all he could carry and concealed the
opening. When he tried to return to the place to recover the balance of treasure, he was unable to retrace his steps. It is believed that the cave was
the depository for loot stolen by Indians.
69. Bloody Springs is located a few miles SE of Pittsville and above the bank of the Pit River. Indians massacred an emigrant train here that
was carrying $60,000 in $20 gold coins. A lone survivor made his way to Fort Crook and told the story, also relating that he witnessed the Indians
held a "contest" to see which of them could throw the coins across the gorge. It ended when all the coins were either in the river or lodged in the
rocks of the gorge walls. An occasional gold piece is still found here today.
70. In 1853, the Bentz and Company store in Long Bar was robbed of 3 silver pocket watches, 2 gold pins, one ring, $500 in $10 and $20 gold
pieces, several hundred dollars in retorted quicksilver and several dollars in gold dust and nugget specimens. The robbers are believed to have
buried the loot just N of East Biggs, 60 miles N of Sacramento.
71. Highwaymen robbed the Shasta-Marysville stage of $16,000 in gold in 1860 at Battle Creek near Lowrey's Ranch. It is commonly believed
that the strongbox was buried somewhere near the holdup site near a dry slough. A knife and some old clothes have been found, but the gold was
not.
72. The outlaws Three Fingered Jack and Joaquin Murrieta buried a strongbox containing 250 pounds of gold nuggets worth $140,000 on the
banks of the Feather River, a few miles S of Paradise. This hoard was never recovered.
73. The outlaw Joaquin Murrieta is credited with burying over $250,000 in loot before he was killed in 1853. In one of his forays, he robbed a
stagecoach of several hundred of pounds of gold nuggets which he buried in a canyon a few miles S of Paradise along the Feather River where,
according to Wells Fargo officials, it remains to this day. Most of the treasure stolen by Murrieta and his gang was cached in the area of their
robberies, primarily in Shasta and Calaveras Counties. Much has yet to be found.
74. $150,000 worth of gold nuggets weighing 250 pounds, along with valuables and cash stolen from stagecoach passengers, was buried on the
muddy banks of the Feather River near the robbery and massacre site, 5 miles S of paradise.
75. The Langley family operated a paying gold mine at (GT) Cherokee in the 1860's in the Cherokee Hills. In their workings they found a
sizeable quantity of raw diamonds and had accumulated quite a large amount of gold dust and nuggets. The Langley's hid 2 saddlebags filled with
their raw gold and diamonds about 1/2 hour's horseback ride up the creek above their camp for safekeeping. The family was attacked by bandits
and the brother who hid the treasure was killed. Not knowing exactly where the cache was made, the family never recovered the treasure. The
remains of an arrastre and a wash-out dam mark the location of the old Langley campsite today.
76. In 1888, a $2,000 payroll was stolen from a stagecoach at a point on Hwy. 29 S of Middletown and just N of the Napa County line. The
strongbox was buried either near the summit of the Calistoga-Middletown Stage Road (Hwy. 29), or at a similar spot on the Ida-Clayton Toll
Road, SW of Middletown and just N of the Sonoma County line. The cache of gold coins is still there. The robbery is attributed to the outlaw Black
Bart.
77. Charles B. Sterling was a rancher and miner in 1849. He buried $5,000 in gold dust contained in a gin bottle in the banks of a slough near
French Crossing on Butte Creek for safekeeping while he took a wagonload of produce into the mountains where he panned for gold. His stay was
longer than usual and when he returned he found that a fire had swept the area and obliterated his landmarks. He searched for, but never found,
his bottle of gold.
78. The Ruggles Brothers robbed a stagecoach in 1892 of $50,000 in gold on the old stage route between Weaverville and Redding, the holdup
taking place about 1 mile past Shasta. Charles, one of the brothers, was badly wounded in the holdup and left behind as John Ruggles rode off
with the loot. Somewhere between Shasta and Woodland on a lonely 125 mile-long trail, John Ruggles buried the $50,000 in gold. It has never
been found.
79. Henry Gordier accumulated a fortune in gold as a miner and, in 1857, retired from prospecting and purchased a herd of cattle, settling
down on a farm on Baxter Creek on the N side of Honey Lake and just outside Wendel. Even with his miserly ways, Gordier was well-liked by his
neighbors and, in 1858, turned up missing. 3 unsavory characters moved into the ranch house and claimed that they had purchased the farm and
Gordier had left the region. When his body was found in the Susan River, however, the 3 were arrested and, after a quick trial, the men were
hanged for his murder. It was presumed that Gordier buried his accumulated gold somewhere in the area of his cabin on Baxter Creek, estimated
by friends to total some $40,000, but searchers failed to find it.
80. John Ellison Trueblood came to California in 1852 and settled on a farm on the outskirts of Red Bluff. He buried his money in an iron pot
somewhere on his farm, 100 to 200 rare octagonal $50 gold slugs. He was killed in an argument over the Southern Pacific RR coming on his land
and the secret of his hidden gold died with him. This cache is worth between $500,000 and $1 million today.
81. Pioneer Peter Lassen became a very wealthy landowner and rancher in the 1820's and amassed thousands of acres along the S bank of
Deer Creek. He is known to have buried his coins and dust in iron pots on his property near his home, at the confluence of Deer Creek and the
Sacremento River at Vina or along the Lassen Trail which follows Deer Creek. Lassen was killed by Piute Indians at the age of 30 and his treasure
hoard was never found.
82. In 1873, Tiburcio Vasquez and his outlaws raided the stage stop of Kingston. The bandits bound 39 men and robbed three area stores
before the alarm was given. In their mad dash to their horses, 3 were shot and killed. The man carrying the loot was wounded but managed to
make his way across the river. Finding no horse, he buried the money and tried to escape on foot. A skeleton was found years later and the
treasure was never recovered. The town of Kingston is no longer in existence in Lassen County and does not appear on any of this author's maps.
83. Cape Mendocino has been the scene of numerous shipwrecks. One of these vessels was supposedly carrying miners from Alaska and
$65,000 in gold bullion. The captain managed to get the ship's safe ashore and buried it within sight of Hwy. 1. The safe and its contents were never
recovered and most searches for this treasure have concentrated in the area just N of Mendocino while some researchers claimed it was buried in
Russian Gulch.
84. In 1867, Henry Sung How was employed by the Southern Pacific RR as a construction worker laying tracks. He became involved with an
outlaw gang and robbed the RR of its payroll. With a posse in hot pursuit, the gang split the loot, each member getting $10,000 in gold coins. The
other members of the gang were shot and killed by the posse and their share of the money recovered, but How holed up and managed to fend off
the lawmen for quite some time until he was finally shot and killed. The posse searched for his share of the loot but it was never found. The
location is about halfway between Blue Canyon and Placerville, about 4 miles N of Balderston Station and 16-18 miles N of Placerville.
85. In the 1880's, Hiram Neal owned 600 acres of land near Bottle Hill. When he was in his 70's, he confided to his nieces and nephews that
there was a rich gold deposit on the property and showed them a gallon jug filled with acorn sized nuggets. Shortly afterwards, on his deathbed,
he refused to reveal where the rich gold ledge was located, nor where the gallon jug of gold nuggets was buried, saying only that it was "buried
nearby." After his death, and for many years, the relatives searched for both the mine and jug, but neither was ever found.
86. A stranger camped below an overhanging ledge and discovered a rich outcropping and took out 37 pounds of gold. Before an emergency
trip of some nature to Napa Valley, he covered the site intending to return but was killed in an accident. His ledge, in the hills near Garden Valley,
has yet to be found.

[Old California]

PLL,

Number 82 is from my area

It's the wrong county but right story, The best I've pulled from here is a 2 cent piece and allot if iron

Someone found a cache of gold coins about 300-400 yards from here several years ago.

Paul (Ca)

[pegleglooker]

hey gang,
Thankx for the update Old cal. I can't help but wonder how many lawmen helped themselves to some if not all of the loot. To me if $17K was lost and only $14K was found at the site. Then either someone lied about the amount or someone got a " finders " fee. If you know what I mean.....

PLL

[Marius]

Hi
Did anyone even once tried to locate any of sites in your 4 posts?
Where did u take that txt from?Yes would be nice to chose one not far from south cal(im in L.A area),and hit lib. for old news papers and maps,and give a try.
Lemme know if u plan any trips,or if anyone wants to team for a weekend of treasure hunts.
Marius
CA

[Oroblanco]

Tag post please ignore

[tapoutking]

I misplaced my California buried treasure book (ironic isn;t it) and there is a story regarding the Sespe mountains, Indians mining for the Santa Barbara Mission and a church that was built near the mine for the indians by the Mission. Anyone have the story It was next on my list of searches but I cannot find my book..

[pegleglooker]

hey tapout,
I googled Santa Barbra, mission, sespe mts and this is what I got:

This is a geological survey from 1907 ( you can download the pdf version of the book )
http://books.google.com/books?id=dB4...um=1&ct=result

Here's another report ( in pdf )
http://www.clays.org/journal/archive...9/29-5-353.pdf

Here's the State Mineralist from 1888
http://books.google.com/books?id=-h0...um=1&ct=result

and finally here is a list from scribd.com
http://www.scribd.com/search?cx=0078...sa=Search#1497

I hope this helps... if you find anything a small token would be nice and of course some pixs

PLL

[tapoutking]

You got it pegleg! Thanks for the info!!!!