Victorio Peak Documents, Symbols and Artifacts

Garry

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Apr 19, 2009
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I found this record recently and it really adds little to what wasn’t already known. But, I found the “details” interesting.

I’m not suggesting that this document proves or disproves anything. It is simply another piece of a large puzzle regarding Doc Noss.

I did a screen capture and, to make everything readable, I broke the record down into 3 sections. I hope it is clear.

There is second sheet that I haven’t included. It was simply a figure of a man on which the doctor had noted the location of all of Noss’s blemishes.

Prison Sentence (Doc Noss) -1.jpg

Prison Sentence (Doc Noss) -2.jpg

Prison Sentence (Doc Noss) -3.jpg

Some of the things "I" found interesting from the record:

Noss was 5’ 8” tall and weighed 146 pounds. (For some reason I got the impression he was a much larger man) I guess he still could have been a tough brawler but size does matter. :laughing7:

Noss states he has one child? I have no idea who the child would be but it may have been from an earlier marriage. There is a Milton Noss in a 1930 directory in Pampas, Texas, who is living with a Myrle (That’s all I have found so far)

Ova is living in Long Beach, California? I have not found any relatives there and it was the depression so I don’t know why she took her family to Long Beach.

The information regarding Doc’s parents is right on. (Both were dead and their place of birth is correct)

Doc had 10 years of education. I always wondered how he came to take up the care of feet as his profession. It doesn't sound like he had much formal training.

Doc had been in New Mexico 2 years. This is the same timeline that John Clarence has. It appears this first 2 years were spent in eastern New Mexico and there is no evidence that I have found that he had reached the Hot Springs area by 1935. The reason I mention this is that people have seemingly accepted the story that Doc and Willie Douthit crossed paths. So far, I can’t match them in my timeline.

Garry
 

treasminder2

Banned
Oct 9, 2011
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663
Note his Convict Number is : 8372

my girlfriends birthday is : 8/3/72

add them up = 20

2+0 is = 2

doc was two

numberslady agrees

so we have a 2 type personallity
incarcerated for insulting while armed

and a Hair Doo that matches Faye Ray's of the " King Kong " movie fame .

WOW , we may have a Sasquatch after all .

Big Foot for a Foot Tickler

oh yeah , I can see a Movie in this ,,,
 

Nov 8, 2004
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Garry, you asked -->What kind of assay of a copper bar or ingot would yield the mineral percentages shown on the report (1930s)? Would it be a destructive or nondestructive test? Fire Assay or something else?

Why did the posters lean toward the assay being of ore instead of ingot?

################################


Garry, a simple fire assay with the proper calculations would do it. Non destructive effectively. A 30 gram sample would do it.
 

Garry

Sr. Member
Apr 19, 2009
256
496
Garry, you asked -->What kind of assay of a copper bar or ingot would yield the mineral percentages shown on the report (1930s)? Would it be a destructive or nondestructive test? Fire Assay or something else?

Why did the posters lean toward the assay being of ore instead of ingot?

################################


Garry, a simple fire assay with the proper calculations would do it. Non destructive effectively. A 30 gram sample would do it.

Real de Tayopa,

Thanks for the info!

To make sure I'm on the same page, you are speaking about assaying an ingot, right?

The reason for such a "small" sample is that the ingot material is homogeneous?

Pieces of ore would require a much larger sample to get the same accuracy?

Would an assay reflecting 72% Copper ever be an "ore" sample?

There is a lot of guys in Arizona digging some mighty big holes for copper at a "far" less concentration and I assume they are making money!

I hope I'm not embarrassing myself too badly with these questions. :icon_scratch:

Garry
 

gollum

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Garry,

Assay 1.jpg

Regarding the assay. Dore bars are composed of all the metallic elements that can be taken out of the raw ore. Different parts of the country have different amounts of different minerals amalgamated into any ore. Some parts of the country may have dore bars that are 65% gold, 15% silver, 10% copper, 7% lead, and 3% other metals (rhodium, platinum, turbinium, etc). So, if the native ore was primarily copper, you would get an assay like the one provided.

This is the way I believe it was meant to be read: The bar was GOLD: 146.18 ounces per ton of GOLD @ $34.41 per ounce = $5103.14 per ton of GOLD
SILVER: 87.30 ounces per ton of SILVER @ $0.83 per ounce = $72.45 per ton of SILVER
COPPER 71.18% of 2000 pounds = 1425 ounces per ton of COPPER @ $0.242 per ounce = $344 per ton of COPPER

Between the handwritten and printed portions that seems easy enough to figure. So, by that measure the bar presented to Hawley & Hawley was 71.18% copper, about 20% gold, and about 9% silver. So, if the bar weighed 40 pounds, eight pounds of that was gold. While far from being a pure gold bar, eight pounds of gold from a bar was NOTHING to sneeze at.

In the 1930s, I believe a fire assay (Cupelation) would have been the main way to assay anything. Chemical Assays would be possible, but fire was mainly used. I don't think that gas chromatographs were available quite yet. While on the surface, the assay does look more like one done on raw ore, it was probably a dore bar which would have looked very rough.

Mike
 

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sdcfia

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Garry,

View attachment 1114828

Regarding the assay. Dore bars are composed of all the metallic elements that can be taken out of the raw ore. Different parts of the country have different amounts of different minerals amalgamated into any ore. Some parts of the country may have dore bars that are 65% gold, 15% silver, 10% copper, 7% lead, and 3% other metals (rhodium, platinum, turbinium, etc). So, if the native ore was primarily copper, you would get an assay like the one provided.

This is the way I believe it was meant to be read: The bar was GOLD: 146.18 ounces per ton of GOLD @ $34.41 per ounce = $5103.14 per ton of GOLD
SILVER: 87.30 ounces per ton of SILVER @ $0.83 per ounce = $72.45 per ton of SILVER
COPPER 71.18% of 2000 pounds = 1425 ounces per ton of COPPER @ $0.242 per ounce = $344 per ton of COPPER

Between the handwritten and printed portions that seems easy enough to figure. So, by that measure the bar presented to Hawley & Hawley was 71.18% copper, about 20% gold, and about 9% silver. So, if the bar weighed 40 pounds, eight pounds of that was gold. While far from being a pure gold bar, eight pounds of gold from a bar was NOTHING to sneeze at.

In the 1930s, I believe a fire assay (Cupelation) would have been the main way to assay anything. Chemical Assays would be possible, but fire was mainly used. I don't think that gas chromatographs were available quite yet. While on the surface, the assay does look more like one done on raw ore, it was probably a dore bar which would have looked very rough.

Mike

I have a bit different take, particularly your third paragraph..

It was a fire assay, whether for a crude ingot or a bag of high-grade ore, and the results are clearly noted. Precious metals are always reported in oz/ton (grams/ton nowadays for the heap leach mines), and since the less valued copper is the hugely predominant component, it's noted as a percentage, used to calculate pounds/ton (not ounces).

One forty pound ingot would contain the following:
GOLD (146.18 oz/ton)(40 lb) / 2000 lb/ton = (2.9236 oz)($34.41 $/oz) = $100.60
SILVER (87.30 oz/ton)(40 lb) / 2000 lb/ton = (1.7460 oz)($0.83 $/oz) = $1.45
COPPER (0.71)(40 lb) = (28.40 lb)(0.242 $/lb) = $6.87
TOTAL Value for one 40 pound ingot = $108.92 ($3,800 today's value)

TOTAL Value for fifty 40 pound ingots (one ton of ingots) = ($108.92)(50) = $5,446.00 ($190,000 today's value)

This is good stuff - really good. It's mostly copper, but I'd definitely call it a gold sample. I might point out for discussion that the missing roughly 30% of weight shown in the assay report could be several things, depending on whether the sample was ore or an ingot. If an ingot, it was obviously crude-smelted, and the remainder could likely have been slag, unmelted gangue, other low-value metals, etc. If ore, probably gangue and other minerals.

Another topic of interest that I mentioned briefly yesterday on another thread - the Santa Rita del Cobre mine, operated commercially by the Spanish since ca 1807, but unofficially at least 50 years before that date. The site today is a huge open pit mine, recovering low grade copper from the large deep porphyry deposit. For the first 100 (150) years of the mine's life, however, it was a series of near-surface underground workings. The miners exploited a large number of extremely rich oxide-zone deposits of high grade copper with rich gold in the veins and vugs. This ore may have carried very similar values as the H&H assay above, but we don't know - although there may be old records somewhere in the famous Chino Map Room in Hurley, NM. The coinage smelting operation at Santa Rita shipped relatively high-quality copper ingots to Mexico to be further refined, or in some cases, stamped directly into coins. The gold? If we know six million pounds of copper per year was shipped out, and the high grade ore - or at least some of it - contained mucho gold, we can only guess how much gold was recovered and where it went. I could tell you a story about some of that gold here, but I can't place other people, including myself, in legal jeopardy involving one of the mine's previous operators. Just assume there are "unsubstantiated rumors" out there.
 

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Nov 8, 2004
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G'd morning Garry: The 3o gram sample = referred to as an assay sample - is composed of varios borings etc in your bar then 'thoroughly mixed' and the 30 gram sample is tested. It gves you a fairly accurate composition of the bar.

And Garry, it is never wrong to ask questions.
 

Garry

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Apr 19, 2009
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I'm still digesting, but a quick question. Would the ounces shown on the assay be troy ounces or regular ounces? (1941)

Thanks,

Garry
 

treasminder2

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TROY ?!

Troy Ounces ?

I know that guy Troy , he gave my Kitten Fleas .

watch out for that shmuck , he's infested
 

BIGSCOTT

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yeah scdfia would be right about the copper, gollums thoughts would put copper at $3.80 per pound which it was not in 1940, I wonder if the handwritten portion of that assay was done by the assayer or someone figureing afterwards.

Alot of the assays between 1933 and 1975 said ore even when it was ingots or such, I always figured this was because legally if they called it bullion it would have to be reported.
 

sdcfia

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yeah scdfia would be right about the copper, gollums thoughts would put copper at $3.80 per pound which it was not in 1940, I wonder if the handwritten portion of that assay was done by the assayer or someone figureing afterwards.

Alot of the assays between 1933 and 1975 said ore even when it was ingots or such, I always figured this was because legally if they called it bullion it would have to be reported.

So, if it was indeed a 40-pound Noss "pig iron" ingot assayed, it had 28 pounds of copper, three ounces of gold and a couple ounces of silver in it. This could be why Noss was always being accused of trying to sell "copper bars", even though the three ounces of gold carried most of the bar's value. It would also make sense that the bars were so darkly tarnished - they were mostly copper.

Not only that, if Noss actually got these bars from the Caballos, from the same source as Douthit, it might also explain why Willie lived so modestly when he got to California and needed to make so many trips back to the Caballos for more. These ingots were valuable, but not in the legendary "gold bar" sense. Maybe that's also why the feds never busted Noss for his ingot sales - they weren't really "gold bars" per se.
 

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UncleMatt

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"I've got chunks of a guy in my stool bigger than that" ~ Joe Piscapo :laughing7:
 

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sdcfia

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I'm still interested in what the "Guerrilla Gang" was. It's mention groups together Reynolds, Douthit, Noss and Ward, all of whom were alleged to have been involved in the Caballo affair ca 1930. Who were they, where did they come from, how were they organized, what did they do? Etc.

A very well-known previous American guerrilla group from the Civil War days was Quantrill's Raiders - Southern sympathizers who terrorized the MO-KS-OK-TX region and elsewhere. These guerilla's better-known personnel were Quantrill (DeWitt Travis), Bloody Bill Anderson and members of the James, Younger and Dalton families, which were all blood-related. The James-Younger-Dalton bunch were involved in all sorts of chicanery in the late 19th century. I wonder if anyone has found any sort of family links between the Caballo guerrillas and the remnants of the Civil War guerrillas - especially the James, Younger and Dalton families?

For those who haven't seen the following historical website, you might be very surprised at the formal group photographs, starting with an array of famous cousins and some "guest appearances" in the group pictures. Guerrillas, outlaws, cousins, gangsters and bad boys - grouped together as adolescents, young adults and later. Yes, that's Billy the Kid and Doc Holiday. What's up with this?!? It would really be telling if any of our Caballo guys could in any way be linked.

Younger Brothers » Jesse James Photo Album
 

gollum

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yeah scdfia would be right about the copper, gollums thoughts would put copper at $3.80 per pound which it was not in 1940, I wonder if the handwritten portion of that assay was done by the assayer or someone figureing afterwards.

Alot of the assays between 1933 and 1975 said ore even when it was ingots or such, I always figured this was because legally if they called it bullion it would have to be reported.

Closer inspection says that this assay was originally done in 1939, but the numbers were figured using 1952 metal prices (.83 for silver, .242 for copper). Letha was probably trying to figure what the bars they assayed in 1939 would have been worth in 1952. Probably part of one of the many lawsuits, they were likely trying to figure the value of the treasure in 1952 dollars.

silver prices.jpeg

Scott,

I don't know how you came to that conclusion. My math was exactly what was written on the assay: "71.18% of 2,000 = 1,423 1,423 x .242 = $344.36" The key number in that equation is .242. That says that the price of copper at the time was .242. That looks like the price per pound for copper in 1952 (see attached):

copperprices.jpeg

Mike
 

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