Hello All
I wanted to post here a link to an episode of Unsolved mysteries I once watched online once an episode of Victorio peak. However it seems to have been removed from the net?.
Although an interesting story of course. For me with this story I have never really came to definite conclusion either way yet I have read some accounts, not all, from both sides of the debate which make some interesting points. One such blogger on the net lambasted believers in the story of taking unverified facts to support the story having some truth to the story. While their own hypothesis does the same thing by using unverified claims as evidence the whole story was fraud.
For any credibility one has determine difference between secondary and first hand accounts. With treasure legends it is not so easy as the more popular the legend becomes the more convoluted the story becomes. With many extras adding their 15 seconds of fame to the story. The real truth behind the story regardless lies with Doc. However due to his life being cut short by Charlie Ryan we will be all left forever and a day to speculate the truth behind what has become an amazing treasure legend.
And perhaps a moot point in some respects to some of the claims. Regardless of which side ones opinion falls on the story, it has ingrained itself into America folklore and a worthy subject for speculation.
Amy
It's tough to take a stand on folklore when nearly everything defining it is hearsay and allegation. That's pretty much the case in Doc's life, ca 1930 to 1950, the period during which the VP legend was built. Most of the VP "testimony" came from Doc's camp followers - some of it is conflicting. His family descendants' opinions are understandably supportive of the legend as we know it, but most of them were not actually present during the prime events. The closest family member was Doc's wife Ova, who was obviously sandbagged by him before he abandoned her for another woman. Ironically, perhaps the most telling hearsay is from one of Doc's business associates, Merle Holzmann, who kept a journal of events for years. She was originally hired on as a partner in the "VP mining operation" for a healthy percentage of the recovery, but soon realized the whole thing was a scam and turned traitor - trying to gather enough evidence for government law enforcement folks to nail Doc for a number of fraudulent activities.
We
do have a scant number of acceptable "facts" along the way to help us try to decide things. We
know the government dogged Doc for years, based on rumors of him violating the Gold Act (selling bullion). No evidence was found, indicating that Doc was not trying to sell
gold bars, even though some of his attempted (and possibly successful) sales were
counterfeit bullion bars. This brings us to another fact: the only surviving Noss assay reports. The bullion bars assayed were about 80% copper, with a forty pound ingot carrying about five ounces of gold and some silver. We know that Noss was very active in, and had associations with Douthit and others in the
Caballo Mountains, where multiple people report gold cache recoveries around the early 1930s, prior to Doc's VP "discovery". Another fact: Doc Noss had a continuing history of trouble with law enforcement, dating back to a prison term served in the NM State Penitentiary, with stops at a variety of other jails and lockups for such things as fraud, assault, domestic violence, D/D, theft, etc. If nothing else, this trail helps establish Noss's character. Critical evidence lacking during the 1930-1950 period: proof of assay for a "gold bar", photograph(s) of the "treasure room" in VP, proof of a "gold bar" that Noss sold to another.
Whatever happened at VP after 1950 is another legend altogether, IMO, and for me has no bearing on Noss's VP claims. If there was a large gold cache at VP, there's no evidence that Doc discovered it himself. If there was not a gold cache in VP prior to 1950, subsequent government activities/coverups there are unknown. Whether this alleged bullion came from illegal German war spoils is strictly speculative on my part.