Willie L Douthit

[sdcfia]

... This may be an entertaining exercise for some. Calculating the value of $1 in 1988 that is now worth $2.08 in 2018 and a quick multpication will give some indication of what our net worth would be in todays dollars. I think most of us would believe we were doing alright financially.

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Garry

Well, do you believe anything the government tells you, or do you trust your own lyin' eyes? A brief recollection of the cost of real estate, vehicles, insurance, food, clothing and nearly everything else vital to everyday life tells me that the cost of living - paid for with our Ponzi bucks then and now - has risen much more than 100% in the past 30 years - I'd say that 400-500% is more realistic.

Be that as it may, it's apparent that Foreman was quite well off in 1988. As Uncle Matt has interjected, the source of his wealth is not as apparent. While I don't personally believe in coincidences. Willie's allegations of finding gold and his later documented wealth might likely indicate the wealth came from the gold, but it's also plausible that his wife came into the marriage with the brains and the dough. After all, Willie was a hubris-ridden braggart who worked at relatively menial jobs in CA for one who allegedly was well-heeled with access to lots of gold. His stories are the cornerstones of most of the Caballo legends, but he may have been merely a hanger-on with the Noss crowd, got in over his head with heavyweights and was frightened off to CA. Lots of stories from Willie, lots of hearsay through the years, lots of supporters who believe what they read in the papers, a boatload of jackals and scammers in T or C, but where's the beef?

 

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[BIGSCOTT]

It's been stated that had it not been for ''Operation Goldfinder'' in 1973 Willie and his story would have been lost.

I think Norman Scott was the one who first tracked down and found Willie and interviewed him and alerted
him to the fact that Operation goldfinder was in the works, causing willie to put these articles in various newspapers.

''Willie is the epitome of a man who has found something,who has been scared all his life,
who has done something wrong and doesn't want to go neaf the place that has anything to do with it.
Hollywood couldn't have cast a better character he is right out of the Maltese falcon''
Norman Scott (Nov 1976)

 

[BIGSCOTT]

In the complete interview that Terry carter posted willie keeps drifting off with a far away stare
thinking back to just what really happened back then

 

[BIGSCOTT]

In the complete interview that Terry carter posted willie keeps drifting off with a far away stare
thinking back to just what really happened back then

 

[Garry]

In the complete interview that Terry carter posted willie keeps drifting off with a far away stare
thinking back to just what really happened back then

I'm looking for information on the, Willie Douthit, video interviews conducted by those associated with the Victorio Peak treasure digs in 1973, 1977, Etc. This may all be covered in Clarence and Whittle's books but I'm looking for a shortcut.

How many interviews did Willie do? What years were the interviews? Which interviews are in the public domain that I can view?

I'm aware of" one" in 1989 (Book 1, The Discovery, Page 26). Some of the time stamps are included in the text and it appears that interview was at least 41 minutes long.

Is this complete interview available on YouTube?

On Page 28 there is another excerpt: Willie finished his story; This appears to be from the 7 minute interview posted above. It could be simply an extract from the longer 1989 version?

I had it in my mind that there were also earlier interviews? Was Willie there in 1973 or 1977?

I hope someone here has figured this all out previously and can help.

Thanks in Advance,

Garry

 

[BIGSCOTT]

Norman Scott i believe was one of the first to interview Willie, in california
also Xanthus Carson interviewed Willie and did a story, not sure if this tory is
in one of his books, or in a treasure magazine as he wrote lots of articles in
treasure and old west magazine, also I believe David Leon Chandler inter viewed him
but his main investigation was Victorio Peak

 

[BIGSCOTT]

In the interview posted above, is that Alex Alonso doing the inter viewing?
and is that Mary Wells Foreman you can hear in the background?

 

[BIGSCOTT]

In one Interview Willie states that out of the city men
three killed one another in a gunfight in the mid thirties
and the others died of various causes over the years the last being 1974
so Willie knew, or figured out who these guys were and kept tabs on them over the years
if Willie had known that even one of the men that had seen the contents of his cave was
alive would he have done an interview at all?

 

[BIGSCOTT]

Three men killed one another in a gunfight in the mid thirties?
Hmmmmmm?

were these three part of a large gunfight where several people were killed? or was it just these three
killing one another in an argument over the gold?

 

[UncleMatt]

WR, you may be looking for nothing. I hate to point that out here, but we have no way at all of knowing if there is any treasure left to find in the Caballos or not, or even if there ever was. When I first started searching the Rocky Mountains for Spanish artifacts and treasure, I decided right from the start I was just going to have fun with it and not convince myself there was something to be found that was not supported by evidence. Its all too tempting to go down that rabbit hole, but it leads only to disappointment and regret. Just have fun with your search, don't depend on finding anything. Just my two cents worth.

 

[Garry]

In the interview posted above, is that Alex Alonso doing the inter viewing?
and is that Mary Wells Foreman you can hear in the background?

Richard,

Thanks for the help!

I’m pretty new to the YouTube videos and it may take a while to understand just what I’m seeing. Putting a date on them, who’s doing the interview, where did the interview take place, how complete is the interview (Looks live they are extracts with additional editing), etc. Also I thought the text in Clarence’s book were quotes but these are also edited for publication. It begins to give me some pause. It is going to take me longer to digest.

One item in the interview I found interesting was at about 5:50 (Old Debbie and I, her husband lets her take care of me. We go all over the world on the Cruise Ships and everthing.)

This Debbie (Stratis) Robinson, who some have called Willie’s girlfriend, appears in Laurence Foreman’s probate and she may have taken him for a large sum of money before his death. I need to review those documents again.

This interview was after Mary died and from Clarence’s book it appears to have been in 1989?

It appears from the background terrain and the sound of equipment backing up that it may have been at Victorio Peak. (I would welcome any thoughts) Was something going on there in 1989?

Garry

 

[BIGSCOTT]

This video was said to be done at Victorio peak by Alex Alonso, it's the same Willie for
sure but he looks different is this a different timeperiod or maybe the hat is
throwing me off.

 

[BIGSCOTT]

Yes I was wondering who? was Debbie, The first video I had assumed was 1973-1976
but you can see willie's face is a little crooked, and he talks out of one side of his mouth
a slight paralysis of the face, so i assumed it was after the brain surgery, but as we see
from Mary's probate that heppened in 1988, unless that wasn't his first surgery or maybe
he had a stroke earlier.

 

[nmth]

i think my head is going to explode.

Deep breaths.

Preferably of clean, crisp NM mountain air...

 

[Garry]

BIGSCOTT,

There is another YouTube Video of Willie by Terry Carter. (19 minutes long).

I have never posted a link to a YouTube Video although I surely could figure it out but again I'm being lazy.

Could you post that one also? Willie has the same clothes as your post above but the backgrond is different. (Victorio Peak??)

Thanks, Garry

 

[BIGSCOTT]

First time ive seen this one thanks for alerting me

 

[nmth]

And each successive letter in the word is smaller than the letter before it.
so that the entire word looks like a tapered arrowhead.

any opinions?
thanks
wr

Your description is very accurate. I'd say the N, which is more like an upside down U, is pretty big, so I capped it.

I don't see the 8 as looking that special.

Seems it could be more coded than I thought. But, check Mahan for a good table of how Spanish script has changed over time. Some characters just look like gibberish depending on the century.

Also, literacy on the frontier was probably rare.

Interestingly, there is another backward E inscription elsewhere in the range, but many miles away. It's still in place.

Tiro can mean "throw" or a shot, like from a rifle.

 

[sdcfia]

The Willie stories form the framework upon which many of the Caballo legends are based, yes, but to me, there is something wrong with it all. I don't mean to pop anyone's balloons, but let's face it - balloons generally remain afloat due to hot air.

Whereas Noss was a documented career psycho, conman, liar, criminal and master grifter, I get the distinct impression that Willie was more of a wannabe camp follower - maybe even a Noss protege, or an acolyte of sorts. I also wonder if young and impressionable Willie (and Buster and others) might have been mesmerized by Doc (as many were) and enthusiastically done his bidding for him back in the day, including dirty work aimed at Doc's rivals in his gold schemes. It fits that possibly Willie was even involved in murder.

The story goes that, in a nutshell, Willie found a gold cave, bravely resisted being tortured to reveal its location, then left town. I wonder if instead he might have been given some gold by Noss as wages, then was targeted by the torturing rivals for information but had no information to give, became scared s%$#less about it, changed his name and vamoosed as far away as he could manage. As time passed in CA and the paranoia wore off (and maybe interest in the murders), he lived out his life quietly, marrying a seemingly capable woman. He kept his head down for decades until he surfaced again when the Noss legends made the news big time. Willie, then an old man who "was there" began drawing attention to himself with lots of stories, often conflicting, but a way to beat his chest. He was a likely a minor player back in the day (apparently), but my guess is that he had no idea where any gold was specifically hidden in the Caballos. Of course, the book he wrote opens a whole new can of worms about him, but we'll shelve that for the time being.

What about the gold? Yes, I suspect there is gold cached in the Caballos, possibly a significant amount We don't know where it came from, although I have my suspicions. We know that there is no proof that a "Padre LaRue" actually existed, and we know for a fact that the Pedro Navarez bandit loot was buried somewhere on his ranch in Chihuahua.

I suspect that Noss was in some way connected to at least some Caballo gold, which he used for seed at Victorio Peak. He scammed folks for years there before Charley Ryan blew out his candles. Since then, we've had a boatload of testimony from various people who swear the stories are all true because they "were there and saw it". Lots of sensational news coverage parroted those testimonies. Books. Videos. Affidavits. Lots of investment scams. However, have any of you seen any hard evidence, or proof of same? The only shred I've seen is the Noss "gold bars" assay report published in the Gold House trilogy. That assay revealed that the 40-pound bars Doc wanted to pawn off were 80% copper, containing a few ounces of gold and some silver. As I've speculated before, this sounds a great deal like the early ore recovered from the oxide zones by the Spanish at Santa Rita del Cobre in the early 1800s. These old copper alloys tended to tarnish in time to a dark patina.

Willie? Merely just another diversion from whatever truths are in the Caballos, IMO.

 

[Garry]

The informtion I have found from documents and contemporary accounts of both Noss and Douthit lead me to believe that Willlie and Doc's paths never crossed. Simply put, Willie was gone before Doc showed up. I think people are spinning the story for whatever reason and it is all undocumented speculation, unless of course you believe that Willie's "word" is all of the documentation needed for it to be a fact?

Garry

 

[sdcfia]

The informtion I have found from documents and contemporary accounts of both Noss and Douthit lead me to believe that Willlie and Doc's paths never crossed. Simply put, Willie was gone before Doc showed up. I think people are spinning the story for whatever reason and it is all undocumented speculation, unless of course you believe that Willie's "word" is all of the documentation needed for it to be a fact?

Garry

I take neither Noss nor Douthit's word on anything related to their activities in New Mexico. Neither do I accept "contemporary accounts", which is just another term for "hearsay". Once you've established two degrees of separation with a "treasure legend", the information cannot be relied upon at all, IMO, due to immutable human nature. I don't wish to spoil peoples' party, but nearly everything we know about this topic is unverified and must be accepted on faith alone. That's fine as long as you can admit it up front.

Exceptions, of course, include census data, city records, county records, court records, hard news items, hospital records, etc. Granted, anyone could slip through these types of cracks, and official records only confirm certain types of facts, but if I were going to devote serious effort towards unravelling these types of rumors, I would turn over every rock along the way. Most lives, however how well documented, only provide a loose shell around a person. 99.99% of our lives remain private (well, not so much nowadays) and lots of things can be accomplished in private. I once spent twenty years following one degree of separation (me) from a "treasure event", and spent a great deal of time verifying many details of an "account" given to me by the zero degree. That particular exercise ended not with a payday, but with a satisfying closure. If I were a poor communicator or had an agenda (here's where human nature rules), I'd pity the guy who followed the information I might provide to him, being the second degree of separation.

Private family secrets are one thing, but these well-known treasure legends are a rat's nest of lies, disinformation and guile. That shouldn't stop anyone from dreaming the dream and peeking in every side canyon - it's fun - but we all need to not only identify what "facts" we believe, but also why we believe them.