Rebel Gold

by Warren Getler

  In early January, Bob received a letter from a wealthy individual in Florida, who said he had invested in a number of treasure-hunting projects and recently had heard about Bob’s success in deciphering treasure carvings. He was seeking advice before putting money into what he described as an Arizona treasure venture, centered on the Superstition area of Lost Dutchman fame.

  As a child, Bob read about the storied Lost Dutchman Mine and was captivated by tales of the missing “Spanish” mother lode. As an adult, he never gave much thought to researching the far-off locale or determining whether the story was anything but myth. In responding to the Florida investor, he said there was no possibility of offering counsel without knowing a great deal more about the target site.

  After a series of phone calls, in which the Floridian made it clear he wanted to check Bob’s qualifications as a treasure expert, Bob agreed that it would be worthwhile for the fellow to come up to the Ouachitas for a couple of days. A few months later, the mountaineer wound up taking the “flatlander” around to a few of his locales in the backwoods, and, by the third day on site, the man said he was well satisfied by what he had seen. He invited Bob to accompany him to Arizona to meet the principals of a group called the Heart Mountain Project (HMP), which, he said, was investigating large rock intaglios as well as clusters of smaller carvings in the Superstitions—all possibly tied to “Spanish treasure.” The group, he explained, had been working on the project on and off for about two decades. Now it was out of funds and was seeking new investors.

  For Bob to join the exploratory trip, he would have to get approval from HMP, the investor explained. After several weeks of correspondence, the HMP partners invited him out to their research site. For his own due diligence—before agreeing to drive to Arizona to assess the situation—Bob asked to see photos, videos, maps and other visual evidence of signs and symbols in the target area, as well as copies of historical documents.

  Within a week, a thick package of documentary material arrived. It contained photos from what must have been dozens of forays into the tough terrain of the Superstitions—an area of the country in which he had yet to set foot.1 From his sifting through the photos of rock carvings alone, Bob sensed there was substance to the rumors. He noted a remarkable likeness to the symbolism found at other KGC sites. He guessed, at this early stage, that the Lost Dutchman treasure trail might well have existed beyond the realm of folklore—albeit for reasons known only to a small group of men, whose job it was to protect and, ultimately, if so required, to retrieve buried wealth.

  One set of photos included a series of close-ups of “stone maps.” Bob had heard of the Superstition stone tablets but had never seen photos of the inscribed slabs. He knew that they were controversial: some people swore by their authenticity, while others thought them bogus, the elaborate work of brainy pranksters. He grinned at the bewildering smorgasbord of human and animal figures, drill holes, dots, lines, symbols, numbers, letters and garbled ungrammatical Spanish phrases neatly chiseled into the stone. The artistic lettering, he noted, suggested a Baconian cipher, with some letters incised in uppercase and others slightly offset.

  He marveled at the tablets’ recurrent thematic symbols: the heart, the horse and the priest, among them. How many times had he encountered man-made hearts in Arkansas and Oklahoma. So many of these—whether sculpted in stone or metal—had a diagonal line running through them. Perhaps, he speculated, the symbol represented the “broken heart” of the defeated South. Or perhaps it suggested Freemasonry’s tenet of the third degree, that of the Master Mason, to be, as it were, “prepared in one’s heart.”2 The horse and the priest had appeared prominently and mysteriously in the Bible Tree’s menagerie of cryptic images. The entire look of the Superstition stone maps smacked of the KGC.

  Then there was the inscribed date, 1847, which appeared twice on the tablets. Might it allude to the end of the fighting in the Mexican-American War, Bob wondered. (That war represented a milestone “victory” in the eyes of KGC expansionists, resulting in Mexico ceding California, most of Arizona and New Mexico and other territories to the United States the following year through treaty stipulations. It was not until December 1853, under the pro-slavery expansionist and pro-KGC President Franklin Pierce, that the southernmost section of modern-day Arizona—from the Gila River south—and southernmost New Mexico were acquired for $10 million under the so-called Gadsden Purchase. Pierce’s envoy to Mexico, James Gadsden of South Carolina, had been a big promoter of the southern railroad routes to the Pacific, a key KGC goal, and was the central force behind securing the 45,000-square-mile purchase—more an ultimatum to Mexico—that completed the U.S.–Mexican border. Gadsden also was one of the largest slave owners in antebellum South Carolina.)

  Of all the cryptic inscriptions on the stone tablets, Bob found himself drawn most acutely to the priest image—a hooded figure with a cross emblazoned on the sleeve of his robe. Was the priest a symbolic Knight Templar, a monk-warrior? At a minimum, the icon appeared to be some kind of holy man holding a staff. His robe, Bob thought, could well be a habit: templars wore long white habits adorned with a red cross.

  To this point, Bob had seen firsthand that the KGC’s underground depository system existed in Arkansas, extended east into Georgia and west into central Oklahoma. Now, he was witnessing tantalizing visual evidence that suggested its tentacles spread into the Far West, into the great Sonoran desert.

  One of the more captivating visuals was a copy of a U.S. survey map from the mid-1800s. It showed the sparse settlements and forts of what today comprises south-central Arizona. The most intriguing elements were the longitudinal lines demarcated in degrees from a meridian of Washington, D.C., a modern-day anachronism. The HMP partners had shaded a quadrant in the northwest corner of the map—partly capturing the course of the Gila River and the Superstitions to the north—and labeled it “Search Area.” This area formed a rectangle comprising the area within 33 degrees and 34 degrees “Long. West of Washington” and that between 33 degrees and 34 degrees north latitude. Was it a coincidence, or did the Masonic-dominated KGC deliberately choose to create a major underground repository for its wealth at such a symbolically fraught geographic coordinate? How clever, indeed, Bob thought. Little did the partners from HMP realize the potential significance of their shaded map.

  Bob’s mind raced back to William Dobson, Grandpa Ashcraft’s summertime associate, whose home for much of the year was just south of the Superstitions, in Coolidge, Arizona. Was there a KGC link between the Superstitions and Hatfield, through, among others, old-timers William Wiley, Dobson and W. D. Ashcraft? Could this explain why Dobson, a native of nearby Cove, Arkansas, had relocated to a remote part of Arizona in the early 1900s, shuttling annually between the small towns of Coolidge and Hatfield for some twenty-five years? Bob held up a pair of strangely posed black-and-white family photos of Dobson and wondered.

  Something else had come his way to support his growing theory that the KGC, in fact, had fanned out deep into the American West. A friend from New Mexico had sent him a remarkable clip from a Hatch, New Mexico, newspaper, the Courier. The article, dated October 6, 1994, was written by the paper’s editor, Gene Ballinger.3 Appearing two decades after Schrader’s Los Angeles Herald Examiner article (which was, at best, a second- or third-hand “insider” account of KGC descendants and their once-removed knowledge of buried KGC gold), the loosely edited Ballinger piece in the small-town paper was a personal testimonial of a journalist (now deceased) whose family members were, in his own words, likely involved in the KGC organization.

  The parallels to the lives of his own relatives—as possible KGC sentinels—riveted Bob as he read the article.

  GHOSTS OF THE RED BLUFFS: WHERE IS $80,000

  IN CONFEDERATE GOLD?

  STATE—Shortly before the end of the Civil War, a well-organized effort was made to move all precious metals and many important records belonging to the Confederacy to safe havens.

  Most gold and sil
ver specie, bar stock, and coinage, along with a great many records were moved from Richmond, Virginia, and Atlanta, Georgia, to locations considered to be “safe” from Union confiscation.

  The officers and men responsible for that removal were all members of a quasi-secret patriotic Confederate Organization known as the Knights of the Golden Circle. The organization should not be confused with the KKK, or any like group.

  The Knights were very active during the Civil War and counted many of the highest ranking officials in the Confederate Government and Confederate armed forces among their ranks.

  As an organization, the Knights and their families, disbanded in 1908, although it is still believed that in some manner, the organization still exists and is loosely tied to the Southern and Western Masonic Orders. Every male member of the Ballinger family has been a member of a Masonic Order since 1773 in America. And until 1932, every male member of the Ballinger family married into the Cherokee tribe, when a “few” outside influences changed that. Belonging to, and marrying into the tribe, was a tradition that started in 1733 when the first family members arrived from Switzerland, and Ireland, and settled in the Carolinas.

  And every male member of the Ballinger family has fought in every war the American people have ever participated in, from the French-Indian Wars, the Revolution, to right now in Haiti, in some capacity. Family members fought on both sides of the Civil War, with most fighting on the side of the Confederacy.

  We have a very vested interest in the future, and the history, of our nation.

  Very little of what most experts say may have been millions of dollars in gold and silver specie, bar stock and coin has ever been found, since it was moved out of Richmond and Atlanta.

  The very purpose for moving and hiding such a hoard was known only to a select few.

  That purpose [was] to continue the Civil War, or start a new one, according to KGC records.

  Neither ever happened.

  Some of that gold is believed to have made it to New Mexico in 1866 or early 1867.

  There were many Confederate sympathizers living in the Territory of New Mexico and West Texas, several of them well-known ranchers whose families still live and ranch in the state….

  Immediately recognizable names from the days of the Civil War, and years following the war, were associated with the Knights, and the movement of missing gold, silver …

  All are best known in history as outlaws in one manner or another. Yet, all fought with distinction for the Confederacy. A fact that might be challenged by some historians, yet true.

  History shows that members of the James gang were in New Mexico, and more than once, after the war, in-between train and bank robberies attributed to them.

  What they were doing here is not known, at least generally. They did not participate in any known criminal activity, they were seen publicly in a saloon and/or gambling hall or two, particularly in Silver City, but they never stayed anywhere very long.

  It is known that Jesse spent several days, on more than one occasion at the John (Chisum) ranch, but no one knows why.

  The link to New Mexico was of extreme importance to the Knights, and Jesse James was a major player.

  As a trusted Lieutenant in the Knights, it had been Jesse’s responsibility to see that an estimated $80,000 (at 1866 valuation) in Confederate gold coin and bars (the coin was a mixture of Spanish, English and French, with a small amount of U.S. gold coinage), was transported from Georgia to a safe haven in New Mexico. The bars were mostly from the New Orleans Mint, which had been seized by the Confederacy at the start of the war, along with gold obtained elsewhere, and locally smelted in the Georgia gold fields.

  That part of the transport assigned to the James brothers, the Youngers, and several other die-hard southerners, passed through Atlanta less than a week before it fell to Union forces.

  Other convoys headed south into Florida, one went into Mexico, another into Canada, after traveling west into Kansas and going north, to avoid Union troops.

  Made up of wagons and pack animals the James convoy moved northwest of Atlanta to outside of Rome, then in a westerly direction through Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas into the Indian Territory (Oklahoma) to New Mexico.

  Where they went in New Mexico is pure speculation.

  None of the wagons, or pack animals, ever appeared with the James brothers when seen in New Mexico, therefore, it is assumed that the equipment and gold was disposed of before they made any public appearance then, or in later years. …

  I became personally interested in the Knights when I found out that there was a firm family connection between the Ballinger, James and Younger families …

  When I found out that my grandfather George, a deputy U.S. Marshal, had moved from Missouri to Oklahoma, to secure tribal rights to family tribal land (Cherokee) in 1902 and then on to New Mexico with his brother, and homesteaded in Lincoln County in 1907, I became more than a little bit curious about what that was all about.

  The Southern Cherokees fought for the Confederacy and were among the last to lay down their arms at the end of the conflict.

  I understood (his) moving to Oklahoma—that was necessary to protect tribal land rights for each member of the family, which are still in family hands.

  But when family records indicated that he moved on to New Mexico, and into Lincoln County, and he and his brother homesteaded there, my curiosity peaked.

  My father John was one year of age when Grandpa homesteaded in New Mexico with his brother and other family members, and built the family ranch….

  Grandpa continued his duties as a deputy U.S. Marshal including service on the Texas/Mexico border, in Oklahoma, the Dakotas and in New Mexico. He died in 1940. I had only met him twice, and then as a very small boy.

  But in tracing the history of the Knights of the Golden Circle, and tracking our own family’s possible involvement in that organization, I finally came to the conclusion that my great-grandfather, and my grandfather, both were in some manner associated with the organization.

  And furthermore, that my grandfather came to New Mexico, and home-steaded here for more than one reason in 1907. One was to make very sure that the cargo that the James boys brought to New Mexico for safe keeping, was indeed, still safe, and to secure additional family property.

  Although Grandpa worked for the Federal Government as an officer of the law, I honestly believe that in his heart, he was still with the Confederacy, as was his father.

  The answers to many of the questions I have had for years may have been lost in 1940 when two steamer trunks belonging to Grandpa were lost while being shipped by train from New Mexico to Missouri. In those trunks were all of his personal records. The trunks were never located.

  The only hint of what Grandpa was most interested in came from my aunt Ora, my father’s oldest sister. Ora passed away three years ago at the age of 96. She was 11 years old when the family came to New Mexico from Oklahoma in 1907. She was also the family historian.

  She told me many years ago that Grandpa, George Ballinger, made it a point of riding south and east of Carrizozo to look at some “red bluffs” several times in 1907 and 1908.

  Aunt Ora said there was something important about those bluffs to her father. She thought maybe a cave or something, but he never said anything, and eventually stopped making the trip. The bluffs were not homesteads owned by any family members at the time.

  I do not know where those red bluffs are. I am not certain that my great-grandfather, or grandfather, were members of the Knights of the Golden Circle, although I believe so.

  I do know that the Knights of the Golden Circle disbanded officially in 1908.

  But we do know that there is no record anywhere that indicates that any part of the missing Confederate Treasury entrusted to the Knights of the Golden Circle, with the exception of two boxes of small gold bars that were accidentally found in Atlanta in the 1970s during construction excavation, and a few scattered, but unconfirmed reports of small caches fou
nd elsewhere, has ever been recovered in the United States, Canada or Mexico.

  The worth of $80,000 in gold bullion and coin at 1866 valuation would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $5 million today. …

  The Ballinger article, with its references to Jesse James and associated KGC operations in New Mexico, and the package of material sent by the Arizona-based Heart Mountain Project, made for a powerful combination. Bob retreated to his “war room” and, with the amassed material laid out in front of him, stayed put for the next three months. No visitors. Minimal phone calls. Even trips to the bathroom were made with old maps and annotated reference books in hand. The mission: to resolve whether the KGC field engineers did, in fact, burrow under the sands and buttes of the Far West, leaving ample treasure there. If the photos, maps and other material sent by the Heart Mountain Project did not add up to a KGC layout, he was not going to be interested. If the material did, in fact, point in that direction, then he was not going to stop until he had unraveled the tablets’ code.

  Bob wanted to know whether the teasing figures and symbols on the stone tablets connected in any way to the surrounding topography and to the carved symbols cut into canyon walls in or near the Superstitions. He could only go so far in operating remotely, with the photos in hand. But then again, he would only venture to the broiling Arizona desert if he knew, without a doubt, that he would get physical confirmation of such a connection.

  Linda did not know what to make of Bob’s return to full immersion. His was a disappearing act that required her to keep her spouse tanked on gallons of hot coffee and a steady flow of sandwiches. She again started to worry about his state of mind, given his total focus on “the maps.” But, as with his earlier stint with the Wolf Map, she could tell he was on to something enormously challenging. At times, he would remain in the study for sixteen hours uninterrupted, prompting her to inquire, politely and with a smile: “Are you going off the deep end?” He would stare back, glassy-eyed, but with a grin splitting his broad face: “Not yet. Depends if I can figure out these maps.” He explained that, as with the Wolf Map, the stone tablets were full of dead ends and false leads. Yet, he declared, he knew deep down that they were genuine treasure maps and most likely KGC.