William H. Smith June 20, 1999

1204 Christmas Tree Lane About 1580 words

Pearce, Az. 85625

303-36-7671

(520) 826-1029

In search of

LA VIRGEN DE GUADALUPE

By

William H. Smith

Alter retiring from the Department of Defense in May 1976, (their choice not mine). I camped at a Treasure/Rockhound Ranch, which I had joined a few years earlier. There I became acquainted with a fellow from Modesta, Texas. He too was retired and belonged to the same treasure hunting organization.

We became very close treasure hunting partners. Vince stands about 5 foot 8 inches and weighs about 120 pounds soaking wet. I stand at 6 foot 4 inches and weight about 220. When together we were a little bit conspicuous, but got along great. Vince had a "Little Yellow Jeep" that we roamed the mountains in. Since the jeep was equipped with a winch, there wasn't anywhere we couldn't go. We took that jeep over all available roads, and made a few of our own. One other member of our treasure hunts should be mentioned, because she was almost always with us, she was a charming redhead and never complained, she enjoyed those trips as much as we did. Vince got acquainted with her while working in the oil fields. He visited with her several times before winning her confidence. Then one day he brought her home with him. Boy was his wife surprised, but she took to that little red dog that had gone wild like a duck does to water.

Vince purchased a piece of land in Arivaca, Arizona. Arivaca is located about 30 miles as the crow flies from Tucson, in a southwest direction. It is an old mining town that was populated by the Spanish. There is still an area just south of Arivaca where you can still prospect their mining site. The area is loaded with history of the Spanish and settlers of years gone by. Vince and I stayed at Arivaca and used it as a base to treasure hunted from.

William (Bill) Smith a retired Air force Sergeant also lived in Arivaca. He used to serve as part of Paul Newman's pit crew, when Paul raced. Once a week we managed to visit with Bill, and enjoyed coffee and chats. He too had done some treasure hunting in that part of Arizona. He told us of the treasure vaults of La Virgen de Guadalupe. Bill said, "I know of a Hispanic man who has taken out one vault of treasure from the "Virgen". According to him there were three more vaults left. He claimed he was an ancestor of one of the soldiers who had originally buried the treasure vaults, and that he had located the "treasure vaults" from papers handed down in his family.

Back in the 70s, Bill told us his son, and this Hispanic man decided to open another vault. They bulldozed a road into the area, and carried in a corrugated culvert to place in the opening of the dig, a dig is what a treasure site is called. They dug to the face of the old tunnel and placed the culvert in the tunnel, they then made a 90-degree turn to the right, and dug for about 25 feet, next they made a 90-degree turn to the left burrowing until they came to another vault. When they opened this vault it was empty. Someone had tunneled in from the top and cleaned it out. According to Bill there was no indication of any of the other vault being cleaned out. If not, he said, "there should be two more vaults of silver and gold waiting to be

claimed". After Bill related this story to Vince and I we went looking for the Virgen. The first time we looked for the "Virgen," we didn't find her. We found the area but the dig eluded us, we came only prepared for a one day outing, as our time ran out and we returned to Arivaca. Driving over the rough mountain road in the dark wasn't our cup of tea. Vince, his red-dog lady, and I decided to come back when we had more time.

About a week later we decided to make another try at finding the "Virgen," we decided to camp in the mountains until we found something. When we told the wives what we planed, they just smiled, secretly hoping we wouldn't find anything so we wouldn't return. This time we were armed, not only with Bill's information, but with copies of old documents that we had acquired, these were documents written by the Franciscan Priests who had covered the four treasure vaults. They wrote blowing down some small peaks that were above them with gunpowder covered the vaults.

There we were, Vince driving, Lady dog in the middle, and me riding shotgun. The back of the Jeep was stocked with water, food, cots, sleeping bags, and other articles we might need, for how ever long we would be looking. I was the cook, neither Vince nor Lady Complained, not even once, they knew that whoever complained would then become the cook. Leaving Arivaca we went to Amado, from there we went south taking I -1 9. Then we drove west on Peck Canyon road, past the Cummings' ranch, through a deep wash, driving on an uncertain road that was scratched out by a bulldozer. After passing a cattle corral we made a left and drove until we found a suitable camping site.

After we settled in, we prowled around some, and found a wash with water in it, and in the wash was a large rock with, CSA 1861 (Confederate States of America) chiseled into it. We had learned earlier that the Confederate soldiers were in the area searching for Spanish treasure to help in their war effort.

The next morning after breakfast Vince left camp for his morning constitution. Upon his return I noticed he had a puzzled look on his face as he said, "you've got to look at something, I've never seen anything like it in this country". What he discovered was a very large Willow tree with a girth of about four feet. The tree was probably around when the Spanish were, and could tell quite a story. In later years someone built a trough below the tree to hold water.

San Ramon Springs was named on our Spanish documents, and was one of the points in locating the Virgen De Guadalupe vaults. We had already asked the ranchers in the area about the San Ramon springs, but none had ever heard of it. Because of the age of this tree we decided to take a compass degree reading from the spring and see where it led us. With the topographical map on the hood of the "Yellow Jeep" we took the readings. Opening the compass to the number of varas the Spanish documents stated the distance was we made an arc on the map, next a straight line was drawn from the spring in the direction the documents indicated, where the lines intersected should be where the "Virgen" was located. Now we were ready, we had something to work with.

Vince, Lady and I left camp and drove to the same spot we were at, the last time we looked for the treasure vaults. Because of the intersecting lines (X marks the spot) we focused our attention on the small hills to our right this time, by giving that area a close glassing with our binoculars we noticed an area that looked like a tailing pile from a mine.

We walked to the area of the tailings, and there she was, La Virgen de Guadalupe. The area was just as Bill had described it, we found the corrugated culvert in place. There was also a small shrine in front of the opening, a place built to burn candles, (this was probably to keep the worker(s) safe while they were under ground). I crawled down to the end of the culvert, and looking to my right I saw large rocks hanging from the ceiling that looked very unsafe, so I went no father into the shaft. I could imagine those rocks falling on my head.

Afterward I crawling out of the "Virgen" and looking to the west we saw a formation that looked like a face and two eyes (the eyes of San Ramon) this was also mentioned in the Spanish documents. The cliffs to the north and east was where of limestone and was mined to be fired at Tumacacori, and used as mortar for the building of the Mission at Tumacacori. The tunnels for the limestone mining were unique, the floor was flat, the walls were perpendicular to the floor, and the ceiling was domed. This engineering design had kept the tunnel from caving in for several hundred years. When I entered the tunnels they looked like they had recently been swept.

Vince, Lady dog and I had spent only one night out, before finding the "Virgen," not ready to go back home we stayed out another night to look the country side over, the next day we saw that the Spanish and Indians had done a lot of living in this area in years past.

We found the "Virgen" and didn't try to excavate her, finding the treasure was enough. She is still waiting for someone to come and claim the other two vaults.

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