I’ve finished Gold House Book 1 and will offer a few comments. First, as Mike (gollum) has stated several times, this is a “must have” book for anyone interested in the Victorio Peak story. I have three others, Curse of the San Andes, by Henry James, 100 Tons of Gold, by David Chandler and Treasure of Victorio Peak, by Phil Koury. All offer different information and different perspectives, but Gold House is the “go to” reference, no doubt. I caution that the book is presented from the Noss family point of view, with all statements and quoted documents clearly interpreted to benefit their vested interests. The objective reader can judge for himself - this material can be interpreted in more than one way. Following are my takes on various aspects.
Douthit/Caballos. Willie Douthit was likely in the middle of a large gold/artifact recovery somewhere in the Caballo Mountains, the details of which are murky and may never be fully revealed. Doc Noss was in some way also a part of it, possibly intimidating Douthit into a partnership and possibly murdering others along the way. I suspect that Noss removed, say, a couple hundred bars of gold and a number of historical artifacts from Willie's cave. It’s my impression that Noss likely relocated the bullion to the Hembrillo Basin vicinity and used the artifacts and some of the gold bars to stage a treasure discovery at Victorio Peak. I think he likely did this to deflect attention away from the Caballo cache to protect the location of the remaining gold bullion there, and also perhaps to keep hidden evidence of murder in the cave that might be traced back to him.
Doc’s gold. There can be little doubt that Noss was in possession of many bars of gold - that which was recovered from the Caballos, in my opinion. Doc always claimed that the bullion was removed from Victorio Peak, but he allowed nobody else into the treasure room, making himself the only witness to its existence. Benny Samaniego and Seraphin Sedillo both claimed to have also been in the Victorio treasure vaults in the early going, but Benny first stated he was in the Caballos, and Sedillo came off as untrustworthy, even from the Noss’s perspective. These two are questionable witnesses, perhaps coached by Noss to help bolster his claims.
The book presents numerous statements from a variety of people in several locations that Doc Noss sold or tried to sell bullion, was seen in the possession of gold bars, was assisted moving gold bars, and even had gold bars stolen from him during the years he was active at Victorio Peak. Even Charley Ryan, the man who would kill Noss, had himself seen 51 gold bars - part of the 110 bars he and Doc were planning to smuggle to a Mexican buyer. When Noss reneged on that deal, Ryan killed him. The point is, maybe a total of a couple hundred gold bars were collectively seen over a ten year period by a substantial number of people, and those bars were seen either in Noss’s possession, or being hidden by him at various locations in the desert surrounding Victorio Peak. None were seen inside Victorio Peak.
The spy. Much is made of the letters and notes written by Merle Horzmann, as well they should be. Horzmann talked herself into the inner workings of the Noss family’s activities when she became secretary of the Noss's mining company that was formed to claim Victorio Peak and attempt to rectify the “accident” that earlier blocked the entrance to the alleged treasure vaults therein. During these years, Horzmann was playing both ends against the middle. On one hand, as a company officer she finagled herself into a share of the treasure itself, if recovered - a share potentially worth millions of dollars to her personally. On the other hand, she admits being a mole for various government and law enforcement agencies, gathering whatever evidence she could in order to be used to prosecute Noss for a variety of crimes, including at first Gold Act violations, and also murder in the Caballo Mountains. It’s clear from Horzmann’s documents that early in the Victorio Peak days, the FBI and the Secret Service (and Horzmann herself) believed Noss’s claims about a treasure trove in the peak - after all, there was growing evidence that Doc had been trying to sell gold bullion to a number of parties, including the US Mint in Denver. The Noss group was always fearful that the government planned to seize the treasure when located, but Horzmann was hopeful that the company would be able to keep a fair share of the treasure for themselves, especially her share. As the years passed, however, belief in the treasure’s existence faded considerably and the government’s focus shifted to prosecuting Noss for a variety of crimes centered on investment fraud. Horzmann too became cynical about the treasure and seemed more interested in calling in favors as a spy rather than collecting here share of the gold. She clearly had doubts there was any treasure.
Doc Noss. Noss's character was constantly defended in the book - his crimes and indiscretions excused due to stress, paranoia and persecution. While those may be explanations of why he did what he did, they aren't excuses and they don't deny that he was guilty of those crimes and indiscretions. Noss was clearly a devious and troubled soul. He was arrested numerous times - maybe dozens - for assault with a deadly weapon, impersonating law officers, assaulting police officers, possession of stolen property, drunk and disorderly conduct, brawling, etc. He deserted his wife and family for another woman. He well could have been involved in multiple murders. He was known to be lie or give misleading information to all kinds of people in all kinds of situations. I don't blame him for the things he did, but I do contend that the proof is overwhelming that he was not a person to be trusted. Or believed.
The Victorio Peak years. The book’s writer views this lengthy period of the 1940s decade as a planned conspiracy by the government to seize the treasure at Victorio Peak, which might well have been the case if any treasure had been located. However, the fact remains that after about twelve years of apparent charades orchestrated by Noss, there was no proof that such a hoard actually existed. The only gold seen was that which was hidden in a number of locations outside the mountain in the surrounding hills. These couple hundred gold bars were the logical spoils from Willie Douthit’s cave in the Caballos, moved to the Hembrillo Basin by Noss and used as discovery props at Victorio Peak originally, and then sold off a little at a time to raise money over the years. In 1949, 110 of these bars were to be sold by Ryan for Noss, but Doc thought he was going to be cheated, so he hid the gold in different places, reneged on the deal, and Ryan killed him for it. By this time, Noss had lost control of Victorio Peak and was working as Ryan’s employee. The 110 bars may have been the last of Noss’s bullion.
Ryan allegedly bought off the judge at his murder trial, promising him a quantity of gold bars from the Mexico deal that fell through. Then, after being acquitted, Ryan stiffed the judge by not paying off, ironically because he didn’t know where Noss had relocated the gold - the reason he killed him in the first place. Remember the Jack Nicholson movie line? “Forget it Jake. It’s Chinatown.” Well, in this case, it’s New Mexico. Ryan went home to Texas and never came back.
Books 2 and 3 in the Gold House trilogy deal with military and political intrigues, crimes and dirty tricks centering on alleged gold recovery at Victorio Peak years after Doc Noss’s death. I don’t intend to read these because if the military and government is involved, I don’t believe anything that is available to the public, even through FOIA. Whatever carefully crafted government scams that went down using the Victorio Peak venue is not what I’m interested in. The question of this thread is “Caballos or Victorio Peak?” If proof of a treasure vault in Victorio Peak surfaces, I’ll reconsider, but until then, I say, “Caballos.”