Treasure Mountain, CO - Lost Frenchmens Gold

[sdcfia]

Yes, that was the la Harpe expedition. I'm interested in the story about the green stone you found on the Arkansas. What did you find?

I would like to hear this too. Was this a landmark in the form of a green stone, a green stone with carvings on it, a deposit of valuable green mineral, etc? It reminds me of the 1530s Cabeza de Vaca report, wherein he describes meeting natives who had (presumably) emerald arrowheads. This report helped fuel the "Seven Cities" mania and set off Marcos de Niza into the Southwest, and later, Coronado.

 

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[lastleg]

There is one thing we can all agree upon: Tito Ortiz is a real human being.

 

[mdog]

Here are some small clips about Villemont.

MSS 350 EVALUATION OF LUIS VILEMONT REPORT, 1799 MAY 19.
1 ITEM.

Luis Vilemont served the French and then the Spanish government in colonial
Louisiana. A naturalist, he made trips to VA, PA, Upper LA, Canada, and NM
for the Spanish crown. Vilemont sent three reports to the secretary of the Indies
outlining his suggestions on finances, Indians, and immigration to LA. Fran-
cisco Requena and Bernardo Yriarte were Spanish officials assigned to evaluate
Vilemont's reports. They concurred with Vilemont that Indians on the colony's
borders should be weaned from dependence on the United States and discour-
aged from engaging in commerce with British subjects. They urged Spain to
protect the otter-skin industry and to use LA as a buffer against Anglo-Ameri-
can ambitions in Mexico. Vilemont's suggestions were not acted upon by the
Spanish. Spanish.

MSS 351 LETTER FROM FRANCISCO REQUENA TO MIGUEL
CAYETANO SOLER, 1799 MAY 19. 1 ITEM.

Miguel Cayetano Soler was treasurer of Spain during the late eighteenth cen-
tury. Requena's letter expresses the concern of Spanish officials about the en-
croachment of Anglo-Americans in LA and the interest of the American govern-
ment in the territory. Spanish.

On this link, scroll down to items 185 and 186. It seems the Spanish King had confidence in Villemont's opinions.

http://www.dsloan.com/catalogues/pdf/Bulletin04.pdf


This article is from the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Napoleon is acknowledging the value of Louisiana after he decided to sell.

Add again that the value of Louisiana was much better understood
than it had been before. " I know the worth of what I give up," said
Bonaparte ; and the French Government knew it indeed. They acted
with open eyes, for they had taken care from the year 1800 to gather
all available information. One of the memoirs with which they en-
lightened themselves had been asked of Louis Vilemont, former cap-
tain in the regiment of Louisiana. It is still unpublished; and it



52 LOUISIANA PUECHASE EXPOSITION.

informed the Government that " from various reports of Canadian
and Indian hunters it is possible to walk from Missouri to the sea in
less than two months and a half."

Here's the link. https://archive.org/stream/finalreportoflou00unit/finalreportoflou00unit_djvu.txt

Mdog here. It seems that Villemont had the confidence of two powerful rulers but there is still no mention of an expedition that he led. We know from Trudeau's letter that Villemont was in St. Louis but there were many explorers that he could have pressed for information.

Louis de Villemont was the brother of Don Carlos de Villemont who was the commandant of Arkansas Post from 1794-1802.

 

[sdcfia]

Do you really think there was anything such as a 'straight-up' explorer guy? Especially with the French and Spanish, let alone the US explorers. "Hey, Brother Pike/Villamont, while yer out there lookin' around, don't forget to ..." Kind of starts to get back to some of Cort's work, plus I subscribe to the theory that has Templars, and others, over here pre-1492. I know you at least consider the possibility of FRENCH Templars being here pre-1492. You also subscribe to the theory of, 'the original owners never forgot that they have this stuff, or where they put it', so, for me, it almost takes extraordinary evidence to support the extraordinary claim that he was fully on the up and up, and was just some 'innocent' French explorer who luckily stumbled upon gold. Kind of like with all of those Treasure Legends released in the 30's - the FIRST thing you do is work from the assumption it is BS, until it proves itself otherwise.

That's why I admire Cort's work - he presents the kind of evidence that can be verified by anyone who is able to draw a straight line. The implications of this evidence may remain speculative, but the associations are clearly established. That raises the bar for his arguments. The difference between you and me is not so much the plot line, but the level of commitment to it. To me, the conspiracies are my current working model - my most logical explanation of the phenomenon - and always subject to refinement with additional evidence. You are more rigid about things, like a proselytizer. I don't want to be a true believer based on faith alone. I just want the truth, not matter what it is. If my model needs tweaking, then I move on.

'We'? You gotta mouse in yer pocket? I have a real damn good idea what was going on. Real good.

Yeah, me too, but I can't prove it yet. I may support a number of your ideas, but that doesn't prove them.

Chapter 2 deals with what Restall calls "the Myth of the King's Army" – the belief that the Spanish conquest was undertaken at the behest of the King of Spain and that the conquistadors were Spanish soldiers. Restall claims that in fact the conquistadors did not necessarily see themselves as Spanish but rather identified as Andalusians, Castilians, Aragonese, Basque, Portuguese, Galician, and even Genoese, Flemish, Greek and Pardo (half-black). Nor were they acting under the command of the Holy Roman Emperor who was also the king of the Spanish realms. And they were not soldiers in a formal military sense of the word but rather a group of feudal lords with their respective footmen, servants, pages and mercenaries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Myths_of_the_Spanish_Conquest

And, don't forget what was going on in Spain in 1492 - the expulsion of Jews:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alhambra_Decree

Spain still maintains regional autonomy, vigorous in places like Barcelona (Catalan) and Granada (Andalusia). Most of the early Conquerors were rich dudes who financed their own expeditions and brought their own private armies. The King wanted them to play nice, but we know how that went. The Church guys who went along were on a heretic killing frenzy and didn't have the time or gumption to slow down the looting and destruction. The question to consider is whether the Conquerors had known targets ahead of time or just lucked into all that gold. To me, the Coronado/Marcos de Niza story is the most fascinating.

As far as the SLV, well, that Christopher O'Brien dude has written a couple books about it. He is also the Dead Cow Guy. He has a book out called Stalking the Herd, which is about cattle mutilations, the first which made the public headlines was in the SLV in the 60's and was actually a horse, not a cow. I don't like his Tito Ortiz story, though. Sumpin' doesn't smell right about it. O'Brien tried to pump me for some treasure info on a forum he is on, recently. He was either pulling the journalistic crap of asking a broad question, and seeing what I would say, or he realized he opened a can of worms with me, lol, and went quiet. He also has a story in one of those books of someone being taken for a ride in a UFO, and shown a treasure site. Kinda like Rog. Except them boys never left the ground ...

Well, O'Brien's job is to make money by selling stuff the public wants. People like the SLV woo-woo, so he does all right I guess.

Well, sdcfia, you'd hate me, then, lol. For you wouldn't want to believe what all of those coincidences tell you about me, so you'd accept them as only such, despite the overwhelming number of them - I guess you'd really hate me for the sheer number of them, lol.

Well, I probably misspoke. I should have said that I love coincidences because when they pile up, I sense a weakness in the presentation that they're attached to. Then we can begin to look under the hood.

 

[lastleg]

Has anyone been to the memorial or likeness of Tito Ortiz at Huntington Beach? Shamrock always
goes on St Paddy's Day.

 

[Randy Bradford]

I just really, really, really want to see the Denver Post version of this story!

 

[mdog]

I just really, really, really want to see the Denver Post version of this story!

Hey, Randy. I just called the Denver Library and they said it might take another week. I'm looking forward to it too.

 

[dog the treasure hunter]

Pffft ... My version is like 5 bazillion times more entertaining. Lol

And accurate ...

Most of you stuff is way over my head Nobody. But i enjoy reading it. I hope you keep posting.

 

[sdcfia]

Pffft ... My version is like 5 bazillion times more entertaining. Lol

And accurate ...

You're an anomalous guy, Nobody, and arguably one of the very few who post in the Treasure Legends section of this forum worth reading. Roger used to claim that the dogmatic treasure legends were all fabricated by folks just for the laughs they got from observing the actions of those who believed them.

 

[lastleg]

Tito Ortiz didn't quail from many but his eyes glazed over contemplating Liddel getting after him.
Liddel had his number no doubt and took the gold right out his hands.

 

[mdog]

I just really, really, really want to see the Denver Post version of this story!

I got a message from the Denver Library saying they had found the articles but my contact will be gone until Thursday. Thursday, I'll pay by phone and see if they can e-mail the articles. If not, I might be lucky to get them in the mail Saturday.

 

[Randy Bradford]

No rush...pretty exciting stuff though...

 

[mdog]

Here's the Denver Post article, part 1.

 

[mdog]

Here's the second article.

 

[mdog]

Here's the third article.

 

[mdog]

There's another article but I have to wait till Thursday for that. I've never done an attachment like this before, if you have
trouble reading them, let me know and I'll try something different.

 

[mdog]

I don't know if I'd want to go riding off into the mountains looking for this one. Maynard Adams first Citadel Mountain book follows Josiah Ward's 1921 articles pretty close. Ward fabricated the name Lebreau who was the sole survivor and the expedition leader in Adams book. Also, Ward doesn't mention Villemont who initiated the expedition. The dates of the expedition are also different, Ward says 1770 and Adams says 1799. It could be that Adams used the Ward article to guide his research and uncovered more evidence about the expedition. Or, maybe it's just a treasure tale meant to entertain the reader. We'll see what the next article says.

 

[Randy Bradford]

I have to confess, I wasn't completely sure the original story even existed since every reference to it was so vague. Treasure writers until recently haven't always presented the best scholarship, most failed to cite sources or give a reader/researcher a clear path backwards through the findings they discuss. Knowing this story is a real thing is actually pretty exciting. Far too often writers not only fail to cite sources, but likewise fail to vet them properly as well. It seems likely many people who wrote about Treasure Mountain never even seen this article, but simply took another writer's word for it that it existed and discussed it as a fact with no verification. Thanks again for bringing this to light mdog, appreciate your time and effort to satisfy some random guys threat on an internet message board.

 

[Corporate Investigations]

Hello all

I am really impressed how this story is being researched and discussed. A pure pleasure seeing it going where the evidence takes you and not seeking only the evidence that fits a pet theory.

Well done!

 

[mdog]

Hello all

I am really impressed how this story is being researched and discussed. A pure pleasure seeing it going where the evidence takes you and not seeking only the evidence that fits a pet theory.

Well done!

Hi Amy,

I don't know about the others but I'm finding out that there is only so much you can do over the internet. The librarians that I've been in touch with have been great about giving me information and advice but there is only so much that they can or will do. I'm learning how to find people who will do the research for me but then I'm at the mercy of their schedule. I took a couple years of French in high school and I've even been thinking about taking some courses so I can read some of the French documents myself. It's been great. If you have a love for history, there's never a dull moment.