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Stories by Kelley (Texas) .............

Yup, C. F. Eckhardt's still around & kickin', 'cause I'm C. F. Eckhardt. While doing research for that book I also did some relic shooting w/a metal detector. A strange, heavy black rock about the size of a pack of king-sized cigarettes set off the electronics. It was in a creekbed not far out of Brady. The 'rock' turned out to be native silver, about 98% pure. There's more of it up there--gold, too--but you have to know where to look. If you check out TexasEscapes.com & look in the archives of 'Charley Eckhardt's Texas,' you'll find a story called The Rangers' Creek of Gold. If you read Dobie's
CORONADO'S CHILDREN--& who hasn't, if you're into lost mines, buried treasure, & similar tales?--you'll find the original of the story in the first section of that book. The story in Texas Escapes will tell you how I came to identify that creek.
 
I enjoyed it. In regards to Jim Bowie and his lost silver mine, and from all the research that I have done, I do not believe that he ever had a silver mine. It is possible that he might have found a cache of silver somewhere in the Hill Country, or the silver was stolen from the Mexicans...we will never know for sure.

Did you ever do any research on gold being in Reagan's Canyon down near the Big Bend? Many years ago, they brought some samples to San Antonio and it was indeed gold. Some folks think the gold may be just across the river in Mexico, not in Texas.

Also, I have read several of your other books too! I ride through Seguin quite often and have been tempted to meet with you and compare some historical notes, but I always figured that you would be too busy. Lately, I have been doing lots of historical research from the Gonzales area up to Luling and Lockhart...lots of interesting history in those areas. Slowly, but surely, I am putting together a journal about my travels throughout South Texas. Kelley (Texas) :)
 
Jim Miller was a cousin of John Wesley Hardin's. He neither drank nor smoked, nor did he ever use profanity. He had 2 nicknames. One was 'Preacher Miller' because, given an hour or so to prepare, he could preach a true hellfire & brimstone Methodist sermon on any subject in the Bible. The other was 'Killer Miller' because he'd kill anybody you wanted dead for $50. His favorite tool was a sawed-off 10-ga. shotgun. Incidentally, his last words just before they jerked him to Jesus were 'Let 'er rip."
 
Last Saturday, I rode the bike to the site of an old community in Caldwell County, Texas that I have been researching. These pictures show all that is left of the old town
 
n/t
 
It seems a shame that in many of those places the lives and history is lost for ever. Shame...
 
Be interesting to hear what the town was when it we going and what became of it and why? I run into old cemetery's out in the woods.
Sometimes just a few of them or perhaps and entire family all in the one plot. I usually try to clean it of sticks etc if it needs it. For awhile in these parts people were doing rubbings of the old head stones on paper and charcoal and framing them for pictures in many homes. I wonder who took the time to cut the grass in the one you have pictured/ Nice gesture for sure. Shows respect for another human being for sure. Thanks for post.

George-CT
 
We are really hurting from lack of rain...and hot temperatures. We reached 102 degrees today, same for the next few days. Yes, I agree with you in that there are so many lost and forgotten places...some lost forever. When I find an old cemetery back in the fields or woods, in a remote area, I sometimes feel uneasy. I feel like I am disturbing the folks buried there. I am very careful to not walk over any grave site or disturb anything. When I view the old buildings or what are left of them, I like to take a coffee break and ponder what their lives were like. I often leave the sites with some sadness knowing that no one really cares anymore. Thanks for reading my story. Kelley (Texas) :)
 
They are pretty much the only thing remaining of what was once a vibrant, town. In a small town called Cumberland, just up the road from Waynes place, there are several cemeteries. This was a very heavily used coal mining area. Some of the graves are of children who were killed in the mines. There is also a separate Chinese cemetery... they were not permitted to be buried in the while section.

Fair winds

micheal
 
I learned the real story of Jim Bowie's silver from Ralph A. Doyal, the grandson of Matthew A. Doyal, whose name is sometimes given as 'Matteo Diaz' for reasons unknown. You'll find his name--miss-spelled as 'Doyle'--on the monument to the Calf Creek fight in McCulloch County. He was with Bowie when they stole silver from a Mexican train of pack mules headed to New Orleans. In New Orleans the Mexican government would trade bar silver for letters of credit so Mexico could trade overseas. The Mexican government was so unstable after 1821 that almost no nation would sell Mexico anything on credit.

Apparently Bowie made a regular business of stealing Mexican silver. He went into the granite hills & came back with silver on several occasions. Since he was the son-in-law of the vice-governor of Coahuila & Texas, he would have been able to get routes & schedules for the silver trains easily. He invented the tale of the mine to explain where he got the silver. That whole business about Xolic & Tres Manos & Bowie living with the Lipans is pure moonshine. There simply isn't enough time not accounted for in his time in Texas for that to have happened.

Bowie, with his brother Rezin P, Caiphas Hamm, George Coryell, Matt Doyal, & others--according to Ralph there were 14 white men & a slave--simply hid in some rocks until most of the train had passed. They cut the rope & walked off with the last 3 mules. Each mule carried tres quintales. A quintal is 101 pounds. It was in half-quintal bars, 6 bars to the mule, 3 on each side, in leather pockets. The soldiers & the muleskinners stayed together at the head of the train. Since the train might be 100 to 150 mules long, they didn't keep close watch on the end mules.

When the Bowie party was told by a 'friendly Comanche'--& there were such, at times--that they were being followed by a band of Wacos & Tawakonis, the men found a place to fort up that had cover and water. I have reason to believe that location is just south of the old Calf Creek school building. Of course, the first thing that happened was the Indians captured the horses & mules, but the packs had been removed. After the fight, according to Matt Doyal, the men buried 909 pounds of pure silver--18 bars--in a hole 'waist deep on a tall man,' which would make it about 3 feet deep. Again according to Matt Doyal, they all agreed that they would not dig up the silver unless all 14 of them were present. The next spring Bowie's wife Ursula & their child died in an epidemic. Bowie took a headfirst dive into a whiskey jug & didn't come up for air until 1835. Unless some of the men broke the agreement--& according to Doyal none of them did--that silver is still where they put it.
 
The Reagan Canyon gold was discovered by a Seminole Negro named Bill Kelly. When he showed a sample to the Reagans they threw it in the Rio Grande. They couldn't believe Kelly knew anything about gold. Kelly gave a sample of the ore to a railroad conductor on the GH&SA who lived in San Antonio. It assayed $20,000 to the ton when gold bullion sold for $20 an ounce. It's one of 3 known lost lodes in the area. One, probably just across the river, is wire gold. The third is somewhere along the old route of the SP, before the tracks were straightened in the 1920s. It's a ledge of feldspar that assays almost half gold.

Unfortunately, the two lodes on the Texas side are on private property. In addition, over the years a lot of the mineral rights have been alienated, so it would almost be impossible to get a legal claim to either even if you found it. To give you an idea of what happens to mineral rights, my step-great grandfather owned a 505-acre farm near Old Ocean, Texas. When he sold it he retained half the mineral rights. Those mineral rights are now spread among something like 150 descendants. There's oil on the place & I draw about $60 a quarter from my share.
 
Coronado's Children. About twenty-five or thirty years ago, I went to one of the two newspapers that were here at that time and went through their files in the basement looking for information about Reagan's Lost Mine. It took awhile, but I finally found it...it was stored on microfilm at that time. I made a copy of the newspaper article and I still have it somewhere around this house...may be stored in a box somewhere with other research papers. Some folks believe it is not a mine, but an exposed rock ledge with gold. Going by memory, which is not very good at times, I keep thinking that there were two Reagans...they were brothers. One of the Reagan brothers brought an ore sample to San Antonio. I also remember something about Bill Kelly having a friend that worked for the railroad and he also brought a sample to San Antonio. Like I stated, many years ago I did some research on that area and somewhere I have a folder with notes and other information about this subject. That area down where Reagan's Canyon is located is dangerous now because of all the drugs coming across the border. First cool day, I need to locate the boxes where I have lots of research records stored...need to refresh my memory. Kelley (Texas) :)
 
Many years ago, probably back in the late 1980's, I located a battle site back on a ranch west of Leon Springs, Texas. I had spent the day riding a horse back in a remote area looking for stray mama cows and calves and was heading back home when I accidently found this site. It was late in the day and as I was moving the cow and calf ahead of me across a bluff, I noticed some rocks that seemed to be out of place. I made a mental note of the location and continued on my way...I was hungry, tired, and the half wild mama cow was giving me a hard time of it.

A few days later I returned to the site with a metal detector and camera. This site was on a bluff and looked down upon a small valley...there was a creek at the bottom of the bluff. Upon investigation, I found eight or nine spots where there were small scattered piles of large rifle cartridges. These were approximately 55 cal. and were the rim fire type of rifle shell. Looking around, I found several old rusted metal buttons, part of a fork, part of a harmonica, a iron chain about four feet long, and best of all, I found a large brass belt plate. I will post a picture of the belt plate when I finish typing this story.

After searching for several hours, I decided it was time to leave. It was at this time that I decided to check the base of the bluff...maybe I would find a few relics down there too. Well, I found some things, but they were not relics...there were bones scattered everywhere along the base of that bluff. These were not large animal bones, but were smaller bones...about the size of human bones. A chill went through me and the hair on the back of my neck stood up...these might be human bones! As I stood there looking up and down the base of that bluff, I noticed that it was real quiet, no bird sounds or anything...it was just a spooky type of quietness. Within seconds I decided that it was time to leave the area...as quickly as possible.

A few days later, I made a visit to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio in the hopes of finding out about the battle site. They had no record of a battle site near Leon Springs. They did tell me that the belt plate was a Civil War officers belt plate. They offered to buy the belt plate but I said no. I have never been able to obtain any information about the battle site. I still have the old 5 1/4 inch floppy disk with the pictures that I took that day, but I need to find someone with an old computer that I can use to transfer them to a disk or something. I need to return to that site and look for some more relics, but it has to be soon because that ranch has been sold and they are starting to build houses. Please have a great day! Kelley (Texas) :)

[attachment 129715 MVC-308S.JPG]
 
bones were human, and were still there, if the State was contacted, that would stop development for a while! I'd hunt it before that continues. Very Interesting Fred!
 
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