Quite a Sabine River Treasure tale......from just across the river, posted on the History of Beauregard Parish FB page. Story of a Lost Mine Another title could be Story of a Lost Mexican or Indian Silver and Lead Mine Supposed to be Located in Beauregard Parish, Louisiana, Near the Mouth of Bayou Anacoco. The legend is to the effect that about one hundred and forty years ago the Mexicans of that part of Mexico now known as the State of Texas operated this mine; that it was almost pure silver and lead, and that there were immense quantities of the metal. It further states that more than one hundred years ago this same mine was being operated by the Indians. So far there is no historical evidence of the truth of this. It is well known that nearly one hundred years ago the early settlers made spurious Mexican money and also that these same people used quantities of crude lead from this mine. There is no question as to the truth of this; however, it is possible that the lead and silver in question may have been bought from a band of trading Indians who brought it from far west and sold it to the white settlers for whiskey and trinkets. There are some of the opinion that a steamboat plying the Sabine River and with large quantities of silver and lead was sunk in the river near the mouth of Anacoco. The reason for this was that the people could only obtain it when the river was very low. Mr. Robert Jones, who is a native of this vicinity, and who has resided in this vicinity practically all of his life, and who served sixteen years as Clerk of Beauregard parish, vouches for the following: • In the late thirties and early forties of the year 1800 there were three brothers who worked this mine. Mr. Jones would not mention any names because the brothers have many descendants in the vicinity of DeRidder and Merryville who are prominent. The brothers made spurious Mexican money and various ornaments out of silver; such as buttons and silver handled knives. Mr. Jones had a brother-in-law who was in the Confederate army with a son of one of the brothers who had a large knife made after the fashion of a Bowie knife. He told this brother-in-law of Mr. Jones that his father made the knife out of a piece of steel and that the silver handle was silver from the mine in question. One of the brothers was known to have died from the effects of fumes from melting the ore. Mr. Jones knew twin brothers, John and Jim Stamps, who at an early age lost their father and they were reared by a man named Palmer, who lived very near the mouth of Anacoco a part of the time in Louisiana and the other part on the Texas side. Both John and Jim said that they had molded hundreds of bullets with which they shot small game. The material for the bullet evidently came from the mine because when the lead supply began to get scarce Mr. Palmer would say, Well boys, the lead is getting low and I must go and get some more. Then he would saddle his horse and be gone for some two hours and return with a piece (chunk) of lead weighing several pounds. The only difference in this and commercial lead that came on the market a few years later was that it was a little harder to melt than the commercial product. Mr. Henry Carter, a friend of Mr. Jones and now deceased, told that he had shot hundreds of bullets from lead that a neighbor had given his father at intervals. He would not show where he got the lead because he had taken a solemn oath not to do so. Mr. Jones said, I knew another man whom everyone knew worked the mine. He has a son living now with whom I am very well acquainted and he showed me a part of the mold used by his father in making spurious Mexican money. I told this man that he should destroy it because of the trouble it could cause him if government officials heard of it being in his possession. This man also told me that his father told him of his inability to tell him and his brothers the location of the mine because it would endanger his life. He had taken an oath never to divulge the secret by showing it to anyone. After the old man was past eighty years old however he took them to the place but would not show them the exact spot. He was in hopes they would discover it without his telling them. They went several times but look as closely as they could they never saw anything to give the location away. In the late seventies Mr. Jones’s father-in-law, M. C. Frazar, and his brother Alexander Frazar were engaged in cutting, rafting, and floating timber down the Sabine River to Orange, Texas (formerly Greens Bluff). They not only cut and floated timber but they bought from their neighbors who could not afford to float it to market. On one occasion they bought a number of sticks of cypress timber cut by one Jessie Gore. This timber was cut about two miles south of the mouth of Anacoco and floated into the river through a small stream known as Jordan’s Branch. This timber was worth several hundred more and was floated to Orange, Texas and sold to Judge D. R. Wingate, a large saw mill operator, and an uncle of the Frazar brothers. This same D. R. Wingate had, in 1851, built about the first saw mill in Texas at Sabine Pass. He operated a fleet of schooners along the Gulf Coast to carry his products and to freight on their return trips. Mr. Jones digresses from his original story here to add something of interest in connection with this same D. R. Wingate. Mr. Wingate built among the first saw mills in the State of Mississippi, if not the first for commercial purposes; this mill was at Logtown, Mississippi on the identical spot where the H. H. Western Lumber Company’s mill now stands. The Western brothers were relatives of Judge Wingate. When the timber in question was sold and delivered in the log boom of the D.R. Wingate Lumber Company, it became the duty of Hugh Ochiltree, the scaler for the mill, to scale the timber; in doing so he discovered a bright substance in the end of the log. He cut it out and sent it to the judge who sent it to the New Orleans mint where it assayed $3.64 in gold and a trace of silver. This Hugh Ochiltree was a brother of Tom Ochiltree of Galveston, Texas, an Irishman who represented the Galveston District in the U. S. Congress during the late seventies and was the wit of the House at the time. There is no way of telling whether the nugget was picked up where the tree was cut or whether it was picked up on the bank of the river on its way down the river. There is not any way of knowing whether it was the only piece of its kind in the vicinity. About the year 1875 there came to the Merryville country a man who called himself Dr. Brazile. He was apparently of Spanish or Mexican descent and remained in that country for some six or eight years. Until his death he had no settled place of residence but moved from place to place camping the majority of the time. It was whispered around that he had a large quantity of money for that time and that he practiced his profession in a small way. He let it be known to a few people with whom he became well acquainted that he was looking for a mine. Judge E. L. Canwell, one of his confidants, on one occasion asked him about the silver mine and he told Cannon, so Cannon told Mr. Jones, that he was not wasting his time with silver, that he knew where it was in large quantities but that it was not worth enough to work with. A man by the name of Aaron Terry, an ex-Confederate soldier and also an ex-Mexican soldier, who knew Dr. Brazile well and who lived on the Texas side of the river, told Mr. Jones that while Dr. Brazile was camped on the Texas side of the river that he was looking for stray cattle and one day happened upon Dr. Brazile’s camp. Before he could turn his horse away Dr. Brazile called to him to came and drink coffee with him. As he drew near the camp he saw that Dr. Brazile was working over a crude forge and scattered all around were pieces of silver that looked like dollars. He sat and talked for half and hour but no explanation was given for the silver. Mr. Terry said there was no doubt in his mind that Dr. Brazile was making spurious money. Later there came two men to the community and on one occasion Dr. Brazile was called to the home of one and was shot and killed. Mrs. Brazile moved away but in the late nineties she returned and asked M. C. Frazar to show her where her husband’s old camp site was. She said that her husband had a quantity of money buried there. Mr. Frazar went to show her the place but on looking around she said she could not remember the exact spot and abandoned the search. Some six or eight months later Mr. Frazar happened to be near the old camp site and found a square hole about four feet in width which had apparently been dug several months. There was nothing to tell whether the searchers had found anything or not. Several dozens of people have visited the vicinity and made some hundreds of excavations but with no success. Mr. Jones says that if there is a mine that it was located in the Sabine River and as the river has changed it course in many places in the last one hundred years the mine may be covered under many feet of sand and likely will never be located again. Miners have told him that there are no geological indications of mineral in the vicinity of the Lost Mine.
Posted on: Fri, 05 Sep 2014 10:59:14 +0000
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