We have seen that the San Saba presidio was fifty miles or more away
from the mines it is supposed to have protected. Not all lost mine
hunters, by any means, have agreed with Dr. Bolton in locating the
mine, or mines, on Honey Creek. It has been located now on the Llano,
now on the San Saba, up and down, across and beyond. Many hunters
assert that numerous mines were scattered over a wide belt extending in
a general way from the Colorado westward along the courses of the Llano
and San Saba to the Nueces canyon, El Cañon, as the Spanish called it.
[54] A vast part of the bullion buried in Texas legends is supposed to
have come from the mines in this area.
Some of the early Texas writers credulous of mineral deposits in the
state have had an immense influence on hunters for the San Saba Mines,
who are often readers of old and out of the way books. These hunters
argue that as the early writers were nearer the sources of history than
their skeptical successors, they must be more reliable.
An article from the now stilled pen of John Warren Hunter recently
appeared in the Frontier Times (Bandera, Texas), detailing a few of the
enterprises that have been undertaken to recover the San Saba Mine. I
quote from the article: [55]
“The poor, credulous tramp prospector has not been alone led off by
the lure of the Lost Mine.... Ben F. Gooch, a one-time wealthy
stockman at Mason, was so sure that he had found the Bowie Mine
that he spent $1500 sinking a shaft that is yet pointed out as
‘Gooch’s Folly.’ A judge of the Supreme Court spent $500 in another
hole near Menard. W. T. Burnum invested $1500 in machinery with
which he pumped out a cave on the divide north of the old mission.
Failing to find the coveted mine at this place, he moved the
machinery and pumped out a small artificial lake just above the
town of Menard.... The Spanish had created this lake for a
purpose.... The Almagres Mine entrance was at the bottom of the
lake, which had been flooded by the Spaniards at the last moment.”