Hoodoo Gold

OK, even this is a little strange to me. This is an actual event that occurred in San Antonio during August of 1909. I’m not making this up, honest!

It seems that Mr. H.A. Alexander, who resided at 545 Gallagher’s Alley, began seeing a strange light coming from the ground at one of the corners of his house. This light had appeared around the end of July 1909 and continued every evening for about a week. It just so happens that the corner of the house where the light was emitting from had been settling some over the years. Mr. Alexander had stated that shortly after he started seeing the light coming from the ground he also began seeing a “vision of buried treasure” in the light.

After about a week of seeing this light and the visions a man arrived at Mr. Alexander’s home and told Mr. Alexander he was a “wise man” and that the light was the “spirits” letting him know that there was a buried treasure there. The self-proclaimed wise man told Mr. Alexander that for $10.00 he would dig the hole so the treasure could be retrieved.

Mr. Alexander was elated that there was a buried treasure on his property and he was even happier that it would only cost him ten dollars to have it dug up. He promptly paid the wise man the ten dollars and the digging was started right away.

Surprisingly, after digging a hole almost ten feet deep, six feet long and four feet wide an iron pot was uncovered. When they removed the lid from the iron pot they saw that it was filled with gold coins. According to the police at the time, the gold was thought to be worth between $30,000 and $50,000.

Now the story takes a really weird turn. It seems that after recovering the gold the wise man told Mr. Alexander that the spirits had more instructions about the treasure. According to the spirits, Mr. Alexander needed to give the wise man $25 and the iron pot with the gold coins needed to be buried in another hole on the same property and left for thirty days. After the thirty days the spirits would consider Mr. Alexander the rightful owner of the gold.

Again, the money was paid to the wise man and the gold was buried by the wise man very near where it was originally dug up. The next day Mr. Alexander could barely contain him self and went to look at the spot where his gold was buried. You saw this coming didn’t you? That’s right, the empty iron pot was found sitting on the ground next to the second hole and the “wise man” was never heard from again.

If all of this hadn’t have been reported by the police it would be very hard to believe but it appears to be a very real story.

There are several questions that could be asked here including just who was this “wise man” and how did he know about the treasure? Nothing I found mentioned a name for the wise man. Another question would be why was there light coming from the ground where the treasure was? Were the spirits trying to give Mr. Alexander a sign or was it something else?

I have researched “treasure auras” and I have even used a psychic or two in my many years of treasure hunting to get information about a treasure location but I have never had a psychic lead me to treasure. They took my money, but they never lead me to treasure!

Strange things happen in the treasure-hunting world and I guess this just proves it. I wonder if there is anything else in that neighborhood?