LAMAR COUNTY - Somewhere near the town of Paris, Texas, a fortune in gold lies buried that has never been found.
The story goes that, in 1882, vanguard feminist Frances Willard (1839–1898), the highly touted American educator, temperance reformer, and women’s suffragist activist, founded the Women’s Christian Temperance Union of Paris.
History remembers Willard fondly as a dynamic woman who was ahead of her time. But her efforts to rid Paris of liquor backfired, thereby castrating the local economy. Of course she was doing the Lord’s work and that must’ve made it easy for her to ignore the families whose lives she’d devastated.
Paris cowboys chuckled at the idea of prohibition, “Won’t never work. She might as well try ‘n dry up the Red River,” commented one grizzled cowpoke. But as Paris wives and women joined the movement, local ranch hands began to feel the squeeze. One Saturday night, the Paris cowboys rode into town to spend an evening as they always had - drinking, carousing, playing cards, dancing with the ladies and raising hell.
But this Saturday night the boys were shocked to find the doors to their usual hangouts heavily chained, padlocked and closed for business. The final blow came when the frustrated cowboys returned to their bunkhouses to find their personal stashes of spirits had been spirited away by the wives of local ranchers, only to be smashed on rocks or emptied onto the ground.
A pleasing victory for Willard and the Temperance movement, but over the next few days the cowboys and ranch hands packed up their belongings, drew their pay and moved on. Paris businesses and ranches now sat idle; newcomers looking for work quickly moved on when they heard that Paris was now dry. But the event did spark an impromptu treasure hunt.
Many of the departing cowboys took the Great Spanish Road to Red River, where half-a-century earlier Indians had massacred a trader’s caravan. Only three survived the massacre and some of the cowboys recalled hearing that the trader’s caravan had buried all their gold before the attack for safekeeping. They couldn’t agree, however, on how much was buried; some had heard it was $25,000, others thought it was $75,000. Regardless, some of the boys decided they’d poke around for a few days to see if they could locate the hoard.
Over the next couple of days, roughly 50 men got caught up in the excitement and set up camp alongside the trail. Nothing was found and the cowboys moved on. Some believe the fortune hunters dug at the wrong site or on the wrong side of the trail. Either way, the treasure is still there. Local research may help better locate the massacre site.
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If you believe everything you read you are reading to much.
Treasure is a Harsh Mistress
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