$10,000,000 Saddle Ridge Hoard (Official Topic)

Thanks for the sanity check on the "revenge for the assassination of Lincoln" bit. The only thing I could think of was that he's trying to somehow connect minting the 1866 coin to the Knights of the Golden Circle to the mint theft and got everything all twisted around.

vermontensium - I've seen a lot of the "I wouldn't tell anybody anything" sentiment surrounding this story, so I'm curious what you think you would do with 1427 coins, a dozen or more finest known, and at least one (1866-S) worth a million dollars or more.

Here is the official position from the U.S.Mint










I think that clears up any " the gov't going to take it all."

The couple hired a law firm, coin experts with 83 years in the business, the experts at PCGS.
Really ? Some fishing guide/historian is going to blow this wide open ? Seriously ?

I had read this a copule days ago regarding taxes, government etc...

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/02/2...report-says/

The total face value of the hoard is $27K, I wonder if the IRS would accept 47% of face value.

I'm frustrated for them that the g'ment even gets their hands in it in the first place...but can't do much about it.

I wonder if they had created an LLC or something if the taxes could have been better sheltered that way...

I wonder how long these people will remain unknown...

And, the very next day, the same sfgate.com refutes it's own article (and basically says Jack Trout was clueless). Nice of them to go back and actually check facts, but it's going to live on as urban myth forever. I stopped in the local coin shop today for the first time in many years. The counter guy was talking gold coins with a customer. The customer brought up the Saddle Ridge hoard and they both started going on about how they were stolen from the mint and the government was going to take them. I finally butted in and told them that the mint has stated that they cannot connect the coins to any theft. It didn't seem like they appreciated being corrected.
http://blog.sfgate.com/stienstra/20.../#21188101=0

There's an interesting post on this article about Augustus C. Widber having embezzled $114k from the city of San Francisco and busted in 1898. He was city treasurer. He apparently achieved the theft by substituting gold with silver dollars in the vault bags, 16 of them, $5000 in gold for $250 in silver. He supposedly gambled or spent it all away, and none of it was found. There's gold in them thar hills!

Very interesting and well written article by Doug Winter

http://raregoldcoins.com/market-blo...ome-thoughts

Without the mystery, to me they're just a bunch of high-end coins I can't afford. I would be interested in buying one just for the story, and for no other reason. Plus, it's fun to research and speculate.

For example, I mentioned Augustus C. Widber above. Turns out his father, James H. Widber, was a forty-niner. Arrived in California in 1849 and worked the gold mines for two and a half years in Trinity county. Ran a drug store at Third & Market in San Francisco after that, two blocks from the Old Mint. Elected treasurer of SF in 1881, and again from 1890 until his death in July, 1895. His obituary is here. I can imagine him first stashing his own coins from cashing in during his years mining, and then having access to freshly minted coins as people cashed their gold and then spent them down the street at his drugstore, or during his years as city treasurer. His history, and his death in 1895, fits the profile.

I can also weave a story about his son Augustus, convicted of embezzling $114k after he took over as treasurer when his father died. He has a gambling problem, he knows his father has been stashing profits from the drugstore over many years, then dies leaving no will, nor any directions to the cache that Augustus knows exists. Unable to find the hidden treasure, feeling robbed of his inheritance, in debt to nefarious characters, and suddenly in charge of the city treasury of San Francisco, Augustus decides that pilfering 16 bags of gold will make up for being cheated out of the wealth of his father.

Not that I'm saying it was definitely James Widber. There are probably a large number of people who fit a similar profile back then. Perhaps one day we will learn where these coins were found. Augustus Widber owned an orchard in Mountain View and a ranch in Walnut Creek that was sold to pay restitution for his embezzlement... perhaps they were originally owned by his father.

Yes and eben if that is the real truth what about the finders staying secret? I think somehow they are going to be libel for taxes one way or another.