When Pedro Nevarez and his gang of bandits sealed up the entrance to the old mine shaft they had filled with stolen loot in New Mexico's Organ Mountains, they had no idea that none of them would ever be back to retrieve the treasure. Instead, they would find death or justice at the hands of Spanish soldiers disguised as a band of traveling monks, and the site would remain unmolested for 270 years, until Ben Brown unearthed the tell-tale cross chiseled in the massive stone that sealed the entrance in 1913.
A seasoned miner and well aware of the legend of the lost treasure cave, Brown quickly covered the inscribed cross and hurried home, determined to find a way to lift the massive stone. He filed a mining claim at the county clerk's office the next morning, loaded up with gear and returned to the Organ Mountain wilderness. Once he had staked his new claim, he cut down the massive juniper tree that had been the key to finding the spot, so that no other treasure seekers would stumble upon it as Brown had.
After great difficulty and effort, he was able to remove the stone, but the shaft underneath was still blocked, filled with debris ans smaller stones. Brown began the excruciating task of removing the dirt and debris from the tunnel, one bucketful at a time. He would crawl down, scoop a bucketful, and crawl back out, sliding the bucket behind him. After two days of this task, he finally caught a glimpse of the treasure that lay within, in the form of a single copper coin. The coin was Spanish and was dated 1635 - just the right time period for the coins and treasures that Pedro's gang had stolen.! Brown was so close....or was he?