New Mexico Mineral Symposium — Abstracts

It is said . . . that Padre La Rue came to Mexico in 1796 and was assigned a small pastorate about 10 days journey south of Paso del Norte. An old soldier told him of a gold prospect in the Sierra Organos near a Spirit Spring. Some years later, after the soldier had died, drought hit the Padre's fields. He and his followers journeyed north and succeeded in finding the gold placers and rich vein(s), but they neglected to report this to the church in Mexico City. A man named Maximo Milliano was sent north to find them. Upon learning of the approaching expedition, the miners hid the gold and the location of the mines. Milliano and his expedition eventually located the Padre and his mining camp but were refused admittance. Allegedly, the Padre and some of his followers were tortured and killed, but none revealed the location of the gold.

Most reports of lost mines are based on some facts. Typically, there are also many variations in background narratives. The Organ Mountain Mining and Smelting Association's 1881-82 prospectus suggested the Padre mine had been worked in Fillmore Canyon on the west side of the Organ Mountains, about 8 mi east of Las Cruces. Sir Kingsley Dunham indicated, in his geologic report on the Organ Mountains published in 1935 by the New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources, that Col. A. J. Fountain may have found the mine shortly before his mysterious disappearance. Dunham also reported that a local goat herder, Tirso Aguire, was a descendant of one of the original miners. L. H. Davis had written in 1917 that Teso Aguirri (Tirso Aguire?) had shown a local prospector the cave in which the Padre lived. Henry James in his 1953 book, The Curse of the San Andres, wrote that he had found records in Santa Fe of Padre La Rue. James further wrote that he believed the lost Padre mine was in Hembrillo Canyon of the San Andres Mountains. Frank Kottlowski, in a 1966 paper on the lost Padre mine for New Mexico Magazine, quite conclusively pointed out the technical inaccuracies in James' book. Tim Kelly, in an article on the lost Padre mine and the Organ mining district published in the 1975 New Mexico Geological Society Guidebook, indicated that historic and geologic evidence support the likelihood that the mine existed--near the east slope of San Agustin Pass. Kelly also provided the Padre with two names, Philip La Rue. The search continues.