USA > California > Amador County > History of Amador County, California, with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 47
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A SHARP MINING BROKER.
A sharp trade was driven in claims, a thousand dollars being frequently paid for a piece of ground thirty feet square. Moore Lerty was particularly successful in selling claims. His operations were bold, and perhaps original. He would open a claim in a good vicinity, down to good-looking dirt, and then would load an old musket with gold-dust, and shoot the ground full of gold. It is said that he has been known to punish a claim with two or three hundred dollars in this way. If he did not sell the claim, he could wash the dirt, and recover the dust. He sold a claim for one thousand dollars in this way to Henry Jones, notably the sharpest man in Vol- cano. Jones tried the claim for a day or two before purchasing, it is said, even going into the hole at night to get the dirt, so as to be sure that he was not imposed on. The dirt was all rich, so he bought it. The fun of the matter was in the fact that the place proved to be really rich, one of the best in the eamp. Another salted claim, in China gulch, also proved good, but several of his swindles coming to light, he fled before the wrath that began to mani-
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HISTORY OF AMADOR COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.
fest itself, and loft the country. A number of houses of respectable appearance were built in 1851, among which were the Volcano Hotel, by G. W. Gemmil; the National, by Dr. Flint, of Flint, Bixby & Co .; the Philadelphia House, by Downs, and some others. The last two were standing until a few years since, a relic of pioneer days.
STOWELL TO THE FRONT AGAIN.
Dr. Flint, since an extensive stock raiser in some of the southern counties, under the name of Flint, Bixby & Co., went into the mountains on the line of the emigrant road, and purchased stock. In driving it down to Volcano some of it escaped, and was taken up by some miners at Fort Ann, who advertised the cattle as well as they were able at that time, as estrays. They refused to give them up to Flint on the proof of ownership which he presented, and a lawyer advised him to avoid the preliminary costs of a suit, a hundred dollars or more, by taking the cattle by force, so as to compel them to initiate the lawsuit if they wanted one. Flint took Rod. Stowell along as the force element; but force was something that both sides could appeal to, and a row ensued, Rod. getting a ball which made a cripple of him for life; and the two miners, wounds which were thought by the physician to be mortal. Stowell was arrested, and found guilty of murder by a jury of miners, and a resolution was passed to hang him when cither of the victims should die, and a guard was set to watch him. Unex- pectedly, the two miners recovered, and Stowell escaped hanging, more on account of the pleadings of his mother than any good-will the people borc him, for his name had become offensive. Clark, then Sheriff of Calaveras county, was present, but did not attempt to rescue the prisoner.
AGRICULTURE.
It could not be expected that such a piece of ground as the Volcano flat should remain idle. In 1851, it was taken up for ranches by several parties. James L. Halstead and Thomas Bryant took up the lower part next to the town, and Van Metre, and another man, the upper part. Halstead and Bryant raised potatoes in 1851, both on the main stream and on the south branch. In 1852, Henry Jones became the owner of the upper ranch, and several acres of potatoes were planted. The soil produced enor- mously. According to Jones, who testified to it under oath, in a suit for the restitution of water which the miners had directed from his ranch, the yield was seven hundred and fifty bushels to the acre. He had ten thousand hills which would aver- age ten pounds to the hill, worth ten cents per pound. Tomatoes, and all kinds of vegetables, flourished with unknown luxuriance, the produce selling at enormous prices. Halstead would make twenty dollars per day carrying vegetables around in a sack. Wash. Lewis at this time was a partner in the ranch. In 1853, an enormous crop of potatoes
was raised, in fact, twice the amount required for the consumption of the place. Jones succeeded in quietly disposing of his while holding out that he would not sell for less than a certain rate. Most of the others, stored in some cabins, were ruined by a hard frost, and potatoes were a white elephant. Prices for vegetables in the early years were, for green corn, one dollar per dozen; cucumbers, fifty cents; toma- toes, ten cents per pound, as also were beans (green), carrots, beets, turnips, parsnips, and cabbage; water- melons, fifty cents to one dollar each; figs, peaches, and pears, twenty-five cents cach, the last being imported from Lower California. An Oregon apple, in the Winter, was worth one dollar as late as 1857.
SOCIETY.
In 1852, Colonel Madeira, John Turner, Captain Richards, Story, Else, Oaf, Addison, Shultis, Wash. Lewis, Joe Lewis, Downs, Hartram, and Stevenson, settled in the place, and there began to be society. It was now possible to get up a respectable dance by pressing into service all-mothers as well as children. Mrs. Henly, a woman who cooked at the Volcano Hotel, and Mr. Hunt were married in 1851, this being the first wedding in the town. The next was Halstead and a sister of the Lewis brothers, soon after crossing the plains; the next, John James and a daughter of Else.
Perhaps few towns could boast of as much talent lying around loose as Volcano. On the flat, back of the town, was a number of cabins where a cluster of intellectual lights daily discussed and solved all the abstruse questions since modestly treated upon by Spencer, Huxley, Tyndal and others. Tom Boucher had edited a magazine in Cincinnati, and disliked to come to shoveling the tough mud in which gold was found in Volcano. Some half a dozen more of the same kind felt and thought the same way. The days were too hot for work, but the cool evenings were conducive to profound thoughts, so they wore their old broadcloth into dirty gloss, read all the books and newspapers that could be found, and trusted to heaven, or the generosity of the boys, for a square meal. This constellation of stars of the first magnitude finally became scattered. The country was not advanced enough in 1853, to sustain such a society.
This does not finish the subject, however. There were others who adapted themselves to the circum- stances. Ellec Hayes, who worked on the grave- yard hill, was a West Pointer, and afterward a brigadier-general, and was killed in the battles of the Wilderness. Sempronius Boyd was afterward a Union gencral, and also member of Congress. Rufus Boyd also became a member of Congress. James T. Farley commenced his career in this place, his first cases being before Justice Stevens. Halstead, who carried vegetables on his back over the town, is now a distinguished lawyer in Santa Cruz, having filled many positions of honor and profit. S. J. K. Handy,
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VOLCANO AND VICINITY.
Judge Black, Moses Tebbs, Judge Reynolds, all men of note, were residents of Volcano in early days, and have made their mark in the world. J. W. Porter, now a lawyer at Jackson, sunk the deepest hole for gravel ever seen about Volcano, and perhaps, in the county. He was as fond of going to the bottom of things while mining as when searching out his law points, and started a shaft on the clay between the limestone and slate at the head of Soldiers' gulch. He went down one hundred and fifty feet, striking the limestone at the bottom, finding gold all the way. Morris M. Estee, one of the foremost lawyers in San Francisco, was a boy here in 1855, just commencing the study of law. M. W. Gordon, since member of the Legislature, and several times County Judge, and always, from the necessity of things, a foremost man, could be seen thirty years sinee swinging the pick as lustily as any of the miners.
There were some prominent physicians, also Dr. Ayer, now of San Francisco, mined in Humbug gulch in an early day. Dr. Morgan, afterward of Sacramento, mined in the Soldiers' gulch, and also on the south branch. He was a wag of the first water, and generally kept some good thing in the way of fun traveling about the camp. He gave " Shirt-tail Bend" its felicitous name. It is related of him that he once sold a good claim for a very in- significant sum. When it proved a big thing, he was so mortified that he took himself out one side and ehastised himself with a big hickory, exclaiming, between the blows, "Take that you d-n fool; sell a good claim for nothing, will you ?" M. K. Boucher, a brother to Tom, the magazine writer, was a man of thorough knowledge in his profession, and of varied reading in general seienee. Dr. Ives, an eminent physician, helped for years to make the waters of Sutter creek a stream of mud and sand. In the chaos of social elements these men threw away the university gown and donned the hickory shirt and canvas pants of the miner. Some, dis- couraged by the apparent worthlessness of their scientific training in the hurly burly of this kind of life, sunk and never recovered, dying in poverty and obscurity; others, gathering wisdom from the rough experience, arose mightier than before, and pushed their way to eminence. With such elements, it is not strange that the old-time laws of ethics and religion should be swept away like cobwebs, as unsuitable for the new circumstances, and new ones established, or at least tried. We, who look at the comparatively orderly days of 1881, can scarcely form an idea of the chaos of thirty years since.
A PHILOSOPHER.
Volcano was famous, in some places at least, for other things than its gold. In 1855 a resident wrote and published a work on natural philosophy, which was sent over all the world, copies of it going to the sovereigns of Europe, the Pope of Rome, and also to the principal scientific and literary men of both continents. The work was entitled, "An
Examiner into the Laws of Nature," and was writ- ten " principally for those who had not examined much into the laws of Nature, and who had not made a variety of galvanie and other experiments, and more especially for the benefit of children." It was so clear and pellucid in argument, so simple and grand in expression, that children, undoubtedly, could appreciate it as well as older persons. A few extracts from the work will give an idea of the majestic sweep of thought which characterized the work from the beginning to the end.
" From examining into the external organization surrounding the surface of the earth, we find therc arc fixed laws created within the physical organiza- tion to bring on periods of changes. Said changes appear approaching towards perfection. By track- ing some of said changes to the present period, we learn that all animated nature has undergone changes. From said changes said cause, so ex- isting in and among men, has been so changed from time to time that it is difficult for one to become acquainted with said cause. Man can only become acquainted with said existing poisonous cause in and among men, in all its branches, from tracing said effects from causes up to the present period, as before said. * *
* I believe a general knowledge of said eause, so existing in and among men, that man will greatly diminish said cause so existing in and among men; and the effects that must follow and from so diminishing said poison, must be beneficial results flowing therefrom. * * * So of the growth of wheat: When said grains become com- posed in said heads and perfeeted, said two statutes, male and female, remained in said grains until the next planting time, if said grains did not become de- composed from some cause. When said wheat stalks and head were perfected, the affinity which com- posed said stalks and head, through said liquid for- mation, and holds said stalks together in forms and shapes, and said stalks were strong and tough, the power of affinity existed in said stalks and heads. What effect followed said wheat stalks, heads, and grains ? When said liquid circulation within said stalks and heads ceased circulating, the power of affinity commeneed decreasing, and said stalks com- menced losing their power and strength gradually, as said power continued diminishing within; and by the time said power had ceased holding said stalks together in form and shape, said pareels within had composed said stalks, and occupied the same position in parcels as they did when said formation com- meneed. Said grains, when perfected and become hard and somewhat solid, said power of affinity existed the greatest in some grains, and if left sub- ject to said law, undergoes the same process as said stalks did."
The author in this lueid way, described the forma- tion of the earth, seas, and mineral lodes; the decomposition of the "said water into said seas into the fine parcels they occupied previous to the formation of said seas," thus forestalling this book by more than a quarter of a century! His biogra- phy written by himself is :-
" The author of this work is in and about five feet and five inches tall; possessed of dark brownish hair and eyes; a projecting forehead over his eyes; rather flat on the top of his head; and has been subject to a crook in one of his fingers on his right
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HISTORY OF AMADOR COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.
hand, the second finger from the thumb, at the first joint from the nail, crooking towards the thumb; and weighs in and about one hundred and twenty pounds.
" My mother did inform me that I was born in Northampton county, and State of Pennsylvania, February 18, 1807. Ana it was my parents' lot to be poor, and to become a subject to the support of a large family, and I being the youngest of the family, and through said cause I did not receive a proper education in my youthful days. All the schooling I did receive at different periods, did not receive one year. Notwithstanding, in the con- struction, form, and shape of my physical organiza- tion, was constructed organs possessed of power to ereate natural impressions in my mind; although said organs was merely excited into action in my youthful days owing to said cause. * * * *
" I had a little money left. I did deposit said money into a banking house, and took a check from said banking house; and I put said check into a letter, and I put said letter into the post-office to be sent home to my friends. The next day it was re- ported through the city that said banking house had failed. From said report, I became aware that said money could not reach the Atlantic States. I was grieved for a few days with sorrows, but on meditat- ing I became at once aware, if I did continne fret- ting and grieving for said disappointments, that I should soon destroy my mind, and I must remain hopeless of doing anything for myself or my friends. I at once came to a conclusion, as I thought that I was born so unlucky; and if I was born so unlucky there must be a sure eause for it. But why was it so, or what cause existed in me that made me so unlucky ? but said canse thereof I could not tell."
Hc labored in the mines three years with poor success.
" In December, 1854, I became so reduced in means that I had but one suit of clothes, which I had on my body. My clothes became subject to lice, and I had to suffer the torments of said lice for five days, before I could possibly raise means to buy clean clothes; and became hungry and did go into a house and ask for something to eat, and told them that I had no money to pay for it."
FORMATION AND COMPOSITION OF THE EARTH.
" In describing the organization of the earth I shall first commence on her surface, and then pene- trate into her internal parts. First, the earth has an outside crust or shell, extending from her surface towards her center, from five hundred to a thousand miles, more or less, which forms a ronndish arch within her. Said ontside ernst or shell is of a nature like the bark of trees, and like oyster shells, and like rocks found on her surface. Said crust or shell is the hardest and most porous on and near her sur- face, like trees are the most solid on and in their eenter. Oyster shells possess the same nature. * * It is often difficult by looking small children in the face, to tell whether they are males or females; the greatest distinction only develops itself in and about the time they mature. The moon is possessed of the same organization as the earth. The moon has a enrrent of air round his or her body, but said air does not as yet earry vapor, for this reason : The moon is not as yet matured to his or her full size; and if the moon is a female her surface cannot produce vegetation as yet. The sea is the stomach of the moon the same as the sea is the stomach of the earth,
and in its organization collects matter of space in parcels possessed of all the different qualities and properties required to compose every separate and different internal and external organ of the moon, in the same order that animals and men receive into their stomachs liquid and all the vegetable ingre- dients for their entire organization. The different organs in said organization separate the different properties required to compose the different parts of the body, although all are mixed up at once in the stomach."
The Professor, by means of electricity, was able to detect all the phases of character.
"I happened to be at a hotel where a number of men had collected, and, by looking at said men in their faces, I soon saw that said men were possessed of different temperaments; and I looked at one man, and thought, owing to his organization, that his body must contain too much electricity, and not enough of caloric, and that his head must contain too much caloric, and not enough electricity. I asked said man if he was not a subject of exciting uneasiness at spells, and if he did not become a sub- ject of blues or horrors during said exciting days? He said, yes. I asked him if said blues did not come on him, and he did not know how. He said, yes. Knowing the days of said periods, I referred him back to said days, and asked him if he was subject of said blues during said days? Hc said, yes. Know- ing the days of said negative period which followed, I asked him how he felt bad in said days. He said he had in a manner become relieved of said blues."
The Knickerbocker Magazine, replied: "Fervently appealed to as an organ of Eastern scientific opinion (?) to make known the views of Professor Horn, we have yielded to the request. Our own views are respectfully requested. We give them freely. We do not believe there is at this moment on the globe a really scientific philosopher who can, in any respect, compare with Professor Horn." What the Pope, Queen Victoria, and the other dignitaries of Europe thought of it, is not known.
EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND FIFTY-THREE.
This season witnessed the infusion of new energy into mining operations. It was found that many of the hills and flats, like Union flat, Mahala flat, and the hills along the junction of the limestone and slate, had gold in paying quantities. Extensive canals were surveyed, and mining was put on a new basis. The Jackson Ditch Company was organized by J. C. Ham, Alonzo Platt, and, soon after, the Volcano Canal Company, by J. C. Shipman, B. F. Wheeler, M. W. Gordon, William Roberts, J. T. Far- ley, W. A. Eliason, and others. The waters of the different forks of Sutter creek were carried on to the hills and flats adjoining, and ground-sluicing inaugurated. Large masses of carth were now moved in a very short time. Slickens was born in the Winter of 1853-54, though few persons had at that time any serious idea of the future growth of the monster, else he had been strangled then and there. On the south branch, near the foot of Hum- bug gulch, was a nice little garden of an acre or two
DAVIS
LIVERY
STABLE
FOREST LIVERY STABLE. THOMPSON DAVIS & MERWIN LEACH, PROPS, PLYMOUTH, AMADOR CO, CAL.
FOREST HOUSE
LITH. BRITTON & ARV. 8. F.
FOREST HOUSE. T.W.EASTON, OWNER & PROPR PLYMOUTH, AMADOR C9 CAL.
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VOLCANO AND VICINITY.
only in extent; but the soil was rieh, and produced an abundance of vegetables. An immigrant, by the name of Payne, gave all he had, about eight hundred dollars, for this little place. The miners carried a stream of water into the head of the gulch, which was but a mile in length, with a fall of three or four hundred feet, and moved a hundred thousand eubic yards of earth down the gulch, which ran a stream of mud, which, in a short time, buried the ranch several feet deep with the slickens, leaving only the roofs of the buildings above the ground. The min- ing law, the only one in force then, gave him no remedy, and he was obliged to submit to the destruc- tion. The impetus given to mining gave a cor- responding growth to the town; and brick, stone and grout (cement), buildings went up in a short time.
INTRODUCTION OF HYDRAULIC MINING.
Some attempts were made in the Winter of 1853-54, but the idea was not fully developed. The invention or use of hydraulic pressure in mining, is generally accredited to Matthewson, of Mokelumne Hill. It is uncertain who first used it in Amador county. Some persons claim it for N. W. Spaulding, near Clinton. In the Winter of 1853-54, tin pipes were used as nozzles, with a pressure of twenty to thirty feet. It was thought impossible to use a hundred feet pressure, but experiments quickly taught the miners that no practical limit was probable; and we soon find the fall increased to seventy-five, one hundred, and even one hundred and fifty feet. The hose began to be made of the heaviest canvas, with two or three thicknesses. With a pressure of one hundred and twenty-five feet, the toughest clays around the camp would melt away like snow before a driving wind, and more gold was saved than before. Experience suggested improvements, and the way was pointed out which led to the Monitor, through which five hundred inches are hurled with foree suffi- cient to move rocks tons in weight.
At first it was customary to build pen-stocks on high and costly frames, which, not only encumbered the ground, but were liable to blow down, or fall, by the moving or sliding of the ground, near large excavations. It was learned that all the pressure was utilized by laying the hose on the ground, along the slope of the hill. Mason & Foster were the first to use iron pipe for hydraulic purposes. This was five and a quarter inches in diameter, and some- thing over two hundred fect long, which, with can- vas hose at the head, gave a pressure of nearly one hundred and fifty feet. This was sufficient to burst eopper-rivetcd, four-inch, leather hose, and force twenty inches of water, miners' measurement, through an inch nozzle. Some difficulty was experienced in providing for the expansion and contraction of the pipe. In a hot day the pipe would expand several inches; a stream of cold water turned in would sud- denly contract it, and, of course, cause a break. This was remedied by making flexible joints, and in a few
weeks the " new notion," as it was termed, became a starting-point for other improvements. The pipe, constructed in March, 1856, is still in use.
THE NATURE OF THE GRAVEL DEPOSITS
Began to be studied. The fact that gulches cross- ing limestone ranges were generally rich below such junction, was observed, though the reasons were then, and are even now, little understood; a subsequent conclusion, that the hills adjoining must be rich, caused many good claims to be opencd. The Mason & Foster claim was of this character. The point of rocks near the foot of the Boardman hill, was as unlikely a place to find gold, except for the theory referred to, as one could well find; yet the ground payed in places from the top down forty or fifty feet. There appeared to have been several channels worn through the rocks by a former river, a subse- quent flow diagonally across the first channels sup- plying the gold, which was much rounded. As no quartz veins are found in the vicinity, the gravel containing the gold must have been moved from a considerable distance. The same deposit was traced for some miles along the limestone towards the Mo- kelumne river. It is now believed by many intelli- gent miners that these deposits are lateral moraines of the glacier period, the location being, to some extent, the consequence of the usual friable nature of the slates along the junction of the limestones, which favored the cutting of a channel on that line.
IN CHINA GULCH.
The Chapline boys, Story & Co., A. J. Holmes, now owner of the Northern Belle mine in Nevada, had good claims in China gulch, on the same range. The south branch, which ran parallel with this range and touching it occasionally, was also im- mensely rich, though the gold was distributed through gravel in places sixty or seventy feet deep. Some places, like the Green claim in Soldiers' gulch, seemed to have no bottom, but kept on paying, though no gold was found on the bed-rock-soft mud "and nothing more." S. B. Boardman worked a channel up through the South Branch flat, striking many rich poekets. This was a potato field in 1853.
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