USA > California > Placer County > History of Placer county, California > Part 17
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dust, and informed Mr. J. D. Iloppe, who was also there, and with whom they were acquainted, where they had obtained it, and of the probability of there being much more in the vicinity. Mr. Hoppe imme- diately engaged a party of seven men, besides him- self, of which Buekner was one, to go with him to the "Sailor's Diggings," having obtained unmistak- able directions as to the route and distance, and about the 10th of August left the fort. In those days there were cirenitons trails, for though the objective point of the party afterward proved to be the place called, the following year, Rector's Bar, after an Oregonian of that name, on the middle fork of the American, they proceeded to Sutter's Mill; thenee northerly to Long (now Greenwood) Valley; over the ridge by Spanish Dry Diggings and down into the canon of the Middle Fork to what was afterward named Spanish Bar, across the river and up the hill to the top of the ridge, up which they traveled on the trail made by the sailors to the place now known as Bird's Valley, where they fixed their camp. One of the men, named Jonathan Keeney, was the first to go down into the canon of the river, where he crevieed with good results, and returned at evening with his gold. Thenceforward the entire party followed Keeney's example-going down to the river in the morning, working during the day and returning to camp on the ridge in the little valley at night. The only tools used by these primitive miners were butcher knives, iron spoons, an occasional small steel bar, and a pan, as they sought for gold only upon and in the crevices of the bed-rock which the high waters of years had flowed over and denuded of all loose material. The gold was coarse, and while some of the crevices worked would yield many pounds of gold, others frequently contained nothing. This rendered the success of the party variable, and though generally lucky, when provisions began to get scarce toward the rainy season, a separation took place, Buckner, Rich- ard Finley and Jonathan Keeney (both of the latter now living in Oregon) starting over an unknown route, with no trail, hoping to reach Johnson's Ranch on Bear River. In this, however, they were disap- pointed, for the first evidenees of civilization they saw were upon arrival at Sinclair's Ranch.
Knowing nothing about dry or ravine diggings, and believing then the tales of trappers and others that it would be impossible to winter at the mines along the rivers, Buckner went to San Francisco and thence to the redwoods, known as the San Antonio, and Prince's Woods, in the hills back of the present city of Oakland, where he found employment making shakes, pickets, whip-sawing lumber, etc. At that time these redwoods contained scores of men of various nationalities and divers professions-run- away sailors, beach-combers, lawyers, doctors, etc., -all similarly occupied from present necessity.
Among these homogeneous spirits who were tem- porarily inhabiting the redwoods was Capt. Ezekiel
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HISTORY OF PLACER COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.
Merritt, who had been a conspicuous character in the formation of the " Bear Flag " party at Sonoma in 1846, and who had left South Carolina in 1832 and wandered into Cahfornia. During the winter an intimate friendship sprang up between Buckner and Merritt, and they determined to blend their fortunes in a venture to the mines as soon as the proper season should arrive. Accordingly the two, accompanied by an Indian boy called Peg, whom Merritt had retained for a number of years as a servant, in April, 1849, left the redwoods and went overland to Knight's Ranch, on Cache Creek-Knight and Gor- don (another settler there) both being old acquaint- ances and friends of Merritt.
Upon learning the destination of his friend, Mr. Knight, with the hospitality then so characteristic of the old California rancheros, insisted upon killing a number of bullocks and jerking the meat, that the Captain and his companions might be provided with a sufficient quantity of carne seen to ward off the chance of starvation while pursuing their search for diggings in an unknown region. Having prepared an ample supply of meat, Mr. Knight's generosity did not stop there; he loaded it upon one of his carts and sent it to the embarcadero at Sacramento, so that the horses of the prospectors might be the fresher for their mountain journey. At this time a survey- ing party were laying out the streets of the future city of Sacramento.
Merritt and Buckner, assisted by Peg, packed up their animals, and first went to Webber Creek; but, not liking the outlook there, took a northerly course and crossed the south fork of the American, a few miles below Sutter's Mill, and traveled across the divide, and descended into the canon of the Middle Fork, reaching the stream at a place where there was quite a fall, caused by an avalanche years before, which had changed the bed of the river.
The month of April was not yet gone; there were no evidences of any work having been done by white men; but while traveling, the little party had observed signs of Indians, and, deeming any they would there meet would be hostile on account of their small number, a sharp lookout was kept. They remained near the falls a day or two, endeavoring to get to the bottom of a deep hole which was just below them, where the crude gold diggers imagined all of the large chunks should be, if there were any at all in the locality, but, not succeeding, they broke camp and started down the stream. Captain Merritt, who was an experienced frontiersman, took the lead. They had proceeded but a short distance when they reached the head of a large bar situated upon the south side of the river; and below them, some dis- tance down the bar, was a jutting point of rocks, beyond which they could not see. The Captain was a nervous, excitable man, and when excited stuttered badly. When a few yards down the bar, he suddenly stopped short, bringing the train to a halt, and ex- claimed: " B-b-by G-g-god, he-he-r's wh-white ma-
man's ha-ha-r ! Ye.yes, a-and Injun's ha-har, too!" And sure enough, so it was; there upon the pebbly bar above high-water mark, among evidences of a plundered camp, was white man's hair, strewn around with that of the Indian-silent evidence that the life of the superior race had not gone out to the great Unknown unavenged and without a strug- gle. No bodies were found, but an ash heap close by, in which there were calcined bones, told the story of the cremation of the white and red men together.
Upon this discovery, the point of rocks ahead became a barrier post beyond which the white men dared not go for fear of an ambuscade, and they accordingly retraced their steps to the head of the bar, where a large, smooth, deep stretch of water occurred above the ripple, while a small low bar showed itself upon the northern side. At the ex- treme head of the bar where they had found the evidences of death, they unpacked their animals in an open space of ground, and prepared for an attack. They remained in that position until the following morning, and, no Indians coming to molest them, nor none being seen, Captain Merritt armed the boy Peg, and sent him around the point of rocks to reconnoi- ter. Hle returned, and reported signs but no Indians in sight. Thereupon all three, with arms in readi- ness in case of necessity, sallied forth for further exploration down the river. Scarcely had they passed the point before some sixty or seventy Indians appeared upon the bench. or higher bar, above them, yelling and gesticulating in a frightful manner, but as they were only armed with bows and arrows, dared not attack. Now that the enemy were in sight, all fear of ambush passed away, and, with Rachael (as Merritt called his old-fashioned rifle), poised for business, the white men watched the yelping savages until the latter apparently became convinced that they could do no harm to the former, and, in the course of a few hours, retreated up the mountain and disappeared from view.
Upon the river bar that the whites were thus left the masters of were fine groves of willows, some ash trees, and many smooth-barked, thrifty alders, and wh le there it occurred to Buckner that, as the bars along the South Fork and other streams to the southward were all designated with names, he would also name the one they were then occupying. lle accordingly took his pocket knife and cut upon the smooth and easily slipping bark of an alder tree " MURDERER'S BAR,"
By which the spot has ever since been known. But Merritt and Buckner did not deem it prudent to remain there. They must eamp in some more open spot less liable to be approached by Indians under cover; and about this time they discerned a dug-out canoe on the bank of the opposite shore, where it had been left probably by some one of the party who had been in the camp of the massacred men, in escaping, or mayhap by the Indians after the killing
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EARLY MINING HISTORY.
was done. The little bar they had seen on the opposite side above the head of the one they were on, was better located for defensive purposes, and there they determined to establish a camp. Peg was indneed to swim the stream and bring over the canoe, which enabled the two white men before nightfall to establish themselves with animals and paraphernalia upon the Placer County side of the Middle Fork at
BUCKNER'S BAR,
With the river between themselves and their danger- ous foe. Who the men killed were has never been sat- isfactorily determined. They probably met their fate late in the fall of 1848; and Mr. Buckner is of the opinion that there were three of them, and that two, named Wood and Graham, came into the country with him in Captain Martin's company of Oregon- ians.
Buckner's Bar was shallow and paid well-one of the men digging, Peg packing the dirt, and the other washing in a rocker dug out of a log and rigged with a rawhide riddle. Merritt, near the end of May, concluded to go down to the settlements, intending to return in a short time, leaving Peg with Buckner. Captain Merritt, like many another gen- erous hearted, open-souled pioneer, when in the set- tlements after prolonged trips in the wilderness was much given to conviviality, and Buckner, knowing the weakness of his friend, exacted the promise from him at parting that he would touch the flowing bowl sparingly in his absence. But, alas, for the weakness of human nature; particularly that sort of human nature enveloped in the casket of a mount- aineer! Reaching the portals of civilization, he en- countered the subtle tempter, and was engulfed. He died a few weeks after leaving the mines; and poor Peg, becoming disconsolate at the non-return of bis master, went to seek him, and Buckner was left alone upon the river.
Toward the latter part of June, however, Tom Buckner's heart was gladdened by the appearance of other men, not hostile, at his camp, in the person of J. B. Charbonneau, Jim Beckwourth and Sam Myers, all noted mountaineers; and from that time onward came large crowds of gold-seekers, so that before the end of July, the river banks fairly swarmed with humanity above and below him for many miles.
PIONEER MINING EXPERIENCES.
With the influx of population came some of the luxuries of civilization, and many of the crude the- ories and plans of inexperienced gold-gatherers. When the water in the river had fallen to a low stage, a plan was formed to cut a canal from the head of Buckner's Bar to a point below the lower end of Murderer's Bar, and one of the rules govern- ing the action of the company stated that, "Any shareholder getting drunk during the time he should be on duty, shall pay into the common treasury of the company a fine of one ounce of gold-dust, and shall also forfeit all dividends during such time."
This was pretty binding, as the gold obtained during the day was divided among the shareholders every night, and, at the same time, the great Danite of the Mormon apostle, Porter Rockwell, was pack- ing into camp whisky by the mule load, which found ready sale. Upon arriving with his train, which he did once a week, at the top of the hill leading into the cañon, Rockwell would sound a horn be carried with him, upon hearing which a partner on the bar, named Jack Smith, would fire off a gun- a signal that " business " would soon begin, when the people would flock in from far up and down the stream for the purpose of getting gloriously drunk, and to have fun! So many of the shareholders in the canal thus becoming subject to fine and the for- feiture of dividends, soon caused grumbling and dis- satisfaction; the scheme collapsed, and the ground was parceled out in small claims to the different individuals.
THE " GLORIOUS DAYS."
The above is but a slight sketch of the " glorious " days of '49 upon the Middle Fork. Along in No- vember came the shortening days; and the south- easterly winds came soughing through the branches of the pines, bringing the winter storms. The pre- vailing opinion obtained that the proper place to spend the winter months was not in the canons of the rivers, but upon the ridges where the " dry dig- gings " were. This was the cause of the desertion of the bars along the various streams, and by De- eember the throngs that had enlivened the echoing canon's sides had folded their tents, shouldered their blankets and climbed the adjacent heights, leaving upon the two bars-Buckner's and Murderer's- seven men, Tom Buckner and another man upon the Placer County side, and William Harris, Elisha Har- din, James Hardin, Freeman Eldridge, and James Lee on the southern side. These men had built cabins upon ground thought to be high above any floods that would ever come; had laid in winter sup- plies; expected to take out considerable gold during the hibernation, and supposed generally that they were well situated, and could, therefore, defy the mountain torrent's wrath. But on the 9th day of January, 1850, the conceit was all taken out of them. The water in the river that day rose sixty feet, and swept off everything they had before they could hardly estimate the extent of the calamity-cabins, provisions, blankets, all and everything, leaving them homeless and without covering or food. But the men had tested the ground which they had located. and, as it was rich, they would not desert it. Going into the settlement at Greenwood Valley, they were enabled to procure another outfit and return to the river. An occasional grizzly bear would straggle down the bill near camp, and would be shot, which, with deer, which were numerous, supplied them with meat.
MINING IN 1850.
With the spring of 1850 again came a rush of
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HISTORY OF PLACER COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.
men upon the rivers. Many of those who had win- tered in the " dry diggings" had met with little or no success, while the frequent arrival of passen- ger ships from the Isthmus and the Eastern States had greatly augmented the throng who were seek- ing for gold, the great majority of whom sought for placers along the various streams. The middle fork of the American received its proportion of population, and by the middle of the summer thou- sands of men were working in close proximity from its junction with the North Fork to well up toward its source. The same crude ideas, incongrnons notions, and absurd plans of the year before with rela- tion to the deposits of gold and the methods of extraction still prevailed, and many and wise were the grand projects of that day. A gigantic fuming operation was projected and begun upon that par- tienlar portion of the Middle Fork written of in the preceding pages. The falls in the stream just above Murderer's Bar at that time were about twenty-five feet high (since blasted away); and, as related above were caused by an immense land-slide, occurring many years previously, and, doubtless so dammed up the water as to have formed quite a lake, which, before the advent of the white man had disappeared by the gradual filling in of the basin, as well as the wearing away of the obstruction. By midsummer, 1850, at least 1,500 men, working with rockers and pans, could be seen scattered along the banks and bars, up and down the stream from these falls, mak- ing varying sums, from a half-ounce to several pounds daily.
A MINING CLAIM.
A " claim " was a spot of ground fifteen feet wide, which, when there was a bar on the opposite side of the river, only extended to the center of the stream; but otherwise-when no bar-clear across, running back into the hill to an indefinite distance. The bed of the river had been tested in many places, and found to be extremely rich, frequently yielding sev- eral ounces of gold to the pan. Meetings were called, at which the subjects of consolidation and fluming were discussed.
GRAND FLUMING OPERATIONS.
These resulted in a final agreement between five companies, whose united membership was over 400, to join flumes, covering a length of more than a mile of the river. These were named, re- spectively, Vermont, Buckner's Bar, Sailor Claim, Murderer's Bar, and New York Bar Companies. As there were then no saw-mills in the country, this was certainly a vast undertaking under the circum- stances; but from the cosmopolitan crowd arose the inventive genius necessary for the occasion. Stephen Tyler and a man named Lefingwell, members of the Murderer's Bar Company, proposed to their asso- ciates that, for the sum of $6.00 per linear foot, they would construct a flume twelve feet wide and
three feet high, provided the company would grade and prepare the way for laying it. This proposal was accepted. Tyler and Lefingwell, immediately after the contract was made, went down to Sacra- mento, where they obtained an ordinary horse-power, such as were in those days used upon threshing machines, a circular saw, and about 150 broncho horses, which, in a few days were all brought to the locality of the scene of this magnificent project.
A MODEL SAW-MILL.
A " saw-mill " was in time improvised, which for uniqueness, perhaps, was never surpassed. A log was placed upon the carriage way of the " mill;" an ad- jacent corral was levied npon for the "motor," and as many broncho horses secured to the levers of the machine as could find room, while yelling vaque- ros, with formidable whips, urged the frightened animals into their utmost efforts of strength and speed. The horses thus used could not endure a long term of service, and, as the exhausted ones were turned out to pick their subsistence upon the hillsides under the watchful eye of a herdsman, fresh relays were drawn from the corral. Some few thousand feet of lumber were sawed by this method; but it was rough and came slowly. The motive power which drove the machinery of the new-fan- gled mill daily became less effective, until, at length, the hills were covered with, starved, spiritless, sore- necked. crippled and generally bunged-up frames of the equine race, instead of the trim, active little beasts fresh from a California caballada of a few weeks before. The contractors finding that they could not accomplish the job in the manner begun, and the men who were building such high hopes of wealth to come from the river's bed, getting anxions as the advancing season brought them nearer and nearer to the time when high water might be ex- pected, an agreement was made that Tyler and Lefingwell would rive out puncheon from the sugar pine, and lay a fiume with that, while the company would get canvas, sew it together and line it-as the puncheon flooring alone would contain large cracks, through which the water would escape, which the canvas would entirely cover up.
Meanwhile the adjoining companies had been pro- gressing in about the same ratio, some whip-sawing lumber, others splitting out puncheon, and some of them cutting poles to lay down as the flooring of the flume upon which to lay canvas lining. By this time a general conclusion had been arrived at that the entire length of flume must be lined with canvas. As the distance was more than a mile, the flume, twelve feet wide, with sides three feet high, and canvas at that time not less than one dollar a yard, and all required sewing together, this involved a great expenditure as well as much labor. Sailors and all others who could or would use the "palm " were set at work at a half-ounce a day wages sewing the canvas flume lining.
RESIDENCE AND SAW MILL OF J. H. WHITE, TODDS VALLEY, PLACER CO.
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EARLY MINING HISTORY.
DOCTORS, LAWYERS AND DIVINES MINING.
While these things were progressing, other neees- sary work was going on, delegations from each com- pany being assigned to the various duties. Gener- ally the flume bed was upon ground above water, but there was one deep hole, varying from twelve to twenty-four feet in water, in which posts had to be set up and stringers placed upon to receive the flume. Otis T. Niehols superintended that portion of the work, and with bis erew comprised of doctors, law- yers, divines, and all others unequal to the task of sewing canvas, had a difficult time in getting the posts in position. The dam by which the water was turned into the flume was at the falls. The eon- struetion of this was superintended by Major Harry Love, afterwards noted in connection with the cap- ture of the bandit Joaquin.
THE GRAND FINALE.
At length, one bright Saturday in September, at 11 o'clock A. M., witnessed the completion of the structure, canvas-lined from head to foot, and the water flowing through it-the realization of months of arduous toil and anxious hopes. The water would require a little time to drain off, and what more proper thing to do eould there be than to wait until Monday morning before beginning gen- eral work ? As high as $60 a pan had been obtained in digging a foundation to the bed-rock for some of the posts which held up the flume; two men owning interests had quietly slipped out of their blankets on Sunday morning, took a rocker and "prospeeted," returning before breakfast with nine pounds and a half of gold; and what could there be to prevent the real- ization of the golden dreams of a fortune won, in which all the participants of the scheme indulged ? But a terrible disappointment was in store for them. Upon the mountain peaks to the eastward, where the river bad its source, on Sunday evening gathered portentous clouds, and deluged the highlands with rain, all unknown to the hopeful men who were low down upon the stream.
The locality written of in the foregoing was not an exceptional place with regard to population and plans for garnering up the gold. Above, for many miles, were wing-dams, races through which the water of the river was directed by dams thrown clear aeross the stream, and obstructions of various sorts, one in succession above another. The copious rain-fall striking the bare granite slopes ran of with great rapidity and soon swelled the streamn beyond the carrying capacity of some of the races high up on the river, and as the dams were not made to with- stand great pressure, they soon gave way, not only letting down the resultant waters of the storm, but also that which had been held baek. The carrying away of one precipitated upon the next below a mass of water and debris, which, in turn, added its own accumulations to the flood, which at length, asit swept on in its downward course, became irresistible.
All of the old miners who were upon the middle fork of the American in 1850 remember the Sep- tember flood. This swollen torrent reached the dam at Murderer's Bar early on the Monday morning when everybody were expecting to go to work in the bed of the river. The alarm was sounded and hundreds of men appeared upon the scene. Rapidly rose the seething waters, the flume running full, until it reached the top of the dam. Higher and higher it piled baek of the rocky barrier that obstructed it, until a greater level was reached, when it began to pour over the dam and slowly fill up the bed of the stream that had been drained. The water reached the floor of the flume, which the fast disap- pearing dam was lightening of its burden of water, but little water now flowing through it. In a few moments more additional rocks are swept away from the crest of the dam, and the water speedily deepens under the flume, which is not solidly spiked to its foundation. Another moment the whole structure floats, breaks from its mooring, and moves down the river out of sight, like an enormous serpent, wrig- gling and twisting along the sinuous stream, held together by its lining of canvas.
Thus, in an bour's time, was the labor of hundreds of men for months destroyed, their fond hopes dis- sipated, and their bright dreams of wealth and bome rudely dispelled. Thousands of men witnessed the passage of the floating flume, which did not break up for several miles, and was the source for two or three years after whence miners along the river supplied themselves with canvas.
MARSHALL PROSPECTING IN PLACER.
Although James W. Marshall, the discoverer of gold, was located upon the south fork of the Ameri- ean where a proper appreciation of the situation and the application of an ordinary amount of labor would have made any individual wealthy, it does not follow that this old pioneer, then quite a young man, was satisfied with his condition; for, according to his own story, related in October, 1881, he, in company with Colonel Ritchie, his son, Richard Ritchie, and a man called Little Todd, in June, 1848, left Sutter's Mill in search of better diggings-a place in the unknown mountains where the large chunks were lying from which the little particles that were found scattered along the streams had been abraded.
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