History of Placer county, California, Part 43

Author: Angel, Myron; Thompson & West, pub
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Oakland, Cal., Thompson & West
Number of Pages: 558

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CHROMIL M.

The name of this metal is derived from the Greek word for color. on account of the varied and beauti-

ful tints of its ores and salts, and their peculiar prop- erties for producing various colors in other substan- ren. It is a greyish-white, brittle metal, capable of a high polish, but very infusible. 1ts specific gravity is 5.9. Its ores are found in Unst in Shetland, in Siberia, and other parts of Europe, and in America. They are in the form of oxides; in one of their com- binations with lead, known as the chromate of lead, and in another with iron, constituting chromate of iron. The ruby and emerald owe their colors to the presence of this beautiful metal. In the arts the finest yellow ever discovered is that obtained from preparations of chromium; and they are also used for tinting glass and emerald green.

TELLURIUM.

This metal was obtained in 1782 from an ore of gold, with which metal it is found combined in the Transylvania mines. In color it most resembles silver. It is a scarce metal, very light and brittle, with a specific gravity of 6.26, easily fused, and so volatile that it burns if heated in the air. It has not been used in any form and is only interesting to sei entific chemists and metallurgists.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

MINING. [CONTINUED. ]

Placer County Mines-Crude Implements in Early Mining-The Story of a Batea-Occurrence of the Gold-River Mining- Temporary Structures-Dry Diggings-Improvements in Mining-Long Tom-Mining Ditches-The Sluice -The Sluice Fork-Rithes-Grizzly and Under Currents-Sluice Pavements-Drift Mining-Hydraulic Mining-Hydraulic Mining at Gold Run -- C'ement Mills-Quartz Mining-Pio- neer Quartz Mining-Empire Mill -- Pioneer Mill-Union Mill-Placer Mill-Heath & Henderson Mill-May & Co's. Milf-Bay State Mill -- Preston & Worrell's Mill-Henson & Co's. Mill-Tom Seymour's Mill-Silver Excitement.

THE minerals whose occurrence and uses are men- tioned in the preceding chapter are the most promi- nent of those existing and sought in California, but the list of all which the rocks of the State contain would comprise about all known to the mineralogist. Strictly speaking, the term mineral includes every inorganic substance flowing from or taken out of the carth, as springs or wells of water, elay for bricks or pottery, sand for mortar, granite for building, etc., but in a more limited sense the word is applied to metals and metalliferous rocks; petroleum, salt and medicinal springs or wells; sulphur beds and kindred matters. However extended or limited it may be. Placer County is pre-eminently rich in min- erals, be it of the pure spring water or the sparkling medicinal fountain; the potters' clay or the granite quarry; the beds of coal or the mountain pile of iron ore; the monumental marble or the builders lime: the deep quartz vein with its bonanzas of the royal metals or its placers in the gently sloping ravines. in the rugged eanons of the high Sierra,

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in the bars and banks and beds of its rivers, or where the ancient glacier or pre-Adamite streams have deposited their mountains of auriferous gravel. Every useful mineral, crowning with the royal gold, is found in an unusual abundance. A bountiful nature has stored the region with prodigal gen- erosity, the full extent of which is yet unknown. Overlying the hidden mineral treasures is a soil, a forest, and a conformation of surface inviting to cul- ture, to mannfacture and to commerce, and above all a climate conducive to health and energy, embracing the semi-tropic with the invigorating north. Mining, agriculture and manufacture, the noblest and most independent resources of civilization and true man- hood. here go hand in hand, each a distinct resource, and either sufficient to support a people, and one, only, the usual blessing of many prosperous counties or States. Great and attractive as are such resources. their development has been comparatively slow.

The occurrence of minerals and the methods of extracting them from the earth were subjects with which but few Americans were conversant when the discovery of gold was made in California and the adventurers of 1848 and 1849 first entered the placers of the Sierra Nevada. From the cities, farms and ships of the East the miners came, with no knowl- edge whatever of the business they intended to pur- sue. Gold in profusion, however, was on, or near the surface of the ground, generously supplying the inexperienced digger, who gradually learned the lesson of mining. Fortunately was this the case, as many a river bar and mountain gulch which furnished well-paid labor several years of employment, yielding millions in the aggregate. could, with modern appliances and energy, have been swept away in a month, or in a single season.

CRUDE IMPLEMENTS IN EARLY MINING.

All the lessons of mining have been those of expe- rience, save in the few instances of the rude wooden bowl, the horn spoon, the rocker and the stamp mill; but even these were unknown to nearly all of the early miners. The Mexicans brought the bowl or batea and the horn spoon; the Georgian introduced the rocker and " quicksilver machine "-which was only an exaggerated rocker-and the Cornishman erected the stamp mill. The discoverers of gold in 1848 did not even know the metal. and some time elapsed before they learned any other way to sep arate it from the earth than by picking it out with their fingers. The circumstance that led to the exposure of the gold and its discovery by Marshall, the washing away of the gravel by the water of the mill race, should have suggested the " ground shice." but no such simple plan was adopted. Near by, on the borders of a stream afterwards named Web- ber Creek, was Baptiste Rouelle, a Frenchman, who had lived in Mexico, but was then whip sawing lum- ber for Sutter, and he understood the use of' the batea. Then mining commenced with pans, Indian baskets,

bowls, and any vessel resembling the favorite Mex- ican implement. Soon after. Isaac Humphrey, who had seen gold mining in Georgia, fashioned a rocker, or cradle, such as had been used in the mines of that State. No invention was made, only the adaptation of the principle in the imitative machines more or less rudely constructed. Anything that was a trongh, four to six feet in length. whether of boards nailed together. a section of a tree dug out, or half of a hollow log. set at an incline of from two to four inebes, into which the auriferous earth was placed. water poured upon it, and the implement rocked back and forth, made the rocker, then thought the perfection of mining machinery. Improvements were gradually added in after years, consisting of making the body light and smooth, cleats near the lower end for riffles, a movable hopper with a per. forated iron plate to receive the earth and water. retaining the coarser gravel, then an apron so inclined as to carry the fine material and water to the upper end of the cradle. and then a frame upon which the rockers set with pintles to hold them in place, and thus was the gold-washing cradle per- fected. The story of the rocker and the pan reached the East soon after the reports of the gold discov- ery, and all the inventive genius of the Yankee nation commenced studying, inventing and patent- ing machines for gold washing, all based upon the rocker and the pan; all complicating the simple apparatus; none with an original idea or a compre- bension of the situation: each improvement more senseless than the preceding, and all useless. In Cornwall the miners had for an indefinite time obtained tin by washing the earth through long wooden boxes. or sluices, catching the metal in the sluice by placing cleats across the current, and sim- ilar sluices had been used in the gold mines of Brazil; but although this was known to some of the early gold miners none thought it applicable to gold min- ing, had the sagacity to apply it, or the courage to make the innovation.

THE STORY OF A BATEA.

The story is related of Gen. John Bidwell. that in March or April, 1844. when in the service of Captam Sutter at Hock Farm, he was told by a Mexican vaquero, na hed Pablo Gutteirez, that he had dis- covered evidences of gold in the foot-hills of the Sierra Nevada on the north side of Bear River This Mexican had some knowledge of gold mining. having washed the sands of his native streams for the precious metal The implement with which he " was familiar was the baten. Bidwell proposed an examination of the country. and the expedition was undertaken The indications were pointed out as proper to the gokl region, but nothing could be done without the batea. Gutteirez talked so much about that important mining implement that Bidwell way convinced that without the batea no gold could be extracted from the earth. An agreement was

ISS

HISTORY OF PLACER COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.

entered into between them to keep the matter a pro- found secret until such means could be provided for obtaining the wonderful batea. The Mexican pro- ; posed that Bidwell should furnish means for a visit to Mexico for the desired article, but the latter was suspicions, thinking it might be a cunning ruse to obtain sufficient money to return a capitalist to his native land, leaving his patron in the lurch. The future General and great ranchero was not to be so easily swindled. As a dernier ressort it was decided that the matter should remain in statu quo for a few years, until Bidwell should accumulate sufficient money to enable both to take the voyage around Cape Horn to Boston, where, it was expected that Yankee ingennity, instructed by the Mexican, could fashion the greatly desired batea. A year or so passed, and in the political disturbances attending the administration of Governor Micheltorena, Gut- teirez was killed, and all hope of obtaining the batea vanished. Had General Bidwell known that the implement so minutely described by the Mexi- can, as being of such particular size and shape, was nothing more nor less than a wooden bowl, very much like a common chopping bowl found in nearly every farmer's kitchen, and that any tin pan or ves- sel of any description that could be manipulated in the hands, would have been of equal service, the dis- - covery of gold might have been made four years before it was, and before the country became a part of the United States.

That such a thing could be possible, that one hav- ing a desire to try washing for gold should be deterred from the attempt simply because he bad not a certain implement, when many equally as good, though different in name, were at hand, seems incredible, but the fact of the stupid and insufficient manner of mining continuing through the first sev- eral years of the industry in California is corrobora- tive evidence of its truth.

OCCURRENCE OF THE GOLD.

The gold, in the first discovery, was contained in the gravel of the river bank or bar. This gravel, when placed in a pan or rocker and agitated with water, readily separated, and moved among its parts, letting the gold free, which, by its great spe- rifie gravity, quickly sought the bottom, while the valueless material, gravel, sand, or clay, was washed over and thrown away. If the work was done by the rocker, the gravel was thrown in the hopper, or riddle, a back and forward mot.on given, while water was poured upon it, the firm particles running through the perforated iron bottom or screen, and flowing out the lower end, leaving the gold in the riffles prepared for it. The hopper is removed as soon as the fine particles pass through, and emptied of the coarse gravel. Two men, one to shovel, carry. and pour in the gravel, the other to manipulate the roeker, would, on a convenient river bar. thus wash from 300 to 400 buckets of gravel a day. The river

bar is a nearly level piece of ground, where the canon of the river bed is broader than the stream at low water, and is usually submerged in times of freshets. The bars of all the streams contained gold. generally the most within one or two feet of the bed-rock, and even the bed rock for a depth of from two to twelve inches contained the golden flakes. In some instances the bars were denuded of gravel, and the gold lay exposed in the rough places of the bed-rock. Thousands of dollars worth, in small flakes and nuggets, have been gathered from the exposed bed-rock of a river bar in a single day by a single individual. Miners have been guided to such exposed bars by Indians, proving that these people had noticed the glittering metal, not knowing its value or appreciating its beauty as an ornament. Generally the bars were of gravel from five to thirty feet in depth, with soil and trees on the surface, where not swept by the torrents of winter floods, and from one to fifty or more acres in extent.

RIVER MINING.

The river beds, where the water ran over gravel, were rich in gold, and after the first year of the dis- covery were mined with far greater energy than judgment, some accounts of which will be related in subsequent pages. The river bed was first approached by wing-dams, a small obstruction of stones and brush packed with soil from the banks, extending a short distance from the bar into the stream, and then down the current a sufficient distance to drain a section of a riffle, thus securing an extension of the bar. Then, where practicable, races were exca- vated through a bar, dams built at the head, and the entire stream turned through the race, draining such a portion of the river bed as the length of race commanded. In other cases flumes of lumber or canvas were built in lieu of race.

These were all temporary works, constructed at great labor and expense during the summer, to be totally destroyed by the first floods of the rainy sea- son, often before the river bed was drained. In such cases the labor of the season was lost, but the following year the work would be renewed, and the trial repeated. Such enterprises continued through the first decade of gold mining until every stream of the Sierra Nevada, in its entire course through the gold region, was turned from its natural channel. In some instances the miners were richly rewarded for their enterprise and labors, in many others the expenditures exceedel the returns even when large amounts of gold were obtained, and in others total failure to find gold was the disappoint- ing result. The richest localities were the riffles, near the bars, where a body of gravel extended across the stream, which were easiest drained, and fortunate were the miners who there made their river claims. But the deep stretches of the river, where, in summer, the water flowed smoothly as in a pond, were the choice claims of the enthusiastic

MR J. G. GARRISON,

MRS. J. G. GARRISON,

RESIDENCE OF J. G. GARRISON, FOREST HILL, PLACER COUNTY, CAL.

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MINING.

and most enterprising companies, as it was believed that there the aseless gravel had been washed away, and the pure gold would be found at the bottom. At great expense these pools were flumed and drained, and often several seasons of renewed attempts were required to prove the theory a fallacy.

The aggregate of the gold thus extracted from the river beds. and the aggregate of the expendi- tures in the labor and wasted efforts, can never be told, but for several years the most of the gold pro- duced in California was from the bars and beds of its rivers. From 1849 to 1857, when river and bar mining was in its decline-although successfully con- tinned some years after, and to some extent to the present time-there had been manifested ship- ments of treasure from San Francisco, aggregating $353,467,283, not including the unknown sums taken by private hands, the product of 1848, the amount retained in use in money, jewelry, etc., in the eoun- try, which have been estimated at nearly the same amount as that manifested at the Custom House. The American was the richest of the rivers, and from its bars and bed and the deep gorges of its tributaries flowed the golden stream that added hundreds of millions to the wealth of the world in the first few years following the discovery.

TEMPORARY STRUCTURES.

The extravagance and waste attending the unskill- ful engineering and improvident customs of the river miners were most extreme, and in reviewing them at this day seemingly improbable and unaccountable. Flumes were constructed from 100 yards to one mile ir: length, of ten to forty feet in width and four to six feet in depth, to carry the whole volume of the stream. Heavy logs and massive hewn timbers from the convenient forest were used for the supports, stringers and frame-work, and sawed sleepers, posts, braces and planking for the body of the fiume. In this would be one or a number of large wheels, turned by the current of the water, connected by pulleys of large rope to great belt-pumps, which raised the leakage of the dams and other water that flowed into the mine. The pumps were unique but effective contrivances, being of a tight box of the required length, ten or forty feet, often six inches in depth by eighteen inches in width, through which run a belt of canvas, leather or rubber, having on one side blocks of wood at intervals of about two feet, acting as buckets. The belt was tightened around a wheel of five or six feet in diameter at the upper end of the pump-box, and a smaller wheel at the lower end, and when set in motion by the water- wheel in the flume, the buckets on the belt would drag through the pump-box a large stream. In addition were tramways, trestles and wheelbarrow runs. cars and wheelbarrows, buckets, tubs, sluices, rockers and pans, carpenter's tools and benches, blacksmith shop, and cabins, and other appliances and convenienees for many men and rapid and exten- sive work. The cost of such a system of works

varied with their extent, but the simplest would reach thousands of dollars. The season of mining. when once the river was drained, was known to be short, and every energy was put forth to glean the gold, the miners working until the storms of the rainy season came, then fleeing with their gold, abandoned all to the flood. He was an exceptionally careful and provident man who would rescue a wheelbarrow, a bucket, a sluice or a plank from the torrent, as it was the custom to let everything go. The next year, if a good prospect had been obtained, if rieh gravel was known to remain, if the bottom had not been drained, and the miners were able, or a new company formed, the work would be repeated and in the fall it would again go down the stream.

This labor and waste were continued year after year. Few efforts were made to construct permanent works or to save the movable. It was the custom to have all swept away by the river, and as it had been the eustom to regard the butea and the rocker as the perfection of implements, it would have been presumptuous, sordid, un-Californian to save a flaming structure from the annual flood.

The first freshets of the fall bore upon their breasts the drift-wood sufficient to build a city. Along the lower streams where the current impelled the drift npon a catching spot, it would pile in heaps, covering acres of extent, and farms were fenced, buildings erected, fire-wood accumulated, and wood yards established from this floating debris, yet all that was thus saved for use was but a moiety of the whole. No wonder that many of the pioneers, now with gray hair and limping gait, refer with a shudder to their hard labor and hopeful days of river mining.

A few newspaper items of river mining reference are here appended.

The Placer Herald of October 27, 1855, says: The success of the river miners on the North Fork of the American River this season, has been beyond all expectation. From nearly every portion of the river, we hear of claims paying well. This may be attributed to the experience which our miners have acquired in this sort of mining, and the extreme low stage of the water in the river at the present time. giving an excellent opportunity for working places which heretofore have never been touched, or only partially worked. Some companies are working their claims night and day, washing as much ground as they possibly can before the rainy season com- mences.

At Little Rattlesnake Bar, Rice & Co., on a claim which has been worked over several times, took out on the 19th inst. six ounces of fine gold, four persons at work. The dirt pays about ten dollars to the wheelbarrow load. The company in the spring, intend fluming the river at the point where they are now at work. At present they have only a small wing dam.

Higher up the river at Tamaroo Bar, Greenwood's company took out last week $1,500 of beautiful gold, and they have a prospect of a rich yield for some time to come.

Hamlin & Co, whose claim is situated a short distanee above Ford's Bar, have dug out in the last two weeks 110 ounces of gold. and on Saturday

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HISTORY OF PLACER COUNTY CALIFORNIA

twenty ounces. The claim is owned by four persons; they have nine men at work upon it. They expect to make a rich haul this week.

November 3, 1855 .- The miners at Poverty Bar and vicinity, on the Middle Fork of the American, are still at work on the bar making good wages. A number of river claims below the bar have failed. Although some of the claims have proved failures, others have turned out rich. One company who bad 1.400 yards of the river turned, after working their ground sold it to a company of Chinamen for ≤9.000.

Cromwell & Co., who worked some forty hands, took out some days as high as 100 ounces.

Ifalfa mile above Poverty is Oregon Bar, which is improving and will no doubt make quite a town. Messrs. Shoecraft & Rust have recently finished a ditch to the place. It takes up the drainage water from the Todd's Valley ditch and the Spring Garden ravine. The water is carried along the side of the mountain above the bar. and this will enable the miners to sluice off the bar in a very convenient manner.

December 1. 1855 .- The most of the miners on the Middle Fork of the American have deserted their claims for the present season. The late rains have raised the streams so much that in many places it was impossible to work any longer. We learn that it is the intention of the miners on the Middle Fork to go into quite an extensive mining operation -fluming that stream for a distance of about five miles. They will commence at the head of Yankee Bar, and extending the flume nearly to the "junc. tion," passing by Maine, Willow, Buckeye, Brown's. Wild Cat, Kennebec. Green Mountain, and other bars.

September 22, 1856 .- The mining operations in this place ( Beal's Bar) are very flattering, taking into account the extensive operations of previous seasons and the great expectations which are but partially realized. In the present season, the miners, by past experience. have been taught to moderate their expectations, and carry on their operations with an adequate investment. There are nine river claims in this immediate vicinity, which are being worked this

First. the .. Round Tent " claim. on the North Fork. where Messrs. Snow. Freeman, Knights & Co., kre doing remarkably well, having taken out last week in less than five days $1,000. The claim was worked in '51 the last time.

Second, the " Oregon " claim, where Philbrick. Ellis & Wheeler, are doing remarkably well, which they richly deserve. this being the third time they have worked this claim.

The next in order is the " Beal's Bar ' claim. wijed by Beeroft. Small, Kent. Baisly and Blinn. This claim is being worked for the sixth or seventh time. notwithstanding that it pays fifty ounces per week. with ten men.

Adjoining this and immediately below is the Texas," owned by Wallace, Grage. Lund, Bryne, Sheppard and Thomas. This claim is also paying very well. and the proprietors are well pleased with their prospects.

Next comes Gallagher & Brynes' .. Wing Dam." The proprietors of this claim are deserving of a rich toward for their energies and perseverance, having to contend with innumerable difficulties, which they have successfully overcome. Their prospects are very good.

Next below is the .. South Fork " claim. worked by Chinamen.

The next below is the "Fancy Dam," owned by Patterson, Bartlett & Co. This claim is being worked for the sixth time, and is yielding from an ounce to 825 per day to the man.

Adjoining this is the " Pinkbeen " claim, being also worked for the sixth time, and is paying well, having yielded 81.000 last week. This claim is owned by Sheldon. Gragg & Elliott.

The next below is the " Wing Dam," owned by Wallace, Thompson, Skiff & Co. They are doing remarkably well. There are several other claims in this neighborhood doing remarkably well.

May 9. 1857 .- Extensive preparations are being made for working on the Middle Fork of the American this summer within a few miles of Auburn. The American Falls Mining Co., located at Mammoth Bar, met on the 6th iust., and elected the following officers for the season: President. Henry Bryon; Secretary and General Financial Agent. Col. J. C. Ball; Treas- urer, Isaac Stonecipher. Trusteees-E. Wagner. Iowa Hill; D. Cooper, Gold Hill; Wm. Marriett, Nerada; H. Bryon and J. K. Parkinson. Mammoth Bar.

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History of Placer county, California, Part 43

Author: Angel, Myron; Thompson & West, pub Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Oakland, Cal., Thompson & West Number of Pages: 558

Author: Angel, Myron; Thompson & West, pub
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Oakland, Cal., Thompson & West
Number of Pages: 558