USA > California > Placer County > History of Placer county, California > Part 52
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Tallman's Lode-Silver, $105.60; gold, $24.11; total, $129.71 per ton.
Bowlder Lode-Gold, 860; silver, $11.28; total, 871.28 per ton. Sulphurets from the same lode as- sayed $1,600.90 per ton.
North Star-Sulphurets, 82,784.12 in gold, and $197.88 in silver, equal to $2,985 per ton.
Peter Waller-Sulphurets, $1,130.12 in gold, and $50.27 in silver per ton. This vein yielded rock very rich in free gold.
Vanderbilt Lode-Gold, $60.28; silver, $8.86; total, $69.14 per ton.
Aspinwall Lode-Gold, $30; silver, $19.61; total, $49.61 per ton. Sulphurets from same lode-gold, $330; silver, $62.04; total, $392.04 per ton.
Great Eastern-Gold, $60; silver, 818.80; total, $78.80 per ton.
Poland Lode-Gold, $1,140 per ton.
The Conrad was discovered October 18, 1865; the Peter Waller in the same month, and on the same ledge; the Wells in December, and all the others named about the same time.
RICH STRIKES.
The gold placers of the Sierra Nevada render pos- sible the sudden acquisition of wealth as they also al- lure people into many successive years of expense and toil without yielding a reward. Fortune is called the " Fickle Goddess," and gold is the most fickle of her representatives. Where gold may possibly be found is easily told, but the quantity in the possi- ble localities is exceedingly variable. The drift of the glacial age directs where to find the placer, and the vein of quartz contains it in place, but the drift may contain an infinitesimal quantity only, and the quartz may be barren, but in either there are depos- its of wealth. Many, led on by strong desire and abounding hope, have sought for one of these depos- its ever since the discovery of gold in 1848, or from the time of their appearance in the golden region, and it has continually avoided their grasp; but others, favored by fortune, have struck upon them unawares, gaining wealth for themselves and fame for the mines.
These are called "rich strikes," and when made are widely published, so that to a distant observer the history of gold mining is made of brilliant sue- cesses, with all the industrious miners rioting in wealth. But the greater number who toil year after year and make no rich strike cannot be enumerated, their deeds are not of the exciting character, and therefore they are not reported in the newspapers, nor do they swell the pages of history. Rare as a rich strike may be in comparison to the time elaps- ing, number of miners and labor expended, there have been many, the stories of some of which are quite interesting. Out of the great number for which Placer County is distinguished, a few will be given as reported by contemporaneous papers.
September 18, 1852 .- The Sub-Marine Company, on the Placer side of the Middle Fork of the Ameri- can River, numbering thirteen men are averaging $3,000 per day, and have reached as high as $4,000.
The Macatee Company are averaging $3,000 per week. The editor of the Herald remarks, "This re- minds us of the days of '49."
September 25, 1852 .- Messrs. Tillinghurst & Co. took from their claim at Tamaroo Bar, in one pan of dirt, $36.25; and in another, $92.80. The claim is paying well.
October 2, 1852 .- At the New York Bar, Evans & Co., with five men, in one day took out with one tom, $550; and Norris & Co. took out $800, and $195 in one pan of dirt.
The R. S. Company, at Little Oregon Bar, have
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got into the river, and are averaging 82 500 per day. This company commenced operations on the 5th of April last, and flumed 1,450 feet of the river, work- ing forty hands.
October 19, 1852 .- The Condemned Bar Company divided between the members of the company the neat sum of $20.000, as the result of the week's work.
December 4, 1852 .- At the new diggings recently struck near Yankee Jim's, the dirt yields $13.00 to the bucket; and at Volcano Slide, on the Middle Fork, diggings have been opened that yield from $1.00 to $100 to the pan.
December 11, 1852 .- Mr. Botts at Spanish Flat, found a piece of gold weighing eight and a quarter ounces.
December 25, 1852 .- Mr. Harper took from his claim, at Spanish Flat, one piece of gold worth $350, and, the same day, 8115 in fine gold.
Mr. Willis took from his claim in Baltimore Ravine, one piece of pure gold, which he sold for $112.
January 17, 1853 .- S. P. Ogden & Co., mining at Hughes' Fiat, near Ophir, took out 8600 in one day, one lump weighing thirty ounces, and. on the 19th, another Inmp, weighing twenty ounces.
A elaim on Doty's Flat Ravine yielded forty ounces in one day.
February 12, 1853 .- Mr. Henry Hoffman, while prospecting at Doty's Flat, found a lump of pure gold, weighing 88} ounces. This is the largest piece yet found, although many others. of smaller size, are reported.
Mr. Shipley took from his elaim, at Purdy's Flat, one piece weighing forty ounces and $11.00, con- taining a little quartz.
March 4, 1853 .- C. C. Collins & Co., at Hughes' Ravine, found a lump weighing 202 ounces.
A quartz crystal was found, with two pieces of gold in the center, a rare and beautiful specimen.
March 5, 1853 .- A lump of gold weighing seventy- eight ounces and thirteen pennyweights, was found in Spanish Gulch, near Ophir.
March 14, 1853 .- Two miners in Auburn Ravine found a lump weighing six ounces and $10.00.
April 2, 1853 .- George Hahn & Co. found a lump in the Ophir diggings, weighing eighty ounces, which sold for 8510, the piece containing quartz. Another piece, from the same diggings, weighed thirty-eight ounces, and yielded $370.
Mr. Earthman, at Millertown, took from a ledge of quartz he had discovered, two barrels full of quartz, estimated at $3.000 a barrel.
June 2, 1853 .- The Railroad Company at Sarahs- ville, found a nugget worth 8750.
The claim of Finley & Co., at Michigan Bluff, is paying at the rate of $1,000 a day, eleven men working.
August 6, 1853 .- The Forest Hill Claim is reported as paying from $1,800 to $2,000 per day. This is
on the "Divide " above Yankec Jim's, and is owned by Messrs. Brown & Snyder.
August 13, 1853 .- The Herald, of this date, says the North Fork of Middle Fork is flumed from the junction to El Dorado Cañon. At the slide above Oak Flat, Dr. Ketchum, and two others, washed from two wheelbarrow loads of dirt, $750.
At Volcano Bar and Cañon, the miners are mak- ing from one ounce to 8750 a day, each. One com- pany of three took out 82,200 in one day, and their claim averages $200 a day.
From Volcano down to Spanish Bar Bridge, are a great many flumes; and from the bridge down to the lower end of Yankee Bar, is one continuous flume, of five miles in length. This includes the well-known slide at Poverty Bar, where rich strikes are expected. Over 1,000 men are employed, and, when the water is drained off, the force will be increased to 4,000. Large sums were taken out in some localities, but the general result at the elose of the season was not as good as expected.
November 5, 1853 .- A miner at Spanish Flat, near Auburn, found a lump of gold worth $500.
The Herald reports, in its mining items, that a miner at Michigan Bluff, in one night found two valuable specimens in his claim. Both father and mother doing well.
April 22, 1854 .-- The Jameson claim, at Iowa Hill, yielded 218 ounces; ten men at work.
May 2, 1854 .- The Grisley Company, of Todd's Valley, took out to-day $380.
October 28, 1854 .- The flumes on the Middle Fork of the American, from the head of Poverty Bar to the junetion, and on the North Fork from the junc- tion to the mouth, have all been swept away by a sudden rise of the river. The Joint Stock Com- pany had for nearly two weeks taken out 81,000 a day, and the prospects were good for a continu- ance, but generally the claims yielded only enough to pay expenses.
November 25, 1854 .- Shipley & Co. took from their claim, two miles above Middletown, one nugget of pure gold worth 8298.50, and two others, one weighing eleven and one-half ounces and the other six and one-quarter ounces.
February 10, 1855 .- The Hazel Green Company, of Iowa Hill, divided 813,000, the result of a fort- night's run. The next week's yield was 176 ounces, four men working.
Mareh 2, 1855 .- One hundred ounces of gold-dust was taken out of Dardanelles claim, near the Forest Honse, $400 of which was taken in a single pan of dirt.
The Wisconsin Tunnel Company took ont, on the 3d. 111 ounces, and on the 2d, eighty ounces, four men at work.
March 7, 1855 .- The New York Tunnel Company, in Brushy Canon, two miles above Yankee Jim's, struck pay dirt which yielded as high as 8400 and $500 to the pan. The gold is in a very hard cement,
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which requires crushing in a mortar or some kind of machine.
April 25, 1855 .- Low & Co., at Roach Hill, in two days, washed out $1,000. They had recently struck gravel in their tunnel.
James O'Neil washed out of his elaim at Bird's Flat, in one pan of dirt, thirteen ounces of gold.
The Jameson claim, at Iowa Hill, in two weeks run, yielded $12,540.
May 7, 1855 .- The Jameson claim yielded, in the last four weeks, $22,000, at an expense of $2,000, or $20,000 clear to divide among ten owners.
June 2, 1855 .-- Mr. Hurlburt, a miner working in a claim on the plains two miles below Cox's Ranch, is averaging from $10.00 to $15.00 a day, the gold being quite coarse. This is remarkable from being in the plains of the Sacramento Valley.
June 16, 1855 .- The Empire claim, at Michigan Bluff, appears to be the richest mine in the State. It is no uncommon thing to wash out six or seven ounces of gold from one pan of dirt. One day's yield was fifty ounces.
August 2, 1855 .-- The Bennet claim, at Wisconsin Hill, yielded $2,000 for one day's work. Over $200 was taken out in one pan of dirt. One lump was dug up worth $139.20.
August 17, 1855 .- A lump of gold weighing thirty- five ounces was found in the claim of Lawrence & Co., at Bird's Flat.
September 29, 1855 .- Rich & Co's. claim, at lowa Hill, yielded twelve ounces of gold in one pan. The Shelving claim, at the same place, yields from $300 to $500 a day.
November 17, 1855 .- Rich gold-bearing quartz struck in Shipley's Ravine, and four miles of claims located on.
Two "strapped " hombres of Auburn, says the Herald, thinking a little manual labor would be better than loafing about town, took their picks and shovels and commenced digging at the head of the ravine above town, near the Sacramento road, and sur- prised themselves by digging into a perfect nest of nuggets-the largest one weighing thirty-four ounces, considerably mixed with quartz. They dug out altogether, in one day, fifty-eight ounces -- making, at the rate of $17.00 an ounce, $980-a snug little sum for one day's labor. J. W. Brown and " Dutch Jim " are the lucky owners of this claim.
December 8, 1855 .- Two men, working five weeks near the head of Little Baltimore Ravine, at Auburn, made $1,200, in coarse gold, the pieces ranging from $1.00 to $60.00 in value.
December 22, 1855 .- A company of four men mining at Cree's Flat, on the road between Auburn and Ophir, dug out a lump of pure gold worth $110.
January 26, 1856 .- The Dardanelles claim, near Yankee Jim's yielded 334 ounces of gold-dust as the result of five and one-half days' washing, equal to $6,000.
March 17, 1856 .- A Chinaman found a lump of
gold weighing sixteen pounds, and worth about 83,300, between Auburn and Ophir, about one mile from the latter place. He started for China the next morning.
March 25, 1856 .- Henry W. Starr found in his claim at Doty's Flat a nugget of the value of $225. The Herald says: " We had a look at the specimen, and find our eyes much improved thereby. From Mr. Starr we learn there is a perfect mania for quartz mining pervading the miners in the vicinity of Ophir, and that the success attending their prospecting has started a mill into existence and several arastras to active work.
August 29, 1856 .- McDonald and partner, mining under Palmer's wagon shop, in Auburn, found a rich lead and took out $125 in four pans of dirt.
October 6, 1856 .- A correspondent of the Herald, Mr. A. Cristy, writing from Lacy's Bar, on the North Fork of the American, says: " All the claims here are paying well, and the majority of them first-rate. On Manhattan Bar, Boles & Co. are doing well. Further down Messrs. Kelly & Smith are doing first- rate. They took out, last Saturday, sixty-five ounees of gold, and this week $300, two men at work. Between Manhattan and Lacy's the miners are all doing well. The flume claim of Martin & Co., on Lacy's, is doing first-rate. Then adjoining Martin & Co. comes your humble servant, doing first-rate and has been for the last three weeks, averaging about two pounds of gold a day. The company numbers your humble servant and Mrs. Cristy, being two of them, and the ' Poughkeepsie ' is the name of the claim."
The miners on the Middle Fork are receiving a rich return for the outlay of labor and money. The Bay State Company, composed of Messrs. Mussy and others, took out in one day sixty-five ounces, and the Empire State Company took out a solid lump weighing twenty-six ounces. The yield from the rivers hereabouts will be more abundant this year than for any one previous.
January 18, 1858 .- A piece of gold and quartz was found in the elaim of Carrie, Chandler & Gage, on Temperance Flat, near Rock Creek, which weighed ninety-five ounces, and on being broken yielded $1,060 in gold.
April 4, 1859 .- The Doig quartz lode at Ophir, one inch in thickness, yields from $300 to $500 a day from the labor of three men. The quartz is crushed in a hand mortar, and from a shaft extend- ing to a depth of fifty feet $20,000 has been taken out.
September, 1859 .- Thirty-three tons of refuse rock from the Doig quartz lode was worked in a quartz mill and yielded 107 ounces of gold worth $16.00 an ounce, being unusually pure for the locality. The ledge where the " poor " rock was taken from was eighteen inches in thickness.
August, 1860 .- Three men mining in a small vein of quartz at Paradise, opposite Spanish Dry Dig-
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gings, took out $3,000 in one week. The vein was believed to be a continuation of the very rich one on the opposite side of the Middle Fork, in El Dorado County.
December 24, 1862 .- A party of miners at Span- ish Flat, one mile from Auburn, found a lump of gold worth $1,000. This place was noted for such things in early days. Tom B. Harper once found a nugget worth $800, and many others have found large pieces.
August 13, 1864 .- A nugget of pure gold weigh- ing six and one-half pounds was found at American Bar, on the North Fork.
December 22, 1864 .- Messrs. Lowerey and Mitchell, two " strapped " individuals recently arrived in the country across the plains, while prospecting for dry diggings on Quartz Prairie, or Quartz Hill, three and one-half miles north of Auburn, struck some friable earth and quartz rich in gold, and in one week took out $6,000. This was named the " Green Emigrant " claim, and created a great excitement, causing the location of many claims on the lead. The yield for the first two years was $20,000, after which the proprietors refused to report, but it was rumored that in the first half of 1867 they made $100,000 working the rock in a hand mortar. This, however, was very doubtful, as the sequel proved, but many rich specimens were exhibited. The two owners performed all the work, permitting no one to enter the mine. In 1869 a company was formed, and the Golden Rule Mill built, with twenty stamps, but no more rich rock was found and the mill was removed.
Quartz Prairie is a high, rolling ridge, the soil being completely mixed with pieces of quartz, sup- posed to come from some vein running through the hill.
December 30, 1865 .- Over 100 ounces of gold was taken out of the Oro Tunnel claim, near Forest Hill, as the week's work of four men. This tunnel was commenced in 1833, and this was the first good yield obtained.
May 19, 1866 .- The Good Friday Company, in one bour's work, took out of their claim $1,400. The mine is situated on the west side of Welty's quartz mill, near Auburn, and the ledge is two inches thick.
November 23, 1867 .- Henriek Robards, a miner on the North Fork of the American River struck a fissure in the bed-rock, and in three days took 815,- 000 of pure scale gold.
December 17, 1870 .- Mr. William G. Greene dis- covered a quartz ledge about two miles from Auburn, from which he extracted sixteen pounds of gold in one day by means of a hand mortar. This became celebrated as the " Greene Mine." In 1871, a four- stamp mill was erected, and on May 16th he is reported to have cleaned up 814,000 from twelve tons of rock.
June 20, 1877 .- Mrs. Bissett, an elderly lady resid- ing on Rock Creek, who occasionally went prospect- ing around among the rocks on the neighboring
hills, made a strike by which she cleaned up between $400 and $600 as the result of one week's work at mining.
June 30, 1877 .- The Placer Herald has the following account of the way a fortune was made in three days :-
PLUCK REWARDED BY LUCK.
The richest strike made in this county for many years, and as rich perhaps as was ever made, we have the pleasure of recording. A. O. Bell, commonly called Pike Bell, who with his family has resided for many years on Bald Hill, a few miles north of Auburn, as many know, is a dauntless prospector. Though occasionally making a strike of some considerable importance in the past, he has managed, like most modern prospectors to keep poor. Last winter in particular, he was in very straightened circumstances; having no money and the merchants refusing to credit him, he offered his horse worth about 850.00 for $10.00, that he might buy bread for his children, and failing in his efforts to sacrifice his borse, be pawned the ring off his wife's finger to obtain the necessaries of life. Under such circumstances many would have given up prospecting and gone at some- thing that promised more certain results. Not so, however, with Pike. Day by day he continued his researches for the glittering treasure, and whether the passing day had revealed a color or not, his spirits were always jubilant, apparently kept up by the hope, that seemed never to desert him, of doing better on the morrow. At last the lucky day came. It was about three weeks ago, when hunting around over the hills, he struck his pick into a little mound which resembled somewhat in appearance an ant- bill, and to his delight be unearthed some pieces of decomposed quartz. attached to which were some colors of gold. Encouraged at this prospect he began to sink on his new lead and was rewarded by finding more or less gold at every stage of descent. Last Saturday he had reached a depth of about thirty feet and had taken out in sinking that far, rock estimated to be worth about $1,500. The rock being rotten, or what is called by quartz miners decomposed, he bad, with little effort, pounded out in a mortar enough to pay expenses as he progressed. The result thus far had been very good, and as the rock had got richer as he got deeper, he was of course entirely pleased at the prospect. Those he had talked to about his mine considered he had a good thing, but none ever dreamed of the great wealth that was in store for him. He had hired men to assist him in working the mine, and on last Monday morning they went to work as usual. The gouge, as we would call it, as it is too rotten to be properly called a ledge, was discovered by noon to have become suddenly richer. In the afternoon chunks of almost pure gold were taken out, and the decom- posed stuff that filled the interstices between the rocks was so rich in gold that Pike began to wash it out with a pan. From three pansful washed Monday afternoon, he obtained gold estimated to be worth between $4,000 and $5,000. That evening he came into town, and, giving us a hint of what he had got, invited us to go out and see it. On Tuesday after- noon, in company with Sheriff McCormick, we visited the mine. We found Bell with a pan of gold in his hands worth from $1,000 to $1,500, which he assured us all came from one pan of dirt; " but," said he, "if you don't believe it, I will wash another pan and show you." We told him to wasb. The pan was
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sent down in the shaft and soon returned filled with a mass of muddy, rocky stuff that sparkled all over with pieces of gold. This was washed out, and was found to contain fully as much of the precious metal, if not more, than the one he had just finished panning when we arrived. It was really the greatest sight we ever saw, and McCormick, who mined in California in its palmiest days, says it knocked the spots off anything he ever saw, except on one partie- ular occasion. Bell having convinced us of the richness of his mine, took ns to his house to show us the proceeds of the previous days' panning, that we might be convinced of all he had told us. The sight was one more easily imagined than described. As we looked upon the pans of gold before us, we thought of Aladdin and his wonderful lamp, and wondered if the story had not been suggested by some such reality as was before us. On Wednesday evening, Mr. Bell (it is " Mr." now since he has lots of gold, it was " Pike" before) was in town again, and he informed us that what we saw was nothing; that he had taken out $10,000 in three pans that day; that he had taken out, all told up to that time, between $30,000 and $35,000, and that he had an offer and was about to sell for $20,000. When asked his notion for selling, he said he would get away with $50,000 and that was money enough for him. To be sure, it is a good stake, and when we consider that it was made in three days, it must be confessed that the chances for making a sudden fortune in California are not all gone.
The sale was not consummated as the purchaser could not raise the money, and afterwards Mr. Bell resumed work. The ledge was found to be about one foot in thickness, and some gold obtained in after years, but no remarkable " strike " as attended the first discovery. As Mr. Bell had been prospecting and working for some years with poor success, at times suffering in poverty, he gratefully named his mine the " Life Preserver," and after taking a trip to his old home in Missouri, returned to his mine to enjoy his fortune.
In 1878, Mr. Bell associated himself with Messrs. Wilkinson & Hathaway of Nevada City, and in May or June of that year, another body of gold was struck and $20,000 taken out. The mine was then sold to Messrs. Wilkinson & Holland, and called the Nevada Hill Mine, and for some time was worked successfully.
August 1 1877 .- The Dutch Flat Forum reports that a Chinese Company, working a hydraulic mine near that place, found a nugget worth $12,000.
THE BIG CREVICE.
A wonderful place for gold is what is known as the Big Crevice, which crosses the Middle Fork of the American diagonally at Murderer's Bar. The opera- tions of the year 1851 enabled the working of the bed of the river, and disclosed the continuation of the crevice across the stream, it having been first broken into and worked to the depth of twelve or fifteen feet by J. D. Galbraith, in 1850, well back under the hill, upon the El Dorado side. A dyke of limestone here crosses the country, and this singular hole seems to have been a cavern which became
filled with sediment rich in gold before the present river system existed, as it contains no gravel. When first found in the stream there was an overlying stratum of gravel about two feet deep, which would yield from twenty-five to fifty cents to the bueket- fnl that was thrown away. Under this was a stratum of soapy, sedimentary slum, about the con- sistency of well-worked putty, that did not contain a particle of grit, and which a shovel would cut as easily as a sharp, thin knife would go through cheese. This material yielded from one to four ounces to the bucketful. At this time of working, the flume for drainage was very imperfect and did not carry more than two-thirds of the water of the stream. Constant bailing would not drain the hole in which the men were laboring, there always being one or more feet of water in which they were com- pelled to stand and work. The water being thrown out with buckets, this process would stir up the softer gold-bearing stratum and cause it to run away from the top stratum and let it into the hole, caus- ing great annoyance. During this operation the gold could be seen lying upon all sides of the pit in apparent handfuls. But four men could work in the excavation, two of whom were constantly bailing out water, one was throwing out the top gravel stratum as it fell in, while the fourth was grappling up the gold-bearing slum. Only for about three hours a day could the hole be placed in condition to enable the fourth man to extract the paying stratum, and but eight days could any work at all be done there. The yield during that time was $4,600.
From time to time the Big Crevice has been attacked, and is now owned by a Sacramento corpo- ration, who have made efforts for several years past to fathom its depths, at one time endeavoring to sink a large iron tube through which to raise the aurifer- ous slum. At one time it was worked under the superintendence of W. M. Manning to a depth of about ninety feet, and, in some parts, sixty feet wide, and yielded many thousands of dollars. Interspersed with the slum, the fissure contains wedge-shaped masses of limestone, that are generally but a few inches thick at one side but gradually thicken to from four to six feet upon the other, and weigh many hundreds of pounds. Stulls were placed in the crevice to prevent these from falling into the pit, but as the workings were carried downward, from time to time the timbers would give way, when some of these masses would fall, and the workmen under- neath were in danger. It is the opinion of Mr. Man- ning, who has had more experience than any other person in working it, that a million of dollars will be taken from it if any method is ever adopted by which it can be thoroughly worked.
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