USA > Oregon > Douglas County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 46
USA > Oregon > Jackson County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 46
USA > Oregon > Josephine County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 46
USA > Oregon > Coos County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 46
USA > Oregon > Curry County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 46
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fied that no ordinary outlay will provide a sufficient supply. Still, there will doubtless be found some man or an association of men who will be willing to make an invest- ment of sufficient capital to construct an immense ditch, bringing water from a great distance to the beds, and then by means of hydraulic apparatus washing down the great banks and separating the gold.
Statisticians have frequently attempted to ascertain the yield of the mines of Jack- son county during all the years subsequent to its settlement ; but a distant approxima- tion is only to be achieved. The principal association concerned in handling the product has been the express company of Wells, Fargo & Co., whose agent at Jackson- ville testifies to having forwarded ten million dollars worth of gold since 1856. A small portion only of this may have come from Josephine county. It is the agent's opinion that an equal amount was extracted during the same time which found other means of egress from the locality. By calculations based upon these figures we are apt to arrive at the opinion that thirty millions represents the quantity mined between the years 1851 and 1884, in Jackson county alone. This is regarded as a reasonable esti- mate, but the true amount may be millions greater or less. Of this amount the quartz mines have furnished a sum somewhat in excess of half a million dollars.
While the average annual yield may have been quite a million a year, the out-put of precious metal has in general decreased each year from 1856 until the present. In the years preceding 1860 it is thought to have averaged over one and a quarter mil- lions, whereas in the year named it was probably not above $1,150,000. By 1870 it had decreased to two-thirds of that amount, and in succeeding years, as the placers become extinct and mining population diminished, very little was done in shal- low diggings, the hydraulics taking the place of picks and shovels, and the yearly product has now sunk to less than $250,000. The yield depends however on the rela- tive rainfall of the season, for circumstanced as the most of the miners are they must look to the evanescent clouds of the heavens for the means wherewith to make their mines produce.
The extent of the mining industry in Jackson county is shown by the fact that 5438 mining locations were made from October 8, 1856, to June 30, 1880. Of these sixteen were copper, one tin, 124 cinnabar, and the rest gold and silver. There were 1221 conveyances of mining claims and 133 transfers of water ditches and rights during the same time. The claims were located as follows : In Big Applegate District, 466; in Little Applegate, 39; Uniontown, 2; Sterling, 151; Jackass, 491; Jackson- ville, 1463; Forty-nine, 234; Willow Springs, 785; Gold Hill, 361; Gall's creek, 95 ; Foot's creek, 288; Evans' creek, 115; Sardine creek, 132; Louse creek, 25; Dry Diggings; 33; Jump-off-Joe, 114; Grave creek, 224; Coyote ereek, 75; Poorman's creek, 300; Steamboat, 45.
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CHAPTER XXXIX.
QUARTZ MINING IN JACKSON COUNTY.
Two Years of Prospecting-Distinction Between Milling and Pocket Veins-Pocket Mining-An Easy Road to Riches-The First Quartz Mine-The Gold Hill Mine-Enormous Yield-The First Quartz Mill-The Blackwell Lead-The Jewitt Mine- Mines on Jackson Creek-Two Quartz Mills-The Fowler Mine- Its History-A Silver Excitement.
The history of quartz mining in Jackson county mostly centers about the dis- covery of the rich leads at Gold hill and Steamboat, and is mainly embraced in the two years of 1860 and 1861, in the first of which the greatest results were attained and the greatest amount of work done. Thus quartz mining will be seen to occupy but a single short period in the county's history, and resembles a spasmodic outburst which suddenly began and as suddenly ceased without very beneficial immediate results to the community, but giving great hopes for a future time when, the subject of mining and milling being better understood, much greater things may be expected. The ledges of gold-bearing quartz have not proved particularly numerous, but perhaps as large a proportion of them have been found to contain workable rock as in any other part of the country. Indeed, it would be difficult to point out any locality whatever in which the net returns have been greater for the amount invested and the work done. The experience of miners has shown that the veins of Jackson county are "spotted"-that is, their content of gold is not uniformly distributed throughout the mass of quartz, but is collected within small spaces of abnormally rich rock technically called "pockets." In other mining countries the same thing occurs; and practical quartz miners are in the habit of distinguishing such veins by the name of "pocket leads," in contradistinction to those veins where gold is uniformly dissemi- nated throughout, which are called "milling leads," as requiring reduction by mill process, whereas pocket veins are worked by more simple means. The working of pocket veins has become an industry of no small importance in the "slate belt" of California, and it is highly possible that a few hints from the experience of the busy workers there might assist in developing the hidden wealth of Jackson county. Twenty years, during which "hunting pockets" has become an exclusive pursuit carried on without reference to ordinary mining, has brought the occupation to the dignity of an art and a profession. The initiated talk abstrusely of "leads," "dikes," "crossings," "elbows," "bends," "blue slate" and the other technicalities of their pur- suit, and have formulated the principles supposed to determine the location of pockets with such approximation as to enable the seeker in many cases to discover the hidden treasure. Pocket mining is the most absorbing and interesting pursuit in the world; and whoever becomes tinctured with it will remain devoted to it for his lifetime. There are many instances known of men laboring assiduously at it for ten, twelve and
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more years, without once striking a color. Its rewards are ill-proportioned, but, per- haps, as certain as those of any branch of gold mining. The greatest pockets known to have been found yielded a quarter of a million of dollars, the two eminent examples which occurred in Jackson county being hardly surpassed. The pursuit possesses the distinguishing and obvious advantage that it can be carried on without capital, and by the exertions of a single individual or two partners. It is customarily followed by two in preference to any other number, especially in case of shaft workings, wherein one man loads the bucket with rock while the other turns the windlass to raise it. With only the ordinary excavating tools and explosives, and with a season's supply f provisions, the latter perhaps advanced as a "grub stake" by some speculative trader, the pocket miner is enabled to pursue his calling, often with good results, sometimes with surpassing luck, and frequently without the slightest return. The art of pocket mining consists essentially in discovering what are called crossings-narrow wins of quartz or yellowish "dike," so-called-and tracing these to their intersectio. with an ordinary quartz vein, at which point, by some mysterious dispensation of nature, a. pocket is usually formed. Elbows are bends in the vein, at which pockets are also to be looked for. The intersection is arrived at by means of a shaft or a tunnel of small diameter, frequently only a yard or so, as the object invariably is to remove as little dirt as possible. Having calculated where the pocket probably lies, the miner arrives at that point in the most expeditious and least laborious way possible, proceeding, usually, along the quartz vein in order to test by means of the pan the nearness of the gold deposit. The "color" is usually struck at a distance of a few feet and thereafter all the earth taken ont is jealously examined lest the pocket be passed and so lost. When finally it is arrived at, the gold is almost entirely contained within the space of a few cubic feet, and frequently of a single bucketful. A panful of the quartz, usually decomposed and soft, may yield a thousand dollars or more. Thus the use of a mill or arastra is most frequently obviated, a single hand mortar and pestle being sufficient for the reduction of the rock, after which it is washed in a pan. Thus unpretentiously, have been taken out some pockets containing not merely ounces, but hundreds of pounds of gold. At other times the gold is found disseminated through several tons of quartz, of varying richness, which requires the use of heavier machinery, either an arastra or stamp mill. Of the former sort was the great Divoll pocket, found in Sonora, California, which yielded over $200,000 in a week, and of the other class was the Fowler ledge at Applegate, which was more productive, but more slowly extracted. Thus systematically is pocket quartz mining pursued in a district of California where a thousand miners, an industrious and worthy class, exist by it. Without their pres- ence the country they inhabit would be almost deserted; for they sustain trade and the small number of agriculturists residing near by. There are, perhaps, sufficient oppor- tunities for the cultivation of their art in the quartz deposits of Jackson county to support an equal number of miners, all of whom would contribute to the material advancement of the country. Perhaps some may reply, There is no opportunity; the veins have all been prospected, and the gold removed. To this we answer. The quartz veins have in no case been worked far below the surface; two hundred feet or there- abouts measures the deepest shaft; but that is a mere scratch, hardly worth consider-
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ing. Possibly the veins are equally rich at all depths, and rich pockets may exist in the lower portions of veins as well as near the surface.
The quartz veins which were first met with by the miners frequently were found to contain pockets of decomposed rock with gold, which being accidentally found upon the surface, the gold was extracted by crushing in a mortar, and no further thought was given to the subject of quartz containing gold, though the theory of that mineral being the " original matrix" of the precious metal had had previous currency. The idea of sinking upon and "exploring the veins was not entertained until the quartz mania broke out in California and spread across the border into Oregon. The first quartz lead which was prospected in Jackson county was the Hicks lead, on the left fork of Jackson creek, above Farmer's Flat. Sonora Hicks and brother, the discov- erers, worked this vein in a necessarily imperfect way and took out some gold, getting, said the Sentinel, $1,000 in two hours! Theirs was a pocket vein, and no mill or arastra was thought of in connection with it. Manry, Davis and Taylor owned the adjoining claim, and put up an arastra upon it, the first apparatus of the kind in Ore- gon. The latter firm purchased the Hicks claim and worked its rock in their arastra. The total yield of the original claim, the first quartz lead worked in Oregon, was about $2,000.
The next quartz discovery of importance was that of the famous Gold Hill lode, near Fort Lane. This took place in January, 1860, the discoverer being one Graham, known as " Emigrant," who, with George Ish, James Hayes, Thomas Chav- ner and John Long, as partners, located this astonishingly rich lode and began to work it. There was an abundance of float rock, found lying upon the surface of the hill, which yielded fabulously in gold, and as soon as the news of the strike became known the whole hill was staked out in claims, the boundaries marked some- times by stretching ropes, and men were busily at work picking up float and crushing it in mortars, whereby much money was realized. Mr. Henry Klippel, the father of quartz mining in Southern Oregon, found a piece of mixed gold and quartz weighing thirteen ounces, which yielded $100 ; and others reported as good results. Excitement ran high. Jacksonville, previously dull, began to bloom. Men who were notoriously " broke" began to put on airs of wealth. Money circulated with facility and every one partook, in spirit, of the good fortune. A daily stage was put on the route between Jacksonville and the new mines, which was crowded with sight-seers, speculators and prospectors. An eating house sprang up near the mine, and Morgan Davis inaugu- rated a trading post. Quartz stock was up; prospecting seized as a fever upon the whole country ; and fabulous discoveries were reported in every direction. As for the original owners of the Gold Hill lead their fortunes seemed boundless, but dissension broke out in their camp. James Hayes, becoming dissatisfied, sold out to Henry Klippel, John MeLaughlin and Charles Williams, for $5,000. Graham sold also to Messrs. Klippel and John E. Ross, for the same sum, the use of the money costing those gentlemen ten per cent. per month. Two arastras were put up to reduce the quartz, mules being the motive power, and armed men guarded the apparatus, mine and quartz wagons from the envious and predacious crowd. Weekly clean-ups were in order and 1,000 ounces of well retorted gold was frequently divided on Saturdays. For some time this extraordinary out-put continued, when the desires of the owners
RESIDENCE OF JOHN RAST, ROSEBURG. DOUGLAS CO.
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outran the capabilities of the slow and primitive mule-propelled arastra, and a steam quartz mill with all the modern improvements was resolved upon. This, the first quartz mill in Jackson county, was purchased in San Francisco and shipped to the mine by the firm of Klippel, MeLaughlin & Williams, whose undertaking was to erush the mining company's quartz for eight dollars per ton, themselves retaining own- ership in the mill. The mill was shipped to Gold Hill rid Scottsburg, in the spring of 1860, and great difficulty was experienced in transporting the heavy boiler, mortars, etc. The cost of freighting was about $2,600, and the total cost of the mill when in running order was about $12,000. It was a twelve-stamp mill, of the ordinary type of free gold mill, amalgamating in battery, and crushing wet. Its first performance was the reduction of one hundred tons of refuse quartz, thrown aside as being too poor for the arastra process, which yielded one hundred dollars per ton. The mill was located at the Dardanelles, and here the rock was hauled from the mine. The next run was on ordinary quartz from the vein, unassorted, and very much to the surprise of all it yielded only three dollars per ton-owing, as was supposed, to defective amalgamation. Another run was carefully conducted for six weeks with a result of two dollars and forty cents per ton. Public confidence in the mine was much shaken, In August the mill and mine suspended operations. In the subsequent workings of the lode very little has been realized. The total product of this famous mine, accord- ing to Mr. Henry Klippel, was about $150,000, nearly all of which was taken from a confined space in the mine, only twenty-two feet long by ten in height and the thick- ness of the vein, which is less than a yard. Repeated tests of ore from other portions of it failed invariably, because the mine is without doubt a pocket ledge, and only to be successfully worked as such. The major part of the explorations subsequently per- formed consisted in sinking a shaft 130 feet deep, on the vein, and running two tunnels to intersect the shaft. A great many small prospect holes have also been sunk, but not to any considerable depth. The vein has all of the characteristics supposed by " mining experts" to insure permanency. It dips somewhat to the east, has a thick, soft " gonge," smooth, well-defined walls, and other presumed valuable qualifications. After its first successful working, its ownership became the subject of a notable law- suit, that of Jacob Ish vs. The Gold Hill Mining Company, wherein the plaintiff sought to dispossess defendants. Ish had entered the land embracing the mining property as agricultural, and had secured a patent thereto, the company remaining in ignorance thereof until its issnance. The circuit court of Jackson county sustained the plaintiff, but upon appeal to the supreme court of Oregon, the decision of the lower court was reversed, thereby, says Mr. Klippel, first enunciating the principle that the state courts have the authority to annul agricultural land grants to individuals in conflict with prior claims. Messrs. Klippel, Mclaughlin & Williams lost $11,000 on the mill. After they had demonstrated its want of success, they leased it to a party of Yreka miners who were equally unsuccessful. Subsequently the mill was sold for $5,000 to Jewitt Brothers and Douthitt, and removed to the Jewitt mine near Vannoy's ferry, where it did good service for awhile, and after was converted into a saw mill. The machinery was dismantled, and some years later the engine was removed to Parker's saw mill on Big Butte creek, where it is still in use.
433
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SOUTHERN OREGON.
The Blackwell lead was discovered a short time subsequent to the finding of the Gold Hill vein. This mine proved far less rich than the other, yielding altogether but a few thousand dollars, thongh having a very promising appearance. It was actively worked and produced at first a good supply of beautiful specimens worth some thous- ands. In the summer of 1860 and subsequently, it was owned by C. C. Beekman, William Hoffman, Dr. L. S. Thompson and U. S. Hayden, who made a contract with the proprietors of the Gold Hill quartz mill to work the mine and crush the ore, turn- ing over to the owners of the lead the amount realized above necessary expenses of working. The deposit of quartz gave out, however, and the attempt failed. At later times the Blackwell lead has been worked, but to no apparent purpose. In 1882 a rotary quartz crusher was put up at the mine and is being experimented with. The total yield of the Blackwell has been from ten to twenty thousand dollars.
The Jewitt ledge, situated on the south side of Rogue river in township thirty-six, south, range five, west, was first prospected in 1860 by the Jewitt brothers, who had caught the quartz fever in common with the rest of the population of Jackson and Josephine counties. Indications proving favorable they associated themselves with D. William Douthitt, of Jacksonville, and began to work their vein. They were signally successful ; they took out $40,000, says Mr. Klippel, and having exhausted the deposit, ceased work. Their rock paid fifty dollars per ton at the first clean-up, the lode being six feet thick at the working point. Subsequent work on the claim has revealed nothing of great importance, but indications are said to be favorable for another rich strike. In 1874 or the succeeding year Messrs. Klippel and Beekman, having possession of the claim, purchased an engine and boiler and set up two steam arastras to work the rock. But owing to certain causes their operations failed of success. The name Elizabeth was given to the ledge. The assay value of the rock is said to average twenty-one dollars, and the arastras pay twelve dollars per ton, the vein's average width now being three feet.
Next in importance stands the Swinden ledge, near Gold Hill, on the donation claim of John Swinden. It was owned by several partners and was prospected in 1860, and in 1862 and 1863 was worked, by a shaft, the quartz being reduced in an arastra. The vein was tolerably rich, at least in one spot, and paid something above expenses, it is thought, though the cost of working was considerable. The ledge is two and a half feet thick and is still thought valuable. In the same mining region are several other veins which have been considerably worked and are still regarded as valuable. The MeDonough and Shump veins are of this class. On Foot's creek quite a number of quartz locations have been made from which a considerable amount of wealth has been extracted, with a first-rate prospect for future success. In 1860 Foot's creek quartz mines were reported to be paying handsomely. The rock was described as dark and soft, with specks of gold visible throughout. Johnson's, and Lyons and Peebler's ledges were particularly successful, according to newspaper reports. In 1861 these leads were mentioned as having fallen off in richness, only ten dollars per ton being realized. On Jackson creek, especially on the right branch, several veins of quartz of considerable promise have at times been prospected, the greater part of the work being done in 1860, directly following the Gold Hill discovery, and at a time that we may designate as the epoch of quartz mining, since at no previous or subsequent time have
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there been any developments to compare with those which took place that year. Four locations were found on Shively gulch, from each of which considerable gold was taken. The principal of these was the Holman ledge, which yielded a total of about $10,000 as reported by credible witnesses. The rock from this mine was worked in the Jack- son creek quartz mill, situated at the forks of Jackson creek. This mill was erected by Henry Pape, who came from Yreka for the purpose and was built in the summer of 1860, at a time when quartz excitement ran high. Mr. Pape had contracted to crush quartz from eight or nine ledges, on the creek, to the amount of 1000 tons for eight dollars per ton, provided the rock paid that much. The first run was from the Holman, eighty or one hundred tons of it yielding forty-two dollars per ton. From a small lot taken from the Davenport claim on the right branch, seventy-five dollars per ton was obtained ; but this mine like all the rest was speedily exhausted. Mr. Pape ran the mill (eight stamps, steam) for four months, at the end of that time selling two-thirds of it to a company of several persons, by whom it was run some months longer. In rather less than a year from its inception it was changed into a saw mill, and at a later date the battery was in use on Wagner creek, where Messrs. Anderson and Rockfellow were working a quartz lead. The engine was put into a saw mill on Forest creek.
Another mill was put rather later on by Charles Drew and Samuel Bowden, a small affair and unsuccessful. It was located up the right branch of Jackson creek and in the vicinity of several promising veins mainly in Timber and Shively gulches. This mill differed from the others in having an amalgamating pan and settler, it being supposed that there was a notable amount of silver in the veins, which would be lost in ordinary battery amalgamation. The mill, after a checkered career of two or more years, was taken down and the boiler is now in use at Karewski's flour mill at Jackson- ville, while a portion of the battery lies upon the ground not far away.
In 1860 Messrs. Johnson, Cupps and Woods possessed a lode upon the right branch, from which fifty ounces of gold were taken in one day. Afterwards Mr. Elder purchased the interest of the two latter and with Johnson, a most persistent quartz miner who still pursues his chosen calling, erected an arastra near their claim, driven by an over-shot water wheel. Boatman and Sheets carried on work upon a vein in Shively gulch, with some success. Elder, Johnson's partner, was a member of the firm to whom H. Pape sold his quartz mill, the remaining partners being Dr. Ganung, afterwards the coroner of Jackson county, and three Germans.
The extraordinary quartz mine known by the several names of the Fowler lode, the Applegate quartz mine, and the Steamboat ledge is situated in township 40, range 4 west, on the right fork of Big Applegate, called Carberry fork, about 200 yards below the summit of the divide separating that stream from Brushy creek, and is seventeen miles by road south of the site of the trading post once owned by W. W. Fowler and Keeler, on Applegate creek. It was discovered in February, 1860, by Frank Fitterman, William Billups and others, who afterwards received into the firm Captain Barnes, John Ely, William P. Ferris, W. W. Fowler and G. W. Keeler, the two latter obtaining their interest in consequence of having furnished the "grub stake" by which the discoverers were enabled to prospect. The rock promised fairly at first and was merely explored a little, until an arastra was completed in June, 1860, and the lode regularly opened. For several months only an average yield was recorded,
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until the beginning of the following year, when the extremely rich portion of the ledge was found. Then the full wealth of the deposit was developed, and an enormous yield was obtained. In one week in February, 1861, money enough was made to pay all previous expenses of the mine. Thirty-five tons of quartz yielded $350 per ton, and fifty tons, comprising the next lot, produced $18,500, or $370 per ton. But these yields were eclipsed by successive ones, for the newspapers of the day spoke of $10,000 as the income for one week, 1,470 ounces as the product of another, and $2,352 as the average yield per ton of the rock worked in March, 1861. Four arastras had been put up and other improvements were resolved upon, when Captain Barnes and Ely sold out their interest to Fowler for $6,000. Ferris had previously sold for a comfortable sum, leaving the seven shares divided as follows: Barnes and Ely, three shares; D. L. Hopkins, one; Mckay and O'Brien, one; Fowler and Keeler, one; Fowler, Anderson and James T. Glenn, one. Mr. Samuel Taylor, a miner of experience, became superintendent in November, 1861, and retained that position for nearly two years, during which the yield was about $190,000, making with the previous yield a total of $280,000. Subsequently about $10,000 was taken out, and to this should be added about $25,000 supposed to have been realized by the O'Brien company, a rival firm which was working the same lead on the other side of the divide. Thus the whole yield of the lead may be summed up at $315,000, which is the amount reported by Superintendent Taylor. After using the arastras for a time, a four-stamp mill was erected, but the supply of rock gave out before it could be utilized. The above- mentioned firm of O'Brien & Company took up their claim upon the same lead, which infringed upon the original company and produced a lawsuit of great celebrity and expensiveness. The Fowler company claimed a portion of land supposed to overlie the vein, but which was found not to do so except for a small portion of its length. The other company ascertained the defect in their rival's position, and took advantage of it by filing an adverse claim. In the courts, after protracted litigation, the Fowler company won, after running tunnels and doing other work to demonstrate the truth of their claims. They got possession of the whole lead, but subsequently took out very little gold, the deposit being pretty nearly exhausted. The mine was abandoned by the owners but afterwards re-located by Mr. Cook, who has made efforts to prove the existence of yet more wealth, but thus far without success. He has tunneled about 300 feet without noticeable results, but still works and hopes.
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