THE SQUAW VALLEY MINING EXCITEMENT
The Tahoe region was once thrilled through and through by a real
mining excitement that belonged to itself alone. It had felt the
wonderful activity that resulted from the discovery of the Comstock
lode in Virginia City. It had seen its southern border crowded with
miners and prospectors hurrying to the new field, and later had heard
the blasting and picking, the shoveling and dumping of rocks while the
road from Placerville was being constructed.
It had seen another road built up from Carson over the King's Canyon
grade, and lumber mills established at Glenbrook in order to supply
the mines with timbers for their tunnels and excavations, as the
valuable ore and its attendant waste-rocks were hauled to the surface.
But now it was to have an excitement and a stampede all its own. An
energetic prospector from Georgetown, El Dorado County, named Knox,
discovered a big ledge of quartz in Squaw Valley. It was similar rock
to that in which the Comstock silver was found in large quantities.
Though the assays of the floating-rock did not yield a large amount of
the precious metals, they showed a little--as high as $3.50 per ton.
This was enough. There were bound to be higher grade ores deeper down.
The finder filed his necessary "locations," and doubtless aided by
copious draughts of "red-eye" saw, in swift imagination, his claim
develop into a mine as rich as those that had made the millionaires
of Virginia City. Anyhow the rumor spread like a prairie fire, and men
came rushing in from Georgetown, Placerville, Last Chance, Kentucky
Flat, Michigan Bluff, Hayden Hill, Dutch Flat, Baker Divide, Yankee
Jim, Mayflower, Paradise, Yuba, Deadwood, Jackass Gulch and all the
other camps whose locators and residents had not been as fortunate
financially as they were linguistically.
Knox started a "city" which he named Knoxville, the remains of
which are still to be seen in the shape of ruined log-cabins, stone
chimneys, foundations of hewed logs, a graveyard, etc., on the left
hand side of the railway coming from Truckee, and about six miles from
Tahoe.
One has but to let his imagination run riot for a few moments to see
this now deserted camp a scene of the greatest activity. The many
shafts and tunnels, dump-piles and prospect-holes show how busy a spot
it must have been. The hills about teemed with men. At night the
log store--still standing--and the saloons--tents, shacks and log
houses--were crowded with those who sought in the flowing bowl some
surcease from the burden of their arduous labors.
Now and again a shooting took place, a man actually "died with his
boots on," as in the case of one King, a bad man from Texas who had a
record, and whose sudden end was little, if any, lamented. He had had
a falling out with the store-keeper, Tracey, and had threatened to
kill him on sight. The former bade him keep away from his store, but
King laughed at the prohibition, and with the blind daring that often
counts as courage with such men--for he assumed that the store-keeper
would not dare to shoot--he came down the following day, intending
himself to do all the shooting there was to be done. But he reckoned
mistakenly. Tracey saw him coming, came to the door, bade him Halt!
and on his sneering refusal, shot the bad man dead.
In September, 1913, I paid a visit to Knoxville. Just above the town,
on the eastern slope of the mountain, were several tunnels and great
dump-piles, clearly showing the vast amount of work that had been
done. The quartz ledge that caused the excitement was distinctly in
evidence, indeed, when the Tahoe Railway roadbed was being graded,
this quartz ledge was blasted into, and the director of operations
sent a number of specimens for assay, the rock looked so favorable.
Here and there were the remains of old log-cabins, with their outside
stone chimneys. In some cases young tamaracks, fifteen and twenty feet
high, had grown up within the areas once confined by the walls. These
ruins extended all the way down to Deer Creek, showing the large
number of inhabitants the town once possessed.
I saw the graveyard by the side of the river, where King's body was
the first to be buried, and I stood in the doorway of the store from
which the shot that killed him was fired.
In imagination, I saw the whole life of the camp, as I have seen
mining-camps after a stampede in Nevada. The shacks, rows of tents,
and the rudely scattered and varied dwellings that the ingenuity and
skill of men hastily extemporized. Most of the log-houses are now
gone, their charred remnants telling of the indifferent carelessness
of campers, prospectors or Indians.
The main street was in a pretty little meadowed vale, lined on either
side with trees, and close to the Truckee, which here rushes and
dashes and roars and sparkles among the bowlders and rocks that
bestrew its bed.
When it was found the ore did not "pan out," the excitement died
down even more rapidly than it arose, and in 1863-4 the camp was
practically dead.
It has been charged that the Squaw Valley claims were "salted" with
ore brought from Virginia City. I am inclined to doubt this, and many
of the old timers deny it. They assert that Knox was "on the square"
and that he firmly believed he had paying ore. It is possible there
may have been the salting of an individual claim or so after the camp
started, but the originators of the camp started it in good faith,
as they themselves were the greatest losers when the "bottom" of the
excitement dropped out.
About a mile further up the river is still to be seen the site of the
rival town of Claraville, founded at the same time as Knoxville.
There is little left here, though the assay office, built up against
a massive square rock still stands. It is of hewed timbers rudely
dovetailed together at the corners.
It would scarcely be worth while to recount even this short history
of the long dead,--almost stillborn--Squaw Valley camp were it not for
the many men it brought to Lake Tahoe who have left their impress and
their names upon its most salient canyons, streams, peaks and other
landmarks. Many of these have been referred to elsewhere.
One of the first to arrive was William Pomin, the brother of the
present captain of the steamer _Tahoe_. His wife gave birth to
the first white child born on Lake Tahoe, and she was named after the
Lake. She now lives in San Francisco. When she was no more than two or
three months old, her mother took her on mule-back, sixty miles over
the trail to Forest Hill, _in one day_. Pomin removed to the
north shore of the Lake when Squaw Valley "busted," and was one of
the founders of Tahoe City, building and conducting one of the first
hotels there.
Another of these old timers was J.W. McKinney, from whom McKinney's
was named. He came from the mining-camp of Georgetown over the trail,
and engaged himself in selling town lots at Knoxville. He and Knox had
worked together in the El Dorado excitement.
He originally came over the plains in the gold-alluring days of '49.
When his party reached the land of the Indians, these aborigines were
too wise to make open attacks. They hit upon the dastardly method of
shooting arrows into the bellies of the oxen, so that the pioneers
would be compelled to abandon them. One night McKinney was on guard
duty. He was required to patrol back and forth and meet another
sentinel at a certain tree. There they would stop and chat for a few
moments before resuming their solitary march. Just before day-break,
after a few words, they separated. On answering the breakfast call
McKinney found he was alone, and on going back to investigate, found
his companion lying dead with an arrow through his heart. The moccasin
tracks of an Indian clearly revealed who was the murderer, and a
little study showed that the Indian had swam the river, waited until
the sentinel passed close by him, and had then sent the arrow true to
its fatal mark.
The next night the Indians shot an arrow into an ox. In the morning it
was unable to travel, but McKinney and his friends had determined
to do something to put a stop to these attacks. Taking the ox in the
shadow of a knoll, they shot it, and eight men then hid in the shelter
of some brush where the carcass was clearly in view.
When the train pulled out it seemed as if they had abandoned the ox.
It was scarcely out of sight when the watchers saw eight Indians come
sneaking up. Each man took the Indian allotted to him, but by some
error two men shot at the same Indian, so that when the guns were
fired and seven men fell dead the other escaped. On one of them was
found seven twenty-dollar gold pieces wrapped up in a dirty rag, which
had doubtless cost some poor emigrant or miner his life. Some of the
party wished to leave this gold with the dead Indian, but McKinney
said his scruples would not allow him to do any such thing, and the
gold found its way into his pocket.
Though a man of practically no education--it is even said by those who
claim to have known him well that he could neither read nor write,
but this seems improbable--he was a man of such keen powers of
observation, retentive memory, ability in conversation and strong
personality, that he was able to associate on an equality with men
of most superior attainments. John Muir was a frequent visitor to
his home, especially in the winter time when all tourists and resort
guests had gone away. John McGee, another well-known lover of the
winter mountains, was also a welcome guest, who fully appreciated the
manly vigor and sterling character of the transplanted Missourian.
John Ward, from whom Ward Creek and Ward Peak (8,665 feet) are named,
was another Squaw Valley mining excitement stampeder. He came in the
early days of the rush, and as soon as the camp died down, located on
the mouth of the creek that now bears his name.
The next creek to the south--Blackwood's,--is named after still
another Squaw Valley stampeder. For years he lived at the mouth of
this creek and gained his livelihood as a fisherman.
The same explanation accounts for Dick Madden Creek.
Barker who has peak, pass and valley named after him, came from
Georgetown to Knoxville, and like so many other of his unfortunate
mining brethren from over the divide, started a dairy on the west side
of the pass which bears his name. The valley, however, was so high and
cold that more than half the year the cream would not rise, so he gave
up dairying and went elsewhere.
These are but a few of many who might be mentioned, whose names
are linked with the Tahoe region, and who came to it in the hope of
"making their everlasting fortunes" when Squaw Valley "started up."