BONANZA CAMP--THE PONCHA BANK--CREEDE DETERMINES TO SEE OTHER
SECTIONS.
Leaving Monarch, the prospector journeyed through Poncha Pass, over
into the San Luis Valley, and began to climb the hills behind the
Sangre de Christo range. On a little stream called Silver Creek he made
a number of locations, among them the Bonanza, and he called the new
camp by that name, just as he named Monarch after what he considered
his best claim. The country here was more accessible and consequently a
more desirable field for prospecting. South of Bonanza, Creede located
the “Twin Mines,” which proved to be good property. The ore in the
twin claims carried two ounces of gold to the ton.
A year later when the pioneer prospector decided to pull out and seek
new fields, he was able to realize fifteen thousand dollars in good,
hard-earned money. One claim was sold for two thousand dollars, the
money to be deposited in Raynolds’ bank at Salida; but the purchasers
for some reason insisted that the money be deposited in a Poncha bank,
very little known at that time, but whose president shortly afterward
killed his man and became well, but not favorably, known. Creede’s two
thousand dollars went to the banker’s lawyers. The bank closed, and now
you may see the ex-president in a little mountain town pleading at the
bar--not the bar of justice.
The camp has never astonished the mining world, but it has furnished
employment for a number of people, and that is good and shows that
the West and the whole world is richer and better because of the
discoveries of Creede.
Creede now determined to see a little, and learn something of mining in
other sections of the West. Leaving Colorado, he traveled through Utah,
Nevada, Arizona and California, prospecting and studying the formation
of the country in the different mining camps. The knowledge gained on
this trip proved valuable to the prospector in after years. This was
his school. The wide West was his school-house, and Nature was his
teacher.