SAM BRANNAN STRIKES IT RICH AND REFUSES TO SHARE WITH MORMON
CHURCH EXCEPT ON ORDER FROM LORD.
_Mine Bargain Fails to Stand Inquiry of Author, But Others Invest
and Figure as Victims of Fraud._
I had early been familiar with Utah and its mines, through an
acquaintance with “Sam” Brannan. Brannan had a history of thrills and
adventures which if gathered into book form would make the heroes of
Dumas look cheap and commonplace. Originally a Mormon, high in the
councils of Brigham Young, he led a body of his co-religionists around
Cape Horn to California, before the earliest Argonauts. He staked out
claims on the American River, about two miles from where Folsom prison
stands, the location being known as “Mormon Island” to this day. The
diggings were so rich that one of California’s evanescent cities sprang
up around it, almost overnight, just as suddenly to disappear. “Sam”
worked his companions on a per diem basis and very soon accumulated
a large fortune--certainly in excess of a million dollars, many well
informed people estimating it at two or three times as much. But while
he settled promptly his labor bills, he was not so businesslike in
squaring accounts with the Mormon Church, which claimed nearly all
the profits. Finally, a trusted agent was dispatched from Salt Lake
City with a peremptory order on Brannan to turn over the ecclesiastical
share of the “dust” at once.
Brannan’s reply was historic and to the point, even if a bit profane.
The gold, he said, had been placed in his safe keeping on the Lord’s
account. He would surrender it upon the Lord’s proper written order;
otherwise not.
“Sam” invested most of his wealth in San Francisco real estate. An
important street bears his name. Like most of the early Mormon leaders,
he was of a coarse-fibered nature, with a rather forbidding, saturnine
face, but singularly keen-witted, resolute, and fearing neither man nor
devil.
The latter quality stood him in good stead. Brigham could not permit
such a flagrant breach of church discipline to remain unpunished.
Flock after flock of “destroying angels” took flight from Salt Lake
City, duly commissioned to bring back Samuel’s scalp or perish in the
attempt. But their holy work was always a dismal failure. Brannan must
have had some foreknowledge of their movement against the security
of his person. Liking not to meet “angels” unawares of any kind, he
arranged to encounter the “destroyers” half way out in the trackless
desert, or mountain fastnesses, with a competent group of exterminators
he seemed to keep on hand for such occasions; and it was the “angels”
who were always taken unawares. Some of them got back to Salt Lake
minus tail feathers and otherwise damaged, but the majority of them
never returned at all. At last, the disciplining of Brannan became so
manifestly an extra-hazardous risk that it was finally abandoned. How
he defied the whole power of Mormonism and actually conducted a private
and successful war against the church was one of the old romances of
the Pacific Coast. In later years Brannan fell a victim to drink,
all his enormous wealth became dissipated and he died penniless and
forgotten in Mexico.
“Sam” never forgot Salt Lake City or Utah. His life would not have
been worth 10 cents if he had once stepped within the territory of
Brigham Young. But he always cast longing eyes at the scene of his
early struggle. He knew Utah and its resources from end to end, and in
our frequent interviews often mentioned the illusive, “pockety” nature
of its mines. Therefore, when Ralston and I took a 30-day option on
the Emma mine, about 40 miles from Salt Lake City, I was prepared to
exercise extreme caution in examining the property.
The Emma mine had startled the Coast with a wonderful burst of
production, considering the limited nature of its plant. Its wealth
was claimed to be fabulous, and it was a matter of some surprise when
its owner’s offer to sell it at the low price of $350,000 was made.
Nevertheless, the proposition seemed well worth looking into. But
remembering Sam Brannan’s counsel, I went unannounced to the mine,
presented my credentials to the superintendent, who gave me permission
to examine the property, although rather surprised that I came alone.
It did not take me long to reach a conclusion that the Emma mine
was nothing more than a large “kidney.” Considerable high-grade ore
had been stoped out of the upper levels. Below, the ore was plainly
pinching out. The whole thing was nothing but a shell, with just
enough in place to fool a tenderfoot. There was no trace of a fissure
vein. Any mining expert would have turned it down without a moment’s
hesitation.
I had just seen all I cared to see when J. W. Woodman of Salt Lake
City, the principal owner of the property, hurried to the mine in
some agitation and expressed his regret that I had not advised him of
my coming. However, he trusted everything was satisfactory. I told
him courteously that I could not pass favorably on the mine, and to
consider the option closed. He wished to argue the matter, but I told
him that the conclusion was final and decisive. Then he took another
tack. He was anxious, he said, to clean up and get away. If he threw
off an even hundred thousand dollars, would Mr. Ralston and myself take
over the property? Again I answered in the negative, and told him, in
so many words, that we did not want the mine at any price.
As a matter of fact, when it was finally bottomed, the mine did not
yield anything like a hundred thousand dollars net. I even doubt if it
made both ends meet.
Such was the Emma mine, famous, or rather infamous, in history. Just
a little later this barren hole in the ground figured in one of the
biggest swindles of modern times, in which great names were involved, a
minister of the United States to England disgraced and ruined, British
investors robbed out of ten million dollars, and the business world
filled with such suspicion that for many years the doors of foreign
credit were barred against American mining enterprise of every sort.
The very character of Americans for common honesty was so seriously
besmirched that it caused an international unfriendliness that time
only partially cured.
It was a fact of common knowledge that the mine had been bonded to
Mr. Ralston and myself for $350,000. It was also well known that I
had examined and must have found it unsatisfactory, for the bond was
allowed to lapse. This alone gave the Emma such a black eye on the
Pacific Coast, then the great market for legitimate properties, that
it became almost a waste of time to make any further attempt to market
it in the neighborhood where the circumstances were known. Ralston
was rather noted for taking a long chance on mining ventures, and
while his luck lasted he usually pulled them through. Therefore, when
he and his associates turned down a developed and going concern, the
wise, conservative natures shook their heads. That is doubtless why
the Emma was taken to a market some five thousand miles from home for
exploitation.
In fact, it was practically taken off the market for quite a while.
After it was first offered for sale to Ralston and myself, my
impression is that I was the only one who examined it qualified to pass
an honest judgment on such a property, until it suddenly blossomed
on the London stock market as the great American ophir, the newly
discovered treasure store, of which the human imagination had dreamed
for ages--and was unloaded on the British public for $10,000,000; or,
to use the parlance of our Anglo-Saxon cousins, for £2,000,000.
I have gone into the early history of the Emma mine so minutely because
it strikes this narrative a little later at an angle so acute that the
two seem to run parallel, and it is necessary to have all the facts in
hand to understand how the great swindle that strained the commercial
friendship of two great peoples almost to the breaking point had a
close relation to the diamond hoax story.