WHAT THEY DISCOVERED.
To return to the notions of the early miners and others, in regard to
the existence of silver in Nevada. Few, it would seem, besides the
Grosch brothers, and one or two of their intimate friends, ever dreamed
of there being any silver-mines in the country. Had there been anything
said about the existence of silver, those who made predictions that it
would be found, would not have been slow to remind their friends of the
fact as soon as the first discovery of silver was made. Some of the
Johntowners say that, in 1853, a Mexican who was hired by them and who
worked a few days in Gold Cañon, tried to tell them that he was of the
opinion that there were silver-mines in the mountains above them. The
man spoke no English, therefore was unable at that time to make himself
understood; now that the silver-mines have been found, all seems plain
enough.
Pointing to the large fragments of quartz rock lying along the bed of
the cañon, the Mexican said: “_Bueno!_”—good! Then pointing toward the
mountain peaks about the head of the cañon, and giving his hand a
general wave over them all, he cried emphatically: “_Mucho plata! mucho
plata!_” “Much silver! much silver! all above you in those hills,” was
what the Mexican said by word and gesture.
The men who were at work with the Mexican remember this, because during
the two or three days he was at work with them he several times uttered
the same words and went through the same pantomime. All that the miners
understood of what the fellow was driving at was, “lots of money, gold,”
somewhere above them in the mountains.
The fact is, that silver was so little in the minds of the early miners,
and they knew so little about any ore of silver, that when they at last
found it, they did not know what it was and cursed it as some kind of
heavy, worthless sand of iron, or some other base metal, that covered up
the quicksilver in the bottom of their rockers and interfered with the
amalgamation and saving of the gold they were washing out. They damned
this stuff from the rising of the sun till the going down thereof, and
worked in it for a considerable length of time before anybody knew what
it was. Until after an assay of the “blasted blue stuff” had been made,
the miners were all working in blissful ignorance of silver existing
anywhere in the country.
In the spring of 1858, which the snow was going off and water was
plentiful, the men who had worked in Six-mile Cañon the year before,
with a number of other miners from Johntown, returned to their diggings.
The newcomers set to work on the cañon above the claims of those who had
mined there the previous year, planting their rockers wherever they
found a spot of ground that would pay wages.
Among those who came to mine on Six-mile Cañon at this time were Peter
O’Riley and Pat McLaughlin, the discoverers of the Comstock silver lode,
and “Old Virginia” who gave his name to Virginia City, under the streets
of which now lie the bonanza mines.
Nick Ambrose, better known in that country as “Dutch Nick,” also moved
up to Six-mile Cañon, following his customers in their exodus from
Johntown. Nick came not to mine, but to minister to the wants of the
miners. He set up a large tent and ran it as a saloon and
boarding-house. The boys paid him $14 per week for board and “slept
themselves;” that is, they were provided with blankets of their own, and
rolling up in these, they just curled down in the sagebrush, wherever
and whenever they pleased.
The liquid refreshment furnished these miners by Nick was probably the
first of that popular brand of whisky known as “tarantula juice” ever
dispensed within the limits of Virginia City. When the boys were well
charged with this whisky it made the snakes and tarantulas that bit them
very sick.
At this time, H. T. P. Comstock was engaged in mining on American Flat
Ravine, a branch of Gold Cañon, a short distance above the point where
Silver City now stands. He was working with a “tom” (a contrivance for
washing auriferous gravel which combines the principles of the rocker
and the sluice-box), and, the water used in the tom being some distance
below where his “pay-dirt” was found, he had a number of lusty Piute
Indians employed in packing the dirt to where he was engaged in washing
it and supervising things in general, as became the proprietor of the
“works.”
The ground worked was not so rich as to greatly excite anyone, it being
about, as the Chinamen say, “two pan, one color,” therefore it is not
likely that the Indians received wages that gave them a very exalted
opinion of mining as a regular business.
At that time Comstock, whose name is now heard in all parts of the world
in connection with the great silver lode bearing his name, was
familiarly known to the miners of Johntown and neighboring mining camps
as “Old Pancake.” This name was given him by his brother miners because
he was never known to bake any bread. He always had—or imagined he
had—so much business on hand that he could spare no time to fool away in
making and baking bread. All of his flour was worked up into pancakes.
And even as, with spoon in hand, he stirred up his pancake batter, it is
said he kept one eye on the top of some distant peak and was lost in
speculations in regard to the wealth in gold and silver that might rest
somewhere beneath its rocky crest.
Meantime, while “Old Pancake” was thus toiling in American-Flat Ravine,
and utilizing the native muscle of the land in his struggles with the
stubborn matrix of auriferous deposits, the miners on Six-mile Cañon
were steadily working along the channel of the same, picking out the
richer places, and the gold extracted was gradually becoming lighter in
color and weight, consequently less valuable; a condition of things that
puzzled them all not a little. As, at that time, the presence of silver
was not suspected, the miners could not imagine what was the matter with
the gold, further than that there seemed to be some kind of bogus stuff
mixed with it in the form of an alloy. This light metal, whatever it
might be, seemed gradually taking the place of the gold and changing the
color of the dust. As a small percentage of silver alters the color of a
great quantity of gold, the value per ounce was not so much reduced as
one would have supposed from looking at it; but in the value there was a
slight but steady decrease.
The miners on Six-mile Cañon worked on in the fall of 1858 with
tolerable success—making small wages—until it became so cold that the
water they had been using in rocking was frozen up, when all hands broke
up camp and returned to Johntown, to go into winter quarters.
In January 1859, there came a spell of fine weather, when some of the
Johntowners struck out in various directions, for the purpose of
prospecting; water being plentiful in all the ravines, owing to the
melting of the snow.
On Saturday, January 28, 1859, “Old Virginia,” H. T. P. (Pancake)
Comstock, and several others struck the surface-diggings at Gold Hill,
and located a considerable number of claims. They claimed the ground for
placer-mining but had no idea of there being a rich vein of gold and
silver-bearing quartz underlying the whole region upon which they were
staking off their gravel-mines.
[Illustration: GOLD DIGGINGS OF 1859.]
They had struck upon the little knoll to which the name of Gold Hill was
soon after given, which knoll stood at the north end of the site of the
present town of Gold Hill. Although at first mistaken for
placer-diggings, the ground forming this hillock was in reality nothing
more than a great mass of the decomposed croppings of the Comstock lode.
This discovery was made at a point on the head of Gold Cañon about a
mile south of where, a few months later, silver was discovered in the
Ophir mine, at the head of Six-mile Cañon. John Bishop, one of the men
who made this strike, thus describes the manner of it. I give his own
words:
“Where Gold Hill now stands, I had noticed indications of a ledge and
had got a little color. I spoke to ‘Old Virginia’ about it, and he
remembered the locality, for he said he had often seen the place when
hunting deer and antelope. He also said that he had seen any quantity
of quartz there. So he joined our party and Comstock also followed
along. When we got to the ground, I took a pan and filled it with
dirt, with my foot, for I had no shovel or spade. The others did the
same thing, though I believe that some of them had shovels. I noticed
some willows growing on the hillside and I started for them with my
pan. The place looked like an Indian spring, which it proved to be.
“I began washing my pan. When I had finished, I found that I had in it
about fifteen cents. None of the others had less than eight cents, and
none more than fifteen. It was very fine gold; just as fine as flour.
Old Virginia decided that it was a good place to locate and work.
“The next difficulty was to obtain water. We followed the cañon along
for some distance and found what appeared to be the same formation all
the way along. Presently Old Virginia and another man who had been
rambling away, came back and said they had found any amount of water
which could be brought right there to the ground.
“I and my partner had meantime had a talk together and had decided to
put the others of the party right in the middle of the good ground.
“After Old Virginia got back we told him this, but were not
understood, as he said if we had decided to ‘hog’ it we could do so
and he would look around further; but he remained, and when the ground
was measured off, took his share with the rest.
“After we had measured the ground we had a consultation as to what
name was to be given the place. It was decidedly not Gold Cañon, for
it was a little hill; so we concluded to call it Gold Hill. That is
how the place came by its present name.”
The new diggings were discovered on Saturday, and the next day (Sunday)
nearly all the male inhabitants of Johntown went up to the head of Gold
Cañon to take a look at and “pass upon” the new mines. The majority of
the sagacious citizens of the then mining metropolis of the country did
not think much of the new strike. They had placer-mines near at home,
five miles below, that prospected much better. However, “Old Pancake”
and some of others interested in the new diggings, blowed about them as
being the big thing of the country.
Although the prospects at first may not all have been as large as stated
by Bishop, who is quoted above, yet Comstock, Old Virginia, and party
soon reached very rich dirt—very much richer than Comstock had ever
found in any part of his American Ravine claim, where he worked the
braves of the Piute tribe. Starting in at about $5 per day, they were
soon making from $15 to $20, and for a time even more to the man.
Believing they were working placer-mines, they were at times moved too
far away from the main deposit of decomposed croppings, when they made
small wages until they got back and started again on the right track.
It was not long before most of the Johntowners had moved to Gold Hill,
camping under the trees at first, then building shanties and eventually
putting up substantial log-houses.
Thus was first discovered, located, and worked that portion of the
Comstock lode lying under the town of Gold Hill, and containing the
Belcher, Crown Point, Yellow Jacket, Imperial, Empire, Kentuck, and
other leading mines of the country—mines that have yielded millions upon
millions in gold and silver bullion.
It was not, however, until these mines had been worked for two or three
years, that they were positively known to be silver-mines and a
continuation of the Comstock lead, then being so successfully mined upon
a mile north, at Virginia City.