GhostMiner

October 2 2012 Part Two I was thinking we probably had a bear in camp and was ready to start yelling to get it to leave. However, when I got closer and shined the light over there I could see the noise was not being caused by a bear. It was a mountain lion and it looked right at me. I was actually shaking while I held the light on it. It was growling real low and kind of hunched down. I realized I had frozen up with fear and snapped out of it. I pulled my Ruger P89DC out of the holster and fired off three rounds in the dirt about twenty feet in front of the lion. It got out of its crouch and bolted off in the other direction. It looked like it had been rooting around the cooking area and must have smelled something. I heard Dustin holler over and wanting to know what was going on. I got back to the tent and told him about the lion. He had his shotgun in his hands. He said he heard the shots and figured there might be a bear in camp. The fact that a lion was so close to our tent made us both more than a little nervous. We decided right then and there to move the camp kitchen another couple hundred feet from the tent. Dustin went back to sleep but it took me about an hour to calm down. I eventually calmed down and got back in the tent but I thought I kept hearing things. Eventually I dozed off. TO BE CONTINUED ................

Here's the gun. I've owned it for a long time. Ruger P89DC. Two 15 round clips. One goes in the gun and the second one is in the holster. I do combat target shooting with it to stay sharp.

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The journal has a week to go until the ending of season one. It ain't pretty.

October 2 2012 Part One Today we brought samples back to camp and panned them. Five trips of each of us carrying 5 gallon buckets one in each hand ½ mile back to camp for a total of 10 buckets. We were able to get samples either at or near bedrock and it wasn’t easy. Tomorrow we’ll run them through the 12 volt highbanker. We can drive them over to the creek from here. I took a walk down the mountain and Gary’s crew is gone. They still have the excavator and trommel sitting waiting to be picked up. They turned out to be some good ole’ boys. I hope to see them next season. Dustin and I are now the only ones out here and the nights are damn cold. We have a propane Buddy heater for heat in the tent if needed. I still have a lot of areas I want to sample but I'm thinking we will only be out here another week or two. My truck is a 1998 Nissan 4X4 crew cab and 4 low will get me into a lot of places. If we stay too long I may need 4 low to get me out of here as there is no road maintenance in winter. I went into town and bought a few bottles of dry red wine which I like to drink and got Dustin some beer. We had stew for supper and I drank a couple glasses of wine and Dustin had a couple beers and we hit the sack. I don’t know why but I woke up in the middle of the night and got out of the tent to take a pee. It was so cold I was shaking and the sky was clear and full of stars. Then I heard something knocking around over near the propane stove which was about 200 feet from our tent. Dustin slept with a loaded 12 gauge shotgun under his cot and he was out like a light. I grabbed my 9MM with an extra clip in the holster. I also grabbed a flashlight. I started to cautiously walk over to where the disturbance was coming from. TO BE CONTINUED .................

Or somebody will get a handle on it for him.

This stuff is all true. These are my personal experiences. Not all of them are written down & some will be from memory. They should be accurate as this wasn't that long ago. All the good, the bad, and the ugly.

SEPTEMBER 26 1936 This morning I was hung over from all of yesterday’s drinking and was not up for work. I figured to rest my hand as well. Later that day after a late breakfast and a cup of whiskey I started to come around. I decided to look for Whiskey Jack’s gold cache. I had several ideas that I won’t put in here but after several hours I was able to find it. There wasn’t a great amount of gold but I had the idea to give it to Hudson as he was facing hard times and our season was getting long in the tooth. Also, Jack had no close relatives or friends that I knew of. So the boys came back with one ounce of gold for the day and I mentioned it to John and he was all for it as well. So after supper I called Hudson over and gave him Jack’s gold. Hudson got real quiet for a minute and looked me in the eye and shook my hand. He was most thankful and told me so. So we poured some cups and set about drinking well into the evening after the crew had turned in. TO BE CONTINUED ...................

October 1 2012 I was talking with Gary today. They are planning on closing down their operation at the bottom of the mountain. He told me they got 50 ounces of gold from their run. I’m not sure how many yards they ran but I think it sounded like they did pretty darn good. Gold is about $1600 an ounce so they got around $80,000. This makes me want to mine here all the more. The old timers missed a lot and never got to all the virgin ground. There has to be thousands of ounces left. He invited Dustin and me to come down for supper and have a few drinks with them so I said sure, we’ll be down. Dustin and I worked some more at the eastern area of virgin gravels trying to get a good hole going deeper into the hill. We worked all day and got in pretty good so I think one more day of digging and we should get some good samples. The old timers worked it to bedrock and left a steep hill of virgin material that is about 90 feet high and at a steep angle. There are several acres of it. We are going in and down as bedrock is only 10 feet or so. I can’t wait to see what these guys from the 1850’s were mining. I bet it was good. We finished up for the day and got cleaned up and headed down to Gary’s camp around 6:00 PM. They were cooking burgers and some stew. It sure smelled good. We had a couple shots of Jack and had supper. Then we all sat around camp and did some more drinking. Dustin and I passed on the joints. Gary was winding tails about mining all over the west. He’d worked claims in Montana, Nevada, Idaho, California, and also worked on a crew up in Alaska. He was quite knowledgeable about anything to do with taking gold out of the ground. We ended up sitting down there talking until 1:00 AM. He said they would be packing up and heading out in a day or so. We shook hands and I thanked him for his hospitality and all his help. He said that they might be back here next year and we’d talk more on how to mine. Then Dustin and I headed back up the mountain to our camp. It was a good night. I really don’t want to leave but cold weather is not far off. TO BE CONTINUED ...................

SEPTEMBER 25 1936 When I woke up this morning my hand was hurting like hell. So was my head. John approached me this morning and had some concerns about my drinking which I have to admit has become excessive. This is the first time anyone has questioned me on this subject and I did not appreciate it. I told John not to worry about me and I was just fine. He didn’t push the subject and it was dropped. Up at the pit I did my best to work and brought up another bottle to keep me going. It was only for the pain. I don’t think John approved but he never said anything. He and Hudson were working up a storm while I did a small amount of shoveling and a bit more time drinking. Once again I was drunk by late afternoon and we did the weigh and got one ounce. Down at camp that night I told the crew I was sorry I couldn’t shovel much gravel that day but would be back at it full bore soon. No one was concerned and told me to just get better. Lately I have been more interested in drinking than mining. I need to get myself back on track but tonight I am going to drink with Hudson again. The rest of the crew has turned in. TO BE CONTINUED ....................

September 30 2012 Another cold night and we ate breakfast as the sun came up. The thermometer said 35 degrees. It warms up nicely by noon though. Today we went all the way out to the eastern most claim where there was full scale hydraulic mining but they never finished the ground because of California’s law that severely limited hydraulic mining starting in 1884. I think there’s about two million yards of virgin gravels left out there. We had to walk out there on an old road because there is a gate and we don’t have a lock on it yet. There are several locks in a daisy chain set up and we need to get our own put in the link. So the walk in is about ½ mile. We took some buckets and a pick and shovel and tried to dig samples out of the side of the hill where the old timers had stopped. It was hard to get in deep enough because of all the sluff and runoff that occurred over the years. This area hasn’t been worked since 1860. We spent all day trying to get a hole into the side but we will need to spend another day or two digging in to get to virgin ground. We left the buckets out there and hiked back to camp around 4:30 PM. We were really tired from the all day digging. Tomorrow we will try to get in deeper. I’m missing that creek site already. Dustin cooked Spam on a frying pan and it sure tasted good. We also had a black bear come to the edge of camp just after dark. He must have smelled our supper. I got a flashlight and headed over in his direction and banged on some pans and he left the area. Hopefully he won’t come back. We are careful to cook away from where we sleep and clean everything up after we eat but there are plenty of bear in this area. TO BE CONTINUED ...................

If only I could.

Another whiskey drinker LOL.

LOL. That's ok.

SEPTEMBER 24 1936 This morning my hand was still sore but I was able to work but at a slower pace than normal. I took a bottle of Bushmills up to the site with me to use as a pain medication when needed. John and Hudson were going to town on the gravels and the noise of the shovels bounced down the mountain. There was plenty of good natured banter between us and I thought to myself if only Whiskey Jack was here to see the work and the gold. We all enjoyed the cooler weather and that was helping us work at a good clip. The longer I worked the sorer my hand was getting and the more whiskey I drank. By early afternoon I was getting drunk but still kept a decent pace. I made it to the end of the day and the weigh but my bottle had run dry. We ended with 3 more ounces in the jar. Back at camp Hudson was going on about how much gold we had made for the day. If only he knew what this crew had accomplished. After supper I broke out a fresh bottle and Hudson joined me in the cups until nearly midnight. TO BE CONTINUED ...................

September 29 2012 We were up bright and early. It got damn cold last night, close to freezing. The sun was coming up and the day was a beauty. I had to run into town to get some supplies and when I was waiting in line to check out of the store I got to talking with a guy in front of me. I told him I was prospecting for gold and was hoping to do some mining in the area. The conversation which had been pleasant turned sour real fast. He looked at me and said “You’re not one of those people are you” with kind of a nasty look on his face. I told him that yes, I was. I told him I realized the old time miners had caused a lot of problems but modern mining wasn’t anything like that. I explained to him about permits, environmental impact studies, & reclamation plans and bonds but it seemed to fall on deaf ears. This guy didn’t like miners and didn’t want to hear any more from me on the subject. Then he asked me where I was prospecting. Now I can get as nasty as anyone if pressed so I just told him that seeing he had such a bad attitude and didn’t want to hear anything more from me that where I was prospecting was none of his business. With that the conversation ended. When I got back to the claims we headed back out to the creek. I wanted one more day out there before moving on to test other ground. We got set up and worked away at the bank gravels. I also tried to get some good samples from higher up on the wall. There were good signs of color and a couple of what I would call hot spots. The problem is it would be real tough getting a little excavator in there and the Forest Service would never let us walk one down the creek. They would also never let us dig this close to the creek with heavy equipment. It would need to be worked by hand so we would need to see some pretty good results from the samples. Otherwise it would be hobby mining which is fine but we were looking for something with some commercial value. I might be able to get an excavator in by staying close to the eastern side and then crossing the creek with an approved permit.Then it might be possible to dig back against the wall and make some room. There were a few places where the banks weren’t too steep and were set back from the creek a bit so I wasn’t ruling it out. The eastern side had more room but we couldn’t get any good samples from that side. It’s always something to slow you down. I would have to give this some thought. TO BE CONTINUED .................

September 28 1936 Dustin and I now had friends on the mountain. We would back each other up if there was trouble. Gary’s crew was a rough bunch but were not afraid to stand up to trouble makers. I felt the same way. Nobody was ever going to push me around on my claims and I had no problem with fighting for what was mine. We set off on an exploration of the northern ravine where the north/south creek ran. The walls got higher and steeper the further north we went and also it was much more remote. The creek was now about 100 feet below the top of the walls and fairly narrow with not much room on either side. There was good water flowing and we had our 12 volt highbanker and a spiral wheel I had purchased. We would use that to clean up the concentrates before a final panning. It was a cool and clear morning and the peacefulness of the location made me want to work there all the more. We shoveled away at the bottom of the steep banks and limited floodplain areas and fed the highbanker. We weren’t able to move much gravel through it at a fast pace but it was perfect for sampling. I found that using a 2200 GPH 12 volt bilge pump I could process about 200 - 400 pounds of gravel per hour and we could do about a yard a day maximum. That would be if we set down all day on one spot without moving but our intentions at this point were to just sample multiple locations and mark them on our maps. We were finding some good spots up there and we worked until around 4:00 PM. We headed back to camp with a little gold in our vile and were quite pleased with the day’s results. It felt good to be out here in the mountains and prospecting for gold. We were away from society and had no cell service. We listened to the radio at night when we relaxed and talked about the claims and life in general. I knew at this point that I would never go back to my regular life. I was hooked. TO BE CONTINUED .............

At this early stage of exploration on the claims I had no idea about the big gold strike that had taken place in 1936. I had not come across the government report yet. That didn't happen until early in 2013. I was not aware of the area up to the north where the prospector made his discovery. Another thing I had yet to learn was how gold fever can change people. I have seen the worst side of people at times because of gold. Not everyone but some. The fever is real and it can be dangerous as you will see.

Thanks much.

BTW, this really captures my story of how I got into gold exploration in California. It will take you from prospecting to mining with large equipment and more. The adventures took place over 9 yrs and are still going to this day. I've even had an engineer come all the way to the mines from Scotland. He was so interested in the real story of the area that he came out in 2019 with his girlfriend from China and worked with us. When you start projects like this you just have no idea where it will take you and the different people you will meet. Even two offers to be on one of the gold mining shows on Discovery - once in 2020 & once in 2021. It will all be told during this thread and it's my personal story. If you ever thought of getting into gold mining & what to expect it's a must read. Or if you're into adventure it's a great read.

September 27 2012 We did some good prospecting along the north/south running creek in the morning. We took samples every 50 feet and there were good colors in 75% of the samples. We only dug down a couple feet in benches and sandbars so we were quite happy with the results. We were finishing supper when Gary and one of his crew came up to camp. They had hustled up the mountain and were nearly out of breath. Gary asked me if I had seen anyone on our claims or near our camp today. I said no and asked him why. He said someone had tried to take some things from their camp down at the west/east creek where they were camped at. The dogs had started barking which alerted him and he caught a glimpse of a couple of guys running away. He said they got his Gold Bug detector but he didn’t think they got anything else. When he saw them they were heading up the mountain in our direction. I told Gary I would take a look around and leave Dustin to watch camp. Gary and his partner headed on up the mountain. I grabbed my handgun with a couple of 15 round clips and started off to the west towards the creek we had been sampling. There was an old logging road on the other side of the creek going up the mountain and I headed up there. Wouldn’t you know it but I saw two guys coming down the old road with a metal detector. This area also happened to be on one of our claims. I played dumb and asked them if they were having any luck. They looked a little wary of me and said no, they weren’t finding anything. They said they were just looking for relics. I saw that the detector was a Gold Bug. I invited them to join us at camp and have a beer. They kind of looked at each other and said sure. So I walked them into camp and told Dustin to get a couple beers for them. I gave him a wink. We sat there drinking beers and talking and they had another beer. I asked them how they liked the Gold Bug. One of them laughed and said they weren’t sure as they hadn’t had it long. They said they had recently bought it from a prospector out this way. Eventually I heard Gary and his partner coming back down the mountain. The two thieves started to stand up and said they had to get going. I pulled my gun and told them to stay put as Gary came walking in. He had quite a surprised look on his face. Gary was the kind of guy you liked to have for a friend but I got the sense that if you crossed him he'd slit your throat. He didn’t say one word but just walked up to one of the thieves and stuck a knife under his chin. His buddy tried to run but Gary’s partner grabbed him and threw him on the ground and held him at gunpoint. I wouldn’t mess with him either. They thanked me and Gary said he owed me one. With that they took the two thieves back down the mountain. I wouldn’t have wanted to be them. TO BE CONTINUED ....................

SEPTEMBER 23 1936 I got up this morning and my right hand was all swelled up and it was hard to use it. I didn’t see anything broken and I dunked it in the cold creek water for awhile but I can’t do any digging today. John and Hudson went up to dig and I stayed at camp on watch and Dutch was at his post. The day passed real slow and I was getting bored. By late afternoon the swelling on my hand had eased a bit and I was starting to use it a little. It was the first time I had gotten hurt and was unable to dig out here. Eventually the crew got back into camp and showed me 3 ounces in the jar. That sure was nice to see and I was feeling a whole lot better now. John told me that Hudson was a working fool and really went at it. He was starved for gold and wanted to see some real bad. John said he barely even looked up and was all business with the pick and shovel work. I was glad to hear that and hoped we could keep things going for a spell so Hudson wouldn’t go home empty handed like so many miners do. We sat around the fire with Hudson and got to know him a little better over cups of whiskey. Hudson said he and a friend had come out to California chasing their dreams of gold mining. He was from Tennessee and everything he owned was on his back. After a few weeks of mining and coming up with no gold his friend headed back east but Hudson stuck it out. This showed our crew he had sand and staying power. The problem was he had been cheated on a worthless claim by the co operative goons. It was a real crime what those gangsters had done to good people out here. We all liked Hudson and told him if we keep mining into next season he had himself a job if he wanted. TO BE CONTINUED ....................

We are at the point of Jed's season winding down. I will begin posting more frequently all the way to the dramatic ending just as promised. I know I have lost some of the readers but there are still some of you out there that like the story. I will also post the winner of the total gold count. I have given up trying to figure out what makes people tick. It has been my pleasure to post this. So with that being said, here we go.

I wish but not always so.

September 26 2012 Eventually everything settled down on the mountain last night. That crew down on the creek seems to be a rowdy bunch. The mornings are nice and cool or even chilly but it warms nicely by late morning. Great for working. Everything out here is really dry and they could use some rain. I didn’t hear any equipment running down below until late morning. Hopefully no one got shot. Today we decided to go over to the north/south running creek just to the west of camp. It’s a seasonal creek and is dry except for some water at the north of that claim. We took the little 12 volt highbanker over there and set it up about 50 feet from the creek. Then we dug in some benches along a mountain that started up at the west side of the creek. We ran material through the highbanker all morning, broke for lunch, and worked until nearly 5:00 PM. We carried everything back to camp and processed the concentrates through the cube. Then we panned it up. Again we saw color. Some really nice little coarse pieces mixed with fine gold. Not bad at all. This area along the creek is a lot easier to work because of available water. In the Spring and early Summer there should be plentiful water all along that area. I am thinking of a big highbanker or a small trommel. I see several areas already that might be mineable on a small to medium scale and plenty of areas to run small hand dug operations with a highbanker or drywasher. We sat around camp talking after our supper and it got dark. Once again we both thought we heard voices in the woods just a short distance north of camp. Once again I took a flashlight into the area but could find nothing. I shouted out to see if anyone was there but it was quiet again. Not sure what is going on. TO BE CONTINUED ..............