** Lost Gold At The Dead Man's Mine ** A Miners Journal **

[GhostMiner]

16 minutes ago, Bedrocker said:

Was his cabin in SW Oregon?

Not far from Medford.

[GhostMiner]

   April 26   2002     Part Two

 

   After looking at the gold in the pan there was no stopping us. Jacob said we were now seeing the beginning of the gold he was digging at this spot back in 1937. Now if we could only find that glory hole. Jacob reminded us that the entire base of the mountain was sprinkled with abundant gold and all we needed to do was put in the time and hard work. He figured we were starting in a good area but time would tell.

   We dug for a few more hours and got ready to call it a day. We were following a downward slope of bedrock. Jacob said we would soon need to make a decision to continue in deeper and cut timber for supports or dig out a wider channel and hope we hit a good spot that hadn't been buried too badly by the slides. I asked Jacob what he thought about the situation. He said we should work our way in deeper for a spell and see what the gravels produced. Jacob advised that we were on bedrock and following it into the mountain. We had begun to hit virgin gravels that were showing some promise. However, he reminded us that the work would be slower and harder from this point forward. He left it up to us. Vern, Jim, and I all agreed to get a drift going into the mountain and see what it held for us. Before we left for the day Jacob took another sample from the gravel sitting on the sloping bedrock where we had stopped digging. He panned it out and set the pan on the table. He had a smile on his face but said nothing. We took a look. The pan had some fines but there was more coarse gold now. We were all beaming from ear to ear. Now I know what gold fever was all about. 

   TO BE CONTINUED .................

[GhostMiner]

   At this point I would like to take a moment to comment on some things I didn't write in my 2002 journal. I was a complete greenhorn as was Jim. Vern was a good prospector. To the horror of my wife, I took the Spring, Summer, & Fall off from a business I ran and went gold mining. I only had the confidence to do this because Vern was a seasoned prospector that had done quite a bit of sampling on the claims. The other thing that convinced me to give this a try was the wild and wooly rich history of this property. I had spent the Winter months of that year doing all the research and made contact with Jim and he was in contact with Jacob. We were pretty sure Jacob would join us in the venture but there was no guarantee until we met with him. My wife was convinced that I would come home penniless if I wasn't murdered on the mine or eaten by wild animals. She had read the old government report on this property with extreme trepidation but reluctantly gave me her blessing as long as I stayed in touch with her as much as possible. I knew I was getting myself into an adventure but had no clue what lie ahead for us. As we began to work the gravels at the old Eastern Drift area I kept a record of the gold we were mining. However, I didn't put any numbers in the journal but instead kept them recorded in a separate record book. For the sake of posting this here, I will include them at the time of the cleanups as I know everyone wants to know what we found.

   Also, as for more on Jacob that I didn't write down back in 2002, I would like to include a bit more information on him. He and his brother were on the old crew back in 1936. In 1936 his brother Jed was the crew leader and was murdered for his gold. At the time of the murder the crew had mined over 1000 ounces. I have no idea how much gold they got when Jed was killed. There was a second incident in 1937 that involved the crew Jacob was leading and three of the crew were shot to death by an unidentified group of men. All of this had been long forgotten and buried away by time just like the gold in the mountain was buried under slides. 

   As for Jacob and what he was like - I found him to be one of the most down to earth people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. By the time I had found him he was trail worn but very rugged. He loved a good joke and his word was his bond. He worked with us as much as his body would allow. His knowledge of the claims and of mining by old school methods were priceless to us. He was a real character for sure. Even at 85 yrs young he still loved his whisky but had moderated his drinking to a little bit here and there. I never saw him drunk. His favorite drink was Tullamore D.E.W. as well as Jameson and Bushmills. He never drank beer. He rolled his own smokes as I wrote in the journal but rarely did I see him smoke more than 2 or 3 a day. He would get in his moods sometimes where he drifted back in time and we learned to leave him alone on those occasions. Jacob was very spry and I never heard him complain about anything. When he saw gold in the pan his eyes would light up and he'd give us a wink and a nudge. He was one of a kind. The adventure we all had together over the 2002 mining season is something I will never forget. Read on.

[Ken Walls]

This has been the most addicted I have ever been to a story. You have been connected to a time in history that most here will never experiance.

[GhostMiner]

47 minutes ago, Ken Walls said:

This has been the most addicted I have ever been to a story. You have been connected to a time in history that most here will never experiance.

   If you had told me years ago that I would be involved in an adventure on a gold mine in the Sierra Nevada Mts I would never have believed it.

[GhostMiner]

   April 27   2002     Part One

 

   This morning was cold and clear and it was Saturday. Jacob thought we should do some digging until mid afternoon and then go out to the Paxton Hotel for supper and a few drinks with the crew. He seemed to like that place I guess. So we all agreed and headed up to the site after breakfast. I took my Mcculloch Pro Mac 650 chainsaw up there with me. We would need to cut up some downed trees for support logs. There was plenty of deadfall we were permitted to use for our mining operation as well as a part of the plan approved to cut trees as needed for mining. Anything I cut would need to be replaced with two saplings so I preferred to just use deadfall if possible.

   Jim and I worked on the timber while Vern and Jacob went over to our newly opened drift. They dug out some holes to set posts and placed bracing supports overhead. We laid them in where needed and felt secure to drive the drift deeper into the mountain. Jacob told us we would need to keep a careful watch on the tunnel we were forming as we went in further. 

   It was slow going now and we were beginning to hit some decent pay gravels. The bedrock continued to gently slope away from us and we followed it in. By noon we decided to take a quick break and I went down to camp and brought up coffee and sandwiches. Jacob took another sample and it looked promising. We stopped for the day around 3:00 PM and headed back down to camp to get cleaned up. The day had been productive and we were all hopeful of seeing good gold soon. Around 6:00 PM we headed for the Paxton Hotel.

   On the ride over Jacob was telling us about the old days and that place. It was an old railroad hotel and there were once active gold mines along the river there. He said that Saturday nights were pretty wild. There used to be what he referred to as a Saturday night hoot. There would be a band and plenty of girls there. He said this sometimes caused fights to break out. He was wondering if they still had the hoots there. I told him I had no idea but probably not. I think he was hoping there would be something like that going on. When we pulled into the parking area the place looked nearly deserted except for a couple of cars.   

   TO BE CONTINUED ...............

[Old Miner Don]

2 hours ago, GhostMiner said:

   April 27   2002     Part One

 

   This morning was cold and clear and it was Saturday. Jacob thought we should do some digging until mid afternoon and then go out to the Paxton Hotel for supper and a few drinks with the crew. He seemed to like that place I guess. So we all agreed and headed up to the site after breakfast. I took my Mcculloch Pro Mac 650 chainsaw up there with me. We would need to cut up some downed trees for support logs. There was plenty of deadfall we were permitted to use for our mining operation as well as a part of the plan approved to cut trees as needed for mining. Anything I cut would need to be replaced with two saplings so I preferred to just use deadfall if possible.

   Jim and I worked on the timber while Vern and Jacob went over to our newly opened drift. They dug out some holes to set posts and placed bracing supports overhead. We laid them in where needed and felt secure to drive the drift deeper into the mountain. Jacob told us we would need to keep a careful watch on the tunnel we were forming as we went in further. 

   It was slow going now and we were beginning to hit some decent pay gravels. The bedrock continued to gently slope away from us and we followed it in. By noon we decided to take a quick break and I went down to camp and brought up coffee and sandwiches. Jacob took another sample and it looked promising. We stopped for the day around 3:00 PM and headed back down to camp to get cleaned up. The day had been productive and we were all hopeful of seeing good gold soon. Around 6:00 PM we headed for the Paxton Hotel.

   On the ride over Jacob was telling us about the old days and that place. It was an old railroad hotel and there were once active gold mines along the river there. He said that Saturday nights were pretty wild. There used to be what he referred to as a Saturday night hoot. There would be a band and plenty of girls there. He said this sometimes caused fights to break out. He was wondering if they still had the hoots there. I told him I had no idea but probably not. I think he was hoping there would be something like that going on. When we pulled into the parking area the place looked nearly deserted except for a couple of cars.   

   TO BE CONTINUED ...............

So there were some girls in them thar hills. That's always a good thing unless it's your girlfriend that's getting hit on lol.

[GhostMiner]

   The Paxton Hotel sits along the Feather River. There are the remains of an old stamp mill just up the river from the hotel and several old gold mine workings including a drift into the mountain.  

[GhostMiner]

   April 27   2002     Part Two

 

   Jacob looked a little disappointed and said back when he was here the place was real busy on a Saturday night. I told him that the night was still young and we went inside. There was a family sitting at a table eating and a young couple sitting at the bar. Jacob wanted to go up to the bar and have a drink before we ate so we took seats at the bar just down a ways from the couple.

   Jacob ordered whisky for all four of us. They didn’t have any of his favorites so he substituted another brand. He did a toast to the mine and our partnership and we slugged down the shots. Jacob ordered another round. I told the bartender to make mine a beer this time. I wasn’t much of a whisky drinker. My partners ordered a glass of ice with theirs but Jacob took his neat. 

   He turned to the young couple and asked them if they were gold miners. They just grinned shyly and stated they were tourists from back east. Jacob turned to me and said back when he came here the place would be full of miners and prospectors on Saturday night. He said the trouble usually started when a few of the local logging crews showed up looking for trouble. He said the loggers were pure trash and rif raf. There was always a fight over women sooner or later. He told us about one bad fight he’d seen where one of the miners got thrown through a plate glass window and got cut up real bad. He said the miners and loggers were going at it pretty good and he and his brother got into the mix. He couldn’t really say who but when the brawl ended the place was all busted up. They all paid for damages and came back on Sunday to help fix the place up. Even the logging crew showed up to help. I asked him if anyone contacted the police. He just laughed and said there was no real law anywhere around there back then. They just handled their own business and that’s the way they liked it. 

   He ordered another round for us before I was half done with my beer and then we moved over to a table and ordered supper. Jacob said he really missed the old days. He said he could still hear his brother cussing up a storm during that fight. Then I saw him drift back in time. He sure had stories to tell.

 

   TO BE CONTINUED ............

[GhostMiner]

   April 27   2002     Part Three

 

   After we finished up our dinner Jacob went back up to the bar and was talking with the bartender. He was asking him about certain people from back in the old days. The bartender was middle aged and didn’t seem to know very much about that far back in time. All he knew was that the place had been sold a couple of times after the war and he didn’t think there was anyone left alive from that time period. 

   Then Jacob told him that he used to come in there back in his day. The bartender looked amazed and set him up with a whisky on the house. Jacob was telling him about the fights and all the loggers and miners that came in on Saturday. The bartender was getting a big kick out of it. While he was talking about the old times a group of three young men had come in and took seats at the bar just down from Jacob. They had been listening to his stories and could hardly believe them. Jacob noticed them and asked if they had ever mined for gold in this area. They told him they hadn’t actually mined but had done lots of prospecting. That’s all it took and the conversation was on.

   TO BE CONTINUED ..............