The Chisana Story

[Steve Herschbach]

My father and I had only a couple days on our visit - one of those three day weekend kind of trips. However, when you have the results we did a return visit was quickly planned. This time more people got involved and so my sister and brother-in-law came equipped with a Fisher Gold Bug.

Armed with our new knowledge from our exploratory trip we spent more time concentrating on higher bench workings away from the creek. I was running the Compass Gold Scanner Pro again. I detected my way across one relatively flat area high above the creek, when I started getting multiple beeps per swing. I called in the troops, and a brief gold rush occurred as we all started finding gold nuggets. This bedrock hump had been mined off, probably just washed off with water directed from one of the large hydraulic giant "water cannons". It did not appear however that the miners had actually cleaned the bedrock and the cracks and crevices were loaded with gold.

Steve's sister detecting bedrock with Fisher Gold Bug

View from above of bedrock "nugget patch" in old bench workings

I got a particularly good signal from one location in the bedrock. A little digging and out popped a 6 pennyweight (9.6 gram) nugget! Plus another one about a third that size. I could see other smaller gold mixed in the dirt in the hole. Here I am holding the nugget just above the bedrock in which it was found.

Steve with 6 pennyweight gold nugget found with Compass Gold Scanner Pro

It was obvious that there was a lot of smaller gold in the pockets and crevices in the bedrock. We started scraping and cleaning bedrock as best we could and filled buckets with the material. This was then carried to a gully some distance away where the material could be fed through a sluice box. The was just barely enough water to run the sluice and feed it with a hand trowel, but it proved quite effective. The bedrock was blocky and came up easily. The rubble was screened into the buckets to remove the oversize material. Finally, when the bedrock was deemed halfway clean, we would splash buckets of water on it to wash it down, and then carefully excavate the last remaining material from the pockets in bedrock. You can see wet areas remaining in the picture below.

Cleaning out cracks and pockets full of gold bearing material

Sluice box set up in gully using all available water

In the meantime metal detecting continued. There was a hot patch of bedrock that I had been working around, but my sister was able to get into it easily with the Gold Bug, and she found a nice 4 pennyweight nugget.

Steve's sister with 4 dwt gold nugget she found with Gold Bug

Steve's brother-in-law sniping for gold in crevices

Time was running out and so our little bedrock cleaning and sluicing operation came to an end. The results were pretty impressive for hand work with simple tools...

Steve with bedrock crevicing results from sluice box

And finally, my results with the Compass Gold Scanner Pro. A nice showing of chucky gold nuggets, the largest weighing in at 6 pennyweight (9.6 grams).

Gold nuggets found by Steve with Compass Gold Scanner Pro

My wife to be made a trip up to Chisana with me in this timeframe and so I had the 6 pennyweight nugget made into a pendant for her. She ended up telling me gold nugget jewelry was not her thing, and she gave it back to me. I sell most of my gold so this is probably the oldest nugget I still have that I found. I wore the nugget on the chain you see around my neck in the picture above for many years. I am not really a jewelry person myself but it came in handy a lot when I was at work talking metal detecting and gold, and could easily pull the nugget out to show people. I eventually did retire it to the jewelry box but still have it, so just got it out to weigh it and take this picture. The nugget is well polished from many years of wear.

All in all another fabulous trip with gold found by all involved! To be continued....

Six pennyweight (9.6 gram) gold nugget found by Steve

[Reno Chris]

Lots of fun you've had up there at Chisana over a long period of many years. Thanks for letting me be a part of that. I've wondered since I was there what an SDC 2300 might do on those benches as some of the bedrock was a bit noisy with the GBII.

[AUminerAK]

 I’ve been  watching for you to post something about your trip this summer.  I feel very fortunate to be one of the few guests to actually mine on these Historic claims. To see pictures from the early 1900s and now your early pictures of when you mined on the claims is aw inspiring. And to be able to say I  recognize  that spot is great. Only detected a few hours this year found gold but nothing big. 

[geof_junk]

AuMinerAk thanks for the way you have Now and Then photos you have taken them with the same aspect and framing. Well done.

[flakmagnet]

Not many people who prospect, chronicle their adventures or have photo's to accompany the words. Your recollections reinforce an important component to the lure of hunting for gold. It takes time, curiosity, ingenuity and above all, patience. There are a lot of accomplished gold hunters looking over your shoulder as you take the time to share your experiences with us. I am sure we are all reliving some of our own dreams through your writing. Thanks.

[jrbeatty]

Steve - -  A front seat view of a different time and continent, yet some of it oddly familiar - - -  Thanks for sharing.

[Steve Herschbach]

On 9/10/2018 at 1:17 AM, AUminerAK said:

 I’ve been  watching for you to post something about your trip this summer.  I feel very fortunate to be one of the few guests to actually mine on these Historic claims. To see pictures from the early 1900s and now your early pictures of when you mined on the claims is aw inspiring. And to be able to say I  recognize  that spot is great. Only detected a few hours this year found gold but nothing big. 

Hi Brian, good to have you here! That post is a perfect setup for a little Chisana history. I am helping out with the Rye Patch hunt today so this will perk things up until my next entry.

First off, the entire area was added to the Preserve portion of Wrangell St.Elias Park & Preserve during the 1970's. The bad news is this required decades of adjustment for Alaskans and Park Service people figuring out how to work with situations like mining claims in a Preserve. Long story short permitting can only be had for previously mined ground - virgin ground is off limits and operations are under a microscope. That is frustrating to say the least.

On the plus side, the Park Service did up a tremendous history of the area, quite detailed and full of photos. I am not sure of the copyright status of the old photos and so will refer you to the entire pdf history. Well worth a look.

A History of the Chisana Mining District, Alaska 1890- 1990

My favorite quote, from the start of Chapter 2:

"Billy James and N. P. Nelson began sluicing Little Eldorado No. 1 on July 4, 1913. Assisted by Andy Taylor and former Dawson City bartender Tommy Doyle, the pair recovered nearly two hundred ounces in just two days. By August 2 they had already garnered $9,000, or an average of about $300 per day." (emphasis added)

And a few old photos...

Wreck of old cabin on Gold Run Creek

Treasure chest! - but nothing in it...

Old wheelbarrow with old rusted gun leaning on it

Canvas roof miners shack

Old wooden flume for diverting water to bench workings

[Jim_Alaska]

Great adventure and chronicling of it Steve. The pictures are an added bonus and really bring the narrative alive.

[flakmagnet]

A beautiful chronicle, thanks again.

 

[outnaboutnak]

On 9/10/2018 at 12:17 AM, AUminerAK said:

Wow. I love B/A and T/N photos. That’s really cool.