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HITTEL

ON

GOLD MINES

AND

MINING.



QUEBEC:
PRINTED BY G. & G. E. DESBARATS.

1864.




HITTEL
ON
GOLD MINES
AND
MINING.


_Chief Industry._--Mining is the chief industry of California. It
employs more men and pays larger average wages than any other branch of
physical labor. Although it has been gradually decreasing in the amount
of its production, in the profits to the individuals engaged in it, and
in its relative importance in the business of the state, it is yet and
will long continue to be the largest source of our wealth, and the
basis to support the other kinds of occupation.

_Metals obtained._--Our mines now wrought are of gold, silver,
quicksilver, copper and coal. Ores of tin, lead, and antimony in large
veins, beds of sulphur, alum and asphaltum; lakes of borax and springs
of sulphate of magnesia, are also found in the state, but they are not
wrought at the present time, though they will probably all become
valuable in a few years. Platinum, iridium, and osmium are obtained
with the gold in some of the placer mines, but are never found alone,
nor are they ever the main object sought by the miner. The annual yield
of our gold mines is about forty millions of dollars, of our quicksilver
two millions of dollars. Our silver, copper and coal mines have been
opened within a year, and their value is yet unknown. All our other
mining is of little importance as compared with the gold.

_Gold Mines._--Our gold mines are divided into placer and quartz. In
the former, the metal is found imbedded in layers of earthy matter,
such as clay, sand and gravel; in the latter it is incased in veins of
rock. The methods of mining must be adapted to the size of the
particles of gold, and the nature of the material in which they are
found. In placer mining, the earthy matter containing the gold, called
the "pay-dirt," is washed in water, which dissolves the clay and
carries it off in solution, and the current sweeps away the sand,
gravel and stones, while the gold, by reason of the higher specific
gravity, remains in the channel or is caught with quicksilver. In
quartz mining the auriferous rock is ground to a very fine powder, the
gold in which is caught in quicksilver, or on the rough surface of a
blanket, over which the fine material is borne by a stream of water.
About two-thirds of our gold is obtained from the placers, and
one-third from the quartz.

A mine is defined and generally understood to mean "a subterraneous
work or excavation for obtaining metals, metallic ores or mineral
substances;" but this definition does not apply to our placer mines,
which are places where gold is taken from diluvial or alluvial
deposits. Most of the work is not subterraneous; it is done in the full
light of day. In some of the claims the pay-dirt lies within two feet
of the surface; in others it lies much deeper, but all the
superincumbent matter is swept away.

Water is the great agent of the placer miner; it is the element of his
power; its amount is the measure of his work, and its cost is the
measure of his profit. With an abundance of water he can wash every
thing; without water he can do little or nothing. Placer mining is
almost entirely mechanical, and of such a kind that no accuracy of
workmanship or scientific or literary education is necessary to mastery
in it. Amalgamation is a chemical process it is true, but it is so
simple that after a few days' experience, the rudest laborer will
manage it as well as the most thorough chemist.

It is impossible to ascertain the amount of gold which has been taken
from the mines of California. Records have been kept of the sums
manifested at the San Francisco Custom House, for exportation, and
deposited for coinage in the mints of the United States; and there is
also some knowledge of the amounts sent in bars and dust to England;
but we have no account of the sums carried by passengers to foreign
countries and coined elsewhere than at London, or used as jewelry, or
of the amount now in circulation in this state. According to the books
of the Custom House of San Francisco, the sums manifested for export
were as follows:

In 1849, $4,921,250; in 1850, $27,676,346; in 1851, $42,582,695; in
1852, $46,586,134; in 1853, $57,331,034; in 1854, $51,328,653; in 1855,
$45,182,631; in 1856, $48,887,543; in 1857, $48,976,697; in 1858,
$47,548,025; in 1859, $47,640,462; in 1860, $42,303,345; in 1861,
$40,639,089; a total of $551,603,904 in twelve years.

The exportation of gold commenced in 1848, but we have no record of the
sums sent away in that year. Previous to 1854 very large sums were
carried away by passengers, who gave no statement at the Custom House;
since that year, the manifests show the exportation correctly within a
few millions. I am entirely satisfied that the total gold yield of
California has been not less than seven hundred millions of dollars;
but I have not room here to state the reasons for this opinion. My
estimate is considerably less than that of most business men of the
state, and less than that made by Hunt's _Merchants' Magazine_. There
was undoubtedly a regular increase in the annual yield of the mines
from 1848 to the end of 1853; and there has been a gradual decrease
since the beginning of 1854--a decrease perhaps not very regular but
still certain. Since 1854 considerable sums exported from San
Francisco, and included in our tables, came from mines beyond the
limits of California, such as the mines in Southern Oregon, in the
eastern part of Washington Territory, in British Columbia, and in
Nevada Territory; and while the California gold yield has been
decreasing, these extraneous supplies have been increasing. Several
millions must be deducted from the annual shipments since 1858, for
foreign gold. The gold yield will undoubtedly continue to fall, but to
what point and at what rate no one can know. I believe that in 1870,
the yield will not exceed thirty millions of dollars.

_Placer Mines._--Placer mines are divided into many classifications.
The first and most important is into deep and shallow. In the former
the pay-dirt is found deep, twenty feet or more beneath the surface; in
the latter, near the surface. The shallow or surface diggings are
chiefly found in the beds of ravines and gullies, in the bars of
rivers, and in shallow flats; the deep diggings are in hills and deep
flats. The pay-dirt is usually covered by layers of barren dirt, which
is sometimes washed, and sometimes left undisturbed, while the pay-dirt
is taken out from beneath it through tunnels or shafts. So far as our
present information goes, we have reason to believe that no gold
country ever possessed so large an extent of paying placer mines, with
the pay-dirt so near the surface, and with so many facilities for
working them as California. In Australia the diggings are very deep and
spotted, that is, the gold is unevenly distributed, and the supply of
water for mining is scanty. In Siberia the winter is terribly cold
during six months of the year. In Brazil the diggings were not so
extensive nor so rich as in this state. Here we have numerous large
streams coming down through the mining districts, very large bodies of
pay-dirt, and a mild climate.

After dividing placers into deep and shallow, the next classification
will be according to their topographical position, as into hill, flat,
bench, bar, river-bed, ancient river-bed, and gulch mines. Hill
diggings are those where the pay-dirt is in or under a hill. Flat
diggings are in a flat. Bench diggings are in a "bench" or narrow table
on the side of a hill above a river. Benches of this kind are not
uncommon in California, and they often indicate the place where the
stream ran in some very remote age. Bars are low collections of sand
and gravel at the side of a river and above its surface at low water.
River-bed claims are those beneath the surface of the river at low
water, and access is obtained to them only by removing the water from
the bed by flumes or ditches. Ancient river-bed claims are those of
which the gold was deposited by streams in places where no streams now
exist. Gulch claims are those in gullies which have no water, save
during a small part of the year. A "claim" is the mining land owned or
held by one man or a company.

The placer mines are again classified according to the manner in which,
or the instruments with which they are wrought. There are sluice
claims, hydraulic claims, tunnel claims, dry washing, dry digging, and
knife claims. In 1849 and 1850, the main classification of the placers
was into wet diggings and dry diggings, the former meaning mines in the
bars and beds of rivers, and dry diggings were those in gullies and
flats where water could be obtained only part of the year or not at
all. That classification was made while nearly all the mining was done
near the surface, before the great deposits of pay-dirt in the hills
had been discovered, and before ditches, sluices, and the hydraulic
process had been introduced. The class of mines then known as the "dry
diggings," and which for several years furnished nearly half of the
gold yield of the state, are now, with a few unimportant exceptions,
exhausted, or left to the attention of the Chinamen.

The purpose of all placer miners is not to catch all the gold in the
dirt which they wash, but to catch the greatest possible quantity
within a given time. It is not supposed that any process used in gold
mining catches all the metal. Part of it is lost; in some processes a
considerable proportion. The general estimate in California is, that
one-twentieth of the gold in the dirt which is washed is lost. Many of
the particles are so very small as to be invisible to the naked eye,
and so light that their specific gravity does not avail to prevent them
from being carried away by the water like sand. The larger pieces will
sink to the bottom and resist the force of the water; the smaller the
particles, the greater the danger that it will be borne away. Many
devices have been tried to catch all the gold, but none have succeeded
perfectly, and some which have caught a portion of what escaped from
the ordinary modes of mining, have been found to cost more than their
yield. The miner does not grieve about that which he cannot catch. He
is not careful