| Show GOLD DUG OUT BY HAND DISCOVERY OF BREY FOGLES mine BY A prospector many urea have been lost in the search for the historic treasure gold Is foaud there on the surface in lumps like plums in a pudding there is not a miner or old settler in the part of california who is not familiar with the story of the famous breyfogle mine it ranks with the gun sight the and the lost cabin legends like them it has cost dozens of lives and so unsuccessful and fatal have been the many expeditions made in search of the mine that it has come to be regarded by many as a myth briefly for the information of those who have never heard the tale the story goes that away back in the early fifties a party in which was a man named breyfogle set out for california by way of the southern utah road a route which lay through the portions of utah and nevada skirted death valley traversed the mojave desert and finally terminated in either the san Be mardino or los angeles valley breyfogle was something of a miner 1 in his way and while prospecting in a wild and forbidding region he found a place where he could literally dig great nuggets of gold out of the decomposed quartz or cement as he called it with his knife As be described the place there was a large deposit of an exceedingly rich character enough to make the whole party wealthy he returned to camp but the travelers were short of provisions and water the indians were troublesome and there was no time to waste in mining they pushed on toward their destination but between the indians and thirst only a few of them ever reached civilization breyfogle told his story exhibited the nuggets he had dug out and careful ly preserved and then spent the rest of his life in a fruitless search for the deposit others who heard the story followed his example and for upward of forty years the breyfogle mine has been a veritable willo will o th ewis luring men to destruction in the terrible deserts of southeastern california and southwestern nevada A LUCKS george montgomery an experienced miner well known in the wood river region of idaho was on a prospecting trip in the region to the southeastward of death valley it should be premised that the old utah road after leaving san Be mardino city turns through the cajon pass and then strikes off in a northeasterly direction across the mojave desert passing besting springs the kingston mountains and then traversing the pahr ump valley this valley lies just on the boundary line between california and nevada and has a general northwesterly and southeasterly course the kingston mountains lying to the west and the range to the east while prospecting in the mountains last named and at the upper end of the valley montgomery made a discovery which bears every indication of being the long sought breyfogle mine or at least one exactly similar but the location answers to that given by breyfogle while the gold has been found just as he said so plentiful that it could be dug out in nuggets with a knife one ledge located by montgomery is eight feet wide and has been traced by its outcroppings outcrop pings for a distance of feet in the decomposed surface rock the gold is found almost like plums in a pudding pieces of quartz picked out are from a quarter to half bright yellow gold while with a hand mortar the lucky discoverer pounded out in a short time a yeast powder can fuu of nuggets of various sizes all along the ledge free gold s found in quantities that astonish ho oldest prospectors and which seem scarcely credible after making several locations montgomery spead the news of hia discovery the result being that some thirty or forty miners are at work in the valley montgomery himself packed ap as large a quantity of the richest specimens as he could carry and made his way across the desert to daggett the nearest railroad point miles away from thero ha came to san francisco FOB MAKY to the question quest ioa whether he was looking for capital or a purchaser mr montgomery returns an emphatic negative the mines be ways are the richest he ever saw and he is satisfied that he can realize a fortune hy working them there ought to be plenty of placer gold in the gulches leading from the ledges that have been discovered baff no effort has been made to find any AH the miners yet in the camp are busy on the quartz claims they have located on one claim taken up by montgomery a cross cut has been pushed for twenty feet across the vein without striking the hanging wall and it is free milling ore all the way besides the deposits of gold some rich silver veins have been found essays assays from which run over a hundred ounces to the ton lead and copper also abound but at present gold is the sole object of search there is plenty of mesquite wood for fuel in the valley within three or four milea of the newly discovered camp while in the mountains fifteen miles away are forests which afford aann dance ot timbering material water can be had at a moderate depth in pahrump valley while at ash meadows fifteen miles away are streams which could be utilized for power in any event Breyfogle the mystery beems to have been solved and perhaps this fact will give another stimulus to the search for the the peg leg mines san francisco letter |
