The miners' express. (Dubuque, Iowa) 1849-1854, 1850-03-27
From the Bureau Ills Advocate.


4
sss Dlscovery Of Diamonds In California.
The following letter from his brother in Cali.
fornia has been sent to us by Mr.. Hansaw for
publication in the .4drocate. twill be read with
great interest, we have no doubt by those whose
attention is directed towards that land of gold
and precious stones. We think it describes, as
the writer intmates, the greatest discovery of this
age, or indeed of any age. We hope if Mr.. Fl
receives any further information from his brother
upon this subject, he will suffer US to lay it before
our readers:
9as} SAN FRANcIsco, Nov Is, 40
Dean BROTHER PHlLo-My letter written
on my arrival at this city in September last, it
has reached you, has informed you of my safe
arrival in this far off land, after many difficulties
and dangers met and over come in the long jour
ney. have news of q far more exciting kind
to tell you than that communicated in my last
Well, to begin where I left off. When had
staid few days in this place became tired Of
lettering about town, and as we were daily hear.
ing great stories from the mining region of the
quantity Of gold found there, soon got in a
hurry to try my luck at the business; so after
procuring the necessary tools started in COM
pany with two persons for the diggings. My
companions were, tall raw boned kentuckian,
of the name of Burton, and big, curly negro
called Jim, who had been his slave in the states,
and who had accompanied his master to this
country, upon the promise that when he had
earned him two thousand dollars clear of expen-
ses, he should have his liberty.
| have agreed with Burton that we should
work in company, and that the proceeds of our
labor should be equally divided between us three.
As my companions were vastly my superiors in
physical power, thought the bargain a good
one for me, and my Kentucky friend has a
kind of superstitous notion about the Yankee
luck and cuteness in finding things, he seemed
equally well satisfied on his part. We were ten
days in getting to the digging upon Feather Riv-
er, after we set out. -a..
We dug steadily and persiveringly for two
weeks, scarcely making enough to pay our ex-
penses. Some days we made five dollars each,
and some days as high fifteen or twenty dol
lars. But for the most part, we made little or
nothing. Having such bad luck we became al
most discouraged, and spent much of our time
wandering about among the ravines and over the
hill sides, digging a little occasionally, hoping
by this means to hit upon some place where gold
was more plenty. One after noon, when we
had been poking about among the rocks upon
the side of a deep gorge, nearly all day, and
were about returning, almost without hope, to
our camp, and Just as Mr.. Burton had stepped
to call Tim, who had climbed far above us on
the hill side, we heard crashing sound, and at
the same instant sudden scream coming direct
ly from the place where we had noticed him a
moment before, leaning against large block of
granite. AS we looked in the direction where
the sound came from, we saw bounding almost
towards us huge rock, which had been loosened
from its resting place 1t passed about twenty
or thirty feet from US, and landed in the bottom
of the gorge. But what had become of Tim2 we
neither saw nor heard anything of him. We
had heard his wild scream the moment the rock
started, and our first thought was that he had
been crushed beneath that bounding rock of
granite. We followed up its path made through
the weeds and shrubs, expecting every step to
meet with his mangled body. We however,
came near the spot from which the rock had
started without finding any thing of him, and
began to wonder what in the world had become
of the poor fellow. When we came to the spot
from which the rock had been removed we dis
covered an opening in the side of the hill, nearly
as large as a common sized WE'LL and we at once
suspected that Tim had accidentally fallen into
the chasm pitfall. We stopped over it calling
him by name, and were answered by groan
from beneath, which at once confirmed our sus-
picions. 5s -
We were now satisfied that Tim had not only
had a fall, but that he was badly hurt. With a
stick, which | found near by measuring about
ten feet in length, tried to reach the bottom of
the chasm, but was unable to do so. however
ascertained that the shaft was not quite perpen-
dicular. The question now was, what should
be done to relieve poor Tim. Mr.. B. happened
to think that he had strong cord at the tent,
and set off with all haste to bring it. He was
absent about half an hour, and came back with
the cord. Before his return, however, Tim had
SO far recovered as to be able to get up and talk
and had related to me how he came in his pre-
sent pitful situation He had stepped to lean
against the uphill side ofthe rock, to take breath
as he was climbing up the steep. Pressing his
weight against it he observed that it moved, and
to have little fun, he thought he would try to
force it from its bed. He therefore braced him.
self, and with great effort ousted the old settler
and sent him whrling down the steep. But just
as the rock rolled over, poor Tim, who was
gerly following up the advantage he had gained,
felt his foothold give way beneath him, and be-
fore he be could recover himself, found himself
in the situation l have described To make a
long story short, we let down the cord, and by
our assistance added to his exertions, we soon
brought Tim to the Upper world again. His
head and shoulders were somewhat bruised his
long woolly hair was filled with mud and dirt his
clothes wet, and his face covered with blood,
which had been running very freely from his
nose. We helped him down the steep to small
stream of water, which crept along among the
loose stones in the bottom of the gully, in order
TO clean his face from the blood, and battle the
bruises about his head. As we were performing
the service, or rather when l was shaking the
mud and dirt from his head into the water.
had a curiosity to see what it was and looking
into the small pool, saw what supposed to be
the same thing, which upon examination, proved
to be diamond about as large as hazlenut.-
Upon cleaning the rest of the dirt from Tins
hair, we found two others quite beautiful,
though not large. One fact was now plain to
my mind, that we had made discovery of i'm
mense value. Neither Mr.. Burton nor Tim,
had any very correct knowledge of the value of
diamonds, but MIR. b. knew they were worth
more than any thing else. My knowledge in
this particular at least was somewhat more than
his, and when told him the probable value of
those we had found he could hardly believe it.
Had we found but one diamond we should have
thought less of the circumstances, but when we
had tshed up three in Tins hair alone, we felt
qnite sure that there were others where they
came from. Accordingly, after returning to our
tent, we began to lay our plans for exploring the
chasm or cave, or whatever it might prove to be.
To our inquiries of Tim in regard to its form and
size, we received no satisfactory answers. His
attention while there had more particularly dir
ected to the opening overhead, and to the means