Eureka daily sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1871-1887, 1877-07-26
BLACK HILLS.
A 3acy Letter From an Old Resi-
dent of Eurckn.


Charley Grimm is in receipt of a let.
Ter from Deadwood City. upon
which we make the following extracts:
DEADwooD CITY, July 18th, 1877.
FRIEND CHARLES: You are the
only one in Eureka that I can get a
letter from. l write to my old friends,
but ! reckon that they have all grown
too lazy to answer. This camp has
gone o the devil. Everything is dead
and dull, and rapidly getting worse.
The Hidden Treasure and Father de
smet, the wonderful quartz mines
that everybody pinned their faith to,
have petered out, found the bottom
and nothing in it. A man can't get
work for his grub. The placer claims
are in much the same fix, not one in a
dozen paying wages, and all playing
out very fast.
There is a great rush for the Big
Horn now. There was a wild report
circulated yesterday that a gulch IS
miles long and paying SIS per day to
the man had been struck up in the Big
Horn range, and In consequence every
body that car get out horseback, or
footback, are going to the new dig
gings. Mr.. Indian is bad, and some
of the stampeders will get their hair
lifted.
Freight is ten cents from here to the
new mines. John Stout is talking
about fitting out and loading one of his
teams and going out with il. II he
AnAg sIalH tn.aIa1A. - Il rfE -. - F.- Ill.,
/ am willing to go anywhere TO get out
of this hole. Chrystal is going to load
his teams next week. or as soon
az they get in here from Cheyenne.
This place will be too dead to skin this
winter unless some better strike is
made in quartz. Bear Buttes still holds
out with expectations, but no mills or
furnaces are in there yet. Chances are
good that there will be none this year.
What prosp poets they have got are
good, but the question j., will they
hold Out? There is no work being
done on them. The owners are hold
ing on for capitalists to come in and
bay them out, and that kind of bust
ness does not develop country worth
a cent. Sprando and Jim Cody are
disguised, and Sprando says he will
sell his interest in the Black Hills for
a song and sing the song himself.
We have had some terrible hot
weather for the last month or six
weeks. Deadwood was visited by a
hurricane about ten days ago, which
damaged considerable properly, and
one man was killed by IA falling tree.
We had a fire in the burg a short
time ago., which frightened all the
property holders out of their wits.
The own is overstoeked with all
kinds of grub and provisions. Corn
is ~ and . cen per pound; hay, II
cents; flour, 10 and II cents; ham, 10
cents; eggs, 80 cents per dozen; and
everything else in proportion. This is
quite a falling off in prices to what it
"a when you was here.
We have a high old time baching il.
/ am only in town every other night.
and that is too much. Stout and
johnnie Gaylor are the chief cooks.
Old Deak, Tom Kennedy and Siutter-
ing Johnnie ring in about grub time.
They were the owners Of a claim on
False Bottom creek, but they did not
find the color on the bedrock, and con-
s%equently threw up the sponge and
cried quits.
Two theaters are running, but doing
nothing. Billy Mather has sold out to
a dry goods and grocery man. Clarke
has sold his stable to the Northwest
ern Transportation Company tor So. 600. |
Johnnie Moss is playing u the Bella
Union, and is leader OF a big brass
band. There is a beer garden in full
blast down in South DeadwoOd. and the
boys all %patronize il; that is. they look
on while the band plays. Not a cent
in circulation and everybody broke.
Yours, ETC., JNo. s. KEEPER.