New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1890-04-16
LOST IN A NINE.

IL Il
They were talking about the re-
cent mining disaster at San Leandro,
that brought the conversation around
to mining accidents generally, and fl
'nally one of the party recalled the
Comstoek horror of two years ago,
buried nine men alive.
Il had a pretty ugly experience in
the mines myself eight years ago."
said one of the party, an ex-Nevadan.
Il was boy of fourteen or fifteen
then, with about as little sense of pru-
dence as most boys Of that age, and I
had a chum about as old who was as
careless as myself.
eve lived toward the north end of
Virginia City, and had big back
yard in which we always planned our
expeditions. One day, in poking
around that yard, we found near an
old shed a big iron ring. This was
fastened to heavy plank cover that
hid the mouth of an old shaft. This
cover was hid by couple of inches of
dirt.
''When the first big. excitement
struck the Comstock everybody went
to digging, and now the whole side of
Mount Davidson is as full of abandoned
shafts as Swiss cheese is Of holes.
Within the town limits all the aban-
boned shafts are filled up or covered
SO as to keep belated pedestrians out of
them. The mine we discovered in the
corner Of the yard had been too extern
sively worked to allow of it's being filled
up, and therefore had been covered as
described.
1--WE didn't lose much time IN prying
Eup that cover and beginning the ex-
ploration of what we found. The
shaft was evidently an upraise from
some drift of the lower mines, for it
went down at an angle of about forty
five. AS soon as we had descended
fifty feet we saw the working had been
very extensive indeed, for drifts and
wines went off from the main shaft in
every direction. We went into sew
eral of these, but always found our
selves stopped by a cave, for the work
ings were very old. Some shovels and
picks that we discovered were almost
gone with rust, and the timbers where
they stood were bent and crushed and
!, rotten. By guarded inquiries we found
that it was in the ground of the Ophir
Mining company, and a drift had prob
ably been extended to this place in an
attempt to strike a ledge to the
west. We knew that the old working
must connect with it somewhere, for
the air was good and there was steady
up draught
Finally the idea took possession of
us to 20 from our mine into some of
the working ones, and come up that
way.
The Andes shaft was only few
hundred yards from our mine, and we
: knew they must be connected. We
knew enough about the mines to take
what we thought were suthc1ent- pre-
cautions against getting lost. The
grain of the rocks Showed us the di-
rections as surely-as a compass, so we
were not allapprehensive We thought
that we might be down several hours,
! however, and so took along a number
Of extra candles and some lunch. Thus
liked, we began to Chamber down the
& old shaft. A hundred feet below the
: surface we found some drifts, and
!, spent an hour or so in them, but all
were either blocked with caves or else
) stopped in the solid porphyry. So we
a had to 60 on clambering down the in
r cline.
ssBen was ahead, and / saw MIN
5 stop, and then he shouted back to
/. me:
: "This is the bottom.
HE stood clear of the walls and
, lifted up his candle to examine the
place.
, "This is the bottom, he repeated.
' s'Are you surep' / called back
9 eyes; II
Il saw his candle disappear amid a
) crash. He called, to me that it was all
right, and to come down, and I eau
q tiously followed, though / could not
r see his light anywhere. Soon found
n out what was the matter. The miners
d had built platform across the shaft
k probably to prevent things from roll.
t ing down, and my companions weight
E had broken through the planks thai
Q had been placed in position so long be
n fore. He had only slid few yards
{ down the incline. and, barring a few
scratches. was unhurt. a very little
way below the old platform we struck
!, the 200-foot. level Of the mine, and
: IIstarted off to explore the tunnels.
: After following a crooked old tunnel
we came to a point where it forked.
Eve entered the left-hand tunnel,
! hut found that it extended less than
) twenty yards. When we came to q
I tstandstill against the wall of rock Ben
put. bis candle close to the wall to OBJ
Serve the grain of the porphyry he
made an, exclamation of surprise. By
!, 1.-THE grain Of the rock we had been
|. travelling almost north, when we
thought we were making progress
!, to the south. When or how we had
!, got turned around we could not tell,
5 but there was no possibility Of doubt
, about it,
I'VE lost no time in retracing our
Is steps, but to our surprise, when we
) came to the crooked tunnel again we
! saw the mouths OF three drifts instead
of two. We took the tunnel that led te