The DeLamar nugget. [volume] (DeLamar, Idaho) 1891-1900, 1892-03-19
SOUTH MOUNTAIN.
A Prpopitious Outlook for the Great
Base Ore District of 0wyhee
County.
SOME ANCIENT HISTORY.


ton concerning South Mountain, the
NUGGET has mad prepared for publica-
tion the following brief history and
description of camp which once for q
time cut an important figure in mining
operations in this county, and from
present indications is going to be again
pretty thoroughly prospected during
the present pear.
South Mountain is located about 20
miles south of DeLamar and is sixty
Fl We miles by good wagon road, south
of Caldwell, on the Oregon Short Line
railway. The mountain is, with the
exception of War Eagle, the most promi-
nent in the Owyhee range. 1t is OF
granite formation bat is capped with
pophyry and contains a broad belt of
mica schst with groupings of dolomite
and lime showing in some of the ore
veins. A large number of veins of ore
have been developed on both sides of a
gnlch which cnts it's way northwesterly
! from The center of the mountain through
whicl runs a beautiful mountain torrent
called South Mountain creek. Mineral
was discovered here in the early seven.
ties, at the time the great mines on
War Eagle mountain were at the height
of their prosperity, and several of the
most prominent earlier discoveries be-
came the property of the South Mount
ain Consolidated Mining and Smelling
Company "a San Francisco stock jobbing
organization which made extensive i'm
proyements there, and presumably a
good deal of money on Pine street out
kof sales of shares. The company erect
ed an expensive smelter, opened up
several mines and produced a consider
able amount of bullion, but from the
their smelling plant or saving fair
percentage of the value Of the ore.
After repeated disappointments, which
the managers attributed to various
causesa want of a proper fux. water
jackets bursting, eic.-while the shares
of the company were considerably above
par, to the CONSERVATION of the share
holders, an assessment was called for,
and before it was paid the bank of Cali
fornia failed, and W. G. Ralston, who
had been moving spirit in the COM
pany committed suicide. If fire had
destroyed everything in this town OF
eight hundred people which bad grown
nd in the camp, it could not have para
lyzed every mining operation there so
Co pletely. Dozens OF mines not owned
by the company, were in various stages
of development, but with 10 market for
their ore, the work on them was at
once suspended to await a revival of
operations by the company. Being at
that time 220 miles from railway, and
in camp where everything cost big
prices, ore with more than 100 ounces
of silver in ton, which could now be
shipped at profit of 100 per cent or
more, was worthless on dump there.
The shareholders did not pay up ass SIS
ments and the COMPANY went the way
of many other speculative companies,
leaving three month unpaid bills, and
wood contractors, charcoal burners.
freighters and every body in the soup.
The next year John Catalow, who had
made some money in the camp, got the
smelter and tried to run it, without
knowing anything about the business
and made a failure, leaving another lot
of creditors, and the camp became as
moribund as the traditional herring. The
buildings were deserted, the mines
abandoned, ranchers in the valleys be-
low began to haul away the wood, then
the doors and windows were taken out
of the houses, the smeter disappeared
by piecemeal, and solitude reigned in
that once lively gulch. None of the
owners soon became Tired of doing
assessment work, and the shines nearly |
all became jumpable, with nobody car
ing to do the jumping. Such was the
condition of things there three years
ago, when prospectors began to again
look the ground over and relocate the
abandoned claims. But dead camp is
a dificnlt thing TO revive. Upuntil the
latter part of last summer bnt little |
attention was paid to it. Thep, how
ever few men got in there who sam
pied and assayed ores from the dumps,