The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1893-05-28

sentiment OF Francis 7 at Pavia. "But
wait till my lawsuits are arranged; wait
till the mountains of California are made
TO yield up their wealth to my methods;
wait lill my eleven patents are working,
and" here the old mans eyes closed, his
fingers were clasped convulsively together
over visionary ld-bags-"wait till then,
ahi!v'
Etienne Derbee has been forty-three
wears in California, but be invariably
speaks in French-in fact he cannot speak
six words of English correctly.
he told the reporter the story Of his
llfe-a strange story, ton.
1T was in January, 1850" said he, "that |
arrived IN San francisco and started for
the extreme southern mines by way of
San Jose. / was accompanied by three
French immigrants, as poor as myself. II
was very severe winter and we were
loaded up like mules. After eighteen days
OF hard walking we reached the first mine,
Aqua FriO, exhausted and half dead,
trampins through three feet of snow. At
night we lay down to rest on a bed of
snow. 1t was our miners baptism.
I'VE had set out from San Francisco
four in number; we arrived only two, the
others having returned 10 San Francisco
halfway, unable TO bear the trip. In the
defile of the Sierra which we had reached
we found the mules of the Ameros dead or
diving under the snow while trying to
regain the plain.
The day after our arrival at Agua Frio
witnessed our first experiment as god
seekers. We had removed with our hand
the three feet of snow which overed the
ground, and we had roughly washed some
OF the earth below in the tinplates in which
we had eaten during our tr p some bran
SOUP. The bran cost US 25 cents pound,
and we had bought it from an American
immigrant from the East who used it to
ieed his oxen when grass failed. The only
seasoning we had for this soup was some
mustard leaves which we found in great
abundance 10 the plains beyond San Jose.
our washlngS for gold. conducted in this
primitive way, yielded us dollar in gold
out OF few hundred pounds of soil. Sub
sequent improvements made it possible to
wash from 10000 to 10000 tons day. 1t is
my conviction that this country IF Calitor-
MIA has metalliferous deposits literally in
Vulnerable and that it is impossible 10 con-
ceive OF their exhaustion"
In this trip Derbec not only explored and
proSpected the Aqua Fro of Mariposa
but The Sherlock diggings, MERGED. Chow
chilla. Bear Valley, Colorado. Coarse Gold
Gulch, Fine Gold Gulch and Quartz Noun
tain al one time these districts were ex-
clusivelv occupied by Indians. and were
then considered as the extreme mineral
and auriferOus limits of the south.
During the hours when he permitted
himself to rest from his mining labors
DerOec cOrreSponded Tor the journal des
Debats of Paris, and in 1851 he returned to
San francisco and became a member of
the editorial staff of the Daily Evening
Picayune and Daily Evening Times, both
! published here. In 1852 he founded the
Echo du Pacific and the Eco del Pacifico
and edited them for several years.
In 1861 the discovery of the Comstock
lode drew Derbec away to Virginia City,
| New, where he established reduction
words by the new lixiviaton processes at
Gold HILL His first labors of this kind
were commenced at San Francisco In 1855
In 1868 and 1864 he put up another estab-
lishment at Progress Camp, situated be
tween Grass Valley and the Allison
Ranch mine. Later he had charge of
HIPS Sulphurets Reduction Works in the
city of Grass Valley on account of the
death of his former partner. Politician
Derbee's indispensable Eco du Pa
cfic and El Eco del Pacifco-were sup
pressed III 1865. but he esta blished the
Courier de San Francisco in the same year.
and these papers were continued till 1887.
In 1869 the iDdefatga bic editor-miner
explored the country to the east and south
OF Fisalia, Kern River Mountains the
lnyo Mountains, Walker Pass, Indepen-
dence Mountains, the soda lakes and de-
posts, Death Valley and environs, Cerro
Gordo Mountains and lakes.
In 1873 be made tour of exploration In
Colorado. in New Mexico, he Rio Grande
country and the Sierra del Orc. He estab.
lished the celebrated Derbec mines M
North Bloomfield, in Nevada County, pur-
chasing with his own funds fifty immense
claims, covering beds of auriferous gravel.
about 5000 feet wide, 5000 feet long and
several hundred feet thick. In 1877 a