The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-08-15
1T WAS NO FL DORADO,
Prominent San Jose. Men De-
frauded in a Mining
Scheme.
ON THE IsTHMUs OF PANAMA
Two of Their Party Died OF Fever
In Pursuit of the Delusive
Bubble.

J. n. Farthing, Mark Mentor and Henry
T. Welsh returned on the steamer Colon,
from Panama, and brought back very de-
pressing news of their enterprise and ex-
perience on the pestilential shores of the
Atlantic. eighty miles north of Colon.
They were glad to get back again to
California, in fact to be alive and WELL al
though it will take some time for Mentor
and Welsh to recover from Panama fever
and the dire effects of miasma after a
months stay on the isthmus. Two of
their party, G. H. Farthing and Thomas
Cooke, were left behind, and they lie in
lonely graves where the Atlantic rolls in
upon the black sands that were supposed
to hold gold in marvellous abundance. But
there was no gold IN these same sands, not
even "a color" save in sporadic traces,
and this contains the burden of the trav-
elers story.
The party, consisting of well-known men
in San Jose, was made up in that city to
develop new gold fields on the eastern side
of the isthmus. A man named Burkhardt
of Laramie, Wyo., who had been down
there, came back to California with de-
scription of the place so glowing and excit-
able that he soon found enterprising men
told wealth floated before them, and rely
ing on Burkhardt's story they invested
several thousand dollars in amalgamators,
in an outfit and incidental machinery, and
then started off for the new Ell Dorado.
Thomas Cooke and G. H. Farthing were
the first to leave. A month later the other
three left San Francisco to join them on
| the Veragua River, eighty miles north of
Colon, where the mine had been located
hxr R,,rl h rdt
"When we got there" said J. Fl. Earth
| ing last night, I'VE found the two young
men had died. They drank from the
Veragua River, and that in itself was
enough to kill them.
"We set to work, got the machinery off
| the sloop, which carried it from Colon, and
erected our plant as fast as we could, being
anxious to begin mining without delay.
"Well, we tested the black sand and, to
our surprise, found it did not pan out more
| than so cents to 81 a ton. 1t was a fraud,
and only then we saw that we had been
| duped. That was hard to bear after q
working test of a sample from the sup
posed mine had given $26 SO ton in San
| Francisco. We learned also from the
natives that Rurkhardt had PANIED and
| washed the black sand until it got that
much gold il it before taking samples
| here.
| "Burkhardt had been a surveyor down
on the isthmus and played US on the mine.
| From what heard down there he thought
| the BOYS would die and we would grow
discouraged and abandon the valuable
| machinery, in which case he would get
| hold of it later on and use it to test the
| gravel and black sand of the Antigua
mine, which is two miles up the river and
one mile back in the foothills, and is very
rich.
"The Antigua mine was worked by the
! first Spaniards on the isthmus, but theil
crude methods could not make it pay
though it yielded fully $50 TO $50 ton.
| There was no owner to claim 1T when
was there. The natives used to wash out
a pan OF % or 80 cents and then leave it.
having been satisfied with their bananas
ard wild animals to support life. SO ]
| filed a claim on it and took particular
pains to let Mr.. Burkhardt know that.
| Then he left Colon Immediately for New
York. He saw it was hopeless to think OF
getting the mining plant and quit.
~ intend to return there in time to re-
ceive my claim from the Government, and
will then work the Antigua mine
Meanwhile the machinery is there on the
coast, at the mouth of the Veragua River
| in care of a Mr.. Ginell who owns the slool
trading at that point.
"How did we avoid the fever? We drank
boiled water entirely and watched oul
| food carefully, but even then Mentor and
Welsh got sick. Welsh was very i'll when
he was taken off the boat and it will take
him good while to get well again. Still
we all are happy to be here with oul
|