The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1896-12-12

soft, and will work remarkably easy.
It's colors are violet blue, in
digo blue, blue black and greenish
black. 1t differs very much from that
in the Frank vein-the vein we dis
covered last fall" A few weeks later
they write that the first assay gave
results of $500 per ton. This
amount seemed to them impossible;
but everything in the above memoir
anda confirms the idea that they had
really struck the Comstock lode.
Some remarkable references to the
discoveries made by the Grosh broth
ers are given by recently found
manuscript written by Francis ].
Hoover, pioneer of '49, who died in
San Francisco some thirty years ago.
1t is called "a True History of the
Discovery of Silver in Washoe," then
Utah, now the State of Nevada, and
is dated Sept. 9, 1868. The story it
tells is, that in July 1858, Frank An
tonic, the "Old Frank" after whom
the Grosh brothers named one of their
mines, went from Ell Dorado county,
California, with five others, to pros
pect in Western Utah. He had a
horse stolen, and while searching for
him son table land running north
and south and broadside to the SUM-
rise," he found rich silver ore, which
he knew, having worked in the silver
mines of Brazil. He kept the speci-
men after he returned to California,
and tried to interest men in the sub
ject, but long without success.
Frank Antonio, the Hoover manu-
script proceeds to say, then told the
Grosh brothers, who had been mining
in Gold Canyon, about his discovery
of silver ore in that region, and final
ly helped them to organize the
"Frank Silver Mining Company
composed of nine members, mostly
Californians. In 1856, the Grosh
brothers found what they supposed to
be the main ledge, and located four
hundred feet for each member of the
company. This, Mr.. Hoover be-
lieves, was along the axis of the Com
stock lode. The first claim notice,
he SAYS, was posted on what is now
the "Ophir," and another was on
Gould and Curry ground.
But the Grosh brothers had no
capital and few friends. They were
compelled to work on the nearly ex-
hausted placers of Gold Canyon in
order to live from day to day. There
is a story to the effect that stock
man and trader named Brown, at
Gravelly Ford, on the Carson, had
agreed to supply funds and that they
wrote him about their monster vein" +"
Selling out, he was about to join
them, when some desperadoes mur-
dered him. Meanwhile Hosea
crushed his foot by a glancing blow
of a heavy pick sometime in August.
He had poor food and was worn out
with overwork. Blood poisoning set
in, and on September End, he died in
their rude cabin of unhewn stone at
the mouth of American Flat Ravine.
DIR. Burke's manuscript says: cat
| the time of Hosea's accident, they
were about even with the world, were
not in debt, and had nothing on
hand. When Hosea was buried,
Allen found himself sixty dollars in
debt" Allen had determined to
cross the Sierras to California and
interest persons of means in the sill
yer claims. Although every day was
now precious, as it was often danger
Gus to cross the mountains after Oc-
tober, he worked in the placers until
he paid his debt, which took until
the middle of November. DIR. Burke
also desired to go to California, and
the two, loading donkey with books,
papers, clothes, blankets and some
provisions started together upon one
of the saddest of journeys.
Already it was showing in the
Sierras and their donkey, straying
back at night, lost them four days
more. 1t was November 20th before
they left Washoe Valley to take an
Indian trail which crossed the east
ern ridge of the Sierras some nine
thousand feet high, thence descended
three thousand feet to Lake Tahoe,
went up the main ridge of the Sierras,
some eleven thousand feet high, and
followed the long western slope into
the California mining camps. The
total distance from the last pioneer
cabin of Western Utah to the first
cabin occupied in winter in Califor,
mia was about hundred miles.
Snowstorm after snowstorm over
whelmed them, preventing return,
and finally, in Squaw Valley near the
II