The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-12-16

The Cyanide Process and What il
Has Done for Mercur." would make g
suitable subject for a lecture or dis
cussion involving the acceptability OF
new processes of ore extraction.
AS a matter of fact, the people OF
this city should feel very thankful that
such a system of ore reduction has
been discovered; as, without it, there
would have been no Mercur today and
consequently no Mercur mines, nor
any Mercur dividends; nor could our
people ever boast of possessing the
greatest gold camp in the world.
Nearly all of the mining men of this
city are acquainted with the history of
the Mercur mine, and the difficulties
that were met with and overcome be-
fore the company was able to begin
the payment of dividends.
In the first place a mill was erected
for the purpose of working the ore by
amalgamation, but as the ore was not
free milling the venture was failure.
Afterwards, when the outlook for the
company was the most gloomy, Gill ).
Pevton and Hal w. Brown, stumbled
onto the cyanide process, and, against
a great deal of opposition, locally, they
decided to try this system as last
resort. To do this they sent a carload
of the ore to Denver, and when they
were satisfied that the process would
work they transformed the old ANAL
gamation mill into a teaching plant,
and although they had some difhculty
at first in working. the ore down to
a fine point, it was not long before
. Lii wi
In this CITY, while experiments with
the cyanide process were under way
Messrs. Pe-rton and Brown were
laughed and sneered at and were con-
sidered as fit subjects for the Provo
insane asylum, and one Salt Lake
chemist and assayer, so-called, claimed
that cyanide would not dissolve gold,
and he gave a lecture to his class on
this subject.
The fact that the Mercur has paid
$525, 900 in dividends within the past
few years while other mines have made
a success on the same lines has long
ago disDelled any doubt in the minds
of the people of this city as to the sue
cess and utilitz of the cyanide pro-
cess, and it is more than likely that
the above well-known facts would
not again have been alluded to
in these columns had it not
occurred yesterday, when Hall
Brown, in cleaning out an old desk.
happened to find an aid copy of the
Black Hills Times that was published
in the year 1892. The Times, in the
issue referred to, had copied a state
ment made by Mr.. Brown and pub
lished in a Denver paper to the effect
that he had been able to save So per
cent of the ASSAY values of Mercur
III
was doing at that time, although a
higher saving has since been made
The article in the Times attacked
Mr.. Brown in a rough-shod manner
and made him out to be a thief, q
blackmailer and a liar. 1t stated that
with the cyanide process no more than
40 oer cent of the value of the ore
could possibly be saved. and then it
went on 20 sa:r that Mr.. Brown was
the agent of the cyanide company and
that he was padding his reports so
people on the strength of his flOwery
statement. But the article did not stop
at this. but insinuated that there was
no such mine as the Mercur and that
the Mercur company was a myth.
OF course Mr.. Brown and Mr.. Peyton
were greatly maligned by such charges
as these, but they have lived to see
the day, and they did not have to wait
so very long, either, when the public
at large is satisfied that the cyanide
process is al right on Camp Floyd
ores. and to realize the fact that had
it not been for this process they would
have had no Mercur today.
There is a moral to this, and this is:
Do not condemn any new process or
any new invention for the treatment
or reduction of ores until they have
first been thoroughly tried.