Birmingham state herald., 1896-05-24


 briefly and also attempt to refute the opinion which to great extent prevails that gold mining is usually entirely spec ulative and should not be classed among the legitimate industries. With the knowledge possessed by the present gen. eration of the sciences of geology, metal lurgy and mining engineering, it is com paratively easy to determine, not only theoretically, but practically, all the ma terial facts with regard to the occur renee of gold bearing ore and whether such occurrence is of sufficient extent and the ore of sufficient richness to War rant the investment of capital In 1ully developing and equipping the property for gold mining operations
 Of course, the first discovery or golo at any particular location must pc loi- lowed by an investment, which may pc considered purely speculative. But IS not such a condition true with regard to every business? For there is period when the capitalist who proposes 10 ein- bark in any line of business must make an expenditure on a speculative pasis in searching for a location, etc. This IS what the gold miner is doing when he goes on a prospecting tour, hoplng to make a discovery. If this work is done with proper judgment and system the greater portion of the speculative char acter is soon eliminated and he IS aple to measure up ore in sight, give the aver age grade. character of the ore as to its adaptability for the various metallurgi- cal processes, etc.
 In my opinion the reason why so much of the gold mining in Alabama Tn the past, and, indeed, throughout the entlfe south has been attended by failure IS because of the fact, which Is clearly demonstrated by examination of nearly any of the occurrences or gold bearing ore in the section, that the developers or the properties have considered It more essential to sink a large number or snai, low pits, scattered here and there ana everywhere over the surface, than to concentrate their work at the point or discovery of the precious metal. Iney seem to forget that one shaft l0o rect deep and drift 100 feet long below the surface will enable the miner expert to determine the value of property with more accuracy than thousand holes z or 8 feet deep scattered over an area or seyenty-five or 100 acres. The capitalist experienced in the development Of mines never purchases a ton of ore that IS not In sight. In other words, ne esuiiates the value of the property entirely on the quantity of ore blocked out In the underground works and figures from that basis as closely and accurately as tne iron master figures the value or the pig iron in his stock yard.
  take a man on to a mountain and with smooth talk convince him that he was standing about millions of hidden wealth, which could be extracted by the eXpeh- diture of few thousand.
 Taking these arguments into consld- eration, am firmly of the opinion that the organization of local development companies, with moderate cash capital at command and with conservative bus mess men at the helm for the purpose of Investigating and determining by ac- tual work the permanency, extent ana valua of some of the so-called gold mines in the south would result In demonstrat- Ing to the world at large that there were some properties in the Appalachian mountains, and in Alabama in particu- lar, which would warrant the in vestigation of capital sufficient to oper- ate the same on an extensive scale.
 Quantity of ore is one of the most inn portant factors in determining the value of a gold mine Grade today is a second- ary consideration, because it has been proven in the black hills of South Da- kota, as we'll as in Alaska, that a large body of low grade ore can be worked more profitably than small body of high grade.
 After having spent nearly five years in visiting the various gold mining dis tricts of Alabama and Georgia l am con- vinced that Alabama presents many op- for successful operations, be- cause of the occurrences in that state of really comparatively great number of large bodies of low grade ore; but 1t is useless to look for bonanzas. These extensive bodies of low grade ore to which I refer are located in Cleburne, Randolph Clay and Tallapoosa counties, and in several different localities there are exposed ore bodies ranging from 13 to 50 feet in thickness, and producing ore which will grade from $3 to $6 per ton, if treated by barrel ch1orination. No really deep work has been done on any of these locations. but on Crooked creek, in Randolph county, on what is known as the Pine Hill property, an incline shaft so feet deep has been. sunk during the last spring and drift 100 feet long driven on the ore body, which occurs in semi-crystalline slate country rock. Tn these workings a vein 13 feet thick has been exposed, which shows by pam ming test free gold through the entire thickness. A carload of the ore will be tested within few weeks at the sam bling chlorination works of the Meek lenburg Iron company at Charlotte, N. c. The prospecting of the property has been under my own superintendence, and the future work will depend entirely on the results obtained from this sam bling. The cost of the mining has been about 75 cents foot, with the openings all 6 feet high and wide enough for trans.
 On an adjoining property in this same district syndicate from Indiana Is erecting a plant furnished with two Crawford mills to treat the same variety of ore l have found on the Pine Hill property.
 The structure of the ore bodies in this district is generally such as I would des- ignate as stratified deposits, rather than veins, although at Pine Hill we have we'll defined slate walls enclosing the ore body; yet we find that the body itself is really composed of strata of quartz, decomposed slate. clay and arsenical pyrtes, and that the structure is cuticular, inasmuch as we find in the workings one lens nearly 80 feet long, which perches out at both extremities, and near where 1t com mences to become narrower towards the northeast 1t Is overlapped by another dis tinct lens. This we have followed in the drift about 50 feet, and have not yet reached it's maximum thickness In the downward trend of one lens determined by the incline shaft that 1t maintained its continuity with great regularity. and the bottom of the shaft today exposes 13 feet of vein material which prospects by banning the entire thickness. At other locations in the same district I do not