The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-08-16

Days of 40 Recalled by the Invasion
of PrOspectOrs.

of PrOspectOrs.
SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. lin years to
come generations now living will sing OF
the days of 81 even as the yray-haired
pioneers of to-day sing of the golden days
of 49, Trinity county, California, is the
newest and richest Eldorado of them all.
Fabulous reports of riches found there are
attracting hundreds and thousands of for
tune hunters. There are nuggets of gold In
Trinity county that are fortunes in them
selves There are golden powders near the
head of the Salmon river on the divide be-
tween the Trinity and Siskiyou mountain
ranges. The excitement caused by the
finds near at home during the last two
weeks has almost dwarfed interest in the
Klondike region, and scores OF searchers
for virgin wealth who were unable to se-
cure the coveted passage to Alaska this
season have turned their steps in the di-
rection of the new camp close by. Before
snow begins to fly in October the now thin
ly populated country where the new finds
have been made will be overrun with pros
pectors.
The town of Reading, in Shasta county,
which adjoins the county of Trinity, is all
ready filed to over1iowing with prospectors
and inexperienced gold seekers. The Red
ding storekeepers are coming money by
supplying tools and outfits. Old-time min
ers have had the youthful fires OF enthusi-
asm rekindled within them and the number
of them starting out for the new fields is
increasing daily. They are bent on secur-
ing a metal which the government mint
pronounces worth $1S.67 an ounce, or about
50 more an ounce than the gold of the Klon-
dixie. Every day there are reports of fresh
and more astounding finds.
The excitement began in earnest one day
the fore part of this week. when Richard
Graves entered Redding with a golden mug
get worth $42 900 reposng under the seat oe
his blackboard. His arrival clinched the
stories that had preceded him, and which
were previously believed to be largely imag-
mary, the outgrowth Of the excitement that
had been caused by the discoveries way up
In Alaska Now there are no doubters in
the California foothills and there is an ex-
odus from all the old mining camps toward
the new fields in Trinity county.
The new Eldorado is located Il bit more
than three hundred miles from San Fran
cisco and is comparatively easy Of access
the greater portion of the year. There are
no frozen mountain passes to follow, as ia
the land between the Alaskan coast and
the Klondike, where hundreds of persons
now blockaded. There is small danger
OF starvation on account Oh no provisions
within hundreds of miles, and altogether
the .allurements of Trinity county far out
number those of Alaska. Coffee creek is
the stream along which the recent big
strikes have been made. 1t is about thirty
miles in length, emptying into the Trinity
river, from the old channels of which SO
much gold was taken in the early days.
Nearly its entire course is through a
gravel bed. The gold in the gravel beds
Is found near bedrock the ricnest gravel
being below the bed of the creek so that
IL is easy for the miners to raise the gravel
to their sluce boxes. The mining machinery
seen on every hand is Of the most primitive
character and the miners operating IL are
for the most part men who started with
no capital except that which nature gave
to them. All, however, report wonderful
success.
These rich finds In Trinity county are the
fulhllment of the prophecies made by the
geologists and mineralogists, These Scien-
tific men long ago claimed that some day
discoveries would be made there which
would amaze the world. 1t seems that the
world is about to be amazed Ii is being
developed that the scientists were right
when they said the fountain head OF the
riches that We're taken from Trinity river
and its tributaries years ago was Ia rated
at the head of Coffee creek and in the
divide between the Trinity and Siskiyou
ranges.
Nuggets worth from $40 to $50 each are
common products of the new diggings along
Coffee creek and the tributary creeks ang