Mexico weekly ledger., 1898-08-25
Mexico Audrain County Thursday August IS ee8

1nty, Missouri, Thur.
The diggings were discovered by Jas.
Downie, after whom the town was
called, in 1850 and were as rich in
placer gold as any ever found in Cali
fornia. The gold was coarse and of q
much finer quality than the gold found
further south.
AS 1 looked down on the town that
afternoon could see that 1t extended
from the fork of the river q distance
of quarter of mile,and on the south
side of the river, on what was called
"Durgan's Flat" there was large
fiume-that carried all of the water in
the river-that extended the whole
length of the town. In this big fiume
there were numerous large under.
shot wheels running at a high speed
and was puzzled to know what they
were for. They reminded me of the
cornstalk wheels that used to make,
when l was Kid, and place in the
spring branch to see them futter. I
soon learned that those wheels were
made for a useful purpose, as each one
ran large canvas pump that lifted
the seepage water from the bed of the
river and enaptied 1t into the fiume. In
the bed of the river nearly every claim
had huge derrick that was used to
lift the great granite boulders, many
of them weighing several tons, from
their beds and swing them around to
the bank OF the stream.
AS we were crossing the bridge near
the lower end of the town we met a
well dressed and handsome young
man who greeted US kindly and said:
"Boys, I can tell by your looks that
you have had hard time. know
what it is for have been through the
mill myself, as suffered great hard
ships on the Humboldt and came near
losing my life from starvation crossing
these mountains.' He then spoke
cheering words to us and told as
where we could and good hotel to
stop at. did not dream then that the
next time that would see the face of
that yonng man it would be as white as
the driven snow and the face of a
corpse.
That bridge the previous year had
been the scene of a terrible tragedy,
Spanish woman having been hanged
from the center of it by mob of Cor
nish miners. A drunken Cornish
miner had gone to the woman's house
late the night before and asked to be
admitted. The woman refused to let
him In and told him to go away. He
then swore that if she did not open the
door he would break it down, and she
told him that If he did 90 she would kill
him. He then proceeded to break down
the door aud she made her word good
by thrusting knife through his heart
John Bigler, the Democratic eandi-
date for Governor, was billed 70 speak
In Downieville that day and had he
spoken a word in the woman's behalf
he might have saved her life, but he
was afraid that he might lose few
votes II he interfered and he kept his
mouth shut until the lgnching bee was
over and then proceeded to address
the miners on the political questions
of the day.
The winter of 1852 53 was the worst
ever experienced by the citizens of
Downieville, as the snow fell to q
much greater depth that winter than
ever known before or since. For sew
eral weeks the snow lay more than
twenty feet deep in the main street of
the town and the people had to run
tunnels through it from house to house
and across the street. On account of
the great depth Of snow on the noun
tains no pack trains could reach the
town and provisions soon grew very
scarce and correspondingly high. A
fifty pound sack of -four was worth
$3.50 and everything else that was eat
able sold at sky scraping prices. A
miner told me that he lived three
weeks on one peck of barley, one rat
and a poor crippled quail that he
caught on the snow. Another miner
told me that in some places In the
mountains the snow drifted into the
deep canyons to depth of 300 feet.
He said that miner who was crossing
one of those canyons saw the top
of pine tree sticking few feet out
Of the snow and he took off his hat
and putting 1t on top of the pine he
tied it firmly with string and left it
there. The following summer after
all the snow had melted away miners
who happened to pass that way were
greatly puzzled to know how in the
world that hat ever got onto the top
OF that tree, $50 feet from the ground.
A man who was in Downieville dur
ing the summer of 1850, the first year
the mines were worked, said that two
companies who had claims on Durgsn's
Flat used to weigh their gold on a
butchers scales every day at noon and
night to see which had the best claim,
and it was seldom that either one
would have less than 80 or so pounds
of gold. A few days after my arrival
I worked half q day for couple of
miners vino had claim near the lower
end of Durgan's Flat, as one of the
men was sick that morning and unable
to work. It was the fourth year that
that piece of ground was being worked
and had not worked more than an