Weekly Arizona journal-miner. [volume] (Prescott, Ariz.) 1903-1908, 1904-01-20

construct dry washer In few hours
that will save every particle of gold
from clean, dry ground-even gold too
fine to be detected without a glass.
Evidently then, no new dry washer is
needed for this kind of 'pay dirt;'
but g dry washer is needed badly
enough. though for kind of ground
these eastern inventors have never
heard of. Every prospector who has
hunted for placers in Arizona, knows
of thousands of acres of red auriferous
gravel that forms mesas along the
rivers. with beds lying from ten to
forty feet thick. These gravel beds,
though ~ell impregnated with gold,
are not rich enough to warrant the
installment of expensive machinery
but would pay we'll could they be
treated by a simple dry process. Thus
far no process has been discovered
that can handle them, the difficulty
being that the red clay which is the
matrix for the gravel is utterly in
tractable. When wet or even damp,
it "balls up" and thsee balls cannot
even be treated in sluice boxes with
an abundance of water. They simply
roll through the sluices, picking up
and packing off any loose gold they
may come in contact with along the
rifles. When dry, the dirt breaks up
into slumps of every size, that cannot
be induced to disintegrate short of
breaking them up by hand.
Nothing short of a stamp mill or
rollers will crush this auriferous
dirt, for sticking in the red clayey
matrix thicker than plums in a pud-
ding, are hard, round quartz pebbles
of every size and in order to pulverize
the Jumps of clay the pebbles must
be crushed at the same time. This, of
course, means powerful machinery run
by steam-and that requires water.
It is an undoubted fact that for
tune awaits the man who will solve
the problem of saving the gold from
these red, auriferous gravels-yes, fur
tunes for all his friends.
But listen to his request! He only
wants ''to get hold of some good, rich
placer fields" l can assure your cor
respondent that if it we're reported
that any ''good rich" placer fields
had been discovered in Arizona half
the camps in the territory-let alone
New Mexico and California-wouId
be all but depopulated by the rush to
said placer fields, provided they we're
think Arizonans are doing for them
selves, to let any such fields be around
loose. L know of dry placers in this
county, where for years you could
find from fifty to a hundred men
working hard with dry washers, and
saving from half a dollar to two dol
lars day, in gold. They were the
old time, independent prospectors,
who would rather be free, and clear
fifty cents day, than make four dol
lars a day under a boss. Also, another
thing that kept up their courage was
the chance-a rare one-of striking a
pocket, and taking out from ten dol
lars to several hundred.
l have no doubt that there are many
wide, sandy storm channels, such
as one meets in the wide deserts,
whose shallow fiat bed rocks are rich |
in alluvial gold that has been accum-
ulating since erosion began. But |
they are so remote from water that |
when the desert traveller passes them
he is generally thirsty himself, with |
forty miles or so to make before he
can get a drink and in such cases,
even the case hardened prospector has
no inclination nor time to stop and |
prospect them.
My advice would be-since your
is asking advice-that
one who is trying to solve the prob
lem of saving gold from the only ex-
tensive dry placers known in the ter
ritory, should send to Arizona and
get a hundred pounds or so of this
red, clayey, auriferous gravel, and
thus have sample before him of what
be had to work on.
P. c. Bicknell.