The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-12-31
Placer Miners Will Invade Belle
 Fourche District
EASY TO MAKE PROFITS
Passing of the "Gold Ships" Leaves the Country Drcary Waste-Secret of Gold Mining in
 the West.

Deadwood S. D.--Dreams of rediscovery pot luck" never gave the miners greater hopes of gaining the gold hidden in the earth than the announcement here that gold ships from Idaho and Wyoming will begin dredging the Belle Fourche river valley next spring.
 Back of the enterprise are the companies that are operating dredges in the Snake river valley in Idaho, and devastating great acres of fertile lands on which crops and orchards flourish.
 For weeks experts placer miners have been working near Belle Fourche and have followed the river to it's source. Trips have been made to the head waters of the Missouri, and now it is hinted that sooned or later every sand bar in the Missouri river may pass through the gold boats, and the particles of the precious metals said to be hidden in the sand left in the brushes of the machinery used in these ships, which are capable of taking gold from dirt containing only twenty five cents worth of the dust to the cubic yard, and return a handsome profit
 Fleets of these ships are now at work in Wyoming, not far from Belle Fourche. their steel shovels cease neither night nor day, and are eating up orchards fields, farms, townships and whole counties, turning the soil upside down and leaving the valleys wastes of rock and tailings They dig their own way from the river i, banks, forming an artificial lake on which they float across the deserts or fertile | fields, picking out the finest particles of gold like wolves seeking the last drop of victims blood. Their machinery Is such and the brushes through which the dirt must pass so fine that almost invisi- ble particles of the metal are gathered in by them. Cyanide. water and oil pro- cesses may all be used on a gold ship and fast as they consume a cubic yard of dirt it is thrown out the back end of the ship, washed clean of it's treasure. No field or placer miners ever yielded such fortunes as may be made with a fleet of gold ships where the dirt is rich. The secret of gold mining Is to handle low grade dirt or ore at such small expense that the small amount of free gold may bring profit The solution of handling low grade ore is the floating dredge, which digs it's own pathway through the felds supplying its own water for washing out the gold Operated by two or three men 1t is capable of washing out fabulous amounts or gold rom poor ulrl dl iato almost beyond belief, but leaving waste behind it which can never be redeemed
 Since the announcement that gold ships will work the valley of the Belle Fourche, old miners are recalling stories Of lost miners along the river. into which these enchanted ships may sail. Great amounts of gold are hidden in these lost mines, Belle Fourche country being full Of stories of discoveries of rich gold mines, which for one reason orsanother were lost afterward.
 Versions of the story of the first in- vasion of the Belle Fourche valley vary. The first gold was found near the river by prospectors years before the Black Hills country was known to the world. and there are stories of the finding of gold in stores unpdecedented, the extrae- ton by the invaders of more wealth than they could carry and the abandonment or the region on account of Indian raids.