The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-10-20
NEAR VIEW OF "scoTTY."
What is Thought of the Croesrs and
 His Mines at Home.

His Mines at Home.
 That eccentric individual, Walter Scott, whom the newspapers have called the Croesus of Death Valley" is we'll known here and is generally believed 10 be a spectacular fraud. He has been in and about Los Angeles for a dozen years or more, and has been engaged in various occupations at different points in the southwest. He once worked in the Kansas City stockyards. He was employed for a year or more as a laborer on the Santa Fe, Prescott and Phoenix railroad; has picked up living at times by break ing ugly and vicious horses, has been a ''cow puncher' on various ranches, and went to Europe as a member of the cowboy gang in Buffalo Bills show. Between times he has spent many months around Los Angeles, and Mrs. Scott, who is a very decent little woman and is credited with having much more sense than her husband, was once what they call hash sling err in Los Angeles restaurant. She
 
 one of the desert hotels when she mar ried "Scotty.' They have had occa- Sional controversies, and at times he has treated her badly, but she is said to be a loyal, patient and forgiving wife.
 Julian M. Gerald president of the Knickerbocker Trust company of New York, once spent summer for his health on ranch where "Scotty" was COW punching" and took a fancy to him. They renewed their acquaint- ance when 'Scotty'' was in New York with Buffalo Bills show. At that time the latter revealed to Gerard the secret of a mysterious gold mine in Death Valley, which he had discovered with the aid of a Navajo Indian. "Scotty'' has told so many different stories about the discovery and his experiences in the desert that he is confused in his own mind. One of his yarns is that he made the discovery when engaged with a government surveying party several years ago. He has told other people that he found the vein while crossing the desert with friend on a prospect ing tour. It makes no difference, how ever, what he says. His memory is so defective that he never tells the same story twice.
 He seems to have convinced MT. Ge- rard of the existence of vein of gold of extraordinary richness, and has suc- ceeded in securing from him at differ ent times during the last two years the sum of fifteen thousand dollars for de veloping the claim" He occasionally goes into the desert from Daggett with the usual prospector's outfit, loaded upon a couple of burros, and after an absence of three or four weeks reap pears with a quantity of cash-silver, gold, treasury notes and coin certifi- cates It has been a standing joke among the miners around Daggett that "Scotty'' has ranch up in Death. Val- ley where he plants silver dollars and raises several crops a year of gold cer- tificates from the seed. He is well known to everybody in that part of the country because of his disposition to splurge and make people talk, about him. Nobody, however, believes in his mine, and the source of his money is a. mystery. He has informed MT Gerard, his partner, that he has located thirty eight claims near Bennetts Hole, about fifty miles from Saratoga Springs; but none of his locations have ever been re- corded, and people familiar with, the lo- cality insist that there is no mineral whatever within fifty miles of Ben TIn1n ay0I s, mountain of pay rock, there is no stamp mill, crusher or other means by which "Scotty" could get the gold out
 A veteran miner, who knows the re- zion thoroughly. says: "Mr, Scott's mines are purely imaginary. There is no mineral where he claims to have lo- cated, and the only way he or any one else could get gold out of that desert is by finding rich placer and working it alone. But in order to work a placer he must have water and there is no water anywhere in that locality. He cannot get any gold out of any mine in the desert without water supply or a. smelter, and even if he could get the gold out he could not change it into money except at some mint or bank Out in this part of the country, with such a sparse population, pretty much everybody knows everybody elses busi- ness and, as certain as he breathes 'Scotty' has sold no gold dust or mug gest to any mint or bank" |
 Some months ago "Scotty'' claimed to have been robbed of a large sum. in gold dust which he was carrying east ill an ordinary handbag. The conduc- tor of the Pullman car in which the robbery was said to have occurred was