Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1906-06-01
LOST MEXICAN MINES.
They Were Concealed by Spaniards and
Prehistoric Races,

Prehistoric Races.
The murder of two American pros
pectors in the Sierra Madre mountains,
state of Sonora, Mexico, last month by
a band of Yaqui Indians has prevented,
perhaps, the reopening of a mine once
successfully worked by a prehistoric
race. About three months ago the
pair, who gave their names as Murphy
and Thomas, came into the little town
of Talanquera, driving two worn-out
pack burros.
In response to the friendly inquiries
of the half dozen Americans who live
In the town and have charge of a mine
near by, they said they had spent sew
eral months prospecting in the cordil-
lera to the westward, and had come out
to renew their stock Of ammunition
and other supplies. Asked what luck
they had had, they returned evasive
answers.
They made friends with an assayer,
and Thomas asked him to assay some
samples. The assayer consented, and
Thomas produced several chunks of
ore The assay showed that the sam
Piles ran more than 100000 Of gold to
the ton. That night in the prospec-
tors room in the fonda they told the
assayer this tale.
Ten weeks previously they were in
the cordillera. One day Murphy, while
hunting a strayed burro, discovered by
accident what looked like bit of ma
sonry. This he found was a wall Of
burned bricks.
Murphy and Thomas together laid
the wall bare and broke hole through
| it. 1t seemed to cover an old tunnel
mouth. After the bad air had cleared
sufficiently, they explored the place to
the end-about a hundred and fifty
feet.
It had a solid rock hanging wall and
was nowhere badly caved. At the end
wide of the richest gold ore they had
ever seen.
They thought at first that 1t was an
old Spanish working, but it had none
of the earmarks Of such. They found
in the dust near the entrance half a
dozen jade images, each about two
inches high, with Mongol-Tartar faces
and queues hanging down their backs.
This led them to think that it ante
dated the Spanish conquest, but being
prospectors and not arch@ologists, they
did not bother about the images. They
showed one to the assayer. He said
he had seen others like 1t in the hands
of the mountain Indians, who called
them tokens of a god who had lived
there in times past, but who had long
ogo gone back to his home overseas,
neither the prospectors nor the as
sayer gave much heed to the jade i'm
ages; they thought more Of the sixty
thousand dollar gold ore.
The upshot Of 1t all was that Murphy
and Thomas agreed to let the assayer
in on the secret. Two days later the
three started for the mine. The va
quis ambushed the party when they
were half way on their journey and
Murphy and Thomas were killed. The
assayer escaped but he doesn't know
where the mine is and hasn't been able
to find it. Neither has anybody else.
| 1t is only one more lost Mexican
mine. It Is a curious fact that In So
nora and Chihuahua nine-tenths OF the
mines that are in operation are proper
ties originally discovered by the Span
iards or their predecessors. worked by
them for a time, abandoned for one
cause or another and then rediscovered
by Americans or Mexicans.
How such mines were originally dis
covered and lost is interesting. The
Spanish conquest in the sixteenth
century was principally actua-
ted by thirst for gold. The close of
the first century after the conquest saw
Mexico a vast mining camp.
| In some of the great workings toll
ed thousands of Indian slaves. In
more remote places there were but a
single Spaniard and a few slaves, but
he was their master. Still further in
the wilderness of mountains the in
domitable Spaniards or with a few
companions, search for gold or silver
bearing ores.
The mining industry assumed such
proportions in the states Of Sonora
and Chihauhau that in the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries nearly two
billion dollars worth of bullion was
sent to Spain. Then the Indians re-
beled, here and there, against their
cruel masters.
Sometimes they killed them under
ground; sometimes as they slept;
sometimes as they fled. Every Span
lard dead meant an abandoned mine
and freedom from slavery. The In
dams, in most cases, carefully filled or
covered up the shafts or tunnels