Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1906-10-06
THE GOLD MINES OF THE
SOIpHERN BLACK

THE GOLD MINES OF THE
SOUTHERN BLACK HILLS.
The gold producing mines ofthe Black
Hills Of South Dakota are all located
within the boundary lines of the lime
stone on the north, south, east and west
a distance of 65 miles in length by "a
miles in width. The northern Hills are
generally supposed to occupy all that
country drained by the Spearfish, White
wood, Bear Butte and Elk creeks with
their tributaries. The central Hills are
embraced in that portion of the public
domain drained by the waters of Rapid
creek and its tributaries, and all south
of that has been loosely termed the
southern Hills. But this is too irregular
and indefinite, and more strict divi-
sion is obtained by apportioning ali the
northern Hills to Lawrence county, the
central Hills to Pennington, and the
southern Hills to Custer county. This
mining district is drained by the waters
of French creek, Beaver, Four Mile and
the upper tributaries of Fall River
which flow from west to east and emp
ties into the South Cheyenne river.
For the purpose of this article then |
will confne my remarks to the mines of
Custer county, which are all embraced
within a radius of twelve miles from
Custer, town of about one thousand
population, / will now proceed to emu
merate some of the mines of this district
which are considered Of the most impor-
tance at the present time, and to com
ment somewhat on the pecularities of
the different ores. The Saginaw, Grand
Junction, Ruberta, Old Bill, Ivanhoe,
Newark, Tom Paine, Lillian Belle, Even
ing Star, New York, Caledonia, Penob-
scot, Globe, North Star, Interstate, West
Fork, Wabash, Extreme, Strasburg, Om-
ega Lizzie, Granite Reef, Mayfower,
Marion, Darwin, Gladstone, Bonanza.
There are about one hundred more
mines in this district Of good promise
which might be mentioned, but the
above have all been developed by shafts
and tunnels of a depth not less than
fifty feet, and from that to AGO feet deep.
These are all groups of mines compris-
ing three or more claims in a group,
some of which are, and others have
BEEN equipped with stamp mills each of
from five to forty stamps capacity. These
mills, with the exception of the Ivan
hoe, have all closed down and are idle.
The reason for this is easily explained.
The ore is not amenable to the free mill
ing process, and no other has as yet
been applied to these ores Is there any
other process that will save the gold2
Yes, chlorination or cyanide, either or
both will save high per cent. Why
has not one or both of these processes
been adopted2 cannot tell. l cannot
form the slightest conception of rea-
son for this state of things but can sim
ply say it has not been done. Is the
ore rich enough TO bear the added ex-
pense2 Yes, according to the writer's
examination and tests it certainly is.
AS an illustration, at one of our mines
near Custer where they had stamp mill
running and saving about 81 90 per ton,
the Supt. (as was his custom) took few
handfuls of ore from the top of the car
as it passed by to test by mortar and
pan, and sent some of it to the company
! headquarters in New York. In few
days be received telegram to Shut
| down the mill, that ore contains S2l00 0O
in gold per ton" The mill closed down
THAT was several years ago. and new
cyanide plant is now being erected on
the mine which is rich in sylvanite.
There are two large belts of gold veins
running from north to south in this
mining district, one passing on the west
side of Custer, and the other on the eas,
side. The veins in these two zones diff
fer in their constituents in a marked de-
gree, although the ores from both are re
fractory, but the veins on the west carry
in combination with the gold (there il
no silver to speak of telurium, iron
sulphur, bismuth and arsenic, while
those on the east side carry tin, anti
mony, wolfram, iron, sulphur, copper
and the gold is combined with platinum
and its aloys-iridium, osmium, pal
adium, etc.
A difficult proposition say you. Wei
suppose it is. We have plenty of chem
lists and metallurgists in the Untec
States, and it would be a sad comment
: ary on our boosted advancement in thes
sciences il there were none skillfu
enough to formulate a process to wor
these ores cheaply and Cn grand scale
In the writers 46 years experience /
the mines of America, he has travele
and sojourned in most of the gold camp
of the west, and considers Custer tn
richest he has ever been, and he believe
that future developments will fully ju'
tify that opinion. The veins for th
most part would be called large, varyin
; from . to 60 feet in width. They occu
in the archean states and are classed {
: vertical fssure veins, with walls of graz
ite, hornhlende and raica slate. tn
: gold is usually found in quartz, SOM
times in phonolite, and often in mingle
: quartz iron and slate, and mineralize
hornblende. There is no porphyry
e Custer county that has yet been foun,
and it is rather peculiar that in Law
? renee county there is no granite, and
r. Pennington county there is very lit
# of either, most of the igneous rock thel
being hornblende and gneiss. In II