New Britain herald., 1920-10-11

tion, which was then well known to
 most of the older residents of that sec tion. This was before I had any
 knowledge of Captain Lemuel Hotch- ksss. Taking the well authenticated history herein before related, together with the old tradition which said his
 tory confirms. St is clear beyond any
 reasonable doubt that thi> is the place
 In Bristol from which Hotchkiss
 brought the ore to supply his shop in
 New Britain. Tho Bristol mlla is
 located on the eastern slope of North
 Chippen's Hill. a little east of Mir.
 Quinion's farm. There is a spring near
 the border of the said farm and the
 tradition is that the old Indian Chief
 Cochipiane (from whom the hill de-
 rives its name) had his wigwam by
 this spring. The iron mine is only
 a few rods easterly from this spring.
 It. is about two miles east Of the Ply
 mouth town line and about one half
 mile south of the Burlington town
 line.
 A few years after locating in New
 Britain I became greatly interested in
 mineralogy and that led me to re-
 visit the old mine at Bristol and to
 secure quite n quantity of the ore for
 sse as cabinet specimens. This ore is
 of the species known as Magnetic, or
 Magnetic iron ore. It occurs in
 octahedral crystals of small size and
 with finely grooved or striated faces.
 The prevailing rock Is called the
 Bristol Granite gneiss." The vein
 containing the ore is a granular rock
 of a pinKish color. in strong contrast
 with the black crystals. The mine
 comprises a pit a few feet in depth
 and as I remember it, about 3o by
 50 feet in area. On the surface sur
 rounding the pit. great slabs of the
 pink rock, thickly dotted with the
 black crystals of iron. may still he
 seen. These slabs were, no doubt.
 worked out from the pit by Hotch-
 kiss or his men. All of the specimens
 which I secured at this mine were
 broken from the rock which IIotch-
 kiss had worked out and left upon the surface Of the ground. where it re-
 mained for more than one hundred years before I reaped the benefit of his
 labor. Quite recently hunter n pass ing that way was attracted to the mine by seeing one of these slabs of pink 1 rock from distance and wondering | what the black spots in it were. He | said to himself There is rock l which looks as if it had had the small pox." On going to tho rock for closer | observation, he realized that he had | 1 been told was in that vicinity.
 Only two specimens of this ore
 were placed in my collection. I re- l served the remainder of what I col 1 lected to use in exchange Cor other minerals. My stock of magnetic was 1 soon exhausted. hence made another trip to the mine for second toad. l Thus I am indebted to the Ho:ch chkiss ] mine not only for these two Sl.eci- mems of Magnetic. but also for many ! other mineral specimens now in the | museum, which were obtained in OK ! change and paid for with the Hotch 1 kiss ore.
 The two specimens of Magnetic now in the museum each consist Of i piece Of rock with crystals of iron ore 1 embedded therein. The smaller siheci- men contains two Of the larger crys- 1 tals and the other contains larger ] number of smaller crystals. Each 1 specimen is labelled "237 Ma,;netitn 1 N2s Bristol, Conn" This spec:&S of 1 mineral is called Magnetic iron ore" l because it is strongly attracted Inv the i magnet. The potable method which Hotchlliss employed to separatt the l iron from the rock was to crush tho
 rock and then extract the ore tr om
 the mass by means of a magne:. Magnetic Is not reported as occur | ring in the so called Bristol Granite 1 gneiss." It was not reported as oc- !, curing in Bristol in the report of the. | minerals of Connecticut by Charles i Upham Shepad, 1886 which rNport l waa made in connection with the Percival and Shepard geological sur l vey of the state Neither is it so re- 1 ported in the 'State Geological and ! History Survey, Bulletin No. 6, Man l ual of the Geology of Connecticut by ] Rice ard Gregory, 1906. This indicates 1 that the Bristol Magnetic Is confined | to quito limited area. Hotchkiss probably ceased manu- facturing in New Britain about Nov.