[Henry DeGroot, Sketches of the Washoe County #13, Alta California, March 17, 1860]

 

Sketches of the Washoe Country — No. 13.

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BY H. DeGROOT.

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A WORD IN CONCLUSION.

            In bringing these hurried sketches to a close, the writer, as one having visited nearly every part of the Washes mines, with a view to giving the result of his observations to the world through the medium of the Press, cannot refrain from again cautioning the public against placing too much confidence in the stories of their wealth, and of the discoveries reported to be constantly transpiring there. The most skeptical is now prepared to admit that silver ore at least six times richer than has ever before been obtained in masses has been found in the Comstock lead, yet the most credulous is not able to prove that anything of the kind has elsewhere been met with, or that there is any positive evidence of its existence. It is true we have abundant rumors to that effect, yet of these it would hardly be too much to affirm, that a large percentage are gross exaggerations of the truth — many of them sheer fabrications, gotten up to subserve some sinister or selfish purpose. That this should be so, no one will wonder when it is considered how large a class may possibly be interested to deceive the public by misrepresentation and false report. Thus, we have the steamboat and stage companies ; the teamsters, inn-keepers, and common-carriers ; the whole of that numerous, wealthy, and influential portion of community engaged in the business of transporting, serving, and entertaining the traveling public, directly interested in stirring up an excitement and starting an emigration over the mountains.

            Add to this the inducements which the owners of mining claims, city lots, and other property, the worth of which chiefly depends on the glowing accounts from, and the filling up of that region with people, have to falsify the condition, and overcolor the prospects thereof, and the most simple will perceive that great allowance should be made for what is said and published about these Washoe matters. We cannot accept as literal facts, what is told us by men naturally truthful about these things, since even the most veracious and guarded in speech, after dabbling a little in stocks, and talking of claims, sulphurets, &c., comes to speak with a species of mining hyperbole, harmless enough to the initiated, but hurtful to outsiders, and most delusive and dangerous when made the basis of business operations.

            To this potent interest acting as a mist in one direction — so concerned to inflame the popular imagination, and set the masses in motion — there is nothing to oppose but the feeble protest of such luckless adventurers, as, straggling back, dare speak out rather than hide their chagrin in silence, or the few others, who, apprehensive of injury from loss of customers, would fain utter a warning note, but whose efforts and arguments are alike impotent because isolated and voiceless. But with their past experience, the people of California hardly need be reminded, or put upon their guard against the recurrence of these things. As a community, they have scarcely yet recovered from one of those sweeping and ruinous movements, into which they have from time to time been precipitated by their own cupidity and rashness, aided by the machinations of speculators and other heartless chafferers in the blood and sinews of the poor. Thus admonished, let them not again be betrayed into another of those senseless stampedes that will result in disaster to themselves, and in engrafting a new and perhaps overshadowing branch on the chronological tree of California delusions.

            And yet, it is not our purpose to entirely discourage emigration to Washoe. After a month or six weeks, when the snow shall have left the foot-hills, and the weather and traveling has improved, industrious and hardy men not being otherwise well employed, and having sufficient means, may repair thither, with perhaps as good prospect of success as to any other field of mining labor. Where the search is to be prosecuted for silver, it would be a good plan for several persons — mechanics, for example, to club together and send one or two suitable persons to act for the company, since, if anything valuable were struck, it would be sufficient for the whole. This plan should be generally acted upon by persons of small resources, or those who having already employment, desire to secure interests of this kind, without losing their situations, or hazarding too much of their scanty means on uncertainties. The necessary outfit will be much the same as that required for other mining expeditions: a microscope, a little nitric acid, some testing tubes, etc., being a useful addition to the miner's equipage.

            The man who does his duty on a trip of this kind, will find it no holiday excursion. He will soon discover, after crossing the Sierra, that he has arrived in a country socially and physically very much inferior to California. Bloodshed, violence, and strife, it is to be apprehended will be fearfully dominant in that region before long. Without law, courts or authorities, filled with desperate and turbulent men, reckless of life, and excited by the strong passion of cupidity, frequent dissensions and quarrels, leading to personal collisions and deadly conflicts, may be looked for. Sufferings, hardships, and deprivations, too, such as even the mining pioneers of California were not compelled to undergo, will have to be encountered by those who go out to labor and prospect on these deserts. Fierce heat, fainting thirst, toilsome travel, exposure, and even hunger, must be the sure lot of those who go there. In this Utah there will be arid plains to cross, steep table lands to surmount, and marshy lagoons to wade through, without a green tree to protect the weary traveler from the glaring sun, or a drop of water to quench his burning thirst. Toiling over the yielding earth, or flinty stones ; sleeping unprotected from the night air, half famished with drouth, the strong limb will grow feeble, and the stout heart faint ; and the hardy miner in the strength of his manhood will yearn like a child for the cool streams that danced by his cabin amongst the woody hills of California. He will find, when perhaps it is too late, that he has come a long way, to reach a lonely, inhospitable, and unfruitful region, of savage aspect and dubious wealth — a land abounding with bitter waters and blistering rocks ; a basin filled with mephitic pools and ponds of lye, thickly strewn with lava, basalt, slag, and cinders, the apparent vestiges of a pre-existent system — a primitive wilderness so scorified, saline, and sulphurous that it would seem to have been rained upon with fire and brimstone, and afterwards sown with salt. Here, without shelter or guide, the miner will be exposed to unwonted deprivations and dangers, and it is much to be feared many a stout and intrepid man, overcome with fatigue and thirst, will yet perish miserably on these solitary deserts, with no shroud but his gray blanket, and no sepulture but the drifting sands.