Lost Dutchman Mine

The Lost Dutchman Mine

The next year, a prospector by the name of Joe Dearing, who was working as a part-time bartender in Pinal, heard the stories of the two dead soldiers and began to look for the lost mine. He soon returned to Pinal, saying that he had found an old mine, describing it as “the most God-awful rough place you can imagine... a ghostly place.” Dearing; however, continued to work as a bartender until he could save enough money for the excavation. To make even more money, he then went to work at the Silver King Mine. Just a week later he was killed in a cave-in without ever disclosing the location to anyone.

Pinal, Arizona around 1880.

Another tale describes an eccentric prospector named Elisha Marcus Reavis, who was better known in the area as the “Madman of the Superstitions” or the “Old Hermit.” One of Arizona's most interesting characters, Reavis was actually college educated and taught school before he began to prospect during the California Gold Rush. Not having much luck in California, he made his way to Arizona in the 1860’s. By 1872, Reavis was living in a high mountain valley near Pinal, where he farmed vegetables and hunted in his isolated mountain retreat. Though he preferred his own company and his large library of books to being with others, he never turned a way a visitor to his retreat and often traveled to the area mining camps to sell his vegetables. It was not his manner that earned him his eccentric reputation; rather, it was his appearance, his high intelligence and the isolated way that he lived. Never shaving or cutting his hair, he seldom bathed and rumors said he was prone to running naked through the canyons, firing a pistol into the sky. Sure that he was “mad,” even the Apache left him alone. In the Spring of 1896 when Reavis hadn’t been seen in some time, one of his few friends went to check on him. The nearly 70 year-old man was found dead about four miles south of his home on a trail near Roger’s Canyon. His head had been severed from his body and was lying several feet away.

Later that year, two easterners went looking for the lost mine. They were never seen again.

Around the turn of the century, two prospectors who went by the names of Silverlock and Malm began to work on the northern edge of Superstition Mountain. Sinking dozens of shafts into mountainside, they found little gold, other than some scarce remains from the Peralta Massacre. In 1910, Malm appeared in Mesa, Arizona telling everyone that Silverlock had tried to kill him. Silverlock was picked up lawmen, judged insane and sent to an asylum. Malm was later sent to the county poor farm, not doing much better himself. Both died within two years.

Also in 1910, the skeleton of a woman was found in a cave high up on Superstition Mountain. With the body were several gold nuggets. The coroner could tell that the woman’s death was recent, but the gold was never explained.

Many skeletons have been found in the Superstition

Mountains, sometimes missing their heads.

More than twenty years later, in 1927, a New Jersey man and his sons were hiking the mountain when rocks began to roll down on them from the cliffs above, as if someone had pushed the boulders. One of the boys’ legs was crushed. Just a year later, two dear hunters were driven off the mountain, when again rolling boulders appeared to have been pushed by someone or “something” down the mountain towards them.

In June, 1931, yet another event added to the legends of Superstition Mountain when Adolph Ruth, a Washington D.C. veterinarian and avid treasure hunting hobbyist went missing in a wilderness area of the peak.

In his search, Ruth utilized a map that his son had obtained in Mexico several years previous, which dated back to the period of the Mexican Revolution (1909-1923), and was later referred to as the Ruth-Peralta map. Ruth was searching for lost Peralta Mines, especially that of the Lost Dutchman. Arriving in the area in May, Ruth convinced two local cowboys to pack him into the mountains, where they left him to his exploring at a place called Willow Springs in West Boulder Canyon around June 14th, 1931.

When nothing had been heard of Ruth for six days, the cowboys’ boss, a man named Tex Barkley, went looking for the treasure hunter. Upon arriving at Ruth’s camp, the rancher could tell that no one had been there in at least a day and reported Ruth missing. A reward was immediately offered by the family and searchers combed the mountain for the next 45 days but Ruth was not found.

Some months later, in December, however; a skull with two holes in it was discovered near the three Red Hills by an archaeological expedition. I turned out to be that of Adolph Ruth. The rest of the treasure hunter’s body would not be found until the next month, in a small tributary on the east slope of Black Top Mesa. Ruth’s treasure map was found at his original campsite.

The headlines were sensational – alleging that Ruth had been murdered for his map. However, the original coroner said that he could not be positive the skull had bullet holes in it. However, Adoph’s son, Erwin, was convinced his father had been killed. Though the coroner acceded that foul play “might” have been involved, the original statement was never changed.

Most believed that Ruth died, probably from the extreme desert heat, and his body was carried away in parts by wild animals. To this day, his death remains a mystery; however, it is but one more life claimed by the mountain and perhaps, its curse.

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