Silver Mining in America

Mining Silver - Page 2

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The general excitement was increased by the discovery of silver deposits elsewhere in Nevada. Many thousand claims were located, not a few of which were large and well-defined, yet of little or no value. In the greater number of cases, however, they were contracted, and the lodes on which they were staked lacked the features of true veins, or proved poor below the surface.

Says Mr. Kimball, "Notwithstanding wide differences in merit, most of these claims -- the best as well as the worst of them -- passed at greatly inflated valuations into the possession of joint-stock companies organized upon the strength of extravagant expectations. During three years, while the excitement lasted, three thousand mining-companies were incorporated in San Francisco alone to work mines in the Washoe district, their nominal capital amounting in the aggregate to a billion dollars, though their market-value never exceeded sixty million dollars. Companies still more numerous, with locations in other parts of Nevada, were formed in Eastern cities.

Hoisting Works of the Comstock Lode, Virginia City, Nevada

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Without waiting for the result of exploration or development, most of the companies hurried into enormous expenditures for mill and machinery, of which a great deal was unfit for any use whatever, even had machinery ever been needed; cities were built in an ambitious and luxurious style; and speculation in city and town lots was scarcely exceeded by the traffic in mining-claims. The furor, if anything, grew for three years, rather than abated. In the summer of 1864 a reaction set in, it having by this time become clear, that, in the Washoe region, the only mines of any considerable and well-established value were those upon the Comstock, and even those for a time were objects of distrust; while the other regions of Nevada, of which such high hopes had been entertained, had together failed to contribute more than five or six per cent of the total production of the State, the rest having been furnished by the Comstock Lode alone."

Among the more prominent companies at work on the Comstock Lode are Gould & Curry, the Ophir, the Savage, the Imperial, the Yellow Jacket, and Prominent the Belcher. Up to 1865, Messrs. Gould & Curry had built companies that rivaled all the other companies put together. To get an idea of the enormous profits of the business, it may be stated that it cost about ten dollars a ton to get the ore mined, and each ton yielded fifty dollars' worth of silver. An idea of the rapid development of these mines may be derived from the following figures. Wells, Fargo, & Company received and transported for these companies silver bullion amounting to $20 million in 1861, $6 million in 1872, $12.5 million in 1863, almost $16 million in 1864, and $15 million in 1865. Altogether some $70 million dollars worth of silver was taken from the Comstock Lode from its discovery up to 1866.

Thereafter, for a few years, there was a slight subsidence in the production ; the lowest point touched being in 1869, when the whole lode is credited with only $7,528,6o7 of precious metal. A new development ensued, however, which was very rapid between 1872 and 1875, in which latter year the yield was $26,o23,o36. It is estimated, however, that forty per cent of the value of the product of the Comstock Lode is in gold, which would make the proportion of silver for that year about $16,ooo,ooo. The $2oo,ooo,ooo yielded from 1859 to 1876 is divided roughly into $8o,ooo,ooo gold and $12o,ooo,ooo silver. Within two years there have been rumors of still richer deposits having been discovered on this lode; but the facts are concealed from the public, probably for stock-jobbing purposes.

Nearly ten years after the Comstock claim was first entered, silver was found abundantly in the white-pine district of Nevada. In some places the White-pine deposit was so rich, that, when the quartz had been mined away, district. sheets of almost pure metal, worth $17,ooo a ton, could be torn out of the vein. This supply was limited, however, and the yield has not been steadily maintained. Silver has also been found in other parts of Nevada in smaller quantities.

Central City, 1865

Central City, 1865, courtesy Denver Public Library

Colorado in the Central City region, and Idaho and Montana, also developed silver-mines of considerable importance after 1865 but, they would never approach the yields of Nevada. By 1879, the the United States produced between $20 and $25 million of silver annually, which was about half of the world's product. At that time, three-quarters of the amount came from the Comstock Lode. yield. A contributor to The Atlantic Monthly magazine remarked that this country contained the largest proportion of silver, compared with other metals, of any in the world; that the production of silver was more steady than that of gold, and that the signs of our silver-supply holding out well for years to come were much more promising than those concerning gold.

Political influences, however, as well as the discovery of an increased supply, later depressed the price of silver considerably; so there was far greater variability in its value than in that of gold. Even before demonetization in 1873 it had fallen off. But, the removal of it from a place in our dollar coinage, and the similar action of Germany in 1874, had the effect of reducing it by degrees to nearly one-eighth of its former price. When the demonetization act of 1878 was enacted, however, there was a tendency toward recovery; and a large class of economists began to think it would regain its old value and place in the coinage of the world.

This; however, was not the case and would never again regain the high values of the 1860's.

Compiled and edited by Kathy Weiser/Legends of America, February, 2010.

About the Article: The article first appeared in a book written by Albert S. Bolles, entitled Industrial History of the United States, Volume IV, in 1879. Published by the Henry Bill Publishing Company, Norwich, C,N. Bolles was a lecturer in Political Economy at the Boston University, editor of the Banker's Magazine, also lectured on banking and trusts at the University of the City of New York, and wrote several other books including The Financial History of the United States, The Conflict Between Labor and Capital, and Practical Banking. Note: The article is not verbatim as it has been edited for the modern reader.

Also See:

The Comstock Lode

Gold Mining in America

Mining History in the United States

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