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There are literally hundreds of "Lost Mines" reported throughout the Southwest. Most lack any kind of collaboration but many have enough credibility to warrant a search for those of the exploring nature. Some of the most famous mines appear to have been found. Below is a list of these with brief descriptions of the original finds plus what information is available about being relocated.
Pegleg Smith set out from Yuma 1829, AZ to Warner Springs, CA with a load of animal skins to trade in Los Angeles. He was the first known American to make the crossing and somewhere out in the desert, he stumbled upon black gold nuggets. He had climbed one of three low hills to get his bearings when he picked up a heavy pebble. Thinking they might be copper, he placed a couple in his pocket and continued on his way. When he arrived in Los Angeles, he showed them to a miner who pointed out that they were not copper but gold. Pegleg made many searches for the 3 low hills but to no avail.
In 1965, a man claiming to have found the elusive bonanza sent a couple of black gold nuggets to the office of Desert Magazine. His story went like this. Ten years prior, he had stumbled upon the 3 low hills while out exploring the desert and rock hunting. He happened to pick up a rock and noticed its usual weight given its size. He scraped the coating off, and low and behold it was gold. To make a long story short, he had them analyzed and they were approximately 70 percent gold and 30 percent copper. The copper had oxidized and turned the nuggets black. He gathered all of the nuggets from the area above ground and even used a metal detector to find any that might have been buried. He slowly sold them in Alaska so as not to draw attention to himself or the area. Only when he was sure he had collected all of the nuggets did he send a couple to magazine with his story. In later issues he described the location even providing some rough maps. As I remember the area is somewhere southwest of the Salton Sea. He did state that the gold sold (at $35/oz.) to about $313,650. Not bad!
This one I have looked for a couple of times. The Clipper Mountains are located just northwest of Essex, CA. The mine was originally discovered by a worker for the railroad. While surveying the area he did a little exploring near the railroad path. On one of his side trips, he discovered what he believed was a old Spanish gold mine. He said he walked through a cut in the rocks on a mountain and stumbled onto an old camp that had what looked like Spanish tools and equipment left around. He tripped over a dutch oven and out tumbled gold. He gathered some and returned back to his camp. When he got a chance, he tried to return to his find but try as he might, he could not relocate the old mine.
Now enters one of the most prolific explorers of the Southwest desert during the 20th Century, Erle Stanley Gardner, the author of the original Perry Mason crime stories. Erle Gardner loved to explore the desert and used all means to do so. On one of his most comprehensive outings he enlisted the use of a helicopter and a small plane to search for the famous Lost Arch gold mine thought to be located in the Turtle Mountains near the Colorado River. While trying to discount other locations, they flew over the Clipper Mountains and spotted evidence of an old mining camp. They managed to get to the old camp and found what they believed was the old Spanish mine. Old tools were evident but Erle stated that gold was not seen. Not much more information is available about where the location could be but when flying past the Clipper Mountains in 2002, I spotted what may be the cut in the mountain. There did seem to be some evidence of an old mine at the location. The location was near the top of the mountains, on the north side. An old mining road now leads to a spot near it. From the ground nothing can be seen.
Hank Brandt found a vein of gold in the Fish Creek Mountains that provided him with enough gold to last his lifetime. His mine was verified because he made regular shipments of gold to the San Francisco mint. When he knew he was at the end of his life, he wrote a waybill for others to follow to his mine. The waybill included an outcropping of jade, whale bones, petrified palms, and a canyon of reddish-brown sandstone. A writer for Desert Magazine named Victor Stoyanow made many search's for the lost mine but was never able to find it. He believed he found some of the clues and realized that Brandt made some errors in his descriptions of landmarks used to locate the mine. Victor's conclusions were that the "jade" was actually an outcrop of Amazonite (a greenish feldspar) that is found in the Fish Creek mountains. The whale bones are believed to have been the tusks of a mastodon that have also been found in the area.
Again, someone wrote a letter to Desert Magazine stating that they had found the remains of the Brandt mine in the Fish Creek mountains. The letter said that a husband and wife team were camping at the north end of the Fish Creek mountains and, using a 4WD vehicle, were exploring along the east side of the mountains looking for clues to the lost mine. On the fifth day of the expedition the couple came upon a dim trail leading up one of the canyons. Hiking up the trail, they found a double-decked cave which was one of the other clues to the mine. They went further up the trail and came upon a mesa with reddish sandstone borders. The sandstone had a shape in it of a ship which was another of the clues to Brandt's mine. They continued on and around a corner they spotted a small mine entrance and a tailings pile. Could this be the lost Brandt mine? As they moved closer they found a cairn (used to mark mines with claim notices). It contained a tin can with a claim notice inside. Pulling the notice out, they read "Hank's Lost Mine", 1951. Apparently someone had found the mine and had not made public the finding.
Once again, a letter sent to Desert Magazine in Jan. 1971 states that this lost gold mine was relocated in the Sheephole mountains. The author followed an old Indian trail up into a canyon in the Sheephole Mountains and stumbled onto what was at one time, a placer mining camp located near an old spring. The spring was long buried under shifting sands but indications were found that the Indians of the area used the spring and so had someone while placer mining the area for gold. The author filed a claim on the area and stated that the location was approximately 15 miles east of Dale Dry lake. This would put it in the correct search area.
References: Some of these stories I remember from reading Erle Stanley Gardner's book about searching for lost mines by air. I believe the title was Searching for Lost Mines by Air by Erle Stanley Gardner. Other information can be found in the book by Choral Pepper titled Desert Lore of Southern California.