High Grade Treasure

Between 1862 and 1886, the Boise Basin produced $300,000,000 in gold.

Highgraders' caches

1. There is no prize for second place in a gold (or silver) rush. Prospectors who arrived after all the paying claims were taken soon lost their grubstakes and found themselves deep within the shafts of other men? mines working 12 hour shifts at back breaking labor for $3 or $4 a day. To lose life and limb under the hazardous conditions that prevailed at the mines and smelters was to be replaced by another man with no more thought given than would be paid to a broken pick axe. The early history of attempts at unionization by mine workers is the story of a long, bloody battle fought by desperate men against greedy owners, strike breakers, hired thugs and gunmen, corrupt politicians, and even the U.S. Army. The miners rarely won. But the mine workers did have a way of striking back ·it was called ?ighgrading.·

Highgraders were hired miners who supplemented their $3 to $4 a day wages by smuggling out small amounts of the choicest ore and selling it themselves. The big mines had inspectors posted at the exits to search departing miners, but the ?ighgraders·developed a number of ingenious devices to deceive them, such as false helmet rims and lunch buckets, hollow pick handles, secret pockets, etc. It is estimated that more than $20,000,000 worth of gold dust was high graded at the Cripple Creek Mines in Colorado alone.

Although the high tide of miners·struggles in Idaho came with the bloody Coeur d·Alens war in the 1890s, there were numerous other trouble spots and points of conflict leading up to and after Coeur d·Alens and numerous cases of angry miners highgrading every scrap of precious metal they could get. Since highgraded ores were usually stockpiled until sufficient amounts to make smelting worthwhile were accumulated and fatalities among mine workers ran high, there is good reason to believe that a number of high-graded caches of rich ore were never recovered.

Perhaps the best reason to attach significant importance to stories of unrecovered highgraders·caches is the highgraders·cache that was recovered. In 1936, 50 pounds of gold bullion were found cached two feet deep about 200 yards north of the Hahn Smelter on the outskirts of Leadore in Lemhi County. The Hahn Smelter was a known hotbed of highgrading activity, and many other highgraders· caches are thought to be hidden in the vicinity, as well as at Hayden Lake in Kootenai County and near Hahn and Gilmore in Lemhi County. In Boise County, the Placerville and Idaho City mining towns were also thought to be collection points for highgraders·caches. Old Orefino and nearby Pierce City were the highgrading centers in Clearwater County, while in Idaho County the action gravitated to Florence, 31 miles south of Grangeville.

There are, no doubt, many others. In general, any area around any past or present commercial mining town would have to be considered highgraders· territory.

City of rocks

2. At least half a dozen outlaw treasures are reportedly hid- den in the City of Rocks State Park. Unless permission could be obtained to search, these treasures are likely to remain hidden. But with so many caches in one locale, they at least merit a brief listing.

Ed Long and an unnamed accomplice hid $100,000 worth of gold dust and nuggets from an 1863 stage robbery in Utah south of the Twin Sisters boulder. Long was killed by a posse and his partner died in prison after passing on this tale.

There was $90,000 from a stage coach robbery near Goose Creek in 1876 was hidden in the City or Rocks by another pair of bandits who met similar fates.

Five bandits who took $100,000 in a robbery near Oakely in 1879 were killed in a gun fight in a box canyon in the City of Rocks but the loot was never recovered.

Wells Fargo paid $144,000 in insurance losses for a stage that disappeared into the City of Rocks in 1876. The leading suspect in the case later died in prison.

In 1866, a lone bandit took $150,000 from a stage coach and hid it in a small cave opening about 500 yards east of a pointed rock on which was carved ?L Day.·These directions were given to a man known as Hampden who searched for the cache but only succeeded in finding a much smaller cache hidden by a different outlaw.

In the 1880s a lone bandit was thought to have hidden $40,000 from a stage coach job somewhere in the City of Rocks.

Outlaw cache

3. During the gold rush days in the Boise Basin, there were so many robberies that Wells Fargo had to suspend operations for a time. Not all of them were successful. For instance, when three outlaws took $90,000 from a stage coach near a tributary of Grimes and Moore Creek north of the present day Arrowrock Dam, the stage messenger took a short cut through the hills to head off and ambush the escaping outlaws. All three were shot dead, but it was soon discovered that they had already cached the treasure box. It was never relocated.

Idaho diamonds

4. Idaho diamonds have been reportedly found in the sands along the Snake River near Isabella Creek in Clearwater County and in the Diamond Basin area of Ada County. Gem quality diamonds have been found in the tailings of an old gold mine at Flat Rock on Goose Creek in Adams County. In the 1890s a prospector reportedly gathered a large number of diamonds along Goose Creek but buried them and then lost track of his markers.

There are several reports of the discovery of pockets of diamonds in the 1870s and 1880s, but it should be remembered that Philip Arnold and John Slack made about $600,000 in 1871 by selling a salted diamond mine to a San Francisco cartel. Arnold was later forced to return $150,000 of the money he received but Slack was never apprehended, and the temptation to duplicate this feat must have been very strong among the con-men who frequented the gold camps. It is possible ·maybe even likely ·that at least some of these so-called discoveries were hoaxes. One diamond pocket was supposedly discovered on the Richard Owens farm five miles south of Port Falls in Kootenai County.

In Owyhee County, a prospector named Sam Wilson supposedly discovered a diamond deposit ?bout 20 miles south of the Snake River ferry·in 1865, but Wilson was drowned later that same year. Since this discovery pre-dates Slack and Arnold, it arouses less suspicion of a possible hoax.

Counterfeiters' cache

5. Around the turn of the century, a gang of Idaho coun- terfeiters began passing a record number of bogus $20 double eagles made of cheap metals thinly plated with gold leaf. A $5,000 reward was offered for their capture. Bill Bodwin, a gambler and part time bounty hunter, set out to claim it. Bodwin infiltrated the gang and got word to authorities that the counterfeiters were headquartered at an old miner? cabin in a steep canyon off of Shingle Creek. Unfortunately, Bodwin, as new man, was forced to stand guard whenever the coins were minted and never got to see the counterfeiters·cache sites further up the mountain. Worse yet, when the posse did arrive, they mistook him for an outlaw and he was very lucky not to get 20 years in the pen like the others did. He never got his reward.

The posse found a few slugs and some gold leaf, which was enough to convict the outlaws, but the main stash (Bodwin testified that they had been cranking 100 double eagles a week) was never found, nor was the real money or the gold.

To get to the hideout after leaving Grangeville, the gang followed the Salmon River 30 miles downstream and then followed the Little Salmon seven more miles before turning west for four additional miles to the point where the canyon met Shingle Creek.

Red Johnson's gold

6. In 1870, Red Johnson deserted the army to join a gang of outlaws in Idaho. Then he deserted the outlaws to head back home to Illinois. Before leaving, he borrowed about $15,000 worth of his comrades·gold. But by the time he reached the mouth of Camas Creek in Jefferson County, his pack horse was spent and could go no further. Since Red hadn? bothered to tell his partners he had ?orrowed· their gold, he was in a powerful hurry to push on. Red shot the horse and buried $12,000 worth of gold on the spot. He went home and never did come back for the rest of his gold, but he did tell a neighbor about it back in Illinois. The neighbor searched, but the cache was never found and Red Johnson? gold is still missing.

Please Note: It is the responsibility of the treasure hunter to gain permission before detecting.

SOURCES:

Cushman, Dan. Great North Trails. McGraw Hill, 1996.

Durden, Victor. ?he Counterfeiters of Shingle Creek.·True West magazine, Winter, 1973.

Florin, Lambert. Ghost Towns of the West. Promontory Press, 1993.

Peterson, Gary D. ?he Crook Magnet.·Treasure Cache annual, 1996.

Terry, Thomas P. U.S. Treasure Atlas. Specialty Pub., 1985.

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