76

deep to bedrock! and was probably a ‘‘gravel” shaft throughout. Some
of the prospectors, however, state that the shaft was about 100 feet deep,
and a boring recently made near the shaft shows that the ground is prob-
ably not over 100 feet deep. Mining was carried on for several years
prior to 1877. It is stated that the channel was drifted across and a raise
of 60 feet made on the far side, and a drive run upstream on bedrock for
500 feet. In 1877 the company, after expending some $30,000, took their
pumps out of the shaft and abandoned the ground, having thoroughly
tested the channel, but without finding ground to pay.? The bedrock
gravels are said to have averaged about one dollar a cubic yard. Consid-
erable mining by hydraulicking and ground-sluicing has been done on the
high bank above the Victoria shaft, the gold being found in the surface
gravels resting on glacial clay. A shaft sunk in the pit is said to have shown
some gold in gravels beneath the glacial clay, but apparently not in suffi-
cient quantity to pay, as no further work was done. The surface gravels
in the valley bottom along the creek from above the Victoria shaft down
to the junction were extensively mined in the early days by wing-dam-
ming of the creek and by ground-sluicing, the gold occurring in the surface
gravels and at their base on the glacial clay.

In 1922, five bore-holes, the locations of which are shown on Figure 10,
were put down by the Cariboo Exploration Company to test the value of
the ground for dredging. The hole at the junction was 56 feet to bedrock;
the one near the Victoria shaft was 95 feet deep and apparently struck
the old driftings of the Victoria Company; the three holes 1,600 feet
farther upstream were 33, 72, and 45 feet to bedrock. The channel is
probably somewhat deeper between the second and third of these holes.
The highest values, 33 cents a cubic yard, were found in the 72-foot bore-
hole. The driller was Alfred Brown, of Barkerville, who supplied the
information regarding the results of the borings.

The Tregillus hydraulic mine (Figure 10) is located on the right bank
of Cunningham creek near the upper end of the wide, flat-bottomed part.
The property consists of three leases totalling 4,500 feet in length and
extending downstream along the right bank from a point about 200 feet
above the lower end of the hydraulic pit, and is held by F. J. Tregillus,
Joseph House, and F. W. Reed. The benches higher upstream on the
same side were mined by hydraulicking, chiefly by Chinese, for many years.
The ditch owned by the Chinese miners was bought by Messrs. Tregillus,
House, and Reed and operations begun at the lower end of the old pit in
May, 1923. The mine was operated by two men, Messrs. House and
Reed, and cleanups of 70 ounces made on July 9 and 15 ounces on August
10 after a run of about forty-five days. The gold has an assay value of
$17.89. The amount of ground moved was determined by the present
writer by measuring the pit and assuming that the original surface had
the same surface slope as the adjacent ground at the head of the pit. This
assumption is probably nearly correct, for the surface slope along the side
of the valley is nearly uniform for a considerable distance. The length of
the cut was 110 feet and the amount of ground moved, that is gravel in
place, was 5,700 cubic yards, the average value being 27 cents a cubic yard.

1Geol. Surv., Canada, Map 368 (1895).
2Ann. Rept., Minister of Mines, B.C., 1877, p. 397.