Rising Star Claim
Carbon County, Wyoming
Gold
PLACER, 20 acres
$4,000
History
By the beginning of the 20th Century, nearly all of the gold districts of the West had been located. However, one small camp tucked away along a tributary of the wild Encampment River in southern Wyoming was waiting to be discovered in a most remarkable manner.
In 1897 a boulder of white quartz the diameter of a wagon wheel weighing eight tons was found at the confluence of Purgatory and East Purgatory Gulches that was laced with coarse free gold. This boulder was six feet long and 4 ½ feet across. An army captain, Chase O’Connel, blew up the boulder and many remarkable free gold specimens were collected from it. Once the broken fragments of this boulder were collected up and crushed, they yielded 700 ounces of gold! Two other smaller boulders found nearby in the gulch bottom weighing several hundred pounds each were also described as being “literally covered with free gold”.
The discovery of these three boulders triggered a sensation in the mining newspapers of the day and the gulch quickly filled with prospectors. These men traced these boulders upstream to a narrow belt of rich small gold-quartz veins less than 1/3 mile from the float boulders that crossed Purgatory and East Purgatory Gulches. This series of veins was prospected continuously from the Golden Eagle lode in the northwest through the Golden Center, Golden Crown, Golden Daisy, Last Chance and Magpie lodes in the southeast. Gold in many of these veins occurred in the form of small nuggets in size from grains of wheat to larger than kernels of corn. Some gold specimens weighing up to 1/10 ounce were also found.
Geology and Potential
The Rising Star Claim encompasses 20.66 acres along the bottom of Purgatory Gulch beginning at the original site of the spectacular quartz boulder discoveries upstream toward the famous Golden Eagle Mine. Although the original boulders were blown up and removed by prospectors in 1897, the detailed accounts of the boulder locations confirm they were found on the southern half of the Rising Star Claim.
With nearly 70 historic mines upstream of the claim and the top end of the claim immediately downstream from the Golden Center-Golden Eagle-Maggie belt of gold-quartz veins, there is an excellent chance that further boulders could be found with metal detectors.
Although placer claims were owned in the 1890’s in Purgatory Gulch by Messers. Houston, Hassett and Culleton, they were not worked on account of the lack of water for placering. Surveys for a water ditch were made but the construction was not completed. This is an amazing opportunity for modern prospecting, as this gulch was never touched by the old timers! The gravels in Purgatory Gulch are probably shallow and the richest gravels on bedrock could be reached in less than 5 feet in most places.
One of the more intriguing discoveries of gold made in Wyoming in the past 50 years was the recovery of 299 gold nuggets by a prospector somewhere in the Sierra Madre with a metal detector. This find was reported to the state geologist, but the exact location was not disclosed. The find must have been made somewhere in a belt of gold-quartz veins similar to those in Purgatory Gulch. After all the gulch once yielded three large boulders weighing over seven tons filled with free gold. What awaits the diligent prospector at the Rising Star Claim?