Railroads and Mining in Utah's Bingham Canyon, Discovery to 1863

Among the first pioneers to settle in the Second Ward was a group of people who were in the Ira Eldredge's Company and arrived in the Valley the 19th of September, 1847. They brought with them a herd of cattle, also horses and sheep. They drew their lots which were situated in the Northeast Block of the Second Ward, better known as Gallagher Block. Among this group were the Bingham Brothers who drove their cattle into a canyon southeast of the city, now Bingham Canyon. One brother Sanford, and his wife, Martha A. Lewis Bingham, spent their summers in the canyon and their winters with Martha's brother, John M. Lewis, who was living in the Second Ward. The Bingham Brothers went to Weber County where they continued with stock raising and dairying.

John Lowder's Find -- In 1862, soon after Stephen S. Harding became Governor of Utah he sent John Lowder early pioneer of Parowan, Utah, who had recently been engaged in freighting with a six mule team from San Bernardino, California to Salt Lake City for Walker Brothers, to procure ten cords of maple wood from Bingham Canyon for his personal use. Mr. Lowder with James Briniger and two other men began building a road up the canyon in order to reach the timber. One Sunday morning, not wishing to engage in labor, the men strolled up what is known as Carr Fork, a branch of the main canyon, hunting for game. In looking across the mountain they saw a place where the hillside had apparently broken off revealing a vein of galena or lead ore several rods long and about a foot wide. They were unable to get to the vein, but obtained samples from the canyon below where the earth had fallen from the mountain side.

The next day Mr. Lowder, while in the act of stooping for a drink in the creek in the main canyon, saw what appeared to be uneven strands of fine wire in the bed of the stream. Reaching in he drew a portion of it to the surface and found it to be a net-work of small wires of all lengths and sizes. On his next trip to Salt Lake City he took these samples--those taken from the side of the mountain and from the stream bed--with him. The lead samples were sent to the office of President Brigham Young where they remained for a number of years. The wire taken from the stream was taken to a goldsmith, Charles Smith by name, there being no assayer in Salt Lake City at that time. He made a test and pronounced it copper. He offered the sample back but Mr. Lowder said "if it is just copper, it is no use to me." Shortly after Mr. Smith was shot and killed in a dispute over water and it is not known what became of the samples of copper left with him.

Sometime after these events General Patrick E. Connor came into the Valley and some of his prospectors discovered that Bingham Canyon contained large deposits of copper. On the 17th of September 1863 the first recorded locations were made. At that time Mr. Lowder was away on a freighting expedition and when he returned all the ground that bore traces of copper in the West Mountain District had been located. - Louella Dalton

(John Lowder's) parents were early converts to the Church and came to Utah and made their first home in the old Seventh Ward in Salt Lake City. In 1859 he married Emily Hodgetts in the Endowment House. He made his living the hard way; freighting with a six-mule team from Salt Lake City to San Bernardino, California. During 1860 and 1861 (when Lowder was 25 years old) he was a Pony Express rider between Salt Lake City and California.

In 1862, while he was logging in Bingham Canyon for Governor Harding, he found some copper material in the canyon stream in the territory now known as the West Mountain District. He did not realize the value of this material and went on freighting. Shortly afterwards, General Patrick E. Connor came to Utah and helped discover the copper in Bingham Canyon. This became the richest and largest open-cut copper mine in the world.

In the latter part of 1863 or the spring of 1864, John Lowder moved his family to Parowan, in Iron County, and in 1864 they, with others, left Parowan to make a settlement on the Sevier River at Panguitch. He did not return to either Salt Lake City or to Bingham Canyon.

The first discovery of a ledge of argentiferous galena was made by a lady the wife of a surgeon of the California Volunteers, under the command of Colonel Connor. A portion of the horses of the California Volunteers had been sent to Bingham Canon to graze, and with them a Company of men as a guard. A picnic party of officers and their wives from Camp Douglas was improvised, and Bingham was selected, as the troops were there. During the rambles of the party on the mountain-sides, this lady, who had a previous acquaintance with minerals in California, picked up a loose piece of ore. The Volunteers immediately prospected for the vein, discovered it, stuck a stake in the ground, made their location, and from that hour Utah has been known to the world as a rich mining country.

Colonel Connor, elated by this discovery, published to the world that there were minerals in Utah upon the domain of the United States and all were free to prospect and that his troops should afford all necessary protection to the prospector and miner. He had had no occupation for his troops they were eating the bread of idleness, and were discontented at being detained in Utah, and not taking part in the war. The discovery in Bingham was opportune, to favor prospecting, and it would appease the men and give them the chance of possibly enriching themselves and the country. An order was promulgated that a certain number of men would be furloughed to prospect, and every facility afforded them to travel within certain boundaries. Wearing the blue, and the honorable sign "U. S.," they could enter what canyons they pleased.

Thus to Colonel Connor, and the California Volunteers under his direction, is the honor due for the first discoveries in Utah.

In the summer of 1864 the Jordan Mining Company was incorporated by General Connor under the laws of California and work by means of a tunnel was commenced on the mine at the cost of sixty dollars per foot. Blasting powder was at that time twenty-five dollars a keg.

The first smelting-furnace in the Territory was erected at Stockton in 1864 by General Connor. He, at this time, became aware of the importance of having the mineral interest developed to the fullest possible extent and induced a large number of his California friends to enter into the enterprise. The Rush Valley Smelting Company was organized at the same time by the military officers at Camp Douglas, and a furnace was built by them at Stockton.

General Connor followed with his second furnace on the reverberatory plan, with an inclined flue one hundred and fifty feet long. During the summer and fall of 1864 furnaces were built by the following parties in and around Stockton and Rush Valley (mining prospects innumerable having by that time been located in the neighborhood), viz: The St. James, Finherty, J. W. Gibson, Nichols and Brand, Hartnet, Davids and Company, and one cupola blast-furnace by Johnson, Monheim and Company. A cupeling furnace was also built by Stock and Weberling in the same year.

But the treatment of ores by smelting was a task new to these Californians and their experience in milling the gold ores of their state was of no service to them in this task. This disadvantage was increased by the fact that charcoal was not abundant, that rates of transportation were excessively high, and both the materials of which the furnaces were built and those used in the daily operations, were very expensive. These are circumstances which would tax the ability of the most experienced; and the Californians, unused to the work, failed entirely. A good deal of money was spent with no result, excepting the establishment of the fact that the ores were easy to treat. During this time of trial the usual history of new mining fields was repeated and companies which were organized with high hopes spent large sums and became bankrupt.

The first mining record of Utah is that of the Jordan Mine in favor of one Ogilvie and some others. Ogilvie, in logging in the canyon, found apiece of ore which he sent to Colonel Connor, who had it assayed. Finding it to be good ore, Connor organized a party of officers and ladies of his camp and went over and located the mine -- the Jordan. A day or two afterwards, Colonel Connor wrote mining laws and held a miners' meeting at Gardner's mill on the Jordan River, where the laws were adopted and Bishop Gardner elected recorder. The district was called the West Mountain Mining District.

It was thereupon that General Connor issued a circular announcing to the world that he had "the strongest evidence that the mountains and canyons in the Territory of Utah abound in rich veins of gold, silver, copper and other minerals, and for the purpose of opening up the country to a new, hardy and industrious population, deems it important that prospecting for minerals should not only be untrammeled but fostered by every proper means. In order that such discoveries may be early and reliably made, the General announces that miners and prospecting parties will receive the fullest protection from the military forces in this district in pursuit of their avocations, providing, always, that private rights are not infringed upon."

It is evident from the tone of the foregoing documents that a portion of General Connor's plan for the reconstruction of Utah was to cause to be established here a military in lieu of a civil government, with himself as the Caesar or Napoleon of the scene. Undoubtedly this was in his heart, and would have been in his hand, if he could have induced his superiors to see eye to eye with him at this critical juncture. As it was, he almost entirely ignored the Governor and the other civil authorities. He seemed to think that all that Utah needed for her redemption was an influx of Gentile miners and merchants, and an overwhelming military force, the latter to be commanded by himself. He even went so far as to threaten that "should violence be offered, or attempted to be offered to miners in the pursuit of their lawful occupation, the offender or offenders, one or many," would be "tried as public enemies, and punished to the utmost extent of martial law.

The fact is, Connor was a born soldier, fond of fighting, and with a penchant for military surroundings. He breathed freely amid the smoke of battle, but an atmosphere of peace was stifling to his lungs and nostrils. Having sought to take part in the war then raging in the East, and being denied that privilege, he was intensely disgusted, and did all that he could to solace himself for the disappointment experienced. What more natural than that having "enlisted to fight traitors" the doughty warrior should do all in his power to carry out his design, even if imagination had to create the "traitors" whom he was determined to fight! A little later the General became much more conservative, and a great deal of his anti-Mormon animus gave way. So much was this the case that a few years afterward, when President Young was on trial before Chief Justice McKean, General Connor volunteered to go bail for the Mormon leader in the sum of $100,000. His attitude in the summer of 1864 was due to the fact that he did not understand the Mormon people as he soon learned to understand them, and was imposed upon by men less honest and sincere in their opposition to the Saints. This much is due to General Connor, who, though not without faults, was the possessor of manly and sterling qualities.

We now have a prospect of peace with the army during the winter. They would not give any contract for winter supplies to a "Mormon" but all their contracts have been given to Gentiles, and the consequence is that they are not supplied with either hay, wood, or flour; finding, however, winter upon them, and but a few days bread on hand, and not being able to procure it, they appealed to Bishop John Sharp for help, to save them from starvation. For flour they offered him $12.00 per hundred pounds. The bishop told them that if he helped them he would have to treat them as he did those in his ward--that was, to know, himself, what quantity of provisions they had on hand. The commissary flung open his stores to the bishop, and the latter found that they had but a few days provisions on hand; so the bishop with President Young's assistance will undertake to feed the army. Bread stuff will be very scarce in the Territory before another harvest. The army is trying to get out its own wood; but they find it "up and down hill business" to them broken legs and frozen limbs being the consequence.

Connor also discovered ore in Little Cottonwood Canyon and was later responsible for mining and smelting operations in Stockton, Utah. Small amounts of gold were found but in insufficient quantities to warrant extensive mining operations. The expenditures far exceeded the revenue.

From the Autumn of 1863 to the latter part of 1865, the period covered by the operations of General Connor and his fellow promoters, little had been accomplished though a great deal had been expended. Several claims were located; one or more smelting furnaces were erected in Rush Valley, but these enterprises failed.

On April 9, 1871, President Young expressed his viewpoint:

We say to the Latter-day Saints, work for these capitalists, and work honestly and faithfully. I am acquainted with a good many of them, and as far as I know them, I do not know but every one is an honorable man. They are capitalists, they want to make money, and they want to make honestly and according to the principles of honest dealing. If they have means and are determined to risk it in opening mines you work for them by the day. Haul their ores, build their furnaces, and take your pay for it, and enter your lands, build houses, improve your farms, buy your stock, and make yourselves better off; but no lawing in the case.

The Knickerbocker and Argenta Mining and Smelting Company was organized in New York to operate in Rush Valley, and expended about one hundred thousand dollars in the purchase of mines and the material for working them. But, owing to the impossibility of making medium and low-grade ores pay at such a distance from the market, the company lost their money and abandoned the enterprise. Thus, after two years of steady, earnest, hopeful toil--from the time of the first discovery in 1863 to the same month in 1865--the business of mining had to be suspended to await the advent of the "iron horse" which was to bring renewed vitality to the occupation of the miner.

With the failure to work the mines profitably came the disbanding of the volunteer troops in the latter part of 1865-6. Their places could now be filled by the regulars--the rebellion by this time having been suppressed--and, as the owners and locators (who were principally military men) could not subsist on non-paying mines, the question arose as to how their rights could be secured while they were seeking employment elsewhere. Their method of solving the difficulty has resulted in the greatest injury to the cause which had its rise in their energy and determination. They called miners' meetings and amended the bylaws of the district in such a manner as to make claims perpetually valid which had had a certain but very small amount of work done upon them. For the performance of this work a certificate was given by the district recorder. This certificate prohibited all subsequent relocation of the ground. In consequence of this provision the mines of Stockton long lay under a ban, and it is only since the wonderful discoveries made in neighboring canyons that mining has been energetically resumed there. While the operations detailed above drew attention chiefly to the Rush Valley mines, discoveries were gradually becoming numerous in other districts.

One great result of the coming of the railway was the development of the local mining industry. From the fall of 1863, when General Connor and his associates made the pioneer movement in this direction, to the years 1868, 1869 and 1870, when Messrs. J. F. Woodman, Robert B. Chisholm, the Woodhulls, the Walkers and other capitalists became actively interested therein, but little practical work was done toward the opening of Utah's mines, notwithstanding the claims of those whose avowed purpose, in stating to the contrary, was, as has been shown, "to invite hither a large Gentile and loyal population," in order to reconstruct the Territory and overthrow the Mormon power. True, much money was expended by General Connor and his California friends, whom he persuaded to embark with him in this precarious enterprise, and among the first, if not the very first, smelting furnaces in Utah were erected by them in Rush Valley. There, after the original discovery in Bingham Canyon, many mining claims had been located. Other officers of Camp Douglas also formed companies and built furnaces in and around Stockton. But owing to inexperience in smelting ores, scarcity of charcoal and high rates of transportation, they soon became bankrupt. A company called the Knickerbocker and Argenta Mining and Smelting Company, organized in New York to operate in Rush Valley, met with no better success. Its projectors, after investing about one hundred thousand dollars in mines and materials with which to work them, finding it impossible in the absence of a railway to make them pay, despairingly abandoned the undertaking. It was now the latter part of 1865, and the mining movement rested to await the advent of the iron horse, when cheaper and speedier transportation, reduction in prices of materials and the influx of capital would solve the difficulties surrounding the struggling enterprise and place it on its feet as a profitable industry.

During the fall of 1868 and in the spring of 1869 mining projects in Utah were proving to be highly remunerative. The driving of the Golden Spike at Promontory on May 10, 1869, and the building of the Utah Central Railroad in 1870 gave impetus to the mining industry. President Young then made the following statement, on April 9, 1871:

We say to the Latter-day Saints, work for these capitalists, and work honestly and faithfully. I am acquainted with a good many of them, and as far as I know them, I do not know but every one is an honorable man. They are capitalists, they want to make money, and they want to make it honestly and according to the principles of honest dealing. If they have means and are determined to risk it in opening mines you work for them by the day. Haul their ores, build their furnaces, and take your pay for it, and enter your lands, build houses, improve your farms, buy your stock, and make yourselves better off; but no lawing in the case.

I will say still further with regard to our rich country here. Suppose there was no railroad across this continent, could you do anything with these mines? Not the least in the world. All this galena would not bear transportation were it not for that; and, take the mines from first to last, there is not enough silver and gold in the galena ore to pay for shipping were it not for the railroad. And then, were it not for this little railroad from Ogden to this city these Cottonwood mines would not pay, for you cannot cart the ore. Well, they want a little more help, and we want to build them a railroad, direct to Cottonwood so that they can make money.

In Utah we have a fine country for stock raising and agriculture and abundance of minerals awaiting development, and we welcome all good citizens who love peace and good order to come and settle with us. It has been our policy from the first to promote the agricultural interests, seeing this was the foundation of all others, and we have been for years furnishing staple products to the surrounding states and territories, and we are now able to supply any demand likely to arise for grain, vegetables, etc., at the market prices, to those engaged in mining pursuits.

We have iron ores and coal in rich abundance. We have called merchants in every department of business, but we lack capital, and there is no safer place to be found in the United States, where property of almost every kind is less taxed and better protected--all reports to the contrary notwithstanding.