The Most Sketchy 1800's Gold Mine I've Seen

hey guys west of mind detective here coming at you with another mine exploring video so right now i'm in an area that i've been to multiple times at least a dozen times if not more and a lot of the mines in this area date back all the way to 1870 so lots of them are super old and then right over here we actually got a creek where there's a whole bunch of trees and then uh this is just a little prospect i don't know if i've ever uh filmed this one before so let's go check it out it only goes in maybe 10 15 feet at the most but it's pretty interesting i remember the last time i went here is funny because there's like so many gnats and i think i dropped my glasses i can't remember if i ever got them back but here's the mine let me get my flashlight out you can see that there's a burnt timber right here and as you guys can see is still a bunch of insects only goes in about 15 feet all right guys so here's the first pretty cool find this is an old cast iron stove you can see that it's still got the uh burner and then also the smoke stack right here and uh says malleable right there and it's pretty cool because usually these don't have the doors that's very cool right there see it's got rivets [Music] and then uh there's actually a patent date right here you could barely read it but it says patented december 22nd 1908 so that's a pretty old find uh but unfortunately the house that used to stand here i believe it burnt down back in the 1930s there was oh there's something else here oh that's sick that's an old shotgun shell it says uh wra company i believe that's winchester repeating arms company and it says 12 gauge rival i believe this thing dates to the really early 1900s made out of brass wow that's sick but anyway there's a i think a wildfire back in 1938 so pretty much all that's left is a couple metal remains the stove and then uh right over this way looks like there's a bed frame yeah so there's a bed frame barely sticking out right there yeah that's pretty cool though all right and then uh we'll be headed to the mine which is just over that way all right so i'm going down the old minus trail and as you can tell it's a pretty overgrown i'd imagine not too many people get back here at least this time of year and uh we're almost to the mine i came out here way later than i wanted to as you guys can tell um sun's quickly going down on us but we do not need a sunlight when we're inside the mine it'll kind of suck hiking back out but it's not too long of a hike yeah we're getting pretty close to the mine all right so i finally made it to the mine here's a look at the gate that has been breached and then a quick look inside there's way less water than the last time i was here oh man i hate it when those bats go back and forth and uh it's a pretty tight squeeze to get in yeah i remember the last time there was at least maybe a foot of water it was about up to here all right so there's looking in and right off the get-go you could see that there's a wooden skip car rails so uh that's definitely indicative of uh in 1800s mine in this case i believe this mine was started back in 1875. but yeah by this point it's pretty cool we're pretty much out of the water at least for the tracks oh all right guys there's a quick look back at the portal and we will continue on straddling this uh strap rail yeah i believe this mine was started way back in 1875 and now you can definitely tell that it's a pretty old all right so step down on the middle and continue on all right we could walk pretty easy right here just look at that mineralization right there lots of iron staining wow lots of gold came out of this one oh man dingbats and then if i remember correctly this is just a little pocket all right guys so we'll continue on so if you guys have been following my channel for a while i've actually been to this mine a couple times but i've only recorded it once so one of the reasons why i wanted to get back to this one is because back then it was uh probably two years ago that i went here but i was using my crappy phone to record and also i didn't have the same type of good lighting so good lighting and uh a good gopro definitely makes a difference so i believe there's actually like a a winds that goes down about 10 feet right here so i really don't want to step in this area i'll try to go along this direction so there's actually a drift that goes off to the left obviously the tracks go off to the right yeah this is a pretty cool and big room it's actually a stoke that goes off this way and then a pretty interesting big hook right there actually i think the winds is these dang bats man scaring the crap out of me uh yeah a little buddy the winds might actually be right here it is creepy being in here alone with all these bats flying around but we'll continue on and uh this actually goes up about 25 feet about 20 feet there's a little bat sleeping right there so i don't want to disturb him no matter how many mines you uh explore you really never get completely used to some of them because this one still creeps the out of me there's a little bat in that drill hole can't see them but and also the thing about this mine is it's so mucky and nasty it really doesn't uh help with the aesthetic this is just oh my god i might actually go on the left oh i would hate to fall in this nasty iron stand water it is oh so nasty and muddy there's a really old ore shoot right here and if i remember correctly there's actually a man way right next to it but so look at the ore chute let's go on the other side of it here's a ladder that has fallen oh yeah actually looks like that ladder has uh fallen from the top about maybe 40 feet above me wow yeah i mean these ladders probably date back to the 1920s or so so that makes sense and then here's a look up above the ore shoot some really old timbering wow we got a pretty interesting retaining wall with a couple of natural timbers this one still has bark on it and yeah there's looking back at the or shoot and then i get another one up ahead sorry about how slow i'm going but it's uh pretty hard to traverse through this particular mine because it is so nasty and uh mucky so we actually got an accumulator right here and then i really like this section because you can see how much mineralization is right here and also it is just so um so humid up in here but yeah this is my god this is the uh the more flooded area i think the last time that i went here is about two feet deep kind of looks like it's uh way less but i'm not going to try it out i think it just ends after 20 feet anyway so but yeah then right now i'm probably going to go either into this stop or the left hand drift i don't believe i showed these uh stalactites the last time i was here so here's a close look at them it's pretty cool you can see all the iron mineralization and the droplets that's one of the bigger ones there's a couple smaller ones up here too yeah that's uh pretty cool to see these formations in the mines there's some really nasty iron water right there so upon further inspection it would definitely make sense that there was probably a skip bucket or skip car that would have ran down these timbers and who knows how far this flooded winds goes down would be interesting to know what's down there but really no way to know so yeah never mind what i said there's probably not a winds right here it's definitely over there i just sloshed down into a few inches of muck yeah i'll probably uh be headed up into the stope check that out real quick so i made it to the top of the ladder and then uh here's a quick look up into the stops you can see that there's a quite a few stalls going across and then uh right up here you could clearly see the prominent quartz vein that they were chasing after i'll show you guys that right quick so yeah right up there i actually got a couple looks like yeah right up in here it's about three or four inches thick keeps going off this direction so yeah that's pretty cool and uh let me try to get up this way there's a remnants of an old ladder and then uh actually it looks like this collapsed there's a couple of drill holes here one there and yeah it's a pretty dang cool view of this stop awesome stuff all right guys so i decided to climb up this uh pretty sketchy uh ledge and uh here's a look at the stoves that's a ladder that i just climbed up and then uh here's a way better view up into the stope there's a little bat flying up there and uh there is a look at that thick vein that they're following it's almost a foot thick right here anyway uh and you could see that they were sampling there's at least four or five drill holes that i see up there and apparently this looks like a raise or something right here so let's take a quick look up here oh it is really uh slippy up in here oh yeah wow i don't know if i'm able to climb that but yeah there's way more stools up there so there's looking down where i just came from the section that i crawled up to is right around there and then uh i'm higher up into the stop right now there's a stool and then looks like there's actually like a a plank so i think there's another access to the stop that i was just looking at and then off this way just more stoke so uh i'll head on over to that plank see if i could uh walk along here and see what's over there so before i walk on over there i'm pretty much to the top of the stop but it really opens up here it's about maybe 30 feet above me at that point and there's actually what looks like two openings there's one there one there so that's probably another access point to get into that higher stop and then uh if you guys seen that last video that i made at this mine uh this is where the ladders lead to a bunch of timbers up there so yeah i'll uh go check out what's over that way all right so i'm almost uh to that plank right there and right here there's a really close-up look at these uh stoles you could really tell that's probably from the 1880s maybe and then uh here's looking where i just came from so let's get on over to that plank and see if it's uh even accessible all right oh never mind it's just a little bit of working oh yeah but there's a look at the vein [Music] that they're chasing yeah looks like there's not much up here it's still pretty cool though all right guys so i'm uh almost to the top there's a little rope right here i would not trust that with my life look at it it's so thin but uh anyway here is a really awesome look at this uh really white quartz that they were following really shiny but uh yeah i'm almost up there really curious to see what's uh up there um i feel a good bit of air from uh my vantage point so that's a good sign all right guys i'm pretty excited uh kind of tired i just did a little bit of rock climbing but there's a hole that i uh squeezed through and if you look right there that red rope that's where it's connected but yeah i'm really excited i have not in my three or four times that i've been to this mine i have not been in this upper slope and then he's looking down it's really collapse there's lots of uh rock fall already looked over that direction uh just ends in about 20 feet but here's looking up got like a little walkway right here and uh there's quite a bit of uh timber supports up there and also looks like some gobbing right here so yeah i'm gonna be uh going up through there checking that out all right guys so i just squeezed through there and then uh right here this is super sketchy uh got a whole bunch of gobbing and uh yeah this retaining wall up above me probably has tons literally tons of rock above it but uh let's go check out over here you could definitely tell that this is probably the oldest section of the mine i mean just look at the timbers and just the methods that they used oh my god but yeah right here that rock must weigh at least two or three tons i mean look at the size of it keeps extending at the top and uh apparently i'm uh right on top of a false floor obviously with a bunch of rock on top of it so this isn't the best scenario just get my foot in here but yeah look at the size of that huge boulder these miners definitely knew that this uh section of the mine was very prone to collapse and uh this is really cool looks like this is a hand human timber you can see how uh they chipped away at it probably with an axe yeah super cool and then uh looking up in here there's a little pocket so i get a couple of a little artifacts um we got this uh bag probably used to uh store the ore anything else ooh we got a few square head nails probably dating back to the late 1800s probably 1880s 1870s yeah that's super old you know those are square head and then uh this looks like the top of a bucket a handle and then yeah you can see the gobbing incorporated there and then there's a view looking back you can see how much rockfall has gone on right there obvious here too um yeah i am usually not this anxious inside of minds but this one is just on a whole different level all right the sketchiness continues here's the rockfall that i was just looking at and uh yeah the drift continues on that way it's pretty cool wow and then uh i'm assuming that there's probably oh yeah there goes the ways up there and uh yeah there's a whole bunch of gobbing on both sides actually wow i've only seen this in another mine which is actually uh also in this area but damn look at that all this tons of rock on top of those uh support timbers that's not a good feeling yep same same deal here all that goblin oh that's a pretty cool view but yeah those uh natural timbers from uh the 1800s that's pretty dang cool how they did this i'm not totally sure but i might be on top of a false floor still yeah look at that oh my god look at that i have never seen that many wedges there's at least uh five or six layers thick and then look at that thick thin timber right there oh my gosh all right let's look up in here all right same deal gobbing on both sides and all that rock resting on top of these timbers but yeah i'd have to think that there's probably a upper level probably need a rope to get up to it but maybe that's for next time yeah this is like some of the sketchiest yeah look at that breaking timber right there yeah i'm probably gonna call it quits i've been in here quite a while here's another opening up to the top that's pretty dang cool oh my gosh you know more rock fall and oh my geez these timbers are just snapping like like twigs look at that probably doesn't help that it's humid in here yeah look at that one imagine all the weight above this look at that i don't think i've ever seen a timber quite like that splitting yeah it keeps keeps going on but i'm uh i'm out of time on this one yeah definitely keeps going but i think i'm gonna call it quits and uh yeah just end it here okay guys so hopefully you can see this but uh that's about a uh oh man i don't even want to think about it at least 50 or 60 football uh so anyway i just got to get down there oh i can't wait to get back to the car this is this is more than i could chew oh my god all right guys quick little update so i made it past the hard part this is quite a steep grade uh the fact that i went up there i'm just gonna admit it this was just uh really dumb even if i had someone with me this was dumb so i'll admit that and uh i'm gonna learn from it uh but anyway i pretty much just gotta walk that direction and then uh yeah i'm down there all right guys so i'm back in the car i can't tell you how relieved i am that i actually got back um that was i have done some sketchy stuff but that was hands down probably uh the sketchiest explorer i think i've ever done uh especially since i was so low um definitely not going to make that mistake again at least attempting to do this stuff that i did um so yeah it's definitely a lesson learned right there but definitely glad that i got to do that because um you know all that gobbing seeing all the the methods that they use from the 1800s that was just so cool to see turn off my there we go but yeah i mean that was a pretty great explore uh not much in terms of artifacts but definitely uh one for the books so i hope you guys enjoyed this video please like and subscribe thanks for watching

Channel: Western Mine Detective

Views: 102,744

Keywords: #mineexploring, #abandonedmines, #1800s, #goldrush

Id: Dw1x35EYJrE

Length: 31min 4sec (1864 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 20 2022