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  ALABAMA GOLD

  Anticipating discoveries of gold in Alabama similar to those experienced in other Piedmont states, prospectors crossed into Cleburne County along the Villa Rica plateau. Since gold was discovered in the neighboring state of Georgia in 1828, gold was believed to have been discovered in Alabama in 1830.9 Although the amount of gold recovered was less than that found in Georgia, even a small amount of money infused into the economy of farming-mining communities stimulated growth and excited miners with the possibility of becoming rich. The story of gold mining in Alabama is intertwined with the broader settlement history, Indian wars and Indian removal to the West. Decades before a western cowboy strapped on his “peacemaker,” frontiersmen and women were “fighting Indians” and staking claim to land in the Old Southwest territory. They lived in rowdy, crowded camps in a hostile environment, where they might be killed or cheated out of their claim or any gold they recovered. From this scene, tall tales found their way into the writing of Old Southwest humorists, such as Johnson Jones Hooper.

  Few records exist to tell about the exciting, peak years of antebellum gold mining in Alabama. But the geological surveys and reports of Alabama’ first state geologist, Michael Tuomey, provide a glimpse of gold mining activity during the early to mid-1800s. Thus Alabama’s earliest gold mining story was left to the statistics and data of Alabama’s first geologists and to the imagination of Old Southwest writers, such as Hooper, Tallapoosa County’s first census taker in 1840. Journals and papers of early travelers in Alabama and detailed conversations and letters of the military leaders, Indian agents and even Native Americans survived from this period, but they share almost no information about the gold mining activity in Alabama that included at least two gold rushes.

  Thousands of settlers came down the Appalachian Mountains as far south as Alabama to claim newly evacuated Creek land and establish farms. Others came to find the “yellow stuff ” rumored to be hidden in Alabama hills and streams. Many believed the Indians knew about rich gold deposits and kept this knowledge concealed from the Europeans. But if they knew where gold was concealed, they neglected its use in artifacts, preferring instead to use copper, stone and shells. The malleability and durability of copper were desirable qualities for molding arrowheads, breastplates, jewelry and ornaments. Large displays of Indian artifacts at the Alabama Department of Archives and History in Montgomery, Horseshoe Bend National Military Park in Tallapoosa County and other museums illustrate the region’s rich Native American heritage and their use of natural resources to craft practical tools, artistic vases and ornamental jewelry. Neither is the gold mining history reflected in Alabama museums; it exists, instead, in the folk history of the mining districts, the records of geologists and the imagination of modern mining enthusiasts.

  Geologist George I. Adams contended that gold mining was “an important factor in the early history of Alabama.”10 The prospect of finding gold attracted rugged individuals with the determination to wrest wealth and good fortune from the land. Prospectors worked day and night with lanterns digging in fields, streams and clay hills of the piney backwoods, searching for enough “yellow stuff ” to make them wealthy. Farmers were sometimes rewarded with small nuggets or flakes they discovered while fishing, farming or hunting. The amount of gold retrieved from Alabama hills and streams in the early 1800s will never be known since much of the gold never made it to a mint but was used locally to purchase supplies, food, livestock and equipment. Alabama miners took an undetermined amount of southern gold to grubstake their claims in the western gold fields as they, with many other southern Piedmont miners, joined the California gold rush in 1849. The story of gold mining at Hog Mountain begins in the distant past when the Old Southwest was America’s frontier, the scene of Indian wars, gold rushes, violation of treaties and Indian removal. The federal land offices were busy establishments with legal and fraudulent claims being filed on lands ceded by Indian treaties; some were legitimate purchases, but other land purchases were the result of tricking a Native American out of land or outright stealing of property.

  The story of Alabama’s most productive gold mine, Hog Mountain, begins with the settlers, prospectors and land speculators who found their way down the Appalachian Mountains into foothills of east-central Alabama. They were Old Southwest frontier families who settled the region, the miners who sought riches in gold and their descendants who, from 1839 to the present, have kept alive an interest in gold mining at Hog Mountain. With highlights from state geological surveys and mining, engineering and history journals and snippets of gold mining events from old newspapers, such as the Niles Register and the Vidette, Alabama Gold shares the story of early gold mining in Alabama in the 1800s. Old documents include a letter written from James Dowd Phillips from the California gold field to his wife, Sarah Ann, in Tallapoosa County describing the 1849 gold rush mining in California. Phillips owned the Blue Hill gold mine in the Devil’s Backbone district in Tallapoosa County.

  This panoramic view of Hog Mountain and surrounding landscape in 2014 shows the location of three successful former gold mining operations. Courtesy of Peggy Jackson Walls.

  In the words of Depression-era miners, Alabama Gold shares the unique story of the Hog Mountain gold mining in the 1930s. The story did not end with the closing of the Hog Mountain Mining and Milling operation (1933– 37). The old caretaker, known only as Mr. Neil, built a house cropping out over Hillabee Creek, where he spent his days washing out gold from the Hog Mountain tailings pile. The tradition of gold mining was continued by locals who panned in the streams of Hillabee, Enitachopco and Broken Arrow and gold mining enthusiasts who joined them. The stories of the miners are expanded and supported with statistical information from geological surveys written by George I. Adams, T.H. Aldrich Jr., William Phillips, E.A. Smith, William Brewer and plant superintendent N.O. Johnson.

  Part I

  THE OLD SOUTHWEST:

  AMERICA’S FIRST GOLD RUSHES

  The significance of the southern excitement both as pilot experiment and education institution should not be minimized, not to mention the impetus it might well have given the land-speculation, canal-building, wildcat-banking boom of the mid-1830s. It is arguable that this lamentably speculative bubble may well have been founded upon the comfortable supposition that all would come right when the paper promises of the banks and of the states were redeemed by Appalachian gold. Yet the industry itself was of southern origins, and it introduced Americans to the idea of rushing for gold and to the techniques with which a hard-working man…might with a little luck gain comfortable wealth.

  —historian Otis Young

  1

  “Alabama Fever”

  Southern Piedmont gold was formed during volcanic and tectonic activity hundreds of millions of years ago at the same time as the Appalachian Mountains. The igneous and metamorphic rocks, known as the Wedowee Schist, followed a general southwest–northeast trend in an irregular line deep within the mountains. They extended as far south as the foothills of east-central Alabama into the present-day counties of Talladega, Randolph and Tallapoosa, located in the Alabama gold belt. Other counties that are partially or wholly in the 3,500-square-mile triangle of land are present-day Chambers, Chilton, Clay, Coosa, Cleburne and Elmore. But at the turn of the nineteenth century, the land known now as Alabama was a part of the Mississippi Territory and belonged to the Creek Nation, which held sovereign power over their ancestral lands. But change was underway that would bring thousands of settlers and miners to the Old Southwest frontier. Early historians found no evidence that the Spanish explorers or the Native Indians discovered gold and consider it likely that “intruders” on the Creek land were the first to discover gold in Alabama. State geologist George I. Adams suggested a connection between the dates of the discovery of gold in 1830 and agitation for removal of Indians in 1832. No definitive document exists to establish precisely the year gold was discovered in Alabama, but geologists and researchers have suggested following t
he discovery of gold in Georgia in 1829, prospectors would be anxious to follow the veins into Alabama in their search for more gold deposits. Geography and chronology support their view.11

  A sketch of a map of the gold region in Alabama in 1892, prepared for William B. Phillips’s report on Alabama Crystalline Schists. Courtesy of the Alabama Department of Archives and History.

  THE OLD FEDERAL ROAD: A THOROUGHFARE THROUGH CREEK LAND

  In 1806, during Thomas Jefferson’s presidency, a postal path was opened for riders to travel from middle Georgia to lower Alabama. Extending deep into Muscogee land, the primitive road became a thoroughfare for travelers, military troops and equipment. In 1811, the path was broadened into what became known as the Old Federal Road for the conveyance of commerce, military weapons and equipment. Forts, inns and stations were built near the road to accommodate travelers and troops. Native Americans watched with increasing anxiety as large numbers of military troops and weapons passed on the road. Tensions soon erupted into the 1813–14 Indian wars.

  THE MASSACRE AT FORT MIMS

  Many historians regarded the wars as a continuation of the War of 1812 and a civil war between two factions of Creeks. Indians who assimilated into the white man’s lifestyle were targets for the warriors known as Red Sticks, whose name stemmed from their practice of painting their rifles red to symbolize war. Skirmishes between settlers and Indians increased in violence as the Creek attempted to defend their land and food supply from the “intruders,” and settlers were equally determined to take possession of the land. The July 27, 1813 Battle of the Burnt Corn Creek is considered by many to be the first battle of the Creek Wars of 1813–14. Notified by a spy who observed Peter McQueen and a few Red Stick warriors as they purchased gunpowder in Mobile, Captain Dixon Baily McQueen and his militia lay in wait at Burnt Corn Creek and attacked the Red Sticks as they ate their noon meal. Few lives were lost, but the entire stock of gunpowder and other supplies were confiscated. In retaliation, on August 30, 1813, Peter McQueen and “Red Eagle” Weatherford led approximately 700 Red Stick warriors in an attack on Fort Mims, killing 250 men, women and children and taking 150 prisoners. The Fort Mims Massacre was the first major battle in the Indian Wars of 1813–14.12

  MASSACRE AT HILLABEE TOWN

  Broken Arrow Creek, named for the Hillabee Tribes who lived along the Hillabee Creek in northeast Tallapoosa County. Courtesy of Peggy Jackson Walls.

  Benjamin Hawkins (1754–1816) was the principal Indian agent for the southeastern region. He was particularly successful in working with the Hillabee tribes in present-day northeast Tallapoosa County and Clay County, where he visited with Robert Grierson, a Scottish trader and cattleman. The name Hillabee, also spelled Hillabi and Hilibis, represented a small group of villages on Hillabee Creek and Enitachopco (Anatitchapko). Grierson and his family lived on a large farm near the main Hillabee Town and natives who had assimilated into the white culture, living in cabins and growing cotton, wheat and vegetables. His wife, Sinnuggee, was a member of the Spanalge clan of the Hilibis. As the husband of a native, Grierson was protected and moved safely among the Indians conducting business. His farming and cattle raising were successful, and on his plantation, he had one of the first cotton gins made by Eli Whitney. Indians lived near Hillabee Creek, from which they derived their tribe name. Grierson sought and received amnesty for the peaceful tribe from General Andrew Jackson, but Major General John Cocke of the Tennessee Militia, unaware of the amnesty granted to the friendly tribe, dispatched General James White to destroy the Hillabee villages on November 18, 1813. Several hundred Indians were taken prisoners, and sixty-four, including women, were killed. As a result of the attack, the Hillabee Indians joined the Red Stick faction in fighting Andrew Jackson at Horseshoe Bend.

  The Indian Wars of 1813–14 ended at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend on March 27, 1814. General Andrew Jackson, with his 3,300 soldiers and allied Cherokees, attacked 1,100 Red Stick warriors gathered at Tohopeka. By the end of the day, the Tallapoosa River ran red with the blood of 800 Native Americans killed in battle. Jackson’s troops sustained only a few casualties, although a few men died of their injuries later. The battle broke the power of the Creek Nation and secured the vast territory and its rich resources for the United States. When Mississippi was officially recognized as a state in 1817, Alabama became a territory. William Bibb served as governor of the territory, becoming the first governor of Alabama when it was recognized by the US government as a state in 1819. Alabama was carved from the twenty-two million acres of the Creek land ceded to the federal government in the Treaty of Fort Jackson. Alexander “Sandy” Grierson, son of Robert Grierson, was one of the signers.

  The year after Andrew Jackson became president (1829–37), he created the Indian Removal Law.13 Creeks signed a treaty in March 1832 that opened a large portion of their Alabama land to white settlement but guaranteed them protected ownership of the remaining portion, which was divided among the leading families. The government did not protect them from speculators, however, who quickly cheated many out of their lands. By 1835, the destitute Creeks began stealing livestock and crops from white settlers. Some eventually committed arson and murder in retaliation for their brutal treatment. In 1836, the secretary of war ordered the removal of the Creeks as a military necessity. By 1837, approximately fifteen thousand Creeks had migrated west. They had never signed a removal treaty.14

  ALABAMA FEVER

  The expression “Alabama Fever” was in use prior to Alabama’s becoming a state due to Europeans’ desire to possess a piece of the rich soil that was so well suited to grow cotton. After the Indian Removal Act was enforced, settlers rushed to stake their claims; they squatted on land not yet vacated by the Native Americans. Settlers came in oxen-drawn wagons bulging with household items and farm animals moving alongside them. Farmers and miners, eager to claim the land to grow cotton and claim any precious minerals they might unearth, came on horseback and on mules with farming and mining equipment. The first settlers were determined to grab a piece of the Old Southwest frontier, even if it meant driving the Native Americans from their ancestral homeland. Many immigrants settled in east-central Alabama, where crystalline rocks were abundant and where, with primitive tools, miners removed placer gold from the ground. Using alluvial mining methods, they retrieved gold flakes and small nuggets from natural traps in the streams and eddies of free-flowing streams.

  This picture of mining tools and miners is used with permission of Pine Mountain Gold Museum, located in Villa Rica, Georgia. Courtesy of Peggy Jackson Walls.

  EARLY GOLD MINING IN ALABAMA: 1830–49

  In 1829 and 1830, miners moved westward from Georgia into Alabama, mining the Villa Rica placer that extended into Cleburne County. Unfortunately, Alabama gold was located on land belonging to the Creek Nation in Alabama, just as Georgia gold was located on the Cherokees’ ancestral land. After the removal of the Indians in Georgia, the Cherokee land was distributed by lotteries in which any non-Cherokee household could participate; in Alabama, deeds for Creek land were sold at federal land offices by government agents. The first authenticated discovery of gold in Alabama was made in 1830 by the nephew and namesake of Governor William Wyatt Bibb and his father-in-law, Todd Robinson. Their discovery of gold in old Autauga County (now Chilton County) was reported in the Niles Herald:15

  A map of the 1829 Old Creek Nation and Cherokee territory in east-central Tallapoosa County. Courtesy of Peggy Jackson Walls.

  Wyatt and Robinson collected their first gold on a tributary of Chestnut Creek, part of an eighty-acre tract they had purchased in the fall of 1830 for $100; it was this sight [sic] that produced the “specimen of pure virgin gold” that Wyatt took to the Mobile Register’s office in the spring of 1831.…The U.S. mint in Philadelphia received its first shipment of gold from Alabama—thirty-one ounces of gold amalgam and dust which the mint assigned a coinage value of $559.16

  In the early 1830s, the story of a Mr. Marable, who “cleaned” ele
ven and three-quarters pounds of pure gold in one day, brought a flood of miners to Randolph County. Marable’s recovery of gold was followed with a great celebration that ended in a “free” fight. He was killed in the affray and never had the opportunity to enjoy his newly found wealth. A heavy rain flooded the area the next day, covering Marable’s discovery. Although prospectors searched for years, the site wasn’t located until 1895. The story illustrates the vulnerability of the lone miner working in the Old Southwest frontier, where a man could make a fortune and lose it, along with his life, all in one day.

  By 1835, Alabama’s first authentic gold rush was underway, as the early gold mining towns of Arbacoochee and nearby Chulafinee and Pinetucky attracted hordes of miners and their families. Overnight, Arbacoochee grew from a small village into a bustling, gold mining camp. A boon to the frontier town, the mining industry offered employment to about six hundred men. By 1845, Arbacoochee was home to about five thousand people. The disorderly, mining camp that sprang up around Arbacoochee consisted of mining supply stores, gambling establishments, hotels, saloons and brothels. Mining companies paid between $0.75 and $1.75 per day during peak production in the mid-1840s. Miners used picks to dislodge rock inside narrow tunnels and shafts and filled wheelbarrows with ore to be transported outside, where they crushed the ore with stamp mills. A process known as amalgamation was employed to draw gold from the crushed ore, after which the amalgam was heated to four hundred degrees and used to separate gold from the mercury. In 1832, almost three hundred years after Hernando de Soto and his men tramped through Creek land east of the Coosa River, enthusiastic observations were made by the Times of London and other papers, reporting, “Alabama gold…deposits yield from one and a half to two and a half pennyweights a day…and under the management of persons of sufficient enterprise and skill, would develop an immense fund of wealth.”17 The success of Alabama’s gold mining industry depended on the lucky turn of a spade in a sandy creek, “gold diggings” from a hillside or the accidental discovery of an unusual rock gleaming from a creek bed.