I have only researched the forums here,on the dusa,and the ldm.
I want to buy a copy of the holmes manuscript the next time i am in the valley.
I have bought no books because to me they are just about fake,to expensive,except for the one that CJ recommended.
I really truthfully want to read facts,and solve a riddle.
I want the Gold,or ore.
I really do not like to sit and read different versions of tales that relate to the same thing.
In my opinion,why have 12 books,read 12 books,that say nothing about how to find the mine.
I have also asked people in this forum to give me there location by pm there spot of finding gold,a ledge,or a marker,or a pit,or what ever eles they have found,and no one will.They say it will come out in another book.
Can I ask you,in your opinion,where would you go,if you cant look for it any more. Or if you don't want to.
I will go pick up the rocks,the ore,the specimens,what ever is out there.
I will move what ever or do what ever I have to.Im not scared.
But no one will tell me.
If you want to limit the number of books, please include The Lost Dutchman Mine by Sims Ely, it is about the best source available, and Sims Ely unlike most of the authors, actually went to Julia, Reiney and even Dick Holmes to ask. When you read it you will soon realize that Sims Ely was no prospector too, for he did not recognize it when a source he talked to told of "winnowing" the gold with her husband (prior to Waltz finding the mine) and the gold being the size of "grains of wheat" which is clearly describing a method of mining a dry placer, not lode gold but Ely did not know that. Also, you do not have to buy a bunch of books, you can often borrow them from public libraries free.
It is not surprising that many treasure hunters are not willing to share their hard-won knowledge about where they would look for the lost mine. They want to get it themselves, and I am not different in that aspect. I don't want to mislead you either. I do not know the location of the mine so can't tell you that, and the spot where I think it is, I would like to go myself so have not told even my closest friends. That said, I would give this advice - think about the geology first; gold normally occurs in a quartz vein and that is what we are after for that is what Waltz had. These veins are formed by the actions of extremely heated waters, coming up from volcanic activity - not like lava, but like a water SO heavy with dissolved minerals that the instant it got under lower pressure and cooled, the minerals crystallized out and formed these veins in the cracks of rock that were already there. The best place to look for this kind of thing, known as "hydrothermic" deposits, are around volcanic calderas but not usually IN the calderas, and there are at least three large calderas in the Superstitions. The edges of these just happen to be where most of our treasure hunters have been looking too. Next - keep in mind that gold has been found along with silver and copper, in a number of places all along the eastern edge of the Superstition mountains, and gold was found in Goldfield in very rich veins. Today they don't consider Goldfield a part of the Superstitions but it was during the time of Waltz. So those are good clues. Next consider where gold can be panned out, for that gold has to be eroding out of the host rock somewhere "upstream" and uphill, and there are only a limited number of places in the Superstitions where you can pan out gold, like Fish creek, Tortilla creek, or Pinto creek. Pinto creek in particular is where the third source on Jacob Waltz (not Julia & Reiney, nor Holmes, but found in the Pioneer Interviews, where unemployed writers were put to work interviewing the old timers in the old folks homes in Arizona during the Great Depression) claims that Waltz really had his mine. Pinto creek drains off of Iron Mountain, which as the name implies has a good amount of iron in the rocks on the mountain, and the Spanish used to say that Iron is the "mother of Gold" for you often find the two metals together, just like you find gold in black sands which are basically a type of iron sulphate.
When you have picked out a likely creek or canyon to follow up, keep your eyes open for float quartz (float meaning it has 'floated" away from the source) as this could be traced back to the vein it came from. It would be wise to pan for gold along the way too, and do that as carefully as you can for you want to find any speck of it, in order to follow it back to the mine.
I would be wary about the clues, for they have become quite mixed up in over 100 years, but keep a list of them with you in case you see anything that seems to fit the clues, but I would not depend on that; stick to the geology first, clues second. In the stories from Waltz and the one from his partner Weiser, we have it that Waltz traveled to Adams Mill to get flour and supplies when their mule raided it, and while he was out, the Indians attacked and Weiser escaped, coming out near where Sacaton is today. This also gives us some information for if the mine were located near the western end of the mountains, then it would have been shorter for Waltz to go to Ft McDowell, but he chose to go to Adams Mill which is near Florence, which is also where Waltz was known to purchase supplies and his dry washer.
Anyway while Waltz could have easily concealed the mine entrance, and even covered up the vein where it was exposed below, he could not have removed every speck of gold that has washed down off the deposit over the millenia, nor the quartz float that would have eroded off the vein. These should leave us a trail that could lead you right back to the mine, with luck and hard work, and not having to depend on any clues or tales or books written by other treasure hunters.
My apologies for taking so many words to explain this, and also for not telling you my own "favorite" spot to look, but I would rather be honest with you than to mislead you. Some people might think it funny to send you off on a wild goose chase, to some place they know has nothing, just because they think it funny. Good luck to you amigo, I hope you find the Lost Dutchman mine - and please send me photos when you do! I get almost as big a kick out of it when someone else makes a great find, as if I did it myself.
Oroblanco
