Note 69 — VII
Reading edition
The following extract from the Journal of Charlevoix, one of the earliest historians of the West, with reference to the Mines upon the Merrimac, may prove not uninteresting. The work is a rare one.
"On the 17th (Oct., 1721), after sailing five leagues farther, I left, on my right, the river Marameg, where they are at present employed in searching for a silver mine. Perhaps your grace may not be displeased if I inform you what success may be expected from this undertaking. Here follows what I have been able to collect about this affair, from a person who is well acquainted with it, and who has resided for several years on the spot.
"In the year 1719, the Sieur de Lochon, being sent by the West India Company, in quality of founder, and having dug in a place which had been marked out to him, drew up a pretty large quantity of ore, a pound whereof, which took up four days in smelting, produced, as they say, two drachms of silver; but some have suspected him of putting in this quantity himself. A few months afterward he returned thither, and, without thinking any more of the silver, he extracted from two or three thousand weight of ore fourteen pounds of very bad lead, which stood him in fourteen hundred francs. Disgusted with a labour which was so unprofitable, he returned to France.
"The company, persuaded of the truth of the indications which had been given them, and that the incapacity of the founder had been the sole cause of their bad success, sent, in his room, a Spaniard called Antonio, who had been taken at the siege of Pensacola; had afterward been a galley-slave, and boasted much of his having wrought in a mine at Mexico. They gave him very considerable appointments, but he succeeded no better than had done the Sieur de Lochon. He was not discouraged himself, and others inclined to believe that he had failed from his not being versed in the construction of furnaces. He gave over the search after lead, and undertook to make silver; he dug down to the rock, which was found to be eight or ten feet in thickness; several pieces of it were blown up and put into a crucible, from whence it was given out that he extracted three or four drachms of silver; but many are still doubtful of the truth of this fact.
"About this time arrived a company of the King's miners, under the direction of one La Renaudiere, who, resolving to begin with the lead mines, was able to do nothing; because neither he himself nor any of his company were in the least acquainted with the construction of furnaces. Nothing can be more surprising than the facility with which the company at that time exposed themselves to great expenses, and the little precaution they took to be satisfied of the capacity of those they employed. La Renaudiere and his miners not being able to procure any lead, a private company undertook the mines of the Marameg, and Sieur Renault, one of the directors, superintended them with care. In the month of June last he found a bed of lead ore two feet in thickness, running to a great length over a chain of mountains, where he has now set his people to work. He flatters himself that there is silver below the lead. Everybody is not of his opinion, but will discover the truth."—Flagg.