A Change of Plan
Roberts was initially unaware that there had been some changes made to the plan of action for the disposal of the Virginia Mining District properties. On September 26, 1870, he had written to Harpending “My idea is for you to go to NY and interest some sharp broker and sell on the best terms possible … Don’t fail to sell New Mexico on some terms.”⁸¹ On November 6th, Roberts writes to Harpending that he had, the previous day, received Harpending’s letter written at Santa Fe. In this letter Harpending had provided Roberts with “full particulars” of his trip. Roberts also says that papers are to be forwarded to Harpending the next day in regard to the New Mexico Mining and Burro Consolidated Companies, which indeed they were.⁸² In his correspondence of November 13th, Roberts informs Harpending that “London letters” were in the process of being prepared for him.
So, at the end of September Roberts’ plan was for Harpending to go to New York to sell; the November 6th letter is undoubtedly Roberts’ acknowledgement of receipt of amendments to that plan. Harpending was already in Santa Fe when he wrote to Roberts to inform him of these amendments, and Roberts in return was informing Harpending that the necessary arrangements were being made in order to facilitate them, i.e. the papers and London letters which were to be forwarded the next day, giving Harpending the authorization to sell. Surely, if Roberts had been aware previously that Harpending was going to proceed with the sale in London, then these papers would already have been prepared and would have been in Harpending’s possession before he left Ralston.
Something else which points to Harpending’s decision to go to London having been made at short notice is Roberts’ statement in the November 6th letter that he himself had “told Mrs. Harpending that you were going to London for a short time.”
Roberts also informs Harpending that several letters would be waiting for him in New York at the offices of Lees & Waller, the New York banking firm which acted as agents in that city for the Bank of California.
It would now seem that the primary reason for Harpending being delayed in New York was not Roberts’ request that he meet Mary Roberts on her arrival, but that Harpending had to bide his time there until the necessary paperwork for London reached him.
An Addition To The Plan
Similarly, it is almost certain that Roberts knew nothing of the “diamonds” in Cooper and Arnold’s possession until they arrived back in San Francisco. None of the correspondences referred to above makes any mention of Cooper and Arnold, or of anything which may be construed as alluding to precious stones of any kind; neither does the Daily Alta report of their arrival at San Diego on November 22nd, despite that item referring to the “fine specimens of silver ore” and the “pieces of pure silver” which they carried with them. Why the pair chose to display the crystals to Editor Wasson alone remains a mystery.
However, it would not be long before Roberts did become – or was made – most keenly aware of those crystals. Just three days after Cooper and Arnold’s arrival in San Francisco, the following telegram was sent from Oakland, California by Roberts. Dated December 1, 1870, it was dispatched to Asbury Harpending and delivered to him at the 5th Avenue Hotel, New York City:
When will Mary start home Harry no better Arnold has returned He made a great discovery of diamonds near Burro are keeping it quiet. GDR
The existence of this telegram offers up several possible scenarios, none of which can, to the best of our knowledge, be either confirmed as fact or dismissed as improbable. Whether or not this telegram was the absolute first that Harpending heard of a diamond discovery, we do not know for certain, but it does prove beyond doubt that Harpending knew of the “discovery” before the organization of the Pyramid Range Silver Mountain Company and the issuing of that company’s prospectus; before he had sailed for London, and most definitely before he received the telegram from “his old friend” W.C.Ralston after he had arrived in London.
Two Probable Scenarios
The following paragraph describes what we consider to be the two most probable scenarios, based on the known facts and the sequence of events.
The plan to reveal the discovery of diamonds was developed while Harpending, Morgan, Arnold and Cooper were all together at Ralston City in the fall of 1870; possibly, Arnold and Cooper were already in possession of the “crystals” by this time, but they had definitely acquired them before they visited Wasson at Tucson. This would mean that Harpending knew about the crystals not only before he left for London, but even before he got to New York and received Roberts’ telegram of December 1, 1870.
Although we do not have a copy of the letter Harpending wrote to Roberts from Santa Fe, there is nothing in Roberts’ reply to that letter, or in any of his two subsequent letters to Harpending (dated November 7 and November 13, 1870) to suggest that he knew of the crystals. Perhaps Harpending deemed it safer to allow Arnold and Cooper to describe the plan to Roberts in person, and to seek his approval before proceeding further with it. In this scenario, Roberts’ telegram to Harpending was nothing more than a signal of that approval, worded in such a way that it would not arouse suspicion. It seems unlikely that Arnold and Cooper would not have told Roberts that Harpending was already aware of the plan.
One other possibility is that it was Roberts himself who devised the plan after Arnold and Cooper had shown him the crystals, and that his telegram was indeed the first that Harpending heard of a diamond discovery.The crystals would undoubtedly have piqued Roberts’ interest; we know from his correspondences to Harpending that he was in a dire financial crisis at this time, and desperately needed the Pyramid Range stock float to succeed. News of an additional treasure trove, in the immediate vicinity of those mountains of pure silver, would have greatly enhanced demand on that stock and driven up its price. However, Arnold and Cooper had arrived back in San Francisco too late for the diamond discovery to have been included in the prospectus, so it would have to be announced at a slightly later date, but soon after the sales of stock had begun.
Unfortunately for Roberts, but to the good fortune of potential investors, Marmaduke Samson’s revelations brought everything to a grinding halt. The Pyramid Range company collapsed almost before it got off the ground. It was launched and crashed within a space of ten days, amidst a cloud of insinuation and outright accusation. There was no chance to publicize the news of the discovery of diamonds and the additional profits they would bring for anyone purchasing stock in the Pyramid Range Silver Mountain Company.
But Roberts was not one to allow a good money making idea to lie idle for any length of time. The diamond discovery would soon resurface, this time in a new and improved form. Roberts was honing his skills, learning from his experiences, and becoming more adept in the planning and execution of his schemes.
The initial “great discovery of diamonds” in December of 1870 was designed to be an enhancement to the Pyramid Range stock float; it would entice investors and ensure maximum sales of stock. In 1872, it would reappear as an independent and much refined stand-alone scheme; a scheme which would become known as The Great Diamond Hoax, described by Marmaduke Sampson as “the greatest swindle ever exposed in America.”⁸³
Although much has been written about both the Pyramid Range affair and The Great Diamond Hoax, very little or no connection has been made between those two events – how one was directly related to the other. Similarly, the role of George D. Roberts, along with Asbury Harpending, in the two events has never been fully explored. As regards the Diamond Hoax, both men are very often described as being just two more of the innocent dupes who are taken in by a scheme dreamt up by Philip Arnold and James B. Slack; inveigled into the hoax but never recognized as being its originators. Dana⁸⁴ for example writes that George D. Roberts “heard the story” of Arnold and Slack’s discovery and subsequently “sought out the two.”
Robert Wilson, whose 2004 article for the Smithsonian Magazine⁸⁵ is often referenced, describes the Diamond Hoax as “a brilliantly acted scam by two Kentucky grifters”, and states that “the first person the pair approached was George D. Roberts”, with Harpending later “swallow[ing] the bait as hungrily as Roberts had.”
Wilson does refer to the “Mountains of Silver” venture at the beginning of his work, but makes no mention of the fact that all four men – Roberts, Harpending, Arnold and Slack – were, to varying degrees, involved in that too.
Dana also cites a San Francisco Bulletin report of October 7, 1872, which gave an account of a party of men who had left San Francisco at the end of August to further explore Arnold and Slack’s “diamond fields.” Among those who made up the party were George D. Roberts, Dr. Charles Cleveland, and “Chas. G. Myers.”⁸⁶ We know from the testimonies given at the Rubery vs. Grant and Sampson libel trial that Chas. G. Myers was in fact Charles Godlove Meyer, the assayer at Ralston City in 1870.⁸⁷
In his testimony, Meyer states that shortly after speaking to Roberts in August of 1872, he traveled to Green River Station (Utah) where he met, among others, Roberts and Cleveland before they all set out for the diamond fields. The party was led by Roberts.
Again we see the names of some of those who had been at Ralston City in the fall of 1870. As per Meyer’s and Cleveland’s trial testimonies, Harpending, Cooper, Arnold and Slack, as well as Meyer and Cleveland themselves, were all there together at that time. The exact same group of people – along with George D. Roberts – with strong connections to both the planned, but thwarted, diamond hoax of 1870, and the better planned – and executed – Great Diamond Hoax of 1872.
Rather than being one of the “worst deceived and cheated men who ever lived”⁸⁸, the evidence is very compelling that it was Roberts who was behind not only the Pyramid Range stock float scam, but also the 1870 and the 1872 diamond “discoveries”, and that the Great Diamond Hoax of 1872 came about as the direct result of what had taken place at Ralston City in October of 1870.
©2007-2024 Jim & Erica Parson
REFERENCES FOR THIS INSTALLMENT
⁸¹Harpending Papers. George D. Roberts to Asbury Harpending, September 26, 1870.
⁸²Harpending Papers. George D. Roberts to Asbury Harpending, November 7, 1870.
⁸³London Times. December 20, 1872.
⁸⁴Dana, Julian (1936). The Man Who Built San Francisco. A Study of Ralston’s Journey with Banners. New York: The Macmillan Company. Page 304.
⁸⁵Wilson, Robert. The Great Diamond Hoax Of 1872. Smithsonian Magazine. June 2004. http://www.smithsonianmagazine.com/history/the-great-diamond-hoax-of-1872-2630188 Accessed on October 8, 2014.
⁸⁶Dana (1936). Page 310.
⁸⁷London Times. December 24, 1874.
⁸⁸Dana (1936). Page 310.
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