Part V has over 200 references, a number of which include detailed and fairly lengthy footnotes. It is important that these notes are read, especially those relating to Hamilton C.McComas and John and William Boyle, as they contain both important corrections to existing writing on these people, and information which, as far as we are aware, has never before been published
Preface
Part V centers on the much vaunted second mining boom at the Virginia Mining District which is reported to have begun in 1879, and which led to the renaming of Ralston City.
In Part IV we showed how there had been little or no mining of any worth carried out in the District during the time of the Pyramid Range affair. Most of what had taken place there had been merely part of the scheme to inflate the worth of the leads and claims in preparation for the launch of what would have been a very profitable fraudulent stock float.
Events at Shakespeare during 1879/1880 bore many similarities to those which had occurred during the Harpending/Roberts era a decade before. There were reports of rich ores, albeit less flamboyant than those which had appeared in 1870; there were promises of the imminent arrival of machinery, and of the erection of mills, and land in and around the town-site was bought and sold.
As we unfold the facts surrounding this second “boom” and Shakespeare’s resurgence, the reader will discover that it too was for the greatest part little more than an illusion; an illusion created once again in order to inflate the value of mining claims. It is true that during this period there were genuine attempts made by some to develop their claims around Shakespeare into working, productive mines, but most of Shakespeare’s present day noteworthiness for having been the center of a second mining boom is unfounded.
There was no second boom – just as there had been no first boom. Stories of Shakespeare’s pre-eminence as a mining center during the very early 1880s are once again based on the misguided belief in glowing newspaper reports of great plans for the claims, the vast numbers of claims recorded, the huge amounts of capital invested, and the quantity of and prices attached to sales and purchases of claims.
Given the greatest prominence in tales of the “second mining boom” are General John Boyle and William G. Boyle, together with Hamilton C. McComas. In Part V we will make a more in-depth examination of the roles played by these three men, and in the process dispel many of the myths and errors in the histories currently assigned to them. We shall also take a look at some less well-known names; less well-known, but still of relevance to this period of Shakespeare’s history.
Heralded as the saviors of both the town-site and the Virginia Mining District, John and William Boyle have long been regarded as the central figures in the rejuvenation of Ralston City and its rebirth as Shakespeare, and indeed they do have a role to play in those events, William G. in particular; but they were not the leading figures. As regards H. C. McComas, it is enough, for now, to say that his role in and his relevance to happenings at Shakespeare have been very badly muddled and misinterpreted by modern-day writers, with important information having been missed altogether.
Above we made reference to some less well-known figures who were associated with Shakespeare. Of these there is one in particular whose pivotal role has gone unnoticed and unexamined. this is largely due to him having been overshadowed by the Boyles, who have been portrayed in a romanticc – though fanciful – way . That figure was James Barry Price, President of the National Mail and Transportation Company. Almost single-handedly he was the reason for Ralston’s continued existence as Shakespeare, and it cannot be over stressed that if not for Price, then neither the Boyles nor Hamilton C. McComas, nor many others, would have been present in Grant County in the first place. The links between Price and all of these other men have gone unnoticed over the years but, had they been investigated sooner those links would have provided answers to many questions. James B. Price was the reason for McComas’ presence in Grant County, and it was the professional association between these two men which would ultimately lead to the death of McComas and his wife and the abduction of their child.
Between 1871 and 1878, Ralston City languished as a mining center, a stark comparison to the beehive of activity it had been in 1870. Some new claims were made in the Virginia Mining District during those years, the better known ones being the “Superior” in 1875, and the “Atwood” and the “Henry Clay” in 1878.¹ In January and February of 1874, five claims were filed for mining properties in the immediate area of the town-site, one of them, the “Waterwitch”, “commencing at [the] well in [the] water gulch” right in the town-site itself. These claims are of interest because of the names of the claimants. Each of the five claims bears the names W. H. Brown, Joseph Herring and John Dunn, but amongst the names of the other co-claimants are to be found those of Generals George Crook, Philip Sheridan, William Worth Belknap, Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman.²In all likelihood these claims were made in their names by proxy.
In June of 1874, there was a spate of claims by J. H. Wemple, some in conjunction with John Evensen. One of these claims, made by Wemple and H. M. Marsh, is recorded as the “Maunted Grande” ( the script was difficult to read in this instance) mine on the Washington ledge. It was claimed on June 10, 1874, and is more than likely the same property later re-located by Morris Lesinsky and Frank McKane on January 1, 1875, as the “Superior” mine which had “formally been known as the Monte Grande.”³
On December 26, 1874, the Virginia Mining District was reorganized and its boundaries redefined. The District now embraced “an area of twenty miles square, the S-W corner of Main and Broad Streets of Ralston being the center thereof.”⁴
A few claims were made in 1875, 1876 and 1877, but throughout all of the years between 1871 and 1878, in nowhere near the volume and frenzy of 1870.
©2007-2024 Jim & Erica Parson
REFERENCES FOR THIS INSTALLMENT
Note:
Documents located at the Grant County Clerk’s Office (1400 Hwy. 180 E. Silver City, NM 88061) are denoted by (GCCO).
Documents located at the New Mexico State Records Center and Archives (1205 Camino Carlos Rey, Santa Fe, NM 87507) are denoted by (NMSRCA).
¹Mining Locations, No 1 (1871-1880). Pages 254, 449 and 476 respectively. (GCCO)
²Ibid. Pages 190-191.
³Ibid. Pages 210 and 254.
⁴Mining Life. January 2, 1875.
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