|
 |
 |
|
 |
|
| Home | Contact Us | Send a Post Card | Coupon Browser | Virtual Tours |
|
| The Thoen Stone |
|
While the Custer Expedition of 1874 confirmed the presence of gold and shared the finding with the world, there are other accounts that lead some researchers to believe a gold discovery by white miners or traders may have taken place long before 1874.
Depending on the interpretation of their journals, the first European men to see the Hills may have been the French explorers, Francois and Joseph Verendrye. The sketchy journal seems to indicate they entered the Northern Hills on New Year's Day, 1743. The Verendyres may have done a little gold prospecting, but their real search was for the mythical Northwest Passage.
Jedediah Smith and his party traveled through the southern Hills in 1823, and may have done a little prospecting as Smith recovered from his run-in with a grizzly along the Cheyenne River.
The Rapid Creek Trading Post, owned and operated by Tom Sarpy, was located at the confluence of Rapid Creek and the Cheyenne River from 1830 to 1832, and by virtue of its proximity to the Hills may have been involved with prospecting endeavors. The explosion of the post’s gunpowder supply hastened the end of this outpost.
Jeremiah Proteau, a fur trader with the American Fur Company, recorded that he and his party reached the northern Black Hills foothills in 1854.
Later Black Hills residents have also challenged the notion that Custer’s expedition was the first white group to explore the Black Hills and search for gold.
Seth Bullock, the pioneer sheriff, rancher, and businessman in the Black Hills from 1876 until his death in 1919, reported in his diary that:
"Shortly after the close of the Civil War, Father DeSmet, the heroic missionary, stated at a dinner party in the home of General Ewing at Columbus, Ohio, that he had repeatedly seen gold dust in the possession of the Sioux Indians. They told him that they got it in the Black Hills and that there was “heap plenty of it.” Where and how the Sioux got the gold which they had from time to time, is a controversial matter." Father DeSmet was "around the Black Hills in 1848 and again in 1851, 1864 and 1870."
Dr. Valentine McGillycuddy, the noted physician, Indian agent, and pioneer resident of the Hills wrote a letter to the editor of the Rapid City Journal in 1927 that detailed evidence of earlier explorations.
McGillycuddy related that he was attached to a military exploration unit in 1875. "We found a very old, abandoned cave near what would later be Rapid City," wrote McGillycuddy. In that cave were found "...a rusted frying pan, an old shovel with the handle decayed, and rusted frame of a pair of spectacles." McGillycuddy also found a decayed and moss-covered log cabin on a peak near Sundance. A similar cabin was found on Elk Creek, but with a pine tree growing through the roof. These signs of exploration appeared to easily predate Custer's visit.
The first American geologist to visit and document the Black Hills for the U.S. military was Dr. Ferdinand V. Hayden, who explored the region as a member of General Harney’s reconnaissance in 1855. Ten years later he reported to the Dakota Historical Society "the lowest Silurian period, or gold-bearing strata, are well developed in these hills."
Two additional military expeditions to the Black Hills region in 1857 and 1859 did little to dispel the rumors and notions that gold was present in the region. G. T. Lee and Toussaint Kensler also claimed to have found gold in the Hills on individual trips during the Civil War. But, the Black Hills region remained as a mysterious and generally unmapped part of the Great Sioux Reservation of the Northern Plains until after the end of the Civil War in 1865, with few documented travels in the region.
After the financial panic of 1873, the American economy was in a state of near depression. Gold was seen as the best, fastest way to help the nation recover financially and psychologically by some highly placed advisors in the government and within President Grant’s administration. Knowing that the metal was somewhere in the Black Hills, General Phillip Sheridan authorized an expeditionary force into the Black Hills in the summer of 1874.
George Armstrong Custer’s 1874 reconnaissance of the Black Hills was organized as a military survey to scout locations for forts in the center of the Reservation. It is speculated that Custer’s unofficial orders also contained a directive to locate and confirm the presence of gold and other valuable minerals that might spur the nation out of the panic. Custer’s expedition played a crucial role in the final determination of gold’s existence in the Hills, and in broadcasting that news to the nation, and the world. This incursion into Sioux lands would have numerous other implications as well.
So, where does this leave us as to the record of the Thoen Stone? The most compelling record of a possible earlier exploration is provided by etchings found this stone tablet.
The Thoen Stone (the stone is now housed in the Adams Memorial Museum in Deadwood, South Dakota) received its name when Louis Thoen and his brother Ivan reportedly discovered the artifact while hauling building stone from the base of Lookout Mountain near Spearfish in 1887. The stone was found near what was described as “the main Indian trail to Deadwood,” with native grasses grown over and covering the stone.
The stone was inscribed with the following account:
The front side read:
"Came to these hills in 1833
seven of us
all died but me Ezra Kind
DeLacompt
Ezra Kind
G.W. Wood
T. Brown
R. Kent
Wm. King
Indian Crow
killed by Indians beyond the high hill
got our gold June 1834"
The reverse side read:
"Got all of the gold we could carry
our ponys all got by Indians
I have lost my gun and nothing to eat
and Indians hunting me.”
Locals and scholars raised questions of the authenticity of the "Thoen Stone" immediately, but the Thoens maintained its authenticity throughout their lives. Frank Thomson's book The Thoen Stone (written in 1966), supported the inscription’s story as written by the elusive and forgotten Ezra Kind, whose roots have been traced back to Saxony, Germany.
So, is the Thoen Stone the real deal? Did Ezra Kind scratch the hasty message on a piece of stone for the Thoen brothers to find 50 years later, or did the Thoens create and perpetuate the lie?
We may never know for certain, but the researchers keep digging.
Sources:
“The Thoen Stone,” by Frank Thomson
Adams Museum, Deadwood, South Dakota
"History of Homestake Gold Mine," author unknown
"The Lance and the Shield," Robert Utley
|
|
|
|
|
