Chrysolite workings, Fryer Hill, Leadville, Lake County, Colorado, USAi

Regional Level Types
Chrysolite workings	Workings
Fryer Hill	Hill
Leadville	Municipality
Lake County	County
Colorado	State
USA	Country

The property of the Chrysolite Mining Company consists of the following claims: Carboniferous, Chrysolite, Vulture, Little Eva, Colorado Chief, Pandora, Fair View, Kit Carson, and All Right. The greater part of the ore extracted from this property has been obtained from the first three claims. The area occupied by the others, as shown by the map, is mostly west and south of the outcrops of the main ore body, indicated in dark blue crossed in black; in other words, over this area the ore has been mainly removed by erosion. The Discovery shaft of the Chrysolite has, so far as known, discovered no ore. The first considerable ore body was opened by Vulture No. 1 shaft, near the northern end of this claim.

Soon after the discovery of this ore body, it was found by some clever persons that, as not unfrequently happens in the location of claim, a small triangular piece of ground in the immediate vicinity of this shaft, about thirty-six feet by sixty on the sides of the triangle, was left unclaimed. The shaft now called the Eaton shaft was at once sunk by these men and the continuation of the Vulture body there discovered. In self-defense the Chrysolite Company were obliged to buy out this little claim, generally known as the Triangle, at what at the time seemed a very high price, but which was repaid to them more than threefold by the ore which they extracted from the ground. A still smaller unoccupied piece of ground between the end lines of the Vulture and the Chrysolite, appropriately called the Sliver, was similarly taken up, and was bought out by he Chrysolite Company, but has thus far proved an unprofitable purchase. This can be distinguished upon the map by the two hafts, Sliver No. 1 and Sliver No.2, which have been sunk upon it. The ore body at the Eaton and Vulture No. 1 shafts was near the outcrop of the upper iron body, and therefore its limit to the westward were soon reached. It was traced eastward, descending irregularly, but at a low angle, as far as the Carboniferous-Little Chief line. This ore body, though narrow, was extremely rich and yielded the greater part of the immense returns which were obtained from the mine in the earlier days of its working. Section B show its outline along an east-and-west line. From it were obtained large masses of chloride of silver, associated with cerussite, a single transparent mass of chloride which weighed several hundred pounds having been extracted.

A second ore body, parallel to this, was found about one hundred feet to the southward, which was traced in a southeasterly direction to the New Discovery-Vulture line, where it widened out and then disappeared. In the bottom of an east-and-west drift, a little south of this body, several masses of limestone were found below the main ore body, which in early clays, before the character of the formation of the ore was understood, much puzzled those in charge of the mine. The extent of this unreplaced limestone was never determined, but it is now evident that it is simply a portion of the Blue Limestone, which existed wherever now the body of vein material is found, and which, for some reason or other, had not been replaced by vein material. Along the Vulture-New Discovery line considerable unreplaced lime-sand was also found on top of the iron body, extending into the New Discovery ground.

The main ore body, which was opened by the Vulture No.1 and Eaton shafts, was traced a little south of east to the extreme southeast corner of the Carboniferous claim, with an average width of about fifty feet and a thickness of twelve to twenty feet. In the eastern portion it is opened by Chyrsolite No.3 and Carboniferous No. 1 shafts. It ends quite abruptly, both on the north and south, though barren vein material is found on rither side of it. Cross-cutting drifts soon pass through this vein material into overlying White Porphyry, showing that the ore body was on the crest of a minor ridge or corrugation in the vein material, on either side of which is a shallow basin. That to the south has proved barren for a considerable distance into the New Discovery ground. Its form is shown in Section F, where it is seen that the upper portion consists largely of unreplaced limestone. An ore shoot was also followed, descending in a northeasterly direction from the Triangle workings, which later developed a large body of ore in the neighborhood of Chrysolite No. 4 shaft. In these older workings the rich ore consisted mainly of carbonate of lead and chloride of silver, with a comparatively small amount of galena. In the vein material a blue-black chert ic prominently found, occurring in bodies up to ten feet in thickness. From this impure silica it pases into silicious iron and then into a clayey limonite, more or less impregnated with oxide of manganese, the extreme form of which, known to miner as " black iron,' is a sort of impure wad. These were the early workings of the mine, made in the upper ore horizon.