82 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 
Specutar Iron Ore, or Rep HematTITE. 
Immediately overlying the talcose slates containing the magnetic ores, is a belt of mica slates 
forming the northern slope of King’s Mountain, from the North Carolina line to Gelkey’s Mountain, 
in Union District. In these slates we find beds of the red ores, or the specular oxide of iron. To 
the north of this, and’ overlying the limestone, in York District, another similar band of. slates 
appears, dipping N. W. and undoubtedly is the corresponding portion of the King’s Mountain 
slates, which were pushed up, and thus appear on the other side of the anticlinal axis, which cor- 
responds nearly with the limestone stratum of York and Spartanburg. These slates also contain 
beds of specular oxide. On the North side of Gelkey’s Mountain we find some beds of ore in the 
singularly bent slates of that locality—externally black, but having a red streak and powder. This 
bed has not been explored to any considerable extent, but the openings are sufficient to show that 
the quantity of ore is very great, and the situation exceedingly favorable, the bed lying on the side 
of a considerable hill. 
Another, and an exceedingly interesting bed, is seen near the furnace. It is two or three feet in 
thickness, distinctly laminated, and breaks into rhomboidal fragments; but the most remarkable 
feature in this bed is the transition state in which it seems to exist. Near the surface the ore is. 
red, and rather pulverulent, particularly at the surface of the lamin. Lower down, or farther into 
the hill, it becomes grey and somewhat magnetic. Still farther removed from the surface, iron 
pytites appears to so great an extent as to lessen the value of the ore very materially. 
Following the strike of the beds, we find them again on the opposite side of the river, first at a 
point near the King’s Mountain Iron Works, on Dear Little Creek—a locality which at one time 
furnished a large amount of ore for these works. It occurs in the state of a red oxide. Along the 
side of the spur of the mountain that approaches the river, numerous exposures of this ore may be 
seen on the left bank of Dear Little Creek. A noted and most remarkable bed occurs a short dis- 
tance north of the meadow branch of King’s Creek, which is known as the Bird Bank. The ore has 
been explored at two points towards the top of a fold in the mica slates, which gives it the appear- 
ance of two parallel beds. This sketch, Fig. 17, will illustrate the manner in which it lies in the 
slates. 
Fig. 17. 
e— Z 
1 
1.—Bed of ore which has been reached at @ and 2, and has the appearance, in the mine, of two 
beds, one overlying the other. 
The ore is black, with thread-like veins of quartz running through it, and in almost every respect 
resembling the ore near Gelkey’s Mountain. The quantity of ore at this locality is immense. 
