92 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 
West’s mine, which is adjoining this, has been explored to a depth of 115 feet: it has therefore 
the deepest shaft in the state. The water is raised by a whim to an adit driven in the hill side, 
and through which the mine was at first explored. Like the other mines, the slates are soft near 
the surface, but become hard below. There are here thick beds of quartz, projecting above. the 
surface, but containing little, if any, gold. ‘These beds are very different from those of massive 
quartz, so common on the ridges in the gold region of Lancaster. They always present the appear- 
ance of stratification, and it seems evident that they are the result of the predominance of quartz 
over the other ingredients of the slates during their deposition. The auriferous part of the slates 
at these mines have a strike of about N. 10° E. and dip 8S. E. 70°, and vary in thickness from a 
few inches to four feet. Here, as elsewhere, excepting in the true talcose slates, the richest gangues 
are those that are most ferruginous; and even in the true massive quartz veins, that portion that 
has the most oxide of iron in it, and is most porous, is the most productive. In Nott’s mine an 
exceedingly rich nest was once found, consisting of brown ochre, from eleven bushels of which 
3000 dwts. of gold were extracted. 
The Bogan mine is a continuation of this group. ‘The slates are interstratified with hornblende 
slates, and eut by trap dykes, one of which was struck in sinking a shaft. Granite is found in the 
beds of the stream near this mine. 
Deposit mines are worked with greater or less success in the vicinity of all these mines, the gold 
being washed down, with the debris of the veins and slates, into the little valleys that intersect 
this region in every direction. Such deposits are readily distinguished from those already men- 
tioned, where the pebbles, &c. have been brought from a distance, are much water-worn and 
rounded, and bear evident marks of the action of water long continued. Here, on the contrary, 
the materials consist principally of the same rocks as those on the hill sides and the surrounding 
country—furnishing an excellent guide to those in search of mines. Nearly all those of this 
vicinity were discovered by tracing up deposits to their sources. 
On the left bank of Broad River, a few miles from Smith’s Ford, some mines exist which belong 
to this group. They are quite interesting, as showing the connection of the auriferous veins with 
the underlying granite. At one excavation a vein passes from the latter rock, through the slates, 
and at another a vein of massive quartz, containing gold, is seen intersecting hornblende. I know 
of no mine where a larger number of fine hand specimens were found than at this; yet it does not 
appear to have been worked to any extent. 
About ten miles above this, on Guion Moore Creek, other mines have been discovered, where the 
lodes consist of thick veins of compact, milky quartz. These also gave good promise of produc- 
tiveness; but hitherto, I believe, the owners have been disappointed. Very similar to these are the 
mines on Allison’s Creek, which were once explored for gold to a considerable extent. Like those 
on Guion Moore Creek, the veins are large and altogether of massive quartz, in mica slates. I 
found at this place sulphuret of copper, which occurs in the veins with iron pyrites. 
I am also inclined to refer to this range the patches of the gold formation in Abbeville District, 
at Parson’s Mountain, and in Edgefield, near the line. At the base of the mountain washing for 
gold has been carried on to some extent, but I cannot say with how much success or profit. The 
gold has been traced to a vein on the mountain side, upon which a shaft has been sunk to the depth 
of sixty feet. In the ‘bottom of the shaft the vein is one foot thick, composed of massive and 
