CHAPTER XXV
ON TO THE DIGGINGS
The year 1874 was one of the most distressing which the American people ever suffered. The great reactionary crash in business affairs, following the great boom which came after the war, had fallen in September, 1873. Not only were thousands of great fortunes wiped out, but everywhere, from the poorest cottage to the grandest mansion, the pinch of hard times was felt. At no time have the people been more despairing and hopeless.
On the evening of August 2, 1874, William McKay, an expert miner with Custer's expedition in the Black Hills, went down to the bank of French Creek, a few yards from the camp, and washed out a pan of earth. When the earth was gone, he held up his pan in the evening sun and found the rim lined with nearly a hundred little particles of gold. These he carried in at once to General Custer, whose head was almost turned at the sight. Custer, as we have seen, at once sent a dispatch about this discovery to the army headquarters in St. Paul. It was received there on the evening of August 11, and the next morning the papers throughout America announced to the discouraged people that rich gold mines had been discovered in the Black Hills.
There was magic in the announcement, and drooping
150
