Vital Creek

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Vital Creek is a creek located in the Omineca Country region of British Columbia, flowing eastward from its source in the Vital Range to meet Silver Creek, joining that creek from the west about 5 miles from its mouth into the Omineca River, about 41 km northeast of Takla Landing. [1] [2]

The Omineca Country, also called the Omineca District or the Omineca, is a historical geographic region of the Northern Interior of British Columbia, roughly defined by the basin of the Omineca River but including areas to the south which allowed access to the region during the Omineca Gold Rush of the 1860s. The term Omineca District also refers to the Omineca Mining District which referred to the same area but was a government administrative division. Today the name loosely refers to the region northwest of Prince George and north of Hwy 16 and occurs in the names of such entities as electoral districts, e.g. Prince George-Omineca.

British Columbia Province of Canada

British Columbia is the westernmost province of Canada, located between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. With an estimated population of 5.016 million as of 2018, it is Canada's third-most populous province.

The Vital Range is a subrange of the Hogem Ranges of the Omineca Mountains, bounded by Fall Creek, Silver Creek and Kenny Creek in northern British Columbia, Canada.

Contents

History

The gold deposits of Vital Creek were discovered in 1869 by Vital Laforce, who had also been among the four discoverers of gold along Williams Creek, which was the foundation of Barkerville. [3] This was the first creek mined in the Omineca. Late in the mining season of 1870, $7,000 was taken out by a party of 15 Chinese miners, giving some hope that significant gold might yet be found in the region. [4]

Williams Creek (British Columbia) river in Canada

Williams Creek is an important historical gold mining creek in the Cariboo goldfields of the Central Interior of British Columbia, entering the Willow River between Barkerville and the town of Wells, which is at the headwaters of the Willow River.

The Omineca Gold Rush was a gold rush in British Columbia, Canada in the Omineca region of the Northern Interior of the province. Gold was first discovered there in 1861, but the rush didn't begin until late in 1869 with the discovery at Vital Creek. There were several routes to the goldfields: two were from Fort St. James, one of which was a water route through the Stuart and Tachie Rivers to Trembleur Lake to Takla Lake and the other was overland, called the Baldy Mountain route. A third route came in overland from Hazelton on the Skeena River and a fourth route used the Fraser River and crossed over the Giscome Portage to Summit Lake, through McLeod Lake, and up the Finlay River to the Omineca River.

The creek has been mined for gold and silver, which occurred simultaneously and were unusual to find in that way. [5] It has been hydraulicked and mined by Chinese syndicates like Gow Sing and Co. The bulk of the gold was obtained on bedrock and in crevices and cracks. [6]

Initial exploration and mining work was carried out by means of drift diggings, followed by ground sluicing and hydraulicking later. Drift mining and hydraulicking were both abandoned in the 1930s as there were no dumping facilities for mining waste. Later exploration to bedrock in pursuit of hard-rock ores met with little success. [7]

Total gold production from Vital Creek between 1876 and 1900 was 117,091 grams, and between 1926 and 1940 another 143,122 grams of gold were taken from the creek. Early takings were from the creek's present channel downstream from a waterfall 3 km upstream from the mouth of the creek. Gold was later found upstream from the waterfall in a pre-glacial channel, in the form of coarse well-worn flakes on the bedrock. [8]

Three jade boulders weighing 2267, 907 and 363 kilograms were reported as having been taken from the creek in 1963. [9]

Nephrite A variety of jade

Nephrite is a variety of the calcium, magnesium, and iron-rich amphibole minerals tremolite or actinolite (aggregates of which also make up one form of asbestos). The chemical formula for nephrite is Ca2(Mg, Fe)5Si8O22(OH)2. It is one of two different mineral species called jade. The other mineral species known as jade is jadeite, which is a variety of pyroxene. While nephrite jade possesses mainly grays and greens (and occasionally yellows, browns or whites), jadeite jade, which is rarer, can also contain blacks, reds, pinks and violets. Nephrite jade is an ornamental stone used in carvings, beads, or cabochon cut gemstones.

Geology

The area drained by the creek is underlain by a north-northwest striking, east-dipping metasedimentary/volcanic formation of the Carboniferous to Jurassic Cache Creek Complex. Phyllite, limestone and tuff are common. White quartz veins up to a metre in width were found within these rocks. [10]

Arquerite, a native amalgam of silver and mercury, is relatively abundant in the gold-bearing gravels of the creek. [11]

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References

  1. ↑ BC MINEFILE Record MINFILE No 093N 044 (MINFILE Record Summary)
  2. ↑ BC Names/GeoBC entry "Vital Creek"
  3. ↑ BC Names/GeoBC entry "Vital Creek"
  4. ↑ British Columbia From The Earliest Times to the Present. Vol. 2, F.W. Howay and E.O.S. Scholefield, S.J. Clarke, Vancouver (1914), p.265
  5. ↑ British Columbia From The Earliest Times to the Present. Vol. 2, F.W. Howay and E.O.S. Scholefield, S.J. Clarke, Vancouver (1914), p.265
  6. ↑ N.L. Barlee (1980), The Guide to Gold Panning, Revised Second Edition, Second Printing. Canada West Publications., ISBN   0-920164-04-8
  7. ↑ Geological Survey of Canada Memoir 252, pp. 141-142, quoted in BC MINFILE reference]
  8. ↑ BC MINEFILE Record MINFILE No 093N 044 (MINFILE Record Summary)
  9. ↑ "Vital", BC MINFILE No 093N 064 (MINFILE Record Summary)
  10. ↑ BC MINEFILE Record MINFILE No 093N 044 (MINFILE Record Summary)
  11. ↑ BC MINEFILE Record MINFILE No 093N 044 (MINFILE Record Summary)

Coordinates: 55°42′47″N125°28′04″W / 55.71306°N 125.46778°W / 55.71306; -125.46778

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