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Cherokee Mine

Past Producer in Butte county in California, United States with commodities Gold, Diamond, Platinum
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Sections on this page
  1. Identification information
  2. Geographic coordinates
  3. Site location context
  4. Geographic areas
  5. Public Land Survey System information
  6. Commodities
  7. Materials information
  8. Mineral occurrence model information
  9. Host and associated rocks
  10. Nearby scientific data
  11. Ore body information
  12. Controls for ore emplacement
  13. Economic information about the deposit and operations
  14. Mining district
  15. Bibliographic references
  16. General comments
  17. Reporter information

Geologic information

Identification information

Deposit ID 10310601
Record type Site
Current site name Cherokee Mine
Alternate or previous names Spring Valley

Comments on the site identification

  • The Cherokee Mine was a highly productive hydraulic mine that was also notable for its production of diamonds.

Geographic coordinates

Geographic coordinates: -121.54712, 39.64016 (WGS84)
Location accuracy 100(meters)
Relative position The mine is about nine miles north of the city of Oroville.

Site location context

Political divisions (FIPS codes)

Butte(county)

California(state)

United States(country)

North America(continent)

Land(continent)

USGS map quadrangles

Cherokee(quadrangle 1:24,000 scale)

Chico(quadrangle 1:100,000 scale)

Chico(quadrangle 1:250,000 scale)

Hydrologic units (watersheds)

Lower Sacramento(hydrologic accounting unit)

Sacramento(hydrologic subregion)

California(hydrologic region)

Geographic areas

Country State County
United States California Butte

Public Land Survey System information

Meridian Township Range Section Fraction State
Mount Diablo 021N 004E 28, 29, 32, 33 California

Comments on the location information

  • Location selected for latitude and longitude is the Cherokee Placer Mine shaft symbol on the USGS 7.5-minute Cherokee quadrangle.

Commodities

Commodity Importance
Gold Primary
Diamond Secondary
Platinum Critical Secondary

Comments on the commodity information

  • Commodity Info: Much of the gold in the blue-gravel horizon is coarse, but there is also much fine gold. Some of the gold has a fineness of 945 (Lindgren, 1911).

    About 400-500 small diamonds were recovered from the gravels of this mine. Several of the stones were more than two carats in weight and of good quality, but most were small and had a pale yellow tinge. This site is the best-known diamond-bearing locality in California.
  • Ore Materials: Native gold, diamond, native platinum
  • Gangue Materials: Quartz, metamorphic rock, igneous rock

Materials information

Materials Type of material
Gold Ore
Diamond Ore
Platinum Ore
Quartz Gangue

Mineral occurrence model information

Model code 119
USGS model code 39a
Deposit model name Placer Au-PGE
Mark3 model number 54

Host and associated rocks

  • Host or associated Host
    Rock type Unconsolidated Deposit > Sand and Gravel
    Stratigraphic age (youngest) Tertiary

Nearby scientific data

(1) -121.54712, 39.64016
ListMap

Economic information

Ore body information

  • General form Irregular

Controls for ore emplacement

  • Mechanical accumulation on irregular bedrock riffles and within river- and stream-channel lag gravels, bars, and point-bar deposits.

Comments on the geologic information

  • REGIONAL GEOLOGY

    The Cherokee Mine is situated at the western edge of the Sierra Nevada geologic province. This province is characterized by extremely complex lithologies and structures that were assembled through various plate-tectonic processes.

    Paleozoic-Mesozoic metamorphic complexes intruded by various Mesozoic plutons compose the basement of the province. This basement is overlain locally by erosional remnants of Cenozoic volcanic and sedimentary rocks, including gravels. Most of these various lithologies contain gold in places.

    Structurally, the metamorphic rocks and some of the plutonic rocks have been deformed by folding and faulting. The major fault zones typically trend northerly or northwesterly, although in places intrusion of the younger plutons has deformed some of the zones so as to assume other trends as well. In contrast, the overlying Cenozoic rocks are relatively undeformed.

    LOCAL GEOLOGY

    The Cherokee Mine was developed within Tertiary gold-bearing gravels deposited along a west-trending channel that underlies the basalt of Table Mountain. At its bottom, the channel is about 700 feet wide and characterized by a very irregular bedrock surface. The materials in these deposits have been derived by erosion of the various basement and older Cenozoic rocks at higher elevations. In places, the basement rocks contain gold within quartz veins and altered rock. Erosion of the gold-bearing basement rocks provided the gold that was eventually deposited in the channel at the Cherokee Mine.

    Lindgren (1911) reported the following stratigraphic section, from bottom to top, at the Cherokee Mine:

    5-10? Hard, cemented greenstone gravel with local streaks of black clay; very poor in gold; no gold on greenstone bedrock; diamonds and platinum also recovered

    20-30? Partly cemented, very coarse blue gravel with large blocks of greenstone; rich in gold, which is concentrated mostly on the surface with the underlying greenstone gravel

    2-3? Decomposed gravels of the blue gravel

    50? White sand and quartzose gravel; some fine gold

    200? Sandy clay

    50-75? Massive basalt

    Lindgren (1911) interpreted the clay hoizon to be part of the Ione Formation.

    Creely (1965) presented another stratigraphic section measured at the Cherokee Mine.

Economic information about the deposit and operations

Operation type Surface-Underground
Development status Past Producer
Commodity type Both
Deposit size Medium
Significant Yes
Discovery year 1854

Mining district

District name Cherokee District

Comments on the workings information

  • The channel was orginally developed by hydraulicking, with the highwall reaching 500 feet. About 150 acres were hydraulicked to bedrock and nearly as much was worked to within 15 feet of bedrock. The lowest material was cemented. Later, the channel was worked by minor drifting, some of which was developed in a coarse, blue gravel. This layer carries coarse gold and was considered the principal productive stratum in the original hydraulic mine.

Comments on other economic factors

  • The Cherokee Mine is estimated to have yielded about $15 million in gold and about 400-500 diamonds.

Comments on development

  • Most of the output of the Cherokee Mining District came from the Cherokee Mine. First developed in 1854, this deposit was hydraulicked exclusively from 1858 to 1890, when anti-debris laws reportedly forced closure. Mine tailings were dumped into Sawmill Ravine, from which they were conveyed to Dry Creek. Mining of this deposit resumed in 1900 by means of various drifting techniques and continued sporadically at least up to 1930.

    Exploratory work was conducted at this mine around 1980-1981.

    The mine has been a source of mercury in nearby Dry Creek (Brown and Murphy, 2005).

Reference information

Bibliographic references

  • Deposit

    Brown, D.L. and Murphy, W.M, 2005, Transport of total and dissolved mercury from the Cherokee watershed, Sacramento River basin, northern California: Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs, v. 37, no. 4, p. 104-105.

  • Deposit

    Clark, W.B., 1970, Gold districts of California: California Division of Mines and Geology Bulletin 193, p. 36-37.

  • Deposit

    Creely, R.S., Geology of the Oroville Quadrangle, California: California Division of Mines and Geology Bulletin 184, 86 p.

  • Deposit

    Helley, E.J. and Harwood, DS., 1985, Geologic map of the late Cenozoic deposits of the Sacramento Valley and northern Sierra foothills, California: U.S. Geological Survey Miscellaneous Field Studies Map MF-1790, scale 1:62,500.

  • Deposit

    Lindgren, W., 1911, Tertiary gravels of the Sierra Nevada: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 73, p. 86-87.

  • Deposit

    Logan, C.A., 1930, Butte County: California State Mining Bureau, 26th Report of the State Mineralogist, p. 387-389.

  • Deposit

    Saucedo, G.J. and Wagner, D.L., 1992, Geologic map of the Chico Quadrangle, California: California Department of Conservation, Division of Mines and Geology Regional Geologic Map Series, Map No. 7A, scale 1:250,000.

  • Deposit

    Waring, C.A., 1919, Butte County: California State Mining Bureau, 15th Annual Report of the State Mineralogist, p. 209-210.

General comments

Subject category Comment text
Deposit This deposit consists of gold-bearing alluvial gravels of Tertiary age deposited along a stream channel estimated by Lindgren (1911) to be about 700 feet wide at its bottom. Gold, diamonds, and platinum are present in specific horizons within the channel deposits that alternate with horizons that are lean or barren of these commodities. The most productive horizon is a 20-30-thick blue gravel near the bottom of the channel. An overlying 50-foot horizon of white sand and quartzose gravel yields lower concentrations of gold.

Reporter information

Type Date Name Affiliation Comment
Reporter 02-AUG-2006 Higgins, Chris T. California Geological Survey CGS (Formerly CDMG)
Editor 01-SEP-2007 Schruben, Paul G. U.S. Geological Survey Converted from S&A FileMaker format to Oracle. Edit checks on rocks, units, and ages with Geolex search, and other fields.

Beyond USGS

Supplemental information added by qvyshift.com. Not part of the original USGS MRDS record.

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Authoritative California resources

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