Peter Netzel

Keyes Lost Diggings Peter Netzel

"Keyes Lost Diggings" by Peter Netzel is an account, told through newspaper articles, of an incredible discovery of gold by Chris Keyes in 1865 in The Little Rockies, a mountain range in north-central Montana. The ending to the story of the Lost Keyes Diggings is as tragic as the find was fabulous. To this day, the location of the Keyes placer diggings is wrapped in profound mystery. Chris Keyes, was prospecting in the Red Water River region near the Bear's Paw Mountains, when he came upon a bonanza of gold. Unfortunately, the location of his rich diggings was lost because Keyes was killed in a massacre by hostile Sioux in the same year that he found it, 1865. The year prior, in 1864, prospector Chris Keyes and his partner, John Lepley, had discovered the first gold in Lewis and Clark County on Silver Creek in Montana. A modest strike, they made six or seven dollars a day; but Keyes became impatient and wanted to move on in search of something better. He carried in his pocket three small nuggets of gold that he had picked up in the valleys of the Bear's Paw in 1862 while engaged in hunting for the American Fur Company at Fort Benton. He was obsessed with the desire to prospect these mountains, and had utmost faith in finding rich diggings there. In February 1865, he shook hands with his partner and set out for what he believed was a glittering gold field. But we will never know where the treasure was located because Keyes was massacred by the Sioux. His secret died with him. While profitable diggings were afterward discovered in the Bear's Paw, there has been no such a find as was made by Keyes. To this day, the location of the Keyes placer diggings is wrapped in profound mystery. The ending to the story of the Lost Keyes Diggings is as tragic as the find was fabulous. If you look, you can almost see the gold out there, hidden somewhere in the Bear's Paw Mountains of north-central Montana!