The Lost Rhoades mines

Utah folklore of long standing

The Lost Rhoades Mine is the central lost-gold story of Utah and of Mormon folklore, and it begins with a real man and real gold. Thomas Rhoads was born in Kentucky in 1794, fought in the War of 1812 and joined the infant Latter-day Saint church in Illinois in 1835. In May 1846, a year ahead of Brigham Young, he led a band of Saints west to scout the land beyond the Rockies, and by October he was in California, farming on the Cosumnes River and working for John Sutter. When gold turned up at Sutter's mill the Rhoads family were reportedly paid in gold dust and worked the placers themselves. In 1849 Young called the Saints home, and Rhoads came back to the Salt Lake Valley with a wagon train he organised with Samuel Brannan. In 1850 Young spoke of "the wealthiest man who came from the mines, Father Rhoades, with $17,000," and the Deseret Mint records a deposit from him on 13 July 1852 of $3,414 in gold dust.

From there the story leaves the record. Family accounts say that in 1852 Young commissioned Rhoads to recover gold known to the Ute leader Walkara, who agreed to reveal mines high in the Uintas, called Carre Shin Ob, "there dwells the Great Spirit," on strict terms: only one man at a time could know the place, he must carry out only what he could pack, and the gold must be used solely for the church, on pain of death if the secret spread. The mines were said to be Spanish, abandoned before 1776. Rhoads made trips of about two weeks with an Indian guide, and the family records say the first load weighed some 62 pounds. In 1855 he received a land grant covering what is now the Kamas Valley at the foot of the range.

After Thomas died in 1869 his son Caleb was said to carry on, a well-known figure in the Uintah Basin who filed many mining claims and is believed to have taken the secret to his grave in 1905. Caleb said the geologists were looking in the wrong place.

The geologists have a point. The historian Leonard Arrington confirmed that the family gave the church large amounts of gold, but warned that this does not show it was mined in Utah, and the Utah Geological Survey notes that the Uintas are mostly Precambrian quartzite and sedimentary rock without the igneous activity that usually makes gold veins. Searchers still work Rock Creek, Blind Stream and Rhoades Canyon. A descendant, Gale Rhoades, spent most of his life on the hunt and died owing investors thousands of dollars.