MINING IN MEXICO — The lost silver triangle of the Sierra

The North American continent still harbors a vast mountain range that few Anglo-Americans have seen — an awesome land cut by perpendicular canyons and towering peaks, a forbidding wilderness virtually unchanged through the centuries. In short, a land of lost cities.

This mysterious land is the Sierra Madre, the Mother Range of Mexico, and the setting for such adventure stories as B. Traven’s Treasure of the Sierra Madre and J. Frank Dobie’s Apache Gold and Yaqui Silver.

The Sierra remains much the same as it appeared to Spanish conquistadors who sought golden riches here in centuries past and found the world’s greatest deposit of silver, and then added to the land of lost cities by abandoning their own.

It is a matter of historical record that while Mexico remained under Spanish rule, some 3,000 to 5,000 mines poured forth a veritable argosy of treasure-laden pack trains bound for the seaports to become part of the treasure fleets sailing to the Spanish motherland.

During the last century and much of the present one, the famous lost mine of the Sierra Madre has been the Tayopa, pronounced and sometimes spelled Tiopa. Tayopa seems to have been not one mine, but a real de minas, or group of mines.

A century ago, Tayopa was rarely mentioned without the equally lost mines of Guaynopa and Guaynopita. The names of Guaynopa and Tayopa were inseparable. Tayopa has been sought over an incredible vast country of high mountains and deep barrancas of the Sierra Madre on both sides of the Sonora-Chihuahua border.

What beautiful names: Tayopa, Guaynopa and Guaynopita. Little more than a century ago, the Tayopa, Guaynopa and Guaynopita were sought by travelers throughout the Sierra. Stories of the fabled lost silver mines had been handed down for generations and lone prospectors risked life and limb to find one of them.

Mexican historian Francisco Almada states that the mines at the Real de Guaynopa were discovered in 1741 by an Indian named Agustin de la Cruz, who was associated with Cristobal Rodriquez, a Spaniard. If that is true, the Spanish settlement and mines of Guaynopa were abandoned by 1762 when Jesuit priest Father Juan Nentvig wrote his Descripcion de Sonora during his mission at Huasabas.

East of Huasabas and farther into the rugged Sierra Madre of eastern Sonora lies Bacadehuachi. Ten leagues east (about 26 miles) lay Nacori, wrote Nentvig. Twelve leagues farther away (about 31 miles) was the Tarahumara ranch of Satechi, beside the stream of that name. Twelve leagues beyond lay the abandoned settlement of “Guainopa”, with its rich silver mines formerly worked by the Spaniards.

Nentvig’s manuscript remained unpublished in English until Buckingham Smith translated it in 1863 under the title Rudo Ensayo: A Description of Sonora and Arizona in 1764. Fewer than

20 years later, both the Guaynopa and Guaynopita were rediscovered, even though a more heralded discovery would not be made until after the U.S. Cavalry pursued Geronimo and his Apaches in eastern Sonora and brought about their surrender in September, 1886.

Early travelers through Sonora heard about the wonders of the famed Guaynopa. Lt. R.W.H. Hardy wrote in his Travels in the Interior of Mexico, published in 1829, that “the mine of Guaynopa, between Bacadequach and Mochapa, has had its day.”

Five years before Guaynopa reaped front-page headlines with its rediscovery by American prospectors, both it and the Guaynopita were known sites and the latter had a camp of miners at it. The writer of the story, appearing only as an “occasional correspondent,” penned a long account on the status of mining in the Sierra Madre for the January 11, 1882, Tombstone Daily Nugget. His descriptions are accurate, and only someone familiar with the region who had visited the mines could have written such an account about two mines that almost everyone for at least five years to come would believe were yet lost. The Nugget prefaced its story with the explanation that “the following interesting communication was written by a reliable gentleman of vast and varied mining experience, and one whose knowledge of the subject is second to none. What he describes is from personal observation and no American has so thoroughly covered the ground as he has”.

Unfortunately, the writer said nothing about Guaynopa, except that southeast of it, up the river in the Great Canyon of the Aros, was the mining camp of Guaynopita: “The leading mines here are the Guaynopita and the Jay Gould, on the same vein and on opposite banks of the river.”

On the south side of the Rio Aros, “the Guaynopita mine has been extensively worked by Mexicans in times past”, stated the writer. “The Jay Gould, as its name would indicate, has been recently located, and is owned and worked by two Americans, who deserve to be saluted as brave, as they are shoving their work of development on by themselves alone, in the most exposed part of the Sierras, relying only on their rifles, strong hands and stout hearts to bear them through to safety and to fortune”.

It may not ever be known just who actually rediscovered Guaynopa, as apparently it would be lost and refound on several occasions. But whether or not anyone had read Smith’s translation of Rudo Ensayo, any traveler who reached the isolated settlements of the Sierra Madre would soon hear about Guaynopa and Tayopa, and usually in that order.

Guaynopa and Guaynopita were probably never as lost as legend would have us believe. One need only to follow the directions. German missionary Juan Nentvig sailed for New Spain in 1750. He was assigned to the Huasabas mission in early 1759 and there he wrote his Descripcion de Sonora, finishing it in 1762. The Jesuit priest remained in Huasabas until 1767 when all Jesuits were banished from the New World.

Father Nentvig stated that the main mission of Bacadehuachi had two dependent missions: Nacori lay 10 leagues east (each league was roughly 2.6 miles), and Mochopa, two leagues farther east. “The Tarahumara ranch of Satechi 12 leagues (31 miles) farther away is also under the jurisdiction of Bacadehuachi,” he wrote. “Twelve leagues beyond in the depopulated town of Guainopa there used to be rich silver mines that were worked by a few Spaniards. Another silver mine with its own smelter existed about three leagues northeast of Bacadehuachi”.

Nentvig was fairly accurate when it came to lost mines. Satachi was 12 leagues beyond Mochopa and 12 leagues beyond that was Guaynopa. That location was certainly available to anyone reading Buckingham Smith’s translation of Nentvig’s Rudo Ensayo, published in 1863.

But to a prospector who did not read it, one only had to listen to the tales of Tayopa, Guaynopa, and Guaynopita upon reaching the villages of eastern Sonora and, especially, Nacori. From there one only had to follow the old Sonora Trail across the Sierra Madre as it led eastward from Satachi to the Espinazo del Diablo — Devil’s Backbone — on up the Rio Aros, and once at the junction of it with the Rio Guaynopa flowing from the north, the ruins of the lost city of Guaynopa and its once fabled silver mines were only about two miles away.

Instead of 12 leagues, or roughly 30 miles northeast of Satachi, the lost Guaynopa lay about that far due east. Six miles or so farther, on the opposite side of the Great Canyon of Aros, would be found Guaynopita — Little Guaynopa. The mystery correspondent for the Tombstone Daily Nugget in early 1882 knew exactly what he was talking about, even though, apparently, his story was little circulated.

It was while the U.S. Cavalry chased Geronimo in the Mexican Sierras in 1885 that Lt. Britton Davis was introduced to the Lost Tayopa Mine. One might have known that it would be in Nacori. In The Truth About Geronimo, Davis recounts that in Nacori they found a population of 313, of which only 15 were adult males. “Every family had lost one or more male members at the hands of the Apache”, he said.

Tayopa “was said to have been much of such wonderful richness that blocks of silver taken from it had to be cut into several pieces so that mules co
uld carry them to the sea coast for shipment to Spain”, Davis was told. “My informant, the white-haired presidente, a man over 80 years of age, told me that his grandfather, who also had lived to be a very old man, had worked the mine as a boy, and that it was in a mountain range to the east of Nacori”. Davis went on to say that the Apaches had attacked Tayopa when all but a handful of the men were at a fiesta, killing everyone in camp, and sealed the entrance to the mine. A century passed and no force strong enough dared to conquer the savages.

“Those who would seek the lost mine of Tayopa,” added Davis, “should bear in mind the statement of the old presidente’s grandfather: `Here in Nacori, where we stand, on a still night one could hear dogs bark and the church bell ring in Tayopa.'”

— Steve Wilson has been researching mining in northern Mexico for the past 25 years or more. His story is adapted from a much longer version which appeared in the 1987-88 “Great Plains Journal,” published by the Museum of the Great Plains, P.O. Box 68, Lawton, OK 73502, U.S.A..