Socorro Mine, Harquahala Mining District, La Paz County, Arizona, USAi

Regional Level Types
Socorro Mine	Mine
Harquahala Mining District	Mining District
La Paz County	County
Arizona	State
USA	Country

Ref.: The Resources of Arizona - A Manual of Reliable Information Concerning the Territory, compiled by Patrick Hamilton (1881), Scottsdale, AZ: 74.

Pratt, J.H. (1902) Gold deposits of Arizona: Engineering and Mining Journal: 73 (June 7, 1902): 795-796.

Smith, F.C. (1907) The cyanidation of raw pyrite concentrates: American Institute of Mining Engineers, Transactions: 37: 570-575.

Bancroft, H. (1911), Reconnaissance of the ore deposits in northern Yuma County, Arizona, USGS Bull. 451: 111-113.

Wilson, E.D., Cunningham, J.B., and Butler, G.M. (1934), Arizona Lode Gold Mines and Gold Mining. Arizona Bureau of Mines Bull. 137: 131-132.

Keith, Stanton B. (1978) State of Arizona Bureau of Geology and Mineral Technology, Geological Survey Branch Bull. 192, Index of Mining Properties in Yuma County, Arizona: 154 (Table 4).

Niemuth, N.J. (1987), Arizona Mineral Development 1984-1986, Arizona Department of Mines & Mineral Resources Directory 29, 46 pp.

Richard, S.M. (1999) Geology of the Socorro Mine - White Marble Mine area, western Harquahala Mountains, west-central Arizona: Arizona Geological Survey Open-File Report 99-09, 35 p., 2 sheets, scale 1:12,000.

U.S. Bureau of Mines - Arizona Bureau of Geology and Mineral Technology production file data.

Arizona Bureau of Mines file data.

MRDS database Dep. ID #10027653, MRDS ID #M003687; and, Dep. ID #10283735, MAS ID #0040120441.

A former surface and underground Au-Ag-Pb-Cu-Fe mine located in the SW¼ sec. 25, T5N, R12W, at the southern base of the Harquahala Mountains, about 11 road miles from Salome, and about 8 miles SE of Wenden, on BLM-administered land. Operated intermittently during the period 1906-1914 and afterward to 1935, and closing in 1960. Owned/operated by the Socorro Gold Mining Co.; Socorro Mines, Inc.; Socorro Gold Co.; Death Valley Arcalveda Consolidated Mines Co.; Gilbert and Schmidt; R.A. Salisbury; Death Valley Arc.; Klix; and, Carl Ludwigs (1974).

Mineralization is a 4 foot wide vein that occupies a fault fissure within the granite & sedimentary rocks (quartzite and limestone). It is 91.44 meters long, 1.22 meters wide, strikes E-W and dips 26ºN (26W per MRDS). and ranges in width from a few inches to several feet. The ore is lensing and irregular. It is mostly oxidized, gold-bearing pyrite in quartz and iron oxides above the 250 foot level, and scattered pyrite in quartz and wall rock, pockets of galena, and minor oxidized copper minerals below, in an irregular, lensing fissure vein in Paleozoic or Mesozoic quartzite, limestone and shale intruded by Laramide granite and related dikes. The vein is vuggy. Free-milling ore, consisting of white quartz and oxidized, gold-bearing iron minerals above the 250 level. Below this level, pyrite is scattered through the quartz. Vein material shows considerable brecciation and recementation by silica. Faulting has taken place on a large scale.

Overthrust faults in the district places Precambrian metamorphics over Paleozoic-Mesozoic sediments. Mineralization locally associated with microdiorite dikes 20 to 25 my in age.

Workings include a 50 foot long tunnel (1881); 375 foot (114.3 meters) deep shaft (1901-1905), plus 2,300 feet of drifts. The shaft inclines 26ºN. Produced $20,000 of Au (1906-1914). A 20-stamp mill equipped for amalgamation, concentration & cyanidation (built 1904). This mine was worked intermittently fom the early 1900's through 1960. It produced some 4,800 tons of ore averaging about 0.2 oz. Au/T, 0.1 oz. Ag/T and a small amount of lead.

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