BAKER, DANIEL J.
Placer Herald (Auburn
Mar 2, 1861
Fatal Mining Accident at the Dardanelles Tunnel
On Monday our community was pained to learn of the sudden death from accident of Mr. D. J. Baker, one of the proprietors of the widely known Dardanelles claim, situated between Todd's Valley and Forest Hill. An extra from the office of the Placer Courier gives the following particulars of the fatality: "This morning at eight o'clock, Daniel J. Baker, one of the owners of the Dardanelles claim, accompanied by Bowers, Frazer, and Shaw, entered a tunnel to inspect the works, preparatory to commencing operations. Bowers had gone to the top of the work on the outside and turned on the water, some two hundred inches; but observing that the shaft was ‘clogged' apparently by a sliding of caving in of the sides, he hastened down into the tunnel to warn the others of the impending danger. He had scarcely reached them, they being then within perhaps twenty feet of the overhanging mouth of the narrow shaft that contained hundreds of tons of water, rock and earth and which was just then, by the force of gravitation, ready to burst through its confinement into the channel below. But a moment or two before Bowers had given the alarm, the party was almost immediately under the shaft, removing a stump or a cluster of roots which had been washed down on Saturday. The one nearest the danger, Frazer, being then perhaps ten feet off, and Baker immediately behind him, hearing the crash coming, turned and said, ‘Baker, we are lost!' and before they could turn around, the mass fell. Frazer grabbed an upright timber on the side of the tunnel where he sustained himself from being washed away into the gulf of destruction which was yawning to receive them but a few feet off. Shaw and Bowers hastily retreated before death and destruction into a side drift close at hand, while the rocks, earth and water was at least four feet in depth around the lower limbs of Frazer, whose only safety was to cling to his hold. The rush and fall lasted perhaps two minutes, and when the persons who survived recovered from the shock and realized the narrow escape from death which they had made, they found that poor Baker was missing! On the first rush or fall, he seems to have been picked up by the earth and water and carried into the perpendicular shaft of forty feet, down which he was dashed, amid the power and weight of many tons to a rocky tunnel of six hundred feet, through which his body was again carried and then dashed from the mouth of a flume to another fall of fifty feet perpendicular height! Here his body lodged but life was extinct, and the soul of the poor mortal had wafted its way into the presence of its Maker. His remains were brought to his residence near at hand, where his grief-stricken wife and a large number of his friends, in sorrow and tears, received them and are preparing them for their long, last resting place. On examination, it was found that the head was almost entirely crushed and one arm broken." Mr. Baker was a native of Riga, Wyoming County, New York, and aged 34 years. The funeral took place at Todd's Valley on Wednesday and was attended by nearly one hundred Masons (of which fraternity deceased was an honored member) and two hundred other citizens
Placer Herald (Auburn
Mar 2, 1861
Fatal Mining Accident at the Dardanelles Tunnel
On Monday our community was pained to learn of the sudden death from accident of Mr. D. J. Baker, one of the proprietors of the widely known Dardanelles claim, situated between Todd's Valley and Forest Hill. An extra from the office of the Placer Courier gives the following particulars of the fatality: "This morning at eight o'clock, Daniel J. Baker, one of the owners of the Dardanelles claim, accompanied by Bowers, Frazer, and Shaw, entered a tunnel to inspect the works, preparatory to commencing operations. Bowers had gone to the top of the work on the outside and turned on the water, some two hundred inches; but observing that the shaft was ‘clogged' apparently by a sliding of caving in of the sides, he hastened down into the tunnel to warn the others of the impending danger. He had scarcely reached them, they being then within perhaps twenty feet of the overhanging mouth of the narrow shaft that contained hundreds of tons of water, rock and earth and which was just then, by the force of gravitation, ready to burst through its confinement into the channel below. But a moment or two before Bowers had given the alarm, the party was almost immediately under the shaft, removing a stump or a cluster of roots which had been washed down on Saturday. The one nearest the danger, Frazer, being then perhaps ten feet off, and Baker immediately behind him, hearing the crash coming, turned and said, ‘Baker, we are lost!' and before they could turn around, the mass fell. Frazer grabbed an upright timber on the side of the tunnel where he sustained himself from being washed away into the gulf of destruction which was yawning to receive them but a few feet off. Shaw and Bowers hastily retreated before death and destruction into a side drift close at hand, while the rocks, earth and water was at least four feet in depth around the lower limbs of Frazer, whose only safety was to cling to his hold. The rush and fall lasted perhaps two minutes, and when the persons who survived recovered from the shock and realized the narrow escape from death which they had made, they found that poor Baker was missing! On the first rush or fall, he seems to have been picked up by the earth and water and carried into the perpendicular shaft of forty feet, down which he was dashed, amid the power and weight of many tons to a rocky tunnel of six hundred feet, through which his body was again carried and then dashed from the mouth of a flume to another fall of fifty feet perpendicular height! Here his body lodged but life was extinct, and the soul of the poor mortal had wafted its way into the presence of its Maker. His remains were brought to his residence near at hand, where his grief-stricken wife and a large number of his friends, in sorrow and tears, received them and are preparing them for their long, last resting place. On examination, it was found that the head was almost entirely crushed and one arm broken." Mr. Baker was a native of Riga, Wyoming County, New York, and aged 34 years. The funeral took place at Todd's Valley on Wednesday and was attended by nearly one hundred Masons (of which fraternity deceased was an honored member) and two hundred other citizens
BAKER, DANIEL J.
Placer Herald (Auburn
Mar 2, 1861
Fatal Mining Accident at the Dardanelles Tunnel
On Monday our community was pained to learn of the sudden death from accident of Mr. D. J. Baker, one of the proprietors of the widely known Dardanelles claim, situated between Todd's Valley and Forest Hill. An extra from the office of the Placer Courier gives the following particulars of the fatality: "This morning at eight o'clock, Daniel J. Baker, one of the owners of the Dardanelles claim, accompanied by Bowers, Frazer, and Shaw, entered a tunnel to inspect the works, preparatory to commencing operations. Bowers had gone to the top of the work on the outside and turned on the water, some two hundred inches; but observing that the shaft was ‘clogged' apparently by a sliding of caving in of the sides, he hastened down into the tunnel to warn the others of the impending danger. He had scarcely reached them, they being then within perhaps twenty feet of the overhanging mouth of the narrow shaft that contained hundreds of tons of water, rock and earth and which was just then, by the force of gravitation, ready to burst through its confinement into the channel below. But a moment or two before Bowers had given the alarm, the party was almost immediately under the shaft, removing a stump or a cluster of roots which had been washed down on Saturday. The one nearest the danger, Frazer, being then perhaps ten feet off, and Baker immediately behind him, hearing the crash coming, turned and said, ‘Baker, we are lost!' and before they could turn around, the mass fell. Frazer grabbed an upright timber on the side of the tunnel where he sustained himself from being washed away into the gulf of destruction which was yawning to receive them but a few feet off. Shaw and Bowers hastily retreated before death and destruction into a side drift close at hand, while the rocks, earth and water was at least four feet in depth around the lower limbs of Frazer, whose only safety was to cling to his hold. The rush and fall lasted perhaps two minutes, and when the persons who survived recovered from the shock and realized the narrow escape from death which they had made, they found that poor Baker was missing! On the first rush or fall, he seems to have been picked up by the earth and water and carried into the perpendicular shaft of forty feet, down which he was dashed, amid the power and weight of many tons to a rocky tunnel of six hundred feet, through which his body was again carried and then dashed from the mouth of a flume to another fall of fifty feet perpendicular height! Here his body lodged but life was extinct, and the soul of the poor mortal had wafted its way into the presence of its Maker. His remains were brought to his residence near at hand, where his grief-stricken wife and a large number of his friends, in sorrow and tears, received them and are preparing them for their long, last resting place. On examination, it was found that the head was almost entirely crushed and one arm broken." Mr. Baker was a native of Riga, Wyoming County, New York, and aged 34 years. The funeral took place at Todd's Valley on Wednesday and was attended by nearly one hundred Masons (of which fraternity deceased was an honored member) and two hundred other citizens
Placer Herald (Auburn
Mar 2, 1861
Fatal Mining Accident at the Dardanelles Tunnel
On Monday our community was pained to learn of the sudden death from accident of Mr. D. J. Baker, one of the proprietors of the widely known Dardanelles claim, situated between Todd's Valley and Forest Hill. An extra from the office of the Placer Courier gives the following particulars of the fatality: "This morning at eight o'clock, Daniel J. Baker, one of the owners of the Dardanelles claim, accompanied by Bowers, Frazer, and Shaw, entered a tunnel to inspect the works, preparatory to commencing operations. Bowers had gone to the top of the work on the outside and turned on the water, some two hundred inches; but observing that the shaft was ‘clogged' apparently by a sliding of caving in of the sides, he hastened down into the tunnel to warn the others of the impending danger. He had scarcely reached them, they being then within perhaps twenty feet of the overhanging mouth of the narrow shaft that contained hundreds of tons of water, rock and earth and which was just then, by the force of gravitation, ready to burst through its confinement into the channel below. But a moment or two before Bowers had given the alarm, the party was almost immediately under the shaft, removing a stump or a cluster of roots which had been washed down on Saturday. The one nearest the danger, Frazer, being then perhaps ten feet off, and Baker immediately behind him, hearing the crash coming, turned and said, ‘Baker, we are lost!' and before they could turn around, the mass fell. Frazer grabbed an upright timber on the side of the tunnel where he sustained himself from being washed away into the gulf of destruction which was yawning to receive them but a few feet off. Shaw and Bowers hastily retreated before death and destruction into a side drift close at hand, while the rocks, earth and water was at least four feet in depth around the lower limbs of Frazer, whose only safety was to cling to his hold. The rush and fall lasted perhaps two minutes, and when the persons who survived recovered from the shock and realized the narrow escape from death which they had made, they found that poor Baker was missing! On the first rush or fall, he seems to have been picked up by the earth and water and carried into the perpendicular shaft of forty feet, down which he was dashed, amid the power and weight of many tons to a rocky tunnel of six hundred feet, through which his body was again carried and then dashed from the mouth of a flume to another fall of fifty feet perpendicular height! Here his body lodged but life was extinct, and the soul of the poor mortal had wafted its way into the presence of its Maker. His remains were brought to his residence near at hand, where his grief-stricken wife and a large number of his friends, in sorrow and tears, received them and are preparing them for their long, last resting place. On examination, it was found that the head was almost entirely crushed and one arm broken." Mr. Baker was a native of Riga, Wyoming County, New York, and aged 34 years. The funeral took place at Todd's Valley on Wednesday and was attended by nearly one hundred Masons (of which fraternity deceased was an honored member) and two hundred other citizens
Gravesite Details
Died at The Dardenelles
Family Members
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