Bethel, Alaska Newspaper Data

"CINNABAR'S END AN ALASKAN TRAGEDY
Duncan McDonald Made Heroic Battle
Attempting to reach his claims, with thermometer fifty below, he finally succumbs and is found close to death by a trapper.

Seward, Alaska, March 17 - Nate H. Coombs, member of the territorial legislature which is meeting in Juneau this month, arrived here recently by dog team from Council on Seward peninsula, and brought word of a tragedy on the lower Kuskokwim involving a fight for life against desperate odds. The hero, who died trying, was Duncan "Cinnabar" McDonald well-known miner, who had lived at Iditarod and later at Bethel, on the Kuskokwim. His story was related by Mrs. Duke F. Stubbs of Aniak, who ministered to him in his last hours.

"Cinnabar" McDonald gained his name by his repeated efforts to interest people with money to handle deposits of cinnabar on the Kuskokwim. It is from this ore that the quicksilver of commerce is produced. McDonald found it an uphill undertaking, for while it is possible to get capital for gold mining, the average man with money to invest knows little or nothing about cinnabar and views it askance. McDonald wrote and talked and dreamed about the mineral he had found and the other miners finally called him "Cinnabar." But cinnabar is not good to eat and McDonald was forced to abandon his hobby from time to time to mine gold, enough at least to keep him in supplies from road houses between Iditarod and Bethel.

Some years ago McDonald found placer ground on Bear creek, a tributary to the Kuskokwim, which looked good. In small gulleys near by pay dirt was found in various pockets and this year a man named Danny Pryce, after four seasons work, broke into the pay upstream. He went "outside" with a "poke" full of nuggets the size of walnuts. Danny was silent about his find, but in a vague way it drifted back to Bethel that he had gone out to get a hydraulic plant.

"Cinnabar" heard it and remembered his claims. He knew well the mining law which provides that any man staking a claim must do work on that claim each year to the amount of $100 to hold it and failure to have proof of such labor recorded within 90 days after the end of the year is considered evidence that the owner had abandoned it, so he hit the trail for Bear creek early in December to do his assessment work.

About 40 days later a trapper living on the Bethel-Aniak trail, who was keeping close to his cabin because it was 50 below zero outside, was attracted by a strange figure crawling up the trail on hands and knees, his whiskers a mass of ice. It was McDonald, fighting for his life. His hands and feet were frozen and the tip of his tongue was frozen to his teeth.

The trapper, long in the wilds, produced two cans of coal oil and a tub and proceeded to "draw the frost" out of the frozen extremities of his friend. Thawing out a frozen man is putting him through the torture of fire. The pain is the same as though the frozen part were held in flames, but it had to be done. Thawing his face and tongue was a job for a surgeon, but the trapper accomplished it.

When it was done and the injured parts wrapped in a mixture of lard and other ingredients, McDonald made it known that there was something wrong inside his chest and he must have a doctor. He signified his willingness to be taken to Aniak, a four-day trip and away they went with the mercury hovering around 45 below, the thawed "Cinnabar" wrapped in many blankets and robes on a dog sled. At Aniak Mrs. Stubbs took the case in hand and Arthur Willis took another team and went to Iditarod for Dr. Moore, another three-day trip.

In the meantime "Cinnabar" found himself going. The frost had bitten into his lungs and for that there is no cure. He lipsed with his injured tongue the story of the nine days before he reached the trapper's cabin.

"Left claim all right, but pretty cold. Second night colder; afraid "siwash it" (sleep out). Moonlight so easy keep going. Lots overflows along creek; had look out keep from getting in.

"Middle night moon lost light; eclipse. Eclipse got me. Afraid stop, missed trail - dark - stepped water. Ought to quit right there. Dead then, but didn't like to give up. Never quit going. Saw sun rise seven times before reached trappers but what's use. Somebody else have to mine them cinnabar claims."

He died delirious, mumbling about his claims and the days and nights he had spent on the trail fighting the cold. The once frozen flesh had already begun to disintegrate, so the kind-hearted men and women and the doctor, who had come a long, hard trail to lend a hand, had to put all that was left of the once hardy frontiersman and prospector out where the mercury still stood at 40 below and the frost had its way with "Cinnabar" McDonald.

When Representative Coombs passed the road house on his way to Seward, the remains of the frozen miner were cached on a shed waiting for the spring to come so that he might be buried. (The Anaconda Standard, March 18, 1917, Page 5, Section Part Two - Submitted by Peggy Thompson)

BETSEY SIMMONS
Miss Betsey Simmons, of Royalton, but who for many years lived in town with Mrs. Sarah Chapman, died very suddenly last Sunday morning from the effects of a shock. (Argus and Patriot, February 23, 1898, page 2 - Submitted by Peggy Thompson)

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