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File Created: 24-Jul-1985 by BC Geological Survey (BCGS)
Last Edit:  12-Apr-2021 by Nicole Barlow (NB)

Summary Help Help

NMI 093N12 Au3
Name HARRISON CREEK Mining Division Omineca
BCGS Map 093N062
Status Past Producer NTS Map 093N12E
Latitude 055º 37' 32'' UTM 10 (NAD 83)
Longitude 125º 38' 46'' Northing 6167582
Easting 333397
Commodities Gold, Mercury, Silver Deposit Types C04 : Paleoplacer U-Au-PGE-Sn-Ti-diam-mag-gar-zir
Tectonic Belt Intermontane Terrane Cache Creek
Capsule Geology

Harrison Creek flows south-southeastward from the Vital Range into Kenny Creek approximately 26 kilometres northeast of Takla Landing. Exploration on the creek dates back to 1870, but the only record of work being carried out prior to 1930 relates to the construction of a dam across the creek and a now inaccessible adit driven by a man named Bodine.

The creek drains an area underlain by a north-northwest striking, steeply dipping sequence of interbedded schistose argillite, slate, chert and andesitic flows and tuffs assigned to the Carboniferous to Jurassic Cache Creek Complex. These rocks host numerous barren-looking, locally rusty, white quartz veins varying up to a metre in width.

Early work concentrated on a preglacial channel approximately 1.6 kilometres in length buried in the right(?) bank, below creek level. In 1934, an adit was driven for 44 metres into the lower end of the channel. A winze sunk to bedrock from the face of this adit was said to have intersected the east rim of the channel, from which "encouraging values in coarse gold" and a 46.66 gram nugget of arquerite, a natural amalgam of mercury and silver, were obtained (Minister of Mines Annual Report 1935, page C28). A flume from Humphrey Creek was proposed in 1936 to facilitate hydraulicking, although it is uncertain whether it was ever constructed. By 1938, three separate workings were being developed, including two shafts to bedrock and the original Gibbon drift, which was now advanced a further 120 metres (Property File - Holland, 1938). Operations, however, appear to have ceased by 1942, although attempts to mine the creek were made as recently as the 1980s.

Recorded production from Harrison Creek up until 1949 is 7216 grams of gold (Geological Survey of Canada Memoir 252, page 141). Records of production resulting from work undertaken sporadically into the 1980s are not available.

In 1983, Golden Porphyrite Ltd. completed geological and geochemical surveys on the property containing the Harrison Creek occurrence. Slightly anomalous gold values were observed in the soil samples but no defined zone or samples were reported.

In 2015, Vern Mann completed a magnetometer survey on the area surrounding the occurrence. Results did not highlight bedrock but possibly outlined the partially mined buried channel.

Bibliography
EMPR AR *1935-C28; 1936-C39; 1937-C34; 1938-C53; 1940-A90
EMPR ASS RPT 12294, 36151
EMPR BULL 28, pp. 43-44
EMPR EXPL 1983-463
EMPR OF 2000-33
EMPR PF (*Holland, S.S. (1938): Report on Harrison Creek Ventures
Limited including miscellaneous maps; Anon. (1937): Preliminary
Report on Harrison Creek Ventures, Ltd.
EMPR PF Chevron (IB, BM (1974): Air photo overlay, BC-2061 23; IB, BM (1974): Air photo overlay, BC-2050 93; Dick (1974): Air photo overlay, Base map; IB BM (1974): Air photo overlay, BC-2061 23; MF (1974): Air photo overlay, BC-2059 103; Dick (1974): Air photo overlay for Vita - Byrnes Lake; MR (1974): Air photo overlay, BC-2061 23; IB, BM (1974): Air photo overlay, BC-2059 63; MF (1974): Air photo overlay, BC-2060 33; unknown (1975): Vital Range area reconnaissance, geochemistry, geology, various scales)
GSC MAP 844A; 907A; 971A; 1424A
GSC MEM *252, pp. 140
GSC P 74-1A; 74-1B, pp. 31-42

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