The Emperor prospect is located about 8.5 kilometres northeast of Stewart on the divide between Bitter and Glacier creeks, approximately 3.2 kilometres east of the Stewart highway (37A).
The area is underlain by north striking, west dipping argillites of the Middle Jurassic Salmon River Formation (Hazelton Group). The argillites are intruded by numerous north trending dikes of quartz diorite, gabbro and lamprophyre (Geological Survey of Canada Memoir 175; Bulletin 58 and 63).
Mineralization comprises two parallel quartz veins, 60 metres apart, that trend north (015 degrees) and dip 50 degrees west. They apparently follow a fault between two dikes. The quartz veins, accompanied by minor calcite, are sparingly mineralized with disseminated pyrite, galena, sphalerite, chalcopyrite and rare jamesonite. The eastern vein, 1.5 to 10 metres wide, has been traced for about 300 metres and comprises closely spaced, drusy quartz veins separated by argillite. The western vein, exposed only in the lower crosscut tunnel, is 1.8 metres wide.
In 1934, a sample was collected from the best section of the eastern vein on the east side of the lower crosscut. The sample assayed 1.4 grams per tonne gold, 133.7 grams per tonne silver, 0.1 per cent copper, 0.5 per cent lead and 14.0 per cent zinc across a width of 1.5 metres (Minister of Mines Annual Report 1934, page B23).
The occurrence was first covered by the North and South claims, owned by McKay in 1923. That year Sieffert organized the North and South Syndicate to develop the property. In 1924, the Syndicate emplaced opencuts, drove a 37 metre long crosscut and drifted 20 metres on the hangingwall of the vein. Emperor Mines was incorporated late that year and purchased the claims. In 1925, the company drove a second, 143 metre long crosscut tunnel 76 metres lower in elevation and 100 metres south of the upper tunnel. The latter tunnel intersected a second, parallel vein about 60 metres west of the main vein. The Emperor property was subsequently allowed to lapse and was restaked as the King claim group by Rochfort in 1934. No further work was reported until 1965 when Silver Arrow Mines Ltd. conducted some stripping on the main vein. No more work was reported until 1980 when Hopper staked the MM 100 claim over the area and carried out prospecting near of the Emperor occurrence. Kingdom Resources Ltd. (later renamed KRL Resources Corp.) subsequently acquired the property. During 1981-83, Kingdom carried out geological mapping, prospecting, trenching, sampling and soil and rock geochemical surveys in the area, mostly west of the occurrence. No further work was done until 1990 when KRL conducted airborne and ground VLF-EM and magnetometer surveys and geological mapping and prospecting; most of this work was done along Victoria Creek, west of the prospect. During 2017 through 2020, Singer Resources Inc. and American Creek Resources Ltd. completed programs of geochemical sampling, a 13.5 line-kilometre induced polarization survey and a 438.5 line-kilometres airborne magnetic and LiDAR survey on the area as the Dunwell property.
