Bunker Hill & Sullivan Mining & Concentrating Co. v. Empire State-Idaho Mining & Developing Co.

This is an action of ejectment, in which the plaintiff in error was plaintiff in the court below. It involves an underground segment of a mineral-bearing ledge claimed by the plaintiff in the action to be a portion of the Stemwinder mining-claim, which claim confessedly is, and was at the time of the alleged trespass upon it by the defendants, owned by the plaintiff. The case comes here on the judgment roU. Annexed to the findings of the court, and made a part of them, is a diagram showing the Stemwinder, Emma, and Last Chance mining claims, with the *539 vein passing through each of them in a northwesterly and southeasterly direction, which diagram is here inserted, to illustrate the positions and claims of the respective parties:

The defendant Last Chance Mining Company is shown by the findings to be the owner of the Emma and Last Chance claims. Both of the latter were patented by the United States more than five years prior to the commencement of this action. The Stem-winder has not been patented. Each of the claims was located in the year 1885. When the claimant of the Emma applied to the government for a patent therefor, the claimant of the Stemwinder filed in the land…