BOSS OF THE BAY MINE
- UPDATE - March 2023
I was recently asked to do a History Hour talk for the SSHS about the Boss of the Bay Mine and was able to add lots more additional research I've uncovered since my first posting a few years ago -
A video of the presentation can be found by Clicking Here
My original story is below -
While most of the Sullivan mines were centered on the riverfront near Sullivan Falls, there were two mines on Waukeag Neck. Most of us are aware that there was once a mine on what was then called Soward's Island. The island earned its current name, Treasure Island, from the presence of the Golden Circle Mine that was in operation in the 1870s and 80s until it proved unprofitable. But there was a second lesser-known mine also located nearby on the mainland on Waugeak Neck.
The Boss of the Bay mine was located on the shoreline of Bass Cove, opposite Soward's Island. Two New York businessmen -- Clement Usher and W.H. Haverstick -- headed the company according to the 1881-82 Maine Annual Register.
A Certificate of Incorporation filed in Hancock County in July of 1880 indicated the Boss of the Bay planned to issue 150,000 shares of stock at a par value of $5.00 per share, for a total capitalization of $750,000, (see Hancock County records book 9002 / page 23).
Later news articles clarified that the owners of the mine were named J. Clement Uhler, J.D. Wilcox, and W.H. Haverstick.
During the Summer of 1882, two years after the men established Boss of the Bay, Emma left her family and moved into the Paris Flats apartment with her lover. Although Uhler was averse to violent methods, evidently Emma's brother George Conkling, who worked as a surveyor in Nevada, was not so inclined. When George was unsuccessful in persuading his sister to leave Haverstick and return to Uhler, he headed to New York from Reno to take matters into his own hand. His plan, it was later revealed, was to bring her back West, away from both Uhler and Haverstick.
Walling picks up the murder tale from the point when Emma, having decided not to meet her brother at his hotel, forces George to instead come to the 23rd Street apartment where he confronts Haverstick.
Conkling's defense of his sister's honor in killing Haverstick did not produce much outrage in New York. After the crime, Emma was hospitalized and was reported to be suffering from "...nervous prostrations," with another report declaring that if she did recover she would "probably be insane." A grand jury was charged with investigating the murder and whether Conkling should stand trial.
Meanwhile, Haverstick was remembered by his colleagues at the Mining Exchange in a diplomatically worded statement, however, an anonymous writer in Chicago thought very little of the dead man's honor.
A week after the shooting, Emma was well enough to appear in the courtroom to provide testimony in her brother's bail inquiry wearing an apparently glamourous outfit of maroon velvet, a sealskin wrap, and diamond earrings. Finding that the shooter acted in self-defense and seeing that Conkling did not pose a threat, the Judge released him on bail despite the urging of the District Attorney. George convinced his sister to accompany him back to Nevada while he awaited trial. In none of the stories is there any word about the fate of her children she had with Uhler.
The Boss of the Bay mine on Waukeag Neck was not the last victim of Haverstick's murder. Emma was also no doubt deeply traumatized by her love affair, the loss of her children, and Haverstick's death at her brother's hand. Toward the end of 1883, Emma returned to NYC and took an apartment under an assumed name. It is possible that she came back to be near her children. But in February 1884, Emma was found dead, evidently the victim of a drug overdose. The NY Times article was uncertain if her death was accidental or it was suicide. Chief Walling was not so kind, he wrote of her death, "...Mrs. Uhler did not reform. She contracted the opium habit, and died a wretched death in this city."
Other articles provided more background on Emma's return to New York and her married life with Uhler. The couple had two children and apparently when Emma moved in with Haverstick, Uhler had "resisted all of his wife's attempts to secure them." When she came back to New York City from Nevada, it was rumored that Emma was staying "fast houses" but had moved onto a respectable boarding house where she died.
At the time of Emma's death, it was reported that J. Clement Uhler and the two children were out of town and her body remained unclaimed. As she was the only witness to Haverstick's murder, and with little public sentiment to proceed with George's prosecution, his counsel filed a motion to revoke his bail and with it, his trial was indefinitely postponed. Meanwhile, in Nevada, Emma's family defended her honor by releasing the news that her death had been ruled accidental and her drug use was "...the only fault which can be proved against her."
Despite the tragedies Emma's affair had caused, J. Clement Uhler assumed the obligation to bury his wife. When asked whether he recognized Emma, Uhler simply replied, "...yes, I recognize her, but she has changed in the last three years." He also added that he believed her death was the result of an accidental overdose as she had become addicted to morphine after the birth of their last child.
Another woman also came forward who stated she was a friend of the family from California. In a final ironic twist, she volunteered that she would have taken care of Emma but was not in a financial position because "...I lost all my money in mining stocks in California and only earn a meager living by my own hands."
One last chapter of the tale involves Emma's brother, the gunman George Conklin. Although his trial was postponed with the death of the only witness, George was so upset upon hearing the news of his sister's death that he "ruptured" a blood vessel and was reported near death in Reno.
J. Clement Uhler apparently relocated to Philadelphia with their children after these painful events. Uhler ultimately served as Secretary for the Speckler Sugar Corporation and sat on the board with Theodore Havermyer (who was the first president of the USGA), and Henry Havermyer when they acquired the company for $2.5 million to add to the largest Sugar Trust in the world.
As to the fate of the Boss of the Bay mine, the entrance of the mineshaft can still be seen at low tide along the shores of Sorrento just past the Blink Bonnie Golf Course. It was described below by Harris McLean in his chapter on the mines in A Bicentennial History of Sullivan Maine.
Postscript 7/3/2020...
Today I located the Boss of the Bay mine entrance and took a few photos -
The Boss of the Bay mine was located on the shoreline of Bass Cove, opposite Soward's Island. Two New York businessmen -- Clement Usher and W.H. Haverstick -- headed the company according to the 1881-82 Maine Annual Register.
Unlike the silver mines near Sullivan Falls, the Golden Circle Mine was digging for gold while Boss of the Bay focused on mining for copper.
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| Stock Certificate Courtesy of the Shalor Winchell Eldridge Collection in the KU Spencer Research Library |
Through the Summer of 1880, The Maine Mining Journal continued to print stories about the new mine.
By the Fall of 1880 news from the two mines on Waukeag Neck sounded promising. The Golden Circle was actively erecting a boarding house on the island and the foundations for a shaft house were almost complete. Meanwhile at the Boss of the Bay, good progress on its cooper vein was underway.
When the mining boom in Sullivan collapsed in 1881 and 1882, nothing more was published about the Boss of the Bay mine. The country was entering an economic depression, and the fortunes of the mining firms in the area followed suit with catastrophic failures in stock prices. So it would not be surprising that a company like Boss of the Bay would go bankrupt during the crisis that culminated in the Panic of 1884.
In March of 1883, the New York papers reported on a murder in an apartment building on West 23rd Street in Manhattan. It simply identified the victim as a broker who had "seduced his partner's wife" to come to live with him. The woman's brother had evidently persuaded her to return to her husband, but during a visit to move her out, he encountered the boyfriend and shot him. The Brooklyn Eagle took the time to editorialize that a skirmish such as this was one of the disadvantages of apartment living.
The next day in dramatic stories about the murder, the newspapers identified the victim as William Haverstick and his lover as Mrs. Uhler, the wife of his partner J. Clement Uhler, the promoters of the Boss of the Bay mine.
The story of the Haverstick murder was retold in newspapers around the country and later recalled by NY Chief of Police George Walling in his memoir of 38 years on the force, Recollections of a New York City Chief of Police, published in 1887.
Walling provides the background that Uhler had married Emma Conkling, then 19 years old, in San Francisco while he was engaged in a prior business in California. After their marriage in 1871, the couple returned to New York City where Emma had "several children" and Uhler entered into a partnership with William Haverstick. Emma, according to Walling, became "infatuated" with Haverstick "...who succeeded in seducing her."
The mining operation in Maine, while evidently started with great promise, likely fell apart in the midst of this affair between Haverstick and his partner's wife. Walling writes that "...the injured husband was averse to violent methods of expressing his disapprobation of the liaison, and when Mrs. Uhler left in bed and board he did little besides protest against an act which would bring disgrace of both families."
John Clement Uhler was a graduate of Pennsylvania College, later renamed Gettysburg College, and had served in the Union Army. After the Civil War, he moved to California and engaged in various banking enterprises, including backing mining stocks. When the American Mining Exchange opened in New York in 1880 he joined the exchange and started a new investment partnership with Haverstick which financed the Maine mine.
During the Summer of 1882, two years after the men established Boss of the Bay, Emma left her family and moved into the Paris Flats apartment with her lover. Although Uhler was averse to violent methods, evidently Emma's brother George Conkling, who worked as a surveyor in Nevada, was not so inclined. When George was unsuccessful in persuading his sister to leave Haverstick and return to Uhler, he headed to New York from Reno to take matters into his own hand. His plan, it was later revealed, was to bring her back West, away from both Uhler and Haverstick.
Walling picks up the murder tale from the point when Emma, having decided not to meet her brother at his hotel, forces George to instead come to the 23rd Street apartment where he confronts Haverstick.
Conkling's defense of his sister's honor in killing Haverstick did not produce much outrage in New York. After the crime, Emma was hospitalized and was reported to be suffering from "...nervous prostrations," with another report declaring that if she did recover she would "probably be insane." A grand jury was charged with investigating the murder and whether Conkling should stand trial.
A week after the shooting, Emma was well enough to appear in the courtroom to provide testimony in her brother's bail inquiry wearing an apparently glamourous outfit of maroon velvet, a sealskin wrap, and diamond earrings. Finding that the shooter acted in self-defense and seeing that Conkling did not pose a threat, the Judge released him on bail despite the urging of the District Attorney. George convinced his sister to accompany him back to Nevada while he awaited trial. In none of the stories is there any word about the fate of her children she had with Uhler.
The Boss of the Bay mine on Waukeag Neck was not the last victim of Haverstick's murder. Emma was also no doubt deeply traumatized by her love affair, the loss of her children, and Haverstick's death at her brother's hand. Toward the end of 1883, Emma returned to NYC and took an apartment under an assumed name. It is possible that she came back to be near her children. But in February 1884, Emma was found dead, evidently the victim of a drug overdose. The NY Times article was uncertain if her death was accidental or it was suicide. Chief Walling was not so kind, he wrote of her death, "...Mrs. Uhler did not reform. She contracted the opium habit, and died a wretched death in this city."
Other articles provided more background on Emma's return to New York and her married life with Uhler. The couple had two children and apparently when Emma moved in with Haverstick, Uhler had "resisted all of his wife's attempts to secure them." When she came back to New York City from Nevada, it was rumored that Emma was staying "fast houses" but had moved onto a respectable boarding house where she died.
At the time of Emma's death, it was reported that J. Clement Uhler and the two children were out of town and her body remained unclaimed. As she was the only witness to Haverstick's murder, and with little public sentiment to proceed with George's prosecution, his counsel filed a motion to revoke his bail and with it, his trial was indefinitely postponed. Meanwhile, in Nevada, Emma's family defended her honor by releasing the news that her death had been ruled accidental and her drug use was "...the only fault which can be proved against her."
Despite the tragedies Emma's affair had caused, J. Clement Uhler assumed the obligation to bury his wife. When asked whether he recognized Emma, Uhler simply replied, "...yes, I recognize her, but she has changed in the last three years." He also added that he believed her death was the result of an accidental overdose as she had become addicted to morphine after the birth of their last child.
Another woman also came forward who stated she was a friend of the family from California. In a final ironic twist, she volunteered that she would have taken care of Emma but was not in a financial position because "...I lost all my money in mining stocks in California and only earn a meager living by my own hands."
One last chapter of the tale involves Emma's brother, the gunman George Conklin. Although his trial was postponed with the death of the only witness, George was so upset upon hearing the news of his sister's death that he "ruptured" a blood vessel and was reported near death in Reno.
J. Clement Uhler apparently relocated to Philadelphia with their children after these painful events. Uhler ultimately served as Secretary for the Speckler Sugar Corporation and sat on the board with Theodore Havermyer (who was the first president of the USGA), and Henry Havermyer when they acquired the company for $2.5 million to add to the largest Sugar Trust in the world.
As to the fate of the Boss of the Bay mine, the entrance of the mineshaft can still be seen at low tide along the shores of Sorrento just past the Blink Bonnie Golf Course. It was described below by Harris McLean in his chapter on the mines in A Bicentennial History of Sullivan Maine.
Postscript 7/3/2020...
Today I located the Boss of the Bay mine entrance and took a few photos -
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