Outposts of Civilization 
Sketches of Early-Day Camps, People, and Happenings

Comstock Gambling

A Comstock veteran wrote this of the sporting days of the great camp:

"The biggest gambling I ever saw was Virginia City, Nev., at the time the bonanza ledges on the Comstock 
were being developed.  That was along in 1872 and 1878.  There are a multitude of gamblers nowadays who 
are incredulous of the truthful stories of the games played every night in the week for about a year 
from June 1872 to July 1878.  I confess that I sometimes wonder whether I was really a participant in 
those golden days of gambling, or whether I have dreamed all that I recollect about them.

"You remember that for months the output from seven mines on the Comstock yielded together $50,000 clear 
profit every day.  John W. Mackay, James G. Fair and James Flood became multi-millionaires in fourteen 
months, while Sharon, Hobart, Ralston, Cobb, O'Brien and a dozen other men leaped from poverty to 
millions in the same time.  Common laborers and camp cooks of a few years before had incomes from mining 
stocks of $150 to $300 a day for two years.  Lots of mining laborers who could not read or write had 
bank deposits in Virginia City in those wonderful days of $10,000 to $15,000.  I have seen hundreds of 
men in cheap red shirts and grimy overalls haul out a buckskin bag of $2,000 or so with no more heed to 
its value than when one produced $2 nowadays.  So you see what an extraordinary field there was in the 
town for gambling.  There were forty or fifty gambling games running there day and night.  Roulette and 
faro were most popular.

"The most superbly appointed gambling place I have ever seen outside of France and Austria was there.  
It was owned by Hiram Gentry and Dan E. Crittenden.  They were both men of education, and they planned 
to establish a Monte Carlo there.  Crittenden was a nephew of United States Senator Crittenden of 
Kentucky.  They were backed by Senators Sharon and Nye, William O. Ralston and one or two other multi-
millionaires had credit at the California Bank in San Francisco for $200,000.  For about a year their 
daily deposits averaged $8,000.  The building was frame - like all others in Virginia City.  Downstairs 
there were four large rooms and upstairs there were three.  One room was especially devoted to Nevada 
and California State Officials, senators, and congressmen.  Another room was for miner and stockmen.  
Still another and larger room was a general gambling room for men of small stakes who played a $50 
limit every night.  There were poker, roulette and faro rooms and connecting all these was a most 
elaborate barroom.  The tables and chairs were of mahogany; the carpets were the finest that money 
could buy in New York.  I have seen cowboys and miners in great rough muddy boots, with pistols 
flapping at their hips and spurs at t heir heels, come stalking across velvet carpets there that cost 
$10 a yard in those days, and throw their feet on polished tables work $100 dollars each.  The windows 
were of the finest French stained glass and represented Bacchanalian and Roman scenes.  The bar was of 
solid onyx, and the floor of Italian colored marble.  The lamps were solid silver, set off by gold.  
Mirrors of heavy plate glass reached from floor to ceiling, and they were held in place by hooks of 
solid silver.  There were goblets of solid silver and delicate drinking vessels of glass and gold.  
The pyramids of cut-glass decanters and bottles at the back of the bar cost $4,000 in Paris.  Then the 
expensive manner of running the house was probably never equaled.  In the exclusive poker rooms' 
bottles of champagne were opened at the expense of Gentry and Crittenden whenever a jackpot was opened.  
I have seen a dozen bottles of champagne that cost in that mining camp $6 a bottle served free to an 
assemblage, because some one told a new funny story or because a rich vein had been struck down in the 
mines.  The house used to reserve $3,500 a month from its profits for the entertainment of its guests.  
On the occasion of the visit of the Duke of Sutherland to Virginia City the bonanza firm of Mackay, 
Fair, Flood and O'Brien must have paid for 500 bottles of champagne drunk and poured on the carpets in 
one day and night at Gentry & Crittenden's house.

"I have sat in games of poker in the house many times when the cheapest chip was $20.  I once played 
for a few hours when the chips ranged from $50 upwards.  Perhaps twenty or thirty times I have known 
men to get up from an all-night poker game with $20,000 winnings.  Winnings of $10,000 in a night or 
an afternoon were not uncommon at Gentry & Crittenden's.

"The biggest game I ever saw was at Gentry & Crittenden's in the summer of 1872.  Lucky Baldwin now 
dead;' Henry M. Vance, who made a fortune with Meigs in the Andean railroad; Senator Bill Sharon and a 
man from St. Louis sat in a game.  I withdrew when the game got too big for me.  Well, the game began 
about 7 o'clock one evening.  The chips were from $100 upward.  It lasted till 3 in the morning.  
There were jack pots started at $900 and $1,000.  One pot contained $12,000 when it opened.  Not a 
word was spoken, and the silence was oppressive.  These millionaires handled thousands as common, 
cheap gamblers do halves and quarters.  A raise of $500 was common, and once I saw the men raise each 
other $2,500.  There was $18.000 in that one pot.  Talk about quick thinking and concentration of the 
mind.  Talk about lightening calculation of chances, and one's inmost thoughts.  Once I saw Senator 
Bill Sharon raise Lucky Baldwin $4,000 and scoop in a tidy sum of $6,000. 

"Take it," was all Baldwin said to break the stillness of the room.

"Boys, I'd like to stay here hours longer.  But I've got to get some sleep tonight because tomorrow 
we're going to have directors' meeting at the Crown Point office,' said Senator Sharon.

"He was then $35,000 winner.  I don't doubt that Sharon went home and slept as easy as if he had won 
a [unknown] change."

The Inyo Register, Bishop, Inyo County, California
Thursday, March 22, 1917
Transcribed by Pat Houser for Inyo County GenWeb, February 27, 2005