Weaver

Overview

The first camp below Rich Hill

Weaver sits on Weaver Creek at the southeast foot of Rich Hill, in the desert east of Congress and about 27 road miles north of Wickenburg. In the spring of 1863 a ten-man party led by Abraham Peeples and guided by the mountain man Pauline Weaver came up from Yuma. Henry Wickenburg left them near the Hassayampa and went on to find the Vulture Mine. The rest reached Rich Hill in late May and found gold the first day. A 2003 study of the district puts their haul at more than 90 ounces within a couple of hours.

The miners organized Weaver Mining District No. 2 and a camp grew up on the creek. It was called Weaverville at first and soon just Weaver. Placer miners took more than 25,000 ounces in the first five years, by one count, and more than $1 million before the easy gold ran out. Hard-rock mining on the veins followed in the 1880s. Two neighbors grew up within a couple of miles, Stanton to the northwest at the old Antelope stage stop, and Octave to the south.

Weaver earned a hard name. After a storekeeper was killed in 1898, residents moved to Octave, and the post office that opened as Weaver in 1899 moved there within a year. What's left is a stone building said to have been the post office, a rock corral, scattered mine machinery and a cemetery of unnamed graves, last described in 2014. The whole district is under mining claim, and we haven't confirmed whether visitors may walk the townsite.

Timeline

From gold rush to empty creek

1. Apr 1, 1863A ten-man prospecting party leaves Yuma. Abraham Peeples leads it, Pauline Weaver guides it, and Henry Wickenburg is along until he splits off near the Hassayampa.
2. Late May 1863The party reaches the foot of Rich Hill and finds placer gold on the first day.
3. 1863Miners organize Weaver Mining District No. 2, and a camp called Weaverville grows up on Weaver Creek. Late in the year Ben Weaver and Charles Genung find the district's first gold-bearing quartz vein.
4. 1863–1868Miners pan more than 25,000 ounces of gold in the first five years, by one count.
5. Jun 21, 1867Pauline Weaver is found dead at Camp Lincoln, later Camp Verde.
6. 1880sWith the easy placer gold gone, hard-rock mining begins on the veins.
7. 1898William Segna, who ran a saloon and general store, is killed. Residents move to Octave, less than a mile to the south.
8. May 26, 1899A post office opens under the name Weaver.
9. Apr 19, 1900The post office moves to Octave.
10. 1930sDepression-era miners return to the Rich Hill placers.
11. Apr 8, 1938A goatherder, Josefa Alvarez, dies. A newspaper of the day says she will be buried in the cemetery on Weaver Creek.
12. 1980s–Metal detectors start a new rush on Rich Hill that was still going in 2003.
13. 2014The latest description we found: a stone building said to be the post office, a rock corral and the cemetery, on ground entirely under mining claim.

Legend and record

Potato nuggets, outlaws and a lost capital

Weaver has more stories than documents. Here is how they stack up against the sources we could check.

The potato patch. The best-known telling says a member of the party went after a stray animal and found nuggets the size of potatoes in a basin on top of the hill, which the men pried loose with their knives. Versions differ on whether he chased a burro, a donkey or lost livestock. A 2003 paper by Melchiorre and colleagues in Mining Engineering quotes the report that the hilltop was "literally graveled with nuggets". The gold was real and rich, but the potato-sized nuggets are legend as far as we can tell. We found no contemporary record of them.

The outlaw town. Wikipedia and a 2014 HistoryNet article say Weaver fell under the control of Francisco Vega and his gang, and that decent folk moved to Stanton and Octave. Neither cites a court case or newspaper. A 2011 Sharlot Hall Museum article by Parker Anderson says only that the district developed a very bad reputation, and doesn't mention Vega. The firmer record comes later. The Arizona Pioneer & Cemetery Research Project reports that storekeeper William Segna was killed in 1898 and that a newspaper then called for Weaver to be wiped out. Treat the Vega gang as a story and the 1898 killing as the documented turning point.

A legend says Prescott beat Weaver for the territorial capital because Weaver's voters were too busy carousing to show up. HistoryNet calls it a legend too.

The namesake. Pauline Weaver was a Tennessee-born mountain man and guide who made little money from the strike. He died at Camp Lincoln in 1867. His remains went to San Francisco in 1892 and came back to Prescott in 1929, where Boy Scouts carried his casket to a grave on what are now the grounds of the Sharlot Hall Museum.

What's left

A stone building, a corral and unnamed graves

An undated listing names one small building and current mining activity. Wikipedia mentions rusting machinery, a partly restored cemetery and the ruins of a stone house. HistoryNet in 2014 named the post office building, the cemetery and a rock corral. The 2009 photo at the top shows a boulder-walled building with its tin roof collapsing onto a newer timber frame, apparently put up to hold the walls.

The cemetery lies below Rich Hill near the creek. Boy Scout troops and the Arizona Pioneer & Cemetery Research Project cleared it and marked the graves they could find with rocks and white crosses. None carries a name. A Sharlot Hall Museum photograph from April 1948 shows headstones and markers that are no longer there.

The 1969 USGS map below marks the cemetery on the east side of Weaver Creek Road, with the Myers and Devils Nest mines on the slopes above. The 1903 sheet is the only one that names Weaver, between Stanton and Octave. On today's aerial the creek bottom is a web of tracks, graded pads and pits, which fits the active mining that the listing reports.

• Stone building, said to be the post office
• Rock corral
• Cemetery, unnamed graves
• Rusting mine machinery
• Placer diggings on Rich Hill

Historic maps

Weaver on USGS maps, 1887–1981

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

18871:250,00019031:125,00019541:250,00019691:24,00019811:100,000

Map & directions

Getting there

Wickenburg is the closest town with services. Both routes run north from Wickenburg on US 93 and AZ 89, then finish on about nine miles of dirt roads past Stanton. They were computed from OpenStreetMap, and we haven't driven them.

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

Photos

Weaver in photos

The stone building at Weaver, 2009Pauline Weaver, the guide the town was named forAZ 89 heading north toward the Weaver Mountains

Visitor reports

Been to Weaver?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

Thanks. Your report reached us, and we'll read it before it goes on the page.

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Nearby

Other sites near Weaver

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our Arizona index.

• Octave0.8 mi S · Yavapai
• Stanton1.5 mi NW · Gila
• Stanton1.5 mi NW · Yavapai
• Yarnell5.2 mi NW · Yavapai
• Placerita8.6 mi NE · Yavapai
• Congress Mine8.8 mi W · Yavapai
• Congress8.8 mi W · Yavapai
• Congress Junction10.2 mi W · Yavapai

Sources

Sources and credits

1. ghosttowns.com, "Weaver": fact sheet fields (roads, legal description, climate, best time, remains, post office dates).
2. Wikipedia, "Weaver, Arizona", retrieved October 2026: coordinates, Weaverville name, the stray-animal story, the Vega gang claim, remains.
3. Melchiorre, Lauretta, Crombie and Gholson, "Rich Hill, Arizona: historic gold district, modern gold rush," Mining Engineering, 2003: the party, dates, first-day yield, later rushes.
4. Jim Pettengill, "Ghost Town: Rich Hill, Arizona," HistoryNet (from Wild West, February 2014): Peeples party, potato-nugget story, early production, the capital legend, remains and claim status.
5. Sharlot Hall Museum, Days Past, "Pauline Weaver, the Legendary First Citizen of Prescott, Part 2" (Ken Edwards, 2000): the ten-man party, the first quartz lode, Weaver's death and reburials.
6. Sharlot Hall Museum, Days Past, "The Antelope Station Murder of George H. 'Yaqui' Wilson" (Parker Anderson, 2011): the district's reputation.
7. Sharlot Hall Museum photo archive, "Weaver Cemetery" (1948 photo): cemetery cleanup, unnamed graves, visitor access and 4WD advice.
8. Arizona Pioneer & Cemetery Research Project, "Weaver" (2008): the 1898 Segna killing, post office dates, the 1938 burial notice.
9. delange.org, "Rich Hill" (photos to 2007): land is private or under claim, the stone building thought to be the post office.
10. Arizona State Parks, "Granite Mountain Hotshots: Area Attractions", as of October 2026: restaurants in Yarnell.
11. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026. Not field-checked.

Photo and map credits

• The stone building at Weaver, 2009: Plazak, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
• Pauline Weaver, the guide the town was named for: Unknown, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
• AZ 89 heading north toward the Weaver Mountains: Qwert üpoiuz, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
• USGS Congress sheet, 1903, the only sheet that names Weaver: the camp on Weaver Creek between Stanton and Octave: U.S. Geological Survey, USGS catalog, Public domain
• Topo map, area base map and aerial imagery: USGS The National Map (public domain).
• Historic maps: USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection (public domain): Prescott 1887, 1:250,000; Congress 1903, 1:125,000; Prescott 1954, 1:250,000; Yarnell 1969, 1:24,000; Bradshaw Mts 1981, 1:100,000.