For months, a thin wall of rock is all that keeps the peace between two rival silver mining companies 300 feet below the Idaho mountains. Above ground, the claims overlap, and the owners of the Ida Elmore Mine and the Golden Chariot Mine both lay claim to any silver in the disputed area. When the rock wall is finally breached, pickaxes give way to pistols and rifles as one hundred miners prepare for battle. When gunfire erupts, the first casualty is John C. Holgate, owner of the Golden Chariot. For the next five days the bloody battle rages on and only comes to end when the territorial governor threatens to dispatch Army troops from Fort Boise to quell the violence. Though the conflict appears to be over, hard feelings spill to the surface, and J. Marion Moore, owner of the Ida Elmore Mine is gunned down in the streets of Silver City. Years later, gunfighter-turned-reporter Bat Masterson tracks down one of the surviving miners to get the real story of the Battle Beneath the Mountain.
