A 66-year-old man who went prospecting for gold Friday morning and hadn’t been seen since was found dead today on the West End of the Olympic Peninsula, the Peninsula Daily News learned this afternoon.
The body of Harold Abbott was found at about 2 p.m. at a site off Hoko-Ozette Road, Clallam County Sheriff’s Department Chief Criminal Deputy Ron Cameron told the PDN.
Abbott, who was diabetic, was traveling alone and his family believed him to be heading to the Umbrella Creek area off Hoko-Ozette Road.
“Foul play is definitely not suspected,” Cameron said.
“It doesn’t appear to be accidental either. At this point it appears to be natural.”
Cameron said he wasn’t sure of the exact site where Abbott was found.
“This site is somewhere we didn’t know about,” he said.
“We didn’t activate the search and rescue team because we didn’t have a starting point.”
Abbott was found by a team of Clallam County sheriff’s deputies and some of his family members.
“His family came out to help because they knew the sites that he frequented,” Cameron said.
