Southern Cross—Early Discoveries of Gold—Heavy Tramps—Walking
on Gold—Bayley’s Reward—Fabulous Finds—The Potato
Ground—Bayley’s Death—The 90-Mile—The Treasure House—Great
Boulder Find—The Londonderry.
Lake Polaris, or Southern Cross, was so called by the Phœnix party of
prospectors, who, owing to an accidental discovery of gold by Mr. Ansty
at Mugakine in 1887, determined thoroughly to prospect the country from
Newcastle and the Yilgarn hills. Their first discovery of payable reefs
was named Golden Valley, and, as would be supposed from the name, the
reefs were rich. Travelling by night, guided by the Southern Cross, the
party went on, and 30 miles farther on found reefs still richer on the
site of what is now called Southern Cross. Two of the prospectors were
eventually lost in the Bush, and their mates, taking a black fellow for
tracking, followed their tracks, mostly in circles, for 30 miles, and at
last found the two poor fellows dead, doubtless from thirst, as they were
without clothing, which is always a sign of that terrible death.
Southern Cross was destined to become in a short time a most important
place in Australian history, although it did not become the talk of the
world, as Coolgardie afterwards did. It was from Southern Cross that the
news of the magnificent discovery of Bayley’s Reward and the other rich
finds at Coolgardie came. From the time when Mr. Colreavy, of the Phœnix
party, first found Golden Valley until now, the finds of gold on the
Coolgardie goldfields have been without parallel in Australian history.
Fraser’s Mine, Southern Cross, paid the first dividend received from any
mine in Western Australia. Captain Oats, one of the most genial men in
the West, is the legal manager for Fraser’s Mine.
When the train came to a stop on our arrival at the Cross, as it is now
usually called, I must confess that I was not much attracted by the
appearance of the place, for anything more dreary-looking one could not
well see. Imagine a sandy desert, with here and there a stunted-looking
tree, a string of camels, with Afghan guides, some bare-looking houses,
and a few mines with poppet-heads standing out like crosses against the
sky. That is Southern Cross. The train stops at 7 A.M. for 40 minutes for
breakfast, and, after travelling from five o’clock the previous night,
one feels inclined for hot coffee at least. I hurried across to the
hotel, and after partaking of a really excellent breakfast, felt a little
more friendly to the place, and had my luggage taken off the train with
the intention of stopping here a day to make inquiries. After a two-hours
rest I started off to see Fraser’s Mine, and then found that I had to
walk half a mile in order to reach the town, the part where the hotel is
being only the railway portion of it. Across flat uninteresting ground
affording very scanty herbage to a few grazing goats, I came at last to
the town proper, which is one fairly long street and two cross ones, of
little houses and shops. I here presented my letter of introduction to
the mayor, who, with his wife, was most hospitable; and, in fact, I found
that, in spite of the dreary-looking surroundings, Southern Cross was
not a bad place after all, and that there were a great many nice genial
people living there. Fraser’s Mine is another two miles on. Nothing
much is to be seen, but close to the mine is a small empty house. It
is the house formerly inhabited by the notorious Deeming (who murdered
and cemented three wives and four children), in which he had stored
the cement in readiness for a new grave for his next wife when he was
stopped by his arrest. I looked inside with a kind of morbid interest,
remembering well the stir there was in Melbourne at the time when this
terrible man committed his last awful crime.
When one thinks of the hardships people had to endure when gold was
first discovered in this desert, and when water was scarce and food
still more so, one feels that they deserved all the money and gold they
got.[2] It then took four days to get to the Cross from York and Northam,
and the Bush roads were terrible. One party of fifty Victorian miners
started from Albany on foot, on what was known as Holland’s Track, and
after undergoing terrible privations, 35 of them reached the Cross in
safety. Holland’s Track is so called from the following circumstances:
John Holland and party set out from Brown Hill, 103 miles from Albany,
to reach Coolgardie _viâ_ Southern Cross, the distance being nearly 350
miles. They paid £50 for three horses and a conveyance. Their road was
through an almost impenetrable bush. Holland’s way of finding the road
was to ride ahead, the team having instructions to follow his tracks. He
then made observations from the highest points, and was enabled to judge
many miles ahead the nature of the country before him and the probable
whereabouts of water. In this respect he was singularly successful. He
would then take his bearings, retrace his tracks, and lead the team
in as direct a line as possible to the place. The length of the track
cut was 230 miles. The greatest portion of this was through country
unexplored, and 130 miles were traversed without encountering tracks of
any description, save that of an occasional emu. There were many high
granite rocks in the country, one of such height and extent—200 feet—that
they named it King Rock. On investigation a splendid supply of water was
found on the top of this, and at the base there is a salt-water lake 2
miles in circumference.
Another party started overland from Adelaide to the Western Australian
goldfields, and went through hardships that can be better imagined than
described. The course taken was from Port Augusta along the west coast to
Israelite Bay, thence to Fraser Range and Southern Cross. The track ran
through dense forests and sand plains, where little exists save stunted
herbage, which not even a camel could eat, every bush on these plains
being armed with thorns. The party camped about 6 miles from Southern
Cross on the only decent patch of pasture for 100 miles.
A Bendigo miner, with his party, started from Narrogin, beyond Broome
Hill, for Southern Cross. After going 15 miles they got bogged twice
on the road, the horses being in the bog to their knees and the dray
to the axle. The second time the men had to carry all their things on
their backs. Next day they had to cut away with an axe big trees that
had fallen across the track. Another day they camped 100 miles from the
Cross, and on getting up early found the horses gone. After a long search
of 15 miles, during which time they had nothing to eat, they finally
found them. Next day the party set out again, and after 25 miles the axle
broke and the dray became a total wreck; they then waited coming events,
and luckily a teamster came along and took some of their things. The rest
they had to leave behind. They arrived at Southern Cross after three
weeks travelling.
[Illustration: TEAMS RETURNED TO SOUTHERN CROSS FROM COOLGARDIE]
These are a few of the experiences of the early days of the Golden West.
After such experiences Southern Cross, no doubt, seemed an oasis in the
desert. Who will say these poor men did not deserve success? I truly hope
they got it. It was five years after the discovery of Southern Cross that
Coolgardie was discovered by Arthur Bayley, who had formerly been working
at the Cross, but afterwards went to Nannine and took 1000 ounces of
gold from a claim there; then returned to the Southern Cross in 1892,
started from that place prospecting, eventually finding Coolgardie.
People who were here in 1892 tell me that when the news came of Bayley’s
find the excitement was indescribable. Southern Cross was almost
deserted. Coolgardie lies about 120 miles from the Cross, and along the
track were to be seen men in scores, using every means of locomotion
conceivable. Some were lucky enough to get teamsters to carry their
swags; others had to carry them on their backs; others, again, had
pack-horses; some had what is called a “one-wheeler” cart. The wheel is
fixed underneath, in the centre is a frame or miniature platform, on
which the goods and swags are placed; four men take hold, one at each
corner, and a start is made. One enterprising man pushed in front of him
an ordinary beer cask, which he had rigged up to resemble a miniature
road-roller. His goods were on top and he was in the shafts. Other
adventurous spirits had their goods in wheelbarrows, which they drove
through the heavy sand. Camels sometimes crossed as much as 22 miles of
sand plain at a stretch, getting one meal at the end. As pack-camels only
travel at the rate of 2½ miles an hour, such a journey would occupy the
whole of the daylight, then the Afghan drivers would let the camels lie
down until the moon rose; then on again in search of food, until at 7 in
the morning perhaps they were lucky enough to find some salt-bush on the
shores of a salt lake.
At the stores at Southern Cross in those days you would see all sorts and
conditions of men coming for their provisions. New chums with white soft
hands would sometimes appear on their way to the goldfields. Those poor
hands would look very different after their owners had put in a month on
the burning sands of the mines.
The railway to Coolgardie from Southern Cross was begun in 1894 and
opened soon afterwards.
[Illustration: Bakery and Miners’ Camp, Southern Cross]
It was with feelings of curiosity that I viewed the desert-looking
country as the train approached the world-famed place. It is nearly
always in waste, arid, and uninteresting places that gold is found. As
the train drew up at the spacious station and I stepped out on to the
wide platforms, where some hundreds of people were waiting, I looked
round me and said to myself: “Am I really at the famous Coolgardie at
last, the Queen Gold City of the West?” I took a cab—dozens of them were
waiting—and drove to Summers’ Hotel, where apartments had been reserved
for me, and with a sigh of contentment gave myself up to the thought of
thoroughly inspecting this famed place. After a very good dinner, with
white-waistcoated waiters in attendance, and with every elegance and
comfort that could be suggested, I took my coffee on the broad balcony
overlooking Bayley Street. I found several people who were here in the
early days, and who gave me all the information I desired about the past
and the present. The first thing that struck me in Coolgardie was, “What
a splendid lot of men there are here!” They were, indeed, unusually tall,
stalwart, and good-looking. And why not? The pick of the Australian
colonies, the flower of our manhood, were here seeking for gold. Next
I was struck by the fine wide streets, lit with electric light, the
handsome buildings, and, lastly, the beautiful horses to be seen in cabs
or carts, or ridden by horsemen. It is wonderful to view this city of
the Golden West which was so recently a desert of sand, mulga-trees,
and scrub, where an occasional emu or kangaroo was monarch of all he
surveyed; where Sir John Forrest and his party of explorers twice camped,
little dreaming of the wealth of gold lying beneath their feet.
The facts about the finding of Coolgardie are thus given in Mr. Bayley’s
own narrative: “One morning before breakfast, while going after horses,
I picked up a nugget weighing half an ounce, and before dinner found 20
more ounces in the same way. We had left Southern Cross three months
previously, prospecting, in consequence of the report of Mr. Hardman, the
Government geologist, who had issued a map showing the places where gold
was most likely to be found, and had not found any gold of consequence
until now. The spot where we made the first find was about 200 miles from
the present Reward Claim. In about a month, by specking and a little dry
blowing, our gold consisted of about 200 ounces. Our rations ran out and
we made tracks to Southern Cross, but went back to the old workings, and
on Sunday afternoon, while fossiking around, we struck the reef. That
evening we picked up about 50 ounces of gold, and on Monday we pegged out
a prospecting area on the reef. That morning a party of three men came on
the scene. They had followed us from Southern Cross. That day we obtained
300 ounces from the cap of the reef. The party who had followed us stole
about 200 ounces from our claim, so we had to report it. For that purpose
I went into the Cross, carrying 554 ounces, which I showed to the Warden.
The field was then declared open. After another two days we collected
another lot of gold, amounting to 528 ounces. I conveyed them to Southern
Cross, and a fortnight after returning to the field had to make another
trip there, escorting 642 ounces. All we found was right on the surface,
and all we did was to knock the stuff out and dolly it with a pestle
and mortar. There were six cartloads of tailings left. After the gold
referred to had been extracted from the quantity of stuff, we obtained a
further amount of 298 ounces. We got a little over 2000 ounces altogether
out of the claim. We only had a five-acre lease of the Reward Claim.”
The news of the unprecedented richness of Bayley’s Find had long ere
this found its way over the entire world. Shortly after the goldfield
was proclaimed, and when the enormous richness of Bayley’s Reward Claim
was flashed all over the Australian continent, Mr. Sylvester Browne, of
Melbourne, a brother to Mr. T. Browne (better known as Rolf Boldrewood,
author of the famous Australian book, “Robbery under Arms”), travelled
to Coolgardie and, after making an examination of the property, bought
the Reward Claim from Bayley and Ford for £6000 and a sixth share in the
mine. The bargain completed, Mr. Sylvester Browne and some three or four
other gentlemen (mostly connections of his) set to work with their own
hands, and with no other tools but picks, shovels, hammers, and an iron
dolly, extracted the enormous quantity of 9000 ounces, or £36,000 worth
of gold, in a few weeks. On April 8, 1893, a parcel of 2500 ounces, worth
£10,000, arrived in Perth, and was lodged in the Union Bank. Then, on
June 7, 3185 ounces more were received by this bank and exhibited, and
on September 6 a third lot of 3605 ounces were deposited by Mr. Everard
Browne on behalf of Bayley’s Reward Company, and, finally, during the
Christmas holidays, a trophy, valued at £30,000, was gazed upon by
admiring crowds at the office of the bank. The trophy is a stirring
sight. It consists of 7000 ounces of smelted gold and 600 or 700 ounces
of rich quartz specimens, and everybody, from the Governor downwards, has
been to see it. This gold was taken from a depth of only 40 feet, while
some of the biggest nuggets at Ballarat, Victoria, were found more than
1000 feet below the surface. It is now placed beyond all doubt that our
golden reefs are what is termed “permanent,” a fact which pessimists,
both in and out of the colony, have until now been loath to admit.
[Illustration: BAYLEY’S REWARD MINE—UNDERLAY SHAFT]
Facts are stubborn things, and an ounce of experience is worth a ton of
theory. Here was a mine which in a few months yielded over,£80,000. The
following is an extract from a Perth newspaper:—
“The cry from Coolgardie is still of astounding discoveries of such rich
gold-bearing rock as mankind has never known before. There is actually
being exhibited at Counsel’s Stores a lump of gold and stone weighing a
little over two hundredweight, in which, it was estimated by experts,
there was nearly a hundredweight and a half of the precious metal. It
looks as if the time were within reasonable distance when _Punch’s_ old
prophecy would be realised, and the Cheapside hawkers be seen going about
with gold snuff-boxes and a ha’porth of snuff for a penny.”
One of the prospectors wrote thus: “I left the field at the end of
January last, when things were at their earliest stage, and even then
phenomenal finds were of daily occurrence. I remember one evening
particularly when the whole camp was thrown into a furore of excitement
owing to three men coming in with a gunny sack full of quartz some 60 lb.
in weight (I saw and handled the stone myself), and before the evening
they had dollied 150 ounces from it. At Adams’ Reef, 25 miles north of
Bayley’s, I saw tons of stone on which the gold was sticking in small
nuggets. There was one place we christened the Potato Ground, owing to
the large size of the nuggets picked up there.
“On Sundays, by way of rest, picks and shovels were abandoned, and almost
every one in the camp went out for an afternoon’s specking (looking on
the ground for nuggets). Before leaving Coolgardie I had the pleasure of
seeing over Bayley’s Reef. I shall never forget the sight; it settled my
career, and I do not think I shall ever follow any avocation but that
of a miner; for there on this reef, instead of, as one usually sees in
an ordinarily rich reef, specks and perhaps here and there nuggets of
gold—on Bayley’s there were veins, in fact, literally outstanding bars of
gold. So much so that if Mr. Bayley had given me leave to do an hour’s
work on it and take the results, my trip to the old country and back to
Western Australia would have cost me nothing, and I warrant I could have
had a pretty good time too.”
Arthur Bayley did not live long to enjoy the wealth he acquired through
his discovery, as he died at Melbourne in 1897, at the early age of
34 years. Gold-mining will trouble him no more. The handsome city of
Coolgardie remains a monument to his memory.
Many other reefs had by this time been discovered by various parties at
different distances from Coolgardie, one notably big and rich one at the
90-Mile, called the “Roaring Gimlet.” No stores or provisions lay that
way, consequently great privations had to be endured. However, those who
managed to remain got surprisingly rich stone on the surface. Here the
quartz was quite white and barren looking, but, on sinking, rich alluvial
gold was found at the rate of 250 ounces to the ton. Half-way to the
90-Mile, at what they call the 45-Mile, surprisingly rich results were
also obtained.
The camp at Bayley’s was at this time a scene of intense excitement; 3000
men were on the field. Such a collection of habitations was never before
seen—blanket-shelters, bush-humpies, and tents covered the ground; men
were digging, specking, dry blowing, and knapping every bit of available
quartz. Then provisions and water got scarce; famine was feared, and many
of the miners had to move on. “Water, water, everywhere, but not a drop
to drink.” Many a poor parched prospector on the weary tramp has said
this, and many explorers in this vast country have given the same cry. No
water—this is the terror of the Australian desert, more deadly than wild
beasts or savages in other countries. As the dragon in olden days guarded
the gate of the Hesperides wherein grew the golden apples, so thirst,
famine and fever seemed at first to guard Nature’s treasure-house.
Civilisation and engineering have now greatly diminished these terrors,
and in the new Eldorado large cities have arisen where once was an
inhospitable desert.
The marvellous City of Kalgoorlie stands on the site of Hannan’s Find.
Twelve months after the finding of Coolgardie an important discovery
was made 24 miles away in a north-easterly direction. About 150 miners
had set out to search for some lost prospectors near Yerilla. They were
compelled by lack of water to halt, and actually camped on the spot
where the find was afterwards made! Rain fell and the main body went
forward and continued their search, but two of the party, named Hannan
and Harrigan, remained, and stumbled on what has since proved to be the
richest field the world has ever known. They had begun specking, and
obtained nearly 100 ounces in a few days. As gold is worth nearly £4 per
ounce, that was good work. They returned to Coolgardie, reported the
find, and secured an area equal to 10 alluvial claims. Nearly 2000 men
followed them on their return to the find, most of whom remained there.
It would be impossible to tell in words the value and marvellous richness
of this new Eldorado. Nine thousand ounces of gold were taken from 4 tons
of stone at Hannan’s mine, and other claims of 50 feet square yielded 400
and 500 ounces of gold each. Some of the prospectors were new chums, and
had never been on a goldfield before. One who knew nothing of mining sunk
his shaft by sheer luck fair on the gold. Hundreds of practical diggers
had walked over the ground before, little thinking that the ironstone
gravel was so rich in the precious metal and that they were passing over
thousands of ounces. Another man dollied (that is, crushed by hand labour
with a heavy weight) 650 ounces in three weeks, the only implements
being half a bottle of quicksilver and the head of a pick. Many a time
these prospectors of the gold country have felt that a spring of fresh
water and a few loaves of bread would be more welcome to them than all
the gleaming gold they were getting. Under what trials did they work! No
water to wash the dirt, and yet the ground so moist that they had to dry
the dirt before they could blow it to find the gold; yet they persevered,
and many found fortunes by hard work and persistence. No wonder many
miners say that gold-mining is not so easy as falling off a log.
An Adelaide syndicate at this time sent Messrs. W. G. Brookman and
Pearce, with a capital of only £150, out of which passages, camels, and
rations had to be found, to prospect around this marvellous new find,
which they did with such success that they discovered a still more
wonderful place 3 miles from Hannan’s Find, and now called the Boulder.
Their find has since proved the greatest of all. The first claim was
called the Great Boulder, and the property included two ironstone hills,
one 100 yards long by 50 feet wide; the other twice that size. These
hills were covered with rich stones, the prospectors picking them up from
all parts, and Mr. Pearce picked up several large slugs (nuggets) at the
foot of the hill. They afterwards took up several more claims, and soon
found these to contain enormous gold-bearing reefs. Messrs. Brookman and
Pearce, by keeping to the old adage, that “a still tongue makes a wise
head,” remained undisturbed, and were able to take up all the ground they
wanted. Lake View Consols, Ivanhoe Associated, and other rich mines were
taken up by this little syndicate, and are now valued at £21,000,000. Mr.
Brookman, as you may suppose, is now one of the millionaires of Western
Australia.
The next great find was the Londonderry, in May 1894, when thousands of
ounces were dollied out from the surface. Lord Fingall bought out the
claim for an interest and £180,000 cash. Then followed the Wealth of
Nations, from whose first find was taken an enormous quantity of gold
and specimens worth £20,000. This claim was soon bought up for £150,000.
The inevitable rush to both these places followed. The men all seemed
to run mad in their thirst for gold. It was at this time that almost
everything showing gold was snapped up and put on the London market.
Stories savouring of the Arabian Nights were in free circulation, and
thousands of people from all parts of the world began to flock to
Western Australia, which from comparative obscurity has now become the
greatest gold-mining country the world has ever seen, and, no doubt, the
interior of this vast country holds an almost inexhaustible quantity of
gold-bearing quartz, which in years to come, when railways and other
appliances have made it easier to reach the far-off fields, will be
discovered and used. We may see such marvellous discoveries of gold
that “Golden Western Australia” will be the fitting name for the once
neglected Cinderella of the colonies.
[Illustration: Bayley Street, Coolgardie, 1897]