WILD NEW GUINEA

Hokitika Guardian, 11 August 1931, Page 2

WILD NEW GUINEA

ADVENTURES WITH NATIVES GOLD PROSPECTORS. i RICH IN POTENTIALITIES. Well seasoned With 15 years’ ex; erience m -New Guinea, Air J. A. Mi l.r, interested in gold mining, arrived in Wellington on Tuesday by the Uiininroa to make arrangements with a 'Ne.v Zealand syndicate to lead a party Ot prsopectors to spine. previously unexplored territory in New Guinea. Mr -Mil'er and h.s party will gain access to the interior from the south so as to avoid crossing a very high.mountain range that has to be crossed traveling from the north.

Interviewed on his arrival, Mr Miller told a “Dominion” reporter that the possibilities for go’d in New Guinea were “absolutely wonder ul.” The surfaces of former German New Guinea, now administered by Australia under' mandate 'from the League of Nations, and of the southern portion Papua, had barely been scratched, At present gold was the staple commodity of New Guinea, for the prmes of copra and rubber had fallen to such an extent as to make them scarcely worth growing. Two years ago the ruling rate for rubber was 3s per lb., and copra £4O a ton; now they were and £l2 a ton respectively.

FORTUNES MAPS, Transport fliffi'cpltlps were very acute in New Guinea, l>e said, and pi conseqqenpp aeroplanes carried the majority of |hp goods from the coast tq the various places inland- Almost everywhere one looked —in the riyeiv beds and on the hill* there were evidence of the presence of gold,-but the overburden, that is the earth and undergrowth, made it very difficult tP make a proper inspection of what really was there. Some of the early miners liad made fabulous sums Ca.pt. Harry Darby, who died in Calcutta some weeks ago, left ..the place wjth £75,000 to his credit—all gained with crude mining implements in about five months. • •

New Guinea con’d not be compared with the Klondyke’, inasmuch as none of the lawlessness present in thfjt place existed, he continued. Of ah the thousands of ounces carried out by the natives, not one ounce has ever been stolen. Two very big concerns were now commencing operations, -lie said—the Placer Company, an Canadian organisation with a capital of about five million pounds, and the Bulolo Gold Mining Co. Both had acquired large areas of land, and were installing the most modern plant and equipment. -

WARLIKE NATIVES. Mr Miller spoke about the dangers from the warlike natives which the prospectors had hod tq fppe, Only within the past five or six months five or six men hftd lost their lives, sojne qf thepi being the two Lehu brothers. Trist, an aviator whp was forced down, find <twp pro pect'Ts pained Alf Belffeld -and Herbert Swanson, Wilde camped near the headwaters o( the Tauri Raver some ten months ago Mr Miller had rather an exciting though unenviable experience. It appears that the fiercest natives are called the Kuku Kuku tribe, nomad’, who live in the inferior, and they are the sworn enemies of the coastal natives. Wanting to secure steel implements, knives and axes, a party of the Kuku Kuku warriors attacked Mr Miller’s camp at dead of night. The natives were beaten off, tut only with the loss of two of their number. The next morning quite 300 arrows were found round about. The natives had shot the arrows in the air hoping that some would penetrate the tents and kill the sleepers inside. Of course they had no chance against modern firearms, but nevertheless it was not an experience to be relished. A BACKWARD RACE. Apart frem gold-mining, Mr Miller did not see any great potentialities in the country, with perhaps the exception of cattle-grazing, which had been carried on with marked success at gome of the mission stations. The natives themselves were very backward, an l those in the interior had in many cases never seen a white man or his commodities before. They were especially frightened at the sight of matches. Missionaries of the various denominations were well-establshed all al ng the coast, but it seemed almost futile trying to instruct such a- backward race. As to the elimtae, Mr Miller added that malaria was extremely prevalent around the coastal regions, hut in on the higher altitudes, quite a pleasant climate was enjoyed.