Tales Told by an Early Pioneer

Lake County Mail, Issue 11, 6 August 1947, Page 12

Tales Told by an Early Pioneer

It was now fast drawing on shearing time and as yet we., had engaged no shearers to do the work, so I got orders to go to tiie Nokomai. diggings situated about 15 miles from the foot of the lake, and there to pick up a few men who could shear.

On my arrival there I went to the bar of the principal shanty, where I saw a good many idlers hanging about, and after talking to some of them on the subject for which I had visited these diggings, they brought matters to a point by saying that they would not shear for less than £3 a hundred sheep and began chaffing me and saying that the squatters 'would have to shear their own sheep that year. I was quite equal to the occasion, however, and had a plentiful supply of chaff to give them in return.

I pointed out that I had never expected to yet gentlemen of means and education such as those were' whom I had the pleasure of addressing to come and shear our commonplace “ jumlmcks ” but that I would be glad to secure the services of any sort of loafers, and to these I would give £1 a 100 and their grub. An angry scene took place and several of the most blackguard-looking ones demanded, with clenched fists, if I alluded to them as loafers. I, however, was not in the least diseoncerted, but repudiated any such meaning of my words, saying that I had only come amongst them —the aristocracy of the diggings, so to speak —to see if .they •ould assist me and benefit their own coaumunity by pointing out any’ idlers likely to be of no use to me, as of course, judging from the present company’s appearance and the expensive drinks which they were imbibing, I felt •ure they were all in too affluent circumstances as I was able to offer them.

Standing near me was a trooper named Mat Callan, who was afterwards promoted to the detective force, and he, with a merry twinkle in his eye, “tipped me th« wink,” and following him outside the shanty, I found him convulsed with laughter at my chaffing of the idlers, for as he told me, they were all hard up, and would be glad to get a job if they could only get one that they were accustomed to, but that doubtless shearing was too hard work for such lazy loafers as they were. He then told me that I had tetter stay at the police camp that night along with Sergeant Baillie and himself, as some of the chaps might be annoyed at my having made such fools ©f them, and would be inclined to do me a dirty trick in turn.

During the evening, when at the camp, conversing with liaillie, Mat came into the tent and said that two of the fellows I had seen at the shanty wanted to speak to me, hut warned me to he on my guard. I went outside, and there found two men dressed in rags, who told me they were “ dead broke ’ and would be glad of the job of shearing if I could get them taken up to the station. I told them to start off at once to that they would be at the foot of the lake early next day, when, they could go up in the boat along with me, the only condition I stipulated for being that they would finish the shearing .before making an attempt to discover gold, and if they did so Mr Rees would give them stores to enable them to prospect the country.

Witli these two I sailed next day for lionie, and so disreputable was the clothin" of one of the men that when we arrived at the station and he heard that there were women living there, he refused to leave the boat until T went and brought an old pair of my trousers and made a present of them. This man was Arthur, the discoverer of Arthur’s Point, who made and kept the grip of probably more gold than any other man who ever worked on the Shotovor. His companion was Harry Redfern, afterwards his mate at Arthur’s Point, and who started the first theatre in Queenstown. But I am anticipating. During my absence several hard up diggers had turned up at the station, and had been promptly engaged to sheax ■o we were able to start work at once.

It was on the 13th of November, 1862 that we began shearing, and, on the following Sunday, Arthur and Henry Redfern went quietly off together up Blow Ho Gully on a prospecting expedition. Coming to the bank of the Shotover, they set to work, and with a pannikin and a butcher’s knile in an hour’s time, they picked up several pounds worth of gold. Hurrying back, they came to me and told me all, and said they must be off. as every minute lost meant pounds out of their pockets, and although I reminded them of thenagreement they said they did not care, and it was not until I pointed out the fact that they could get food from no one except Mr Rees that they felt themselves in somewhat of a fix. The men were completely their heads with excitment, and when I took them to Mr Rees he saw that it would he useless to try to keep them at work, so he paid them off, gave them flour, tea, and sugar, and let them go. They at once pegged out the famous Arthur’s Point claim and it is now a matter of history how much they raised therefrom.

It was not until December 10 that we finished shearing, owing to the paucity of hands, and then we begaln to get ready to start with the sheep for the top of the lake, under terms of my arrangement with Mr Rees. But the stir of the diggings delayed everything; hands ran off from the station, and the few of us who did stick to our work were busy day and night. At last the services of ,a shepherd, named James Reid was secured and he, George Simpson and I, started off with the sheep, reaching the Buckleburn in four days’ time. But the diggers were keeping pace with us, for rafts and wretched looking boats of all descriptions were being constructed and paddled up the lake side, and everywhere the prospecting hole of the digger was conspicuous by its presence. When we reached Simpson’s Creek, we found a little community of settlers there, and hero we were able to do a little business in the way of butchering. I have mentioned that on our last trip from the head of the lake four lambs were lost. These four we picked up on this journey, three of them being rams and one a wether. They were not more than, 14 months old, the first pair of second teeth being just through the gums, and yet, they weighed as follows: The wether, 72 pounds; and the rams, 82, 85, and 83 pounds respectively of clean mutton. Those acquainted with the usual size and weights of Merino sheep will be able to appreciate the splendid growth of these four stray lambs.

My account of the settlement of the Wakatipu Lake District draws to an end, and as it is not my purpose to carry on the narrative further than the time when the goldfields having been declared, the country became over-run with people and the few of us who represented the original Wakatipians were lost in the general crowd. My stay at the head of the lake on this occasion extended to six months, when Mr Rees’s runs, with the exception of the peninsula one, having been compensated for, his rights thereto ceased, and so I left the Buckleburn station for ever. For a few months I remained, in Queenstown, which had sprung up on the site of our home station, the wool shod having been purchased from Mr Roes and opened as the Queen’s Hotel, and then, having invested in some land in Southland, and having built a house thereon, I stocked up and leaving it in charge of George Simpson, I sailed for England, homo and beauty.

Three years afterwards I revisited the Lake District, and what a change had come over everything. A few of my old friends still remained, but alas they were few indeed, and even these

had lost the homely, friendly style which characterised the Wakatipians, and had developed a taste for the bustle of crowded haunts, and for the pleasure . which wealth alone can procure.

On the banks of the Waitaki River, Mr and Mrs Rees and I again met, before I sailed from New Zealand in 18(58, and 1 mean no insinuation when I say that we three heartily agreed that the life in the Wakatipn district, before the advent of the diggings, was far preferable to what could be had after that time.

(To be continued)