Fortune to Poverty

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 112, 2 August 1927, Page 12

Fortune to Poverty

Goldfield Memories

Fates of Shotover Finders

Wealth beyond their dreams was won by the four finders of the famous Shotover mine at Thames in ’67, but strange are the ways of fate—they all died in poverty.

The actual circumstances of the find seem to have become hazy, but Mr. James Mays, of Devonport. has a vivid recollection of the incidents leading to the uncovering of the reef and of the fact that if he had not been busy just at the moment he might have been a sharer in the golden treasure.

Mr. Mays and a fellow apprentice in the building trade found themselves stranded in the middle of 1867 by the fact that their employer, a Parnell builder, had adopted the then fashionable practice of going bankrupt. Mr. Mays was the proud possessor of £9, saved by him by the foresight of his elder brother, and his fellowworker had a few pounds, too.

The first rush to the Thames had then subsided, as no quantity of alluvial gold had been found, but a second boom was developing; the youths came to the unanimous conclusion that if they could* get a tent they could live at the Thames for about

‘■five bob a week,” so the great adventure began with the purchase of a military tent and the securing of passages to the Thames in a cutter, the Severn, which took 2| days, to reach the end of the Firth.

The passengers had to land in the mud, which seemed a huge lark to the boys. They got to Shortland and near Butt’s pub. erected t-heir tent. There was a huge community fire always burning just opposite the hotel, and newcomers congregated there, since it was the place where all the field gossip was bandied about. Mr. Mays and his partner, under the guidance of an old Bendigo man, constructed a “cradle” and spent a couple of days “panning” the beach; then Mr. Mays commenced his contracting career by undertaking to erect a store (the first on the mining field) for the sum of £1; the building consisted of sharpened 3x4 timber driven into the ground, with a couple of rafters overhead. The finishing was bagging. Other buildings were undertaken, and while working at one of these a Mr. Ebenezer White, of Parnell, came wandering along, and seeing the young fellow Mays, whom he knew in Parnell as one of the boys who rang the bells at the Bishop’s Chapel, he stopped to yarn with him. Mr. White was employed as an interpreter by the Government in dealing with the Maoris. He told Mr. Mays that the Maoris had told him that there was gold in the Kurunui Creek. RUMOURS OF GOLD Rumours of gold existing were heard so frequently that no one bothered much about the latest rumour. Mr. White having nothing special to do, suggested going along to the creek, but Mr. Mays was busy and could not go just then. However, some by-

standers volunteered to go with Mr. White, and as they went along they gathered up others. The creek was inspected, and though no gold was found, yet, as the Maoris had stated, there was a reef running across the face exposed by a waterfall.

Some of the stone was knocked out and passed around from hand to hand. The unanimous opinion was that though the stone did not contain gold it might carry silver. Not in the least disappointed, the explorers returned from their expedition to get tea and relate their yarn at the fireside. Among the listeners was a man named Murphy, whose name was long attached to a hill at the back of the Thames town. Murphy, after listening to the tale of the prospectors, thundered that he would soon settle the question as to whether the stone found contained gold. He was handed a specimen, and having scraped a clear place in the fire, he threw’ the stone in and let it “burn.” When the outer scale fell off, Murphy, getting down on his hands and knees, gave a lusty puff and blew’ away the debris. After a close examination of the heated stone he was convinced that it did not contain gold, and the audience thus satisfied, returned to spinning its other stories.

Later on, a more curious onlooker, with more experience, raked the abandoned specimen out of the ashes and broke it up, rather out of idle curiosity than from the belief that the others had missed anything. The fractured stone showed traces of gold, and the upshot was that the Shotover claim was pegged out by Hunt, Geo. Clarkson, Wm. Cobley and John White. FATES OF THE FINDERS The four original owners of the claim found themselves wealthy beyond hopes. Hunt built or acquired jx fine home in Remuera and provided his mother with a nice home at Takapuna, buying the old hotel there on the corner of the road leading to the lake; afterwards he went to England, but died a poor man in Sydney in 1900. Cobley took up his residence at Devonport and owned the land fronting Cheltenham beach. He made the road leading to the beach, which was long known as Cobley’s beach. One time, annoj'ed by the fact that he had missed the last ferry, he was induced by Captain Casey, a well-known shipbroker, to buy the boat Lalla Rookh and run a ferry service to the wharf at Church Street, Devonport. He, too, died poor. White having lost his money, was thrown on the beneficence of friends, who secured him a job in a timber mill north of Auckland. Almost as soon as lie commenced work he was fatally injured. Clarkson, having got through his money, was glad to take a job in a mine within 50 miles of his bonanza, sharpening picks at 30 “bob” a week.