BRADSHAW TERRACE, SOUTH BULLER.

Westport Times, Volume IV, Issue 643, 9 April 1870, Page 2

BRADSHAW TERRACE, SOUTH BULLER.

RESULTS OF THE RUSH.

The work of stripping and washing has now been fairly commenced by several parties who had taken up claims at the foot of Bradshaw Terrace, on the south side of the Buller—the situation of the rush of last week. A number of others, encouraged by the results of the first experimental washinc;, have come from the Northern Terraces withiu the past few days, and are now at work stripping paddocks along the line of lead. Some swaginen have made their appearance also from Brighton and places to the southward of Charleston, and one'or two, acting upon advice, have come up from Hokitika, or have returned from Wangapeka, where they had wasted several months to no practical advantage. There is thus every appearance of those who have held to their claims being settled on the ground, and of a considerable accession soon being made to their numbers. The ground continues to prove itself, in each instance, capable of yielding wages, and some prospects give promise of a better result.

A few of the parties still live in Westport overnight, crossing the river each morning, and the way they take is still by the Lagoon. Others, however, have rigged up tents upon the cleared ground, or on the top of the Terrace, near the open pakihi; and on the site selected on the occasion of the first visit of the Warden, the nucleus, and nothing more than the nucleus, of a township is springing up. Mr Craddock, of the South Spit, who had the temporary use of Bradshaw's building, has had a wooden store of his removed from the South Spit to the new town site, and is now having it erected on what will probably be called Penniall Parade. Mr Brown, of the Camp Store, is also having a bush building erected as a store, to which is to be attached a bakery. An oven of magnificent dimensions is already in course of construction under the personal superintendence oi iurr cf. tt. King, late of Giles Terrace. The occupation of these sites, and also of the ground which is being dug, is subject to arrangements which yet have to be made between the Warden and Messrs Bradshaw and Penniall, the agricultural leaseholders; and, no doubt, sufficient and satisfactory arrangements will.be made. A hope may likewise be entertained that some steps will be taken for the formation of a track and bridge over the short space of land and water intervening between the ground and Packers' Point. A humble track, leading to the survey track, which is used by a few, was cut by Mr King, and he has also placed a small boat on the creek for general accommodation, but both a bridge and a better track deserve to be made.

Of the different claims, that on the Buller side of the prospectors, held by a party of six, and extending over the cleared ground, has been bottomed in two places, and a good payable prospect has been got in both shafts. At this point of the lead the surface deposit is greater than elsewhere, and the shafts have had to be sunk fourteen feet. The ground is dry, however, and seems to stand very well, so that the project of the party to work it by driving along the line of lead seems to be feasible, and certainly preferable to stripping. The prospectors are at present stripping, and they were on Thursday washing up the wash obtained from their first paddock. The result was not known when the claim was visited on that day, but there was a good deal of rough gold in the pan containing the washings of the blankets, and, with sufficient appliances in use, there would have been more. Blankets and low set ripples scarcely seem to answer the purpose of saving the gold got here, and the supply of water was rather light. A good rush of water, sharply set ripples, and plush would probably suit the purpose better. In the claim taken up originally by Champion and others, a party of four or five were opening a paddock, bnt they had not got further than securing a fair prospect, and ascertaining that they were on the centre of the lead. Gracey and his mate had sunk a paddock rather off the lead, but sufficiently on the edge not to make their day's labor altogether valueless. Their prospects still seem to show that it is a fair wages claim. M'Masters has been employing himself searching for a supply of water, but his ground will be regularly under work in a few days by himself or old mates. Morris and Miller have done as much work in actual stripping as any on the ground, and, with the assistance of a pump merely, for which there was little enough water, were about to put through their wash. Though they did not say so, it was said that their last washed dishful had yielded about five grains. Another party beyond were, on Thurß-

day, just completing their tail-race to the creek, and several beyond them were more or less advanced in similar work or in the work of preliminary stripping. Fresh claims to the southward had been pegged out, and the lead, so far as it is known, is being gradually taken up either by some of those who formed the first rush, or by strangers who are now more encouraged by the prospects and by the product of washings which have since been obtained. Since the ground has been more opened up, it scarcely presents so much of the features of an ancient beach as of an old river-bed—the former bed of the creek which now runs, as a rule, in a direction parallel to that of the lead. Should tbis be the case, the lead may be found to extend a considerable distance up the creek, towards Addison's Plat.