THE KIMBERLEY RUSH. PERSONAL NARRATIVE.

Waikato Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2211, 9 September 1886, Page 3

THE KIMBERLEY RUSH.

PERSONAL NARRATIVE.

The followihg extracts are taken from a detailed report of a conversation with a returned digger, published in the Lyttelton Times :— •

FA' AGG KRATED REI'OKTS. " We heard nothing at Derby of all the big finds reported to have been made. In fact, the stories that we brought were news to the people there. At Derby it was said that Cambridge Gulf was the place to get reliable news, and 1 heard that at Cambridge Gulf e\eryone said that if you wanted to get news you must go to Derby. The day before we arrived news came to Derby from a sheep station 25 miles off that three men had arrived theie from the fields and would be in Derby that night. We waited for two days and they did not come, but we heard that they had a liOoz nugget with them. The ne\t day they came in, and, so far from having any 20oz nugget, they said that they belonged to a party of seven, who, after prospecting for a, fortnight, had struck gold, and had got two ounces in a week. They had come down to buy provision*.. "To show how some people vvill start stones : A man told me that two blacks and a white man had got IOOOoz m a week. I said, ' Well, I'll start a yarn, and tell everybody that they got 1 He said, ' Don't do that, for there's the man who told me, and he assured me it was 10000/.' I went up to the man he pointed out, and said, just to tiy him, 'I say, mate, is it tine that two black men and a white man have got 2000oz in a week V He said ' Yes.' When I was there the steamer Otway c.ime in from Cambridge Gulf with a number of Government officials on board. I overheard one of them, who .seemed to be connected with the constabulary, talking to a f i iend of his, the captain of a small craft, on the jetty, who asked him the news from the Gulf. He replied, ' There are a number of fellows arriving, and a number coming back fiom the fields, some with a little gold, but more with none. Drays and pack saddles are lying abandoned on the road.' He also stated that some men had died on the road. I told a fellow-passenger what I had heard, and he went up to the official. After they had been conversing a few minutes I joined them, and the passenger told me th.it the official had told him quite a different tale. I ta\ed the official with saying what I had heard him say, and he admitted that drays had been aban doncrl, but said it was because the road was not suitable for them. He admitted, too, that one man had died of exhaustion, but he put tilings in a very different way to what he had to his friend the captain. THE WHKELBAUKOW MOVEMENT. " A good deal has been said about men going to the diggings with wheelbarrows. Now, I'll tell you the tmth about this wheelbarrow movement. Those who are going in that way are doing so because it is then last chance. They b.ne lost their ! hordes, or never had any. There is no work to bo gut at Derby. They have no means of getting away, and so they set out in twos, one wheeling the barrow, the ntliur drawing it witJi rope-*. Tlie bairow is loaded with, perhaps a hundred and a half of provisions. It will take them four weeks to pet to the held. In four months' time the wet season will set in, and it will be impossible to get down to Derby, and then where will the poor fellows be, with their provisions gone, and no means of getting any more. I can tell you that none of those waiting at Derby ate in good heart. Most of those whom we found in Derby were Australians ; most of those, who have arrived t«ince, and aie making their way to the Held-*, are New Zealauders. Even if it .should turn out a good diggings those who wait for six months before they go will be the wisest, j

THE CLIMATE. "The climate is very hot, but not unbearably m>. The niprhts 1 found very cold, and that w what is so trying. Everyone there seems to have had fever or ague ; but they don't appear to think much of it. Everyone cum ie* a bottle of some patent medicine — I don't retnembei the name ; but they won't t.ike the quinine. I can't say that I heard of the fever or ague proving fatal.

THK BLACKS. " I saw a few blacks about the Constabulary camp, and more wretched looking creatures I never saw. Their hair is long, their arms and legs like pipe stems, and their bodies not much bigger. They seemed quite inoffensive ; but I heard of two men being s;>i;.ned on the way to the diggings, and one ot the Constabulary told me that whenevei any of the wild blacks approached the camp, the only way was t<« pop them off and say nothing about it, for they were so treacherous that if one tried to make friends with them they were sure to watcli an oppuitunity to spear him, though they would not attack openly.

CONCLUSION. " Now I have told you pretty well all I know about Kimberley, and 1 Mould like you to advice anyone ■who thinks of going theie to wait. I have heard nothing really gnod ot the place yet. Of course the storekeepers and other people at Derby were not going to tell me all the bad thing* they could. They are in hopes of being able to do some trade with the stuff they have brought there. I asked once how it was, if the diggings were so good, some of the atorekeeperd didn't go there instead of waiting at Derby, where they are doing next to nothing. The reply was that they daren't, for fear they should be plundered. So many wheelbarrow men, with only a Hinall supply of provisions and no money, have gone up, that they would probably loot the first lot of food they came across, to .save tbem->elves from starvation. T fancy there i.s a good deal of money sunk in speculations for providing supplies for the diggers. I heard of one fum, or company, which was said to have invested £0000 in the business. Among other things, they had a lot of camels — 75 we heard at first— which were to be used in packing goods to the fields. When the camels came in from some place inland, we found there were only 24 of them. That's a specimen of the way things are exaggerated. One man, who landed from the Triumph, expected to make a deal of money by carting «-oods to the diggings for the others, and I believe he will, but the money he will pet is that which was brought over by those who were with him in the Triumph, and who naturally stick to one another to a certain extent. The people at Derby were always talking of the great things that were going to happen, but, as far as I could hear, they had been talking that way from the first, and nothing ever did happen. Before we left New Zealand we heard that an escort was about to start for the goldfields, and we reckoned that it would be back by the time we got to Derby. When we got there it had not started, though people were still baying that it was going to start m a day or two It hadn't started when I left, and I don't biippose it has .started yet. I <Wg think there is anything for it to bria* down, and I don t suppose that oil the gold got from all parts of the field *ver *»"<* ifc was firbfc dlhCom ' ed amuunth Smote than a few hundred ounces cert'i y very much lens than a thousand I way Bay that though X have left the

place I have a considerable interest in it yet, as 1 invested some money in the fitting out of our party, and my mates are still thore."