AFRICAN GOLD RUSH

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXII, Issue 68, 3 March 1932, Page 6

AFRICAN GOLD RUSH

DISCOVERY IN KENYA. EUROPEANS SEEKING FORTUNES. Considerable interest has been aroused at Nairobi, Kenya, South Africa, in the recent discoveries of gold at Kakamega, and although iiiey are not to be compared with the great finds in the past in the Klondyke and Australian fields, there is reason to believe that the alluvial deposits are more extensive than was at first surmised. Kakamega lies 20 miles north of Kisumu, the railhead on the northeastern shore of Lake Victoria.

The workings have been confined to rivulets feeding the river Yala, and it would be hard to guess that the hot valleys even now shelter 400 European prospectors and their attendant natives. Prospectors’ licenses cost only a few shillings, and there is a tax of 10s levied cn each claim staked.

Many farmers, tired of growing maize to feed the locusts, have turned their eyes to Kakamega, and have set. out in their lorries for the goldfields. It is thought that richer deposits, and even nuggets, will be discovered when the workings have been further developed. At present the new prospector stakes his claim on a certain stream and spends the first few days clearing the rich alluvial deposit from the gold streak, which may be Ift. or 2ft. below the surface. Thon having constructed his channel for washing, he begins operations in earnest. The gold streak may be 2ft. or 3ft. thick, but below that the bed of the stream yields nothing.