KLONDYKE GOLD RUSH.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15663, 17 July 1914, Page 9

KLONDYKE GOLD RUSH.

MR. BEDDOE'S REMINISCENCES.

Some interesting reminiscences of the Klondyke gold rush were related by Mr. W. A. Beddoe, F.R.G.S., Trade Commissioner for Canada, in the course of a.lecture on Canada, delivered last night at the Leys Institute. The first find of gold in Yukon was made on August 17, 1896, by a Scotchman named Carraack. A month before the discovery, Mr. Beddoe met Carmack at his encampment on the Yukon River. There Carmack was living with an Indian wife and a number of children. " I was going down tho Yukon River with Indians," said Mr. Beddoe, describing the encounter, "and when opposito the Klondyke River, an Indian came out in a canoe, and pointing to Carmack's tent, invited me ashore. I went to the bank and scrambled up through dense overhanging bushes, and met Carmack. At the point where I met Carmack is bow the very centre of tho city of Dawson. Carmack invited mo to spend tho day and night, and leave next day. This I did. I had to cut down trees to put up my tent. Carmack. had not seen a white man for years, and I had travelled nearly 2000 miles without seeing any persons but Indians. I proceeded on my way down the river, and ultimately emerged into Behring Sea, spent two months with the Esquimaux, and finally reached tho Pacific Coast in a trading boat. A month later Carmack went up the Klondyke River, and turned into Rabbit Creek, where he made the greatest gold discovery of the century, staking a claim which realised for him nearly £100,000. Three years later, in 1899, Mr. Beddoe again visited the Yukon, and at the place whore he had met Carmack he found a city of 12,000 people.