OTAGO EMERGES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26707, 28 February 1948, Page 6

OTAGO EMERGES

"The New Iniquity"

Not for long could the Free Church keep Otago to itself. Wakefield’s dream of a settlement bound together by loyalty to one church was too exclusive to work, and the “ new iniquity," as the gold-rush immigrants of the ’sixties were Called, had a profound influence on the nature of’the colony. Gold in the rivers, gold in the hills, gold to be unearthed by digging and. purified by panning. Men and women on foot with heavy swags, or in drays with tents and picks- and shovels, gold-fevered, swarming to the gold. In 1861 Gabriel Read found gold in rich deposits in the Tuapeka River; "for ten hours’ work, with •pan and butcher's knife, I was enabled to collect ten ounces of gold." The news flew. Tokomairiro, the nearest township, was deserted, and at next Sunday’s service the minister and precentor formed the congregation, while one of the elders took church at the goldfield. Then from further afield they came. “ Every man who can get away has gone to the diggings. The blacksmith’s forge is blown out, the carpenters have bolted, the sawmill is silent,” wrote the Rev. (by now Dr) Thomas Burns. They came from the California and Victoria gold-diggings. In less than a . year twenty thousand new immigrants had arrived. For a few short months “ Gabriel’s Gully ” saw a buzz of human activity. Then Hartley and Reilly made a spectacular find in the Dunstan area and panned eighty-seven pounds of gold out of ffie Molyneux before their news brought a second gold rush.

Dunedin prospered. Revenue soared from £97,000 in 1860 to £470,000 in 1862. In ten years nearly : twenty-four million pounds, worth of gold was won. Prices rose, bread was a shilling a loaf. Work was neglected. Who cared, when there was gold to be had for ■ the ■ taking? But some who looked further ahead were not ajtogcther happy. Wrote the Otago Witness: “We are not of the number who look upon the discovery of gold as th« greatest of blessings.” Flour was wanted more, and those who dug for gold could not dig for crops. “ The, bulk of them arc quiet, civil, hardworking fellows," wrote Dr Burns, but went on to speak of others, who “ keep our police force very busy.” It seemed for a time as though the " new iniquity ” would swamp the "old identities,” and turn the carefully planned Free Church settlement into a mere gold camp. But no such catastrophe happened. The newcomers helped to widen the interests of the colony, while the sound cotninonseiise of the settlement was able to turn- the ephemeral glitter of gold into a permanent prosperity. ■ - G. B.