PIONEERING DAYS.

Waikato Times, Volume 104, Issue 17446, 5 July 1928, Page 9

PIONEERING DAYS.

MR COATES' NARRATIVE. VISIT TO THAMES QOLDFIELDS. A SHORT STAY. In my last I had arrived in Auckland per S.S. Taranaki. Auckland in those days was very little larger than Hamilton is to-day. Neither Ponsoaby nor Parnell was in the town or whatever it was called. It had not seen a Are brigade. One of the nights that I was there a fire took place in ' the Exchange Hotel in Queen Street, and I saw some men bring otft a piano from the upstairs sitting room on to the -balcony and then fling it into the street, which seemed a very foolish thing to do. To me it did not appear as if trade was good ,in Auckland, but it rapidly improved after the Thames Goldfleld got properly going. I haa a pretty good look round the town. I went up "Jacob's ladder" on to Port Brittomart, where the 28th Royal Irish were stationed. They seemed a very fine body of men and were very popular in Auckland. The next day I took a trip to Shortland in the Enterprise No. 2, the. only boat then running to the Thames and she was not a nice boat to travel an. I had a good look around • the new goldfleld and slept the first night in a tent at a place called Punga Flat, but, like a great many there, I was disappointed that the gold was only to be got out of the quartz or rock, there being no alluvial gold as in the Souwi Island. ~ ' . On the evening of the second my stay I went to the first theatre held on the new goldfleld. It was a rather rough built place, being only finished that day. The actors were Johnny Hall and his wife. The part chosen for the flrst night was Jessies Dream," depicting the dreadful night at Lucknow during the Indian' Mutiny. On the third day I went back to Auckland fully determined to go • farming in the Waikato.