C. Nyal de Kaye
New member
There are quite a few lonely graves on Australia's remote gold fields. Many of the sites are well-marked, some are sign-posted, and all are worth a visit in my opinion. Mind you, I'm the sort of bloke that regularly visits cemeteries, so maybe I'm a bad judge.
Lots of people just vanished in the gold-rush days. Even these days people die out there despite our better means of communication. The problem today is that in many remote parts of the country mobile phones don't work. If you get yourself lost you could wait by a lonely track for a long time before anyone came along; and they'd probably be lost too. The Australian poet, Banjo Paterson, wrote a line adequately describing this sort of place as A road seldom crossed 'cept by folk that are lost ... That covers it pretty well.
There is no water, no shelter, no food and very few people. In the old days these factors simply meant a lonely death for many. The young man in this story did die a lonely death, through no fault of his own, but he also had friends who found and buried him as we will see.
The young man was John Aspinall and he was just 23 when he died. He was born in New Zealand into a gold prospecting family. His father had discovered a gold bearing reef in NZ and had become quite wealthy. Young John grew up on that goldfield and was, by age 22, quite a knowledgeable and experienced prospector. His father died and John decided to leave the family home and make his own fortune in one of the many exciting gold-rushes then being reported from Western Australia.
He landed at Fremantle and set out on the long overland journey to Coolgardie, which, at that time, was the epicentre of gold exploration and the main restocking area for the miners. He and his mates left Coolgardie and set out looking for new ground and ultimately came to a spot called Hawkes Nest on the Mount Margaret Gold Fields. These days it is easy to get to and is about 25 kms (15 miles) from Laverton.
John and his associates determined that Hawkes Nest would be a very rich area, and how right they were. Millions of dollars worth of gold was found in that general area, and is still being found there now, some of it by me.
It happened that John's mates went back to Coolgardie for supplies, leaving John alone at the camp. It was a journey of about 390 kms (240 miles). He was busy prospecting and testing the ground. In his diary he records that the heat "one day this summer" reached 172
Lots of people just vanished in the gold-rush days. Even these days people die out there despite our better means of communication. The problem today is that in many remote parts of the country mobile phones don't work. If you get yourself lost you could wait by a lonely track for a long time before anyone came along; and they'd probably be lost too. The Australian poet, Banjo Paterson, wrote a line adequately describing this sort of place as A road seldom crossed 'cept by folk that are lost ... That covers it pretty well.
There is no water, no shelter, no food and very few people. In the old days these factors simply meant a lonely death for many. The young man in this story did die a lonely death, through no fault of his own, but he also had friends who found and buried him as we will see.
The young man was John Aspinall and he was just 23 when he died. He was born in New Zealand into a gold prospecting family. His father had discovered a gold bearing reef in NZ and had become quite wealthy. Young John grew up on that goldfield and was, by age 22, quite a knowledgeable and experienced prospector. His father died and John decided to leave the family home and make his own fortune in one of the many exciting gold-rushes then being reported from Western Australia.
He landed at Fremantle and set out on the long overland journey to Coolgardie, which, at that time, was the epicentre of gold exploration and the main restocking area for the miners. He and his mates left Coolgardie and set out looking for new ground and ultimately came to a spot called Hawkes Nest on the Mount Margaret Gold Fields. These days it is easy to get to and is about 25 kms (15 miles) from Laverton.
John and his associates determined that Hawkes Nest would be a very rich area, and how right they were. Millions of dollars worth of gold was found in that general area, and is still being found there now, some of it by me.
It happened that John's mates went back to Coolgardie for supplies, leaving John alone at the camp. It was a journey of about 390 kms (240 miles). He was busy prospecting and testing the ground. In his diary he records that the heat "one day this summer" reached 172
