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One Man’s Goldfield: the story of the Horseshoe Bend Diggings, William Rigney and Somebody’s Darling

much the same description of land between the Beaumont and Teviot River. Most of
the country had a beautiful cover of grasses.

After crossing the Teviot River, the country got much more open and the cover of
grasses not so good. Towards the Molyneux River the country still continued scrubby,
and therefore I did not make an attempt to get to the bank of the river, so continued on
the high ground to the top of the Knobby Ridges. These ridges are well named, as
they are closely covered with rocks. At this stage I had travelled over all the country
now known as Waitahuna, Tuapeka, Beaumont, Ormaglade, Teviot, Long Valley, and
3
Knobby Ranges."

The first settlement closely followed the early exploration of the area. Walter Miller
took up the Oven Hills Run in 1859, John Cargill the Teviot Run in 1860, and
4
Archibald Anderson the Beaumont Run in 1858.

The runholders were quick to develop transport systems to allow them to bring stock
in and ship wool out. When the first gold seekers arrived in the area in 1863 they
were directed to Horseshoe Bend as a location where gold had been seen by a
ferryman employed to ferry the Beaumont Station wool clip across the Clutha for
onward transport to Dunedin by wagon. The wool was transported by bullock team
from the Station to the east bank of the river and ferried across in a boat made of
sewn hides to an accommodation house on the west bank. The proprietor of the
accommodation house, Thomas Evans, stored the wool until it could be shipped to
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Dunedin on wagons returning from delivering supplies to the inland goldfields.

Only ten years passed from the first European sighting of the area to the settling of the
sheep stations and the arrival of the gold seekers. The population of Horseshoe Bend
grew during the gold mining years to a peak of around two hundred and has now
declined again to a single permanent dwelling.

The discovery of gold

The date of the discovery of gold at the Bend is not recorded. The Beaumont Station
ferryman directed the first gold miners to the Bend in 1863, suggesting that the
presence of gold had been known for some time prior to that but that no effort had
been made to mine it.

The majority of miners moving inland to the Arrow and Dunstan gold rushes crossed
the Clutha river by ferry at Beaumont, and continued inland on the west bank of the
river. This route avoided the steep sides of the river between Beaumont and Millers
Flat and, incidentally, what was to become the Horseshoe Bend Diggings.

One party chose to ignore the regular route, either out of the desire to explore the east
side of the river or to save the five shillings per person fare to cross the river on the
ferry. The party followed the old Maori track up the side of the river and camped for
the night at the mouth of Jesse's Creek, now known as the Little Minzion Burn. John
Patallo, the Beaumont Station ferryman, lived on the small island in the middle of the
river opposite the mouth of Jesse's Creek. He visited the miner's camp in the evening

3 Beattie, H "Otago Place Names" Otago Daily Times and Witness Newspaper Company. 1948
4 Webster, A.H.H "Teviot Tapestry. A History of the Roxburgh- Millers Flat District" Otago Centennial Publications. 1948
5 Stewart, R.T Original manuscript used for a radio presentation. Circa 1940

© Jeff Robertson 7