Dr Lloyd Carpenter

On the road between the famed tourist hubs of Wanaka and Arrowtown on New Zealand’s South Island lies the former 1860s gold-rush-era town of Cardrona. There, beside an immaculately kept heritage precinct of nineteenth-century wooden buildings, tourists pause at the Cardrona Hotel, an architectural relic of the rush for gold in Central Otago. This hotel has emerged in guidebooks and local histories, and on social media sites and ratings guides, as a tourism and craft beer ‘must-do’ and… Show more

On the road between the famed tourist hubs of Wanaka and Arrowtown on New Zealand’s South Island lies the former 1860s gold-rush-era town of Cardrona. There, beside an immaculately kept heritage precinct of nineteenth-century wooden buildings, tourists pause at the Cardrona Hotel, an architectural relic of the rush for gold in Central Otago. This hotel has emerged in guidebooks and local histories, and on social media sites and ratings guides, as a tourism and craft beer ‘must-do’ and, according to Heritage New Zealand, has become New Zealand’s most photographed hotel. Its popularity defies belief and even logic, and yet each new visitor to the region appears determined to leave with at least one photograph of its distinctive facade in their portfolio. The story behind the survival of the heritage-listed structure and its elevation to the heights of popular and tourist culture ‘icon’ status stems from a combination of its remote location, the enduring romanticization of the gold rush, a succession of eccentric owners, the mythopoeia of a popular book from the 1950s and its inclusion in a brewer’s marketing campaign. Each has scaffolded the Cardrona Hotel to become iconic to the gold-rush era, heritage tourism and New Zealand’s popular culture and identity. Show less

Much of Otago goldfields history begins with the idea that a ruling class of newspaper-owning, ‘Old Identity’ settlers paternalistically subverted news of Otago gold finds to hold back the morally-corrupting influence of the ‘New Iniquity’ of gold miners.
However, a search of newspaper articles before 1860 reveals gold being found – and reported – across the province from the first years of settlement. The newspaper editors, albeit after an initial fear of the ‘mania’ of gold rushes, held… Show more

Much of Otago goldfields history begins with the idea that a ruling class of newspaper-owning, ‘Old Identity’ settlers paternalistically subverted news of Otago gold finds to hold back the morally-corrupting influence of the ‘New Iniquity’ of gold miners.
However, a search of newspaper articles before 1860 reveals gold being found – and reported – across the province from the first years of settlement. The newspaper editors, albeit after an initial fear of the ‘mania’ of gold rushes, held nothing back from their readers.
This article discusses the events leading up to the ‘official’ recognition of the Otago gold rush, examines the historiography of the ideas of newspaper cover-ups and compares the situation in America and Australia, reaching a new conclusion about gold reports in New Zealand. Show less

The history of Māori miners at the Aorere gold rush in 1856-8 is well-documented in research by Hilary and John Mitchell; Philip Ross May examined the multi-layered history of Māori in history of the goldfields of the Buller, and Westland, and the full story of the convoluted machinations of government agents and miners and their dealings with the Māori of the Coromandel are becoming known as Treaty of Waitangi hearings examine the past. However the story of the Māori miners of Otago has… Show more

The history of Māori miners at the Aorere gold rush in 1856-8 is well-documented in research by Hilary and John Mitchell; Philip Ross May examined the multi-layered history of Māori in history of the goldfields of the Buller, and Westland, and the full story of the convoluted machinations of government agents and miners and their dealings with the Māori of the Coromandel are becoming known as Treaty of Waitangi hearings examine the past. However the story of the Māori miners of Otago has remained relatively unknown, beyond a few legends offered as exotic participants parenthetic to the real events of the gold rush there. On closer examination it is clear that the true history of Māori miners in Central Otago is far richer, more complex, and much older than is widely known. This article examines this history until the mid-1860s. Show less

The historic reserve at the goldfields-era ghost town of Bendigo is a spectacularly beautiful place of stone ruins, abandoned cottages and mining detritus scattered across a quintessential Central Otago landscape.
The archaeological landscape features one atypical ruin, the remains of a very substantial house. Unlike similar structures which have crumbled naturally through years of exposure to the extreme Bendigo climate, it was deliberately wrecked during a bitter industrial dispute in… Show more

The historic reserve at the goldfields-era ghost town of Bendigo is a spectacularly beautiful place of stone ruins, abandoned cottages and mining detritus scattered across a quintessential Central Otago landscape.
The archaeological landscape features one atypical ruin, the remains of a very substantial house. Unlike similar structures which have crumbled naturally through years of exposure to the extreme Bendigo climate, it was deliberately wrecked during a bitter industrial dispute in 1881. This conflict tore the community apart, as in scenes reminiscent of Highland Clearances and Irish Land League battles, armed police oversaw the employer-decreed destruction of homes and the eviction of families in what was the only New Zealand dispute to escalate into this sort of extreme behaviour.
I used contemporary local and regional newspaper reports to examine the events of the strike and discuss the profoundly polarised parties in the dispute, highlighting some unique aspects of the events in the context of New Zealand’s labour history. Show less

Abandoned shafts, moonscapes of sluice workings and mullock piles beside old mines are typical elements in landscapes shaped by a gold rush. In Otago the prevalence of these landscapes means that for many areas, economic histories detailing gold yields, mining enterprises and the miners that worked them are lost or ignored as typical visual markers of an interesting heritage.
Taking Otago’s Rise and Shine Valley as an exemplar landscape, I detail nine decades of its mining history and… Show more

Abandoned shafts, moonscapes of sluice workings and mullock piles beside old mines are typical elements in landscapes shaped by a gold rush. In Otago the prevalence of these landscapes means that for many areas, economic histories detailing gold yields, mining enterprises and the miners that worked them are lost or ignored as typical visual markers of an interesting heritage.
Taking Otago’s Rise and Shine Valley as an exemplar landscape, I detail nine decades of its mining history and explain its remaining archaeology. This reveals layers of the industrial and mining past that is not apparent to the casual observer. Show less

The first dam on Central Otago’s Clutha River was not the 1956 Roxburgh dam, but a gold-mining enterprise’s structure built 93 years earlier, when the river was still known as the Molyneux. If it had succeeded, it would be lauded with other colonial-era New Zealand engineering feats such as the Denniston Incline and Raurimu Spiral; because it failed, it is forgotten.
In 1864, two years after the goldfield began, miners organised Cromwell businessmen as shareholders to form the Nil… Show more

The first dam on Central Otago’s Clutha River was not the 1956 Roxburgh dam, but a gold-mining enterprise’s structure built 93 years earlier, when the river was still known as the Molyneux. If it had succeeded, it would be lauded with other colonial-era New Zealand engineering feats such as the Denniston Incline and Raurimu Spiral; because it failed, it is forgotten.
In 1864, two years after the goldfield began, miners organised Cromwell businessmen as shareholders to form the Nil Desperandum Company. Where the Clutha was bifurcated by Knobby Island at Quartz Reef Point they would build a timber crib cofferdam at each end of the island and pump the enclosed space dry to mine the riverbed. The upstream structure was to be built at 45° to the flow, 270 metres long, 15 metres thick and 7.5 metres high, constructed from timber frameworks filled with stone and backed by an additional rockfill buttress.
This paper discusses this engineering feat, including how it was built, what it achieved and when the methodology was used elsewhere in New Zealand. Show less

Bendigo is the name of an Australian city with a golden past, an historic reserve centred on a Central Otago ghost town, a Pennsylvanian State Park and a former All-England champion boxer. The name “Bendigo” appears on hotel signs, gold dredges and mining claims in several countries and is on the nameplate of a Confederate blockade runner wrecked off North Carolina. More than an example of an early global brand, “Bendigo” acquired a peculiar significance throughout narratives of colonial… Show more

Bendigo is the name of an Australian city with a golden past, an historic reserve centred on a Central Otago ghost town, a Pennsylvanian State Park and a former All-England champion boxer. The name “Bendigo” appears on hotel signs, gold dredges and mining claims in several countries and is on the nameplate of a Confederate blockade runner wrecked off North Carolina. More than an example of an early global brand, “Bendigo” acquired a peculiar significance throughout narratives of colonial Australasia with the town remembered in an unusually rapid, unique nostalgiacising process. This article examines the way the name developed and the manner in which the Australian Bendigo emerged through legend, memory and pioneering mythology to become an assiduously romanticised “Old Bendigo” and how this influenced the perception of people from there. Show less

An enduring legacy of the Central Otago gold rush is the network of water races crossing the landscape. Lacking the romance of schist cottage ruins or hint of enterprise inherent in herringbone tailings, mullock heaps and dredging tailings, these watercourses are unremarkable except for their potential re-use for irrigation.
But the employment and judicious use of water was critical to the development of gold claims, when self-taught hydraulic engineers organised, financed and built water… Show more

An enduring legacy of the Central Otago gold rush is the network of water races crossing the landscape. Lacking the romance of schist cottage ruins or hint of enterprise inherent in herringbone tailings, mullock heaps and dredging tailings, these watercourses are unremarkable except for their potential re-use for irrigation.
But the employment and judicious use of water was critical to the development of gold claims, when self-taught hydraulic engineers organised, financed and built water races to open alluvial mining areas. The Rise and Shine syndicate worked their sluicing claim in Bendigo Creek’s headwaters for 35 years and changed the fortunes of the Bendigo Gully gold field.
Examination of the syndicate and its archaeology reveals a group of miners who developed a profitable claim, built a community and proved adept at employing their water resource in a way that confounds popular tourism-oriented depictions of the gold rush as rootless men in ephemeral towns. Show less

Gold rushes are exciting events marked by the construction and collapse of boom settlements, of miners rushing from one place to the next and of stories of rich finds and ‘duffer’ hoaxes which become the legends defining the era. One such goldfields settlement is Bendigo, a rush town of the Central Otago gold rush. A lack of documentary sources has led to writers speculating and misinterpreting the timeline of the events which caused the town to appear.
Re-analysing the journal on which the… Show more

Gold rushes are exciting events marked by the construction and collapse of boom settlements, of miners rushing from one place to the next and of stories of rich finds and ‘duffer’ hoaxes which become the legends defining the era. One such goldfields settlement is Bendigo, a rush town of the Central Otago gold rush. A lack of documentary sources has led to writers speculating and misinterpreting the timeline of the events which caused the town to appear.
Re-analysing the journal on which the narratives have been based, together with additional documentary evidence leads to new conclusions about when this town became an important centre of mining in Otago and reveals an intriguing study of some of the personalities of the early Bendigo goldfield.
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The received narrative of the discovery of the rich quartz mine at Bendigo in Central Otago, has the success of Thomas Logan, Jack Garrett, Brian Hebden and George Goodger of the Cromwell Company predicated on a fraud committed by Logan. It is an intriguing tale of a significant theft by a dishonest man in the midst of a famous gold rush to an iconic town and is found in all popular histories of the goldfield. But is it correct? Using primary sources and contemporary narratives, the evidence of… Show more

The received narrative of the discovery of the rich quartz mine at Bendigo in Central Otago, has the success of Thomas Logan, Jack Garrett, Brian Hebden and George Goodger of the Cromwell Company predicated on a fraud committed by Logan. It is an intriguing tale of a significant theft by a dishonest man in the midst of a famous gold rush to an iconic town and is found in all popular histories of the goldfield. But is it correct? Using primary sources and contemporary narratives, the evidence of Logan’s actions during the early days at Bendigo is evaluated and a new conclusion reached. Show less