Coles’s Find – a fair prospect

Cole’s Find Near Wiluna
How a Returned Soldier Discovered a Goldfield
by Horace Stirling

George Cole, the discoverer of Cole’s Find, 11 miles south of Wiluna, is a scion of a family of 15, four of whom first saw the light within an interval of eleven months. His father and mother are both living. Mrs. Cole is a resident of Newcastle Street, her husband being one of the best-known pioneers of the far outback country, he having overlanded to Wiluna, via Eucla, from New South Wales with his wife and their family, during the early nineties. Three of the Cole boys enlisted for the war, and a fourth tried several times to do so, but, much to his, chagrin, was turned down. Of the three Cole heroes, one made the supreme sacrifice, another was seriously wounded and gassed, while George, the lucky prospector of the Wiluna find, got through the terrible ordeal without a scratch.

Henry Cole, the head of this virile clan of nine stalwart sons and six bonnie girls is in his 69th year. He stands 6ft. 2in. in his socks, and is as erect as a sentinel. His steel-grey eyes flash with the resplendency of Brazilian diamonds when he, with Kitchener-like equipoise, relates to his auditors that his mother is still an active resident of the backblocks of New South Wales and is going strong. In her 97th year! Moreover, that his wife had two sets of twins in 11 months, and that one of his daughters commenced her matrimonial enterprise by presenting her lord and master with a pigeon pair.

The fortunate discoverer of the recent field is the juvenile of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Cole’s nine sons. The writer first met him at Leonora, last December, when the young hero, of about 20 summers, started out with a comrade-in-arms named James Ridley, who was the owner of the best-equipped tandem team that ever left the terminus township. Later in the month, I met Cole and Ridley at Lawlers, 80 miles further north, where they were given a hearty send off. their equipment from the Repatriation Department, together with the appointment of their expedition in general, and their self-reliance withal, being the admired of the admiring.

At Mt. Sir Samuel, 36 miles N.E. from Lawlers, George Cole met his father, whom he had not seen since his two brothers and he had enlisted to fight the Hun, an interval of upwards of four years. After spending a couple of days in the old mining town, which, like Lake Way (Wiluna), immortalises the name of a recent Chief Justice of South Australia, Ridley and Cole drove their tandem, in shifts, for another 50 miles, as far as Mt. Keith, where they agreed to differ as to their expedition’s future destinations and operations. Cole decided to prospect Mt. Lawrence, on the slopes of which his valuable find is located, while Ridley decided to remain at Mt. Keith to help an old friend named Ryan to develop a claim he had been working in that vicinity. So, like Abraham and Lot of old, the two heroes separated,

Cole going to the right hand and Ridley going to the left hand.

The tandem team, belonging to the Repatriation Department, Cole left with Ridley, together with the whole of their other equipment, and single-handedly, he started for Mt Lawrence, 35 miles away. En route, he came across the camp of George McHugh, the under-ground manager of the Violet mine, which Mr. Bernales is about placing upon the London market. McHugh and Cole are old friends. Consequently, the former’s sulky and horse were immediately placed at the disposal of the young soldier, who made straight for his objective Mt. Lawrence, on the southern side of which he came across the auriferous belt that is now a hive of industry and is known throughout the Commonwealth as Cole’s Find. George McHugh was the first to be informed of the new discovery, and after confirming his anticipations, by the activities of the dolly and the dish, McHugh resigned his position on the Violet and joined Cole, as partner-halves in his bonanza.

Camels in the Outback – Photo Desert Companion

Four claims, comprising- 78 acres of 19ft lode and extensive quartz formations the former assaying 11 dwt, and the quartz 6ozs were pegged out before the townspeople of Wiluna were aware of the sensational find that had been made within pistol shot, as it were, of their lawns and flower gardens. But, just as Cole and McHugh were driving their last peg, about 3.30 a.m., a rush had set in, with the result that upwards of

20 claims were applied for before sundown.

Cole’s Reward and the adjoining three leases are likely to be placed on the London market, with a view to their flotation. For every description of mining the country surrounding Mt. Lawrence is ideal, there being a plentiful supply of timber, while freshwater is obtainable within 50ft. of the surface, and creeks abound in every direction.

George Cole is now preparing to start upon an expedition beyond the spinifex country, about 150 miles from Mt. Lawrence, where he knows of an auriferous belt. In this undertaking, he will have the services of three Government camels that are being paddocked at Leinster Downs, near Lawlers, to the order of the W.A. Gold and Silver Fields Expedition, which holds an option over his recent discoveries, and which despatched a prospecting party from Wongawall,150 miles east of Mt. Sir Samuel about the middle of March, to an auriferous belt in the vicinity of the Warburton Ranges, near the borderline of South Australia.