The Story of Honest Ed Turnbull

SOLITARY HORSEMAN WHO STARTED A GREAT GOLD RUSH
Some Made Fortunes – Some Died on the Trail

The following report of the discovery of Coolgardie was published in a English paper, “People.” It was written by its special correspondent at Ruckinge in Kent: “Our Special Correspondent” proceeds to give his readers some hair-raising happenings. “Honest Ed. Turnbull” certainly secured the ear of an ardent listener. Hark to this his narrative.

Honest Ed Turnbull

Honest Ed Turnbull pulled something from his pocket and thumped it on the table, something which gleamed dully in the dim rays of the kerosene lamp. It was a nugget of glistening yellow gold, virgin gold from Coolgardie, one of the richest strikes ever made in the history of man. And Honest Ed was there the trapper boy of a coal mine in Newcastle, who rose to be manager of many famous gold mines. He was bitten like thousands of others by the Gold Bug.

His clear blue eyes gleamed with the gold fever, and his face, burned black by the scorching rays of the sun, creased into a thousand merry wrinkles as he related to me the miracle of Coolgardie. lt was the real story of a gold rush and he told a sad picture of thirst, starvation, privation and death on the trail. But in richer, gayer colors he painted the solitary horseman who rode a hundred miles into the desert from Southern Cross and returned with £2000 in gold strapped to his saddle girths. (£2000 in gold strapped to his saddle girths! And as much more, we presume, on the crupper.)

The news spread like wildfire. Gold, gold, gold!

Miners once apathetic and hopeless were now jubilant. The mighty trek from Southern Cross began. Men of all types, races, and colours flocked to the great new goldfield. A calico town sprang up overnight. “My father and I got wind of the strike,” he added, “when we were in Perth, Australia. We had £200 and took it along with us. We needed every penny of it before we were through. We bought a camel at Southern Cross. It cost us £50. A loaf of bread cost two shillings. brackish water was a shilling a quart, bacon was unbuyable. The unfortunate gold digger whose funds ran out. starved to death, or died of thirst”.

Dying men were strewn along the trail of the great rush, begging for any sort of assistance and help. Some gave a little, a very little water, some gave a little food. But no real help was forthcoming, for men were in the grip of the wildest fever of all, the mad lust for gold. On the road back to Southern Cross the transport teams showed a little more humanity, and carted the men into hospital.

The location on the strike was the very horror of dry barrenness, an unspeakable place of thirst and sand was in every hot breath of the wind. (While tents, frying-pans, and euchre packs flew in the willy-willy.)

GOLD STEALING

But in that dry desert lay millions in gold which men hungered for. Nature could do its worst. No man could give in with a fortune in his grasp. So we staked our claims despite the most intolerable hardships. And money flowed like water in the gold mad towns, and in its wake all forms of vice. Everybody was armed. I myself packed a Colt, and was ready for anything. As for the diggers, cards were their children, dice their passion. (No mention here of rope quoits or snakes and ladders.)

They, too, were ready for anything – anything from gambling to manslaughter. Men sat hunched over tables on which lay their sharpshooters, playing friendly little games of poker for £500 a stake. On many occasions I saw £200 in the kitty at a game of pitch and toss. There were a few licensed saloons, but sly grog shops and discreet gin mills roared wide open.(Not to mention the rum condensers and hop beer breweries.)

Honest diggers, women faded, beautiful and wanton, thieves, liars and desperadoes were all equal citizens at Coolgardie at that stage. (And mining experts!) Ed sighed regretfully. “Bad times and bad days, but I wish I could live them over again.” he said wistfully. “I’ll never forget the thrill when I first struck gold. Four pennyweights – a few shining grains of the precious metal lay in my pan. “But hundreds of diggers gathered round to see and satisfy themselves, and immediately pegged new claims, and dug all round us.

For they saw in that pan not just twelve shillings worth of gold, but a great and mighty hope.”

Ed’s clear eyes misted a little. “But though Dad and I laboured like maniacs for eighteen months, all we got from our stake was a miserable £300 in gold, and we spent over £200 getting it. For most diggers, however, that’s the way it goes, even at the richest strike”.

SOLD FOR £4000

Bailey, the man who discovered Coolgardie, (Honest Ed. Turnbull nearly got his name right)  sold out his claim for £4000. Yet from Coolgardie and its sister mines in Kalgoorlie, over £158,000,000 worth of pure gold has been taken in the last forty years. Foolish of Bailey, you think. But in his own estimation, and the estimation of diggers at that time, he was a wise man. For rich claims had a way of petering out suddenly, leaving a miner high and dry. A famous instance is that of the Londonderry mine. They struck it so rich that the miners sold out to a London syndicate for £20,000. The syndicate set to work, shafts were sunk, but the rich mine suddenly gave out and proved a miserable failure. The gold was only in a single crevice. This was the Londonderry.

Ed tossed his nugget into the air, caught it deftly, and placed it carefully in his pocket. “A miner was always liable to have his claim jumped,” he explained. “It would happen in this way. Some crook would come along, flash a nugget, and say he had made a rich strike ten miles away. The miner couldn’t afford to ignore his statement, would go to investigate, and when he came back, find someone else working his claim. It got so bad that the honest miners formed a union to protect themselves, and lynchings were not uncommon.”

MILLIONS IN GOLD

Later, when the mines were in the hands of the big syndicates, every effort was made to stop gold stealing. Miners were carefully searched, but even then they got away with it. “One young fellow once showed me a 28lb amalgam of mercury and gold, which he said he was going to take out of the mine. I thought he was joking, but get it out he did, and I knew him later as the proprietor of a flourishing hotel. (And probably an opium den, and a shooting gallery.)”

But there was a trio at Kalgoorlie who reduced gold stealing to a fine art. At that time I acted as one of the scouts who were trying to pick these fellows up. This was how they worked it. “A man named Clark received the stolen gold from the miners in the saloons. This he took to his partners Coulter and Treffene, at their smelting hideout in the bush. “Two detectives were sent out to investigate their activities.

They never returned. They were murdered.

They cut up the bodies, tried to burn them, and eventually left the remains in a disused mine shaft. Then fate took a hand in the game. Suspicion was aroused when the old mine became the haunt of myriad of flies, and the mutilated remains of the two officers were discovered. “Clark turned King’s evidence. The other two were hanged.”

Edward Ernest ‘Ed’ TURNBULL –  was born on the 27 Feb 1869 in Morpeth, Northumberland, England. He came to Victoria in Australia in about 1869-70 with his parents. He was the oldest child of Daniel Turnbull and Jane nee Lee. All of his seven siblings were born in Victoria. He had a relationship with Annie Margaret TIMMONS and they had one daughter, Monica Josephine Breustedt born in 1894. He then married Susannah Ada YEW the following year in 1895 in Victoria. The couple had one child, Norman Edward Turnbull, born 7 Dec 1900 in Boulder, Western Australia. Ed died in Perth Western Australia in 1943 aged 74 yrs and his ashes were scattered at Karrakatta Cemetery as were those of his wife who died in 1948 aged 79 yrs.