Welcome Stranger
Template:Short description Script error: No such module "Distinguish". Script error: No such module "about". Template:Use dmy dates Template:Use Australian English
Welcome Stranger is the name of the largest alluvial gold nugget ever discovered. It was unearthed by Cornish miners John Deason and Richard Oates on 5Script error: No such module "String".February 1869 in Moliagul, 9 miles north-west of Dunolly in Victoria, Australia.[2]
Discovery
Found only Script error: No such module "convert". below the surface, near the base of a tree on a slope leading to what was then known as Bulldog Gully, the nugget had a gross weight of Script error: No such module "convert". (241 lb 10 oz). Its trimmed weightTemplate:Explain was Script error: No such module "convert". (210 lbs), and its net weightTemplate:Explain was Script error: No such module "convert". (192 lbs 11.5 oz).[3]
At the time of the discovery, there were no scales capable of weighing a nugget this large, so it was broken into three pieces on an anvil by Dunolly-based blacksmith Archibald Walls.[4]
Deason, Oates, and a few friends took the nugget to the London Chartered Bank of Australia, in Dunolly, which advanced them £9,000. Deason and Oates were finally paid an estimated £9,381 (Expression error: Unrecognized punctuation character "[".) for their nugget, which became known as the "Welcome Stranger". At August 2019 gold prices, it would be worth US$3.4 million [2.3 million GBP]. It was heavier than the "Welcome Nugget" of Script error: No such module "convert". that had been found in Ballarat in 1858. The goldfields warden F. K. Orme reported that Script error: No such module "convert". of smelted gold had been obtained from it,[5] irrespective of scraps that were given away by the finders, estimated as totalling another Script error: No such module "convert"..Script error: No such module "Unsubst".
The nugget was soon melted down and the gold was sent as ingots to Melbourne for forwarding to the Bank of England. It left the country on board the steamship Reigate which departed on 21 February.[6]
An obelisk commemorating the discovery of the "Welcome Stranger" was erected near the spot in 1897. A replica of the "Welcome Stranger" is in the Old Treasury building, Treasury Place, Melbourne, Victoria; another replica is owned by descendants of John Deason and is now on display at the Dunolly Rural Transaction Centre.[7]
Discoverers
John Deason was born in 1829 on the island of Tresco, Isles of Scilly, Script error: No such module "convert". off the southwestern tip of Cornwall, England, UK. In 1851, he was a tin dresser before becoming a gold miner.[9] Deason continued with gold mining and workings most of his life and, although he became a store keeper at Moliagul, he lost a substantial proportion of his wealth through poor investments in gold mining. He bought a small farm near Moliagul where he lived until he died in 1915, aged 85 years.[10]
Richard Oates was born about 1827 at Pendeen in Cornwall.[11] After the 1869 find, Oates returned to the UK and married. He returned to Australia with his wife and they had four children. The Oates family, in 1895, purchased Script error: No such module "convert". of land at Marong, Victoria, about Script error: No such module "convert". west of Bendigo, Victoria, which Oates farmed until his death in Marong in 1906, aged 79 years.[12]
Descendants of the two discoverers gathered to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the discovery of the nugget.[13]
See also
- List of gold nuggets by size
- Beyers-Holtermann Specimen, the largest specimen of native gold ever mined. It was reef gold, with quartz, and so not a nugget.
References
<templatestyles src="Reflist/styles.css" />
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Potter, Terry F. (1999) The Welcome Stranger: a definitive account of the worlds largest alluvial gold nugget. Template:ISBN
- ↑ "Wills and Bequests". Melbourne Punch (1 December 1887)
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
Further reading
Template:Wikisource/outer coreScript error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters". Template:Sister project
<templatestyles src="Refbegin/styles.css" />
- Deason, Denise (2005). Welcome, stranger: The amazing true story of one man's legendary search for gold – at all costs. Melbourne: Viking / Penguin Books. Template:ISBN.
Script error: No such module "Coordinates".