6 
or four weeks after Spring Creek was opened. Both Wise and Fisher 
got a good deal of gold on Spring Creek. At Reid’s Creek, I was 
buying gold soon after it was opened up, and gaive jQ2 16s. per ounce 
for it. Brown’s party consisted of four men, named Brown, Maidment,. 
Gaire, and Old Jack. I bought as much as 70 lbs. weight of gold from 
them—one week's working in 9 feet sinking. One day Brown came into 
the small store I kept, carrying a prospecting dish on his head, covered 
with a cloth. I said, “ What have you got there?” He answered, “ A 
little gold,” and there were 70 lbs. weight in the dish. This party 
took away ^49,000 in hard cash, after two months’ work. The old hut 
where my store stood was an out-station at the junction of Rocky Creek 
and the Woolshed Creek. 
About three months after this a man named Carrol, discovered gold 
at Yackandandah, which is the original blacks’ name for that place. I 
brought Carrol up from Goulburn, and I also brought up, from Sydney, 
Johnson (afterwards known as the “ Woolshed Boss”), who was the 
first discoverer of gold on Woolshed Creek. The run through which 
Reid’s Creek flows was taken up in 1838. In 1845, or the beginning of 
1846, I commenced the flour-mill, long known as Reid’s Mill. We "were 
cutting a race to bring water to the wheel. One day we were examining 
the stuff being dug out, and I took up a bit, and said, " This looks like 
gold.” Afterwards gold was discovered in California in a similar way. 
Later on, the ground around Reid’s Mill was worked for gold, so that I 
actually found gold before its discovery in California, by Sutor in his 
mill race. 
[.Report sent in yd April, 1905.] 
[This report is by the late Hon. David Reid, of “ Moorwatha,” Howlong, N.S.W. Mr. Reid arrived in 
Sydney in 1823, and was among the first pioneers to bring stock into Victoria in 1837. He was 85 years of 
age when he furnished this report. I regret to say he has recently died.—E. J. D.] 
THE WEDDERBURN GOLD-FIELD. 
(no. 7 ON LOCALITY MAP.) 
By E. J. Dutin , F.G.S., Director, Geological Survey. 
At Wedderburn the salient features of the topography are a series of 
low ridges and spurs, separated by broad shallow gullies and alluvial flats.. 
The surface of these spurs and ridges is strewn with fragments of quartz 
and ironstone. It is a prominent feature that quartz is present in unusual 
abundance. About ij miles west of the town is ai strong outcrop of this 
mineral. Great masses rise 12 to 14 feet above the surface; but, as a 
rule, the quartz occurs as fragments but so abundantly in places that the 
surface is nearly white. 
Another feature that attracts attention is that, within the best zone 
for gold, which extends for a width of about 2 miles from Wedderburn 
in a westerly direction, and runs about N. 7 deg. W., the soil is of a 
deep-red colour. Mallee vegetation covers a great deal of the surface; 
larger varieties of eucalypts grow in belts and patches. 
Where the underlying rocks are exposed in railway cuttings and in 
shafts, &c., the rocks are seen to belong to the Ordovician series. They 
consist of red, yellow, grey, and white soft beds of sandstones and slates, 
much decomposed and very friable. These are frequently seamed by veins 
