The gold rush in BC’s Cariboo region began in 1861. Soon after, thousands of would-be gold diggers arrived in the creeks. It was typical of the period and the work involved in the diggings that songs would be made. California’s 1849 gold rush generated many such songs, as had the Australian rush, which began in 1851. Surprisingly, we know of only one song from the Fraser River gold rush of 1858 and of a handful from the Cariboo. In BC, we haven’t found songs in the vernacular tradition, (i.e., songs passed on orally); all of the BC gold rush songs have been found in manuscript or printed form.
But now the first Cariboo song in the oral tradition has been uncovered. This is the first evidence that Cariboo songs lived not just in print but in the mouths of Cariboo miners.
Philip J. Thomas, the foremost BC song collector, located the only song from the Fraser River gold rush, “Far from Home.” Thomas discovered it in of September 1859. The magazine identified its author only as “W.H.D.” and its place of origin as Emory’s Bar at the mouth of Emory Creek, some seven km south of Yale. That it was a song rather than a poem is suggested by the tune. “Far from Home” has been sung by local singers since Thomas first introduced it, but no other orally transmitted version has yet been found.
