No, not that Cariboo. In the mid-1890S there was a brief placer gold rush on Cariboo Creek, which emptied into the Columbia River close to Burton, not far from Nakusp, in West Kootenay. The silver riches of West Kootenay were vast, but silver did not have the same allure as gold. There had been scattered placer gold excitement in the years leading up to the Cariboo Creek rush, for example, on Hall Creek southwest of Kootenay Lake and on Forty-Nine Creek on Kootenay Lake. Forty-Nine Creek yielded a decent amount of gold, but most of the other strikes did not pan out. It was hoped that Cariboo Creek, the newest Kootenay “El Dorado,” would prove more productive.
The Sinixt First Nation had roamed the lands around Cariboo Creek in the early and mid-nineteenth century and had established a large camp—known as xaieken— at the mouth of Cariboo was reporting “exceedingly rich” showings and predicting a “regular stampede” when the news was circulated.1
