Reliving Canada’s Gold Rush in Barkerville, BC

Brief History of the Canadian Gold Rush

The Canadian gold rush is credited with bringing settlers to parts of Western Canada in the mid to late 1800s. Prior to this time, there had been gold rushes in California, but they were beginning to dry up. People were hearing stories of “easy gold” to be found in Canada and decided to go see for themselves. These discoveries were often made accidentally by fur traders. Then word would spread, and more people would flock to the area. 

Some prospectors also came to the area looking for gold after hearing the Haida people had discovered it in the Queen Charlotte Islands. The gold was found in deposits of sand or gravel in a stream or riverbed. Once these discoveries were made, some companies set up mines to see what else was there. There were a few different locations of Canadian gold rushes, but one of the early ones was near the Fraser River and then eventually towards what is now Barkerville. 

It is important to note that when these places began to be settled, it did displace the Indigenous peoples who had been living on and working the land for years before this. While the gold rushes of this time had little effect on the Canadian economy, it did have a large effect on the way of life of the Indigenous peoples who inhabited these parts of Canada. 

In some cases, the prospectors would continue to move north towards Alaska as their searches dried up, but in most cases the areas did become permanent settlements for white people. This led to rapid resource development, growing industries, violence, and systems of authority that were not familiar to the Indigenous communities and were devastating to their way of life. (Those who are in charge of the historic site currently have spoken about this here on their website.)

Billy Barker Strikes Gold

Billy Barker, who the community is named after, had begun his days of finding gold in California, but it was on Williams Creek, BC where he really struck it big while mining at a depth of 52 feet. This find became the beginning of a multi-billion dollar industrial revolution that the surrounding communities and the province of British Columbia was built on. Though he continued with other mining ventures, none other paid off like this one.