CHAPTER VI.
Campbell's Creek.—My First Gold Digging.—Gold License.— License Hunting.
In the month of December, 1852, my father paid us a flying visit, and returned with my eldest sister, who was one of the first women on the Mount Alexander diggings. She drove up in a cart on the top of some loading, and was five days on the road. As they rode through Forest Creek the cry ran along the lead, "A woman! a woman!" Men shouted out to their mates below, who hurried to the top, and hundreds of eyes were fixed on her the whole way from Golden Point till she reached her future home at Campbell's Creek. Not many weeks after I was sent for, and although my fare was paid to ride on the dray, I was so anxious to say I had performed the journey to the diggings on foot, that I walked every inch of the way. About a fortnight after the remaining portion of the family arrived. We found a most comfortable tent (12 x 20) erected, with door, window, and chimney (these alone cost £20), boarded and lined with drugget throughout. It was divided into two rooms; the front one (12 x 12) was our best parlour, the other my parents' bedroom. In the front of the tent a flag-pole was erected and a flag kept flying.
Some years ago I was reading Dickens' "Household Words," when I came across the following:—"There can be no difficulty in finding doctors, as it is the custom for new arrivals to advertise full particulars of their birth, parentage, and education. The majority are Scotch and Irish, some intensely national; we note Dr. Preshaw, of Edinburgh. He begs to intimate that he has pitched his tent at Moonlight Flat, Forest Creek. Dr. Preshaw has been engaged in extensive practice for twenty-four years; his tent will be distinguished by his name across an ensign flying, and a Scotch thistle on end."
When we arrived at Campbell’s Creek, the flat now known as Preshaw’s Flat was a beautiful green sward. We had not been there many days before a party of diggers put down a shaft in front of our tent. They bottomed at a depth of about 40 ft., and although they got gold, still not in any quantity. The very fact of gold being obtained, however, caused a rush, and before a week passed fully 1000 men were on the ground. Although living so near, none of us pegged out a claim till late in the day, and had to content ourselves with a hole down by the side of the
