Keish’s Story

First Nations people have been at home in the Yukon for many thousands of years, and have played an important role in the territory’s history. By many accounts, the Bonanza discovery was made by a man from the Tagish First Nation. Stories from the First Nations community about the discovery of gold emphasize the family relations and responsibilities among the characters in the story, rather than the quest for gold.

The Tagish man who is said to have found gold in Bonanza Creek was named Keish. English speakers called him “Skookum Jim” because of his legendary strength. (Skookum means strong in the Chinook dialect.) He once carried 156 pounds of bacon on his back over the Chilkoot Pass! Kiesh’s sister, Shaaw Tláa, was married to a non-native man named George Carmack who called her Kate. Two years before the gold strike on Bonanza, Shaaw Tláa and George Carmack left her home in the southern Yukon and went down the Yukon River to look for gold. The year before, one of her sisters had gone down river with her husband also to look for gold. When the family did not hear from either sister for two years, they began to worry. Keish was their only brother, and it was his responsibility to make sure Shaaw Tláa and her sister were alive and well. He decided to go down river himself to find out what had happened to them. Two of his nephews, Káa Goox (also called Dawson Charlie), and Koołseen (also called Patsy Henderson) went with him. Koołseen was probably not more than 11 years old, but he later said he was the one who did most of paddling on the trip. The three men found Shaaw Tláa, George and their daughter fishing for salmon at the mouth of the Klondike River with the local Hän-speaking First Nation people. It was late in the summer of 1896, and Keish, Káa Goox and Koołseen decided to camp with their relatives until winter. While they were there George told them about another prospector named Robert Henderson. He had found gold on a creek that emptied into the Klondike River upstream from where the group was camped. George wanted to go look for him and see how much gold there was on the creek. Koołseen stayed in camp to look after the dogs and continue fishing while the other three men went up to Henderson’s claim. Along the way they looked for gold, but they did not stake any claims because they wanted to find the richest place. They went all the way to Henderson’s camp, but didn’t stake there either. Some people say Henderson insulted the Tagish men, either by saying he didn’t want them to stake near his claim, or by refusing to sell them any of his tobacco, or both. On the way back to their fish camp, the group stopped to rest and fell asleep under some trees. Keish woke up feeling thirsty so he went down to the creek for a drink of water. As he leaned down to drink he saw something glittering on the rocks. He called Carmack and Káa Goox to come with the gold pan and shovel. The pan that they took to test the spot had more gold in it than they had ever seen before. They tested a few more places nearby and then decided to stake claims right there. Keish had found the best place to stake by accident! George staked the double sized discovery claim, but agreed to share with Keish, who staked his own claim beside George’s. Káa Goox staked the claim on the other side. Then they hurried to the town of Fortymile to register their claims and tell people about their find. Robert Henderson’s Story

Although George Carmack, Skookum Jim and Dawson Charlie staked the first claims on Bonanza Creek, the first person to find gold in the Klondike River drainage was Robert Henderson. In fact, many people say Henderson deserves credit for starting the gold rush as Carmack and his friends were only prospecting on a creek draining into the Klondike because of Henderson’s advice.

Robert Henderson had spent many years prospecting all over the north. In 1894, he took the advice of a trading post owner named Joe Ladue and began prospecting on the Indian River. Henderson spent about two years looking for gold on the creeks that empty into the Indian River. One day in 1896 he decided to climb over the hill that separates the Indian and Klondike rivers. The first creek he went to had more gold than any of the creeks he had been testing on the Indian River so he named the creek Gold Bottom and decided to stake a claim and start mining right there. Then he went back to the Indian River to tell the other people prospecting there that there was more gold on the new creek and they should come there to mine. Three men returned with him and together they mined about $750 dollars worth of gold. By August they were running out of food and supplies, so Henderson went to Joe Ladue’s trading post to buy more. On the way back to his claim he met George and Kate Carmack and their relatives Skookum Jim, Dawson Charlie, and Patsy Henderson (who was not related to Robert Henderson) fishing for salmon with a group of local Hän First Nations people at the mouth of the Klondike River. Robert Henderson told Carmack about the gold on Gold Bottom Creek. He said that there was room for George to stake a claim, but not for the whole camp, because he wanted to make sure there would be enough claims left for his old friends from his early days of prospecting. Not long after Henderson left their camp, Carmack, Skookum Jim, and Dawson Charlie decided to take a trip up to Gold Bottom. When they got there they liked what they saw so each of them staked a claim. Carmack told Henderson he was going to prospect on Rabbit Creek (which was the original name for Bonanza) on the way back to fish camp. He promised to send a message to Henderson if they found the creek was rich in gold. On their way back to the fish camp at the mouth of the Klondike River the three men found a place on Rabbit Creek that was very rich with gold. There was so much gold there that the men said the layers of gold in the dirt looked like cheese in a sandwich. It was so rich they decided to rename the whole creek Bonanza. Each of the three men staked a claim; Carmack staked a double-sized discovery claim, while Skookum Jim and Dawson Charlie each got a normal sized claim. When they finished staking the three men hurried to the town of Fortymile to register their claims. They told everyone they met along the way about the gold they had found, but they did not go back to tell Henderson. Many people from other areas of the Yukon were already on their way to the Klondike River when Carmack and his friends found gold on Bonanza Creek. They had heard about Henderson’s find on Gold Bottom Creek, and they were on their way to stake there. To recognize Henderson’s role in the Klondike discoveries, the Canadian government awarded him a pension of two hundred dollars a month. George Carmack’s Story Although the Canadian government now gives credit to Keish (Skookum Jim) for finding the gold on Bonanza Creek, George Carmack always said that he was the one who first found it. This version of the Discovery story is based on what Carmack wrote many years later about the discovery on Bonanza Creek.

George Carmack went to the mouth of the Klondike River to fish for salmon in the summer of 1896 after having a dream in which two large salmon appeared with gold nuggets instead of scales. He was thinking he could make some money by fishing commercially. While he was there some old friends Skookum Jim, Dawson Charlie, and their young nephew Patsy Henderson came to see him. George and his friends decided to go on a prospecting trip up the Klondike River to hunt for moose and see if there was a place to cut wood to sell at Forty Mile. The salmon run was poor and they were not catching many fish. Before they left, Robert Henderson came along and told them that he was mining on a creek called Gold Bottom, and there was pretty good gold recovery there. He said that there was room for George to stake a claim there but there was no room for his native friends. They were not very happy about that insult and George decided that rather than stake near Henderson they should go and find a different creek to mine on. The next morning they set off. After walking for a few hours they came to a creek that George thought looked like it might have gold in it. They stopped to pan some gravel and see if he was right. When George was nearly finished panning, he stopped and asked his friends to spit in the pan for good luck. Then he dipped his pan in the water and swirled it. A streak of gold appeared at the bottom. The men were excited and decided to continue on up the creek hoping to find a spot with even more gold. They went all the way over the hill to Henderson’s claim, and told him about the gold that they found on Bonanza Creek, but Henderson and his mining partners didn’t seem interested in the news. On the way back to their fish camp, Carmack spotted a place in the creek that looked like it might have a lot of gold so he went to take a look. When he got close to the creek he spotted a big piece of gold lying right there on the surface! He could hardly believe it, so he picked it up and bit it to make sure it was real. He shouted for Charlie and Jim to bring the pan and shovel. When he dug into the gravel, they could see gold lying there, as thick as the cheese in a sandwich. The pan that Carmack took from that spot was the richest one he had ever seen! All three men started to do a crazy happy dance right there beside the creek. George Carmack staked the double sized discovery claim for himself because he had found the gold, and each of his friends got a regular sized claim. They renamed the creek Bonanza because it was so rich, and set off to go register their new claims in the town of Fortymile. On the way there, they told everyone they met that they should go stake claims on Bonanza because it was the richest creek they had ever seen.