William Guybon Atherstone

27 May 1814 – 26 June 1898 · Atherstone line

Connection to the Koup

Took part in something recorded here: Atherstone reports the Karoo rocks "too young" for a productive goldfield (1872).

Names

Baptismal name

William Guybon

Given

William Guybon

Surname

Atherstone

The formal baptismal name and the name a person was actually called are both kept, and neither is derived from the other. Spelling drift between records is evidence, not noise.

A life in the record

1. 27 May 1814 born Born
2. 1872 event Atherstone reports the Karoo rocks "too young" for a productive goldfield
   His verdict held for twenty years, and was vindicated in 1892. He also urged the government to offer £5,000 to anyone who found a real goldfield in the Cape - "the best and least expensive way of discovering gold in the Colony."
3. 1872 event Atherstone suspects the first nugget was salted; Dunn says it was worked by human hands
   Atherstone suspected Californian or Australian gold planted on the farm; Thomas Bain disagreed and could say why. Dr E.J. Dunn examined the nugget and reported it "bears conclusive evidence of having been in human possession prior to discovery... broken off by human agency - this never occurs in all
4. 26 June 1898 died Died

Stories

• subject The Prince Albert gold rush

What we don't know

• Neither parent is recorded, so this person is not attached to the tree above them.
• No dated record ties this person to a specific piece of ground.

A sourced gap beats an unsourced fill. These are the open questions on this person, stated rather than papered over.

Sources

1. "The Karoo's mini gold bonanza" Engineering News / Mining Weekly21 Feb 2014
2. Rose Willis & Doreen Atkinson, "Zeekoegat: Explorations in the Koup Karoo" (2022) Karoo Development Foundation38pp cameo

Research notes

These are working notes, not finished prose: they carry the reasoning, the corrections and the things still marked to verify. They are kept here so the page itself can read as what is known.