Dunedin historian Ian Church has drawn a link between the surprise find of gold on Otago Peninsula 136 years ago and the misfortunes of steamer Victory.
Victory ran aground on what is now Victory beach on July 3, 1861, while in the hands of chief mate George Hand, who was later sentenced to three months' hard labour for being drunk and in breach of duty.
Mr Church's research of Otago goldfields led him to an Otago Witness newspaper report (July 5, 1862) which noted during the lengthy - and ultimately unsuccessful - attempts to refloat Victory, its captain, James Toogood, found specimens of gold on the shores of Wickliffe Bay.
"Some of the specimens are said to contain small specks of gold, and, from the quantity of quartz which is exposed on the surface it is presumed that it may be the outcrop of a reef which is there concealed by the silt and driven sand."
Interest in the peninsula's gold-mining past has arisen since the Dunedin City Council bought the $2.6 million Harbour Cone property next to Battery Creek where there have been several attempts to mine gold.
Mr Church notes that two men who attempted to mine at Harbour Cone were from Port Chalmers.
Conrad Basan, a labourer, may have been killed during World War 1, while William Sheldermine, a clerk, chased gold, unsuccessfully, in other parts of Otago.
Victory was an iron screw steamer of 426 tonnes built at Dumbarton, Scotland, in 1849 and was carrying mail, cargo and passengers from Melbourne to Dunedin.
It was undamaged when it went aground on sand but could not be refloated.
Parts of it were salvaged but its remains can still be seen at Victory beach at low tide.
