Road to Lithium Lodge

(PART 1)

CHAPTER 1

Harry Koestlich discovers the

Bikita Tinfields 1911

S omewhere in the Bikita district the air was oppressive and heavy. To the north black clouds banked one upon the other heralding the imminent threat of rain. When rain set in from the north all roads became soggy and water logged, all ox transport ceased. Harry Koestlich knew this only too well. Astride his big brown stallion he gazed impatiently at the slow gait of his tented wagon as the sixteen tired oxen strained at their yokes. Expecting rain Harry did not stop at the little stream to the east of Marangaranga Mountain when his driver had suggested the usual outspan. He did not even notice the green outcrop nor the big white grey heavy crystals lying loose on the road, broken out of the outcrop by the turning wheels of the many transport wagons. A grey lowrie made a floppy landing on a nearby mimosa and called out to Harry ‘go away, go away’. Perhaps the wise old bird foresaw the possibility of too much activity there once the precious scheelite bearing reef was discovered. Who knows? Again it entreated the impatient white rider to ‘go-a-way, go-a-way’.

Koestlich good naturedly, shouted back, ‘voetsek’. But, now, he must push on to at least beyond the black turf spruit that lay some three miles to the north-west. Every year wagons got bogged down there and only by hitching three spans to a wagon could one successfully cross the seemingly bottomless black mud vlei. Koestlich slowly cantered on ahead of the wagon to examine the bad road ahead allowing the bay to crop a mouthful of grass whenever he saw a green patch near the road.

These however were sparse as this was the main Pioneer road to Gazaland from Fort Victoria and Umvuma. Thousands of tonnes of ore were transported over this road every year from the Umkondo Copper Mine to the smelter at Umvuma and it was also just possible Koestlich might meet up with a convoy at the outspan beyond the black vlei. He might even get assistance from them if the vlei was too wet and he got stuck. Harry reached the vlei and found it comparatively dry apart from the small stream that trickled from the spring in the nearby low lying kopjes above the road. Overhead the sky darkened menacingly and thunder echoed back from the surrounding hills and kopjes as the lone wagon slowly approached. The Basuto driver cracked his long whip, shouting encouragement to panting long horn team. Rarely did he ever strike an ox. They were under his care and he treated them like children. He had been driving for 30 years and took a pride in his team. Each ox had its name and responded instantly when he affectionately called out to it, as only an experienced driver did when walking alongside his ox team occasionally waving the long tanned hide whip over their backs.

‘Swartland, ysterkop, wit voet, trek trek trek Kerels,’ he’d call out, or ‘Tel op jou pote Ringhals. Heuistoe, voorman huistoe je le le dikeet uitspan toe’ and the span would understand in their own simple way that the outspan must close and there would be water and grass and rest. Kleinbooi never neglected his dumb friends and they knew this. Even when it was inspan time and the Foeleier (African loader) drove them to the front of the wagon opposite the long line of yokes, each ox seemed to know where he was expected to line up and have the riem looped around his horns and then when it was his turn, to step without any hesitation under the waiting yoke manoeuvring its horns between the two skeis and allowed the stroop too be pulled around their necks and fastened. Having completed the inspan Kleinbooi would softly call to the lead ox ‘Kaptein, loop Kaptein’ and the lead ox would without hesitation walk forward and arch his back as the trek chain scrapped over his back and he stood parallel to his team mate under the same yoke. In like fashion the remaining even numbered oxen arched their backs and positioned themselves. The two hind beasts, usually heavily built, to carry the disselboom automatically stepped on either side of the wagon shaft ready to have the skeis draped on their necks and the stroop tied in position. Kleinbooi would then breathe through his teeth making a hissing snake like sound that gradually got louder and the team slowly advanced till the trek chain was pulled taut. Only then did the Kleinbooi call to the lead ox ‘kom Kaptein, kom, pad toe, Kaptein, loop Kaptein.’

The two front oxen would then move forward and the rest of the team slowly took the strain of the trek chain and the heavy iron shod wheels moved slowly forward without the slightest jerk.

Some four hundred yards from the black vlei Koestlich waited for the wagon. As it drew level there was a flash of lightening followed by a crush of thunder. Instantly the heavens seemed to open as the storm had broke. Rain poured down unabated, in a blinding sheet. Koestlich dismounted and running to the rear of the wagon halted the team by applying the hand brake. Kleinbooi and the other Africans took shelter under the wagon while Harry Koestlich took cover under a nearby wild fig tree and remained there with his horse until the storm abated some 30 minutes later. Muddy water 12 inches deep ran down from the nearby kopje onto the road and down to the black vlei. Koestlich was not thinking of the vlei or the difficult task ahead of to get his wagon across the quagmire of soft black mud. He was staring at black crystals, imbedded in an outcrop of white rock, some twenty feet away. It might be ironstone, he thought, as he tried to prise one out with his knife. He could not. He tried another crystal. No the crystals were too hard. He might break the blade of his knife. The rain had eased off to a slight drizzle so he walked back to the wagon to get his prospecting pick. As he approached the wagon he detected scales of bright shiny mica on the ground. As he stooped to pick up one he spotted a black crystal the size of an orange. He picked it up, it was heavy, very heavy. What could it be? It seemed heavier than iron, on closer examination it seemed to have a crystalline shape on the one side. His prospector’s intuition seemed to tell him it might not be iron but something more valuable. He’d seen ironstone at Mashaba, and the other places, but this crystal seemed to weigh a lot heavier in his hand. He put the rounded crystal in his pocket and looked around for more specimens.

As the water subsided in the gravel road he saw dozens of smaller black crystals. He picked them up. They also were heavy. Then he picked up a small eight sided crystal, black and shiny. Surely this was not ordinary iron! For thirty minutes Koestlich walked further up the kopje and wherever the water had made little riffles he was able to pick up several black crystals all heavy too. He’d stumbled onto something at last. Yes Harry had indeed made a find. He had discovered the Bikita Tinfields, although he did not know it at the time. Nor was there any premonition of the future connected with his new discovery. Yes indeed Harry Koestlich could not have foreseen the significance of what lay hidden at Bikita. Where, wealth beyond the prospectors wildest dreams were years later to be discovered with the demand for the rare minerals of lithium and beryllium.

To Kleinbooi’s request to try and cross the vlei, Koestlich, now trembling with that excitement, which only a prospector can experience ordered the driver to turn the wagon onto higher ground and outspan. For hours the prospector walked over the surrounding ground examining outcrop after outcrop. Wherever he went he found the black crystals only with the waning of short African twilight did he return to his wagon to again examine the black crystals in the flickering light of the big camp fire? After a hearty meal of roasted reed buck liver and sadza, followed by strong black coffee, the elated Koestlich rolled himself in his kaross, perhaps to dream of the big black heavy stones and crystals and untold wealth.

Following the heavy rains of the day before, dawn was heralded in with more rain from the north. This however did not deter Harry Koestlich from prospecting the surrounding hills. The rock formations he mistakenly took to be granite because he had not seen a pegmatite formation before. There were several parallel outcrops stretching away to the south for thousands of yards. The main orebody outcropped till it reached a hill and here it joined with a big white quartz outcrop and this latter gave way to a mauve and bluish micaceous foreign looking formation that was no heavier than the quartz in the outcrops. Here also the black crystals could be detected in the different outcrops. To the west of the mauve and white outcrop hill was another higher hill. Here also Koestlich found rocky outcrops containing some of the heavy black mineral as well. For three days the prospector roamed the area and discovered a new running stream to the south which the local Africans who lived nearby called the Fashu River. They also told of another and bigger river not far to the north, called the Mungezi, where fish could be caught in the many deep pools. Koestlich visited this Mungezi River and verified this to be true. If the black minerals he had discovered was of any economic value he must find out as much as he could about local conditions before he returned with his brother Justice to peg, beacon and register the find.

Harry Koestlich only had two prospecting licenses with him and reasoned that the greater part of the area could not be protected and to erect a prospecting notice could lead to outsiders horning in on his discovery. It was his discovery and he intended to peg the whole area before the district got to hear of it.

So Harry Koestlich decided against pegging at that stage. Only he knew of this new discovery and the Africans with him could be relied upon to keep quite as well if a fitting enough reward was offered. In any case the boys had been with him for some years now and regarded him as their master and friend. Harry Koestlichs native name was ‘Skenure’ because the unruly hair on his head reminded the Africans of the bird named Skenure whose head of feathers were also unruly and refused to lie smooth like normal birds. The sky had cleared by the end of the second day and the sun started drying out the wet road and the black turf vlei. But it would take a full week before the wagon could travel back to Fort Victoria where Koestlich was making for with a load of hides from a lonely outpost store in the eastern Bikita. Koestlich had taken a load of merchandise from Fort Victoria and combined the trip to hunt and prospect as well. But, eager to find out more about his new discovery the prospector decided to set off alone on horseback and the wagon could follow on. Filling his saddle bags with beskuit and biltong, some mealie meal, a pot and a few necessities, Koestlich set off on the morning of the fourth day. He passed Fudu Holman’s store on Ashcombe farm some three miles to the west and skirted Marah hill. On reaching the Mtilikwe River he found the latter to be in flood.

That evening his stallion showed signs of horse sickness and died the next morning. Harry had lost more than one horse from the dreaded scourge that took its toll year after year. No matter what precautions one took, horses were smitten with the cursed fever and in nine cases out of ten succumbed. The odd one that managed to shake off the malady and recover was highly prized and was known as a ‘salted horse’ and immune to further attacks. Such mounts were few and far between and fetched a very high price. What chance did this one have, he pondered as he washed the poor animals head with cold water to ease the fever and give what relief he could. The poor animal stood with drooping head as mucus dripped from its swollen nostrils, its breathing uneven and difficult. When the trembling legs finally collapsed and the roan lay sprawled out Koestlich knew any hope of recovery was minimal. One got attached to a horse just as one did with a dog, perhaps even more so.

What did the Boers say ‘Be kind to everyone but never lend your wife, your gun or your horse?’ How true! Mosquitoes buzzed incessantly round his head on the river bank making sleep well nigh impossible. When he awoke at dawn the roan was dead. He was still 14 miles from Fort Victoria. His brother Justice was erecting a three stamp mill on the Matabele mine for Sarluis a Jewish trader cum miner. Harry persuaded an African man on the opposite bank of the river to take a message to his brother requesting him to bring or send a saddled horse to the Mtilikwe River. When the African agreed Harry parcelled a number of the black crystals in a handkerchief and attempted to throw the parcel across the swollen stream. His first attempt failed and the parcel fell short of the opposite bank. He made another parcel and this time the bundle fell on dry ground which the African retrieved and then set out for the Matabele mine some ten miles away. The next morning Justice Koestlich arrived at the Mtilikwe River and managed to swim the two horses to where Harry was waiting.

In due course the brothers reached the Matabele mine and Harry helped Justice complete the erection of the ‘three stamp mill’. Sarluis the owner of the Matabele mine would not agree to the Koestlichs deferring the completion of the installation of, the ‘three stamp mill’. So it was several months before the brothers completed the contract and got the plant running and producing. When this latter was achieved the Koestlichs returned to nearby Fort Victoria where they lived. They still did not know what Harry had actually found at Bikita and wanted to keep the matter as secret as possible. They did not mention or discuss the black minerals in public.

They sent some the crystals to Government Geological Survey offices which was, at that time located in Bulawayo, for identification and if possible a report on the mineral. In due course they got back a report classifying the black crystals as magnetite, a form of iron but asking for the locality of the discovery. The Koestlichs however did not comply with this latter request nor did they agree with the determination report. Reading through an old German publication on minerals Justice Koestlich concurred with a description of cassiterite, mentioned therein, and found them to be very much alike. The book also described a simple smelting test which the brothers carried out on an old charcoal forge. It was not long before they had produced a button of white tin metal. This caused great jubilation in the house of Koestlich because they realized now that Harry had indeed found tin also known as cassiterite. After so many years of fruitless prospecting they had struck it rich at last, no more doing odd jobs for others. They would now become wealthy respected mine owners and producers.

Could they be blamed for building sand castles, don’t we all at times? They had waited so long for this breakthrough, these hard working, intelligent Germans who most people seemed to like and respect. There was however one big snag. The lack of capital to work the mine! Much as they disliked the idea of taking in outsiders they realized that a sleeping partner must be found to put up the necessary cash for development and the erection of a milling and concentrating plant. They decided to take Sarluis into their confidence and give him a thirty three and a third percent interest in the venture. Sarluis was only too willing to get in on the ground floor as it were and an agreement was signed by the trio. Sarluis was to put up all the cash to a certain specified figure agreed upon and the brothers were now ready to go out and peg the claims at Bikita, in their joint names. No one seems to know how the town folk of Fort Victoria got wind of the discovery but by now it was generally known that the Koestlichs had found something big somewhere in the bush.

Justice Koestlich related to the author, in 1952, how they were followed and questioned about the discovery in 1911.

‘They gave us no rest at all’ he said. ‘No matter where we went they pestered us. One chap even had the audacity to follow me to the lavatory, while others keep vigil opposite where we lived. If we turned up at the old Thatched House Hotel everybody offered us drinks and even tried to make us drunk to get some information. One chap, deep in his cups, eventually tried to pick a fight with Harry. We suspected Sarluis of letting the cat out of the bag, but he swore on oath he had not divulged anything to anybody. We also put the Africans on the carpet but here again we got no satisfaction. We then decided to trick the whole lot of them. On a certain afternoon Harry and I boldly walked into the mines department and took out several prospecting license in the name of Harry Koestlich, Justice Koestlich and Michael Samuel Sarluis. By the time we left the Mines Department at least 24 men were busy taking out prospecting licenses. The game was on.

We took into our confidence an old friend of ours, a German named Willie Goelst. Willie was a transport rider cum prospector cum hunter and had experience in pegging and beaconing of claims. So at dawn the following morning we sneaked quietly out of our house and mounted three horses that Kleinbooi, our wagon driver, had ready for us. We rode hell for leather, out of the town on the Mashaba road westwards and directly opposite to where Bikita was, leaving a trail of dust behind us for the jackals to follow. We rode the guts out of the horses for some ten miles and turned off the road into the bush onto high ground and dismounted to watch the panorama from a vantage point. Before long dust appeared on the road and rider after rider swept on towards Mashaba the small asbestos mining town some 15 miles further on. Behind the mounted men came chaps in light buggies and more than one on bicycles and believe it or not one rider on a donkey. We were now satisfied we’d put them off on a false trail and so returned leisurely to near Fort Victoria. Close to the town we turned east across the Umhigashi River and handed over our horses to Kleinbooi and the other Africans who were waiting for us in the thick bush. With them also waiting was Michael Sarluis and Mapfumo my head prospecting boy with five fresh horses for riding and two pack horse loaded up with provisions. I instructed Kleinbooi to load up the wagon with more provisions, tables, chairs etc and follow us to Bikita.

My brother Harry, Willie Goelst, Sarluis, Mapfumo and myself all mounted on fresh horses with our saddle bags packed with necessities and our blanket rolls tied to our saddles set out for Bikita just before 9.00am. We pushed the mounts at a fair pace crossing the four main rivers, Korumudzi, Popotekwe, Mtilikwe where Harry’s stallion had died earlier that year, and the Mazoe River. When we reached the small Rurgwe stream about 9 miles from Bikita we rested the horses. We made some coffee, had a snack and then resumed our journey at about 3pm. We skirted the tall Marah hill and chuckled somewhat as we passed near Fudu Holman’s store on the thickly wooded kopje on Ashcombe farm. We now got quite anxious because the tin prospect was only three mile distant, as Holman might easily have got to know of Harry’s discovery from the local tribesmen. Then also Jack Holdsworth a mining man himself with a store and a small gold mine, namely the Gem, only about a mile and a half to two miles from Harry’s discovery might also have pegged it by now. However, there was nothing we could do but to carry on and hope for the best.

We arrived at the tin outcrop at 4.30pm and followed Harry as he turned south at the Pioneer road into the thick undergrowth about 1,500 feet from where he had made his historic first discovery some 4 months previous. We did not wish to erect our discovery stake and notice out in the open for the whole world to see at this stage of the pegging. So we keep to the bush and well away from the road and prying eyes. Mapfumo quickly cut a stout five foot long pole while we gathered stones to erect a cairn to support our first stake. We knew we had to stake our claims before sunset. As the sun was already low on the western horizon we selected a nearby tree, next to a small outcrop of rock, to affix our first discovery notice. Using a soft pencil I filled in the discovery notice in bold letters and Harry signed his name as discoverer. After witnessing his signature myself, Harry tied the linen square notice to the pole with tree bark known as Makavi supplied by Mapfumo, taken from a young green sapling nearby. The time, 5.00pm on the 19th of May 1911. We had staked our first claim. Not too long after this the sun set and we made camp for the night.

We were in high spirits as no one had forestalled us to the discovery. Sarluis produced a bottle of schnapps’ and we sat down to enjoy the customary Rhodesian sundowner. The following day we prospected north and south deciding on the best way to peg our claims. Two days later Harry, on the afternoon of the 21st of May, erected the second discovery notice some 5,000 feet to the south west which was witnessed by Sarluis. Here tin crystals were visible in white quartz rock. The next day on the 22nd of May, while Willie Goelst, Harry and myself worked out the details of where to cut our first boundary lines Sol set off with Mapfumo to erect yet another and a third discovery peg and notice to the north east some 5,000 feet odd from our first discovery peg. Now we were satisfied no one could horn in on our discovery.

Our wagons had arrived by now and we set about pitching a permanent camp. Mapfumo visited nearby native kraals and engaged a dozen boys to help cut beacon lines. Each boy had his own small axe known as ‘sano’ at which the Makaranga are so adept at felling trees both large and small. Sol returned to Fort Victoria on horseback to attend some business and returned with more prospecting licenses. We had now traversed the area thoroughly and worked out how to peg our claims. Our first claim beacon was erected a couple of yards north of the old Pioneer road and west of the black turf vlei and about 1,200 feet west from where Harry had picked up his first tin crystal. We wanted to make an accurate job of our pegging so we decided to use a small prismatic compass to sight our beacon lines. As we left the first beacon to go southward Willie Goelst twisted his ankle jumping across the wash-away in the Pioneer road and was in much pain for several days. We advised him to return to town to rest his leg for a few days but he would have none of this and stayed with us. All went according to plan for some 5,000 feet. Then as we cut out the thick scrub and packed temporary beacons some 600 feet apart on a straight line we encountered some ironstone formation that distorted the compass needle and gave some false readings causing the beacons to be off line. I had brought a small theodolite, so I decided to use this in place of the prismatic compass. Back I went to the Pioneer road to check up on the beacons and to correct any errors. For the rest of the survey I stuck to my theodolite and had no more trouble keeping a straight line and making an accurate survey map.

We decided to peg off 14 blocks of ground each measuring about 60 acres and containing 30 claims each. The beacons we packed were big and solid at least 2 feet at the top and 4 feet at the base and 2feet high. By the end of June we had surveyed and secured the ground needed. In due course we returned to Fort Victoria and handed in duplicate discovery and registration papers along with two surveyed maps. On the 4th of July 1911 we received registration of our 14 blocks an area comprising nearly 900 acres. These claims we called the Squenula claims after Harry’s native name. While we were beaconing at Bikita some necessities we required were naturally purchased at Holdsworth store nearby so it was not long before Jack Holdsworth himself paid us visit at our camp. With him was Billy Bently another old timer. They inquired if they could peg next door to us. We told them to carry on and peg as long as they did not cross our boundaries. They pegged some blocks of claims to the east of us after we got registration and after we had established all our boundary lines etc. Holdsworth pegged several blocks and got registration and called these blocks the Ranga claims.’

‘Well that’s about the end of the story as far as I can remember concerning the original pegging in 1911,’ concluded the old gentleman.

‘What was the attitude of the town folk in Fort Victoria when they found out you had fooled them?’ I asked the old gentleman.

‘They were sore of course and very sore indeed and naturally so. I noticed none of them offered to buy us a drink, in the old Thatched hotel, after that’ said Justice.

‘How did you fair on the tin mine after you got registration’ I asked him.

‘Well in due course Harry and I returned to Bikita to open up the tin reefs and do some development. There were outcrops with visible tin crystals everywhere. We decided to purchase and erect a five stamp gravity mill and a steam engine at the northern end of the claims where a good supply of permanent water was found in a small stream that traversed across the claims. We also reasoned that if the water supply on the little stream near the mill would dry up then we could pump water from the Mungezi River itself less than a mile away. While I erected the mill and the steam engine etc Harry mined rich surface ore which we stockpiled near the mill. About that time the Willoughby’s Company heard about our rich tin strike and offered to buy us out. After much discussion with Sarluis we agreed, seeing that we did not have much capital, to give them an option to develop but not the right to produce any tin. They sent out a man named Oliver to sink shafts and develop the reefs at depth. Oliver was a nice enough man. The natives named him ‘Masokies’ which means vests. Oliver always wore shorts and a white vest. He only wore a shirt when he went to town. Now as I remember rightly, five shafts were sunk to a depth of 75 feet each and in places crosscuts were put in at depth. However I don’t think this man who was in charge knew very much about tin formations and nothing spectacular was found at depth. The Willoughby Company after a while decided to abandon the development programme and their option. There were two reasons for this. The one reason, the price of tin had dropped somewhat and the values they encountered at depth were not as rich at the top. This was about the middle of November 1913. Sarluis who had by now lost interest in the would be tin Eldorado of Bikita, decided to sell his interest to a man from Mashaba by the name of Walter Baddard. This transaction went through for £500 in November 1913. Baddard was a hard working slave driver, who worked the Africans beyond their limit of their abilities. The boys named him ‘Hokoyo’ which means beware—danger. He was well and truly named. The Africans both hated and feared him. He never spared the rod and desertions were common place. When Baddard joined us we therefore concentrated on production. But, as is always the case we’d had our various teething problems with the mill and steam engine. Concentration of the crushed tin ore was carried out with hand operated sluice boxes and hand panning a slow business and tedious, requiring many, many hands.

By July 1914 we had produced some 10 tons of tin concentrates and we were waiting to dispose of when the first set back hit us badly. England declared war on Germany. As Harry and I were German nationals we were arrested and proclaimed enemy aliens. Harry Koestlich was out in the bush somewhere prospecting and could not be contacted. So a wanted notice was posted outside the magistrate’s office in Fort Victoria offering a reward of five pounds for his arrest. His crime? Being a German? There was even a pen sketch of Harry on the five pound wanted notice. We were given very little time to settle our affairs and told that we were to be interned at a prisoner of war camp in Port Elizabeth in South Africa. Between 1914 and 1919 I can only remember receiving one letter from Walter Baddard. We had no means of finding out how the mine was progressing I suppose for security reasons. But both Harry and I held up hope that we would be able to return to Bikita when hostilities ceased. Both of us had always comported ourselves with decorum and regarded Rhodesia as our adopted home and we had no intention of returning to Germany. After the Willoughby Company had pulled out Harry and I toyed with the idea of interesting a German backing concern to take over the claims. But Sarluis was eager to get out and having sold his interest we had to deal with Baddard. Then of course the price of tin went down and it was very difficult to interest anybody. But little did we know what an uncertain future held for us.

When peace did come in 1919 Harry and I informed the authorities at Port Elizabeth that we wished to return to Rhodesia. We were informed that there would be no difficulty of this so we packed our meagre belongings in two big tin trunks and consigned them to Fort Victoria. We were given two second class tickets to Rhodesia and we were actually on the station at Port Elizabeth ready to entrain when we were informed that a petition had been signed in Fort Victoria objecting to our return to Rhodesia as no Germans were wanted there. The South African authorities therefore would not allow us to proceed on our journey. Both Harry and I petitioned the authorities in Salisbury, Rhodesia to allow us to return to Bikita, but we got no satisfaction whatsoever. We were however informed that the Squenula tin claims had been forfeited in August 1917. Our letters to Baddard were never answered so we never found out what happened to our tools and five stamp mill and steam engine, sluice boxes etc etc. nor what happened to the ten tons of tin concentrates. We were now truly strangers in a strange and hostile country what a bleak future to look forward to. No home. No friends. No money. I found an old prospecting license among my papers, so I sent this off to Salisbury asking them to refund the 20/- I had paid for the right to prospect for minerals and now denied me. I received a curt reply refusing any refund and returning my prospecting licenses.’

The old gentleman smiled sadly as he took the old prospecting license out of his wallet for me to see and examine. It was dated 1912 with the official Mines Department stamp of Fort Victoria.

‘Then what happened,’ I inquired sympathetically.

‘Well not wishing to return to Germany, Harry and I applied to the authorities in South to allow us to stay on there. And this was granted. We were now penniless as we left the POW camp in Port Elizabeth. All this was a very great blow to poor old Harry. The tin mine was his discovery and its loss was a scar he carried to his grave some years later. I worked my way to Cape Town for work there but Harry insisted on going up to the Transvaal. And some years later I was informed that indeed he had died there. To me this was a great shock as we were such very good friends he and I.’

At the time Justice Koestlich had narrated his story to me in 1952, I the author, was the owner of most of the original Squenula tin claims and I could visualize just what his feelings were in 1919. But gentleman that he was he did not begrudge me my good fortune. We remained good friends until his death some years later.

CHAPTER 2

The Bikita Tinfields 1914 to 1928

A fter the pegging of the Squinula tin claims by the Koestlich brothers and Sarluis from May to July 1911 tin fever hit the Bikita district. Prospectors came from every part of Rhodesia and some as far afield as South Africa. By the end of 1911 every square inch of ground had been pegged and registered for miles around the Koestlich pegging. But as is always the case in pegging rushes of this kind in a new mining area very little actual development was done and within two years most of the claims were forfeited by their once enthusiastic owners. I, the author, had taken part in mad pegging rushes over a period of forty years from Bikita right down to the Grasfontien diamond diggings in the 1920’s. It is surprising what area people will put under claims during a rush. Of course not only the bone fide prospectors and mining men get pegging fever but the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker buys a prospecting license and gives it a go. They have visions of over night wealth and early retirement with not a worry in the world nor the slightest idea of pegging procedure or know how. They will rush around wildly pegging on growing trees large or small, pegging a farmers homestead or vegetable garden, sometimes the poor old farmer himself. We old timers watched them with some trepidation. The bone fide prospectors do not want to upset Mr. Farmer in any way at all by infringing on his rights. We want to be friendly with him and cause him a minimum of annoyance, inconvenience and disturbance. We mostly succeed. It is these weekend enthusiasts and rock hounds that bark up the wrong tree.

True there was a slump in the price of tin between 1912-1914 but had more development work been carried out on many of these tin claims, payable tin strikes would have been uncovered. The small trading stores Holdsworth and Holman did a flourishing business while this rush lasted. Jack Leadingham pegged a kopje to the west of and adjacent to the Squinula tin claims and to this day this hill is known as Leadingham Hill. Walter Baddard now that his German partners were locked up as POW in Port Elisabeth in far away South Africa carried on producing from the rich tin outcrops. But not having sufficient capital to develop soon found himself in difficulties. The price of tin continued to slump even lower. His water supply dried up and he could not afford to put in a pumping plant at the Mungezi River as the Koestlichs had visualized. There was only sufficient water for tedious and slow hand panning. Labour was a problem. It did not take long for word to spread that ‘Hokoyo’ was on his own now and the local tribesmen refused to work for him, in any numbers sufficient for him to carry on. They knew him only to well. Justice Koestlich had been able to keep the wheels turning. But Baddard not being an engineer could not cope with the many break downs. He eventually closed down the mine. The Koestlich and Baddard syndicate had owned 13 blocks of claims and these had to be protected by development work or a payment of £5 per block per year to the Mines Department. In-order to keep up payments, £65 per year then, Baddard sold the five-stamp-mill, the steam engine and the sluice boxes etc. He also sold the ten tons of tin concentrates to meet expenses and keep the tin kettle boiling. By 1917 Baddard was dead broke and decided to let the Squenula tin claims go to forfeiture.

In due course a notice was posted outside the Mines department advertising the news that the 13 Squenula blocks of claims would be open for re-pegging on the 13th August 1917. Walter Baddard was now back in his old stomping grounds in Mashaba. But not withstanding the fact that he had just allowed the rich tin claims to be forfeited. Baddard decided to re-peg part of the area in his own name. A few days prior to the 13th August 1917 he traveled through to Bikita in the company of two friends Allan Edington and our old friend Michael Samuel Sarluis. However, unbeknown to Baddard and company others were also interested in pegging the rich Koestlich tin claims. Jimmy and Bill Laing, who owned the Empress gold mine at Mashaba, were very friendly with Willie Goelst. The Laings arranged for their party to slip out east of Bikita and also peg on the 13th of August. As Jimmy Laing wasn’t able to accompany the party, he authorized Willie Goelst, Charles and James Standish to peg as his agents and Bill Laing to peg on his own behalf.

Let me now hand over to Willie Goelst who told the author in 1952, of the second rush at Bikita in August 1917.

‘Jimmy Laing handed me, Charlie and Jimmy Standish each a prospecting license with instructions to peg if possible the best claims at Bikita. Willie Laing also joined our party to peg a block of claims for himself. We told no-one of our intended trip to Bikita. How very like the time I accompanied my old friends the Koestlichs in1911. The only difference being the means of transportation. We used horses in 1911. Our party in 1917 traveled out to Bikita in two motor cars. We arrived near the claims just after sunset. We parked the cars in a patch of thick bush about half a mile from where we intended pegging. I knew the area well, having been present at the original pegging and beaconing with the Koestlichs in 1911. We sat in the cars all night and worked out our plan of campaign. All the linen notices were actually filled in the night before. Each of us had an African assistant who carried with him a small ‘sanu’ or axe for use later in the pegging. Although it was cold during the night we refrained from even kindling a fire incase the enemy might detect our presence.

We knew Baddard’s party was camped somewhere on the claims and I assumed he would camp near water. If this was so then were safe and had a good chance of getting in first and of pegging on the waterless hill. Baddard’s party was indeed camped near the black turf vlei where Harry Koestlich had picked up his first tin crystal. The vlei always had water, winter and summer. In fact we could now hear laughing and singing way in the distance towards where I thought they would be camped.

‘Walter and his party have a couple of bottles of whisky in camp. They will find it difficult to be up and early before sunrise tomorrow,’ I even remarked to my friends

You see, at one time pegging had to be carried out between the hours of sunrise and sunset. But by August 1917 the mining law had been changed to read from 6am to 6pm. If I remember rightly the sun rose at about 6.15am in the middle of August when we did our pegging. It was well after midnight when the merry making ceased to the east of us and the Baddard party turned in to get some sleep. We were up long before dawn the next morning and made our way as silently as we could. Before long we reached the foot path that led us very close to the area that we intended pegging. We still had 30 minutes to 6am so we located the original Koestlich beacons near at hand with their steel pegs and iron plates. Now we had arranged that on the stroke of 6am I would fire a revolver shot in the air and this was the signal for everyone to stake their notices at 6am sharp. At 6am I therefore fired a shot and erected my prospecting notice and a minute later erected the D.P. peg, and so did my companions.

My witness was Cherumbi. Charlie Standish had a witness named Dodzo and Jimmy Standish was assisted by Chandirengwa, and Bill Laing had Mandiseri as his witness. By 7am all the beacons were lettered according to law and the registration notices posted. We then made our way down the hill towards the Baddard camp. Walter was anything but pleased, as he and his pals had been caught napping after their night of revelry. They had only woken up when I fired my revolver and then the sent a chap post haste to scout out the land higher up the slope where we were busy pegging. They had then rushed about and pegged near their camp. I examined the one prospecting notice nearby and saw their pegging time was 6.17 am.

‘What are you calling your pegging?’ asked Baddard of Jimmy Standish, who suggested calling the blocks the ‘Challenge’ claims.

‘Seeing as we have to accept what’s happened, I’ll call mine the ‘Accepted’ replied Baddard.

And indeed so the two lots of peggings were actually named. We returned to Fort Victoria and immediately handed in our papers and sketches at 9.25 am the same day and received registration papers for the four Challenge blocks of claims. Later the same day Walter Baddard also handed in his papers and also got registration for the two ‘Accepted’ blocks. Baddard’s pal, a man by the name of Edington, also pegged two blocks of claims but he only got registration on one of them as his second block was found to be a complete over pegging of one of Holdsworth’s ‘Ranga’ blocks.

So ended Willie Goelst story of the second pegging of the tin claims.

After going to all the trouble and rushing out to Bikita post haste to peg the tin claims in August 1917 the Laings and Baddard let their claims go to forfeiture. By October 1921 all the claims were again open for relocation except of course those belonging to old Holdsworth at Ranga. Now old Jack Holdsworth who lived nearby at his Ranga claims kept a sharp lookout for these forfeiture publications and decided to re-peg the whole Bikita Tinfields as and when the ground was open for pegging. As the blocks of ground were forfeited Holdsworth stepped in and put up prospecting and discovery notices. He had no intention of registering these peggings. All he did was simply peg the different claims and so prevent other prospectors from securing the ground. His action was quite legal and nothing in the mining law prevented him from keeping outsiders from homing in. The procedure was quite simple. As long as he had sufficient prospecting licenses, costing twenty shillings each, he could secure the whole main area for himself. Because one prospecting notice accompanied by a discovery peg and discovery notice protects a locator or prospector for a radius of 3,000 feet around his pegging for some 31 days. When this period of time expires the pegger simply waits seven clear days and on the morning of the eighth day or 39 days from when he posted his first prospecting notice he can again peg for the same area.

Holdsworth posted four lots of prospecting and discovery notices on four different days and for four years kept on renewing his notices. This was quite easy as he was the only one living on the Bikita tin fields at the time. Holdsworth’s reasoning was logical. It cost him practically nothing to hold the ground and some one might just be interested enough to take over his pegging, at a price. This is exactly what happened in November 1921 when Captain E A McIntyre met Holdsworth and agreed to take over some of his ‘held’ claims. For the sum of £1,000 Holdsworth allowed McIntyre to peg five blocks of ground. Two blocks were pegged and registered as the Bikita blocks of claims, on the southern end where tin was visible in white quartz and a mauve micaeous formation known as lepidolite, an ore of lithium and of no economic value at the time. The other three blocks were to the north and near to where Harry Koestlich had found his first tin crystals next to the Pioneer road. These three blocks were called the Nigel tin claims. Registration of the five blocks was affected on the 23rd November 1921. The area in between Holdsworth held with one prospecting and one discovery notice for just on 12 months because he religiously renewed these notices as they expired.

Then Holdsworth got careless and in jumped Stewart Smith, a man from Selukwe. Smith was a miner, cum farmer and cattle buyer and ran a butcher shop at Selukwe at onetime. He traveled far and wide selling cattle as a side line and making quite a handsome profit. During November / December in 1922 he was down in Ndanga in the Bikita district south east of the Bikita tin fields on a cattle buying trip when he ran into John Chaddock also buying steers. The two men camped for the night at a cattle dip tank ready for the cattle sale the following morning. Sitting round the camp fire that night, Stewart Smith asked Chaddock,

‘Where are you heading for, after the cattle sale tomorrow, Chaddock?’

‘Oh I’m pushing off towards Zaka. There’s a kraal head down there that has a fine herd of tollies I’m after. When I’ve bought what I want down there I’ll trek back and pick up the cattle here and make tracks for Fort Victoria and offload my parcel there, for some viable butchers just before Christmas. I hope to get a decent price.’

‘Why not come back with me on my cart and horse and have a look at some of the cattle at Marangaranga hill. You can tie your bicycle on the back of the cart’

‘No, I can’t do that as I have already arranged to buy a parcel just beyond the Tokwe River. Thanks all the same for the offer.’

So Chaddock went on his way to Zaka and Smith towards Marangaranga the following day.

Chaddock told me (the author) years later, ‘I missed the boat by not accompanying Stewart Smith that day. If I was with him I would have shared in his bit of luck. But how was I to know what was to transpire? Even Smith did not know at the time.’

‘Yes indeed Chaddock you certainly missed the boat,’ I told him.

Stewart Smith jogged along at a leisurely pace until he got to the Rozva River near the Marangaranga hill. There he made camp for the night. Not long afterwards two Africans passing on their way home recognized the cattle buyer and offered him a parcel at their kraal past Holdsworth mining camp. Smith knew the kraal; he’d purchased cattle there before.

‘Have the cattle ready for my inspection at sunrise. I’ll be at your kia’s pretty early,’ he told them.

The following morning Smith set off from the Rozva River quite early and got to the African village an hour later. There to his annoyance he learnt the cattle had not been kraaled the night before and having strayed might not be found till late. So all he could do was to wait until they were brought in from the veld or proceed on his way back to Fort Victoria. He decided to wait. The horses were outspanned and knee halted so that they couldn’t stray to far while they were grazing. Smith then decided to walk around the area and do a bit of prospecting as he usually did in his leisure hours. In the distance he saw a beacon with steel plates and pegs on them. So he decided to investigate. On the one plate the painted letters stood out quite plainly, the A peg of the Squenula.

So this was the place where the Koestlichs originally pegged in 1911 soliloquized Smith as he walked on. Wonder who owns the ground now. The story of how the crafty Germans had put the other prospectors off the scent and on the false rush to Mashaba was common knowledge and of course had caused many a laugh in different pubs over the years. In a clearing Smith spied a white prospecting notice on a pole. He walked towards it and read ‘Prospecting notice. Notice is hereby given that the under signed being lawfully entitled to act under prospecting license 53211 issued at the Mines Department, Fort Victoria, to John Holdsworth hereby claims for a period of 31 days from the under mentioned date of posting this notice the exclusive right of prospecting on all ground open to prospecting within the area described a radius of 1,000 feet from this notice the date and hour of posting the notice and the signature of the locator, J Holdsworth, and the witness to this notice marked ‘X’ by Mbaiwa.

Smith noticed that the prospecting notice had been posted on the 27th September 1922. When this notice had lapsed the date was altered to the 6th November 1922. He quickly worked out the dates. This last pegging on the 6th November had lapsed 31 days later i.e. on the 7th of December. And it was now the 9th of that month. Allowing for 7 clear days this meant that the ground would be open for relocation on the 15th December, in six days time. Smith noted this in a small note book and returned to the beacon with the plated pegs and made notes, then returned to his cart. Not long afterwards the cattle arrived at the kraal and Smith bought what he was after and set off for Fort Victoria. Once there he went to the Mines Department and perused the original Squenula and the Challenge peggings of 1911 and 1917. He made sketches of the pegging maps available in the Mines Department and purchased new linen notices and prospecting licenses. According to the Mines Department there were 4 blocks of claims unregistered. Namely the original Squenula’s all contiguous and situated between ground owned by Captain McIntyre, i.e. the Bikita on the south and the Nigel on the northern boundary. Smith decided to return to Bikita and peg the open ground if he could get in before Holdsworth that is.

On the 13th December Smith set out from Fort Victoria accompanied by one of his herdsmen. He allowed himself two full days to reach the Bikita Tinfields. The dirt road was heavy going as there had been a lot of rain. When the horses trotted down the drift at the Mtilikwe the river was in flood and Smith had to wait until the 15th December before his horse was able to cross the river. On reaching the Popotekwe River the cart could again not cross as the water ran too swift at the narrow crossing and more time was lost. It was only with difficulty that they crossed at noon on the 16th December. Smith was now worried that Holdsworth could easily have re-pegged the open ground by now. He contemplated giving up the idea of repegging.

Well there was only one more major river to cross and should there be any delay there he would abandon his trip and return to Fort Victoria. However the Umzori River was not difficult to cross and they proceeded on their way to a point near the tin fields about 6pm on the 16th December. Too late to peg any ground. Making camp some distance from the road in a clearing, well protected by trees and near the Fashu stream Smith walked about 2 miles to get to the prospecting notice he’d examined earlier. He had some difficulty finding it in the waning twilight but was elated that Holdsworth had not renewed the prospecting notice yet and the ground would be open for relocation in the morning. He walked on down the hill towards the old Pioneer road to see if any other pegging had taken place but saw no white linen notices of any kind. He reached the road at last and walked briskly to where he’d left his cart and horses beyond the small river.

Very early the next morning heavy rain set in turning the road into a quagmire. At 5am Smith set out to reach the claims. Cutting straight across the treeless valley that he might have done normally was out of the question as it was too wet, he had to keep to the road. It was heavy going and the two horses made slow progress. As they descended towards a small stream in the black vlei Smith saw a big white cairn beacon he’d seen before a few yards north of the Pioneer road. He stopped to examine the print on the steel plates fixed to the upright pegs. Staring at him and still quite legible was the A peg of the Squenula. This happened to be the original Koestlich beacon. Then he read another plate also nailed to a wooden post the D peg of Nigel, Smith knew now he had arrived near the point where he would erect his first prospecting notice, discovery peg and discovery notice. He crossed the narrow stream and the black vlei and turned the horse and cart onto higher ground and quickly outspanned. His witness quickly cut two poles and the first prospecting notice was posted at 7am 17th December 1922. He then proceeded to find the six beacons and write the appropriate lettering on each old peg found in the cairn of stones.

By 12noon of the same day Smith had pegged the four main blocks of claims on the Bikita tin fields which he named Al Hayat. I believe Al Hayat means ‘Life-Good luck’ in Arabic. Now little did he know nor did he realize he just pegged the worlds largest and most important lithium deposit in the form of petalite ore nor for that matter did Harry or Justice Koestlich or Jimmy Laing know this or even about the rich beryl deposits that lay exposed on the gravel surface. Stewart Smith returned to far off Fort Victoria where he entrained for Selukwe to spend Christmas with his wife and family.

Years later the author questioned old Jack Holdsworth about the pegging of the Al Hayat. The old prospector laughed.

‘Yes I slipped up very badly then. But one gets careless you know. Who would have thought that Stewart Smith would have arrived on the tin fields in all that rain and spot my dummy pegs. Oh well, I thought at the time good luck to him anyway and now you people own the claims. But your father had to pay a lot of money for that at that time.’

Incidentally this was the last time the main tin blocks were pegged as they were not forfeited again since 1922. After this, tin claim owners at Bikita religiously protected their claims as the price of tin maintained a steady price of round about £200 to £250 a long ton delivered to overseas ports.

CHAPTER 3

Holdsworth, Jimmy Miller and Osborne

H oldsworth was a rough diamond and a veteran of many mining camps. His unpropitious grounding and his misguided outlook on life, picked up in his early teens in the mining camps of Australia, slowly but surely took root in the character forming of the would be prospector and miner. The mould so meticulously fashioned in the polluted mud of depravity and intrigue could not help but produce a pattern so perfect in improbity and deception. Wherever he went he left a stinking trail behind him, Australia, Barberton, in South Africa and eventually Rhodesia. His advent on the goldfields of Felixberg in Rhodesia aroused no great interest at first, but, later when rich mined ore disappeared from the shaft heads at night suspicion was focused on the syndicate of prospectors, of which old Holdsworth was a member. These illegal prospecting activities culminated in banishment from the area.

A Miners meeting, a bush court, a verdict of guilty, hangs him on the nearest tree or get out in 24 hours. Felixberg was notorious to the extreme. One man in a drunken brawl was felled to the ground with a whiskey bottle and then kicked to death by enraged Felixberg miners in the old Enkeldoorn hotel pub. While yet another enjoying a midnight bottle party suddenly collapsed with violent stomach convulsions and was dead within the hour of arsenical poisoning. The marked man is a dead man. So the midnight mining syndicate quietly dispersed. Holdsworth took the line of least resistance and beat a hasty retreat to his new gold strike he’d just registered in the Bikita district, the Gem mine. Here he went to ground trading and prospecting. The law never caught up with him. The very thought of an actual prosecution was more than distasteful and frightening in the extreme.

We have just seen how Jack Holdsworth lost his 4 blocks of ground in December 1922 to Stewart Smith. Holdsworth had a big mining camp at Ranga. Between the years 1918 and 1922 he produced nearly 14 Tons of tin concentrates, valued at about £2,300. There were two parallel tin bearing reefs on Ranga and quite a big tonnage of alluvial and eluvial gravels which his gang hand panned during the rainy season when the small Ranga spruit was fed with water from the surrounding foot hills. The price of tin in 1918 was £268 a ton and old Jack had struck