Gold was discovered on the lower Fraser in 1858. The news soon spread and a gold rush was underway.

Thouands of miners, mostly Americans from the now exhausted goldfields of California, made the trip 250 kilometres upriver to the first big strike at Yale.

They travelled by canoe, sailboat, and raft. As time went on, more gold deposits were discovered, and a string of mining communities grew up along the Fraser. Prospectors fanned out eastward and there were smaller 'rushes' for the next eight years.

The British authorities in Victoria were suddenly faced with the problem of trying to maintain law and order in a part of the world to which they had weak legal claim.

Governor Douglas decided to establish British authority. He claimed the area for Britain, drew up mining rules and regulations, sold licences to the miners, hired police officers, and sent circuit judges around to all the mining communities.

Douglas also built a road into the Cariboo region alongside the Fraser River, from Yale in south, north to Quesnel and Barkerville. This road effectively opened up the interior of British Columbia.

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