Cariboo Region
The Cariboo region originally referred to the gold-field region surrounding
Quesnel and
Barkerville, but now encompasses the entire area from Cache Creek to
Prince George,
1 which, presently, is part of the Cariboo Land District.
2The name Cariboo, a French derivative of the Algonquin “xalibu”, was chosen to reflect
the abundance of caribou that inhabited the area.
3 In
this despatch,
Douglas notes his adoption of the
more convenient orthography
of
Cariboo,
instead of the previous incarnations, though he adds that
it should be written Cariboeuf
or Rein Deer, the country having been so named from its being a favorite haunt of
that species of the deer kind.
The Cariboo country gold discoveries were quite substantial throughout the early 1860’s;
Akrigg and Akrigg note that a small group of miners who arrived at
Antler Creek in early 1861 occasionally found $75 to $100 worth in a single pan.
- 1. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Place Names (Vancouver: UBC Press, 1997), 38.
- 2. Cariboo Land District, BC Geographical Names Information System.
- 3. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Place Names (Vancouver: UBC Press, 1997), 38.
- 4. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 211.