Colonial Despatches

The community of Rich Bar is located roughly 5 km south of Quesnel, on the Fraser River.

According to this despatch, Rich Bar was also referred to as Ferguson’s Bar, and like the other bars situated along the Fraser River, was rich with gold deposits. The same despatch notes that miners initially earned up to $60 per day; however, such earnings would shortly fall to $7-$10 after miners had depleted the original pay-streak, and more exhaustive methods of extracting the gold were necessary.

Unlike the other bars, the same despatch notes that the soil at Rich Bar was free of trees and roots, and the covering sand itself contained enough gold to cover the cost of some of the more intensive mining expenses. Douglas also notes in the above dispatch that numerous chunks of a dark brown mass similar to coal, which he presumed to be a form of lignite, were also discovered in the region.

An incorporated township near the old mining sites still bears the name Rich Bar.