Lightband Gully

{{Short description|Valley in New Zealand; site of first payable gold discovery in South Island}} {{Use New Zealand English|date=January 2025}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2025}} {{Infobox valley | name = Lightband Gully | other_name = Lightbands Gully | photo = | photo_caption =  | map =  | map_image = | map_caption = Location of Lightband Gully  | location = [[Parapara, Tasman|Parapara]] | country = New Zealand | region = | district = Tasman | coordinates = {{coord|40.750|S|172.641|E|display=inline,title}} | coordinates_ref =  | elevation = | elevation_m = 60–90 | elevation_ft = | elevation_ref = | length = | length_mi = | length_km = | length_orientation = | length_note = | width = | width_mi = | width_km = | width_orientation = | width_note = | area = | area_mi2 = | area_km2 = | depth = | depth_ft = | depth_m = | type = | age = | border = | topo = | traversed = | river = unnamed }} '''Lightband Gully''', sometimes also '''Lightbands '''or''' Lightband's Gully''', is a valley in the hills behind the [[Golden Bay / Mohua]] township of [[Parapara, Tasman|Parapara]] in New Zealand. The valley is notable as the site of the first payable gold discovery—in October 1856—in the [[South Island]], and this started the [[Golden Bay gold rush]]. This gold rush, which lasted for three years, triggered a name change of the area, from Massacre Bay to Golden Bay.

==Location== Lightband Gully is a valley in the hills behind Parapara.<ref>{{LINZ |id=26490 |name=Lightband Gully |access-date=25 January 2025}} </ref> The creek that flows through the valley is not named.<ref name="topomap">{{cite web |title=Lightband Gully, Tasman |url= https://www.topomap.co.nz/NZTopoMap/nz44494/Lightband-Gully/Tasman |publisher=NZ Topo Map |access-date=24 January 2025}}</ref> The valley begins at the confluence of two creeks, one of which is Graham Creek.<ref>{{LINZ |id=21692 |name=Graham Creek |access-date=25 January 2025}}</ref> Lightband Gully's creek flows into Appos Creek, which in turn discharges into the [[Aorere River]].<ref name="topomap" />

There is legal access—mostly via [[Paper street|paper roads]]—from Plain Road: a corridor accesses Appos Flat, then descends along Appos Creek to its confluence with the creek coming out of Lightband Gully, with the paper road then following up the gully and beyond it along an unnamed tributary.<ref>{{cite web |title=Lightband Gully, Nelson, NZL |url= https://maps.herengaanuku.govt.nz/Viewer/?map=9cd99517a0db4d18a894c3839df4d3a3 |publisher=[[Herenga ā Nuku Aotearoa, the Outdoor Access Commission]] |access-date=25 January 2025}}</ref>

==History== [[File:Lightband Gully memorial 02 (cropped).jpg|thumb|Lightband Gully memorial in Parapara]] On 1 September 1856, Nelson banker David Sclanders chaired a meeting in [[Nelson, New Zealand|Nelson]] at which it was decided to put forward a £500 bonus for the discovery of a "workable gold field" within the Nelson–Tasman area.<ref>{{cite news |title=Bonus for the discovery of a workable gold field |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NENZC18560903.2.8.1 |access-date=25 January 2025 |work=[[The Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle]] |volume=XV |date=3 September 1856 |page=2}}</ref> John Ellis and John James found gold in October 1856{{efn|At the hearing for the gold bonus, they would later claim that they first found gold in July 1856; they put the date forward to increase their chances to obtain the payout.<ref name="gold bonus">{{cite news |title=The gold bonus |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NENZC18580210.2.10 |access-date=25 January 2025 |work=[[The Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle]] |volume=XVII |date=10 February 1858 |page=3}}</ref> All later reports put the date at October 1856, though, for example this history.<ref>{{cite news |title=The history of Collingwood |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP18880116.2.39 |access-date=25 January 2025 |work=[[The Press]] |volume=XLV |issue=6962 |date=16 January 1888 |page=5}}</ref>}} at the point where Lightband Gully's creek flows into Appos Creek.<ref name="NZ Geographic">{{cite journal |last1=Hindmarsch |first1=Gerard |title=Kahurangi; Our newest National Park |journal=New Zealand Geographic |date=Jul–Sep 1995 |issue=27 |url= https://www.nzgeo.com/stories/kahurangi-our-newest-national-park/}}</ref>

[[William Lightband]], a son of [[George Lightband]], was told about the find by Ellis and James.<ref name="gold bonus" /> From 1851 to 1853, Lightband Jr. had been on Australian gold fields.<ref name="NZETC Westland">{{cite book |title=The Cyclopedia of New Zealand : Nelson, Marlborough & Westland Provincial Districts |year=1906 |url= https://ndhadeliver.natlib.govt.nz/webarchive/20210104000423/http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-Cyc05Cycl-t1-body1-d1-d2-d5.html#Cyc05Cycl-fig-Cyc05Cycl130a |publisher=[[The Cyclopedia of New Zealand]] |location=Christchurch |chapter=Brightwater}}</ref> Lightband Jr. and William Hough did some further prospecting at the original claim, and after a week they moved further up the valley. By February 1857, they found a location that gave good returns.<ref name="gold bonus" /> That month, Lightband Jr. chaired a meeting where rules were agreed on for gold fields; these were adopted for all subsequent gold fields in the country.<ref name="The Prow" /><ref>{{cite news |title=Our gold fields |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NENZC18570228.2.7 |access-date=25 January 2025 |work=[[The Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle]] |volume=XV |date=28 February 1857 |page=2}}</ref>

The wider area proved to hold gold, and over the following three years, some 2000 miners came to the Aorere gold field. Finding gold triggered the change of the area's name: in 1642, [[Abel Tasman]] had called the area Murderers ("Moordenaers") Bay, which later became Massacre Bay, but this became Golden Bay in the 1850s.<ref name="The Prow">{{cite web |last1=Stephens |first1=Joy |title=Aorere gold |url= https://www.theprow.org.nz/enterprise/aorere-gold/ |publisher=The Prow |access-date=25 January 2025 |date=12 October 2021}}</ref> The bonus for the gold field discovery was never paid out.<ref name="NZETC Westland" />

There is a monument on the old alignment of [[State Highway 60 (New Zealand)|State Highway 60]] that commemorates Lightband Gully, which is {{cvt|2|mi}} inland from the location.<ref name="NZ Geographic" /> The inscription reads:<blockquote>Two miles west of this spot<br/>at Lightband's Gully the first<br/>South Island discovery of<br/>payable gold was made in 1856</blockquote>

After the [[Cobb Reservoir]] and the [[Cobb Power Station]] had been completed in 1956, workers and machinery were shifted to Parapara to realign the state highway and build he causeway through the [[Parapara Inlet]]; the latter was under construction in the early 1960s.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Dawber |first1=Carol |last2=Win |first2=Cheryl |ref={{sfnRef|Dawber and Win|2008}} |title=Between the ports : Collingwood to Waitapu |date=March 2008 |publisher=River Press |location=Dunedin |isbn=978-0-9582779-1-4 |pages=72–73}}</ref> Since then, the monument has no longer been adjacent to the highway.{{efn|The monument is located in what appears to be a private driveway, but the location remains legal road.}} The gully was named for William Lightband.<ref>{{cite book |last = Reed |first = A. W. |authorlink = Clif Reed |title = Place Names of New Zealand |year = 2010 |publisher = Raupo |location = Rosedale, North Shore |isbn = 9780143204107 |editor = Peter Dowling |page = 217}}</ref>

==Footnotes== {{notelist}}

==References== {{Reflist}} {{Tasman District}}

[[Category:History of the Tasman District]] [[Category:1856 in New Zealand]] [[Category:Aorere gold rush]] [[Category:Valleys of New Zealand]] [[Category:Landforms of the Tasman District]]