Hugh Murray's Scrap Book

Slumach became part of the Pitt Lake gold legend in 1939 in an article written by Jack Mahony who interviewed pioneer Hugh Murray. The "Slummock" in their story was a middle-aged “half-breed Red River Indian” who was hanged for murdering another half-breed prospector by drowning. This "romantic fiction” included the first published text of the probably equally fictional "Jackson letter." Thanks to Barry Dykes, archivist at the New Westminster Museum, I had an opportunity to go through this large volume at my leisure. A very interesting collection of cuttings, but there was nothing about Pitt Lake Gold there. If Hugh Murray did collect cuttings about the discoverers of the Lost Creek, he must have kept them somewhere else. Shown are some pages of the scrap book. Click on the images for enlargements.