Deadman's Curse: Slumach's Gold

Just before he was hanged, an indigenous prospector accused of murder set a curse on anyone who searched for his hidden gold. Over a century later, a prospector, a mountaineer, a truth-seeker and a way-shower band together to walk the same paths of those who went looking for Slumach’s cursed gold and never returned.   Deadman's Curse: Slumach's Gold is a historical, true crime podcast hosted by Kru Williams from History Television's hit original series Deadmans Curse: The Legend of Lost Gold. Join Kru and the team as they investigate the curse and legend surrounding the lost gold mine of Pitt Lake.   On their quest they're joined by members of the Stó:lō and Katzie First Nations, historians and cultural experts of diverse backgrounds, as they sort fact from fiction and give Slumach a voice from the other side of the veil. Their quest begins June 06. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On a cold January evening in 1891, a condemned man was led slowly back to his cell for the very last time the night before his execution. The next morning, the hangman arrived at the man’s cell and they headed toward the gallows where a black cap was put on, and at 8 o’clock exactly the bolt was drawn, and the trap fell. His death was painless.  The man’s name was Slumach, and he had just paid the ultimate penalty for his crime. But, not long after his death, rumours began to surface that he had discovered a lucrative and hidden stash of gold in the mountains, a source worth billions. It is said that just before Slumach was hanged, he muttered these words as a warning to anyone who dared to search for his secret gold mine: ‘Nika memloose, mine memloose.’ In this episode we look at how a single bullet was the catalyst for a 150 year old mystery. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Taylor Starr Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Great Pacific Media Website: https://greatpacifictv.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When we last left off, a man named Slumach shot and killed a man named Louis Bee on September 8, 1890, along the reedy shores of what was then known as Lillooet Slough, near the vast expanse of Pitt Lake in southern British Columbia. In this episode, we take you through the relentless manhunt for Slumach, and the facts of the case as reported in the press. We also share details from the trial, which lasted no more than seven or eight hours, and where the defence called no witnesses. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Taylor Starr Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Copies of the original court records - https://www.slumach.ca/legal.htm Great Pacific Media Website: https://greatpacifictv.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Slumach, accused of shooting Louis Bee and then fleeing, was tried for murder. The trial took mere days and the jury reached a guilty verdict in just 15 minutes, even though no witnesses for the defence were called or testified and, in the end, Slumach was hanged for murder. But what if we told you the official accounts don’t tell the whole story? In this episode we walk along the same reedy shores and sleep under the same stars as Slumach did in the late 1800s to learn from the land. The Pitt Lake region is the scene of the crime; the lake, and the silent mountains surrounding it, are the only witnesses that remain and they hold the truth behind the legend, the curse, and the gold. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guests: Don Froese Adam Palmer Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The legend of Slumach and his gold goes by many names: the Legend of the Lost Mine of Pitt Lake, the Legend of the Lost Creek Mine, the Legend of Slumach’s Gold. The story always starts with a variation on ‘a brash young man from Pitt Lake’, bragging about his wealth, spending it freely in New Westminster on booze and women. He would always disappear for a while to a creek rich with gold nuggets–a source that would be worth billions today. But in our investigation into Slumach’s story, from the killing of Louis Bee to his execution, not a single newspaper article from the time mentioned anything about gold.  Not one word. In this episode, we’re on the path of many others who have gone before us, who have gone looking for the lost gold mine. But is there a mine for us to find? And how was Slumach connected to it? Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guests: Don Froese Adam Palmer Gail Starr Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

80 years after Slumach’s execution, exclusive information emerged as part of a family story passed down through history: Slumach’s story from his lips to only one person’s ears. In this episode, we hear the account of what happened from Slumach’s perspective.  He was a wanted man and seen as a menace to society, so there seemed to be little interest in pursuing Slumach’s motive. This raises the questions: Did Slumach shoot Louis Bee in cold blood to protect his gold as the legend says? Or was it actually self-defence? Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guests: Don Froese Dr. Keith Carlson, PhD https://www.keiththorcarlson.com/ Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We left off as we introduced you to Ms Amanda Charnley, a Katzie woman and Peter Pierre’s daughter. Pierre was a catechist for the Roman Catholic Order of Mary Immaculate. He was also a healer and leader within the Katzie First Nation, and Slumach’s nephew. Charnley described Slumach as ‘a harmless old widower who lived at the bottom end of Pitt Lake in a shack which was on the abandoned Silver Creek Indian Reserve.’ In this episode, we look at Slumach because the legend and newspapers painted him out to be some demon, evil incarnate. But could it have been just the opposite? Maybe he was just a man, and forces beyond his control doomed his fate. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Don Froese Gail Starr Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Over the course of this podcast, we’ve discussed the ways in which Slumach and so many Indigenous peoples were at the mercy of an ongoing colonial enterprise that sought to extract wealth from a bountiful land no matter the cost, and often, the cost was justice. Slumach was vilified in the media, as part of a tradition of British colonial dominance that dehumanised Indigenous people and the legal mechanisms at the time doomed Slumach from the start. In this episode we look at an alternative, one that centres on healing. So what would that look like? What is the traditional justice process? Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Gail Starr Don Froese Dr. Keith Carlson   https://www.keiththorcarlson.com/ Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Instagram - @kru_williams Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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In the decades following Slumach’s execution, we see people injured–sometimes fatally–while going into the region looking for a gold mine without much proof of its existence. Gold represented wealth and power, freedom from hunger and oppression, a source of abundance.  People have killed and died for gold, crossed oceans for gold. Its lustre and scarcity easily made it the stuff of legend. In this episode, we’re on the search for El Dorado and while we don’t have a treasure map, we have the Jackson Letter, which may hold the key to finding Slumach’s lost mine and his cursed gold. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Adam Palmer Brian Antonson https://www.amazon.ca/Slumachs-Gold-Search-Rick-Antonson/dp/1894974352 Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Five years after Slumach died, on August 16, 1896, gold was discovered in the Klondike region of Yukon, bordering Alaska to the far north of British Columbia.  As it happened almost 40 years earlier with BC’s Fraser Gold Rush, some 30-to-40,000 fortune-seekers from around the world streamed into the Rocky Mountain wilderness in search of another El Dorado. Prospectors who passed through the region heard the tale of the old Indigenous man hanged for murder not so long before. Most knew of the Jackson Letter, which described the location of the bonanza above Pitt Lake that awaited the lucky finder.  Many went searching…some never came back. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Adam Palmer Daryl Friesen - @FrozenGoldDaryl Brian Antonson https://www.amazon.ca/Slumachs-Gold-Search-Rick-Antonson/dp/1894974352 Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

60 years after Slumach’s death, in 1951, The Province newspaper, one of Vancouver’s major dailies that is still in existence, connected Slumach’s name to a curse. Up until that moment, the curse was nowhere to be found in newspaper articles at the time, even when they reported on the misfortunes of those seeking gold. Pulp fiction turned Slumach into an evil madman, and promoted the idea that getting his gold was as easy as hiking into the mountains north of Pitt Lake, which led to the deaths of many ill-prepared prospectors. In this episode, we investigate the origin of: ‘Nika memloose, mine memloose,’ and the curse attributed to Slumach. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Len Pierre - @lenpierreconsulting Brian Antonson https://www.amazon.ca/Slumachs-Gold-Search-Rick-Antonson/dp/1894974352 Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the final episode of the season, we share our final findings into the investigation of Slumach’s story, the legend and the curse, and explore unanswered questions after walking the same path and sleeping under the same stars Slumach did over 150 years ago.  We’ve been entrusted to rewrite his legacy in our search for the truth, and Slumach’s story is not over. Neither is our quest for his gold. Host:  Kru Williams - @kru_williams Guest: Don Froese Taylor Starr Adam Palmer Len Pierre - @lenpierreconsulting Brian Antonson https://www.amazon.ca/Slumachs-Gold-Search-Rick-Antonson/dp/1894974352 Facebook - @deadmanscursegpm Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this special episode of Deadman’s Curse, Kru Williams is joined by co-writer and executive producer, Ernest White II, to allow Kru to share his personal insights on what it was like contributing to the podcast, filming the TV series, and diving into the legend, and the curse, of Slumach and his lost gold. Host:  Ernest White II  Guest: Kru Williams Contact: Facebook - @HISTORYCanada  Instagram - @deadmanscurse Instagram - @Historyca Instagram - @kru_williams Instagram - @ernestwhiteii Twitter - @HistoryTVCanada Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices