- Alternative Names
- Stockyard Creek
- Turtons Creek
The area near Foster (Stockyard Creek) in South Gippsland is replete with stories of gold, both real and imaginary. Gold was first found at Stockyard Creek in 1871. The rush to nearby Turtons Creek began in December 1872. It was fuelled by prospectors attracted by a story told by a surveyor, James Robinson, who had dreamt of finding huge quantities of gold at Turtons Creek. It was a short-lived rush, lasting three to four months. The early finds were very rich but few and far between. No lead was ever found and there was much speculation as to how the gold came to be there. One story to persist for many years was that the gold had come originally from several caches of treasure hidden along the creek bed by the pirate Benito Bonito and his associates in and about 1821 and in later years. The treasure had been hidden originally on Cocos Island, near Panama.
