Harry F. Waugh (d. 1910)
Harry Waugh was born in New Brunswick. In 1896, he staked one of the first claims on Bonanza after the discoverers.1) Waugh, Dan McGillivray, Dave Edwards, and Dave McKay were on their way up the Klondike River in August to check out Robert Henderson’s claims on Gold Bottom. They met George Carmack, Skookum Jim, and Dawson Charlie on their way back down the Klondike River after discovering coarse gold on Bonanza Creek.2) After getting directions to the strike, McKay went on to stake Claim No. 3 Below Discovery, Waugh staked Claim 15 Below, McGillivray staked Claim 15, and Edwards staked Claim No. 17 Below.3) They found gold on a shallow bar of gravel, later known as Poverty Bar.4)
In 1897, Waugh and McKay owned Claims Nos 14, 15, and 16 Below Discovery on Bonanza Creek. There were four men working on the claims. They recovered $600 taken from the bottom of a prospect hole. That year, Claim No. 7 Above Discovery on Bonanza was owned by James Tweed, Harry Waugh, England, McGalgh, and John Heightman. There were twenty men working on the claim and $200,000 worth of gold was recovered. The partners sold the claim on 10 June 1901.5) In 1898, Isaac Burpee purchased Harry Waugh’s partners’ interest in claim Nos. 14, 15, and 16 Below Discovery on Bonanza Creek. He and Waugh then bought Nos. 16 and 17 on Hunker Creek. All of the claims were rich.6)
Harry Waugh and “Black” Sullivan appeared at Hershel Island in 1906 with specimens of gold-bearing quartz and went out to Dawson via the whaler Kar-Luk to record their Peel River claims. Andrew Hunker and Thomas O'Brien backed the expedition.7) In March 1907, an Order in Council (OIC) allowed Waugh to stake no more than fifty quartz claims in the vicinity of the Peel River. Waugh had presented his case for a concession of this size because the area was difficult to access and the cost for a prospector to visit the area to stake one claim would be too great. Waugh proposed that he organize a prospecting expedition provided he be allowed to stake for himself and others a number of claims between the Peel and Hart rivers. The OIC gave Waugh until 31 December 1907 to stake and record his claims. The federal minister thought it was in the public interest that the area should be thoroughly prospected, and Wilfred Laurier signed the Order.8)
Waugh organized a party of six men to travel from Athabasca to the Peel River in 1909. The party included Lancelot Warn, Stanley Warn, Harold Warn, C.R. Curtis, Benford Dunphy, and Oscar Nuhn, the latter being tasked with setting up a wireless telegraph at the mine. The men travelled from Athabasca down the Mackenzie to the delta where they were lost before backtracking over the mountains and into the Peel watershed. They had seven tonnes of machinery, to set up a quartz mill, and eight tonnes of supplies. Lance and Stanley remained on the Peel until the spring of 1910 when, hearing of Waugh’s suicide, they travelled to Dawson. Lance returned to the Peel property the following season while Stanley returned to Vancouver. The Lance and Stanley Warn fonds at the Dawson City Museum includes diaries and photographs of the expedition.9)
Harry Waugh and Oscar Nuhn arrived in Whitehorse in February 1910 after a long overland trip from the Mackenzie River country. They were on their way outside the territory.10) Waugh committed suicide after he was unable to raise the money to develop his mine.11)