By Beverley Hamann

Imagine carrying water 20 miles so you can water your garden! This is exactly what the early settlers did in Walhachin in the early 1900’s

It began in 1907 when a good looking, intelligent and natural leader had, what he thought was a good idea. Charles Barnes, an American, was a land surveyor working out of Ashcroft, B.C. After visiting the benchlands on the banks of the Thompson River between Kamloops and Cache Creek in 1907, he had a vision to build a settlement and plant thousands of acres of fruit trees and vegetables there.

Barnes was an entrepreneur of great enthusiasm and steely determination, so it was only a matter of time before financing from Britain was in place for the purchase of the property, and plans were underway to promote the whole idea to wealthy Englishmen. In 1908 the townsite was laid out and in a short time families had purchased plots and were arriving from England to set up residence as orchardists.

As only the wealthy could afford such a move to another country, most of the new immigrants were "upper-class" and many were titled aristocracy. As such they certainly were not accustomed to working the land. They had no practical skills and they stubbornly refused to accept advice from the locals who they considered “lower class” and inferior. The new orchardists proceeded to do things their way, with great optimism and unbridled determination in the pursuit of their goals.

Grand houses were built - houses with 12ft. ceilings, French doors and indoor plumbing. In 1910 a very posh hotel was built - a place where the “snobbish” English could wine, dine, entertain and take afternoon teas, as well as accommodate their visitors. By Christmas 1911 there were 180 permanent residents and Barnes’ dream was becoming a reality.

The lumber for the flume cost $20,250 for approximately 1,350,000 board feet. This figure would have been much higher had they used top-grade. Instead, the flume was build with reject lumber to economize and stay on budget. This was the first of many mistakes that ultimately doomed the whole project.

The reject lumber was of varying lengths and thicknesses and not thick enough to prevent warping or seepage and too thin to be properly caulked. Not only was there considerable water loss, but also seepage weakened the shallow footings of the trestle foundation and sometimes washed out the trestle itself. The flume was built to carry 30” of water but could manage barely 6” due to the weaknesses in its construction - and much of that water was lost along the twenty-mile route, due to leakage and evaporation.

In order to produce income while waiting for the orchards to bear fruit, it was decided to plant vegetables in the furrows between the fruit trees. Potatoes, tomatoes, onions and tobacco were grown as filler crops and produced excellent quality and harvests of record size. In 1910 more than 2,000 tons of Walhachin potatoes were shipped to market!

football club. They also enjoyed social events, balls and dance and music recitals. Lord Anglesey, one of the titled English, built a fabulous house with an inground concrete swimming pool, to which he invited his wealthy friends to socialize and relax.

But, all was not as it seemed and the survival of the settlement was doomed… in more ways than one.

The cost of maintaining the flume to irrigate the orchards was exorbitant. Freight was a problem - the trains allowed to transport the produce were infrequent and often shipments were spoiled before reaching their destination. Competition was a problem - the cost of fruit production in Canada was much higher than in the United States where labour costs, government taxes, duties and water costs, were lower.

Then, in June 1914 war broke out. The orchardists immediately started joining military units, either in Britain or Canada. Walhachin, in fact, was credited with having the highest enlistment rate per capita of any city in Canada. By 1916 only a handful of older men remained.

The men and women who did stay tried their best to maintain the orchards and the flume, but the task was onerous and finances were drained. Many of the orchardists were killed in war and by 1918 when it was over, the soldiers who did return to Walhachin found the flume in a hopeless state of repair. No one was able to raise the finances necessary to repair the flume, and without that there could be no orchards.

Many of the English settlers started packing their things and moving away. By 1922 they were all gone.

The dream was over - Walhachin was no more.

References:
“Walhachin, Catastrophe or Camelot?” by Joan Weir
“Settlement Abandonment - A Case Study of Walhachin”.
Nelson A. Riis, Unpublished Master’s Thesis
Department of Geography, University of British Columbia, 1970.