Barkerville Gold Intersects 15.15 g/t (0.44 oz/t) Au Over 5.60 Metres Including 32.41 g/t (0.95 oz/t) Au Over 1.55 Metres in Phase I Island Mountain Exploration Drilling

VANCOUVER, Oct. 19, 2016 /CNW/ - Barkerville Gold Mines Ltd. (TSXV: BGM) (the "Company" or "Barkerville") is pleased to announce the first results from the recently initiated Phase I exploration drilling program on Island Mountain at the Company's flagship Cariboo Gold Project (CGP).  The results of these drillholes are presented in Table 2. A drillhole location plan map and longitudinal section are offered at the end of this release.  

Drilling Highlights:

• BGM-16-503: 11.62 g/t (0.34 oz/t) Au over 6.20 metres including 16.22 g/t (0.47 oz/t) Au over 3.60 metres
• BGM-16-506: 10.74 g/t (0.31 oz/t) Au over 4.50 metres including 12.95 g/t (0.38 oz/t) Au over 3.50 metres
• BGM-16-509: 38.35 g/t (1.12 oz/t) Au over 1.70 metres including 62.10 g/t (1.81 oz/t) Au over 0.50 metres
• BGM-16-512: 6.05 g/t (0.18 oz/t) Au over 12.60 metres including 11.51 g/t (0.34 oz/t) Au over 4.70 metres
• BGM-16-514: 192.50 g/t (5.61 oz/t) Au over 2.17 metres
• BGM-16-517: 15.15 g/t (0.44 oz/t) Au over 5.60 metres including 32.41 g/t (0.95 oz/t) Au over 1.55 metres
• BGM-16-518: 19.51 g/t (0.57 oz/t) Au over 3.00 metres including 41.10 g/t (1.20 oz/t) Au over 1.00 metres
• BGM-16-522: 24.64 g/t (0.72 oz/t) Au over 4.00 metres including 35.75 g/t (1.04 oz/t) Au over 2.60 metres

*Note: Reported core lengths represent 50-75% true widths.

Island Mountain Phase I Drilling

The recently initiated 20,000 metre Phase I exploratory and stratigraphic drilling program on Island Mountain represents the first major drilling campaign of its kind since it was last explored in 2009. The program is intended to determine the extents of the vein systems that have historically never been developed or explored as well as discovering new occurrences and extensions to the massive sulphide replacement bodies. Past exploration and mining primarily focused on the replacement hosted gold as opposed to the veining due to the higher gold tenor and as such, the extents of the vein sets have never been investigated.

As demonstrated by drillhole BGM-16-517, which intersected a previously unidentified vein set grading
15.15 g/t (0.44 oz/t) Au over 5.60 metres including 32.41 g/t (0.95 oz/t) Au over 1.55 metres, the undeveloped veining extends well into the footwall rocks below the replacement bodies. This solitary pierce point occurs 90 metres behind and footwall to the former Aurum Mine workings and is untested in all directions.

The deepest intersection to date, BGM-16-522 drilled through another new series of veins grading
12.40 g/t (0.36 oz/t) Au over 1.00 metres and 24.00 g/t (0.70 oz/t) Au over 1.00 metres in an area located 70 metres footwall to the former Aurum Mine at a vertical depth of -400 metres below surface. This same stratigraphic drillhole intersected massive sulphide replacement mineralization grading
24.64 g/t (0.72 oz/t) Au over 4.00 metres including 35.75 g/t (1.04 oz/t) Au over 2.60 metres in the historically undeveloped area between the former Mosquito Creek and Aurum Mines. The pierce point is a very significant intercept due to the fact that this area is devoid of mine development and has had only sparse exploration drilling for a strike length of 900 metres and a dip potential of 275 metres between the two former mines.

The down dip extension of the unmined veining at the former Mosquito Creek Mine was confirmed by
BGM-16-514 which intersected 192.50 g/t (5.61 oz/t) Au over 2.17 metres. This new intercept occurs
60 metres below the deepest level of the mine at a vertical depth of -200 metres below surface and is open in all directions.

Island Mountain Exploration and Development History

The former Aurum and Island Mountain Mines produced vein and replacement ore from 1934-1967 before being shut down due to depressed gold prices and financial misfortunes. Subsequent to a protracted history of fragmented tenement ownerships and unconnected exploration programs, the former Aurum Mine was developed and brought into production from 1980-1987. As illustrated in Table 1, the high tenor of the massive sulphide replacement mineralization led to preferential mining of that ore type despite the abundance and awareness of the quartz vein mineralization. Moreover, underground exploration drilling programs were focused on delineating the massive sulphide bodies with drillhole lengths that averaged only 30 metres from the underground development and as such were not able to outline the vein systems by exploring the host footwall rocks.

After 1987, exploration by various operators on the unconsolidated land package was dominated by grassroots programs in the form of mapping, trenching, soil sampling and limited drilling programs in select areas. Disjointed land title amongst the various previous owners inhibited exploration of the complete mine sequence and only 10,000 metres of surface and underground diamond drilling has been performed since 2009 again focusing on the replacement hosted mineralization.

Table 1: Historic production from the Wells area mines.

"This first phase of exploration drilling on Island Mountain, although designed to understand the structural, lithological and alteration controls on the gold mineralization, has had every drillhole thus far intersect significant occurrences," noted Chris Lodder, President and CEO of Barkerville.  "In combination with underground mapping and sampling on Island Mountain, this initial campaign should develop a confident geologic model to guide future resource drilling".

Qualified Persons

Exploration activities at the Cariboo Gold Project are jointly administered on site by the Company's Project Managers, Maggie Layman, P.Geo. and Wanda Carter, P.Geo. As per National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects, Paul Geddes, P.Geo. Vice President Exploration, is the Qualified Person for the Company and has prepared, validated and approved the technical and scientific content of this news release. The Company strictly adheres to CIM Best Practices Guidelines in conducting, documenting, and reporting its exploration activities on the Cariboo Gold Project.

Quality Assurance – Quality Control

Once received from the drill and processed, all drill core samples are sawn in half, labelled and bagged.  The remaining drill core is subsequently stored on site at the Company's secure facility in Wells, BC.  Numbered security tags are applied to lab shipments for chain of custody requirements.  The Company inserts quality control (QC) samples at regular intervals in the sample stream, including blanks and reference materials with all sample shipments to monitor laboratory performance. The QAQC program was designed and approved by Lynda Bloom, P.Geo. of Analytical Solutions Ltd., and is overseen by Paul Geddes, P.Geo, Vice President Exploration.

Drill core samples are submitted to ALS Geochemistry's analytical facility in North Vancouver, British Columbia for preparation and analysis. The ALS facility is accredited to the ISO/IEC 17025 standard for gold assays and all analytical methods include quality control materials at set frequencies with established data acceptance criteria. The entire sample is crushed and 250 grams is pulverized. Analysis for gold is by 50g fire assay fusion with atomic absorption (AAS) finish with a lower limit of 5ppb and upper limit of 10,000ppb. Samples with gold assays greater than 10,000ppb are re-analyzed using 50g fire assay with gravimetric finish, as well as 1,000g screen metallic fire assay. Samples are also analyzed using a 48 multi-elemental geochemical package by a 4-acid digestion, followed by Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectroscopy (ICP-AES) and Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectroscopy (ICP-MS).

About Barkerville Gold Mines Ltd.
The Company is focused on developing its extensive land package located in the historical Cariboo Mining District of central British Columbia. Barkerville's mineral tenures cover 1,164 square kilometres along a strike length of 60 kilometres which includes several past producing hard rock mines of the historic Barkerville Gold Mining Camp near the town of Wells, British Columbia. The QR Project, located approximately 110 kilometres by highway and all weather road from Wells was acquired by Barkerville in 2010 and boasts a fully permitted 900 tonne/day gold milling and tailings facility. Test mining of the Bonanza Ledge open pit was completed in March of 2015 with 91,489 tonnes of ore milled producing 25,464 ounces of gold. The Company has completed a number of drilling and exploration programs over the past 20 years and is currently compiling this data with all historical information in order develop geologic models which will assist new management and provide the framework to continue to explore the Cariboo Gold Project. An extensive drill program is currently underway with the goal of delineating additional high grade gold mineralization.

Cautionary Statement on Forward -Looking Information
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange ("TSXV") nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSXV) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. No stock exchange, securities commission or other regulatory authority has approved or disapproved the information contained herein. This news release contains forward-looking information which is not comprised of historical facts. Forward-looking information involves risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual events, results, performance, prospects and opportunities to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information. Forward looking information in this news release includes, but is not limited to, the Company's objectives, goals or future plans, statements regarding exploration results and exploration plans. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from such forward-looking information include, but are not limited to, capital and operating costs varying significantly from estimates, the preliminary nature of metallurgical test results, delays in obtaining or failures to obtain required governmental, environmental or other project approvals, uncertainties relating to the availability and costs of financing needed in the future, changes in equity markets, inflation, fluctuations in commodity prices, delays in the development of projects and the other risks involved in the mineral exploration and development industry, and those risks set out in the Company's public documents filed on SEDAR. Although the Company believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing the forward-looking information in this news release are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information, which only applies as of the date of this news release, and no assurance can be given that such events will occur in the disclosed time frames or at all. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, other than as required by law.

Table 2: Length weighted gold composites for drillholes BGM-16-503 through BGM-16-522:

Notes:

*Core lengths represent 50-75% true widths. Rock not recovered by drilling was assigned zero grade and not included in the composites. Top cuts have not been applied to high grade assays. Conversion factor: 1.0 oz/t = 34.2857 g/t. NSA – No Significant Assays.

Table 2: Drillhole Collar Orientations

SOURCE Barkerville Gold Mines Ltd.