 In the resulting recession, many colonists were made insolvent, and Gray, who relied on rent from his city cottages for much of his income, was forced to borrow heavily in a desperate gamble to avoid joining them.By 1845 however, with a little help from the Burra copper mine, the colony's economy had turned around and by 1848 Gray had repaid his creditors.In 1850–1851 Gray added another including sections 165, 215, 216 and 169 to his holdings in the Reedbeds area, but later that year an exodus of able-bodied men from South Australia to the Victorian goldfields began, and until late 1853 when the tide started to turn, income from his rental properties dropped away, and he invested in no new properties.