The Albert Goldfield (or Albert mining district) is an area of 1300 square kilometres (500 square miles) in the
outback
The Outback is a remote, vast, sparsely populated area of Australia. The Outback is more remote than the bush. While often envisaged as being arid, the Outback regions extend from the northern to southern Australian coastlines and encompass a n ...
of
New South Wales
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, image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, es ...
where
gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...
was discovered in 1880.
Gold was found at Mount Browne, which is south west of
Tibooburra. There were other finds at Good Friday, Easter Monday, Nuggerty, Pioneer Reef and Warratta Creek.
The Albert Goldfield region is very hot and dry. Summer temperatures on the Gold field can reach 50°C. Because of the shortage of water, towns were started at
Milparinka and Tibooburra where there was water available. Towns at
Albert and Mount Browne did not last for long because of the lack of water. By 1881 there were more than 2000 people living on the gold diggings or in the towns.
[ Geologist W.H.J. Slee was appointed resident Goldfield Warden. There was no water in the mine area to use in separating the placer gold. Miners either took their dirt to one of the towns to use water to pan for the gold, or used a method called ]dry blowing
Dry blowing is a method to extract gold particles from dry soil without the use of water. A machine specialized to use this method is known as a dry blower. It is a form of winnowing.
Methods
*One method is to pour dry soil from a height into a ...
,slate
Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...
and collect it in the tin dish. Once his dish was "about half full of dirt", the miner would stand "with his back or side to the wind ... and begin throwing the stuff up and catching it, or sometimes slowly pouring it from one dish to another", allowing the wind to carry away the less dense particles, leaving the gold behind in the dish. This process required "very dry surface dirt." When "good sized nuggets" were found, they were removed from the dish before the remaining material was processed. If he saw smaller pieces of gold in the dish, the miner might use his own breath to blow the sand and dust away. The observer found the dry blowing process to be "both tedious and unhealthy."
Life on the goldfields was hard, water was scarce, fresh fruit and vegetables were unavailable, and basic commodities, such as flour, were very expensive. Disease, including cholera
Cholera is an infection of the small intestine by some strains of the bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea that lasts a few days. Vomiting and ...
and typhoid
Typhoid fever, also known as typhoid, is a disease caused by '' Salmonella'' serotype Typhi bacteria. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often there is a gradual onset of a high fever over several ...
, was common.
The village of Albert itself at its height had a population of 900. In June 1902 a large meteorite landed at nearby Mt Brown.[Ramdohr, P. (1973). The Opaque Minerals in Stony Meteorites. Elsevier Publishing Company: Amsterdam; London: New York. 245 pages.; Rubin, A. E. (1994) Metallic copper in ordinary chondrites. Meteoritics 29 (1): 93-98. (Jan 1994).]
By 1893 the gold rush had ended and most people had left the goldfields.[
An area of surviving ruins from the goldfield are listed on the New South Wales Heritage Register.]
References
External links
Mount Browne
{{coord missing, New South Wales
Geography of New South Wales
Gold mining in New South Wales
Gold mines in New South Wales