PIONEER BATTERY SITE
DARTMOUTH TRACK DARTMOUTH, TOWONG SHIRE
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Statement of Significance
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PIONEER BATTERY SITE - History
Heritage Inventory History of Site:
The Pioneer Co. installed a battery powered by portable steam engine at the head of McKay's Creek in 1884. The Pioneer worked in conjunction with the neighbouring Bobbie Burns Co. During the mid-1880s their claim, worked by shaft, gave average yields of 1–3 oz per ton.
Morrow (2: p. 114) wrote: 'The Pioneer was one of the more remote mines to visit. To find it, the instructions were "Leaving the Mascotte machine track, you follow along the Gibb for about two miles, when having passed a tree marked, 'Water J. Harris', which refers to water in a guly a short distance off the track, you come across another tree marked 'Pioneer'. Here turn off to the right, and soon pick up a faint track, which becomes better defined as you proceed down the spur at an angle of thirty-five degrees slope, the direction of which is westerly. Then you reach the ridge of a very particularly formed razorback spur tending nearly south; and on this spur is the Pioneer, Bobbie Burns and Republic claims."'
References: Mining Surveyors' Reports (Dark River Subdivision), March & June 1884, March & September 1886
Morrow (1), p. 3
Morrow (2), p. 114Heritage Inventory Description
PIONEER BATTERY SITE - Heritage Inventory Description
Features of the Pioneer battery site are a portable steam engine and pumping engine./nPortable steam engine: A single-cylinder portable engine still stands on its four wheels. The fly-wheel still in position, but the flue has gone from the smoke box and the engine's front plate has fallen off. /nPumping engine: Single-stroke steam pumping engine. Engine is approximately 6ft long.
Heritage Inventory Significance:/nRegional/nHeritage Inventory Significance: National Estate./nThe site has scientific significance because of its rarity.
Recorded By: David Bannear. Date recorded: 1994
Heritage Inventory Key Components: /nPortable steam engine - A single-cylinder portable engine still stands on its four wheels. The fly-wheel still in position, but the flue has gone from the smoke box and the engine's front plate has fallen off. /nPumping engine -Single-stroke steam pumping engine. Engine is approximately 6 ft long.
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PIONEER BATTERY SITEVictorian Heritage Inventory
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