COBBLER'S GULLY CHIMNEY REMAINS (10)
DINGO PARK ROAD CHEWTON, MOUNT ALEXANDER SHIRE
-
Add to tour
You must log in to do that.
-
Share
-
Shortlist place
You must log in to do that.
- Download report
Statement of Significance
The Cobblers Gully Quartz Roasting Site consists of the remains of small quartz roasting kiln. Below the kiln are some largely buried foundations, including a circular feature which may be the site of a Chilean Mill. The tailings associated with the foundations are very coarse. There are several carting tracks associated with the site. The site is perhaps very early, possibly dating to the mid 1850s.
The Cobblers Gully Quartz Roasting Site is of historical, scientific and archaeological importance to the State of Victoria.
The Cobblers Gully Quartz Roasting Site is historically and scientifically important as a characteristic and well preserved example of an important form of gold mining. A necessary preliminary to early quartz crushing was the roasting of the rock in a kiln. Roasting 'softened' the quartz, making it brittle and easier to crush. It was also used to 'burn off' other minerals which hampered the retrieval of gold. Quartz roasting was widely carried out on most goldfields from the 1850s, but by the 1860s improvements in crushing technology largely discredited the process. Evidence of this metallurgical process, such as the Cobblers Gully Site, is extremely rare in the State of Victoria.
The Cobblers Gully Quartz Roasting Site is archaeologically important for its potential to yield artefacts and evidence which will be able to provide significant information about the technological history of gold mining. This would especially be so if the site did date from the mid 1850s and the circular feature proved to be a Chilean Mill.
[Source: Victorian Heritage Register]
-
-
-
-
COBBLERS GULLY GOLD PUDDLING SITEVictorian Heritage Register H1249
-
COBBLERS GULLY QUARTZ ROASTING SITEVictorian Heritage Register H1277
-
EUREKA REEF GOLD MINING PRECINCTVictorian Heritage Register H1233
-
-