Maldon - Grand Junction Quartz Kilns
The remains of three quartz kilns from the Grand Junction Company mine are located in the bush beside Mantons Gully Road.
The kilns are located west of Parkins Reef Road. Follow Mantons Gully Road, which is accessible in a 2WD car, and you will come to a small gravel parking area on the north side of the track. The kilns are located to the north in the bush about 140m from the parking area. Little of the quartz kilns remain intact and the area has loose rock and blackberries.
The story of quartz mining in Lisle's and Manton's Gullies revolves a round the working of three parallel reefs, Lisle's, Manton's and Braithwaite's (or the Mount), all worked extensively by small mining companies during the 19th Century. The vicinity experienced one period of large scale mining - in the early 1880s, the Grand Junction Company drove a tunnel from the head of Manton's Gully and, after encouraging results, erected a 24-head battery and three roasting kilns to burn the quartz prior to crushing. The initial success of the Grand Junction during the early 1880s, blossomed into a full-scale mining boom and soon the whole of the ground along the line of the reefs (a distance of 1 1/4 miles), was taken up. After the 1880s, however, little work was done.
The Lisle's and Manton's Gullies quartz gold mines are of historical, archaeological and scientific importance to the State of Victoria. They are one of the few places known in Victoria where accessible and significant evidence of horse-powered haulage whims still exist. Relics in Lisle's and Manton's Gullies document a range of mining operations carried out over an 80-year period from 1856 to the 1930s. The various elements present appear to reflect the extensive use of the tribute system of milling, where small cooperative parties of miners laboured under contract to mining companies for a share of any profits. This system of working is reflected in the dense distribution of the whim platforms (and associated mullock heaps and blacksmith shops) and the continuous line of closely spaced shafts, each group serviced by a carefully constructed siding access track. The Lisle's and Manton's Gullies quartz gold mines are scientifically significant for their ongoing potential to yield artefacts and evidence which will be able to provide significant information about the technological history of gold mining.
Location
Mantons Gully Road, Maldon 3463 Map
Web Links
→ Lisles and Manton Gullies Quartz Gold Mines (Victorian Heritage Database)
