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|
1845 |
August. Shepherds William Streair and
Thomas Pickett discover outcrops of copper close to the Burra Burra
Creek. Special Survey of 20,000 acres undertaken and divided between
South Australian Mining Association and Princess Royal Mining
Association
September 29 - South Australian
Mining Association begins mining operations at the Burra Burra Mine. |
|
1846 |
Samuel Stocks jnr. Appointed Resident
Director.
Dr Ferdinand Von Sommer and then
Captain Ey act as Superintendents.
Governor Robe visits and goes
underground.
Bon Accord Mining
Company begins mining operations adjoining the Burra Burra Mine. |
|
1847 |
January. Captain
Henry Roach of Cornwall appointed Superintendent of the Burra Burra
Mine.
First smelting operations fail. |
|
1848 |
Mine employs 567
Miners strike for a week and then
later stage an unsuccessful strike over wages from November to January
1849
Mine pays a dividend of 600%
Foundation stone of Patent Copper Co.
Smelters laid n December
The Gulf Road initiated to Port
Wakefield. |
|
1849 |
Apoinga Smelter takes Burra ore
Patent
Copper Company (later called the English & Australian Copper Company)
begin smelting ore at Burra using Newcastle coal.
Roach’s Engine house completed and
pumping begins in October.
Dividends affected by 1848-49 strike:
2 of 100%. |
|
1850 |
Dividends paid reached a staggering
800%. |
|
1851 |
Workforce at the mine exceeds 1,000
with 378 at the smelting works and other employee of the smelting
works bring their total to about 1,000.
Peacock’s Engine House built.
Discovery of gold in eastern states.
Patent Copper Co. reorganised as
English and Australian Copper Co.
November - Death of Thomas Pickett,
discoverer of the Burra Burra Mine. |
|
1852 |
Miners etc. desert the district for
Victoria.
Schneider’s Engine transported to
Burra and installed
Employees drop to under 100.
Ayers keeps his officers by
substantially raising salaries.
Pumping ceases in October: mine
flooded. |
|
1853 |
Mine virtually at a standstill
Roach’s Engine House dismantled
English and Australian Copper Company
import mules from South America. |
|
1854 |
Men slowly return but by April work
force still only 191 and only 30 underground.
Decision to restart the mine in
December. |
|
1855 |
Schneider’s Engine begins to pump out
the mine in January. |
|
1856 |
South Australian Mining Association
to establish a candle factory near the slaughterhouse to satisfy its
need for 53 tons of candles per year. |
|
1857 |
Schneider’s pump proves inadequate.
Railway reaches Gawler.
The Gulf Road closes. |
|
1858 |
Morphett’s Engine House built.
William Woollacott leaves Adelaide
with the engine for Morphett’s Engine House. |
|
1859 |
This was the peak year for employment
with 1208 men and boys at work. The mine paid £178,900 in wages and
expenses, but the cost were rising as the mine deepened. At the same
time the price of copper was falling. Having peaked at £126 per ton
in 1858, it was £112 per ton in1859 and by 1861 had fallen to £87 per
ton in Adelaide. Even more significantly the 1858 profit per ton of
£4-8-3 was a mere £1-14-8 the following year.
Ayers reduced the wages of tutworkers
to 6/- a day and cut all but essential tutwork. Similar cuts in
payments were ordered for tributers. Expenditure of repairs etc. was
cut to a minimum.
William Woollacott arrives with the
new engine.
Installation runs all through the
year.
The wage bill peaks at £178,900.
Employment at the mine exceeds 1,200
Profits per ton begin to fall |
|
1860 |
Miners began to move to the new
fields of Wallaroo and Moonta Mines.
Morphett’s engine begins pumping on
1 March
Fire in the mine kills two miners |
|
1861 |
Migration to Wallaroo and Moonta
continued and others also headed to mines in Queensland and NSW as
well as to smaller mines north of Burra in the Flinders Ranges etc.
Port Adelaide Smelting Works begin.
Burra Smelting confined to summer
month.
Miners begin to leave for Yorke
Peninsula and elsewhere. |
|
1862 |
Schneider’s Engine is stopped.
Workforce at the mine is cut to 631
and the wages bill is almost halved.
Exodus of miners continues |
|
1863 |
The Burra ore was still averaging 23%
copper compared with Moonta’s 18%, but getting it was costing £10-2-1
per ton against £7-15-7 for the latter’s. SAMA was pulling down
cottages when their tenants departed. Kooringa was still all
leasehold and there were few businesses in substantial premises.
Trouble looms as Burra ore now cost
£10-2-1 per ton to raise compared with £4-15-7 a ton at Moonta. |
|
1864 |
For a while copper rose to £110 per
ton and a major strike at the Yorke Peninsula mines saw some miners
return to Burra.
Smelting at Burra further reduced.
The dividend of 300% proves to be the
last regular dividend paid. |
|
1865 |
By July SAMA as losing £800-£I,000 per month. The population of the
combined towns was still about 4,000, by which time Moonta had reached
4,000 and the three Yorke Peninsula towns had about 10,000 people in
all.
Yorke Peninsula mines continue to
grow and outflow of Burra’s population continues. |
|
1866 |
The copper price slumped by £8 per
ton. On 19 February Ayers informed Captain roach that all operations
would cease and a letter dismissed all officers from the end of March.
1867 became a year of desperation with mass unemployment in Burra and
Adelaide. There was no unemployment relief except for a meager ration
for families without an able bodied man in residence. Though wages had
been cut to a low 6/- a day, Ayers thought 4/- a day would be
adequate. In Burra people left, cottages were demolished and shops and
businesses were abandoned. To make matters worse the wool producers
were in the grip of a drought, which extended from 1864 to September
1869 on the eastern plains.
In fact, bad as it was, the situation
was not quite as bad as the original notice had suggested. By the
middle of the year the mine was still employing about 200 to dress
low-grade ore previously discarded, but Captain Roach had returned to
Adelaide and the accountant Mr. Challoner was running the mine on
orders from Ayers. The mine was maintained on
standby with the pump at Morphett’s Shaft still keeping the mine free
of water. Grave’s Engine House was under construction with a new pump
ordered from Cornwall.
Graves Shaft Burra Mine still
employing over 600 and population of town almost 4000. |
|
1867 |
Underground mining suspended in
February with the loss of over 500 jobs.
Captain Roach, William Cahlloner
(Mine Accountant) and William Elphick (Mine assayer) given 1 month’s
notice. Parliament approves extension of railway to Burra. |
|
1868 |
John Darlington, a mining engineer
with extensive experience of the then new open-cut mining system,
arrived in Adelaide in June and the following month went to Burra to
assess its open-cut prospects. He found a mine in soft clayey ground
that needed extensive and costly timbering. In September he
recommended trying open-cut mining as an economic alternative. Ayers
and three directors: G.S. Kingston, John Beck and Archibald Jaffery,
went to Burra and accepted the recommendation.
Graves engine House completed but the
engine order was cancelled. Building never used.
Decision made to convert to open cut. |
|
1869 |
Work on the material in the Burra
Creek stopped and a further 200 jobs went. By April all extraction
work had ceased. A 363 ton stockpile was sold off and by October the
workforce had fallen from 1,200 to 46. (11 mechanics, 19 miners, 7
labourers, 4 boys and 5 officers.) Wages fell from £130,000 per annum
to just £1,313-6-8 for the six months to March 1870. The Burra
population fell from c.5,480 to 3,400 and occupied houses from 1225 to
877.
The year largely passed in ordering
and obtaining the necessary machinery. In April in its 24th Annual
Report SAMA decided to make properties in Kooringa available for
freehold sale as their 21 year leases expired.
Workforce reduced to 46 of whom 19
were miners. |
|
1870 |
In January Henry Ayers left with his
family for England and his son, 25 year old Harry Lockett Ayers,
became Acting Secretary of SAMA. William Challoner continued as chief
accountant and superintendent of the mine. (At £32 per month) William
Swanborough was retained as supervisor of the open-cut operations. (At
£25 per month) By June operations at the open-cut were underway and
good results were expected.
By October 10,000 wagons, or 14,000
tons had been excavated and sent to the tip some 100’ beyond the
dressing tower and dressing was expected to begin in six weeks. The
arrangements had cost some £25,000. Burra became
Open cutting of Burra Burra Mine began, Australia’s first open-cut
mine. The timber recovered from the old workings during the
operations of the open-cut was used to fuel the pump engine and the
water was used to separate the ore from the waste after it had been
pounded to the consistency of flour.
|
|
1871 |
By the middle of the year friction
between Challoner and Swansborough which saw Challoner confirmed as
the superior officer, but poor results saw him being asked to resign
by October. After 25 years service as accountant and two as mine
manager SAMA was not even represented at his farewell dinner in Burra
in December. As far as getting material out of the open-cut was
concerned all was going well.
Ulooloo goldfield
discovered |
|
1872 |
The problem that began to worry the
directors were multiplying.
(a) Little orey stuff was being
discovered by October the previous six months had produced only 6,974
tons of orey stuff to 37,174 tons of attle (waste).
(b) Morphett’s Shaft was producing
96,000 gallons of water per hour, but this was proving inadequate for
washing the amount of ore and new 20” lifts had to be installed.
(c) The new dressing tower proved
unsatisfactory and the old stamps had to be reintroduced. A new 15
head battery was ordered.
(d) Dressing machinery tried at
Moonta with success was tried, but the Burra ores proved very hard to
separate from their waste.
The receipts on ore raised were
10,426
Receipts from rent were
2,024
£12,450
Expenses were
13,661
Overall loss was
£1,211
The first dividend since 1864 was
paid from accumulated funds and proved to be the last before the mine
closed.
|
|
1873 |
To assist in the dressing operations
a new 24’ x 4’ water wheel was constructed. The failure of the
dressing machinery to deliver satisfaction saw Captain Robert Sanders
take over from Swansborough. As the water level dropped to the 40
fathom and then the 50 fathom level, some underground work was
resumed. Small profits made 1873-76 went into capital investment in
new machinery.
|
|
1876 |
By this time tutworkers were sinking
new shafts, deepening old ones and driving
new levels. 39 tributers were at
work and they raised 254 tons of good ore. By October the workforce
was back to 307 of which 102 were in the traditional categories of
tutworkers and tributers. Haulage from the open-cut continued to be
satisfactory, but ore separation remained a difficulty. Six months in
this year saw the open-cut yield 22,790 tons of deads, 26,382 tons of
orey stuff and 1,156 tons of old timber.
Captain Sanders reports remained
consistently optimistic, but in fact no new lodes of significance were
being discovered.
|
|
1877 |
Morphett’s Shaft was being pushed
towards 100 fathoms, with drives at different levels in an attempt to
find new lodes, but to no avail. The cost of production had risen so
that the mine was losing £12-17-0 on each ton of ore. The cost of
production had almost doubled since 1868. the price of copper was low
and dropped to less than £80 a ton.
In August the five SAMA directors:
Sir George Strickland Kingston, John Beck, Henry Rymill, The Hon.
William Morgan MLC, and James Francis Wigley, visited the mine. After
this Sir Henry Ayers, secretary, wrote to Captain Sanders instructing
extreme economy or the closure of the mine would be considered.
Economies had no answer in the face of rising production costs and a
falling copper price.
In September the miners were finally
given a week’s notice and work ceased on 29 September 1877 with the
loss of 300 jobs.
The exploratory work in Morphett’s
Shaft had just reached 100 fathoms. The mine offices received one
month’s notice, Captain Sanders being dismissed with all the others.
About the 10 October there was a final inspection at the bottom of
Morphett’s Shaft by Captain Osborne, Manager of Kapunda Mine, Captain
Samuel Higgs, Manager of Wallaroo Mine and Captain Hancock,
Superintendent of Moonta Mine. Their reports were non-committal.
The pump at Morphett’s Shaft was
stopped in the last week of October and the waters began to rise in
the mine.
The mine was put into mothballs to be
reopened when copper prices rose, but the sale of plant and equipment
in November made it clear that the directors did not expect this to be
any time soon.
September 29 - Burra Burra Mine
closed after 32 years.
|
|
1880 |
The lode found when St. Mary’s foundations were dug
is briefly searched for. |
|
1881 |
News that the Mine had been sold in England for
£100,000 proved to be false. |
|
1882 |
Captain Killicoat and John Drew unsuccessfully
negotiate to buy the Mine. |
|
1884 |
Negotiations with a Sydney syndicate are reported. |
|
1886 |
Two tributors are working a surface pitch. |
|
1887 |
Two tributors are making wages. |
|
1888 |
A local syndicate involving C. Drew, J. Dunstan
Jun., E.C. Lockyer, W.R. Ridgway & F.W. Holder negotiate to buy the
Mine. They are told nothing can be done as the mine is under offer in
London. Tributors now number 34 men and boys and rising. In December
Sir Henry Ayers advised the mine has been sold in London. |
|
1889 |
The Copper Syndicate fail, copper galls to £40 per
ton, settlement of the sale on 13 March fails to take place.
Numbers working on tribute fall to “several”. |
|
1890 |
About 9 tributors work surface material. |
|
1891 |
Mr Paynter installs equipment to treat the
slagheap. Work begins in October. |
|
1892 |
Copper prices fall and in February Mr. Paynter
stops crushing and by April his plant is for sale.
SAMA launches litigation related to the failed sale
of 1889. |
|
1897 |
SAMA decides on some exploratory boring which
begins in November under Mr. Leahy. |
|
1898 |
Boring at Morphett’s shaft exceeds 1000’. |
|
1899 |
Tributors continue to work at the mine. Mr Leahy
sinks a second shaft but boring ceases in November.
Joe Ford secures a portion of the site and sinks a
shaft.
Copper at £75 per ton. Hon. J. Martin MLC of
Gawler backs the Burra Slag Extraction Co which take an 8 year lease
to treat the slag. Trial crushings are unde way by November. |
|
1900 |
An Adelaide based syndicate begins negotiations to
buy the mine.
In January the Burra Slag Extraction Co. Installs
electric arc lights and works three shifts.
|
|
1901 |
The Adelaide syndicate leads to floating of the
Burra Burra Copper Co., which buys the Mine. In march the Premier, F.
W. Holder, and other politicians visit the works.
|
|
1902 |
Burra Slag Extraction Co. closes for a month due to
low copper prices. Work resumed in February, ceased briefly in May
but hen wen ton till all the slag was treated by the end of October.
Burra Burra Copper Co. lacked developmental
capital. It hoped to accumulate capital from royalties from Elder,
Smith and F. H. Snow’s Electro-magnetic, Separation Co. which would
treat tailings at the Mine. |
|
1903 |
Burra Burra Copper Co. doing very little: employing
about 7 miners. Electro Magnetic Separation Co. began work in July
after many problems.
In December Burra Burra Copper Co. called tenders
for a shaft at Bunce’s. |
|
1904 |
By February the Electro-Magnetic process had
failed. By May the plant was being demolished and so was the Burra
Slag Extraction Co. plant.
Burra Burra Copper Co. was employing about 22 men
at various sites but most work was at a shaft near Peacocks air
shaft. Several tributors continue to work pitches but with little
success. |
|
1905 |
Burra Burra Copper Company lacked the funds to
dewater the mine A public meeting urged Government aid. The
Government agreed to send a pump from Sliding Rock. In May the
Directors advised the mine was under offer to a London Company.
In November C.A. Smith & Co. contracted to lower
the water 25 to 50ft. |
|
1906 |
Pumping finally began in may and the pool level
dropped 8 to 10 feet but falling share prices for Burra Burra Copper
Company showed a public lack of confidence. Copper reached £90 per
ton and then £100+. |
|
1907 |
In January the negotiations with an
Adelaide-Melbourne syndicate failed. Pumping ceased. Some tributors
continued.
The Burra Copper Slag Smelting Co. brought in a
smelter from Leigh Creek in January to re-smelt the slag from the
Burra Slag Extraction Co. It began in April, had problems in May and
was abandoned in Jun.
Mr Horn took an option on the Mine to run to 13 May
and later he took a one sixth interest and Great Fingall Consolidated
an five sixth interest in a 9 month option.
As a consequence more exploratory boring was
undertaken buy copper prices began to fall about £66 per ton in
September. |
|
1908 |
The Kooringa Prospecting Syndicate (Great Fingall
and Horn etc) decided by February that the 4 bores produced little
suggestion of success and with copper at £61 per ton decided not to
proceed. |
|
1909 -1911 |
Tributors in small numbers operated n the mine and
some along the creek working tailings and waste.
|
|
1912 |
The old mine owners South Australian Mining
Association in liquidation sold off about 20 lots of the reaming
properties n and around Kooringa and Graham. |
|
1913 |
A further SAMA sale of all remaining properties in
and around the town. |
|
1916 |
Burra Burra Copper Company in January sold its
Burra Mine properties. After the auction the Mine block itself was
sold to A. J. McBride for £3000 for 262 cares. It is expected the
tailings will be treated. Experiments to treat tailings by the du
Faur process were undertaken. |
|
1917 |
English and Australian Copper Co. sells its
holdings in Burra in six lots in April. |
|
1921 |
Chimney stack for Morphett’s Engine House blown up
for building stone. |
|
1922 |
Further tests by du Faur on treatment of tailings. |
|
1925 |
Morphett’s Engine House, shaft etc. destroyed by
fire by young boys smoking our rabbits.
|
