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Article Compiled by J. Berry, 2008, from Original Research notes ©2000 Denis Goodland.
 The Brimbramalla Mine is located in an area aptly known as The Glen which, particularly in winter, can be a damp cold place, but on early mornings when a mist descends from the ridges and shrouds the gums and fern trees it can be a truly magical place. The Brimbramalla Mine, sometimes erroneously referred to as Shoebridge’s Mine, was one of many in the area and its name, unlike many of the others, can be positively attributed to a particular series of leases. Generally the leases involved were MT 3. later to become GL 3. and GL 20; whilst a kilometre down the the valley on the banks of the Bimberamalla River (then known by the miners as Brimbramalla Creek) was MT 5, the battery site. There is still an old 5 head battery, lying on its side, and a scatter of artefacts around the mine to this day, whilst the old engine rusts away down near the river.
A drive goes straight into the hillside (the only one on the Brimbramalla Field) for about 100 metres and a dry creek passes within a few metres of the portal. Immediately opposite and across the creek can be seen the foundations of the tramway whilst to the left of the drive are the tailings stacked along the creek bank. Some hundred metres above the drive is a very large tailings dump and caved in shafts and stopes, some over one hundred feet deep.
The reefs run east and west, the main reefs are known as The Big Reef and the Little Reef. Ironically the Little Reef carried by far the most gold.
A report by Mr. Milne, of the Department of Mines, in 1893, tells us that on the side of a steep hill there are a number of parallel quartz veins and shafts down 20 or 30 feet. The shaft’s showing values of 1/2 oz. to the ton. Aid was given to sink the number 2 shaft to 50 feet and drive 25 feet.
Ramas F. Britton has taken lease GL 17, number 562, during 1893. This was the first lease and was surveyed from GL 6 just below Rixon’s Hill. The longer than usual traverse line ran up the ridge from Rixon’s Hill then down the next ridge which ends at Folders Road Ford. Ramas Britton had come from Yalwal and had previously been working GL 6 with Sinclair and Rigley. It is interesting to note that a minor rush took place at Britten’s Hill in 1894, on the Black Flat Road. Britton held the lease until the 1st of April 1894 when James and John Duffy took over; they later sold out to David Logan in 1904 and the lease was cancelled in 1906: GL 7 was worked for about 8 years.
In 1896 Patrick Duffy and Co. took up the Prospecting Claim MT 3; the ‘and Co.’ on the claim must have been John McLeod and David Logan because a year later the three take up GL 20 which encompasses MT 3. A five head battery was erected on a flat of the Brimbramalla Creek. From now on GL 20, MT 5, John and James Duffy, and MT 3 are referred to in the Department of Mines Annual Reports as McLeods, Why, I have no idea, unless McLeod was the principal or perhaps the spokesman.
The owners have struck payable gold ! During 1897 they put through 200 tons for a return of 100 ozs. taken from a reef 2 and 1/2 inches wide. Unfortunately they are losing a lot of gold in the pyrites and the party are considering erecting a cyanide plant to treat the tailings. With John and James Duffy owning MT 5 it is reasonable to assume that they own the battery, remembering that they are working GL 7. It does rather seem to be a family affair, the same names keep appearing on leases and tend to get confusing. From the newspaper and Mines Department Reports it is difficult to say exactly from which lease any specific crushing came. For instance J. Steel. J. McLeod and David Logan have taken up GL 24, number 931. During the years 1897 - 1898 a lot of development and testing took place with aid from the Prospecting Board.
By 1900 the whole conglomeration of names and leases has become the Brimbramalla Mine. Although other leases, i.e. GL 25 James Bede Duffy (still in the family) and two new names appear; C. Andrews and McGuire, GL 27, number 687.
In 1902 Mr. Polkinghorne, an Inspector of the Department of Mines, reports six shafts down; No. 1 is 84 feet deep, No. 2 is 30 feet, No. 3 is 50 feet, No. 4 is 40 feet, No. 5 is 75 feet and No. 6 is 50 feet with aid, and about 300 feet of driving and considerable stoping has been done. No. 1 shaft is down 80 feet on a 2 inch to 2 foot wide reef and at the 80 foot level has been driven 160 feet. Unfortunately no plans exist so we don’t know which shaft is which. Crushing at this time yielded 1 oz. to the ton.
Four months later No. 1 shaft is down to 88 feet and has obtained aid to sink another 100 feet.
 On the 22nd of August 1902 a Mortgage Agreement was registered over the mine, machinery, buildings, and even the tailings dump; in fact everything that was situated on the leases. The agreement was between the owners, Patrick Duffy, John McLeod and David Logan all resident at Brimbramalla Creek, and Mr. Jurgen Adolph Thomsen, of Nelligen. The amount of the loan was for L160 to enable them to erect a Cyanide Plant to treat the tailings. Interest was set at L10 per annum, with the whole being repayable by the 8th of August 1903. Repayments were to be made by giving Thomsen one quarter of profits, less working expenses, after each clean up of the battery or plant; L2 per week per man being considered fair as working expenses. The mortgage was repaid on the 17th of June 1903. That year the tailings had assayed at 6 dwts.
On the 25th of May 1903 John Francis Shoebridge, of Shallow Crossing, applied for GL 3, application No. 64 Batemans Bay, of 5 acres for a period of 15 years. In December of that year it was reported that the Shoebridge brothers have moved their battery from the Black Diamond Mine, at Currowan, to Brimbramalla making three batteries on the field. Two of John’s brothers, Alfred (a storekeeper at Nelligen), and Thomas, jnr., held leases at various times at Currowan. Thomas’ leases, GL’s 12 and 15, at Currowan were cancelled on the 30th of June 1903 but, in partnership with Edward Perkins of Cooma, he was to take them up again in 1910. At Brimbramalla John applied for and was granted 3 months suspension of work on GL 3, on the 5th of January 1904. Early in April 1904 it was reported that Shoebridge’s ten head Mill at Brimbramalla was nearing completion. Later that month the Shoebridge brothers were ready to commence crushing large quantities of stone at Brimbramalla. The venture was short lived as the lease was cancelled on the 18th of April 1905.
1903 saw 30 tons of stone returning 2 oz. of gold per ton.
In 1904 the mine was let on tribute to Rolfe and party from Nerriga. They stoped out 85 tons of stone which averaged 3 1/2 ozs. to the ton. In return the owners would receive 5% of the gold over the plate from the tributors..
Things were very satisfactory for 1905, a parcel of 23 1/2 tons produced a yield of 93 ozs. valued at 370 pounds sterling, and again a parcel of 22 tons yielded 4 oz. to the ton. The average for the year was 2 oz./ton.
1906 wasn’t so happy, returns were just enough to cover expenditure. Quartz for this year was from the 160 foot level, but the chutes were irregular.
Work practices changed during 1908, according to the Annual Report, while the mine was still being worked on tribute they had a parcel of 36 tons sent to Cockle Creek Smelting Works in Sydney. This returned 171 ozs/ valued at 684 pounds sterling. No doubt as well as the pyrites they were having a sulphur problem, which required roasting of the ore to release all the gold.
1909 and the mine is now worked by G. Dent on tribute, and although not mentioned in the reports I wonder if G. Dent was the tributor in 1908 and made the decision to ship ore to Cockle Creek.
Dent sent more ore to Cockle Creek Custom Smelters during 1910 when he was reported to be working a reef 4 to 5 inches wide which produced 186 ozs. of gold from 60 tons.
Brimbramalla Mine’s Achilles heel showed up in 1911; Water ! Rising water levels led to an application for a suspension of labour, which was granted, to enable a pumping plant to be purchased and erected at the mine. Dent and party crushed 64 tons for a return of three ozs. to the ton.
The 1912 Annual Report tells us that the mine owned by McLeod was worked under offer of purchase by the Brimbramalla Gold-Mining Company No Liability. In this year a lot of development work went on under the new company with the main shaft reaching the 188 foot level and another name has appeared, that of Sellick, of Shallow Crossing via Nelligen, although certainly not a new name to the field.
1913 and McLead and Sellick’s mine is still worked on tribute by Dent and at a depth of 140 feet an underhand stope was worked with the vein from 4 to 6 inches in width, a 15 ton parcel of ore produced 36 ozs.
 In the 1914 Annual Report the mine is referred to as being owned by Sellick and Esperson and the first thought is that McLeod had at last sold out. But no, because the next year’s report tells us the mine is still under the ownership of Sellick and McCleod [sic]. Esperson was the owner of a sawmill across the river from the battery and he made parts for sulkies. Incidentally the original ford was some 300 metres further upstream from the existing one.
During 1914 the ground was flooded by surface water and it was at this time that it was taken up as as a claim, MT 3. The owner de-watered the mine and work was able to recommence. Dent still held the mine on tribute. In three months he raised 35 tons for 61 ozs. of gold and at a depth of 140 feet an underground shaft was worked.
This underground shaft would be the one the Wade brothers used in 1934 in their attempt to de-water the mine.
1915 brings another change of tributors, the McKenna brothers. Working at a depth of 100 feet, a stope was carried 45 feet west and during their first four months they raised 25 tons of stone for 45 ozs. of gold. The effects of the Great War were starting to be felt as the mine was idle during the latter part of the year owing to a shortage of explosives and the difficulty of transporting the ore to Cockle Creek.
In 1918 MT/Lease 3, the Brimbramalla Mine passed into the hands of William Warburton, and for the next 15 years there are no reports surviving.
In 1933 the Wade brothers, Mick and Max, took over a large number of leases on the gold field and amongst them were the Brimbramalla Mine leases. Their leases GL’s 31 and 32 covered the lot, except for GL 7 further up the ridge, whilst further down GL 33 covered the old battery site.
Popular belief has it that old Tom Shoebridge put the battery in its existing spot, however GL 33 was for a pump site and pipeline from the river to the mine, GL 32, yet Shoebridge didn’t take over Lease 32 until eight or nine years later.
The only conclusions I can come to is Wade DID move the battery, or a new one, to the mine site when he put in the pipeline (you need water to run a battery) or DID NOT get around to it and Tom Shoebridge took up the idea in 1939 and shifted the battery, or again a new battery. Stevenson who held an E.L. over the mine in 1971 told me that he could remember seeing parts of the battery down on the river flat. These would now be covered by silt and flood debris. It is not unknown for old mine sites to have worn shoes, dies and shafts, etc., lying around the battery site, so that doesn’t prove that the old battery wasn’t moved up. Too many years have passed and I doubt that we will ever find the answers.
In 1935 Lightning Gold took over the Wade’s Leases, GL’s 31 and 32.
In 1937 G. Shoebridge took over GL 31 and two years later GL 32.
Tommy Dunn, of Batemans Bay, told me that old man Shoebridge had given him the battery sometime around 1939-40. Tommy went off to war, but before doing so, burnt the culvert so that the battery could not be taken out for war scrap. So it’s Tommy we have to thank for its existence at the mine today.
An Exploration License was taken up over the area in 1970.
©Copyright 2000 Dennis Goodland, Basin View. Used under License by Oz History Mine 2008.
List of petitioners seeking that their mail be sent from Nelligen rather than Brooman, June 1891, extracted from Brimbramalla Post Office File, Part 1, 1889-1892 SP32/1.
T.G. Wray, Miner, Brimbramalla
Thomas Wild, Miner, Brimbramalla
J.A. Brown, Miner, Brimbramalla
Otto Atndt, Miner, Brimbramalla
D. [or P ?] Dawson, Miner, Brimbramalla
James Kells, Miner, Brimbramalla
William Lawrence, Miner, Brimbramalla
George Dent, Miner, Brimbramalla
Edward Boot, Miner, Brimbramalla
William Radburn, Miner, Brimbramalla
Daniel Sullivan, Miner, Brimbramalla
George Dent, Miner, Brimbramalla [Different signature]
John Jackson, Miner, Brimbramalla
William Smith, Miner, Brimbramalla
Henry Gowen, Miner, Brimbramalla
G.A. Laurence [?], Miner, Brimbramalla
James B. Duffy, Miner, Brimbramalla
Patrick Murphy, Miner, Brimbramalla
William McMillan, Miner, Brimbramalla
Joseph Bishop, Miner, Brimbramalla
James Barclay, Miner, Brimbramalla
E.M. Clinton, Store Keeper, Brimbramalla
F. Foran, Assistant Store Keeper, Brimbramalla
E. Walker, Butcher, Brimbramalla
John Duffy, Miner, Brimbramalla
Charles North, Miner, Brimbramalla
James Anthony, Miner, Brimbramalla
Alexander Stevenson, Miner, Brimbramalla
Robert Gerrit, Miner, Brimbramalla
Patrick Duffy, Miner, Brimbramalla
D. Clunen, Miner, Brimbramalla
D. Latta, Miner, Brimbramalla
Brimbramalla Mines Map
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