Discovery and early mining The presence of silver in the area had first been noticed in 1888. Small scale mining took place, but expectations of a silver boom were dashed when it was found that much of the complex ores could not be smelted, even after being taken at great expense to the smelter at Newcastle. Initially, miners extracted only the purest ores from shallow workings. The deposits in the area near Bora Creek were described in Government Geologist Edward Pittman's 1901 work,
The Mineral Resources of New South Wales. The deposit consisted of a rich but complex lode, with
quartz gangue, intruding into surrounding
granite rock. The edges of the lode carried areas of rich silver-lead ore, and mineralisation was also dispersed throughout the quartz. Pittman noted that the
Cockle Creek smelter did not accept ores from Bora Creek for smelting due to the presence of
stannite. Early operations (1897—1899) The first deposit that would be exploited commercially at scale was found in 1890. In 1897, the mining lease was bought by
John Howell (1833—1910), and it become the Conrad mine. It is probable that the Conrad mine was named after one of Howell's grandsons, Conrad George Howell Blakemore, born in 1897. Howell was intrigued by the problem of processing the valuable but complex ores. However, it would take, until 1912, to completely solve the problem of recovering an optimal amount of the valuable content of the complex ore. later to be known as the 'South Blocks', 'Conrad South Blocks' or 'Conrad South' mine. The mines were all on the same
line of lode and each become owned by a separate
listed company. The opening of the mines lead to the formation of a mining village, named
Howell, after John Howell. The main street of Howell was Conrad Street, and it continued from the village to site of the Conrad mine.
Conrad Silver Lead Mining Company (No Liability) (1898—1903) A company, Conrad Silver Lead Mining Company (
No Liability), was formed in August 1898. The authorized capital of the company was £25,000 in £1 shares, paid to 10%. Subscribers were John Howell, his wife 'Lizzie' Howell, Howell's daughter, Maude Blakemore, son-in-law
George Blakemore, and three others; Mary P. Adams, H. Edwin Moore, and Richard Festus O'Rourke, who was nominated as manager of the venture. and he was also secretary of Howell Consolidated Gold Mines, another venture associated with Howell. The new company seems to have acquired the mine, from John Howell, at a value of £6,000. At the time that the company was floated, Howell had not long resigned as general manager of the Smelting Company of Australia, the company that owned and operated the
Dapto Smelting Works. Howell's approach to processing the complex ore of the Conrad mine was to separate the component minerals, by gravity separation, into fractions that could be successfully smelted, and subsequently further refined. In 1901, the concentrator plant was reported to produce one ton of concentrates and slimes from every three to four tons of run-of-mine ore. The capacity of the mill was reported to be around 280 tons of ore per week.
King Conrad mine (1899—1904) A mining lease adjacent to the Conrad mine's lease, was taken up by a local prospector, Peter Alwell, and became the King Conrad mine. Alwell and his partners sold the King Conrad to a Melbourne syndicate, for £60,000, in April 1900. By December 1900, there was a well-equipped mine and concentrator under construction. The first meeting of new company held in June 1901 was optimistic about the future of the mine. The mine started its mill in February 1902. By that time, the mine was down to 400 feet. The King Conrad used a similar approach to that used by the Conrad mine, separating the minerals by gravity separation. By July 1902, the King Conrad company had run out of capital, and the mine was idle. A petition was made to wind up King Conrad Silver and Lead Mining Company in August 1902, and the company went into liquidation, in September 1902. There was an unsuccessful auction of its leases and assets, in January 1903; the company owed £12,000 to
Union Bank of Sydney, as mortgagee. By late 1902, it was apparent that the King Conrad mine would not survive alone, and rumours circulated that its mining operations would be combined with those of the adjacent Conrad mine. However, that combination would not to happen, until 1906, although the moves to do so were underway by 1904. In August 1903, there was talk of work in the King Conrad mine resuming under a new company. In November 1903, it was reported that six men were employed there making a drive toward the Conrad mine workings. During late 1904, an English syndicate began working the King Conrad mine. H. Edwin Moore took over management of the mine, during the 12 month option. He also managed the adjacent properties of Consolidated Conrad Silver Mines. In August 1905, the syndicate extended their option to purchase the mine. That became a particular problem, as no smelter wanted stannite At first the stannite was stockpiled, while Howell worked on a solution for a method of recovering valuable tin metal from the stannite.
Wilfley tables were added to the concentration process, Howell's method was to smelt the stannite-rich ore and thus separate it into two salable products; an argentiferous copper
matte—containing over 60 per cent copper and 300 ounces of silver per ton—and a tin-lead metal alloy—55% tin and 45% lead—which was cast into tin-lead bullion. There was a market for such materials, which could be refined further.—would also end up in the matte, with the copper and silver. A refinery would first convert the matte to impure metallic 'blister copper'. The next stage of refining would be to separate the copper from the gold-silver, by electrolytic refining, producing pure 'cathode copper'. The remnant sludge was than converted to
dore bullion, an alloy of gold and silver, which could be refined further. By 1903, John Howell was around 70 years old, and his mine manager son-in-law, George Blakemore, was fully occupied in far away Cobar. The Howell family were trying to dispose of their interests in the Conrad mine and management responsibility, and seeking new investors and management to take it over. With the problem of the stannite ore appearing to have been resolved, the mine seemed to have a bright future, albeit with more capital needed. However, in 1906, doubts would emerge about whether the problem of treating the complex ore had really been solved completely.
Consolidated Conrad Silver Mines (1903—1905) The original Bora Creek Extended mine, was in an area known as 'The South blocks', but that distance appears to have been overstated. By 1903, it seems that it had ceased to operate, but was referred to as the Conrad South Blocks mine, or just Conrad South mine. A new company, Consolidated Conrad Silver Mines, was floated in January 1903. It had authorized capital of £125,000—as 125,000 shares of £1 each, but 25,000 of the shares were reserved for a future issue—and
working capital of £10,000. The new company took over the properties of the Conrad mine, the Conrad South Blocks mine, but not the King Conrad mine. In February 1903, the company was setting up new smelter and dam, and had restarted the existing concentrator plant of the old Conrad company. By late 1904, the properties of Consolidated Conrad Silver Mines and the neighbouring King Conrad mine were both under option to an English syndicate, which would become Conrad Stannite Mines Limited. Management of both mining properties was taken over by H. Edwin Moore, in late 1904. was constructed during 1906, at 'Snake Gully', on Borah Creek, with only partial success, before the
Cactoblastis cactorum moth was introduced from
South America. Before white arsenic was captured from furnace off-gases, the poisonous compound had been released to the environment, The dispute was settled in January 1980, and operations had resumed by February 1908, when a miner, J. Pike, was seriously injured there in a rockfall. However, in February 1909, British investors in the company were expressing concern that the earnings were far less than had been expected. It seems that mining operations effectively ceased soon afterwards.
Conrad Silver Mines Ltd. (1909—1913) The Conrad reopened in December 1909, under a new company, the Conrad Silver Mines, Ltd., with capital of £20,000 (or £30,000); the old company had £375,000 capital. The new company had the benefit of the mine development paid for by the old company. The new company had a Sydney-based board of directors. Three shifts began working the smelters, with 150 tons of ore per day being treated. The new company had been put together by C.B. Besley. In 1912, largely through the efforts of the mine's chemical analyst, A.S. Winter, the last of the difficulties of treating the Conrad mine's stannite ore—dealing with the lead-tin alloy—was finally overcome.
Managers (1898—1913) During the years of its initial operation, from 1898 to 1913, despite the changes in ownership, management of the mine largely remained in the hands of John Howell and his extended family. After John Howell became ill, during 1901, the mine was managed briefly by his son-in-law,
George Blakemore, until he became the mine manager of the Great Cobar mine. Howell remained manager of the mine until at least the second half of 1903, after he succeeded in smelting stannite. Howell made a visit to America, around August 1903, leaving the Conrad mine under the management of
Edgar Arthur Ashcroft. managed the mine, from at latest August 1904, with two interruptions, up to the time that the mine closed. H. Edwin Moore was in charge of the Consolidated Conrad and King Conrad Mines, by late 1904, he was an unusual choice to manage the mines. He had returned to America in 1900, but apparently was back in Australia in 1904. On 9 April 1910, a miner Joseph Dillon, was killed in a rockfall. He was buried at Howell General Cemetery. On 27 July 1911, Ernest Foster died, also in a rockfall. At least two miners died as a result of accidents in the workings of the King Conrad mine. On 23 December 1900, Donald Duff was struck on the back of the head by a rock that had fallen from the surface, he died on the following day without regaining consciousness. On 26 March 1908, Thomas Gagan (or Gagin) was killed when five tons of ore fell from the roof onto him.
Closure and aftermath (1913—1948) In March 1913, the mine was closed, after a dispute over how mine workers should be paid—by day labour or contract—at a time when the silver price had already begun to fall. B.C. Besley warned that adoption of day labour wages would make the Conrad mine uneconomic, and when he lost the argument he closed the mine. Equipment and buildings of the mine were sold at auction, over two days in June 1914. After its closure, the mine was worked by locals on a small scale, during and after the
First World War, but eventually it filled with groundwater and became inaccessible. or in some cases burned down in fires. Nonetheless, a much-diminished small village persisted. After closure of the school in 1942, by the late 1940s, the village had almost disappeared. It was described in November 1948 as "
A mere handful of buildings, now reaching the ramshackle derelict state, are all that remains of a lively community." The last manager of the mine, B.C. Besley, bought the mining leases, from the liquidator of the Conrad Silver Mines Limited, and he still held the leases in 1939. He sold an option over the mine leases in that year, but there was no revival of the mine at that time. == Reopening and final closure (1949—1952) ==